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diff --git a/14276-0.txt b/14276-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a21a95a --- /dev/null +++ b/14276-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9654 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14276 *** + +ITALIAN JOURNEYS + +By + +W.D. Howells + +1867 and 1895 + + + + + PAGE +CONTENTS. + +The Road to Rome from Venice: + I. Leaving Venice 9 + II. From Padua to Ferrara 10 + III. The Picturesque, the Improbable, and + the Pathetic in Ferrara 14 + IV. Through Bologna to Genoa 43 + V. Up and Down Genoa 52 + VI. By Sea from Genoa to Naples 65 + VII. Certain Things in Naples 75 + VIII. A Day in Pompeii 89 + IX. A Half-hour at Herculaneum 106 + X. Capri and Capriotes 116 + XI. The Protestant Ragged Schools at Naples 136 + XII. Between Rome and Naples 147 + XIII. Roman Pearls 151 + +Forza Maggiore 178 + +At Padua 196 + +A Pilgrimage to Petrarch's House at Arquà 216 + +A Visit to the Cimbri 235 + +Minor Travels: + I. Pisa 251 + II. The Ferrara Road 259 + III. Trieste 264 + IV. Bassano 274 + V. Possagno, Canova's Birthplace 280 + VI. Como 285 + +Stopping at Vicenza, Verona, and Parma 293 + +Ducal Mantua 321 + + + + +THE ROAD TO ROME FROM VENICE. + +I. + +LEAVING VENICE. + +We did not know, when we started from home in Venice, on the 8th of +November, 1864, that we had taken the longest road to Rome. We thought +that of all the proverbial paths to the Eternal City that leading to +Padua, and thence through Ferrara and Bologna to Florence, and so +down the sea-shore from Leghorn to Civita Vecchia, was the best, the +briefest, and the cheapest. Who could have dreamed that this path, +so wisely and carefully chosen, would lead us to Genoa, conduct us on +shipboard, toss us four dizzy days and nights, and set us down, void, +battered, and bewildered, in Naples? Luckily, + + "The moving accident is not my trade," + +for there are events of this journey (now happily at an end) which, +if I recounted them with unsparing sincerity, would forever deter the +reader from taking any road to Rome. + +Though, indeed, what is Rome, after all, when you come to it? + + + + +II. + +FROM PADUA TO FERRARA. + +As far as to Ferrara there was no sign of deviation from the direct +line in our road, and the company was well enough. We had a Swiss +family in the car with us to Padua, and they told us how they were +going home to their mountains from Russia, where they had spent +nineteen years of their lives. They were mother and father and only +daughter and the last, without ever having seen her ancestral country, +was so Swiss in her yet childish beauty, that she filled the morning +twilight with vague images of glacial height, blue lake, snug chalet, +and whatever else of picturesque there is in paint and print about +Switzerland. Of course, as the light grew brighter these images melted +away, and left only a little frost upon the window-pane. + +The mother was restively anxious at nearing her country, and told us +every thing of its loveliness and happiness. Nineteen years of absence +had not robbed it of the poorest charm, and I hope that seeing it +again took nothing from it. We said how glad we should be if we were +as near America as she was to Switzerland. "America!" she screamed; +"you come from America! Dear God, the world is wide--the world is +wide!" The thought was so paralyzing that it silenced the fat little +lady for a moment, and gave her husband time to express his sympathy +with us in our war, which he understood perfectly well. He trusted +that the revolution to perpetuate slavery must fail, and he hoped that +the war would soon end, for it made cotton very dear. + +Europe is material: I doubt if, after Victor Hugo and Garibaldi, there +were many upon that continent whose enthusiasm for American +unity (which is European freedom) was not somewhat chilled by the +expensiveness of cotton. The fabrics were all doubled in price, and +every man in Europe paid tribute in hard money to the devotion with +which we prosecuted the war, and, incidentally, interrupted the +cultivation of cotton. + +We shook hands with our friends, and dismounted at Padua, where we +were to take the diligence for the Po. In the diligence their loss was +more than made good by the company of the only honest man in Italy. +Of course this honest man had been a great sufferer from his own +countrymen, and I wish that all English and American tourists, who +think themselves the sole victims of publican rapacity and deceit in +Italy, could have heard our honest man's talk. The truth is, these +ingenious people prey upon their own kind with an avidity quite as +keen as that with which they devour strangers; and I am half-persuaded +that a ready-witted foreigner fares better among them than a traveller +of their own nation. Italians will always pretend, on any occasion, +that you have been plundered much worse than they but the reverse +often happens. They give little in fees; but their landlord, their +porter, their driver, and their boatman pillage them with the same +impunity that they rob an Inglese. As for this honest man in the +diligence, he had suffered such enormities at the hands of the +Paduans, from which we had just escaped, and at the hands of the +Ferrarese, into which we were rushing (at the rate of five miles scant +an hour), that I was almost minded to stop between the nests of those +brigands and pass the rest of my days at Rovigo, where the honest man +lived. His talk was amusingly instructive, and went to illustrate the +strong municipal spirit which still dominates all Italy, and which is +more inimical to an effectual unity among Italians than Pope or Kaiser +has ever been. Our honest man of Rovigo was a foreigner at Padua, +twenty-five miles north, and a foreigner at Ferrara, twenty-five miles +south; and throughout Italy the native of one city is an alien in +another, and is as lawful prey as a Russian or an American with people +who consider every stranger as sent them by the bounty of Providence +to be eaten alive. Heaven knows what our honest man had paid at his +hotel in Padua, but in Ferrara the other week he had been made to give +five francs apiece for two small roast chickens, besides a fee to +the waiter; and he pathetically warned us to beware how we dealt with +Italians. Indeed, I never met a man so thoroughly persuaded of the +rascality of his nation and of his own exceptional virtue. He took +snuff with his whole person; and he volunteered, at sight of a +flock of geese, a recipe which I give the reader: Stuff a goose with +sausage; let it hang in the weather during the winter; and in the +spring cut it up and stew it, and you have an excellent and delicate +soup. + +But after all our friend's talk, though constant, became dispiriting, +and we were willing when he left us. His integrity had, indeed, been +so oppressive that I was glad to be swindled in the charge for our +dinner at the Iron Crown, in Rovigo, and rode more cheerfully on to +Ferrara. + + + + +III. + +THE PICTURESQUE, THE IMPROBABLE, AND THE PATHETIC IN FERRARA. + +I. + +It was one of the fatalities of travel, rather than any real interest +in the poet, which led me to visit the prison of Tasso on the night of +our arrival, which was mild and moonlit. The _portier_ at the +Stella d'Oro suggested the sentimental homage to sorrows which it is +sometimes difficult to respect, and I went and paid this homage in the +coal-cellar in which was never imprisoned the poet whose works I had +not read. + +The famous hospital of St. Anna, where Tasso was confined for seven +years, is still an asylum for the infirm and sick, but it is no longer +used as a mad-house. It stands on one of the lone, silent Ferrarese +streets, not far from the Ducal Castle, and it is said that from the +window of his cell the unhappy poet could behold Leonora in her tower. +It may be so; certainly those who can believe in the genuineness of +the cell will have no trouble in believing that the vision of Tasso +could pierce through several brick walls and a Doric portico, and at +last comprehend the lady at her casement in the castle. We entered a +modern gateway, and passed into a hall of the elder edifice, where a +slim young soldier sat reading a romance of Dumas. This was the keeper +of Tasso's prison; and knowing me, by the instinct which teaches an +Italian custodian to distinguish his prey, for a seeker after the True +and Beautiful, he relinquished his romance, lighted a waxen taper, +unbolted a heavy door with a dramatic clang, and preceded me to the +cell of Tasso. We descended a little stairway, and found ourselves in +a sufficiently spacious court, which was still ampler in the poet's +time, and was then a garden planted with trees and flowers. On a low +doorway to the right was inscribed the legend "PRIGIONE DI TASSO," and +passing through this doorway into a kind of reception-cell, we entered +the poet's dungeon. It is an oblong room, with a low wagon-roof +ceiling, under which it is barely possible to stand upright. A single +narrow window admits the light, and the stone casing of this window +has a hollow in a certain place, which might well have been worn there +by the friction of the hand that for seven years passed the prisoner +his food through the small opening. The young custodian pointed to +this memento of suffering, without effusion, and he drew my attention +to other remarkable things in the cell, without troubling himself +to palliate their improbability in the least. They were his stock in +trade; you paid your money, and took your choice of believing in +them or not. On the other hand, my _portier_, an ex-_valet de place_, +pumped a softly murmuring stream of enthusiasm; and expressed the +freshest delight in the inspection of each object of interest. + +One still faintly discerns among the vast number of names with which +the walls of the ante-cell are bewritten, that of Lamartine. The name +of Byron, which was once deeply graven in the stucco, had been scooped +away by the Grand Duke of Tuscany (so the custodian said), and there +is only part of a capital B now visible. But the cell itself is still +fragrant of associations with the noble bard, who, according to the +story related to Valery, caused himself to be locked up in it, and +there, with his head fallen upon his breast, and frequently smiting +his brow, spent two hours in pacing the floor with great strides. It +is a touching picture; but its pathos becomes somewhat embarrassing +when you enter the cell, and see the impossibility of taking more than +three generous paces without turning. When Byron issued forth, after +this exercise, he said (still according to Valery) to the custodian: +"I thank thee, good man! The thoughts of Tasso are now all in my mind +and heart." "A short time after his departure from Ferrara," adds the +Frenchman, maliciously, "he composed his 'Lament of Tasso,' a mediocre +result from such inspiration." No doubt all this is colored, for +the same author adds another tint to heighten the absurdity of the +spectacle: he declares that Byron spent part of his time in the cell +in writing upon the ceiling Lamartine's verses on Tasso, which he +misspelled. The present visitor has no means of judging of the truth +concerning this, for the lines of the poet have been so smoked by the +candles of successive pilgrims in their efforts to get light on them, +that they are now utterly illegible. But if it is uncertain what were +Byron's emotions on visiting the prison of Tasso, there is no doubt +about Lady Morgan's: she "experienced a suffocating emotion; her +heart failed her on entering that cell; and she satisfied a melancholy +curiosity at the cost of a most painful sensation." + +I find this amusing fact stated in a translation of her ladyship's +own language, in a clever guide-book called _Il Servitore di Piazza_, +which I bought at Ferrara, and from which, I confess, I have learnt +all I know to confirm me in my doubt of Tasso's prison. The Count +Avventi, who writes this book, prefaces it by saying that he is a +valet de place who knows how to read and write, and he employs these +unusual gifts with singular candor and clearness. No one, he says, +before the nineteenth century, ever dreamed of calling the cellar in +question Tasso's prison, and it was never before that time made the +shrine of sentimental pilgrimage, though it has since been visited by +every traveller who has passed through Ferrara. It was used during the +poet's time to hold charcoal and lime; and not long ago died an old +servant of the hospital, who remembered its use for that purpose. It +is damp, close, and dark, and Count Avventi thinks it hardly possible +that a delicate courtier could have lived seven years in a place +unwholesome enough to kill a stout laborer in two months; while it +seems to him not probable that Tasso should have received there the +visits of princes and other distinguished persons whom Duke Alfonso +allowed to see him, or that a prisoner who was often permitted to ride +about the city in a carriage should have been thrust back into such a +cavern on his return to the hospital. "After this," says our _valet +de place_ who knows how to read and write, "visit the prison of Tasso, +certain that _in the hospital of St. Anna_ that great man was confined +for many years;" and, with this chilly warning, leaves his reader to +his emotions. + +I am afraid that if as frank caution were uttered in regard to other +memorable places, the objects of interest in Italy would dwindle sadly +in number, and the _valets de place_, whether they know how to read +and write or not, would be starved to death. Even the learning of +Italy is poetic; and an Italian would rather enjoy a fiction than know +a fact--in which preference I am not ready to pronounce him unwise. +But this characteristic of his embroiders the stranger's progress +throughout the whole land with fanciful improbabilities; so that if +one use his eyes half as much as his wonder, he must see how much +better it would have been to visit, in fancy, scenes that have an +interest so largely imaginary. The utmost he can make out of the most +famous place is, that it is possibly what it is said to be, and +is more probably as near that as any thing local enterprise could +furnish. He visits the very cell in which Tasso was confined, and has +the satisfaction of knowing that it was the charcoal-cellar of the +hospital in which the poet dwelt. And the _genius loci_--where is +that? Away in the American woods, very likely, whispering some dreamy, +credulous youth,--telling him charming fables of its _locus_, and +proposing to itself to abandon him as soon as he sets foot upon its +native ground. You see, though I cared little about Tasso, and nothing +about his prison, I was heavily disappointed in not being able to +believe in it, and felt somehow that I had been awakened from a +cherished dream. + + +II. + +But I have no right to cast the unbroken shadow of my skepticism upon +the reader, and so I tell him a story about Ferrara which I actually +believe. He must know that in Ferrara the streets are marvelous long +and straight. On the corners formed by the crossing of two of the +longest and straightest of these streets stand four palaces, in only +one of which we have a present interest. This palace my guide took +me to see, after our visit to Tasso's prison, and, standing in its +shadow, he related to me the occurrence which has given it a sad +celebrity. It was, in the time of the gifted toxicologist, the +residence of Lucrezia Borgia, who used to make poisonous little +suppers there, and ask the best families of Italy to partake of them. +It happened on one occasion that Lucrezia Borgia was thrust out of +a ball-room at Venice as a disreputable character, and treated with +peculiar indignity. She determined to make the Venetians repent their +unwonted accession of virtue, and she therefore allowed the occurrence +to be forgotten till the proper moment of her revenge arrived, +when she gave a supper, and invited to her board eighteen young and +handsome Venetian nobles. Upon the preparation of this repast she +bestowed all the resources of her skillful and exquisite knowledge; +and the result was, the Venetians were so felicitously poisoned +that they had just time to listen to a speech from the charming and +ingenious lady of the house before expiring. In this address she +reminded her guests of the occurrence in the Venetian ball-room, and +perhaps exulted a little tediously in her present vengeance. She was +surprised and pained when one of the guests interrupted her, and, +justifying the treatment she had received at Venice, declared himself +her natural son. The lady instantly recognized him, and in the sudden +revulsion of maternal feeling, begged him to take an antidote. This he +not only refused to do, but continued his dying reproaches, till his +mother, losing her self-command, drew her poniard and plunged it into +his heart. + +The blood of her son fell upon the table-cloth, and this being hung +out of the window to dry, the wall received a stain, which neither +the sun nor rain of centuries sufficed to efface, and which was only +removed with the masonry, when it became necessary to restore the +wall under that window, a few months before the time of my visit to +Ferrara. Accordingly, the blood-stain has now disappeared; but the +conscientious artist who painted the new wall has faithfully restored +the tragic spot, by bestowing upon the stucco a bloody dash of +Venetian red. + + +III. + +It would be pleasant and merciful, I think, if old towns, after having +served a certain number of centuries for the use and pride of men, +could be released to a gentle, unmolested decay. I, for my part, would +like to have the ducal cities of North Italy, such as Mantua, Modena, +Parma, and Ferrara, locked up quietly within their walls, and left to +crumble and totter and fall, without any harder presence to vex them +in their decrepitude than that of some gray custodian, who should come +to the gate with clanking keys, and admit the wandering stranger, if +he gave signs of a reverent sympathy, to look for a little while upon +the reserved and dignified desolation. It is a shame to tempt these +sad old cities into unnatural activity, when they long ago made their +peace with the world, and would fain be mixing their weary brick +and mortar with the earth's unbuilded dust; and it is hard for the +emotional traveller to restrain his sense of outrage at finding them +inhabited, and their rest broken by sounds of toil, traffic, and +idleness; at seeing places that would gladly have had done with +history still doomed to be parts of political systems, to read the +newspapers, and to expose railway guides and caricatures of the Pope +and of Napoleon in their shop windows. + +Of course, Ferrara was not incorporated into a living nation against +her will, and I therefore marveled the more that she had become a +portion of the present kingdom of Italy. The poor little State had +its day long before ours; it had been a republic, and then subject to +lords; and then, its lords becoming dukes, it had led a life of gayety +and glory till its fall, and given the world such names and memories +as had fairly won it the right to rest forever from making history. +Its individual existence ended with that of Alfonso II., in 1597, when +the Pope declared it reverted to the Holy See; and I always fancied +that it must have received with a spectral, yet courtly kind of +surprise, those rights of man which bloody-handed France distributed +to the Italian cities in 1796; that it must have experienced a ghostly +bewilderment in its rapid transformation, thereafter, under Napoleon, +into part of the Cispadan Republic, the Cisalpine Republic, the +Italian Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy, and that it must have sunk +back again under the rule of the Popes with gratitude and relief at +last--as phantoms are reputed to be glad when released from haunting +the world where they once dwelt. I speak of all this, not so much from +actual knowledge of facts as from personal feeling; for it seems to +me that if I were a city of the past, and must be inhabited at all, +I should choose just such priestly domination, assured that though +it consumed my substance, yet it would be well for my fame and final +repose. I should like to feel that my old churches were safe from +demolition: that my old convents and monasteries should always shelter +the pious indolence of friars and nuns. It would be pleasant to have +studious monks exploring quaint corners of my unphilosophized annals, +and gentle, snuff-taking abbés writing up episodes in the history of +my noble families, and dedicating them to the present heirs of past +renown; while the thinker and the reviewer should never penetrate +my archives. Being myself done with war, I should be glad to have my +people exempt, as they are under the Pope, from military service; and +I should hope that if the Legates taxed them, the taxes paid would be +as so many masses said to get my soul out of the purgatory of perished +capitals. Finally, I should trust that in the sanctified keeping of +the Legates my mortal part would rest as sweetly as bones laid in +hallowed earth brought from Jerusalem; and that under their serene +protection I should be forever secure from being in any way exhumed +and utilized by the ruthless hand of Progress. + +However, as I said, this is a mere personal preference, and other old +cities might feel differently. Indeed, though disposed to condole with +Ferrara upon the fact of her having become part of modern Italy, I +could not deny, on better acquaintance with her, that she was still +almost entirely of the past. She has certainly missed that ideal +perfection of non-existence under the Popes which I have just +depicted, but she is practically almost as profoundly at rest under +the King of Italy. One may walk long through the longitude and +rectitude of many of her streets without the encounter of a single +face: the place, as a whole, is by no means as lively as Pompeii, +where there are always strangers; perhaps the only cities in the world +worthy to compete with Ferrara in point of agreeable solitude are +Mantua and Herculaneum. It is the newer part of the town--the modern +quarter built before Boston was settled or Ohio was known--which is +loneliest; and whatever motion and cheerfulness are still felt in +Ferrara linger fondly about the ancient holds of life--about the +street before the castle of the Dukes, and in the elder and narrower +streets branching away from the piazza of the Duomo, where, on market +days, there is a kind of dreamy tumult. In the Ghetto we were almost +crowded, and people wanted to sell us things, with an enterprise +that contrasted strangely with shopkeeping apathy elsewhere. Indeed, +surprise at the presence of strangers spending two days in Ferrara +when they could have got away sooner, was the only emotion which the +whole population agreed in expressing with any degree of energy, but +into this they seemed to throw their whole vitality. The Italians are +everywhere an artless race, so far as concerns the gratification of +their curiosity, from which no consideration of decency deters them. +Here in Ferrara they turned about and followed us with their eyes, +came to windows to see us, lay in wait for us at street-corners, and +openly and audibly debated whether we were English or German. We might +have thought this interest a tribute to something peculiar in our +dress or manner, had it not visibly attended other strangers who +arrived with us. It rose almost into a frenzy of craving to know more +of us all, when on the third day the whole city assembled before our +hotel, and witnessed, with a sort of desperate cry, the departure +of the heavy-laden omnibus which bore us and our luggage from their +midst. + + +IV. + +I doubt if, after St. Mark's in Venice, the Duomo at Parma, and the +Four Fabrics at Pisa, there is a church more worthy to be seen for +its quaint, rich architecture, than the Cathedral at Ferrara. It is +of that beloved Gothic of which eye or soul cannot weary, and we +continually wandered back to it from other more properly interesting +objects. It is horribly restored in-doors, and its Renaissance +splendors soon drove us forth, after we had looked at the Last +Judgment by Bastianino. The style of this painting is muscular and +Michelangelic, and the artist's notion of putting his friends in +heaven and his foes in hell is by no means novel; but he has achieved +fame for his picture by the original thought of making it his revenge +for a disappointment in love. The unhappy lady who refused his love +is represented in the depths, in the attitude of supplicating the pity +and interest of another maiden in Paradise who accepted Bastianino, +and who consequently has no mercy on her that snubbed him. But I +counted of far more value than this fresco the sincere old sculptures +on the façade of the cathedral, in which the same subject is treated, +beginning from the moment the archangel's trump has sounded. The +people getting suddenly out of their graves at the summons are all +admirable; but the best among them is the excellent man with one +leg over the side of his coffin, and tugging with both hands to +pull himself up, while the coffin-lid tumbles off behind. One sees +instantly that the conscience of this early riser is clean, for he +makes no miserable attempt to turn over for a nap of a few thousand +years more, with the pretense that it was not the trump of doom, but +some other and unimportant noise he had heard. The final reward of the +blessed is expressed by the repose of one small figure in the lap of +a colossal effigy, which I understood to mean rest in Abraham's bosom; +but the artist has bestowed far more interest and feeling upon the +fate of the damned, who are all boiling in rows of immense pots. It is +doubtful (considering the droll aspect of heavenly bliss as figured +in the one small saint and the large patriarch) whether the artist +intended the condition of his sinners to be so horribly comic as it +is; but the effect is just as great, for all that, and the slowest +conscience might well take alarm from the spectacle of fate so +grotesque and ludicrous; for, wittingly or unwittingly, the artist +here punishes, as Dante knew best how to do, the folly of sinners as +well as their wickedness. Boiling is bad enough; but to be boiled in +an undeniable dinner-pot, like a leg of mutton, is to suffer shame us +well as agony. + +We turned from these horrors, and walked down by the side of the Duomo +toward the Ghetto, which is not so foul as one could wish a Ghetto +to be. The Jews were admitted to Ferrara in 1275, and, throughout the +government of the Dukes, were free to live where they chose in +the city; but the Pope's Legate assigned them afterward a separate +quarter, which was closed with gates. Large numbers of Spanish Jews +fled hither during the persecutions, and there are four synagogues +for the four languages,--Spanish, German, French, and Italian. Avventi +mentions, among other interesting facts concerning the Ferrarese Jews, +that one of their Rabbins, Isaaco degli Abranelli, a man of excellent +learning in the Scriptures, claimed to be descended from David. His +children still abide in Ferrara; and it may have been one of his +kingly line that kept the tempting antiquarian's shop on the corner +from which you turn up toward the Library. I should think such a man +would find a sort of melancholy solace in such a place: filled with +broken and fragmentary glories of every kind, it would serve him for +that chamber of desolation, set apart in the houses of the Oriental +Hebrews as a place to bewail themselves in; and, indeed, this idea may +go far to explain the universal Israelitish fondness for dealing in +relics and ruins. + + +V. + +The Ghetto was in itself indifferent to us; it was merely our way to +the Library, whither the great memory of Ariosto invited us to see his +famous relics treasured there. + +We found that the dead _literati_ of Ferrara had the place wholly to +themselves; not a living soul disputed the solitude of the halls with +the custodians, and the bust of Ariosto looked down from his monument +upon rows of empty tables, idle chairs, and dusty inkstands. + +The poet, who was painted by Titian, has a tomb of abandoned ugliness, +and sleeps under three epitaphs; while cherubs frescoed on the +wall behind affect to disclose the mausoleum, by lifting a frescoed +curtain, but deceive no one who cares to consider how impossible it +would be for them to perform this service, and caper so ignobly as +they do at the same time. In fact this tomb of Ariosto shocks with +its hideousness and levity. It stood formerly in the Church of San +Benedetto, where it was erected shortly after the poet's death, and it +was brought to the Library by the French, when they turned the church +into a barracks for their troops. The poet's dust, therefore, rests +here, where the worm, working silently through the vellum volumes on +the shelves, feeds upon the immortality of many other poets. In the +adjoining hall are the famed and precious manuscripts of Ariosto and +of Tasso. A special application must be made to the librarian, in +order to see the fragment of the _Furioso_ in Ariosto's hand, and the +manuscript copy of the _Gerusalemma_, with the corrections by Tasso. +There are some pages of Ariosto's Satires, framed and glazed for the +satisfaction of the less curious; as well as a letter of Tasso's, +written from the Hospital of St. Anna, which the poet sends to a +friend, with twelve shirts, and in which he begs that his friend will +have the shirts mended, and cautions him "not to let them be mixed +with others." But when the slow custodian had at last unlocked that +more costly fragment of the _Furioso_, and placed it in my hands, the +other manuscripts had no value for me. It seems to me that the one +privilege which travel has reserved to itself, is that of making +each traveller, in presence of its treasures, forget whatever other +travellers have said or written about them. I had read so much of +Ariosto's industry, and of the proof of it in this manuscript, that I +doubted if I should at last marvel at it. But the wonder remains +with the relic, and I paid it my homage devoutly and humbly, and was +disconcerted afterward to read again in my Valery how sensibly all +others had felt the preciousness of that famous page, which, filled +with half a score of previous failures, contains in a little open +space near the margin, the poet's final triumph in a clearly written +stanza. Scarcely less touching and interesting than Ariosto's painful +work on these yellow leaves, is the grand and simple tribute which +another Italian poet was allowed to inscribe on one of them: "Vittorio +Alfieri beheld and venerated;" and I think, counting over the many +memorable things I saw on the road to Rome and the way home +again, this manuscript was the noblest thing and best worthy to be +remembered. + +When at last I turned from it, however, I saw that the custodian had +another relic of Messer Lodovico, which he was not ashamed to match +with the manuscript in my interest. This was the bone of one of the +poet's fingers, which the pious care of Ferrara had picked up from his +dust (when it was removed from the church to the Library), and +neatly bottled and labeled. In like manner, they keep a great deal +of sanctity in bottles with the bones of saints in Italy; but I found +very little savor of poesy hanging about this literary relic. + +As if the melancholy fragment of mortality had marshaled us the way, +we went from the Library to the house of Ariosto, which stands at the +end of a long, long street, not far from the railway station. There +was not a Christian soul, not a boy, not a cat nor a dog to be seen +in all that long street, at high noon, as we looked down its narrowing +perspective, and if the poet and his friends have ever a mind for a +posthumous meeting in his little reddish brick house, there is nothing +to prevent their assembly, in broad daylight, from any part of the +neighborhood. There was no presence, however, more spiritual than a +comely country girl to respond to our summons at the door, and nothing +but a tub of corn-meal disputed our passage inside. Directly I found +the house inhabited by living people, I began to be sorry that it was +not as empty as the Library and the street. Indeed, it is much better +with Petrarch's house at Arquà, where the grandeur of the past +is never molested by the small household joys and troubles of the +present. That house is vacant, and no eyes less tender and fond than +the poet's visitors may look down from its windows over the slope of +vines and olives which it crowns; and it seemed hard, here in Ferrara, +where the houses are so many and the people are so few, that Ariosto's +house could not be left to him. _Parva sed apta mihi_, he has +contentedly written upon the front; but I doubt if he finds it large +enough for another family, though his modern housekeeper reserves him +certain rooms for visitors. To gain these, you go up to the second +story--there are but two floors--and cross to the rear of the +building, where Ariosto's chamber opens out of an ante-room, and looks +down upon a pinched and faded bit of garden. [In this garden the poet +spent much of his time--chiefly in plucking up and transplanting the +unlucky shrubbery, which was never suffered to grow three months +in the same place,--such was the poet's rage for revision. It was +probably never a very large or splendid garden, for the reason that +Ariosto gave when reproached that he who knew so well how to describe +magnificent palaces should have built such a poor little house: "It +was easier to make verses than houses, and the fine palaces in his +poem cost him no money."] In this chamber they say the poet died. It +is oblong, and not large. I should think the windows and roof were +of the poet's time, and that every thing else had been restored; I am +quite sure the chairs and inkstand are kindly-meant inventions; +for the poet's burly great arm-chair and graceful inkstand are both +preserved in the Library. But the house is otherwise decent and +probable; and I do not question but it was in the hall where we +encountered the meal-tub that the poet kept a copy of his "_Furioso_," +subject to the corrections and advice of his visitors. + +The ancestral house of the Ariosti has been within a few years +restored out of all memory and semblance of itself; and my wish to see +the place in which the poet was born and spent his childhood resulted, +after infinite search, in finding a building faced newly with stucco +and newly French-windowed. + +Our _portier_ said it was the work of the late English Vice-Consul, +who had bought the house. When I complained of the sacrilege, he said: +"Yes, it is true. But then, you must know, the Ariosti were not one of +the noble families of Ferrara." + + +VI. + +The castle of the Dukes of Ferrara, about which cluster so many sad +and splendid memories, stands in the heart of the city. I think +that the moonlight which, on the night of our arrival, showed me its +massive walls rising from the shadowy moat that surrounds them, and +its four great towers, heavily buttressed, and expanding at the top +into bulging cornices of cavernous brickwork, could have fallen on +nothing else in all Italy so picturesque, and so full of the proper +dread charm of feudal times, as this pile of gloomy and majestic +strength. The daylight took nothing of this charm from it; for the +castle stands isolated in the midst of the city, as its founder meant +that it should [The castle of Ferrara was begun in 1385 by Niccolò +d'Este to defend himself against the repetition of scenes of tumult, +in which his princely rights were invaded. One of his tax-gatherers, +Tommaso da Tortona, had, a short time before, made himself so +obnoxious to the people by his insolence and severity, that they rose +against him and demanded his life. He took refuge in the palace of +his master, which was immediately assailed. The prince's own life was +threatened, and he was forced to surrender the fugitive to the people, +who tore Tortona limb from limb, and then, after parading the city +with the mutilated remains, quietly returned to their allegiance. +Niccolò, therefore, caused this castle to be built, which he +strengthened with massive walls and towers commanding the whole city, +and rendered inaccessible by surrounding it with a deep and wide canal +from the river Reno.], and modern civilization has not crossed the +castle moat, to undignify its exterior with any visible touch of the +present. To be sure, when you enter it, the magnificent life is gone +out of the old edifice; it is no stately halberdier who stands on +guard at the gate of the drawbridge, but a stumpy Italian soldier in +baggy trousers. The castle is full of public offices, and one sees in +its courts and on its stairways, not brilliant men-at-arms, nor gay +squires and pages, but whistling messengers going from one office to +another with docketed papers, and slipshod serving-men carrying the +clerks their coffee in very dirty little pots. Dreary-looking suitors, +slowly grinding through the mills of law, or passing in the routine of +the offices, are the guests encountered in the corridors; and all that +bright-colored throng of the old days, ladies and lords, is passed +from the scene. The melodrama is over, friends, and now we have a play +of real life, founded on fact and inculcating a moral. + +Of course the custodians were slow to admit any change of this kind. +If you could have believed them,--and the poor people told as many +lies as they could to make you,--you would believe that nothing had +ever happened of a commonplace nature in this castle. The taking-off +of Hugo and Parisina they think the great merit of the castle; and one +of them, seeing us, made haste to light his taper and conduct us down +to the dungeons where those unhappy lovers were imprisoned. It is the +misfortune of memorable dungeons to acquire, when put upon show, just +the reverse of those properties which should raise horror and distress +in the mind of the beholder. It was impossible to deny that the +cells of Parisina and of Hugo were both singularly warm, dry, and +comfortable; and we, who had never been imprisoned in them, found +it hard to command, for our sensation, the terror and agony of the +miserable ones who suffered there. We, happy and secure in these +dungeons, could not think of the guilty and wretched pair bowing +themselves to the headsman's stroke in the gloomy chamber under the +Hall of Aurora; nor of the Marquis, in his night-long walk, breaking +at last into frantic remorse and tears to know that his will had been +accomplished. Nay, there upon its very scene, the whole tragedy faded +from us; and, seeing our wonder so cold, the custodian tried to kindle +it by saying that in the time of the event these cells were much +dreadfuller than now, which was no doubt true. The floors of the +dungeons are both below the level of the moat, and the narrow windows, +or rather crevices to admit the light, were cut in the prodigiously +thick wall just above the water, and were defended with four +successive iron gratings. The dungeons are some distance apart: that +of Hugo was separated from the outer wall of the castle by a narrow +passage-way, while Parisina's window opened directly upon the moat. + +When we ascended again to the court of the castle, the custodian, +abetted by his wife, would have interested us in two memorable wells +there, between which, he said, Hugo was beheaded; and unabashed by the +small success of this fable, he pointed out two windows in converging +angles overhead, from one of which the Marquis, looking into the +other, discovered the guilt of the lovers. The windows are now walled +up, but are neatly represented to the credulous eye by a fresco of +lattices. + +Valery mentions another claim upon the interest of the tourist which +this castle may make, in the fact that it once sheltered John Calvin, +who was protected by the Marchioness Renée, wife of Hercules II.; and +my _Servitore di Piazza_ (the one who knows how to read and write) +gives the following account of the matter, in speaking of the domestic +chapel which Renée had built in the castle: "This lady was learned in +belles-lettres and in the schismatic doctrines which at that time were +insinuating themselves throughout France and Germany, and with +which Calvin, Luther, and other proselytes, agitated the people, +and threatened war to the Catholic religion. Nationally fond of +innovation, and averse to the court of Rome on account of the +dissensions between her father and Pope Julius II., Renée began +to receive the teachings of Calvin, with whom she maintained +correspondence. Indeed, Calvin himself, under the name of Huppeville, +visited her in Ferrara, in 1536, and ended by corrupting her mind and +seducing her into his own errors, which produced discord between +her and her religious husband, and resulted in his placing her in +temporary seclusion, in order to attempt her conversion. Hence, the +chapel is faced with marble, paneled in relief, and studied to avoid +giving place to saints or images, which were disapproved by the almost +Anabaptist doctrines of Calvin, then fatally imbibed by the princess." + +We would willingly, as Protestants, have visited this wicked chapel; +but we were prevented from seeing it, as well as the famous frescoes +of Dosso Dossi in the Hall of Aurora, by the fact that the prefect was +giving a little dinner (_pranzetto_) in that part of the castle. We +were not so greatly disappointed in reality as we made believe; but +our _servitore di piazza_ (the unlettered one) was almost moved to +_lesa maestà_ with vexation. He had been full of scorching patriotism +the whole morning; but now electing the unhappy and apologetic +custodian representative of Piedmontese tyranny, he bitterly assailed +the government of the king. In the times of His Holiness the Legates +had made it their pleasure and duty to show the whole castle to +strangers. But now strangers must be sent away without seeing its +chief beauties, because, forsooth, the prefect was giving a little +dinner. Presence of the Devil! + + +VII. + +In our visits to the different churches in Ferrara we noticed devotion +in classes of people who are devout nowhere else in Italy. Not only +came solid-looking business men to say their prayers, but gay young +dandies, who knelt and repeated their orisons and then rose and went +seriously out. In Venice they would have posted themselves against a +pillar, sucked the heads of their sticks, and made eyes at the young +ladies kneeling near them. This degree of religion was all the more +remarkable in Ferrara, because that city had been so many years +under the Pope, and His Holiness contrives commonly to prevent the +appearance of religion in young men throughout his dominions. + +Valery speaks of the delightful society which he met in the gray old +town; and it is said that Ferrara has an unusual share of culture in +her wealthy class, which is large. With such memories of learning and +literary splendor as belong to her, it would be strange if she did +not in some form keep alive the sacred flame. But, though there may +be refinement and erudition in Ferrara, she has given no great name to +modern Italian literature. Her men of letters seem to be of that race +of grubs singularly abundant in Italy,--men who dig out of archives +and libraries some topic of special and momentary interest and print +it, unstudied and unphilosophized. Their books are material, not +literature, and it is marvelous how many of them are published. A +writer on any given subject can heap together from them a mass of fact +and anecdote invaluable in its way; but it is a mass without life or +light, and must be vivified by him who uses it before it can serve the +world, which does not care for its dead local value. It remains to be +seen whether the free speech and free press of Italy can reawaken the +intellectual activity of the cities which once gave the land so many +literary capitals. + +What numbers of people used to write verses in Ferrara! By operation +of the principle which causes things concerning whatever subject you +happen to be interested in to turn up in every direction, I found a +volume of these dead-and-gone immortals at a book-stall, one day, in +Venice. It is a curiously yellow and uncomfortable volume of the year +1703, printed all in italics. I suppose there are two hundred odd +rhymers selected from in that book,--and how droll the most of them +are, with their unmistakable traces of descent from Ariosto, Tasso, +and Guarini! What acres of enameled meadow there are in those pages! +Brooks enough to turn all the mills in the world go purling through +them. I should say some thousands of nymphs are constantly engaged +in weaving garlands there, and the swains keep such a piping on those +familiar notes,--_Amore, dolore, crudele_, and _miele_. Poor little +poets! they knew no other tunes. Do not now weak voices twitter from a +hundred books, in unconscious imitation of the hour's great singers? + +I think some of the pleasantest people in Italy are the army +gentlemen. There is the race's gentleness in their ways, in spite of +their ferocious trade, and an American freedom of style. They brag in +a manner that makes one feel at home immediately; and met in travel, +they are ready to render any little kindness. + +The other year at Reggio (which is not far from Modena) we stopped to +dine at a restaurant where the whole garrison had its coat off and was +playing billiards, with the exception of one or two officers, who were +dining. These rose and bowed as we entered their room, and when the +waiter pretended that such and such dishes were out (in Italy the +waiter, for some mysterious reason, always pretends that the best +dishes are out), they bullied him for the honor of Italy, and made him +bring them to us. Indeed, I am afraid his life was sadly harassed by +those brave men. We were in deep despair at finding no French bread, +and the waiter swore with the utmost pathos that there was none; but +as soon as his back was turned, a tightly laced little captain rose +and began to forage for the bread. He opened every drawer and cupboard +in the room, and finding none, invaded another room, captured several +loaves from the plates laid there, and brought them back in triumph, +presenting them to us amid the applause of his comrades. The dismay of +the waiter, on his return, was ineffable. + +Three officers, who dined with us at the _table d'hôte_ of the Stella +d'Oro in Ferrara (and excellent dinners were those we ate there), were +visibly anxious to address us, and began not uncivilly, but still +in order that we should hear, to speculate on our nationality among +themselves. It appeared that we were Germans; for one of these +officers, who had formerly been in the Austrian service at Vienna, +recognized the word _bitter_ in our remarks on the _beccafichi_. As I +did not care to put these fine fellows to the trouble of hating us for +others' faults, I made bold to say that we were not Germans, and to +add that _bitter_ was also an English word. Ah! yes, to be sure, one +of them admitted; when he was with the Sardinian army in the Crimea, +he had frequently heard the word used by the English soldiers. He +nodded confirmation of what he said to his comrades, and then was good +enough to display what English he knew. It was barely sufficient to +impress his comrades; but it led the way to a good deal of talk in +Italian. + +"I suppose you gentlemen are all Piedmontese?" I said. + +"Not at all," said our Crimean. "I am from Como; this gentleman, il +signor Conte, (il signor Conte bowed,) is of Piacenza; and our friend +across the table is Genoese. The army is doing a great deal to unify +Italy. We are all Italians now, and you see we speak Italian, and not +our dialects, together." + +My cheap remark that it was a fine thing to see them all united under +one flag, after so many ages of mutual hate and bloodshed, turned the +talk upon the origin of the Italian flag; and that led our Crimean to +ask what was the origin of the English colors. + +"I scarcely know," I said. "We are Americans." + +Our friends at once grew more cordial. "Oh, Americani!" They had great +pleasure of it. Did we think Signor Leencolen would be reëlected? + +I supposed that he had been elected that day, I said. + +Ah! this was the election day, then. _Cospetto_! + +At this the Genoese frowned superior intelligence, and the Crimean +gazing admiringly upon him, said he had been nine months at Nuova +York, and that he had a brother living there. The poor Crimean +boastfully added that he himself had a cousin in America, and that the +Americans generally spoke Spanish. The count from Piacenza wore an +air of pathetic discomfiture, and tried to invent a transatlantic +relative, as I think, but failed. + +I am persuaded that none of these warriors really had kinsmen in +America, but that they all pretended to have them, out of politeness +to us, and that they believed each other. It was very kind of them, +and we were so grateful that we put no embarrassing questions. Indeed, +the conversation presently took another course, and grew to include +the whole table. + +There was an extremely pretty Italian present with her newly wedded +husband, who turned out to be a retired officer. He fraternized at +once with our soldiers, and when we left the table they all rose and +made military obeisances. Having asked leave to light their cigars, +they were smoking--the sweet young bride blowing a fairy cloud from +her rosy lips with the rest. "Indeed," I heard an Italian lady once +remark, "why should men pretend to deny us the privilege of smoking? +It is so pleasant and innocent." It is but just to the Italians to +say that they do not always deny it; and there is, without doubt, a +certain grace and charm in a pretty _fumatrice_. I suppose it is a +habit not so pleasing in an ugly or middle-aged woman. + + + + +IV. + +THROUGH BOLOGNA TO GENOA. + +I. + +We had intended to stay only one day at Ferrara, but just at that +time the storms predicted on the Adriatic and Mediterranean coasts, by +Mathieu de la Drome, had been raging all over Italy, and the railway +communications were broken in every direction. The magnificent work +through and under the Apennines, between Bologna and Florence, had +been washed away by the mountain torrents in a dozen places, and the +roads over the plains of the Romagna had been sapped by the flood, and +rendered useless, where not actually laid under water. + +On the day of our intended departure we left the hotel, with other +travellers, gayly incredulous of the landlord's fear that no train +would start for Bologna. At the station we found a crowd of people +waiting and hoping, but there was a sickly cast of doubt in some +faces, and the labeled employés of the railway wore looks of ominous +importance. Of course the crowd did not lose its temper. It sought +information of the officials running to and fro with telegrams, in +a spirit of national sweetness, and consoled itself with saying, as +Italy has said under all circumstances of difficulty for centuries: +_Ci vuol pazienza_! At last a blank silence fell upon it, as the +_Capo-Stazione_ advanced toward a well-dressed man in the crowd, and +spoke to him quietly. The well-dressed man lifted his forefinger and +waved it back and forth before his face:-- + +_The Well-dressed Man_.--Dunque, non si parte più? (No departures, +then?) + +The _Capo-Stazione_ (waving _his_ forefinger in like manner.)--Non si +parte più. (Like a mournful echo.) + +We knew quite as well from this pantomime of negation as from the +dialogue our sad fate, and submitted to it. Some adventurous spirit +demanded whether any trains would go on the morrow. The Capo-Stazione, +with an air of one who would not presume to fathom the designs of +Providence, responded: "Who knows? To-day, certainly not. To-morrow, +perhaps. But"--and vanished. + +It may give an idea of the Italian way of doing things to say that, as +we understood, this break in the line was only a few miles in extent, +that trains could have approached both to and from Bologna, and that +a little enterprise on the part of the company could have passed +travellers from one side to the other with very small trouble or +delay. But the railway company was as much daunted by the inundation +as a peasant going to market, and for two months after the accident +no trains carried passengers from one city to the other. No doubt, +however, the line was under process of very solid repair meanwhile. + +For the present the only means of getting to Bologna was by carriage +on the old highway, and accordingly we took passage thither in the +omnibus of the Stella d'Oro. + +There was little to interest us in the country over which we rode. It +is perfectly flat, and I suppose the reader knows what quantities +of hemp and flax are raised there. The land seems poorer than in +Lombardy, and the farm-houses and peasants' cottages are small and +mean, though the peasants themselves, when we met them, looked well +fed, and were certainly well clad. The landscape lay soaking in a +dreary drizzle the whole way, and the town of Cento when we reached +it, seemed miserably conscious of being too wet and dirty to go +in-doors, and was loitering about in the rain. Our arrival gave the +poor little place a sensation, for I think such a thing as an omnibus +had not been seen there since the railway of Bologna and Ferrara was +built. We went into the principal caffè to lunch,--a caffè much too +large for Cento, with immense red-leather cushioned sofas, and a cold, +forlorn air of half-starved gentility, a clean, high-roofed caffè and +a breezy,--and thither the youthful nobility and gentry of the place +followed us, and ordered a cup of coffee, that they might sit down and +give us the pleasure of their distinguished company. They put on their +very finest manners, and took their most captivating attitudes for the +ladies' sake; and the gentlemen of our party fancied that it was for +them these young men began to discuss the Roman question. How +loud they were, and how earnest! And how often they consulted +the newspapers of the caffè! (Older newspapers I never saw off a +canal-boat.) I may tire some time of the artless vanity of the young +Italians, so innocent, so amiable, so transparent, but I think I never +shall. + +The great painter Guercino was born at Cento, and they have a noble +and beautiful statue of him in the piazza, which the town caused to be +erected from contributions by all the citizens. Formerly his house +was kept for a show to the public; it was full of the pictures of the +painter and many mementos of him; but recently the paintings have been +taken to the gallery, and the house is now closed. The gallery is, +consequently, one of the richest second-rate galleries in Italy, and +one may spend much longer time in it than we gave, with great profit. +There are some most interesting heads of Christ, painted, as Guercino +always painted the Saviour, with a great degree of humanity in the +face. It is an excellent countenance, and full of sweet dignity, but +quite different from the conventional face of Christ. + + +II. + +At night we were again in Bologna, of which we had not seen the gloomy +arcades for two years. It must be a dreary town at all times: in a +rain it is horrible; and I think the whole race of arcaded cities, +Treviso, Padua, and Bologna, are dull, blind, and comfortless. The +effect of the buildings vaulted above the sidewalks is that of +a continuous cellarway; your view of the street is constantly +interrupted by the heavy brick pillars that support the arches; the +arcades are not even picturesque. Liking always to leave Bologna as +quickly as possible, and, on this occasion, learning that there was no +hope of crossing the Apennines to Florence, we made haste to take the +first train for Genoa, meaning to proceed thence directly to Naples by +steamer. + +It was a motley company that sat down in Hotel Brun the morning +after our arrival in Bologna to a breakfast of murky coffee and furry +beefsteaks, associated with sleek, greasy, lukewarm fried potatoes. I +am sure that if each of our weather-bound pilgrims had told his story, +we had been as well entertained as those at Canterbury. However, no +one thought fit to give his narrative but a garrulous old Hebrew from +London, who told us how he had been made to pay fifteen guineas for a +carriage to cross the Apennines, and had been obliged to walk part of +the way at that price. He was evidently proud, now the money was gone, +of having been cheated of so much; and in him we saw that there was +at least one human being more odious than a purse-proud +Englishman--namely, a purse-proud English Jew. He gave his noble name +after a while, as something too precious to be kept from the +company, when recommending one of the travellers to go to the Hotel +d'Angleterre in Rome: "The best 'otel out of England. You may mention +my name, if you like--Mr. Jonas." The recipient of this favor noted +down the talismanic words in his pocket-book, and Mr. Jonas, conscious +of having conferred a benefit on his race, became more odious to it +than ever. An Englishman is of a composition so uncomfortably original +that no one can copy him, though many may caricature. I saw an +American in London once who thought himself an Englishman because he +wore leg-of-mutton whiskers, declaimed against universal suffrage and +republics, and had an appetite for high game. He was a hateful animal, +surely, but he was not the British lion; and this poor Hebrew at +Bologna was not a whit more successful in his imitation of the +illustrious brute, though he talked, like him, of nothing but hotels, +and routes of travel, and hackmen and porters, and seemed to have +nothing to do in Italy but get through it as quickly and abusively as +possible. + +We were very glad, I say, to part from all this at Bologna and take +the noon train for Genoa. In our car there were none but Italians, +and the exchange of "_La Perseveranza_" of Milan for "_Il Popolo_" +of Turin with one of them quickly opened the way for conversation and +acquaintance. (_En passant_: I know of no journal in the United States +whose articles are better than those of the "_Perseveranza_," and it +was gratifying to an American to read in this ablest journal of Italy +nothing but applause and encouragement of the national side in our +late war.) My new-made friend turned out to be a Milanese. He was +a physician, and had served as a surgeon in the late war of Italian +independence; but was now placed in a hospital in Milan. There was a +gentle little blonde with him, and at Piacenza, where we stopped +for lunch, "You see," said he, indicating the lady, "we are newly +married,"--which was, indeed, plain enough to any one who looked at +their joyous faces, and observed how great disposition that little +blonde had to nestle on the young man's broad shoulder. "I have a +week's leave from my place," he went on, "and this is our wedding +journey. We were to have gone to Florence, but it seems we are fated +not to see that famous city." + +He spoke of it as immensely far off, and herein greatly amused us +Americans, who had outgrown distances. + +"So we are going to Genoa instead, for two or three days." "Oh, +have you ever been at Genoa?" broke in the bride. "What magnificent +palaces! And then the bay, and the villas in the environs! There is +the Villa Pallavicini, with beautiful gardens, where an artificial +shower breaks out from the bushes, and sprinkles the people who pass. +Such fun!" and she continued to describe vividly a city of which +she had only heard from her husband; and it was easy to see that she +walked in paradise wherever he led her. + +They say that Italian husbands and wives do not long remain fond +of each other, but it was impossible in the presence of these happy +people not to believe in the eternity of their love, and it was hard +to keep from "dropping into poetry" on account of them. Their bliss +infected every body in the car, and in spite of the weariness of our +journey, and the vexation of the misadventures which had succeeded one +another unsparingly ever since we left home, we found ourselves far on +the way to Genoa before we thought to grumble at the distance. There +was with us, besides the bridal party, a lady travelling from Bologna +to Turin, who had learned English in London, and spoke it much better +than most Londoners. It is surprising how thoroughly Italians master +a language so alien to their own as ours, and how frequently you find +them acquainted with English. From Russia the mania for this tongue +has spread all over the Continent, and in Italy English seems to be +prized first among the virtues. + +As we drew near Genoa, the moon came out on purpose to show us the +superb city, and we strove eagerly for a first glimpse of the proud +capital where Columbus was born. To tell the truth, the glimpse was +but slight and false, for railways always enter cities by some mean +level, from which any picturesque view is impossible. + +Near the station in Genoa, however, is the weak and ugly monument +which the municipality has lately raised to Columbus. The moon made +the best of this, which stands in a wide open space, and contrived, +with an Italian skill in the arrangement of light, to produce an +effect of undeniable splendor. On the morrow, we found out by the +careless candor of the daylight what a uselessly big head Columbus +had, and how the sculptor had not very happily thought proper to +represent him with his sea-legs on. + + + + +V. + +UP AND DOWN GENOA. + +I had my note-book with me on this journey, and pledged myself to +make notes in it. And, indeed, I did really do something of the kind, +though the result of my labors is by no means so voluminous as I would +like it to be, now when the work of wishing there were more notes is +so easy. We spent but one day in Genoa, and I find such a marvelous +succinct record of this in my book that I am tempted to give it here, +after the fashion of that Historical Heavyweight who writes the Life +of "Frederick the Great." + + "_Genoa, November 13_.--Breakfast _à la fourchette_ excellently + and cheaply. I buy a hat. We go to seek the Consul, and, after + finding every thing else for two hours, find him. Genoa is the + most magnificent city I ever saw; and the new monument to + Columbus about the weakest possible monument. Walk through the + city with Consul; Doge's palace; cathedral; girl turning + somersaults in the street; blind madman on the cathedral steps. + We leave for Naples at twelve midnight." + +As for the breakfast, it was eaten at one of the many good caffè in +Genoa, and perhaps some statistician will like to know that for a +beefsteak and potatoes, with a half-bottle of Ligurian wine, we paid a +franc. For this money we had also the society of an unoccupied waiter, +who leaned against a marble column and looked on, with that gentle, +half-compassionate interest in our appetites, which seems native +to the tribe of waiters. A slight dash of surprise is in this +professional manner; and there is a faint smile on the solemn, +professional countenance, which is perhaps prompted by too intimate +knowledge of the mysteries of the kitchen and the habits of the cook. +The man who passes his life among beefsteaks cannot be expected to +love them, or to regard without wonder the avidity with which others +devour them. I imagine that service in restaurants must beget simple +and natural tastes in eating, and that the jaded men who minister +there to our pampered appetites demand only for themselves-- + + "A scrip with herbs and fruits supplied, + And water from the spring." + +Turning from this thought to the purchase of my hat, I do not believe +that literary art can interest the reader in that purely personal +transaction, though I have no doubt that a great deal might be said +about buying hats as a principle. I prefer, therefore, to pass to our +search for the Consul. + +A former Consul at ----, whom I know, has told me a good many stories +about the pieces of popular mind which he received at different times +from the travelling public, in reproof of his difficulty of discovery; +and I think it must be one of the most jealously guarded rights +of American citizens in foreign lands to declare the national +representative hard to find, if there is no other complaint to +lodge against him. It seems to be, in peculiar degree, a quality of +consulship at ----, to be found remote and inaccessible. My friend +says that even at New York, before setting out for his post, when +inquiring into the history of his predecessors, he heard that they +were one and all hard to find; and he relates that on the steamer, +going over, there was a low fellow who set the table in a roar by a +vulgar anecdote to this effect:-- + +"There was once a consul at ----, who indicated his office-hours by +the legend on his door, 'In from ten to one.' An old ship-captain, +who kept coming for about a week without finding the Consul, at last +furiously wrote, in the terms of wager, under this legend, 'Ten to one +you're out!'" + +My friend also states that one day a visitor of his remarked: "I'm +rather surprised to find you in. As a general rule, I never do find +consuls in." Habitually, his fellow-countrymen entertained him with +accounts of their misadventures in reaching him. It was useless to +represent to them that his house was in the most convenient locality +in ----, where, indeed, no stranger can walk twenty rods from his +hotel without losing himself; that their guide was an ass, or their +courier a rogue. They listened to him politely, but they never +pardoned him in the least; and neither will I forgive the Consul at +Genoa. I had no earthly consular business with him, but a private +favor to ask. It was Sunday, and I could not reasonably expect to find +him at his office, or any body to tell me where he lived; but I have +seldom had so keen a sense of personal wrong and national neglect as +in my search for that Consul's house. + +In Italy there is no species of fact with which any human being you +meet will not pretend to have perfect acquaintance, and, of course, +the driver whose fiacre we took professed himself a complete guide to +the Consul's whereabouts, and took us successively to the residences +of the consuls of all the South American republics. It occurred to +me that it might be well to inquire of these officials where their +colleague was to be found; but it is true that not one consul of them +was at home! Their doors were opened by vacant old women, in whom +a vague intelligence feebly guttered, like the wick of an expiring +candle, and who, after feigning to throw floods of light on the +object of my search, successively flickered out, and left me in total +darkness. + +Till that day, I never knew of what lofty flights stairs were capable. +As out-of-doors, in Genoa, it is either all up or down hill, so +in-doors it is either all up or down stairs. Ascending and descending, +in one palace after another, those infinite marble steps, it became +a question not solved to this hour, whether it was worse to ascend or +descend,--each ordeal in its turn seemed so much more terrible than +the other. + +At last I resolved to come to an understanding with the driver, and +I spent what little breath I had left--it was dry and hot as the +simoom--in blowing up that infamous man. "You are a great driver," I +said, "not to know your own city. What are you good for if you can't +take a foreigner to his consul's?" "Signore," answered the driver +patiently, "you would have to get a book in two volumes by heart, +in order to be able to find everybody in Genoa. This city is a +labyrinth." + +Truly, it had so proved, and I could scarcely believe in my good luck +when I actually found my friend, and set out with him on a ramble +through its toils. + +A very great number of the streets in Genoa are footways merely, +and these are as narrow, as dark, as full of jutting chimney-places, +balconies, and opened window-shutters, and as picturesque as the +little alleys in Venice. They wander at will around the bases of the +gloomy old stone palaces, and seem to have a vagabond fondness for +creeping down to the port, and losing themselves there in a certain +cavernous arcade which curves round the water with the flection of the +shore, and makes itself a twilight at noonday. Under it are clangorous +shops of iron-smiths, and sizzling shops of marine cooks, and, looking +down its dim perspective, one beholds chiefly sea-legs coming and +going, more or less affected by strong waters; and as the faces to +which these sea-legs belong draw near, one discerns sailors from all +parts of the world,--tawny men from Sicily and Norway, as diverse in +their tawniness as olive and train-oil; sharp faces from Nantucket +and from the Piraeus, likewise mightily different in their sharpness; +blonde Germans and blonde Englishmen; and now and then a colored +brother also in the seafaring line, with sea-legs, also, more or less +affected by strong waters like the rest. + +What curious people are these seafarers! They coast the whole world, +and know nothing of it, being more ignorant and helpless than children +on shore. I spoke with the Yankee mate of a ship one day at Venice, +and asked him how he liked the city. + +Well, he had not been ashore yet. + +He was told he had better go ashore; that the Piazza San Marco was +worth seeing. + +Well, he knew it; he had seen pictures of it; but he guessed he +wouldn't go ashore. + +Why not, now he was here? + +Well, he laid out to go ashore the next time he came to Venice. + +And so, bless his honest soul, he lay three weeks at Venice with his +ship, after a voyage of two months, and he sailed away without ever +setting his foot on that enchanted ground. + +I should have liked to stop some of those seafarers and ask them what +they thought of Genoa. + +It must have been in the little streets--impassable for horses--that +the people sat and talked, as Heine fabled, in their doorways, and +touched knees with the people sitting and talking on the thresholds +of the opposite side. But we saw no gossipers there on our Sunday in +Genoa; and I think the domestic race of Heine's day no longer lives in +Genoa, for every body we saw on the streets was gayly dressed in the +idea of the last fashions, and was to be met chiefly in the public +promenades. The fashions were French; but here still lingers the +lovely phantom of the old national costume of Genoa, and snow-white +veils fluttered from many a dark head, and caressed many an olive +cheek. It is the kindest and charitablest of attirements, this white +veil, and, while decking beauty to the most perilous effect, befriends +and modifies age and ugliness. + +The pleasure with which I look at the splendor of an Italian crowd in +winter is always touched with melancholy. I know that, at the time +of its noonday promenade, it has nothing but a cup of coffee in its +stomach; that it has emerged from a house as cold and dim as a cellar; +and that it will presently go home to dine on rice and boiled beef. I +know that chilblains secretly gnaw the hands inside of its kid gloves, +and I see in the rawness of its faces the anguish of winter-long +suffering from cold. But I also look at many in this crowd with the +eye of the economist, and wonder how people practicing even so great +self-denial as they can contrive to make so much display on their +little means,--how those clerks of public offices, who have rarely an +income of five hundred dollars a year, can dress with such peerless +gorgeousness. I suppose the national instinct teaches them ways and +means unknown to us. The passion for dress is universal: the men are +as fond of it as the women; and, happily, clothes are comparatively +cheap. It is no great harm in itself, this display: it is only a pity +that there is often nothing, or worse than nothing, under the shining +surface. + +We walked with the brilliant Genoese crowd upon the hill where the +public promenade overlooks a landscape of city and country, houses and +gardens, vines and olives, which it makes the heart ache to behold, it +is so faultlessly beautiful. Behind us the fountain was-- + + "Shaking its loosened silver in the sun;" + +the birds were singing; and there were innumerable fair girls going +by, about whom one might have made romances if one had not known +better. Our friend pointed out to us the "pink jail" in which Dickens +lived while at Genoa; and showed us on the brow of a distant upland +the villa, called _Il Paradiso_, which Byron had occupied. I dare +say this Genoese joke is already in print: That the Devil reëntered +Paradise when Byron took this villa. Though, in loveliest Italy, one +is half-persuaded that the Devil had never left Paradise. + +After lingering a little longer on that delicious height, we turned +and went down for a stroll through the city. + +My note-book says that Genoa is the most magnificent city I ever saw, +and I hold by my note-book, though I hardly know how to prove it. +Venice is, and remains, the most beautiful city in the world; but her +ancient rival impresses you with greater splendor. I suppose that +the exclusively Renaissance architecture, which Ruskin declares the +architecture of pride, lends itself powerfully to this effect in +Genoa. It is here in its best mood, and there is little grotesque +Renaissance to be seen, though the palaces are, as usual, loaded with +ornament. The Via Nuova is the chief thoroughfare of the city, and the +crowd pours through this avenue between long lines of palaces. Height +on height rise the stately, sculptured façades, colonnaded, statued, +pierced by mighty doorways and lofty windows; and the palaces seem to +gain a kind of aristocratic _hauteur_ from the fact that there are for +the most part no sidewalks, and that the carriages, rolling insolently +through the crowd, threaten constantly to grind the pedestrian up +against their carven marbles, and immolate him to their stony pride. +There is something gracious and gentle in the grandeur of Venice, +and much that the heart loves to cling to; but in Genoa no sense of +kindliness is touched by the magnificence of the city. + +It was an unspeakable relief, after such a street, to come, on a +sudden, upon the Duomo, one of the few Gothic buildings in Genoa, and +rest our jaded eyes on that architecture which Heaven seems truly to +have put into the thoughts of man together with the Christian faith. +O beloved beauty of aspiring arches, of slender and clustered columns, +of flowering capitals and window-traceries, of many-carven breadths +and heights, wherein all Nature breathes and blossoms again! There is +neither Greek perfection, nor winning Byzantine languor, nor insolent +Renaissance opulence, which may compare with this loveliness of yours! +Alas that the interior of this Gothic temple of Genoa should abound in +the abomination of rococo restoration! They say that the dust of St. +John the Baptist lies there within a costly shrine; and I wonder that +it can sleep in peace amid all that heathenish show of bad taste. But +the poor saints have to suffer a great deal in Italy. + +Outside, in the piazza before the church, there was an idle, cruel +crowd, amusing itself with the efforts of a blind old man to find +the entrance. He had a number of books which he desperately laid down +while he ran his helpless hands over the clustered columns, and which +he then desperately caught up again, in fear of losing them. At other +times he paused, and wildly clasped his hands upon his eyes, or wildly +threw up his arms; and then began to run to and fro again uneasily, +while the crowd laughed and jeered. Doubtless a taint of madness +afflicted him; but not the less he seemed the type of a blind soul +that gropes darkly about through life, to find the doorway of some +divine truth or beauty,--touched by the heavenly harmonies from +within, and miserably failing, amid the scornful cries and bitter glee +of those who have no will but to mock aspiration. + +The girl turning somersaults in another place had far more popular +sympathy than the blind madman at the temple door, but she was hardly +a more cheerful spectacle. For all her festive spangles and fairy-like +brevity of skirts, she had quite a work-a-day look upon her honest, +blood-red face, as if this were business though it looked like sport, +and her part of the diversion were as practical as that of the famous +captain of the waiters, who gave the act of peeling a sack of potatoes +a playful effect by standing on his head. The poor damsel was going +over and over, to the sound of most dismal drumming and braying, +in front of the immense old palace of the Genoese Doges,--a classic +building, stilted on a rustic base, and quite worthy of Palladio, if +any body thinks that is praise. + +There was little left of our day when we had dined; but having seen +the outside of Genoa, and not hoping to see the inside, we found even +this little heavy on our hands, and were glad as the hour drew near +when we were to take the steamer for Naples. + +It had been one of the noisiest days spent during several years in +clamorous Italy, whose voiceful uproar strikes to the summits of her +guardian Alps, and greets the coming stranger, and whose loud Addio +would stun him at parting, if he had not meanwhile become habituated +to the operatic pitch of her every-day tones. In Genoa, the hotels, +taking counsel of the vagabond streets, stand about the cavernous +arcade already mentioned, and all the noise of the shipping reaches +their guests. We rose early that Sunday morning to the sound of a +fleet unloading cargoes of wrought-iron, and of the hard swearing of +all nations of seafaring men. The whole day long the tumult followed +us, and seemed to culminate at last in the screams of a parrot, who +thought it fine to cry, "_Piove! piove! piove_!"