Leading the Blind

CHAPTER EIGHT ROME AND NAPLES

Railways soon ran the length and breadth of Italy, so that the journey to Rome became far more comfortable. Even by the 1850s tourists could get there from London in four and a half days, by taking the train as far as Marseilles and a boat to Civitta Vecchia — where Stendhal had been the French consul in the 1830s. With regard to the shipping lines, Murray’s South Italy and Naples, 1853, states: ‘Formerly there was considerable competition between the companies; but they have latterly amalgamated, by no means to the advantage of travellers. The fares are exorbitant, and there is no longer any inducement to accelerate the speed. The complaints are consequently numerous, and travellers are frequently exposed both to annoyance and loss by the failure of the steamers to keep their engagements. Considering the importance of the line, and the large profits which the companies derive from English travellers, the proprietors should bear in mind that a want of punctuality, incivility on the part of their officers, or exorbitant charges, will inevitably force their best customers to support the French mail line exclusively, or to fall back on the old system of travelling by land.’

These complaints are omitted from the next edition of the handbook, suggesting that they had some effect; or perhaps Murray himself had been taken to task, because a note in the preface says: ‘The Publisher thinks proper to state that Mr. Blewitt, the author of the former edition of this Handbook, having been prevented superintending the present, is not responsible for the changes that have been introduced in it.’

By 1872 the railway to Rome went via Paris, Munich, Innsbruck and the Brenner Pass, a distance of 1547 miles which took three days, for the fare of twelve pounds. In 1875 there were 1600 miles of railway in Italy, and 8164 by 1889. Bradshaw, in 1897, says that Rome could be reached from London in two and a half days for ten pounds.

Such progress towards becoming a great European power was not, according to Macmillan’s Italy and Sicily, 1905, an unmixed blessing, was even ‘a little precipitate, as no social transformation had taken place which correspond to the political revolution. Owing to the variety of local conditions, one district is almost a century behind another. The Italian revolution was a triumph for the middle classes, and the labouring classes had to bear an undue share of its burdens, while they profited but little from its immediate benefits.’

Most of the hotels were full when Charlotte Eaton and her companion arrived in Rome after their arduous journey from Florence, but when they found one: ‘You cannot conceive, without having travelled Vetturino, and lodged in the holes we have done, how delightful is the sensation of being in a habitable hotel, how acceptable the idea of a good dinner, and how transporting the prospect of sleeping in a clean bed.’

Thirty years later there were not only far more hotels, but many comfortable lodging houses. Families who intended to stay a long time ‘may meet with roomy and splendid apartments in some of the great palaces; in those of the Dukes Braschi, Altieri, Ceva, and Sermoneta, there is a princely suite generally let to foreigners. However respectable the landlord may appear, a formal written agreement is desirable, and a careful verification of the inventory still more so. In the Corso it will be as well to stipulate for the exclusive possession of the windows during the Carnival, or the lodger may be surprised to find his apartments converted into show-rooms during the festivities, besides being obliged to pay for a place at his own window.’

Murray also tells us that foreigners, especially the English, ‘cannot be too strongly cautioned against a set of disreputable characters who are constantly hanging about the Piazza di Spagna and the neighbouring streets, offering lodgings for hire. Such fellows ought to be avoided by respectable persons; those who place any confidence in them, as regards procuring apartments, will probably have to repent having listened to them.’

For the purpose of changing money there were three English bankers in Mr Murray’s list, one of whom was also in the wine business. ‘It is impossible not to feel, after any competent trial, how vastly different is the treatment an average Englishman receives from an English banker above an Italian one. No silly vanity should induce any traveller to afford certain grandiose Roman establishments the opportunity of fleecing him, for they will not even do it with civility, except to a duke or other great lord.’

There was an English Club in Rome, of which it was said: ‘The rules are somewhat illiberal, as regards artists residing in Rome, who are excluded.’ One could find the usual English doctors and dentists, as well as grocers and chemists, who grew more numerous as the century advanced. Hotels are also noted at which the ‘Anglo-American element is predominant’.

