STRUTT'S PEDESTRIAN TOUR IN CALABRIA AND SICILY.

Ma. &rat= is an artist, and set out from Rome on a pedestrian tour through Calabria and part of Sicily, in order to fill his sketch-

book with the costumes of the peasantry. Ile was accompanied by an English friend, who had a turn for poetry ; and fell in with three

Frenchmen, who joined company for a great part of the journey. They got beset by the peasant-brigands of a part of Calabria, and were robbed; the necessary steps connected with which affair, and the indignant sympathy of the Calabrian gentry, delayed the party, but introduced them to the domestic life and judicial prac- tices of the people, in a manner not attainable in any other way. Released from the trouble connected with this adventure, the associated tourists pursued their journey in safety to Reggio, opposite Messina ; crossed over to Sicily ; travelled along the Eastern coast as far as Syracuse; and ascended Etna ; when the party broke up ; Mr. Sratrrr visiting Palermo and its neighbour- hood, in his professional capacity, to execute some paintings for a Sicilian prince.

The form of the work is that of letters; written of apparently, for the author's family, stage by stage. The style is easy, lively, and familiar, without sinking to feebleness : but the matter, or the treatment of the matter, rather consists in skimming the surface of things than in any very deep examination. The consequence is, that only subjects obviously striking in themselves are very striking in Mr. griturr's narrative, unless upon points that directly relate to his own profession.

The novelty of his route, and the manner of performing his jour- ney, however, give an air of freshness to his pages. Though lying so close to Naples, and constantly passed by vessels on both its

coasts, Calabria is one of the least-traversed countries in Europe. Some of this neglect arises from its leading to nowhere, for Sicily

and Greece are accessible by easier ways; some from its contain- ing no show-places, and few attractions in the form of antiquities of a tangible kind : but perhaps the want of roads, inns, and tra- velling-accommodations, with the bad reputation of its inhabi- tants, and the alleged danger of robbery and murder, are the real causes of its neglect—for it has attractions. The scenery is mag- nificent; the climate in the colder seasons delightful ; and the Mediterranean shore is studded with reminiscences of its old feudal state, and of the times when the Saracens were an objc:t.- of terror to Europe, and these coasts were especially obnoxious to raids for the purpose of carrying off slaves to Barbary. Nor is the present social state unworthy of examination : being, in fact, with national modifications, very like that which prevailed throughout Europe during the middle ages; the gentry or territorial nobility remaining almost as unchanged as the peasantry, among whom blood-feuds, lawlessness, and the other characteristics of an un- settled government, still prevail. There are also some curious sprinklings of foreign races,—villages of Saracen origin, retaining their features though not their dress ; and numerous settlements of, Albanians, speaking a kind of Greek, wearing their old costume engrafted on the Calabrian, and said by the aboriginal inhabitants to be the robbers of the country, though the neighbouring Italians place all Calabrians in the lowest grade—" Brutta lingua e brntta gente," said Mr. STaurr's landlady on the frontier village. The

organized banditti, which once made Calabria so famous, is now pretty well broken up ; and the professsion chiefly carried on upon individual account, or in a small way, since the stringent measures of the French General MANNES, when he held the government of the province. " By this severe judge, no proofs, no court, no twelve jurymen were required ; the bare accusation of brigandage condemned a man, and the sen-

tence was invariably death. In vain did the culprits hide themselves in the most impenetrable fastnesses. Mann& ordered the Capo Urbano to assemble the Urbane of the district, and make instant capture of them, 'otherwise,' said he, 'in three days your heads shall answer for theirs.' So terrible at last did his name become among the Calabrians, that a peasant,sent for by the General, what- ever might be the pretext, always gave himself up for lost, confessed and received absolution before be set out, and bade all his friends farewell; showing, by the melancholy tone of his 'Mantles has sent for me,' how hopeless he was of ever returning. Yet these were the only measures to be pursued in a country desolated by whole troops of bandits; who, not content with pillaging and mur- dering travellers, dared even to sack and burn villages, and to extort, vi et armis, the most exorbitant sums from those rich proprietors whose domestic forces were unable to repel the invaders."