--"It rains! it +rains! it rains!"--and had, no doubt, a secret interest in some +umbrella-shop. This unprincipled bird dwelt somewhere in the +neighborhood of the street where you see the awful tablet in the wall +devoting to infamy the citizens of the old republic that were false to +their country. The sight of that pitiless stone recalls with a thrill +the picturesque, unhappy past, with all the wandering, half-benighted +efforts of the people to rend their liberty from now a foreign and now +a native lord. At best, they only knew how to avenge their wrongs; but +now, let us hope, they have learnt, with all Italy, to prevent them. +The will was never wanting of old to the Ligurian race, and in this +time they have done their full share to establish Italian freedom. + +I do not know why it should have been so surprising to hear the +boatman who rowed us to the steamer's anchorage speak English; but, +after his harsh Genoese profanity in getting his boat into open water, +it was the last thing we expected from him. It had somehow the effect +of a furious beast addressing you in your native tongue, and +telling you it was "Wary poordy wedder;" and it made us cling to his +good-nature with the trembling solicitude of Little Red-Riding-Hood, +when she begins to have the first faint suspicions of her grandmother. +However, our boatman was no wild beast, but took our six cents of +_buonamano_ with the base servility of a Christian man, when he had +put our luggage in the cabin of the steamer. I wonder how he should +have known us for Americans? He did so know us, and said he had been +at New York in better days, when he voyaged upon higher seas than +those he now navigated. + +On board, we watched with compassion an old gentleman in the cabin +making a hearty meal of sardines and fruit-pie, and I asked him if +he had ever been at sea. No, he said. I could have wept over that +innocent old gentleman's childlike confidence of appetite, and +guileless trust of the deep. + +We went on deck, where one of the gentle beings of our party declared +that she would remain as long as Genoa was in sight; and to tell the +truth, the scene was worthy of the promised devotion. There, in a +half-circle before us, blazed the lights of the quay; above these +twinkled the lamps of the steep streets and climbing palaces; over +and behind all hung the darkness on the heights,--a sable cloud dotted +with ruddy points of flame burning in the windows of invisible houses. + + "Merrily did we drop" + +down the bay, and presently caught the heavy swell of the open sea. +The other gentle being of our party then clutched my shoulder with a +dreadful shudder, and after gasping, "O Mr. Scribbler, why _will_ the +ship roll so?" was meekly hurried below by her sister, who did not +return for a last glimpse of Genoa the Proud. + +In a moment heaven's sweet pity flapped away as with the sea-gull's +wings, and I too felt that there was no help for it, and that I must +go and lie down in the cabin. With anguished eyes I beheld upon the +shelf opposite to mine the innocent old gentleman who had lately +supped so confidently on sardines and fruit-pie. He lay upon his back, +groaning softly to himself. + + + + +VI. + +BY SEA FROM GENOA TO NAPLES. + +I. + +Like the Englishman who had no prejudices, I do hate a Frenchman; and +there were many Frenchmen among our passengers on the _Messina_, in +whose company I could hardly have been happy, had I not seen them +horribly sea-sick. After the imprudent old gentleman of the sardines +and fruit-pie, these wretched Gauls were the first to be seized with +the malady, which became epidemic, and were miserable up to the last +moment on board. To the enormity of having been born Frenchmen, they +added the crime of being commercial travellers,--a class of fellow-men +of whom we know little at home, but who are met everywhere in European +travel. They spend more than half their lives in movement from place +to place, and they learn to snatch from every kind of travel its +meagre comforts, with an insolent disregard of the rights and feelings +of other passengers. They excuse an abominable trespass with a cool +"Pardon!" take the best seat everywhere, and especially treat women +with a savage rudeness, to which an American vainly endeavors to +accustom his temper. I have seen commercial travellers of all nations, +and I think I must award the French nation the discredit of producing +the most odious commercial travellers in the world. The Englishman +of this species wraps himself in his rugs, and rolls into his corner, +defiantly, but not aggressively, boorish; the Italian is almost a +gentleman; the German is apt to take sausage out of a newspaper and +eat it with his penknife; the Frenchman aggravates human nature beyond +endurance by his restless ill-breeding, and his evident intention not +only to keep all his own advantages, but to steal some of yours upon +the first occasion. There were three of these monsters on our +steamer: one a slight, bloodless young man, with pale blue eyes and +an incredulous grin; another, a gigantic full-bearded animal in +spectacles; the third an infamous plump little creature, in absurdly +tight pantaloons, with a cast in his eye, and a habit of sucking his +teeth at table. When this wretch was not writhing in the agonies of +sea-sickness, he was on deck with his comrades, lecturing them upon +various things, to which the bloodless young man listened with his +incredulous grin, and the bearded giant in spectacles attended with a +choked look about the eyes, like a suffering ox. They were constantly +staggering in and out of their state-room, which, for my sins, was +also mine; and opening their abominable commodious travelling bags, or +brushing their shaggy heads at the reeling mirror, and since they +were born into the world, I think they had never cleaned their +finger-nails. They wore their hats at dinner, but always went away, +after soup, deadly pale. + + +II. + +In contrast with these cattle, what polished and courtly gentlemen +were the sailors and firemen! As for our captain, he would in any +company have won notice for his gentle and high-bred way; in his place +at the head of the table among these Frenchmen, he seemed to me the +finest gentleman I had ever seen. He had spent his whole life at sea, +and had voyaged in all parts of the world except Japan, where he meant +some day, he said, to go. He had been first a cabin-boy on a little +Genoese schooner, and he had gradually risen to the first place on +a sailing-vessel, and now he had been selected to fill a commander's +post on this line of steamers. (It is an admirable line of boats, +not belonging I believe to the Italian government, but much under its +control, leaving Genoa every day for Leghorn, Naples, Palermo, and +Ancona, on the Adriatic coast.) The captain had sailed a good deal in +American waters, but chiefly on the Pacific coast, trading from the +Spanish republican ports to those of California. He had been in that +State during its effervescent days, when every thing foul floated +to the top, and I am afraid he formed there but a bad opinion of our +people, though he was far too courteous to say outright any thing of +this sort. + +He had very fine, shrewd blue eyes, a lean, weather-beaten, kindly +face, and a cautious way of saying things. I hardly expected him to +turn out so red-hot a Democrat as he did on better acquaintance, but +being a warm friend of man myself, I was not sorry. Garibaldi was +the beginning and ending of his political faith, as he is with every +enthusiastic Italian. The honest soul's conception of all concrete +evil was brought forth in two words, of odd enough application. In +Europe, and Italy more particularly, true men have suffered chiefly +from this form of evil, and the captain evidently could conceive of +no other cause of suffering anywhere. We were talking of the American +war, and when the captain had asked the usual question, "_Quando +finirà mai questa guerra_?" and I had responded as usual, "_Ah, ci +vuol pazienza_!" the captain gave a heavy sigh, and turning his head +pensively aside, plucked his grapes from the cluster a moment in +silence. + +Then he said: "You Americans are in the habit of attributing this war +to slavery. The cause is not sufficient." + +I ventured to demur and explain. "No," said the captain, "the cause is +not sufficient. We Italians know the only cause which could produce a +war like this." + +I was naturally anxious to be instructed in the Italian theory, hoping +it might be profounder than the English notion that we were fighting +about tariffs. + +The captain frowned, looked at me carefully, and then said:-- + +"In this world there is but one cause of mischief--the Jesuits." + + +III. + +The first night out, from Genoa to Leghorn, was bad enough, but that +which succeeded our departure from the latter port was by far the +worst of the three we spent in our voyage to Naples. How we envied the +happy people who went ashore at Leghorn! I think we even envied the +bones of the Venetians, Pisans, and Genoese who met and slew each +other in the long-forgotten sea-fights, and sank too deeply through +the waves to be stirred by their restless tumult. Every one has +heard tell of how cross and treacherous a sea the Mediterranean is in +winter, and my own belief is, that he who has merely been sea-sick on +the Atlantic should give the Mediterranean a trial before professing +to have suffered every thing of which human nature is capable. Our +steamer was clean enough and staunch enough, but she was not large--no +bigger, I thought, than a gondola, that night as the waves tossed her +to and fro, till unwinged things took flight all through her cabins +and over her decks. My berth was placed transversely instead of +lengthwise with the boat,--an ingenious arrangement to heighten +sea-sick horrors, and dash the blood of the sufferer from brain to +boots with exaggerated violence at each roll of the boat; and I begged +the steward to let me sleep upon one of the lockers in the cabin. +I found many of my agonized species already laid out there; and the +misery of the three French commercial travellers was so great, that, +in the excess of my own dolor, it actually afforded me a kind of +happiness, and I found myself smiling at times to see the giant, with +the eyes of a choked ox, rise up and faintly bellow. Indeed, there was +something eldritch and unearthly in the whole business, and I think a +kind of delirium must have resulted from the sea-sickness. Otherwise, +I shall not know how to account for having attributed a kind of +consciousness and individuality to the guide-book of a young American +who had come aboard at Leghorn. He turned out afterward to be the +sweetest soul in the world, and I am sorry now that I regarded with +amusement his failure to smoke off his sickness. He was reading his +guide-book with great diligence and unconcern, when suddenly I marked +him lay it softly, softly down, with that excessive deliberation which +men use at such times, and vanish with great dignity from the +scene. Thus abandoned to its own devices, this guide-book began its +night-long riots, setting out upon a tour of the cabin with the first +lurch of the boat that threw it from the table upon the floor. I heard +it careen at once wildly to the cabin door, and knock to get out; and +failing in this, return more deliberately to the stern of the boat, +interrogating the tables and chairs, which had got their sea-legs on, +and asking them how they found themselves. Arrived again at the point +of starting, it seemed to pause a moment, and then I saw it setting +forth on a voyage of pleasure in the low company of a French hat, +which, being itself a French book, I suppose it liked. In these +travels they both ran under the feet of one of the stewards and were +replaced by an immense _tour de force_ on the table, from which the +book eloped again,--this time in company with an overcoat; but it +seemed the coat was too miserable to go far: it stretched itself at +full length on the floor, and suffered the book to dance over it, back +and forth, I know not how many times. At last, as the actions of +the book were becoming unendurable, and the general sea-sickness was +waxing into a frenzy, a heavy roll, that made the whole ship shriek +and tremble, threw us all from our lockers; and gathering myself up, +bruised and sore in every fibre, I lay down again and became sensible +of a blissful, blissful lull; the machinery had stopped, and with +the mute hope that we were all going to the bottom, I fell tranquilly +asleep. + + +IV. + +It appeared that the storm had really been dangerous. Instead of being +only six hours from Naples, as we ought to be at this time, we were +got no further than Porto Longone, in the Isle of Elba. We woke in a +quiet, sheltered little bay, whence we could only behold, not feel, +the storm left far out upon the open sea. From this we turned our +heavy eyes gladly to the shore, where a white little town was settled, +like a flight of gulls upon the beach, at the feet of green and +pleasant hills, whose gentle lines rhymed softly away against the sky. +At the end of either arm of the embracing land in which we lay, stood +gray, placid old forts, with peaceful sentries pacing their bastions, +and weary ships creeping round their feet, under guns looking out so +kindly and harmlessly, that I think General ---- himself would not +have hesitated (except, perhaps, from a profound sentiment of regret +for offering the violence) to attack them. Our port was full of +frightened shipping--steamers, brigs, and schooners--of all sizes and +nations; and since it was our misfortune that Napoleon spent his exile +in Elba at Porto Ferrato instead of Porto Longone, we amused ourselves +with looking at the vessels and the white town and the soft hills, +instead of hunting up dead lion's tracks. + +Our fellow-passengers began to develop themselves: the regiment of +soldiers whom we were transporting picturesquely breakfasted forward, +and the second-cabin people came aft to our deck, while the English +engineer (there are English engineers on all the Mediterranean +steamers) planted a camp-stool in a sunny spot, and sat down to read +the "Birmingham Express." + +Our friends of the second cabin were chiefly officers with their wives +and families, and they talked for the most part of their sufferings +during the night. They spoke such exquisite Italian that I thought +them Tuscans, but they told me they were of Sicily, where their +beautiful speech first had life. Let us hear what they talked of in +their divine language, and with that ineffable _tonic_ accent which +no foreigner perfectly acquires, and let us for once translate the +profanities Pagan and Christian, which adorn common parlance in +Italy:-- + +"Ah, my God! how much I suffered!" says a sweet little woman with +gentle brown eyes, red, red lips, and blameless Greek lines of face. +"I broke two basins!" + +"There were ten broken in all, by Diana!" says this lady's sister. + +"Presence of the Devil!" says her husband; and + +"Body of Bacchus!" her young brother, puffing his cigar. + +"And you, sir," said the lady, turning to a handsome young fellow in +civil dress, near her, "how did you pass this horrible night?" + +"Oh!" says the young man, twirling his heavy blond mustache, "mighty +well, mighty well!" + +"Oh mercy of God! You were not sick?" + +"I, signora, am never sea-sick. I am of the navy." + +At which they all cry oh, and ah, and declare they are glad of it, +though why they should have been I don't know to this day. + +"I have often wished," added the young man meditatively, and in a +serious tone, as if he had indeed given the subject much thought, +"that it might please God to let me be sea-sick once, if only that I +might know how it feels. But no!" He turned the conversation, as +if his disappointment were too sore to dwell upon; and hearing our +English, he made out to let us know that he had been at New York, and +could spik our language, which he proceeded to do, to the great pride +of his countrymen, and our own astonishment at the remarkable forms of +English speech to which he gave utterance. + + +V. + +We set out from Porto Longone that night at eight o'clock, and next +evening, driving through much-abated storm southward into calm waters +and clear skies, reached Naples. At noon, Monte Circeo where Circe +led her disreputable life, was a majestic rock against blue heaven +and broken clouds; after nightfall, and under the risen moon, Vesuvius +crept softly up from the sea, and stood a graceful steep, with wreaths +of lightest cloud upon its crest, and the city lamps circling far +round its bay. + + + + +VII. + +CERTAIN THINGS IN NAPLES. + +I. + +Perhaps some reader of mine who visited Naples under the old disorder +of things, when the Bourbon and the Camorra reigned, will like to hear +that the pitched battle which travellers formerly fought, in landing +from their steamer, is now gone out of fashion. Less truculent boatmen +I never saw than those who rowed us ashore at Naples; they were so +quiet and peaceful that they harmonized perfectly with that tranquil +scene of drowsy-twinkling city lights, slumbrous mountains, and +calm sea, and, as they dipped softly toward us in the glare of the +steamer's lamps, I could only think of Tennyson's description:-- + + "And round about the keel with faces pale, + Dark faces pale against the rosy flame, + The mild-eyed melancholy lotus-eaters came." + +The mystery of this placidity had been already solved by our captain, +whom I had asked what price I should bargain to pay from the steamer +to the shore. "There is a tariff," said he, "and the boatmen keep to +it. The Neapolitans are good people, (_buona gente_,) and only needed +justice to make them obedient to the laws." I must say that I found +this to be true. The fares of all public conveyances are now fixed, +and the attempts which drivers occasionally make to cheat you, seem +to be rather the involuntary impulses of old habit than deliberate +intentions to do you wrong. You pay what is due, and as your man +merely rumbles internally when you turn away, you must be a very timid +_signorin_, indeed, if you buy his content with any thing more. I +fancy that all these things are now much better managed in Italy than +in America, only we grumble at them there and stand them in silence at +home. Every one can recall frightful instances of plunder, in which +he was the victim, at New York--in which the robbery had none of the +neatness of an operation, as it often has in Italy, but was a brutal +mutilation. And then as regards civility from the same kind of people +in the two countries, there is no comparison that holds in favor of +us. All questions are readily and politely answered in Italian travel, +and the servants of companies are required to be courteous to the +public whereas, one is only too glad to receive a silent snub from +such people at home. + + +II. + +The first sun that rose after our arrival in Naples was mild and warm +as a May sun, though we were quite in the heart of November. We early +strolled out under it into the crowded ways of the city, and drew near +as we might to that restless, thronging, gossiping southern life, +in contrast with which all northern existence seems only a sort of +hibernation. The long Toledo, on which the magnificence of modern +Naples is threaded, is the most brilliant and joyous street in +the world; but I think there is less of the quaintness of Italian +civilization to be seen in its vivacious crowds than anywhere else +in Italy. One easily understands how, with its superb length and +straightness, and its fine, respectable, commonplace-looking houses, +it should be the pride of a people fond of show; but after Venice and +Genoa it has no picturesque charm; nay, even busy Milan seems less +modern and more picturesque. The lines of the lofty palaces on the +Toledo are seldom broken by the façade of a church or other public +edifice; and when this does happen, the building is sure to be coldly +classic or frantically baroque. + +You weary of the Toledo's perfect repair, of its monotonous iron +balconies, its monotonous lofty windows; and it would be insufferable +if you could not turn out from it at intervals into one of those +wondrous little streets which branch up on one hand and down on the +other, rising and falling with flights of steps between the high, +many-balconied walls. They ring all day with the motleyest life of +fishermen, fruit-venders, chestnut-roasters, and idlers of every age +and sex; and there is nothing so full of local color, unless it be the +little up-and-down-hill streets in Genoa. Like those, the by-streets +of Naples are only meant for foot-passengers, and a carriage never +enters them; but sometimes, if you are so blest, you may see a mule +climbing the long stairways, moving solemnly under a stack of straw, +or tinkling gayly down-stairs, bestridden by a swarthy, handsome +peasant--all glittering teeth and eyes and flaming Phrygian cap. The +rider exchanges lively salutations and sarcasms with the by-standers +in his way, and perhaps brushes against the bagpipers who bray +constantly in those hilly defiles. They are in Neapolitan costume, +these _pifferari_, and have their legs incomprehensibly tied up in the +stockings and garters affected by the peasantry of the provinces, +and wear brave red sashes about their waists. They are simple, +harmless-looking people, and would no doubt rob and kill in the most +amiable manner, if brigandage came into fashion in their neighborhood. + +Sometimes the student of men may witness a Neapolitan quarrel in these +streets, and may pick up useful ideas of invective from the remarks of +the fat old women who always take part in the contests. But, though +we were ten days in Naples, I only saw one quarrel, and I could have +heard much finer violence of language among the gondoliers at any +ferry in Venice than I heard in this altercation. + +The Neapolitans are, of course, furious in traffic. They sell a great +deal, and very boisterously, the fruit of the cactus, which is about +as large as an egg, and which they peel to a very bloody pulp, and lay +out, a sanguinary presence, on boards for purchase. It is not good +to the uncultivated taste; but the stranger may stop and drink, with +relish and refreshment, the orangeade and lemonade mixed with snow and +sold at the little booths on the street-corners. These stands looks +much like the shrines of the Madonna in other Italian cities, and a +friend of ours was led, before looking carefully into their office, +to argue immense Neapolitan piety from the frequency of their +ecclesiastical architecture. They are, indeed, the shrines of a god +much worshiped during the long Neapolitan summers; and it was the +profound theory of the Bourbon kings of Naples, that, if they kept +their subjects well supplied with snow to cool their drink, there was +no fear of revolution. It shows how liable statesmen are to err, that, +after all, the Neapolitans rose, drove out the Bourbons, and welcomed +Garibaldi. + +The only part of the picturesque life of the side streets which seems +ever to issue from them into the Toledo is the goatherd with his +flock of milch-goats, which mingle with the passers in the avenues as +familiarly as with those of the alley, and thrust aside silk-hidden +hoops, and brush against dandies' legs, in their course, but keep on +perfect terms with every body. The goatherd leads the eldest of the +flock, and the rest follow in docile order and stop as he stops to ask +at the doors if milk is wanted. When he happens to have an order, one +of the goats is haled, much against her will, into the entry of a, +house, and there milked, while the others wait outside alone, nibbling +and smelling thoughtfully about the masonry. It is noticeable that +none of the good-natured passers seem to think these goats a great +nuisance in the crowded street; but all make way for them as if they +were there by perfect right, and were no inconvenience. + +On the Toledo people keep upon the narrow sidewalks, or strike out +into the carriage-way, with an indifference to hoofs and wheels which +one, after long residence in tranquil Venice, cannot acquire, in +view of the furious Neapolitan driving. That old comprehensive gig of +Naples, with which many pens and pencils have familiarized the reader, +is nearly as hard to find there now as the _lazzaroni_, who have gone +out altogether. You may still see it in the remoter quarters of +the city, with its complement of twelve passengers to one horse, +distributed, two on each thill, four on the top seats, one at each +side, and two behind; but in the Toledo it has given place to much +finer vehicles. Slight buggies, which take you anywhere for half a +franc, are the favorite means of public conveyance, and the private +turn-outs are of every description and degree. Indeed, all the +Neapolitans take to carriages, and the Strand in London at six o'clock +in the evening is not a greater jam of wheels than the Toledo in the +afternoon. Shopping feels the expansive influence of the out-of-doors +life, and ladies do most of it as they sit in their open carriages +at the shop-doors, ministered to by the neat-handed shopmen. They are +very languid ladies, as they recline upon their carriage cushions; +they are all black-eyed, and of an olive pallor, and have gloomy rings +about their fine eyes, like the dark-faced dandies who bow to them. +This Neapolitan look is very curious, and I have not seen it elsewhere +in Italy; it is a look of peculiar pensiveness, and comes, no doubt, +from the peculiarly heavy growth of lashes which fringes the lower +eyelid. Then there is the weariness in it of all peoples whose summers +are fierce and long. + +As the Italians usually dress beyond their means, the dandies of +Naples are very gorgeous. If it is now, say, four o'clock in the +afternoon, they are all coming down the Toledo with the streams +of carriages bound for the long drive around the bay. But our +foot-passers go to walk in the beautiful Villa Reale, between this +course and the sea. The Villa is a slender strip of Paradise, a mile +long; it is rapture to walk in it, and it comes, in description, to +be a garden-grove, with feathery palms, Greekish temples, musical +fountains, white statues of the gods, and groups of fair girls in +spring silks. If I remember aright, the sun is always setting on the +bay, and you cannot tell whether this sunset is cooled by the water +or the water is warmed by the golden light upon it, and upon the city, +and upon all the soft mountain-heights around. + + +III. + +Walking westward through the whole length of the Villa Reale, and +keeping with the crescent shore of the bay, you come, after a while, +to the Grot of Posilippo, which is not a grotto but a tunnel cut for +a carriage-way under the hill. It serves, however, the purpose of a +grotto, if a grotto has any, and is of great length and dimness, and +is all a-twinkle night and day with numberless lamps. Overlooking the +street which passes into it is the tomb of Virgil, and it is this +you have come to see. To reach it, you knock first at the door of a +blacksmith, who calls a species of custodian, and, when this +latter has opened a gate in a wall, you follow him up-stairs into a +market-garden. + +In one corner, and standing in a leafy and grassy shelter somewhat +away from the vegetables, is the poet's tomb, which has a kind of +claim to genuineness by virtue of its improbable appearance. It looks +more like a bake-oven than even the Pompeian tombs; the masonry is +antique, and is at least in skillful imitation of the fine Roman work. +The interior is a small chamber with vaulted or wagon-roof ceiling, +under which a man may stand upright, and at the end next the street +is a little stone commemorating the place as Virgil's tomb, which was +placed there by the Queen of France in 1840, and said by the custodian +(a singularly dull ass) to be an exact copy of the original, whatever +the original may have been. This guide could tell us nothing more +about it, and was too stupidly honest to pretend to know more. The +laurel planted by Petrarch at the door of the tomb, and renewed +in later times by Casimir Delavigne, has been succeeded by a third +laurel. The present twig was so slender, and looked so friendless and +unprotected, that even enthusiasm for the memory of two poets could +not be brought to rob it of one of its few leaves; and we contented +ourselves with plucking some of the grass and weeds that grew +abundantly on the roof of the tomb. + +There was a dusty quiet within the tomb, and a grassy quiet without, +that pleased exceedingly; but though the memories of the place were +so high and epic, it only suggested bucolic associations, and, sunken +into that nook of hill-side verdure, made me think of a spring-house +on some far-away Ohio farm; a thought that, perhaps, would not have +offended the poet, who loved and sang of humble country things, and, +drawing wearily to his rest here, no doubt turned and remembered +tenderly the rustic days before the excellent veterans of Augustus +came to exile him from his father's farm at Mantua, and banish him to +mere glory. But I believe most travellers have much nobler sensations +in Virgil's tomb, and there is a great deal of testimony borne to +their lofty sentiments on every scribbleable inch of its walls. Valery +reminded me that Boccaccio, standing near it of old, first felt his +fate decided for literature. Did he come there, I wonder, with poor +Fiammetta, and enter the tomb with her tender hand in his, before ever +he thought of that cruel absence she tells of? "O donne pietose!" I +hope so, and that this pilgrimage, half of love and half of letters, +took place, "nel tempo nel quale la rivestita terra più che tutto +l'altro anno si mostra bella." + +If you ascend from the tomb and turn Naplesward from the crest of the +hill, you have the loveliest view in the world of the sea and of the +crescent beach, mightily jeweled at its further horn with the black +Castel dell' Ovo. Fishermen's children are playing all along the +foamy border of the sea, and boats are darting out into the surf. The +present humble muse is not above saying also that the linen which the +laundresses hang to dry upon lines along the beach takes the sun like +a dazzling flight of white birds, and gives a breezy life to the scene +which it could not spare. + + +IV. + +There was a little church on our way back from Posilippo, into which +we lounged a moment, pausing at the altar of some very successful +saint near the door. Here there were great numbers of the usual +offerings from the sick whom the saint had eased of their various +ills,--waxen legs and arms from people who had been in peril of +losing their limbs, as well as eyes, noses, fingers, and feet, and the +crutches of those cured of lameness; but we were most amused with the +waxen effigies of several entire babies hung up about the altar, which +the poor souls who had been near losing the originals had brought +there in gratitude to the saint. + +Generally, however, the churches of Naples are not very interesting, +and one who came away without seeing them would have little to regret. +The pictures are seldom good, and though there are magnificent +chapels in St. Januarius, and fine Gothic tombs at Santa Chiara, +the architecture is usually rococo. I fancy that Naples has felt the +damage of Spanish taste in such things as well as Spanish tyranny in +others. Indeed, I saw much there which reminded me of what I had read +about Spain rather than what I had seen in Italy; and all Italian +writers are agreed in attributing the depravation of Naples to the +long Spanish dominion. It is well known how the Spaniards rule their +provinces, and their gloomy despotism was probably never more cruelly +felt than in Italy, where the people were least able to bear it. I +had a heart-felt exultation in walking through the quarter of the city +where the tumults of Massaniello had raged, and, if only for a few +days, struck mortal terror to the brutal pride of the viceroy; but +I think I had a better sense of the immense retribution which has +overtaken all memory of Spanish rule in Naples as we passed through +the palace of Capo di Monte. This was the most splendid seat of the +Spanish Bourbon, whose family, inheriting its power from the violence +of other times, held it with violence in these; and in one of the +chief saloons of the palace, which is now Victor Emanuel's, were +pictures representing scenes of the revolution of 1860, while the +statuette of a Garibaldino, in his red shirt and all his heroic +rudeness, was defiantly conspicuous on one of the tables. + + +V. + +There was nothing else that pleased me as well in the palace, or in +the grounds about it. These are all laid out in pleasant successions +of grove, tangled wilderness, and pasture-land, and were thronged, +the Saturday afternoon of our visit, with all ranks of people, who +strolled through the beautiful walks and enjoyed themselves in the +peculiarly peaceful Italian way. Valery says that the Villa Reale in +the Bourbon time was closed, except for a single day in the year, +to all but the nobles; and that on this occasion it was filled with +pretty peasant women, who made it a condition of their marriage +bargains that their husbands should bring them to the Villa Reale on +St. Mary's Day. It is now free to all on every day of the year, and +the grounds of the Palace Capo di Monte are opened every Saturday. I +liked the pleasant way in which sylvan Nature and Art had made friends +in these beautiful grounds, in which Nature had consented to overlook +even the foolish vanity of the long aisles of lime, cut and trimmed in +formal and fantastic shapes, according to the taste of the silly times +of bagwigs and patches. On every side wild birds fluttered through +these absurd trees, and in the thickets lurked innumerable pheasants, +which occasionally issued forth and stalked in stately, fearless +groups over the sunset-crimsoned lawns. There was a brown gamekeeper +for nearly every head of game, wearing a pheasant's wing in his hat +and carrying a short, heavy sword; and our driver told us, with an +awful solemnity in his bated breath, that no one might kill this game +but the king, under penalty of the galleys. + + +VI. + +We went one evening to the opera at San Carlo. It is one of the three +theatres--San Carlo of Naples, La Scala of Milan, and Fenice of +Venice--on which the Italians pride themselves; and it is certainly +very large and imposing. The interior has a _bel colpo d'occhio_, +which is what many Italians chiefly value in morals, manners, and +architecture; but after this comes great shabbiness of detail. The +boxes, even of the first order, are paved with brick tiles, and the +red velvet border of the box which the people see from the pit is not +supported in style by the seats within, which are merely covered with +red oil-cloth. The opera we saw was also second-rate, and was to the +splendor of the scenic arrangements what the oil-cloth was to the +velvet. The house was full of people, but the dress of the audience +was not so fine as we had expected in Naples. The evening dress is not +_de rigueur_ at Italian theatres, and people seemed to have come to +San Carlo in any pleasant carelessness of costume. + + +VII. + +The Italians are simple and natural folks, pleased through all +their show of conventionality with little things, and as easy and +unconscious as children in their ways. There happened to be a new +caffè opened in Naples while we were there, and we had the pleasure +of seeing all ranks of people affected by its magnificence. Artless +throngs blocked the sidewalk day and night before its windows, gazing +upon its mirrors, fountains, and frescos, and regarding the persons +over their coffee within as beings lifted by sudden magic out of the +common orbit of life and set dazzling in a higher sphere. All the +waiters were uniformed and brass-buttoned to blinding effect, and the +head waiter was a majestic creature in a long blue coat reaching to +his feet, and armed with a mighty silver-headed staff. This gorgeous +apparition did nothing but walk up and down, and occasionally advance +toward the door, as if to disperse the crowds. At such times, however, +before executing his purpose, he would glance round on the splendors +they were admiring, and, as if smitten with a sense of the enormous +cruelty he had meditated in thinking to deprive them of the sight, +would falter and turn away, leaving his intent unfulfilled. + + + + +VIII. + +A DAY IN POMPEII. + +I. + +On the second morning after our arrival in Naples, we took the seven +o'clock train, which leaves the Nineteenth Century for the first cycle +of the Christian Era, and, skirting the waters of the Neapolitan bay +almost the whole length of our journey, reached the railway station +of Pompeii in an hour. As we rode along by that bluest sea, we saw +the fishing-boats go out, and the foamy waves (which it would be an +insolent violence to call breakers) come in; we saw the mountains +slope their tawny and golden manes caressingly downward to the waters, +where the islands were dozing yet; and landward, on the left, we saw +Vesuvius, with his brown mantle of ashes drawn close about his throat, +reclining on the plain, and smoking a bland and thoughtful morning +pipe, of which the silver fumes curled lightly, lightly upward in the +sunrise. + +We dismounted at the station, walked a few rods eastward through a +little cotton-field, and found ourselves at the door of Hotel Diomed, +where we took breakfast for a number of sesterces which I am sure +it would have made an ancient Pompeian stir in his urn to think of +paying. But in Italy one learns the chief Italian virtue, patience, +and we paid our account with the utmost good nature. There was +compensation in store for us, and the guide whom we found at the gate +leading up the little hill to Pompeii inclined the disturbed balance +in favor of our happiness. He was a Roman, spoke Italian that Beatrice +might have addressed to Dante, and was numbered Twenty-six. I suppose +it is known that the present Italian Government forbids people to +be pillaged in any way on its premises, and that the property of the +State is no longer the traffic of custodians and their pitiless +race. At Pompeii each person pays two francs for admission, and is +rigorously forbidden by recurrent sign-boards to offer money to the +guides. Ventisei (as we shall call him) himself pointed out one of +these notices in English, and did his duty faithfully without asking +or receiving fees in money. He was a soldier, like all the other +guides, and was a most intelligent, obliging fellow, with a +self-respect and dignity worthy of one of our own volunteer soldiers. + +Ventisei took us up the winding slope, and led us out of this living +world through the Sea-gate of Pompeii back into the dead past--the +past which, with all its sensuous beauty and grace, and all its +intellectual power, I am not sorry to have dead, and for the most +part, buried. Our feet had hardly trodden the lava flagging of the +narrow streets when we came in sight of the laborers who were exhuming +the inanimate city. They were few in number, not perhaps a score, and +they worked tediously, with baskets to carry away the earth from the +excavation, boys and girls carrying the baskets, and several athletic +old women plying picks, while an overseer sat in a chair near by, and +smoked, and directed their exertions. + +They dig down about eight or ten feet, uncovering the walls and +pillars of the houses, and the mason, who is at hand, places little +iron rivets in the stucco to prevent its fall where it is weak, while +an artist attends to wash and clean the frescos as fast as they are +exposed. The soil through which the excavation first passes is not +of great depth; the ashes which fell damp with scalding rain, in the +second eruption, are perhaps five feet thick; the rest is of that +porous stone which descended in small fragments during the first +eruption. A depth of at least two feet in this stone is always left +untouched by the laborers till the day when the chief superintendent +of the work comes out from Naples to see the last layers removed; +and it is then that the beautiful mosaic pavements of the houses are +uncovered, and the interesting and valuable objects are nearly always +found. + +The wonder was, seeing how slowly the work proceeded, not that +two thirds of Pompeii were yet buried, but that one third had been +exhumed. We left these hopeless toilers, and went down-town into the +Forum, stepping aside on the way to look into one of the Pompeian +Courts of Common Pleas. + + +II. + +Now Pompeii is, in truth, so full of marvel and surprise, that it +would be unreasonable to express disappointment with Pompeii in +fiction. And yet I cannot help it. An exuberant carelessness of phrase +in most writers and talkers who describe it had led me to expect much +more than it was possible to find there. In my Pompeii I confess that +the houses had no roofs--in fact, the rafters which sustained the +tiles being burnt, how could the roofs help falling in? But otherwise +my Pompeii was a very complete affair: the walls all rose to their +full height; doorways and arches were perfect; the columns were all +unbroken and upright; putting roofs on my Pompeii, you might have +lived in it very comfortably. The real Pompeii is different. It is +seldom that any wall is unbroken; most columns are fragmentary; and +though the ground-plans are always distinct, very few rooms in the +city are perfect in form, and the whole is much more ruinous than I +thought. + +But this ruin once granted, and the idle disappointment at its +greatness overcome, there is endless material for study, instruction, +and delight. It is the revelation of another life, and the utterance +of the past is here more perfect than anywhere else in the world. +Indeed, I think that the true friend of Pompeii should make it a +matter of conscience, on entering the enchanted city, to cast out of +his knowledge all the rubbish that has fallen into it from novels and +travels, and to keep merely the facts of the town's luxurious life +and agonizing death, with such incidents of the eruption as he can +remember from the description of Pliny. These are the spells to +which the sorcery yields, and with these in your thought you can +rehabilitate the city until Ventisei seems to be a _valet de place_ of +the first century, and yourselves a set of blond barbarians to whom he +is showing off the splendors of one of the most brilliant towns of the +empire of Titus. Those sad furrows in the pavement become vocal with +the joyous rattle of chariot-wheels on a sudden, and you prudently +step up on the narrow sidewalks and rub along by the little shops +of wine, and grain, and oil, with which the thrifty voluptuaries of +Pompeii flanked their street-doors. The counters of these shops run +across their fronts, and are pierced with round holes on the top, +through which you see dark depths of oil in the jars below, and not +sullen lumps of ashes; those stately _amphoræ_ behind are full of +wine, and in the corners are bags of wheat. + +"This house, with a shop on either side, whose is it, XXVI.?" + +"It is the house of the great Sallust, my masters. Would you like his +autograph? I know one of his slaves who would sell it." + +You are a good deal stared at, naturally, as you pass by, for people +in Pompeii have not much to do, and, besides, a Briton is not an +every-day sight there, as he will be one of these centuries. The skins +of wild beasts are little worn in Pompeii; and those bold-eyed Roman +women think it rather odd that we should like to powder our shaggy +heads with brick-dust. However, these are matters of taste. We, for +our part, cannot repress a feeling of disgust at the loungers in the +street, who, XXVI. tells us, are all going to soak themselves half the +day in the baths yonder; for, if there is in Pompeii one thing more +offensive than another to our savage sense of propriety, it is the +personal cleanliness of the inhabitants. We little know what a change +for the better will be wrought in these people with the lapse of time, +and that they will yet come to wash themselves but once a year, as we +do. + +(The reader may go on doing this sort of thing at some length for +himself; and may imagine, if he pleases, a boastful conversation among +the Pompeians at the baths, in which the barbarians hear how Agricola +has broken the backbone of a rebellion in Britain; and in which all +the speakers begin their observations with "Ho! my Lepidus!" and "Ha! +my Diomed!" In the mean time we return to the present day, and step +down the Street of Plenty along with Ventisei.) + + +III. + +It is proper, after seeing the sites of some of the principal temples +in Pompeii (such as those of Jupiter and Venus), to cross the fields +that cover a great breadth of the buried city, and look into the +amphitheatre, where, as every body knows, the lions had no stomach +for Glaucus on the morning of the fatal eruption. The fields are now +planted with cotton, and of course we thought those commonplaces about +the wonder the Pompeians would feel could they come back to see that +New-World plant growing above their buried homes. We might have told +them, the day of our visit, that this cruel plant, so long watered +with the tears of slaves, and fed with the blood of men, was now an +exile from its native fields, where war was plowing with sword and +shot the guilty land, and rooting up the subtlest fibres of the +oppression in which cotton had grown king. And the ghosts of wicked +old Pompeii, remembering the manifold sins that called the fires of +hell to devour her, and thinking on this exiled plant, the latest +witness of God's unforgetting justice, might well have shuddered, +through all their shadow, to feel how terribly He destroys the enemies +of Nature and man. + +But the only Pompeian presences which haunted our passage of the +cotton-field were certain small + + "Phantoms of delight," + +with soft black eyes and graceful ways, who ran before us and plucked +the bolls of the cotton and sold them to us. Embassies bearing red and +white grapes were also sent out of the cottages to our excellencies; +and there was some doubt of the currency of the coin which we gave +these poor children in return. + +There are now but few peasants living on the land over the head of +Pompeii, and the Government allows no sales of real estate to be made +except to itself. The people who still dwell here can hardly be said +to own their possessions, for they are merely allowed to cultivate +the soil. A guard stationed night and day prevents them from making +excavations, and they are severely restricted from entering the +excavated quarters of the city alone. + +The cotton whitens over two thirds of Pompeii yet interred: happy the +generation that lives to learn the wondrous secrets of that sepulchre! +For, when you have once been at Pompeii, this phantasm of the past +takes deeper hold on your imagination than any living city, and +becomes and is the metropolis of your dreamland forever. O marvelous +city! who shall reveal the cunning of your spell? Something not +death, something not life--something that is the one when you turn +to determine its essence as the other! What is it comes to me at this +distance of that which I saw in Pompeii? The narrow and curving, but +not crooked streets, with the blazing sun of that Neapolitan November +falling into them, or clouding their wheel-worn lava with the black, +black shadows of the many-tinted walls; the houses, and the gay +columns of white, yellow, and red; the delicate pavements of mosaic; +the skeletons of dusty cisterns and dead fountains; inanimate garden +spaces with pygmy statues suited to their littleness; suites of fairy +bed-chambers, painted with exquisite frescos; dining-halls with +joyous scenes of hunt and banquet on their walls; the ruinous sites +of temples; the melancholy emptiness of booths and shops and jolly +drinking-houses; the lonesome tragic theatre, with a modern Pompeian +drawing water from a well there; the baths with their roofs perfect +yet, and the stucco bass-reliefs all but unharmed; around the whole, +the city wall crowned with slender poplars; outside the gates, the +long avenue of tombs, and the Appian Way stretching on to Stabiae; +and, in the distance, Vesuvius, brown and bare, with his fiery breath +scarce visible against the cloudless heaven;--these are the things +that float before my fancy as I turn back to look at myself walking +those enchanted streets, and to wonder if I could ever have been so +blest. + +For there is nothing on the earth, or under it, like Pompeii. + +The amphitheatre, to which we came now, after our stroll across the +cotton-fields, was small, like the vastest things in Pompeii, and had +nothing of the stately magnificence of the Arena at Verona, nor any +thing of the Roman Coliseum's melancholy and ruinous grandeur. But its +littleness made it all the more comfortable and social, and, seated +upon its benches under a cool awning, one could have almost chatted +across the arena with one's friends; could have witnessed the +spectacle on the sands without losing a movement of the quick +gladiators, or an agony of the victim given to the beasts--which must +have been very delightful to a Pompeian of companionable habits +and fine feelings. It is quite impossible, however, that the bouts +described by Bulwer as taking place all at the same time on the arena +should really have done so: the combatants would have rolled and +tumbled and trampled over each other an hundred times in the narrow +space. + +Of all the voices with which it once rang the poor little amphitheatre +has kept only an echo. But this echo is one of the most perfect ever +heard: prompt clear, startling, it blew back the light chaff we threw +to it with amazing vehemence, and almost made us doubt if it were not +a direct human utterance. Yet how was Ventisei to know our names? And +there was no one else to call them but ourselves. Our "_dolce duca_" +gathered a nosegay from the crumbling ledges, and sat down in the cool +of the once-cruel cells beneath, and put it prettily together for the +ladies. When we had wearied ourselves with the echo he arose and led +us back into Pompeii. + + +IV. + +The plans of nearly all the houses in the city are alike: the +entrance-room next the door; the parlor or drawing-room next that; +then the _impluvium_, or unroofed space in the middle of the house, +where the rains were caught and drained into the cistern, and where +the household used to come to wash itself, primitively, as at a pump; +the little garden, with its painted columns, behind the _impluvium_, +and, at last, the dining-room. There are minute bed-chambers on either +side, and, as I said, a shop at one side in front, for the sale of the +master's grain, wine, and oil. The pavements of all the houses are of +mosaic, which, in the better sort, is very delicate and beautiful, and +is found sometimes perfectly uninjured. An exquisite pattern, often +repeated, is a ground of tiny cubes of white marble with dots of black +dropped regularly into it. Of course there were many picturesque and +fanciful designs, of which the best have been removed to the Museum +in Naples; but several good ones are still left, and (like that of the +Wild Boar) give names to the houses in which they are found. + +But, after all, the great wonder, the glory, of these Pompeian houses +is in their frescos. If I tried to give an idea of the luxury of color +in Pompeii, the most gorgeous adjectives would be as poorly able to +reproduce a vivid and glowing sense of those hues as the photography +which now copies the drawing of the decorations; so I do not try. + +I know it is a cheap and feeble thought, and yet, let the reader +please to consider: A workman nearly two thousand years laying upon +the walls those soft lines that went to make up fauns and satyrs, +nymphs and naiads, heroes and gods and goddesses; and getting weary +and lying down to sleep, and dreaming of an eruption of the mountain; +of the city buried under a fiery hail, and slumbering in its bed of +ashes seventeen centuries; then of its being slowly exhumed, and, +after another lapse of years, of some one coming to gather the shadow +of that dreamer's work upon a plate of glass, that he might infinitely +reproduce it and sell it to tourists at from five francs to fifty +centimes a copy--I say, consider such a dream, dreamed in the hot +heart of the day, after certain cups of Vesuvian wine! What a piece of +_Katzenjämmer_ (I can use no milder term) would that workman think it +when he woke again! Alas! what is history and the progress of the arts +and sciences but one long _Katzenjämmer_! + +Photography cannot give, any more than I, the colors of the frescos, +but it can do the drawing better, and, I suspect, the spirit also. I +used the word workman, and not artist, in speaking of the decoration +of the walls, for in most cases the painter was only an artisan, and +did his work probably by the yard, as the artisan who paints walls and +ceilings in Italy does at this day. But the old workman did his work +much more skillfully and tastefully than the modern--threw on expanses +of mellow color, delicately paneled off the places for the scenes, and +penciled in the figures and draperies (there are usually more of the +one than the other) with a deft hand. Of course, the houses of the +rich were adorned by men of talent; but it is surprising to see the +community of thought and feeling in all this work, whether it be from +cunninger or clumsier hands. The subjects are nearly always chosen +from the fables of the gods, and they are in illustration of the +poets, Homer and the rest. To suit that soft, luxurious life which +people led in Pompeii, the themes are commonly amorous, and sometimes +not too chaste; there is much of Bacchus and Ariadne, much of Venus +and Adonis, and Diana bathes a good deal with her nymphs,--not to +mention frequent representations of the toilet of that beautiful +monster which the lascivious art of the time loved to depict. One of +the most pleasing of all the scenes is that in one of the houses, of +the Judgment of Paris, in which the shepherd sits upon a bank in +an attitude of ineffable and flattered importance, with one leg +carelessly crossing the other, and both hands resting lightly on his +shepherd's crook, while the goddesses before him await his sentence. +Naturally the painter has done his best for the victress in this +rivalry, and you see + + "Idalian Aphrodite beautiful," + +as she should be, but with a warm and piquant spice of girlish +resentment in her attitude, that Paris should pause for an instant, +which is altogether delicious. + + "And I beheld great Here's angry eyes." + +Awful eyes! How did the painter make them? The wonder of all these +pagan frescos is the mystery of the eyes--still, beautiful, unhuman. +You cannot believe that it is wrong for those tranquil-eyed men and +women to do evil, they look so calm and so unconscious in it all; and +in the presence of the celestials, as they bend upon you those eternal +orbs, in whose regard you are but a part of space, you feel that here +art has achieved the unearthly. I know of no words in literature which +give a _sense_ (nothing gives the idea) of the _stare_ of these gods, +except that magnificent line of Kingsley's, describing the advance +over the sea toward Andromeda of the oblivious and unsympathizing +Nereids. They floated slowly up, and their eyes + + "Stared on her, silent and still, like the eyes in the house + of the idols." + +The colors of this fresco of the Judgment of Paris are still so fresh +and bright, that it photographs very well, but there are other frescos +wherein there is more visible perfection of line, but in which the +colors are so dim that they can only be reproduced by drawings. One of +these is the Wounded Adonis cared for by Venus and the Loves; in which +the story is treated with a playful pathos wonderfully charming. +The fair boy leans in the languor of his hurt toward Venus, who sits +utterly disconsolate beside him, while the Cupids busy themselves +with such slight surgical offices as Cupids may render: one prepares a +linen bandage for the wound, another wraps it round the leg of Adonis, +another supports one of his heavy arms, another finds his own emotions +too much for him and pauses to weep. It is a pity that the colors of +this beautiful fresco are grown so dim, and a greater pity that most +of the other frescos in Pompeii must share its fate, and fade away. +The hues are vivid when the walls are first uncovered, and the ashes +washed from the pictures, but then the malice of the elements begins +anew, and rain and sun draw the life out of tints which the volcano +failed to obliterate. In nearly all cases they could be preserved +by throwing a roof above the walls, and it is a wonder that the +Government does not take this slight trouble to save them. + +Among the frescos which told no story but their own, we were most +pleased with one in a delicately painted little bed-chamber. This +represented an alarmed and furtive man, whom we at once pronounced The +Belated Husband, opening a door with a night-latch. Nothing could have +been better than this miserable wretch's cowardly haste and cautious +noiselessness in applying his key; apprehension sat upon his brow, +confusion dwelt in his guilty eye. He had been out till two o'clock +in the morning, electioneering for Pansa, the friend of the people +("Pansa, and Roman gladiators," "Pansa, and Christians to the Beasts," +was the platform), and he had left his _placens uxor_ at home alone +with the children, and now within this door that _placens uxor_ +awaited him! + + +V. + +You have read, no doubt, of their discovering, a year or two since, +in making an excavation in a Pompeian street, the molds of four human +bodies, three women and a man, who fell down, blind and writhing, in +the storm of fire eighteen hundred years ago; whose shape the settling +and hardening ashes took; whose flesh wasted away, and whose bones lay +there in the hollow of the matrix till the cunning of this time found +them, and, pouring liquid plaster round the skeletons, clothed them +with human form again, and drew them forth into the world once more. +There are many things in Pompeii which bring back the gay life of the +city, but nothing which so vividly reports the terrible manner of her +death as these effigies of the creatures that actually shared it. The +man in the last struggle has thrown himself upon his back and taken +his doom sturdily--there is a sublime calm in his rigid figure. The +women lie upon their faces, their limbs tossed and distorted, their +drapery tangled and heaped about them, and in every fibre you see how +hard they died. One presses her face into her handkerchief to draw +one last breath unmixed with scalding steam; another's arms are wildly +thrown abroad to clutch at help; another's hand is appealingly raised, +and on her slight fingers you see the silver hoops with which her poor +dead vanity adorned them. + +The guide takes you aside from the street into the house where they +lie, and a dreadful shadow drops upon your heart as you enter their +presence. Without, the hell-storm seems to fall again, and the whole +sunny plain to be darkened with its ruin, and the city to send up the +tumult of her despair. + +What is there left in Pompeii to speak of after this? The long street +of tombs outside the walls? Those that died before the city's burial +seem to have scarcely a claim to the solemnity of death. + +Shall we go see Diomed's Villa, and walk through the freedman's long +underground vaults, where his friends thought to be safe, and were +smothered in heaps? The garden-ground grows wild among its broken +columns with weeds and poplar saplings; in one of the corridors they +sell photographs, on which, if you please, Ventisei has his bottle, +or drink-money. So we escape from the doom of the calamity, and so, at +last, the severely forbidden _buonamano_ is paid. A dog may die many +deaths besides choking with butter. + +We return slowly through the city, where we have spent the whole day, +from nine till four o'clock. We linger on the way, imploring Ventisei +if there is not something to be seen in this or that house; we make +our weariness an excuse for sitting down, and cannot rend ourselves +from the bliss of being in Pompeii. + +At last we leave its gates, and swear each other to come again many +times while in Naples, and never go again. + +Perhaps it was as well. You cannot repeat great happiness. + + + + +IX. + +A HALF-HOUR AT HERCULANEUM. + +I. + +The road from Naples to Herculaneum is, in fact, one long street; it +hardly ceases to be city in Naples till it is town at Portici, and in +the interval it is suburb, running between palatial lines of villas, +which all have their names ambitiously painted over their doors. Great +part of the distance this street is bordered by the bay, and, as far +as this is the case, it is picturesque, as every thing is belonging to +marine life in Italy. Sea-faring people go lounging up and down among +the fishermen's boats drawn up on the shore, and among the fishermen's +wives making nets, while the fishermen's children play and clamber +everywhere, and over all flap and flutter the clothes hung on poles +to dry. In this part of the street there are, of course, oysters, and +grapes, and oranges, and cactus-pulps, and cutlery, and iced drinks +to sell at various booths; and Commerce is exceedingly dramatic and +boisterous over the bargains she offers; and equally, of course, +murderous drinking shops lurk at intervals along the pavement, and +lure into their recesses mariners of foreign birth, briefly ashore +from their ships. The New York Coffee House is there to attract my +maritime fellow-countrymen, and I know that if I look into that place +of refreshment I shall see their honest, foolish faces flushed with +drink, and with the excitement of buying the least they can for the +most money. Poor souls! they shall drink that pleasant morning away +in the society of Antonino the best of Neapolitans, and at midnight, +emptied of every soldo, shall arise, wrung with a fearful suspicion +of treachery, and wander away under Antonino's guidance to seek the +protection of the Consul; or, taking the law into their own hands, +shall proceed to clean out, _more Americano_, the New York Coffee +House, when Antonino shall develop into one of the landlords, and +deal them the most artistic stab in Naples: handsome, worthy Antonino; +tender-eyed, subtle, pitiless! + + +II. + +Where the road to Herculaneum leaves the bay and its seafaring life, +it enters, between the walls of lofty, fly-blown houses, a world of +maccaroni haunted by foul odors, beggars, poultry, and insects. There +were few people to be seen on the street, but through the open doors +of the lofty fly-blown houses we saw floury legions at work making +maccaroni; grinding maccaroni, rolling it, cutting it, hanging it +in mighty skeins to dry, and gathering it when dried, and putting it +away. By the frequency of the wine-shops we judged that the legions +were a thirsty host, and by the number of the barber-surgeons' shops, +that they were a plethoric and too full-blooded host. The latter shops +were in the proportion of one to five of the former; and the artist +who had painted their signs had indulged his fancy in wild excesses of +phlebotomy. We had found that, as we came south from Venice, science +grew more and more sanguinary in Italy, and more and more disposed to +let blood. At Ferrara, even, the propensity began to be manifest on +the barbers' signs, which displayed the device of an arm lanced at +the elbow, and jetting the blood by a neatly described curve into a +tumbler. Further south the same arm was seen to bleed at the wrist +also; and at Naples an exhaustive treatment of the subject appeared, +the favorite study of the artist being to represent a nude figure +reclining in a genteel attitude on a bank of pleasant greensward, and +bleeding from the elbows, wrists, hands, ankles, and feet. + + +III. + +In Naples everywhere one is surprised by the great number of English +names which appear on business houses, but it was entirely bewildering +to read a bill affixed to the gate of one of the villas