"The Vardarelli were discovered; but still it was no easy matter to get at
them. Instead of losing men by a direct attack, the soldiers blocked up
the air-hole with stones, set a guard over it, and then going round to the
door of the cellar, which was barricadoed on the inner side, they heaped
lighted fagots and combustibles against it, so that the staircase was soon
one immense furnace. After a time the door gave way, and the fire poured
like a torrent into the retreat of the unfortunate bandits. Still a
profound silence reigned in the vault. Presently two carbine shots were
fired; two brothers, determined not to fall alive into the hands of their
enemies, had shot each other to death. A moment afterwards an explosion
was heard; a bandit had thrown himself into the flames, and his cartridge
box had blown up. At last the remainder of the unfortunate men being
nearly suffocated, and seeing that escape was impossible, surrendered at
discretion, were dragged through the air-hole, and immediately bound hand
and foot, and conveyed to prison.
"As to the eight who had refused to come to Foggia, and the two who had
escaped, they were hunted down like wild beasts, tracked from cavern to
cavern, and from forest to forest. Some were shot, others betrayed by the
peasantry, some gave themselves up, so that, before the year was out, all
the Vardarelli were dead or prisoners. The woman who had displayed such
masculine courage, was the only one who finally escaped. She was never
heard of afterwards."
M. Dumas finds that the climate of Naples, delightful as it is, has
nevertheless its little drawbacks and disadvantages. He returns one night
from an excursion in the environs, and has scarcely got into bed, when he
is almost blown out of it again by a tornado of tropical violence.
"At midnight, when we returned to Naples, the weather was perfect, the sky
cloudless, the sea without a ripple. At three in the morning I was
awakened by the windows of my room bursting open, their eighteen panes of
glass falling upon the floor with a frightful clatter. I jumped out of bed,
and felt that the house was shaking. I thought of Pliny the Elder, and
having no desire for a similar fate, I hastily pulled on my clothes and
hurried out into the corridor. My first impulse had apparently been that
of all the inmates of the hotel, who were all standing, more or less
dressed, at the doors of their apartments; amongst others, Jadin, who made
his appearance with a phosphorus box in his hand, and his dog Milord at
his heels. 'What a terrible draught in the house!' said he to me. This
same draught, as he called it, had just carried off the roof of the Prince
of San Feodoro's palace, including the garrets and several servants who
were sleeping in them.
"My first thought had been of an eruption of Vesuvius, but there was no
such luck for us; it was merely a hurricane. A hurricane at Naples,
however, is rather different from the same thing in any other European
country.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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