Wanderings in Corsica: Its History and Its Heroes. Vol. 2 of 2

CHAPTER V.

MARIANA, AND RETURN TO BASTIA.

The paese of Cervione lies northward from Aleria, on the slope of the hill. I wish that I had visited it, and this desire is now my punishment for neglecting the opportunity of doing so when it was in my power; for although it contains nothing worth seeing, it was the royal residence of Theodore. It happens at times that one is afflicted with the travelling-sickness to such an extent, that with a sleepy eye he passes heedlessly over many interesting objects. I just got a glimpse of Cervione on the height, and gave it up for the ruins of Mariana.

Northward from Cervione, the Colo River disembogues—the largest stream in the island, watering numerous valleys in its course. The heat of summer had almost dried it up. All around, the stream has at various times overflowed on the extensive flats of Mariana, or Marana as the Corsicans now call it. Here, on the left bank of the river, stood the second Roman colony: Marius founded it. It is remarkable that in this bloody land of the Corsicans the two great avengers and deadly foes, Marius and Sulla, must needs have planted colonies. Their terrible names, which perpetuate the memory of the most horrible cruelties of civil war and intestine revolution, cast a deeper shade of gloom over the already gloomy and oppressive air of Corsica.

I sought for the ruins of Mariana. They lie towards the sea-shore, a league from the highway. As at Aleria, I found here a wide extent of level ground everywhere covered with the debris of walls. It is melancholy to wander over such ground—one cannot but reflect that these stones once constituted a city, in which the life of many centuries dwelt. Fain would one take Amphion's lyre and try, by the magic power of melody, to reconstruct the fragments, and have one peep at the town and the citizens as they were. What kind of people? to what epoch did they belong? The ruins of Mariana tell even less than those of Aleria: they do not afford materials even for fixing the date of the town's existence. It flatters the Corsican if the stranger finds in those stones the remains of Roman buildings; and in pleasing self-delusion, the traveller may sit down on one of these ruinous heaps and think of Marius sitting on the ruins of Carthage, and mourning the fall of that mighty city. The remains of two churches are the only objects which attract attention. They are the most remarkable mediæval remains in Corsica. The first and smaller must have been a handsome chapel—its long nave is still in good preservation. It has a pulpit ornamented on the outside by six semicircular pillars of the Corinthian order. There are sculptures of very simple workmanship on the entablature of the side entrance. A mile farther on, lie the beautiful remains of a larger church, the nave of which is also still standing. It is called the Canonica, a cathedral church, consisting of three naves, with rows of ornamental pillars of the Doric order, and on each side a pulpit of the Gothic chapel-architecture. The central nave is 110 feet long and fifty broad. The façade is very much injured, and of the Pisan style. There are sculptures on the arch of the portal—griffins, dogs hunting a stag, and a lamb—of such wretched execution that it might belong to the eighteenth century. It is said that this Canonica was a Roman temple, which the Mahometans converted into a mosque, and the Christians in their turn into a church, after Hugo Colonna had won Mariana from the Moors. It is easy to see that the building has been at some past time restored, but it does not follow that it was originally Roman. On the contrary, it bears throughout the appearance of a cathedral church erected by the Pisans. Its forms are exquisitely pure, noble and simple, and of the finest symmetry; and this, along with the perfect purity of the Corsican marble with which the church is covered, certainly gives it all the appearance of a piece of ancient architecture.

When I entered the interior of the church, the community of worshippers whom I found there on their knees took me by surprise. They were thriving wild-trees, which stood in rows behind one another across the nave, and quietly flourished in this retired spot. A he-goat with a venerable beard stood right before the altar, and seemed to have forgotten his food and to be lost in religious contemplation. The herds were in the habit of pasturing their goats in the vicinity of the Canonica. I inquired about coins, but without success, although here, as well as in other parts of Corsica, a great many imperial ones have been found—with which, indeed, half the world is blessed. From this old Marian colony, which was planted at an earlier period than Aleria—and which must have been a colony of citizens, and not of soldiers like Sulla's—the only Roman road in Corsica ran by Aleria to Præsidium, and thence to Portus Favoni, terminating in Palæ situated on the strait now called Bonifazio. The island in those times was even more pathless than in the present day, and the Romans never penetrated into the interior of the hill-country.

Bastia is again visible in the distance, and the circle of my wanderings is completed. To the left lie the blood-drenched hills of Borgo, where many a battle has been fought, and where the Corsicans won their last victory over their French oppressors. In the distance shimmers the still, picturesque Stagno di Biguglia, and above stands Biguglia itself, once the head-quarters of the Genoese governors. The old castle now lies level with the ground. The last village before reaching Bastia is Furiani. Its gray keep is in ruins; the ivy and the white wood-vine cover its black walls with the most luxuriant green. Once more the eye turns from this spot to gaze on the lovely Goloebne, and far away towards the misty blue hills, which from out the interior of the island send a farewell greeting from their cloud-capt summits. A beautiful and healthy pilgrimage is now completed. And here the traveller stands still in pleasing retrospect, and thanks the good Powers who have been with him by the way. Yet it is difficult for the heart to tear itself away from this wonderful island. It has now become like a friend to me. The calm valleys, with their olive-groves; the enchanting gulfs; the fresh, breezy hills, with their fountains and their pine-covered summits; towns and villages, and their hospitable inhabitants,—much have they contributed to the mind and heart of the stranger, much that will not soon be forgotten.

Still once more, that Corsican reclining under the old olive-tree yonder, calls up before me the land and its people.

THE STRANGER.

THE CORSICAN.

THE STRANGER.

NOTE.

I shall mention here, at the close of my book, the more important of the works which have been of service to me in its composition. The common experience, that every subject, however isolated its nature, drags a whole continent of literature after it, is in this case confirmed. I have already named all the historians—as Filippini, Peter of Corsica, Cambiaggi, Jacobi, Limperani, Renucci, Gregori, &c. I shall add to them, Robiquet's Recherches Historiques et Statistiques sur la Corse: Paris, 1835—a book rich in material, and to which I am indebted for valuable information. I have also used Niccolo Tommasco's Lettere di Pasquale de Paoli: Firenze, 1846; and the same author's Canti Popolari Corsi, in the collection of Corsican, Tuscan, and Greek popular songs. The dirges I have given are extracted from the Saggio di Versi Italiani e di Canti Popolari Corsi: Bastia, 1843. I owe the material of the Corsican stories—which are in no case fictitious—to a collection of such narratives by Renucci: Bastia, 1838; the treatment of the material is my own. The English Boswell's book—"Journal of a Tour in Corsica, with Memorabilia of Pasquale Paoli"—is worth reading, because the author was personally acquainted with the great Corsican, and noted down his conversations with him. I am, further, considerably indebted to Valery's Voyages en Corse, à l'Ile d'Elbe et en Sardaigne: Bruxelles, 1838. It is unnecessary to mention other works not specially relating to Corsica.