on this road: +"This Desirable Property for Sale." I should scarcely have cared to +buy that desirable property, though the neighborhood seemed to be a +favorite summer resort, and there were villas, as I said, nearly the +whole way to Portici. Those which stood with their gardens toward the +bay would have been tolerable, no doubt, if they could have kept their +windows shut to the vile street before their doors; but the houses +opposite could have had no escape from its stench and noisomeness. It +was absolutely the filthiest street I have seen anywhere outside of +New York, excepting only that little street which, in Herculaneum, +leads from the theatre to the House of Argo. + +This pleasant avenue has a stream of turbid water in its centre, +bordered by begging children, and is either fouler or cleaner for the +water, but I shall never know which. It is at a depth of some fifty or +sixty feet below the elevation on which the present city of Portici is +built, and is part of the excavation made long ago to reach the plain +on which Herculaneum stands, buried under its half-score of successive +layers of lava, and ashes, and Portici. We had the aid of all the +virtuous poverty and leisure of the modern town--there was a vast +deal of both, we found--in our search for the staircase by which you +descend to the classic plain, and it proved a discovery involving the +outlay of all the copper coin about us, while the sight of the famous +theatre of Herculaneum was much more expensive than it would have been +had we come there in the old time to see a play of Plautus or Terence. + +As for the theatre, "the large and highly ornamented theatre" of which +I read, only a little while ago, in an encyclopedia, we found it, by +the light of our candles, a series of gloomy hollows, of the general +complexion of coal-bins and potato-cellars. It was never perfectly +dug out of the lava, and, as is known, it was filled up in the last +century, together with other excavations, when they endangered the +foundations of worthless Portici overhead. (I am amused to find myself +so hot upon the poor property-holders of Portici. I suppose I should +not myself, even for the cause of antiquity and the knowledge of +classic civilization, like to have my house tumbled about my ears.) +But though it was impossible in the theatre of Herculaneum to gain +any idea of its size or richness, I remembered there the magnificent +bronzes which had been found in it, and did a hasty reverence to +the place. Indeed, it is amazing, when one sees how small a part of +Herculaneum has been uncovered, to consider the number of fine works +of art in the Museo Borbonico which were taken thence, and which argue +a much richer and more refined community than that of Pompeii. A third +of the latter city has now been restored to the light of day; but +though it has yielded abundance of all the things that illustrate the +domestic and public life, and the luxury and depravity of those old +times, and has given the once secret rooms of the museum their worst +attraction, it still falls far below Herculaneum in the value of its +contributions to the treasures of classic art, except only in the +variety and beauty of its exquisite frescos. + +The effect of this fact is to stimulate the imagination of the visitor +to that degree that nothing short of the instant destruction of +Portici and the excavation of all Herculaneum will satisfy him. If the +opening of one theatre, and the uncovering of a basilica and two +or three houses, have given such richness to us, what delight and +knowledge would not the removal of these obdurate hills of ashes and +lava bestow! + +Emerging from the coal-bins and potato-cellars, the visitor +extinguishes his candle with a pathetic sigh, profusely rewards the +custodian (whom he connects in some mysterious way with the ancient +population of the injured city about him), and, thoughtfully removing +the tallow from his fingers, follows the course of the vile stream +already sung, and soon arrives at the gate opening into the exhumed +quarter of Herculaneum. And there he finds a custodian who enters +perfectly into his feelings; a custodian who has once been a guide in +Pompeii, but now despises that wretched town, and would not be +guide there for any money since he has known the superior life of +Herculaneum; who, in fine, feels toward Pompeii as a Bostonian feels +toward New York. Yet the reader would be wrong to form the idea that +there is bitterness in the disdain of this custodian. On the contrary, +he is one of the best-natured men in the world. He is a mighty mass of +pinguid bronze, with a fat lisp, and a broad, sunflower smile, and +he lectures us with a vast and genial breadth of manner on the +ruins, contradicting all our guesses at things with a sweet "Perdoni, +signori! ma----." At the end, we find that he has some medallions of +lava to sell: there is Victor Emanuel, or, if we are of the _partito +d'azione_, there is Garibaldi; both warm yet from the crater of +Vesuvius, and of the same material which destroyed Herculaneum. We +decline to buy and the custodian makes the national shrug and grimace +(signifying that we are masters of the situation, and that he washes +his hands of the consequence of our folly) on the largest scale that +we have ever seen: his mighty hands are rigidly thrust forth, his +great lip protruded, his enormous head thrown back to bring his +face on a level with his chin. The effect is tremendous, but we +nevertheless feel that he loves us the same. + + +IV. + +The afternoon on which we visited Herculaneum was in melancholy +contrast to the day we spent in Pompeii. The lingering summer had at +last saddened into something like autumnal gloom, and that blue, blue +sky of Naples was overcast. So, this second draught of the spirit +of the past had not only something of the insipidity of custom, but +brought rather a depression than a lightness to our hearts. There was +so little of Herculaneum: only a few hundred yards square are exhumed, +and we counted the houses easily on the fingers of one hand, leaving +the thumb to stand for the few rods of street that, with its flagging +of lava and narrow border of foot-walks, lay between; and though the +custodian, apparently moved at our dejection, said that the excavation +was to be resumed the very next week, the assurance did little to +restore our cheerfulness. Indeed, I fancy that these old cities must +needs be seen in the sunshine by those who would feel what gay lives +they once led; by dimmer light they are very sullen spectres, and +their doom still seems to brood upon them. I know that even Pompeii +could not have been joyous that sunless afternoon, for what there was +to see of mournful Herculaneum was as brilliant with colors as any +thing in the former city. Nay, I believe that the tints of the frescos +and painted columns were even brighter, and that the walls of the +houses were far less ruinous than those of Pompeii. But no house was +wholly freed from lava, and the little street ran at the rear of the +buildings which were supposed to front on some grander avenue not yet +exhumed. It led down, as the custodian pretended, to a wharf, and he +showed an iron ring in the wall of the House of Argo, standing at the +end of the street, to which, he said, his former fellow-citizens used +to fasten their boats, though it was all dry enough there now. + +There is evidence in Herculaneum of much more ambitious domestic +architecture than seems to have been known in Pompeii. The ground-plan +of the houses in the two cities is alike; but in the former there was +often a second story, as was proven by the charred ends of beams still +protruding from the walls, while in the latter there is only one house +which is thought to have aspired to a second floor. The House of Argo +is also much larger than any in Pompeii, and its appointments were +more magnificent. Indeed, we imagined that in this more purely +Greek town we felt an atmosphere of better taste in every thing than +prevailed in the fashionable Roman watering-place, though this, too, +was a summer resort of the "best society" of the empire. The mosaic +pavements were exquisite, and the little bed-chambers dainty and +delicious in their decorations. The lavish delight in color found +expression in the vividest hues upon the walls, and not only were the +columns of the garden painted, but the foliage of the capitals was +variously tinted. The garden of the House of Argo was vaster than any +of the classic world which we had yet seen, and was superb with a +long colonnade of unbroken columns. Between these and the walls of +the houses was a pretty pathway of mosaic, and in the midst once stood +marble tables, under which the workmen exhuming the city found certain +crouching skeletons. At one end was the dining-room, of course, and +painted on the wall was a lady with a parasol. + +I thought all Herculaneum sad enough, but the profusion of flowers +growing wild in this garden gave it a yet more tender and pathetic +charm. Here--where so long ago the flowers had bloomed, and perished +in the terrible blossoming of the mountain that sent up its fires +in the awful similitude of Nature's harmless and lovely forms, and +showered its destroying petals all abroad--was it not tragic to find +again the soft tints, the graceful shapes, the sweet perfumes of the +earth's immortal life? Of them that planted and tended and plucked and +bore in their bosoms and twined in their hair these fragile children +of the summer, what witness in the world? Only the crouching skeletons +under the tables. Alas and alas! + + +V. + +The skeletons went with us throughout Herculaneum, and descended +into the cell, all green with damp, under the basilica, and lay down, +fettered and manacled in the place of those found there beside the big +bronze kettle in which the prisoners used to cook their dinners. How +ghastly the thought of it was! If we had really seen this kettle and +the skeletons there--as we did not--we could not have suffered more +than we did. They took all the life out of the House of Perseus, and +the beauty from his pretty little domestic temple to the Penates, and +this was all there was left in Herculaneum to see. + +"Is there nothing else?" we demand of the custodian. + +"Signori, this is all." + +"It is mighty little." + +"Perdoni, signori! ma----." + +"Well," we say sourly to each other, glancing round at the walls of +the pit, on the bottom of which the bit of city stands, "it is a good +thing to know that Herculaneum amounts to nothing." + + + + +X. + +CAPRI AND CAPRIOTES. + +I. + +I have no doubt + + "Calm Capri waits," + +where we left it, in the Gulf of Salerno, for any traveller who may +choose to pay it a visit; but at the time we were there we felt that +it was on exhibition for that day only, and would, when we departed, +disappear in its sapphire sea, and be no more; just as Niagara ceases +to play as soon as your back is turned, and Venice goes out like a +pyrotechnic display, and all marvelously grand and lovely things make +haste to prove their impermanence. + +We delayed some days in Naples in hopes of fine weather, and at last +chose a morning that was warm and cloudy at nine o'clock, and burst +into frequent passions of rain before we reached Sorrento at noon +The first half of the journey was made by rail, and brought us to +Castellamare, whence we took carriage for Sorrento, and oranges, and +rapture,--winding along the steep shore of the sea, and under the +brows of wooded hills that rose high above us into the misty weather, +and caught here and there the sunshine on their tops. In that heavenly +climate no day can long be out of humor, and at Sorrento we found +ours very pleasant, and rode delightedly through the devious streets, +looking up to the terraced orange-groves on one hand, and down to the +terraced orange-groves on the other, until at a certain turning of the +way we encountered Antonino Occhio d'Argento, whom fate had appointed +to be our boatman to Capri. We had never heard of Antonino before, and +indeed had intended to take a boat from one of the hotels; but when +this corsair offered us his services, there was that guile in his +handsome face, that cunning in his dark eyes, that heart could not +resist, and we halted our carriage and took him at once. + +He kept his boat in one of those caverns which honey-comb the cliff +under Sorrento, and afford a natural and admirable shelter for such +small craft as may be dragged up out of reach of the waves, and here I +bargained with him before finally agreeing to go with him to Capri. +In Italy it is customary for a public carrier when engaged to give +his employer as a pledge the sum agreed upon for the service, which is +returned with the amount due him, at the end, if the service has been +satisfactory; and I demanded of Antonino this _caparra_, as it is +called. "What _caparra_?" said he, lifting the lid of his wicked eye +with his forefinger, "this is the best _caparra_," meaning a face +as honest and trustworthy as the devil's. The stroke confirmed my +subjection to Antonino, and I took his boat without further parley, +declining even to feel the muscle of his boatmen's arms, which he +exposed to my touch in evidence that they were strong enough to row us +swiftly to Capri. The men were but two in number, but they tossed the +boat lightly into the surf, and then lifted me aboard, and rowed to +the little pier from which the ladies and T. got in. + +The sun shone, the water danced and sparkled, and presently we raised +our sail, and took the gale that blew for Capri--an oblong height +rising ten miles beyond out of the heart of the azure gulf. On the way +thither there was little interest but that of natural beauty in the +bold, picturesque coast we skirted for some distance; though on +one mighty rock there were the ruins of a seaward-looking Temple of +Hercules, with arches of the unmistakable Roman masonry, below +which the receding waves rushed and poured over a jetting ledge in a +thunderous cataract. + +Antonino did his best to entertain us, and lectured us unceasingly +upon his virtue and his wisdom, dwelling greatly on the propriety and +good policy of always speaking the truth. This spectacle of veracity +became intolerable after a while, and I was goaded to say: "Oh then, +if you never tell lies, you expect to go to Paradise." "Not at all," +answered Antonino compassionately, "for I have sinned much. But the +lie doesn't go ahead" (_non va avanti_), added this Machiavelli of +boatmen; yet I think he was mistaken, for he deceived us with perfect +ease and admirable success. All along, he had pretended that we could +see Capri, visit the Blue Grotto, and return that day; but as we drew +near the island, painful doubts began to trouble him, and he feared +the sea would be too rough for the Grotto part of the affair. "But +there will be an old man," he said, with a subtile air of prophecy, +"waiting for us on the beach. This old man is one of the Government +guides to the Grotto, and he will say whether it is to be seen +to-day." + +And certainly there was the old man on the beach--a short patriarch, +with his baldness covered by a kind of bloated woolen sock--a +blear-eyed sage, and a bare-legged. He waded through the surf toward +the boat, and when we asked him whether the Grotto was to be seen, he +paused knee-deep in the water, (at a secret signal from Antonino, as +I shall always believe,) put on a face of tender solemnity, threw back +his head a little, brought his hand to his cheek, expanded it, and +said, "No; to-day, no! To-morrow, yes!" Antonino leaped joyously +ashore, and delivered us over to the old man, to be guided to the +Hotel di Londra, while he drew his boat upon the land. He had reason +to be contented, for this artifice of the patriarch of Capri relieved +him from the necessity of verifying to me the existence of an officer +of extraordinary powers in the nature of a consul, who, he said, would +not permit boats to leave Capri for the main-land after five o'clock +in the evening. + +When it was decided that we should remain on the island till the +morrow, we found so much time on our hands, after bargaining for +our lodging at the Hotel di Londra, that we resolved to ascend the +mountain to the ruins of the palaces of Tiberius, and to this end we +contracted for the services of certain of the muletresses that had +gathered about the inn-gate, clamorously offering their beasts. The +muletresses chosen were a matron of mature years and of a portly habit +of body; her daughter, a mere child; and her niece, a very pretty girl +of eighteen, with a voice soft and sweet as a bird's. They placed +the ladies, one on each mule, and then, while the mother and daughter +devoted themselves to the hind-quarters of the foremost animal, +the lovely niece brought up the rear of the second beast, and the +patriarch went before, and T. and I trudged behind. So the cavalcade +ascended; first, from the terrace of the hotel overlooking the bit +of shipping village on the beach, and next from the town of Capri, +clinging to the hill-sides, midway between sea and sky, until at last +it reached the heights on which the ruins stand. Our way was through +narrow lanes, bordered by garden walls; then through narrow streets +bordered by dirty houses; and then again by gardens, but now of a +better sort than the first, and belonging to handsome villas. + +On the road our pretty muletress gossiped cheerfully, and our +patriarch gloomily, and between the two we accumulated a store of +information concerning the present inhabitants of Capri, which, I am +sorry to say, has now for the most part failed me. I remember that +they said most of the land-owners at Capri were Neapolitans, and that +these villas were their country-houses; though they pointed out one +of the stateliest of the edifices as belonging to a certain English +physician who had come to visit Capri for a few days, and had now been +living on the island twenty years, having married (said the +muletress) the prettiest and poorest girl in the town, from this +romance--something like which the muletress seemed to think might +well happen concerning herself--we passed lightly to speak of kindred +things, the muletress responding gayly between the blows she bestowed +upon her beast. The accent of these Capriotes has something of German +harshness and heaviness: they say _non bosso_ instead of _non posso_, +and _monto_ instead of _mondo_, and interchange the _t_ and _d_ a good +deal; and they use for father the Latin _pater_, instead of _padre_. +But this girl's voice, as I said, was very musical, and the island's +accent was sweet upon her tongue. + +_I_.--What is your name? + +_She_.--Caterina, little sir (signorin). + +_I_.--And how old are you, Caterina? + +_She_.--Eighteen, little sir. + +_I_.--And you are betrothed? + +She feigns not to understand; but the patriarch, who has dropped +behind to listen to our discourse, explains,--"He asks if you are in +love." + +_She_.--Ah, no! little sir, not yet. + +_I_.--No? A little late, it seems to me. I think there must be some +good-looking youngster who pleases you--no? + +_She_.--Ah, no! one must work, one cannot think of marrying. We are +four sisters, and we have only the _buonamano_ from hiring these +mules, and we must spin and cook. + +_The Patriarch_.--Don't believe her; she has two lovers. + +_She._--Ah, no! It isn't true. He tells a fib--he! + +But, nevertheless, she seemed to love to be accused of lovers,--such +is the guile of the female heart in Capri,--and laughed over the +patriarch's wickedness. She confided that she ate maccaroni once +a day, and she talked constantly of eating it just as the Northern +Italians always talk of _polenta._ She was a true daughter of the +isle, and had never left it but once in her life, when she went to +Naples. "Naples was beautiful, yes; but one always loves one's own +country the best." She was very attentive and good, but at the end was +rapacious of more and more _buonamano_. "Have patience with her, sir," +said the blameless Antonino, who witnessed her greediness; "they do +not understand certain matters here, poor little things!" + +As for the patriarch, he was full of learning relative to himself and +to Capri; and told me with much elaboration that the islanders lived +chiefly by fishing, and gained something also by their vineyards. But +they were greatly oppressed by taxes, and the strict enforcement +of the conscriptions, and they had little love for the Italian +Government, and wished the Bourbons back again. The Piedmontese, +indeed, misgoverned them horribly. There was the Blue Grotto, for +example: formerly travellers paid the guides five, six, ten francs for +viewing it; but now the Piedmontese had made a tariff, and the poor +guides could only exact a franc from each person. Things were in a +ruinous condition. + +By this we had arrived at a little inn on the top of the mountain, +very near the ruins of the palaces, "Here," said the patriarch, "it is +customary for strangers to drink a bottle of the wine of Tiberius." We +obediently entered the hostelry, and the landlord--a white-toothed, +brown-faced, good-humored peasant--gallantly ran forward and presented +the ladies with bouquets of roses. We thought it a pretty and graceful +act, but found later that it was to be paid for, like all pretty and +graceful things in Italy; for when we came to settle for the wine, and +the landlord wanted more than justice, he urged that he had presented +the ladies with flowers,--yet he equally gave me his benediction when +I refused to pay for his politeness. + +"Now here," again said the patriarch in a solemn whisper, "you can see +the Tarantella danced for two francs; whereas down at your inn, if you +hire the dancers through your landlord, it will cost you five or six +francs." The difference was tempting, and decided us in favor of an +immediate Tarantella. The muletresses left their beasts to browse +about the door of the inn and came into the little public room, where +were already the wife and sister of the landlord, and took their +places _vis-à-vis_, while the landlord seized his tambourine and +beat from it a wild and lively measure. The women were barefooted +and hoopless, and they gave us the Tarantella with all the beauty of +natural movement and free floating drapery, and with all that splendid +grace of pose which animates the antique statues and pictures of +dancers. They swayed themselves in time with the music; then, filled +with its passionate impulse, advanced and retreated and whirled +away;--snapping their fingers above their heads, and looking over +their shoulders with a gay and a laughing challenge to each other, +they drifted through the ever-repeated figures of flight and wooing, +and wove for us pictures of delight that remained upon the brain like +the effect of long-pondered vivid colors, and still return to illumine +and complete any representation of that indescribable dance. Heaven +knows what peril there might have been in the beauty and grace of the +pretty muletress but for the spectacle of her fat aunt, who, I must +confess, could only burlesque some of her niece's airiest movements, +and whose hard-bought buoyancy was at once pathetic and laughable. She +earned her share of the spoils certainly, and she seemed glad when the +dance was over, and went contentedly back to her mule. + +The patriarch had early retired from the scene as from a vanity with +which he was too familiar for enjoyment, and I found him, when the +Tarantella was done, leaning on the curb of the precipitous rock +immediately behind the inn, over which the Capriotes say Tiberius used +to cast the victims of his pleasures after he was sated with them. +These have taken their place in the insular imagination as Christian +martyrs, though it is probable that the poor souls were any thing but +Nazarenes. It took a stone thrown from the brink of the rock twenty +seconds to send back a response from the water below, and the depth +was too dizzying to look into. So we looked instead toward Amalfi, +across the Gulf of Salerno, and toward Naples, across her bay. On +every hand the sea was flushed with sunset, and an unspeakable calm +dwelt upon it, while the heights rising from it softened and softened +in the distance, and withdrew themselves into dreams of ghostly +solitude and phantom city. His late majesty the Emperor Tiberius is +well known to have been a man of sentiment, and he may often have +sought this spot to enjoy the evening hour. It was convenient to his +palace, and he could here give a fillip to his jaded sensibilities +by popping a boon companion over the cliff, and thus enjoy the fine +poetic contrast which his perturbed and horrible spirit afforded to +that scene of innocence and peace. Later he may have come hither also, +when lust failed, when all the lewd plays and devices of his fancy +palled upon his senses, when sin had grown insipid and even murder +ceased to amuse, and his majesty uttered his despair to the Senate in +that terrible letter: "What to write to you, or how to write, I +know not; and what not to write at this time, may all the gods and +goddesses torment me wore than I daily feel that I suffer if I do +know." + +The poor patriarch was also a rascal in his small way, and he +presently turned to me with a countenance full of cowardly trouble and +base remorse, "I pray you, little sir, not to tell the landlord +below there that you have seen the Tarantella danced here; for he has +daughters and friends to dance it for strangers, and gets a deal of +money by it. So, if he asks you to see it, do me the pleasure to say, +lest he should take on (_pigliarsi_) with me about it: 'Thanks, but we +saw the Tarantella at Pompeii!'" It was the last place in Italy where +we were likely to have seen the Tarantella; but these simple people +are improvident in lying, as in every thing else. + +The patriarch had a curious spice of malice in him, which prompted +him to speak evil of all, and to as many as he dared. After we had +inspected the ruins of the emperor's villa, a clownish imbecile of +a woman, professing to be the wife of the peasant who had made the +excavations, came forth out of a cleft in the rock and received +tribute of us--why, I do not know. The patriarch abetted the +extortion, but Parthianly remarked, as we turned away, "Her husband +ought to be here; but this is a _festa_, and he is drinking and gaming +in the village," while the woman protested that he was sick at home. +There was also a hermit living in great publicity among the ruins, and +the patriarch did not spare him a sneering comment. [This hermit I +have heard was not brought up to the profession of anchorite, but was +formerly a shoemaker, and according to his own confession abandoned +his trade because he could better indulge a lethargic habit in the +character of religious recluse.] He had even a bad word for Tiberius, +and reproached the emperor for throwing people over the cliff, though +I think it a sport in which he would himself have liked to join. The +only human creatures with whom he seemed to be in sympathy were the +brigands of the main-land, of whom he spoke poetically as exiles and +fugitives. + +As for the palace of Tiberius, which we had come go far and so +toilsomely to see, it must be confessed there was very little left +of it. When that well-meaning but mistaken prince died, the Senate +demolished his pleasure-houses at Capri, and left only those +fragments of the beautiful brick masonry which yet remain, clinging +indestructible to the rocks, and strewing the ground with rubbish. The +recent excavations have discovered nothing besides the uninteresting +foundations of the building, except a subterranean avenue leading +from one part of the palace to another: this is walled with delicate +brickwork, and exquisitely paved with white marble mosaic; and this +was all that witnessed of the splendor of the wicked emperor. Nature, +the all-forgetting, all-forgiving, that takes the red battle-field +into her arms and hides it with blossom and harvest, could not +remember his iniquity, greater than the multitudinous murder of war. +The sea, which the despot's lust and fear had made so lonely, slept +with the white sails of boats secure upon its breast; the little bays +and inlets, the rocky clefts and woody dells, had forgotten their +desecration; and the gathering twilight, the sweetness of the +garden-bordered pathway, and the serenity of the lonely landscape, +helped us to doubt history. + +We slowly returned to the inn by the road we had ascended, noting +again the mansion of the surprising Englishman who had come to Capri +for three months and had remained thirty years; passed through the +darkness of the village,--dropped here and there with the vivid red of +a lamp,--and so reached the inn at last, where we found the landlord +ready to have the Tarantella danced for us. We framed a discreeter +fiction than that prepared for us by the patriarch, and went in to +dinner, where there were two Danish gentlemen in dispute with as many +rogues of boatmen, who, having contracted to take them back that night +to Naples, were now trying to fly their bargain and remain at Capri +till the morrow. The Danes beat them, however, and then sat down +to dinner, and to long stories of the imposture and villany of the +Italians. One of them chiefly bewailed himself that the day before, +having unwisely eaten a dozen oysters without agreeing first with the +oyster-man upon the price, he had been obliged to pay this scamp's +extortionate demand to the full, since he was unable to restore him +his property. We thought that something like this might have happened +to an imprudent man in any country, but we did not the less join him +in abusing the Italians--the purpose for which foreigners chiefly +visit Italy. + + +II. + +Standing on the height among the ruins of Tiberius's palace, the +patriarch had looked out over the waters, and predicted for the morrow +the finest weather that had ever been known in that region; but in +spite of this prophecy the day dawned stormily, and at breakfast time +we looked out doubtfully on waves lashed by driving rain. The entrance +to the Blue Grotto, to visit which we had come to Capri, is by a +semicircular opening, some three feet in width and two feet in height, +and just large enough to admit a small boat. One lies flat in the +bottom of this, waits for the impulse of a beneficent wave, and is +carried through the mouth of the cavern, and rescued from it in like +manner by some receding billow. When the wind is in the wrong quarter, +it is impossible to enter the grot at all; and we waited till nine +o'clock for the storm to abate before we ventured forth. In the mean +time one of the Danish gentlemen, who--after assisting his companion +to compel the boatmen to justice the night before--had stayed at +Capri, and had risen early to see the grotto, returned from it, and we +besieged him with a hundred questions concerning it. But he preserved +the wise silence of the boy who goes in to see the six-legged calf, +and comes out impervious to the curiosity of all the boys who are +doubtful whether the monster is worth their money. Our Dane would +merely say that it was now possible to visit the Blue Grotto; that he +had seen it; that he was glad he _had_ seen it. As to its blueness, +Messieurs--yes, it is blue. _C'est i dire_.... + +The ladies had been amusing themselves with a perusal of the hotel +register, and the notes of admiration or disgust with which the +different sojourners at the inn had filled it. As a rule, the English +people found fault with the poor little hostelry and the French people +praised it. Commander Joshing and Lieutenant Prattent, R.N., of +the former nation, "were cheated by the donkey women, and thought +themselves extremely fortunate to have escaped with their lives from +the effects of Capri vintage. The landlord was an old Cossack." On the +other hand, we read, "J. Cruttard, homme de lettres, a passè quinze +jours ici, et n'a eu que des félicités du patron de cêt hôtel et de sa +famille." Cheerful man of letters! His good-natured record will keep +green a name little known to literature. Who are G. Bradshaw, Duke +of New York, and Signori Jones and Andrews, Hereditary Princes of the +United States? Their patrician names followed the titles of several +English nobles in the register. But that which most interested the +ladies in this record was the warning of a terrified British matron +against any visit to the Blue Grotto except in the very calmest +weather. The British matron penned her caution after an all but fatal +experience. The ladies read it aloud to us, and announced that for +themselves they would be contented with pictures of the Blue Grotto +and our account of its marvels. + +On the beach below the hotel lay the small boats of the guides to the +Blue Grotto, and we descended to take one of them. The fixed rate is a +franc for each person. The boatmen wanted five francs for each of us. +We explained that although not indigenous to Capri, or even Italy, +we were not of the succulent growth of travellers, and would not be +eaten. We retired to our vantage ground on the heights. The guides +called us to the beach again. They would take us for three francs +apiece, or say six francs for both of us. We withdrew furious to the +heights again, where we found honest Antonino, who did us the pleasure +to yell to his fellow-scoundrels on the beach, "You had better take +these signori for a just price. They are going to the syndic to +complain of you." At which there arose a lamentable outcry among the +boatmen, and they called with one voice for us to come down and go +for a franc apiece. This fable teaches that common-carriers are rogues +everywhere; but that whereas we are helpless in their hands at home, +we may bully them into rectitude in Italy, where they are afraid of +the law. + +We had scarcely left the landing of the hotel in the boat of the +patriarch--for I need hardly say he was first and most rapacious of +the plundering crew--when we found ourselves in very turbulent waters, +in the face of mighty bluffs, rising inaccessible from the sea. Here +and there, where their swarthy fronts were softened with a little +verdure, goat-paths wound up and down among the rocks; and midway +between the hotel and the grotto, in a sort of sheltered nook, we saw +the Roman masonry of certain antique baths--baths of Augustus, says +Valery; baths of Tiberius, say the Capriotes, zealous for the honor +of their infamous hero. Howbeit, this was all we saw on the way to +the Blue Grotto. Every moment the waves rose higher, emulous of the +bluffs, which would not have afforded a foothold, or any thing to +cling to, had we been upset and washed against them--and we began +to talk of the immortality of the soul. As we neared the grotto, the +patriarch entertained us with stories of the perilous adventures of +people who insisted upon entering it in stormy weather,--especially +of a French painter who had been imprisoned in it four days, and kept +alive only on rum, which the patriarch supplied him, swimming into +the grotto with a bottle-full at a time. "And behold us arrived, +gentlemen!" said he, as he brought the boat skillfully around in front +of the small semicircular opening at the base of the lofty bluff. We +lie flat on the bottom of the boat, and complete the immersion of that +part of our clothing which the driving torrents of rain had spared. +The wave of destiny rises with us upon its breast--sinks, and we are +inside of the Blue Grotto. Not so much blue as gray, however, and the +water about the mouth of it green rather than azure. They say that +on a sunny day both the water and the roof of the cavern are of the +vividest cerulean tint--and I saw the grotto so represented in the +windows of the paint-shops at Naples. But to my own experience it did +not differ from other caves in color or form: there was the customary +clamminess in the air; the sound of dropping water; the sense of dull +and stupid solitude,--a little relieved in this case by the mighty +music of the waves breaking against the rocks outside. The grot is not +great in extent, and the roof in the rear shelves gradually down to +the water. Valery says that some remains of a gallery have caused +the supposition that the grotto was once the scene of Tiberius's +pleasures; and the Prussian painter who discovered the cave was led +to seek it by something he had read of a staircase by which Barbarossa +used to descend into a subterranean retreat from the town of Anacapri +on the mountain top. The slight fragment of ruin which we saw in one +corner of the cave might be taken in confirmation of both theories; +but the patriarch attributed the work to Barbarossa, being probably +tired at last of hearing Tiberius so much talked about. + +We returned, soaked and disappointed, to the hotel, where we found +Antonino very doubtful about the possibility of getting back that day +to Sorrento, and disposed, when pooh-poohed out of the notion of bad +weather, to revive the fiction of a prohibitory consul. He was staying +in Capri at our expense, and the honest fellow would willingly have +spent a fortnight there. + +We summoned the landlord to settlement, and he came with all his +household to present the account,--each one full of visible longing, +yet restrained from asking _buonamano_ by a strong sense of previous +contract. It was a deadly struggle with them, but they conquered +themselves, and blessed us as we departed. The pretty muletress took +leave of us on the beach, and we set sail for Sorrento, the ladies +crouching in the bottom of the boat, and taking their sea-sickness in +silence. As we drew near the beautiful town, we saw how it lay on +a plateau, at the foot of the mountains, but high above the sea. +Antonino pointed out to us the house of Tasso,--in which the novelist +Cooper also resided when in Sorrento,--a white house not handsomer nor +uglier than the rest, with a terrace looking out over the water. The +bluffs are pierced by numerous arched caverns, as I have said, +giving shelter to the fishermen's boats, and here and there a devious +stairway mounts to their crests. Up one of these we walked, noting how +in the house above us the people, with that puerility usually +mixed with the Italian love of beauty, had placed painted busts of +terra-cotta in the windows to simulate persons looking out. There was +nothing to blame in the breakfast we found ready at the Hotel Rispoli; +and as for the grove of slender, graceful orange-trees in the midst +of which the hotel stood, and which had lavished the fruit in every +direction on the ground, why, I would willingly give for it all the +currant-bushes, with their promises of jelly and jam, on which I gaze +at this moment. + +Antonino attended us to our carriage when we went away. He had kept +us all night at Capri, it is true, and he had brought us in at the end +for a prodigious _buonamano_; yet I cannot escape the conviction that +he parted from us with an unfulfilled purpose of greater plunder, and +I have a compassion, which I here declare, for the strangers who fell +next into his hands. He was good enough at the last moment to say that +his name, Silver-Eye, was a nickname given him according to a custom +of the Sorrentines; and he made us a farewell bow that could not be +bought in America for money. + +At the station of Castellamare sat a curious cripple on the stones,--a +man with little, short, withered legs, and a pleasant face. He showed +us the ticket-office, and wanted nothing for the politeness. After we +had been in the waiting-room a brief time, he came swinging himself in +upon his hands, followed by another person, who, when the cripple had +planted himself finally and squarely on the ground, whipped out a +tape from his pocket and took his measure for a suit of clothes, +the cripple twirling and twisting himself about in every way for the +tailor's convenience. Nobody was surprised or amused at the sight, and +when his measure was thus publicly taken, the cripple gravely swung +himself out as he had swung himself in. + + + + +XI. + +THE PROTESTANT RAGGED SCHOOLS AT NAPLES. + +I had the pleasure one day of visiting nearly all the free schools +which the wise philanthropy of the Protestant residents of Naples has +established in that city. The schools had a peculiar interest for me, +because I had noticed (in an uncareful fashion enough, no doubt) the +great changes which had taken place in Italy under its new national +government, and was desirous to see for myself the sort of progress +the Italians of the south were making in avenues so long closed to +them. I believe I have no mania for missionaries; I have heard of the +converted Jew-and-a-half, and I have thought it a good joke; but +I cannot help offering a very cordial homage to the truth that the +missionaries are doing a vast deal of good in Naples, where they are +not only spreading the gospel, but the spelling-book, the arithmetic, +and the geography. + +It is not to be understood from the word missionaries, that this work +is done by men especially sent from England or America to perform it. +The free Protestant schools in Naples are conducted under the auspices +of the Evangelical Aid Committee,--composed of members of the English +Church, the Swiss Church, and the Presbyterian Church; the President +of this committee is Dr. Strange, an Englishman, and the Treasurer +is Mr. Rogers, the American banker. The missionaries in Naples, +therefore, are men who have themselves found out their work and +appointed themselves to do it. The gentleman by whose kindness I was +permitted to visit the schools was one of these men,--the Rev. Mr. +Buscarlet, the pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Naples, a Swiss by +birth, who had received his education chiefly in Scotland. + +He accompanied me to the different schools, and as we walked up the +long Toledo, and threaded our way through the sprightly Neapolitan +crowd, he told me of the origin of the schools, and of the peculiar +difficulties encountered in their foundation and maintenance. They +are no older than the union of Naples with the Kingdom of Italy, when +toleration of Protestantism was decreed by law; and from the first, +their managers proceeded upon a principle of perfect openness and +candor with the parents who wished to send their children to them. +They announced that the children would be taught certain branches of +learning, and that the whole Bible would be placed in their hands, +to be studied and understood. In spite of this declaration of the +Protestant character of the schools, the parents of the children +were so anxious to secure them the benefits of education, that +they willingly ran the risk of their becoming heretics. They +were principally people of the lower classes,--laborers, hackmen, +fishermen, domestics, and very small shopkeepers, but occasionally +among them were parents able to send their children to other schools, +yet preferring the thorough and conscientious system practiced in +these. So the children came, and thanks to the peaceful, uncombative +nature of Italian boys, who get on with much less waylaying and +thumping and bullying than boys of northern blood, they have not +been molested by their companions who still live the wild life of the +streets, and they have only once suffered through interference of +the priests. On complaint to the authorities the wrong was promptly +redressed, and was not again inflicted. Of course these poor little +people, picked up out of the vileness and ignorance of a city that +had suffered for ages the most degrading oppression, are by no means +regenerate yet, but there seems to be great hope for them. Now at +least they are taught a reasonable and logical morality--and who can +tell what wonders the novel instruction may not work? They learn for +the first time that it is a foolish shame to lie and cheat, and it +would scarcely be surprising if some of them were finally persuaded +that Honesty is the best Policy--a maxim that few Italians believe. +And here lies the trouble,--in the unfathomable, disheartening +duplicity of the race. The children are not quarrelsome, nor cruel, +nor brutal; but the servile defect of falsehood fixed by long +generations of slavery in the Italians, is almost ineradicable. The +fault is worse in Naples than elsewhere in Italy; but how bad it is +everywhere, not merely travellers, but all residents in Italy, must +bear witness. + +The first school which we visited was a girls' school, in which some +forty-four little women of all ages, from four to fifteen years, +were assembled under the charge of a young Corfute girl, an Italian +Protestant, who had delegated her authority to different children +under her. The small maidens gathered around their chiefs in groups, +and read from the book in which they were studying when we appeared. +Some allowance must be made for difference of the languages, Italian +being logically spelled and easily pronounced; but I certainly never +heard American children of their age read nearly so well. They seemed +also to have a lively understanding of what they read, and to be +greatly interested in the scriptural stories of which their books were +made up. They repeated verses from the Bible, and stanzas of poetry, +all very eagerly and prettily. As bashfulness is scarcely known +to their race, they had no hesitation in showing off their +accomplishments before a stranger, and seemed quite delighted with +his applause. They were not particularly quiet; perhaps with young +Neapolitans that would be impossible. I saw their copy-books, in which +the writing was very good, (I am sure the printer would like mine to +be as legible,) and the books were kept neat and clean, as were the +hands and faces of the children. Taking the children as one goes in +the streets of Naples, it would require a day perhaps to find as many +clean ones as I saw in these schools, where cleanliness is resolutely +insisted upon. Many of the children were ragged; here and there +was one hideous with _ophthalmia_; but there was not a clouded +countenance, nor a dirty hand among them. We should have great hopes +for a nation of which the children can be taught to wash themselves. + +There were fourteen pupils in the boys' superior school, where +geography, mathematics, linear drawing, French, Italian history, and +ancient history were taught. A brief examination showed the boys to +be well up in their studies;--indeed they furnished some recondite +information about Baffin's Bay for which I should not myself have +liked to be called on suddenly. Their drawing-books were prodigies of +neatness, and betrayed that aptness for form and facility of execution +which are natural to the Italians. Some of these boys had been in the +schools nearly three years; they were nearly all of the class which +must otherwise have grown up to hopeless vagabondage; but here they +were receiving gratis an education that would fit them for employments +wherein trained intellectual capacity is required. If their education +went no higher than this, what an advance it would be upon their +original condition! + +In the room devoted to boys of lower grade, I entangled myself in +difficulties with a bright-eyed young gentleman, whom I asked if he +liked Italian history better than ancient history. He said he liked +the latter, especially that of the Romans, much better. "Why, that +is strange. I should think an Italian boy would like Italian history +best." "But were not the Romans also Italians, Signore?" I blush to +say that I basely sneaked out of this trouble by answering that they +were not like the Italians of the present day,--whatever that meant. +But indeed all these young persons were startlingly quick with their +information, and knowing that I knew very little on any subject with +certainty, I think I was wise to refuse all offers to examine them in +their studies. + +We left this school and returned to the Toledo by one of those +wonderful little side streets already mentioned, which are forever +tumultuous with the oddest Neapolitan life--with men quarreling +themselves purple over small quantities of fish--with asses braying +loud and clear above their discord--with women roasting pine-cones +at charcoal fires--with children in the agonies of having their hair +combed--with degraded poultry and homeless dogs--with fruit-stands +and green groceries, and the little edifices of ecclesiastical +architecture for the sale of lemonade--with wandering bag-pipers, and +herds of nonchalant goats--with horses, and grooms currying them--and +over all, from vast heights of balcony, with people lazily hanging +upon rails and looking down on the riot. Reëntering the stream of the +Toledo, it carried us almost to the Museo Borbonico before we again +struck aside into one of the smaller streets, whence we climbed quite +to the top of one of those incredibly high Neapolitan houses. Here, +crossing an open terrace on the roof, we visited three small rooms, in +which there were altogether some hundred boys in the first stages +of reclamation. They were under the immediate superintendence of Mr. +Buscarlet and he seemed to feel the fondest interest in them. Indeed, +there was sufficient reason for this: up to a certain point, the +Neapolitan children learn so rapidly and willingly that it can hardly +be other than a pleasure to teach them. After this, their zeal flags; +they know enough; and their parents and friends, far more ignorant +than they, are perfectly satisfied with their progress. Then the +difficulties of their teachers begin; but here, in these lowest grade +schools, they had not yet begun. The boys were still eager to learn, +and were ardently following the lead of their teachers. They were +little fellows, nearly all, and none of them had been in school more +than a year and a half, while some had been there only three or four +months. They rose up with "_Buon giorno, signori_," as we entered, and +could hardly be persuaded to lapse back to the duties of life during +our stay. They had very good faces, indeed, for the most part, and +even the vicious had intellectual brightness. Just and consistent +usage has the best influence on them; and one boy was pointed out +as quite docile and manageable, whose parents had given him up as +incorrigible before he entered the school. As it was, there was +something almost pathetic in his good behavior, as being possible to +him, but utterly alien to his instincts. The boys of these schools +seldom play truant, and they are never severely beaten in school; when +quite intractable, notice is given to their parents, and they usually +return in a more docile state. It sometimes happens that the boys are +taken away by their parents, from one motive or another; but they find +their way back again, and are received as if nothing had happened. + +The teacher in the first room here is a handsome young Calabrian, +with the gentlest face and manner,--one of the most efficient teachers +under Mr. Buscarlet. The boys had out their Bibles when we entered, +and one after another read passages to us. There were children of +seven, eight, and nine years, who had been in the school only three +months, and who read any part of their Bibles with facility and +correctness; of course, before coming to school they had not known one +letter from another. The most accomplished scholar was a youngster, +named Saggiomo, who had received eighteen months' schooling. He was +consequently very quick indeed, and wanted to answer all the hard +questions put to the other boys. In fact, all of them were ready +enough, and there was a great deal of writhing and snapping of fingers +among those who longed to answer some hesitator's question--just as +you see in schools at home. They were examined in geography, and +then in Bible history--particularly Joseph's story. They responded +in chorus to all demands on this part of study, and could hardly be +quieted sufficiently to give Saggiomo's little brother, aged five, a +chance to tell why Joseph's brethren sold him. As soon as he could +be heard he piped out: "_Perchè Giuseppe aveva dei sogni_!" (Because +Joseph had dreams.) It was not exactly the right answer, but nobody +laughed at the little fellow, though they all roared out in correction +when permitted. + +In the next room, boys somewhat older were examined in Italian +history, and responded correctly and promptly. They were given a +sum which they performed in a miraculously short time; and their +copy-books, when shown, were equally creditable to them. Their teacher +was a Bolognese,--a naturalized Swiss,--who had been a soldier, +and who maintained strict discipline among his irregulars, without, +however, any perceptible terrorism. + +The amount of work these teachers accomplish in a day is incredible: +the boys' school opens at eight in the morning and closes at four, +with intermission of an hour at noon. Then in the evening the same +men teach a school for adults, and on Sunday have their classes in the +Sunday-schools. And this the whole year round. Their pay is not great, +being about twenty dollars a month, and they are evidently not wholly +self-interested from this fact. The amount of good they accomplish +under the direction of their superiors is in proportion to the work +done. To appreciate it, the reader must consider that they take the +children of the most ignorant and degraded of all the Italians; that +they cause them to be washed corporeally, first of all, and then set +about cleansing them morally; and having cleared away as much of the +inherited corruption of ages as possible, they begin to educate them +in the various branches of learning. There is no direct proselyting +in the schools, but the Bible is the first study, and the children +are constantly examined in it; and the result is at least not +superstition. The advance upon the old condition of things is +incalculably great; for till the revolution under Garibaldi in 1860, +the schools of Naples were all in the hands of the priests or their +creatures, and the little learning there imparted was as dangerous as +it could well be made. Now these schools are free, the children +are honestly and thoroughly taught, and if they are not directly +instructed in Protestantism, are at least instructed to associate +religion with morality, probably for the first time in their lives. +Too much credit cannot be given to the Italian government which has +acted in such good faith with the men engaged in this work, protecting +them from all interruption and persecution; but after all, the great +praise is due to their own wise, unflagging zeal. They have worked +unostentatiously, making no idle attacks on time-honored prejudices, +but still having a purpose of enlightenment which they frankly avowed. +The people whom they seek to benefit judge them by their works, and +the result is that they have quite as much before them as they can do. +Their discouragements are great. The day's teaching is often undone at +home; the boys forget as aptly as they learn; and from the fact that +only the baser feelings of fear and interest have ever been appealed +to before in the Neapolitans, they have often to build in treacherous +places without foundation of good faith or gratitude. Embarrassments +for want of adequate funds are sometimes felt also. But no one can +study their operations without feeling that success must attend their +efforts, with honor to them, and with inestimable benefits to the +generation which shall one day help to govern free Italy. + + + + +XII. + +BETWEEN ROME AND NAPLES. + +One day it became plain even to our reluctance that we could not stay +in Naples forever, and the next morning we took the train for Rome. +The Villa Reale put on its most alluring charm to him that ran down +before breakfast to thrid once more its pathways bordered with palms +and fountains and statues; the bay beside it purpled and twinkled in +the light that made silver of the fishermen's sails; far away rose +Vesuvius with his nightcap of mist still hanging about his shoulders; +all around rang and rattled Naples. The city was never so fair before, +nor could ever have been so hard to leave; and at the last moment +the landlord of the Hotel Washington must needs add a supreme pang by +developing into a poet, and presenting me with a copy of a comedy +he had written. The reader who has received at parting from the +gentlemanly proprietor of one of our palatial hotels his "Ode on the +Steam Elevator," will conceive of the shame and regret with which I +thought of having upbraided our landlord about our rooms, of having +stickled at small preliminaries concerning our contract for board, and +for having altogether treated him as one of the uninspired. Let me do +him the tardy justice to say that he keeps, after the Stella d'Oro at +Ferrara, the best hotel in Italy, and that his comedy was really very +sprightly. It is no small thing to know how to keep a hotel, as we +know, and a poet who does it ought to have a double acclaim. + +Nobody who cares to travel with decency and comfort can take the +second-class cars on the road between Naples and Rome, though these +are perfectly good everywhere else in Italy. The Papal city makes her +influence felt for shabbiness and uncleanliness wherever she can, and +her management seems to prevail on this railway. A glance into +the second-class cars reconciled us to the first-class,--which in +themselves were bad,--and we took our places almost contentedly. + +The road passed through the wildest country we had seen in Italy; and +presently a rain began to fall and made it drearier than ever. The +land was much grown up with thickets of hazel, and was here and there +sparsely wooded with oaks. Under these, hogs were feeding upon the +acorns, and the wet swine-herds were steaming over fires built at their +roots. In some places the forest was quite dense; in other places it +fell entirely away, and left the rocky hill-sides bare, and solitary +but for the sheep that nibbled at the scanty grass, and the shepherds +that leaned upon their crooks and motionlessly stared at us as we +rushed by. As we drew near Rome, the scenery grew lonelier yet; the +land rose into desolate, sterile, stony heights, without a patch of +verdure on their nakedness, and at last abruptly dropped into the +gloomy expanse of the Campagna. + +The towns along the route had little to interest us in their looks, +though at San Germano we caught a glimpse of the famous old convent of +Monte-Cassino, perched aloft on its cliff and looking like a part of +the rock on which it was built. Fancy now loves to climb that steep +acclivity, and wander through the many-volumed library of the ancient +Benedictine retreat, and on the whole finds it less fatiguing and +certainly less expensive than actual ascent and acquaintance with +the monastery would have been. Two Croatian priests, who shared our +compartment of the railway carriage, first drew our notice to the +place, and were enthusiastic about it for many miles after it was +out of sight. What gentle and pleasant men they were, and how hard it +seemed that they should be priests and Croats! They told us all about +the city of Spalato, where they lived, and gave us such a glowing +account of Dalmatian poets and poetry that we began to doubt at last +if the seat of literature were not somewhere on the east coast of the +Adriatic; and I hope we left them the impression that the literary +centre of the world was not a thousand miles from the horse-car office +in Harvard Square. + +Here and there repairs were going forward on the railroad, and most +of the laborers were women. They were straight and handsome girls, +and moved with a stately grace under the baskets of earth balanced on +their heads. Brave black eyes they had, such as love to look and to +be looked at; they were not in the least hurried by their work, but +desisted from it to gaze at the passengers whenever the train stopped. +They all wore their beautiful peasant costume,--the square white linen +head-dress falling to the shoulders, the crimson bodice, and the red +scant skirt; and how they contrived to keep themselves so clean at +their work, and to look so spectacular in it all, remains one of the +many Italian mysteries. + +Another of these mysteries we beheld in the little beggar-boy at +Isoletta. He stood at the corner of the station quite mute and +motionless during our pause, and made no sign of supplication or +entreaty. He let his looks beg for him. He was perfectly beautiful +and exceedingly picturesque. Where his body was not quite naked, his +jacket and trousers hung in shreds and points; his long hair grew +through the top of his hat, and fell over like a plume. Nobody could +resist him; people ran out of the cars, at the risk of being left +behind, to put coppers into the little dirty hand held languidly out +to receive them. The boy thanked none, smiled on none, but looked +curiously and cautiously at all, with the quick perception and the +illogical conclusions of his class and race. As we started he did not +move, but remained in his attitude of listless tranquillity. As we +glanced back, the mystery of him seemed to be solved for a moment: he +would stand there till he grew up into a graceful, prayerful, pitiless +brigand, and then he would rend from travel the tribute now go freely +given him. But after all, though his future seemed clear, and he +appeared the type of a strange and hardly reclaimable people, he was +not quite a solution of the Neapolitan puzzle. + + + + +XIII. + +ROMAN PEARLS. + +I. + +The first view of the ruins in the Forum brought a keen sense of +disappointment. I knew that they could only be mere fragments and +rubbish, but I was not prepared to find them so. I learned that I +had all along secretly hoped for some dignity of neighborhood, some +affectionate solicitude on the part of Nature to redeem these works of +Art from the destruction that had befallen them. But in hollows below +the level of the dirty cowfield, wandered over by evil-eyed buffaloes, +and obscenely defiled by wild beasts of men, there stood here an +arch, there a pillar, yonder a cluster of columns crowned by a bit +of frieze; and yonder again, a fragment of temple, half-gorged by +the façade of a hideous Renaissance church; then a height of vaulted +brick-work, and, leading on to the Coliseum, another arch, and then +incoherent columns overthrown and mixed with dilapidated walls--mere +phonographic consonants, dumbly representing the past, out of which +all vocal glory had departed. The Coliseum itself does not much better +express a certain phase of Roman life than does the Arena at Verona; +it is larger only to the foot-rule, and it seemed not grander +otherwise, while it is vastly more ruinous. Even the Pantheon failed +to impress me at first sight, though I found myself disposed to return +to it again and again, and to be more and more affected by it. + +Modern Rome appeared, first and last, hideous. It is the least +interesting town in Italy, and the architecture is hopelessly +ugly--especially the architecture of the churches. The Papal city +contrives at the beginning to hide the Imperial city from your +thought, as it hides it in such a great degree from your eye, and old +Rome only occurs to you in a sort of stupid wonder over the depth at +which it is buried. I confess that I was glad to get altogether away +from it after a first look at the ruins in the Forum, and to take +refuge in the Conservatorio delle Mendicanti, where we were charged +to see the little Virginia G. The Conservatorio, though a charitable +institution, is not so entirely meant for mendicants as its name would +imply, but none of the many young girls there were the children of +rich men. They were often enough of parentage actually hungry and +ragged, but they were often also the daughters of honest poor folk, +who paid a certain sum toward their maintenance and education in the +Conservatorio. Such was the case with little Virginia, whose father +was at Florence, doubly impeded from seeing her by the fact that he +had fought against the Pope for the Republic of 1848, and by the +other fact that he had since wrought the Pope a yet deadlier injury by +turning Protestant. + +Ringing a garrulous bell that continued to jingle some time after we +were admitted, we found ourselves in a sort of reception-room, of the +general quality of a cellar, and in the presence of a portress who was +perceptibly preserved from mold only by the great pot of coals that +stood in the centre of the place. Some young girls, rather pretty than +not, attended the ancient woman, and kindly acted as the ear-trumpet +through which our wishes were conveyed to her mind. The Conservatorio +was not, so far, as conventual as we had imagined it; but as the +gentleman of the party was strongly guarded by female friends, and +asked at once to see the Superior, he concluded that there was, +perhaps, something so unusually reassuring to the recluses in his +appearance and manner that they had not thought it necessary to behave +very rigidly. It later occurred to this gentleman that the promptness +with which the pretty mendicants procured him an interview with the +Superior had a flavor of self-interest in; and that he who came to the +Conservatorio in the place of a father might have been for a moment +ignorantly viewed as a yet dearer and tenderer possibility. From +whatever danger there was in this error the Superior soon appeared to +rescue him, and we were invited into a more ceremonious apartment on +the first floor, and the little Virginia was sent for. The visit +of the strangers caused a tumult and interest in the quiet old +Conservatorio of which it is hard to conceive now, and the excitement +grew tremendous when it appeared that, the signori were Americani and +Protestanti. We imparted a savor of novelty and importance to Virginia +herself, and when she appeared, the Superior and her assistant looked +at her with no small curiosity and awe, of which the little maiden +instantly became conscious, and began to take advantage. Accompanying +us over the building and through the grounds, she cut her small +friends wherever she met them, and was not more than respectful to the +assistant. + +It was from an instinct of hospitality that we were shown the +Conservatorio, and instructed in regard to all its purposes. We saw +the neat dormitories with their battalions of little white beds; the +kitchen with its gigantic coppers for boiling broth, and the refectory +with the smell of the frugal dinners of generations of mendicants in +it. The assistant was very proud of the neatness of every thing, and +was glad to talk of that, or, indeed, any thing else. It appeared that +the girls were taught reading, writing, and plain sewing when they +were young, and that the Conservatorio was chiefly sustained by pious +contributions and bequests. Any lingering notion of the conventual +character of the place was dispelled by the assistant's hurrying to +say, "And when we can get the poor things well married, we are glad to +do so." + +"But how does any one ever see them?" + +"Eh! well, that is easily managed. Once a month we dress the +marriageable girls in their best, and take them for a walk in the +street. If an honest young man falls in love with one of them going +by, he comes to the Superior, and describes her as well as he can, +and demands to see her. She is called, and if both are pleased, the +marriage is arranged. You see it is a very simple affair." + +And there was, to the assistant's mind, nothing odd in the whole +business, insomuch that I felt almost ashamed of marveling at it. + +Issuing from the backdoor of the convent, we ascended by stairs and +gateways into garden spaces, chiefly planted with turnips and the like +poor but respectable vegetables, and curiously adorned with fragments +of antique statuary, and here and there a fountain in a corner, +trickling from moss-grown rocks, and falling into a trough of +travertine, about the feet of some poor old goddess or Virtue who had +forgotten what her name was. + +Once, the assistant said, speaking as if the thing had been within +her recollection, though it must have been centuries before, the +antiquities of the Conservatorio were much more numerous and striking; +but they were now removed to the different museums. Nevertheless they +had still a beautiful prospect left, which we were welcome to enjoy if +we would follow her; and presently, to our surprise, we stepped from +the garden upon the roof of the Temple of Peace. The assistant had not +boasted without reason: away before us stretched the Campagna, a level +waste, and empty, but for the umbrella-palms that here and there +waved like black plumes upon it, and for the arched lengths of +the acqueducts that seemed to stalk down from the ages across the +melancholy expanse like files of giants, with now and then a ruinous +gap in the line, as if one had fallen out weary by the way. The city +all around us glittered asleep in the dim December sunshine, and +far below us,--on the length of the Forum over which the Appian Way +stretched from the Capitoline Hill under the Arch of Septimius Severus +and the Arch of Titus to the Arch of Constantine, leaving the Coliseum +on the left, and losing itself in the foliage of the suburbs,--the +Past seemed struggling to emerge from the ruins, and to reshape and +animate itself anew. The effort was more successful than that which we +had helped the Past to make when standing on the level of the Forum; +but Antiquity must have been painfully conscious of the incongruity of +the red-legged Zouaves wandering over the grass, and of the bewildered +tourists trying to make her out with their Murrays. + +In a day or two after this we returned again to our Conservatorio, +where we found that the excitement created by our first visit had been +kept fully alive by the events attending the photographing of Virginia +for her father. Not only Virginia was there to receive us, but her +grandmother also--an old, old woman, dumb through some infirmity of +age, who could only weep and smile in token of her content. I think +she had but a dim idea, after all, of what went on beyond the visible +fact of Virginia's photograph, and that she did not quite understand +how we could cause it to be taken for her son. She was deeply +compassionated by the Superior, who rendered her pity with a great +deal of gesticulation, casting up her eyes, shrugging her shoulders, +and sighing grievously. But the assistant's cheerfulness could not be +abated even by the spectacle of extreme age; and she made the most of +the whole occasion, recounting with great minuteness all the incidents +of the visit to the photographer's, and running to get the dress +Virginia sat in, that we might see how exactly it was given in the +picture. Then she gave us much discourse concerning the Conservatorio +and its usages, and seemed not to wish us to think that life there +was altogether eventless. "Here we have a little amusement also," she +said. "The girls have their relatives to visit them sometimes, and +then in the evening they dance. Oh, they enjoy themselves! I am half +old (_mezzo-vecchia_). I am done with these things. But for youth, +always kept down, something lively is wanted." + +When we took leave of these