For those who liked to hunt: ‘A subscription pack of hounds is now kept, numbering several of the Roman princes among the subscribers, and affords very good sport to strangers residing at Rome during the winter; as foxes are abundant, and the country well suited for hunting’, but travellers were expected to send a donation to the secretary of the hunt ‘towards the maintenance of the hounds and huntsmen, at the end of the season’.

You might, of course, during your stay in the Holy City, wish to be presented to the Pope, in which case, you would receive a letter a few days before informing you of the time, generally about midday, when you were expected to wear either uniform or evening dress. ‘It is the etiquette that Protestants should show the same mark of respect to his Holiness as they do to their own sovereign, by kissing his hand. Roman Catholics will consider it their duty towards the head of their Church to kiss the Pope’s foot or knee. The presentation of ladies, except in the case of royal princesses or crowned heads, only takes place on Sundays, after the Pope’s dinner-hour.’

In the early Murray we may read — though this is condensed in later editions — that: ‘The Foundling Hospital contains upwards of 3000 children; the number annually received is 1150. In 1865, the last date for which we have returns, embracing a period of 10 years, out of 11,425 received in the hospital, 9260 died.’ This, in spite of the fact that: ‘Few cities in Europe are so distinguished for their institutions of public charity as Rome, and in none are the hospitals more magnificently lodged, or endowed with more princely liberality’, proving that if a bastard can’t live well, he or she can at least die in splendour.

One charitable institution is a hospital for Poor Protestants, which ‘deserves particular mention. It can accommodate 8 or 10 patients, and is well deserving of the support of our countrymen who visit Rome, as the only one where poor British Protestants can be received without being subjected to the persecution of the friars and attendants in the other hospitals to bring about their conversion to Romanism; upon no charity in Rome can the contribution of the English Protestants be more worthily bestowed.’

In a long section on climate and health we find the curious remarks that ‘the progress of malaria at Rome is dependent on the extension of the population. Whenever the population has diminished, the district in which the decrease has taken place has become unhealthy; and whenever a large number of persons has been crowded in a confined space, as in the Ghetto, the salubrity of the situation has become apparent in spite of the uncleanly habits of the inhabitants.’

It was thought in those days that the dreaded malaria was more likely to strike while you were asleep, ‘hence the couriers who carry the mails at all seasons between Rome and Naples make it a rule not to sleep whilst crossing the Pontine marshes, and generally smoke as an additional security’.

Murray goes to great lengths to put the perils of disease at Rome in their place, almost as if to talk them out of existence, while Baedeker’s 1897 guidebook is as usual more pragmatic — and brief, but the most sensible hints seem to be those from Rambles in Rome, by S. Russell Forbes: ‘Perhaps the health of no city in the world is so much talked about by people who know nothing whatever of the subject, as Rome. People get ill in Rome, of course, just as in any other place; but more than half the sickness is caused through their own imprudence.’ Under ‘Useful Hints’ the author gives us: ‘Avoid bad odours. Do not ride in an open carriage at night. Take lunch in the middle of the day. This is essential. It is better to take a light breakfast and lunch, than a heavy breakfast and no lunch. If out about sunset, throw an extra wrap or coat on, to avoid the sudden change in the atmosphere. There is no danger beyond being apt to take a cold. Colds are the root of all evil at Rome. Do not sit about the ruins at night. It may be very romantic, but it is very unwise. There is no harm in walking. Close your windows at night within a few inches. If you get into a heat, do not go into the shade or into a building till you have cooled down. Do not over-fatigue yourself. Follow these hints, and you will avoid that great bugbear, Roman fever.’

In 1872 Murray tells us that travellers should be on their guard against ‘an unworthy practice of innkeepers, and other interested parties at Nice, Florence, and even in Paris, and to which the newspapers have unfortunately lent themselves, in discrediting the sanitary state of Rome, thereby preventing strangers resorting to it, by representing epidemics of every kind as raging in it; indeed, the same thing has been practised in Rome itself, as regards Naples. Let the traveller shut his ears to such reports, or in case of doubt apply to some of the respectable medical men at Rome or Naples for precise information on the subject.’

