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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/36818-8.txt b/36818-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ed2fc1a --- /dev/null +++ b/36818-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6466 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad with +Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected, by Anna Jameson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected + Vol. I (of 3) + +Author: Anna Jameson + +Release Date: July 23, 2011 [EBook #36818] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + + + + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + +VISITS AND SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. + +VOL. I. + + +[Illustration: SIGFRIED KRIMHILDE + + _Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff._ + + _Group from the Fresco in the King of Bavaria's Palace at Munich. + Painted by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld._ + + _Published by Saunders & Otley 1834._] + + + + + + +VISITS AND SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD + +WITH TALES AND MISCELLANIES NOW FIRST COLLECTED. + +BY MRS. JAMESON, + +AUTHOR OF THE "CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN," "LIVES OF CELEBRATED FEMALE +SOVEREIGNS," &c. + +IN THREE VOLUMES. + +VOL. I. + +SECOND EDITION. + + + LONDON + SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. + 1835. + + + LONDON: + IBOTSON AND PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. I. + + + PAGE + + Preface vii + + + SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER, + PART I. IN THREE DIALOGUES. + + +I. A Scene in a Steam Boat 4 + A Singular Character 20 + Gallery at Ghent 25 + The Prince of Orange's Pictures 27 + A Female Gambler 38 + Cologne--the Medusa 44 + Professor Walraf 51 + Schlegel and Madame de Staël 55 + Story of Archbishop Gerard 64 + Heidelberg--Elizabeth Stuart 68 + An English Fanner's idea of the Picturesque 85 + + +II. Frankfort 88 + The Theatre, Madame Haitzinger 92 + The Versorgung Haus 98 + The Städel Museum 103 + Dannecker, Memoir of his Life and Works 106 + German Sculpture--Rauch, Tieck, Schwanthaler 147 + + +III. Goethe and his daughter-in-law 160 + The German Women 167 + German Authoresses 177 + German Domestic Life and Manners 187 + German Coquetterie and German Romance 199 + The Story of a Devoted Sister 205 + + SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER, + PART II. + + _Memoranda at Munich, Nuremberg, and Dresden._ + + +I. MUNICH 241 + + The Theatre--representation of "Egmont" 245 + Leo von Klenze 250 + The Glyptothek--its general arrangement--Egina + Marbles--Account of the Frescos of Cornelius--Canova's + Paris and Thorwaldson's Adonis 252-273 + The Opera at Munich, the Kapel Meister Stuntz 274 + The Poems of the King of Bavaria 279 + A public day at the New Palace 281 + Thoughts on Female Singers--Their condition and destiny 284 + The Munich Gallery--Thoughts on Pictures--their moral + influence 287 + Rubens and the Flemish Masters 295 + The Gallery of Schleissheim 304 + The Boisserée Gallery--The old German School of Painting--Its + Effects on the Modern German School of Art 304 + Representation of the Braut von Messina 310 + The Hofgarten at Munich 313 + The King's passion for Building 316 + + + + +THE AUTHOR TO THE READER. + + +It seems a foolish thing to send into the world a book requiring +a preface of apologies; and yet more absurd, to presume that any +deprecation on the part of the author could possibly win indulgence +for what should be in itself worthless. + +For this reason, and with a very deep feeling of the kindness I have +already experienced from the public, I should now abandon these little +volumes to their destiny without one word of preface or remark, but +that a certain portion of their contents seems to require a little +explanation. + +It was the wish and request of my friends, many months ago, that I +should collect various literary trifles which were scattered about in +print or in manuscript, and allow them to be published together. My +departure for the continent set aside this intention for the time. I had +other and particular objects in view, which still keep full possession +of my mind, and which have been suspended not without reluctance, in +order to prepare these volumes for the press;--neither had I, while +travelling in Germany, the slightest idea of writing any thing of that +country: so far from it, that except during the last few weeks at +Munich, I kept no regular notes: but finding on my return to England, +that many particulars which had strongly excited my interest, with +regard to the relative state of art and social existence in the two +countries, appeared new to those with whom I conversed,--after some +hesitation, I was induced to throw into form the few memoranda I had +made on the spot. They are now given to the public in the first and +second volumes of this little collection, with a very sincere feeling +of their many imperfections, and much anxiety with regard to the +reception they are likely to meet with; yet in the earnest hope that +what has been written in perfect simplicity of heart, may be perused +both by my English and German friends, particularly the artists, with +indulgence; that those who read and doubt may be awakened to inquiry, +and those who read and believe may be led to reflection; and that those +who differ from, and those who agree with the writer, may both find some +interest and amusement in the literal truth of the facts and impressions +she has ventured to record. + +It was difficult to give sketches of art, literature, and character, +without making now and then some _personal_ allusions; but though I +have often sketched from the life, I have adhered throughout to this +principle--never to give publicity to any name not already before the +public, and in a manner public property. + +Two of the tales of the third volume, "The False One," and "The Indian +Mother," were written at different times, to prove that I could write +in a style which should not be recognised as mine even by my most +intimate friends, and the _ruse_ so far succeeded, that both, as I am +informed, have been attributed to other writers. + + A. J. + +May 1834. + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + +PART I. + +IN THREE DIALOGUES. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +I. + +MEDON--ALDA. + + +MEDON. + +And so we are to have no "_Sentimental Travels in Germany_" on +hot-pressed paper, illustrated with views taken on the spot? + +ALDA. + +No. + +MEDON. + +You have unloaded Time of his wallet only to deal out his "scraps of +things past," his shreds of remembrance, in beggarly, indolent fashion, +over your own fire-side? You are afraid of being termed an egotist; you, +who within these ten minutes have assured me that not any opinion of any +human being should prevent you from doing, saying, writing--any thing-- + +ALDA. + +Finish the sentence--any thing, _for truth's sake_. But how is the cause +of truth to be advanced by the insolent publication of a mass of crude +thoughts and hasty observations picked up here and there, "as pigeons +pick up peas," and which now lie safe within the clasps of those little +green books? You need not look at them; they do not contain another +Diary of an Ennuyée, thank Heaven! nor do I feel much inclined to play +the _Ennuyeuse_ in public. + +MEDON. + +"Take any form but _that_, and my firm nerves shall never tremble;" +but with eyes to see, a heart to feel, a mind to observe, and a pen +to record those observations, I do not perceive why you should not +contribute one drop to that great ocean of thought which is weltering +round the world! + +ALDA. + +If I could. + +MEDON. + +There are people, who when they travel open their eyes and their ears, +(aye, and their mouths to some purpose,) and shut up their hearts and +souls. I have heard such persons make it their boast, that they have +returned to old England with all their old prejudices thick upon +them; they have come back, to use their own phrase, "with no foreign +ideas--just the same as they went:" they are much to be congratulated! +I hope you are not one of these? + +ALDA. + +I hope not; it is this cold impervious pride which is the perdition +of us English, and of England. I remember that in one of my several +excursions on the Rhine, we had, on board the steamboat, an English +family of high rank. There was the lordly papa, plain and shy, who never +spoke to any one except his own family, and then only in the lowest +whisper. There was the lady mamma, so truly lady-like, with fine-cut +patrician features, and in her countenance a kind of passive _hauteur_, +softened by an appearance of suffering, and ill-health. There were two +daughters, proud, pale, fine-looking girls, dressed _à ravir_, with +that indescribable air of high pretension, so elegantly impassive--so +self-possessed--which some people call _l'air distingué_, but which, +as extremes meet, I would rather call the refinement of vulgarity--the +polish we see bestowed on debased material--the plating over the +steel--the stucco over the brick-work! + +MEDON. + +Good; you _can_ be severe then! + +ALDA. + +I spoke generally: bear witness to the general truth of the picture, +for it will fit others as well as the personages I have brought before +you, who are, indeed, but specimens of a species. This group, then, had +designedly or instinctively entrenched themselves in a corner to the +right of the steersman, within a fortification of tables and benches, so +arranged as to forbid all approach within two or three yards; the young +ladies had each their sketch-book, and wielded pencil and Indian rubber, +I know not with what effect,--but I know that I never saw either +countenance once relax or brighten, in the midst of the divine scenery +through which we glided. Two female attendants, seated on the outer +fortifications, formed a kind of piquet guard; and two footmen at the +other end kept watch over the well-appointed carriages, and came and +went as their attendance was required. No one else ventured to approach +this aristocratic Olympus; the celestials within its precincts, though +not exactly seated "on golden stools at golden tables," like the +divinities in the song of the Parcæ,[1] showed as supreme, as godlike +an indifference to the throng of mortals in the nether sphere: no word +was exchanged during the whole day with any of the fifty or sixty human +beings who were round them; nay, when the rain drove us down to the +pavilion, even there, amid twelve or fourteen others, they contrived to +keep themselves aloof from contact and conversation. In this fashion +they probably pursued their tour, exchanging the interior of their +travelling carriage for the interior of an hotel; and every where +associating only with those of their own caste. What do they see of all +that is to be seen? What can they know of what is to be known? What do +they endure of what is to be endured? I can speak from experience--I +have travelled in that same style. As they went, so they return; +happily, or rather pitifully, unconscious of the narrow circle in which +move their factitious enjoyments, their confined experience, their +half-awakened sympathies! And I should tell you, that in the same +steam-boat were two German girls, under the care of an elderly relative, +I think an aunt, and a brother, who was a celebrated _jurisconsulte_ +and judge: their rank was equal to that of my countrywomen; their blood, +perhaps, more purely noble, that is, older by some centuries; and +their family more illustrious, by God knows how many quarterings; +moreover, their father was a minister of state. Both these girls were +beautiful;--fair, and fair-haired, with complexions on which "the rose +stood ready with a blush;" and one, the youngest sister, was exquisitely +lovely--in truth, she might have sat for one of Guido's angels. +They walked up and down the deck, neither seeking nor avoiding the +proximity of others. They accepted the telescopes which the gentlemen, +particularly some young Englishmen, pressed on them when any distant or +remarkable object came in view, and repaid the courtesy with a bright +kindly smile; they were natural and easy, and did not deem it necessary +to mount guard over their own dignity. Do you think I did not observe +and feel the contrast? + +MEDON. + +If nations begin at last to understand each other's true +interests--morally and politically, it will be through the agency of +gifted men; but if ever they learn to love and sympathize with each +other, it will be through the medium of you women. You smile, and +shake your head; but in spite of a late example, which might seem to +controvert this idea, I still think so;--our prejudices are stronger +and bitterer than yours, because they are those which perverted reason +builds up on a foundation of pride; but yours, which are generally +those of fancy and association, soon melt away before your own kindly +affections. More mobile, more impressible, more easily yielding to +external circumstances, more easily lending yourselves to different +manners and habits, more quick to perceive, more gentle to judge;--yes, +it is to you we must look, to break down the outworks of prejudice--you, +the advanced guard of humanity and civilization! + + "The gentle race and dear, + By whom alone the world is glorified!" + + +Every feeling, well educated, generous, and truly refined woman, who +travels, is as a dove sent out on a mission of peace; and should bring +back at least an olive-leaf in her hand, if she bring nothing else. +It is her part to soften the intercourse between rougher and stronger +natures; to aid in the interfusion of the gentler sympathies; to speed +the interchange of art and literature from pole to pole: not to pervert +wit, and talent, and eloquence, and abuse the privileges of her sex, to +sow the seeds of hatred where she might plant those of love--to embitter +national discord and aversion, and disseminate individual prejudice and +error. + +ALDA. + +Thank you! I need not say how entirely I agree with you. + +MEDON. + +Then tell me, what have _you_ brought home? if but an olive-leaf, let us +have it; come, unpack your budget. Have you collected store of anecdotes, +private, literary, scandalous, abundantly interspersed with proper names +of grand-dukes and little dukes, counts, barons, ministers, poets, +authors, actors, and opera dancers? + +ALDA. + +Me? + +MEDON. + +Cry you mercy!--I did but jest, so do not look so indignant! But have +you then traced the cause and consequences of that undercurrent of +opinion which is slowly but surely sapping the foundations of empires? +Have you heard the low booming of that mighty ocean which approaches, +wave after wave, to break up the dikes and boundaries of ancient power? + +ALDA. + +I? no; how should I--skimming over the surface of society with perpetual +sunshine and favouring airs--how should I sound the gulfs and shoals +which lie below? + +MEDON. + +Have you, then, analysed that odd combination of poetry, metaphysics, +and politics, which, like the three primeval colours, tinge in various +tints and shades, simple and complex, all literature, morals, art, and +even conversation, through Germany? + +ALDA. + +No, indeed! + +MEDON. + +Have you decided between the different systems of Jacobi and Schelling? + +ALDA. + +You know I am a poor philosopher; but when Schelling was introduced +to me at Munich, I remember I looked up at him with inexpressible +admiration, as one whose giant arm had cut through an isthmus, and +whose giant mind had new modelled the opinions of minds as gigantic +as his own. + +MEDON. + +Then you are of this new school, which reveals the union of faith and +philosophy? + +ALDA. + +If I am, it is by instinct. + +MEDON. + +Well, to descend to your own peculiar sphere, have you satisfied +yourself as to the moral and social position of the women in Germany? + +ALDA. + +No, indeed!--at least, not yet. + +MEDON. + +Have you examined and noted down the routine of the _domestic_ education +of their children? (we know something of the public and national +systems.) Can you give some accurate notion of the ideas which generally +prevail on this subject? + +ALDA. + +O no! you have mentioned things which would require a life to study. +Merely to have thought upon them, to have glanced at them, gives me no +right to discuss them, unless I could bring my observations to some +tangible form, and derive from them some useful result. + +MEDON. + +Yet in this last journey you had an object--a purpose? + +ALDA. + +I had--a purpose which has long been revolving in my mind--an object +never lost sight of;--but give me time!--time! + +MEDON. + +I see;--but are you prepared for consequences? Can you task your +sensitive mind to stand reproach and ridicule? Remember your own story +of Runckten the traveller, who, when about to commence his expedition +into the desarts of Africa, prepared himself, by learning beforehand +to digest poisons; to swallow without disgust reptiles, spiders, +vermin---- + +ALDA. + +"Thou hast the most unsavoury similes!" + +MEDON. + +Take a proverb then--"Bisogna coprirsi bene il viso innanzi di +struzzicare il vespaio." + +ALDA. + +I will _not_ hide my face; nor can I answer you in this jesting vein, +for to me it is a serious thought. There is in the kindly feeling, the +spontaneous sympathy of the public towards me, something which fills me +with gratitude and respect, and tells me to respect myself; which I +would not exchange for the greater _éclat_ which hangs round greater +names;--which I will not forfeit by writing one line from an unworthy +motive; nor flatter, nor invite, by withholding one thought, opinion, +or sentiment, which I believe to be true, and to which I can put the +seal of my heart's conviction. + +MEDON. + +Good! I love a little enthusiasm now and then; so like Britomart in the +enchanter's palace, the motto is, + + "Be bold, be bold, and every where be bold!" + +ALDA. + +I should rather say, be gentle, be gentle, every where be gentle; and +then we cannot _be too bold_.[2] + +MEDON. + +Well, then, I return once more to the charge. Have you been rambling +about the world for these six months--yet learned nothing? + +ALDA. + +On the contrary. + +MEDON. + +Then what, in Heaven's name, _have_ you learned? + +ALDA. + +Not much; but I have learned to sweep my mind of some ill-conditioned +cobwebs. I have learned to consider my own acquired knowledge but as a +torch flung into an abyss, making the darkness visible, and showing me +the extent of my own ignorance. + +MEDON. + +Then give us--give _me_, at least--the benefit of your ignorance; only +let it be all your own. I honour a profession of ignorance--if only for +its rarity--in these all-knowing times. Let me tell you, the ignorance +of a candid and not uncultivated mind is better than the second-hand +wisdom of those who take all things for granted; who are the echoes of +others' opinions, the utterers of others' words; who _think_ they know, +and who _think_ they think: I am sick of them all. Come, refresh me with +a little ignorance--and be serious. + +ALDA. + +You make me smile; after all, 'tis only going over old ground, and I +know not what pleasure, what interest it can impart, beyond half an +hour's amusement. + +MEDON. + +Sceptic! is that nothing? In this harsh, cold, working-day world, is +half an hour's amusement nothing? Old ground!--as if you did not know +the pleasure of going over old ground with a new companion to refresh +half-faded recollections--to compare impressions--to correct old ideas +and acquire new ones? O I can suck knowledge out of ignorance, as a +weazel sucks eggs!--Begin. + +ALDA. + +Where shall I begin? + +MEDON. + +Where, but at the beginning? and then diverge as you will. Your first +journey was one of mere amusement? + +ALDA. + +Merely, and it answered its purpose; we travelled _à la milor +Anglais_--a _partie carrée_--a barouche hung on the most approved +principle--double-cushioned--luxurious--rising and sinking on its +springs like a swan on the wave--the pockets stuffed with new +publications--maps and guides _ad infinitum_; English servants for +comfort, foreign servants for use; a chess-board, backgammon tables--in +short, surrounded with all that could render us entirely independent of +the amusements we had come to seek, and of the people among whom we had +come to visit. + +MEDON. + +Admirable--and English! + +ALDA. + +Yes, and pleasant. I thought, not without gratitude, of the contrast +between present feelings and those of a former journey. To abandon +oneself to the quickening influence of new objects without care or +thought of to-morrow, with a mind awake in all its strength; with +restored health and cheerfulness; with sensibility tamed, not dead; +possessing one's soul in quiet; not seeking, nor yet shrinking from +excitement; not self-engrossed, nor yet pining for sympathy; was not +this much? Not so interesting, perhaps, as playing the _Ennuyée_; +but, oh! you know not how sad it is to look upon the lovely through +tearful eyes, and walk among the loving and the kind, wrapped as in +a death-shroud; to carry into the midst of the most glorious scenes +of nature, and the divinest creations of art, perceptions dimmed and +troubled with sickness and anguish: to move in the morning with aching +and reluctance--to faint in the evening with weariness and pain; to feel +all change, all motion, a torment to the dying heart; all rest, all +delay, a burthen to the impatient spirit; to shiver in the presence of +joy, like a ghost in the sunshine, yet have no sympathy to spare for +suffering. How could I remember that all this _had been_, and not bless +the miracle-worker--Time? And _apropos_ to the miracles of time--I had +on this first journey, one source of amusement, which I am sorry I +cannot share with you at full length; it was the near contemplation +of a very singular character, of which I can only afford you a sketch. +Our CHEF _de voyage_, for so we chose to entitle him who was the planner +and director of our excursion, was one of the most accomplished and most +eccentric of human beings: even courtesy might have termed him old, at +seventy; but old age and he were many miles asunder, and it seemed as +though he had made some compact with Time, like that of Faust with the +devil, and was not to surrender to his inevitable adversary till the +very last moment. Years could not quench his vivacity, nor "stale his +infinite variety." He had been one of the prince's wild companions in +the days of Sheridan and Fox, and could play alternately blackguard and +gentleman, and both in perfection; but the high-born gentleman ever +prevailed. He had been heir to an enormous income, most of which had +slipped through his fingers _unknownst_, as the Irish say, and had stood +in the way of a coronet, which, somehow or other, had slipped over his +head to light on that of his eldest son. He had lived a life which would +have ruined twenty iron constitutions, and had suffered what might well +have broken twenty hearts of common stuff; but his self-complacency +was invulnerable, his animal spirits inexhaustible, his activity +indefatigable. The eccentricities of this singular man have been matter +of celebrity; but against each of these stories it would be easy to +place some act of benevolence, some trait of lofty gentlemanly feeling, +which would at least neutralize their effect. He often told me that he +had early in life selected three models, after which to form his own +conduct and character; namely, De Grammont, Hotspur, and Lord Herbert of +Cherbury; and he certainly _did_ unite, in a greater degree than he knew +himself, the characteristics of all three. Such was our CHEF, and thus +led, thus appointed, away we posted on, from land to land, from city +to city-- + +MEDON. + +Stay--stay. This is galloping on at the rate of Lenora, and her phantom +lover-- + + "Tramp, tramp across the land we go, + Splash, splash across the sea!" + + +Take me with you, and a little more leisurely. + +ALDA. + +I think Bruges was the first place which interested me, perhaps from +its historical associations. Bruges, where monarchs kissed the hand +to merchants, now emptied of its former splendour, reminded me of the +improvident steward in scripture, that could not dig, and to beg was +ashamed. It had an air of grave idleness and threadbare dignity; and its +listless, thinly-scattered inhabitants looked as if they had gone astray +among the wide streets and huge tenantless edifices. There is one thing +here which you must see--the tomb of Charles the Bold, and his daughter, +Mary of Burgundy. The tomb is of the most exquisite workmanship, +composed of polished brass and enamelled escutcheons; and there the +fiery father and the gentle daughter lie, side by side, in sculptured +bronze, equally still, cold, and silent. I remember that I stood long +gazing on the inscription, which made me smile, and made me think. There +was no mention of defeat and massacre, disgraceful flight, or obscure +death. "But," says the epitaph, after enumerating his titles, his +exploits, and his virtues, "fortune, who had hitherto been his good lady, +ungently turned her back upon him on such a day of such a year, and +_oppressed_ him"--an amusing instance of mingled courtesy and _naïveté_. +Ghent was our next resting place. The aspect of Ghent, so familiarized +to us of late by our travelled artists, made a strong impression upon +me, and I used to walk about for hours together, looking at the strange +picturesque old buildings coëval with the Spanish dominion, with their +ornamented fronts and peaked roofs. There is much trade here, many +flourishing manufactories, and the canals and quays often exhibited a +lively scene of bustle, of which the form, at least, was new to us. The +first exposition, or exhibition, of the newly-founded Royal Academy +of the Netherlands was at this season open. You will allow it was a +fair opportunity of judging of the present state of painting, in the +self-same land, where she had once found, if not a temple, at least +a home. + +MEDON. + +And learned to be homely--but the result? + +ALDA. + +I can scarce express the surprise I felt at the time, though it has +since diminished on reflection. All the attempts at historical painting +were bad, without exception. There was the usual assortment of Virgins, +St. Cecilias, Cupids and Psyches, Zephyrs and Floras;--but such +incomparable atrocities! There were some cabinet pictures in the same +style in which their Flemish ancestors excelled--such as small interior +conversation pieces, battle pieces, and flowers and fruit; some of these +were really excellent, but the proportion of bad to good was certainly +fifty to one. + +MEDON. + +Something like our own Royal Academy. + +ALDA. + +No; because with much which was quite as bad, quite as insipid, as +coarse in taste, as stupidly presumptuous in attempt, and ridiculous +in failure, as ever shocked me on the walls of Somerset House, there +was nothing to be compared to the best pictures I have seen there. As I +looked and listened to the remarks of the crowd around me, I perceived +that the taste for art is even as low in the Netherlands as it is here +and elsewhere. + +MEDON. + +And, surely, not from the want of models, nor from the want of facility +in the means of studying them. You visited, of course, Schamp's +collection? + +ALDA. + +Surely; there were miracles of art crowded together like goods in a +counting-house, with wondrous economy of space, and more lamentable +economy of light. Some were nailed against doors, inside and out, or +suspended from screens and window-shutters. Here I saw Rubens' picture +of Father Rutseli, the confessor of Albert and Isabella: one of those +heads more suited to the crown than to the cowl--grand, sagacious, +intellectual, with such a world of meaning in the eye, that one almost +shrunk away from the expression. Here, too, I found that remarkable +picture of Charles the First, painted by Lely during the king's +imprisonment at Windsor--the only one for which he sat between his +dethronement and his death: he is still melancholy and gentlemanlike, +but not quite so dignified as on the canvass of Vandyke. This is the +very picture that Horace Walpole mentions as lost or abstracted from the +collection at Windsor. How it came into Schamp's collection, I could +not learn. A very small head of an Italian girl by Correggio, or in his +manner, hung close beside a Dutch girl by Mieris: equally exquisite as +paintings, they gave me an opportunity of contrasting two styles, both +founded in nature--but the nature, how different! the one all life, +the other life and soul. Schamp's collection is liberally open to the +public, as well as many others; if artists fail, it is not for want +of models. + +MEDON. + +Perhaps for want of patronage? Yet I hear that the late king of the +Netherlands sent several young artists to Italy at his own expense, +and that the Prince of Orange was liberal and even munificent in his +purchases--particularly of the old masters. + +ALDA. + +When I went to see the collection of the Prince of Orange at Brussels, +I stepped from the room in which hung the glorious Vandykes, perhaps +unequalled in the world, into the adjoining apartment, in which were two +unfinished portraits disposed upon easels. They represented members of +the prince's family; and were painted by a native artist of fashionable +fame, and royally patronised. These were pointed out to my admiration as +universally approved. What shall I say of them? Believe me, that they +were contemptible beyond all terms of contempt! Can you tell me why the +Prince of Orange should have sufficient taste to select and appropriate +the finest specimens of art, and yet purchase and patronize the vilest +daubs ever perpetrated by imbecility and presumption? + +MEDON. + +I know not, unless it be that in the former case he made use of others' +eyes and judgment, and in the latter, of his own. + +ALDA. + +I might have anticipated the answer; but be that as it may, of all the +galleries I saw in the Netherlands, the small but invaluable collection +he had formed in his palace pleased me most. I remember a portrait of +Sir Thomas More, by Holbein. A female head, by Leonardo da Vinci, said +to be one of the mistresses of Francis I., but this is doubtful; that +most magnificent group, Christ delivering the keys to St. Peter, by +Rubens, once in England; about eight or ten Vandykes, masterpieces--for +instance, Philip IV. and his minister Olivarez, and a Chevalier le Roy +and his wife: all that you can imagine of chivalrous dignity, and +lady-like grace. But there was one picture, a family group, by Gonsalez, +which struck me more than all the rest put together. I had never seen +any production of this painter, whose works are scarcely known out of +Spain; and I looked upon this with equal astonishment and admiration. +There was also a small, but most curious collection of pictures, of +the ancient Flemish and German schools, which it is now the fashion +to admire, and, what is worse, to imitate. The word _fashion_ does +not express the national enthusiasm on this subject which prevails in +Germany. I can understand that these pictures are often most interesting +as historic documents, and often admirable for their literal transcripts +of nature and expression, but they can only possess comparative +excellence and relative value; and where the feeling of ideal beauty and +classic grace has been highly cultivated, the eye shrinks involuntarily +from these hard, grotesque, and glaring productions of an age when +genius was blindly groping amid the darkness of ignorance. To confess +the truth, I was sometimes annoyed, and sometimes amused, by the cant I +heard in Germany about those schools of painting which preceded Albert +Durer. Perhaps I should not say _cant_--it is a vile expression; and in +German affectation there is something so very peculiar--so poetical, +so--so _natural_, if I might say so, that I would give it another name +if I could find one. In this worship of their old painters, I really +could sympathize sometimes, even when it most provoked me. Retzsch, whom +I had the delight of knowing at Dresden, showed me a sketch, in which he +had ridiculed this mania with the most exquisite humour: it represented +the torso of an antique Apollo (emblematical of ideal grace), mutilated +and half buried in the earth, and subject to every species of profanation; +it serves as a stool for a German student, who, with his shirt-collar +turned down, and his hair dishevelled, and his cap stuck on one side, +_à la_ Rafaelle, is intently copying a stiff, hard, sour-looking old +Madonna, while Ignorance looks on, gaping with admiration. No one knows +better than Retzsch the value of these ancient masters--no one has a +more genuine feeling for all that is admirable in them; but no one feels +more sensibly the gross perversion and exaggeration of the worship paid +to them. I wish he would publish this good-humoured little bit of satire, +which is too just and too graceful to be called a caricature. + +I must tell you, however, that there were two most curious old pictures +in the Orange Gallery, which arrested my attention, and of which I have +retained a very distinct and vivid recollection; and that is more than I +can say of many better pictures. They tell, in a striking manner, a very +interesting story: the circumstances are said to have occurred about +the year 985, but I cannot say that they rest on any very credible +authority. + +Of these two pictures, each exhibits two scenes. A certain nobleman, a +favourite of the Emperor Otho, is condemned to death by his master on +the false testimony of the Empress (a sort of Potiphar's wife), who has +accused him of having tempted her to break her marriage vow. In the +back-ground we see the unfortunate man led to judgment; he is in his +shirt, bare-footed and bare-headed. His wife walks at his side, to whom +he appears to be speaking earnestly, and endeavouring to persuade her +of his innocence. A friar precedes them, and a crowd of people follow +after. On the walls of the city stand the Emperor and his wicked +Empress, looking down on the melancholy procession. In the foreground, +we have the dead body of the victim, stretched upon the earth, and the +executioner is in the act of delivering the head to his wife, who looks +grim with despair. The severed head and flowing blood are painted with +such a horrid and literal fidelity to nature, that it has been found +advisable to cover this portion of the picture. + +In the foreground of the second picture, the Emperor Otho is represented +on his throne surrounded by his counsellors and courtiers. Before him +kneels the widow of the Count: she has the ghastly head of her husband +in her lap, and in her left-hand she holds firmly and unhurt the +red-hot iron, the fiery ordeal by which she proves to the satisfaction +of all present the innocence of her murdered lord. The Emperor looks +thunderstruck; the Empress stands convicted, and is condemned to death; +and in the back-ground, we have the catastrophe. She is bound to a +stake, the fire is kindled, and she suffers the terrible penalty of +her crime. These pictures, in subject and execution, might be termed +tragico-comico-historical; but in spite of the harshness of the drawing, +and the thousand defects of style and taste, they fix the attention by +the vigour of the colouring and the expression of the heads, many of +which are evidently from the life. The story is told in a very complete +though very inartificial manner. The painter, Derick Steuerbout, was one +of the very earliest of the Flemish masters, and lived about 1468, many +years before Albert Durer and Holbein. I have heard that they were +painted for the city of Lorraine, and until the invasion of the French, +they remained undisturbed, and almost unnoticed, in the Hotel-de-Ville. + +MEDON. + +Does this collection of the Prince of Orange still exist at Brussels? + +ALDA. + +I am told that it does--that the whole palace, the furniture, the +pictures, remain precisely as the prince and his family left them: that +even down to the princess's work-box, and the portraits of her children +which hang in her boudoir, nothing has been touched. This does not speak +well for king Leopold's gallantry; and, in his place, I think I would +have sent the private property of my rival after him. + +MEDON. + +So would not I, for this is not the age of chivalry, but of common +sense. As to the pictures, the Belgians might plead that they were +purchased with the public money, therefore justly public property. No, +no; he should not have a picture of them--"If a Vandyke would save his +soul, he should not; I'd keep them, by this hand!" that is, as long as +I had a plausible excuse for keeping them; but the princess should have +had her work-box and her children by the first courier. What more at +Brussels? + +ALDA. + +I can recollect no more. The weather was sultry: we dressed, and dined, +and ate ices, and drove up and down the Allée Verte, and saw I believe +all that is to be seen--churches, palaces, hospitals, and so forth. We +went from thence to Aix-la-Chapelle and Spa. As it was the height of the +season, and both places were crowded with gay invalids, perhaps I ought +to have been very much amused, but I confess I was _ennuyée_ to death. + +MEDON. + +This I can hardly conceive; for though there might have been little to +amuse one of your turn of mind, there should have been much to observe. + +ALDA. + +There might have been matter for observation, or ridicule, or reflexion, +at the moment, but nothing that I remember with pleasure. Spa I disliked +particularly. I believe I am not in my nature cold or stern; but there +was something in the shallow, tawdry, vicious gaiety of this place, +which disgusted me. In all watering-places extremes meet; sickness and +suffering, youth and dissipation, beggary and riches, collect together; +but Spa being a very small town, a mere village, the approximation is +brought immediately under the eye at every hour, every moment; and the +beauty of the scenery around only rendered it more disagreeable: to me, +even the hill of Annette and Lubin was polluted. Our Chef de voyage, who +had visited Spa fifty years before, when on his _grand tour_, walked +about with great complacency, recalling his youthful pleasures, and +the days when he used to gallant his beautiful cousin, the Duchess of +Rutland, of divine memory. While the rest of the party were amused, I +fell into my old, habit of thinking and observing, and my contemplations +were not agreeable. But instead of dealing in these general remarks, +I will sketch you one or two pictures which have dwelt upon my memory. +We had a well-dressed laquais-de-place, whose honesty and good-humour +rendered him an especial favourite. His wife being ill, I went to see +her; to my great surprise he conducted me to a little mud hovel, worse +than the worst Irish cabin I ever heard described, where his wife lay +stretched upon some straw, covered with a rug, and a little neglected +ragged child was crawling about the floor, and about her bed. It seems +then, that, this poor man, who every day waited at our luxurious table, +dressed in smiles, and must habitually have witnessed the wasteful +expenditure of the rich, returned every night to his miserable home, +if home it could be called, to feel the stings of want with double +bitterness. He told me that he and his wife lived the greater part of +the year upon water-gruel, and that the row of wretched cabins, of which +his own formed one, was inhabited by those who, like himself, were +dependent upon the rich, extravagant, and dissipated strangers for the +little pittance which was to support them for a twelvemonth. Was not +this a fearful contrast? I should tell you that the benevolence of our +Chef rendered this poor couple independent of change or chance for the +next year. My other picture is in a different style. You know that +at Spa the theatre immediately joins the ball-room. As soon as the +performances are over, the parterre is laid down with boards, and in a +few minutes metamorphosed into a gambling saloon. One night curiosity +led me to be a spectator at one of the _rouge et noir_ tables. While I +was there, a Flemish lady of rank, the Baroness B----, came in, hanging +on the arm of a gentleman; she was not young, but still handsome. I had +often met her in our walks, and had been struck by her fine eyes, and +the amiable expression of her countenance. After one or two turns up +and down the room, laughing and talking, she carelessly, and as if from +a sudden thought, seated herself at the table. By degrees she became +interested in the game, her stakes became deeper, her countenance became +agitated, and her brow clouded. I left her playing. The next evening +when I entered, I found her already seated at the table, as indeed I had +anticipated. I watched her for some time with a painful interest. It was +evident that she was not an habitual gambler, like several others at the +same table, whose hard impassive features never varied with the variations +of the game. There was one little old withered skeleton of a woman, like +a death's head in artificial flowers, who stretched out her harpy claws +upon the rouleaus of gold and silver, without moving a muscle or a +wrinkle of her face,--with hardly an additional twinkle in her dull grey +eye. Not so my poor baroness, who became every moment more agitated and +more eager: her eyes sparkled with an unnatural keenness, her teeth +became set, and her lips drawn away from them, wore, instead of the +sweet smile which had at first attracted my attention, a grin of +desperation. Gradually, as I looked at her, her countenance assumed so +hideous, and, I may add, so vile an expression, that I could no longer +endure the spectacle. I hastened from the room--more moved, more shocked +than I can express; and often, since that time, her face has risen upon +my day and night dreams like a horrid supernatural mask. Her husband, +for this wretched woman was a wife and a mother, came to meet her a few +days afterwards, and accompany her home; but I heard that in the interval +she had attempted self-destruction, and failed. + +MEDON. + +The case is but too common; and even you, who are always seeking reasons +and excuses for the delinquencies of your sex, would hardly find them +here. + +ALDA. + +And unless I could know what were the previous habits and education +of the victim, through what influences, blest or unblest, her mind +had been trained, her moral existence built up--should I condemn? Who +had taught this woman self-knowledge?--who had instructed her in the +elements of her own being, and guarded her against her own excitable +temperament?--what friendly voice had warned her ignorance?--what secret +burden of misery--what joyless emptiness of heart--what fever of the +nerves--what weariness of spirit--what "thankless husband or faithless +lover" had driven her to the edge of the precipice? In this particular +case I know that the husband bore the character of being both negligent +and dissipated; and where was _he_,--what were his haunts and his +amusements, while his wife staked with her gold, her honour, her reason, +and her life? Tell me all this before we dare to pass judgment. O it is +easy to compute what is done! and yet, who but the Being above us all, +can know what is resisted? + +MEDON. + +You would plead then for a _female_ gambler? + +ALDA. + +Why do you lay such an emphasis upon _female_ gambler? In what respect +is a female gambler worse than one of your sex? The case is more +pitiable;--more rare--therefore, perhaps, more shocking; but why more +hateful? + +MEDON. + +You pose me. + +ALDA. + +Then I will leave you to think;--or shall I go on? for at this rate we +shall never arrive at the end of our journey. I was at Aix-la-Chapelle, +was I not? Well, I spare you the relics of Charlemagne, and if you have +any dear or splendid associations with that great name, spare your +imagination the shock it may receive in the cathedral at Aix, and leave +"Yarrow unvisited."[3] Luckily the theatre at Aix is beautiful, and +there was a fine opera, and a very perfect orchestra; the singers +tolerable. It was here I first heard the Don Juan and the Freyschutz +performed in the German fashion, and with German words. The Freyschutz +gave me unmixed pleasure. In the Don Juan I missed the recitative, +and the soft Italian flow of syllables, from which the music had been +divorced; so that the ear, long habituated to that marriage of sweet +sounds, was disappointed; but to listen without pleasure and excitement +was impossible. I remember that on looking round, after Donna Anna's +song, I was surprised to see our Chef de voyage bathed in tears; but, +no whit disconcerted, he merely wiped them away, saying, with a smile, +"It is the very prettiest, softest thing to cry to one's self!" +Afterwards, when we were in the carriage, he expressed his surprise that +any man should be ashamed of tears. "For my own part," he added, "when +I wish to enjoy the very high sublime of luxury, I dine alone, order a +mutton cutlet, _cuite à point_, with a bottle of Burgundy on one side, +and Ovid's epistle of Penelope to Ulysses on the other; and so I read, +and eat, and cry to myself. And then he repeated with enthusiasm-- + + "Hanc tua Penelope lento tibi mittit Ulysse: + Nil mihi rescribas attamen ipse veni;" + + +his eyes glistening as he recited the lines; he made me feel their +beauty without understanding a word of their sense. "Strangest, and +happiest of men!" I thought as I looked at him, "that after living +seventy years in this world, can still have tears to spare for the +sorrows of Penelope!" Well, our next resting place was Cologne. + +MEDON. + +You pause?--you have nothing to say of Cologne? No English traveller, +except your professed tourists and guide-book makers, ever has; of the +crowds who pass through the place, on their way up or down the Rhine, +how few spend more than a night or a day there! their walk is between +the Rheinberg and the cathedral; they look, perhaps, with a sneering +curiosity at the shrine of the Three Kings; cut the usual jests on the +Leda and the Cupid and Psyche;[4] glance at the St. Peter of Rubens; +lounge on the bridge of boats; stock themselves with eau-de-Cologne, and +then away! And yet this strange old city, which a bigoted priesthood, +a jealous magistracy, and a variety of historical causes, have so +long kept isolated in the midst of Europe, with its Roman origin, its +classical associations, the wild gothic superstitions of which it has +been the theatre; its legion of martyrs, its three kings and eleven +thousand virgins, and the peculiar manners and physiognomy of the people, +strangely take the fancy. What has become of its three hundred and fifty +churches, and its thirty thousand beggars?--Thirty thousand beggars! +Was there ever such a splendid establishment of licensed laziness, +and consecrated rags and wallets! What a magnificent idea does it give +one of the inexhaustible charity, and the incalculable riches of the +inhabitants! but the French came with their besom of purification +and destruction; and lo! the churches were turned into arsenals, the +convents into barracks; and from its old-accustomed haunts, "the genius +of beggary was with sighing sent." I really believe, that were I again +to visit Cologne, I would not be content with a mere superficial glance, +as heretofore. + +ALDA. + +And you would do well. To confess the truth, our first impressions of +the place were exceedingly disagreeable; it appeared a huge, rambling, +gloomy old city, whose endless narrow dirty streets, and dull +dingy-looking edifices, were any thing but inviting. Nor on a second +and a third visit were we tempted to prolong our stay. Yet Cologne has +since become most interesting to me from a friendship I formed with +a Colonese, a descendant of one of the oldest families of the place. +How she loved her old city!--how she worshipped every relic with the +most poetical, if not the most pious veneration!--how she looked +down upon Berlin with scorn, as an upstart city, "_une ville ma chére, +qui n'a ni histoire, ni antiquité_." The cathedral she used to call +"_mon Berceau_," and the three kings "_mes trois pères_." Her profound +knowledge of general history, her minute acquaintance with the local +antiquities, the peculiar customs, the wild legends, the solemn +superstitions of her birth-place, added to the most lively imagination +and admirable descriptive powers, were to me an inexhaustible source +of delight and information. It appears that the people of Cologne have +a distinct character, but little modified by intercourse with the +surrounding country, and preserved by continual intermarriages among +themselves. They have a dialect, and songs, and ballads, and music, +peculiar to their city; and are remarkable for an original vein of +racy humour, a revengeful spirit, an exceeding superstition, a blind +attachment to their native customs, a very decided contempt for +other people, and a surpassing hatred of all innovations. They never +admitted the jurisdiction of the electors of Cologne, and, although +the most bigoted people in the world, were generally at war with +their archbishops. Even Napoleon could not make them comformable. +The city is now attached to Prussia, but still retains most of its +ancient privileges, and all its ancient spirit of insubordination and +independence. When, in 1828, the king of Prussia wished to force upon +them an unpopular magistrate, the whole city rose, and obliged the +obnoxious president to resign; the government, armed with all its legal +and military terrors, could do nothing against the determined spirit +of this half-civilized, fearless, reckless, yet merry, good-humoured +populace. A history of this grotesque revolution, which had the same +duration as the celebrated _trois jours de Paris_, and exhibited in +its progress and issue some of the most striking, most characteristic, +most farcical scenes you can imagine, were worthy of a Colonese Walter +Scott. How I wish I could give you some of my friend's rich graphic +sketches and humorous pictures of popular manner! but I feel that their +peculiar spirit would evaporate in my hands. The event is celebrated in +their local history as "_la Revolution du Carnaval_:" and this reminds +me of another peculiarity of Cologne. The carnival is still celebrated +there with a degree of splendour and fantastic humour, exceeding even +the festivities of Rome and Naples in the present day; but as the season +of the carnival is not the season for flight with our English birds of +passage, few have ever witnessed these extraordinary Saturnalia. Such is +the general ignorance or indifference relative to Cologne, that I met +the other day with a very accomplished man, and a lover of art, who had +frequently visited the place, and yet he had never seen the Medusa. + +MEDON. + +Nor I, by this good light!