Wanderings in Corsica: Its History and Its Heroes. Vol. 1 of 2

"On! on! These are his footsteps plainly; Trust the dumb lead of the betraying track! For as the bloodhounds trace the wounded deer, So we, by his sweat and blood, do scent him...

After Pasquale Paoli and his brother Clemens, with their companions, had left Corsica, the French easily made themselves masters of the whole island. Only a few straggling gueri...

There is still a third very remarkable house in Vescovato--the house of the Ceccaldi family, from which two illustrious Corsicans have sprung; the historian already mentioned, a...

An up-hill walk of two hours between fruit-gardens, the walls of which the beautiful wreaths of the clematis garlanded all the way along, and then through groves of chestnuts, b...

Some miles to the southwards of Bastia, on the heights of the east coast, lies Vescovato, a spot celebrated in Corsican history. Leaving the coast-road at the tower of Buttafuoc...

Here is a second Letter of Consolation, which Seneca wrote in the second or third year of his Corsican exile, to Polybius, the freedman of Claudius, a courtier of the ordinary s...

The origin of the bandit life is to be sought almost exclusively in the ancient custom of the Vendetta, that is, of exacting blood for blood. Almost all writers on this subject,...

It was late when I reached Rostino, or Morosaglia. Under this name is understood, not a single paese, but a number of villages scattered among the rude, stern hills. I found my...

I left Morosaglia before Ave Maria, to descend the hills to Ponte Nuovo. Near the battle-field is the post-house of Ponte alla Leccia, where the Diligence from Bastia arrives af...

The situation of Bastia, though not one of the very finest, takes one by surprise. The town lies like an amphitheatre round the little harbour; the sea here does not form a gulf...

The population of the several arrondissements, five in number, was as follows:--In the arrondissement of Ajaccio, 55,008; Bastia, 20,288; Calvi, 24,390; Corte, 56,830; Sartene,...

In the end of October, the expected decisive document arrived from Versailles in the form of an edict issued by the Doge and Senate of Genoa, and signed by the Emperor and the F...

Fair fruits grew for Seneca in his exile; and perhaps he owed some of his exalted philosophy rather to his Corsican solitude than to the teachings of an Attalus or a Socio. In t...

The voyage across to Corsica from Leghorn is very beautiful, and more interesting than that from Leghorn to Genoa. We have the picturesque islands of the Tuscan Channel constant...

It was not till the close of the war of Sampiero that the wretched condition of the island became fully apparent. It had become a mere desert, and the people, decimated by the w...

Sampiero was coldly received at the French court; the courtiers whispered, avoided him, sneered at him from behind their virtuous mask. Sampiero was not the man to be dismayed b...

The Tower of Seneca can be seen at sea, and from a distance of many miles. It stands on a gigantic, quite naked mass of granite, which rises isolated from the mountain-ridge, an...

It was an instructive lesson that Francesco Marmocchi, _quondam_ professor of natural history, _quondam_ minister of Tuscany, now Fuoruscito, and poor solitary student, gave me,...

It is traversed by a rugged mountain range, called the Serra, the highest summits of which, Monte Alticcione and Monte Stello, reach an altitude of more than 5000 feet. Rich and...

"The wedding-day is near, when thou must wear Fair garments, and fair gifts present to all The youths that lead thee home; for of such things The rumour travels far, and brings...

I was told in a bookseller's shop into which I had gone in search of a Geography of the island, that there was one then in the press, and that its author was Francesco Marmocchi...

I wished to go from Oreto to Morosaglia, Paoli's native place, through Orezza. Marcantonio had promised to accompany me, and to provide good horses. He accordingly awoke me earl...

All the thoughts and wishes of the Corsican people were thus directed towards a common aim. The spirit of the nation was vigorous and buoyant; ennobled by the purest love of cou...

The sympathy for the Corsicans had now become livelier than ever. In England especially, public opinion spoke loudly for the oppressed nation, and called upon the Government to...

Early in the morning of the 12th of March 1736, a vessel under British colours was seen steering towards Aleria. The people who crowded to the shore greeted it with shouts of jo...

In the meantime, voices from the shore had announced the arrival of the boatmen; I therefore took my leave of the pretty Benvenuta, wished her all sorts of pleasant things, and...

It was now that Sampiero began to show himself in all his greatness; for the man must be admitted to be really great whom adversity does not bend, but who gathers double strengt...

This was once the seat of the most powerful seigniors of Cape Corso, and above Erba Lunga stands the old castle of the Signori dei Gentili. The Gentili, with the Seigniors da Ma...

The second day after my arrival in Bastia, I was awakened during the night by an appalling noise in my locanda, in the street of the Jesuits. It was as if the Lapithæ and Centau...

The imperial ratification was daily expected; but before it arrived, the Genoese Senate allowed the exasperation of defeat and the desire of revenge to hurry it into an action w...

A good road leads upwards from the marina of Luri. You move in one continual garden--in an atmosphere of balsamic fragrance. Cottages approaching the elegant style of Italian vi...

The Corsicans, like other brave peoples of fiery and imaginative temperament, have a war-dance, called the Moresca. Its origin is matter of dispute--some asserting it to be Moor...

The canon Orticoni had been sent to the Continent to seek the protection of the foreign powers, and Giafferi to Tuscany to procure arms and ammunition, which were much needed; a...

How beautiful the walks are here in the morning, or at moon-rise! A few steps and you are by the sea, or among the hills, and there or here, you are rid of the world, and deep i...