simple folks, we took leave of almost the +only natural and unprepared aspect of Italian life which we were to +see in Rome; but we did not know this at the time. + + +II. + +Indeed, it seems to me that all moisture of romance and adventure has +been wellnigh sucked out of travel in Italy, and that compared with +the old time, when the happy wayfarer journeyed by vettura through the +innumerable little states of the Peninsula,--halted every other mile +to show his passport, and robbed by customs officers in every color of +shabby uniform and every variety of cocked hat,--the present railroad +period is one of but stale and insipid flavor. Much of local life and +color remains, of course; but the hurried traveller sees little of it, +and, passed from one grand hotel to another, without material change +in the cooking or the methods of extortion, he might nearly as well +remain at Paris. The Italians, who live to so great extent by the +travel through their country, learn our abominable languages and +minister to our detestable comfort and propriety, till we have slight +chance to know them as we once could,--musical, picturesque, and full +of sweet, natural knaveries, graceful falsehood, and all uncleanness. +Rome really belongs to the Anglo-Saxon nations, and the Pope and the +past seem to be carried on entirely for our diversion. Every thing is +systematized as thoroughly as in a museum where the objects are all +ticketed; and our prejudices are consulted even down to alms-giving, +Honest Beppo is gone from the steps in the Piazza di Spagna, and now +the beggars are labeled like policemen, with an immense plate bearing +the image of St. Peter, so that you may know you give to a worthy +person when you bestow charity on one of them, and not, alas! to some +abandoned impostor, as in former days. One of these highly recommended +mendicants gave the last finish to the system, and begged of us in +English! No custodian will answer you, if he can help it, in the +Italian which he speaks so exquisitely, preferring to speak bad French +instead, and in all the shops on the Corso the English tongue is _de +rigueur_. + +After our dear friends at the Conservatorio, I think we found one of +the most simple and interesting of Romans in the monk who showed us +the Catacombs of St. Sebastian. These catacombs, he assured us, were +not restored like those of St. Calixtus, but were just as the martyrs +left them; and, as I do not remember to have read anywhere that +they are formed merely of long, low, narrow, wandering underground +passages, lined on either side with tombs in tiers like berths on +a steamer, and expanding here and there into small square chambers, +bearing the traces of ancient frescos, and evidently used as +chapels,--I venture to offer the information here. The reader is to +keep in his mind a darkness broken by the light of wax tapers, a +close smell, and crookedness and narrowness, or he cannot realize the +catacombs as they are in fact. Our monkish guide, before entering the +passage leading from the floor of the church to the tombs, in which +there was still some "fine small dust" of the martyrs, warned us that +to touch it was to incur the penalty of excommunication, and then +gently craved pardon for having mentioned the fact. But, indeed, it +was only to persons who showed a certain degree of reverence that +these places were now exhibited; for some Protestants who had been +permitted there had stolen handfuls of the precious ashes, merely to +throw away. I assured him that I thought them beasts to do it; and I +was afterwards puzzled to know what should attract their wantonness in +the remnants of mortality, hardly to be distinguished from the common +earth out of which the catacombs were dug. + + +III. + +Returning to the church above we found, kneeling before one of the +altars, two pilgrims,--a man and a woman. The latter was habited in +a nun-like dress of black, and the former in a long pilgrim's coat of +coarse blue stuff. He bore a pilgrim's staff in his hand, and showed +under his close hood a fine, handsome, reverent face, full of a sort +of tender awe, touched with the pathos of penitence. In attendance +upon the two was a dapper little silk-hatted man, with rogue so +plainly written in his devotional countenance that I was not surprised +to be told that he was a species of spiritual _valet de place_, +whose occupation it was to attend pilgrims on their tour to the Seven +Churches at which these devotees pray in Rome, and there to direct +their orisons and join in them. + +It was not to the pilgrims, but to the heretics that the monk now +uncovered the precious marble slab on which Christ stood when he met +Peter flying from Rome and turned him back. You are shown the prints +of the divine feet, which the conscious stone received and keeps +forever; and near at hand is one of the arrows with which St. +Sebastian was shot. We looked at these things critically, having to +pay for the spectacle; but the pilgrims and their guide were all faith +and wonder. + +I remember seeing nothing else so finely superstitious at Rome. In a +chapel near the Church of St. John Lateran are, as is well known, +the marble steps which once belonged to Pilate's house, and which the +Saviour is said to have ascended when he went to trial before Pilate. +The steps are protected against the wear and tear of devotion by a +stout casing of wood, and they are constantly covered with penitents, +who ascend and descend them upon their knees. Most of the pious people +whom I saw in this act were children, and the boys enjoyed it with a +good deal of giggling, as a very amusing feat. Some old and haggard +women gave the scene all the dignity which it possessed; but certain +well-dressed ladies and gentlemen were undeniably awkward and absurd, +and I was led to doubt if there were not an incompatibility between +the abandon of simple faith and the respectability of good clothes. + + +IV. + +In all other parts of Italy one hears constant talk among travellers +of the malaria at Rome, and having seen a case of Roman fever, I know +it is a thing not to be trifled with. But in Rome itself the malaria +is laughed at by the foreign residents,--who, nevertheless, go out of +the city in midsummer. The Romans, to the number of a hundred thousand +or so, remain there the whole year round, and I am bound to say I +never saw a healthier, robuster-looking population. The cheeks of the +French soldiers, too, whom we met at every turn, were red as their +trousers, and they seemed to flourish on the imputed unwholesomeness +of the atmosphere. All at Rome are united in declaring that the fever +exists at Naples, and that sometimes those who have taken it there +come and die in Rome, in order to give the city a bad name; and I +think this very likely. + +Rome is certainly dirty, however, though there is a fountain in every +square, and you are never out of the sound of falling water. The Corso +and some of the principal streets do not so much impress you with +their filth as with their dullness; but that part of the city where +some of the most memorable relics of antiquity are to be found is +unimaginably vile. The least said of the state of the archways of the +Coliseum the soonest mended; and I have already spoken of the Forum. +The streets near the Theatre of Pompey are almost impassable, and the +so-called House of Rienzi is a stable, fortified against approach by +a _fossé_ of excrement. A noisome smell seems to be esteemed the most +appropriate offering to the memory of ancient Rome, and I am not sure +that the moderns are mistaken in this. In the rascal streets in the +neighborhood of the most august ruins, the people turn round to stare +at the stranger as he passes them; they are all dirty, and his decency +must be no less a surprise to them than the neatness of the French +soldiers amid all the filth is a puzzle to him. We wandered about a +long time in such places one day, looking for the Tarpeian Rock, less +for Tarpeia's sake than for the sake of Miriam and Donatello and the +Model. There are two Tarpeian rocks, between which the stranger takes +his choice; and we must have chosen the wrong one, for it seemed but +a shallow gulf compared to that in our fancy. We were somewhat +disappointed; but then Niagara disappoints one; and as for Mont +Blanc.... + + +V. + +It is worth while for every one who goes to Rome to visit the Church +of St. Peter's; but it is scarcely worth while for me to describe +it, or for every one to go up into the bronze globe on the top of the +cupola. In fact, this is a great labor, and there is nothing to +be seen from the crevices in the ball which cannot be far more +comfortably seen from the roof of the church below. + +The companions of our ascent to the latter point were an English lady +and gentleman, brother and sister, and both Catholics, as they at once +told us. The lady and myself spoke for some time in the Tuscan tongue +before we discovered that neither of us was Italian, after which we +paid each other some handsome compliments upon fluency and perfection +of accent. The gentleman was a pleasant purple porpoise from the +waters of Chili, whither he had wandered from the English coasts in +early youth. He had two leading ideas: one concerned the Pope, to +whom he had just been presented, and whom he viewed as the best and +blandest of beings; the other related to his boy, then in England, +whom he called Jack Spratt, and considered the grandest and greatest +of boys. With the view from the roof of the church this gentleman did +not much trouble himself. He believed Jack Spratt could ride up to the +roof where we stood on his donkey. As to the great bronze globe which +we were hurrying to enter he seemed to regard it merely as a rival in +rotundity, and made not the slightest motion to follow us. + +I should be loth to vex the reader with any description of the scene +before us and beneath us, even if I could faithfully portray it. But I +recollect, with a pleasure not to be left unrecorded, the sweetness +of the great fountain playing in the square before the church, and +the harmony in which the city grew in every direction from it, like +an emanation from its music, till the last house sank away into +the pathetic solitude of the Campagna, with nothing beyond but the +snow-capped mountains lighting up the remotest distance. At the same +moment I experienced a rapture in reflecting that I had underpaid +three hackmen during my stay in Rome, and thus contributed to avenge +my race for ages of oppression. + +The vastness of St. Peter's itself is best felt in looking down upon +the interior from the gallery that surrounds the inside of the dome, +and in comparing one's own littleness with the greatness of all the +neighboring mosaics. But as to the beauty of the temple, I could not +find it without or within. + + +VI. + +In Rome one's fellow-tourists are a constant source of gratification +and surprise. I thought that American travellers were by no means the +most absurd among those we saw, nor even the loudest in their approval +of the Eternal City. A certain order of German greenness affords, +perhaps, the pleasantest pasturage for the ruminating mind. For +example, at the Villa Ludovisi there was, beside numerous Englishry +in detached bodies, a troop of Germans, chiefly young men, frugally +pursuing the Sehenswürdigkeiten in the social manner of their nation. +They took their enjoyment very noisily, and wrangled together with +furious amiability as they looked at Guercino's "Aurora." Then two of +them parted from the rest, and went to a little summer-house in the +gardens, while the others followed us to the top of the Casino. There +they caught sight of their friends in the arbor, and the spectacle +appeared to overwhelm them. They bowed, they took off their hats, they +waved their handkerchiefs. It was not enough: one young fellow mounted +on the balustrade of the roof at his neck's risk, lifted his hat on +his cane and flourished it in greeting to the heart's-friends in the +arbor, from whom he had parted two minutes before. + +In strange contrast to the producer of this enthusiasm, so pumped and +so unmistakably mixed with beer, a fat and pallid Englishwoman sat +in a chair upon the roof and coldly, coldly sketched the lovely +landscape. And she and the blonde young English girl beside her +pronounced a little dialogue together, which I give, because I saw +that they meant it for the public: + +_The Young Girl_.--I wonder, you knoa, you don't draw-ow St. Petuh's! + +_The Artist_.--O ah, you knoa, I can draw-ow St. Petuh's from so +mennee powints. + +I am afraid that the worst form of American greenness appears abroad +in a desire to be perfectly up in critical appreciation of the arts, +and to approach the great works in the spirit of the connoisseur. The +ambition is not altogether a bad one. Still I could not help laughing +at a fellow-countryman when he told me that he had not yet seen +Raphael's "Transfiguration," because he wished to prepare his mind for +understanding the original by first looking at all the copies he could +find. + + +VII. + +The Basilica San Paolo fuori le Mura surpasses every thing in splendor +of marble and costly stone--porphyry, malachite, alabaster--and luxury +of gilding that is to be seen at Rome. But I chiefly remember it +because on the road that leads to it, through scenes as quiet and +peaceful as if history had never known them, lies the Protestant +graveyard in which Keats is buried. Quite by chance the driver +mentioned it, pointing in the direction of the cemetery with his whip. +We eagerly dismounted and repaired to the gate, where we were met by +the son of the sexton, who spoke English through the beauteous line of +a curved Hebrew nose. Perhaps a Christian could not be found in Rome +to take charge of these heretic graves, though Christians can be got +to do almost any thing there for money. However, I do not think +a Catholic would have kept the place in better order, or more +intelligently understood our reverent curiosity. It was the new +burial-ground which we had entered, and which is a little to the right +of the elder cemetery. It was very beautiful and tasteful in every +way; the names upon the stones were chiefly English and Scotch, +with here and there an American's. But affection drew us only to the +prostrate tablet inscribed with the words, "Percy Bysshe Shelley, Cor +Cordium," and then we were ready to go to the grave of him for whom we +all feel so deep a tenderness. The grave of John Keats is one of +few in the old burying-ground, and lies almost in the shadow of the +pyramid of Caius Cestius; and I could not help thinking of the wonder +the Roman would have felt could he have known into what unnamable +richness and beauty his Greek faith had ripened in the heart of the +poor poet, where it was mixed with so much sorrow. Doubtless, in his +time, a prominent citizen like Caius Cestius was a leading member of +the temple in his neighborhood, and regularly attended sacrifice: it +would have been but decent; and yet I fancied that a man immersed like +him in affairs might have learned with surprise the inner and more +fragrant meaning of the symbols with the outside of which his life was +satisfied; and I was glad to reflect that in our day such a thing is +impossible. + +The grave of our beloved poet is sunken to the level of the common +earth, and is only marked by the quaintly lettered, simple stone +bearing the famous epitaph. While at Rome I heard talk of another and +grander monument which some members of the Keats family were to place +over the dust of their great kinsman. But, for one, I hope this may +never be done, even though the original stone should also be left +there, as was intended. Let the world still keep unchanged this +shrine, to which it can repair with at once pity and tenderness and +respect. + +A rose-tree and some sweet-smelling bushes grew upon the grave, and +the roses were in bloom. We asked leave to take one of them; but at +last could only bring ourselves to gather some of the fallen petals. +Our Hebrew guide was willing enough, and unconsciously set us a little +example of wantonness; for while he listened to our explanation of +the mystery which had puzzled him ever since he had learned English, +namely, why the stone should say "_writ_ on water," and not _written_, +he kept plucking mechanically at one of the fragrant shrubs, pinching +away the leaves, and rending the tender twig, till I, remembering the +once-sensitive dust from which it grew, waited for the tortured +tree to cry out to him with a voice of words and blood, "Perchè mi +schianti?" + + +VIII. + +It seems to me that a candid person will wish to pause a little +before condemning Gibson's colored statues. They have been grossly +misrepresented. They do not impress one at all as wax-work, and there +is great wrong in saying that their tinted nakedness suggests impurity +any more than the white nakedness of other statues. The coloring +is quite conventional; the flesh is merely warmed with the hue +representing life; the hair is always a very delicate yellow, the eyes +a tender violet, and there is no other particularization of color; a +fillet binding the hair may be gilded,--the hem of a robe traced +in blue. I, who had just come from seeing the fragments of antique +statuary in Naples Museum, tinted in the same way, could not feel +that there was any thing preposterous in Gibson's works, and I am not +ashamed to say that they gave me pleasure. + +As we passed, in his studio, from one room to another, the workman who +showed the marbles surprised and delighted us by asking if we would +like to see the sculptor, and took us up into the little room where +Gibson worked. He was engaged upon a bass-relief,--a visit of Psyche +to the Zephyrs, or something equally aërial and mythological,--and +received us very simply and naturally, and at once began with some +quaint talk about the subject in hand. When we mentioned our pleasure +in his colored marbles we touched the right spring, and he went on to +speak of his favorite theory with visible delight, making occasional +pauses to bestow a touch on the bass-relief, and coming back to his +theme with that self-corroborative "Yes!" of his, which Hawthorne +has immortalized. He was dressed with extraordinary slovenliness and +indifference to clothes, had no collar, I think, and evidently did +not know what he had on. Every thing about him bespoke the utmost +unconsciousness and democratic plainness of life, so that I could +readily believe a story I heard of him. Having dined the greater part +of his life in Roman restaurants where it is but wholesome to go over +your plate, glass, spoon, and knife and fork with your napkin before +using them, the great sculptor had acquired such habits of +neatness that at table in the most aristocratic house in England +he absent-mindedly went through all that ceremony of cleansing +and wiping. It is a story they tell in Rome, where every body is +anecdoted, and not always so good-naturedly. + + +IX. + +One Sunday afternoon we went with some artistic friends to visit the +studio of the great German painter, Overbeck; and since I first read +Uhland I have known no pleasure so illogical as I felt in looking at +this painter's drawings. In the sensuous heart of objective Italy he +treats the themes of mediæval Catholicism with the most subjective +feeling, and I thought I perceived in his work the enthusiasm which +led many Protestant German painters and poets of the romantic school +back into the twilight of the Romish faith, in the hope that they +might thus realize to themselves something of the earnestness which +animated the elder Christian artists. Overbeck's work is beautiful, +but it is unreal, and expresses the sentiment of no time; as the work +of the romantic German poets seems without relation to any world men +ever lived in. + +Walking from the painter's house, two of us parted with the rest +on the steps of the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore, and pursued our +stroll through the gate of San Lorenzo out upon the Campagna, which +tempts and tempts the sojourner at Rome, until at last he must go +and see--if it will give him the fever. And, alas! there I caught the +Roman fever--the longing that burns one who has once been in Rome to +go again--that will not be cured by all the cool contemptuous things +he may think or say of the Eternal City; that fills him with fond +memories of its fascination, and makes it forever desired. + +We walked far down the dusty road beyond the city walls, and then +struck out from the highway across the wild meadows of the Campagna. +They were weedy and desolate, seamed by shaggy grass-grown ditches, +and deeply pitted with holes made in search for catacombs. There was +here and there a farm-house amid the wide lonesomeness, but oftener +a round, hollow, roofless tomb, from which the dust and memory of the +dead had long been blown away, and through the top of which--fringed +and overhung with grasses, and opening like a great eye--the evening +sky looked marvelously sad. One of the fields was full of grim, +wide-horned cattle, and in another there were four or five buffaloes +lying down and chewing their cuds,--holding their heads horizontally +in the air, and with an air of gloomy wickedness which nothing could +exceed in their cruel black eyes, glancing about in visible pursuit +of some object to toss and gore. There were also many canebrakes, +in which the wind made a mournful rustling after the sun had set in +golden glitter on the roofs of the Roman churches and the transparent +night had fallen upon the scene. + +In all our ramble we met not a soul, and I scarcely know what it is +makes this walk upon the Campagna one of my vividest recollections +of Rome, unless it be the opportunity it gave me to weary myself upon +that many-memoried ground as freely as if it had been a woods-pasture +in Ohio. Nature, where history was so august, was perfectly simple +and motherly, and did so much to make me at home, that, as the night +thickened and we plunged here and there into ditches and climbed +fences, and struggled, heavy-footed, back through the suburbs to +the city gate, I felt as if half my boyhood had been passed upon the +Campagna. + + +X. + +Pasquino, like most other great people, is not very interesting upon +close approach. There is no trace now in his aspect to show that he +has ever been satirical; but the humanity that the sculptor gave him +is imperishable, though he has lost all character as a public censor. +The torso is at first glance nothing but a shapeless mass of stone, +but the life can never die out of that which has been shaped by art +to the likeness of a man, and a second look restores the lump to +full possession of form and expression. For this reason I lament that +statues should ever be restored except by sympathy and imagination. + + +XI. + +Regarding the face of Pompey's statue in the Spada Palace, I was more +struck than ever with a resemblance to American politicians which I +had noted in all the Roman statues. It is a type of face not now to be +found in Rome, but frequent enough here, and rather in the South +than in the North. Pompey was like the pictures of so many Southern +Congressmen that I wondered whether race had not less to do with +producing types than had similarity of circumstances; whether a +republicanism based upon slavery could not so far assimilate character +as to produce a common aspect in people widely separated by time and +creeds, but having the same unquestioned habits of command, and the +same boundless and unscrupulous ambition. + + +XII. + +When the Tiber, according to its frequent habit, rises and inundates +the city, the Pantheon is one of the first places to be flooded--the +sacristan told us. The water climbs above the altar-tops, sapping, +in its recession, the cement of the fine marbles which incrust the +columns, so that about their bases the pieces have to be continually +renewed. Nothing vexes you so much in the Pantheon as your +consciousness of these and other repairs. Bad as ruin is, I think I +would rather have the old temple ruinous in every part than restored +as you find it. The sacristan felt the wrongs of the place keenly, and +said, referring to the removal of the bronze roof, which took place +some centuries ago, "They have robbed us of every thing" (_Ci hanno +levato tutto_); as if he and the Pantheon were of one blood, and he +had suffered personal hurt in its spoliation. + +What a sense of the wildness everywhere lurking about Rome we had +given us by that group of peasants who had built a fire of brushwood +almost within the portico of the Pantheon, and were cooking their +supper at it, the light of the flames luridly painting their swarthy +faces! + + +XIII. + +Poor little Numero Cinque Via del Gambero has seldom, I imagine, known +so violent a sensation as that it experienced when, on the day of the +Immaculate Conception, the Armenian Archbishop rolled up to the door +in his red coach. The master of the house had always seemed to like +us; now he appeared with profound respect suffusing, as it were, his +whole being, and announced, "Signore, it is Monsignore come to take +you to the Sistine Chapel in his carriage," and drew himself up in a +line, as much like a series of serving-men as possible, to let us +pass out. There was a private carriage for the ladies near that of +Monsignore, for he had already advertised us that the sex were not +permitted to ride in the red coach. As they appeared, however, he +renewed his expressions of desolation at being deprived of their +company, and assured them of his good-will with a multiplicity of +smiles and nods, intermixed with shrugs of recurrence to his poignant +regret. But! In fine, it was forbidden! + +Monsignore was in full costume, with his best ecclesiastical clothes +on, and with his great gold chain about his neck. The dress was richer +than that of the western archbishops; and the long white beard of +Monsignore made him look much more like a Scriptural monsignore than +these. He lacked, perhaps, the fine spiritual grace of his brother, +the Archbishop at Venice, to whose letter of introduction we owed his +acquaintance and untiring civilities; but if a man cannot be plump and +spiritual, he can be plump and pleasant, as Monsignore was to the last +degree. He enlivened our ride with discourse about the Armenians at +Venice, equally beloved of us; and, arrived at the Sistine Chapel, he +marshaled the ladies before him, and won them early entrance through +the crowd of English people crushing one another at the door. Then +he laid hold upon the captain of the Swiss Guard, who was swift to +provide them with the best places; and in nowise did he seem one of +the uninfluential and insignificant priests that About describes the +archbishops at Rome to be. According to this lively author, a Swiss +guard was striking back the crowd on some occasion with the butt of +his halberd, and smote a cardinal on the breast. He instantly +dropped upon his knees, with "Pardon, Eminenza! I thought it was a +monsignore!" Even the chief of these handsome fellows had nothing but +respect and obedience for our Archbishop. + +The gentlemen present were separated from the ladies, and in a very +narrow space outside of the chapel men of every nation were penned up +together. All talked--several priests as loudly as the rest. But the +rudest among them were certain Germans, who not only talked but stood +upon a seat to see better, and were ordered down by one of the Swiss +with a fierce "_Giù, signore, giù_!" Otherwise the guard kept good +order in the chapel, and were no doubt as useful and genuine as any +thing about the poor old Pope. What gorgeous fellows they were, and, +as soldiers, how absurd! The weapons they bore were as obsolete as the +excommunication. It was amusing to pass one of these play-soldiers on +guard at the door of the Vatican--tall, straight, beautiful, superb, +with his halberd on his shoulder--and then come to a real warrior +outside, a little, ugly, red-legged French sentinel, with his Minié on +his arm. + +Except for the singing of the Pope's choir--which was angelically +sweet, and heavenly far above all praise--the religious ceremonies +affected me, like all others of that faith, as tedious and empty. Each +of the cardinals, as he entered the chapel, blew a sonorous nose; and +was received standing by his brother prelates--a grotesque company +of old-womanish old men in gaudy gowns. One of the last to come was +Antonelli, who has the very wickedest face in the world. He sat with +his eyes fastened upon his book, but obviously open at every pore +to all that went on about him. As he passed out he cast gleaming, +terrible, sidelong looks upon the people, full of hate and guile. + +From where I stood I saw the Pope's face only in profile: it was +gentle and benign enough, but not great in expression, and the smile +on it almost degenerated into a simper. His Holiness had a cold; and +his _recitative_, though full, was not smooth. He was all priest +when, in the midst of the service, he hawked, held his handkerchief up +before his face, a little way off, and ruthlessly spat in it! + + + + +FORZA MAGGIORE. + +I imagine that Grossetto is not a town much known to travel, for it is +absent from all the guide-books I have looked at. However, it is chief +in the Maremma, where sweet Pia de' Tolommei languished and perished +of the poisonous air and her love's cruelty, and where, so many mute +centuries since, the Etrurian cities flourished and fell. Further, one +may say that Grossetto is on the diligence road from Civita Vecchia +to Leghorn, and that in the very heart of the place there is a lovely +palm-tree, rare, if not sole, in that latitude. This palm stands in a +well-sheltered, dull little court, out of every thing's way, and turns +tenderly toward the wall that shields it on the north. It has no other +company but a beautiful young girl, who leans out of a window high +over its head, and I have no doubt talks with it. At the moment we +discovered the friends, the maiden was looking pathetically to the +northward, while the palm softly stirred and opened its plumes, as a +bird does when his song is finished; and there is very little question +but it had just been singing to her that song of which the palms are +so fond,-- + + "Ein Fichtenbaum steht einsam + Im Norden auf kahler Höh'." + +Grossetto does her utmost to hide the secret of this tree's +existence, as if a hard, matter-of-fact place ought to be ashamed of +a sentimentality of the kind. It pretended to be a very worldly town, +and tried to keep us in the neighborhood of its cathedral, where the +caffè and shops are, and where, in the evening, four or five officers +of the garrison clinked their sabres on the stones, and promenaded up +and down, and as many ladies shopped for gloves; and as many citizens +sat at the principal caffè and drank black coffee. This was lively +enough; and we knew that the citizens were talking of the last week's +news and the Roman question; that the ladies were really looking for +loves, not gloves; that such of the officers as had no local intrigue +to keep their hearts at rest were terribly bored, and longed for +Florence or Milan or Turin. + +Besides the social charms of her piazza, Grossetto put forth others +of an artistic nature. The cathedral was very old and very +beautiful,--built of alternate lines of red and white marble, and +lately restored in the best spirit of fidelity and reverence. But +it was not open, and we were obliged to turn from it to the group of +statuary in the middle of the piazza, representative of the Maremma +and Family returning thanks to the Grand Duke Leopold III. of Tuscany +for his goodness in causing her swamps to be drained. The Maremma and +her children are arrayed in the scant draperies of Allegory, but +the Grand Duke is fully dressed, and is shown looking down with some +surprise at their figures, and with a visible doubt of the propriety +of their public appearance in that state. + +There was also a Museum at Grossetto, and I wonder what was in it? + +The wall of the town was perfect yet, though the moat at its feet had +been so long dry that it was only to be known from the adjacent fields +by the richness of its soil. The top of the wall had been leveled, and +planted with shade, and turned into a peaceful promenade, like most of +such mediæval defenses in Italy; though I am not sure that a little +military life did not still linger about a bastion here and there. +From somewhere, when we strolled out early in the morning, to walk +upon the wall, there came to us a throb of drums; but I believe that +the only armed men we saw, beside the officers in the piazza, were +the numerous sportsmen resorting at that season to Grossetto for +the excellent shooting in the marshes. All the way to Florence we +continued to meet them and their dogs; and our inn at Grossetto +overflowed with abundance of game. On the kitchen floor and in the +court were heaps of larks, pheasants, quails, and beccafichi, at which +a troop of scullion-boys constantly plucked, and from which the great, +noble, beautiful, white-aproned cook forever fried, stewed, broiled, +and roasted. We lived chiefly upon these generous birds during our +sojourn, and found, when we attempted to vary our bill of fare, that +the very genteel waiter attending us had few distinct ideas beyond +them. He was part of the repairs and improvements which that +hostelry had recently undergone, and had evidently come in with +the four-pronged forks, the chromo-lithographs of Victor Emanuel, +Garibaldi, Solferino, and Magenta in the large dining-room, and the +iron stove in the small one. He had nothing, evidently, in common with +the brick floors of the bed-chambers, and the ancient rooms with +great fire-places. He strove to give a Florentine blandishment to the +rusticity of life in the Maremma; and we felt sure that he must know +what beefsteak was. When we ordered it, he assumed to be perfectly +conversant with it, started to bring it, paused, turned, and, with a +great sacrifice of personal dignity, demanded, "_Bifsteca di manzo, o +bifsteca di motone_?"--"Beefsteak of beef, or beefsteak of mutton?" + +Of Grossetto proper, this is all I remember, if I except a boy whom I +heard singing after dark in the streets,-- + + "Camicia rossa, O Garibaldi!" + +The cause of our sojourn there was an instance of _forza maggiore_, as +the agent of the diligence company defiantly expressed it, in refusing +us damages for our overturn into the river. It was in the early +part of the winter when we started from Rome for Venice, and we were +travelling northward by diligence because the railways were still more +or less interrupted by the storms and floods predicted of Matthieu +de la Drôme,--the only reliable prophet France has produced since +Voltaire;--and if our accident was caused by an overruling Providence, +the company, according to the very law of its existence, was not +responsible. To be sure, we did not see how an overruling Providence +was to blame for loading upon our diligence the baggage of two +diligences, or for the clumsiness of our driver; but on the other +hand, it is certain that the company did not make it rain or cause +the inundation. And, in fine, although we could not have travelled +by railway, we were masters to have taken the steamer instead of the +diligence at Civita Vecchia. + +The choice of either of these means of travel had presented itself in +vivid hues of disadvantage all the way from Rome to the Papal port, +where the French steamer for Leghorn lay dancing a hornpipe upon the +short, chopping waves, while we approached by railway. We had +leisure enough to make the decision, if that was all we wanted. Our +engine-driver had derived his ideas of progress from an Encyclical +Letter, and the train gave every promise of arriving at Civita Vecchia +five hundred years behind time. But such was the desolating and +depressing influence of the weather and the landscape, that we reached +Civita Vecchia as undecided as we had left Rome. On the one hand, +there had been the land, soaked and sodden,--wild, shagged with +scrubby growths of timber and brooded over by sullen clouds, and +visibly inhabited only by shepherds, leaning upon their staves at +an angle of forty-five degrees, and looking, in their immovable +dejection, with their legs wrapped in long-haired goat-skins, like +satyrs that had been converted, and were trying to do right; turning +dim faces to us, they warned us with every mute appeal against the +land, as a waste of mud from one end of Italy to the other. On +the other hand, there was the sea-wind raving about our train and +threatening to blow it over, and whenever we drew near the coast, +heaping the waves upon the beach in thundering menace. + +We weakly and fearfully remembered our former journeys by diligence +over broken railway routes; we recalled our cruel voyage from Genoa to +Naples by sea; and in a state of pitiable dismay we ate five francs' +worth at the restaurant of the Civita Vecchia station before we knew +it, and long before we had made up our minds. Still we might have +lingered and hesitated, and perhaps returned to Rome at last, but for +the dramatic resolution of the old man who solicited passengers for +the diligence, and carried their passports for a final Papal _visa_ +at the police-office. By the account he gave of himself, he was one of +the best men in the world, and unique in those parts for honesty and +truthfulness; and he besought us, out of that affectionate interest +with which our very aspect had inspired him, not to go by steamer, but +to go by diligence, which in nineteen hours would land us safe, +and absolutely refreshed by the journey, at the railway station in +Follonica. And now, once, would we go by diligence? twice, would we +go? three times, would we go? + +"Signore," said our benefactor, angrily, "I lose my time with you;" +and ran away, to be called back in the course of destiny, as he knew +well enough, and besought to take us as a special favor. + +From the passports he learned that there was official dignity among +us, and addressed the unworthy bearer of public honors as Eccellenza, +and, at parting bequeathed his advantage to the conductor, commending +us all in set terms to his courtesy. He hovered caressingly about us +as long as we remained, straining politeness to do us some last little +service; and when the diligence rolled away, he did all that one man +could to give us a round of applause. + +We laughed together at this silly old man, when out of sight; but we +confessed that, if travel in our own country ever came, with advancing +corruption, to be treated with the small deceits practiced upon it in +Italy, it was not likely to be treated with the small civilities also +there attendant on it,--and so tried to console ourselves. + +At the moment of departure, we were surprised to have enter the +diligence a fellow-countryman, whom we had first seen on the road from +Naples to Rome. He had since crossed our path with that iteration of +travel which brings you again and again in view of the same trunks +and the same tourists in the round of Europe, and finally at Civita +Vecchia he had turned up, a silent spectator of our scene with the +agent of the diligence, and had gone off apparently a confirmed +passenger by steamer. Perhaps a nearer view of the sailor's hornpipe, +as danced by that vessel in the harbor, shook his resolution. At +any rate, here he was again, and with his ticket for Follonica,--a +bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked man, and we will say a citizen of Portland, +though he was not. For the first time in our long acquaintance with +one another's faces, we entered into conversation, and wondered +whether we should find brigands or any thing to eat on the road, +without expectation of finding either. In respect of robbers, we were +not disappointed; but shortly after nightfall we stopped at a lonely +post-house to change horses, and found that the landlord had so far +counted on our appearance as to have, just roasted and fragrantly +fuming, a leg of lamb, with certain small fried fish, and a +sufficiency of bread. It was a very lonely place as I say; the sky was +gloomy overhead; and the wildness of the landscape all about us gave +our provision quite a gamy flavor; and brigands could have added +nothing to our sense of solitude. + +The road creeps along the coast for some distance from Civita Vecchia, +within hearing of the sea, and nowhere widely forsakes it, I believe, +all the way to Follonica. The country is hilly, and we stopped every +two hours to change horses; at which times we looked out, and, seeing +that it was a gray and windy night, though not rainy, exulted that we +had not taken the steamer. With very little change, the wisdom of +our decision in favor of the diligence formed the burden of our talk +during the whole night; and to think of eluded sea-sickness requited +us in the agony of our break-neck efforts to catch a little sleep, as, +mounted upon our nightmares, we rode steeple-chases up and down the +highways and by-ways of horror. Any thing that absolutely awakened us +was accounted a blessing; and I remember few things in life with so +keen a pleasure as the summons that came to us to descend from our +places and cross a river in one boat, while the two diligences of +our train followed in another. Here we had time to see our +fellow-passengers, as the pulsating light of their cigars illumined +their faces, and to discover among them that Italian, common to all +large companies, who speaks English, and is very eager to practice +it with you,--who is such a benefactor if you do not know his own +language, and such a bore if you do. After this, being landed, it was +rapture to stroll up and down the good road, and feel it hard and real +under our feet, and not an abysmal impalpability, while all the +grim shapes of our dreams fled to the spectral line of small boats +sustaining the ferry-barge, and swaying slowly from it as the drowned +men at their keels tugged them against the tide. + +"_S' accommodino, Signori_!" cries the cheerful voice of the +conductor, and we ascend to our places in the diligence. The +nightmares are brought out again; we mount, and renew the +steeple-chase as before. + +Suddenly, it all comes to an end, and we sit wide awake in the +diligence, amid a silence only broken by the hiss of rain against the +windows, and the sweep of gusts upon the roof. The diligence stands +still; there is no rattle of harness, nor other sound to prove that we +have arrived at the spot by other means than dropping from the clouds. +The idea that we are passengers in the last diligence destroyed +before the Deluge, and are now waiting our fate on the highest ground +accessible to wheels, fades away as the day dimly breaks, and we find +ourselves planted, as the Italians say, on the banks of another +river. There is no longer any visible conductor, the horses have been +spirited away, the driver has vanished. + +The rain beats and beats upon the roof, and begins to drop through +upon us in great, wrathful tears, while the river before us rushes +away with a momently swelling flood. Enter now from the depths of +the storm a number of rainy peasants, with our conductor and driver +perfectly waterlogged, and group themselves on the low, muddy shore, +near a flat ferry-barge, evidently wanting but a hint of _forza +maggiore_ to go down with any thing put into it. A moment they +dispute in pantomime, sending now and then a windy tone of protest +and expostulation to our ears, and then they drop into a motionless +silence, and stand there in the tempest, not braving it, but enduring +it with the pathetic resignation of their race, as if it were some +form of hopeless political oppression. At last comes the conductor to +us and says, It is impossible for our diligences to cross in the +boat, and he has sent for others to meet us on the opposite shore. +He expected them long before this, but we see! They are not come. +Patience and malediction! + +Remaining planted in these unfriendly circumstances from four o'clock +till ten, we have still the effrontery to be glad that we did not +take the steamer. What a storm that must be at sea! When at last +our connecting diligences appear on the other shore, we are almost +light-hearted, and make a jest of the Ombrone, as we perilously pass +it in the ferry-boat too weak for our diligences. Between the landing +and the vehicles there is a space of heavy mud to cross, and when we +reach them we find the _coupé_ appointed us occupied by three young +Englishmen, who insist that they shall be driven to the boat. With +that graceful superiority which endears their nation to the world, and +makes the travelling Englishman a universal favorite, they keep +the seats to which they have no longer any right, while the tempest +drenches the ladies to whom the places belong; and it is only by the +_forza maggiore_ of our conductor that they can be dislodged. In +the mean time the Portland man exchanges with them the assurances of +personal and national esteem, which that mighty bond of friendship, +the language of Shakespeare and Milton, enables us to offer so +idiomatically to our transatlantic cousins. + +What Grossetto was like, as we first rode through it, we scarcely +looked to see. In four or five hours we should strike the railroad at +Follonica; and we merely asked of intermediate places that they +should not detain us. We dined in Grossetto at an inn of the Larthian +period,--a cold inn and a damp, which seemed never to have been +swept since the broom dropped from the grasp of the last Etrurian +chambermaid,--and we ate with the two-pronged iron forks of an extinct +civilization. All the while we dined, a boy tried to kindle a fire +to warm us, and beguiled his incessant failures with stories of +inundation on the road ahead of us. But we believed him so little, +that when he said a certain stream near Grossetto was impassable, our +company all but hissed him. + +When we left the town and hurried into the open country, we perceived +that he had only too great reason to be an alarmist. Every little +rill was risen, and boiling over with the pride of harm, and the broad +fields lay hid under the yellow waters that here and there washed over +the road. Yet the freshet only presented itself to us as a pleasant +excitement; and even when we came to a place where the road itself +was covered for a quarter of a mile, we scarcely looked outside the +diligence to see how deep the water was. We were surprised when our +horses were brought to a stand on a rising ground, and the conductor, +cap in hand, appeared at the door. He was a fat, well-natured man, +full of a smiling goodwill; and he stood before us in a radiant +desperation. + +Would Eccellenza descend, look at the water in front, and decide +whether to go on? The conductor desired to content; it displeased him +to delay,--_ma, in somma_!--the rest was confided to the conductor's +eloquent shoulders and eyebrows. + +Eccellenza, descending, beheld but a disheartening prospect. On every +hand the country was under water. The two diligences stood on a stone +bridge spanning the stream, that, now swollen to an angry torrent, +brawled over a hundred yards of the road before us. Beyond, the ground +rose, and on its slope stood a farm-house up to its second story in +water. Without the slightest hope in his purpose and merely as an +experiment, Eccellenza suggested that a man should be sent in on +horseback; which being done, man and horse in a moment floundered into +swimming depths. + +The conductor, vigilantly regarding Eccellenza, gave a great shrug of +desolation. + +Eccellenza replied with a foreigner's broken shrug,--a shrug of +sufficiently correct construction, but wanting the tonic accent, +as one may say, though expressing, however imperfectly, an equal +desolation. + +It appeared to be the part of wisdom not to go ahead, but to go back +if we could; and we reëntered the water we had just crossed. It had +risen a little meanwhile, and the road could now be traced only by the +telegraph-poles. The diligence before us went safely through; but our +driver, trusting rather to inspiration than precedent, did not follow +it carefully, and directly drove us over the side of a small viaduct. +All the baggage of the train having been lodged upon the roof of our +diligence, the unwieldy vehicle now lurched heavily, hesitated, as if +preparing, like Cæsar, to fall decently, and went over on its side +with a stately deliberation that gave us ample time to arrange our +plans for getting out. + +The torrent was only some three feet deep, but it was swift and muddy, +and it was with a fine sense of shipwreck that Eccellenza felt his +boots filling with water, while a conviction that it would have been +better, after all, to have taken the steamer, struck coldly home to +him. We opened the window in the top side of the diligence, and +lifted the ladies through it and the conductor, in the character of +life-boat, bore them ashore; while the driver cursed his horses in +a sullen whisper, and could with difficulty be diverted from that +employment to cut the lines and save one of them from drowning. + +Here our compatriot, whose conversation with the Englishman at the +Ombrone we had lately admired, showed traits of strict and severe +method which afterward came into even bolder relief. The ladies being +rescued, he applied himself to the rescue of their hats, cloaks, +rubbers, muffs, books, and bags, and handed them up through the window +with tireless perseverance, making an effort to wring or dry each +article in turn. The other gentleman on top received them all rather +grimly, and had not perhaps been amused by the situation but for the +exploit of his hat. It was of the sort called in Italian as in English +slang a stove-pipe (_canna_), and having been made in Italy, it was +of course too large for its wearer. It had never been any thing but a +horror and reproach to him, and he was now inexpressibly delighted +to see it steal out of the diligence in company with one of the +red-leather cushions, and glide darkly down the flood. It nodded and +nodded to the cushion with a superhuman tenderness and elegance, and +had a preposterous air of whispering, as it drifted out of sight,-- + + "It may be we shall reach the Happy Isles,-- + It may be that the gulfs shall wash us down." + +The romantic interest of this episode had hardly died away, when our +adventure acquired an idyllic flavor from the appearance on the scene +of four peasants in an ox-cart. These the conductor tried to engage to +bring out the baggage and right the fallen diligence; and they, after +making him a little speech upon the value of their health, which +might be injured, asked him, tentatively, two hundred francs for +the service. The simple incident enforced the fact already known to +us,--that, if Italians sometimes take advantage of strangers, they +are equally willing to prey upon each other; but I doubt if any thing +could have taught a foreigner the sweetness with which our conductor +bore the enormity, and turned quietly from those brigands to carry the +Portland man from the wreck, on which he lingered, to the shore. + +Here in the gathering twilight the passengers of both diligences +grouped themselves, and made merry over the common disaster. As the +conductor and the drivers brought off the luggage our spirits rose +with the arrival of each trunk, and we were pleased or not as we found +it soaked or dry. We applauded and admired the greater sufferers among +us: a lady who opened a dripping box was felt to have perpetrated a +pleasantry; and a Brazilian gentleman, whose luggage dropped to pieces +and was scattered in the flood about the diligence, was looked upon as +a very subtile humorist. Our own contribution to these witty passages +was the epigrammatic display of a reeking trunk full of the pretty +rubbish people bring away from Rome and Naples,--copies of Pompeian +frescos more ruinous than the originals; photographs floating loose +from their cards; little earthen busts reduced to the lumpishness of +common clay; Roman scarfs stained and blotted out of all memory of +their recent hues; Roman pearls clinging together in clammy masses. + +We were a band of brothers and sisters, as we all crowded into one +diligence and returned to Grossetto. Arrived there, our party, knowing +that a public conveyance in Italy--and everywhere else--always stops +at the worst inn in a place, made bold to seek another, and found it +without ado, though the person who undertook to show it spoke of it +mysteriously and as of difficult access, and tried to make the simple +affair as like a scene of grand opera as he could. + +We took one of the ancient rooms in which there was a vast fire-place, +as already mentioned, and we there kindled such a fire as could not +have been known in that fuel-sparing land for ages. The drying of the +clothes was an affair that drew out all the energy and method of our +compatriot, and at a late hour we left him moving about among the +garments that dangled and dripped from pegs and hooks and lines, +dealing with them as a physician with his sick, and tenderly nursing +his dress-coat, which he wrung and shook and smoothed and pulled this +way and that with a never-satisfied anxiety. At midnight, he hired +a watcher to keep up the fire and turn the steaming raiment, and, +returning at four o'clock, found his watcher dead asleep before the +empty fire-place. But I rather applaud than blame the watcher for +this. He must have been a man of iron nerve to fall asleep amid all +that phantasmal show of masks and disguises. What if those reeking +silks had forsaken their nails, and, decking themselves with the +blotted Roman scarfs and the slimy Roman pearls, had invited the +dress-coats to look over the dripping photographs? Or if all those +drowned garments had assumed the characters of the people whom they +had grown to resemble, and had sat down to hear the shade of Pia de' +Tolommei rehearse the story of her sad fate in the Maremma? I say, if +a watcher could sleep in such company, he was right to do so. + + * * * * * + +On the third day after our return to Grossetto, we gathered together +our damaged effects, and packed them into refractory trunks. Then +we held the customary discussion with the landlord concerning the +effrontery of his account, and drove off once more toward Follonica. +We could scarcely recognize the route for the one we had recently +passed over; and it was not until we came to the scene of our wreck, +and found the diligence stranded high and dry upon the roadside, that +we could believe the whole landscape about us had been flooded three +days before. The offending stream had shrunk back to its channel, and +now seemed to feign an unconsciousness of its late excess, and had +a virtuous air of not knowing how in the world to account for that +upturned diligence. The waters, we learned, had begun to subside the +night after our disaster; and the vehicle might have been righted +and drawn off--for it was not in the least injured--forty-eight hours +previously; but I suppose it was not _en règle_ to touch it without +orders from Rome. I picture it to myself still lying there, in the +heart of the marshes, and thrilling sympathetic travel with the +spectacle of its ultimate ruin: + + "Disfecemi Maremma." + +We reached Follonica at last, and then the cars hurried us to Leghorn. +We were thoroughly humbled in spirit, and had no longer any doubt +that we did ill to take the diligence at Civita Vecchia instead of +the steamer; for we had been, not nineteen hours, but four days on the +road, and we had suffered as aforementioned. + +But we were destined to be partially restored to our self-esteem, if +not entirely comforted for our losses, when we sat down to dinner in +the Hotel Washington, and the urbane head-waiter, catching the drift +of our English discourse, asked us,-- + +"Have the signori heard that the French steamer, which left Civita +Vecchia the same day with their diligence, had to put back and lie in +port more than two days on account of the storm? She is but now come +into Leghorn, after a very dangerous passage." + + + + +AT PADUA + +I. + +Those of my readers who have frequented the garden of Doctor +Rappaccini no doubt recall with perfect distinctness the quaint +old city of Padua. They remember its miles and miles of dim arcade +over-roofing the sidewalks everywhere, affording excellent opportunity +for the flirtation of lovers by day and the vengeance of rivals by +night. They have seen the now-vacant streets thronged with maskers, +and the Venetian Podestà going in gorgeous state to and from the vast +Palazzo della Ragione. They have witnessed ringing tournaments in +those sad empty squares, and races in the Prato della Valle, and +many other wonders of different epochs, and their pleasure makes me +half-sorry that I should have lived for several years within an hour +by rail from Padua, and should know little or nothing of these great +sights from actual observation. I take shame to myself for having +visited Padua so often and so familiarly as I used to do,--for having +been bored and hungry there,--for having had toothache there, upon one +occasion,--for having rejoiced more in a cup of coffee at Pedrocchi's +than in the whole history of Padua,--for having slept repeatedly in +the bad-bedded hotels of Padua and never once dreamt of Portia,--for +having been more taken by the _salti mortali_[_Salti mortali_ are +those prodigious efforts of mental arithmetic by which Italian +waiters, in verbally presenting your account, arrive at six as the +product of two and two.] of a waiter who summed up my account at a +Paduan restaurant, than by all the strategies with which the city has +been many times captured and recaptured. Had I viewed Padua only over +the wall of Doctor Rappaccini's garden, how different my impressions +of the city would now be! This is one of the drawbacks of actual +knowledge. "Ah! how can you write about Spain when once you have been +there?" asked Heine of Théophile Gautier setting out on a journey +thither. + +Nevertheless it seems to me that I remember something about Padua with +a sort of romantic pleasure. There was a certain charm which I can +dimly recall, in sauntering along the top of the old wall of the +city, and looking down upon the plumy crests of the Indian corn that +flourished up so mightily from the dry bed of the moat. At such times +I could not help figuring to myself the many sieges that the wall had +known, with the fierce assault by day, the secret attack by night, the +swarming foe upon the plains below, the bristling arms of the besieged +upon the wall, the boom of the great mortars made of ropes and leather +and throwing mighty balls of stone, the stormy flight of arrows, the +ladders planted against the defenses and staggering headlong into the +moat, enriched for future agriculture not only by its sluggish waters, +but by the blood of many men. I suppose that most of these visions +were old stage spectacles furbished up anew, and that my armies +were chiefly equipped with their obsolete implements of warfare from +museums of armor and from cabinets of antiquities; but they were very +vivid for all that. + +I was never able, in passing a certain one of the city gates, to +divest myself of an historic interest in the great loads of hay +waiting admission on the outside. For an instant they masked again the +Venetian troops that, in the War of the League of Cambray, entered the +city in the hay-carts, shot down the landsknechts at the gates, and, +uniting with the citizens, cut the German garrison to pieces. But it +was a thing long past. The German garrison was here again; and the +heirs of the landsknechts went clanking through the gate to the +parade-ground, with that fierce clamor of their kettle-drums which is +so much fiercer because unmingled with the noise of fifes. Once more +now the Germans are gone, and, let us trust, forever; but when I +saw them, there seemed little hope of their going. They had a great +Biergarten on the top of the wall, and they had set up the altars of +their heavy Bacchus in many parts of the city. + +I please myself with thinking that, if I walked on such a spring +day as this in the arcaded Paduan streets, I should catch glimpses, +through the gate-ways of the palaces, of gardens full of vivid bloom, +and of fountains that tinkle there forever. If it were autumn, and +I were in the great market-place before the Palazzo della Ragione, I +should hear the baskets of amber-hued and honeyed grapes humming with +the murmur of multitudinous bees, and making a music as if the wine +itself were already singing in their gentle hearts. It is a great +field of succulent verdure, that wide old market-place; and fancy +loves to browse about among its gay stores of fruits and vegetables, +brought thither by the world-old peasant-women who have been bringing +fruits and vegetables to the Paduan market for so many centuries. They +sit upon the ground before their great panniers, and knit and doze, +and wake up with a drowsy "_Comandala_?" as you linger to look +at their grapes. They have each a pair of scales,--the emblem of +Injustice,--and will weigh you out a scant measure of the fruit if you +like. Their faces are yellow as parchment, and Time has written them +so full of wrinkles that there is not room for another line. Doubtless +these old parchment visages are palimpsests, and would tell the whole +history of Padua if you could get at each successive inscription. +Among their primal records there must be some account of the Roman +city, as each little contadinella remembered it on market-days; and +one might read of the terror of Attila's sack, a little later, with +the peasant-maid's personal recollections of the bold Hunnish trooper +who ate up the grapes in her basket, and kissed her hard, round red +cheeks,--for in that time she was a blooming girl,--and paid nothing +for either privilege. What wild and confused reminiscences on the +wrinkled visage we should find thereafter of the fierce republican +times, of Ecelino, of the Carraras, of the Venetian rule! And is it +not sad to think of systems and peoples all passing away, and these +ancient women lasting still, and still selling grapes in front of the +Palazzo della Ragione? What a long mortality! + +The youngest of their number is a thousand years older than the +palace, which was begun in the twelfth century, and which is much the +same now as it was when first completed. I know that, if I entered it, +I should be sure of finding the great hall of the palace--the vastest +hall in the world--dim and dull and dusty and delightful, with nothing +in it except at one end Donatello's colossal marble-headed wooden +horse of Troy, stared at from the other end by the two dog-faced +Egyptian women in basalt placed there by Belzoni. + +Late in the drowsy summer afternoons I should have the Court of the +University all to myself, and might study unmolested the blazons of +the noble youth who have attended the school in different centuries +ever since 1200, and have left their escutcheons on the walls to +commemorate them. At the foot of the stairway ascending to the schools +from the court is the statue of the learned lady who was once a +professor in the University, and who, if her likeness belie not her +looks, must have given a great charm to student life in other times. +At present there are no lady professors at Padua any more than at +Harvard; and during late years the schools have suffered greatly from +the interference of the Austrian government, which frequently closed +them for months, on account of political demonstrations among the +students. But now there is an end of this and many other stupid +oppressions; and the time-honored University will doubtless regain +its ancient importance. Even in 1864 it had nearly fifteen hundred +students, and one met them everywhere under the arcades, and could +not well mistake them, with that blended air of pirate and dandy which +these studious young men loved to assume. They were to be seen a good +deal on the promenades outside the walls, where the Paduan ladies are +driven in their carriages in the afternoon, and where one sees the +blood-horses and fine equipages for which Padua is famous. There used +once to be races in the Prato della Valle, after the Italian notion of +horse-races; but these are now discontinued, and there is nothing to +be found there but the statues of scholars and soldiers and statesmen, +posted in a circle around the old race-course. If you strolled thither +about dusk on such a day as this, you might see the statues unbend a +little from their stony rigidity, and in the failing light nod to each +other very pleasantly through the trees. And if you stayed in Padua +over night, what could be better to-morrow morning than a stroll +through the great Botanical Garden,--the oldest botanical garden in +the world,--the garden which first received in Europe the strange +and splendid growths of our hemisphere,--the garden where Doctor +Rappaccini doubtless found the germ of his mortal plant? + +On the whole, I believe I would rather go this moment to Padua than to +Lowell or Lawrence, or even to Worcester; and as to the disadvantage +of having seen Padua, I begin to think the whole place has now assumed +so fantastic a character in my mind that I am almost as well qualified +to write of it as if I had merely dreamed it. + +The day that we first visited the city was very rainy, and we spent +most of the time in viewing the churches. These, even after the +churches of Venice, one finds rich in art and historic interest, and +they in no instance fall into the maniacal excesses of the Renaissance +to which some of the temples of the latter city abandon themselves. +Their architecture forms a sort of border-land between the Byzantine +of Venice and the Lombardic of Verona. The superb domes of St. +Anthony's emulate those of St. Mark's; and the porticos of other +Paduan churches rest upon the backs of bird-headed lions and leopards +that fascinate with their mystery and beauty. + +It was the wish to see the attributive Giottos in the Chapter which +drew us first to St. Anthony's, and we saw them with the satisfaction +naturally attending the contemplation of frescos discovered only since +1858, after having been hidden under plaster and whitewash for many +centuries; but we could not believe that Giotto's fame was destined +to gain much by their rescue from oblivion. They are in nowise to +be compared with this master's frescos in the Chapel of the +Annunziata,--which, indeed, is in every way a place of wonder and +delight. You reach it by passing through a garden lane bordered with +roses, and a taciturn gardener comes out with clinking keys, and lets +you into the chapel, where there is nobody but Giotto and Dante, nor +seems to have been for ages. Cool it is, and of a pulverous smell, as +a sacred place should be; a blessed benching goes round the walls, and +you sit down and take unlimited comfort in the frescos. The gardener +leaves you alone to the solitude and the silence, in which the talk +of the painter and the exile is plain enough. Their contemporaries and +yours are cordial in their gay companionship: through the half-open +door falls, in a pause of the rain, the same sunshine that they saw +lie there; the deathless birds that they heard sing out in the garden +trees; it is the fresh sweetness of the grass mown so many hundred +years ago that breathes through all the lovely garden grounds. + +But in the midst of this pleasant communion with the past, you have +a lurking pain; for you have hired your brougham by the hour; and you +presently quit the Chapel of Giotto on this account. + +We had chosen our driver from among many other drivers of broughams in +the vicinity of Pedrocchi's, because he had such an honest look, and +was not likely, we thought, to deal unfairly with us. + +"But first," said the signor who had selected him, "how much is your +brougham an hour?" + +So and so. + +"Show me the tariff of fares." + +"There is no tariff." + +"There is. Show it to me." + +"It is lost, signor." + +"I think not. It is here in this pocket. Get it out." + +The tariff appears, and with it the fact that he had demanded just +what the boatman of the ballad received in gift,--thrice his fee. + +The driver mounted his seat, and served us so faithfully that day in +Padua that we took him the next day for Arquà. At the end, when he +had received his due, and a handsome _mancia_ besides, he was still +unsatisfied, and referred to the tariff in proof that he had been +under-paid. On that confronted and defeated, he thanked us very +cordially, gave us the number of his brougham, and begged us to ask +for him when we came next to Padua and needed a carriage. + +From the Chapel of the Annunziata he drove us to the Church of Santa +Giustina, where is a very famous and noble picture by Romanino. But as +this writing has nothing in the world to do with art, I here dismiss +that subject, and with a gross and idle delight follow the sacristan +down under the church to the prison of Santa Giustina. + +Of all the faculties of the mind there is none so little fatiguing to +exercise as mere wonder; and, for my own sake, I try always to wonder +at things without the least critical reservation. I therefore, in the +sense of deglutition, bolted this prison at once, though subsequent +experiences led me to look with grave indigestion upon the whole idea +of prisons, their authenticity, and even their existence. + +As far as mere dimensions are concerned, the prison of Santa Giustina +was not a hard one to swallow, being only three feet wide by about +ten feet in length. In this limited space, Santa Giustina passed five +years of the paternal reign of Nero (a virtuous and a long-suffering +prince, whom, singularly enough, no historic artist has yet arisen to +whitewash), and was then brought out into the larger cell adjoining, +to suffer a blessed martyrdom. I am not sure now whether the sacristan +said she was dashed to death on the stones, or cut to pieces with +knives; but whatever the form of martyrdom, an iron ring in the +ceiling was employed in it, as I know from seeing the ring,--a +curiously well-preserved piece of iron-mongery. Within the narrow +prison of the saint, and just under the grating, through which the +sacristan thrust his candle to illuminate it, was a mountain of +candle-drippings,--a monument to the fact that faith still largely +exists in this doubting world. My own credulity, not only with regard +to this prison, but also touching the coffin of St. Luke, which I saw +in the church, had so wrought upon the esteem of the sacristan, that +he now took me to a well, into which, he said, had been cast the bones +of three thousand Christian martyrs. He lowered a lantern into the +well, and assured me that, if I looked through a certain screenwork +there, I could see the bones. On experiment I could not see the +bones, but this circumstance did not cause me to doubt their presence, +particularly as I did see upon the screen a great number of coins +offered for the repose of the martyrs' souls. I threw down some +_soldi_, and thus