--I never even heard of it! + +ALDA. + +And how shall I attempt to describe it? Unless I had the "large +utterance of the early gods," or could pour forth a string of Greek or +German compounds, I know not in what words I could do justice to the +effect it produced upon me. This wondrous mask measures about two feet +and a half in height;[5] the colossal features, and I may add, the +colossal expression, grand without exaggeration--so awfully vast, and +yet so gloriously beautiful; the full rich lips curled with disdain--the +mighty wings overshadowing the knit and tortured brow--the madness in +the large dilated eyes--the wreathing and recoiling snakes, came upon me +like something supernatural, and impressed me at once with astonishment, +horror, and admiration. I was quite unprepared for what I beheld. As I +stood before it my mind seemed to elevate and enlarge itself to admit +this new vision of grandeur. Nothing but the two Fates in the Elgin +marbles, and the Torso of the Vatican, ever affected me with the same +inexpressible sense of the sublime: and this is not a fragment of some +grand mystery, of which the remainder has been "to night and chaos +hurled;" it is entire, in admirable preservation, and the workmanship as +perfect as the conception is magnificent. I know not if it would have +affected another in the same manner. For me, the ghastly allegory of the +Medusa has a peculiar fascination. I confess that I have never wholly +understood it, nor have any of the usual explanations satisfied me; +it appears to me, that the Greeks, in thus blending the extremes of +loveliness and terror, had a meaning, a purpose, more than is dreamt +of by our philosophy. + +MEDON. + +But, how came this wonderful relic to Cologne, of all places in the +world? + +ALDA. + +It stopped there on its road to England. + +MEDON. + +By what perverse destiny?--was it avarice on our part, or force or fraud +on that of others? + +ALDA. + +It was, as Desdemona says, "our wretched fortune:" but the story, with +all its circumstances, does so much honour to human nature, that it +has half reconciled me to our loss. You must have heard of Professor +Wallraf of Cologne, one of the canons of the cathedral, who, with his +professorship and his canonship together, may have possessed from +five to seven hundred francs a year. He was one of those wonderful +and universal scholars, of whom we read in former times--men who +concentrated all their powers and passions, and intellectual faculties, +in the acquirement and advancement of knowledge, without any selfish aim +or object, and from the mere abstract love of science. Early in life +this man formed the resolution to remove from his native city the reproach +of self-satisfied ignorance and monastic prejudices, which had hitherto +characterized it; and in the course of a long existence of labour and +privation, as professor and teacher, he contrived to collect together +books, manuscripts, pictures, gems, works of art, and objects of natural +history, to an immense amount. In the year 1818, on recovering from +a dangerous illness, he presented his whole collection to his native +city; and the magistracy, in return, bestowed on him a pension of three +thousand francs for the remainder of his life. He was then more than +seventy. About the same time a dealer in antiquities arrived from Rome, +bringing with him this divine Medusa, with various other busts and +fragments: he was on his way to England, where he hoped to dispose of +them. He asked for his whole collection twelve thousand francs, and +refused to sell any part of it separately. The city refused to make the +purchase, thinking it too dear, and Wallraf, in despair at the idea +of this glorious relic being consigned to other lands, mortgaged his +yearly pension in order to raise the money, purchased the Medusa, +presented it to the city, and then cheerfully resumed his accustomed +life of self-denial and frugality. His only dread was lest he should die +before the period was expired. He lived, however, to pay off his debt, +and in three months afterwards he died.[6] Was not this admirable? The +first time I saw the Medusa I did not know this anecdote; the second +time, as I looked at it, I thought of Wallraf, and felt how much a moral +interest can add to the charm of what is in itself most perfect. + +MEDON. + +I will certainly make a pilgrimage to this Medusa. She must be worth +all the eleven thousand virgins together. What next? + +ALDA. + +Instead of embarking in the steam-boat, we posted along the left +bank of the Rhine, spending a few days at Bonn, at Godesberg, and at +Ehrenbreitstein; but I should tell you, as you allow me to diverge, that +on my second journey, I owed much to a residence of some weeks at Bonn. +There I became acquainted with the celebrated Schlegel, or I should +rather say, M. le Chevalier de Schlegel, for I believe his titles and +his "starry honours" are not indifferent to him; and in truth he wears +them very gracefully. I was rather surprised to find in this sublime +and eloquent critic, this awful scholar, whose comprehensive mind has +grasped the whole universe of art, a most agreeable, lively, social +being. Of the judgments passed on him in his own country, I know little, +and understand less; I am not deep in German literary polemics. To me +he was the author of the lectures on "Dramatic Literature," and the +translator of Shakspeare, and, moreover, all that was amiable and +polite: and was not this enough? + +MEDON. + +Enough for you, certainly; but, I believe that at this time Schlegel +would rather found his fame on being one of the greatest oriental +critics of the age, than on being the interpreter of the beauties of +Calderon and Shakspeare. + +ALDA. + +I believe so; but for my own part, I would rather hear him talk of +Romeo and Juliet, and of Madame de Staël, than of the Ramayana, the +Bhagvat-Gita, or even the "eastern Con-fut-zee." This, of course, is +only a proof of my own ignorance. Conversation may be compared to a lyre +with seven chords--philosophy, art, poetry, politics, love, scandal, +and the weather. There are some professors, who, like Paganini, "can +discourse most eloquent music" upon one string only; and some who can +grasp the whole instrument, and with a master's hand sound it from the +top to the bottom of its compass. Now, Schlegel is one of the latter: +he can thunder in the bass or caper in the treble; he can be a whole +concert in himself. No man can trifle like him, nor, like him, blend in +a few hours' converse, the critic, philologist, poet, philosopher, and +man of the world--no man narrates more gracefully, nor more happily +illustrates a casual thought. He told me many interesting things. "Do +you know," said he one morning, as I was looking at a beautiful edition +of Corinne, bound in red morocco, the gift of Madame de Staël; "do you +know that I figure in that book?" I asked eagerly in what character? +He bid me guess. I guessed playfully, the Comte d'Erfeuil. "No! no!" +said he, laughing, "I am immortalized in the Prince Castel-Forte, the +faithful, humble, unaspiring, friend of Corinne." + +MEDON. + +To any man but Schlegel, such an immortality were worth a life. Nay, +there is no man, though his fame extended to the ends of the earth, whom +the pen of Madame de Staël could not honour. + +ALDA. + +He seemed to think so, and I liked him for the self-complacency with +which he twined her little myrtle leaf with his own palmy honours. Nor +did he once refer to what I believe every body knows, her obligations to +him in her De l'Allemagne. + +MEDON. + +Apropos--do tell me what is the general opinion of that book among the +Germans themselves. + +ALDA. + +I think they do not judge it fairly. Some speak of it as eloquent, but +superficial:[7] others denounce it altogether as a work full of mistakes +and flippant, presumptuous criticism: others again affect to speak of +it, and even of Madame de Staël herself, as things of another era, quite +gone by and forgotten; this appeared to me too ridiculous. They forget, +or do not know, what _we_ know, that her De l'Allemagne was the first +book which awakened in France and England a lively and general interest +in German art and literature. It is now five-and-twenty years since it +was published. The march of opinion, and criticism, and knowledge of +every kind, has been so rapid, that much has become old which then was +new; but this does not detract from its merit. Once or twice I tried to +convince my German friends that they were exceedingly ungrateful in +abusing Madame de Staël, but it was all in vain; so I sat swelling with +indignation to hear my idol traduced, and called--O profanation!-- +"_cette Staël_." + +MEDON. + +But do you think the Germans could at all appreciate or understand such +a phenomenon as Madame de Staël must have appeared in those days? She +whisked through their skies like a meteor, before they could bring the +telescope of their wits to a right focus for observation. How she must +have made them open their eyes!--and you see in the correspondence +between Goethe and Schiller what _they_ thought of her. + +ALDA. + +Yes, I know that with her lively egotism and Parisian volubility, +she stunned Schiller and teased Goethe: but while our estimate of +_manner_ may be allowed to be relative and comparative, our estimate +of _character_ should be positive and abstract. Madame de Staël was +in manner the Frenchwoman, accustomed to be the cynosure of a salon, +but she was not ridiculous or egoiste in character. She was, to use +Schlegel's expression, "femme grande et magnanime jusque dans les replis +de son âme." The best proof is the very spirit in which she viewed +Germany, in spite of all her natural and national prejudices. To apply +your own expression, she went forth, in the spirit of peace, and brought +back, not only an olive leaf, but a whole tree, and it has flourished. +She had a universal mind. I believe she never thought, and still less +_made_, any one ridiculous in her life.[8] + +At Bonn much of my time was spent in intimate and almost hourly +intercourse with two friends, one of whom I have already mentioned to +you--a rare creature!--the other, who was herself the daughter of a +distinguished authoress,[9] was one of the most generally accomplished +women I ever met with. Opposed to each other in the constitution of +their minds--in all their views of literature and art, and all their +experience of life--in their tastes, and habits, and feelings--yet +mutually appreciating each other: both were distinguished by talents of +the highest order and by great originality of character, and both were +German, and very essentially _German_: English society and English +education would never have produced two such women. Their conversation +prepared me to form correct ideas of what I was to see and hear, and +guarded me against the mistakes and hasty conclusions of vivacious +travellers. At Bonn I also saw, for the first time, a specimen of the +fresco painting, lately revived in Germany with such brilliant success. +By command of the Prussian Board of Education the hall of the university +of Bonn is to be painted in fresco, and the work has been entrusted +to C. Hermann, Götzenberger, and Förster--all, I believe, pupils of +Cornelius. The three sides of the hall are to represent the three +faculties--Theology, Jurisprudence, and Philosophy; the first of these +is finished, and here is an engraving of it. You see Theology is throned +in the centre. The four evangelists, with St. Peter and St. Paul, stand +on the steps of the throne; around her are the fathers and doctors of +the church, and (which is the chief novelty of the composition) grouped +together with a very liberal disregard to all religious differences; +for there you see pope Gregory, and Ignatius Loyola, and St. Bernard, +and Abelard, and Dante; and here we have Luther, and Melanchthon, +and Calvin, and Wickliff, and Huss. On the opposite side of the hall, +Philosophy, under which head are comprised all science, poetry, and art, +is represented surrounded by the great poets, philosophers, and artists, +from Homer, Aristotle, and Phideas, down to Shakspeare, Raffaelle, +Goethe, and Kant. Jurisprudence, which is not begun, is to occupy the +third side. The cartoons pleased me better than the paintings, for the +drawing and grouping are really fine; but the execution struck me as +somewhat hard and mannered. I shall have much to say hereafter of the +fresco painting in Germany; for the present, proceed we on our journey. + +Tell me, had you a full moon while you were on the Rhine? + +MEDON. + +Truly, I forget. + +ALDA. + +Then you had _not_; for it would so have blended with your recollections, +that as a circumstance it could not have been forgotten; and take +my advice, when next you are off on your annual flight, consult the +calendar, and propitiate the fairest of all the fair Existences of +heaven to give you the light of her countenance. If you never took a +solitary ramble, or, what is better, a _tête-à-tête_ drive through the +villages and vineyards between Bonn and Plittersdorf, when the moon +hung over the Drachenfels, when the undulating outlines of the Seven +Mountains seemed to dissolve into the skies, and the Rhine was spread +out at their feet like a lake--so ample, and so still;--if you have +never seen the stars shine through the ruined arch of the Rolandseck, +and the height of Godesberg, with its single giant tower, stand out of +the plain,--black, and frowning against the silvery distance, then you +have not beheld one of the loveliest landscapes ever presented to a +thoughtful worshipper of nature. There is a story, too, connected with +the ruins of Godesberg:--one of those fine tragedies of real life, which +distance all fiction. It is not so popular as the celebrated legend +of the brave Roland, and his cloistered love; but it is at least +as authentic. You know that, according to tradition, the castle of +Godesberg was founded by Julian the Apostate; another, and a more +interesting apostate, was the cause of its destruction. + +Gerard[10] de Truchses, Count Waldbourg, who was archbishop and elector +of Cologne in 1583, scandalized his see, and all the Roman Catholic +powers, by turning Protestant. According to himself, his conversion was +owing to "the goodness of God, who had revealed to him the darkness and +the errors of popery;" but according to his enemies, it was owing to his +love for the beautiful Agnes de Mansfeld, canoness of Gersheim; she was +a daughter of one of the greatest Protestant houses in Germany; and her +two brothers, bigoted Calvinists, and jealous of the honour of their +family, conceived themselves insulted by the public homage which a +Catholic priest, bound by his vows, dared to pay to their sister. They +were yet more incensed on discovering that the love was mutual, and +loudly threatened vengeance to both. Gerard renounced the Catholic +faith, and the lovers were united. He was excommunicated and degraded, +of course; but he insisted on his right to retain his secular dominions +and privileges, and refused to resign the electorate, which the emperor, +meantime, had awarded to Ernest of Bavaria, bishop of Liege. The contest +became desperate. The whole of that beautiful and fertile plain, from +the walls of Cologne to the Godesberg, grew "familiar with bloodshed as +the morn with dew;" and Gerard displayed qualities which showed him more +fitted to win and wear a bride, than to do honour to any priestly vows +of sanctity and temperance. Attacked on all sides,--by his subjects, who +had learned to detest him as an apostate, by the infuriated clergy, and +by the Duke of Bavaria, who had brought an army to enforce his brother's +claims,--he carried on the struggle for five years, and at last, reduced +to extremity, threw himself, with a few faithful friends, into the +castle of Godesberg. After a brave defence, the castle was stormed and +taken by the Bavarians, who left it nearly in the state we now see it--a +heap of ruins. + +Gerard escaped with his wife, and fled to Holland, where Maurice, Prince +of Orange, granted him an asylum. Thence he sent his beautiful and +devoted wife to the court of Queen Elizabeth, to claim a former promise +of protection, and supplicate her aid, as the great support of the +Protestant cause, for the recovery of his rights. He could not have +chosen a more luckless ambassadress; for Agnes, though her beauty was +somewhat impaired by the persecutions and anxieties which had followed +her ill-fated union, was yet most lovely and stately, in all the pride +of womanhood; and her misfortunes and her charms, as well as the +peculiar circumstances of her marriage, excited the enthusiasm of all +the English chivalry. Unhappily the Earl of Essex was among the first to +espouse her cause with all the generous warmth of his character, and his +visits to her were so frequent, and his admiration so indiscreet, that +Elizabeth's jealousy was excited even to fury. Agnes was first driven +from the court, and then ordered to quit the kingdom. She took refuge in +the Netherlands, where she died soon afterwards; and Gerard, who never +recovered his dominions, retired to Strasbourg, where he died. So ends +this sad eventful history, which, methinks, would make a very pretty +romance. The tower of Godesberg, lasting as their love and ruined as +their fortunes, still remains one of the most striking monuments in that +land, where almost every hill is crowned with its castle, and every +castle has its tale of terror, or of love.[11] + +Another beautiful picture, which, merely as a picture, has dwelt on my +remembrance, was the city of Coblentz and the fort of Ehrenbreitstein, +as viewed from the bridge of boats under a cloudless moon. The city, +with its fantastic steeples and masses of building, relieved against +the clear deep blue of the summer sky--the lights which sparkled in the +windows reflected in the broad river, and the various forms and tall +masts of the craft anchored above and opposite--the huge hill, with its +tiara of fortifications, which, in the sunshine and in the broad day, +had disappointed me by its formality, now seen under the soft moonlight, +as its long lines of architecture and abrupt angles were projected in +brightness or receded in shadow, had altogether a most sublime effect. +But _apropos_ to moonlights and pictures--of all the enchanted and +enchanting scenes ever lighted by the full round moon, give me +Heidelberg! Not the Colosseum of Rome--neither in itself, nor yet in +Lord Byron's description, and I have both by heart--can be more grand; +and in moral interest, in poetical associations, in varying and wondrous +beauty, the castle of Heidelberg has the advantage. In the course of +many visits, Heidelberg became to me familiar as the face of a friend, +and its remembrance still "haunts me as a passion." I have known it +under every changeful aspect which the seasons, and the hours, and the +changeful moods of my own mind, could lend it. I have seen it when the +sun, rising over the Geisberg, first kindled the vapours as they floated +away from the old towers, and when the ivy and the wreathed verdure on +the walls sparkled with dewy light: and I have seen it when its huge +black masses stood against the flaming sunset; and its enormous shadow, +flung down the chasm beneath, made it night there, while daylight +lingered around and above. I have seen it when mantled in all the bloom +and foliage of summer, and when the dead leaves were heaped on the paths, +and choked the entrance to many a favourite nook. I have seen it when +crowds of gay visitors flitted along its ruined terraces,[12] and music +sounded near; and with friends, whose presence endeared every pleasure; +and I have walked alone round its desolate precincts, with no companions +but my own sad and troubled thoughts. I have seen it when clothed in +calm and glorious moonlight. I have seen it when the winds rushed +shrieking through its sculptured halls, and when grey clouds came +rolling down the mountains, folding it in their ample skirts from the +view of the city below. And what have I seen to liken to it by night or +by day, in storm or in calm, in summer or in winter! Then its historical +and poetical associations-- + +MEDON. + +There now!--will you not leave the picture, perfect as it is, and not +for ever seek in every object something more than is there? + +ALDA. + +I do not seek it--I find it. You will say--I have _heard_ you say--that +Heidelberg wants no beauty unborrowed of the eye; but if history had not +clothed it in recollections, fancy must have invested it in its own +dreams. It is true, that it is a mere modern edifice compared with all +the classic, and most of the gothic ruins; yet over Heidelberg there +hangs a terror and a mystery peculiar to itself: for the mind which +acquiesces in decay, recoils from destruction. Here ruin and desolation +make mocks with luxurious art and gay magnificence. Here it is not the +equal, gradual power of time, adorning and endearing what yet it spares +not, which has wrought this devastation, but savage war and elemental +rage. Twice blasted by the thunderbolt, three times consumed by fire, +ten times ravaged, plundered, desecrated by foes, and at last dismantled +and abandoned by its own princes, it is still strong to endure and +mighty to resist all that time, and war, and the elements may do against +it--and, mutilated rather than decayed, may still defy centuries. The +very anomalies of architecture and fantastic incongruities of this +fortress-palace, are to me a fascination. Here are startling and +terrific contrasts. That huge round tower--the tower of Frederic the +Victorious--now "deep trenched with thunder fires," looks as if built +by the Titans or the Huns; and those delicate sculptures in the palace +of Otho-Henry, as if the genius of Raffaelle or Correggio had breathed +on the stone. What flowing grace of outline! what luxuriant life! what +endless variety and invention in those half-defaced fragments! These are +the work of Italian artists, whose very names have perished;--all traces +of their existence and of their destinies so utterly lost, that one +might almost believe, with the peasantry, that these exquisite remains +are not the work of mortal hands, but of fairies and spirits of air, +evoked to do the will of an enchanter. The old palatines, the lords of +Heidelberg, were a magnificent and magnanimous race. Louis III., +Frederic the Victorious, Frederic II., Otho-Henry, were all men who had +stepped in advance of their age. They could think as well as fight, in +days when fighting, not thinking, was the established fashion among +potentates and people. A liberal and enlightened spirit, and a love of +all the arts that humanise mankind, seem to have been hereditary in +this princely family. Frederic I. lay under the suspicion of heresy +and sorcery, in consequence of his tolerant opinions, and his love of +mathematics and astronomy. His personal prowess, and the circumstance +of his never having been vanquished in battle, gave rise to the report, +that he was assisted by evil demons; and for years, both before and +after his accession, he was under the ban of the secret tribunal. +Heidelberg was the scene of some of the mysterious attacks on his life, +but they were constantly frustrated by the fidelity of his friends, and +the watchful love of his wife. + +It was at Heidelberg this prince celebrated a festival, renowned +in German history, and, for the age in which it occurred, most +extraordinary. He invited to a banquet all the factious barons whom he +had vanquished at Seckingen, and who had previously ravaged and laid +waste great part of the palatinate. Among them were the Bishop of Metz +and the Margrave of Baden. The repast was plentiful and luxurious, but +there was no bread. The warrior guests looked round with surprise +and inquiry. "Do you ask for bread?" said Frederic, sternly; "you, +who have wasted the fruits of the earth, and destroyed those whose +industry cultivates it? There is no bread. Eat and be satisfied; and +learn henceforth mercy to those who put the bread into your mouths." +A singular lesson from the lips of an iron-clad warrior of the middle +ages. + +It was Frederic II. and his nephew Otho-Henry, who enriched the library, +then the first in Europe next to the Vatican, with treasures of +learning, and who invited painters and sculptors from Italy to adorn +their noble palace with the treasures of art. In less than one hundred +years those beautiful creations were defaced or utterly destroyed, and +all the memorials and records of their authors are supposed to have +perished at the time when the ruthless Tilly stormed the castle, and the +archives and part of the library of precious MSS. were taken to litter +his dragoons' horses, during a transient scarcity of straw.[13]--You +groan! + +MEDON. + +The anecdote is not new to me; but I was thinking, at the moment, of a +pretty phrase in the letters of the Prince de Ligne, "la guerre--c'est +un malheur--mais c'est le plus beau des malheurs." + +ALDA. + +O if there be any thing more terrific, more disgusting, than war and +its consequences, it is that perversion of all human intellect--that +depravation of all human feeling--that contempt or misconception of every +Christian precept, which has permitted the great, and the good, and the +tenderhearted, to admire war as a splendid game--a part of the poetry +of life--and to defend it as a glorious evil, which the very nature and +passions of man have ever rendered, and will ever render, necessary and +inevitable. Perhaps the idea of human suffering--though when we think +of it in detail it makes the blood curdle--is not so bad as the general +loss to humanity, the interruption to the progress of thought in the +destruction of the works of wisdom or genius. Listen to this magnificent +sentence out of the volume now lying open before me--"Who kills a man, +kills a reasonable creature--God's image; but he who destroys a good +book, kills reason itself. Many a man lives a burthen to the earth, but +a good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit embalmed and +treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life. It is true, no age can +restore a life, whereof perhaps there is no great loss: and revolutions +of ages do not oft recover the loss of rejected truth, for the want of +which whole nations fare the worse; therefore we should be wary how we +spill the seasoned life of man preserved and stored up in books." + +MEDON. + +"Methinks we do know the fine Roman hand." Milton, is it not? + +ALDA. + +Yes; and after this, think of Milton's Areopagitica, or his Paradise +Lost, under the hoofs of Tilly's dragoon horses, or feeding the fishes +in the Baltic! It might have happened had he written in Germany instead +of England. + +MEDON. + +Do you forget that the cause of the thirty years war was a woman? + +ALDA. + +A woman and religion; the two best or worst things in the world, +according as they are understood and felt, used and abused. You allude +to Elizabeth of Bohemia, who was to Heidelberg what Helen was to Troy? + +One of the most interesting monuments of Heidelberg, at least to an +English traveller, is the elegant triumphal arch raised by the palatine +Frederic V. in honour of his bride--this very Elizabeth Stuart. I well +remember with what self-complacency and enthusiasm our Chef walked about +in a heavy rain, examining, dwelling upon every trace of this celebrated +and unhappy woman. She had been educated at his country-seat, and one +of the avenues of his magnificent park yet bears her name. On her +fell a double portion of the miseries of her fated family. She had the +beauty and the wit, the gay spirits, the elegant tastes, the kindly +disposition, of her grandmother, Mary of Scotland. Her very virtues as +a wife and a woman, not less than her pride and feminine prejudices, +ruined herself, her husband, and her people. When Frederick hesitated to +accept the crown of Bohemia, his high-hearted wife exclaimed--"Let me +rather eat dry bread at a king's table than feast at the board of an +elector;" and it seemed as if some avenging demon hovered in the air, +to take her literally at her word, for she and her family lived to +eat dry bread--aye, and to beg it before they ate it; but she _would_ +be a queen. Blest as she was in love, in all good gifts of nature and +fortune, in all means of happiness, a kingly crown was wanting to +complete her felicity, and it was cemented to her brow with the blood of +two millions of men. And who was to blame? Was not her mode of thinking +the fashion of her time, the effect of her education? Who had + + "Put in her tender heart the aspiring flame + Of golden sovereignty?" + + +For how many ages will you men exclaim against the mischiefs and +miseries, caused by the influence of women; thus allowing the influence, +yet taking no thought how to make that influence a means of good, +instead of an instrument of evil! + +Elizabeth had brought with her from England some luxurious tastes, as +yet unknown in the palatinate; she had been familiarized with the dramas +of Shakspeare and Fletcher, and she had figured in the masques of Ben +Jonson. To gratify her, Frederic added to the castle of Heidelberg the +theatre and banqueting-room, and all that beautiful group of buildings +at the western angle, the ruins of which are still called the _English +palace_. She had inherited from her grandmother, or had early imbibed +from education, a love of nature and of amusements in the open air, +and a passion for gardening; and it was to please her, and under her +auspices, that Frederic planned those magnificent gardens, which were +intended to unite within their bounds, all that nature could contribute +or art devise; had they been completed, they would have rendered +Heidelberg a pleasure-palace, fit for fairy-land. Nor were those designs +unworthy of a prosperous and pacific sovereign, whose treasury was +full, whose sway was just and mild, whose people had long enjoyed in +tranquillity the fruits of their own industry. When I had the pleasure +of spending a few days with the Schlossers, at their beautiful seat +on the Necker, (Stift Neuburg,) I went over the ground with Madame de +Schlosser, who had seen and studied the original plans. Her description +of the magnitude and the sumptuous taste of these unfinished designs, +while we stood together amid a wilderness of ruins, was a commentary on +the vicissitudes of this world, worth fifty moral treatises, and as many +sermons. + + "For in the wreck of IS and WAS, + Things incomplete and purposes betray'd, + Make sadder transits o'er Truth's mystic glass, + Than noblest objects utterly decay'd." + + +Close to the ruins of poor Elizabeth's palace, there where the effigies +of her handsome husband, and his bearded ancestor Louis V. look down +from the ivy-mantled wall, you remember the beautiful terrace towards +the west? It is still,--after four centuries of changes, of disasters, +of desolation,--the garden of Clara. When Frederic the Victorious +assumed the sovereignty, in a moment of danger and faction, he took, +at the same time, a solemn vow never to marry, that the rights of his +infant nephew, the son of the late palatine, should not be prejudiced, +nor the peace of the country endangered by a disputed succession. He +kept his oath religiously, but at that very time he loved Clara Dettin +de Wertheim, a young girl of plebeian origin, and a native of Augsburg, +whose musical talents and melody of voice had raised her to a high +situation in the court of the late princess palatine. Frederick, with +the consent of his nephew, was united to Clara by a left-hand marriage, +an expedient still in use in Germany, and, I believe, peculiar to its +constitution; such a marriage is valid before God and man, yet the wife +has no acknowledged rights, and the offspring no supposed existence. +Clara is celebrated by the poets and chroniclers of her time, and +appears to have been a very extraordinary being in her way. In that age +of ignorance, she had devoted herself to study--she could sympathize in +her husband's pursuits, and share the toils of government--she collected +round her the wisest and most learned men of the time--she continued to +cultivate the beautiful voice which had won the heart of Frederic, and +her song and her lute were always ready to soothe his cares. Tradition +points out the spot where it is said she loved to meditate, and, looking +down upon the little hamlet, on the declivity of the hill, to recall +her own humble origin; that little hamlet, embowered in foliage, and +the remembrance of Clara, have survived the glories of Heidelberg. Her +descendants became princes of the empire, and still exist in the family +of Lowenstein. + +Then, for those who love the marvellous, there is the wild legend of +the witch Jetta, who still flits among the ruins, and bathes her golden +tresses in the Wolfsbrunnen; but why should I tell you of these +tales--you, whose head is a sort of black-letter library? + +MEDON. + +True; but it is pleasant to have one's old recollections taken down +from their shelves and dusted, and placed in a new light; only do not +require, even if I again visit Heidelberg, that I should see it as you +have beheld it, with your quick spirit of association, and clothed in +the hues of your own individual mind. While you speak, it is not so much +the places and objects you describe, as their reflection in your own +fancy, which I see before me; and every different mind will reflect them +under a different aspect. Then, where is truth? you say. If we want +information as to mere facts--the situation of a town, the measurement +of a church, the date of a ruin, the catalogue of a gallery--we can go +to our dictionaries and our _guides des voyageurs_. But if, besides form +and outline, we must have colouring too, we should remember that every +individual mind will paint the scene with its own proper hues; and if +we judge of the mind and the objects it represents relatively to each +other, we may come at the truth, not otherwise. I would ask nothing of +a traveller, but accuracy and sincerity in the expression of his +opinions and feelings. I have then a page out of the great book of human +nature--the portrait of a particular mind; when that is fairly before me +I have a standard by which to judge: I can draw my own inferences. Will +you not allow that it is possible to visit Heidelberg, and to derive +the most intense pleasure from its picturesque beauty, without dreaming +over witches and warriors, palatines and princes? Can we not admire and +appreciate the sculpture in the palace of Otho-Henry, without losing +ourselves in vague, wondering reveries over the destinies of the +sculptors? + +ALDA. + +Yes; but it is amusing, and not less instructive, to observe the +manner in which the individual character and pursuits shall modify the +impressions of external things; only we should be prepared for this, as +the pilot makes allowance for the variation of the needle, and directs +his course accordingly. It is a mistake to suppose that those who cannot +see the imaginative aspect of things, see, therefore, the only true +aspect; they only see one aspect of the truth. _Vous étes orfêvre, +Monsieur Josse_, is as applicable to travellers as to every other +species of egotist. + +Once, in an excursion to the north, I fell into conversation with a +Sussex farmer, one of that race of sturdy, rich, and independent +English yeomen, of which I am afraid few specimens remain: he was quite +a character in his way. I must sketch him for you; but only Miss Mitford +could do him justice. His coat was of the finest broad-cloth; his +shirt-frill, in which was stuck a huge agate pin, and his neckcloth, were +both white as the snow; his good beaver shone in all its pristine gloss, +and an enormous bunch of gold seals adorned his watch-chain; his voice +was loud and dictatorial, and his language surprisingly good and flowing, +though tinctured with a little coarseness and a few provincialisms. He +had made up his mind about the Reform Bill--the Catholic Question--the +Corn Laws--and about things in general, and things in particular; he +had doubts about nothing: it was evident that he was accustomed to lay +down the law in his own village--that he was the tyrant of his own +fire-side--that his wife was "his horse, his ox, his ass, his any thing," +while his sons went to college, and his daughters played on the piano. +London was to him merely a vast congregation of pestilential vapours--a +receptacle of thieves, cut-throats and profligates--a place in which no +sensible man, who had a care for his life, his health, or his pockets, +would willingly set his foot; he thanked God that he never spent but two +nights in the metropolis, and at intervals of twenty-seven years: the +first night he had passed in the streets, in dread of fire and vermin; +and on the last occasion, he had not ventured beyond Smithfield. What he +did not know, was to him not worth knowing; and the word _French_, which +comprised all that was foreign, he used as a term, expressing the most +unbounded abhorrence, pity, and contempt. I should add, that though +rustic, and arrogant, and prejudiced, he was not vulgar. We were at +an inn, on the borders of Leicestershire, through which we had both +recently travelled; my farmer was enthusiastic in his admiration of +the country. "A fine country, madam--a beautiful country--a splendid +country!" + +"Do you call it a fine country?" said I, absently, my head full of the +Alps and Appenines, the Pyrenean, and the river Po. + +"To be sure I do; and where would you see a finer?" + +"I did not see any thing very picturesque," said I. + +"_Picturesque!_" he repeated with some contempt; "I don't know what +_you_ call picturesque; but _I_ say, give me a soil, that when you turn +it up you have something for your pains; the fine soil makes the fine +country, madam!" + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE AND CHARACTER. + + + + +II. + + +MEDON. + +I observed the other evening, that in making a sort of imaginative bound +from Coblentz to Heidelberg, you either skipped over Frankfort, or left +it on one side. + +ALDA. + +Did I?--if I had done _either_, in my heart or my memory, I had been +most ungrateful; but I thought you knew Frankfort well. + +MEDON. + +I was there for two days, on my way to Switzerland, and it rained the +whole time from morning till night. I have a vision in my mind of +dirty streets, chilly houses, dull shops, dingy-looking Jews, dripping +umbrellas, luxurious hotels, and exorbitant charges,--and this is all +I can recollect of Frankfort. + +ALDA. + +Indeed!--I pity you. To me it was associated only with pleasant +feelings, and, in truth, it is a pleasant place. Life, there, appears in +a very attractive costume: not in a half-holiday, half-beggarly garb, as +at Rome and Naples; nor in a thin undress of superficial decency as at +Berlin; nor in a court domino, hiding, we know not what--as at Vienna +and Munich; nor half motley, half military, as at Paris; nor in rags +and embroidery, as in London; but at Frankfort all the outside at least +is fair, substantial, and consistent. The shops vie in splendour with +those of London and Paris; the principal streets are clean, the houses +spacious and airy, and there is a general appearance of cheerfulness and +tranquillity, mingled with the luxury of wealth and the bustle of +business, which, after the misery, and murmuring, and bitterness of +faction, we had left in London, was really a relief to the spirits. +It is true, that during my last two visits, this apparent tranquillity +concealed a good deal of political ferment. The prisons were filled +with those unfortunate wretches who had endeavoured to excite a popular +tumult against the Prussian and Austrian governments. The trials were +going forward every day, but not a syllable of the result transpired +beyond the walls of the Römer Saal. Although the most reasonable and +liberal of the citizens agreed in condemning the rashness and folly of +these young men, the tide of feeling was evidently in their favour: for +instance, it was not the _fashion_ to invite the Prussian officers, and +I well remember that when Goethe's Egmont was announced at the theatre, +it was forbidden by the magistracy, from a fear that certain scenes and +passages in that play might call forth some open and decided expression +of the public feeling; in fact, only a few evenings before, some +passages in the Massaniello had been applied and applauded by the +audience, in a manner so _ill-bred_, that the wife of one of the +ministers of the Holy Alliance, rose and left her box, followed by some +other old women,--male and female. The theatre is rather commodious than +splendid; the established company, both for the opera and the regular +drama, excellent, and often varied by temporary visits of great actors +and singers from the other theatres of Germany. On my first visit to +Frankfort, which was during the fair of 1829, Paganini, then in the +zenith of his glory, was giving a series of concerts; but do not ask +me any thing about him, for it is a worn-out subject, and you know I am +not one of the enthusiastic, or even the orthodox, with regard to his +merits. + +MEDON. + +You do not mean--you will not tell me--that with all your love of music, +you were insensible to the miraculous powers of that man? + +ALDA. + +I suppose they were miraculous, as I heard every one say so round me; +but I listened to him as to any other musician, for the sake of the +pleasure to be derived from music, not for the sake of wondering at +difficulties overcome, and impossibilities made possible--they might +have remained impossibilities for me. But insensible I was _not_ to +the wondrous charm of his tone and expression. I was thrilled, melted, +excited, at the moment, but it left no relish on the palate, if I may +use the expression. To throw me into such _convulsions_ of enthusiasm, +as I saw this man excite here and on the continent, I must have the +orchestra with all its various mingling world of sound, or the _divine_ +human voice breathing music and passion together; but this is a matter +of feeling, habit, education, like all other tastes in art. + +I think it was during our third visit to Frankfort that Madame +Haitzinger-Neumann was playing the _gast-rolles_, for so they courteously +denominate the parts filled by occasional visitors, to whom, as guests, +the precedence is always given. Madame Haitzinger is the wife of +Haitzinger, the tenor singer, who was in London, and sung in the Fidelio, +with Madame Devrient-Schroeder. She is one of the most celebrated +actresses in Germany for light comedy, if any comedy in Germany can be +called light, in comparison with the same style of acting in France or +England. Her figure is rather large-- + +MEDON. + +Like most of the German actresses--for I never yet saw one who had +attained to celebrity, who was not much too _embonpoint_ for our ideas +of a youthful or sentimental heroine-- + +ALDA. + +Not Devrient-Schroeder? + +MEDON. + +Devrient is all impassioned grace; but I think that in time even _she_ +will be in danger of becoming a little--how shall I express it with +sufficient delicacy?--a _little_ too substantial. + +ALDA. + +No, not if a soul of music and fire, informing a feverish, excitable +temperament, which is to the mantling spirit within, what the +high-pitched instrument is to the breeze which sweeps over its +chords,--not if these can avert the catastrophe; but what if you had +seen Mademoiselle Lindner, with a figure like Mrs. Liston's--all but +spherical--enacting Fenella and Clärchen? + +MEDON. + +I should have said, that only a German imagination could stand it! It +is one of Madame de Staël's clever aphorisms, that on the stage, "Il +faut menager les caprices des yeux avec le plus grand scrupule, car ils +peuvent detruire, sans appel tout effet sérieux;" but the Germans do not +appear to be subject to these _caprices des yeux_; and have not these +fastidious scruples about corporeal grace; for them sentiment, however +clumsy, is still sentiment. Perhaps they are in the right. + +ALDA. + +And Mademoiselle Lindner _has_ sentiment; she must have been a fine +actress, and is evidently a favourite with the audience. But to return +to Madame Haitzinger;--she is handsome, with a fair complexion, and no +very striking expression; but there is a heart and soul, and mellowness +in her acting, which is delicious. I could not give you an idea of her +manner by a comparison with any of our English actresses, for she is +essentially German; she never aimed at making points; she was never +broadly arch or comic, but the general effect was as rich as it was true +to nature. I saw her in some of her favourite parts: in the comedy of +"Stille Wasser sind tief;" (our Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, admirably +adapted to the German stage by Schroeder;) in the "Mirandolina," +(the famous Locandiera of Goldoni,) and in the pretty lively vaudeville +composed for her by Holtei, "Die Wiener in Berlin," in which the popular +waltzes and airs, sung in the genuine national spirit, and enjoyed by +the audience with a true national zest, delighted us _foreigners_. +Herr Becker is an excellent actor in tragedy and high comedy. Of their +singers I could not say so much--there were none I should account +first-rate, except Dobler, whom you may remember in England. + +One of the most delightful peculiarities of Frankfort, one that most +struck my fancy, is the public garden, planted on the site of the +ramparts; a girdle of verdure and shade--of trees and flowers circling +the whole city; accessible to all and on every side,--the promenade of +the rich, the solace of the poor. Fifty men are employed to keep it in +order, and it is forbidden to steal the flowers, or to kill the singing +birds which haunt the shrubberies. + +MEDON. + +And does this prohibition avail much in a population of sixty thousand +persons? + +ALDA. + +It does generally. A short time before we arrived some mischievous +wretch had shot a nightingale, and was caught in the fact. His +punishment was characteristic; his hands were tied behind him, and +a label setting forth his crime was fixed on his breast: in this guise, +with a police officer on each side, he was marched all round the +gardens, and made the circuit of the city, pursued by the hisses of +the populace and the abhorrent looks of the upper classes; he was not +otherwise punished, but he never again made his appearance within the +walls of the city. This was the only instance which I could learn of +the infraction of a law which might seem at least nugatory. + +Of the spacious, magnificent, well-arranged cemetery, its admirable +apparatus for restoring suspended animation, and all its beautiful +accompaniments and memorials of the dead, there was a long account +published in London, at the time that a cemetery was planned for this +great overgrown city; and in truth I know not where we could find a +better model than the one at Frankfort; it appeared to me perfection. + +The institutions at Frankfort, both for charity and education, are +numerous as becomes a rich and free city; and those I had an opportunity +of examining appeared to me admirably managed. Besides the orphan schools, +and the Burger schule, and the school for female education, established +and maintained by the wives of the citizens, there are several infant +schools, where children of a year old and upwards are nursed, and fed, +and kept out of mischief and harm, while their parents are at work. +These are also maintained by subscription among the ladies, who take +upon them in turns the task of daily superintendence; and I shall not +easily forget the gentle-looking, elegant, well-dressed girl, who, +defended from the encroachments of dirty little paws by a large apron, +sat in the midst of a swarm of thirty or forty babies, (the eldest not +four years old,) the very personification of feminine charity! But +the hospital for the infirm poor--Das Versorgung Haus--pleased me +particularly; 'tis true, that the cost was not a third--what do I say? +not a sixth of the expense of some of our institutions for the same +purpose. There was no luxury of architecture, nor huge gates shutting +in wretchedness, and shutting out hope; nor grated windows; nor were the +arrangements on so large a scale as in that splendid edifice, the Hopital +des Vieillards, at Brussels;--a house for the poor need not be either a +prison or a palace. But here, I recollect, the door opened with a latch; +we entered unannounced, as unexpected. Here there was perfect neatness, +abundance of space, of air, of light, of water, and also of occupation. +I found that, besides the inmates of the place, many poor old creatures, +who could not have the facilities or materials for work in their own +dwellings, or whose relatives were busied in the daytime, might find +here employment of any kind suited to their strength or capacity,--for +which, observe, they were paid; thus leaving them to the last possible +moment the feeling of independence and usefulness. I observed that many +of those who seemed in the last stage of decrepitude had hung round +their beds sundry little prints and pictures, and slips of paper, on +which were written legibly, texts from scripture, moral sentences, and +scraps of poetry. The ward of the superannuated and the sick was at a +distance from the working and eating rooms; and all breathed around +that peace and quiet which should accompany old age, instead of that +"life-consuming din" I _have_ heard in such places. On the pillow of +one bed, there was laid by some chance a bouquet of flowers. + +In this ward there was an old man nearly blind and lethargic; another +old man was reading to him. I remarked a poor bed-ridden woman, utterly +helpless, but not old, and with good and even refined features; and +another poor woman, seated by her, was employed in keeping the flies +from settling on her face. To one old woman, whose countenance struck +me, I said a few words in English--I could speak no German, unluckily. +She took my hand, kissed it, and turning away, burst into tears. No one +asked for any thing even by a look, nor apparently wanted any thing; and +I felt that from the unaffected good-nature of the lady who accompanied +us, we had not so much the appearance of coming to look at the poor +inmates as of paying them a kind visit;--and this was as it should +be. The mild, open countenances of the two persons who managed the +establishment, pleased me particularly; and the manner of the matron +superintendent, as she led us over the rooms, was so simple and kind, +that I was quite at ease: I experienced none of that awkward shyness +and reluctance I have felt when ostentatiously led over such places in +England--feeling ashamed to stare upon the misery I could not cure. In +such cases I have probably attributed to the sufferers a delicacy or a +sensibility, long blunted, if ever possessed; but I was in pain for them +and for myself. + +One thing more: there was a neat chapel; and we were shown with some +pride the only piece of splendour in the establishment. The communion +plate of massy silver was the gift of two brothers, who had married +on the same day two sisters; and these two sisters had died nearly at +the same time--I believe it was actually on the same day. The widowed +husbands presented this plate in memory of their loss and the virtues +of their wives; and I am sorry I did not copy the simple and affecting +inscription in which this is attested. There was also a silver vase, +which had been presented as an offering by a poor miller whom an +unexpected legacy had raised to independence. + +I might give you similar sketches of other institutions, here and +elsewhere, but I did not bestow sufficient attention on the practical +details, and the comparative merits of the different methods adopted, +to render my observations useful. Though deeply interested, as any +feeling, thinking being must be on such subjects, I have not studied +them sufficiently. There are others, however, who are doing this better +than I could:--blessings be on them, and eternal praise!