Part 6

A good stick might not be useless. Then with your short skirt which enable you to walk quickly and well protected from the gushes of ashes raised by the wind, you may go any where you like even on the lava of Boscotrecase, on the mountains of lappillus in Ottaiano, on the observatory and the crater, if you have the strength and courage to do it. You may see all, and know all, and you will return home with a world of new and deep impressions. If you want to breakfast, you will find what is necessary anywhere even in Ottaiano or Boscotrecase, but don't forget to carry within you a tender heart, and any thing you can possibly gather to give to women and to babies. Anything, an apron or an handkerchief to one single woman, or a small shirt or a little dress to one single child. Don't forget this and God will bless your steps.

April 23th 1906.

A PRINCE

I stop a moment to look at him! I had always seen him silent and thoughtful through the fields, when the black lava smoked furiously covered by the sepulchral sheet of ashes, in those towns destroyed by the stones, but in that day he was thoughtful and sad. On his brow was written a silent sorrow.

We were in a deserted spot, outside Somma Vesuviana in the saddest hour of that sad Monday, which will never leave anybody's memory. We saw him going away, without daring to inquire from anybody, what could be the reason of his depression. But two hours later we found out that he had been witnessing at S. Giuseppe the drawing out of the bodies from the ruins of the church, where more than two hundred persons had been buried. Till then the Duke had only witnessed the destruction of the houses and lands where human life had been spared. But there he had seen death, the formidable host, and all the horror of it, and all his sorrow as a man and as a Christian rose from his kind tender heart and showed in his brow.

* * * * *

No commemorative inscription, nor the plause of assemblies can be an adequate recompense to the work of this prince. These forms are all academical and nearly bureaucratic. Let them go with the banalities which are still smotering modern society, it is difficult to escape such conventionalism. For us that is not enough. We think with terror of what would have become of one hundred and fifty thousand people, running away under a rain of fire, if the Duke of Aosta had not been there! We tremble at the thought of what would have happened if he had not thought of all, ordered all, provided to all. What is an inscription, a vote, an applause before this real great soul, where one finds harmoniously blended, the virtues of the soldier and of the Christian? where a prince has all the virtues of a true citizen, where heroism is united to simplicity and where the ardour of good is ineffable? Let your memorial stone raise a word of admiration, but all this will never tell how high, pure, efficacious has been the energetic enthusiasm of Emmanuele Filiberto in order to save a whole population. Let him continue. Don't you see? All his spirit and will are now ready to every thing. He wants to get to the point, he wants not only to help but he is already looking forward to the building of the places. He wants to save the lands, the fields, he wants work to start over again, he wants every man to build again his roof, his bread. Let him continue.

To morrow every body will forget perhaps the terrible catastrophe. He does not forget, he will not let the others forget, he will surmount every obstacle with his moral strength, he will accomplish a longer, deeper, and more lasting work, he will rebuild a civil life there where it has been destroyed. We, profoundly moved, and full of admiration for all that this prince is doing, we mark this first period of his great work, where he has saved by his example and his strength of action this country, and we see him going ahead fortified by his faith, towards the greatest of works, and our eyes are wandering, and our soul believes in him.

April 26 1906.

INDEX

QUIA PULVIS ES _pag._ 17

TOWARDS THE CITY OF FIRE " 23

A PRAYER " 39

IN THE DEAD TOWNS " 49

IN THE COUNTRY OF DEATH " 61

THE HEROES " 85

LET US SPEAK TO THE PEOPLE " 97

TO THE WOMEN OF NAPLES " 107

EASTER OF RESURRECTION " 117

FOUR-THOUSAND LITTLE BOXES " 127

A WOMAN " 133

LET THE GUILTY ONES BE PUNISHED " 143

LET THE LAND BE SAVED " 153

EVERY DAY HAS ITS MORROW " 167

THE NEW POMPEI " 173

IGNIS ARDENS " 201

OPEN ROADS " 223

THE WAY TO GO " 229

A PRINCE " 235

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:

--Obvious print and punctuation errors were corrected.

--The exact name of the town is "Ottaviano"; since "Ottaiano" is constantly used in the book, it has been left as it is.