For travellers who were sick, or so ailing that they died, the following difficulties were likely to arise: ‘Although somewhat indirectly connected with the sanitary matters at Rome, it may not be out of place here to allude to what is frequently a subject of complaint amongst foreign visitors. — The exorbitant demands made by a few hotel keepers, and the letters of lodgings generally, in the shape of indemnities in cases of death occurring in their houses. That they are fully entitled to such in case of deaths from infectious diseases, such as typhus fever, scarlatina, or small-pox, there can be no doubt, — as for re-papering the rooms and destruction of the carpets and bedding, or making them over to some charitable establishment, as is generally the case in hotels, after purification; but the case is different in the ordinary run of fatal maladies. In Rome, as elsewhere in Southern Europe, pulmonary consumption, in its later and final stages, is considered — and with some appearance of reason — to leave behind it infectious consequences: hence it has been a general custom to believe it to be dangerous to inhabit an apartment where a person labouring under phthisis has died, without a thorough disinfecting, — the removal of papering, carpets, bedding etc.; families must, therefore, be prepared for a demand under such circumstances, whereon it will be better to come to an understanding through their banker, or physician.’

From that topic we might move on to Murray’s description of the Protestant burial ground which ‘all foreign travellers will regard with melancholy interest. The silence and seclusion of the spot, and the inscriptions which tell the British traveller in his native tongue of those who have found their last resting-place beneath the bright skies of the Eternal City, appeal irresistibly to the heart. The cemetery has an air of romantic beauty which forms a striking contrast with the tomb of the ancient Roman and with the massive city walls and towers which overlook it. Among those who are buried here are the poets Shelley and Keats.’

Before leaving Rome for regions further south it may not be out of place to see how guidebooks deal with the subject of begging. Charlotte Eaton, at the village of Radifalconi, on the way to the city, was disappointed at not finding gems and casts from ancient medals on sale at the inn. ‘The Italians seem to neglect the most obvious means of making money honestly, but spare no trouble to get at it by begging of cheating. We were assailed by a crowd of stout, sturdy clamorous beggars, any one of whom, if they had provided themselves with these casts to sell, might have made a considerable sum by us, and probably by most travellers.’

Begging is not mentioned in the early Murray guidebooks, but in the 1908 edition to Rome we read: ‘It is safe to assume that all beggars are professional idlers, and of the criminal class. The honest poor do not beg. Even the physically afflicted could, in nearly every case, earn their living by work if they chose to do so. In order to meet the fierce competition in this overcrowded profession many children are intentionally maimed for life by their parents, who are then able to live in idleness on the alms obtained by the sacrifice.’

In 1897 Baedeker advises: ‘Begging, which is most prevalent at the church-doors, has recently increased in frequency in the streets of Rome … The foolish practice of “scattering” copper coins to be struggled for by the street-arabs is highly reprehensible, and, like most idle gratuities to children, has a demoralising effect upon the recipients.’

Perhaps begging was a further corruption of tourism, because Augustus J. C. Hare, in Cities of Southern Italy, relates: ‘Without having suffered from it, no one can imagine the pest of beggars which make a long stay in the once enchanting Amalfi almost unendurable. Three-fifths of the able-bodied men, and every other woman and child, beg. The greater part of the population now loiter idle all day long in the streets or on the beach, ready to pounce upon strangers, till the traveller, half-maddened, is driven back to his hotel, or into the higher mountains. The only hope of future comfort is never, under any circumstances, to be tempted to give to a beggar; once give, and you are lost.’

The South was said to begin at Naples, and judging from the remarks in most guidebooks, people ought rather to die than see it. In 1853 Murray says: ‘Travellers are liable to four custom-house visitations from the frontier to Naples, which may generally be compromised for the sum of from 6 to 12 carlini. In fact the constant appeal of “buona grazia” will soon convince the traveller, however much he may disapprove of the system, that his convenience will be consulted by a compromise.’

