Stretched on beds, curled up on doorsteps, sprawled upon roofs, sleepy southern Italians awakened at 1:10 a. m. one night last week to find the world crashing about their heads. Straight across the country's "ankle," from Naples on the west to Foggia and Bari on the east, the earth heaved in the most terrible disaster since a quake plus a tidal wave snuffed out the lives of 77,000 Sicilians and Calabrians at Messina in 1908. More than 3,500 were reported killed last week, and how many thousands were injured no man knew. For four days after the quake the earth that had leaped in convulsion quivered with minor earthquakes like a frightened horse.
Centre of the disturbance and scene of the greatest loss of life were the mountain villages of Avellino, Villanova-Albanese, Melfi, in the Apennines back of Naples. Here thousands were mangled, buried alive in the debris of stone houses that crumpled and knocked each other down like rows of toy soldiers. Though Bari on the Adriatic was shaken by severe tremors and many houses damaged, none was killed, none injured. Fascist engineers were proud, for modern Bari is their handiwork. They have converted a small sleepy fishing village into a great modern port (rival of Brindisi), laid out broad avenues and block after block of modern sanitary dwellings which with cracked plaster and sprung roofs were still safely standing last week.
Saintly Skull. In Naples, too, though tenements were split open, though houses, churches and bridges fell, the loss of life was comparatively small. The first tremors set all the church-bells in the city to jangling. Crying Miracola! Miracola! (Miracle! Miracle!) pious Neapolitans tumbled from their houses to pray in the streets. At dawn hundreds were kneeling before the cathedral, calling upon St. Januarius.
A great and good man, a bishop and a martyr, St. Januarius is not the Patron Saint of Earthquakes, but of Naples. Tortured and beheaded by the Emperor Diocletian, his skull and two phials containing his blood (see cut) are among the most sacred relics of Naples Cathedral. Eighteen times a year the phials of blood miraculously liquefy. The skull has a reputation for stopping eruptions of Mt. Vesuvius. While the faithful prayed in the square last week, dour Cardinal Ascalesi, splendid in scarlet soutane and sash, held high the gold-encased skull, blessed 20,000 worshippers.
Relief. All Italy mobilized for the relief of the stricken district. From his desk in the red brick palazzo Venezia, Il Duce ordered to the stricken district five regiments, a squadron of observation planes, and his brand new Earthquake Relief Train. From the Vatican Pope Pius sent a special nuncio, Mgr. Spirito Chiapetta. Little King Vittorio Emanuele went himself, motored from village to village. Exhausted soldiers and rescue squads, grief-stricken peasants glimpsed a pair of bright eyes and the top of His Majesty's campaign cap as the car passed, were comforted.