There is not a house to be
seen on this route and from there being a good deal of wood, and no
appearance of cultivation, one fancies oneself rather in the wilds of a new
country like America, than in so old a one as Italy.
Ronciglione is an old rubbishing town half in ruins and contains no one
thing remarkable.
The next morning at four o'clock we started from Ronciglione and reached
Baccano to breakfast.
Baccano contains only two buildings; but they are both very large and
roomy; the one is the inn, and the other serves as a barrack for the
Military. There is always a strong military detachment here for the
security of the road against robbers, who occasionally infest this
neighbourhood. The inn is of immense size. Travellers, who arrive here
late, would do well to halt here the whole night, as not only the road is
dangerous on account of robbers, but because if they arrive at Rome after
five o'clock p.m., they cannot release their baggage and carriage from the
Custom house till next day. Every carriage public or private that arrives
in Rome is bound, unless a special permission to the contrary be obtained
from the Government, to drive direct to the Custom house (Dogana). In the
like manner, on travelling from Rome to Florence, people generally prefer
to start from Rome at twelve o'clock and bring to the night at Baccano, so
as to avoid the bad inn at Ronciglione and sleep in preference at Viterbo.
I here speak only of those who travel by short stages as the vetturini
do.
Ariosto has given a celebrity to this wretched place Baccano in his poem of
the Orlando Furioso, in the story of Giocondo in the 28th Canto, as being
the identical place where Fausto, the brother of Giocondo, remained to
await the return of his brother from Rome, to which place he had gone back,
when half way between Baccano and Rome, to fetch the monile which he had
left behind him, and found his wife not alone and dying with grief as
he apprehended, but sotto la coltre with a servant of the family.
The country between Baccano and Rome is as unpleasing and even worse than
that between the former place and Ronciglione. It is hilly, but not a tree,
nor a house, nor a sign of cultivation to be seen except the two or three
wretched hovels at La Storta. There is nothing at all that announces the
approach to a capital city; and in addition to the dismal landscape there
is a sight still more dismal that salutes the eye of the traveller at
intervals of two or three miles and which does not tend to inspire pleasing
ideas; and this is the sight of arms and legs of malefactors and murderers
suspended on large poles on the road side; for it is the custom here to cut
off the arms and legs of murderers after decapitation, and to suspend them
in terrorem on poles, erected on the very spot where they committed the
murder.