Before entering the Kingdom of Naples we pass through the town of Aversa, which has ‘acquired considerable celebrity for its lunatic asylum, called the Maddalena, established by Murat, and capable of containing 500 persons … one of the earliest to throw aside restraints, and to rely on moral influences founded on the basis of occupation and amusement for the cure. It was more interesting a few years ago, before the barbarous practices of the dark ages were abolished in other countries, than it is now, when the more recent system of England has left it somewhat in the background in regard to modern improvements.’

Murray expatiates tediously at times on the hotels at Naples, but his main points are that travellers should bargain with landlords on arrival and ‘refuse to pay any charge which they know, from experience elsewhere, to be exorbitant. There need be no delicacy on the subject; for it is the common custom of the country. All foreigners make it a rule to adopt this precaution, and for this reason they not only pay about a third less than English travellers, but escape the annoyances and delays of disputed bills.’

There seems to have been some justification for this advice because ‘the principal hotels rank among the best and dearest in Italy’ but the expense of staying in them is ‘greater than any which they have experienced elsewhere from the time of leaving England. No one can deny that the great hotels of Naples are distinguished by their excellent management, and by all which can reconcile the visitor to high charges; and while they continue to deserve this praise, there will always be travellers to support them without reference to expense.’ He goes on to say that the landlords ‘will still further consult their own interests by adopting in every branch of their establishments, and especially in the charges for apartments, a scale of prices which will put an end to the reproach that they have the dearest inns in Italy … In these times of railroads and steam, the general public are the best patrons; and those landlords who become known for the moderation of their charges will be abundantly repaid not only by the increased number of visitors, but by the longer period during which they will be induced to stay.’

One hotel particularly noted is the newly built Hôtel des Etrangers, ‘well situated, and highly spoken of for reasonable charges and an obliging landlord, who has been a courier in English families. His wife, an Englishwoman, was formerly a lady’s maid in the Duke of Newcastle’s family, and has introduced many English comforts into the establishment.’ The hotel, renamed the Royal des Etrangers, still existed in 1912, and had an asterisk of commendation in Baedeker.

The streets at Naples were not lit at night until 1840, when oil lamps were introduced. They were shortly afterwards superseded by gas, ‘which in so crowded and intricate a city has proved one of the greatest improvements which modern civilisation has effected. Within the last few years foot-pavements have been laid down in the principal thoroughfares, but such is the inveteracy of habit that even now the people can hardly be induced to relinquish their ancient custom of walking in the middle of the streets.’

The Corso of Naples, about a mile and a half in length, was paved with flagstones and ‘from morning to night, and we almost add from night to daybreak, the Corso is thronged with people and with carriages; the people shouting at the top of their voices, and the carriages threading their way between the pagodas of the lemonade-sellers, the stalls of the vendors of iced-water, the charcoal fires of the sausage dealers, and a hundred groups of busy people, whose sole occupation appears to be to pass as much of their lives as possible in the open air. It is at all times the noisiest street in Europe, and on extraordinary occasions it presents a perfect sea of human beings, swayed here and there by each successive current, and presenting to the eye of the traveller one of the most curious spectacles it is possible to imagine.’

The impression is of an Indian or oriental city today, but sixty years later Baedeker can still say: ‘The life of the people in Naples is carried on with greater freedom and more careless indifference to publicity than in any other town in Europe.’

In the narrow side streets, much cooking took place in the open air, while other dealers ‘tempt the crowd with fragments from the trattorie or with trays of carefully assorted cigar-ends. The female members of the community are seen going through their toilet, and performing various unpleasing acts of attention to their children, regardless of the public gaze. In summer the children often run about quite naked.’