--My general +impression was, pleasure from the benevolence and simplicity of heart +with which these institutions were conducted and superintended, and +wonder, not to be expressed, at their extreme cheapness. + +The day preceding my visit to the Versorgung Haus, I had been in a fever +of indignation at the fate of poor R----, one of the conspirators, who +had become insane from the severity of his confinement. I had descanted +with great complacency on our open tribunals and our trials by jury, and +yet I could not help thinking to myself, "Well, if _we_ have not their +state-prisons, neither have _they_ our poor-houses!" + +MEDON. + +It is plain that the rich, charitable, worldly prosperous, self-seeking, +Frankfort, would be your chosen residence after all! + +ALDA. + +No--as a fixed residence I should not prefer Frankfort. There is a +little too much of the pride of purse--too much of the aristocracy of +wealth--too much dressing and dinnering--and society is too much broken +up into sets and circles to please me: besides, it must be confessed, +that the arts do not flourish in this free imperial city. + +The Städel Museum was opened just before our last visit to Frankfort. +A rich banker of that name bequeathed, in 1816, his collection of +prints and pictures, and nearly a million and a half of florins, for +the commencement and maintenance of this institution, and they have +certainly begun on a splendid scale. The edifice in which the collection +is arranged is spacious, fitted up with great cost, and generally with +great taste, except the ceilings, which, being the glory and admiration +of the good people of Frankfort, I must endeavour to describe to you +particularly. The elaborate beauty of the arabesque ornaments, their +endless variety, and the vivid colouring and gilding, reminded me of some +of the illuminated manuscripts; but I was rather amused than pleased, +and rather surprised to see art and ornament so misplaced--invention, +labour, money, time, lavished to so little purpose. No effect was +aimed at--none produced. The strained and wearied eye wandered amid +a profusion of unmeaning forms, and of gorgeous colours, which never +harmonized into a whole: and after I had half broken my neck by looking +up at them through an opera glass, in order to perceive the elegant +interlacing of the minute patterns and exquisite finish of the +workmanship, I turned away laughing and provoked, and wondering at such +a strange perversion, or rather sacrifice, of taste. + +MEDON. + +But the collection itself?-- + +ALDA. + +It is not very interesting. It contains some curious old German +pictures; Städel having been, like others, smitten with the mania of +buying Van Eyks and Hemlings and Schoréels. Here, however, these old +masters, as part of a school, or history of art, are well placed. +There are a few fine Flemish paintings--and, in particular, a wondrous +portrait by Flinck, which you must see. It is a lady in black, on the +left side of the door--of--I forget which room--but you cannot miss +it: those soft eyes will look out at you, till you will feel inclined +to ask her name, and wonder the lips do not unclose to answer you. Of +first-rate pictures there are none--I mean none of the historical and +Italian schools: the collection of casts from the antique is splendid +and well-selected. + +MEDON. + +But Bethmann, the banker, had already set an example of munificent +patronage of art: when he shamed kings, for instance, by purchasing +Dannecker's Ariadne--one of the chief lions of Frankfort, if fame +says true. + +ALDA. + +How! have you not seen it? + +MEDON. + +No--unhappily. The weather, as I have told you, was dreadful. I was +discouraged--I procrastinated. That flippant observation I had read in +some English traveller, that "Dannecker's Ariadne looked as if it had +been cut out of old Stilton cheese," was floating in my mind. In short, +I was careless, as we often are, when the means of gratifying curiosity +appear secure, and within our reach. I repent me now. I wish I had +settled to my own satisfaction, and with mine own eyes, the disputed +merits of this famous statue; but I will trust to you. It ought to be +something admirable. I do not know much of Dannecker, or his works, but +by all accounts he has not to complain of the want of patronage. To him +cannot be applied the pathetic common-place, so familiar in the mouths +of our young artists, about "chill penury," the struggle to live, the +cares that "freeze the genial current of the soul," the efforts of +unassisted genius, and so forth. Want never came to him since he devoted +himself to art. He appears to have had leisure and freedom to give full +scope to his powers, and to work out his own creations. + +ALDA. + +Had he? Had he indeed? His own story would be different, I fancy. +Dannecker, like every patronized artist I ever met with, would execrate +patronage if he dared. Good old man! The thought of what he might have +done, and could have done, breaks out sometimes in the midst of all +his self-complacent _naïve_ exultation over what he _has_ done. I will +endeavour to give you a correct idea of the Ariadne, and then I will +tell you something of Dannecker himself. His history is a good +commentary upon royal patronage. + +I had heard so much of this statue, that my curiosity was strongly +excited. A part of its fame may be owing to its situation, and the +number of travellers who go to visit Bethmann's Museum, as a matter of +course. I used to observe that all travellers, who were on the road to +Italy, praised it, and all who were on their way home criticised it. +As I ascended the steps of the pavilion in which it is placed, the +enthusiasm of expectation faded away from my mind: I said to myself, +"I shall be disappointed!"--Yet I was not disappointed. + +The Ariadne occupied the centre of a cabinet, hung with a dark grey +colour, and illuminated by a high lateral window, so that the light and +shade, and the relief of the figure, were perfectly well managed and +effective. Dannecker has not represented Ariadne in her more poetical +and picturesque character, as, when betrayed and forsaken by Theseus, +she stood alone on the wild shore of Naxos, "her hair blown by the +winds, and all about her expressing desolation." It is Ariadne, immortal +and triumphant, as the bride of Bacchus. The figure is larger than life. +She is seated, or rather reclined, on the back of a panther. The right +arm is carelessly extended: the left arm rests on the head of the +animal, and the hand supports the drapery, which appears to have just +dropped from her limbs. The head is turned a little upwards, as if she +already anticipated her starry home; and her tresses are braided with +the vine leaves. The grace and ease of the attitude, so firm, and yet +so light; the flowing beauty of the form, and the position of the head, +enchanted me. Perhaps the features are not sufficiently _Greek_: for, +though I am not one of those who think all beauty comprised in the +antique models, and that nothing can be orthodox but the straight nose +and short upper lip, still to Ariadne the pure _classical_ ideal of +beauty, both in form and face, are properly in character. A cast from +that divine head, the Greek Ariadne, is placed in the same cabinet, and +I confess to you, that the contrast being immediately brought before the +eye, Dannecker's Ariadne seemed to want refinement, in comparison. It is +true, that the moment chosen by the German sculptor required an expression +altogether different. In the Greek bust, though already circled by the +viny crown, and though all heaven seems to repose on the noble arch of +that expanded brow, yet the head is declined, and a tender melancholy +lingers round the all-perfect mouth, as if the remembrance of a mortal +love--a mortal sorrow--yet shaded her celestial bridal hours, and made +pale her immortality. But, Dannecker's Ariadne is the flushed queen +of the Bacchante, and, in the clash of the cymbals and the mantling +cup, she has already forgotten Theseus. There is a look of life, an +individual truth in the beauty of the form, which distinguishes it from +the long-limbed vapid pieces of elegance called nymphs and Venuses, which + + "Stretch their white arms, and bend their marble necks," + + +in the galleries of our modern sculptors. One objection struck me, +but not till after a second or third view of the statue. The panther +seemed to me rather too bulky and ferocious. It is true, it is not a +natural, but a mythological panther, such as we see in the antique +basso-relievos, and the arabesques of Herculaneum: yet, methinks if +he appeared a little more conscious of his lovely burthen, more tamed +by the influence of beauty, it would have been better. However, the +sculptor may have had a design, a feeling, in this very point, which has +escaped me: I regret now that I did not ask him. One thing is certain, +that the extreme massiveness of the panther's limbs serves to give a +firmness to the support of the figure, and sets off to advantage its +lightness and delicacy. It is equally certain that if the head of the +animal had been ever so slightly turned, the pose of the right arm, and +with it the whole attitude, must have been altered. + +The window of the cabinet is so contrived, that by drawing up a blind +of stained glass, a soft crimson tint is shed over the figure, as if +the marble blushed. This did not please me: partly from a dislike to all +trickery in art; partly because, to my taste, the pale colourless purity +of the marble is one of the beauties of a fine statue. + +It is true that Dannecker has been unfortunate in his material. The +block from which he cut his figure is imperfect and streaky; but how it +could possibly have suggested the idea of _Stilton cheese_ I am at a loss +to conceive. It is not worse than Canova's Venus, in the Pitti palace, +who has a terrible black streak across her bosom. M. Passavant,[14] who +was standing by when I paid my last visit to the Ariadne, assured me, +that when the statue was placed on its pedestal, about sixteen years +ago, these black specks were scarcely visible, and that they seemed to +multiply and grow darker with time. This is a lamentable, and, to me, an +unaccountable fact. + +MEDON. + +And, I am afraid, past cure: but now tell me something of the sculptor +himself. After looking on a grand work of art, we naturally turn to look +into the mind which conceived and created it. + +ALDA. + +Dannecker, like all the great modern sculptors, sprung from the people. +Thorwaldson, Flaxman, Chantrey, Canova, Schadow, Ranch--I believe we may +go farther back, to Cellini, Bandinelli, Bernini, Pigalle--all I can at +this moment recollect, were of plebeian origin. When I was at Dresden, +I was told of a young count, of noble family, who had adopted sculpture +as a profession. This, I think, is a solitary instance of any person of +noble birth devoting himself to this noblest of the arts. + +MEDON. + +Do you forget Mrs. Darner and Lady Dacre? + +ALDA. + +No; but I do not think that either the exquisite modelling of Lady +Dacre, or the meritorious _attempts_ of Mrs. Damer, come under the head +of sculpture in its grand sense. By-the-bye, when Horace Walpole said +that Mrs. Damer was the first female sculptor who had attained any +celebrity, he forgot the Greek girl, Lala,[15] and the Properzia Rossi +of modern times. + +Dannecker was born at Stuttgardt in 1758. On him descended no hereditary +mantle of genius; it was the immediate gift of Heaven, and apparently +heaven-directed. His father was a groom in the duke's stable, and +appears to have been merely an ill-tempered, thick-headed boor. How +young Dannecker picked up the rudiments of reading and writing, he does +not himself remember; nor by what circumstances the bent of his fancy +and genius was directed to the fine arts. Like other great men, who have +been led to trace the progress of their own minds, he attributed to his +mother the first promptings to the fair and good, the first softening +and elevating influences which his mind acknowledged. He had neither +paper nor pencils; but next door to his father there lived a +stone-cutter, whose blocks of marble and free-stone were every day +scrawled over with rude imitations of natural objects in chalk or +charcoal--the first essays of the infant Dannecker. When he was beaten +by his father for this proof of idleness, his mother interfered to +protect or to encourage him. As soon as he was old enough, he assisted +his father in the stable; and while running about the precincts of the +palace, ragged and bare-foot, he appears to have attracted, by his +vivacity and alertness, the occasional notice of the duke himself. + +Duke Charles, the grandfather of the present king of Wurtemburg, had +founded a military school, called the Karl Schüle, (Charles' School,) +annexed to the Hunting Palace of the Solitude. At this academy, music and +drawing were taught as well as military tactics. One day, when Dannecker +was about thirteen, his father returned home in a very ill-humour, and +informed his family that the duke intended to admit the children of his +domestics into his new military school. The boy, with joyful eagerness, +declared his intention of going immediately to present himself as a +candidate. The father, with a stare of astonishment, desired him to +remain at home, and mind his business; on his persisting, he resorted to +blows, and ended by locking him up. The boy escaped by jumping out of +the window; and, collecting several of his comrades, he made them a long +harangue in praise of the duke's beneficence, then placing himself at +their head, marched them up to the palace, where the whole court was +assembled for the Easter festivities. On being asked their business, +Dannecker replied as spokesman--"Tell his highness the duke we want to +go to the Karl-schüle." One of the attendants, amused, perhaps, with +this juvenile ardour, went and informed the duke, who had just risen +from table. He came out himself and mustered the little troop before +him. He first darted a rapid scrutinizing glance along the line, then +selecting one from the number, placed him on his right-hand; then +another, and another, till only young Dannecker and two others remained +on his left. Dannecker has since acknowledged that he suffered for a few +moments such exquisite pain and shame at the idea of being rejected, +that his first impulse was to run away and hide himself; and that his +surprise and joy, when he found that he and his two companions were the +accepted candidates, had nearly overpowered him. The duke ordered them +to go the next morning to the Solitude, and then dismissed them. When +Dannecker returned home, his father, enraged at losing the services +of his son, turned him out of the house, and forbade him ever more to +enter it; but his mother (mother like) packed up his little bundle of +necessaries, accompanied him for some distance on his road, and parted +from him with blessings, and tears, and words of encouragement and love. + +At the Karl-schüle Dannecker made but little progress in his studies. +Nothing could be worse managed than this royal establishment. The inferior +teachers were accustomed to employ the poorer boys in the most servile +offices, and in this, so called, academy, he was actually obliged to +learn by stealth: but here he formed a friendship with Schiller, who, +like himself, was an ardent genius pining and writhing under a chilling +system; and the two boys, thrown upon one another for consolation, +became friends for life. Dannecker must have been about fifteen when +the Karl-schüle was removed from the Solitude to Stuttgard. He was then +placed under the tuition of Grubel, a professor of sculpture, and in the +following year he produced his first original composition. It was a Milo +of Crotona modelled in clay, and was judged worthy of the first prize. +Dannecker was at this time so unfriended and little known, that the +duke, who appears to have forgotten him, learnt with astonishment that +this nameless boy, the son of his groom, had carried off the highest +honours of the school from all his competitors. For a few years he +was employed in the duke's service in carving cornices, Cupids, and +caryatides, to ornament the new palaces at Stuttgard and Hohenheim: +this task-work, over which he often sighed, may possibly have assisted +in giving him that certainty and mechanical dexterity in the use of his +tools for which he is remarkable. About ten years were thus passed; he +then obtained permission to travel for his improvement with an allowance +of three hundred florins a-year from the duke. With these slender means +Dannecker set off for Paris on foot. There, for the first time, he had +opportunities of studying the living model. His enthusiasm for his art +enabled him to endure extraordinary privations of every kind; for out +of his little pension of £23 a-year he had not only to feed and clothe +himself, but to purchase all the materials for his art, and the means +of instruction; and this in an expensive capital, surrounded with +temptations which an artist and an enthusiastic young man finds it +difficult to withstand. He told me himself that day after day he has +studied in the Louvre dinnerless, and dressed in a garb which scarce +retained even the appearance of decency. He left Paris, after a two +years' residence, as simple in mind and heart as when he entered it, and +considerably improved in his knowledge of anatomy and in the technical +part of his profession. The treasures of the Louvre, though far inferior +to what they now are, had let in a flood of ideas upon his mind, among +which (as he described his own feelings) he groped as one bewildered and +intoxicated, amazed rather than enlightened. + +MEDON. + +But Dannecker must have been poor in spirit as in pocket--simple, +indeed, if he did not profit by the opportunities which Paris afforded +of studying human nature, noting the passions and their physiognomy, and +gaining other experiences most useful to an artist. + +ALDA. + +There I differ from you. Would you send a young artist--more particularly +a young sculptor--to study the human nature of London or Paris?--to +seek the ideal among shop-girls and opera-dancers? Or the sublime and +beautiful among the frivolous and degraded of one sex, the money-making +or the brutalized of the other? Is it from the man who has steeped his +youthful prime in vulgar dissipation, by way of "seeing life," as it is +called, who has courted patronage at the convivial board, that you shall +require that union of lofty enthusiasm and patient industry, which are +necessary, first to conceive the grand and the poetical, then consume +long years in shaping out his creation in the everlasting marble? + +MEDON. + +But how is the sculptor himself to live during those long years? It must +needs be a hard struggle. I have heard young artists say, that they have +been forced on a dissipated life merely as a means of "getting on in the +world," as the phrase is. + +ALDA. + +So have I. It is so base a plea, that when I hear it, I generally regard +it as the excuse for dispositions already perverted. The men who talk +thus are doomed: they will either creep through life in mediocrity and +dependence to their grave; or, at the best, if they have parts, as well +as cunning and assurance, they may make themselves the fashion, and make +their fortune; they may be clever portrait-painters and bust-makers, but +when they attempt to soar into the historical and ideal department of +their art, they move the laughter of gods and men; to them the higher, +holier fountains of inspiration are thenceforth sealed. + +MEDON. + +But think of the temptations of society! + +ALDA. + +I think of those who have overcome them. "Great men have been among us," +though they be rare. Have we not had a Flaxman? But the artist must +choose where he will worship. He cannot serve God and Mammon. That man +of genius who thinks he can tamper with his glorious gifts, and for a +season indulge in social excesses, stoop from his high calling to the +dregs of earth, abandon himself to the stream of common life, and trust +to his native powers to bring him up again;--O believe it, he plays a +desperate game!--one that in nearly ninety-nine cases out of a hundred +is fatal. + +MEDON. + +I begin to see your drift; but you would find it difficult to prove that +the men who executed those works, on which we now look with wonder and +despair, lived like anchorites, or were unexceptionable moral characters. + +ALDA. + +Will you not allow that they worked in a different spirit? Or do you +suppose that it was by the possession of some sleight-of-hand that these +things were performed?--That it was by some knack of chiselling, some +secret of colouring now lost, that a Phidias or a Correggio still remain +unapproached, and, as people will tell you, unapproachable? + +MEDON. + +They had a different nature to work from. + +ALDA. + +A different modification of nature, but not a different nature. Nature +and truth are one, and immutable, and inseparable as beauty and love. +I do maintain that, in these latter times, we have artists, who in +genius, in the power of looking at nature, and in manual skill, are +not beneath the great ancients, but their works are found wanting in +comparison; they have fallen short of the models their early ambition +set before them; and why?--because, having genius, they want the moral +grandeur that should accompany it, and have neglected the training of +their own minds from necessity, or from dissipation or from pride, so +that having imagination and skill, they have yet wanted the materials +out of which to work. Recollect that the great artists of old were +not mere painters or mere sculptors, who were nothing except with the +pencil or the chisel in their hand. They were philosophers, scholars, +poets, musicians, noble beings, whose eyes were not ever on themselves, +but who looked above, before, and after. Our modern artists turn +coxcombs, and then fancy themselves like Rafaelle; or they are greedy +of present praise, or greedy of gain; or they will not pay the price +for immortality; or they have sold their glorious birthright of fame +for a mess of pottage. + +Poor Dannecker found his mess of pottage bitter now and then, as you +shall hear. He set off for Italy, in 1783, with his pension raised to +four hundred florins a year, that is, about thirty pounds: he reached +Rome, on foot, and he told me that, for some months after his arrival, +he suffered from a terrible depression of spirits, and a painful sense +of loneliness: like Thorwaldson, when he too visited that city some +years afterwards, a friendless youth, he was often home-sick and +heart-sick. At this time he used to wander about among the ruins and +relics of almighty Rome, lost in the sense of their grandeur, depressed +by his own vague aspirations--ignorant, and without courage to apply +himself. Luckily for him, Herder and Goethe were then residing at Rome; +he became known to them, and their conversation directed him to higher +sources of inspiration in his art than he had yet contemplated--to the +very well-heads and mother-streams of poetry. They showed him the +distinction between the _spirit_ and the _form_ of ancient art. Dannecker +felt, and afterwards applied some of the grand revelations of these men, +who were at once profound critics and inspired poets. He might have +grasped at more, but that his early nurture was here against him, and +his subsequent destinies as a court sculptor seldom left him sufficient +freedom of thought or action to follow out his own conceptions. While at +Rome he also became acquainted with Canova, who, although only one year +older than himself, had already achieved great things. He was now at +work on the monument of the Pope Ganganelli. The courteous, kind-hearted +Italian would sometimes visit the poor German in his studio, and cheer +him by his remarks and encouragement. + +Dannecker remained five years at Rome; he was then ordered to return to +Stuttgard. As he had already greatly distinguished himself, the Duke +of Wurtemburg received him with much kindness, and promised him his +protection. Now, the protection and the patronage which a sovereign +accords to an artist generally amounts to this: he begins by carving or +painting the portrait of his patron, and of some of the various members +of his patron's family. If these are approved of, he is allowed to stick +a ribbon in his button-hole, and is appointed professor of fine arts, +with a certain stipend, and thenceforth his time, his labour, and his +genius belong as entirely to his master as those of a hired servant; his +path is marked out for him. It was thus with Dannecker; he received a +pension of eight hundred florins a year and his professorship, and upon +the strength of this he married Henrietta Rapp. From this period his +life has passed in a course of tranquil and uninterrupted occupation, +yet, though constantly employed, his works are not numerous; almost +every moment being taken up with the duties of his professorship, in +trying to teach what no man of genius can teach, and in making drawings +and designs after the fancies of the Grand Duke. He was required to +compose a basso-relievo for the duke's private cabinet. The subject which +he chose was as appropriate as it was beautifully treated--Alexander +pressing his seal upon the lips of Parmenio. He modelled this in +bas-relief, and the best judges pronounced it exquisite; but it did +not please the duke, and instead of receiving an order to finish it in +marble, he was obliged to throw it aside, and to execute some design +dictated by his master. The original model remained for many years +in his studio; but a short time before my last visit to him he had +presented it as a birth-day gift to a friend. The first great work which +gave him celebrity as a sculptor, was the mausoleum of Count Zeppelin, +the duke's favourite, in which the figure of Friendship has much +simplicity and grace: this is now at Louisberg. While he was modelling +this beautiful figure, the first idea of the Ariadne was suggested to +his fancy, but some years elapsed before it came into form. At this time +he was much employed in executing busts, for which his fine eye for +living nature and manly simplicity of taste peculiarly fitted him. In +this particular department of his art he has neither equal nor rival, +except our Chantrey. The best I have seen are those of Schiller, Gluck, +and Lavater. Never are the fine arts, never are great artists, better +employed than when they serve to illustrate and to immortalize each +other! About the year 1808, Dannecker was considered, beyond dispute, +the first sculptor in Germany; for as yet Rauch, Tieck, and Schwanthaler +had not worked their way up to their present high celebrity. He +received, in 1811, an intimation, that if he would enter the service of +the king of Bavaria, he should be placed at the head of the school of +sculpture at Munich, with a salary three times the amount of that which +he at present enjoyed.-- + +MEDON. + +Which Dannecker declined? + +ALDA. + +He did. + +MEDON. + +I could have sworn to it--_extempore_! What is more touching in the +history of men of genius than that deep and constant attachment they +have shown to their early patrons! Not to go back to the days of Horace +and Mecænas, nor even to those of Ariosto and Tasso and the family of +Este, or Cellini and the Duke of Florence, or Lucas Kranach, and the +Elector John Frederic--[16] do you remember Mozart's exclamation, when +he was offered the most magnificent remuneration if he would quit the +service of Joseph II. for that of the Elector of Saxony--"Shall I leave +my good Emperor?" In the same manner Metastasio rejected every +inducement to quit the service of Maria Theresa,---- + +ALDA. + +Add Goethe and the Duke of Weimar, and a hundred other instances. The +difficulty would be to find _one_, in which the patronage of the great +has not been repaid ten thousand fold in gratitude and fame. Dannecker's +love for his native city, and his native princes, prevailed over his +self-interest; his decision was honourable to his heart; but it is +not less certain that at Munich he would have found more enlightened +patronage, and a wider scope for his talents. Frederic, the late king of +Wurtemburg, who had married our princess royal, was a man of a coarse +mind and profligate habits. Napoleon had gratified his vulgar ambition +by making him a king, and thereupon he stuck a huge, tawdry gilt +crown on the top of his palace, the impudent sign of his subservient +_majesty_. I never looked at it without thinking of an overgrown child +and its new toy; he also, to commemorate the acquisition of his kingly +titles, instituted the order of the Wurtemburg crown, and Dannecker +was gratified by this new order of merit, and a bit of ribbon in his +button-hole. + +But in the mean time the model of the Ariadne remained in his studio, +and it was not till the year 1809 that he could afford to purchase a +block of marble, and begin the statue on speculation. It occupied him +for seven years, but in the interval he completed other beautiful works. +The king ordered him to execute a Cupid in marble, for which he gave +him the design. It was a design which displeased the pure mind and high +taste of Dannecker; he would not so desecrate his divine art: "c'etait +travailler pour le diable!" said he to me, in telling the story. He +therefore only half fulfilled his commission; and changing the purpose +and sentiment of the figure, he represented the Greek Cupid at the +moment that he is waked by the drop of burning oil from Psyche's lamp. +An English general, I believe Sir John Murray, saw this charming statue, +in 1814, and immediately commanded a work from the sculptor's hands: he +wished, but did not absolutely require, a duplicate of the statue he so +admired. Dannecker, instead of repeating himself, produced his Psyche, +whom he has represented--not as the Greek allegorical Psyche, the +bride of Cupid, "with lucent fans, fluttering"--but as the abstract +personification of the human soul; or, to use Dannecker's own words, +"Ein rein, sittlich, sinniges Wesen,"--a pure, moral, intellectual +being. As he had an idea that Love had become moral and sentimental +after he had been waked by the drop of burning oil, so I could not +help asking him whether this was Psyche, grown reasonable after she +had beheld the wings of Love? He has not in this beautiful statue quite +accomplished his own idea. It has much girlish grace and simplicity, but +it wants elevation; it is not sufficiently ideal, and will not stand a +comparison either with the Psyche of Westmacott, or that of Canova. The +Ariadne was finished in 1816, but the sculptor was disappointed in his +hope that this, his masterpiece, would adorn his native city. The king +showed no desire to possess it, and it was purchased by M. Bethmann, +of Frankfort, for a sum equal to about one thousand pounds. Soon after +the Ariadne was finished, Dannecker conceived, in a moment of pious +enthusiasm, his famous statue of the Redeemer, which has caused a great +deal of discussion in Germany. This was standing in his work-room when +we paid our first visit to him. He told me what I had often heard, that +the figure had visited him in a dream three several times; and the +good old man firmly believed that he had been divinely inspired, and +predestined to the work. While the visionary image was fresh in his +imagination, he first executed a small clay model, and placed it +before a child of five or six years old;--there were none of the usual +emblematical accompaniments--no cross--no crown of thorns to assist the +fancy--nothing but the simple figure roughly modelled; yet the child +immediately exclaimed, "The Redeemer!" and Dannecker was confirmed in +his design. Gradually the completion of this statue became the one +engrossing idea of his enthusiastic mind: for eight years it was his +dream by night, his thought by day; all things else, all the affairs and +duties of life, merged into this. He told me that he frequently felt as +if pursued, excited by some strong, irresistible power, which would even +visit him in sleep, and impel him to rise from his bed and work. He +explained to me some of the difficulties he encountered, and which he +was persuaded that he had perfectly overcome only through divine aid, +and the constant study of the Scriptures. They were not few nor trifling. +Physical power, majesty, and beauty, formed no part of the character of +the Saviour of the world: the glory that was around him was not of this +earth, nor visible to the eye; "there was nothing in him that he should +be desired;" therefore to throw into the impersonation of exceeding +humility and benignity a superhuman grace, and from material elements +work out a manifestation of abstract moral grandeur--this was surely +not only a new and difficult, but a bold and sublime enterprize. + +You remember Michael Angelo's statue of Christ in the church of Santa +Maria sopra Minerva at Rome? + +MEDON. + +Perfectly; and I never looked at it without thinking of Neptune and +his trident. + +ALDA. + +The same thought occurred to me, and must inevitably have occurred to +others. Dannecker is not certainly so great a man as Michael Angelo, +but here he has surpassed him. Instead of emulating the antique models, +he has worked in the antique spirit--the spirit of faith and enthusiasm. +He has taken a new form in which to clothe a grand poetical conception. +Whether the being he has represented be a fit subject for the plastic +art, has been disputed; but it appears to me that Dannecker has more +nearly approached the christian ideal than any of his predecessors; +there is nothing to be compared to it, except Titian's Christo della +Moneta, and that is a head merely. The sentiment chosen by the sculptor +is expressed in the inscription on the pedestal: "Through me, to the +Father." The proportions of the figure are exceedingly slender and +delicate; the attitude a little drooping; one hand is pressed on the +bosom, the other extended; the lips are unclosed as in the act to speak. +In the head and facial line, by carefully throwing out every indication +of the animal propensities, and giving added importance and development +to all that indicates the moral and intellectual faculties, he has +succeeded in embodying a species of ideal, of which there is no other +example in art. I have heard, (not from Dannecker himself,) that when +the head of the Jupiter Tonans was placed beside the Christ, the merely +physical grandeur of the former, compared with the purely intellectual +expression of the latter, reminded every one present of a lion's head +erect and humanized. + +MEDON. + +But what were your own impressions? After all this eulogium, which +I believe to be just, tell me frankly, were you satisfied yourself? + +ALDA. + +No--not quite. The expression of the mouth in the last finished statue +(he has repeated the subject three times) is not so fine as in the +model, and the simplicity of the whole bordered on meagreness. This, +I think, is a general fault in all Dannecker's works. He has of course +avoided nudity, but the flowing robe, which completely envelopes the +figure, is so managed as to disclose the exact form of the limbs. One +little circumstance will give you an idea of the attention and accuracy +with which he seized and embodied every touch of individual character +conveyed in Holy Writ. In the original model he had made the beard +rather full and thick, and a little curled, expressing the prime of +manhood; but recollecting that in the gospel the Saviour is represented +as sinking under the weight of the cross, which the first man they met +accidentally was able to carry, he immediately altered his first +conception, and gave to the beard that soft, flowing, downy texture +which is supposed to indicate a feeble and delicate temperament. + +I shall not easily forget the countenance of the good and gifted old +man, as, leaning on the pedestal, with his cap in his hand, and his long +grey hair waving round his face, he looked up at his work with a mixture +of reverence and exultation, saying, in his imperfect and scarce +intelligible French, "Oui, quand on a fait comme cela, on reste sur la +terre!" meaning, I suppose, that this statue had ensured his immortality +on earth. He added, "They ask me often where are the models after which +I worked? and I answer, _here_, and _here_;" laying his hand first on +his head, then on his heart. + +I remember that when we first entered his room he was at work on one of +the figures for the tomb of the late Queen Catherine of Wurtemburg. You +perhaps recollect her in England when only Duchess of Oldenburg? + +MEDON. + +Yes; I remember, as a youngster, joining the mob who shouted before the +windows of the Pulteney-hotel, and hailed her and her brother Alexander +as if they had been a newly descended Jupiter and Juno! O verily, times +are changed! + +ALDA. + +But in that woman there were the elements of a fine nature. She had +the talents, the strength of mind, and far-reaching ambition of her +grandmother, Catherine of Russia, but was not so perverted. During her +short reign as Queen of Wurtemburg, the influence of her active mind was +felt through the whole government. She founded, among other institutions, +a school for the daughters of the nobility connected with the court,--in +plain English, a charity-school for the nobility of Wurtemburg, who are +among the most indigent and most ignorant of Germany. There are a few, +very few, brilliant exceptions. One lady of rank said to me, "As to an +English governess, _that_ is an advantage I can never hope to have for +my daughters. The princesses have an English governess, but _we_ cannot +dream of such a thing." The late queen really deserved the regrets of +her people. The king, whose sluggish mind she ruled or stimulated, is +now devoted to his stables and hunting. He has married another wife, but +he has erected to the honour of Catherine a splendid mausoleum, on the +peak of a high hill, which can be seen from almost every part of the +city; and on the summer evenings when the red sun-set falls upon its +white columns it is a beautiful object. The figure on which Dannecker +was occupied, represented Prayer, or what he called, "La triomphe de +la Prière;" it recalled to my mind Flaxman's lovely statue of the same +subject,--the "Our Father which art in Heaven," but suffered by the +involuntary comparison. On the rough base of the statue he had tried to +spell the name of Chantrey, but not very successfully. I took up a bit +of chalk and wrote underneath, in distinct characters, FRANCIS CHANTREY. + +"I grow old," said he, looking from his work to the bust of the late +queen which stood opposite. "I have carved the effigies of three +generations of poets, and as many of princes. Twenty years ago I was +at work on the tomb of the Duke of Oldenburg, and now I am at work upon +_her's_ who gave me that order. All die away: soon I shall be left +alone. Of my early friends none remain but Goethe. I shall die before +him, and perhaps he will write my epitaph." He spoke with a smile, not +foreseeing that he would be the survivor. + +Three years afterwards[17] I again paid Dannecker a visit, but a change +had come over him: his feeble, trembling hand could no longer grasp the +mallet, or guide the chisel; his eyes were dim; his fine benevolent +countenance wore a childish, vacant smile, now and then crossed by a +gleam of awakened memory or thought--and yet he seemed so perfectly +happy! He walked backwards and forwards, from his Christ to his bust +of Schiller, with an unwearied self-complacency, in which there was +something mournful, and yet delightful. While I sat looking at the +magnificent head of Schiller, the original of the multifarious casts +and copies which are dispersed through all Germany, he sat down beside +me, and taking my hands between his own, which trembled with age and +nervous emotion, he began to speak of his friend. "Nous etions amis dès +l'enfance; aussi j'y ai travaillé avec amour, avec douleur--on ne peut +pas plus faire." He then went on--"When Schiller came to Louisberg, he +sent to tell me that he was very ill--that he should not live very long, +and that he wished me to execute his bust. It was the first wish of my +own heart. I went immediately. When I entered the house, I found a lady +sitting on the _canapé_--it was Schiller's wife, and I did not know her; +but she knew me. She said, 'Ah! you are Dannecker!--Schiller expects +you;'--then she ran into the next room, where Schiller was lying down +on a couch, and in a moment after he came in, exclaiming as he entered, +'Where is he? where is Dannecker?' That was the moment--the expression +I caught--you see it here--the head raised, the countenance full of +inspiration, and affection, and bright hope! I told him that to keep up +this expression he must have some of his best friends to converse with +him while I took the model, for I could not talk and work too. O if +I could but remember what glorious things then fell from those lips! +Sometimes I stopped in my work--I could not go on--I could only listen." +And here the old man wept; then suddenly changing his mood, he said--"But +I must cut off that long hair; he never wore it so; it is not in the +fashion, you know!" I begged him for heaven's sake not to touch it; he +then, with a sad smile, turned up the sleeve of his coat and showed me +his wrist, swelled with the continual use of his implements--"You see +I _cannot_!" And I could not help wishing at the moment, that while his +mind was thus enfeebled, no transient return of physical strength might +enable him to put his wild threat in execution. What a noble bequest to +posterity is the effigy of a great man, when executed in such a spirit +as this of Schiller! I assure you I could not look at it, without +feeling my heart "overflow in silent worship" of moral and intellectual +power, till the deification of great men in the old times appeared to me +rather religion than idolatry. I have been affected in the same manner +by the busts of Goethe, Scott, Homer, Milton, Howard, Newton;--never by +the painted portraits of the same men, however perfect in resemblance +and admirable in execution. + +MEDON. + +Painting gives us the material, sculpture the abstract, ethical aspect +of the man. In the bust, whatever is common-place, familiar, and actual, +is thrown out or kept down: in a picture it is not only retained, but, +in most cases, it is necessarily obtrusive. Goethe, in a blue coat and +metal buttons, and a white neckcloth, would not recall the author of the +"Iphigenia;" still less does that wrinkled, decrepit-looking face, in +the gallery at Hardwicke, portray Boyle, the philosopher. + +ALDA. + +Dannecker told me that he first modelled the head of Schiller the exact +size of life, and conscientiously rendered each, even the slightest, +individual trait; yet this head appeared to every one smaller than +nature, and to himself almost _mesquin_.[18] He was in despair. He +repeated the bust in a colossal size; and the development of the +intellectual organization, on a larger scale, immediately gave what was +wanting:--it appeared to the eye or to the mind's eye as only the size +of life. He showed me a beautiful basso-relievo of the Muse of Tragedy, +listening with an inspired look to the revelations of the Muse of +History. This admirable little group struck me the more, because long +ago I had clothed nearly the same idea in imperfect words. + +I took leave of Dannecker with emotion: I shall never see him again! +But he is one of those who cannot die; to use his own expression--"Quand +on a fait _comme cela_, on reste sur la terre." When Canova, then a +melancholy invalid, paid him a visit, he was so struck by the child-like +simplicity, the pure unworldly nature, the genuine goodness, and lively +happy temperament of the German sculptor, that he gave him the surname +of _il Beato_; and if the epithet _blessed_ can, with propriety, be +bestowed on any mortal, it is on him whose long life has been one of +labour and of love; who has left behind him lasting memorials of his +genius; who has never profaned the talents which God has given him +to any unworthy purpose:--but in the midst of all the beautiful and +exciting influences of poetry and art, has kept from youth to age a soul +serene, a conscience and a life pure in the sight of God and man. Such +was our own Flaxman--such is Dannecker! + +MEDON. + +Who are now the principal sculptors in Germany? + +ALDA. + +Rauch, of Berlin; Christian Frederic Tieck, the brother of the +celebrated poet and critic, Ludwig Tieck; and Schwanthaler, of Munich. +Rauch is the court sculptor of Berlin. He has, like Dannecker,[19] his +professorship, his order of merit,[20] and, I believe, one or two places +under the government, besides constant employment in his art. He works +_by the piece_, as the labourers say. But though he too has yoked his +genius to the car of power and patronage, he has done great things. The +statue of the late queen of Prussia is reckoned his _chef-d'oeuvre_, +and is not, perhaps, exceeded in modern sculpture. It was conceived and +worked out in all the inspiration of love and grief; as Dannecker would +say, "Mit Lieb und Schmerzen." He had been attached to the queen's +personal service, and shared, in an intense degree, the enthusiastic, +devoted affection with which all her subjects regarded that beautiful +and amiable woman. This statue he executed at Carrara; and a living +eagle, which had been taken captive among the Appenines, was the +original of that magnificent eagle he has placed at her feet:--nothing, +you see, like going at once to nature! In the course of twenty-five +years Rauch has executed sixty-nine busts, of which twenty are colossal. +Among his numerous other works, designed or executed within the same +time, there is the colossal statue of Blucher, now at Breslau; this is +in bronze, upon a granite pedestal. There is another statue of Blucher +at Berlin, of which the pedestal, rich with bas-reliefs, is also in +bronze. Rauch has been employed for the last twenty years in modelling +field-marshals and generals, and has devoted his best powers to vanquish +the difficulties presented by monotonous faces, drilled figures, +military uniforms, and regimental boots and buttons; and all that man +_can_ do, I am told he has done. I have seen some of his busts, which +are quite admirable. At Peterstein, near Munich, I saw his statue of a +little girl, about ten years old, which, in its simplicity, truth, and +elegance, reminded me of Chantrey's Lady Louisa Russell, though in +conception and _manner_ as distinct as possible. The full length of +Goethe, in his dressing-gown, of which there is such an infinitude of +casts and copies throughout Germany, is also by Rauch. + +Christian Tieck is the old and intimate friend of Rauch. They live, +or did live, under the same roof, and it is not known that a moment +of jealousy or rivalship ever disturbed the union between these two +celebrated and gifted men, who, starting nearly at the same time,[21] +have run their brilliant career together in the self-same path, and, +whatever judgment the world or posterity may form of their comparative +merits, seem determined to enter the temple of immortality hand in hand. +Tieck's works are dispersed from one end of Germany to the other. His +statue of Neckar; his busts of Madame de Staël, of her second husband +Rocca, of the Duke and Duchess de Broglie, and of A. W. Schlegel, +I have seen; and all, particularly the busts of Rocca and Schlegel are +exceedingly fine. At Munich, at Dresden, and at Weimar, I saw many of +his works; and at Manheim the bust of Madame de Heygendorf,[22] full of +beauty, and life, and expression. At Berlin, Tieck has been employed +for many years in designing and executing the sculptured ornaments of +the new theatre. There is a colossal Apollo; a Pegasus, striking the +fountain of Helicon from the rock, colossal Muses, and a variety of +other heathen perpetrations--all (as I am assured) exceedingly fine +in their way. I believe his seated statue of Iffland (the Garrick of +Germany) is considered one of his _chef-d'oeuvres_. He also, like +Rauch, has been much employed in modelling generals and trophies, in +memory of the late war. + +Schwanthaler, the son of a statuary of Munich, is still a young man; his +works first began to create a sensation in Germany in the year 1823. +In spirit and fire, and creative talent, in a fine classic feeling for +his art, he appeared to me to be treading in the steps of Flaxman, and +like _him_, he is a profound and accomplished scholar, who has sought +inspiration at the very fountain of Greek poetry. His basso-relievo of +the battle of the ships in the Iliad, his games of Greece, his designs +from the Theogony of Hesiod, and a variety of other works which I have +seen, appeared to me full of imagination, and in a pure and vigorous +style of art. Of him, and some other sculptors, you will find more +particulars in the note-book I kept at Munich; we will look over it +together one of these days. + +MEDON. + +Thank you; but I must needs ask you a question. In the works you have +enumerated, nothing has struck me as new, or in a new spirit, except +perhaps the Christ of Dannecker, and the statue of the queen of Prussia. +Now, why should not sculpture have its Gothic (or romantic) school, as +well as its antique, or classical school? + +ALDA. + +And has it not? + +MEDON. + +If you allude to the sculpture of the middle ages, _that_ has not become +a school of art, like their architecture and their painting: yet can it +be true that there is something in our modern institutions, our northern +descent, our christian faith, inimical to the spirit of sculpture?--and, +while poetry in every other form is regenerate around us, that in +sculpture alone we are doomed to imitate, never to create?--doomed to +the servile reproduction of the same ideas? that this alone, of all +the fine arts, is to belong to some peculiar mode of existence, some +peculiar mode of thinking, feeling, and believing? "Qui me delivrera des +Grecs et des Remains?"