Sicily is not quite so fresh as Calabria; but, though more fre- quented than the/ore-foot of Italy, it has not been nearly so much written about as many other places, and its land is not yet overrun by tourists: it is only in the capital cities that modern innovations have made way, and brigands congregate even in their vicinity. From this novelty of subject in both the countries where Mr. STRUTT travelled, more interest attaches to his volume than the mere literary merit of the writer might have imparted. It should, however, be observed, that Mr. STRUTT has the eye of an artist ; so that, if the descriptions are short and with little in them, they present the characteristic points of the outline. Here is a touch of his quality, in one of his fullest pictures.

A BANDIT'S WIDOW.

After dinner we had the honour of a visit from three of the first women of the village, who had been invited by our host in order to display the richness of the Caraffa costume ; and now came sailing in with all the conscious dignity of their splendid gala dresses; taking their places, to our great delight, directly in the middle of the room. • • • The last of the trio was Petronilla Jaccia, notorious as having been the wife of a brigand, whose expeditions she had frequently accompanied, and whose infamous exploits she had vigorously se- conded and shared. Petronilla is exactly what romantic young ladies would imagine a bandit's bride to be—tall, dark, with regular features, black eyes, and no inconsiderable portion of sullen beauty : it is, indeed, shrewdly reported at Caraffa, that she lies been eminently indebted to her personal attractions for delivery from more than one well-deservedjusticial chastisement. Onee,.ta particular, when under actual sentence of death, it would have gone hard with her had not a private interview with the judge softened his obdurate sense of duty, and induced him to exert himself in procuring her a reprieve. Now, however, the bold husband, who led her into such dangers, is no more; he was murdered by some of his men, a few years ago ; and Petronilla, collecting the spoil his valour and her own had won, retired to her native village, where she at present resides, one of the richest and most consequential of its inhabi- tants.

THROWING THE HATCHET.

As we returned, we passed a vaccaro, tending his cows : we fell into conver- sation with him ; and having heard much of the skill of these fellows with the hatchet, and seeing the weapon stuck as usual in his broad belt, we begged for a proof of his dexterity : he willingly complied; and planting a stick in the ground, retired to tome distance, produced the axe, which, hurled back fore- most, turned whistling in the air, and in an instant cut down the stick. On our complimenting him he said—" I can throw well at a good mark : the other day, for instance, I had a quarrel with a man in that lupin-field, and I sent the hatchet so neatly that it opened his face from the eye to the chin." We left him chuckling over the remembrance of his exploit, and returned home, as the light gradually faded from the horizon.

A STRANGER IN A CALABRIAN CITY.

I shall not be sorry to leave Catanzaro, where the curiosity of the inhabi- tants is only equalled by their impertinence. On entering a shop, ten or twelve persons squeeze in with you; and the tradesman, instead of serving you, begins questioning you as to whence you come, where you are going, what is your ob- ject in travelling, &c. One respectable-looking chemist, to whom I said that I came from England, gravely informed me that he supposed that country was not in the kingdom of Naples, as he knew of no such place.

FILIAL OBEDIENCE IN CALABRIA.

We staid conversing sonic time with a young man, who had a fine natural taste for music ; and with some young priests, who envied greatly our facility of travelling. " How is it possible," they cried, "that your parents should have allowed you, so young, to leave them and travel so far, to girar ii ,tondo; whilst we cannot even get permission from our fathers to go and see Catan- zero ? " This is one proof among many others we have had occasion to remark, of the height to which filial duty is carried in this country : a young man, who had certainly arrived at years of discretion, being at least three or four and twenty, complained in our presence that his father would not give him leave to go to the next village ; but the idea of going without leave seemed not for an instant to have entered his bead. The great respect and deference paid to parents throughout Calabria has been adduced, I think, by Galanti, as one proof of its inhabitants being descended from the ancient Samnites, who carried the final principle to its highest perfection.

BRIGAND DOMESTIC LIFE.