In the words of J. C. Hare: ‘Naples has been described as a paradise inhabited by devils: but they are lively, and amusing devils — insouciant and idle: good-natured and thieving: kind-hearted and lying: always laughing, except if thwarted, when they will stab their best friend without a pang. Almost everybody in Naples cheats, but cheats in as lively and pleasant a manner as is compatible with possibilities. Nearly all the officials peculate, and perhaps not more than two-thirds of the taxes ever reach the public exchequer. If the traveller is robbed, he will never secure redress …

‘As it is the universal custom amongst the lower orders to marry at seventeen, and Neapolitan women are proverbially prolific, the tall, narrow houses in the back streets swarm with children, and are like rabbit-warrens; whole families live huddled together, but not without cleanliness or decency, though the air sometimes resounds at once with blows and cries, singing and laughter … Little, however, is needed to sustain life at Naples, and there are thousands who consider a dish of beans at midday to be sumptuous fare, while the horrible condiment called pizza (made of dough baked with garlic, rancid bacon, and strong cheese) is esteemed a feast.’ And so many people consider it in modern-day London.

As in most other great towns Murray assumes the traveller to have a macabre interest in cemeteries. In Naples only the rich, he says, can afford to be buried in a church, the old cemetery of Naples being used for the dead of the public hospitals, ‘and for the poorest classes who cannot afford the expense of burial in the Campo Santo Nuovo or in the churches.’

The ground forms a parallelogram of upwards of 300 feet, surrounded on three sides by a lofty wall, and bounded on the forth side by an arcade. It contains 366 deep round pits, some of which are arranged under the arcade, but the greater part are in the area. The pits are covered with large stones; their number, of course, gives one for every day of the year and one over. One of them is opened every evening, and cleared out to make room for the dead of the day. A priest resides upon the spot, and towards evening the miscellaneous funeral takes place. By this time a large pile of bodies is generally accumulated. They are brought by their relatives or by the hospital servants, stripped of every particle of clothing upon the spot, and left to be disposed of at the appointed time, unattended, in most instances, by the person to whom they were bound in life by ties of kindred or feeling. The bodies are thrown into the pit, with as much unconcern as if they were the plague patients of Florence whom Boccaccio has described; quick lime is then thrown in, and the stone covering is replaced for another year. As many as forty bodies are frequently thus disposed of in a single evening. The pits when first opened are generally so full of carbonic acid gas that a light is extinguished at its mouth; and it is said that whenever they have been examined the day after a burial, the bodies have been overrun with rats and enormous cock-roaches, which clear the bones more expeditiously than the lime.

Perhaps there would be fewer dead to inter at such charnel houses if the hospitals were run better, Murray suggests, when mentioning the main hospital at Naples: ‘The extent of its resources are unknown, as its ample revenues are administered by one of the great officers of the court, who is practically irresponsible.’

One of the most painful spectacles for nineteenth-century British travellers was the treatment of animals, especially donkeys and dogs, who seem, on the whole, to have had a worse time than human beings. ‘The grossest brutality to animals used to be a Neapolitan characteristic,’ J. C. Hare says, adding that the local retort to ill-usage was: ‘So what? They aren’t Christians.’ For this attitude, Hare adds, the priest was chiefly responsible.

Macmillan’s guide at the turn of the century reports: ‘A local Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has done a vast amount of good, though it has met with the most violent opposition from the very persons who are chiefly interested in its operations. The continual protest on the part of English travellers against acts of wanton cruelty has probably more effect upon the Neapolitan cabman than any number of police restrictions, the justice or reasonableness of which he is wholly incapable of understanding. The Society has done immense work in removing from the streets of Naples sights and sounds which were sickening to English eyes and ears. Collecting-boxes are to be found in all the best hotels.’