enthralled the sacristan. + +If the signor cared to see prisons, he said, the driver must take him +to those of Ecelino, at present the property of a private gentleman +near by. As I had just bought a history of Ecelino, at a great +bargain, from a second-hand book-stall, and had a lively interest in +all the enormities of that nobleman, I sped the driver instantly to +the villa of the Signor P----. + +It depends here altogether upon the freshness or mustiness of the +reader's historical reading whether he cares to be reminded more +particularly who Ecelino was. He flourished balefully in the early +half of the thirteenth century as lord of Vicenza, Verona, Padua, and +Brescia, and was defeated and hurt to death in an attempt to possess +himself of Milan. He was in every respect a remarkable man for +that time,--fearless, abstemious, continent, avaricious, hardy, +and unspeakably ambitious and cruel. He survived and suppressed +innumerable conspiracies, escaping even the thrust of the assassin +whom the fame of his enormous wickedness had caused the Old Man of the +Mountain to send against him. As lord of Padua he was more incredibly +severe and bloody in his rule than as lord of the other cities, for +the Paduans had been latest free, and conspired the most frequently +against him. He extirpated whole families on suspicion that a single +member had been concerned in a meditated revolt. Little children and +helpless women suffered hideous mutilation and shame at his hands. +Six prisons in Padua were constantly filled by his arrests. The whole +country was traversed by witnesses of his cruelties,--men and women +deprived of an arm or leg, and begging from door to door. He had long +been excommunicated; at last the Church proclaimed a crusade against +him, and his lieutenant and nephew--more demoniacal, if possible, +than himself--was driven out of Padua while he was operating against +Mantua. Ecelino retired to Verona, and maintained a struggle against +the crusade for nearly two years longer, with a courage which never +failed him. Wounded and taken prisoner, the soldiers of the victorious +army gathered about him, and heaped insult and reproach upon him; +and one furious peasant, whose brother's feet had been cut off by +Ecelino's command, dealt the helpless monster four blows upon the head +with a scythe. By some, Ecelino is said to have died of these wounds +alone; but by others it is related that his death was a kind of +suicide, inasmuch as he himself put the case past surgery by tearing +off the bandages from his hurts, and refusing all medicines. + + +II. + +Entering at the enchanted portal of the Villa P----, we found +ourselves in a realm of wonder. It was our misfortune not to see the +magician who compelled all the marvels on which we looked, but +for that very reason, perhaps, we have the clearest sense of his +greatness. Everywhere we beheld the evidences of his ingenious but +lugubrious fancy, which everywhere tended to a monumental and mortuary +effect. A sort of vestibule first received us, and beyond this dripped +and glimmered the garden. The walls of the vestibule were covered with +inscriptions setting forth the sentiments of the philosophy and piety +of all ages concerning life and death; we began with Confucius, and +we ended with Benjamino Franklino. But as if these ideas of mortality +were not sufficiently depressing, the funereal Signor P---- had +collected into earthen _amphoræ_ the ashes of the most famous men of +ancient and modern times, and arranged them so that a sense of their +number and variety should at once strike his visitor. Each jar was +conspicuously labeled with the name its illustrious dust had borne +in life; and if one escaped with comparative cheerfulness from the +thought that Seneca had died, there were in the very next pot the +cinders of Napoleon to bully him back to a sense of his mortality. + +We were glad to have the gloomy fascination of these objects broken by +the custodian, who approached to ask if we wished to see the prisons +of Ecelino, and we willingly followed him into the rain out of our +sepulchral shelter. + +Between the vestibule and the towers of the tyrant lay that garden +already mentioned, and our guide led us through ranks of weeping +statuary, and rainy bowers, and showery lanes of shrubbery, until we +reached the door of his cottage. While he entered to fetch the key +to the prisons, we noted that the towers were freshly painted and +in perfect repair; and indeed the custodian said frankly enough, on +reappearing, that they were merely built over the prisons on the site +of the original towers. The storied stream of the Bacchiglione sweeps +through the grounds, and now, swollen by the rainfall, it roared, a +yellow torrent, under a corner of the prisons. The towers rise from +masses of foliage, and form no unpleasing feature of what must be, in +spite of Signor P----, a delightful Italian garden in sunny weather. +The ground is not so flat as elsewhere in Padua, and this inequality +gives an additional picturesqueness to the place. But as we were +come in search of horrors, we scorned these merely lovely things, and +hastened to immure ourselves in the dungeons below. The custodian, +lighting a candle, (which ought, we felt, to have been a torch,) went +before. + +We found the cells, though narrow and dark, not uncomfortable, and the +guide conceded that they had undergone some repairs since Ecelino's +time. But all the horrors for which we had come were there in perfect +grisliness, and labeled by the ingenious Signor P---- with Latin +inscriptions. + +In the first cell was a shrine of the Virgin, set in the wall. Beneath +this, while the wretched prisoner knelt in prayer, a trap-door opened +and precipitated him upon the points of knives, from which his body +fell into the Bacchiglione below. In the next cell, held by some rusty +iron rings to the wall, was a skeleton, hanging by the wrists. + +"This," said the guide, "was another punishment of which Ecelino was +very fond." + +A dreadful doubt seized my mind. "Was this skeleton found here?" I +demanded. + +Without faltering an instant, without so much as winking an eye, the +custodian replied, "_Appunto_." + +It was a great relief, and restored me to confidence in the +establishment. I am at a loss to explain how my faith should have been +confirmed afterwards by coming upon a guillotine--an awful instrument +in the likeness of a straw-cutter, with a decapitated wooden figure +under its blade--which the custodian confessed to be a modern +improvement placed there by Signor P----. Yet my credulity was so +strengthened by his candor, that I accepted without hesitation the +torture of the water-drop when we came to it. The water-jar was as +well preserved as if placed there but yesterday, and the skeleton +beneath it--found as we saw it--was entire and perfect. + +In the adjoining cell sat a skeleton--found as we saw it--with its +neck in the clutch of the garrote, which was one of Ecelino's more +merciful punishments; while in still another cell the ferocity of +the tyrant appeared in the penalty inflicted upon the wretch whose +skeleton had been hanging for ages--as we saw it--head downwards from +the ceiling. + +Beyond these, in a yet darker and drearier dungeon, stood a heavy +oblong wooden box, with two apertures near the top, peering through +which we found that we were looking into the eyeless sockets of a +skull. Within this box Ecelino had immured the victim we beheld there, +and left him to perish in view of the platters of food and goblets of +drink placed just beyond the reach of his hands. The food we saw was +of course not the original food. + +At last we came to the crowning horror of Villa P----, the supreme +excess of Ecelino's cruelty. The guide entered the cell before us, +and, as we gained the threshold, threw the light of his taper vividly +upon a block that stood in the middle of the floor. Fixed to the +block by an immense spike driven through from the back was the little +slender hand of a woman, which lay there just as it had been struck +from the living arm, and which, after the lapse of so many centuries, +was still as perfectly preserved as if it had been embalmed. The sight +had a most cruel fascination; and while one of the horror-seekers +stood helplessly conjuring to his vision that scene of unknown +dread,--the shrinking, shrieking woman dragged to the block, the wild, +shrill, horrible screech following the blow that drove in the spike, +the merciful swoon after the mutilation,--his companion, with a sudden +pallor, demanded to be taken instantly away. + +In their swift withdrawal, they only glanced at a few detached +instruments of torture,--all original Ecelinos, but intended for the +infliction of minor and comparatively unimportant torments,--and then +they passed from that place of fear. + + +III. + +In the evening we sat talking at the Caffè Pedrocchi with an abbate, +an acquaintance of ours, who was a Professor in the University of +Padua. Pedrocchi's is the great caffè of Padua, a granite edifice +of Egyptian architecture, which is the mausoleum of the proprietor's +fortune. The pecuniary skeleton at the feast, however, does not much +trouble the guests. They begin early in the evening to gather into the +elegant saloons of the caffè,--somewhat too large for so small a city +as Padua,--and they sit there late in the night over their cheerful +cups and their ices, with their newspapers and their talk. Not so many +ladies are to be seen as at the caffè in Venice, for it is only in the +greater cities that they go much to these public places. There are few +students at Pedrocchi's, for they frequent the cheaper caffè; but you +may nearly always find there some Professor of the University, and +on the evening of which I speak there were two present besides our +abbate. Our friend's great passion was the English language, which +he understood too well to venture to speak a great deal. He had been +translating from that tongue into Italian certain American poems, and +our talk was of these at first. Then we began to talk of distinguished +American writers, of whom intelligent Italians always know at least +four, in this succession,--Cooper, Mrs. Stowe, Longfellow, and Irving. +Mrs. Stowe's _Capanna di Zio Tom_ is, of course universally read; and +my friend had also read _Il Fiore di Maggio_,--"The May-flower." +Of Longfellow, the "Evangeline" is familiar to Italians, through a +translation of the poem; but our abbate knew all the poet's works, +and one of the other professors present that evening had made such +faithful study of them as to have produced some translations rendering +the original with remarkable fidelity and spirit. I have before +me here his _brochure_, printed last year at Padua, and containing +versions of "Enceladus," "Excelsior," "A Psalm of Life," "The +Old Clock on the Stairs," "Sand of the Desert in an Hour-Glass," +"Twilight," "Daybreak," "The Quadroon Girl," and "Torquemada,"--pieces +which give the Italians a fair notion of our poet's lyrical range, and +which bear witness to Professor Messadaglia's sympathetic and +familiar knowledge of his works. A young and gifted lady of Parma, +now unhappily no more, lately published a translation of "The Golden +Legend;" and Professor Messadaglia, in his Preface, mentions a version +of another of our poet's longer works on which the translator of the +"Evangeline" is now engaged. + +At last, turning from literature, we spoke with the gentle abbate of +our day's adventures, and eagerly related that of the Ecelino prisons. +To have seen them was the most terrific pleasure of our lives. + +"Eh!" said our friend, "I believe you." + +"We mean those under the Villa P----." + +"Exactly." + +There was a tone of politely suppressed amusement in the abbate's +voice; and after a moment's pause, in which we felt our awful +experience slipping and sliding away from us, we ventured to say, "You +don't mean that those are _not_ the veritable Ecelino prisons?" + +"Certainly they are nothing of the kind. The Ecelino prisons were +destroyed when the Crusaders took Padua, with the exception of the +tower, which the Venetian Republic converted into an observatory." + +"But at least these prisons are on the site of Ecelino's castle?" + +"Nothing of the sort. His castle in that case would have been outside +of the old city walls." + +"And those tortures and the prisons are all"-- + +"Things got up for show. No doubt, Ecelino used such things, and many +worse, of which even the ingenuity of Signor P---- cannot conceive. +But he is an eccentric man, loving the horrors of history, and what he +can do to realize them he has done in his prisons." + +"But the custodian--how could he lie so?" + +Our friend shrugged his shoulders. "Eh! easily. And perhaps he even +believed what he said." + +The world began to assume an aspect of bewildering ungenuineness, +and there seemed to be a treacherous quality of fiction in the ground +under our feet. Even the play at the pretty little Teatro Sociale +where we went to pass the rest of the evening appeared hollow and +improbable. We thought the hero something of a bore, with his patience +and goodness; and as for the heroine, pursued by the attentions of the +rich profligate, we doubted if she were any better than she should be. + + + + +A PILGRIMAGE TO PETRARCH'S HOUSE AT ARQUÀ. + +I. + +We said, during summer days at Venice, when every _campo_ was a +furnace seven times heated, and every canal was filled with boiling +bathers, "As soon as it rains we will go to Arquà." Remembering the +ardors of an April sun on the long, level roads of plain, we could not +think of them in August without a sense of dust clogging every pore, +and eyes that shrank from the vision of their blinding whiteness. So +we stayed in Venice, waiting for rain, until the summer had almost +lapsed into autumn; and as the weather cooled before any rain reached +us, we took the moisture on the main-land for granted, and set out +under a cloudy and windy sky. + +We had to go to Padua by railway, and take carriage thence to Arquà +upon the road to Ferrara. I believe no rule of human experience was +violated when it began to rain directly after we reached Padua, +and continued to rain violently the whole day. We gave up this day +entirely to the rain, and did not leave Padua until the following +morning when we count that our pilgrimage to Petrarch's house actually +began. + +The rain had cooled and freshened the air, but it was already too +late in the season for the summer to recover herself with the elastic +brilliancy that follows the rain of July or early August; and there +was I know not what vague sentiment of autumn in the weather. There +was not yet enough of it to stir the + + "Tears from the depth of some divine despair;" + +but in here and there a faded leaf (for in Europe death is not +glorified to the foliage as in our own land), in the purple of the +ripening grapes, and in the tawny grass of the pastures, there was +autumn enough to touch our spirits, and while it hardly affected the +tone of the landscape, to lay upon us the gentle and pensive spell of +its presence. Of all the days in the year I would have chosen this to +go pilgrim to the house of Petrarch. + +The Euganean Hills, on one of which the poet's house is built, are +those mellow heights which you see when you look southwest across the +lagoon at Venice. In misty weather they are blue, and in clear weather +silver, and the October sunset loves them. They rise in tender azure +before you as you issue from the southern gate of Padua, and grow in +loveliness as you draw nearer to them from the rich plain that washes +their feet with endless harvests of oil and wine. + +Oh beauty that will not let itself be told! Could I not take warning +from another, and refrain from this fruitless effort of description? A +friend in Padua had lent me Disraeli's "Venetia," because a passage +of the story occurs in Petrarch's house at Arquà, and we carried the +volumes with us on our pilgrimage. I would here quote the description +of the village, the house, and the hills from this work, as +faultlessly true, and as affording no just idea of either; but nothing +of it has remained in my mind except the geological fact that the +hills are a volcanic range. To tell the truth, the landscape, as we +rode along, continually took my mind off the book, and I could +not give that attention either to the elegant language of its +descriptions, or the adventures of its well-born characters, which +they deserved. I was even more interested in the disreputable-looking +person who mounted the box beside our driver directly we got out of +the city gate, and who invariably commits this infringement upon your +rights in Italy, no matter how strictly and cunningly you frame your +contract that no one else is to occupy any part of the carriage but +yourself. He does not seem to be the acquaintance of the driver, for +they never exchange a word, and he does not seem to pay any thing for +the ride. He got down, in this instance, just before we reached the +little town at which our driver stopped, and asked us if we wished +to drink a glass of the wine of the country. We did not, but his own +thirst seemed to answer equally well, and he slaked it cheerfully at +our cost. + +The fields did not present the busy appearance which had delighted +us on the same road in the spring, but they had that autumnal charm +already mentioned. Many of the vine-leaves were sear; the red grapes +were already purple, and the white grapes pearly ripe, and they formed +a gorgeous necklace for the trees, around which they clung in opulent +festoons. Then, dearer to our American hearts than this southern +splendor, were the russet fields of Indian corn, and, scattered among +the shrunken stalks, great nuggets of the "harmless gold" of pumpkins. + +At Battaglia (the village just beyond which you turn off to go to +Arquà) there was a fair, on the blessed occasion of some saint's day, +and there were many booths full of fruits, agricultural implements, +toys, clothes, wooden ware, and the like. There was a great crowd +and a noise, but, according to the mysterious Italian custom, nobody +seemed to be buying or selling. I am in the belief that a small +purchase of grapes we made here on our return was the great +transaction of the day, unless, indeed, the neat operation in alms +achieved at our expense by a mendicant villager may be classed +commercially. + +When we turned off from the Rovigo road at Battaglia we were only +three miles from Arquà. + + +II. + +Now, all the way from this turning to the foot of the hill on which +the village was stretched asleep in the tender sunshine, there was on +either side of the road a stream of living water. There was no other +barrier than this between the road and the fields (unless the vines +swinging from tree to tree formed a barrier), and, as if in graceful +excuse for the interposition of even these slender streams, Nature +had lavished such growth of wild flowers and wild berries on the banks +that it was like a garden avenue, through the fragrance and beauty of +which we rolled, delighted to silence, almost to sadness. + +When we began to climb the hill to Arquà, and the driver stopped to +breathe his horse, I got out and finished the easy ascent on foot. The +great marvel to me is that the prospect of the vast plain below, on +which, turning back, I feasted my vision, should be there yet, and +always. It had the rare and saddening beauty of evanescence, and awoke +in me the memory of all beautiful scenery, so that I embroidered the +landscape with the silver threads of western streams, and bordered it +with Ohio hills. Ohio hills? When I looked again it was the storied +Euganean group. But what trans-oceanic bird, voyaging hither, dropped +from its mouth the blackberry which took root and grew and blossomed +and ripened, that I might taste Home in it on these classic hills? + +I wonder did Petrarch walk often down this road from his house just +above? I figured him coming to meet me with his book in his hand, in +his reverend poetic robes, and with his laurel on, over that curious +kind of bandaging which he seems to have been fond of--looking, in a +word, for all the world like the neuralgic Petrarch in the pictures. + +Drawing nearer, I discerned the apparition to be a robeless, laureless +lout, who belonged at the village inn. Yet this lout, though not +Petrarch, had merits. His face and hands, and his legs, as seen from +his knees down, had the tone of the richest bronze; he wore a mountain +cap with a long tasseled fall to the back of it; his face was comely +and his eye beautiful; and he was so nobly ignorant of every thing +that a colt or young bullock could not have been better company. He +merely offered to guide us to Petrarch's house, and was silent, except +when spoken to, from that instant. + +I am here tempted to say: Arquà is in the figure of a man stretched +upon the hill slope. The head, which is Petrarch's house, rests upon +the summit. The carelessly tossed arms lie abroad from this in one +direction, and the legs in the opposite quarter. It is a very lank +and shambling figure, without elegance or much proportion, and the +attitude is the last wantonness of loafing. We followed our lout +up the right leg, which is a gentle and easy ascent in the general +likeness of a street. World-old stone cottages crouch on either side; +here and there is a more ambitious house in decay; trees wave over +the street, and down its distance comes an occasional donkey-cart very +musically and leisurely. By all odds, Arquà and its kind of villages +are to be preferred to those hamlets of the plain which in Italy cling +to the white-hot highway without a tree to shelter them, and bake and +burn there in the merciless sun. Their houses of stuccoed stone are +crowded as thickly together as city houses, and these wretched little +villages do their worst to unite the discomforts of town and country +with a success dreadful to think of. In all countries villages are +hateful to the heart of civilized man. In the Lombard plains I wonder +that one stone of them rests upon another. + +We reached Petrarch's house before the custodian had arrived to admit +us, and stood before the high stone wall which shuts in the front of +the house, and quite hides it from those without. This wall bears +the inscription, _Casa Petrarca_, and a marble tablet lettered to the +following effect:-- + + SE TI AGITA + SACRO AMORE DI PATRIA, + T'INCHINA A QUESTE MURA + OVE SPIRÒ LA GRAND' ANIMA, + IL CANTOR DEI SCIPIONI + E DI LAURA. + +Which may be translated: "If thou art stirred by love of country, +bow to these walls, whence passed the great soul, the singer of the +Scipios and of Laura." + +Meanwhile we became the centre of a group of the youths of Arquà, who +had kindly attended our progress in gradually increasing numbers from +the moment we had entered the village. They were dear little girls and +boys, and mountain babies, all with sunburnt faces and the gentle and +the winning ways native to this race, which Nature loves better than +us of the North. The blonde pilgrim seemed to please them, and they +evidently took us for _Tedeschi_. You learn to submit to this fate +in Northern Italy, however ungracefully, for it is the one that +constantly befalls you outside of the greatest cities. The people know +about two varieties of foreigners--the Englishman and the German. If, +therefore, you have not _rosbif_ expressed in every lineament of your +countenance; if the soles of your boots are less than an inch thick, +and your clothes are not reduced in color to the invariable and +maddening tone of the English tweed,--you must resign yourself to be +a German. All this is grievous to the soul which loves to spread its +eagle in every land and to be known as American, with star-spangled +conspicuousness all over the world: but it cannot be helped. I vainly +tried to explain the geographical, political, and natural difference +between Tedeschi and Americani to the custodian of Petrarch's house. +She listened with amiability, shrugged her shoulders hopelessly, and +said, in her rude Venetian, "_Mi no so miga_" (I don't know at all). + +Before she came, I had a mind to prove the celebrity of a poet on the +spot where he lived and died,--on his very hearthstone, as it were. +So I asked the lout, who stood gnawing a stick and shifting his weight +from one foot to the other,-- + +"When did Petrarch live here?" + +"Ah! I don't remember him." + +"Who was he?" + +"A poet, signor." + +Certainly the first response was not encouraging, but the last +revealed that even to the heavy and clouded soul of this lout the +divine fame of the poet had penetrated--and he a lout in the village +where Petrarch lived and ought to be first forgotten. He did not +know when Petrarch had lived there,--a year ago, perhaps, or many +centuries,--but he knew that Petrarch was a poet. A weight of +doubt was lifted from my spirit, and I responded cheerfully to +some observations on the weather offered by a rustic matron who was +pitching manure on the little hill-slope near the house. When, at +last, the custodian came and opened the gate to us, we entered a +little grassy yard from which a flight of steps led to Petrarch's +door. A few flowers grew wild among the grass, and a fig-tree leaned +its boughs against the wall. The figs on it were green, though they +hung ripe and blackening on every other tree in Arquà. Some ivy clung +to the stones, and from this and the fig-tree, as we came away, we +plucked memorial leaves, and blended them with flowers which the youth +of Arquà picked and forced upon us for remembrance. + +A quaint old door opened into the little stone house, and admitted us +to a kind of wide passage-way with rooms on either side; and at the +end opposite to which we entered, another door opened upon a balcony. +From this balcony we looked down on Petrarch's garden, which, +presently speaking, is but a narrow space with more fruit than flowers +in it. Did Petrarch use to sit and meditate in this garden? For me I +should better have liked a chair on the balcony, with the further and +lovelier prospect on every hand of village-roofs, sloping hills all +gray with olives, and the broad, blue Lombard plain, sweeping from +heaven to heaven below. + +The walls of the passage-way are frescoed (now very faintly) in +illustration of the loves of Petrarch and Laura, with verses from the +sonnets inscribed to explain the illustrations. In all these Laura +prevails as a lady of a singularly long waist and stiff movements, and +Petrarch, with his face tied up and a lily in his hand, contemplates +the flower in mingled botany and toothache. There is occasionally a +startling literalness in the way the painter has rendered some of +the verses. I remember with peculiar interest the illustration of a +lachrymose passage concerning a river of tears, wherein the weeping +Petrarch, stretched beneath a tree, had already started a small creek +of tears, which was rapidly swelling to a flood with the torrent from +his eyes. I attribute these frescos to a later date than that of the +poet's residence, but the portrait over the door of the bedroom inside +of the chamber, was of his own time, and taken from him--the custodian +said. As it seemed to look like all the Petrarchian portraits, I did +not remark it closely, but rather turned my attention to the walls of +the chamber, which were thickly over-scribbled with names. They were +nearly all Italian, and none English so far as I saw. This passion for +allying one's self to the great, by inscribing one's name on places +hallowed by them, is certainly very odd; and (I reflected as I added +our names to the rest) it is, without doubt, the most impertinent and +idiotic custom in the world. People have thus written themselves down, +to the contempt of sensible futurity, all over Petrarch's house. + +The custodian insisted that the bedroom was just as in the poet's +time; some rooms beyond it had been restored; the kitchen at its +side was also repaired. Crossing the passage-way, we now entered the +dining-room, which was comparatively large and lofty, with a mighty +and generous fire-place at one end, occupying the whole space left by +a balcony-window. The floor was paved with tiles, and the window-panes +were round and small, and set in lead--like the floors and +window-panes of all the other rooms. A gaudy fresco, representing some +indelicate female deity, adorned the front of the fire-place, which +sloped expanding from the ceiling and terminated at the mouth without +a mantel-piece. The chimney was deep, and told of the cold winters +in the hills, of which, afterward, the landlady of the village inn +prattled less eloquently. + +From this dining-room opens, to the right, the door of the room which +they call Petrarch's library; and above the door, set in a marble +frame, with a glass before it, is all that is mortal of Petrarch's +cat, except the hair. Whether or not the fur was found incompatible +with the process of embalming, and therefore removed, or whether it +has slowly dropped away with the lapse of centuries, I do not know; +but it is certain the cat is now quite hairless, and has the effect +of a wash-leather invention in the likeness of a young lamb. On the +marble slab below there is a Latin inscription, said to be by the +great poet himself, declaring this cat to have been "second only +to Laura." We may, therefore, believe its virtues to have been rare +enough; and cannot well figure to ourselves Petrarch sitting before +that wide-mouthed fire-place, without beholding also the gifted cat +that purrs softly at his feet and nestles on his knees, or, with +thickened tail and lifted back, parades, loftily round his chair in +the haughty and disdainful manner of cats. + +In the library, protected against the predatory enthusiasm of visitors +by a heavy wire netting, are the desk and chair of Petrarch, which I +know of no form of words to describe perfectly. The front of the +desk is of a kind of mosaic in cubes of wood, most of which have been +carried away. The chair is wide-armed and carved, but the bottom is +gone, and it has been rudely repaired. The custodian said Petrarch +died in this chair while he sat writing at his desk in the little nook +lighted by a single window opening on the left from his library. He +loved to sit there. As I entered I found he had stepped out for a +moment, but I know he returned directly after I withdrew. + +On one wall of the library (which is a simple oblong room, in nowise +remarkable) was a copy of verses in a frame, by Cesarotti, and on the +wall opposite a tribute from Alfieri, both _manu propriâ_. Over and +above these are many other scribblings; and hanging over the door of +the poet's little nook was a criminal French lithograph likeness of +"Pétrarque" when young. + +Alfieri's verses are written in ink on the wall, while those of +Cesarotti are on paper, and framed, I do not remember any reference to +his visit to Petrarch's house in Alfieri's autobiography, though the +visit must have taken place in 1783, when he sojourned at Padua, and +"made the acquaintance of the celebrated Cesarotti, with whose lively +and courteous manners he was no less satisfied than he had always been +in reading his (Cesarotti's) most masterly version of 'Ossian.'" It is +probable that the friends visited the house together. At any rate, +I care to believe that while Cesarotti sat "composing" his tribute +comfortably at the table, Alfieri's impetuous soul was lifting his +tall body on tiptoe to scrawl its inspirations on the plastering. + +Do you care, gentle reader, to be reminded that just before this visit +Alfieri had heard in Venice of the "peace between England and the +United Colonies," and that he then and there "wrote the fifth ode of +the 'America Libera,'" and thus finished that poem? + +After copying these verses we returned to the dining-room, and while +one pilgrim strayed idly through the names in the visitor's book, +the other sketched Petrarch's cat, before mentioned, and Petrarch's +inkstand of bronze--a graceful little thing, having a cover surmounted +by a roguish cupid, while the lower part is supported on three lion's +claws, and just above the feet, at either of the three corners, is an +exquisite little female bust and head. Thus sketching and idling, +we held spell-bound our friends the youth of Arquà, as well as our +driver, who, having brought innumerable people to see the house of +Petrarch, now for the first time, with great astonishment, beheld the +inside of it himself. + +As to the authenticity of the house I think there can be no doubt, and +as to the genuineness of the relics there, nothing in the world could +shake my faith in them, though Muratori certainly characterizes them +as "superstitions." The great poet was sixty-five years old when he +came to rest at Arquà, and when, in his own pathetic words, "there +remained to him only to consider and to desire how to make a good +end." He says further, at the close of his autobiography: "In one of +the Euganean hills, near to ten miles from the city of Padua, I have +built me a house, small but pleasant and decent, in the midst of +slopes clothed with vines and olives, abundantly sufficient for a +family not large and discreet. Here I lead my life, and although, as I +have said, infirm of body, yet tranquil of mind, without excitements, +without distractions, without cares, reading always, and writing and +praising God, and thanking God as well for evil as for good; which +evil, if I err not, is trial merely and not punishment. And all the +while I pray to Christ that he make good the end of my life, and +have mercy on me, and forgive me, and even forget my youthful sins; +wherefore, in this solitude, no words are so sweet to my lips as +these of the psalm: '_Delicta juventutis meoe, et ignorantias meas ne +memineris_.' And with every feeling of the heart I pray God, when it +please Him, to bridle my thoughts, so long unstable and erring; and +as they have vainly wandered to many things, to turn them all to +Him--only true, certain, immutable Good." + +I venerate the house at Arquà because these sweet and solemn words +were written in it. We left its revered shelter (after taking a final +look from the balcony down upon "the slopes clothed with vines and +olives") and returned to the lower village, where, in the court of the +little church, we saw the tomb of Petrarch--"an ark of red stone, upon +four columns likewise of marble." The epitaph is this:-- + + "Frigida Francisci lapis hic tegit ossa Petrarcae; + Suscipe, Virgo parens, animam; sate Virgine, parce + Fessaque jam terris Coeli requiescat in arce." + +A head of the poet in bronze surmounts the ark. The housekeeper of the +parish priest, who ran out to enjoy my admiration and bounty, told me +a wild local tradition of an attempt on the part of the Florentines +to steal the bones of Petrarch away from Arquà, in proof of which +she showed me a block of marble set into the ark, whence she said a +fragment had been removed by the Florentines. This local tradition I +afterwards found verified, with names and dates, in a little "Life of +Petrarch," by F. Leoni, published at Padua in 1843. It appears that +this curious attempt of the Florentines to do doubtful honor to the +great citizen whose hereditary civic rights they restored too late +(about the time he was drawing nigh his "good end" at Arquà), was made +for them by a certain monk of Portagruaro named Tommaso Martinelli. He +had a general instruction from his employers to bring away from Arquà +"any important thing of Petrarch's" that he could; and it occurred to +this ill-advised friar to "move his bones." He succeeded on a night of +the year 1630 in stealing the dead poet's arm. The theft being at once +discovered, the Venetian Republic rested not till the thief was also +discovered; but what became of the arm or of the sacrilegious monk +neither the Signor Leoni nor the old women of Arquà give any account. +The Republic removed the rest of Petrarch's body, which is now said to +be in the Royal Museum of Madrid. + +I was willing to know more of this quaint village of Arquà, and I rang +at the parish priest's door to beg of him some account of the place, +if any were printed. But already at one o'clock he had gone to bed for +a nap, and must on no account be roused till four. It is but a quiet +life men lead in Arquà, and their souls are in drowsy hands. The +amount of sleep which this good man gives himself (if he goes to bed +at 9 P.M. and rises at 9 A.M., with a nap of three hours during the +day) speaks of a quiet conscience, a good digestion, and uneventful +days. As I turned this notion over in my mind, my longing to behold +his reverence increased, that I might read life at Arquà in the smooth +curves of his well-padded countenance. I thought it must be that +his "bowels of compassion were well-rounded," and, making sure of +absolution, I was half-minded, if I got speech with him, to improve +the occasion by confessing one or two of my blackest sins. + +Ought I to say here that, on the occasion of a second visit to Arquà, +I succeeded in finding this excellent ecclesiastic wide awake at two +o'clock in the afternoon, and that he granted me an interview at that +hour? Justice to him, I think, demands this admission of me. He was +not at all a fat priest, as I had prefigured him, but rather of a +spare person, and of a brisk and lively manner. At the village inn, +after listening half an hour to a discourse on nothing but white wine +from a young priest, who had stopped to drink a glass of it, I was +put in the way of seeing the priest of Arquà by the former's courtesy. +Happily enough, his reverence chanced to have the very thing I wanted +to see--no other than Leoni's "Life of Petrarch," to which I have +already referred. Courtesy is the blood in an Italian's veins, and I +need not say that the ecclesiastic of Arquà, seeing my interest in +the place, was very polite and obliging. But he continued to sleep +throughout our first stay in Arquà, and I did not see him then. + +I strolled up and down the lazy, rambling streets, and chiefly devoted +myself to watching the young women who were washing clothes at the +stream running from the "Fountain of Petrarch." Their arms and legs +were bronzed and bare, and they chattered and laughed gayly at their +work. Their wash-tubs were formed by a long marble conduit from the +fountain; their wash-boards, by the inward-sloping conduit-sides; and +they thrashed and beat the garments clean upon the smooth stone. To +a girl, their waists were broad and their ankles thick. Above their +foreheads the hair was cut short, and their "back hair" was gathered +into a mass, and held together by converging circle of silver pins. + +The Piazza della Fontana, in Arquà, is a place some fifty feet in +length and breadth, and seems to be a favorite place of public resort. +In the evening, doubtless, it is alive with gossipers, as now with +workers. It may be that then his reverence, risen from his nap, +saunters by, and pauses long enough to chuck a pretty girl under the +chin or pinch an urchin's cheek. + +Our dinner was ready by the time I got back to the inn, and we sat +down to a chicken stewed in oil and a stoup of the white wine of +Arquà. It was a modest feast, but, being a friend to oil, I found it +savory, and the wine was both good and strong. While we lingered +over the repast we speculated somewhat carelessly whether Arquà had +retained among its simplicities the primitive Italian cheapness of +which you read much. When our landlord leaned over the table and made +out our account on it with a bit of chalk, the bill was as follows:-- + + Soldi. + Chicken 70 + Bread 8 + Wine 20 + -- + Total 98 + +It surely was not a costly dinner, yet I could have bought the same +chicken in Venice for half the money; which is but another proof that +the demand of the producer is often much larger than the supply of +the consumer, and that to buy poultry cheaply you must not purchase it +where raised,-- + + ..."On misty mountain ground, + Its own vast shadow glory crowned,"-- + +but rather in a large city after it has been transported forty miles +or more. Not that we begrudged the thrifty inn-keeper his fee. We paid +it cheerfully, as well for his own sake as for that of his pleasant +and neat little wife, who kept the whole inn so sweet and clean; and +we bade them a most cordial farewell as we drove away from their door. + + +III. + +Returning, we stopped at the great castle of the Obizzi (now the +property of the Duke of Modena), through which we were conducted by a +surly and humorous _custode_, whose pride in life was that castle and +its treasures, so that he resented as a personal affront the slightest +interest in any thing else. He stopped us abruptly in the midst of the +museum, and, regarding the precious antiques and curiosities around +him, demanded: + +"Does this castle please you?" Then, with a scornful glance at us, +"Your driver tells me you have been at Arquà? And what did you see at +Arquà? A shabby little house and a cat without any hair on. I would +not," said this disdainful _custode_, "go to Arquà if you gave me a +lemonade." + + + + +A VISIT TO THE CIMBRI. + +I had often heard in Venice of that ancient people, settled in the +Alpine hills about the pretty town of Bassano, on the Brenta, whom +common fame declares to be a remnant of the Cimbrian invaders of Rome, +broken up in battle, and dispersed along the borders of North Italy, +by Marius, many centuries ago. So when the soft September weather +came, last year, we sallied out of Venice, in three, to make +conquest of whatever was curious in the life and traditions of these +mountaineers, who dwell in seven villages, and are therefore called +the people of the Sette Communi among their Italian neighbors. We +went fully armed with note-book and sketch-book, and prepared to take +literary possession of our conquest. + +From Venice to the city of Vicenza by railroad, it is two hours; and +thence one must take a carriage to Bassano (which is an opulent and +busy little grain mart, of some twelve thousand souls, about thirty +miles north of Venice). We were very glad of the ride across the +country. By the time we reached the town it was nine o'clock, and +moonlight, and as we glanced out of our windows we saw the quaint +up-and-down-hill streets peopled with promenaders, and every body +in Bassano seemed to be making love. Young girls strolled about the +picturesque ways with their lovers, and tender couples were cooing +at the doorways and windows, and the scene had all that surface +of romance with which the Italians contrive to varnish the real +commonplaceness of their life. Our ride through the twilight landscape +had prepared us for the sentiment of Bassano; we had pleased ourselves +with the spectacle of the peasants returning from their labor in the +fields, led in troops of eight or ten by stalwart, white-teethed, +bare-legged maids; and we had reveled in the momentary lordship of +an old walled town we passed, which at dusk seemed more Gothic and +Middle-Age than any thing after Verona, with a fine church, and +turrets and battlements in great plenty. What town it was, or what it +had been doing there so many ages, I have never sought to know, and I +should be sorry to learn any thing about it. + +The next morning we began those researches for preliminary information +concerning the Cimbri which turned out so vain. Indeed, as we drew +near the lurking-places of that ancient people, all knowledge relating +to them diffused itself into shadowy conjecture. The barber and the +bookseller differed as to the best means of getting to the Sette +Communi, and the _caffetiere_ at whose place we took breakfast knew +nothing at all of the road, except that it was up the mountains, and +commanded views of scenery which verily, it would not grieve us to +see. As to the Cimbri, he only knew that they had their own language, +which was yet harder than the German. The German was hard enough, but +the Cimbrian! _Corpo_! + +At last, hearing of a famous cave there is at Oliero, a town some +miles further up the Brenta, we determined to go there, and it was a +fortunate thought, for there we found a nobleman in charge of the cave +who told us exactly how to reach the Sette Communi. You pass a bridge +to get out of Bassano--a bridge which spans the crystal swiftness of +the Brenta, rushing down to the Adriatic from the feet of the Alps on +the north, and full of voluble mills at Bassano. All along the road to +Oliero was the finest mountain scenery, Brenta-washed, and picturesque +with ever-changing lines. Maize grows in the bottom-lands, and +tobacco, which is guarded in the fields by soldiers for the monopolist +government. Farm-houses dot the valley, and now and then we passed +villages, abounding in blonde girls, so rare elsewhere in Italy, but +here so numerous as to give Titian that type from which he painted. + +At Oliero we learned not only which was the road to the Sette Communi, +but that we were in it, and it was settled that we should come the +next day and continue in it, with the custodian of the cave, who +for his breakfast and dinner, and what else we pleased, offered to +accompany us. We were early at Oliero on the following morning, and +found our friend in waiting; he mounted beside our driver, and we rode +up the Brenta to the town of Valstagna where our journey by wheels +ended, and where we were to take mules for the mountain ascent. Our +guide, Count Giovanni Bonato (for I may as well give him his title, +though at this stage of our progress we did not know into what +patrician care we had fallen), had already told us what the charge +for mules would be, but it was necessary to go through the ceremony of +bargain with the muleteer before taking the beasts. Their owner was a +Cimbrian, with a broad sheepish face, and a heavy, awkward accent of +Italian which at once more marked his northern race, and made us feel +comparatively secure from plunder in his hands. He had come down from +the mountain top the night before, bringing three mules laden with +charcoal, and he had waited for us till the morning. His beasts were +furnished with comfortable pads, covered with linen, to ride upon, and +with halters instead of bridles, and we were prayed to let them have +their heads in the ascent, and not to try to guide them. + +The elegant leisure of Valstagna (and in an Italian town nearly the +whole population is elegantly at leisure) turned out to witness the +departure of our expedition; the pretty little blonde wife of our +inn-keeper, who was to get dinner ready against our return, held up +her baby to wish us _boun viaggio_, and waved us adieu with the infant +as with a handkerchief; the chickens and children scattered to right +and left before our advance; and with Count Giovanni going splendidly +ahead on foot, and the Cimbrian bringing up the rear, we struck on +the broad rocky valley between the heights, and presently began the +ascent. It was a lovely morning; the sun was on the heads of the +hills, and the shadows clothed them like robes to their feet; and +I should be glad to feel here and now the sweetness, freshness, +and purity of the mountain air, that seemed to bathe our souls in a +childlike delight of life. A noisy brook gurgled through the valley; +the birds sang from the trees; the Alps rose, crest on crest, around +us; and soft before us, among the bald peaks showed the wooded +height where the Cimbrian village of Fozza stood, with a white chapel +gleaming from the heart of the lofty grove. Along the mountain sides +the smoke curled from the lonely huts of shepherds, and now and then +we came upon one of those melancholy refuges which are built in +the hills for such travellers as are belated in their ways, or are +overtaken there by storms. + +The road for the most part winds by the brink of precipices,--walled +in with masonry of small stones, where Nature has not shored it up +with vast monoliths,--and is paved with limestone. It is, of course, +merely a mule-path, and it was curious to see, and thrilling to +experience, how the mules, vain of the safety of their foothold, kept +as near the border of the precipices as possible. For my own part, I +abandoned to my beast the entire responsibility involved by this line +of conduct; let the halter hang loose upon his neck, and gave him no +aid except such slight service as was occasionally to be rendered +by shutting my eyes and holding my breath. The mule of the fairer +traveller behind me was not only ambitious of peril like my own, but +was envious of my beast's captaincy, and continually tried to pass him +on the outside of the path, to the great dismay of the gentle rider; +while half-suppressed wails of terror from the second lady in the +train gave evidence of equal vanity and daring in her mule. Count +Giovanni strode stolidly before, the Cimbrian came behind, and we +had little coherent conversation until we stopped under a spreading +haw-tree, half-way up the mountain, to breathe our adventurous beasts. + +Here two of us dismounted, and while one of the ladies sketched the +other in her novel attitude of cavalier, I listened to the talk of +Count Giovanni and the Cimbrian. This Cimbrian's name in Italian +was Lazzaretti, and in his own tongue Brück, which, pronouncing less +regularly, we made Brick, in compliment to his qualities of good +fellowship. His broad, honest visage was bordered by a hedge of red +beard, and a light of dry humor shone upon it: he looked, we thought, +like a Cornishman, and the contrast between him and the _viso sciolto, +pensieri stretti_ expression of Count Giovanni was curious enough. + +Concerning his people, he knew little; but the Capo-gente of Fozza +could tell me everything. Various traditions of their origin were +believed among them; Brick himself held to one that they had first +come from Denmark. As we sat there under the spreading haw-tree, +Count Giovanni and I made him give us the Cimbrian equivalent of some +Italian phrases, which the curious may care to see in correspondence +with English and German. Of course, German pronunciation must be given +to the words:-- + + _English. Cimbrian. German._ + + I go, I gehe, Ich gehe. + Thou goest, Du gehst, Du gehst. + He goes, Ar geht, Er geht. + We go, Hamish gehen, Wir gehen. + You go, Hamish setender gehnt, Ihr geht. + They go, Dandern gehnt, Sie gehen. + I went, I bin gegehnt, Ich bin gegangen. + Thou wentest, Du bist gegehnt, Du bist gegangen. + He went, Der iganget, Er ist gegangen + Good day, Uter tag, Guten Tag. + Good night, Uter nast, Gute Nacht. + How do you do? Bie estater? Wie steht's? + How goes it? Bie gehts? Wie geht's? + I, I, Ich. + Thou, Du, Du. + He, she, Di, Er, sie. + We, Borandern, Wir. + You, Ihrt, Ihr. + They, Dandern, Sie. + The head, Da kof, Der Kopf. + Breast, Petten, Brust (_Italian_ petto) + Face, Denne, Gesicht. + Arm, Arm, Arm. + Foot, Vuss, Fuss. + Finger, Vinger, Finger. + Hand, Hant, Hand. + Tree, Pom, Baum. + Hat, Hoit, Hut. + God, Got, Gott. + Heaven, Debelt, Himmel. + Earth, Erda, Erde. + Mountain, Perk, Berg. + Valley, Tal, Thal. + Man, Mann, Mann. + Woman, Beip, Weib. + Lady, Vrau, Frau. + Child, Hint, Kind. + Brother, Pruder, Bruder. + Father, Vada, Vater. + Mother, Muter, Mutter. + Sister, Schwester, Schwester, + Stone, Stone, Stein. + +A general resemblance to German and English will have been observed in +these fragments of Cimbrian, while other words will have been noticed +as quite foreign to either. + +There was a poor little house of refreshment beside our spreading haw, +and a withered old woman came out of it and refreshed us with clear +spring water, and our guides and friends with some bitter berries of +the mountain, which they admitted were unpleasant to the taste, but +declared were very good for the blood. When they had sufficiently +improved their blood, we mounted our mules again, and set out with the +journey of an hour and a quarter still between us and Fozza. + +As we drew near the summit of the mountain our road grew more level, +and instead of creeping along by the brinks of precipices, we began +to wind through bits of meadow and pleasant valley walled in by lofty +heights of rock. + +Though September was bland as June at the foot of the mountain, we +found its breath harsh and cold on these heights; and we remarked that +though there were here and there breadths of wheat, the land was +for the most part in sheep pasturage, and the grass looked poor and +stinted of summer warmth. We met, at times, the shepherds, who seemed +to be of Italian race, and were of the conventional type of shepherds, +with regular faces, and two elaborate curls trained upon their cheeks, +as shepherds are always represented in stone over the gates of villas. +They bore staves, and their flocks went before them. Encountering us, +they saluted us courteously, and when we had returned their greeting, +they cried with one voice,--"Ah, lords! is not this a miserable +country? The people are poor and the air is cold. It is an unhappy +land!" And so passed on, profoundly sad; but we could not help smiling +at the vehement popular desire to have the region abused. We answered +cheerfully that it was a lovely country. If the air was cold, it was +also pure. + +We now drew in sight of Fozza, and, at the last moment, just before +parting with Brick, we learned that he had passed a whole year in +Venice, where he had brought milk from the main-land and sold it in +the city. He declared frankly that he counted that year worth all the +other years of his life, and that he would never have come back to his +native heights but that his father had died, and left his mother and +young brothers helpless. He was an honest soul, and I gave him two +florins, which I had tacitly appointed him over and above the bargain, +with something for the small Brick-bats at home, whom he presently +brought to kiss our hands at the house of the Capo-gente. + +The village of Fozza is built on a grassy, oblong plain on the crest +of the mountain, which declines from it on three sides, and on the +north rises high above it into the mists in bleaker and ruggeder +acclivities. There are not more than thirty houses in the village, and +I do not think it numbers more than a hundred and fifty souls, if +it numbers so many. Indeed, it is one of the smallest of the Sette +Communi, of which the capital, Asiago, contains some thousands of +people, and lies not far from Vicenza. The poor Fozzatti had a church, +however, in their village, in spite of its littleness, and they had +just completed a fine new bell tower, which the Capo-gente deplored, +and was proud of when I praised it. The church, like all the other +edifices, was built of stone; and the village at a little distance +might look like broken crags of rock, so well it consorted with the +harsh, crude nature about it. Meagre meadowlands, pathetic with tufts +of a certain pale-blue, tearful flower, stretched about the village +and southward as far as to that wooded point which had all day been +our landmark in the ascent. + +Our train drew up at the humble door of the Capo-gente (in Fozza all +doors are alike humble), and, leaving our mules, we entered by his +wife's invitation, and seated ourselves near the welcome fire of the +kitchen--welcome, though we knew that all the sunny Lombard plain +below was purple with grapes and black with figs. Again came from +the women here the wail of the shepherds: "Ah, lords! is it not a +miserable land?" and I began to doubt whether the love which I had +heard mountaineers bore to their inclement heights was not altogether +fabulous. They made haste to boil us some eggs, and set them before us +with some unhappy wine, and while we were eating, the Capo-gente came +in. + +He was a very well-mannered person, but had, of course, the +bashfulness naturally resulting from lonely life at that altitude, +where contact with the world must be infrequent. His fellow-citizens +seemed to regard him with a kind of affectionate deference, and some +of them came in to hear him talk with the strangers. He stood till we +prayed him to sit down, and he presently consented to take some wine +with us. + +After all, however, he could not tell us much of his people which we +had not heard before. A tradition existed among them, he said, that +their ancestors had fled to these Alps from Marius, and that they +had dwelt for a long time in the hollows and caves of the mountains, +living and burying their dead in the same secret places. At what time +they had been converted to Christianity he could not tell; they +had, up to the beginning of the present century, had little or no +intercourse with the Italian population by which they were surrounded +on all sides. Formerly, they did not intermarry with that race, and it +was seldom that any Cimbrian knew its language. But now intermarriage +is very frequent; both Italian and Cimbrian are spoken in nearly all +the families, and the Cimbrian is gradually falling into disuse. They +still, however, have books of religious instruction in their ancient +dialect, and until very lately the services of their church were +performed in Cimbrian. + +I begged the Capo to show us some of their books and he brought us +two,--one a catechism for children, entitled "Dar Kloane Catechism +vor z' Beloseland vortraghet in z' gaprecht von siben Komünen, un vier +Halghe Gasang. 1842. Padova." The other book it grieved me to see, for +it proved that I was not the only one tempted in recent times to +visit these ancient people, ambitious to bear to them the relation of +discoverer, as it were. A High-Dutch Columbus, from Vienna, had been +before me, and I could only come in for Amerigo Vespucci's tempered +glory. This German savant had dwelt a week in these lonely places, +patiently compiling a dictionary of their tongue, which, when it was +printed, he had sent to the Capo. I am magnanimous enough to give +the name of his book, that the curious may buy it if they like. It +is called "Johann Andreas Schweller's Cimbrisches Wörterbuch. Joseph +Bergman. Vienna, 1855." + +Concerning the present Cimbri, the Capo said that in his community +they were chiefly hunters, wood-cutters, and charcoal-burners, and +that they practiced their primitive crafts in those gloomier and +wilder heights we saw to the northward, and descended to the towns +of the plain to make sale of their fagots, charcoal, and wild-beast +skins. In Asiago and the larger communities they were farmers and +tradesmen like the Italians; and the Capo believed that the Cimbri, in +all their villages, numbered near ten thousand. He could tell me of +no particular customs or usages, and believed they did not differ from +the Italians now except in race and language. [The English traveller +Rose, who (to my further discomfiture, I find) visited Asiago in 1817, +mentions that the Cimbri have the Celtic custom of _waking_ the dead. +"If a traveller dies by the way, they plant a cross upon the spot, +and all who pass by cast a stone upon his cairn. Some go in certain +seasons in the year to high places and woods, where it is supposed +they worshiped their divinities, but the origin of the custom is +forgot amongst themselves." If a man dies by violence, they lay him +out with his hat and shoes on, as if to give him the appearance of a +wayfarer, and "symbolize one surprised in the great journey of life." +A woman dying in childbed is dressed for the grave in her bridal +ornaments. Mr. Rose is very scornful of the notion that these people +are Cimbri, and holds that it is "more consonant to all the evidence +of history to say, that the flux and reflux of Teutonic invaders +at different periods deposited this backwater of barbarians" in the +district they now inhabit. "The whole space, which in addition to +the seven burghs contains twenty-four villages, is bounded by rivers, +alps, and hills. Its most precise limits are the Brenta to the east, +and the Astico to the west."] They are, of course, subject to the +Austrian Government, but not so strictly as the Italians are; and +though they are taxed and made to do military service, they are +otherwise left to regulate their affairs pretty much at their +pleasure. + +The Capo ended his discourse with much polite regret that he had +nothing more worthy to tell us; and, as if to make us amends for +having come so far to learn so little, he said there was a hermit +living near, whom we might like to see, and sent his son to conduct us +to the hermitage. It turned out to be the white object which we had +seen gleaming in the wood on the mountain from so great distance +below, and the wood turned out to be a pleasant beechen grove, in +which we found the hermit cutting fagots. He was warmly dressed in +clothes without rent, and wore the clerical knee-breeches. He saluted +us with a cricket-like chirpiness of manner, and was greatly amazed to +hear that we had come all the way from America to visit him. His +hermitage was built upon the side of a white-washed chapel to St. +Francis, and contained three or four little rooms or cupboards, in +which the hermit dwelt and meditated. They opened into the chapel, of +which the hermit had the care, and which he kept neat and clean like +himself. He told us proudly that once a year, on the day of the +titular saint, a priest came and said mass in that chapel, and it was +easy to see that this was the great occasion of the old man's life. +For forty years, he said, he had been devout; and for twenty-five he +had dwelt in this place, where the goodness of God and the charity of +the poor people around had kept him from want. Altogether, he was a +pleasant enough hermit, not in the least spiritual, but gentle, +simple, and evidently sincere. We gave some small coins of silver to +aid him to continue his life of devotion, and Count Giovanni bestowed +some coppers with the stately blessing, "_Iddio vi benedica, padre +mio_." + +So we left the hermitage, left Fozza, and started down the mountain +on foot, for no one may ride down those steeps. Long before we reached +the bottom, we had learned to loathe mountains and to long for dead +levels during the rest of life. Yet the descent was picturesque, and +in some things even more interesting than the ascent had been. We +met more people: now melancholy shepherds with their flocks; now +swine-herds and swine-herdesses with herds of wild black pigs of the +Italian breed; now men driving asses that brayed and woke long, loud, +and most musical echoes in the hills; now whole peasant families +driving cows, horses, and mules to the plains below. On the way +down, fragments of autobiography began, with the opportunities of +conversation, to come from the Count Giovanni, and we learned that he +was a private soldier at home on that _permesso_ which the Austrian +Government frequently gives its less able-bodied men in times of +peace. He had been at home some years, and did not expect to be again +called into the service. He liked much better to be in charge of the +cave at Oliero than to carry the musket, though he confessed that he +liked to see the world, and that soldiering brought one acquainted +with many places. He had not many ideas, and the philosophy of his +life chiefly regarded deportment toward strangers who visited the +cave. He held it an error in most custodians to show discontent when +travellers gave them little; and he said that if he received never +so much, he believed it wise not to betray exultation. "Always be +contented, and nothing more," said Count Giovanni. + +"It is what you people always promise beforehand," I said, "when you +bargain with strangers, to do them a certain service for what they +please; but afterward they must pay what you please or have trouble. I +know you will not be content with what I give you." + +"If I am not content," cried Count Giovanni, "call me the greatest ass +in the world!" + +And I am bound to say that, for all I could see through the mask of +his face, he was satisfied with what I gave him, though it was not +much. + +He had told us casually that he was nephew of a nobleman of a certain +rich and ancient family in Venice, who sent him money while in the +army, but this made no great impression on me; and though I knew there +was enough noble poverty in Italy to have given rise to the proverb, +_Un conte che non conta, non conta niente_, yet I confess that it was +with a shock of surprise I heard our guide and servant saluted by +a lounger in Valstagna with "_Sior conte, servitor suo_!" I looked +narrowly at him, but there was no ray of feeling or pride visible in +his pale, languid visage as he responded, "_Buona sera, caro_." + +Still, after that revelation we simple plebeians, who had been all day +heaping shawls and guide-books upon Count Giovanni, demanding menial +offices from him, and treating him with good-natured slight, felt +uncomfortable in his presence, and welcomed the appearance of our +carriage with our driver, who, having started drunk from Bassano in +the morning, had kept drunk all day at Valstagna, and who now drove us +back wildly over the road, and almost made us sigh for the security of +mules ambitious of the brinks of precipices. + + + + +MINOR TRAVELS. + + + + +I. + +PISA. + +I am afraid that the talk of the modern railway traveller, if he is +honest, must be a great deal of the custodians, the vetturini, and the +facchini, whose agreeable acquaintance constitutes his chief knowledge +of the population among which he journeys. We do not nowadays carry +letters recommending us to citizens of the different places. If we +did, consider the calamity we should be to the be-travelled Italian +communities we now bless! No, we buy our through-tickets, and we put +up at the hotels praised in the hand-book, and are very glad of a +little conversation with any native, however adulterated he be by +contact with the world to which we belong. I do not blush to own that +I love the whole rascal race which ministers to our curiosity and +preys upon us, and I am not ashamed to have spoken so often in this +book of the lowly and rapacious but interesting porters who opened to +me the different gates of that great realm of wonders, Italy. I doubt +if they can be much known to the dwellers in the land, though they +are the intimates of all sojourners and passengers; and if I have any +regret in the matter, it is that I did not more diligently study them +when I could. The opportunity once lost, seldom recurs; they are all +but as transitory as the Object of Interest itself, I remember +that years ago when I first visited Cambridge, there was an old man +appeared to me in the character of Genius of the College Grounds, who +showed me all the notable things in our city,--its treasures of art, +its monuments,--and ended by taking me into his wood-house, and sawing +me off from a wind-fallen branch of the Washington Elm a bit of the +sacred wood for a remembrancer. Where now is that old man? He +no longer exists for me, neither he nor his wood-house nor his +dwelling-house. Let me look for a month about the College Grounds, and +I shall not see him. But somewhere in the regions of traveller's faëry +he still lives, and he appears instantly to the new-comer; he has an +understanding with the dryads, who keep him supplied with boughs from +the Washington Elm, and his wood-house is full of them. + +Among memorable custodians in Italy was one whom we saw at Pisa, where +we stopped on our way from Leghorn after our accident in the Maremma, +and spent an hour in viewing the Quattro Fabbriche. The beautiful old +town, which every one knows from the report of travellers, one yet +finds possessed of the incommunicable charm which keeps it forever +novel to the visitor. Lying upon either side of the broad Arno, it +mirrors in the flood architecture almost as fair and noble as that +glassed in the Canalazzo, and its other streets seemed as tranquil +as the canals of Venice. Those over which we drove, on the day of +our visit, were paved with broad flag-stones, and gave out scarcely a +sound under our wheels. It was Sunday, and no one was to be seen. Yet +the empty and silent city inspired us with no sense of desolation. The +palaces were in perfect repair; the pavements were clean; behind those +windows we felt that there must be a good deal of easy, comfortable +life. It is said that Pisa is one of the few places in Europe where +the sweet, but timid spirit of Inexpensiveness--everywhere pursued by +Railways--still lingers, and that you find cheap apartments in those +well-preserved old palaces. No doubt it would be worth more to live in +Pisa than it would cost, for the history of the place would alone be +to any reasonable sojourner a perpetual recompense, and a princely +income far exceeding his expenditure. To be sure, the Tower of Famine, +with which we chiefly associate the name of Pisa, has been long razed +to the ground, and built piecemeal into the neighboring palaces, but +you may still visit the dead wall which hides from view the place +where it stood; and you may thence drive on, as we did, to the great +Piazza where stands the unrivaledest group of architecture in +the world, after that of St. Mark's Place in Venice. There is the +wonderful Leaning Tower, there is the old and beautiful Duomo, +there is the noble Baptistery, there is the lovely Campo-Santo, and +there--somewhere lurking in portal or behind pillar, and keeping +out an eagle-eye for the marveling stranger--is the much-experienced +cicerone who shows you through the edifices. Yours is the +fourteen-thousandth American family to which he has had the honor of +acting as guide, and he makes you feel an illogical satisfaction in +thus becoming a contribution to statistics. + +We entered the Duomo, in our new friend's custody, and we saw the +things which it was well to see. There was mass, or some other +ceremony, transacting; but as usual it was made as little obtrusive as +possible, and there was not much to weaken the sense of proprietorship +with which travellers view objects of interest. Then we ascended the +Leaning Tower, skillfully preserving its equilibrium as we went by +an inclination of our persons in a direction opposed to the tower's +inclination, but perhaps not receiving a full justification of the +Campanile's appearance in pictures, till we stood at its base, and saw +its vast bulk and height as it seemed to sway and threaten in the +blue sky above our heads. There the sensation was too terrible for +endurance,--even the architectural beauty of the tower could not save +it from being monstrous to us,--and we were glad to hurry away from it +to the serenity and solemn loveliness of the Campo Santo. + +Here are the frescos painted five hundred years ago to be ruinous and +ready against the time of your arrival in 1864, and you feel that you +are the first to enjoy the joke of the Vergognosa, that cunning jade +who peers through her fingers at the shameful condition of deboshed +father Noah, and seems to wink one eye of wicked amusement at you. +Turning afterward to any book written about Italy during the time +specified, you find your impression of exclusive possession of the +frescos erroneous, and your muse naturally despairs, where so many +muses have labored in vain, to give a just idea of the Campo Santo. +Yet it is most worthy celebration. Those exquisitely arched and +traceried colonnades seem to grow like the slim cypresses out of the +sainted earth of Jerusalem; and those old paintings, made when Art +was--if ever--a Soul, and not as now a mere Intelligence, enforce +more effectively than their authors conceived the lessons of life and +death; for they are themselves becoming part of the triumphant decay +they represent. If it was awful once to look upon that strange scene +where the gay lords and ladies of the chase come suddenly upon three +dead men in their coffins, while the devoted hermits enjoy the peace +of a dismal righteousness on a hill in the background, it is yet more +tragic to behold it now when the dead men are hardly discernible in +their coffins, and the hermits are but the vaguest shadows of gloomy +bliss. Alas! Death mocks even the homage done him by our poor fears +and hopes: with dust he wipes out dust, and with decay he blots the +image of decay. + +I assure the reader that I made none of these apt reflections in +the Campo Santo at Pisa, but have written them out this morning in +Cambridge because there happens to be an east wind blowing. No +one could have been sad in the company of our cheerful and patient +cicerone, who, although visibly anxious to get his fourteen-thousandth +American family away, still would not go till he had shown us that +monument to a dead enmity which hangs in the Campo Santo. This is the +mighty chain which the Pisans, in their old wars with the Genoese, +once stretched across the mouth of their harbor to prevent the +entrance of the hostile galleys. The Genoese with no great trouble +carried the chain away, and kept it ever afterward till 1860, when +Pisa was united to the kingdom of Italy. Then the trophy was restored +to the Pisans, and with public rejoicings placed in the Campo Santo, +an emblem of reconciliation and perpetual amity between ancient +foes. [I read in Mr. Norton's _Notes of Travel and Study in Italy_, +that he saw in the Campo Santo, as long ago as 1856, "the chains that +marked the servitude of Pisa, now restored by Florence," and it is +of course possible that our cicerone may have employed one of those +chains for the different historical purpose I have mentioned. It would +be a thousand pities, I think, if a monument of that sort should be +limited to the commemoration of one fact only.] It is not a very good +world,--_e pur si muove_. + +The Baptistery stands but a step away from the Campo Santo, and our +guide ushered us into it with the air of one who had till now held in +reserve his great stroke and was ready to deliver it. Yet I think he +waited till we had looked at some comparatively trifling sculptures +by Nicolò Pisano before he raised his voice, and uttered a melodious +species of howl. While we stood in some amazement at this, the +conscious structure of the dome caught the sound and prolonged it with +a variety and sweetness of which I could not have dreamed. The man +poured out in quick succession his musical wails, and then ceased, +and a choir of heavenly echoes burst forth in response. There was a +supernatural beauty in these harmonies of which I despair of giving +any true idea: they were of such tender and exalted rapture that +we might well have thought them the voices of young-eyed cherubim, +singing as they passed through Paradise over that spot of earth where +we stood. They seemed a celestial compassion that stooped and soothed, +and rose again in lofty and solemn acclaim, leaving us poor and +penitent and humbled. + +We were long silent, and then broke forth with cries of admiration of +which the marvelous echo made eloquence. + +"Did you ever," said the cicerone after we had left the building, +"hear such music as that?" + +"The papal choir does not equal it," we answered with one voice. + +The cicerone was not to be silenced even with such a tribute, and he +went on: + +"Perhaps, as you are Americans, you know Moshu Feelmore, the +President? No? Ah, what a fine man! You saw that he had his heart +actually in his hand! Well, one day he said to me here, when I told +him of the Baptistery echo, 'We have the finest echo in the world in +the Hall of Congress.' I said nothing, but for answer I merely howled +a little,--thus! Moshu Feelmore was convinced. Said he, 'There is no +other echo in the world besides this. You are right.' I am unique," +pursued the cicerone, "for making this echo. But," he added with +a sigh, "it has been my ruin. The English have put me in all the +guide-books, and sometimes I have to howl twenty times a day. When our +Victor Emanuel came here I showed him the church, the tower, and the +Campo Santo. Says the king, 'Pfui!'"