One incident was related to us, which is not calculated to show their domestic transactions in a very favourable light, in spite of the usual romantic ideas of the eternal fidelity of a brigand's bride. The chief of a band which infested this province had a young wife, very much attached to him, who followed him in all his perilous wanderings, and presented him with a son and heir worthy, she hoped, of imitating the glorious exploits of his sire. This unfortunate little bambino, however, so disturbed the peace of the brigand's tent with its infantine cries, that he threatened more than once to put an end to its wailing ; and one night, when returning savage and disappointed from an unsuccessful expedition, he was again provoked by its squalls, rising suddenly in a fury, he put his threat into executiou before the eyes of the terrified mother. From that moment love gave place in her heart to hatred and the desire of vengeance; whilst her husband, enraged at her continually regretting the child, and !perhaps suspecting some vindictive intentions on her part, resolved, after some domestic squabbles, upon putting her also to death. One night, having confided his project to his nephew, whom he had left at the head of the camp of brigands, he told him not to give the alarm if be heard the report of a gun, as it would merely be himself giving a quietus to la Giuditta : and with this warning he departed to his own tent, a little distant from the others. Now it so happened that his loving spouse had fixed upon this very evening for the performance of her own long-nursed schemes of revenge ; and having deferred her own fate by her more than usually amiable demeanour, and artfully got her victim to sleep, she discharged the contents of a rifle into his body; and cutting off his head, escaped with it to Reggio, where she claimed and obtained a reward from the authorities for his destruction. The nephew heard the report of the rifle in the night; and being forewarned, merely muttered to himself, "'o zio ch' ammazza Is Giuditta," and turned quietly round to sleep again.

VIEW FROM MOUNT ETNA.

It took us an hour of laborious walking to reach the summit of the cone; but we were well repaid on our arrival by the magnificence of the prospect, and the awful grandeur of the vast crater, whose precipitous dark abyss sunk to an im- mense depth below us. Its sheer rocky sides are rent in various directions, affording escape to the impatient vapours that burst from every part; and the sun, which illuminated the one side whilst it left the other and the bottom in shadow and darkness, discovered in it a thousand beautiful variations of tint, caused by the exhaling sulphur. When we threw some masses of scoriie down the crater, the thundering noise produced was frightful, as if old Etna roared at the insult : altogether, the impression produced by this stupendous volcano is one of the most powerful I have ever experienced. To attempt to give an idea of it upon paper was ridiculous ; yet we did attempt it, though with fingers numbed with cold, and ill-calculated to undertake such a task.

We next turned our attention to the surrounding prospect. Sicily lay, as it

were, at our feet, bright and sparkling, except where Etna flung his gigantic shadows across the country. The sea was perfectly visible, encircling the whole Maud, even beyond Palermo and Marsala ; so that we saw it at once as an island upon the map. The Pharos appeared a mere stream ; and Calabria, with its Appennines, shrunk into insigniheance, quite a near neighbour The Gulf of Tarento, and the old high-heeled boot-form of Italy, might be easily traced; whilst the isles of Lipari, Vulcano, and distant Stromboli, rising from the sea to the North, slightly misty in that quarter, and the bold heights of Malta far South, seemed, at such an elevated horizon, like mountains suspended in the sky. The view of Etna itself was perfect ; with its various lower craters, and its eruptions, whose course we traced on every side; particularly that de• structive one which poured in 1669 from the Monte Rosso, a dark double- headed eminence, rather above and westward of Nicolosi, and almost over- whelmed Catania with its disastrous flood.

NEAPOLITAN SOLDIERS.

Wherever I stop, the long gun of my friendMarmoreano may be seen watch- fully circling about the neighbourhood; for there is still some degree of danger in the environs of Palermo, and the activity and courage of the Neapolitan gendarmes are not very highly esteemed. Seven of them, the other day, cap- tured a brigand, and were taking him to town, when eight of his companions appeared, and immediately rescued him from the unresisting soldiers. Yester- day another, employed in preventing the contraband introduction of bread, which may not be brought within a certain distance of Pidermo without paying duty, had his gun taken from him, and his person ignobly kicked by a peasant, who was offended at some suspicion being expressed as to the contents cd his pockets. The peasant is now in prison ; but the commandant is advised to let him go, in order not to spread the story of the superiority of an unarmed peasant to s gendarme.