Italy’s Queen has a wonderful reputation the world around for her heroism and daring. More than once she has rendered signal and distinguished service when great disasters have visited her country, so that this reputation is not undeserved. I have some personal knowledge of this side of her character and it is a privilege to give her full credit. There are other sides of her life as a Queen, however, in which she falls lamentably short of her position. Of these I shall have to speak also.
Queen Elena and the King were in Rome at the time of the great earthquake which devastated Southern Calabria and the western tip of Sicily. No sooner had the first authentic reports reached their Majesties than they started for Messina, travelling to Naples by special train and then by the Italian cruiser Regina Elena. As it happened, I arrived at Messina, also by sea, at almost the same moment as the Flagship. I was put ashore, to visit the wrecked city, in a small boat, and not one hundred yards away a little drab launch was bouncing over the rude waves toward what was left of a slanting stage, bearing King Victor Em{262}manuel. On the deck of the Regina Elena, anxiously watching each rise and fall of the little boat, stood the Queen. From almost the same angle I could watch the progress toward shore, only when the King stepped ashore I was much nearer, and therefore could see more distinctly the panic-stricken survivors hurling themselves madly at the feet of their King, and could hear much better the wild shouts: “Vive Vitorio Emmanuele!” It was a strange, weird hurrah, coming from the lips of the bereaved, the sorely stricken, the wounded, the dying. Certainly it impressed me deeply. Later, from an officer aboard the cruiser, I heard that the Queen was moved as never before in her life, and well she might be. Before her, in endless panorama, lay the ruined, smoking city. The King, and the crowd he attracted, loomed big on the quay, the foreground. Behind, stretching to the orange and lemon clad hills which after a mile rise abruptly to a great height, lay the biggest pile of human suffering, of dead bodies and pinioned, starving living that the world has known in many centuries. Yet out of this ghastly picture arose the cry: “Long live the King!” “Long live Queen Elena!” Truly it was overpowering. The Queen stood it as long as she could, and then with her hands pressed to her face she went sobbing to her cabin.
After an hour the King returned to the ship. The Queen met him at the gangway. Now her tears were dried. She wore a long nurse’s apron,{263} and from that hour, so long as she remained near the scene of disaster, Queen Elena worked as a nurse. With her own hands she bandaged the bleeding. She assisted at amputations and other serious operations and from time to time she visited other ships that were caring for the injured and spoke the cheering words, which, coming from the sovereign, meant so much more than any stimulant.
In connection with this dire catastrophe there was at least one incident that was full of humour. M. Tardieu, a French journalist, had occasion to visit the Minister of Marine who was of the Royal party aboard the Flagship. When Tardieu had finished his business, the Minister, pointing to a parrot which was occupying a prominent place on the deck, related this story:
“A squad of Italian soldiers at work among the ruins heard a voice crying ‘Maria,’ ‘Maria.’ They dug for hours getting nearer, but always the voice cried unceasingly ‘Maria,’ ‘Maria.’ At last when they reached the room from which the sounds were coming they found not............