--here the cicerone gave that +sweeping outward motion with both hands by which Italians dismiss a +trifling subject--"'make me the echo!' I was forced," concluded the +cicerone with a strong sense of injury in his tone, "to howl half an +hour without ceasing." + + + + +II. + +THE FERRARA ROAD. + +The delight of one of our first journeys over the road between Padua +and Ferrara was a Roman _cameriere_ out of place, who got into the +diligence at Ponte Lagoscuro. We were six in all: The Englishman who +thought it particularly Italian to say "Sì" three times for every +assent; the Veneto (as the citizen of the province calls himself, the +native of the city being Veneziano) going home to his farm near Padua; +the German lady of a sour and dreadful countenance; our two selves, +and the Roman _cameriere_. The last was worth all the rest--being a +man of vast general information acquired in the course of service +with families of all nations, and agreeably communicative. A brisk +and lively little man, with dancing eyes, beard cut to the mode of the +Emperor Napoleon, and the impressive habit of tapping himself on the +teeth with his railroad-guide, and lifting his eyebrows when he +says any thing specially worthy of remark. He, also, long after the +conclusion of an observation, comes back to himself approvingly, +with "_Sì_!" "_Vabene_!" "_Ecco_!" He speaks beautiful Italian and +constantly, and in a little while we know that he was born at +Ferrara, bred at Venice, and is now a citizen of Rome. "St. Peter's, +Signori,--have you ever seen it?--is the first church of the world. +At Ferrara lived Tasso and Ariosto. Venice is a lovely city. Ah! what +beauty! But unique. My second country. _Sì, Signori, la mia seconda +patria_." After a pause, "_Va bene_." + +We hint to him that he is extremely fortunate in having so many +countries, and that it will be difficult to exile so universal a +citizen, which he takes as a tribute to his worth, smiles and says, +"Ecco!" + +Then he turns to the Veneto, and describes to him the English manner +of living. "Wonderfully well they eat--the English. Four times a day. +With rosbif at the dinner. Always, always, always! And tea in the +evening, with rosbif cold. _Mangiano sempre. Ma bene, dico_." After +a pause, "_Sì_!" "And the Venetians, they eat well, too. Whence the +proverb: '_Sulla Riva degli Schiavoni, si mangiano bei bocconi_.' +('On the Riva degli Schiavoni, you eat fine mouthfuls.') Signori, I am +going to Venice," concludes the cameriere. + +He is the politest man in the world, and the most attentive to ladies. +The German lady has not spoken a word, possibly not knowing the +language. Our good cameriere cannot bear this, and commiserates her +weariness with noble elegance and originality. "_La Signora si trova +un poco sagrificata_?" ("The lady feels slightly sacrificed!") We all +smile, and the little man very gladly with us. + +"An elegant way of expressing it," we venture to suggest. The Veneto +roars and roars again, and we all shriek, none louder than the Roman +himself. We never can get over that idea of being slightly sacrificed, +and it lasts us the whole way to Padua; and when the Veneto gets down +at his farm-gate, he first "reverences" us, and then says, "I am very +sorry for you others who must be still more slightly sacrificed." + +At Venice, a week or two later, I meet our cameriere. He is not so +gay, quite, as he was, and I fancy that he has not found so many _bei +bocconi_ on the Riva degli Schiavoni, as the proverb and a sanguine +temperament led him to expect. Do I happen to know, he asks, any +American family going to Rome and desiring a cameriere? + + * * * * * + +As I write, the Spring is coming in Cambridge, and I cannot help +thinking, with a little heartache, of how the Spring came to meet us +once as we rode southward from Venice toward Florence on that road +from Padua to Ferrara. It had been May for some time in Tuscany, +and all through the wide plains of Venetia this was the railroad +landscape: fields tilled and tended as jealously as gardens, and +waving in wheat, oats, and grass, with here and there the hay cut +already, and here and there acres of Indian corn. The green of the +fields was all dashed with the bloody red of poppies; the fig-trees +hung full of half-grown fruit; the orchards were garlanded with vines, +which they do not bind to stakes in Italy, but train from tree to +tree, leaving them to droop in festoons and sway in the wind, with the +slender native grace of vines. Huge stone farm-houses shelter under +the same roof the family and all the live stock of the farm; thatched +cottages thickly dotting the fields, send forth to their cultivation +the most picturesque peasants,--men and women, pretty young girls in +broad hats, and wonderful old brown and crooked crones, who seem never +to have been younger nor fairer. Country roads, level, straight, and +white, stretch away on either hand, and the constant files of poplars +escort them wherever they go. All about, the birds sing, and the +butterflies dance. The milk-white oxen dragging the heavy carts turn +up their patient heads, with wide-spreading horns and mellow eyes, +at the passing train; the sunburnt lout behind them suspends the +application of the goad; unwonted acquiescence stirs in the bosom of +the firm-minded donkey, and even the matter-of-fact locomotive seems +to linger as lovingly as a locomotive may along these plains of +Spring. + +At Padua we take a carriage for Ponte Lagoscuro, and having fought the +customary battle with the vetturino before arriving at the terms of +contract; having submitted to the successive pillage of the man who +had held our horses a moment, of the man who tied on the trunk, and +of the man who hovered obligingly about the carriage, and desired to +drink our health--with prodigious smacking of whip, and banging of +wheels, we rattle out of the Stella d'Oro, and set forth from the gate +of the old city. + +I confess that I like posting. There is a freedom and a fine sense of +proprietorship in that mode of travel, combined with sufficient +speed, which you do not feel on the railroad. For twenty francs and +_buonamano_, I had bought my carriage and horses and driver for the +journey of forty miles, and I began to look round on the landscape +with a cumulative feeling of ownership in everything I saw. For me, +old women spinning in old-world fashion, with distaff and spindle, +flax as white as their own hair, came to roadside doors, or moved +back and forth under orchard trees. For me, the peasants toiled in the +fields together, wearing for my sake wide straw hats, or gay ribbons, +or red caps. The white oxen were willing to mass themselves in +effective groups, as the ploughman turned the end of his furrow; young +girls specially appointed themselves to lead horses to springs as we +passed; children had larger eyes and finer faces and played more +about the cottage doors, on account of our posting. As for the +vine-garlanded trees in the orchards, and the opulence of the endless +fertile plain; the white distance of the road before us with its +guardian poplars,--I doubt if people in a diligence could have got so +much of these things as we. Certainly they could not have had all to +themselves the lordly splendor with which we dashed through gaping +villages, taking the street from everybody, and fading magnificently +away upon the road. + + + + +III. + +TRIESTE. + +If you take the midnight steamer at Venice you reach Trieste by six +o'clock in the morning, and the hills rise to meet you as you enter +the broad bay dotted with the sail of fishing-craft. The hills are +bald and bare, and you find, as you draw near, that the city lies at +their feet under a veil of mist, or climbs earlier into view along +their sides. The prospect is singularly devoid of gentle and pleasing +features, and looking at those rugged acclivities, with their aspect +of continual bleakness, you readily believe all the stories you have +heard of that fierce wind called the Bora which sweeps from them +through Trieste at certain seasons. While it blows, ladies walking +near the quays are sometimes caught up and set afloat, involuntary +Galateas, in the bay, and people keep in-doors as much as possible. +But the Bora, though so sudden and so savage, does give warning of its +rise, and the peasants avail themselves of this characteristic. They +station a man on one of the mountain tops, and when he feels the first +breath of the Bora, he sounds a horn, which is a signal for all within +hearing to lay hold of something that cannot be blown away, and cling +to it till the wind falls. This may happen in three days or in nine, +according to the popular proverbs. "The spectacle of the sea," says +Dall' Ongaro, in a note to one of his ballads, "while the Bora blows, +is sublime, and when it ceases the prospect of the surrounding hills +is delightful. The air, purified by the rapid current, clothes them +with a rosy veil, and the temperature is instantly softened, even in +the heart of winter." + +The city itself, as you penetrate it, makes good with its stateliness +and picturesqueness your loss through the grimness of its environs. It +is in great part new, very clean, and full of the life and movement +of a prosperous port; but, better than this, so far as the mere +sight-seer is concerned, it wins a novel charm from the many public +staircases by which you ascend and descend its hillier quarters, and +which are made of stone, and lightly railed and balustraded with iron. + +Something of all this I noticed in my ride from the landing of the +steamer to the house of friends in the suburbs, and there I grew +better disposed toward the hills, which, as I strolled over them, +I found dotted with lovely villas, and everywhere traversed by +perfectly-kept carriage-roads, and easy and pleasant foot-paths. It +was in the spring-time, and the peach-trees and almond-trees hung +full of blossoms and bees, the lizards lay in the walks absorbing the +vernal sunshine, the violets and cowslips sweetened all the grassy +borders. The scene did not want a human interest, for the peasant +girls were going to market at that hour, and I met them everywhere, +bearing heavy burdens on their own heads, or hurrying forward with +their wares on the backs of donkeys. They were as handsome as heart +could wish, and they wore that Italian costume which is not to be seen +anywhere in Italy except at Trieste and in the Roman and Neapolitan +provinces,--a bright bodice and gown, with the head-dress of dazzling +white linen, square upon the crown, and dropping lightly to the +shoulders. Later I saw these comely maidens crouching on the ground in +the market-place, and selling their wares, with much glitter of eyes, +teeth, and earrings, and a continual babble of bargaining. + +It seemed to me that the average of good looks was greater among the +women of Trieste than among those of Venice, but that the instances of +striking and exquisite beauty were rarer. At Trieste, too, the Italian +type, so pure at Venice, is lost or continually modified by the mixed +character of the population, which perhaps is most noticeable at the +Merchants' Exchange. This is a vast edifice roofed with glass, where +are the offices of the great steam navigation company, the Austrian +Lloyds,--which, far more than the favor of the Imperial government, +has contributed to the prosperity of Trieste,--and where the +traffickers of all races meet daily to gossip over the news and the +prices. Here a Greek or Dalmat talks with an eager Italian or a slow, +sure Englishman; here the hated Austrian button-holes the Venetian +or the Magyar; here the Jew meets the Gentile on common ground; here +Christianity encounters the hoary superstitions of the East, and makes +a good thing out of them in cotton or grain. All costumes are seen +here, and all tongues are heard, the native Triestines contributing +almost as much to the variety of the latter as the foreigners. "In +regard to language," says Cantù, "though the country is peopled by +Slavonians, yet the Italian tongue is spreading into the remotest +villages where a few years since it was not understood. In the city it +is the common and familiar language; the Slavonians of the North use +the German for the language of ceremony; those of the South, as well +as the Israelites, the Italian; while the Protestants use the German, +the Greeks the Hellenic and Illyric, the _employés_ of the civil +courts the Italian or the German, the schools now German and now +Italian, the bar and the pulpit Italian. Most of the inhabitants, +indeed, are bi-lingual, and very many tri-lingual, without counting +French, which is understood and spoken from infancy. Italian, German, +and Greek are written, but the Slavonic little, this having remained +in the condition of a vulgar tongue. But it would be idle to +distinguish the population according to language, for the son adopts a +language different from the father's, and now prefers one language and +now another; the women incline to the Italian; but those of the upper +class prefer now German, now French, now English, as, from one decade +to another, affairs, fashions, and fancies change. This in the salons; +in the squares and streets, the Venetian dialect is heard." + +And with the introduction of the Venetian dialect, Venetian discontent +seems also to have crept in, and I once heard a Triestine declaim +against the Imperial government quite in the manner of Venice. It +struck me that this desire for union with Italy, which he declared +prevalent in Trieste, must be of very recent growth, since even so +late as 1848, Trieste had refused to join Venice in the expulsion of +the Austrians. Indeed, the Triestines have fought the Venetians from +the first; they stole the Brides of Venice in one of their piratical +cruises in the lagoons; gave aid and comfort to those enemies of +Venice, the Visconti, the Carraras, and the Genoese; revolted from St. +Mark whenever subjected to his banner, and finally, rather than remain +under his sway, gave themselves five centuries ago to Austria. + +The objects of interest in Trieste are not many. There are remains of +an attributive temple of Jupiter under the Duomo, and there is near +at hand the Museum of Classical Antiquities founded in honor of +Winckelmann, murdered at Trieste by that ill-advised Pistojese, +Ancangeli, who had seen the medals bestowed on the antiquary by Maria +Theresa and believed him rich. There is also a scientific museum +founded by the Archduke Maximilian, and, above all, there is the +beautiful residence of that ill-starred prince,--the Miramare, where +the half-crazed Empress of the Mexicans vainly waits her husband's +return from the experiment of paternal government in the New World. It +would be hard to tell how Art has charmed rock and wave at Miramare, +until the spur of those rugged Triestine hills, jutting into the sea, +has been made the seat of ease and luxury, but the visitor is aware of +the magic as soon as he passes the gate of the palace grounds. These +are in great part perpendicular, and are over clambered with airy +stairways climbing to pensile arbors. Where horizontal, they are +diversified with mimic seas for swans to sail upon, and summer-houses +for people to lounge in and look at the swans from. On the point of +land furthest from the acclivity stands the Castle of Miramare, half +at sea, and half adrift in the clouds above:-- + + "And fain it would stoop downward + To the mirrored wave below; + And fain it would soar upward + In the evening's crimson glow." + +I remember that a little yacht lay beside the pier at the castle's +foot, and lazily flapped its sail, while the sea beat inward with as +languid a pulse. That was some years ago, before Mexico was dreamed of +at Miramare: now, perchance, she who is one of the most unhappy among +women looks down distraught from those high windows, and finds in the +helpless sail and impassive wave the images of her baffled hope, and +that immeasurable sea which gives back its mariners neither to love +nor sorrow. I think though she be the wife and daughter of princes, we +may pity this poor Empress at least as much as we pity the Mexicans to +whom her dreams have brought so many woes. + +It was the midnight following my visit to Miramare when the fiacre +in which I had quitted my friend's house was drawn up by its greatly +bewildered driver on the quay near the place where the steamer for +Venice should be lying. There was no steamer for Venice to be seen. +The driver swore a little in the polyglot profanities of his native +city, and descending from his box, went and questioned different +lights--blue lights, yellow lights, green lights--to be seen at +different points. To a light, they were ignorant, though eloquent, and +to pass the time, we drove up and down the quay, and stopped at the +landings of all the steamers that touch at Trieste. It was a snug +fiacre enough, but I did not care to spend the night in it, and I +urged the driver to further inquiry. A wanderer whom we met, declared +that it was not the night for the Venice steamer; another admitted +that it might be; a third conversed with the driver in low tones, and +then leaped upon the box. We drove rapidly away, and before I had, in +view of this mysterious proceeding, composed a fitting paragraph for +the _Fatti Diversi_ of the _Osservatore Triestino_, descriptive of the +state in which the Guardie di Polizia should find me floating in the +bay, exanimate and evidently the prey of a _triste evvenimento_--the +driver pulled up once more, and now beside a steamer. It was the +steamer for Venice, he said, in precisely the tone which he would +have used had he driven me directly to it without blundering. It was +breathing heavily, and was just about to depart, but even in the hurry +of getting on board, I could not help noticing that it seemed to have +grown a great deal since I had last voyaged in it. There was not +a soul to be seen except the mute steward who took my satchel, and +guiding me below into an elegant saloon, instantly left me alone. +Here again the steamer was vastly enlarged. These were not the narrow +quarters of the Venice steamer, nor was this lamp, shedding a soft +light on cushioned seats and paneled doors and wainscotings the sort +of illumination usual in that humble craft. I rang the small silver +bell on the long table, and the mute steward appeared. + +_Was_ this the steamer for Venice? + +_Sicuro_! + +All that I could do in comment was to sit down; and in the mean time +the steamer trembled, groaned, choked, cleared its throat, and we were +under way. + +"The other passengers have all gone to bed, I suppose," I argued +acutely, seeing none of them. Nevertheless, I thought it odd, and +it seemed a shrewd means of relief to ring the bell, and pretending +drowsiness, to ask the steward which was my state-room. + +He replied with a curious smile that I could have any of them. Amazed, +I yet selected a state-room, and while the steward was gone for the +sheets and pillow-cases, I occupied my time by opening the doors of +all the other state-rooms. They were empty. + +"Am I the only passenger?" I asked, when he returned, with some +anxiety. + +"Precisely," he answered. + +I could not proceed and ask if he composed the entire crew--it seemed +too fearfully probable that he did. + +I now suspected that I had taken passage with the Olandese Volante. +There was nothing in the world for it, however, but to go to bed, and +there, with the accession of a slight sea-sickness, my views of the +situation underwent a total change. I had gone down into the Maelstrom +with the Ancient Mariner--I was a Manuscript Found in a Bottle! + +Coming to the surface about six o'clock A.M., I found a daylight as +cheerful as need be upon the appointments of the elegant cabin, and +upon the good-natured face of the steward when he brought me the caffè +latte, and the buttered toast for my breakfast. He said "_Servitor +suo_!" in a loud and comfortable voice, and I perceived the +absurdity of having thought that he was in any way related to the +Nightmare-Death-in-life-that-thicks-man's-blood-with-cold. + +"This is not the regular Venice steamer, I suppose," I remarked to the +steward as he laid my breakfast in state upon the long table. + +No. Properly, no boat should have left for Venice last night, which +was not one of the times of the tri-weekly departure. This was one of +the steamers of the line between Trieste and Alexandria, and it was +going at present to take on an extraordinary freight at Venice for +Egypt. I had been permitted to come on board because my driver said I +had a return ticket, and would go. + +Ascending to the deck I found nothing whatever mysterious in the +management of the steamer. The captain met me with a bow in the +gangway; seamen were coiling wet ropes at different points, as they +always are; the mate was promenading the bridge, and taking the rainy +weather as it came, with his oil-cloth coat and hat on. The wheel of +the steamer was as usual chewing the sea, and finding it unpalatable, +and making vain efforts at expectoration. + +We were in sight of the breakwater outside Malamocco, and a pilot-boat +was making us from the land. Even at this point the innumerable +fortifications of the Austrians began, and they multiplied as we +drew near Venice, till we entered the lagoon, and found it a nest of +fortresses one with another. + +Unhappily the day being rainy, Venice did not spring resplendent from +the sea, as I had always read she would. She rose slowly and languidly +from the water,--not like a queen, but like the gray, slovenly, +bedrabbled, heart-broken old slave she really was. + + + + +IV. + +BASSANO. + +I have already told, in recounting the story of our visit to the +Cimbri, how full of courtship we found the little city of Bassano on +the evening of our arrival there. Bassano is the birthplace of the +painter Jacopo da Ponte, who was one of the first Italian painters to +treat scriptural story as accessory to mere landscape, and who had a +peculiar fondness for painting Entrances into the Ark, for in these he +could indulge without stint the taste for pairing-off early acquired +from observation of local customs in his native town. This was +the theory offered by one who had imbibed the spirit of subtile +speculation from Ruskin, and I think it reasonable. At least it does +not conflict with the fact that there is at Bassano a most excellent +gallery of paintings entirely devoted to the works of Jacopo da Ponte, +and his four sons, who are here to be seen to better advantage than +anywhere else. As few strangers visit Bassano, the gallery is little +frequented. It is in charge of a very strict old man, who will not +allow people to look at the pictures till he has shown them the +adjoining cabinet of geological specimens. It is in vain that you +assure him of your indifference to these scientific _seccature_; he is +deaf and you are not suffered to escape a single fossil. He asked us a +hundred questions, and understood nothing in reply, insomuch that when +he came to his last inquiry, "Have the Protestants the same God as the +Catholics?" we were rather glad that he should be obliged to settle +the fact for himself. + +Underneath the gallery was a school of boys, whom as we entered we +heard humming over the bitter honey which childhood is obliged to +gather from the opening flowers of orthography. When we passed out, +the master gave these poor busy bees an atom of holiday, and they all +swarmed forth together to look at the strangers. The teacher was a +long, lank man, in a black threadbare coat, and a skull-cap--exactly +like the schoolmaster in "The Deserted Village." We made a pretense of +asking him our way to somewhere, and went wrong, and came by accident +upon a wide flat space, bare as a brick-yard, beside which was +lettered on a fragment of the old city wall, "Giuoco di Palla." It +was evidently the playground of the whole city, and it gave us a +pleasanter idea of life in Bassano than we had yet conceived, to think +of its entire population playing ball there in the spring afternoons. +We respected Bassano as much for this as for her diligent remembrance +of her illustrious dead, of whom she has very great numbers. It +appeared to us that nearly every other house bore a tablet announcing +that "Here was born," or "Here died," some great or good man of whom +no one out of Bassano ever heard. There is enough celebrity in Bassano +to supply the world; but as laurel is a thing that grows anywhere, I +covet rather from Bassano the magnificent ivy that covers the portions +of her ancient wall yet standing. The wall, where visible, is seen to +be of a pebbly rough-cast, but it is clad almost from the ground +in glossy ivy, that glitters upon it like chain-mail upon the vast +shoulders of some giant warrior. The moat beneath is turned into a +lovely promenade bordered by quiet villas, with rococo shepherds and +shepherdesses in marble on their gates; where the wall is built to the +verge of the high ground on which the city stands, there is a swift +descent to the wide valley of the Brenta waving in corn and vines and +tobacco. + +We went up the Brenta one day as far as Oliero, to visit the famous +cavern already mentioned, out of which, from the secret heart of the +hill, gushes one of the foamy affluents of the river. It is reached +by passing through a paper-mill, fed by the stream, and then through +a sort of ante-grot, whence stepping-stones are laid in the brawling +current through a succession of natural compartments with dome-like +roofs. From the hill overhead hang stalactites of all grotesque and +fairy shapes, and the rock underfoot is embroidered with fantastic +designs wrought by the water in the silence and darkness of the +endless night. At a considerable distance from the mouth of the cavern +is a wide lake, with a boat upon it, and voyaging to the centre of the +pool your attention is drawn to the dome above you, which contracts +into a shaft rising upward to a height as yet unmeasured and even +unpierced by light. From somewhere in its mysterious ascent, an +auroral boy, with a tallow candle, produces a so-called effect of +sunrise, and sheds a sad, disheartening radiance on the lake and the +cavern sides, which is to sunlight about as the blind creatures of +subterranean waters are to those of waves that laugh and dance above +ground. But all caverns are much alike in their depressing and gloomy +influences, and since there is so great opportunity to be wretched on +the surface of the earth, why do people visit them? I do not know that +this is more dispiriting or its stream more Stygian than another. + +The wicked memory of the Ecelini survives everywhere in this part of +Italy, and near the entrance of the Oliero grotto is a hollow in the +hill something like the apsis of a church, which is popularly believed +to have been the hiding-place of Cecilia da Baone, one of the many +unhappy wives of one of the many miserable members of the Ecelino +family. It is not quite clear when Cecilia should have employed this +as a place of refuge, and it is certain that she was not the wife of +Ecelino da Romano, as the neighbors believe at Oliero, but of Ecelino +il Monaco, his father; yet since her name is associated with the grot, +let us have her story, which is curiously illustrative of the life of +the best society in Italy during the thirteenth century. She was the +only daughter of the rich and potent lord, Manfredo, Count of Baone +and Abano, who died leaving his heiress to the guardianship of +Spinabello da Xendrico. When his ward reached womanhood, Spinabello +cast about him to find a suitable husband for her, and it appeared to +him that a match with the son of Tiso du Camposampiero promised +the greatest advantages. Tiso, to whom he proposed the affair, was +delighted, but desiring first to take counsel with his friends upon +so important a matter, he confided it for advice to his brother-in-law +and closest intimate, Ecelino Balbo. It had just happened that Balbo's +son, Ecelino il Monaco, was at that moment disengaged, having +been recently divorced from his first wife, the lovely but light +Speronella; and Balbo falsely went to the greedy guardian of Cecilia, +and offering him better terms than he could hope for from Tiso, +secured Cecilia for his son. At this treachery the Camposampieri were +furious; but they dissembled their anger till the moment of revenge +arrived, when Cecilia's rejected suitor encountering her upon a +journey beyond the protection of her husband, violently dishonored his +successful rival. The unhappy lady returning to Ecelino at Bassano, +recounted her wrong, and was with a horrible injustice repudiated and +sent home, while her husband arranged schemes of vengeance in due time +consummated. Cecilia next married a Venetian noble, and being in +due time divorced, married yet again, and died the mother of a large +family of children. + +This is a very old scandal, yet I think there was an _habitué_ of the +caffè in Bassano who could have given some of its particulars from +personal recollection. He was an old and smoothly shaven gentleman, in +a scrupulously white waistcoat, whom we saw every evening in a corner +of the caffè playing solitaire. He talked with no one, saluted no +one. He drank his glasses of water with anisette, and silently played +solitaire. There is no good reason to doubt that he had been doing the +same thing every evening for six hundred years. + + + + +V. + +POSSAGNO, CANOVA'S BIRTHPLACE. + +It did not take a long time to exhaust the interest of Bassano, but we +were sorry to leave the place because of the excellence of the inn at +which we tarried. It was called "Il Mondo," and it had everything +in it that heart could wish. Our rooms were miracles of neatness and +comfort; they had the freshness, not the rawness, of recent repair, +and they opened into the dining-hall, where we were served with +indescribable salads and risotti. During our sojourn we simply enjoyed +the house; when we were come away we wondered that so much perfection +of hotel could exist in so small a town as Bassano. It is one of +the pleasures of by-way travel in Italy, that you are everywhere +introduced in character, that you become fictitious and play a part as +in a novel. To this inn of The World, our driver had brought us with a +clamor and rattle proportioned to the fee received from us, and +when, in response to his haughty summons, the cameriere, who had been +gossiping with the cook, threw open the kitchen door, and stood out to +welcome us in a broad square of forth-streaming ruddy light, amid the +lovely odors of broiling and roasting, our driver saluted him with, +"Receive these gentle folks, and treat them to your very best. They +are worthy of anything." This at once put us back several centuries, +and we never ceased to be lords and ladies of the period of Don +Quixote as long as we rested in that inn. + +It was a bright and breezy Sunday when we left "Il Mondo," and gayly +journeyed toward Treviso, intending to visit Possagno, the birthplace +of Canova, on our way. The road to the latter place passes through a +beautiful country, that gently undulates on either hand till in the +distance it rises into pleasant hills and green mountain heights. +Possagno itself lies upon the brink of a declivity, down the side of +which drops terrace after terrace, all planted with vines and figs and +peaches, to a watercourse below. The ground on which the village is +built, with its quaint and antiquated stone cottages, slopes gently +northward, and on a little rise upon the left hand of us coming from +Bassano, we saw that stately edifice with which Canova has honored his +humble birthplace. It is a copy of the Pantheon, and it cannot help +being beautiful and imposing, but it would be utterly out of place in +any other than an Italian village. Here, however, it consorted well +enough with the lingering qualities of the old pagan civilization +still perceptible in Italy. A sense of that past was so strong with +us as we ascended the broad stairway leading up the slope from the +village to the level on which the temple stands at the foot of a +mountain, that we might well have believed we approached an altar +devoted to the elder worship: through the open doorway and between the +columns of the portico we could see the priests moving to and fro, and +the voice of their chanting came out to us like the sound of hymns to +some of the deities long disowned; and I remembered how Padre L---- +had said to me in Venice, "Our blessed saints are only the old gods +baptized and christened anew." Within as without, the temple resembled +the Pantheon, but it had little to show us. The niches designed by +Canova for statues of the saints are empty yet; but there are busts by +his own hand of himself and his brother, the Bishop Canova. Among the +people was the sculptor's niece, whom our guide pointed out to us, and +who was evidently used to being looked at. She seemed not to dislike +it, and stared back at us amiably enough, being a good-natured, plump, +comely dark-faced lady of perhaps fifty years. + +Possagno is nothing if not Canova, and our guide, a boy, knew +all about him,--how, more especially, he had first manifested his +wonderful genius by modeling a group of sheep out of the dust of the +highway, and how an Inglese happening along in his carriage, saw the +boy's work and gave him a plateful of gold napoleons. I dare say +this is as near the truth as most facts. And is it not better for the +historic Canova to have begun in this way than to have poorly picked +up the rudiments of his art in the workshop of his father, a maker of +altar-pieces and the like for country churches? The Canova family was +intermarried with the Venetian nobility, and will not credit those +stories of Canova's beginnings which his townsmen so fondly cherish. +I believe they would even distrust the butter-lion with which the +boy-sculptor is said to have adorned the table of the noble Falier, +and first won his notice. + +Besides the temple at Possagno, there is a very pretty gallery +containing casts of all Canova's works. It is an interesting place, +where Psyches and Cupids flutter, where Venuses present themselves +in every variety of attitude, where Sorrows sit upon hard, +straight-backed classic chairs, and mourn in the society of faithful +Storks; where the Bereft of this century surround death-beds in Greek +costume appropriate to the scene; where Muses and Graces sweetly pose +themselves and insipidly smile, and where the Dancers and Passions, +though nakeder, are no wickeder than the Saints and Virtues. In all, +there are a hundred and ninety-five pieces in the gallery, and among +the rest the statue named George Washington, which was sent to America +in 1820, and afterwards destroyed by fire in the Capitol. The figure +is in a sitting posture; naturally, it is in the dress of a Roman +general; and if it does not look much like George Washington, it does +resemble Julius Cæsar. + +The custodian of the gallery had been Canova'a body-servant, and he +loved to talk of his master. He had so far imbibed the family spirit +that he did not like to allow that Canova had ever been other than +rich and grand, and he begged us not to believe the idle stories of +his first essays in art. He was delighted with our interest in the +imperial Washington, and our pleasure in the whole gallery, which we +viewed with the homage due to the man who had rescued the world from +Swaggering in sculpture. When we were satisfied, he invited us, with +his mistress's permission, into the house of the Canovas adjoining +the gallery; and there we saw many paintings by the sculptor,--pausing +longest in a lovely little room decorated after the Pompeian manner +with _scherzi_ in miniature panels representing the jocose classic +usualities: Cupids escaping from cages, and being sold from them, and +playing many pranks and games with Nymphs and Graces. + +Then Canova was done, and Possagno was finished; and we resumed our +way to Treviso, a town nearly as much porticoed as Padua, and having a +memory and hardly any other consciousness. The Duomo, which is perhaps +the ugliest duomo in the world, contains an "Annunciation," by Titian, +one of his best paintings; and in the Monte di Pietà is the grand and +beautiful "Entombment," by which Giorgione is perhaps most worthily +remembered. The church of San Nicolò is interesting from its quaint +and pleasing frescos by the school of Giotto. At the railway station +an admirable old man sells the most delicious white and purple grapes. + + + + +VI. + +COMO. + +My visit to Lake Como has become to me a dream of summer,--a vision +that remains faded the whole year round, till the blazing heats of +July bring out the sympathetic tints in which it was vividly painted. +Then I behold myself again in burning Milan, amidst noises and +fervors and bustle that seem intolerable after my first six months +in tranquil, cool, mute Venice. Looking at the great white Cathedral, +with its infinite pinnacles piercing the cloudless blue, and gathering +the fierce sun upon it, I half expect to see the whole mass calcined +by the heat, and crumbling, statue by statue, finial by finial, arch +by arch, into a vast heap of lime on the Piazza, with a few charred +English tourists blackening here and there upon the ruin, and +contributing a smell of burnt leather and Scotch tweed to the horror +of the scene. All round Milan smokes the great Lombard plain, and +to the north rises Monte Rosa, her dark head coifed with tantalizing +snows as with a peasant's white linen kerchief. And I am walking out +upon that fuming plain as far as to the Arco della Pace, on which +the bronze horses may melt any minute; or I am sweltering through the +city's noonday streets, in search of Sant' Ambrogio, or the Cenacolo +of Da Vinci, or what know I? Coming back to our hotel, "Alla Bella +Venezia," and greeted on entering by the immense fresco which covers +one whole side of the court, it appeared to my friend and me no wonder +that Garibaldi should look so longingly from the prow of a gondola +toward the airy towers and balloon-like domes that swim above the +unattainable lagoons of Venice, where the Austrian then lorded it in +coolness and quietness, while hot, red-shirted Italy was shut out +upon the dusty plains and stony hills. Our desire for water became +insufferable; we paid our modest bills, and at six o'clock we took +the train for Como, where we arrived about the hour when Don Abbondio, +walking down the lonely path with his book of devotions in his hand, +gave himself to the Devil on meeting the bravos of Don Rodrigo. I +counsel the reader to turn to _I Promessi Sposi_, if he would know +how all the lovely Como country looks at that hour. For me, the ride +through the evening landscape, and the faint sentiment of pensiveness +provoked by the smell of the ripening maize, which exhales the same +sweetness on the way to Como that it does on any Ohio bottom-land, +have given me an appetite, and I am to dine before wooing the +descriptive Muse. + +After dinner, we find at the door of the hotel an English architect +whom we know, and we take a boat together for a moonlight row upon the +lake, and voyage far up the placid water through air that bathes our +heated senses like dew. How far we have left Milan behind! On the lake +lies the moon, but the hills are held by mysterious shadows, which for +the time are as substantial to us as the hills themselves. Hints of +habitation appear in the twinkling lights along the water's edge, and +we suspect an alabaster lamp in every casement, and in every invisible +house a villa such as Claude Melnotte described to Pauline,--and some +one mouths that well-worn fustian. The rags of sentimentality flutter +from every crag and olive-tree and orange-tree in all Italy--like the +wilted paper collars which vulgar tourists leave by our own mountains +and streams, to commemorate their enjoyment of the landscape. + +The town of Como lies, a swarm of lights, behind us; the hills and +shadows gloom around; the lake is a sheet of tremulous silver. There +is no telling how we get back to our hotel, or with what satisfied +hearts we fall asleep in our room there. The steamer starts for the +head of the lake at eight o'clock in the morning, and we go on board +at that hour. + +There is some pretense of shelter in the awning stretched over the +after part of the boat; but we do not feel the need of it in the fresh +morning air, and we get as near the bow as possible, that we may be +the very first to enjoy the famous beauty of the scenes opening +before us. A few sails dot the water, and everywhere there are small, +canopied row-boats, such as we went pleasuring in last night. We reach +a bend in the lake, and all the roofs and towers of the city of Como +pass from view, as if they had been so much architecture painted on +a scene and shifted out of sight at a theatre. But other roofs and +towers constantly succeed them, not less lovely and picturesque than +they, with every curve of the many-curving lake. We advance over +charming expanses of water lying between lofty hills; and as the lake +is narrow, the voyage is like that of a winding river,--like that of +the Ohio, but for the primeval wildness of the acclivities that guard +our Western stream, and the tawniness of its current. Wherever the +hills do not descend sheer into Como, a pretty town nestles on the +brink, or, if not a town, then a villa, or else a cottage, if there is +room for nothing more. Many little towns climb the heights half-way, +and where the hills are green and cultivated in vines or olives, +peasants' houses scale them to the crest. They grow loftier and +loftier as we leave our starting-place farther behind, and as we +draw near Colico they wear light wreaths of cloud and snow. So cool +a breeze has drawn down between them all the way that we fancy it to +have come from them till we stop at Colico, and find that, but for the +efforts of our honest engine, sweating and toiling in the dark +below, we should have had no current of air. A burning calm is in +the atmosphere, and on the broad, flat valley,--out of which a marshy +stream oozes into the lake,--and on the snow-crowned hills upon the +left, and on the dirty village of Colico upon the right, and on the +indolent beggars waiting to welcome us, and sunning their goitres at +the landing. + +The name Colico, indeed, might be literally taken in English as +descriptive of the local insalubrity. The place was once large, but it +has fallen away much from sickness, and we found a bill posted in its +public places inviting emigrants to America on the part of a German +steamship company. It was the only advertisement of the kind I +ever saw in Italy, and I judged that the people must be notoriously +discontented there to make it worth the while of a steamship company +to tempt from home any of the home-keeping Italian race. And +yet Colico, though undeniably hot, and openly dirty, and tacitly +unhealthy, had merits, though the dinner we got there was not among +its virtues. It had an accessible country about it; that is, its woods +and fields were not impenetrably walled in from the vagabond foot; +and after we had dined we went and lay down under some greenly waving +trees beside a field of corn, and heard the plumed and panoplied maize +talking to itself of its kindred in America. It always has a welcome +for tourists of our nation wherever it finds us in Italy; and +sometimes its sympathy, expressed in a rustling and clashing of its +long green blades, or in its strong sweet perfume, has, as already +hinted, made me homesick, though I have been uniformly unaffected by +potato-patches and tobacco-fields. If only the maize could impart to +the Italian cooks the beautiful mystery of roasting-ears! Ah! then +indeed it might claim a full and perfect fraternization from its +compatriots abroad. + +From where we lay beside the corn-field, we could see, through the +twinkling leaves and the twinkling atmosphere, the great hills across +the lake, taking their afternoon naps, with their clouds drawn like +handkerchiefs over their heads. It was very hot, and the red and +purple ooze of the unwholesome river below "burnt like a witch's +oils." It was indeed but a fevered joy we snatched from Nature there; +and I am afraid that we got nothing more comfortable from sentiment, +when, rising, we wandered off through the unguarded fields toward a +ruined tower on a hill. It must have been a relic of feudal times, +and I could easily believe it had been the hold of one of those wicked +lords who used to rule in the terror of the people beside peaceful and +happy Como. But the life, good or bad, was utterly gone out of it +now, and what was left of the tower was a burden to the sense. A few +scrawny blackberries and other brambles grew out of its fallen stones; +harsh, dust-dry mosses painted its weather-worn walls with their +blanched gray and yellow. From its foot, looking out over the valley, +we saw the road to the Splügen Pass lying white-hot in the valley; and +while we looked, the diligence appeared, and dashed through the dust +that rose like a flame before. After that it was a relief to stroll +in dirty by-ways, past cottages of saffron peasants, and poor stony +fields that begrudged them a scanty vegetation, back to the steamer +blistering in the sun. + +Now indeed we were glad of the awning, under which a silent crowd of +people with sunburnt faces waited for the departure of the boat. The +breeze rose again as the engine resumed its unappreciated labors, and, +with our head toward Como, we pushed out into the lake. The company +on board was such as might be expected. There was a German +landscape-painter, with three heart's-friends beside him; there +were some German ladies; there were the unfailing Americans and +the unfailing Englishman; there were some French people; there were +Italians from the meridional provinces, dark, thin, and enthusiastic, +with fat silent wives, and a rhythmical speech; there were Milanese +with their families, out for a holiday,--round-bodied men, with blunt +square features, and hair and vowels clipped surprisingly short, there +was a young girl whose face was of the exact type affected in rococo +sculpture, and at whom one gazed without being able to decide whether +she was a nymph descended from a villa gate, or a saint come from +under a broken arch in a Renaissance church. At one of the little +towns two young Englishmen in knickerbockers came on board, who were +devoured by the eyes of their fellow-passengers, and between whom and +our kindly architect there was instantly ratified the tacit treaty of +non-intercourse which travelling Englishmen observe. + +Nothing further interested us on the way to Como, except the gathering +coolness of the evening air; the shadows creeping higher and higher +on the hills; the songs of the girls winding yellow silk on the reels +that hummed through the open windows of the factories on the shore; +and the appearance of a flag that floated from a shallop before the +landing of a stately villa. The Italians did not know this banner, and +the Germans loudly debated its nationality. The Englishmen grinned, +and the Americans blushed in silence. Of all my memories of that hot +day on Lake Como, this is burnt the deepest; for the flag was that +insolent banner which in 1862 proclaimed us a broken people, and +persuaded willing Europe of our ruin. It has gone down long ago from +ship and fort and regiment, as well as from the shallop on the +fair Italian lake. Still, I say, it made Como too hot for us that +afternoon, and even breathless Milan was afterwards a pleasant +contrast. + + + + +STOPPING AT VICENZA, VERONA, AND PARMA. + +I. + +It was after sunset when we arrived in the birthplace of Palladio, +which we found a fair city in the lap of caressing hills. There are +pretty villas upon these slopes, and an abundance of shaded walks and +drives about the houses which were pointed out to us, by the boy who +carried our light luggage from the railway station, as the property of +rich citizens "but little less than lords" in quality. A lovely grove +lay between the station and the city, and our guide not only took us +voluntarily by the longest route through this, but, after reaching +the streets, led us by labyrinthine ways to the hotel, in order, he +afterwards confessed, to show us the city. He was a poet, though in +that lowly walk of life, and he had done well. No other moment of our +stay would have served us so well for a first general impression of +Vicenza as that twilight hour. In its uncertain glimmer we seemed +to get quite back to the dawn of feudal civilization, when Theodoric +founded the great Basilica of the city; and as we stood before +the famous Clock Tower, which rises light and straight as a mast +eighty-two metres into the air from a base of seven metres, the +wavering obscurity enhanced the effect by half concealing the tower's +crest, and letting it soar endlessly upward in the fancy. The Basilica +is greatly restored by Palladio, and the cold hand of that friend of +virtuous poverty in architecture lies heavy upon his native city in +many places. Yet there is still a great deal of Lombardic architecture +in Vicenza; and we walked through one street of palaces in which +Venetian Gothic prevailed, so that it seemed as if the Grand Canal had +but just shrunk away from their bases. When we threw open our window +at the hotel, we found that it overlooked one of the city gates, from +which rose a Ghibelline tower with a great bulging cornice, full of +the beauty and memory of times long before Palladio. + +They were rather troublous times, and not to be recalled here in all +their circumstance; but I think it due to Vicenza, which is now little +spoken of, even in Italy, and is scarcely known in America, where her +straw-braid is bought for that of Leghorn, to remind the reader +that the city was for a long time a republic of very independent and +warlike stomach. Before she arrived at that state, however, she had +undergone a great variety of fortunes. The Gauls founded the city +(as I learn from "The Chronicles of Vicenza," by Battista Pagliarino, +published at Vicenza in 1563) when Gideon was Judge in Israel, and +were driven out by the Romans some centuries later. As a matter of +course, Vicenza was sacked by Attila and conquered by Alboin; after +which she was ruled by some lords of her own, until she was made +an imperial city by Henry I. Then she had a government more or less +republican in form till Frederick Barbarossa burnt her, and "wrapped +her in ashes," and gave her to his vicar Ecelino da Romano, who "held +her in cruel tyranny" from 1236 to 1259. The Paduans next ruled +her forty years, and the Veronese seventy-seven, and the Milanese +seventeen years; then she reposed in the arms of the Venetian Republic +till these fell weak and helpless from all the Venetian possessions +at the threat of Napoleon. Vicenza belonged again to Venice during the +brief Republic of 1848, but the most memorable battle of that heroic +but unhappy epoch gave her back to Austria. Now at last, and for the +first time, she is Italian. Vicenza is + + "Of kindred that have greatly expiated + And greatly wept," + +and but that I so long fought against Ecelino da Romano, and the +imperial interest in Italy, I could readily forgive her all her past +errors. To us of the Lombard League, it was grievous that she should +remain so doggishly faithful to her tyrant; though it is to be granted +that perhaps fear had as much to do with her devotion as favor. The +defense of 1848 was greatly to her honor, and she took an active part +in that demonstration against the Austrians which endured from 1859 +till 1866. + +Of the demonstration we travellers saw an amusing phase at the +opera which we attended the evening of our arrival in Vicenza. +"Nabucodonosor" was the piece to be given in the new open-air theatre +outside the city walls, whither we walked under the starlight. It +was a pretty structure of fresh white stucco, oval in form, with some +graceful architectural pretensions without, and within very charmingly +galleried; while overhead it was roofed with a blue dome set with such +starry mosaic as never covered temple or theatre since they used to +leave their houses of play and worship open to the Attic skies. The +old Hebrew story had, on this stage brought so near to Nature, effects +seldom known to opera, and the scene evoked from far-off days the +awful interest of the Bible histories,--the vague, unfigured oriental +splendor--the desert--the captive people by the waters of the river of +Babylon--the shadow and mystery of the prophecies. When the Hebrews, +chained and toiling on the banks of the Euphrates, lifted their voices +in lamentation, the sublime music so transfigured the commonplaceness +of the words, that they meant all deep and unutterable affliction, and +for a while swept away whatever was false and tawdry in the show, and +thrilled our hearts with a rapture rarely felt. Yet, as but a moment +before we had laughed to see Nebuchadnezzar's crown shot off his head +by a squib visibly directed from the side scenes,--at the point when, +according to the libretto, "the thunder roars, and a bolt descends +upon the head of the king,"--so but a moment after some new absurdity +marred the illusion, and we began to look about the theatre at the +audience. We then beheld that act of _dimostrazioni_ which I have +mentioned. In one of the few boxes sat a young and very beautiful +woman in a dress of white, with a fan which she kept in constant +movement. It was red on one side, and green on the other, and gave, +with the white dress, the forbidden Italian colors, while, looked +at alone, it was innocent of offense. I do not think a soul in the +theatre was ignorant of the demonstration. A satisfied consciousness +was reflected from the faces of the Italians, and I saw two Austrian +officers exchange looks of good-natured intelligence, after a glance +at the fair patriot. I wonder what those poor people do, now they +are free, and deprived of the sweet, perilous luxury of defying their +tyrants by constant acts of subtle disdain? Life in Venetia must be +very dull: no more explosion of pasteboard petards; no more treason +in bouquets; no more stealthy inscriptions on the walls--it must be +insufferably dull. _Ebbene, pazienza_! Perhaps Victor Emanuel may +betray them yet. + +A spirit of lawless effrontery, indeed, seemed to pervade the whole +audience in the theatre that night at Vicenza, and to extend to the +ministers of the law themselves. There were large placards everywhere +posted, notifying the people that it was forbidden to smoke in the +theatre, and that smokers were liable to expulsion; but except for +ourselves, and the fair patriot in the box, I think every body there +was smoking and the policemen set the example of anarchy by smoking +the longest and worst cigars of all. I am sure that the captive +Hebrews all held lighted cigarettes behind their backs, and that +Nebuchadnezzar, condemned to the grass of the field, conscientiously +gave himself up to the Virginia weed behind the scenes. + +Before I fell asleep that night, the moon rose over the top of the +feudal tower, in front of our hotel, and produced some very pretty +effects with the battlements. Early in the morning a regiment of +Croats marched through the gate below the tower, their band playing +"The Young Recruit." These advantages of situation were not charged in +our bill; but, even if they had been, I should still advise my reader +to go, when in Vicenza, if he loves a pleasant landlord and a good +dinner, to the Hotel de la Ville, which he will find almost at his +sole disposition for however long time he may stay. His meals will be +served him in a vast dining-hall, as bare as a barn or a palace, but +for the pleasant, absurd old paintings on the wall, representing, as +I suppose, Cleopatra applying the Asp, Susannah and the Elders, the +Roman Lucrezia, and other moral and appetizing histories. I take it +there is a quaint side-table or two lost midway of the wall, and that +an old woodcut picture of the Most Noble City of Venice hangs over +each. I know that there is a screen at one end of the apartment behind +which the landlord invisibly assumes the head waiter; and I suspect +that at the moment of sitting down at meat, you hear two Englishmen +talking--as they pass along the neighboring corridor--of wine, in +dissatisfied chest-tones. This hotel is of course built round a court, +in which there is a stable and--exposed to the weather--a diligence, +and two or three carriages and a driver, and an ostler chewing straw, +and a pump and a grape-vine. Why the hotel, therefore, does not smell +like a stable, from garret to cellar, I am utterly at a loss to know. +I state the fact that it does not, and that every other hotel in Italy +does smell of stable as if cattle had been immemorially pastured in +its halls, and horses housed in its bed-chambers,--or as if its only +guests were centaurs on their travels. + +From the Museo Civico, whither we repaired first in the morning, and +where there are some beautiful Montagnas, and an assortment of good +and bad works by other masters, we went to the Campo Santo, which is +worthy to be seen, if only because of the beautiful Laschi monument by +Vela, one of the greatest modern sculptors. It is nothing more than +a very simple tomb, at the door of which stands a figure in +flowing drapery, with folded hands and uplifted eyes in an attitude +exquisitely expressive of grief. The figure is said to be the portrait +statue of the widow of him within the tomb, and the face is very +beautiful. We asked if the widow was still young, and the custodian +answered us in terms that ought to endear him to all women, if not +to our whole mortal race,--"Oh quite young, yet. She is perhaps fifty +years old." + +After the Campo Santo one ought to go to that theatre which Palladio +built for the representation of classic tragedy, and which is perhaps +the perfectest reproduction of the Greek theatre in the world. Alfieri +is the only poet of modern times, whose works have been judged worthy +of this stage, and no drama has been given on it since 1857, when the +"Oedipus Tyrannus" of Sophocles was played. We found it very silent +and dusty, and were much sadder as we walked through its gayly +frescoed, desolate anterooms than we had been in the Campo Santo. Here +used to sit, at coffee and bassett, the merry people who owned the now +empty seats of the theatre,--lord, and lady, and abbé--who affected +to be entertained by the scenes upon the stage. Upon my word, I +should like to know what has become, in the other world, of those poor +pleasurers of the past whose memory makes one so sad upon the scenes +of their enjoyment here! I suppose they have something quite as +unreal, yonder, to satisfy them as they had on earth, and that they +still play at happiness in the old rococo way, though it is hard to +conceive of any fiction outside of Italy so perfect and so entirely +suited to their unreality as this classic theatre. It is a Greek +theatre, for Greek tragedies; but it could never have been for +popular amusement, and it was not open to the air, though it had a +sky skillfully painted in the centre of the roof. The proscenium is a +Greek façade, in three stories, such as never was seen in Greece; +and the architecture of the three streets running back from the +proscenium, and forming the one unchangeable scene of all the dramas, +is--like the statues in the niches and on the gallery inclosing the +auditorium--Greek in the most fashionable Vicentine taste. It must +have been but an operatic chorus that sang in the semicircular space +just below the stage and in front of the audience. Admit and forget +these small blemishes and aberrations, however, and what a marvelous +thing Palladio's theatre is! The sky above the stage is a wonderful +trick, and those three streets--one in the centre and serving as +entrance for the royal persons of the drama, one at the right for +the nobles, and one at the left for the citizens--present unsurpassed +effects of illusion. They are not painted, but modeled in stucco. In +perspective they seem each half a mile long, but entering them you +find that they run back from the proscenium only some fifteen feet, +the fronts of the houses and the statues upon them decreasing in +recession with a well-ordered abruptness. The semicircular gallery +above the auditorium is of stone, and forty statues of marble crown +its colonnade, or occupy niches between the columns. + + +II. + +It was curious to pass, with the impression left by this costly and +ingenious toy upon our minds, at once to the amphitheatre in Verona, +which, next to the Coliseum, has, of all the works bequeathed us +by the ancient Roman world, the greatest claim upon the wonder and +imagination. Indeed, it makes even a stronger appeal to the fancy. We +know who built the Coliseum, but in its unstoried origin, the Veronese +arena has the mystery of the Pyramids. Was its founder Augustus, +or Vitellus, or Antoninus, or Maximian, or the Republic of Verona? +Nothing is certain but that it was conceived and reared by some mighty +prince or people, and that it yet remains in such perfection that the +great shows of two thousand years ago might take place in it to-day. +It is so suggestive of the fierce and splendid spectacles of Roman +times that the ring left by a modern circus on the arena, and absurdly +dwarfed by the vast space of the oval, had an impertinence which +we hotly resented, looking down on it from the highest grade of the +interior. It then lay fifty feet below us, in the middle of an ellipse +five hundred feet in length and four hundred in breadth, and capable +of holding fifty thousand spectators. The seats that the multitudes +pressed of old are perfect, yet; scarce a stone has been removed from +the interior; the aedile and the prefect might take their places again +in the balustraded tribunes above the great entrance at either end of +the arena, and scarcely see that they were changed. Nay, the victims +and the gladiators might return to the cells below the seats of the +people, and not know they had left them for a day; the wild beasts +might leap into the arena from dens as secure and strong as when first +built. The ruin within seems only to begin with the aqueduct, which +was used to flood the arena for the naval shows, but which is now +choked with the dust of ages. Without, however, is plain enough the +doom which is written against all the work of human hands, and which, +unknown of the builders, is among the memorable things placed in the +corner-stone of every edifice. Of the outer wall that rose high over +the highest seats of the amphitheatre, and encircled it with stately +corridors, giving it vaster amplitude and grace, the earthquake of six +centuries ago spared only a fragment that now threatens above one of +the narrow Veronese streets. Blacksmiths, wagon-makers, and workers +in clangorous metals have made shops of the lower corridors of the old +arena, and it is friends and neighbors with the modern life about it, +as such things usually are in Italy. Fortunately for the stranger, the +Piazza Bra flanks it on one hand, and across this it has a magnificent +approach. It is not less happy in being little known to sentiment, and +the traveller who visits it by moonlight, has a full sense of grandeur +and pathos, without any of the sheepishness attending homage to that +battered old coquette, the Coliseum, which so many emotional people +have sighed over, kissing and afterwards telling. + +But he who would know the innocent charm of a ruin as yet almost +wholly uncourted by travel, must go to the Roman theatre in Verona. +It is not a favorite of the hand-books; and we were decided to see it +chiefly by a visit to the Museum, where, besides an admirable gallery +of paintings, there is a most interesting collection of antiques in +bronze and marble found in excavating the theatre. The ancient edifice +had been completely buried, and a quarter of the town was built over +it, as Portici is built over Herculaneum, and on the very top stood a +Jesuit convent. One day, some children, playing in the garden of one +of the shabby houses, suddenly vanished from sight. Their mother ran +like one mad (I am telling the story in the words of the peasant who +related it to me) to the spot where they had last been seen, and fell +herself into an opening of the earth there. The outcry raised by these +unfortunates brought a number of men to their aid, and in digging to +get them out, an old marble stairway was discovered. This was about +twenty-five years ago. A certain gentleman named Monga owned the land, +and he immediately began to make excavations. He was a rich man, but +considered rather whimsical (if my peasant represented the opinion +of his neighbors), and as the excavation ate a great deal of money +(_mangiava molti soldi_), his sons discontinued the work after his +death, and nothing has been done for some time, now. The peasant +in charge was not a person of imaginative mind, though he said the +theatre (supposed to have been built in the time of Augustus) +was completed two thousand years before Christ. He had a purely +conventional admiration of the work, which he expressed at regular +intervals, by stopping short in his course, waving both hands over the +ruins, and crying in a sepulchral voice, "_Qual' opera_!" However, +as he took us faithfully into every part of it, there is no reason to +complain of him. + +We crossed three or four streets, and entered at several different +gates, in order to see the uncovered parts of the work, which could +have been but a small proportion of the whole. The excavation has been +carried down thirty and forty feet below the foundations of the modern +houses, revealing the stone seats of the auditorium, the corridors +beneath them, and the canals and other apparatus for naval shows, as +in the great Amphitheatre. These works are even more stupendous than +those of the Amphitheatre, for in many cases they are not constructed, +but hewn out of the living rock, so that in this light the theatre is +a gigantic sculpture. Below all are cut channels to collect and carry +off the water of the springs in which the rock abounds. The depth of +one of these channels near the Jesuit convent must be fifty feet below +the present surface. Only in one place does the ancient edifice rise +near the top of the ground, and there is uncovered the arched front +of what was once a family-box at the theatre, with the owner's name +graven upon the arch. Many