In 1853 the area of the Grotto del Cane, in the environs of the city, was a place for stray dogs to avoid. ‘This celebrated cave, which the books of our early childhood classed among the wonders of the world, is nothing more than a small aperture, resembling a cellar, at the base of a rocky hill. The cavern, known to Pliny, is continually exhaling from its sides and floor volumes of steam mixed with carbonic acid gas … Cluverius says that the grotto was once used as a place of execution for Turkish captives, who were shut up within its walls and left to die of suffocation, a merciful fate compared with the lingering tortures which the Mohametan pirates of the same period inflicted on their Christian captives. It is said that Don Pedro de Toledo tried the same experiment upon two galley slaves, with fatal results. Addison, on his visit to the cavern, made a series of very interesting experiments which anticipated all those performed by subsequent observers. He found that a viper was nine minutes in dying on the first trial, and ten minutes on the second, this increased vitality being attributable, in his opinion, to the large stock of air which it had inhaled after the first trial. He found that the dog was not longer in expiring on the first experiment than on the second. It has frequently been asserted that the dog, upon which this experiment is usually performed for the amusement of travellers, is so accustomed to “die” that he becomes indifferent to his fate. We disbelieve this statement altogether, and on the simple ground that we have never seen any dog in perfect health who has long been the subject of the exhibition. The effects of the gas, moreover, are seen quite as well, if not better, in a torch, a lighted candle, or a pistol.’

Augustus Hare says in 1911, ‘Extortionate wretches generally swarm in the neighbourhood with animals which they offer to “die” for the amusement of visitors; a dog is the favourite victim.’ Baedeker, a few years later, tells us: ‘Dogs are no longer provided for the exhibition of this cruel experiment, but the curiosity of the traveller is sufficiently gratified by observing that a light is immediately extinguished when brought in contact with the vapour.’

The final comment on this matter will be taken from Macmillan’s guidebook of 1905: ‘The fumes being most powerful close to the floor, a dog or other animal is soon overcome by breathing the fumes, and a wretched dog is kept in readiness for the cruel and vulgar experiment, on the consent of the inhuman visitor’ — thus putting the blame where it really lay.

After seeing the churches and picture galleries of Naples, and its street life, the traveller may now visit the asterisked environs, the first of which must surely be the ascent of Vesuvius, ‘for many centuries one of the most active volcanoes in the world’. The mid-Victorian Murray gives a blow by blow description of the fifty-three eruptions up to that time, in the last of which: ‘A young Polish officer was struck by a mass of large size, which caused a compound fracture of the thigh, lacerating the artery in such a manner that he bled to death on the spot. An American officer was struck on the arm by a stone, which stripped the flesh down to the elbow, producing alarming haemorrhage, which endangered his life for many days.’ Perhaps for the rest of his time on earth he considered that Goethe had much to answer for, in saying that Vesuvius was ‘a peak of hell, rising out of Paradise’, thus tempting all tourists to climb it.

The ascent was usually made from Resina, reached by railway or private carriage, a place ‘infested by self-called guides, pretended mineral dealers, and padroni of horses and mules, who are most importunate in their offers of services, which are too frequently both dear and worthless’.

A kind of sedan chair with twelve bearers ‘is required for delicate ladies and invalids. A great coat or cloak, and a warm neckerchief, to put on as soon as the ascent is made, a strong walking stick, and stout boots, may be mentioned as the desiderata of the excursion.’ During an eruption, hundreds of people assemble to witness the sight: ‘When a stream of lava is rolling slowly down the mountain, the kettle is boiled on its surface and the eggs are cooked in its crevices. Coins also are usually dropped into the lava, which is then detached from the mass and preserved as a reminiscence.

‘The ascent over the loose scoriae generally occupies about an hour, varying of course with the state of the cone. At times it is necessary for the guides to assist the traveller, which they do by strapping a long leathern belt around his waist, and pulling him up the steep incline by main force.’

By 1912 there was no need for such a scramble, because Thomas Cook & Co. had constructed a rack-and-pinion railway almost to the summit, to which firm the thanks of tourists were due, Baedeker says, ‘for the energy with which, in face of serious difficulties, they maintain order and discipline among the guides and others, who have been accustomed for generations to practise extortion upon travellers’.

From Vesuvius our intrepid traveller would visit Pompeii, having read the Younger Pliny’s vivid account, reprinted verbatim in his Murray, of its eruption in AD 79. A copy of Bulwer-Lytton’s Last Days of Pompeii may also have been in his knapsack, and if he wanted to stay overnight, Murray would tell him that the Hôtel Bellevue was ‘a new inn, close to the railway, kept by S. Prosperi, a very civil and obliging landlord’.