--who will deliver me from gods and goddesses, and +from all these + + "Repetitions, wearisome of sense, + Where soul is dead, and feeling hath no place?" + + +ALDA. + +You are little better than a heretic in these matters. But I will admit +thus much--that the classical and mythological sculpture of our modern +artists, is to the ancient marbles, what Racine's tragedies are to those +of Sophocles; that we are so far condemned to the "repetition wearisome +of _forms_," from which the ancient spirit has evaporated; but that is +not the fault of the subjects, but of the manner of treating them, for +never can the beautiful mythology of ancient Greece, which has woven +itself into our earliest dreams of poetry, become a "creed out-worn." +Its forms, and its symbols, and its imagery, have mingled with every +branch of art, and become a universal language. It is the deification of +the material world; and therefore, that art, which in its perfection may +be called the apotheosis of form, finds there its proper region and +element. + +MEDON. + +You do not suppose that, with all my Gothic tastes, I am such a Goth +as not to feel the truth of what you say? But I am an enemy to the +exclusive in every thing; and--pardon me--your worship of the Elgin +marbles and the Niobe, is, I think, a little too exclusive. All I ask +is, that modern sculpture should be allowed, like painting and poetry, +to have its romantic, as well as its classical school. + +ALDA. + +It has been otherwise decided. + +MEDON. + +But it has not been otherwise proved. There has been much theoretical +eloquence and criticism expended on the subject, but I deny that the +experiment has been fairly and practically brought before us. I know +very well you are ready with a thousand instances of attempt and +failure, but may we not seek the cause in the mistaken application of +certain classical, or, I should say, pedantic ideas on the subject? If +I ask for Milton's Satan, standing like a tower in his spiritual might, +his thunder-scarred brow wreathed with the diadem of hell, why am I to +be presented with an Athlete, or an Achilles? Why would Canova give us +for the head of Dante's Beatrice that of a muse, or an Aspasia? and for +Petrarch's Laura, a mere _tête de nymphe_? I contend that to apply the +forms suggested by the modern poetry demands a different spirit from +that of classic art. How to apply or modify the example bequeathed to us +by the great masters of old, Flaxman has shown us in his Dante. And why +should we not have in sculpture a Lear as well as a Laocoon? a Constance +as well as a Niobe? a Gismunda as well as a Cleopatra?---- + +ALDA. + +Or a Tam o'Shanter as well as a laughing Faun? + +MEDON. + +When I am serious and poetical, which is not often, I will not allow you +to be perverse and ironical! + +ALDA. + +See, here is a passage which I have just found among Mrs. Austin's +beautiful specimens of translation: "The critic of art ought to keep in +view, not only the capabilities, but the proper objects of art. Not all +that art can accomplish ought she to attempt. It is from this cause +alone, and because we have lost sight of these principles, that art +among us has become more extensive and difficult, and less effective and +perfect."[23] + +MEDON. + +Very well,--and very true:--but who shall bring a rule and compass to +measure the capabilities of art, and define its proper objects? May +there not exist in the depths or heights of philosophy and art, truths +yet to be revealed, as there are stars in heaven, whose light has +not yet reached the naked eye? and why should not criticism have its +telescope for truth, as well as its microscope for error? Art may be +finite; but who shall fix its limits, and say, "thus far shalt thou go?" +There are those who regard the distant as the unattainable, the unknown +as the unexisting, the actual as the necessary;--are you one of such, +O you of little faith! For my own part, I look forward to a new era in +sculpture. I believe that the purely natural and the purely ideal are +_one_, and susceptible of forms and modifications as yet untried. For +Nature, the infinite, sits within her tabernacle, not made by human +hands, and Genius and Love are the cherubim, to whom it is permitted +to look into her unveiled eyes, and reflect their light; Art is the +priestess of her divine mysteries, and Criticism, the door-keeper of +her temple, should be Janus-headed, looking forward as well as backward. +Reason estimates what has been done; Imagination alone divines what +_may_ be done. But I am losing myself in these reveries. To attempt +something new,--perfectly new in style and conception--and spend, like +Dannecker, eight years in working out that conception--and then perhaps +eight years more waiting for a purchaser, and this in a country where +one must eat and pay taxes--truly, it is not easy. + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + + + + +III. + + +MEDON. + +You have been frowning and musing in your chair for the last half-hour, +with your fore-finger between the leaves of your book--where were your +thoughts? + +ALDA. + +They were far--very far! I am afraid that I appear very stupid? + +MEDON. + +O not at all! you know there are stars which appear dim and fixed to +the eye, while they are taking flights and making revolutions, which +imagination cannot follow nor science compute. + +ALDA. + +Upon my word, you are very sublimely ironical--my thoughts were not +quite so far. + +MEDON. + +May one beg, or borrow them?--What is your book? + +ALDA. + +Mrs. Austin's "Characteristics of Goethe." I came upon a passage which +sent back my thoughts to Weimar. I was again in his house; the faces, +the voices of his grandchildren were around me; the room in which he +studied, the bed in which he slept, the old chair in which he died,--and, +above all, _her_ in whose arms he died--from whose lips I heard the +detail of his last moments-- + + * * * * * + +MEDON. + +What! all this emotion for Goethe? + +ALDA. + +For Goethe!--I should as soon think of weeping because the sun set +yesterday, which now is pouring its light around me! Our tears are for +those who suffer, for those who die, for those who are absent, for +those who are cold or lost--not for those who cannot die, who cannot +suffer,--who must be, to the end of time, a presence and an existence +among us! No. + +But I was reading here, among the Characteristics of Goethe, who +certainly "knew all qualities, with a learned spirit in human dealings," +that he was not only the quick discerner and most cordial hater of all +affectation;--but even the unconscious affectation--the _nature de +convention_,--the taught, the artificial, the acquired in manner or +character, though it were meritorious in itself, he always detected, +and it appeared to impress him disagreeably. Stay, I will read you the +passage--here it is. + +"Even virtue, laboriously and painfully acquired, was distasteful to +him. I might almost affirm, that a faulty but vigorous character, if +it had any real native qualities as its basis, was regarded by him +with more indulgence and respect than one which, at no moment of its +existence, is genuine; which is incessantly under the most unamiable +constraint, and consequently imposes a painful constraint on others. +'Oh,' said he, sighing, on such occasions, 'if they had but the heart to +commit some absurdity, that would be something, and they would at least +be restored to their own natural soil, free from all hypocrisy and +acting: wherever that is the case, one may entertain the cheering hope +that something will spring from the germ of good which nature implants +in every individual. But on the ground they are now upon, nothing can +grow.' 'Pretty dolls,' was his common expression when speaking of them. +Another phrase was, 'That's a piece of nature,' (literally, _das ist +eine Natur_, that is a nature,) which from Goethe's lips was considerable +praise."[24] + +This last phrase threw me back upon my remembrances. I thought of the +daughter-in-law of the poet,--the trusted friend, the constant companion, +the devoted and careful nurse of his last years. It accounted for the +unrivalled influence which apparently she possessed--I will not say +_over_ his mind--but _in_ his mind, in his affections; for in her he +found truly _eine Natur_--a piece of nature, which could bear even _his_ +microscopic examination. All other beings who approached Goethe either +were, or had been, or might be, more or less modified by the action of +that universal and master spirit. Consciously, or unconsciously, in love +or in fear, they bowed down before him, and gave up their individuality, +or forgot it, in his presence; they took the bent he chose to impress, +or the colour he chose to throw upon them. Their minds, in presence of +his, were as opake bodies in the sun, absorbing in different degrees, +reflecting in various hues, his vital beams; but HER'S was, in comparison, +like a transparent medium, through which the rays of that luminary +passed,--pervading and enlightening, but leaving no other trace. +Conceive a woman, a young, accomplished, enthusiastic woman, who had +qualities to attach, talents to amuse, and capacity to appreciate, GOETHE; +who, for fourteen or fifteen years, could exist in daily, hourly +communication with that gigantic spirit, yet retain, from first to +last, the most perfect simplicity of character, and this less from the +strength than from the purity and delicacy of the original texture. +Those oft-abused words, _naïve_, _naïveté_, were more applicable to her +in their fullest sense than to any other woman I ever met with. Her +conversation was the most untiring I ever enjoyed, because the stores +which fed that flowing eloquence were all native and unborrowed: you +were not borne along by it as by a torrent--_bongré_, _malgré_,--nor +dazzled as by an artificial _jet d'eau_ set to play for your amusement. +There was the obvious wish to please--a little natural _coquetterie_-- +vivacity without effort, sentiment without affectation, exceeding +mobility, which yet never looked like caprice; and the most consummate +refinement of thought, and feeling, and expression. From that really +elegant and highly-toned mind, nothing flippant nor harsh could ever +proceed; slander died away in her presence; what was evil she would +not hear of; what was malicious she would not understand; what was +ridiculous she would not see. Sometimes there was a wild, artless +fervour in her impulses and feelings, which might have become a +feather-cinctured Indian on her savannah; then, the next moment, her +bearing reminded you of the court-bred lady of the bed-chamber. Quick +in perception, yet femininely confiding, uniting a sort of restless +vivacity with an indolent gracefulness, she appeared to me by far +the most poetical and genuine being of my own sex I ever knew in +highly-cultivated life: one to whom no wrong could teach mistrust; no +injury, bitterness; one to whom the common-place realities, the vulgar +necessary cares of existence, were but too indifferent;--who was, in +reality, all that other women try to appear, and betrayed, with a +careless independence, what they most wish to conceal. I draw from the +life,--now, what would you say to such a woman if you met with her in +the world? + +MEDON. + +I should say--she had no business there. + +ALDA. + +How? + +MEDON. + +I repeat that the woman you have just portrayed is hardly fit for +the world. + +ALDA. + +Say rather, the world is not fitted for her. As the Sabbath was made for +man, not man for the Sabbath, so the world was made for man, not man for +the world--still less woman. + +MEDON. + +Do you know what you mean? + +ALDA. + +I think I do, though I am afraid I can but ill-explain myself. By the +world, I mean that system of social life in all its complicate bearings +by which we are surrounded; which was, I suppose, devised at first with +a reference to the wants, the happiness, and the benefit of men, but +for which no _man_ was specifically created; his being has a high and +individual purpose beyond the world. Now, it seems to me one reason of +the low average of what we call _character_, that we judge a human soul, +not as it is abstractedly, but simply in relation to others, and to +the circumstances around it. If it be in harmony with the world, and +worldly, we praise it--it is a very respectable soul; if so constituted, +that it is in discord with a world, (which, observe, all our philosophers, +our pastors, and our masters, unite to assure us, is a sad wicked place, +and must be reformed or renounced forthwith,) then--I pray your attention +to this point--_then_ the fault, the bitter penalty, lies not upon this +said wicked world,--O no!--but on that unlucky "piece of nature," which +in its power, its goodness, its purity, its truth, its faith, and its +tenderness, stands aloof from it. Is it not so? + +MEDON. + +Do you apply this personally? + +ALDA. + +No, generally; but I return to her who suggested the thought, and whom +I ought not, perhaps, to have made the subject of such a conversation as +this: it is against all my principles, contrary to my custom; and, in +truth, I speak of one in whom there is so much to love, that we cannot +praise without being accused of partiality; and so much to admire, that +we could not censure without being suspected of envy. I might as well +be silent therefore. Yet shall such a woman bear such a name, and hold +such a position as the mother of Goethe's posterity;[25]--shall she be +rendered by both a mark for observation, from one end of Europe to the +other;--shall she be "condemned to celebrity," and shall it be allowed +to ignorance, or ill-nature, or vanity, to prate of her;--and shall it +be forbidden to friendship even to speak?--that were hardly just. Of +those effusions of her creative and poetical talents, which charm her +friends, I say nothing, because in all probability neither you nor the +public will ever benefit by them. I met with several other women in +Germany who possessed striking poetical genius, and whose compositions +were equally destined to remain unknown, except to the circle of their +immediate friends and relatives. + +MEDON. + +Mr. Hayward, in his notes to his translation of Faust, remarks on the +strong prejudice against female authorship, which still exists in +Germany; but he has hopes that it will not endure, and that something +may be done "to unlock the stores of fancy and feeling which the +Ottilies and the Adèles have hived up." Tell me--did you find this +prejudice entertained by the women themselves, or existing chiefly on +the part of the men? + +ALDA. + +It was expressed most strongly by the women, but it must have originated +with the men. All your prejudices you instil into us; and then we are +not satisfied with adopting them, we exaggerate them--we mix them up with +our fancies and affections, and transmit them to your children. You are +"the mirrors in which we dress ourselves." + +MEDON. + +For which you dress yourselves! + +ALDA. + +Psha!--I mean that your minds and opinions are the mirrors in which we +form our own. You legislate for us, mould us, form us as you will. If +you prefer slaves and playthings to companions and helpmates, is that +our fault? In Germany I met with some men who, perhaps out of compliment, +descanted with enthusiasm on female talent, and in behalf of female +authorship; but the women almost uniformly spoke of the latter with +dread, as something formidable, or with contempt, as of something +beneath them: what is an unworthy prejudice in your sex, becomes, when +transplanted into ours, a _feeling_;--a mistaken, but a genuine, and +even a generous feeling. Many women, who have sufficient sense and +simplicity of mind to rise above the mere _prejudice_, would not contend +with the _feeling_: they would not scruple to encounter the public +judgment in a cause approved by their own hearts, but they have not +courage to brave or to oppose the opinions of friends and kindred-- + +MEDON. + +Or risk the loss of a lover. You remember the axiom of that clever +Frenchman,[26] who certainly spoke the existing opinions of his country +only a few years ago, when he said--"Imprimer, pour une femme de moins +de cinquante ans c'est mettre son bonheur à la plus terrible des +lotteries; si elle a un amant elle commencera par le perdre." + +ALDA. + +I really believe that in Germany the latter catastrophe would be in most +cases inevitable; and where is the woman who knowingly would risk it? + +MEDON. + +All, however, have not lovers to lose, or husbands to displease, +or friends to affront; and if the women, in compliance with our +self-revolving egotism, affect to prostrate themselves, and undervalue +one another--do the men allow it to this extent? Do not the Germans most +justly boast, that in their land arose the first feeling of veneration +for women, the result of the Christian dispensation, grafted on the +old German manners? Do they not point to their literature and their +institutions, as more favourable to your sex than any other? Does not +even Madame de Staël exalt the fine earnestness of the German feeling +towards you, infinitely above the system of French gallantry?--that +flimsy veil of conventional good-breeding, under which we seek to +disguise the demoralization of one sex, and the virtual slavery of the +other? Have I not heard you say, that it is the present fashion among +the poets, artists, and writers of Germany, to defer in all things to +the middle ages? Are not the maxims and sentiments of chivalry ready on +their lips, the forms and symbols of the old chivalrous times to be +traced in every department of literature and art among them? + +ALDA. + +All this is true; and I will believe that all this is something more +than mere theory, when I see the Germans less slovenly in their +interior, and less egotistical in their domestic relations. The theme is +unwelcome, unpleasant, ungraceful,--in fact, I can scarcely persuade +myself to say one word against those high-minded, benevolent, admirable, +and "most-thinking people;" so I will not dwell upon it: but I must +confess that the personal negligence of the men, and the forbearance of +the women on this point, astonished me. I longed to remind these +worshippers of the age of chivalry of that advice of St. Louis to his +son--"Il faut être toujours propre et bien proprement habillé, afin +d'être _mieux aimé de sa femme_;" the really good-natured and well-bred +Germans will, I am sure, forgive this passing remark, and allow its +truth: they _did_ at once agree with me, that the tavern-life of the men, +more particularly the clever professional men in the south of Germany, +(another remnant, I presume, either of the age of chivalry, or the +Bürschen-sitten--I know not which,) was calculated to retard the social +improvement and refinement of both sexes. And, apropos to chivalry, +the fact is, that the institutions of a generous but barbarous period, +invented to shield our helplessness, when women were exposed to every +hardship, every outrage, have been much abused, and must be considerably +modified to suit a very different state of society. That affectation of +poetical homage, which your strength paid to our weakness, when the laws +were not sufficient to defend us, we would now gladly exchange for more +real honour, more real protection, more equal rights. I speak thus, +knowing that, however open to perversion these expressions may be, _you_ +will not misapprehend me; you know that I am no vulgar, vehement arguer +about the "rights of women;" and, from my habitual tone of feeling and +thought, the last to covet any of your masculine privileges. + +MEDON. + +I do perfectly understand you; but, pray what are our strictly masculine +privileges, that you should covet them? Fighting! getting drunk! and +keeping a mistress!--I beg your pardon if I shock your delicacy; but +certainly, upon the score of masculine privileges, the less that is said +the better: there are nations in which it is a masculine privilege to +sit and smoke, while women draw the plough. It was some time ago,--and +now, in some countries, it is still a masculine privilege to cultivate +the mind at all; and in Germany, apparently, it is still a masculine +privilege to publish a book without losing _caste_ in society; whereas +here, in England, we have fallen into the opposite extreme; female +authorship is in danger of becoming a fashion,--which Heaven avert! I +should be sorry to see you women taking the pen you have hitherto so +honoured, in the same spirit in which you used to make filigree, cobble +shoes, and paint velvet. + +ALDA. + +It is too true that mere vanity and fashion have lately made some women +authoresses;--more write for money, and by this employment of their +talents earn their own independence, add to the comforts of a parent, +or supply the extravagance of a husband. Some, who are unhappy in their +domestic relations, yet endowed with all that feminine craving after +sympathy, which was intended to be the charm of our sex, the blessing of +yours, and somehow or other has been turned to the bane of both, look +abroad for what they find not at home; fling into the wide world the +irrepressible activity of an overflowing mind and heart, which can +find no other unforbidden issue,--and to such "fame is love disguised." +Some write from the mere energy of intellect and will; some few from +the pure wish to do good, and to add to the stock of happiness and +the progress of thought; and many from all these motives combined in +different degrees. + +MEDON. + +And have none of these motives produced authoresses in Germany? + +ALDA. + +Yes; but fashion and vanity, and the love of excitement, have not +as yet tempted the German women to print their effusions; their most +distinguished authoresses have become so, either from real enthusiasm or +from necessity; and in the lighter departments of literature they boast +at present some brilliant names. I will run over a few. + +There is Helmina von Chezy--but before I speak of _her_, I should tell +you of her famous grandmother, Anna Louisa Karshin, though _she_ +belonged to the last century. The Karshin was the daughter of a poor +innkeeper and brewer, in a little village of Silesia. She spent her +early years in herding cows. She learned to read by stealth, by stealth +she became a poetess; was first married to a boorish sulky weaver, +secondly to a drunken tailor, and suffered for years every extremity of +poverty and misery; at one time she travelled about the neighbouring +country, the first example of an itinerant poetess, declaiming her own +verses, and always ready with an ode or a sonnet to celebrate a wedding, +or hail a birthday. In this strange profession she excited much +astonishment--went through some singular, but not disreputable +adventures--and earned considerable sums of money, which her husband +spent in drink and profligacy. Gifted with as much energy as genius, +she struggled through all, and gradually became known to several of the +critics and poets of the last century, particularly Count Stolberg and +Gleim, and obtained the title of the German Sappho. She found means to +reach Berlin, where she worked her way up to distinction, and supported +herself, two children, and an orphan brother, by her talents. She was +recommended to Frederick the Great as worthy of a pension, and--would +you believe it?--that _munificent_ patron of his country's genius, sent +her a gratuity of two dollars, in a piece of paper. This extraordinary +and spirited woman, who had probably subsisted for half her life on +charity, instantly returned them to the niggardly despot, after writing +in the envelope four lines impromptu, which are yet repeated in Germany. +I am not quite sure that I remember them accurately, and it is no matter, +for they have not much either of poetry or point. + + "Zwey Thaler sind zu wenig; + Zwey Thaler macht kein Glück; + Zwey Thaler gebt kein König; + Fritz, hier send ich sie zurück." + + +She died in 1791, and a selection of her poems was published in the +following year. + +The granddaughter of the Karshin, the more celebrated Helmina von Chezy, +is likewise a poetess; her principal work is a tale of chivalry, in +verse, _Die drei Weissen Rosen_, (The three White Roses) which was +published in 18--, and she wrote the opera of Euryanthe, for Weber to +set to music. Her songs and lighter poems are, I am told, exceedingly +beautiful. + +Caroline Pichler, of Vienna, I need only mention. I believe her +historical romances have been translated into half-a-dozen languages. +The Siege of Vienna is reckoned her best. + +Madame Schoppenhauer, the daughter of a senator of Dantzic, is +celebrated for her novels, travels, and works on art. She resided for +many years at Weimar, where she drew round her a brilliant literary +circle, which the talents of her daughter farther adorned. Since +Goethe's death she has fixed her residence at Bonn, where it is probable +the remainder of her life will be spent. One of the best of her novels, +"Die Tante," has been translated by Madame de Montolieu, under the title +of "La Tante et la Nièce." Another very pretty little book of hers, +"Ausflucht an dem Rhein," I should like to see translated. Beside being +an excellent writer on art, Madame Schoppenhauer is herself no mean +artist. Moreover, she is a kind-hearted, excellent old lady, with a few +old lady-like prejudices about England and the English, which I forgave +her,--the more easily as I had to thank her in my own person for many +and kind attentions. + +Madame von Helvig, of Weimar, (born Amalia von Imhoff,) was the friend +of Schiller, under whose auspices her first poems were published. Her +rare knowledge of languages, her learning and critical taste in works of +arts, have distinguished her almost as much as her genius for poetry. + +The second wife of the Baron de la Motte-Fouquet, was a very accomplished +woman, and the author of several poems and romances. + +Frederica Brun, (born Münter,) the daughter of a learned ecclesiastic +of Gotha, is celebrated for her prose writings, and particularly her +travels in Italy, where she resided at different periods. Madame Brun +was a friend of Madame de Staël, who mentions her in her de l'Allemagne, +and describes the extraordinary talents for classical pantomime +possessed by her daughter Ida Brun. + +Louisa Brachmann is, I believe, more renowned for her melancholy death +than her poetical talents; both together have procured her the name of +the "German Sappho." The wretched woman threw herself into the river +at Halle, and perished, as it was said, for the sake of some faithless +Phaon. This was in 1822, when she must have been between forty and +fifty; and pray observe, I do not notice this fact of her age in +ridicule. A woman's heart may overflow _inwardly_ for long, long years, +till at last the accumulated sorrow bursts the bounds of reason, and +then all at once we see the result of causes to which none gave heed, +and of secret agonies to which none gave comfort--in folly, madness, +destruction. Whatever might have been the cause,--thus she died. Her +works in prose and verse may be found in every bookseller's shop in +Germany. There is also a life of this unhappy and gifted woman by +professor Schutz. + +Fanny Tarnow is one of the most remarkable and most fertile of all the +modern German authoresses. Her genius was developed by misfortune and +suffering: while yet an infant, she fell from a window two stories +high, and was taken up, to the amazement of the assistants, without +any apparent injury, except a few bruises; but all the vital functions +suffered, and during ten or twelve years she was extended on a couch, +neither joining in any of the amusements of childhood, nor subjected +to the usual routine of female education. She educated herself. She +read incessantly, and, as it was her only pleasure, books of every +description, good and bad, were furnished her without restraint. She +was about eleven years old when she made her first _known_ poetical +attempt, inspired by her own feelings and situation. It was a dialogue +between herself and the angel of death. In her seventeenth year she +was sufficiently recovered to take charge of her father's family, after +he had lost, by some sudden misfortune, his whole property. He held +subsequently, a small office under government, the duties of which were +principally performed by his admirable daughter. Her first writings were +anonymous, and for a long time her name was unknown. Her most celebrated +novel, the "Thekla," was published in 1815; and from this time she has +enjoyed a high and public reputation. Fanny Tarnow resides, or did +reside, in Dresden. + +I have yet another name here, and not the least interesting, that of +Johanna von Weissenthurn, one of the most popular dramatic writers in +Germany. She was educated for the stage, even from infancy, her parents +and relations being, I believe, strolling players. She lived, for many +years, a various life of toil, and adventure, and excitement; such, +perhaps, as Goethe describes in the Wilhelm Meister; a life which does +sometimes blunt the nicer feelings, but is sure to develop talent +where it exists. Johanna at length rose through all the grades of her +profession, and became the first actress at the principal theatre at +Vienna. She played in the "Phoedra," before Napoleon, when he occupied +the Austrian capital in 1806, and the conqueror sent to her, after the +performance, a complimentary message, and a gratuity of three thousand +francs; but her lasting reputation is founded on her dramatic works, +which are played in every theatre in Germany. The plots, which, I +am told, are remarkable for fancy and invention, have been borrowed, +without acknowledgment, both by French and English playwrights. I +was quite charmed with one of her pieces which I saw at Munich, (Die +Erben--the Heirs,) and with another which was represented at Frankfort. +Johanna von Weissenthurn has also written poems and tales. + +I have come to the end of my memoranda on this subject, and regret it +much. I might easily give you more names, and quote second-hand the +opinions I heard of the merits and characteristics of these authoresses; +but I speak of nothing but what I _know_, and not being able to form +any judgment myself, I will give none. Only it appears to me that the +Germans themselves assign to no female writer the same rank which here +we proudly give to Joanna Baillie and Mrs. Hemans. I could hear of none +who had ever exercised any thing like the moral influence possessed by +Maria Edgeworth and Harriet Martineau, in their respective departments; +nor could learn that any German woman had yet given _public_ proof that +the most feminine qualities were reconcilable with the highest scientific +attainments--like Mrs. Marcet and Mrs. Somerville. + +MEDON. + +You said the other night, that you had not formed any opinion as to the +moral and social position of the women in Germany; but you must have +brought away some general impressions of manner and character;--frankly, +were they favourable or unfavourable? + +ALDA. + +Frankly, they were most favourable. Remember that I am not prepared with +any general sweeping conclusions: I cannot assure you from my own +knowledge, that among my own sex the proportion of virtue and happiness +is greater in Germany than in England. On the contrary-- + + ----In every land + I saw, wherever light illumineth, + Beauty and anguish walking hand in hand, + The downward slope to death. + + In every land I thought that, more or less, + The stronger, sterner nature overbore + The softer, uncontroll'd by gentleness, + And selfish evermore![27] + + +--Why do you smile? + +MEDON. + +You amuse me with the perseverance with which you ring the changes on +your favourite text, in prose and in verse; and yet, to adopt Voltaire's +witty metaphor, _we_ are the hammers and _you_ the anvils all the world +over. But is that all? You need not have gone to Germany to verify that! + +ALDA. + +No, sir; it is not _all_. In the first place, you know I have a +sufficient contempt for our English intolerance, with regard to +manners-- + +MEDON. + +Why, yes; with reason. The influence of mere _manner_ among our +fashionable people, and the stress laid upon it as a distinction, have +become so vulgarized and abused, that I should be relieved even by a +reaction which should throw us out of the insipidity of conventional +manner into primeval rudeness. + +ALDA. + +No, no, no!--no extremes: but though so sensible to the ridicule of +referring the social habits, opinions, customs, of other nations, to the +arbitrary standard of our own, still I could not help falling into +comparisons; certain distinctions between the German and the English +women struck me involuntarily. In the highest circles a stranger finds +society much alike every where. A court-ball--the _soirée_ of an +ambassadress--a minister's dinner--present nearly the same physiognomy. +It is in the second class of society, which is also every where, and in +every sense, the best, that we behold the stamp of national character. +I was not condemned to see my German friends always _en grande +toilette_; I had better opportunities of judging and appreciating their +domestic habits and manners, than most travellers enjoy. + +I thought the German women, of a certain rank, more _natural_ than +we are. The moral education of an English girl is, for the most part, +_negative_; the whole system of duty is thus presented to the mind. +It is not "this you must do;" but always "you must not do this--you +must not say that--you must not think so;" and if by some hardy, +expanding nature, the question be ventured, "Why?"--the mamma or the +governess are ready with the answer--"It is not the custom--it is not +lady-like--it is ridiculous!" But is it wrong?--why is it wrong?--and +then comes answer, pat--"My dear, you must not argue--young ladies +never argue." "But, mamma, I was thinking----" "My dear, you must not +think--go write your Italian exercise," and so on! The idea that certain +passions, powers, tempers, feelings, interwoven with our being by our +almighty and all-wise Creator, are to be put down by the fiat of a +governess, or the edict of fashion, is monstrous. Those who educate +us imagine that they have done every thing, if they have silenced +controversy, if they have suppressed all external demonstration of an +excess of temper or feeling; not knowing, or not reflecting, that unless +our nature be self-governed and self-directed by an appeal to those +higher faculties, which link us immediately with what is divine, their +labour is lost. + +Now, in Germany the women are less educated to suit some particular +fashion; the cultivation of the intellect, and the forming of the +manners, do not so generally supersede the training of the moral +sentiments--the affections--the impulses; the latter are not so +habitually crushed or disguised; consequently the women appeared to me +more natural, and to have more individual character. + +MEDON. + +But the English women pique themselves on being natural, at least they +have the word continually in their mouths. Do you know that I once +overheard a well-meaning mother instructing her daughter how to be +natural? You laugh, but I assure you it is a simple fact. Now, I really +do not object to natural insipidity, but I do object to conventional +insipidity: I object to a rule of elegance which makes the negative the +test of the natural. It seems hard that those who have hearts and souls +must needs put them into a strait-waistcoat, in order to oblige those +who choose to have none; and be guilty of the grossest affectation, to +escape the imputation of being affected! + +ALDA. + +I think there is less of this among the Germans; more of the individual +character is brought into the daily intercourse of society--more of the +poetry of existence is brought to bear on the common realities of life. +I saw a freshness of feeling--a genuine (not a taught) simplicity, which +charmed me. Sometimes I have seen affectation, but it amused me; it +consisted in the exaggeration of what is in itself good, not in the +mean renunciation of our individuality--the immolation of our soul's +truth to a mere fashion of behaviour. As Rochefoucauld called hypocrisy, +(that last extreme of wickedness,) "_the homage which vice pays to +virtue_;" so the _nature de convention_, that last and worst excess of +affectation, is the homage which the artificial pays to the natural. + +The German women are much more engrossed by the cares of housekeeping +than women of a similar rank of life in England. They carry this too far +in many instances, as we do the opposite extreme. In England, with our +false, conventional refinement, we attach an idea of vulgarity to certain +cares and duties, in which there is nothing vulgar. To see the young and +beautiful daughter of a lady of rank running about, busied in household +matters, with the keys of the wine-cellar and the store-room suspended +to her sash, would certainly surprise a young Englishwoman, who, +meantime, is netting a purse, painting a rose, or warbling some "Dolce +mio Bene," or "Soavi Palpiti," with the air of a nun at penance. The +description of Werther's Charlotte, cutting bread and butter, has +been an eternal subject of laughter among the English, among whom fine +sentiment must be garnished out with something finer than itself; and no +princess can be suffered to go mad, or even be in love, except in white +satin. To any one who has lived in Germany, the union of sentiment +and bread and butter, or of poetry with household cares, excites no +laughter. The wife of a state minister once excused herself from going +with me to a picture gallery, because on that day she was obliged to +reckon up the household linen; she was one of the most charming, truly +elegant, and accomplished women I ever met with. At another time, I +remember that a very accomplished woman, who had herself figured in a +court, could not do something or other--I forget what--because it was +the "grösse Wäsche," (the great wash,) an event by the way which I +often found very mal-a-propos, and which never failed to turn a German +household upside down. You must remember that I am not speaking of +tradesmen and mechanics, but of people of my own, or even a superior +rank of life. It is true that I met with cases in which the women had, +without necessity, sunk into mere domestic drudges--women whose souls +were in their kitchen and their household stuff--whose talk was of +dishes and of condiments; but then the same species of women in England +would have been, instead of busy with the idea of being useful, +frivolous and silly, without any idea at all. + +MEDON. + +And whether a woman put her soul into an apple tart, or a new bonnet, +signifies little, if there be no capacity there for any thing better. +I hate mere fine ladies; but equally avoid those who seem born to +"suckle fools and chronicle small beer." The accomplishments which +embellish social life--the cultivation which raises you to a companionship +with men--I cannot spare these to make mere nurses and housewifes, as I +conceive the generality of the German women aim to be, and which I have +been told the opinions of the men approve. + +ALDA. + +As to what we term accomplishments, there was certainly much less +exhibition and parade of them in society; they formed less an established +and necessary part of education than with us; but, of really accomplished, +well-informed women, believe me I found no deficiency--far otherwise: +if the inclination or the talent existed, means and opportunity were +not wanting for mental culture of a very high species. I met with fewer +women who drew badly, sang tolerably, or rather intolerably, scratched +the harp, and quoted Metastasio; but I met with quite as many women who, +without pretension, were finished musicians, painted like artists, +possessed an extensive acquaintance with their own literature, and an +uncommon knowledge of languages; and were, besides, very good housewives +after the German fashion. More or less acquaintance with the French +language was a matter of course, but English was preferred: every where +I met with women who had cultivated with success, not our language +merely, but our literature. Shakspeare, whether studied in English, or +in some of their excellent translations, I found a species of household +god, whose very name was breathed with reverence, as if it were that of +a supernatural being. Lord Byron, and Sir Walter Scott, and Campbell, +are familiar names. Wordsworth and Shelley are beginning to be known, +but they are pronounced more difficult of comprehension than Shakspeare +himself; yet I met with a German lady who could repeat Coleridge's +"Ancient Mariner" by heart. Of our great modern poets, Crabbe appeared +the least understood and appreciated in Germany, for the obvious reason, +that his subjects and portraits are almost exclusively national. There +are, however, several German editions of his works. The men read him as +a study. The only German lady I met with who had read his works through, +pronounced them "not poetry." Bulwer is exceedingly popular among the +women; so is Moore. Some of those who most admired the latter, gave as +one reason that "his English style was so easy." + +MEDON. + +Of all our poets, Moore should seem the least allied to a German taste. +Shall I confess to you? He reminds me perpetually of Prince Potemkin's +larder, in which you could always have _petits-patés_ and champagne, +_ad libitum_, but never a morsel of bread or a drop of water! + +ALDA. + +The simile is e'en too wickedly just; but I except his Irish ballads: +by the way, I was pleased to find some of our beautiful Irish melodies +almost naturalized in Germany, and sung either with Moore's words, or +German versions of them. I remember that at Stift-Neuberg I heard the +air of Ally Croker sung to an excellent translation of Moore's words,[28] +and with as much of the national spirit and feeling as if we had been on +the banks of the Shannon instead of the banks of the Neckar. The singer, +an amateur, and a most extraordinary musical genius, who had joined our +circle from Heidelberg, did not understand, or at least did not speak, +English; yet there was no Irish, or Scotch, or English air which he had +not at the ends of his fingers; and when he struck up, "Of noble race +was Shenkin," it was as if all the souls of all the Welsh harpers since +High-born Hoel had inspired him. This gifted person was, however, of your +sex, and our discourse, at present, is of mine. + +I heard an English lady, who had resided for some time in Germany, +remark, that the "German mothers _spoiled_ their children terribly;" in +other words, the children lived more habitually with the mothers, were +under little restraint, and behaved in the drawing-room much as if they +were in the nursery, and were treated, as they grew up, on more equal +terms. + +That high exterior polish, those brilliant conversational talents, which +I have seen in many English and French women, must be rare among the +Germans: they are too simple, and too much in earnest. The trifling +of a polished French woman is often most graceful; the trifling of an +Englishwoman gracious and graceful; but the trifling of a German woman +is, in comparison, heavy work; to use a common expression, it is not +_in them_. I met with _one_ satirical woman. You know I once ventured +to assert that no woman is _naturally_ satirical, and to touch upon the +causes which foster this artificial vice--and here was a case in point. +It was that of a mind which had originally been a piece of nature's +noblest handiwork, first bruised, then gradually festered by the action +of all evil influences. + +MEDON. + +And, "lilies that fester are far worse than weeds," so singeth the poet; +but do you make the cause also the excuse? How many minds have endured +the most withering influences of misery and mischief, if not untouched, +at least uninjured--unembittered! + +ALDA. + +I grant you: but before we assume the power of judging, of computing the +degree of virtue in the latter case, of vice in the former, we should +look to the original conformation of the human being--the material +exposed to these influences. Fire hardens the clay and dissolves the +metal. This plate of tempered steel, on which I am going to etch, shall +corrode, effervesce, be absolutely decomposed by the action of a few +drops of nitrous acid, which has no effect whatever on this lump of wax. +Now, carry this analogy into the consideration of the human character--it +will spare us a long argument. + +As to the chapter of coquettes-- + +MEDON. + +Ah! _glissez, mortel, n'appuyez pas!_ + +ALDA. + +And why not?--Don't you know that I meditate, with the assistance of +certain _professorins_, a complete Natural History of Coquettes, (in +quarto,) which shall rival the famous Dutch treatise on Butterflies, +in heaven knows how many folio volumes? In the first part of this +stupendous work we intend to treat systematically of every known +species, from the _coquetterie instinctive_, which may be termed the +wild genus, indigenous in all females, up to the _coquetterie calculée +et philosophique_, the most refined specimen reared in the hot-bed of +artificial life. In the second part, we shall treat the whole history of +_Coquetterie_, from that first pretty experiment of dear Mamma Eve, when +she turned away from Adam, + + "----As conscious of her worth, + That would be woo'd and not unsought be won," + + +down to--to--how shall I avoid being personal?--down to the Lady Adeline +Amundevilles of our own day. With some women _coquetterie_ is an instinct; +with others, an amusement; with others, a pursuit; with others, a science. +With the German women it is a passion: they play the coquette as they do +every thing else, with sentiment, with good faith, with enthusiasm. + +MEDON. + +Why then it is no longer _coquetterie_--it is love! + +ALDA. + +I beg your pardon; it is something very different. True, perhaps, "that +thin partitions do the bounds divide;" but, to a nice observer, the +division is not the less complete. In short, you can imagine nothing +more distinct than an English coquette and a German coquette; in the +first case, one is reminded of Dryden's fanciful simile-- + + "So cold herself, while she such warmth express'd, + 'Twas Cupid bathing in Diana's stream!" + + +But, in the latter case, it is Diana bending the bow, and brandishing +the darts of Cupid; and with an unsuspicious _gaucherie_, which now and +then turns the point against her own bosom. + +I observed, and I verified my own observations, by the information of +some intelligent medical men, that there is less ill-health among the +superior rank of women, in Germany, than with us; all that class of +diseases, which we call nervous, which in England have increased, +and are increasing in such a fearful ratio, are far less prevalent; +doubtless, because the habits of social life are more natural. The use +of noxious stimulants among the better class of women is almost unknown, +and rare among the very lowest classes--would to heaven we could say +the same! No where, not even at Munich, one of the most profligate of +the German capitals, was I ever shocked by the exhibition of female +suffering and depravity in another form, as in the theatres and the +streets of London. + +I have been asked twenty times since my return to England, whether the +German women are not very _exaltée_--very romantic? I could only answer, +that they appeared to me less calculating, less the slaves of artificial +manners and modes of thinking; more imaginative, more governed by +natural feeling, more enthusiastic in love and religion, than with us. +If this is what my English friends term _exaltée_, I certainly cannot +think the German women would have reason to be offended by the +application of the word to them, however satirically meant. Perhaps it +may be from necessity, that they are generally more simple in their +tastes, and more frugal in their expenses; they had certainly a most +formidable idea of the extravagance of fashionable English women, and +of our luxurious habits. I believe that they are sometimes difficult of +access, and apparently inhospitable, because they suspect us of scoffing +at their simplicity, at the homeliness of their accommodations, and +their housewively occupations. For my own part I slipped so quietly +and naturally into all their social and domestic habits, and cared so +little about the differences and distinctions, which some of the English +thought it fine to be always remarking and lamenting, that my German +friends used to express their surprise, by saying--"Savez vous, ma +chère, que vous ne me faites pas de tout l'effet d'une Anglaise!"--an +odd species of compliment, but certainly meant as such. It is true +that I was sometimes a little tired of the everlasting knitting and +cross-stitch; and it is true I may at times have felt the want of +certain external luxuries, with which we are habitually pampered in this +prodigal land, till they become necessaries; but I would be well content +to exchange them all a thousand times over, for the cheap mental and +social pleasures--the easy intercourse of German life. + +MEDON. + +Apropos to German romance. I met with a striking instance of it even in +my short and rapid journey across part of the country. A lady of birth +and rank, who had been _dame d'honneur_ in the court of a sovereign +princess, (a princess by the way of very equivocal reputation,) on +the death of a lover, to whom she had been betrothed, devoted herself +thenceforth to the service of the sick in the hospitals; she could not +enter a religious order, being a Protestant, but she fulfilled all the +offices of a vowed Sister of Charity. When she applied to the physician +for leave to attend the hospital at ----, he used every endeavour to +dissuade her from her undertaking--all in vain! Then he tried to disgust +her by imposing, in the first instance, duties the most fearful and +revolting to a delicate woman; she stood this test, and persisted. It is +now five years since I saw her; perhaps she may by this time be tired of +her charitable, or rather her romantic, self-devotion. + +ALDA. + +No, _that_ she is not. I know to whom you allude. She follows steadily +and quietly the same pious vocation in which she has persevered for +fifteen years, and in which she seems resolved to die. + +Now, in return for your story, though I knew it all before, I will tell +you another; but lest you should suspect me of absolute invention and +romancing, I must tell you how I came by it. + +I was travelling from Weimar to Frankfort, and had stopped at a little +town, one or two stages beyond Fulda; I was standing at the window of +the inn, which was opposite to the post-house, and looking at a crowd +of travellers who had just been disgorged from a huge Eil-wagen or +post-coach, which was standing there. Among them was one female, who, +before I was aware, fixed my attention. Although closely enveloped in a +winter dress from head to foot, her height, and the easy decision with +which she moved, showed that her figure was fine and well-proportioned; +and as the wind blew aside her black veil, I had a glimpse of features +which still farther excited my curiosity. I had time to consider her, +as she alighted and walked over to the inn alone. She entered at once +the room--it was a sort of public saloon--in which I was; summoned the +waiter, whom she addressed in a good-humoured, but rather familiar +style, and ordered breakfast; not a cup of chocolate or _caffee au +lait_, as became a heroine, for you see I was resolved that she should +be one, but a very substantial German breakfast--soup, a cutlet, and a +pint (eine halbe flasche) of good wine: it was then about ten o'clock. +While this was preparing, she threw off her travelling accoutrements; +first a dark cloak, richly lined with fur; one or two shawls; a sort +of pelisse, or rather surtout, reaching to the knees, with long loose +sleeves, such as you may see in the prints of Tartar or Muscovite +costumes; this was made of beautiful Indian shawl, lined with blue +silk, and trimmed with sables: under these splendid and multifarious +coverings she wore a dress of deep mourning. Her figure, when displayed, +excited my admiration: it was one of the most perfect I ever beheld. +Her feet, hands, and head, were small in proportion to her figure; her +face was not so striking--it was pretty, rather than handsome; her small +mouth closed firmly, so as to give a marked and singular expression +of resolution and decision, to a physiognomy otherwise frank and +good-humoured. Her eyes, also small, were of a dark hazel, bright, +and with long blonde eyelashes. Her abundant fair hair was plaited in +several bands, and fastened on the top of her head, in the fashion +of the German peasant girls. Her voice would have been deemed rather +high-pitched, for "ears polite," but it was not deficient in melody; and +though her expression was grave, and even sad, upon our first encounter, +I soon found that mirth, and not sadness, was the natural character of +her mind, as of her countenance. When any thing ridiculous occurred, +she burst at once into a laugh--such a merry, musical peal, that it was +impossible not to sympathize in it. Her whole appearance and manner gave +me the idea of a farmer's buxom daughter: nothing could be more distinct +from our notions of the lady-like, yet nothing could be more free from +impropriety, more expressive of native innocence and modesty; but the +splendour of her dress did not exactly suit with her deportment--it +puzzled me. I observed, when she drew off her glove, that she wore a +number of silver rings of a peculiar fashion, and among them a fine +diamond. She walked up and down while her breakfast was preparing, +seemingly lost in painful meditations; but when it appeared, she sat +down and did justice to it, as one who had been many hours without food. +While she was thus engaged, the conducteur of the Eil-wagen and one +of the passengers came in, and spoke to her with interest and respect. +Soon afterwards came the mistress of the inn, (who had never deigned to +notice me, for it is not the fashion in Germany;) she came with an offer +of particular services, and from the conversation I gathered, to my +astonishment, that this young creature--she seemed not more than two or +three and twenty--was on her way home, alone and unprotected, from--can +you imagine?