poor little houses have of course been +demolished to carry on the excavations, and to the walls that joined +them cling memorials of the simple life that once inhabited them. To +one of the buildings hung a melancholy fire-place left blackened with +smoke, and battered with use, but witnessing that it had once been the +heart of a home. It was far more touching than any thing in the +elder ruin; and I think nothing could have so vividly expressed the +difference which, in spite of all the resemblances noticeable in +Italy, exists between the ancient and modern civilization, as that +family-box at the theatre and this simple fireside. + +I do not now remember what fortunate chance it was that discovered +to us the house of the Capulets, and I incline to believe that we +gravitated toward it by operation of well-known natural principles +which bring travellers acquainted with improbabilities wherever they +go. We found it a very old and time-worn edifice, built round an +ample court, and we knew it, as we had been told we should, by the cap +carven in stone above the interior of the grand portal. The family, +anciently one of the principal of Verona, has fallen from much of its +former greatness. On the occasion of our visit, Juliet, very dowdily +dressed, looked down from the top of a long, dirty staircase which +descended into the court, and seemed interested to see us; while her +mother caressed with one hand a large yellow mastiff, and distracted +it from its first impulse to fly upon us poor children of sentiment. +There was a great deal of stable litter, and many empty carts standing +about in the court; and if I might hazard the opinion formed upon +these and other appearances, I should say that old Capulet has now +gone to keeping a hotel, united with the retail liquor business, both +in a small way. + +Nothing could be more natural, after seeing the house of the Capulets, +than a wish to see Juliet's Tomb, which is visited by all strangers, +and is the common property of the hand-books. It formerly stood in a +garden, where, up to the beginning of this century, it served, says my +"Viaggio in Italia," "for the basest uses,"--just as the sacred prison +of Tasso was used for a charcoal bin. We found the sarcophagus under +a shed in one corner of the garden of the Orfanotrofio delle +Franceschine, and had to confess to each other that it looked like a +horse-trough roughly hewn out of stone. The garden, said the boy +in charge of the moving monument, had been the burial-place of the +Capulets, and this tomb being found in the middle of the garden, was +easily recognized as that of Juliet. Its genuineness, as well as its +employment in the ruse of the lovers, was proven beyond cavil by a +slight hollow cut for the head to rest in, and a hole at the foot "to +breathe through," as the boy said. Does not the fact that this relic +has to be protected from the depredations of travellers, who could +otherwise carry it away piecemeal, speak eloquently of a large amount +of vulgar and rapacious innocence drifting about the world? + +It is well to see even such idle and foolish curiosities, however, in +a city like Verona, for the mere going to and fro in search of them +through her streets is full of instruction and delight. To my mind, no +city has a fairer place than she that sits beside the eager Adige, and +breathes the keen air of mountains white with snows in winter, green +and purple with vineyards in summer, and forever rich with marble. +Around Verona stretch those gardened plains of Lombardy, on which +Nature, who dotes on Italy, and seems but a step-mother to all +transalpine lands, has lavished every gift of beauty and fertility. +Within the city's walls, what store of art and history! Her +market-places have been the scenes of a thousand tragic or ridiculous +dramas; her quaint and narrow streets are ballads and legends full +of love-making and murder; the empty, grass-grown piazzas before +her churches are tales that are told of municipal and ecclesiastical +splendor. Her nobles sleep in marble tombs so beautiful that the dust +in them ought to be envied by living men in Verona; her lords lie in +perpetual state in the heart of the city, in magnificent sepulchres of +such grace and opulence, that, unless a language be invented full +of lance-headed characters, and Gothic vagaries of arch and finial, +flower and fruit, bird and beast, they can never be described. Sacred +be their rest from pen of mine, Verona! Nay, while I would fain bring +the whole city before my reader's fancy, I am loath and afraid to +touch any thing in it with my poor art: either the tawny river, +spanned with many beautiful bridges, and murmurous with mills afloat +and turned by the rapid current; or the thoroughfares with their +passengers and bright shops and caffès; or the grim old feudal towers; +or the age-embrowned palaces, eloquent in their haughty strength of +the times when they were family fortresses; or the churches with the +red pillars of their porticos resting upon the backs of eagle-headed +lions; or even the white-coated garrison (now there no more), with its +heavy-footed rank and file, its handsome and resplendent officers, +its bristling fortifications, its horses and artillery, crowding the +piazzas of churches turned into barracks. All these things haunt my +memory, but I could only at best thinly sketch them in meagre black +and white. Verona is an almost purely Gothic city in her architecture, +and her churches are more worthy to be seen than any others in North +Italy, outside of Venice. San Zenone, with the quaint bronzes on its +doors representing in the rudeness of the first period of art the +incidents of the Old Testament and the miracles of the saints--with +the allegorical sculptures surrounding the interior and exterior of +the portico, and illustrating, among other things, the creation of +Eve with absolute literalness--with its beautiful and solemn crypt +in which the dust of the titular saint lies entombed--with its minute +windows, and its vast columns sustaining the roof upon capitals of +every bizarre and fantastic device--is doubtless most abundant in that +Gothic spirit, now grotesque and now earnest, which somewhere appears +in all the churches of Verona; which has carven upon the façade of +the Duomo the statues of Orlando and Olliviero, heroes of romance, and +near them has placed the scandalous figure of a pig in a monk's robe +and cowl, with a breviary in his paw; which has reared the exquisite +monument of Guglielmo da Castelbarco before the church of St. +Anastasia, and has produced the tombs of the Scaligeri before the +chapel of Santa Maria Antica. + +I have already pledged myself not to attempt any description of these +tombs, and shall not fall now. But I bought in the. English tongue, as +written at Verona, some "Notices," kept for sale by the sacristan, +"of the Ancient Churg of Our Lady, and of the Tombs of the most +illustrious Family Della-Scala," and from these I think it no +dereliction to quote _verbatim_. First is the tomb of San Francesco, +who was "surnamed the Great by reason of his valor." "With him the +Great Alighieri and other exiles took refuge. We see his figure +extended upon a bed, and above his statue on horsebac with the vizor +down, and his crest falling behind his shoulders, his horse covered +with mail. The columns and capitals are wonderful." "Within the +Cemetery to the right leaning against the walls of the church is the +tomb of John Scaliger." "In the side of this tomb near the wall of +Sacristy, you see the urn that encloses the ashes of Martin I.," "who +was traitorously killed on the 17th of October 1277 by Scaramello of +the Scaramelli, who wished to revenge the honor of a young lady of his +family." "The Mausoleum that is in the side facing the Place encloses +the Martin II.'s ashes.... This building is sumptuous and wonderful +because it stands on four columns, each of which has an architrave +of nine feet. On the beams stands a very large square of marble that +forms the floor, on which stands the urn of the Defunct. Four other +columns support the vault that covers the urn; and the rest is adorned +by facts of Old Testament. Upon the Summit is the equestrian statue as +large as life." Of "Can Signorius," whose tomb is the most splendid +of all, the "Notices" say: "He spent two thousand florins of gold, +in order to prepare his own sepulchre while he was yet alive, and +to surpass the magnificence of his predecessors. The monument is as +magnificent as the contracted space allows. Six columns support the +floor of marble on which it stands covered with figures. Six other +columns support the top, on that is the Scaliger's statues.... +The monument is surrounded by an enclosure of red marble, with six +pillars, on which are square capitols with armed Saints. The rails of +iron with the Arms of the Scala, are worked with a beauty wonderful +for that age," or, I may add, for any age. These "rails" are an +exquisite net-work of iron wrought by hand, with an art emulous of +that of Nicolò Caparra at Florence. The chief device employed is a +ladder (_scala_) constantly repeated in the centres of quatre-foils; +and the whole fabric is still so flexible and perfect, after the lapse +of centuries, that the net may be shaken throughout by a touch. Four +other tombs of the Scaligeri are here, among which the "Notices" +particularly mention that of Alboin della Scala: "He was one of the +Ghibelline party, as the arms on his urn schew, that is a staircase +risen by an eagle--wherefore Dante said, _In sulla Scala porta il +santo Uccello_." + +I should have been glad to meet the author of these delightful +histories, but in his absence we fared well enough with the sacristan. +When, a few hours before we left Verona, we came for a last look it +the beautiful sepulchres, he recognized us, and seeing a sketch-book +in the party, he invited us within the inclosure again, and then ran +and fetched chairs for us to sit upon--nay, even placed chairs for +us to rest our feet on. Winning and exuberant courtesy of the Italian +race! If I had never acknowledged it before, I must do homage to it +now, remembering the sweetness of the sacristans and custodians of +Verona. They were all men of the most sympathetic natures. He at San +Zenone seemed never to have met with real friends till we expressed +pleasure in the magnificent Mantegna, which is the pride of his +church. "What coloring!" he cried, and then triumphantly took us into +the crypt: "What a magnificent crypt! What works they executed +in those days, there!" At San Giorgio Maggiore, where there are a +Tintoretto and a Veronese, and four horrible swindling big pictures by +Romanino, I discovered to my great dismay that I had in my pocket but +five soldi, which I offered with much abasement and many apologies +to the sacristan; but he received them as if they had been so many +napoleons, prayed me not to speak of embarrassment, and declared that +his labors in our behalf had been nothing but pleasure. At Santa +Maria in Organo, where are the wonderful _intagli_ of Fra Giovanni da +Verona, the sacristan fully shared our sorrow that the best pictures +could not be unveiled as it was Holy Week. He was also moved with us +at the gradual decay of the _intagli_, and led us to believe that, to +a man of so much sensibility, the general ruinous state of the church +was an inexpressible affliction; and we rejoiced for his sake that it +should possess at least one piece of art in perfect repair. This was +a modern work, that day exposed for the first time, and it represented +in a group of wooden figures The Death of St. Joseph. The Virgin and +Christ supported the dying saint on either hand; and as the whole was +vividly colored, and rays of glory in pink and yellow gauze descended +upon Joseph's head, nothing could have been more impressive. + + +III. + +Parma is laid out with a regularity which may be called characteristic +of the great ducal cities of Italy, and which it fully shares with +Mantua, Ferrara, and Bologna. The signorial cities, Verona, Vicenza, +Padua, and Treviso, are far more picturesque, and Parma excels only in +the number and beauty of her fountains. It is a city of gloomy aspect, +says Valery, who possibly entered it in a pensive frame of mind, for +its sadness did not impress us. We had just come from Modena, where +the badness of our hotel enveloped the city in an atmosphere of +profound melancholy. In fact, it will not do to trust to travellers in +any thing. I, for example, have just now spoken of the many beautiful +fountains in Parma because I think it right to uphold the statement +of M. Richard's hand-book; but I only remember seeing one fountain, +passably handsome, there. My Lord Corke, who was at Parma in 1754, +says nothing of fountains, and Richard Lasells, Gent., who was there a +century earlier, merely speaks of the fountains in the Duke's +gardens, which, together with his Grace's "wild beasts" and "exquisite +coaches," and "admirable Theater to exhibit Operas in," "the Domo, +whose Cupola was painted by the rare hand of Corregio," and the church +of the Capuchins, where Alexander Farnese is buried, were "the Chief +thing to be seen in Parma" at that day. + +The wild beasts have long ago run away with the exquisite coaches, but +the other wonders named by Master Lasells are still extant in Parma, +together with some things he does not name. Our minds, in going +thither, were mainly bent upon Correggio and his works, and while our +dinner was cooking at the admirable Albergo della Posta, we went +off to feast upon the perennial Hash of Frogs in the dome of the +Cathedral. This is one of the finest Gothic churches in Italy, and +vividly recalls Verona, while it has a quite unique and most beautiful +feature in the three light-columned galleries, that traverse the +façade one above another. Close at hand stands the ancient Baptistery, +hardly less peculiar and beautiful; but, after all, it is the work of +the great painter which gives the temple its chief right to wonder and +reverence. We found the fresco, of course, much wasted, and at first +glance, before the innumerable arms and legs had time to order and +attribute themselves to their respective bodies, we felt the +justice of the undying spite which called this divinest of frescos a +_guazzetto di rane_. But in another moment it appeared to us the most +sublime conception of the Assumption ever painted, and we did not find +Caracci's praise too warm where he says: "And I still remain stupefied +with the sight of so grand a work--every thing so well conceived--so +well seen from below--with so much severity, yet with so much judgment +and so much grace; with a coloring which is of very flesh." The height +of the fresco above the floor of the church is so vast that it +might well appear like a heavenly scene to the reeling sense of the +spectator. Brain, nerve, and muscle were strained to utter exhaustion +in a very few minutes, and we came away with our admiration only +half-satisfied, and resolved to ascend the cupola next day, and see +the fresco on something like equal terms. In one sort we did thus +approach it, and as we looked at the gracious floating figures of the +heavenly company through the apertures of the dome, they did seem to +adopt us and make us part of the painting. But the tremendous depth, +over which they drifted so lightly, it dizzied us to look into; and +I am not certain that I should counsel travellers to repeat our +experience. Where still perfect, the fresco can only gain from +close inspection,--it is painted with such exquisite and jealous +perfection,--yet the whole effect is now better from below, for the +decay is less apparent; and besides, life is short, and the stairway +by which one ascends to the dome is in every way too exigent. It is +with the most astounding sense of contrast that you pass from the +Assumption to the contemplation of that other famous roof frescoed by +Correggio, in the Monastero di San Paolo. You might almost touch +the ceiling with your hand, it hovers so low with its counterfeit of +vine-clambered trellis-work, and its pretty boys looking roguishly +through the embowering leaves. It is altogether the loveliest room +in the world; and if the Diana in her car on the chimney is truly a +portrait of the abbess for whom the chamber was decorated, she was +altogether worthy of it, and one is glad to think of her enjoying life +in the fashion amiably permitted to nuns in the fifteenth century. +What curious scenes the gayety of this little chamber conjures up, and +what a vivid comment it is upon the age and people that produced it! +This is one of the things that makes a single hour of travel worth +whole years of historic study, and which casts its light upon all +future reading. Here, no doubt, the sweet little abbess, with the +noblest and prettiest of her nuns about her, received the polite +world, and made a cheerful thing of devotion, while all over +transalpine Europe the sour-hearted Reformers were destroying pleasant +monasteries like this. The light-hearted lady-nuns and their gentlemen +friends looked on heresy as a deadly sin, and they had little reason +to regard it with favor. It certainly made life harder for them in +time, for it made reform within the Church as well as without, so that +at last the lovely Chamber of St. Paul was closed against the public +for more than two centuries. + +All Parma is full of Correggio, as Venice is of Titian and Tintoretto, +as Naples of Spagnoletto, as Mantua of Giulio Romano, as Vicenza of +Palladio, as Bassano of Da Ponte, as Bologna of Guido Reni. I have +elsewhere noticed how ineffaceably and exclusively the manner of the +masters seems to have stamped itself upon the art of the cities where +they severally wrought,--how at Parma Correggio yet lives in all the +sketchy mouths of all the pictures painted there since his time. One +might almost believe, hearing the Parmesans talk, that his manner had +infected their dialect, and that they fashioned their lazy, incomplete +utterance with the careless lips of his nymphs and angels. They almost +entirely suppress the last syllable of every word, and not with +a quick precision, as people do in Venice or Milan, but with an +ineffable languor, as if language were not worth the effort of +enunciation; while they rise and lapse several times in each sentence, +and sink so sweetly and sadly away upon the closing vocable that the +listener can scarcely repress his tears. In this melancholy +rhythm, one of the citizens recounted to me the whole story of the +assassination of the last Duke of Parma in 1850; and left me as softly +moved as if I had been listening to a tale of hapless love. Yet it was +an ugly story, and after the enchantment of the recital passed away, I +perceived that when the Duke was killed justice was done on one of the +maddest and wickedest tyrants that ever harassed an unhappy city. + +The Parmesans remember Maria Louisa, Napoleon's wife, with pleasant +enough feelings, and she seems to have been good to them after the +manner of sovereigns, enriching their city with art, and beautifying +it in many ways, besides doing works of private charity and +beneficence. Her daughter by a second marriage, the Countess +Sanvitali, still lives in Parma; and in one of the halls of the +Academy of Fine Arts the Duchess herself survives in the marble of +Canova. It was she who caused the two great pictures of Correggio, +the St. Jerome and the Madonna della Scodella, to be placed alone in +separate apartments hung with silk, in which the painter's initial A +is endlessly interwoven. "The Night," to which the St. Jerome is "The +Day," is in the gallery at Dresden, but Parma could have kept nothing +more representative of her great painter's power than this "Day." It +is "the bridal of the earth and sky," and all sweetness, brightness, +and tender shadow are in it. Many other excellent works of Correggio, +Caracci, Parmigianino, and masters of different schools are in this +gallery, but it is the good fortune of travellers, who have to see so +much, that the memory of the very best alone distinctly remains. Nay, +in the presence of prime beauty nothing else exists, and we found +that the church of the Steccata, where Parmigianino's sublime "Moses +breaking the Tables of the Law" is visible in the midst of a multitude +of other figures on the vault, really contained nothing at last but +that august and awful presence. + +Undoubtedly the best gallery of classical antiquities in North Italy +is that of Parma, which has derived all its precious relics from the +little city of Valleja alone. It is a fine foretaste of Pompeii +and the wonders of the Museo Borbonico at Naples, with its antique +frescos, and marble, and bronzes. I think nothing better has come out +of Herculaneum than the comic statuette of "Hercules Drunk." He is in +bronze, and the drunkest man who has descended to us from the elder +world; he reels backward, and leers knowingly upon you, while one hand +hangs stiffly at his side, and the other faintly clasps a wine-cup--a +burly, worthless, disgraceful demigod. + +The great Farnese Theatre was, as we have seen, admired by Lasells; +but Lord Corke found it a "useless structure" though immense. "The +same spirit that raised the Colossus at Rhodes," he says, "raised the +theatre at Parma; that insatiable spirit and lust of Fame which would +brave the Almighty by fixing eternity to the name of a perishable +being." If it was indeed this spirit, I am bound to say that it did +not build so wisely at Parma as at Rhodes. The play-house that Ranuzio +I. constructed in 1628, to do honor to Cosmo II. de' Medici (pausing +at Parma on his way to visit the tomb of San Carlo Borromeo), and that +for a century afterward was the scene of the most brilliant spectacles +in the world, is now one of the dismalest and dustiest of ruins. This +_Theatrum orbis miraculum_ was built and ornamented with the +most perishable materials, and even its size has shrunken as the +imaginations of men have contracted under the strong light of later +days. When it was first opened, it was believed to hold fourteen +thousand spectators; at a later _fête_ it held only ten thousand; the +last published description fixes its capacity at five thousand; and +it is certain that for many and many a year it has held only the stray +tourists who have looked in upon its desolation. The gay paintings +hang in shreds and tatters from the roof; dust is thick upon the seats +and in the boxes, and on the leads that line the space once flooded +for naval games. The poor plaster statues stand naked and forlorn amid +the ruin of which they are part; and the great stage, from which +the curtain has rotted away, yawns dark and empty before the empty +auditorium. + + + + +DUCAL MANTUA. + +In that desperate depth of Hell where Dante beholds the Diviners +doomed to pace with backward-twisted faces, and turn forever on the +past the rainy eyes once bent too daringly on the future, the sweet +guide of the Tuscan poet points out among the damned the daughter of a +Theban king, and discourses to his charge:-- + + Manto was she: through many lands she went + Seeking, and paused where I was born, at last. + Therefore I choose thou be on me intent + A little. When from life her father passed, + And they of Bacchus' city became slaves, + Long time about the world the daughter cast. + Up in fair Italy is a lake that laves + The feet of Alps that lock in Germany: + Benaco called.... + And Peschiera in strong harness sits + To front the Brescians and the Bergamasques, + Where one down-curving shore the other meets. + There all the gathered waters outward flow + That may not in Benaco's bosom rest, + And down through, pastures green a river go. + + * * * * * + + As far as to Governo, where, its quest + Ended at last, it falls into me Po. + But far it has not sought before a plain + It finds and floods, out-creeping wide and slow + To be the steaming summer's offense and bane. + Here passing by, the fierce, unfriendly maid + Saw land in the middle of the sullen main, + Wild and unpeopled, and here, unafraid + Of human neighborhood, she made her lair, + Rested, and with her menials wrought her trade, + And lived, and left her empty body there. + Then the sparse people that were scattered near + Gathered upon that island, everywhere + Compassed about with swamps and kept from fear. + They built their city above the witch's grave, + And for her sake that first made dwelling there + The name of Mantua to their city gave. + +To this account of the first settlement of Mantua Virgil adds a +warning to his charge to distrust all other histories of the city's +foundation; and Dante is so thoroughly persuaded of its truth, that +he declares all other histories shall be to him as so many lifeless +embers. Nevertheless, divers chroniclers of Mantua reject the +tradition here given as fabulous; and the carefullest and most +ruthless of these traces the city's origin, not to the unfriendly +maid, but to the Etruscan King Ocno, fixing the precise date of its +foundation at thirty years before the Trojan war, one thousand five +hundred and thirty-nine years after the creation of the world, three +hundred years before Rome, and nine hundred and fifteen years after +the flood, while Abimelech was judge in Israel. "And whoever," says +the compiler of the "Flower of the Mantuan Chroniclers" (it is a very +dry and musty flower, indeed), citing doughty authorities for all his +facts and figures,--"whoever wishes to understand this more curiously, +let him read the said authors, and he will be satisfied." + +But I am as little disposed to unsettle the reader's faith in +the Virgilian tradition, as to part with my own; and I therefore +uncandidly hold back the names of the authorities cited. This +tradition was in fact the only thing concerning Mantuan history +present to my thoughts as I rode toward the city, one afternoon of a +pleasant Lombard spring; and when I came in sight of the ancient hold +of sorcery, with the languid waters of its lagoons lying sick at +its feet, I recognized at least the topographical truth of Virgil's +description. But old and mighty walls now surround the spot which +Manto found sterile and lonely in the heart of the swamp formed by the +Mincio, no longer Benaco; and the dust of the witch is multitudinously +hidden under the edifices of a city whose mighty domes, towers, and +spires make its approach one of the stateliest in the world. It is a +prospect on which you may dwell long as you draw toward the city, for +the road from the railway station winds through some two miles of flat +meadow-land before it reaches the gate of the stronghold which the +Italians call the first hope of the winner of the land, and the last +hope of the loser of Italy. Indeed, there is no haste in any of the +means of access to Mantua. It lies scarce forty miles south of Verona, +and you are three hours in journeying this distance in the placid +railway train,--a distance which Romeo, returning to Verona from his +exile in Mantua, no doubt travelled in less time. There is abundant +leisure to study the scenery on the way; but it scarcely repays the +perusal, for it lacks the beauty of the usual Lombard landscape. +The soil is red, stony, and sterile; the orchard-trees are scant and +slender, and not wedded with the caressing vines which elsewhere in +North Italy garland happier trees and stretch gracefully from trunk to +trunk. Especially the landscape looks sad and shabby about the little +village of Villafranca, where, in 1864, the dejected prospect seemed +incapable of a smile even in spring; as if it had lost all hope and +cheerfulness since the peace was made which confirmed Venetia to the +alien. It said as plainly as real estate could express the national +sentiment, "Come si fa? Ci vuol pazienza!" and crept sullenly out of +sight, as our pensive train resumed its meditative progress. No doubt +this poor landscape _was_ imbued, in its dull, earthy way, with a +feeling that the coming of Garibaldi would irrigate and fertilize it +into a paradise; as at Venice the gondoliers believed that his army +would bring in its train cheap wine and hordes of rich and helpless +Englishmen bent on perpetual tours of the Grand Canal without +understanding as to price. + +But within and without Mantua was a strong argument against +possibility of change in the political condition of this part of +Italy. Compassed about by the corruption of the swamps and the +sluggish breadth of the river, the city is no less mighty in her +artificial defenses than in this natural strength of her position; +and the Croats of her garrison were as frequent in her sad, handsome +streets, as the priests in Rome. Three lakes secure her from approach +upon the east, north, and south; on the west is a vast intrenched +camp, which can be flooded at pleasure from one of the lakes; while +the water runs three fathoms deep at the feet of the solid brick walls +all round the city. There are five gates giving access by drawbridges +from the town to the fortressed posts on every side, and commanding +with their guns the roads that lead to them. The outlying forts, with +the citadel, are four in number, and are each capable of holding +from two to three thousand men. The intrenched camp, for cavalry and +artillery, and the barracks of the city itself, can receive a garrison +of from thirty to forty thousand men; and the measureless depths of +the air are full of the fever that fights in defense of Mantua, and +serves with equal zeal whoever is master of the place, let him be +French, Italian, or Austrian, so only that he have an unacclimated +enemy before him. + +I confess that little of this formidable military knowledge burdened +me on the occasion of my visit to Mantua, and I have already confessed +that I was but very imperfectly informed of the history of the city. +But indeed, if the reader dealt candidly with himself, how much +could he profess to know of Mantuan history? The ladies all have +some erudite associations with the place as giving the term of +_mantua-making_ to the art of dress, and most persons have heard that +Mantua's law was once death to any he that uttered mortal drugs there, +and that the place was till a few years since an Austrian fortress +on the Mincio. Of Giulio Romano, and his works to Mantua, a good +many have heard; and there is something known to the reader of the +punctuated edition of Browning about Sordello. But of the Gonzagas of +Mantua, and their duchy, what do you know, gentle reader? + +For myself, when in Mantua, I tried to make a virtue of my want of +information, and fancied that a sort of general ignorance was +more favorable to my enjoyment of what I saw there than thorough +acquaintance with the city's history would have been. It certainly +enabled me to accept all the poetic fiction of the custodians, and +to embroider with their pleasing improbabilities the business-like +succinctness of the guide-books; to make out of the twilight which +involved all impressions a misty and heroic picture of the Mantuan +past, wherein her great men appeared with a stately and gigantic +uncertainty of outline, and mixed with dim scenes of battle, intrigue, +and riot, and were gone before Fact could lay her finger on any shape, +and swear that it was called so, and did so and so. But even if there +had been neither pleasure nor profit in this ignorance, the means of +dispelling it are so scant in modern literature that it might well +have been excused in a far more earnest traveller. The difficulty, +indeed, which I afterwards experienced in trying to learn something of +Mantua, is my best excuse for writing of its history here. + +I fancy that the few recent books on the subject are not in the hands +of most readers, and I have a comforting belief that scarcely a +reader of mine has been a reader of the "Grande Illustrazione de +Lombardo-Veneto."[Mantova e Sua Provincia, per 'Avvocato Bartolomeo +Arrighi: _Grande Illustrazione del Lombardo-Veneto, ossia Storia delle +Città, des Borghi, Communi, Castelli, etc., fino ai Tempi moderni. +Per Cura di Cesare Cantù, e a' altri Literati_. Milano, 1859.] Yet +I suppose that he forms some notion of this work from its title, and +figures to himself a physical bulk of six volumes,--large, abounding +in ill-printed wood-cuts, and having the appalling features which +repel our race from pictorial history-books generally. + +The "Grande Illustrazione del Lombardo-Veneto" includes notice of all +those dear and famous cities of North Italy which we know,--of Verona, +Vicenza, Padua, Venice, Mantua, Modena, Brescia, Bergamo, and the +rest; but here we have only to do with the part which concerns Mantua. +This is written by the advocate Bartolomeo Arrighi, whose ingenious +avoidance of all that might make his theme attractive could not +be sufficiently celebrated here, and may therefore be left to the +reader's fancy. There is little in his paper to leaven statistical +heaviness; and in recounting one of the most picturesque histories, +he contrives to give merely a list of the events and a diagram of +the scenes. Whatever illustrated character in princes or people he +carefully excludes, and the raciness of anecdote and the flavor +of manner and epoch distil not into his compilation from the elder +historiographers. I have therefore to go back, in my present purpose, +to the authors whose substance he has desiccated; and with their help, +and that of one or two antiquated authors of this century, I shall try +to rehabilitate the ducal state of Mantua, + + "Which was an image of the mighty world," + +and present some shadow of its microcosmal life. The story has the +completeness of a tragedy; but it runs over many centuries, and it +ends like a farce, though it ends with a death. One feels, indeed, +almost as great satisfaction in the catastrophe as the Mantuans +themselves, who terminated their national existence and parted from +their last Duke with something like exultation. + +As I recall my own impressions of the city, I doubt if any good or bad +fortune could rouse her to such positive emotion now. She seemed +sunken, that dull April evening of our visit, into an abiding lethargy; +as if perfect repose, and oblivion from the many-troubled past,--from +the renown of all former famine, fire, intrigue, slaughter, and +sack,--were to be preferred by the ghost of a once populous and haughty +capital to the most splendid memories of national life. Certainly, the +phantom of bygone Mantuan greatness did not haunt the idle tourists who +strolled through her wide streets, enjoying their quiet beauty and +regularity, and finding them, despite their empty, melancholy air, full +of something that reminded of home. Coming from a land where there is a +vast deal of length, breadth, and rectitude in streets, as well as human +nature, they could not, of course, feel that wonder in the Mantuan +avenues which inspired a Venetian ambassador, two centuries since, to +write the Serenest Senate in praise of their marvelous extent and +straightness; but they were still conscious of a certain expansive +difference from Gothic Verona and narrow Venice. The windows of the +ground-floors were grated to the prison-like effect common throughout +Italy; but people evidently lived upon the ground-floors, and at many of +the iron-barred windows fair young prisoners sat and looked out upon the +streets, or laughed and chatted together. About the open doorways, +moreover, people lounged gossiping; and the interiors of the +entry-halls, as they appeared to the passing glance, were clean, and had +not that forbidding, inhospitable air characteristic of most +house-entrances in North Italy. But sculptured Venice and Verona had +unfitted the travellers for pleasure in the stucco of Mantua; and they +had an immense scorn for the large and beautiful palaces of which the +before-quoted ambassador speaks, because they found them faced with +cunningly-moulded plaster instead of carven stone. Nevertheless, they +could not help a kind of half-tender respect for the old town. It shares +the domestic character of its scenes with the other ducal cities, +Modena, Parma, and Ferrara; and this character is, perhaps, proper to +all long and intensely municipalized communities. But Mantua has a +ghostly calm wholly its own; and this was not in the least broken that +evening by chatters at thresholds, and pretty laughers at grated +windows. It was very, very quiet. Perhaps half a score of carriages +rumbled by us in our long walk, and we met some scattered promenaders. +But for the most part the streets were quite empty; and even in the +chief piazza, where there was still some belated show of buying and +selling, and about the doors of the caffès, where there was a good deal +of languid loafing, there was no indecency of noise or bustle There were +visibly few people in the place, and it was in decay; but it was not +squalid in its lapse. The streets were scrupulously neat and clean, and +the stuccoed houses were all painted of that pale saffron hue which +gives such unquestionable respectability to New England towns. Before we +returned to our lodgings, Mantua had turned into twilight; and we walked +homeward through a placid and dignified gloom, nowhere broken by the +flare of gas, and only remotely affected, here and there, by the light +of lamps of oil, faintly twinkling in a disheartened Mantuan fashion. + +If you turn this pensive light upon the yellow pages of those old +chronicles of which I spoke, it reveals pictures fit to raise both +pity and wonder for the past of this city,--pictures full of the glory +of struggles for freedom, of the splendor of wise princes, of the +comfort of a prosperous and contented people, of the grateful fruits +of protected arts and civilization; but likewise stained with images +of unspeakable filth and wickedness, baseness and cruelty, incredible +shame, suffering, and sin. + +Long before the birth of Christ, the Gauls drive out the Etruscans +from Mantua, and aggrandize and beautify the city, to be in their turn +expelled by the Romans, under whom Mantua again waxes strong and fair. +In this time, the wife of a farmer not far from the city dreams a +marvelous dream of bringing forth a laurel-bough, and in due time +bears into the world the chiefest of all Mantuans, with a smile upon +his face. This is a poet, and they call his name Virgil. He goes from +his native city to Rome, when ripe for glory, and has there the good +fortune to win back his father's farm, which the greedy veterans of +Augustus, then settled in the Cremonese, had annexed to the spoils +bestowed upon them by the Emperor. Later in this Roman time, and only +three years after the death of Him whom the poet all but prophesied, +another grand event marks an epoch in Mantuan history. According to +the pious legend, the soldier Longinus, who pierced the side of Christ +as he hung upon the cross, has been converted by a miracle; wiping +away that costly blood from his spear-head, and then drawing his hand +across his eyes, he is suddenly healed of his near-sightedness, and +stricken with the full wonder of conviction. He gathers anxiously the +precious drops of blood from his weapon into the phial from which +the vinegar mixed with gall was poured, and, forsaking his life of +soldier, he wanders with his new-won faith and his priceless treasure +to Mantua, where it is destined to work famous miracles, and to be +the most valued possession of the city to all after-time. The saint +himself, preaching the Gospel of Christ, suffers martyrdom under +Tiberius; his tongue is cut out, and his body is burnt; and his ashes +are buried at Mantua, forgotten, and found again in after ages +with due signs and miraculous portents. The Romans give a civil +tranquillity to Mantua; but it is not till three centuries after +Christ that the persecutions of the Christians cease. Then the temples +of the gods are thrown down, and churches are built; and the city goes +forward to share the destinies of the Christianized empire, and be +spoiled by the barbarians. In 407 the Goths take it, and the Vandals +in their turn sack and waste it, and scatter its people, who return +again after the storm, and rebuild their city. Attila, marching to +destroy it, is met at Governo (as you see in Raphael's fresco in +the Vatican) by Pope Leo I., who conjures him to spare the city, and +threatens him with Divine vengeance if he refuse; above the pontiff's +head two wrathful angels, bearing drawn swords, menace the Hun with +death if he advance; and, thus miraculously admonished, he turns aside +from Mantua and spares it. The citizens successfully resist an attack +of Alboin; but the Longobards afterwards, unrestrained by the visions +of Attila, beat the Mantuans and take the city. From the Lombards the +Greeks, sent thither by the Exarch of Ravenna, captured Mantua +about the end of the sixth century; and then, the Lombards turning +immediately to besiege it again, the Greeks defend their prize long +and valiantly, but in the end are overpowered. They are allowed to +retire with their men and arms to Ravenna, and the Lombards dismantle +the city. + +Concerning our poor Mantua under Lombard rule there is but little +known, except that she went to war with the Cremonese; and it may be +fairly supposed that she was, like her neighbors, completely involved +in foreign and domestic discords of every kind. That war with the +Cremonese was about the possession of the river Ollio; and the +Mantuans came off victors in it, slaying immense numbers of the enemy, +and taking some thousands of them prisoners, whom their countrymen +ransomed on condition of building one of the gates of Mantua with +materials from the Cremonese territory, and mortar mixed with water +from the disputed Ollio. The reader easily conceives how bitter a pill +this must have been for the high-toned Cremonese gentlemen of that +day. + +When Charlemagne made himself master of Italy, the Mantuan lands and +Mantuan men were divided up among the brave soldiers who had helped to +enslave the country. These warriors of Charlemagne became counts; and +the _contadini_, or inhabitants of each _contado_ (county), became +absolutely dependent on their will and pleasure. It is recorded (to +the confusion of those who think primitive barbarism is virtue) that +the corruption of those rude and brutal old times was great, that all +classes were sunk in vice, and that the clergy were especially venal +and abominable. After the death of Charlemagne, in the ninth century, +wars broke out all over Italy between the factions supporting +different aspirants to his power; and we may be sure that Mantua had +some share in the common quarrel. As I have found no explicit record +of this period, I distribute to the city, as her portion of the +calamities, at least two sieges, one capture and sack, and a +decimation by famine and pestilence. We certainly read that, fifty +years later, the Emperor Rudolph attacked it with his Hungarians, took +it, pillaged it, and put great part of its people to the sword. During +the siege, some pious Mantuans had buried (to save them from the +religious foe) the blood of Christ, and part of the sponge which had +held the gall and vinegar, together with the body of St. Longinus. +Most unluckily, however, these excellent men were put to the sword, +and all knowledge of the place of sepulture perished with them. + +At the end of these wars Mantua received a lord, by appointment of the +Emperor, and the first lord's son married the daughter of the Duke +of Lorraine, from which union was born the great Countess Matilda. +Boniface was the happy bridegroom's name, and the wedding had a wild +splendor and profuse barbaric jollity about it, which it is pleasant +enough to read of after so much cutting and slashing. The viands were +passed round on horseback to the guests, and the horses were shod +with silver shoes loosely nailed on, that they might drop off and be +scrambled for by the people. Oxen were roasted whole, as at a Kentucky +barbecue; and wine was drawn from wells with buckets hung on silver +chains. It was the first great display of that magnificence of which +after princes of Mantua were so fond; and the wretched hinds out of +whose sweat it came no doubt thought it very fine. + +Of course Lord Boniface had his wars. There was a plot to depose +him discovered in Mantua, and the plotters fled to Verona. Boniface +demanded them; but the Veronese answered stoutly that theirs was +a free city, and no man should be taken from it against his will. +Boniface marched to attack them; and the Veronese were such fools as +to call the Duke of Austria to their aid, promising submission to his +government in return for his help. It was then that Austria first put +her finger into the Italian _pasticcio_, where she kept it so many +centuries. But the Austrian governor whom the Duke set over the +Veronese made himself intolerable,--the Austrian governor always +does,--and they drove him out of the city. On this the Duke turns +about, unites with Boniface, takes Verona and sacks it. + +An altogether pleasanter incident of Boniface's domination was the +miraculous discovery of the sacred relics, buried and lost during the +sack of Mantua by the Hungarians. The place of sepulture was revealed +thrice to a blind pauper in a dream. People dug where he bade them +and found the relics. Immediately on its exhumation the Blood wrought +innumerable miracles; and the fame of it grew so great, that the Pope +came to see it, attended by such concourse of the people that they +were obliged to sleep in the streets. It was an age that drew the +mantle of exterior devotion and laborious penances and pilgrimages +over the most hideous crimes and unnatural sins. But perhaps the poor +believers who slept in the streets of Mantua on that occasion were +none the worse for their faith when the Pope pronounced the Blood +genuine and blessed it. I am sure that for some days of enthusiasm +they abstained from the violence of war, and paused a little in that +career of vice and wickedness of which one reads in Italian history, +with the full conviction that Sodom and Gomorrah also were facts, and +not merely allegory. I have no doubt that the blind beggar believed +that Heaven had revealed to him the place where the Blood was buried, +that the Pope believed in the verity of the relic, and that the devout +multitudes were helped and uplifted in their gross faith by this +visible witness to the truth that Christ had died for them upon the +bloody tree. Poor souls! they had much to contend with in the way to +any good. The leaven of the old pleasure-making pagan civilization +was in them yet (it is in the Italians to this day); and centuries +of Northern invasion had made them fierce and cruel, without teaching +them Northern virtues. Nay, I question much if their invaders had so +many rugged virtues to teach as some people would have us think. They +seem to have liked well the sweet corruptions of the land, and the +studied debaucheries of ages of sin, and to have enjoyed them as +furiously and clumsily as bears do the hoarded honey of civilized +bees. + +After the death of Boniface the lordship of Mantua fell to his famous +daughter, Matilda, of whom most have heard. She was a woman of strong +will and strong mind; she held her own, and rent from others with a +mighty hand, till she had united nearly all Lombardy under her +rule. She was not much given to the domestic affections; she had two +husbands (successively), and, if the truth must be told, divorced them +both: one because he wished to share her sovereignty, perhaps usurp +it; and the other because he was not warm enough friend of religion. +She had no children, and, indeed, in her last marriage contract it was +expressly provided that the spouses were to live in chastity together, +and as much asunder as possible, Matilda having scruples. She was +a great friend to learning,--founded libraries, established the +law schools at Bologna, caused the codification of the canon law, +corresponded with distant nations, and spoke all the different +languages of her soldiers. More than literature, however, she loved +the Church; and fought on the side of Pope Gregory VII in his wars +with the Emperor Henry IV. Henry therefore took Mantua from her in +1091, and up to the year 1111 the city enjoyed a kind of republican +government under his protection. In that year Henry made peace with +Matilda, and appointed her his vice-regent in Italy; but the Mantuans, +after twenty years of freedom, were in no humor to feel the weight of +the mailed hand of this strong-minded lady. She was then, moreover, +nigh to her death; and, hearing that her physicians had given her up, +the Mantuans refused submission. The great Countess rose irefully from +her deathbed, and, gathering her army, led it in person, as she always +did, laid siege to Mantua by land and water, entered the city in 1114, +and did not die till a year after. Such is female resolution. + +The Mantuans now founded a republican government, having unlimited +immunities and privileges from the Emperor, whose power over them +extended merely to the investure of their consuls. Their republic was +democratic, the legislative council of nine rectors and three curators +being elective by the whole people. This government, or something like +it, endured for more than a century, during which period the Mantuans +seem to have done nothing but war with their neighbors in every +direction,--with the Veronese chiefly, with the Cremonese a good +deal, with the Paduans, with the Ferrarese, with the Modenese and the +Bolognese: indeed, we count up twelve of these wars. Like the English +of their time, the Mantuans were famous bowmen, and their shafts took +flight all over Lombardy. At the same time they did not omit to fight +each other at home; and it must have been a dullish kind of day +in Mantua when there was no street-battle between families of the +factious nobility. Dante has peopled his Hell from the Italy of this +time, and he might have gone farther and fared worse for a type of +the infernal state. The spectacle of these countless little Italian +powers, racked, and torn, and blazing with pride, aggression, +and disorder, within and without,--full of intrigue, anguish, and +shame,--each with its petty thief or victorious faction making war +upon the other, and bubbling over with local ambitions, personal +rivalries, and lusts,--is a spectacle which the traveller of to-day, +passing over the countless forgotten battle-fields, and hurried from +one famous city to another by railroad, can scarcely conjure up. +Parma, Modena, Bologna, Ferrara, Padua, Mantua Vicenza, Verona, +Bassano,--all are now at peace with each other, and firmly united in +the national sentiment that travellers were meant to be eaten alive +by Italians. Poor old cities! it is hard to conceive of their bygone +animosities; still harder to believe that all the villages squatting +on the long white roads, and waking up to beg of you as your diligence +passes, were once embroiled in deadly and incessant wars. Municipal +pride is a good thing, and discentralization is well; and we have to +thank these intensely local little states for genius triply crowned +with the glories of literature, art, and science, which Italy might +not have produced if she had been united, and if the little states had +loved themselves less and Italy more. Though, after all, there is +the doubt whether it is not better to bless one's obscure and happy +children with peace and safety, than to give to the world a score of +great names at the cost to millions of incalculable misery. + +Besides their local wars and domestic feuds the Mantuans had +troubles on a much larger scale,--troubles, indeed, which the Emperor +Barbarossa laid out for all Italy. In Carlyle's History of Frederick +the Great you can read a pleasanter account of the Emperor's business +at Roncaglia about this time than our Italian chroniclers will give +you. Carlyle loves a tyrant; and if the tyrant is a ruffian and bully, +and especially a German, there are hardly any lengths to which that +historian will not go in praise of him. Truly, one would hardly +guess, from that picture of Frederick Redbeard at Roncaglia, with +the standard set before his tent, inviting all men to come and have +justice done them, that the Emperor was actually at Roncaglia for +the purpose of conspiring with his Diet to take away every vestige +of liberty and independence from miserable Italy. Among other cities +Mantua lost her freedom at this Diet, and was ruled by an imperial +governor and by consuls of Frederick's nomination till 1167, when she +joined the famous Lombard League against him. The leagued cities +beat the Emperor at Legnano, and received back their liberties by the +treaty of Costanza in 1183; after which, Frederick having withdrawn to +Germany, they fell to fighting among themselves again with redoubled +zeal, and rent their league into as many pieces as there had been +parties to it. In 1236 the Germans again invaded Lombardy, under +Frederick II.; and aided by the troops of the Ghibelline cities, +Verona, Padua, Vicenza, and Treviso, besieged Mantua, which +surrendered to this formidable union of forces, thus becoming once +more an imperial city, and irreparably fracturing the Lombard League. +It does not appear, however, that her ancient liberties were withdrawn +by Frederick II.; and we read that the local wars went on after this +with as little interruption as before. The wars went on as usual, and +on the old terms with Verona and Cremona; and there is little in +their history to interest us. But in 1256 the famous tyrant of Padua, +Eccelino da Romano, who aspired to the dominion of Lombardy, gathered +his forces, and went and sat down before Mantua. The Mantuans refused +to surrender at his summons; and Eccelino, who had very little notion +of what the Paduans were doing in his absence, swore that he would cut +down the vines in those pleasant Mantuan vineyards, plant new ones, +and drink the wine of their grapes before ever he raised the siege. +But meantime that conspiracy which ended in Eccelino's ruin had +declared itself in Padua, and the tyrant was forced to abandon the +siege and look to his dominion of other cities. + +After which there was something like peace in Mantua for twenty years, +and the city waxed prosperous. Indeed, neither industry nor learning +had wholly perished during the wars of the republic, and the people +built grist-mills on the Mincio, and cultivated belles-lettres to +some degree. Men of heavier science likewise nourished, and we read of +jurists and astronomers born in those troublous days, as well as of a +distinguished physician, who wrote a ponderous dictionary of simples, +and dedicated it to King Robert of Naples. But by far the greatest +Mantuan of this time was he of whom readers have heard something from +a modern poet. He is the haughty Lombard soul, "in the movement of the +eyes honest and slow," whom Dante, ascending the inexplicable heights +of Purgatory, beheld; and who, summoning all himself, leaped to the +heart of Virgil when he named Mantua: "O Mantuan! I am Sordello, of +thine own land!" + +Of Virgil the superstition of the Middle Ages had made a kind of +wizard, and of Sordello the old writers fable all manner of wonders; +he is both knight and poet, and has adventures scarcely less +surprising than those of Amadis of Gaul. It is pretty nearly certain +that he was born in 1189 of the Visconti di Goito, in the Mantuan +country, and that he married Beatrice, a sister of Eccelino, and had +amours with the youngest sister of this tyrant, the pretty Cunizza, +whom Dante places in his "Paradiso." This final disposition of +Cunizza, whom we should hardly think now of assigning a place among +the blest, surprised some people even in that day, it seems; for an +old commentator defends it, saying: "Cunizza was always, it is true, +tender and amorous, and properly called a daughter of Venus; but she +was also compassionate, benign, and merciful toward those unhappy ones +whom her brother cruelly tormented. Therefore the poet is right +in feigning to find her in the sphere of Venus. _For if the gentle +Cyprians deified their Venus, and the Romans their Flora, how much +more honestly may a Christian poet save Cunizza_." The lady, whose +salvation is on these grounds inexpugnably accomplished, was married +to Count Sanbonifazio of Padua, in her twenty-fourth year; and +Sordello was early called to this nobleman's court, having already +given proofs of his poetic genius. He fell in love with Cunizza, whom +her lord, becoming the enemy of the Eccelini, began to ill-treat. A +curious glimpse of the manners and morals of that day is afforded by +the fact, that the brothers of Cunizza conspired to effect her escape +with Sordella from her husband's court, and that, under the protection +of Eccelino da Romano, the lovers were left unmolested to their +amours. Eccelino, indeed, loved this weak sister with extraordinary +tenderness, and we read of a marvelous complaisance to her amorous +intrigues by a man who cared nothing himself for women. Cunizza lived +in one of her brother's palaces at Verona, and used to receive there +the visits of Sordello after Eccelino had determined to separate them. +The poet entered the palace by a back door, to reach which he must +pass through a very filthy alley; and a servant was stationed there to +carry Sordello to and fro upon his back. One night Eccelino took the +servant's place, bore the poet to the palace door, and on his return +carried him back to the mouth of the alley, where he revealed +himself, to the natural surprise and pain of Sordello, who could have +reasonably expected anything but the mild reproof and warning given +him by his truculent brother-in-law: "Ora ti basti, Sordello. Non +venir più per questa vile strada ad opere ancor più vili."--"Let this +suffice thee, Sordello. Come no more by this vile path to yet viler +deeds." + +It was probably after this amour ended that Sordello sat out upon his +travels, visiting most courts, and dwelling long in Provence, where +he learned to poetize in the Provençal tongue, in which he thereafter +chiefly wrote, and composed many songs. He did not, however, neglect +his Lombard language, but composed in it a treatise on the art of +defending towns. The Mantuan historian, Volta, says that some of +Sordello's Provençal poems exist in manuscript in the Vatican and +Chigi libraries at Rome, in the Laurentian at Florence, and the +Estense at Modena. He was versed in arms as well as letters, and +he caused Mantua to be surrounded with fosses five miles beyond her +walls; and the republic having lodged sovereign powers in his hands +when Eccelino besieged the city, Sordello conducted the defense with +great courage and ability, and did not at all betray the place to his +obliging brother-in-law, as the latter expected. Verci, from whose +"History of the Eccelini" we have drawn the account of Sordello's +intrigue with Cunizza, says: "The writers represent this Sordello as +the most polite, the most gentle, the most generous man of his time, +of middle stature, of beautiful aspect and fine person, of lofty +bearing, agile and dexterous, instructed in letters, and a good poet, +as his Provençal poems manifest. To these qualities he united military +valor in such degree that no knight of his time could stand before +him." He was properly the first Lord of Mantua, and the republic seems +to have died with him in 1284. + +The madness which comes upon a people about to be enslaved commonly +makes them the agents of their own undoing. The time had now come for +the destruction of the last vestiges of liberty in Mantua, and the +Mantuans, in their assembly of the Four Hundred and Ninety, voted full +power into the hands of the destroyer. That Pinamonte Bonacolsi whom +Dante mentions in the twentieth canto of the "Inferno," had been +elected captain of the republic, and, feigning to fear aggression from +the Marquis of Ferrara, he demanded of the people the right to banish +all enemies of the state. This reasonable demand was granted, and +the captain banished, as is well known, all enemies of Pinamonte +Bonacolsi. After that, having things his own way, he began to favor +public tranquillity, abolished family feuds and the ancient amusement +of street-battles, and led his enslaved country in the paths of +material prosperity; for which he was no doubt lauded in his day +by those who thought the Mantuans were not prepared for freedom. +He resolved to make the captaincy of the republic hereditary in the +Bonacolsi family; and when he died, in 1293, his power descended to +his son Bordellone. This Bordellone seems to have been a generous and +merciful captain enough, but he loved ease and pleasure; and a rough +nephew of his, Guido Botticella, conspired against him to that degree +that Bordellone thought best, for peace and quietness' sake, to +abdicate in his favor. Guido had the customary war with the Marquis of +Ferrara, and then died, and was succeeded by his brother Passerino, a +very bad person, whose son at last brought his whole family to grief. +The Emperor made him vicar of Modena; and he used the Modenese very +cruelly, and shut up Francesco Pico and his sons in a tower, where he +starved them, as the Pisans did Ugolino. In those days, also, the Pope +was living at Avignon, and people used to send him money and other +comforts there out of Italy. An officer of Passerino's, being of +Ghibelline politics, attacked one of these richly laden emissaries, +and took his spoils, dividing them with Passerino. For this the Pope +naturally excommunicated the captain of Mantua, and thereupon his +neighbors made a great deal of pious war upon him. But he beat the +Bolognese, the most pious of his foes, near Montevoglio, and with his +Modenese took from them that famous bucket, about which Tassoni +made his great Bernesque epic, "The Rape of the Bucket" (_La Secchia +Rapita_), and which still hangs in the tower of the Duomo at Modena. +Meantime, while Passerino had done everything to settle himself +comfortably and permanently in the tyranny of Mantua, his worthless +son Francesco fell in love with the wife of Filippino Gonzaga. + +According to the old Mantuan chronicles the Gonzagas were of a royal +German line, and had fixed themselves in the Mantuan territory in 770 +where they built a castle beyond Po, and began at once to take part in +public affairs. They had now grown to be a family of such consequence +that they could not be offended with impunity, and it was a great +misfortune to the Bonacolsi that Francesco happened to covet Filippino +Gonzaga's wife. As to the poor lady herself, it is of infinite +consequence to her eternal health whether she was guilty or no, but to +us still on earth, it seems scarcely worth while to inquire, after so +great lapse of time. History, however, rather favors the notion of +her innocence; and it is said that Francesco, unable to overcome her +virtue, took away her good fame by evil reports. At the same time he +was greatly wroth--it is scarcely possible to write seriously of these +ridiculous, wicked old shadows--that this lady's husband should have +fallen in love with a pretty concubine of his, Bonacolsi's; and, after +publicly defaming Filippino's wife, he threatened to kill him for this +passion. The insult and the menace sank deep into the bitter hearts +of the Gonzagas; and the head of that proud race, Filippino's uncle, +Luigi Gonzaga, resolved to avenge the family dishonor. He was a secret +and taciturn man, and a pious adulator of his line has praised him +for the success with which he dissembled his hatred of the Bonacolsi, +while conspiring to sweep them and their dominion away. He won over +adherents among the Mantuans, and then made a league with Can Grande +of Verona to divide the spoils of the Bonacolsi; and so, one morning, +having bribed the guards to open the city gates, he entered Mantua +at the head of the banded forces. The population was roused with +patriotic cries of "Long live the Mantuan people!" and, as usual, +believed, poor souls, that some good was meant them by those who came +to overthrow their tyrants. The Bonacolsi were dreaming that pleasant +morning of anything but ruin, and they offered no resistance to the +insurrection till it burst out in the great square before the Castello +di Corte. They then made a feeble sally from the castle, but were +swiftly driven back, and Passerino, wounded to death under the great +Gothic archway of the palace, as he retreated, dropped from his +languid hands the bridle-rein of his charger and the reins of that +government with which he had so long galled Mantua. The unhappy +Francesco fled to the cathedral for protection; but the Gonzagas slew +him at the foot of the altar, with tortures so hideous and incredible, +that I am glad to have our friend, the advocate Arrighi, deny the fact +altogether. Passerino's brother, a bishop, was flung into a tower to +starve, that the Picos might be avenged; and the city of Mantua was +liberated. + +In that day, when you freed a city from a tyrant, you gave it up to be +pillaged by the army of liberation; and Mantua was now sacked by +her deliverers. Can Grande's share of the booty alone amounted to a +hundred thousand gold florins (about two hundred and fifty thousand +dollars). The Mantuans, far from imitating the ungrateful Paduans, +who, when the Crusaders liberated them from Eccelino, grudged these +brave fellows three days' pillage of their city, and even wished back +their old tyrant,--the Mantuans, we say, seemed not in the least +to mind being devoured, but gratefully elected the Gonzaga their +captain-general, and purchased him absolution from the Pope for his +crimes committed in the sack. They got this absolution for twenty +thousand gold florins; and the Pope probably sold it cheap, +remembering his old grudge against the Bonacolsi, whom the Gonzaga had +overthrown. All this was in the year of grace 1328. + +I confess that I am never weary of reading of these good, heroic, +virtuous old times in Italy, and that I am here tempted to digress +into declamation about them. There is no study more curious and +interesting, and I am fond of tracing the two elements of character +visible in Italian society, and every individual Italian, as they flow +down from the remotest times to these: the one element, that capacity +for intellectual culture of the highest degree; the other element, +that utter untamableness of passion and feeling. The presence of these +contradictory elements seems to influence every relation of Italian +life;--to make it capable of splendor, but barren of comfort; to +endear beauty, but not goodness, to the Italian; to lead him to +recognize and celebrate virtues, but not to practice them; to produce +a civilization of the mind, and not of the soul. + +When Luigi Gonzaga was made lord of Mantua, he left his castle beyond +Po, to dwell in the city. In this castle he had dwelt, like other +lords of his time, in the likeness of a king, spending regally and +keeping state and open house in an edifice strongly built about with +walls, encircled with ditches passable by a single drawbridge, and +guarded day and night, from castle moat to castle crest, by armed +vassals. Hundreds ate daily at his board, which was heaped with a rude +and rich profusion, and furnished with carven goblets and plate of +gold and silver. In fair weather the banquet-hall stood open to all +the winds that blew; in foul, the guests were sheltered from the storm +by curtains of oiled linen, and the place was lighted with torches +borne by splendidly attired pages. The great saloons of the castle +were decked with tapestries of Flanders and Damascus, and the floor +was strewn with straw or rushes. The bed in which the lord and lady +slept was the couch of a monarch; the household herded together in the +empty chambers, and lay upon the floor like swine. The garden-fields +about the castle smiled with generous harvests; the peasant lay +down after his toil, at night, in deadly fear of invasion from some +neighboring state, which should rob him of everything, dishonor his +wife and daughters, and slay him upon the smoking ruins of his home. + +In the city to which this lord repaired, the houses were built +here and there at caprice, without numbers or regularity, and only +distinguished by the figure of a saint, or some pious motto painted +above the door. Cattle wandered at will through the crooked, narrow, +and filthy streets, which rang with the clamor of frequent feud, and +reeked with the blood of the embattled citizens; over all the squalor +and wickedness rose the loveliest temples that ever blossomed from +man's love of the beautiful, to the honor and glory of God. + +In this time Crusaders went to take the Lord's sepulchre from the +infidel, while their brothers left at home rose against one another, +each petty state against its neighbor, in unsparing wars of rapine +and devastation,--wars that slew, or, less mercifully, mutilated +prisoners,--that snatched the babe from the embrace of its violated +mother, and dashed out its brains upon the desolated hearth. A +hopeless, hellish time of sack, plunder, murder, famine, plague, and +unnatural crime; a glorious age, in which flourished the gentlest and +sweetest poet that ever sang, and the grimmest and grandest that ever +upbraided a godless generation for its sins,--in which Petrarch was +crowned with laurel at Rome, and Dante wandered in despair from court +to court, learning in the bitterness of his exile's heart, + + "come sa di sale + Lo pane altrui, e come è duro calle + Lo scendere e il salir per l'altrui scale." + +It was a time ignorant of the simplest comfort, but debauched with the +vices of luxury; in which cities repressed the license of their people +by laws regulating the length of women's gowns and the outlays +at weddings and funerals. Every wild misdeed and filthy crime was +committed, and punished by terrible penalties, or atoned for by fines. +A fierce democracy reigned, banishing nobles, razing their palaces, +and ploughing up the salt-sown sites; till at last, in the uttermost +paroxysm of madness, it delivered itself up to lords to be defended +from itself, and was crushed into the abjectest depths of slavery. +Literature and architecture flourished, and the sister arts were born +amid the struggles of human nature convulsed with every abominable +passion. + +For nearly four hundred years the Gonzagas continued to rule the city, +which the first prince of their line, having well-nigh destroyed, +now rebuilt and restored to greater splendor than ever; and it is the +Mantua of the Gonzagas which travellers of this day look upon when +they visit the famous old city. Their pride and their wealth adorned +it; their wisdom and prudence made it rich and prosperous; their +valor glorified it; their crimes stain its annals with infamy; their +wickedness and weakness ruined it and brought it low. They were a +race full of hereditary traits of magnificence, but one reads their +history, and learns to love, of all their long succession, only one or +two in their pride, learns to pity only one or two in their fall. They +were patriotic, but the patriotism of despotic princes is self-love. +They were liberal--in spending the revenues