The guidebook leads one from ruin to ruin, describing each house in ample detail, never failing to point out the remains of the dead: ‘One cast of a young girl, part of which still exists, possessed exceeding elegance of form; the neck and breast especially were perfect models of feminine beauty.’

The House of the Vestals is: ‘A double house, comprising a vestibule, an atrium with the usual apartments on each side, formerly richly paved with mosaics and decorated with luxurious pictures by no means in accordance with the name given to it.’

This sneaky form of euphemism, perhaps intended by Murray’s handbook to indicate those risqué ornaments a gentleman might wish to see, was employed in the description of the House of Sallust, whose Venereum ‘consists of a small court, the real prototype of the Oriental harem, surrounded by a portico, of octagonal columns, a sacrarium dedicated to Diana, two sleeping-rooms at the sides with glazed windows looking into the court … Every part is elaborately decorated, and the paintings are appropriately expressive of the use to which the apartments were applied. The sleeping rooms contain pictures of Mars, Venus, and Cupid, and the entire wall at the back of the court is covered with a large painting, representing the story of Diana and Actaeon, an evident allusion to the danger of prying too closely into the mysteries of this portion of the mansion.’

One is also warned of, or guided to, the Tavern: ‘… a building so called from the number of cooking vessels, tripods, pots, and pans of bronze and earthenware which were found in it. The walls are covered with licentious paintings, representing the usual routine of low tavern scenes.’

Our attention is also directed to a baker’s shop, where: ‘The frequent occurrence of the phallus over the entrance doors, and the obscene pictures found in several of the houses, have induced the belief that this was the quarter of the courtesans.’

In the House of the Triumphant Hercules certain statues were said to be in bad taste, ‘but curious from their variety and arrangement; among them are, Love riding a dolphin, a bearded satyr, a stag, a fawn extracting a thorn from a goat’s foot, a goat caressing its young one lying in the lap of a shepherdess, and others which we need not particularise’.

Such paintings and statues presented problems to guidebook writers of the Victorian Age. Baedeker, as late as 1912, says of the Lupanare, which was locked: ‘The bad character of the house is sufficiently indicated by the paintings and inscriptions.’ In the next edition we are informed that: ‘Most of the licentious paintings have been either destroyed or removed.’

At the entrance to the House of the Vettii is ‘a representation of Priapus (covered) … Beside the kitchen is a room (locked) containing paintings not suited for general inspection and a statuette of Priapus.’ Other guidebooks ignore the issue, though a later Baedeker sums it up by saying that though the best of the paintings have been removed, many of those left ‘merit inspection. The scenes present a uniformly soft, erotic character, corresponding to the peaceful and pleasure-loving taste of the age.’

Visiting Capri in 1853 called for the hire of a ten-oared boat from Sorrento, at the cost of five ducats. The twenty miles there and back enabled the traveller to return the same evening, since accommodation on the island was said to be ‘indifferent’. An Englishman who had spent three days there, however, was so delighted with the island’s salubrity and scenery that ‘he made it his residence for thirty years’. By the next edition of Murray three inns offered ‘clean and tolerably comfortable accommodations’. He also mentions that the Blue Grotto was discovered by two Englishmen swimming off the coast in 1822.

By 1912 steamers took only two hours to do the journey, though Baedeker tells us that ‘on windy days the roughness of the water is apt to occasion sea-sickness’. Later in the nineteenth-century, when tourists (and artists) went there in large numbers, fourteen hotels are listed, as well as numerous lodgings.

J. C. Hare comments that the natives are ‘pleasant and civil in their manners, and full of courtesies to strangers. The women are frequently beautiful, and good models may be obtained here by artists more cheaply than anywhere else. One lira a day is the usual price of a model, and yet the artist may feel he is doing no injustice, as 60c. a day would be the wages of a hard day’s work in the fields.’