--even from the wilds of Siberia! But then what had brought +her there? I listened, in hopes of discovering, but they all spoke so +fast that I could make out nothing more. Afterwards, I had occasion to +go over to a little shop to make some purchase. On my return, I found +her crying bitterly, and my maid, also in tears, was comforting her with +great volubility. Now, though my _having_ in German, like Orlando's +beard, was not considerable, and my heroine spoke still less French, I +could not help assisting in the task of consolation--never, certainly, +were my curiosity and interest more strongly excited! Subsequently we +met at Frankfort, where she was lodged in the same hotel, and I was +enabled to offer her a seat in my vehicle to Mayence. Thus, I had +opportunities of hearing her whole history related at different times, +and in parts and parcels; and I will now endeavour to give it to you +in a connected form. I may possibly make some mistake with regard +to the order of events, but I promise you faithfully, that where my +recollection of names, or dates, or circumstances, may fail me, I will +not, like Mademoiselle de Montpensier, make use of my imagination +to supply the defects of my memory. You shall have, if not the whole +truth, at least as much of it as I can remember, and with no fictitious +interpolations and improvements. Of the animation of voice and manner, +the vivid eloquence, the graphic spirit, the quick transitions of +feeling, and the grace and vivacity of gesture and action with which +the relation was made to me by this fine untutored child of nature, +I can give you no idea--it was altogether a study of character, I shall +never forget. + +My heroine--truly and in every sense does she deserve the name--was the +daughter of a rich brewer and wine merchant of Deuxponts.[29] She was +one of five children, two much older and two much younger than herself. +Her eldest brother was called Henri: he had early displayed such +uncommon talents, and such a decided inclination for study, that his +father was determined to give him all the advantages of a learned +education, and sent him to the university of Erlangen, in Bavaria, +whence he returned to his family, with the highest testimonies of his +talents and good conduct. His father now destined him for the clerical +profession, with which his own wishes accorded. His sister fondly +dwelt upon his praises, and described him, perhaps with all a sister's +partiality, as being not only the pride of his family, but of all his +fellow-citizens, "tall, and handsome, and good," of a most benevolent +enthusiastic temper, and devoted to his studies. When he had been at +home for some time, he attracted the notice of one of the princes in the +north of Germany, with whom he travelled, I believe, in the capacity +of secretary. The name of the prince, and the particulars of this +part of his life, have escaped me; but it appeared that, through the +recommendation of this powerful patron, he became professor of theology +in a university of Courland, I think at Riga, or somewhere near it, for +the name of this city was continually recurring in her narrative. Henri +was at this time about eight-and-twenty. + +While here, it was his fate to fall passionately in love with the +daughter of a rich Jew merchant. His religious zeal mingled with his +love; he was as anxious to convert his mistress as to possess her--and, +in fact, the first was a necessary preliminary to the second; the +consequences were all in the usual style of such matters. The relations +discovered the correspondence, and the young Jewess was forbidden to see +or to speak to her lover. They met in secret. What arguments he might +use to convert this modern Jessica, I know not, but they prevailed. She +declared herself convinced, and consented to fly with him beyond the +frontiers, into Silesia, to be baptized, and to become his wife. + +Apparently their plans were not well-arranged, or were betrayed; for +they were pursued by her relations and the police, and overtaken before +they reached the frontiers. The young man was accused of carrying off +his Jewish love by force, and this, I believe, at Riga, where the Jews +are protected, is a capital crime. The affair was brought before the +tribunal, and the accused defended himself by declaring that the girl +had fled with him by her own free will; that she was a Christian, and +his betrothed bride, as they had exchanged rings, or had gone through +some similar ceremony. The father Jew denied this on the part of his +daughter, and Henri desired to be confronted with the lady who was thus +said to have turned his accuser. Her family made many difficulties, but +by the order of the judge she was obliged to appear. She was brought +into the court of justice pale, trembling, and supported by her father +and others of her kindred. The judge demanded whether it was by her own +will that she had fled with Henri Ambos? She answered in a faint voice, +"_No_." Had then violence been used to carry her off? "_Yes._" Was she +a Christian? "_No._" Did she regard Henri as her affianced husband? +"_No._" + +On hearing these replies, so different from the truth,--from all he +could have anticipated, the unfortunate young man appeared for a few +minutes stupified; then, as if seized with a sudden frenzy, he made a +desperate effort to rush upon the young Jewess. On being prevented, he +drew a knife from his pocket, which he attempted to plunge into his own +bosom, but it was wrested from him; in the scuffle he was wounded in +the hands and face, and the young lady swooned away. The sight of his +mistress insensible, and his own blood flowing, restored the lover to +his senses. He became sullenly calm, offered not another word in his own +defence, refused to answer any questions, and was immediately conveyed +to prison. + +These particulars came to the knowledge of his family after the lapse of +many months, but of his subsequent fate they could learn nothing. Neither +his sentence nor his punishment could be ascertained; and although +one of his relations went to Riga, for the purpose of obtaining some +information--some redress--he returned without having effected either +of the purposes of his journey. Whether Henri had died of his wounds, +or languished in a perpetual dungeon, remained a mystery. + +Six years thus passed away. His father died: his mother, who persisted +in hoping, while all others despaired, lingered on in heart-wearing +suspense. At length, in the beginning of last year, (1833,) a travelling +merchant passed through the city of Deuxponts, and inquired for the +family of Ambos. He informed them that in the preceding year he had +seen and spoken to a man in rags, with a long beard, who was working in +fetters with other criminals, near the fortress of Barinska, in Siberia; +who described himself as Henri Ambos, a pastor of the Lutheran church, +unjustly condemned, and besought him with tears, and the most urgent +supplications, to convey some tidings of him to his unhappy parents, and +beseech them to use every means to obtain his liberation. + +You must imagine--for I cannot describe as she described--the feelings +which this intelligence excited. A family counsel was held, and it +was determined at once that application should be made to the police +authorities at St. Petersburgh, to ascertain beyond a doubt the fate +of poor Henri--that a petition in his favour must be presented to the +Emperor of Russia; but who was to present it? The second brother offered +himself, but he had a wife and two children; the wife protested that she +should die if her husband left her, and would not hear of his going; +besides, he was the only remaining hope of his mother's family. The +sister then said that she would undertake the journey, and argued that +as a woman she had more chance of success in such an affair than her +brother. The mother acquiesced. There was, in truth, no alternative; and +being amply furnished with the means, this generous, affectionate, and +strong-minded girl, set off alone, on her long and perilous journey. +"When my mother gave me her blessing," said she, "I made a vow to God +and my own heart, that I would not return alive without the pardon of +my brother. I feared nothing; I had nothing to live for. I had health +and strength, and I had not a doubt of my own success, because I was +_resolved_ to succeed; but ah! _liebe madame!_ what a fate was mine! and +how am I returning to my mother!--my poor old mother!" Here she burst +into tears, and threw herself back in the carriage; after a few minutes +she resumed her narrative. + +She reached the city of Riga without mischance. There she collected the +necessary documents relative to her brother's character and conduct, +with all the circumstances of his trial, and had them properly attested. +Furnished with these papers, she proceeded to St. Petersburgh, where she +arrived safely in the beginning of June, 1833. She had been furnished with +several letters of recommendation, and particularly with one to a German +ecclesiastic, of whom she spoke with the most grateful enthusiasm, by the +title of M. le Pasteur. She met with the utmost difficulty in obtaining +from the police the official return of her brother's condemnation, place +of exile, punishment, &c.; but at length, by almost incredible boldness, +perseverance, and address, she was in possession of these, and with the +assistance of her good friend the pastor, she drew up a petition to the +emperor. With this she waited on the minister of the interior, to whom, +with great difficulty, and after many applications, she obtained access. +He treated her with great harshness, and absolutely refused to deliver +the petition. She threw herself on her knees, and added tears to +entreaties; but he was inexorable, and added brutally--"Your brother +was a _mauvais sujet_; he _ought_ not to be pardoned, and if I were the +emperor I would not pardon him." She rose from her knees, and stretching +her arms towards heaven, exclaimed with fervour--"I call God to witness +that my brother was innocent! and I thank God that you are not the +emperor, for I can still hope!" The minister, in a rage, said--"Do you +dare to speak thus to me! Do you know who I am?" "Yes," she replied; +"you are his excellency the minister C----; but what of that? you are +a cruel man! but I put my trust in God and the emperor; and then," said +she, "I left him, without even a curtsey, though he followed me to the +door, speaking very loud and very angrily." + +Her suit being rejected by all the ministers, (for even those who +were most gentle, and who allowed the hardship of the case, still +refused to interfere, or deliver her petition,) she resolved to do, +what she had been dissuaded from attempting in the first instance--to +appeal to the emperor in person: but it was in vain she lavished +hundreds of dollars in bribes to the inferior officers; in vain she +beset the imperial suite, at reviews, at the theatre, on the way to +the church: invariably beaten back by the guards, or the attendants, +she could not penetrate to the emperor's presence. After spending six +weeks in daily ineffectual attempts of this kind, hoping every morning, +and almost despairing every evening--threatened by the police, and +spurned by the officials--Providence raised her up a friend in one of +her own sex. Among some ladies of rank, who became interested in her +story, and invited her to their houses, was a Countess Elise, something +or other, whose name I am sorry I did not write down. One day, on seeing +her young _protegée_ overwhelmed with grief, and almost in despair, she +said, with emotion, "I cannot dare to present your petition myself, I +might be sent off to Siberia, or at least banished the court; but all I +can do I will. I will lend you my equipage and servants. I will dress +you in one of my robes; you shall drive to the palace the next levee +day, and obtain an audience under my name; when once in the presence of +the emperor you must manage for yourself. If I risk thus much, will you +venture the rest?" "And what," said I, "was your answer?" "Oh!" she +replied, "I could not answer; but I threw myself at her feet, and kissed +the hem of her gown!" I asked her whether she had not feared to risk the +safety of her generous friend? She replied, "That thought did strike +me--but what would you have?--I cast it from me. I was _resolved_ to +have my brother's pardon--I would have sacrificed my own life to obtain +it--and, God forgive me, I thought little of what it might cost another." + +This plan was soon arranged, and at the time appointed my resolute +heroine drove up to the palace in a splendid equipage, preceded by a +running footman, with three laced laquais in full dress, mounted +behind. She was announced as the Countess Elise ----, who supplicated +a particular audience of his majesty. The doors flew open, and in a few +minutes she was in the presence of the emperor, who advanced one or +two steps to meet her, with an air of gallantry, but suddenly started +back---- + +Here I could not help asking her, whether in that moment she did not +feel her heart sink? + +"No," said she firmly; "on the contrary, I felt my heart beat quicker +and higher!--I sprang forward and knelt at his feet, exclaiming, with +clasped hands--'Pardon, imperial majesty!--Pardon!'" "Who are you?" said +the emperor, astonished; "and what can I do for you?" He spoke gently, +more gently than any of his ministers, and overcome, even by my own +hopes, I burst into a flood of tears, and said--"May it please your +imperial majesty, I am not Countess Elise ----, I am only the sister of +the unfortunate Henri Ambos, who has been condemned on false accusation. +O pardon!--pardon! Here are the papers--the proofs. O imperial +majesty!--pardon my poor brother!" I held out the petition and the +papers, and at the same time, prostrate on my knees, I seized the skirt +of his embroidered coat, and pressed it to my lips. The emperor said, +"Rise--rise!" but I would not rise; I still held out my papers, resolved +not to rise till he had taken them. At last the emperor, who seemed much +moved, extended one hand towards me, and took the papers with the other, +saying--"Rise, mademoiselle--I command you to rise." I ventured to kiss +his hand, and said, with tears, "I pray of your majesty to read that +paper." He said, "I will read it." I then rose from the ground, and stood +watching him while he unfolded the petition and read it. His countenance +changed, and he exclaimed once or twice, "Is it possible?--This is +dreadful!" When he had finished, he folded the paper, and without +any observation, said at once--"Mademoiselle Ambos, your brother is +pardoned." The words rung in my ears, and I again flung myself at his +feet, saying--and yet I scarce know what I said--"Your imperial majesty +is a god upon earth; do you indeed pardon my brother? Your ministers +would never suffer me to approach you; and even yet I fear----!" He +said, "Fear nothing: you have my promise." He then raised me from the +ground, and conducted me himself to the door. I tried to thank and bless +him, but could not; he held out his hand for me to kiss, and then bowed +his head as I left the room. "Ach ja! the emperor is a good man,--ein +schöner, feiner, Mann! but he does not know how cruel his ministers are, +and all the evil they do, and all the justice they refuse, in his name!" + +I have given you this scene as nearly as possible in her own words. +She not only related it, but almost acted it over again; she imitated +alternately, her own and the emperor's voice and manner; and such was +the vivacity of her description that I seemed to hear and behold both, +and was more profoundly moved than by any scenic representation I can +remember. + +On her return she received the congratulations of her benefactress, the +Countess Elise, and of her good friend the pastor, but both advised her +to keep her audience and the emperor's promise a profound secret. She +was the more inclined to this; because, after the first burst of joyous +emotion, her spirits sank. Recollecting the pains that had been taken to +shut her from the emperor's presence, she feared some unforeseen obstacle, +or even some knavery on the part of the officers of government. She +described her sufferings during the next few days, as fearful; her +agitation, her previous fatigues, and the terrible suspense, apparently +threw her into a fever, or acted on her excited nerves so as to produce +a species of delirium, though, of course, she would not admit this. +After assuring me very gravely that she did not believe in ghosts, she +told me that one night, after her interview with the emperor, she was +reading in bed, being unable to sleep; and on raising her eyes from her +book she saw the figure of her brother, standing at the other end of the +room; she exclaimed, "My God, Henri! is that you!" but without making +any reply, the form approached nearer and nearer to the bed, keeping +its melancholy eyes fixed on her's, till it came quite close to the bed +side, and laid a cold heavy hand upon her. + +MEDON. + +The night-mare, evidently. + +ALDA. + +Without doubt; but her own impression was as of a reality. The figure, +after looking at her sadly for some minutes, during which she had no +power either to move or speak, turned away; she then made a desperate +effort to call out to the daughter of her hostess, who slept in the next +room--"Luise! Luise!" Luise ran in to her. "Do you not see my brother +standing there?" she exclaimed with horror, and pointing to the other +end of the room, whither the image, conjured up by her excited fancy and +fevered nerves, appeared to have receded. The frightened, staring Luise, +answered, "Yes." "You see," said she, appealing to me--"that though I +might be cheated by my own senses, I could not doubt those of another. I +thought to myself, _then_, my poor Henri is dead, and God has permitted +him to visit me. This idea pursued me all that night, and the next day; +but on the following day, which was Monday, just five days after I had +seen the Emperor, a _laquais_, in the imperial livery, came to my lodging, +and put into my hands a packet, with the "Emperor's _compliments_ to +Mademoiselle Ambos." It was the pardon for my brother, with the Emperor's +seal and signature: then I forgot every thing but joy!" + +Those mean, official animals, who had before spurned her, now pressed +upon her with offers of service, and even the Minister C---- offered to +expedite the pardon himself to Siberia, _in order to save her trouble_; +but she would not suffer the precious paper out of her hands: she +determined to carry it herself--to be herself the bearer of glad + tidings:--she had resolved that none but herself should take off those +fetters, the very description of which had entered her soul; so, having +made her arrangements as quickly as possible, she set off for Moscow, +where she arrived in three days. According to her description, the +town in Siberia, to the governor of which she carried an official +recommendation, was nine thousand versts beyond Moscow; and the fortress +to which the wretched malefactors were exiled was at a great distance +beyond that. I could not well make out the situation of either, and, +unluckily, I had no map with me but a road map of Germany, and it was +evident that my heroine was no geographer. She told me that, after +leaving Moscow, she travelled post seven days and seven nights, only +sleeping in the carriage. She then reposed for two days, and then posted +on for another seven days and nights. + +MEDON. + +Alone? + +ALDA. + +Alone! and wholly unprotected, except by her own innocence and energy, +and a few lines of recommendation, which had been given to her at St. +Petersburgh. The roads were every where excellent, the post-houses at +regular distances, the travelling rapid; but often, for hundreds of miles, + +there were no accommodations of any kind--scarce a human habitation. +She even suffered from hunger, not being prepared to travel for so many +hours together without meeting with any food she could touch without +disgust. She described, with great truth and eloquence, her own +sensations as she was whirled rapidly over those wide, silent, solitary, +and apparently endless plains. "Sometimes," said she, "my head seemed +to turn--I could not believe that it was a waking reality--I could not +believe that it was myself. Alone, in a strange land,--so many hundred +leagues from my own home, and driven along as if through the air, with a +rapidity so different from any thing I had been used to, that it almost +took away my breath." + +"Did you ever feel fear?" I asked. + +"Ach ja! when I waked sometimes in the carriage, in the middle of the +night, wondering at myself, and unable immediately to collect my thoughts. +Never at any other time." + +I asked her if she had ever met with insult? She said she had twice met +with "wicked men;" but she had felt no alarm--she knew how to protect +herself; and as she said this, her countenance assumed an expression +which showed that it was not a mere boast. Altogether, she described her +journey as being _grausam_, (horrible,) in the highest degree, and, +indeed, even the recollection of it made her shudder; but at the time +there was the anticipation of an unspeakable happiness, which made all +fatigues light, and all dangers indifferent. + +At length, in the beginning of August, she arrived at the end of her +journey, and was courteously received by the commandant of the fortress. +She presented the pardon with a hand which trembled with impatience and +joy, too great to be restrained, almost to be borne. The officer looked +very grave, and took, she thought, a long time to read the paper, which +consisted only of six or eight lines. At last he stammered out, "I am +sorry--but the Henri Ambos mentioned in this paper--_is dead_!" Poor +girl! she fell to the earth. + +When she reached this part of her story she burst into a fresh flood +of tears, wrung her hands, and for some time could utter nothing but +passionate exclamations of grief. "Ach! lieber Gott! was für ein +schreckliches Schicksal war das meine!" "What a horrible fate was mine! +I had come thus far to find--not my brother--_nur ein Grab_!" (only a +grave!) she repeated several times, with an accent of despair. The +unfortunate man had died a year before. The fetters in which he worked +had caused an ulcer in his leg, which he neglected, and, after some +weeks of horrid suffering, death released him. The task-work, for nearly +five years, of this accomplished, and even learned man, in the prime of +his life and mental powers, had been to break stones upon the road, +chained hand and foot, and confounded with the lowest malefactors. + +In giving you thus conscientiously, the mere outline of this story, +I have spared you all comments. I see, by those indignant strides +majestical, that you are making comments to yourself; but sit down and +be quiet, if you can: I have not much more to tell! + +She found, on inquiry, that some papers and letters, which her unhappy +brother had drawn up by stealth, in the hope of being able at some time +to convey them to his friends, were in the possession of one of the +officers, who readily gave them up to her; and with these she returned, +half broken-hearted, to St. Petersburgh. If her former journey, when +hope cheered her on the way, had been so fearful, what must have been +her return? I was not surprised to hear that, on her arrival, she was +seized with a dangerous illness, and was for many weeks confined to her +bed. + +Her story excited much commiseration; and a very general interest and +curiosity was excited about herself. She told me that a great many +persons of rank invited her to their houses, and made her rich presents, +among which were the splendid shawls and the ring, which had caught my +attention, and excited my surprise, in the first instance. The Emperor +expressed a wish to see her, and very graciously spoke a few words of +condolence. "But they could not bring my brother back to life!" said +she, expressively. He even presented her to the Empress. "And what," +I asked, "did the Empress say to you?" "_Nothing_; but she looked +_so_,"--drawing herself up. + +On receiving her brother's pardon from the Emperor, she had written +home to her family; but she confessed that since that time she had not +written--she had not courage to inflict a blow which might possibly +affect her mother's life; and yet the idea of being obliged to _tell_ +what she dared not write, seemed to strike her with terror. + +But the strangest event of this strange story remains to be told; and +I will try to give it in her own simple words. + +She left Petersburgh in October, and proceeded to Riga, where those +who had known her brother received her with interest and kindness, and +sympathized in her affliction. "But," said she, "there was one thing +I had resolved to do, which yet remained undone. I was resolved to +see the woman who had been the original cause of all my poor brother's +misfortunes. I thought if once I could say to her, 'Your falsehood has +done this!' I should be satisfied; but my brother's friends dissuaded +me from this idea. They said it was better not; that it could do my +poor Henri no good; that it was wrong; that it was unchristian; and +I submitted. I left Riga with a voiturier. I had reached Pojer, on +the Prussian frontiers, and there I stopped at the Douane, to have my +packages searched. The chief officer looked at the address on my trunk, +and exclaimed, with surprise, 'Mademoiselle Ambos! Are you any relation +of the Professor Henri Ambos?'--'I am his sister.' 'Good God! I was the +intimate friend of your brother! What has become of him?' I then told +him all I have now told you, liebe madame!--and when I came to an end, +this good man burst into tears, and for some time we wept together. The +kutscher, (driver,) who was standing by, heard all this conversation, +and when I turned round, he was crying too. My brother's friend pressed +on me offers of service and hospitality, but I could not delay; for, +besides that my impatience to reach home increased every hour, I had +not much money in my purse. Of three thousand dollars, which I had +taken with me to St. Petersburgh, very little remained, so I bade him +farewell, and I proceeded. At the next town, where my kutscher stopped +to feed his horses, he came to the door of my calèche, and said, 'You +have just missed seeing the Jew lady, whom your brother was in love +with; that calèche which passed us by just now, and changed horses here, +contained Mademoiselle S----, her sister, and her sister's husband!' +Good God! imagine my surprise! I could not believe my fortune: it seemed +that Providence had delivered her into my hands, and I was resolved +that she should not escape me. I knew they would be delayed at the +Custom-house. I ordered the man to turn, and drive back as fast as +possible, promising him a reward of a dollar if he overtook them. +On reaching the Custom-house, I saw a calèche standing at a little +distance. I felt myself tremble, and my heart beat so--but not with +fear. I went up to the calèche--two ladies were sitting in it. I +addressed the one who was the most beautiful, and said, 'Are you +Mademoiselle Emilie S----?' I suppose I must have looked very strange, +and wild, and resolute, for she replied, with a frightened manner--'I +am; who are you, and what do you want with me?' I said, 'I am the sister +of Henri Ambos, whom you murdered!' She shrieked out; the men came +running from the house; but I held fast the carriage-door, and said, +'I am not come to hurt you, but you are the murderess of my brother, +Henri Ambos. He loved you, and your falsehood has killed him. May God +punish you for it! May his ghost pursue you to the end of your life!' I +remember no more. I was like one mad. I have just a recollection of her +ghastly, terrified look, and her eyes wide open, staring at me. I fell +into fits; and they carried me into the house of my brother's friend, +and laid me on a bed. When I recovered my senses, the calèche and +all were gone. When I reached Berlin, all this appeared to me so +miraculous--so like a dream--I could not trust to my own recollection, +and I wrote to the officer of Customs, to beg he would attest that it +was really true, and what I had said when I was out of my senses, and +what _she_ had said; and at Leipsic I received his letter, which I will +show you." And at Mayence she showed me this letter, and a number of +other documents; her brother's pardon, with the Emperor's signature; +a letter of the Countess Elise ----; a most touching letter from her +unfortunate brother; (over this she wept much;) and a variety of other +papers, all proving the truth of her story, even to the minutest +particulars. The next morning we were to part. I was going down the +Rhine, and she was to proceed to Deuxponts, which she expected to reach +in two days. As she had travelled from Berlin almost without rest, +except the night we had spent at Frankfort, she appeared to me ready to +sink with fatigue; but she would not bid me farewell that night, although +I told her I should be obliged to set off at six the next morning; but +kissing my hand, with many expressions of gratitude, she said she would +be awake and visit me in my room to bid me a last adieu. As there was +only a very narrow passage between the two rooms, she left her door a +little open that she might hear me rise. However, on the following +morning she did not appear. When dressed, I went on tiptoe into her +room, and found her lying in a deep calm sleep, her arm over her head. +I looked at her for some minutes, and thought I had never seen a finer +creature. I then turned, with a whispered blessing and adieu, and went +on my way. + +This is all I can tell you. If at the time I had not been travelling +_against_ time, and with a mind most fully and painfully occupied, +I believe I should have been tempted to accompany my heroine to +Deuxponts--at least I should have retained her narrative more accurately. +Not having made any memoranda till many days afterwards, all the names +have escaped my recollection; but if you have any doubts of the general +truth of this story, I will at least give you the means of verifying it. +Here is her name, in her own handwriting, on one of the leaves of my +pocket-book--you can read the German character; + + =Bety Ambos von Zweibruken.= + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + + +PART II. + +MEMORANDA AT MUNICH, NUREMBURG, AND DRESDEN. + + + + +I. + +MEMORANDA AT MUNICH. + + +SEPT. 28th.--A week at Munich! and nothing done! nothing seen! My first +_excursions_ I made to-day--from my bed to the sofa--from the sofa to +the window. Every one told me to be prepared against the caprices of the +climate, but I did not imagine that it would take a week or a fortnight +to be _acclimatée_. + +What could induce the princes of Bavaria to plant their capital in the +midst of these wide, marshy, bleak, barren plains, and upon this rough +unmanageable torrent,--"the Isar rolling rapidly,"--when they might have +seated themselves by the majestic Danube? The Tyrolean Alps stretching +south and west, either form a barrier against the most genial airs of +heaven, or if a stray zephyr find his way from Italy, his poor little +wings are frozen to his back among the mountain snows, and he drops +shivering among us, wrapt in a misty cloud. I never saw such fogs: +they are as dense and as white as a fleece, and look, and feel too, +like rarefied snow;--but as no one else complains, I think it must be +indisposition which makes me so peevish and so chilly. Sitting at the +window being my best amusement, I do not like to find the only objects +which are to give me a foretaste of the splendour of Munich, quite +veiled from sight, and shrouded in mist, even for a few morning hours. + +I am lodged in the Max-Joseph's-Platz, opposite to the theatre: a +situation at once airy, quiet, and cheerful. + +The theatre is in itself a beautiful object; the portico, of the +Corinthian order, is supported by eight pillars; the ascent is by a +noble flight of steps, with four gigantic bronze candelabras at the +corners; and nothing, at least to my unlearned eyes, could be more +elegant--more purely classical and Greek, than the whole, were it not +for the hideous roof _upon the roof_,--one pediment, as it were, riding +on the back of the other. Some internal arrangement of the theatre may +render this deformity necessary, but it _is_ a deformity, and one that +annoys me whenever I look at it. + +On the right, I have the new palace, which forms one side of the square: +a long range of plain, almost rustic, architecture; altogether a striking, +but rather a pleasing contrast, to the luxuriant grace of the theatre. +Just now, when I looked out, what a beautiful scene! The full moon, +rising over the theatre, lights up half the white columns, and half are +lost in shade. The performances are just over; (half-past nine!) crowds +of people emerging from the portico into the brilliant moonshine, (many +of them military, in glittering accoutrements,) descend the steps, and +spread themselves through the square, single, or in various groups; +carriages are drawing up and drawing off,--and all this gay confusion is +without the least noise or tumult. Except the occasional low roll of the +carriage-wheels over the well-gravelled road, I hear no sound, though +within a few yards of the spot. It looks like some lovely optical or +scenic illusion; a moving picture, magnified. + +_Oct. 4th._--To my great consternation--summoned in form before the +police, and condemned to pay a fine of ten florins for having omitted to +fill up specifically a certain paper which had been placed in my hands +on my arrival. In the first place, I did not understand it; secondly, +I never thought about it; and thirdly, I had been too ill to attend to +it. I made a show of resistance, but it was all in vain, of course;--my +permission to reside here is limited to six weeks, but may be renewed. + +Last night I was induced, but only upon great persuasion, to venture +over to the theatre. I had been tantalised _so_ long by looking at the +exterior! Then it was a pleasant evening--broad daylight; and the whole +theatre being heated by stoves to an even regulated warmth according to +the season, I was assured that once within the doors there would be no +danger of fresh indisposition from draughts or cold. + +Entering the box, my first glance was of course at the stage. The +drop-scene, or curtain, a well painted copy of Guido's Aurora, pleased +me infinitely more than the beautiful drop-curtain at Manheim: _that_ +was very elegant, but this is more than elegant. It harmonized with the +place, and in my own mind it touched certain chords of association, +which had long been silent. It was as if the orchestre had suddenly +welcomed me with some delicious, often-heard, and well-remembered piece +of music: the effect upon the senses was similar--nor can I describe +it;--but, surprised and charmed, I kept my eyes fixed for some minutes +upon the picture: the light being thrown full upon it, while the rest +of the theatre was comparatively in deep shade, like all the foreign +theatres, rendered it more effective. The rest of the decorations +corresponded in splendour; the two colossal muses, as Caryatides +supporting the king's state box, the noble columns of white and gold, +and the Caryatides on each side of the proscenium, were all in fine +taste. The size and proportions of the interior seemed most happily +calculated for seeing and hearing. On the whole, I never beheld a +theatre which so entirely _satisfied_ me--no one more easily pleased, +and no one less easily satisfied! + +When I looked down on the _parterre_, I beheld a motley assemblage in +various costumes: there were a great number of the military; there were +the well-dressed daughters of people of some condition, in the French +fashion of two or three years back; there were girls in the Tyrolean +costume, with their scarlet boddices and silver chains; and the women of +Munich, with their odd little two-horned caps of rich gold or silver +brocade,--forming altogether a singular spectacle. As for the scenery, +it was very well, but would bear no comparison to Stanfield's glorious +illusions. + +The inducement held out to me to-night was to see Ferdinand Eslair play +the Duke of Alva in "Egmont." Eslair, formerly one of the first actors +at Manheim, when Manheim boasted the first theatre in Germany, is +esteemed the finest tragedian here, and the Duke of Alva is one of his +best characters. It appeared to me a superb piece of acting; so quietly +stern, so fearfully hard and composed: it was a fine conception cast in +bronze:--in this consisted its beauty and truth as a whole. Some of his +_silent_ passages, and his by-play, were admirable. He gave us, in the +scene with Egmont, an exact living transcript of Titian's famous picture +of the Duke of Alva; the dress, the attitude, the position of the +helmet and the glove on the table beside him, every thing was so well +calculated, at once so unobtrusive and so unexpected, that it was like +a recognition. Egmont was well played by Racke, but did not strike me +so much. Mademoiselle Schöller, who plays the young heroines here, is a +pupil of Madame Schröder, (the German Siddons,) and promises well; but +she wants development; she wants the power, the passion, the tenderness, +the energy of Clärchen. Clärchen is a plebeian girl, but an impassioned +and devoted woman--she is a sort of Flemish Juliet. There is the same +truth of nature and passion, the same impress of intense and luxuriant +life--but then it is a different life--it is a Rubens compared to a +Titian--and such Clärchen ought to be. Now to give all the internal +power and poetry, yet preserve all the external simplicity and homeliness +of the character,--to give all the _abandon_, yet preserve all the +delicacy,--to give the delicacy, yet keep clear of all super-refinement, +and in the concentrated despair of her last scene (where she poisons +herself) to be calm without being cold, and profoundly tragic without +the usual tragedy airs, must be difficult--exceedingly difficult; in +short, to play Clärchen, as I conceive the character ought to be played, +would require a young actress, uniting sufficient genius to conceive +it aright, with sufficient delicacy and judgment not to colour it too +highly: there was no danger of the latter mistake with Mademoiselle +Schöller, in whose hands Clärchen became a mere pretty affectionate +girl. In that lovely scene with Egmont in the third act, which might +be contrasted with Juliet's balcony scene, as a test of the powers of a +young actress, Mademoiselle Schöller was timid even to feebleness; the +change of manner, when Clärchen substitutes the tender familiarity of +the second person singular (Du) for the tone of respect in which she +before addressed her lover, should have been felt and marked, so as to +have been _felt_ and _remarked_: but this was not the case. In short, +I was disappointed by this scene. + +The Flemish costumes were correct and beautiful. The Prince of Orange, +in particular, looked as if he had just walked out of one of Vandyke's +pictures. + +After seeing this fine tragedy--surely enough for one evening's +amusement--I was at home and in bed by half-past ten. They manage these +things better here than in England. + +_Friday._--Dinner at the French ambassador's _five_ o'clock. I mark +this, because extraordinarily late at Munich. The plebeian dinner hour +is twelve, or earlier; the general hour, one; the genteel hour, two; +the fashionable hour, _three_; but five is super-elegant--in the very +extreme of finery--like a nine o'clock dinner in London. There were +present some French and Austrians of high rank, who had all visited +England; and the conversation turning on our English aristocratic +society--the only society they knew any thing about--I had another proof +of the ridicule with which foreigners treat our assumption of superior +morality and domestic happiness. But the person who fixed my attention +was Leo von Klenze, the celebrated architect, and deservedly a favourite +of the king, who has, I believe, bestowed on him the superfluous honours +of nobility. With the others, I had no sympathies--with him a thousand, +though he knew it not. I looked at him with curiosity--with interest. +I liked his plain, but marked and clever countenance, and his easy +manners. I felt an unconscious desire to be agreeable, and longed to +make him talk; but I knew that this was not the place or the moment for +us to see each other to the greatest advantage. We had, however, some +little conversation--a kind of beginning. He told me at dinner that the +Glypthothek, (the gallery of sculpture here,) was planned and built by +the present king, when only prince royal, and the expenses liquidated +from his private purse, out of his yearly savings. He spoke with modesty +of himself--with gratitude and admiration of the king, of whose talent, +vivacity, impatience, and enthusiasm for art and artists I had already +heard some characteristic anecdotes. + +After coffee, part of the company dispersed to the opera, or elsewhere; +others remained to lounge and converse. After the opera, we re-assembled +with additions, and then tea, and cards, and talk, till past eleven. +Madame de Vaudreuil receives almost every evening, and this seems to be +the general routine. + +_Oct. 6._--They are now celebrating here the _Volksfest_, (literally the +"_people's feast_,") or annual fair of Munich, and this has been a grand +day of festivity. There have been races, a military review, &c.; but, +except the race-horses in their embroidered trappings, which were led +past my window, and a long cavalcade of royal carriages and crowds of +people, in gay and grotesque costumes, hurrying by, I have seen nothing, +being obliged to keep my room; so I listened to the firing of the cannon, +and the shouts of the populace, and thought. + + * * * * * + +_Oct. 8._--First visit to the Glypthothek--just returned--my imagination, +still filled with "the blaze, the splendour, and the symmetry,"--excited +as I never thought it could be again excited after seeing the Vatican; +but this is the Vatican in miniature. Can it be possible that this +glorious edifice was planned by a young prince, and erected out of his +yearly savings? I am wonder-struck! I was not prepared for any thing so +spacious, so magnificent, so perfect in taste and arrangement. + +I do not yet know the exact measurement of the building; but it contains +twelve galleries, the smallest about fifty, and the largest about one +hundred and thirty feet in length. It consists of a square, built round +an open central court, and the approach is by a noble portico of eight +Ionic columns, raised on a flight of steps. As it stands in an open +space, a little out of the town, with trees planted on either side, the +effect is very imposing and beautiful. There are no exterior windows, +they all open into the central court. + +From the portico we enter a hall, paved with marble. Over the principal +door is the name of the king, and the date of the erection. Two side +doors lead to the galleries. Over the door on the left there is an +inscription to the honour of Leo von Klenze, the architect of the +building. Over the door on the right, is the name of Peter Cornelius, +the painter, by whom the frescos were designed and chiefly executed. +Thus the king, with a noble magnanimity, uniting truth and justice, +has associated in his glory those to whom he chiefly owes it--and this +charmed me. It is in much finer feeling, much higher taste, than those +eternal (no, not _eternal_!) great N's of that imperial egotist, Napoleon, +whose vulgar appetite for vulgar fame would allow no participation. + +I walked slowly through the galleries so excited by the feeling of +admiration, that I could make no minute or particular observations. The +floors are all paved with marbles of various colours--the walls, to a +certain height, are stuccoed in imitation of grey or dark green marble, +so as to throw out the sculpture, and give it the full effect. The +utmost luxury of ornament has been lavished on the walls and ceilings, +some in painting, some in relief; but in each, the subjects and +ornaments are appropriate to the situation, and as each gallery has +been originally adapted to its destination, every where the effect to be +produced has been judiciously studied. The light is not too great, nor +too generally diffused--it is poured in from high semicircular windows +on one side only, so as to throw the sculpture into beautiful relief. +Two lofty and spacious halls are richly painted in fresco, with subjects +from the Greek mythology, and the whole building would contain, I +suppose, six times, or ten times, the number of works of art now there; +at the same time all are so arranged that there appears no obvious +deficiency. The collection was begun only in 1808, and since that time +the king has contrived to make some invaluable acquisitions. I found +here many of the most far-famed relics of ancient art, many that I had +already seen in Italy; for instance, the Egina marbles, the Barberini +Faun, the Barberini Muse, or Apollo, the Leucothoë, the Medusa Rondanini +above all, the Ilioneus; but I cannot now dwell on these. I must go +again and again before I can methodise my impressions and recollections. + +_Oct. 11._--Yesterday and to-day, at the Glypthothek, where the cushioned +seats, though rather more classical than comfortable, enabled me to +lounge away the time, unwearied in body as in mind. + +The arrangement of the galleries is such as to form not only a splendid +exhibition and school of art, but a regular progressive history of the +rise and decline of sculpture. Thus we step from the vestibule into +the Egyptian gallery, of which the principal treasure is the colossal +Antinous of Rossoantico, with the attributes of Osiris. + +I admired in this room the exquisite beauty and propriety of the +basso-relievo over the door, designed and modelled by Schwanthaler. It +is of course intended to be symbolical of the birth of art among the +Egyptians. Isis discovers the body of her lost husband Osiris, concealed +in a sarcophagus: she strikes it with the mystic wand, and he stands +revealed, and restored to her. The imitation of the Egyptian style +is perfect. + +From the Egyptian, we step into the Etruscan gallery, of which the +ceiling is painted in the most vivid and beautiful colours. The third +room contains the famous Egina marbles, which I had seen at Rome when +Thorwaldson was engaged in restoring them. To appreciate the classical +beauty and propriety of the arrangement of these singular relics, we +must call to mind their history, their subject, and their original +destination. Thus Æacus, the first king of the Island of Ægina, was +the son of Jupiter, or rather Zeus, (for the Greek designations are +infinitely more elegant and expressive than the Roman.) The temple +was dedicated to Zeus, and the groups which adorned the pediments +represented the history of the two branches of the Æacidæ, descended +from Telamon and Peleus, sons of Æacus. On two long tables or stands +of marble, supported by griffins, imitated from those which originally +ornamented the temple, are ranged the two groups of figures: neither +group is quite entire. Of that which represents the fight of Telamon +and Hercules with Laomedon, King of Troy, there are only five figures +remaining; and of the other group, the conflict for the body of +Patroclus, there are ten figures. Along the walls, on tables of marble, +are ranged a variety of fragments from the same temple, which must have +been splendidly rich in sculpture, within and without. On the ceiling of +this room, the four Æacidæ, Æacus, Peleus, Achilles, and Neoptolemus, +are represented in relief, by Schwanthaler. There is also a small model +of the western front of the temple restored, and painted as it is proved +to have been originally; (for instance, the field of the Tympanum was of +a sky blue.) This model is fixed in the wall opposite to the window. It +is extremely curious and interesting, but I thought not well placed as +an ornament.