The first historically accredited event in relation to Corsica, is that immigration of the fugitive Phocæans definitely mentioned by Herodotus. We know that these Asiatic Greeks...

Now in possession of the kingly title, Theodore wished to see himself surrounded by a kingly court, and was, therefore, not sparing in his distribution of dignities. He named Do...

Two bold men now again rise in succession to oppose Genoa. Giampolo da Leca had, as we have seen, become connected with the Fregosi. Although these nobles had resigned their tit...

The Corsicans did not believe in the return of their king, nor in the help he promised to send them. Under the pressure of severe necessity, the poor people, intoxicated with th...

After the death of Vincentello, the seigniors contended with each other for the title of Count of Corsica; Simon da Mare, Giudice d'Istria, Renuccio da Leca, Paolo della Rocca,...

At the news of Sampiero's fall, the bells were rung in Genoa, and the city was illuminated. The murderers quarrelled disgracefully over their Judas-hire; that of Vittolo amounte...

For half a century the island lay in a state of exhaustion--the hatred of Genoa continuing to be fostered by general and individual distress, and at length absorbing into itself...

Sampiero was born in Bastelica, a spot lying above Ajaccio, in one of the wildest regions of the Corsican mountains, not of an ancient family, but of unknown parents. Guglielmo,...

I did not neglect to visit the house of Count Matteo Buttafuoco, which was at one time to have been the domicile of Rousseau. It is a structure of considerable pretensions, the...

If we reflect on the number of great men that Corsica has produced within the space of scarcely a hundred years, we cannot but be astonished that an island so small, and so thin...

Once more ambassadors set out for France, five in number; but the Genoese intercepted them off the coast. Three leapt into the sea to save themselves by swimming, one of whom wa...

The convent of Morosaglia is perhaps the most venerable monument of Corsican history. The hoary structure as it stands there, brown and gloomy, with the tall, frowning pile of i...

The nature of its interior prevents us from believing that the condition of the island was by any means so flourishing during the long periods of its subjection to the Romans, a...

For a long period the history of the Corsicans presents nothing but a bloody picture of the tyranny of the barons over the lower orders, and the quarrels of these nobles with ea...

The oldest notices of Corsica we have, are to be found in the Greek and Roman historians and geographers. They do not furnish us with any precise information as to what races or...

Meanwhile the Turk was besieging Bonifazio with furious vigour, ravaging at the same time the entire surrounding country. Dragut was provoked by the heroic resistance of the inh...

Corsica remained in the possession of the Romans, from whom in later times it received the Christian religion, till the fall of Rome made it once more a prey to the rovers by la...

Corsica was now rent into factions. One section of the inhabitants inclined to Pisa, another to Genoa, many of the seigniors maintained an independent position, and the Terra de...

A man of a similar order began now to take the place of Arrigo della Rocca. Making their appearance constantly at similar political junctures, these bold Corsicans bear an aston...

take my leave. 'Fra Agostino,' said he, 'you are sick, you must have something to eat.' 'My lord bishop,' said I, 'I never saw a brother eat on Good-Friday.' 'No matter, I give...

The people themselves, driven to desperation after the departure of Boccaneria, begged the assistance of Genoa. The republic accordingly sent Tridano della Torre to the island....

With Giampolo and Renuccio ended the resistance of the Corsican seigniors. The noble families of the island decayed, their strong keeps fell into ruin, and at present we hardly...

Near Vescovato lies the little hamlet of Venzolasca. It is a walk as if through paradise, over the hills to it through the chestnut-groves. On my way I passed the forsaken Capuc...

Pisa made a formal surrender of the island to Genoa, and thirty years after the death of Giudice, the Terra del Commune, and the greater number of the seigniors submitted to the...

The legislator Sambucuccio fared as many other legislators have done. His death was a sudden and severe blow to his enactments. The seigniors immediately issued from their castl...

Pasquino Seneca now transforms himself in a twinkling into the dignified moralist; he writes his treatise "Concerning Clemency, to the Emperor Nero"--a pleasantly contradictory...

I had heard in Stretta that a countryman of mine was living there, a Prussian--a strange old man, lame, and obliged to use crutches. The townspeople had also informed him of my...

PAGE CHAP. I.--Earliest Accounts, 1 II.--The Greeks, Etruscans, Carthaginians, and Romans in Corsica, 4 III.--State of the Island during the Roman Period, 8 IV.--Commencement of...

CHAP. I.--State of Corsica in the Sixteenth Century--A Greek Colony established on the Island, 66 II.--Insurrection against Genoa, 72 III.--Successes against Genoa, and German M...

CHAP. I.--Vescovato and the Corsican Historians, 246 II.--Rousseau and the Corsicans, 256 III.--The Moresca--Armed Dance of the Corsicans, 259 IV.--Joachim Murat, 264 V.--Venzol...

CHAP. I.--Arrival in Corsica, 130 II.--The City of Bastia, 137 III.--Environs of Bastia, 144 IV.--Francesco Marmocchi of Florence--The Geology of Corsica, 149 V.--A Second Lesso...

"Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita Mi ritrovai per una selva oscura, Che la diritta via era smarrita. Ahi quanto a dir qual era è cosa dura. Questa selva selvaggia, ed aspra,...

CHAP. I.--Southern Part of Cape Corso, 198 II.--From Brando to Luri, 203 III.--Pino, 208 IV.--The Tower of Seneca, 212 V.--Seneca Morale, 218 VI.--Seneca Birbone, 225 VII.--Sene...