of the state for the glory +of their family. They were brave, and led many nameless Mantuans +to die in forgotten battles for alien quarrels which they never +understood. + +The succession of the Gonzagas was of four captains, ending in 1407; +four marquises, ending in 1484; and ten dukes, ending in 1708. + +The first of the captains was Luigi, as we know. In his time the great +Gothic fabric of the Castello di Corte was built; and having rebuilt +the portions of the city wasted by the sack, he devoted himself, +as far as might be in that age, to the arts of peace; and it is +remembered of him that he tried to cure the Mantuan air of its +feverish unwholesomeness by draining the swampy environs. During his +time, Petrarch, making a sentimental journey to the birthplace of +Virgil, was splendidly entertained and greatly honored by him. For the +rest, Can Grande of Verona was by no means content with his hundred +thousand golden florins of spoil from the sack of the city, but +aspired to its seigniory, declaring that he had understood Gonzaga +to have promised him it as the condition of alliance against the +Bonacolsi. Gonzaga construed the contract differently, and had so +little idea of parting with his opinion, that he fought the Scaligero +on this point of difference till he died, which befell thirty years +after his election to the captaincy. + +Him his son Guido succeeded,--a prince already old at the time of his +father's death, and of feeble spirit. He shared his dominion with his +son Ugolino, excluding the younger brothers from the dominion. These, +indignant at the partiality, one night slew their brother Ugolino at a +supper he was giving; and being thereupon admitted to a share in their +father's government, had no trouble in obtaining the pardon of the +Pope and Emperor. One of the murderers died before the father; the +other, named Ludovico, was, on the death of Guido, in 1370, elected to +the captaincy, and ruled long, wisely, and well. He loved a peaceful +life; and though the Emperor confirmed him in the honors conferred on +him by the Mantuans, and made him Vicar imperial, Ludovico declined to +take part with Ghibellines against Guelphs, remained quietly at home, +and spent himself much in good works, as if he would thus expiate his +bloody crime. He gathered artists, poets, and learned men about him, +and did much to foster all arts. In his time, Mantua had rest from +war, and grew to have twenty-eight thousand inhabitants; but it was +not in the nature of a city of the Middle Ages to be long without a +calamity of some sort, and it is a kind of relief to know that Mantua, +under this peaceful prince, was well-nigh depopulated by a pestilence. + +In 1381 he died, and with his son Francesco the blood-letting began +again. Indeed, this captain spent nearly his whole life in war with +those pleasant people, the Visconti of Milan. He had married the +daughter of Barnabo Visconti, but discovering her to be unfaithful to +him, or believing her so, he caused her to be put to death, refusing +all her family's intercessions for mercy. After that, a heavy sadness +fell upon him, and he wandered aimlessly about in many Italian +cities, and at last married a second time, taking to wife Margherita +Malatesta. He was a prince of high and generous soul and of manly +greatness rare in his time. There came once a creature of the Visconti +to him, with a plot for secretly taking off his masters; but the +Gonzaga (he must have been thought an eccentric man by his neighbors) +dismissed the wretch with scornful horror. I am sure the reader will +be glad to know that he finally beat the Visconti in fair fight, and +(the pest still raging in Mantua) lived to make a pilgrimage to the +Holy Land. When he returned, he compiled the city's statutes, divided +the town into four districts, and named its streets. So he died. + +And after this prince had made his end, there came another Francesco, +or Gianfrancesco, who was created Marquis of Mantua by the Emperor +Sigismund. He was a friend of war, and having been the ward of +the Venetian Republic (Venice was fond of this kind of trust, and +sometimes adopted princely persons as her children, among whom the +reader will of course remember the Queen of Cyprus, and the charming +Bianca Capello, whose personal attractions and singularly skillful +knowledge of the use of poisons made her Grand Duchess of Tuscany +some years after she eloped from Venice), he became the leader of +her armies on the death of Carmagnola, who survived the triumphal +reception given him by the Serenest Senate only a very short time. [It +seems scarcely worth while to state the fact that Carmagnola, +suspected of treasonable correspondence with the Visconti, was +recalled to Venice to receive distinguished honors from the republic. +The Senate was sitting in the hall of the Grand Council when he +appeared, and they detained him there with various compliments till +night fell. Then instead of lights, the Sbirri appeared, and seized +Carmagnola. "I am a dead man," he exclaimed, on beholding them. And +so indeed he was; for, three days after, he was led out of prison, +and beheaded between the pillars of the Piazzetta.] The Gonzaga +took Verona and Padua for the republic, and met the Milanese in many +battles. Venice was then fat and insolently profuse with the spoils +of the Orient, and it is probable that the Marquis of Mantua acquired +there that taste for splendor which he introduced into his hitherto +frugal little state. We read of his being in Venice in 1414, when the +Jewelers and Goldsmiths' Guild gave a tournament in the Piazza San +Marco, offering as prizes to the victorious lances a collar enriched +with pearls and diamonds, the work of the jewelers, and two helmets +excellently wrought by the goldsmiths. On this occasion the Gonzaga, +with two hundred and sixty Mantuan gentlemen, mounted on superb +horses, contested the prizes with the Marquis of Ferrara, at the +head of two hundred Ferrarese, equally mounted, and attended by their +squires and pages, magnificently dressed. There were sixty thousand +spectators of the encounter. "Both the Marquises," says Mutinelli +in his "Annali Urbani," "being each assisted by fourteen well-armed +cavaliers, combated valorously at the barrier, and were both judged +worthy of the first prize: a Mantuan cavalier took the second." + +The Marquis Gonzaga was the first of his line who began that royal +luxury of palaces with which Mantua was adorned. He commenced the +Ducal Palace; but before he went far with the work, he fell a prey to +the science then much affected by Italian princes, but still awaiting +its last refinement from the gifted Lucrezia Borgia. The poor Marquis +was poisoned by his wife's paramour, and died in the year 1444. +Against this prince, our advocate Arrighi records the vandalism of +causing to be thrown down and broken in pieces the antique statue +of Virgil, which stood in one of the public places of Mantua, and of +which the head is still shown in the Museum of the city. In all times, +the Mantuans had honored, in diverse ways, their great poet, and at +certain epochs had coined money bearing his face. With the common +people he had a kind of worship (more likely as wizard than as poet), +and they celebrated annually some now-forgotten event by assembling +with songs and dances about the statue of Virgil, which was destroyed +by the uncle of the Marquis, Malatesta, rather than by the Marquis's +own order. This ill-conditioned person is supposed to have been +"vexed because our Mantuan people thought it their highest glory to be +fellow-citizens of the prince of poets." We can better sympathize with +the advocate's indignation at this barbarity, than with his blame of +Francesco for having consented, by his acceptance of the marquisate, +to become a prince of the Roman Empire. Mantua was thus subjected +to the Emperors, but liberty had long been extinguished; and the +voluntary election of the Council, which bestowed the captaincy on +each succeeding generation of the Gonzagas, was a mere matter of form, +and of course. + +The next prince, Lodovico Gonzaga, was an austere man, and had been +bred in a hard school, if I may believe some of our old chroniclers, +whom, indeed, I sometimes suspect of being not altogether faithful. It +is said that his father loved his younger brother better than him, +and that Lodovico ran away in his boyhood, and took refuge with his +father's hereditary enemies, the Visconti. To make dates agree, +it must have been the last of these, for the line failed during +Lodovico's time, and he had wars with the succeeding Sforza. In the +day of his escapade, Milan was at war with Mantua and with Venice, and +the Marquis Gonzaga was at the head of the united armies, as we have +already seen. So the father and son met in several battles; though +the Visconti, out of love for the boy, and from a sentiment of piety +somewhat amazing in them, contrived that he should never actually +encounter his parent face to face. Lodovico came home after the wars, +wearing a long beard; and his mother called her son "the Turk," a +nickname that he never lost. + +Il Turco was a lover of the arts and of letters, and he did many +works to enrich and beautify the city. He established the first +printing-office in Mantua, where the first book printed was the +"Decamerone" of Boccaccio. He founded a college of advocates, and he +dug canals for irrigation; and the prosperity of Mantuan manufacturers +in his time may be inferred from the fact that, when the King of +Denmark paid him a visit, in 1474, the merchants decked their shops +with five thousand pieces of fine Mantuan cloth. + +The Marquis made his brilliant little court the resort of the arts and +letters; and hither from Florence came once the elegant Politian, who +composed his tragedy of "Orfeo" in Mantua, and caused it to be first +represented before Lodovico. But it must be confessed that this was +a soil in which art flourished better than literature, and that even +born Mantuan poets went off, after a while, and blossomed in other +air. The painter Mantegna, whom the Marquis invited from Padua, passed +his whole life here, painting for the Marquis in the palaces and +churches. The prince loved him, and gave him a house, and bestowed +other honors upon him; and Mantegna executed for Lodovico his famous +pictures representing the Triumph of Julius Cæsar. [Now at Hamilton +Court, in England.] It was divided into nine compartments, and, as a +frieze, went round the upper part of Lodovico's newly erected palace +of San Sebastian. Mantegna also painted a hall in the Castello di +Corte, called the Stanza di Mantegna, and there, among other subjects +of fable and of war, made the portraits of Lodovico and his wife. It +was partly the wish to see such works of Mantegna as still remained in +Mantua that took us thither; and it was chiefly this wish that carried +us, the morning after our arrival, to the Castello di Corte, or the +Ducal Palace. Our thirst for Mantegnas was destined to be in no degree +satisfied in this pile, but it was full of things to tempt us to +forget Mantegna, and to make us more and more interested in the +Gonzagas and their Mantua. + +It is taken for granted that no human being ever yet gained an idea of +any building from the most artful description of it; but if the reader +cares to fancy a wide piazza, or open square, with a church upon the +left hand, immense, uninteresting edifices on the right, and an ugly +bishop's palace of Renaissance taste behind him, he may figure before +him as vastly and magnificently as he pleases the superb Gothic front +of the Castello di Corte. This façade is the only one in Italy that +reminds you of the most beautiful building in the world, the Ducal +Palace at Venice; and it does this merely by right of its short +pillars and deep Gothic arches in the ground story, and the great +breadth of wall that rises above them, unbroken by the second line of +columns which relieves and lightens this wall in the Venetian palace. +It stands at an extremity of the city, upon the edge of the broad +fresh-water lagoon, and is of such extent as to include within its +walls a whole court-city of theatre, church, stables, playground, +course for riding, and several streets. There is a far older edifice +adjoining the Castello di Corte, which Guido Bonacolsi began, and +which witnessed the bloody end of his line, when Louis Gonzaga +surprised and slew his last successor. But the palace itself is all +the work of the Gonzagas, and it remains the monument of their kingly +state and splendid pride. + +It was the misfortune of the present writer to be recognized by the +_employé_ (formerly of Venice) who gives the permissions to travellers +to visit the palace, and to be addressed in the presence of the +_Custode_ by the dignified title to which his presence did so little +honor. This circumstance threw upon the Custode, a naturally tedious +and oppressive old man, the responsibility of being doubly prolix and +garrulous. He reveled in his office of showing the palace, and did +homage to the visitor's charge and nation by an infinite expansion +upon all possible points of interest, lest he should go away +imperfectly informed of anything. By dint of frequent encounter with +strangers, this Custode had picked up many shreds and fragments +of many languages, and did not permit the travellers to consider +themselves as having at all understood him until he had repeated +everything in Italian, English, French, and German. He led the +way with his polyglot babble through an endless number of those +magnificent and uninteresting chambers which palaces seem specially +built to contain, that men may be content to dwell in the humbler +dullness of their own houses; and though the travellers often prayed +him to show them the apartments containing the works of Mantegna, +they really got to see nothing of this painter's in the Ducal Palace, +except, here and there, some evanescent frescoes, which the Custode +would not go beyond a _si crede_ in attributing to him. Indeed, it is +known that the works of Mantegna suffered grievously in the wars of +the last century, and his memory has faded so dim in this palace where +he wrought, that the guide could not understand the curiosity of the +foreigners concerning the old painter; and certainly Giulio Romano has +stamped himself more ineffaceably than Mantegna upon Mantua. + +In the Ducal Palace are seen vividly contrasted the fineness and +strength, the delicacy and courage of the fancy, which, rather than +the higher gift of imagination, characterize Giulio's work. There is +such an airy refinement and subtile grace in the pretty grotesques +with which he decorates a chamber; there is such daring luxury of +color and design in the pictures for which his grand halls are merely +the frames. No doubt I could make fine speeches about these paintings; +but who, not seeing them, would be the wiser, after the best +description and the choicest critical disquisition? In fact, our +travellers themselves found it pleasanter, after a while, to yield to +the guidance of the Custode, and to enjoy the stupider marvels of the +place, than to do the set and difficult admiration of the works of +art. So, passing the apartments in good preservation (the Austrian +Emperors had taken good care of some parts of the palace of one of +their first Italian possessions), they did justice to the splendor +of the satin beds and the other upholstery work; they admired rich +carpentering and costly toys; they dwelt on marvelous tapestries +(among which the tapestry copies of Raphael's cartoons, woven at +Mantua in the fifteenth century, are certainly worthy of wonder); +and they expressed the proper amazement at the miracles of art which +caused figures frescoed in the ceilings to turn with them, and follow +and face them from whatever part of the room they chose to look. Nay, +they even enjoyed the Hall of the Rivers, on the sides of which the +usual river-gods were painted, in the company of the usual pottery, +from which they pour their founts, and at the end of which there +was an abominable little grotto of what people call, in modern +landscape-gardening, rock-work, out of the despair with which its +unmeaning ugliness fills them. There were busts of several Mantuan +duchesses in the gallery, which were interesting, and the pictures +were so bad as to molest no one. There was, besides all this, a +hanging garden in this small Babylon, on which the travellers looked +with a doleful regret that they were no longer of the age when a +hanging garden would have brought supreme comfort to the soul. It +occupied a spacious oblong, had a fountain and statues, trees and +flowers, and would certainly have been taken for the surface of the +earth, had not the Custode proudly pointed out that it was on a level +with the second floor, on which they stood. + +After that they wandered through a series of unused, dismantled +apartments and halls, melancholy with faded fresco, dropping stucco, +and mutilated statues of plaster, and came at last upon a balcony +overlooking the Cavallerizza, which one of the early dukes built after +a design by the inevitable Giulio Romano. It is a large square, and +was meant for the diversion of riding on horseback. Balconies go all +found it between those thick columns, finely twisted, as we see +them in that cartoon of Raphael, "The Healing of the Lame Man at the +Beautiful Gate of the Temple"; and here once stood the jolly dukes and +the jolly ladies of their light-hearted court, and there below rode +the gay, insolent, intriguing courtiers, and outside groaned the +city under the heavy extortions of the tax-gatherers. It is all in +weather-worn stucco, and the handsome square is planted with trees. +The turf was now cut and carved by the heavy wheels of the Austrian +baggage-wagons constantly passing through the court to carry munitions +to the fortress outside, whose black guns grimly overlook the dead +lagoon. A sense of desolation had crept over the sight-seers, with +that strange sickness of heart which one feels in the presence of ruin +not to be lamented, and which deepened into actual pain as the Custode +clapped his hands and the echo buffeted itself against the forlorn +stucco, and up from the trees rose a score of sullen, slumberous owls, +and flapped heavily across the lonesome air with melancholy cries. It +only needed, to crush these poor strangers, that final touch which the +Custode gave, as they passed from the palace through the hall in which +are painted the Gonzagas, and in which he pointed out the last Duke of +Mantua, saying he was deposed by the Emperor for felony, and somehow +conveying the idea of horse-stealing and counterfeiting on the part of +his Grace. + +A very different man from this rogue was our old friend Lodovico, who +also, however, had his troubles. He was an enemy of the Ghibellines, +and fought them a great deal. Of course he had the habitual wars with +Milan, and he was obliged to do battle with his own brother Carlo +to some extent. This Gonzaga had been taken prisoner by Sforza; and +Lodovico, having paid for him a ransom of sixty thousand florins of +gold (which Carlo was scarcely worth), seized the fraternal lands, and +held them in pledge of repayment. Carlo could not pay, and tried +to get back his possessions by war. Vexed with these and other +contentions, Lodovico was also unhappy in his son, whose romance I +may best tell in the words of the history [Volta: _Storia di Mantova_.], +from which I take it: + + "Lodovico Gonzaga, having agreed with the Duke of Bavaria to + take his daughter Margherita as wife for his (Lodovico's) + first-born, Federico, and the young man having refused her, + Lodovico was so much enraged that he sought to imprison him; + but the Marchioness Barbara, mother of Federico, caused him to + fly from the city till his father's anger should be abated. + Federico departed with six attendants [The _Fioretto delle + Cronache_ says "persons of gentle condition."]; but this flight + caused still greater displeasure to his father, who now + declared him banished, and threatened with heavy penalties any + one who should give him help or favor. Federico, therefore, + wandered about with these six attendants in diverse places, and + finally arrived in Naples; but having already spent all his + substance, and not daring to make himself known for fear of his + father, he fell into great want, and so into severe sickness. + His companions having nothing wherewith to live, and not + knowing any trade by which to gain their bread, did menial + services fit for day-laborers, and sustained their lord with + their earnings, he remaining hidden in a poor woman's house + where they all dwelt. + + "The Marchioness had sent many messengers in divers provinces + with money to find her son, but they never heard any news of + him; so that they thought him dead, not hearing anything, + either, of his attendants. Now it happened that one of those + who sought Federico came to Naples, and presented himself to + the king with a letter from the said lady, praying that he + should make search in his territory for a company of seven men, + giving the name and description of each. The king caused this + search to be made by the heads of the district; and one of + these heads told how in his district there were six Lombard men + (not knowing of Federico, who lay ill), but that they were + laborers and of base condition. The king determined to see + them; and they being come before him, he demanded who they + were, and how many; as they were not willing to discover their + lord, on being asked their names they gave others, so that the + king, not being able to learn anything, would have dismissed + them. But the messenger sent by the Marchioness knew them, and + said to the king, 'Sire, these are the attendants of him whom I + seek; but they have changed their names.' The king caused them + to be separated one from another, and then asked them of their + Lord; and they, finding themselves separated, minutely narrated + everything; and the king immediately sent for Federico, whom + his officers found miserably ill on a heap of straw. He was + brought to the palace, where the king ordered him to be cared + for, sending the messenger back to his mother to advise her how + the men had been found and in what great misery. The + Marchioness went to her husband, and, having cast herself at + his feet, besought him of a grace. The Marquis answered that he + would grant everything, so it did not treat of Federico. Then + the lady opened him the letter of the king of Naples, which had + such effect that it softened the soul of the Marquis, showing + him in how great misery his son had been; and so, giving the + letter to the Marchioness, he said, 'Do that which pleases + you.' The Marchioness straightway sent the prince money, and + clothes to clothe him, in order that he should return to + Mantua; and having come, the son cast himself at his father's + feet, imploring pardon for himself and for his attendants; and + he pardoned them, and gave those attendants enough to live + honorably and like noblemen, and they were called The Faithful + of the House of Gonzaga, and from them come the _Fedeli_ of + Mantua. + + "The Marquis then, not to break faith, caused Federico to take + Margherita, daughter of the Duke of Bavaria, for his wife, and + celebrated the nuptials splendidly; so that there remained the + greatest love between father and son." + +The son succeeded to the father's dominion in 1478; and it is recorded +of him in the "Flower of the Chronicles," that he was a hater of +idleness, and a just man, greatly beloved by his people. They chiefly +objected to him that he placed a Jew, Eusebio Malatesta, at the head +of civil affairs; and this Jew was indeed the cause of great mischief: +for Ridolfo Gonzaga coming to reside with his wife for a time at the +court of his brother, the Marquis, Malatesta fell in love with +her. She repelled him, and the bitter Jew thereupon so poisoned her +husband's mind with accusations against her chastity, that he took her +home to his town of Lazzaro, and there put the unhappy and innocent +lady to death by the headsman's hand in the great square of the city. + +Federico was Marquis only six years, and died in 1484, leaving +his marquisate to his son Francesco, the most ambitious, warlike, +restless, splendid prince of his magnificent race. This Gonzaga wore a +beard, and brought the custom into fashion in Italy again. He founded +the famous breed of Mantuan horses, and gave them about free-handedly +to other sovereigns of his acquaintance. To the English king he +presented a steed which, if we may trust history, could have been sold +for almost its weight in gold. He was so fond of hunting that he kept +two hundred dogs of the chase, and one hundred and fifty birds of +prey. + +Of course this Gonzaga was a soldier, and indeed he loved war better +even than hunting, and delighted so much in personal feats of arms +that, concealing his name and quality, in order that the combat should +be in all things equal, he was wont to challenge renowned champions +wherever he heard of them, and to meet them in the lists. Great part +of his life was spent in the field; and he fought in turn on nearly +all sides of the political questions then agitating Italy. In 1495 +he was at the head of the Venetian and other Italian troops when they +beat the French under Charles VIII. at Taro, and made so little use +of their victory as to let their vanquished invaders escape from them +after all. Nevertheless, if the Gonzaga did not here show himself a +great general, he did great feats of personal valor, penetrating to +the midst of the French forces, wounding the king, and with his own +hand taking prisoner the great Bastard of Bourbon. Venice paid him +ten thousand ducats for gaining the victory, such as it was, and when +peace was made he went to visit the French king at Vercelli; and there +Charles gave his guest a present of two magnificent horses, which the +Gonzaga returned yet more splendidly in kind. About five years later +he was again at war with the French, and helped the Aragonese drive +them out of Naples. In 1506, Pope Julius II. made him leader of the +armies of the Church (for he had now quitted the Venetian service), +and he reduced the city of Bologna to obedience to the Holy See. In +1509 he joined the League of Cambray against Venice, and, being made +Imperial Captain-General, was taken prisoner by the Venetians. They +liberated him, however, the following year; and in 1513 we find him at +the head of the league against the French. + +A curious anecdote of this Gonzaga's hospitality is also illustrative +of the anomalous life of those times, when good faith had as little +to do with the intercourse of nations as at present; but good fortune, +when she appeared in the world, liked to put on a romantic and +melodramatic guise. An ambassador from the Grand Turk on his way to +Rome was taken by an enemy of the Pope, despoiled of all his money, +and left planted, as the Italians expressively say, at Ancona. +This ambassador was come to concert with Alexander VI. the death of +Bajazet's brother, prisoner in the Pope's hands, and he bore the Pope +a present of 50,000 gold ducats. It was Gian Della Rovere who seized +and spoiled him, and sent the papers (letters of the Pope and Sultan) +to Charles VIII. of France, to whom Alexander had been obliged to give +the Grand Turk's brother. The magnificent Gonzaga hears of the Turk's +embarrassing mischance, sends and fetches him to Mantua, clothes him, +puts abundant money in his purse, and dispatches him on his way. The +Sultan, in reward of this courtesy to his servant, gave a number of +fine horses to the Marquis, who, possibly being tired of presenting +his own horses, returned the Porte a ship-load of excellent Mantuan +cheeses. This interchange of compliments seems to have led to a kind +of romantic friendship between the Gonzaga and the Grand Turk, who did +occasionally interest himself in the affairs of the Christian dogs; +and who, when Francesco lay prisoner at Venice, actually wrote to the +Serenest Senate, and asked his release as a personal grace to him, the +Grand Turk. And Francesco was, thereupon, let go; the canny republic +being willing to do the Sultan any sort of cheap favor. + +This Gonzaga, being so much engaged in war, seems to have had little +time for the adornment of his capital. The Church of Our Lady of +Victory is the only edifice which he added to it; and this was merely +in glorification of his own triumph over the French at Taro. Mantegna +painted an altar-piece for it, representing the Marquis and his wife +on their knees before the Virgin, in act of rendering her thanks for +the victory. The French nation avenged itself for whatever wrong was +done its pride in this picture by stealing it away from Mantua in +Napoleon's time; and it now hangs in the gallery of the Louvre. + +Francesco died in 1519; and after him his son, Federico II., the first +Duke of Mantua, reigned some twenty-one years, and died in 1540. The +marquisate in his time was made a duchy by the Emperor Charles V., +to whom the Gonzaga had given efficient aid in his wars against the +French. This was in the year 1530; and three years later, when the +Duke of Monferrato died, and the inheritance of his opulent little +state was disputed by the Duke of Savoy, by the Marquis of Saluzzo, +and by the Gonzaga, who had married the late Duke's daughter, +Charles's influence secured it to the Mantuan. The dominions of the +Gonzagas had now reached their utmost extent, and these dominions +were not curtailed till the deposition of Fernando Carlo in 1708, when +Monferrato was adjudged to the Duke of Savoy, and afterwards confirmed +to him by treaty. It was separated from the capital of the Gonzagas by +a wide extent of alien territory, but they held it with a strong +hand, embellished the city, and founded there the strongest citadel in +Italy. + +Federico, after his wars for the Emperor, appears to have reposed in +peace for the rest of his days, and to have devoted himself to the +adornment of Mantua and the aggrandizing of his family. His court +was the home of many artists; and Titian painted for him the Twelve +Cæsars, which the Germans stole when they sacked the city in 1630. +But his great agent and best beloved genius was Giulio Pippi, called +Romano, who was conducted to Mantua by pleasant Count Baldassare +Castiglione. + +Pleasant Count Baldassare Castiglione! whose incomparable book of the +"Cortigiano" succeeded in teaching his countrymen every gentlemanly +grace but virtue. He was born at Casatico in the Mantovano, in the +year 1476, and went in his boyhood to be schooled at Milan, where he +learnt the profession of arms. From Milan he went to Rome, where +he exercised his profession of arms till the year 1504, when he was +called to gentler uses at the court of the elegant Dukes of Urbino. He +lived there as courtier and court-poet, and he returned to Rome as the +ambassador from Urbino. Meantime his liege, Francesco Gonzaga, was but +poorly pleased that so brilliant a Mantuan should spend his life in +the service and ornament of other princes, and Castiglione came back +to his native country about the year 1516. He married in Mantua, and +there finished his famous book of "The Courtier," and succeeded in +winning back the favor of his prince. Federico, the Duke, made him +ambassador to Rome in 1528; and Baldassare did his master two signal +services there,--he procured him to be named head of all the Papal +forces, and he found him Giulio Romano. So the Duke suffered him to +go as the Pope's Nuncio to Spain, and Baldassare finished his courtly +days at Toledo in 1529. + +The poet made a detour to Mantua on his way to Spain, taking with +him the painter, whom the Duke received with many caresses, as Vasari +says, presented him a house honorably furnished, ordered provision for +him and his pupils, gave them certain brave suits of velvet and satin, +and, seeing that Giulio had no horse, called for his own favorite +Luggieri, and bestowed it on him. Ah! they knew how to receive +painters, those fine princes, who had merely to put their hands into +their people's pocket, and take out what florins they liked. So the +Duke presently set the artist to work, riding out with him through the +gate of San Bastiano to some stables about a bow-shot from the walls, +in the midst of a flat meadow, where he told Giulio that he would be +glad (if it could be done without destroying the old walls) to have +such buildings added to the stables as would serve him for a kind of +lodge, to come out and merrily sup in when he liked. Whereupon Giulio +began to think out the famous Palazzo del T. + +This painter is an unlucky kind of man, to whom all criticism seems +to have agreed to attribute great power and deny great praise. +Castiglione had found him at Rome, after the death of his master +Raphael, when his genius, for good or for ill, began for the first +time to find original expression. At Mantua, where he spent all the +rest of his busy life, it is impossible not to feel in some degree +the force of this genius. As in Venice all the Madonnas in the +street-corner shrines have some touch of color to confess the +painter's subjection to Titian or Tintoretto; as in Vicenza the +edifices are all in Greekish taste, and stilted upon pedestals in +honor and homage to Palladio; as in Parma Correggio has never died, +but lives to this day in the mouths and chiaroscuro effects of all the +figures in all the pictures painted there;--so in Mantua Giulio Romano +is to be found in the lines of every painting and every palace. It is +wonderful to see, in these little Italian cities which have been the +homes of great men, how no succeeding generation has dared to wrong +the memory of them by departing in the least from their precepts +upon art. One fancies, for instance, the immense scorn with which the +Vicentines would greet the audacity of any young architect who dared +to think Gothic instead of Palladian Greek, and how they would put +him to shame by asking him if he knew more than Palladio about +architecture! It seems that original art cannot arise in the presence +of the great virtues and the great errors of the past; and Italian art +of this day seems incapable of even the feeble, mortal life of other +modern art, in the midst of so much immortality. + +Giulio Romano did a little of everything for the Dukes of +Mantua,--from painting the most delicate and improper little fresco +for a bed-chamber to restraining the Po and the Mincio with immense +dikes, restoring ancient edifices and building new ones, draining +swamps and demolishing and reconstructing whole streets, painting +palaces and churches, and designing the city slaughter-house. He grew +old and very rich in the service of the Gonzagas; but though Mrs. +Jameson says he commanded respect by a sense of his own dignity as an +artist, the Bishop of Casale, who wrote the "Annali di Mantova," says +that the want of nobility and purity in his style, and his "gallant +inventions, were conformable to his own sensual life, and that he did +not disdain to prostitute himself to the infamies of Aretino." + +His great architectural work in Mantua is the Palazzo del T, or Tè, +as it is now written. It was first called Palazzo del T, from the +convergence of roads there in the form of that letter; and the modern +Mantuans call it Del Tè, from the superstition, transmitted to us by +the Custode of the Ducal Palace, that the Gonzagas merely used it +on pleasant afternoons to take tea in! so curiously has latter-day +guidemanship interpreted the jolly purpose expressed by the Duke to +Giulio. I say nothing to control the reader's choice between T and Tè, +and merely adhere to the elder style out of reverence for the past. +It is certain that the air of the plain on which the palace stands +is most unwholesome; and it may have been true that the dukes never +passed the night there. Federico did not intend to build more than +a lodge in this place; but fascinated with the design offered him +by Giulio, he caused the artist to go on, and contrive him a palace +instead. It stands, as Vasari says, about a good bow-shot from one of +the city's gates; and going out to see the palace on our second day +in Mantua, we crossed a drawbridge guarded by Austrian soldiers. Below +languished a bed of sullen ooze, tangled and thickly grown with long, +villainous grasses, and sending up a damp and deathly stench, which +made all the faces we saw look feverish and sallow. Already at that +early season the air was foul and heavy, and the sun, faintly making +himself seen through the dun sky of the dull spring day, seemed sick +to look upon the place, where indeed the only happy and lively things +were the clouds of gnats that danced before us, and welcomed us to the +Palazzo del T. Damp ditches surround the palace, in which these gnats +seemed to have peculiar pleasure; and they took possession of the +portico of the stately entrance of the edifice as we went in, and held +it faithfully till we returned. + +In one of the first large rooms are the life-size portraits of the +six finest horses of the Gonzaga stud, painted by the pupils of Giulio +Romano, after the master's designs. The paintings attest the beauty of +the Mantuan horses, and the pride and fondness of their ducal owners; +and trustworthy critics have praised their eminent truth. But it is +only the artist or the hippanthrop who can delight in them long; and +we presently left them for the other chambers, in which the invention +of Giulio had been used to please himself rather than his master. +I scarcely mean to name the wonders of the palace, having, indeed, +general associations with them, rather than particular recollections +of them. + +One of the most famous rooms is the Chamber of Psyche (the apartments +are not of great size), of which the ceiling is by Giulio and the +walls are by his pupils. The whole illustrates, with every variety +of fantastic invention, the story of Psyche, as told by Apuleius, and +deserves to be curiously studied as a part of the fair outside of a +superb and corrupt age, the inside of which was full of rottenness. +The civilization of Italy, as a growth from the earliest Pagan times, +and only modified by Christianity and the admixture of Northern blood +and thought, is yet to be carefully analyzed; and until this analysis +is made, discussion of certain features must necessarily be incomplete +and unsatisfactory. No one, however, can stand in this Chamber of +Psyche, and not feel how great reality the old mythology must still +have had, not only for the artists who painted the room, but for +the people who inhabited it and enjoyed it. I do not say that they +believed it as they believed in the vital articles of Christian faith, +but that they accepted it with the same spirit as they accepted the +martyrology of the Church; and that to the fine gentlemen and ladies +of the court, those jolly satyrs and careless nymphs, those Cupids +and Psyches, and Dianas and Venuses, were of the same verity as the +Fathers of the Desert, the Devil, and the great body of the saints. +If they did not pray to them, they swore by them, and their names were +much oftener on their lips; and the art of the time was so thoroughly +Pagan, that it forgot all Christian holiness, and clung only to +heathen beauty. When it had not actually a mythologic subject to deal +with, it paganized Christian themes. St. Sebastian was made to look +like Apollo, and Mary Magdalene was merely a tearful, triste Venus. +There is scarcely a ray of feeling in Italian art since Raphael's +time which suggests Christianity in the artist, or teaches it to the +beholder. In confessedly Pagan subjects it was happiest, as in +the life of Psyche, in this room; and here it inculcated a gay and +spirited license, and an elegant absence of delicacy, which is still +observable in Italian life. It would be instructive to know in what +spirit the common Mantuans of his day looked upon the inventions of +the painter, and how far the courtly circle which frequented this room +went in discussion and comment on its subjects; they were not +nice people, and probably had no nasty ideas about the unspeakable +indecency of some of the scenes. [The ruin in the famous room frescoed +with the Fall of the Giants commences on the very door-jambs, which +are painted in broken and tumbling brick-work; and throughout there is +a prodigiousness which does not surprise, and a bigness which does not +impress; and the treatment of the subject can only be expressed by +the Westernism _powerfully weak_. In Kugler's _Hand-book of Italian +Painting_ are two illustrations, representing parts of the fresco, +which give a fair idea of the whole.] + +Returning to the city we visited the house of Giulio Romano, which +stands in one of the fine, lonesome streets, and at the outside +of which we looked. The artist designed it himself; and it is very +pretty, with delicacy of feeling in the fine stucco ornamentation, but +is not otherwise interesting. + +We passed it, continuing our way toward the Arsenal, near which we had +seen the women at work washing the linen coats of the garrison in the +twilight of the evening before; and we now saw them again from the +bridge, on which we paused to look at a picturesque bit of modern +life in Mantua. The washing-machine (when the successful instrument +is invented) may do its work as well, but not so charmingly, as these +Mantuan girls did. They washed the linen in a clear, swift-running +stream, diverted from the dam of the Mincio to furnish mill-power +within the city wall; and we could look down the watercourse past +old arcades of masonry half submerged in it, past pleasant angles of +houses and a lazy mill-wheel turning slowly, slowly, till our view +ended in the gallery of a time-worn palace, through the columns of +which was seen the blue sky. Under the bridge the stream ran very +strong and lucid, over long, green, undulating water-grasses, which it +loved to dimple over and play with. On the right were the laundresses +under the eaves of a wooden shed, each kneeling, as their custom is, +in a three-sided box, and leaning forward over the washboard that +sloped down into the water. As they washed they held the linen in one +hand, and rubbed it with the other; then heaped it into a mass upon +the board and beat it with great two-handed blows of a stick. They +sang, meanwhile, one of those plaintive airs of which the Italian +peasants are fond, and which rose in indescribable pathos, pulsing +with their blows, and rhythmic with the graceful movement of their +forms. Many of the women were young,--though they were of all +ages,--and the prettiest among them was third from where we stood +upon the bridge. She caught sight of the sketch-book which one of the +travellers carried, and pointed it out to the rest, who could hardly +settle to their work to be sketched. Presently an idle baker, whose +shop adjoined the bridge, came out and leaned upon the parapet, and +bantered the girls. "They are drawing the prettiest," he said, at +which they all bridled a little; and she who knew herself to be +prettiest hung her head and rubbed furiously at the linen. Long before +the artist had finished the sketch, the lazy, good-humored crowd which +the public practice of the fine arts always attract in Italy, had +surrounded the strangers, and were applauding, commenting, comparing, +and absorbing every stroke as it was made. When the book was closed +and they walked away, a number of boys straggled after them some +spaces, inspired by a curious longing and regret, like that which +leads boys to the eager inspection of fireworks when they have gone +out. We lost them at the first turning of the street, whither the +melancholy chorus of the women's song had also followed us, and where +it died pathetically away. + +In the evening we walked to the Piazza Virgiliana, the beautiful space +laid out and planted with trees by the French, at the beginning of +this century in honor of the great Mantuan poet. One of its bounds is +the shore of the lake which surrounds the city, and from which now +rose ghostly vapors on the still twilight air. Down the slow, dull +current moved one of the picturesque black boats of the Po; and +beyond, the level landscape had a pleasant desolation that recalled +the scenery of the Middle Mississippi. It might have been here in this +very water that the first-born of our first Duke of Mantua fell from +his boat while hunting water-fowl in 1550, and took a fever of which +he died only a short time after his accession to the sovereignty of +the duchy. At any rate, the fact of the accident brings me back from +lounging up and down Mantua to my grave duty of chronicler. +Francesco's father had left him in childhood to the care of his uncle, +the Cardinal Hercules, who ruled Mantua with a firm and able hand, +increasing the income of the state, spending less upon the ducal stud, +and cutting down the number of mouths at the ducal table from eight +hundred to three hundred and fifty-one. His justice tended to severity +rather than mercy; but reformers of our own time will argue well of +his heart, that he founded in that time a place of refuge and +retirement for abandoned women. Good Catholics will also be pleased to +know that he was very efficient in suppressing the black heresy of +Calvin, which had crept into Mantua in his day,--probably from +Ferrara, where the black heretic himself was then, or about then, in +hiding under the protection of the ill-advised Marchioness Renée. The +good Cardinal received the Pope's applause for his energy in this +matter, and I doubt not his hand fell heavily on the Calvinists. Of +the Duke who died so young, the Venetian ambassador thought it worth +while to write what I think it worth while to quote, as illustrating +the desire of the Senate to have careful knowledge of its neighbors: +"He is a boy of melancholy complexion. His eyes are full of spirit, +but he does not delight in childish things, and seems secretly proud +of being lord. He has an excellent memory, and shows much inclination +for letters." + +His brother Guglielmo, who succeeded him in 1550, seems to have +had the same affection for learning; but he was willful, harsh, and +cruelly ambitious, and cared, an old writer says, for nothing so +much as perpetuating the race of the Gonzagas in Mantua. He was a +hunchback, and some of his family (who could not have understood his +character) tried to persuade him not to assume the ducal dignity; but +his haughty temper soon righted him in their esteem, and it is said +that all the courtiers put on humps in honor of the Duke. He was not +a great warrior, and there are few picturesque incidents in his reign. +Indeed, nearly the last of these in Mantuan history was the coronation +at Mantua of the excellent poet Lodovico Ariosto, by Charles V., in +1532, Federico II. reigning. But the Mantuans of Guglielmo's day were +not without their sensations, for three Japanese ambassadors passed +through their city on the way to Rome. They were also awakened to +religious zeal by the reappearance of Protestantism among them. The +heresy was happily suppressed by the Inquisition, acting under Pius +V., though with small thanks to Duke William, who seems to have taken +no fervent part in the persecutions. "The proceedings," says Cantù, +writing before slavery had been abolished, "were marked by those +punishments which free America inflicts upon the negroes to-day, +and which a high conception of the mission of the Church moves us +to deplore." The Duke must have made haste after this to reconcile +himself with the Church; for we read that two years later he was +permitted to take a particle of the blood of Christ from the church of +St. Andrea to that of Sta. Barbara, where he deposited it in a box of +crystal and gold, and caused his statue to be placed before the shrine +in the act of adoring the relic. + +Duke William managed his finances so well as to leave his spendthrift +son Vincenzo a large sum of money to make away with after his death. +Part of this, indeed, he had earned by obedience to his father's +wishes in the article of matrimony. The prince was in love with the +niece of the Duke of Bavaria, very lovely and certainly high-born +enough, but having unhappily only sixty thousand crowns to her +portion. So she was not to be thought of, and Vincenzo married the +sister of the Duke of Parma, of whom he grew so fond, that, though +two years of marriage brought them no children, he could scarce +be persuaded to suffer her divorce on account of sterility. This +happened, however, and the prince's affections were next engaged by +the daughter of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. The lady had a portion +of three hundred thousand crowns, which entirely charmed the +frugal-minded Duke William, and Vincenzo married her, after certain +diplomatic preliminaries demanded by the circumstances, which scarcely +bear statement in English, and which the present history would blush +to give even in Italian. + +Indeed, he was a great beast, this splendid Vincenzo, both by his own +fault and that of others; but it ought to be remembered of him, that +at his solicitation the most clement lord of Ferrara liberated from +durance in the hospital of St. Anna his poet Tasso, whom he had kept +shut in that mad-house seven years. On his delivery, Tasso addressed +his "Discorso" to Vincenzo's kinsman, the learned Cardinal Scipio +Gonzaga; and to this prelate he submitted for correction the +"Gerusalemme," as did Guarini his "Pastor Fido." + +When Vincenzo came to power he found a fat treasury, which he enjoyed +after the fashion of the time, and which, having a princely passion +for every costly pleasure, he soon emptied. He was crowned in 1587; +and on his coronation day rode through the streets throwing gold to +the people, after the manner of the Mantuan Dukes. He kept up an army +of six thousand men, among a population of eighty thousand all told; +and maintained as his guard "fifty archers on horseback, who also +served with the arquebuse, and fifty light-horsemen for the guard of +his own person, who were all excellently mounted, the Duke possessing +such a noble stud of horses that he always had five hundred at +his service, and kept in stable one hundred and fifty of marvelous +beauty." He lent the Spanish king two hundred thousand pounds out +of his father's sparings; and when the Archduchess of Austria, +Margherita, passed through Mantua on her way to wed Philip II. of +Spain, he gave her a diamond ring worth twelve thousand crowns. Next +after women, he was madly fond of the theatre, and spent immense sums +for actors. He would not, indeed, cede in splendor to the greatest +monarchs, and in his reign of fifteen years he squandered fifty +million crowns! No one will be surprised to learn from a contemporary +writer in Mantua, that this excellent prince was adorned with all +the Christian virtues; nor to be told by a later historian, that in +Vincenzo's time Mantua was the most corrupt city in Europe. A satire +of the year 1601, which this writer (Maffei) reduces to prose, says +of that period: "Everywhere in Mantua are seen feasts, jousts, masks, +banquets, plays, music, balls, delights, dancing. To these, the +young girls," an enormity in Italy, "as well as the matrons, go in +magnificent dresses; and even the churches are scenes of love-making. +Good mothers, instead of teaching their daughters the use of the +needle, teach them the arts of rouging, dressing, singing, and +dancing. Naples and Milan scarcely produce silk enough, or India and +Peru gold and gems enough, to deck out female impudence and pride. +Courtiers and warriors perfume themselves as delicately as ladies; +and even the food is scented, that the mouth may exhale fragrance. +The galleries and halls of the houses are painted full of the loves +of Mars and Venus, Leda and the Swan, Jove and Danae, while the +devout solace themselves with such sacred subjects as Susannah and the +Elders. The flower of chastity seems withered in Mantua. No longer in +Lydia nor in Cyprus, but in Mantua, is fixed the realm of pleasure." +The Mantuans were a different people in the old republican times, when +a fine was imposed for blasphemy, and the blasphemer put into a basket +and drowned in the lake, if he did not pay within fifteen days; which +must have made profanity a luxury even to the rich. But in that day +a man had to pay twenty soldi (seventy-five cents) if he spoke to +a woman in church; and women were not allowed even the moderate +diversion of going to funerals, and could not wear silk lace about the +neck, nor have dresses that dragged more than a yard, nor crowns of +pearls or gems, nor belts worth more than ten livres (twenty-five +dollars), nor purses worth more than fifteen soldi (fifty cents.) + +Possibly as an antidote for the corruption brought into the world with +Vincenzo, there was another Gonzaga born about the same period, who +became in due time Saint Louis Gonzaga, and remains to this day one of +the most powerful friends of virtue to whom a good Catholic can pray. +He is particularly recommended by his biographer, the Jesuit Father +Cesari, in cases of carnal temptation, and improving stories are told +Italian youth of the miracles he works under such circumstances. He +vowed chastity for his own part at an age when most children do not +know good from evil, and he carried the fulfillment of this vow to +such extreme, that, being one day at play of forfeits with other +boys and girls, and being required to kiss--not one of the little +maidens--but her _shadow_ on the wall, he would not, preferring to +lose his pawn. Everybody, I think, will agree with Father Cesari that +it would be hard to draw chastity finer than this. + +San Luigi Gonzaga descended from that Ridolfo who put his wife to +death, and his father was Marquis of Castiglione delle Stivere. He was +born in 1568, and, being the first son, was heir to the marquisate; +but from his earliest years he had a call to the Church. His family +did everything possible to dissuade him--his father with harshness, +and his uncle, Duke William of Mantua, with tenderness--from his +vocation. The latter even sent a "bishop of rare eloquence" to labor +with the boy at Castiglione; but everything was done in vain. In due +time Luigi joined the Company of Jesus, renounced this world, and +died at Rome in the odor of sanctity, after doing such good works as +surprised every one. His brother Ridolfo succeeded to the marquisate, +and fell into a quarrel with Duke William about lands, which dispute +Luigi composed before his death. About all which the reverend Jesuit +Father Tolomei has shown how far heaviness can go in the dramatic +form, and has written a pitiless play, wherein everybody goes into a +convent with the fall of the curtain. Till the reader has read this +play, he has never (properly speaking) been bored. For the happiness +of mankind, it has not been translated out of the original Italian. + +From the time of the first Vincenzo's death, there are only two tragic +events which lift the character of Mantuan history above the quality +of _chronique scandaleuse_, namely, the Duke Ferdinand's repudiation +of Camilla Faa di Casale, and the sack of Mantua in 1630. The first of +these events followed close upon the demise of the splendid Vincenzo; +for his son Francesco reigned but a short time, and died, leaving a +little daughter of three years to the guardianship of her uncle, +the Cardinal Ferdinand. The law of the Mantuan succession excluded +females; and Ferdinand, dispensed from his ecclesiastical functions +by the Pope, ascended the ducal throne. In 1615, not long after his +accession, as the chronicles relate, in passing through a chamber +of the palace he saw a young girl playing upon a cithern, and being +himself young, and of the ardent temper of the Gonzagas, he fell in +love with the fair minstrel. She was the daughter of a noble servant +of the Duke, who had once been his ambassador to the court of the Duke +of Savoy, and was called Count Ardizzo Faa Monferrino di Casale; but +his Grace did not on that account hesitate to attempt corrupting her; +indeed, a courtly father of that day might well be supposed to have +few scruples that would interfere with a gracious sovereign's designs +upon his daughter. Singularly enough, the chastity of Camilla was +so well guarded that the ex-cardinal was at last forced to propose +marriage. It seems that the poor girl loved her ducal wooer; and +besides, the ducal crown was a glittering temptation, and she +consented to a marriage which, for state and family reasons, was made +secret. When the fact was bruited, it raised the wrath and ridicule +of Ferdinand's family, and the Duke's sister Margaret, Duchess of +Ferrara, had so lofty a disdain of his _mésalliance_ with an inferior, +that she drove him to desperation with her sarcasms. About this time +Camilla's father died, with strong evidences of poisoning; and the +wife being left helpless and friendless, her noble husband resorted to +the artifice of feigning that there had never been any marriage, and +thus sought to appease his family. Unhappily, however, he had given +her a certificate of matrimony, which she refused to surrender when +he put her away, so that the Duke, desiring afterwards to espouse +the daughter of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, was obliged to present +a counterfeit certificate to his bride, who believed it the real +marriage contract, and destroyed it. When the Duchess discovered the +imposition, she would not rest till she had wrung the real document +from Camilla, under the threat of putting her son to death. The +miserable mother then retired to a convent, and died of a broken +heart, while Ferdinand bastardized his only legitimate son, a noble +boy, whom his mother had prettily called Jacinth. After this, a +kind of retribution, amid all his political successes, seems to have +pursued the guilty Duke. His second wife was too fat to bear children, +but not to bear malice; and she never ceased to distrust and reproach +the Duke, whom she could not believe in anything since the affair +of the counterfeit marriage contract. She was very religious, and +embittered Ferdinand's days with continued sermons and reproofs, +and made him order, in the merry Mantuan court, all the devotions +commanded by her confessor. + +So Ferdinand died childless, and, it is said, in sore remorse, and was +succeeded in 1626 by his brother Vincenzo, another hope of the faith +and light of the Church. His brief reign lasted but one year, and +was ignoble as it was brief, and fitly ended the direct line of the +Gonzagas. Vincenzo, though an ecclesiastic, never studied anything, +and was disgracefully ignorant. Lacking the hereditary love of +letters, he had not the warlike boldness of his race; and resembled +his ancestors only in the love he bore to horses, hunting, and women. +He was enamored of the widow of one of his kinsmen, a woman no longer +young, but of still agreeable person, strong will, and quick wit, +and of a fascinating presence, which Vincenzo could not resist. The +excellent prince was wooing her, with a view to seduction, when he +received the nomination of cardinal from Pope Paul V. He pressed his +suit, but the lady would consent to nothing but marriage, and Vincenzo +bundled up the cardinal's purple and sent it back, with a very +careless and ill-mannered letter to the ireful Pope, who swore never +to make another Gonzaga cardinal. He then married the widow, but soon +wearied of her, and spent the rest of his days in vain attempts +to secure a divorce, in order to be restored to his ecclesiastical +benefices. And one Christmas morning _he_ died childless; and three +years later the famous sack of Mantua took place. The events leading +to this crime are part of one of the most complicated episodes of +Italian history. + +Ferdinand, as guardian of his brother's daughter Maria, claimed +the Duchy of Monferrato as part of his dominion; but his claim was +disputed by Maria's grandfather, the Duke of Savoy, who contended that +it reverted to him, on the death of his daughter, as a fief which had +been added to Mantua merely by the intermarriage of the Gonzagas with +his family. He was supported in this claim by the Spaniards, then at +Milan. The Venetians and the German Emperor supported Ferdinand, and +the French advanced the claim of a third, a descendant of Lodovico +Gonzaga, who had left Mantua a century before, and entered upon the +inheritance of the Duchy of Nevers-Rethel. The Duke of Savoy was one +of the boldest of his warlike race; and the Italians had great hopes +of him as one great enough to drive the barbarians out of Italy. But +nearly three centuries more were wanted to raise his family to the +magnitude of a national purpose; and Carlo Emanuel spent his greatness +in disputes with the petty princes about him. In this dispute for +Monferrato he was worsted; for at the treaty of Pavia, Monferrato was +assured to Duke Ferdinand of Mantua. + +Ferdinand afterwards died without issue, and Vincenzo likewise died +childless; and Charles Gonzaga of Nevers-Rethel, who had married +Maria, Ferdinand's ward, became heir to the Duchy of Mantua, but his +right was disputed by Ferrante Gonzaga of Guastalla. Charles hurriedly +and half secretly introduced himself into Mantua without consultation +with Venetian, Spaniard, or German. While Duke Olivares of Spain was +meditating his recognition, his officer at Milan tried to seize Mantua +and failed; but the German Emperor had been even more deeply offended, +and claimed the remission of Charles's rights as a feudatory of the +Roman Empire, until he should have regularly invested him. Charles +prepared for defense. Meanwhile Spain and Savoy seized Monferrato, but +they were afterwards defeated by the French, and the Spanish Milanese +was overrun by the Venetians and Mantuans. The German Emperor then +sent down his Landsknechts, and in 1630 besieged Mantua, while the +French promised help and gave none, and the Pope exhorted Charles +to submit. The Venetians, occupied with the Uskok pirates, could do +little in his defense. To the horrors of this unequal and desperate +war were added those of famine; and the Jews, passing between the camp +and the city, brought a pest from the army into Mantua, which raged +with extraordinary violence among the hungry and miserable people. In +vain they formed processions, and carried the blood of Christ about +the city. So many died that there were not boats enough to bear them +away to their sepulture in the lakes, and the bodies rotted in the +streets. There was not wanting at this time the presence of a traitor +in the devoted city; and that this wretch was a Swiss will be a +matter of no surprise. The despicable valor of these republicans has +everywhere formed the best defense of tyrants, and their fidelity has +always been at the service of the highest bidder. The recreant was +a lieutenant in the Swiss Guard of the Duke; and when he had led the +Germans into Mantua, and received the reward of his infamy, two German +soldiers, placed over him for his protection, killed him and plundered +him of his spoil. + +The sack now began, and lasted three days, with unspeakable horrors. +The Germans (then the most slavish and merciless of soldiers) violated +Mantuan women, and buried their victims alive. The harlots of their +camp cast off their rags, and robing themselves in the richest spoils +they could find, rioted with brutal insult through the streets, and +added the shame of drunken orgies to the dreadful scene of blood and +tears. The Jews were driven forth almost naked from the Ghetto. The +precious monuments of ages were destroyed; or such as the fury of the +soldiers spared, the avarice of their generals consumed; and pictures, +statues, and other works of art were stolen and carried away. The +churches were plundered, the sacred houses of religion were sacked, +and the nuns who did not meet a worse fate went begging through the +streets. + +The imperial general, Aldringher, had, immediately upon entering the +city, appropriated the Ducal Palace to himself as his share of the +booty. He placed a strong guard around it, and spoiled it at leisure +and systematically, and gained fabulous sums from the robbery. After +the sack was ended, he levied upon the population (from whom his +soldiers had forced everything that terror and torture could wring +from them) four contributions, amounting to a hundred thousand +doubloons. This population had, during the siege and sack, been +reduced from thirty to twelve thousand; and Aldringher had so +thoroughly accomplished his part of the spoliation, that the Duke +Charles, returning after the withdrawal of the Germans, could not find +in the Ducal Palace so much as a bench to sit upon. He and his family +had fled half naked from their beds on the entry of the Germans, and, +after a pause in the citadel, had withdrawn to Ariano, whence the +Duke sent ambassadors to Vienna to expose his miserable fate to +the Emperor. The conduct of Aldringher was severely rebuked at the +capital; and the Empress sent Carlo's wife ten thousand zecchini, with +which they returned at length to Mantua. It is melancholy to read how +his neighbors had to compassionate his destitution: how the Grand Duke +of Tuscany sent him upholstery for two state chambers; how the Duke +of Parma supplied his table-service; how Alfonso of Modena gave him +a hundred pairs of oxen, and as many peasants to till his desolated +lands. His people always looked upon him with evil eyes, as the cause +of their woes; and after a reign of ten years he died of a broken +heart, or, as some thought, of poison. + +Carlo had appointed as his successor his nephew and namesake, who +succeeded to the throne ten years after his uncle's death, the +princess Maria Gonzaga being regent during his minority. Carlo II. +early manifested the amorous disposition of his blood, but his +reign was not distinguished by remarkable events. He was of imperial +politics during those interminable French-Austrian wars, and the +French desolated his dominions more or less. In the time of this +Carlo II., we read of the Jews being condemned to pay the wages of +the Duke's archers for the extremely improbable crime of killing some +Hebrews who had been converted; and there is account of the Duchess +going on foot to the sanctuary of Our Lady of Grace, to render thanks +for her son's recovery from a fever, and her daughter's recovery from +the bite of a monkey. Mantua must also have regained something of its +former gayety; for in 1652 the Austrian Archdukes and the Medici spent +Carnival there. Carlo II. died, like his father, with suspicions of +poisoning, and undoubted evidences of debauchery. He was a generous +and amiable prince; and, though a shameless profligate, was beloved by +his subjects, with whom, no doubt, his profligacy was not a reproach. + +Ferdinand Carlo, whose ignoble reign lasted from 1665 to 1708, was +the last and basest of his race. The histories of his country do not +attribute a single virtue to this unhappy prince, who seems to have +united in himself all the vices of all the Gonzagas. He was licentious +and depraved as the first Vincenzo, and he had not Vincenzo's +courage; he was luxurious as the second Francesco, but had none of +his generosity; he taxed his people heavily that he might meanly enjoy +their substance without making them even the poor return of national +glory; he was grasping as Guglielmo, but saved nothing to the state; +he was as timid as the second Vincenzo, and yet made a feint of making +war, and went to Hungary at one time to fight against the Turk. But he +loved far better to go to Venice in his gilded barge, and to spend his +Carnivals amid the infinite variety of that city's dissoluteness. He +was so ignorant as scarcely to be able to write his name; but he knew +all vicious things from his cradle, as if, indeed, he had been gifted +to know them by instinct through the profligacy of his parents. It is +said that even the degraded Mantuans blushed to be ruled by so dull +and ignorant a wretch; but in his time, nevertheless, Mantua was all +rejoicings, promenades, pleasure-voyages, and merry-makings. "The +Duke recruited women from every country to stock his palace," says an +Italian author, "where they played, sang, and made merry at his will +and theirs." "In Venice," says Volta, "he surrendered himself to such +diversions without shame, or stint of expense. He not only took part +in all public entertainments and pleasures of that capital, but he +held a most luxurious and gallant court of his own; and all night long +his palace was the scene of theatrical representations by dissolute +women, with music and banqueting, so that he had a worse name than +Sardanapalus of old." He sneaked away to these gross delights in 1700, +while the Emperor was at war with the Spaniards, and left his Duchess +(a brave and noble woman, the daughter of Ferrante Gonzaga, Duke of +Guastalla) to take care of the duchy, then in great part occupied by +Spanish and French forces. This was the War of the Spanish Succession; +and it used up poor Ferdinand, who had not a shadow of interest in +it. He had sold the fortress of Casale to the French in 1681, feigning +that they had taken it from him by fraud: and now he declared that +he was forced to admit eight thousand French and Spanish troops into +Mantua. Perhaps indeed he was, but the Emperor never would believe it; +and he pronounced Ferdinand guilty of felony against the Empire, and +deposed him from his duchy. The Duke appealed against this sentence to +the Diet of Ratisbon, and, pending the Diet's decision, made a journey +of pleasure to France, where the Grand Monarch named him generalissimo +of the French forces in Italy, though he never commanded them. He +came back to Mantua after a little, and built himself a splendid +theatre,--the cheerful Duke. + +But his end was near. The French and Austrians made peace in 1707; and +next year, Monferrato having fallen to Savoy, the Austrians entered +Mantua, whence the Duke promptly fled. The Austrians marched into +Mantua on the 29th of February, that being leap-year, and Ferdinand +came back no more. Indeed, trusting in false hopes of restoration +held out to him by Venice and France, he died on the 5th of the July +following, at Padua,--it was said by poison, but more probably of sin +and sorrow. So ended Ducal Mantua. + +The Austrians held the city till 1797. The French Revolution took +it and kept it till 1799, and then left it to the Austrians for two +years. Then the Cisalpine Republic possessed it till 1802; and then it +was made part of the Kingdom of Italy, and so continued twelve years; +after which it fell again to Austria. In 1848, there was a revolution, +and the Austrian soldiers stole the precious silver case that held +the phial of the true blood. Now at last it belongs to the Kingdom +of Italy, with the other forts of the Quadrilateral--thanks to the +Prussian needle-gun. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Italian Journeys, by William Dean Howells + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14276 *** |