[30] + +I remember asking W----, who has been in every part of the world, what +was the most beautiful scene he had ever beheld, taking natural beauty +and poetical associations together? He replied, after a little thought, +"A sunset from the temple of Ægina;"--and I can conceive this. Lord +Byron introduces it into his Grecian Sunset--but as an object-- + + "On old Ægina's steep and Idra's Isle, + The god of gladness sheds his parting smile." + + +From the Ægina gallery we enter the Hall of Apollo. The ceiling of this +room, splendidly decorated in white and gold, represents the emblems +of the four principal cities of Greece, viz. the Athenian owl, the +winged-horse of Corinth, the Chimera of Sicyon, and the wolf of Argos. + +The chief glory of this apartment is that celebrated colossal statue, +once known as the Barberini muse, now considered by antiquarians as an +Apollo, and supposed to be the work of Ageladas, the master of Phidias. +It is certainly older than the sculptures of the Parthenon. In its +severe massy grandeur, there is something of the heaviness and formality +of the most ancient Greek school, and in point of style it forms a link +between the Ægina marbles and the Elgin marbles. It should seem that the +eyes of this statue were once represented by gems--the orifices remain, +surrounded by a ring of bronze. + +In the same room are those two sublime busts which almost take away +one's breath--the colossal head of Pallas, resembling that of the +Minerva of Velletri, now in the Vatican; and the Achilles. + +The next room is the Hall of Bacchus. The ceiling is richly ornamented +with all the festive emblems of the god, in white and gold relief. In +the centre we have that wondrous statue, the gigantic Sleeping Satyr, +called by some the Barberini Faun. Antiquaries and connoisseurs refer +this work either to Scopas or Praxiteles, and, from the situation in +which it was discovered, suppose it to have once ornamented the tomb +of Adrian. I cannot tell how this may be, but here we behold with +astonishment the grotesque, the elegant, and the sublime mingled +together, and each in perfection: _how_, I know not; but I feel it +is so. I once saw a drawing of this statue, which gave me the idea of +something coarse and heavy; whereas, in the original, the delicate beauty +of the workmanship, and the inimitable sleepy abandonment of the attitude, +soften the effect of the colossal forms. I would place this statue +immediately after the Elgin marbles; it is, with all its excellence, +a degree lower in style. + +In this gallery I found the famous head of the laughing faun, called +from the greenish stain on the cheek, the fauno colla macchia, and +also a sarcophagus, representing in the most exquisite sculpture, the +marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne. The blending of the idea of death with +the fullness of life, and even with the most luxuriant and festive +associations of life, is common among the Greeks, and, from one or two +known instances, appears to have been carried to an extreme which makes +one shrink; still, any thing rather than our detestable death's head and +cross bones! In nature, and in poetry, death is beautiful. It is the +diseases and vices of artificial life which have rendered it lamentable, +terrible, disgusting. + +Fixed in the wall, opposite to the window, there is a bas relief of +amazing beauty--the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite. It is a piece +of lyric poetry. + +The Hall of Niobe contains few objects; but among them some of the most +perfect specimens of Grecian art; and first, the ILIONEUS. + +It was because the Grecian sculptors were themselves poets and creators, +that "marble grew divine" beneath their hands, and became so instinct +with the indestructible spirit of life, that their half-defaced ruins +retain their immortality: else how should we stand shivering with +awe before those tremendous fragments--the sister Fates in the Elgin +marbles! Or, how should I, who am incapable of estimating the technical +perfection of art, stand entranced--as to-day I stood--before the +Ilioneus? It was not merely admiration; it was the overpowering +sentiment of harmonious and pathetic beauty running along every +nerve--such a feeling as music has sometimes awakened. I suppose the +Ilioneus stands alone, like the Torso of the Vatican--the _ne plus +ultra_ of grace, as the latter is of grandeur. + +The first time I ever saw a cast of this divine statue was in the +vestibule of Goethe's house, at Weimar. It immediately fixed my +attention. Afterwards I saw another in Dannecker's studio, and from him +I learned its history. It was discovered about ten years ago at Prague, +in the possession of a stone-mason, and is supposed to have formed part +of the collection of ancient works of art which the Emperor Rodolph +collected in Italy about 1600.[31] A certain Dr. Barth purchased it +for a trifle, and brought it to Vienna, where Dannecker happened to +be at that time, and was called upon with others to pronounce on its +merits and value. It was at once attributed to the hand, either of +Praxiteles or Scopas, and on farther and minute examination, the style, +the proportions, and the evident purport of the figure, have decided +that it belongs to the group of Niobe and her children. It has attained +the appellation of Ilioneus, which Ovid gives to the youngest of her +sons. It represents a youth kneeling. The head and arms are wanting; +but the supplicatory expression of the attitude, the turn of the body, +so deprecating, so imploring; the bloom of adolescence, which seems +absolutely shed over the cold marble, the unequalled delicacy and +elegance of the whole, touched me unspeakably. + +The King of Bavaria is said to have paid for this exquisite relic 15,000 +florins--a large sum for a little potentate; but for the object itself, +its value is not to be computed by money. Its weight in gold were poor +in comparison. + +In the same room is the Medusa Rondanini, the common model of almost all +the Medusa heads, but certainly not equal to the sublime colossal mask +at Cologne. There is also an antique duplicate of the Mercury of the +Belvidere; another of the Venus of Cnidos; another (most beautiful) +of one of the sons of Niobe, recumbent, lifeless; and some other +master-pieces. + +These six rooms occupy one side of the building, and contain altogether +one hundred and forty-seven specimens of ancient art. + +I do not quite understand Flaxman's division of ancient art into three +periods--the heroic age, the philosophic age, and the age of perfection. +Perhaps if he had lived to correct his essays, he would have made +this more clear. According to his distinction, would not the group of +the Niobe belong to the age of perfection?--and the Parthenon to the +philosophic age? which, allowing his definition of the two styles, I +cannot grant. I suppose these six galleries include a period of about +seven hundred years; (putting the dateless antiquity of some of the +Egyptian relics out of the question.) We begin with the heavy motionless +forms, "looking tranquillity," which yet have often a certain dignity; +then the stiff hard elaborate figures of the earliest Greek school, with +their curled heads and perpendicular draperies, in some of which dawns +the first feeling of vigour and grace, as in the Ægina marbles; the +next is the union of grandeur and elegance; and the next is the utmost +poetical refinement. I recollect that somewhere in Boswell's life of +Johnson, a conversation is recorded as taking place at the table of Sir +Joshua Reynolds; in the course of which Sir Joshua remarked, that it +was impossible to conceive what the ancient writers meant, when they +represented sculpture as having passed its zenith when the Apollo and +the Laocoon were produced. None of the great scholars or artists then +present could explain the mystery--now no longer a mystery. When Sir +Joshua made this remark, the Elgin marbles were unknown in England. + +Between this range of galleries, and a corresponding range on the +opposite side, are two immense halls, called the Fest-Saale, or banqueting +halls, and as yet containing no sculpture. Here the painter Cornelius +has found "ample space and verge enough" for his grand conceptions, and +the subjects are appropriate to the general destination of the whole +building. The frescos in the first hall, (Götter-Saal, or hall of the +gods,) present a magnificent view of the whole Greek mythology. + +Whatever may be thought of the conception and execution of certain +parts, on minute examination the grand, yet simple arrangement of the +whole design addresses itself to the understanding, while the splendour +of colour, and variety of the grouping, seize on the imagination: +certainly, when we look round, the first feeling is not critical. But +this beautiful, progressive, and pictorial development of the old +mythology, as it must have been the result of profound learning and +study, ought to be considered methodically to understand all its merit; +for instance, in the centre of the roof we have the primeval god, Eros, +in four compartments; first, with the dolphin, representing water; +secondly, with the eagle, representing light or fire; thirdly, with the +peacock, representing air; and lastly, with Cerberus, representing +earth. Disposed around these primeval elements, we have the seasons of +the year, and the day. The spring, as Psyche, is followed by the history +of Aurora, (the morning,) in four compartments. The summer, as Ceres, +is followed by the noon, i. e. the history of Helios or Apollo, in four +compartments. The autumn, as Bacchus; and then evening, expressed in the +history of Diana. Winter, as Saturn, and the history of night, and the +divinities which preside over it. These twenty-four compartments, of +various forms and sizes, compose the ceiling, intermingled with ornaments +of rich and rare device, and appropriate arabesques, combining, with +much fancy and invention, all the classical emblems and allegories, such +as satyrs, fauns, syrens, dryads, Graces, Furies, &c. &c. + +But the grand summary is reserved for the walls. On one side is +represented the kingdom of Olympus, with Jove in his state, the assemblage +of the gods, and the apotheosis of Psyche. The opposite side represents +the domain of Pluto, with the infernal gods, and the story of Orpheus. +The third side, over against the window, is the triumph of Neptune and +Amphitrite, surrounded by the sea-gods. + +The figures in these three frescos are colossal, about eight feet in +height. The colouring of the flesh is a little too red and dingy, and +in some of the attitudes I thought that the energy was strained into +contortion; but through the whole there is a grand poetic feeling. All +the designs are by Peter Cornelius, executed by himself, with the aid of +professor Zimmerman, Schlotthauer, Heinrich Hess, and a number of pupils +and assistants. + +There are also along the frieze some beautiful bas-reliefs; and over the +two doors are two alto-relievos by Schwanthaler, the one representing +Cupid and Psyche in each others arms, the symbol of immortal love: the +other, the re-union of Ceres and Proserpine, emblematical of eternal +life after death. This is all I can remember, except that the painting +of this hall occupied six years, and was finished in 1826. + +_Oct. 11._--A small vestibule divides the two great halls. This is +painted with the history of Prometheus and Pandora; but, owing to the +unavoidable disposition of the light, much of the beauty is lost. + +From this vestibule we enter the second great banqueting hall, or the +Hall of the Trojans, painted like the former in fresco, and on the +same enormous scale, but with a different distribution of the parts. +It represents chiefly the history of those demigods and heroes who +contended in the Trojan war. Thus, in the centre of the ceiling we have +first the original cause of the war, the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, +and the appearance of the goddess of Discord, with her fatal apple. +Around this are the twelve gods who were present at the feast, modelled +in relief by Schwanthaler. Then follow twelve compartments, containing +the most striking scenes of the Iliad, divided and adorned by the most +rich and fanciful arabesques, combining the exploits or histories of +the Grecian heroes, which are not included in the Iliad. The figures in +these compartments are the size of life. On the walls we have the three +principal incidents of the Trojan war; first, the wrath of Achilles; +secondly, opposite to the window, the fight for the body of Patrocles, +and Achilles shouting to the warriors. There is wonderful energy and +movement in this picture. The third is the destruction of Troy. The +figure of Hecuba sitting in motionless horror and despair, with her +dishevelled grey hair, her daughters clinging to her;--the beautiful +attitudes of Polyxena and Cassandra; the silent remorse of Helen; the +wild fury of the conquerors, and the vigour and splendour of the whole +painting, render this composition exceedingly striking:--I did not +quite like the figure of Priam. All these designs are by Cornelius, and +executed partly by him, and partly under his direction by Zimmermann, +Schlotthauer, and their pupils. The arabesques are by Eugene Neureuther: +and there are two admirable and spirited bas-reliefs by Schwanthaler--one +representing the battle of the ships, and the other the combat of Achilles +with the river gods. + +The paintings in this hall were finished in 1830. + +We then enter the range of galleries, devoted to the later Greek, and +the Roman sculpture. The first, corresponding in size and situation with +the Hall of Niobe, contains nothing peculiarly interesting, except the +famous figure of the young warrior anointing himself after the bath, and +called the Alexander. + +The next gallery is the Roman Hall, about one hundred and thirty feet +in length, and forms a glorious _coup d'oeil_. The utmost luxury of +architectural decoration has been lavished on the ceilings; and the +effect of the marble pavement, with the disposition of the busts, +candelabræ, altars, as seen in perspective, is truly and tastefully +magnificent. I particularly admired the ceiling, which is divided into +three domes, adorned with bas-reliefs, taken from the Roman history and +manners: these were designed by Schwanthaler. I cannot remember any +thing remarkable in this gallery; or rather, there were too many things +deserving of notice, for me to note all. The standing Agrippina has, +however, dwelt on my mind; and an exceeding fine bust of Octavius Cæsar, +crowned with the oak leaves. + +A small room contains the sculpture in coloured marble, porphyry, and +bronze; and the last is the hall of modern sculpture. In the centre of +the ceiling is a phoenix, rising from its ashes, and around it the heads +of four distinguished sculptors--Nicolo da Pisa, the restorer of the art +in the fourteenth century; Michael Angelo, Canova, and Thorwaldson. + +Two of the most celebrated productions of modern sculpture are +here:--the Paris of Canova, and the Adonis of Thorwaldson. As they are +placed near to each other, and the aim is alike in both to exhibit the +utmost perfection of youthful and effeminate beauty, the merits of the +two artists were fairly brought into comparison. Thorwaldson's statue +reminded me of the Antinous; Canova's recalled the young Apollo. I +hardly know which to prefer as a conception; but the material and +workmanship of the Paris pleased me most. The marble of Thorwaldson's +statue, though faultless in purity of tint, has a coarse _gritty_ grain, +and glitters disagreeably in certain lights, as if it were spar or +lump-sugar; whereas the smooth close compact grain of Canova's marble, +which is something of a creamy white, seemed to me infinitely preferable +to the eye. This, however, is hyper-criticism: in both, the feeling is +classically and beautifully true. The soft melancholy of the countenance +and attitude of Adonis, as if anticipative of his early death, and the +languid self-sufficiency of Paris, appeared to me equally admirable. +There is also in this room a duplicate by Canova of his Venus, in the +Pitti palace; a girl tying her sandal, by Rodolph Schadow--a pendant, +I presume, to his charming Filatrice, now at Chatsworth; and some fine +busts. I looked round in vain for a single specimen of English art. +I thought it just possible that some work of Flaxman, or Chantrey, or +Gibson, might have found its way hither--but no!-- + +_Oct. 12._--Last night to the opera with a pleasant party; but, tired +and over-excited with my morning at the Glyptothek, I wanted soothing, +and was not in a humour for the noisy florid music of Wilhelm Tell. +It is an opera which, as it becomes familiar, tires, and does not +attach--just like some clever people I have met with. Pellegrini (not +the Pelligrini we had in England, but a fixture here, and their best +male singer--a fine _basso cantante_) acted Tell. I say _acted_, because +he did not merely sing his part--he acted it, and well; so well, that +once I felt my eyes moisten. Madame Spitzeder sang in Matilda von +Hapsburg tolerably. Their first tenor, Bayer, I do not like; his +intonation is defective. The decorations and dresses are beautiful. As +for the dancing, it is not fair to say any thing about it. Unfortunately +the first bars of the Tyrolienne brought Taglioni before my mind's eye, +and who or what could stand the comparison? How she leapt like a stag! +bounded like a young faun! floated like the swan-down on the air! Yet +even Taglioni, though she makes the nearest approach to it, does not +complete my idea of a poetical dancer; but as she improved upon Herbelet, +we may find another to improve upon _her_. One more such _artist_--I use +the word in the general and German sense, not in the French meaning--one +more such artist, who should bring modesty, and sense, and feeling, into +this lovely and most desecrated art, might do something to retrieve +it--might introduce the necessity for dancers having heads as well as +heels, and in time revolutionize the whole _corps de ballet_. + +_Wednesday._--This morning, M. Herman Stuntz, the King's chapel-master, +called on me. I had heard of him as a fine composer, and also much of +his opera, produced for the Scala at Milan, the Costantino il Grande. +I was pleased to find him not a musician only, like most musicians, but +intelligent and enthusiastic on other subjects, and with that childlike +simplicity of mind and manner, so often combined with talent. We touched +upon every thing from the high sublime to the deep absurd--ran round the +whole circle of art in a sort of touch-and-go style, and his _naïveté_ +and originality pleased me more and more. He said some true and +delightful things about music; but would insist that of all languages +the English is the most difficult to ally to musical sounds--infinitely +worse than German. He complained of the shut mouth, the _claquement +des dents_, and the predominance of aspirates in our pronunciation. +I objected to the guttural sounds, and the open mouths, and the _yaw +yaw_ of the Germans. Then followed an animated discussion on vocal sounds +and musical expression, and we parted, I believe, mutually pleased. + +The father of Stuntz is a Swiss--a man of letters, an enthusiast, a +philosopher, an artist; in short, a most extraordinary and eccentric +character. He entirely educated his two children, of whom the son, +Herman Stuntz, takes a high rank as a composer; and the daughter is a +distinguished female artist, but, being nobly married, she now only +paints pictures to give them away, and those who possess them are, with +reason, extremely proud of the possession. + +In the evening, Madame Meric, _prima-donna aus London_, as the +play-bills set forth, made her first appearance in the Gazza Ladra. She +is engaged here for a limited time, and takes the _gast-rolles_--that +is, she plays the first parts as a matter of course--in short, she is a +STAR. The regular prima-donna is Madame Scheckner-Wagen. Meric has talent, +voice, style, and unwearied industry; but she has not _genius_, neither +is her organ first-rate. Comparisons in some cases are unjust as well as +odious. Yet was it my fault that I remembered in the same part the syren +Sontag, and the enchantress Malibran? Meric, besides being a fine singer, +is an amiable woman;--married to an extravagant, dissipated husband, and +working to provide for her child--a common fate among the women of her +profession. + + * * * * * + +----Sat up late reading, for the third or fourth time, a chance volume +of Madame Roland's works. What a complete French woman! but then, what +a mind! how large in capacity! how stored with knowledge! how strong +in conscious truth! how finely toned! how soft, and yet how firm! What +wonderful industry united to the quickest talent! Some things written +at eighteen and twenty have most surprised me; some passages in the +"Vie privée," and the "Appel," have most charmed me. She is not very +eloquent, and I should think had not a playful or poetic fancy. There +is an almost total want of imagery in her style; but great power, +unaffected elegance, with a sort of negligence at times, which adds to +its beauty. Then, to remember that all I have just read was written in +a prison, in daily, hourly expectation of death! but _that_ excites more +interest than surprise, for a situation of strong excitement of mind +and passion, with external repose and solitude, must be favourable to +this development of the faculties, where there is character as well as +talent. Some of her disclosures are a little too _naïve_. I am amused +by the quantity of feminine vanity which is mixed up with all this +loftiness of spirit, this real independence of soul. Madame de Staël had +not _more_ vanity, whatever they may say; but it was less balanced by +self-esteem--it required more sympathy. Then we have those two admirable +women * * and * *. What exquisite feminine vanity is there! Yet, happily, +in both instances how far removed from all ill-nature and presumption, +and how unconsciously betrayed! I should think Joanna Baillie, among our +great women, must be most exempt from this failing, perhaps, because, of +all the five, she has the most profound sense of religion. Lavater said, +that "the characteristic of _every_ woman's physiognomy was vanity." +A phrenologist would say that it was the characteristic of every woman's +head. How far, then, may a woman be vain with a good grace and betray +it without ridicule? By vanity, I mean _now_, a great wish to please, +mingled with a consciousness of the powers of pleasing, and not what +Madame Roland describes,--"cette ambition constante, ce soin perpetuel +d'occuper de soi, et de paraitre autre ou meilleur que l'on n'est en +effet," for this is diseased vanity. + + * * * * * + +Dr. Martius[32] lent me two pretty little volumes of "Poems, by Louis +I. king of Bavaria," the present king--the first royal author we have +had, I believe, since Frederic of Prussia--the best since James I. of +Scotland. These poems are chiefly lyrical, consisting of odes, sonnets, +epigrams. Some are addressed to the queen, others to his children, others +to different ladies of the court, whom he is said to have particularly +admired, and a great number were composed during his tour in Italy in +1817. Of the merit of these poems I cannot judge; and when I appealed to +two different critics, both accomplished men, one assured me they were +admirable; the other shrugged up his shoulders--"Que voulez vous? c'est +un Roi!" The earnest feeling and taste in some of these little poems +pleased me exceedingly--of that alone I could judge: for instance, there +is an address to the German artists, which contains the following +beautiful lines: he is speaking of art-- + + "In der Stille muss es sich gestalten, + Wenn es kräftig wirkend soll ersteh'n; + Aus dem Herzen nur kann sich entfalten, + Das was wahrhaft wird zum Herzen geh'n. + + Ja! ihr nehmet es aus reinen Tiefen, + Fromm und einfach, wie die Vorweit war, + Weckend die Gefühle, welche schliefen, + Ehrend zeugt's von Euch und immerdar. + + Sklavisch an das Alte euch zu halten, + Eures Strebens Zweck ist dieses nicht + Seyd gefasst von himmlischen Gewalten, + Dringet rastlos zu dem hehren Licht!" + + +Which may be thus literally rendered-- + + "To rise into vigorous, active influence, it (art) must spring + up and develop itself in secrecy and in silence; out of the + heart alone can that unfold itself which shall truly go to the + heart again. + + "Yes! pious and simple as the old world was, ye draw it (art) + from the same pure depths, awakening the feelings which slumber! + and it shall bear honourable witness of ye--and for ever! + + "Slavishly to cling to antiquity, this is not the end of your + labours! Be ye, therefore, upheld by heavenly power; press on, + and rest not, to the high and holy light!" + + +Methinks this magnificent prince deserves, even more than his ancestor, +Maximilian I., to be styled the Lorenzo de' Medici of Bavaria. The power +to patronize, the sentiment to feel, the genius to celebrate art, are +rarely united, even in individuals. He must be a noble being--a genius +_born in the purple_, on whose laurels there rests not a bloodstain, +perhaps not even a tear! + +This is a holiday. I was sitting at my window, translating some of these +poems, when I saw a crowd round the doors of the new palace; for it is +a day of public admission. Curiosity tempted me to join this crowd;--no +sooner thought than done. I had M. de Klenze's general order for +admittance in my pocket-book, but wished to see how this was managed, +and mingled with the crowd, which was waiting to be admitted _en masse_. +I was at once recognized as a stranger, and every one with simple +civility made way for me. Groups of about twenty or thirty people were +admitted at a time, at intervals of a quarter of an hour, and each group +placed under the guidance of one of the workmen as cicerone. He led +them through the unfinished apartments, explaining to his open-mouthed +auditors the destination of each room, the subjects of the pictures on +the walls and ceilings, &c. &c. There were peasants from the south, +in their singular dresses, mechanics and girls of Munich, soldiers, +travelling students. I was much amused. While the cicerone held +forth, some merely wondered with foolish faces, some admired, some +looked intelligent, and asked various questions, which were readily +answered--all seemed pleased. Every thing was done in order: two +groups were never in the same apartment; but as one went out, another +entered. Thus many hundreds of these poor people were gratified in the +course of the day. It seemed to me a wise as well as benevolent policy +in the king thus to appeal to the sympathy, and gratify the pride, of +his subjects of all classes, by allowing them--inviting them, to take an +interest in his magnificent undertakings, to consider them _national_ +as well as royal. I am informed that these works are carried on without +any demands on the Staatskasse, (the public treasury,) and without +any additional taxes: so far from it, that the Bavarian House of +Representatives curtailed the supplies by 300,000 florins only last +year, and refused the king an addition to the civil list, which he had +requested for the travelling expenses of two of his sons. The king is +said to be economical in the _extreme_ in his domestic expenses, and not +very generous in money to those around him--unlike his open-hearted, +open-handed father, Max-Joseph; in short, there are grumblers here as +elsewhere, but strangers and posterity will not sympathize with them. + +This is the fourth time I have seen this splendid and truly royal +palace, but will make no memoranda till I have gone over the whole with +Leo von Klenze. He has promised to be my cicerone himself, and I feel +the full value of the compliment. Count V---- told me last night, that +he (De Klenze) has made for this building alone upwards of seven hundred +drawings and designs with his own hand. + +_Oct. 13._--Called on my English friends, the C * * s, and found them +pleasantly settled in a beautiful furnished lodging near the Hofgarten, +for which they pay twenty-four florins (or about two pounds) a month. +We had some conversation about music, (they are all musicians,) and the +opera, and Malibran, whom they have lately seen in Italy; and Pasta, +whom they had visited at Como; and they confirmed what Mr. J. M. Stuntz +and M. K. had all told me of her benevolence and excellent character. +I could not find that any new genius had arisen in Italy to share the +glory of our three queens of the lyrical drama,--Pasta, Malibran, and +Schröder Devrient. Other singers have more or less talent and feeling, +more or less compass of voice, facility, or agility; but these three +women possess _genius_, and stamp on every thing they do their own +individual character. Of the three, Pasta is the grandest and most +finished artist; Malibran the most versatile in power and passion; while +Schröder Devrient has that energy of heart and soul--that capacity for +exciting, and being excited, which gives her such unbounded command +over the feelings and senses of her audience.[33] So far we were agreed; +but as the conversation went on, I was doomed to listen to a torrent +of commonplace and sarcastic criticism on the private habits of these +and other women of the same profession: one was accused of vulgarity, +another of bad temper, and another of violence and caprice: one was +suspected of a _penchant_ for porter, another had been heard to swear, +or--something very like it. Even pretty lady-like Sontag was reproached +with some trifling breach of mere conventional manner,--she had used her +fingers where she should have taken a spoon, or some such nonsense. +My God! to think of the situation of these women! and then to look +upon _those_ women, who, fenced in from infancy by all the restraints, +the refinements, the comforts, the precepts of good society,--the one +arranging a new cap, the other embroidering a purse, the third reading +a novel, all satisfied with petty occupations and amusements, "far, far +removed from want and grief and fear,"--now sitting in judgment, and +passing sentence of excommunication on others of their sex, who have +been steeped in excitement from childhood, their nerves for ever in a +state of tension between severest application and maddening flattery; +cast on the world without chart or compass--with energies misdirected, +passions uncontrolled, and all the inflammable and imaginative part of +their being cultivated into excess as a part of their profession--of +their material! O when will there be charity in the world? When will +human beings, women especially, show mercy and justice to each other, +and not judge of results, without a reference to causes? and when will +reflection upon these causes lead to their removal? They are evils which +press upon few, but are reflected on many, inasmuch as they degrade art +and the pursuit of art;--but all can sneer, and few can think. + + * * * * * + +I begin at length to feel my way among the pictures here. Hitherto +I have been bewildered. I have lounged away morning after morning +at the gallery of the Hofgarten, at Schleissheim, and at the Duc +de Leuchtenberg's; and returned home with dazzled eyes and a mind +overflowing, like one "oppressed with wealth, and with abundance +sad," unable to recall or to methodize my own impressions. + +Professor Zimmermann tells me that the king of Bavaria possesses +upwards of three thousand pictures: of these about seventeen hundred +are at Schleissheim; nine hundred in the Munich gallery; and the rest +distributed through various palaces. The national gallery, or Pinakothek, +which is now building under the direction of Leo von Klenze, is destined +to contain a selection from these multifarious treasures, of which the +present arrangement is only temporary. + +The king of Bavaria unites in his own person the three branches of +the House of Wittelsbach: the palatines of the Rhine, the dukes of +Deuxponts, and the electors of Bavaria, all sovereign houses, and +descended from Otto von Wittelsbach, who received the investiture of the +dukedom of Bavaria in 1180. Thus it is that the celebrated gallery once +at Dusseldorf, formed under the auspices of the elector John William; +the various collections at Manheim, Deuxponts, and Heidelberg, are now +concentrated at Munich, where, from the days of Duke Albert V. (1550) +up to the present time, works of art have been gradually accumulated +by successive princes. + +Somebody calls the gallery at Munich, the court of Rubens; and Sir +Joshua Reynolds says that no one should judge of Rubens who had not +studied him at Antwerp and Dusseldorf. I begin to feel the truth of +this. My devoted worship of the Italian school of art rendered me +long--I will not say _blind_ to the merits of the Flemish painters--for +that were to be "sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing!" but, in +truth, without that full feeling of their power which I have since +acquired. + +Certainly we have in these days mean ideas about painting--mean and +false ideas! It has become a mere object of luxury and connoisseurship, +or _virtù_: unless it be addressed to our personal vanity, or to the +puerile taste for ornament, show, furniture,--it is nothing. The noble +art which was once recognized as the priestess of nature, as a great +moral power capable of acting on the senses and the imagination of +assembled human beings--as such applied by the lawgivers of Greece, and +by the clergy of the Roman Catholic church,--how is it now vulgarized +in its objects! how narrowed in its application! And if it be said, +that in the present state of society, in these calculating, money-making, +political, intellectual times, we are acted upon by far different +influences, rendering us infinitely less sensible to the power of +painting, then I think it is _not true_, and that the cultivated +susceptibility to other moral or poetical excitements--as politics or +literature--does not render us less sensible to the moral influence +of painting; on the contrary: but she has fallen from her high estate, +and there are none to raise her. The public--the national spirit, is +wanting; individual patronage is confined, is misdirected, is arbitrary, +demanding of the artist any thing rather than the highest and purest +intellectual application of his art, and affording nor space nor +opportunity for him to address himself to the grand universal passions, +principles, and interests of human nature! Suppose a Michael Angelo +to be born to us in England: we should not, perhaps, set him to make +a statue of snow, but where or how would his gigantic genius, which +revelled in the great deeps of passion and imagination, find scope for +action? He would struggle and gasp like a stranded Leviathan! + +But this is digressing: the question is, may not the moral effect of +painting be still counted on, if the painter be himself imbued with the +right spirit?[34] + +There is, in the academy at Antwerp, a picture by Rubens, which represents +St. Theresa kneeling before Christ, and interceding for the souls in +purgatory. The treatment of the subject is exceedingly simple; the +upper part of the picture is occupied by the Redeemer, with his usual +attributes, and the saint, habited as a nun. In the lower part of the +picture, instead of a confused mob of tormented souls, and flames, and +devils with pitchforks, the painter has represented a few heads as if +rising from below. I remember those of Adam, Eve, and Mary Magdalene. I +remember--and never shall forget--the expression of each! The extremity +of misery in the countenance of Adam; the averted, disconsolate, repentant +wretchedness of Eve, who hides her face in her hair; the mixture of agony, +supplication, hope, in the face of the Magdalene, while a cherub of pity +extends his hand to her, as if to aid her to rise, and at the same +time turns an imploring look towards the Saviour. As I gazed upon this +picture, a feeling sank deep into my heart, which did not pass away with +the tears it made to flow, but has ever since remained there, and has +become an abiding principle of action. This is only one instance out of +many, of the _moral_ effect which has been produced by painting. + +To me it is amusing, and it cannot but be interesting and instructive to +the philosopher and artist, to observe how various people, uninitiated +into any of the technicalities of art, unable to appreciate the amount +of difficulties overcome, are affected by pictures and sculpture. But +in forming our judgment, our taste in art, it is unsafe to listen to +opinions springing from this vague kind of enthusiasm; for in painting, +as in music--"just as the soul is pitched, the _eye_ is pleased." + +I amuse myself in the gallery here with watching the countenances of +those who look at the pictures. I see that the uneducated eye is caught +by subjects in which the individual mind sympathizes, and the educated +taste seeks abstract excellence. Which has the most enjoyment? The last, +I think. Sensibility, imagination, and quick perception of form and +colour, are not alone necessary to feel a work of art; there must be the +power of association; the mind trained to habitual sympathy with the +beautiful and the good; the knowledge of the meaning, and the +comprehension of the object of the artist. + +In the gallery here there are eighty-eight pictures of Rubens--some +among the very finest he ever painted; for instance, that splendid +picture, Castor and Pollux carrying off the daughters of Leucippus, so +full of rich life and movement; the destruction of Sennacherib's host; +Rubens and his wife, full lengths, seated in a garden; that wonderful +picture of the defeat of the Amazons; the meeting of Jacob and Laban; +the picture of the Earl of Arundel and his wife, with other figures, +full lengths;[35] and a series of the designs for the large paintings +of the history of Marie de' Medici, now in the Louvre. His group of boys +with fruits and flowers, exhibits the richest, loveliest combination +of colours ever presented to the eye; and on that wonderful picture of +the fallen (or rather _falling_) angels, he has lavished such endless +variety of form, attitude, and expression, that it would take a day to +study it. It is not a large picture: the eye, or rather the imagination, +easily takes in the general effect of tumult, horror, destruction, but +the understanding dwells on the detail with still increasing astonishment +and admiration. These are a few that struck me, but it is quite in vain +to attempt to particularize. + +One may begin by disliking Rubens in general, (I think I did,) but one +must end by standing before him in ecstacy and wonder. It is true, that +always luxuriant, he is often gross and sensual--he can sometimes be +brutally so. His bacchanalian scenes are not like those of Poussin, +classical, godlike debauchery, but the abandoned drunken revelry of +animals--the very sublime of brute licentiousness; and painted with a +breadth of style, a magnificent luxuriance of colour, which renders them +more revolting. The _physique_ predominates in all his pictures, and not +only to grossness, even to ferocity. His picture here of the slaughter +of the Innocents, makes me sick--it has absolutely polluted my +imagination. Surely this is not the vocation of high art.--And as for +his martyrdoms--they are worse than Spagnoletto's. + +For all this, he is the TITAN of painting: his creations are "of the earth +and earthy," but he has called down fire and light from heaven, wherewith +to animate and to illumine them. + +Rubens is just such a painter as Dryden is a poet, and _vice versâ_: +his women are just like Dryden's women, gross, exaggerated, unrefined +animals: his men, like Dryden's men, grand, thinking, acting animals. +Like Dryden, he could clothe his genius in thunder, dip his pencil in +the lightning and the sunbeams of heaven, and rush fearlessly upon a +subject which others had trembled to approach. In both we see a singular +and extraordinary combination of the plainest, coarsest realities of +life, with the loftiest imagery, the most luxurious tints of poetry. +Both had the same passion for allegory, and managed it with equal +success. "The thoughts that breathe and words that burn" of Dryden, may +be compared to the living, moving forms, the glowing, melting, dazzling +hues of Rubens, under whose pencil + + "Desires and adorations, + Winged persuasions and wild destinies, + Splendours, and glooms, and glimmering incarnations + Of hopes, and fears, and twilight fantasies,--" + + +took form and being--became palpable existences: and yet with all this +inventive power, this love of allegorical fiction, it is _life_, the +spirit of animal life, diffused through and over their works; it is the +blending of the plain reasoning with splendid creative powers;--of +wonderful fertility of conception with more wonderful facility of +execution; it is the combination of truth, and grandeur, and masculine +vigour, with a general coarseness of taste, which may be said to +characterise both these great men. Neither are, or can be, favourites +of the women, for the same reasons. + +There must have been something analogous in the genius of Rubens and +Titian. The distinction was of climate and country. They appear to +have looked at nature under the same aspect, but it was a different +nature,--the difference between Flanders and Venice. They were both +painters of flesh and blood: by nature, poets; by conformation, +colourists; by temperament and education, magnificent spirits, scholars, +and gentlemen, lovers of pleasure and of fame. The superior sentiment +and grace, the refinement and elevation of Titian he owed to the poetical +and chivalrous spirit of his age and country. The delicacy of taste +which reigned in the Italian literature of that period influenced the +arts of design. As to the colouring--we see in the pictures of Rubens +the broad daylight effects of a northern climate, and in those of +Titian, the burning fervid sun of a southern clime, necessarily modified +by shade, before the objects could be seen: hence the difference between +the _glow_ of Rubens, and the _glow_ of Titian: the first "i' the colours +of the rainbow lived," and the other bathed himself in the evening sky; +the one dazzles, the other warms. I can bring before my fancy at this +moment, the Helen Forman of Rubens, and Titian's "La Manto;" the "man +with a hawk" of Rubens, and Titian's "Falconer;" can any thing in heaven +or earth be more opposed? Yet in all alike, is it not the intense feeling +of life and individual nature which charms, which fixes us? I know not +which I admire most; but I adore Titian--his men are all made for power, +and his women for love. + +And Rembrandt--king of shadows! + + ----Earth-born + And sky-engendered--son of mysteries! + + +was not he a poet? He reminds me often of the Prince Sorcerer, nurtured +"in the cave of Domdaniel, under the roots of the sea."[36] Such an +enchanted "den of darkness" was his mill and its skylight to him; +and there, magician-like, he brooded over half-seen forms, and his +imagination framed strange spells out of elemental light and shade. +Thence he brought his unearthly shadows; his dreamy splendours; his +supernatural gleams; his gems flashing and sparkling with internal +light; his lustrous glooms; his wreaths of flaming and embossed gold; +his wicked wizard-like heads--turbaned, wrinkled, seared, dusky; pale +with forbidden studies--solemn with thoughtful pain--keen with the +hunger of avarice--and furrowed with an eternity of years! I have seen +pictures of his in which the shadowy background is absolutely peopled +with life. At first all seems palpable darkness, apparent vacancy; but +figure after figure emerges--another and another; they glide into view, +they take shape and colour, as if they grew out of the canvass even +while we gaze; we rub our eyes, and wonder whether it be the painter's +work or our own fancy! + +Of all the great painters Rembrandt is perhaps least understood; the +admiration bestowed on him, the enormous prices given for his pictures, +is in general a fashion--a mere matter of convention--like the price of +a diamond. To feel Rembrandt truly, it is not enough to be an artist or +an amateur picture-fancier--one should be something of a poet too. + +There are nineteen of his pictures here; of these "Jesus teaching the +doctors in the temple," though a small picture, impressed me with +awe,--the portraits of the painter Flinck and his wife, with wonder. +All are ill-hung, with their backs against the light--for them the worst +possible situation. + +Van Dyck is here in all his glory: there are thirty-nine of his pictures. +The celebrated full-length, "the burgomaster's wife in black," so often +engraved, does not equal, in its inexpressible, unobtrusive elegance, +the "Lady Wharton," at Devonshire House.[37] Then we have Wallenstein +with his ample kingly brow; fierce Tilly; the head of Snyders; the lovely +head of the painter's wife, Maria Ruthven,--sweet-looking, delicate, +golden-haired, and holding the theorbo, (she excelled in music, I +believe,) and virgins, holy families, and other scriptural subjects. +His famous picture of Susanna does not strike me much. + +The four apostles of Albert Durer--wonderful! In expression, in calm +religious majesty, in suavity of pencilling, and the grand, pure style +of the heads and drapery, quite like Raffaelle. I compared, yesterday, +the three portraits--that of Raffaelle, by himself; (the famous head +once in the Altaviti palace, and engraved by Morghen;) Albert Durer, by +himself; and Giorgione, by himself. Raffaelle is the least handsome, and +rather disappointed me; the eyes, in particular, rather project, and +have an expression which is not pleasing; the mouth and the brow are +full of power and passion. Albert Durer is beautiful, like the old +heads of our Saviour; and the predominant expression is calm, dignified, +intellectual, with a tinge of melancholy. This picture was painted +at the age of twenty-eight: he was then suffering from that bitter +domestic curse, a shrewish, avaricious wife, who finally broke his heart. +Giorgione is not handsome, but it is a sublime head, with such a large +intellectual development, such a profound expression of sentiment! +Giorgione died of a faithless mistress, as Albert Durer died of a +scolding wife.[38] + +By Paris Bordone, of Trevigi, there is a head of a Venetian lady, in +a dress of crimson velvet, with dark splendid eyes which tell a whole +history. By Murillo, there are eight pictures--not one in his most +elevated style, but all perfect miracles of painting and of nature. +There are thirty-three pictures of Vander Werff, a number sufficient to +make one's blood run cold. One, a Magdalene, is of the size of life; the +only large picture by this elegant, elaborate, soulless painter I ever +saw: he is to me detestable. + +By Joseph Vernet there are two delicious landscapes, a morning and an +evening. I cannot farther particularize; but there are specimens of +almost every known painter; those, however, of Titian, Correggio, Julio +Romano, and Nicolo Poussin, are very few and not of a very high class, +while those of the early German painters, and the Dutch, and the Flemish +schools, are first-rate. + +There is one English picture--Wilkie's "Opening of the Will:" it is very +much admired here, and looked upon as a sort of curiosity. I wish the +artists of the two countries were better known to each other: both would +benefit by such an intercourse. + +At the palace of Schleissheim[39] there are nearly two thousand pictures: +of these some hundreds are positively _bad_; some hundreds are curious +and valuable, as illustrating the history and progress of art; some few +are really and intrinsically admirable. + +But the grand attraction here is the far-famed Boisserée Gallery, which +is arranged at Schleissheim, until the Pinakothek is ready for its +reception. This is the collection about which so many volumes have been +written, and which has excited such a general enthusiasm throughout +Germany. This enthusiasm, as a fashion, a mania, is beginning to subside, +but the impress it has left upon art, and the tone it has given to the +pursuit, the feeling of art, will not so soon pass away. The gallery +derives its name from two brothers, Sulpitz and Melchior Boisserée,[40] +who, with a friend (Bertram) were employed for many years in collecting +from various convents, and old churches, and obscure collections of +family relics, the productions of the early painters of Germany, from +William of Cologne, called by the Germans "Meister Wilhelm," down to +Albert Durer and Holbein. + +The productions of the Greek or Byzantine painters found their way +into Germany, as into Italy, in the thirteenth century, and Wilhelm of +Cologne appeared to have been the Cimabue of the north--the founder of +that school of painting called the _Byzantine-Niederrheinische_, or +Flemish school, and the precursor of Rubens, as Cimabue was the +precursor of Michael Angelo. + +Out of this stiff, and rude, and barbarous style of art, arose and +spread the Alt-Deutsche, or Gothic school of painting, which produced +successively, Van Eyck, (1370,) Hemling, Wohlgemuth,[41] Martin Schoen, +Mabuse, Johan Schoreel, Lucas Kranach, Kulmbach, Albert Altorffer, Hans +Asper, Johan von Mechlem, Behem, Albert Durer, and the two Holbeins. I +mention here only those artists whose pictures fixed my attention; there +are many others, and many pictures by unknown authors. Albert Durer was +born exactly one hundred years after Van Eyck. + +The Boisserée gallery contains about three hundred and fifty pictures; +but I did not count them; and no official catalogue has yet been +published. The subjects are generally sacred; the figures are heads of +saints, and scenes from Scripture. A few are portraits; and there are +a few, but very few, subjects from profane history. The painters whose +works I at once distinguished from all others, were Van Eyck, Johan +Schoreel, Hemling, and Lucas Kranach. I can truly say that the two +pictures of Van Eyck, representing St. Luke painting the portrait of +the Virgin, and the offering of the three kings; and that of Johan +Schoreel, representing the death of the Virgin Mary, perfectly amazed +me. I remember also several wondrous heads by Lucas Kranach; one by +Behem, called, I know not why, "Helena:" and a picture of Christ and the +little children, differing from all the rest in style, with something of +the Italian grace of drawing, and suavity of colour. The artist, Sedlar, +had studied in Lombardy, probably under Correggio; (one of the children +certainly might call Correggio father.) The date on this extraordinary +production is 1530. Of the painter I know nothing. The general and +striking faults, or rather deficiencies of the old German school of +art, are easily enumerated. The most flagrant violations of taste and +costume,[42] bad drawing of the figure and extremities, faulty perspective; +stiff, hard meagre composition, negligence or ignorance of all effect of +chiaro-scuro. But what, then, is the secret of the interest which these +old painters inspire, of the enthusiasm they excite, even in these +cultivated days? It arises from a perception of the _mind_ they brought +to bear upon their subjects, the simplicity and integrity of feeling +with which they worked, and the elaborate marvellous beauty of the +execution of parts. I could give no idea in words of the intense nature +and expression in some of the heads, of the grand feeling united to the +most finished delicacy in the conception and painting of _countenance_, +of the dazzling splendour of colouring in the draperies, and the richness +of fancy in the ornaments and accessories. + +But I _do_ fear that the just admiration excited by this kind of +excellence, and a great deal of national enthusiasm, has misled the +modern German artists to a false, at least an exaggerated estimate, and +an injudicious imitation, of their favourite models. It has produced or +encouraged that general hardness of manner, that tendency to violent +colour, and high glazy finish, which interfere too often with the +beauty, and feeling, and effect of their compositions, at least in the +eyes of those who are accustomed to the free broad style of English +art.