This song was written in Naples and environs, in around the 1880's, when a funicular railway was installed that I believe goes part way up the side of Mount Vesuvius. The Neapolitans immediately wrote a song about it. The Italian words that I know are about a fellow who "Goes up" where there is "hot fire" to see his sweetie, who is, so to speak, cold to him. The connection with the funicular is implied: he rides it up the mountain. The chorus just has fun with the name "funicular."

I was told in Naples that a funicular is a cog-wheel railway.

Whoops. Got to go. More on this later, as well, I hope, as an alternate set of Italian words. - Rita Ferrara