[43] + +_Thursday Evening._--At the theatre. Schiller's "Braut von Messina." +This was the first time I had ever seen the tragic choruses brought on +the stage, in the genuine style of the Greek drama; and the deep sonorous +voice and measured recitation (I could almost say _recitative_) of +Eslair, who was at the head of the chorus of Don Manuel--the emphatic +lines being repeated or echoed by his followers--as well as the peculiar +style of the whole representation, impressed me with a kind of solemn +terror. It was wholly different from any thing I had ever witnessed, +and was rather like a poem declaimed on the stage, than what we are +accustomed to call a play. I was fortunate in seeing Madame Schröder +in Donna Isabella, for she does not often perform, and it is one of +the finest parts of this grand actress. Don Manuel and Don Cæsar were +played by Forst and Schunke--both were young, very well looking, and +good actors. Beatrice was played by Madll. Shöller. The costumes were +beautiful, and all the arrangements of the stage contrived with the most +poetical effect. One scene in the first act, where Donna Isabella stands +between her two sons, a hand on the shoulder of each, beseeching them to +be reconciled; while they remain silent, turning from each other with +folded arms, and dark averted faces;--the chorusses drawn up on each +side, all dressed alike, all precisely in the same attitude, leaning on +their shields, with lowering looks fixed on the group in the centre, was +admirably managed; and, from the effect that it produced, made me feel +that uniformity may be one element of the sublime. Afterwards, a very +lively soirée. + + * * * * * + +_Friday._--The Hofgarten at Munich is a square, planted with trees, and +gravelled, and serving as a public promenade. On one side is the royal +palace; opposite to it, the picture gallery; on the east, the king's +riding house, and on the west, a long arcade, open towards the garden +which connects the palace and the picture gallery; under this arcade are +shops, cafés, restaurateurs, &c. as in the _Palais Royal_ at Paris. + +But what distinguishes this arcade from all others, is the peculiar style +of decoration. It is painted in fresco by the young artists who studied +under Cornelius. There is, first, a series of sixteen compartments, about +eleven feet in length, containing subjects from the history of Bavaria. +They are all by various artists, and of course of different degrees of +merit, generally better in the composition than the painting, but some +have great vigour and animation in both respects. + +For instance, Otho von Wittelsbach receiving from the emperor, Frederic +Barbarossa, the investiture of the dukedom of Bavaria in 1180, painted +by Zimmermann. + +The marriage of Otho the Illustrious, to Agnes, Countess Palatine of the +Rhine, in 1225, painted by my friend, Wilhelm Röckel, of Schleissheim, +to whom I am indebted for many polite attentions. + +The engagement between Louis the Severe, of Bavaria, and the fierce +fiery Ottocar, king of Bohemia, upon the bridge at Mühldorf, in 1258, +painted by Stürmer of Berlin. This is very animated and terrific. I +think the artist had Rubens' defeat of the Amazons full in his mind. + +The victory of the emperor, Louis of Bavaria, over Frederic of Austria, +his competitor for the empire in 1322, painted by Hermann of Dresden. + +The storming of Godesberg, when the unfortunate Archbishop Gerard, and +Agnes of Mansfield had taken refuge there in 1583,[44] painted by Gassen +of Coblentz. + +Maximilian I. in 1623, invested with the forfeit electorate of the +Palatine Frederic V.[45] painted by Eberle of Dusseldorf. + +Maximilian Joseph I. father of the present king, bestowing on his people +a new constitution and representative government in 1818, painted by +Monten of Dusseldorf. + +These have dwelt on my memory. Over all the pictures, the name of the +subject and the date are inscribed in large gold letters, so that those +who walk may read. The costumes and manners of each epoch have been +attended to with the most scrupulous accuracy; and I see every day +groups of soldiers, and of the common people, with their children, +standing before these paintings, spelling the titles, and discussing +the various subjects represented. The further end of the arcade is +painted with a series of Italian scenes, selected by the king after +his return from Italy, and executed by Rottmann of Heidelberg, a young +landscape-painter of great merit, as De Klenze assures me, and he is +a judge of _genius_. Under each picture is a distich, composed by the +king himself. These are in distemper, I believe: freely, but rather +hastily executed, and cold and ineffective in colour, perhaps the fault +of the vehicle. The ceilings and pillars are also gaily painted with +arabesques, and other ornaments; and at the upper end there is a grand +seated figure, looking magnificent and contemplative, and calling +herself BAVARIA. This is well painted by Kaulbach. + +I walk through these arcades once or twice every day, as I have several +friends lodged over them; and can seldom arrive at the end without +pausing two or three times. + +I learn that the king's passion for building, and the forced +encouragement given to the enlargement and decoration of his capital, +has been carried to an excess, and, like all extremes, has proved +mischievous, at least for the time. He has rendered it too much a +fashion among his subjects, who are suffering from rash speculations +of this kind. Many beautiful edifices in the Ludwig's Strasse, and the +neighbourhood of the Maximilian's Platz, and the Karoline's Platz, +remain untenanted. A suite of beautiful unfurnished apartments, and even +a pretty house in the finest part of Munich may be had for a trifle. +Some of these new houses are enormous. Madame M. told me that she has +her whole establishment on one floor, but then she has twenty-three +rooms. + +Though the country round Munich is flat and ugly, a few hours' journey +brings us into the very midst of the Tyrolian Alps. In June or July all +the people fly to the mountains, and baths, and lakes in South Bavaria, +and rusticate among the most glorious scenery in the world. "Come to +us," said my friend, Luise K----; "come to us in the summer months, +_and we will play at Arcadia_." + +And truly, when I listened to her description of her mountain life, and +all its tranquil, primitive pleasures, and all the beauty and grandeur +which lie beyond that giant-barrier which lifts itself against the +evening sky, and when I looked into those clear affectionate eyes--"dieser +Blick voll Treu und Gute," and beheld the expression of a settled +happiness, the light of a heart at peace with itself and all the world, +reflected on the countenances of her children--a recollection of the +unquiet destiny which drives me in an opposite direction came over me-- + + Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound + Upon a wheel of fire, which mine own tears + Do scald like molten lead. + + +[Illustration] + + +END OF VOL. I. + + +LONDON: + +IBOTSON & PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. + + + + +ADDENDA + +_To Page 179, Vol._ i. + + +Therese Huber, who died in 1829, was a woman every way remarkable, in +her domestic history, in her position, her writings, and her character. +She was employed by Cotta to edit his famous "Morgenblatt," in her time +the most esteemed and the most influential of the literary periodicals +of Germany, and which she conducted for many years with extraordinary +energy and success; she wrote also several romances, published under her +husband's name, and long attributed to him even by her most intimate +friends. Therese Huber is distinguished by a profound knowledge of her +own sex, and by her just and admirable views of our destination and +situation in society. Some of her private letters have been published, +since her death, with those of Caroline Woltmann, in the "Deutsche +Briefe," and they place in yet stronger light the fine original powers +of this gifted woman. + + +VOL. I. + + + Page 2, line 16, _for_ great, _read_ green. + 43 -- 14, _for_ altamen, _read_ attamen. + 46 -- 5, omit _patrician_. + 47 -- 2, _for_ 'vengeful, _read_ revengeful. + 95 -- 2, _for_ Haitsinger, _read_ Haitzinger. + 95 -- 12, _for_ tiefe, _read_ tief. + 95 -- 21, _for_ Becher, _read_ Becker. + 147 -- 2, in the note, _for_ Hienrich, _read_ Heinrich. + 147 -- 3, in the note, _for_ Wladimer, _read_ Wladimir. + 181 -- 1, _for_ first, _read_ second. + 184 -- 17, _for_ Erden, _read_ Erben. + 193 -- 5, _for_ wsäche, _read_ wäsche. + 197 -- 14, _after_ since, _insert_ "High-born Hoel." + 211 -- 9, _for_ Elangau, _read_ Erlangen. + 230 -- 10, _for_ liebe, _read_ lieber. + 230 -- 11, _for_ schrecklich Schichsal, _read_ schreckliches + Schicksal. + 230 -- 13, _for_ grab, _read_ Grab. + 252 -- 19, _for_ twelve, _read_ eight. + 270 -- 16, _for_ Neurather, _read_ Neureuther. + 291 -- 1, in the note, _for_ par, _read_ pas; and _for_ pas + _read_ par. + + * * * * * + + + + +FOOTNOTES: + + +[Footnote 1: In Goethe's Iphigenia.] + +[Footnote 2: Over another iron door was writt, + + _Be not too bold._ + +FAIRY QUEEN, Book iii. Canto XI.] + +[Footnote 3: See Wordsworth's Poems.] + +[Footnote 4: Two celebrated antique gems which adorn the relics of the +Three Kings.] + +[Footnote 5: It is nearly twice the size of the famous and well known +Medusa Rondinelli, now in the Glyptothek at Munich.] + +[Footnote 6: Professor Wallraff died on the 18th of March, 1824.] + +[Footnote 7: Amongst others, Jean Paul, in the "Heidelberger Jahrbücher +der Literatur," 1815.] + +[Footnote 8: Since the above passage was written, Mrs. Austin has +favoured me with the following note: "Goëthe admired, but did not like, +still less esteem, Madame de Staël. He begins a sentence about her +thus--'As she had no idea what duty meant,' &c. + +"However, after relating a scene which took place at Weimar, he adds, +'Whatever we may say or think of her, her visit was certainly followed +by very important results. Her work upon Germany, which owed its rise +to social conversations, is to be regarded as a mighty engine which at +once made a wide breach in that Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices, +which divided us from France; so that the people across the Rhine, +and afterwards those across the channel, at length came to a nearer +knowledge of us; whence we may look to obtain a living influence over +the distant west. Let us, therefore, bless that conflict of national +peculiarities which annoyed us at the time, and seemed by no means +profitable.'"--_Tag- und Jahres Hefte_, vol. 31, last edit. + +To that WOMAN who had sufficient strength of mind to break through a +"Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices," surely something may be +forgiven.] + +[Footnote 9: Johanna Schopenhauer, well known in Germany for her +romances and her works on art. Her little book, "Johan van Eyk und seine +Nachfolger," has become the manual of those who study the old German +schools of painting.] + +[Footnote 10: Or Gebhard, for so the name is spelt in the German +histories.] + +[Footnote 11: For the story of Archbishop Gebhard and Agnes de Mansfeld, +see Schiller's History of the Thirty Years' War, and Coxe's History of +the House of Austria.] + +[Footnote 12: The gardens and plantations round the castle are a +favourite promenade of the citizens of Heidelberg, and there are in +summer bands of music, &c.] + +[Footnote 13: When Gustavus Adolphus took Mayence, during the same +war, he presented the whole of the valuable library to his chancellor, +Oxenstiern; the chancellor sent it to Sweden, intending to bestow it on +one of the colleges; but the vessel in which it was embarked foundered +in the Baltic sea, and the whole went to the bottom.] + +[Footnote 14: M. Passavant is a landscape-painter of Frankfort, an +intelligent, accomplished man, and one of the few German artists who +had a tolerably correct idea of the state of art in England. He is the +author of "Kunstreise durch England und Belgium."] + +[Footnote 15: She was cotemporary with Cleopatra, (B. C. 33,) and was +particularly celebrated for her busts in ivory. The Romans raised a +statue to her honour, which was in the Guistiniani collection.--V. PLINY.] + +[Footnote 16: Lucas Kranach (1472) was one of the most celebrated of the +old German painters; from a principle of gratitude and attachment, he +shared the imprisonment of the elector John Frederic, during five years.] + +[Footnote 17: In September, 1833.] + +[Footnote 18: His own expression.] + +[Footnote 19: Dannecker has been ennobled; his proper titles run +thus--Johan Heinrich von Dannecker, Hofrath, (court counsellor,) knight +of the orders of the Wurtemburg crown, and of Wladimir, and professor +of sculpture at Stuttgardt.] + +[Footnote 20: Rauch is knight of the Red Eagle, and member of the +senate.] + +[Footnote 21: Christian Rauch was born in 1777, and Christian Frederic +Tieck in 1776.] + +[Footnote 22: Formerly Madame Jageman, the principal actress of the +theatre at Weimar. Her talents were developed under the auspices of +Goethe and Schiller. She was the original Thekla of the Wallenstein, and +the original Princess Leonora of the Tasso. In these two characters she +has never yet been equalled. The quietness, amounting to passiveness, in +the _external_ delineation of the Princess in Tasso, affords so little +_material_ for the stage, that Madame Wolff, then the first actress, +preferred the character of Leonora Sanvitale, and Madame Jageman was +supposed to derogate in accepting that of the Princess. Such is the +consummate, but evanescent delicacy of the conception, that Goethe never +expected to see it developed on the stage; and at the rehearsal he threw +himself back in his chair, and shut his eyes, that the image which lived +in his imagination might not be profaned by any tasteless exaggeration +of action or expression. He soon opened them, however, and before the +rehearsal was finished, started off the chair, and nearly embraced the +actress. She looked and felt the part as only a woman of exceeding +taste and delicacy would have done; the very tone of her mind, and the +character of her beauty, fitted her to represent the fair, gentle, +fragile, but dignified Leonora.] + +[Footnote 23: Lessing.] + +[Footnote 24: Characteristics of Goethe, vol. i. p. 29.] + +[Footnote 25: I believe it was in allusion to this distinction, and her +own noble birth, that her father-in-law used to call her playfully, +"_die kleine Ahnfrau_," (the little ancestress.)] + +[Footnote 26: M. Besle, otherwise the Comte de Stendhal, and, I believe, +he has half a dozen other _aliases_.] + +[Footnote 27: Alfred Tennyson.] + +[Footnote 28: "Thro' Erin's isle, to sport awhile," &c.] + +[Footnote 29: In the German maps, Zweibrücken; the capital of those +provinces of the kingdom of Bavaria, which lie on the left bank of +the Rhine.] + +[Footnote 30: The entire grouping of these figures is from the design +of Mr. Robert Cockerell, one of the original discoverers, who in +ascertaining their relative position has been guided in some measure +by the situation in which their fragments were found strewed in front +of the temple, and overwhelmed with masses of the frieze and pediment; +but has been much more indebted to his own artist-like feeling, and +architectural skill. He is of opinion that the western pediment +contained several other figures besides the ten which have been +restored.] + +[Footnote 31: The character of the Emperor Rodolph would be one of the +most interesting speculations in philosophical history. He was evidently +a fine artist, degraded into a bad sovereign--a man whose constructive +and imaginative genius was misplaced upon a throne. The melancholy, and +incipient madness which hovered over him, was possibly the result of the +natural faculties suppressed or perverted.] + +[Footnote 32: The celebrated traveller, natural philosopher, and botanist. +He has the direction of most of the scientific institutions at +Munich.] + +[Footnote 33: I remember Madame Devrient, in describing the effect which +music had upon herself, pressing her hand upon her bosom, and saying, +with simple but profound feeling, "_Ah! cela use la vie!_"] + +[Footnote 34: "A l'exposition de Paris (1822) on a vu un millier de +tableaux représentant des sujets de l'Ecritoire Sainte, peints par des +peintres qui n'y croient pas du tout: admirés et jugés par des gens qui +n'y croient pas beaucoup, et enfin payés par des gens qui, apparemment, +n'y croient pas, non plus. + +"L'on cherche après cela le pourquoi de la décadence de l'art!"] + +[Footnote 35: Of this celebrated picture, Sir Joshua Reynolds says, +that it is miscalled, and certainly does _not_ contain the portraits +of the Earl and Countess of Arundel. Perhaps he is mistaken. It appears +that the Earl of Arundel, of James the First's time, (the collector of +the Arundelian marbles,) with his Countess, sat to Rubens in 1620, and +that "Robin the Dwarf" was introduced into this picture, which was not +painted in England, but at Brussels. Rubens was at this time at the +height of his reputation, and when requested to paint the portrait of +the Countess of Arundel, he replied, "Although I have refused to execute +the portraits of many princes and noblemen, especially of his lordship's +rank yet from the Earl I am bound to receive the honour he does me +in commanding my services, regarding him as I do, in the light of +an evangelist to the world of art, and the great supporter of our +profession."--(See Tierney's History and Antiquities of the Castle and +Town of Arundel.)] + +[Footnote 36: In Southey's Thalaba.] + +[Footnote 37: Now removed with the other Vandykes to Chatsworth.] + +[Footnote 38: See a curious letter of Pirkheimer on the death of Albert +Durer, quoted in the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 21. "In Albert I have +truly lost one of the best friends I had in the whole world, and nothing +grieves me deeper than that he should have died so painful a death, +which, under God's providence, I can ascribe to nobody but his huswife, +who gnawed into his very heart, and so tormented him that he departed +hence the sooner; for he was dried up to a faggot, and might nowhere +seek him a jovial humour or go to his friends." (After much more, +reflecting on this intolerable woman, he concludes with edifying +_naïveté_;) "She and her sister are not queans; they are, I doubt not, +in the number of honest, devout, and altogether God-fearing women, but +a man might better have a quean who was otherwise kindly, than such a +gnawing, suspicious, quarrelsome, _good_ woman, with whom he can have +no peace or quiet neither by day nor by night."] + +[Footnote 39: Schleissheim is a country palace of the king of Bavaria, +about six miles from Munich; it has originally been a beautiful +building, but is not now inhabited, and looks forlorn and dilapidated. +The pictures are distributed, without any attempt at arrangement, +through forty-five rooms.] + +[Footnote 40: Natives, I believe, of Cologne.] + +[Footnote 41: Albert Durer was the scholar of Wohlgemuth.] + +[Footnote 42: I particularly recollect a picture, containing many +hundred figures, all painted with the elaborate finish of a miniature, +and representing the victory of Alexander over Darius. All the Persians +are dressed like Turks, while Alexander and his host are armed to the +teeth, in the full costume of chivalry, with heraldic banners, displaying +the different devices of the old Germanic nobles, the cross, the black +eagle, &c. &c.] + +[Footnote 43: The observations of Mr. Phillips, (Lectures on the History +and Principles of Painting,) on Giotto, and the earliest Italian school, +apply in a great measure to the early German painters, and I cannot +refuse myself the pleasure of quoting them.--"As it appears to me, that +painting at the present time, is swerving among us from the true point +of interest, tending to ornament, to the loss of truth and sentiment, I +think I cannot do better than endeavour to restrain the encroachment of +so insidious a foe, to prevent, if possible, our advance in so erroneous +and fatal a course, by showing how strong is the influence of art +where truth and simplicity prevail; and that, where no ornament is +to be found--nay, where imperfections are numerous; where drawing is +frequently defective, perspective violated, colouring employed without +science, and chiaro-scuro rarely, if ever thought of. The natural +question then is, what can excite so much interest in pictures, where +so much is wanting to render them perfect? I answer, that which leads +to the forgetfulness of the want of those interesting and desirable +qualities in the pictures of Giotto, is the excitation caused by their +fulness of feeling--well-directed, ardent, concentrated feeling! by +which his mind was engaged in comprehending the points most worthy of +display in the subject he undertook to represent, and led to the +clearness and intelligence with which he has selected them; add to this +the simplicity and ability with which he has displayed that feeling." +* * * "This is the first true step in the natural system of the art, or +of the application of it, and this was Giotto's more especially. The rest +is useful, as it assists the influence of this, the _indispensable_. +This, to continue the figure, taken from the stage, (in a previous part +of the Lecture,) is as Garrick acting Macbeth or Lear in a tie-wig and +a general's uniform of his day; the passion and the character reaching +men's hearts, notwithstanding the absurd costume. If the art be found +thus strong to attract the mind, to excite feeling and thought, and to +engage the heart, by the mere force of unadorned truth in the important +points, and without the aid of the valuable auxiliaries I have above +alluded to, is it not manifest that in its basis it is correct? and that +the utmost force of historical painting is to be sought by continual +emendation of this system, maintaining the spirit of its simplicity, +supplying its wants, calling in the aid of those auxiliaries within +reasonable bounds, not permitting them to usurp the throne of taste and +attraction, but rather requiring them to assist in humbler guise to +maintain and strengthen the legitimate authority of feeling. + +After reading these beautiful passages, written by a man who unites +the acute discriminative judgment of a practical artist with the finest +feeling of the ultimate object and aim of high poetical art, I felt +almost tempted to expunge my own superficial and imperfect notes, (above +written,) and should have done so, but for the hope that my deficiencies +will induce some one more competent in taste and knowledge to take up +the subject of the early German painters. It is certain that the modern +historical painters of Germany are working on the principle here +laid down by Mr. Phillips, particularly Overbeck and Wach, which they +have derived from a study of their national school of art; but other +enthusiasts should remember that the redeeming excellence of this school +was feeling, and that feeling can never be a matter of mere imitation. +I cannot understand why the omissions of ignorance should be confounded +with the achievements of native genius, by those for whom "knowledge +has unlocked her ample stores," and to whom the recovery of those +"rich spoils of time," the antique marbles, must have revealed the wide +difference between "the simplicity of elegance" and "the simplicity of +indigence."] + +[Footnote 44: See p. 56.] + +[Footnote 45: See p. 66.] + + * * * * * + +[Transcriber's Note: Errata as given in the original have been applied to +the text. Other than the most exceedingly obvious typographical errors, +all inconsistent spelling, hyphenation, diacriticals, archaic usage, etc. +have been preserved as printed in the original. The equals signs used +to bracket the signature at the end of part I indicate characters in a +Fraktur typeface.] + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad +with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected, by Anna Jameson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + +***** This file should be named 36818-8.txt or 36818-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/8/1/36818/ + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected + Vol. I (of 3) + +Author: Anna Jameson + +Release Date: July 23, 2011 [EBook #36818] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + + + + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="nopage1" name="nopage1"></a>[pg]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 6em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> +<big>VISITS AND SKETCHES</big><br /> <small>AT HOME AND ABROAD.</small> +</p> +<p class="center"> +VOL. I. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="nopage2" name="nopage2"></a>[pg]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p><!--[Blank Page]--><br /></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagei" name="pagei"></a>[i]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p><!--[Blank Page]--><br /></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageii" name="pageii"></a>[ii]</span></p> + +<div class="figure"> +<a name="image-0001"><!--IMG--></a> +<a href="images/ill-1.jpg"><img src="images/ill-1s.jpg" width="500" height="645" +alt="SIGFRIED -- KRIMHILDE" /></a> +<br /> +<big> +SIGFRIED — KRIMHILDE<br /> +</big> +<small> +<i>Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff.</i><br /> +</small> +<i>Group from the Fresco in the King of Bavaria's Palace at Munich. +Painted by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld.</i> +<br /> +<small> +<i>Published by Saunders & Otley 1834.</i> +</small> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageiii" name="pageiii"></a>[iii]</span></p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0002" id="h2H_4_0002"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h1> + <big>VISITS AND SKETCHES</big><br /> + AT HOME AND ABROAD +<br /> +<small> + WITH<br /> TALES AND MISCELLANIES NOW FIRST COLLECTED. +</small> +</h1> + +<p class="center"> +BY MRS. JAMESON, +<br /> +<small> +AUTHOR OF THE "CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN," "LIVES OF CELEBRATED FEMALE +SOVEREIGNS," &c. +</small> +</p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> +IN THREE VOLUMES. +</p> +<p class="center"> +<big>VOL. I.</big> +</p> +<p class="center"> +SECOND EDITION. +</p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> + LONDON <br /> +<small> + SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. <br /> + 1835. +</small> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pageiv" name="pageiv"></a>[iv]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> + LONDON: <br /> +<small> + IBOTSON AND PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. </small> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagev" name="pagev"></a>[v]</span></p> + +<div><a name="h2H_TOC" id="h2H_TOC"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + CONTENTS OF VOL. I. +</h2> + +<table class="toc" summary="Table of Contents"> + +<tr><td></td><td></td><td align="right"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr> + +<tr><td colspan="2"> Preface </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#pagevii">vii</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td colspan="3"> +<p class="center"> + <span class="sc">Sketches of Art, Literature, and Character, + Part I.<br /> in Three Dialogues.</span> +</p> +</td></tr> + +<tr><td>I. </td><td>A Scene in a Steam Boat </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page4">4</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>A Singular Character </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page20">20</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Gallery at Ghent </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page25">25</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Prince of Orange's Pictures </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page27">27</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>A Female Gambler </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page38">38</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Cologne—the Medusa </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page44">44</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Professor Walraf </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page51">51</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Schlegel and Madame de Staël </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page55">55</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Story of Archbishop Gerard </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page64">64</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Heidelberg—Elizabeth Stuart </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page68">68</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>An English Fanner's idea of the Picturesque </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page85">85</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td>II. </td><td>Frankfort </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page88">88</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Theatre, Madame Haitzinger </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page92">92</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Versorgung Haus </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page98">98</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Städel Museum </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page103">103</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Dannecker, Memoir of his Life and Works </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page106">106</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>German Sculpture—Rauch, Tieck, Schwanthaler </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page147">147</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td>III. </td><td>Goethe and his daughter-in-law </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page160">160</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The German Women </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page167">167</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>German Authoresses </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page177">177</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> +<span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevi" name="pagevi"></a>[vi]</span> + + </td><td>German Domestic Life and Manners </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page187">187</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>German Coquetterie and German Romance </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page199">199</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Story of a Devoted Sister </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page205">205</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td colspan="3"> +<p class="center"> + <span class="sc">Sketches of Art, Literature, and Character, + Part II.</span> +<br /> + <i>Memoranda at Munich, Nuremberg, and Dresden.</i> +</p> +</td></tr> + +<tr><td>I. </td><td><span class="sc">Munich</span> </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page241">241</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Theatre—representation of "Egmont" </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page245">245</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Leo von Klenze </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page250">250</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Glyptothek—its general arrangement—Egina + Marbles—Account of the Frescos of Cornelius—Canova's + Paris and Thorwaldson's Adonis </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page252">252</a>-<a href="#page273">273</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Opera at Munich, the Kapel Meister Stuntz </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page274">274</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Poems of the King of Bavaria </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page279">279</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>A public day at the New Palace </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page281">281</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Thoughts on Female Singers—Their condition and destiny </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page284">284</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Munich Gallery—Thoughts on Pictures—their moral influence</td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page287">287</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Rubens and the Flemish Masters </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page295">295</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Gallery of Schleissheim </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page304">304</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Boisserée Gallery—The old German School of Painting—Its + Effects on the Modern German School of Art </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page304">304</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>Representation of the Braut von Messina </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page310">310</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The Hofgarten at Munich </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page313">313</a> </td></tr> + +<tr><td> </td><td>The King's passion for Building </td> +<td align="right" style="vertical-align: bottom;"><a href="#page316">316</a> </td></tr> +</table> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagevii" name="pagevii"></a>[vii]</span></p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0003" id="h2H_4_0003"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + THE AUTHOR TO THE READER. +</h2> + +<p> +It seems a foolish thing to send into the world a book requiring +a preface of apologies; and yet more absurd, to presume that any +deprecation on the part of the author could possibly win indulgence +for what should be in itself worthless. +</p> +<p> +For this reason, and with a very deep feeling of the kindness I have +already experienced from the public, I should now abandon these little +volumes to their destiny without one word of preface or remark, but +that a certain portion of their contents seems to require a little +explanation. +</p> +<p> +It was the wish and request of my friends, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="pageviii" name="pageviii"></a>[viii]</span> + + many months ago, that I +should collect various literary trifles which were scattered about in +print or in manuscript, and allow them to be published together. My +departure for the continent set aside this intention for the time. I had +other and particular objects in view, which still keep full possession +of my mind, and which have been suspended not without reluctance, in +order to prepare these volumes for the press;—neither had I, while +travelling in Germany, the slightest idea of writing any thing of that +country: so far from it, that except during the last few weeks at +Munich, I kept no regular notes: but finding on my return to England, +that many particulars which had strongly excited my interest, with +regard to the relative state of art and social existence in the two +countries, appeared new to those with whom I conversed,—after some +hesitation, I was induced to throw into form the few memoranda I had +made on the spot. They are now given to the public in the first and +second volumes of this little collection, with a very sincere + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="pageix" name="pageix"></a>[ix]</span> + + feeling +of their many imperfections, and much anxiety with regard to the +reception they are likely to meet with; yet in the earnest hope that +what has been written in perfect simplicity of heart, may be perused +both by my English and German friends, particularly the artists, with +indulgence; that those who read and doubt may be awakened to inquiry, +and those who read and believe may be led to reflection; and that those +who differ from, and those who agree with the writer, may both find some +interest and amusement in the literal truth of the facts and impressions +she has ventured to record. +</p> +<p> +It was difficult to give sketches of art, literature, and character, +without making now and then some <i>personal</i> allusions; but though I +have often sketched from the life, I have adhered throughout to this +principle—never to give publicity to any name not already before the +public, and in a manner public property. +</p> +<p> +Two of the tales of the third volume, "The False One," and "The Indian +Mother," were written at different times, to prove that I could + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="pagex" name="pagex"></a>[x]</span> + + write +in a style which should not be recognised as mine even by my most +intimate friends, and the <i>ruse</i> so far succeeded, that both, as I am +informed, have been attributed to other writers. +</p> +<p class="right"> + A. J. +</p> +<p> +May 1834. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexi" name="pagexi"></a>[xi]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> +<big>SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER.</big> +</p> + +<h2> +PART I. +<br /> +<small> +IN THREE DIALOGUES. +</small> +</h2> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="pagexii" name="pagexii"></a>[xii]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p><!--[Blank Page]--><br /></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page1" name="page1"></a>[1]</span></p> + +<div class="figure"> +<a name="image-0002"><!--IMG--></a> +<a href="images/ill-2.jpg"><img src="images/ill-2s.png" width="500" height="420" +alt="(a parrot, perched)" /></a> +</div> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0004" id="h2H_4_0004"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + I. +</h2> + + +<p class="center"> +MEDON—ALDA. +</p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And so we are to have no "<i>Sentimental Travels in Germany</i>" on +hot-pressed paper, illustrated with views taken on the spot? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page2" name="page2"></a>[2]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You have unloaded Time of his wallet only to deal out his "scraps of +things past," his shreds of remembrance, in beggarly, indolent fashion, +over your own fire-side? You are afraid of being termed an egotist; you, +who within these ten minutes have assured me that not any opinion of any +human being should prevent you from doing, saying, writing—any thing— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Finish the sentence—any thing, <i>for truth's sake</i>. But how is the cause +of truth to be advanced by the insolent publication of a mass of crude +thoughts and hasty observations picked up here and there, "as pigeons +pick up peas," and which now lie safe within the clasps of those little +green books? You need not look at them; they do not contain another +Diary of an Ennuyée, thank Heaven! nor do I feel much inclined to play +the <i>Ennuyeuse</i> in public. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page3" name="page3"></a>[3]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +"Take any form but <i>that</i>, and my firm nerves shall never tremble;" +but with eyes to see, a heart to feel, a mind to observe, and a pen +to record those observations, I do not perceive why you should not +contribute one drop to that great ocean of thought which is weltering +round the world! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +If I could. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +There are people, who when they travel open their eyes and their ears, +(aye, and their mouths to some purpose,) and shut up their hearts and +souls. I have heard such persons make it their boast, that they have +returned to old England with all their old prejudices thick upon +them; they have come back, to use their own phrase, "with no foreign +ideas—just the same as they went:" they are much to be congratulated! +I hope you are not one of these? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page4" name="page4"></a>[4]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I hope not; it is this cold impervious pride which is the perdition +of us English, and of England. I remember that in one of my several +excursions on the Rhine, we had, on board the steamboat, an English +family of high rank. There was the lordly papa, plain and shy, who never +spoke to any one except his own family, and then only in the lowest +whisper. There was the lady mamma, so truly lady-like, with fine-cut +patrician features, and in her countenance a kind of passive <i>hauteur</i>, +softened by an appearance of suffering, and ill-health. There were two +daughters, proud, pale, fine-looking girls, dressed <i>à ravir</i>, with +that indescribable air of high pretension, so elegantly impassive—so +self-possessed—which some people call <i>l'air distingué</i>, but which, +as extremes meet, I would rather call the refinement of vulgarity—the +polish we see bestowed on debased material—the plating over the +steel—the stucco over the brick-work! +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Good; you <i>can</i> be severe then! +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page5" name="page5"></a>[5]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I spoke generally: bear witness to the general truth of the picture, +for it will fit others as well as the personages I have brought before +you, who are, indeed, but specimens of a species. This group, then, had +designedly or instinctively entrenched themselves in a corner to the +right of the steersman, within a fortification of tables and benches, so +arranged as to forbid all approach within two or three yards; the young +ladies had each their sketch-book, and wielded pencil and Indian rubber, +I know not with what effect,—but I know that I never saw either +countenance once relax or brighten, in the midst of the divine scenery +through which we glided. Two female attendants, seated on the outer +fortifications, formed a kind of piquet guard; and two footmen at the +other end kept watch over the well-appointed carriages, and came and +went as their attendance was required. No one else ventured to approach +this aristocratic Olympus; the celestials within its precincts, though +not exactly seated "on golden stools at golden tables," like the +divinities in the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page6" name="page6"></a>[6]</span> + + song of the Parcæ,<a href="#note-1" name="noteref-1"><small> 1</small></a> showed as supreme, as godlike +an indifference to the throng of mortals in the nether sphere: no word +was exchanged during the whole day with any of the fifty or sixty human +beings who were round them; nay, when the rain drove us down to the +pavilion, even there, amid twelve or fourteen others, they contrived to +keep themselves aloof from contact and conversation. In this fashion +they probably pursued their tour, exchanging the interior of their +travelling carriage for the interior of an hotel; and every where +associating only with those of their own caste. What do they see of all +that is to be seen? What can they know of what is to be known? What do +they endure of what is to be endured? I can speak from experience—I +have travelled in that same style. As they went, so they return; +happily, or rather pitifully, unconscious of the narrow circle in which +move their factitious enjoyments, their confined experience, their +half-awakened sympathies! And I should tell you, that in the same +steam-boat were two German girls, under the care + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page7" name="page7"></a>[7]</span> + + of an elderly relative, +I think an aunt, and a brother, who was a celebrated <i>jurisconsulte</i> +and judge: their rank was equal to that of my countrywomen; their blood, +perhaps, more purely noble, that is, older by some centuries; and +their family more illustrious, by God knows how many quarterings; +moreover, their father was a minister of state. Both these girls were +beautiful;—fair, and fair-haired, with complexions on which "the rose +stood ready with a blush;" and one, the youngest sister, was exquisitely +lovely—in truth, she might have sat for one of Guido's angels. +They walked up and down the deck, neither seeking nor avoiding the +proximity of others. They accepted the telescopes which the gentlemen, +particularly some young Englishmen, pressed on them when any distant or +remarkable object came in view, and repaid the courtesy with a bright +kindly smile; they were natural and easy, and did not deem it necessary +to mount guard over their own dignity. Do you think I did not observe +and feel the contrast? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page8" name="page8"></a>[8]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +If nations begin at last to understand each other's true +interests—morally and politically, it will be through the agency of +gifted men; but if ever they learn to love and sympathize with each +other, it will be through the medium of you women. You smile, and +shake your head; but in spite of a late example, which might seem to +controvert this idea, I still think so;—our prejudices are stronger +and bitterer than yours, because they are those which perverted reason +builds up on a foundation of pride; but yours, which are generally +those of fancy and association, soon melt away before your own kindly +affections. More mobile, more impressible, more easily yielding to +external circumstances, more easily lending yourselves to different +manners and habits, more quick to perceive, more gentle to judge;—yes, +it is to you we must look, to break down the outworks of prejudice—you, +the advanced guard of humanity and civilization! +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i8"> "The gentle race and dear, </p> +<p class="i2"> By whom alone the world is glorified!" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page9" name="page9"></a>[9]</span></p> + +<p> +Every feeling, well educated, generous, and truly refined woman, who +travels, is as a dove sent out on a mission of peace; and should bring +back at least an olive-leaf in her hand, if she bring nothing else. +It is her part to soften the intercourse between rougher and stronger +natures; to aid in the interfusion of the gentler sympathies; to speed +the interchange of art and literature from pole to pole: not to pervert +wit, and talent, and eloquence, and abuse the privileges of her sex, to +sow the seeds of hatred where she might plant those of love—to embitter +national discord and aversion, and disseminate individual prejudice and +error. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Thank you! I need not say how entirely I agree with you. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Then tell me, what have <i>you</i> brought home? if but an olive-leaf, let us +have it; come, unpack your budget. Have you collected store of anecdotes, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page10" name="page10"></a>[10]</span> + + private, literary, scandalous, abundantly interspersed with proper names +of grand-dukes and little dukes, counts, barons, ministers, poets, +authors, actors, and opera dancers? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Me? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Cry you mercy!—I did but jest, so do not look so indignant! But have +you then traced the cause and consequences of that undercurrent of +opinion which is slowly but surely sapping the foundations of empires? +Have you heard the low booming of that mighty ocean which approaches, +wave after wave, to break up the dikes and boundaries of ancient power? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I? no; how should I—skimming over the surface of society with perpetual +sunshine and favouring airs—how should I sound the gulfs and shoals +which lie below? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page11" name="page11"></a>[11]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Have you, then, analysed that odd combination of poetry, metaphysics, +and politics, which, like the three primeval colours, tinge in various +tints and shades, simple and complex, all literature, morals, art, and +even conversation, through Germany? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, indeed! +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Have you decided between the different systems of Jacobi and Schelling? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +You know I am a poor philosopher; but when Schelling was introduced +to me at Munich, I remember I looked up at him with inexpressible +admiration, as one whose giant arm had cut through an isthmus, and +whose giant mind had new modelled the opinions of minds as gigantic +as his own. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page12" name="page12"></a>[12]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Then you are of this new school, which reveals the union of faith and +philosophy? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +If I am, it is by instinct. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Well, to descend to your own peculiar sphere, have you satisfied +yourself as to the moral and social position of the women in Germany? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, indeed!—at least, not yet. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Have you examined and noted down the routine of the <i>domestic</i> education +of their children? (we know something of the public and national +systems.) Can you give some accurate notion of the ideas which generally +prevail on this subject? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page13" name="page13"></a>[13]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +O no! you have mentioned things which would require a life to study. +Merely to have thought upon them, to have glanced at them, gives me no +right to discuss them, unless I could bring my observations to some +tangible form, and derive from them some useful result. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Yet in this last journey you had an object—a purpose? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I had—a purpose which has long been revolving in my mind—an object +never lost sight of;—but give me time!—time! +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I see;—but are you prepared for consequences? Can you task your +sensitive mind to stand reproach and ridicule? Remember your own story +of Runckten the traveller, who, when about to commence his expedition +into the desarts of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page14" name="page14"></a>[14]</span> + + Africa, prepared himself, by learning beforehand +to digest poisons; to swallow without disgust reptiles, spiders, +vermin—— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +"Thou hast the most unsavoury similes!" +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Take a proverb then—"Bisogna coprirsi bene il viso innanzi di +struzzicare il vespaio." +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I will <i>not</i> hide my face; nor can I answer you in this jesting vein, +for to me it is a serious thought. There is in the kindly feeling, the +spontaneous sympathy of the public towards me, something which fills me +with gratitude and respect, and tells me to respect myself; which I +would not exchange for the greater <i>éclat</i> which hangs round greater +names;—which I will not forfeit by writing one line from an unworthy +motive; nor flatter, nor invite, by withholding one thought, opinion, +or sentiment, which I believe to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page15" name="page15"></a>[15]</span> + + be true, and to which I can put the +seal of my heart's conviction. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Good! I love a little enthusiasm now and then; so like Britomart in the +enchanter's palace, the motto is, +</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "Be bold, be bold, and every where be bold!" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I should rather say, be gentle, be gentle, every where be gentle; and +then we cannot <i>be too bold</i>.<a href="#note-2" name="noteref-2"><small> 2</small></a> +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Well, then, I return once more to the charge. Have you been rambling +about the world for these six months—yet learned nothing? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +On the contrary. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page16" name="page16"></a>[16]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Then what, in Heaven's name, <i>have</i> you learned? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Not much; but I have learned to sweep my mind of some ill-conditioned +cobwebs. I have learned to consider my own acquired knowledge but as a +torch flung into an abyss, making the darkness visible, and showing me +the extent of my own ignorance. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Then give us—give <i>me</i>, at least—the benefit of your ignorance; only +let it be all your own. I honour a profession of ignorance—if only for +its rarity—in these all-knowing times. Let me tell you, the ignorance +of a candid and not uncultivated mind is better than the second-hand +wisdom of those who take all things for granted; who are the echoes of +others' opinions, the utterers of others' words; who <i>think</i> they know, +and who <i>think</i> they think: I am sick of them all. Come, refresh me with +a little ignorance—and be serious. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page17" name="page17"></a>[17]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +You make me smile; after all, 'tis only going over old ground, and I +know not what pleasure, what interest it can impart, beyond half an +hour's amusement. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Sceptic! is that nothing? In this harsh, cold, working-day world, is +half an hour's amusement nothing? Old ground!—as if you did not know +the pleasure of going over old ground with a new companion to refresh +half-faded recollections—to compare impressions—to correct old ideas +and acquire new ones? O I can suck knowledge out of ignorance, as a +weazel sucks eggs!—Begin. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Where shall I begin? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Where, but at the beginning? and then diverge as you will. Your first +journey was one of mere amusement? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page18" name="page18"></a>[18]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Merely, and it answered its purpose; we travelled <i>à la milor +Anglais</i>—a <i>partie carrée</i>—a barouche hung on the most approved +principle—double-cushioned—luxurious—rising and sinking on its +springs like a swan on the wave—the pockets stuffed with new +publications—maps and guides <i>ad infinitum</i>; English servants for +comfort, foreign servants for use; a chess-board, backgammon tables—in +short, surrounded with all that could render us entirely independent of +the amusements we had come to seek, and of the people among whom we had +come to visit. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Admirable—and English! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Yes, and pleasant. I thought, not without gratitude, of the contrast +between present feelings and those of a former journey. To abandon +oneself to the quickening influence of new objects without care or +thought of to-morrow, with a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page19" name="page19"></a>[19]</span> + + mind awake in all its strength; with +restored health and cheerfulness; with sensibility tamed, not dead; +possessing one's soul in quiet; not seeking, nor yet shrinking from +excitement; not self-engrossed, nor yet pining for sympathy; was not +this much? Not so interesting, perhaps, as playing the <i>Ennuyée</i>; +but, oh! you know not how sad it is to look upon the lovely through +tearful eyes, and walk among the loving and the kind, wrapped as in +a death-shroud; to carry into the midst of the most glorious scenes +of nature, and the divinest creations of art, perceptions dimmed and +troubled with sickness and anguish: to move in the morning with aching +and reluctance—to faint in the evening with weariness and pain; to feel +all change, all motion, a torment to the dying heart; all rest, all +delay, a burthen to the impatient spirit; to shiver in the presence of +joy, like a ghost in the sunshine, yet have no sympathy to spare for +suffering. How could I remember that all this <i>had been</i>, and not bless +the miracle-worker—Time? And <i>apropos</i> to the miracles of time—I had +on this first journey, one source of amusement, which I am sorry I +cannot + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page20" name="page20"></a>[20]</span> + + share with you at full length; it was the near contemplation +of a very singular character, of which I can only afford you a sketch. +Our <span class="sc">Chef</span> <i>de voyage</i>, for so we chose to entitle him who was the planner +and director of our excursion, was one of the most accomplished and most +eccentric of human beings: even courtesy might have termed him old, at +seventy; but old age and he were many miles asunder, and it seemed as +though he had made some compact with Time, like that of Faust with the +devil, and was not to surrender to his inevitable adversary till the +very last moment. Years could not quench his vivacity, nor "stale his +infinite variety." He had been one of the prince's wild companions in +the days of Sheridan and Fox, and could play alternately blackguard and +gentleman, and both in perfection; but the high-born gentleman ever +prevailed. He had been heir to an enormous income, most of which had +slipped through his fingers <i>unknownst</i>, as the Irish say, and had stood +in the way of a coronet, which, somehow or other, had slipped over his +head to light on that of his eldest son. He had lived a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page21" name="page21"></a>[21]</span> + + life which would have ruined +twenty iron constitutions, and had suffered what might well have +broken twenty hearts of common stuff; but his self-complacency +was invulnerable, his animal spirits inexhaustible, his activity +indefatigable. The eccentricities of this singular man have been matter +of celebrity; but against each of these stories it would be easy to +place some act of benevolence, some trait of lofty gentlemanly feeling, +which would at least neutralize their effect. He often told me that he +had early in life selected three models, after which to form his own +conduct and character; namely, De Grammont, Hotspur, and Lord Herbert of +Cherbury; and he certainly <i>did</i> unite, in a greater degree than he knew +himself, the characteristics of all three. Such was our <span class="sc">Chef</span>, and thus +led, thus appointed, away we posted on, from land to land, from city +to city— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Stay—stay. This is galloping on at the rate of Lenora, and her phantom +lover— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "Tramp, tramp across the land we go, </p> +<p class="i2"> Splash, splash across the sea!" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +Take me with you, and a little more leisurely. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page22" name="page22"></a>[22]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I think Bruges was the first place which interested me, perhaps from +its historical associations. Bruges, where monarchs kissed the hand +to merchants, now emptied of its former splendour, reminded me of the +improvident steward in scripture, that could not dig, and to beg was +ashamed. It had an air of grave idleness and threadbare dignity; and its +listless, thinly-scattered inhabitants looked as if they had gone astray +among the wide streets and huge tenantless edifices. There is one thing +here which you must see—the tomb of Charles the Bold, and his daughter, +Mary of Burgundy. The tomb is of the most exquisite workmanship, +composed of polished brass and enamelled escutcheons; and there the +fiery father and the gentle daughter lie, side by side, in sculptured +bronze, equally still, cold, and silent. I remember that I stood long +gazing on the inscription, which made me smile, and made me think. There +was no mention of defeat and massacre, disgraceful flight, or obscure +death. "But," says the epitaph, after enumerating his titles, his +exploits, and his virtues, "fortune, who had + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page23" name="page23"></a>[23]</span> + + hitherto been his good lady, +ungently turned her back upon him on such a day of such a year, and +<i>oppressed</i> him"—an amusing instance of mingled courtesy and <i>naïveté</i>. +Ghent was our next resting place. The aspect of Ghent, so familiarized +to us of late by our travelled artists, made a strong impression upon +me, and I used to walk about for hours together, looking at the strange +picturesque old buildings coëval with the Spanish dominion, with their +ornamented fronts and peaked roofs. There is much trade here, many +flourishing manufactories, and the canals and quays often exhibited a +lively scene of bustle, of which the form, at least, was new to us. The +first exposition, or exhibition, of the newly-founded Royal Academy +of the Netherlands was at this season open. You will allow it was a +fair opportunity of judging of the present state of painting, in the +self-same land, where she had once found, if not a temple, at least +a home. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And learned to be homely—but the result? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page24" name="page24"></a>[24]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I can scarce express the surprise I felt at the time, though it has +since diminished on reflection. All the attempts at historical painting +were bad, without exception. There was the usual assortment of Virgins, +St. Cecilias, Cupids and Psyches, Zephyrs and Floras;—but such +incomparable atrocities! There were some cabinet pictures in the same +style in which their Flemish ancestors excelled—such as small interior +conversation pieces, battle pieces, and flowers and fruit; some of these +were really excellent, but the proportion of bad to good was certainly +fifty to one. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Something like our own Royal Academy. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No; because with much which was quite as bad, quite as insipid, as +coarse in taste, as stupidly presumptuous in attempt, and ridiculous +in failure, as ever shocked me on the walls of Somerset House, there +was nothing to be compared to the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page25" name="page25"></a>[25]</span> + + best pictures I have seen there. As I +looked and listened to the remarks of the crowd around me, I perceived +that the taste for art is even as low in the Netherlands as it is here +and elsewhere. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And, surely, not from the want of models, nor from the want of facility +in the means of studying them. You visited, of course, Schamp's +collection? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Surely; there were miracles of art crowded together like goods in a +counting-house, with wondrous economy of space, and more lamentable +economy of light. Some were nailed against doors, inside and out, or +suspended from screens and window-shutters. Here I saw Rubens' picture +of Father Rutseli, the confessor of Albert and Isabella: one of those +heads more suited to the crown than to the cowl—grand, sagacious, +intellectual, with such a world of meaning in the eye, that one almost +shrunk away from the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page26" name="page26"></a>[26]</span> + + expression. Here, too, I found that remarkable +picture of Charles the First, painted by Lely during the king's +imprisonment at Windsor—the only one for which he sat between his +dethronement and his death: he is still melancholy and gentlemanlike, +but not quite so dignified as on the canvass of Vandyke. This is the +very picture that Horace Walpole mentions as lost or abstracted from the +collection at Windsor. How it came into Schamp's collection, I could +not learn. A very small head of an Italian girl by Correggio, or in his +manner, hung close beside a Dutch girl by Mieris: equally exquisite as +paintings, they gave me an opportunity of contrasting two styles, both +founded in nature—but the nature, how different! the one all life, +the other life and soul. Schamp's collection is liberally open to the +public, as well as many others; if artists fail, it is not for want +of models. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Perhaps for want of patronage? Yet I hear that the late king of the +Netherlands sent several + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page27" name="page27"></a>[27]</span> + + young artists to Italy at his own expense, +and that the Prince of Orange was liberal and even munificent in his +purchases—particularly of the old masters. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +When I went to see the collection of the Prince of Orange at Brussels, +I stepped from the room in which hung the glorious Vandykes, perhaps +unequalled in the world, into the adjoining apartment, in which were two +unfinished portraits disposed upon easels. They represented members of +the prince's family; and were painted by a native artist of fashionable +fame, and royally patronised. These were pointed out to my admiration as +universally approved. What shall I say of them? Believe me, that they +were contemptible beyond all terms of contempt! Can you tell me why the +Prince of Orange should have sufficient taste to select and appropriate +the finest specimens of art, and yet purchase and patronize the vilest +daubs ever perpetrated by imbecility and presumption? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page28" name="page28"></a>[28]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I know not, unless it be that in the former case he made use of others' +eyes and judgment, and in the latter, of his own. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I might have anticipated the answer; but be that as it may, of all the +galleries I saw in the Netherlands, the small but invaluable collection +he had formed in his palace pleased me most. I remember a portrait of +Sir Thomas More, by Holbein. A female head, by Leonardo da Vinci, said +to be one of the mistresses of Francis I., but this is doubtful; that +most magnificent group, Christ delivering the keys to St. Peter, by +Rubens, once in England; about eight or ten Vandykes, masterpieces—for +instance, Philip IV. and his minister Olivarez, and a Chevalier le Roy +and his wife: all that you can imagine of chivalrous dignity, and +lady-like grace. But there was one picture, a family group, by Gonsalez, +which struck me more than all the rest put together. I had never seen +any production of this painter, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page29" name="page29"></a>[29]</span> + + whose works are scarcely known out of +Spain; and I looked upon this with equal astonishment and admiration. +There was also a small, but most curious collection of pictures, of +the ancient Flemish and German schools, which it is now the fashion +to admire, and, what is worse, to imitate. The word <i>fashion</i> does +not express the national enthusiasm on this subject which prevails in +Germany. I can understand that these pictures are often most interesting +as historic documents, and often admirable for their literal transcripts +of nature and expression, but they can only possess comparative +excellence and relative value; and where the feeling of ideal beauty and +classic grace has been highly cultivated, the eye shrinks involuntarily +from these hard, grotesque, and glaring productions of an age when +genius was blindly groping amid the darkness of ignorance. To confess +the truth, I was sometimes annoyed, and sometimes amused, by the cant I +heard in Germany about those schools of painting which preceded Albert +Durer. Perhaps I should not say <i>cant</i>—it is a vile expression; and in +German + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page30" name="page30"></a>[30]</span> + + affectation there is something so very peculiar—so poetical, +so—so <i>natural</i>, if I might say so, that I would give it another name +if I could find one. In this worship of their old painters, I really +could sympathize sometimes, even when it most provoked me. Retzsch, whom +I had the delight of knowing at Dresden, showed me a sketch, in which he +had ridiculed this mania with the most exquisite humour: it represented +the torso of an antique Apollo (emblematical of ideal grace), mutilated +and half buried in the earth, and subject to every species of profanation; +it serves as a stool for a German student, who, with his shirt-collar +turned down, and his hair dishevelled, and his cap stuck on one side, +<i>à la</i> Rafaelle, is intently copying a stiff, hard, sour-looking old +Madonna, while Ignorance looks on, gaping with admiration. No one knows +better than Retzsch the value of these ancient masters—no one has a +more genuine feeling for all that is admirable in them; but no one feels +more sensibly the gross perversion and exaggeration of the worship paid +to them. I wish he would publish this good-humoured + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page31" name="page31"></a>[31]</span> + + little bit of satire, +which is too just and too graceful to be called a caricature. +</p> +<p> +I must tell you, however, that there were two most curious old pictures +in the Orange Gallery, which arrested my attention, and of which I have +retained a very distinct and vivid recollection; and that is more than I +can say of many better pictures. They tell, in a striking manner, a very +interesting story: the circumstances are said to have occurred about +the year 985, but I cannot say that they rest on any very credible +authority. +</p> +<p> +Of these two pictures, each exhibits two scenes. A certain nobleman, a +favourite of the Emperor Otho, is condemned to death by his master on +the false testimony of the Empress (a sort of Potiphar's wife), who has +accused him of having tempted her to break her marriage vow. In the +back-ground we see the unfortunate man led to judgment; he is in his +shirt, bare-footed and bare-headed. His wife walks at his side, to whom +he appears to be speaking earnestly, and endeavouring to persuade her of +his innocence. A friar precedes them, and a crowd of people + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page32" name="page32"></a>[32]</span> + + follow +after. On the walls of the city stand the Emperor and his wicked +Empress, looking down on the melancholy procession. In the foreground, +we have the dead body of the victim, stretched upon the earth, and the +executioner is in the act of delivering the head to his wife, who looks +grim with despair. The severed head and flowing blood are painted with +such a horrid and literal fidelity to nature, that it has been found +advisable to cover this portion of the picture. +</p> +<p> +In the foreground of the second picture, the Emperor Otho is represented +on his throne surrounded by his counsellors and courtiers. Before him +kneels the widow of the Count: she has the ghastly head of her husband +in her lap, and in her left-hand she holds firmly and unhurt the +red-hot iron, the fiery ordeal by which she proves to the satisfaction +of all present the innocence of her murdered lord. The Emperor looks +thunderstruck; the Empress stands convicted, and is condemned to death; +and in the back-ground, we have the catastrophe. She is bound to a +stake, the fire is kindled, and she suffers the terrible + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page33" name="page33"></a>[33]</span> + + penalty of +her crime. These pictures, in subject and execution, might be termed +tragico-comico-historical; but in spite of the harshness of the drawing, +and the thousand defects of style and taste, they fix the attention by +the vigour of the colouring and the expression of the heads, many of +which are evidently from the life. The story is told in a very complete +though very inartificial manner. The painter, Derick Steuerbout, was one +of the very earliest of the Flemish masters, and lived about 1468, many +years before Albert Durer and Holbein. I have heard that they were +painted for the city of Lorraine, and until the invasion of the French, +they remained undisturbed, and almost unnoticed, in the Hotel-de-Ville. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Does this collection of the Prince of Orange still exist at Brussels? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I am told that it does—that the whole palace, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page34" name="page34"></a>[34]</span> + + the furniture, the +pictures, remain precisely as the prince and his family left them: that +even down to the princess's work-box, and the portraits of her children +which hang in her boudoir, nothing has been touched. This does not speak +well for king Leopold's gallantry; and, in his place, I think I would +have sent the private property of my rival after him. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +So would not I, for this is not the age of chivalry, but of common +sense. As to the pictures, the Belgians might plead that they were +purchased with the public money, therefore justly public property. No, +no; he should not have a picture of them—"If a Vandyke would save his +soul, he should not; I'd keep them, by this hand!" that is, as long as +I had a plausible excuse for keeping them; but the princess should have +had her work-box and her children by the first courier. What more at +Brussels? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page35" name="page35"></a>[35]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I can recollect no more. The weather was sultry: we dressed, and dined, +and ate ices, and drove up and down the Allée Verte, and saw I believe +all that is to be seen—churches, palaces, hospitals, and so forth. We +went from thence to Aix-la-Chapelle and Spa. As it was the height of the +season, and both places were crowded with gay invalids, perhaps I ought +to have been very much amused, but I confess I was <i>ennuyée</i> to death. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +This I can hardly conceive; for though there might have been little to +amuse one of your turn of mind, there should have been much to observe. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +There might have been matter for observation, or ridicule, or reflexion, +at the moment, but nothing that I remember with pleasure. Spa I disliked +particularly. I believe I am not in my nature cold or stern; but there +was something in the shallow, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page36" name="page36"></a>[36]</span> + + tawdry, vicious gaiety of this place, +which disgusted me. In all watering-places extremes meet; sickness and +suffering, youth and dissipation, beggary and riches, collect together; +but Spa being a very small town, a mere village, the approximation is +brought immediately under the eye at every hour, every moment; and the +beauty of the scenery around only rendered it more disagreeable: to me, +even the hill of Annette and Lubin was polluted. Our Chef de voyage, who +had visited Spa fifty years before, when on his <i>grand tour</i>, walked +about with great complacency, recalling his youthful pleasures, and +the days when he used to gallant his beautiful cousin, the Duchess of +Rutland, of divine memory. While the rest of the party were amused, I +fell into my old, habit of thinking and observing, and my contemplations +were not agreeable. But instead of dealing in these general remarks, +I will sketch you one or two pictures which have dwelt upon my memory. +We had a well-dressed laquais-de-place, whose honesty and good-humour +rendered him an especial favourite. His wife being ill, I went to see + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page37" name="page37"></a>[37]</span> + + her; to my great surprise he conducted me to a little mud hovel, worse +than the worst Irish cabin I ever heard described, where his wife lay +stretched upon some straw, covered with a rug, and a little neglected +ragged child was crawling about the floor, and about her bed. It seems +then, that, this poor man, who every day waited at our luxurious table, +dressed in smiles, and must habitually have witnessed the wasteful +expenditure of the rich, returned every night to his miserable home, +if home it could be called, to feel the stings of want with double +bitterness. He told me that he and his wife lived the greater part of +the year upon water-gruel, and that the row of wretched cabins, of which +his own formed one, was inhabited by those who, like himself, were +dependent upon the rich, extravagant, and dissipated strangers for the +little pittance which was to support them for a twelvemonth. Was not +this a fearful contrast? I should tell you that the benevolence of our +Chef rendered this poor couple independent of change or chance for the +next year. My other picture is in a different style. You know that +at + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page38" name="page38"></a>[38]</span> + + Spa the theatre immediately joins the ball-room. As soon as the +performances are over, the parterre is laid down with boards, and in a +few minutes metamorphosed into a gambling saloon. One night curiosity +led me to be a spectator at one of the <i>rouge et noir</i> tables. While I +was there, a Flemish lady of rank, the Baroness B——, came in, hanging +on the arm of a gentleman; she was not young, but still handsome. I had +often met her in our walks, and had been struck by her fine eyes, and +the amiable expression of her countenance. After one or two turns up +and down the room, laughing and talking, she carelessly, and as if from +a sudden thought, seated herself at the table. By degrees she became +interested in the game, her stakes became deeper, her countenance became +agitated, and her brow clouded. I left her playing. The next evening +when I entered, I found her already seated at the table, as indeed I had +anticipated. I watched her for some time with a painful interest. It was +evident that she was not an habitual gambler, like several others at the +same table, whose hard impassive features never + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page39" name="page39"></a>[39]</span> + + varied with the variations +of the game. There was one little old withered skeleton of a woman, like +a death's head in artificial flowers, who stretched out her harpy claws +upon the rouleaus of gold and silver, without moving a muscle or a +wrinkle of her face,—with hardly an additional twinkle in her dull grey +eye. Not so my poor baroness, who became every moment more agitated and +more eager: her eyes sparkled with an unnatural keenness, her teeth +became set, and her lips drawn away from them, wore, instead of the +sweet smile which had at first attracted my attention, a grin of +desperation. Gradually, as I looked at her, her countenance assumed so +hideous, and, I may add, so vile an expression, that I could no longer +endure the spectacle. I hastened from the room—more moved, more shocked +than I can express; and often, since that time, her face has risen upon +my day and night dreams like a horrid supernatural mask. Her husband, +for this wretched woman was a wife and a mother, came to meet her a few +days afterwards, and accompany + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page40" name="page40"></a>[40]</span> + + her home; but I heard that in the interval +she had attempted self-destruction, and failed. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +The case is but too common; and even you, who are always seeking reasons +and excuses for the delinquencies of your sex, would hardly find them +here. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And unless I could know what were the previous habits and education +of the victim, through what influences, blest or unblest, her mind +had been trained, her moral existence built up—should I condemn? Who +had taught this woman self-knowledge?—who had instructed her in the +elements of her own being, and guarded her against her own excitable +temperament?—what friendly voice had warned her ignorance?—what secret +burden of misery—what joyless emptiness of heart—what fever of the +nerves—what weariness of spirit—what "thankless husband or faithless + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page41" name="page41"></a>[41]</span> + + lover" had driven her to the edge of the precipice? In this particular +case I know that the husband bore the character of being both negligent +and dissipated; and where was <i>he</i>,—what were his haunts and his +amusements, while his wife staked with her gold, her honour, her reason, +and her life? Tell me all this before we dare to pass judgment. O it is +easy to compute what is done! and yet, who but the Being above us all, +can know what is resisted? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You would plead then for a <i>female</i> gambler? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Why do you lay such an emphasis upon <i>female</i> gambler? In what respect +is a female gambler worse than one of your sex? The case is more +pitiable;—more rare—therefore, perhaps, more shocking; but why more +hateful? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You pose me. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page42" name="page42"></a>[42]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Then I will leave you to think;—or shall I go on? for at this rate we +shall never arrive at the end of our journey. I was at Aix-la-Chapelle, +was I not? Well, I spare you the relics of Charlemagne, and if you have +any dear or splendid associations with that great name, spare your +imagination the shock it may receive in the cathedral at Aix, and leave +"Yarrow unvisited."<a href="#note-3" name="noteref-3"><small> 3</small></a> Luckily the theatre at Aix is beautiful, and +there was a fine opera, and a very perfect orchestra; the singers +tolerable. It was here I first heard the Don Juan and the Freyschutz +performed in the German fashion, and with German words. The Freyschutz +gave me unmixed pleasure. In the Don Juan I missed the recitative, +and the soft Italian flow of syllables, from which the music had been +divorced; so that the ear, long habituated to that marriage of sweet +sounds, was disappointed; but to listen without pleasure and excitement +was impossible. I remember that on looking round, after Donna Anna's +song, I was surprised to see our Chef de voyage bathed in + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page43" name="page43"></a>[43]</span> + + tears; but, +no whit disconcerted, he merely wiped them away, saying, with a smile, +"It is the very prettiest, softest thing to cry to one's self!" +Afterwards, when we were in the carriage, he expressed his surprise that +any man should be ashamed of tears. "For my own part," he added, "when +I wish to enjoy the very high sublime of luxury, I dine alone, order a +mutton cutlet, <i>cuite à point</i>, with a bottle of Burgundy on one side, +and Ovid's epistle of Penelope to Ulysses on the other; and so I read, +and eat, and cry to myself. And then he repeated with enthusiasm— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2"> "Hanc tua Penelope lento tibi mittit Ulysse: </span><br /> +<span class="i2"> Nil mihi rescribas attamen ipse veni;" </span> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="continued"> +his eyes glistening as he recited the lines; he made me feel their +beauty without understanding a word of their sense. "Strangest, and +happiest of men!" I thought as I looked at him, "that after living +seventy years in this world, can still have tears to spare for the +sorrows of Penelope!" Well, our next resting place was Cologne. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page44" name="page44"></a>[44]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You pause?—you have nothing to say of Cologne? No English traveller, +except your professed tourists and guide-book makers, ever has; of the +crowds who pass through the place, on their way up or down the Rhine, +how few spend more than a night or a day there! their walk is between +the Rheinberg and the cathedral; they look, perhaps, with a sneering +curiosity at the shrine of the Three Kings; cut the usual jests on the +Leda and the Cupid and Psyche;<a href="#note-4" name="noteref-4"><small> 4</small></a> glance at the St. Peter of Rubens; +lounge on the bridge of boats; stock themselves with eau-de-Cologne, and +then away! And yet this strange old city, which a bigoted priesthood, +a jealous magistracy, and a variety of historical causes, have so +long kept isolated in the midst of Europe, with its Roman origin, its +classical associations, the wild gothic superstitions of which it has +been the theatre; its legion of martyrs, its three kings and eleven +thousand virgins, and the peculiar + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page45" name="page45"></a>[45]</span> + + manners and physiognomy of the people, +strangely take the fancy. What has become of its three hundred and fifty +churches, and its thirty thousand beggars?—Thirty thousand beggars! +Was there ever such a splendid establishment of licensed laziness, +and consecrated rags and wallets! What a magnificent idea does it give +one of the inexhaustible charity, and the incalculable riches of the +inhabitants! but the French came with their besom of purification +and destruction; and lo! the churches were turned into arsenals, the +convents into barracks; and from its old-accustomed haunts, "the genius +of beggary was with sighing sent." I really believe, that were I again +to visit Cologne, I would not be content with a mere superficial glance, +as heretofore. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And you would do well. To confess the truth, our first impressions of +the place were exceedingly disagreeable; it appeared a huge, rambling, +gloomy old city, whose endless narrow dirty streets, and dull +dingy-looking edifices, were any thing but + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page46" name="page46"></a>[46]</span> + + inviting. Nor on a second +and a third visit were we tempted to prolong our stay. Yet Cologne has +since become most interesting to me from a friendship I formed with +a Colonese, a descendant of one of the oldest families of the place. +How she loved her old city!—how she worshipped every relic with the +most poetical, if not the most pious veneration!—how she looked +down upon Berlin with scorn, as an upstart city, "<i>une ville ma chére, +qui n'a ni histoire, ni antiquité</i>." The cathedral she used to call +"<i>mon Berceau</i>," and the three kings "<i>mes trois pères</i>." Her profound +knowledge of general history, her minute acquaintance with the local +antiquities, the peculiar customs, the wild legends, the solemn +superstitions of her birth-place, added to the most lively imagination +and admirable descriptive powers, were to me an inexhaustible source +of delight and information. It appears that the people of Cologne have +a distinct character, but little modified by intercourse with the +surrounding country, and preserved by continual intermarriages among +themselves. They have a dialect, and songs, and ballads, and music, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page47" name="page47"></a>[47]</span> + + peculiar to their city; and are remarkable for an original vein of +racy humour, a revengeful spirit, an exceeding superstition, a blind +attachment to their native customs, a very decided contempt for +other people, and a surpassing hatred of all innovations. They never +admitted the jurisdiction of the electors of Cologne, and, although +the most bigoted people in the world, were generally at war with +their archbishops. Even Napoleon could not make them comformable. +The city is now attached to Prussia, but still retains most of its +ancient privileges, and all its ancient spirit of insubordination and +independence. When, in 1828, the king of Prussia wished to force upon +them an unpopular magistrate, the whole city rose, and obliged the +obnoxious president to resign; the government, armed with all its legal +and military terrors, could do nothing against the determined spirit +of this half-civilized, fearless, reckless, yet merry, good-humoured +populace. A history of this grotesque revolution, which had the same +duration as the celebrated <i>trois jours de Paris</i>, and exhibited + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page48" name="page48"></a>[48]</span> + + in +its progress and issue some of the most striking, most characteristic, +most farcical scenes you can imagine, were worthy of a Colonese Walter +Scott. How I wish I could give you some of my friend's rich graphic +sketches and humorous pictures of popular manner! but I feel that their +peculiar spirit would evaporate in my hands. The event is celebrated in +their local history as "<i>la Revolution du Carnaval</i>:" and this reminds +me of another peculiarity of Cologne. The carnival is still celebrated +there with a degree of splendour and fantastic humour, exceeding even +the festivities of Rome and Naples in the present day; but as the season +of the carnival is not the season for flight with our English birds of +passage, few have ever witnessed these extraordinary Saturnalia. Such is +the general ignorance or indifference relative to Cologne, that I met +the other day with a very accomplished man, and a lover of art, who had +frequently visited the place, and yet he had never seen the Medusa. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page49" name="page49"></a>[49]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Nor I, by this good light!—I never even heard of it! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And how shall I attempt to describe it? Unless I had the "large +utterance of the early gods," or could pour forth a string of Greek or +German compounds, I know not in what words I could do justice to the +effect it produced upon me. This wondrous mask measures about two feet +and a half in height;<a href="#note-5" name="noteref-5"><small> 5</small></a> the colossal features, and I may add, the +colossal expression, grand without exaggeration—so awfully vast, and +yet so gloriously beautiful; the full rich lips curled with disdain—the +mighty wings overshadowing the knit and tortured brow—the madness in +the large dilated eyes—the wreathing and recoiling snakes, came upon me +like something supernatural, and impressed me at once with astonishment, +horror, and admiration. I was quite unprepared for what I beheld. As I + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page50" name="page50"></a>[50]</span> + + stood before it my mind seemed to elevate and enlarge itself to admit +this new vision of grandeur. Nothing but the two Fates in the Elgin +marbles, and the Torso of the Vatican, ever affected me with the same +inexpressible sense of the sublime: and this is not a fragment of some +grand mystery, of which the remainder has been "to night and chaos +hurled;" it is entire, in admirable preservation, and the workmanship as +perfect as the conception is magnificent. I know not if it would have +affected another in the same manner. For me, the ghastly allegory of the +Medusa has a peculiar fascination. I confess that I have never wholly +understood it, nor have any of the usual explanations satisfied me; +it appears to me, that the Greeks, in thus blending the extremes of +loveliness and terror, had a meaning, a purpose, more than is dreamt +of by our philosophy. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But, how came this wonderful relic to Cologne, of all places in the +world? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page51" name="page51"></a>[51]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It stopped there on its road to England. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +By what perverse destiny?—was it avarice on our part, or force or fraud +on that of others? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It was, as Desdemona says, "our wretched fortune:" but the story, with +all its circumstances, does so much honour to human nature, that it +has half reconciled me to our loss. You must have heard of Professor +Wallraf of Cologne, one of the canons of the cathedral, who, with his +professorship and his canonship together, may have possessed from +five to seven hundred francs a year. He was one of those wonderful +and universal scholars, of whom we read in former times—men who +concentrated all their powers and passions, and intellectual faculties, +in the acquirement and advancement of knowledge, without any selfish aim +or object, and from the mere abstract love of science. Early in life +this man formed the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page52" name="page52"></a>[52]</span> + + resolution to remove from his native city the reproach +of self-satisfied ignorance and monastic prejudices, which had hitherto +characterized it; and in the course of a long existence of labour and +privation, as professor and teacher, he contrived to collect together +books, manuscripts, pictures, gems, works of art, and objects of natural +history, to an immense amount. In the year 1818, on recovering from +a dangerous illness, he presented his whole collection to his native +city; and the magistracy, in return, bestowed on him a pension of three +thousand francs for the remainder of his life. He was then more than +seventy. About the same time a dealer in antiquities arrived from Rome, +bringing with him this divine Medusa, with various other busts and +fragments: he was on his way to England, where he hoped to dispose of +them. He asked for his whole collection twelve thousand francs, and +refused to sell any part of it separately. The city refused to make the +purchase, thinking it too dear, and Wallraf, in despair at the idea +of this glorious relic being consigned to other lands, mortgaged + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page53" name="page53"></a>[53]</span> + + his +yearly pension in order to raise the money, purchased the Medusa, +presented it to the city, and then cheerfully resumed his accustomed +life of self-denial and frugality. His only dread was lest he should die +before the period was expired. He lived, however, to pay off his debt, +and in three months afterwards he died.<a href="#note-6" name="noteref-6"><small> 6</small></a> Was not this admirable? The +first time I saw the Medusa I did not know this anecdote; the second +time, as I looked at it, I thought of Wallraf, and felt how much a moral +interest can add to the charm of what is in itself most perfect. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I will certainly make a pilgrimage to this Medusa. She must be worth +all the eleven thousand virgins together. What next? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Instead of embarking in the steam-boat, we posted along the left +bank of the Rhine, spending a few days at Bonn, at Godesberg, and at +Ehrenbreitstein; but I should tell you, as you allow me + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page54" name="page54"></a>[54]</span> + + to diverge, that +on my second journey, I owed much to a residence of some weeks at Bonn. +There I became acquainted with the celebrated Schlegel, or I should +rather say, M. le Chevalier de Schlegel, for I believe his titles and +his "starry honours" are not indifferent to him; and in truth he wears +them very gracefully. I was rather surprised to find in this sublime +and eloquent critic, this awful scholar, whose comprehensive mind has +grasped the whole universe of art, a most agreeable, lively, social +being. Of the judgments passed on him in his own country, I know little, +and understand less; I am not deep in German literary polemics. To me +he was the author of the lectures on "Dramatic Literature," and the +translator of Shakspeare, and, moreover, all that was amiable and +polite: and was not this enough? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Enough for you, certainly; but, I believe that at this time Schlegel +would rather found his fame on being one of the greatest oriental +critics of the age, than on being the interpreter of the beauties of +Calderon and Shakspeare. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page55" name="page55"></a>[55]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I believe so; but for my own part, I would rather hear him talk of +Romeo and Juliet, and of Madame de Staël, than of the Ramayana, the +Bhagvat-Gita, or even the "eastern Con-fut-zee." This, of course, is +only a proof of my own ignorance. Conversation may be compared to a lyre +with seven chords—philosophy, art, poetry, politics, love, scandal, +and the weather. There are some professors, who, like Paganini, "can +discourse most eloquent music" upon one string only; and some who can +grasp the whole instrument, and with a master's hand sound it from the +top to the bottom of its compass. Now, Schlegel is one of the latter: +he can thunder in the bass or caper in the treble; he can be a whole +concert in himself. No man can trifle like him, nor, like him, blend in +a few hours' converse, the critic, philologist, poet, philosopher, and +man of the world—no man narrates more gracefully, nor more happily +illustrates a casual thought. He told me many interesting things. "Do +you know," said he one morning, as I was looking at a beautiful edition +of Corinne, bound in red morocco, the gift + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page56" name="page56"></a>[56]</span> + + of Madame de Staël; "do you +know that I figure in that book?" I asked eagerly in what character? +He bid me guess. I guessed playfully, the Comte d'Erfeuil. "No! no!" +said he, laughing, "I am immortalized in the Prince Castel-Forte, the +faithful, humble, unaspiring, friend of Corinne." +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +To any man but Schlegel, such an immortality were worth a life. Nay, +there is no man, though his fame extended to the ends of the earth, whom +the pen of Madame de Staël could not honour. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +He seemed to think so, and I liked him for the self-complacency with +which he twined her little myrtle leaf with his own palmy honours. Nor +did he once refer to what I believe every body knows, her obligations to +him in her De l'Allemagne. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Apropos—do tell me what is the general opinion of that book among the +Germans themselves. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page57" name="page57"></a>[57]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I think they do not judge it fairly. Some speak of it as eloquent, but +superficial:<a href="#note-7" name="noteref-7"><small> 7</small></a> others denounce it altogether as a work full of mistakes +and flippant, presumptuous criticism: others again affect to speak of +it, and even of Madame de Staël herself, as things of another era, quite +gone by and forgotten; this appeared to me too ridiculous. They forget, +or do not know, what <i>we</i> know, that her De l'Allemagne was the first +book which awakened in France and England a lively and general interest +in German art and literature. It is now five-and-twenty years since it +was published. The march of opinion, and criticism, and knowledge of +every kind, has been so rapid, that much has become old which then was +new; but this does not detract from its merit. Once or twice I tried to +convince my German friends that they were exceedingly ungrateful in +abusing Madame de Staël, but it was all in vain; so I sat swelling with +indignation to hear my idol traduced, and called—O profanation!— +"<i>cette Staël</i>." +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page58" name="page58"></a>[58]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But do you think the Germans could at all appreciate or understand such +a phenomenon as Madame de Staël must have appeared in those days? She +whisked through their skies like a meteor, before they could bring the +telescope of their wits to a right focus for observation. How she must +have made them open their eyes!—and you see in the correspondence +between Goethe and Schiller what <i>they</i> thought of her. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Yes, I know that with her lively egotism and Parisian volubility, +she stunned Schiller and teased Goethe: but while our estimate of +<i>manner</i> may be allowed to be relative and comparative, our estimate +of <i>character</i> should be positive and abstract. Madame de Staël was +in manner the Frenchwoman, accustomed to be the cynosure of a salon, +but she was not ridiculous or egoiste in character. She was, to use +Schlegel's expression, "femme grande et magnanime jusque dans les replis +de son âme." The best proof is the very spirit in which she viewed +Germany, in spite of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page59" name="page59"></a>[59]</span> + + all her natural and national prejudices. To apply +your own expression, she went forth, in the spirit of peace, and brought +back, not only an olive leaf, but a whole tree, and it has flourished. +She had a universal mind. I believe she never thought, and still less +<i>made</i>, any one ridiculous in her life.<a href="#note-8" name="noteref-8"><small> 8</small></a> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page60" name="page60"></a>[60]</span></p> + +<p> +At Bonn much of my time was spent in intimate and almost hourly +intercourse with two friends, one of whom I have already mentioned to +you—a rare creature!—the other, who was herself the daughter of a +distinguished authoress,<a href="#note-9" name="noteref-9"><small> 9</small></a> was one of the most generally accomplished +women I ever met with. Opposed to each other in the constitution of +their minds—in all their views of literature and art, and all their +experience of life—in their tastes, and habits, and feelings—yet +mutually appreciating each other: both were distinguished by talents of +the highest order and by great originality of character, and both were +German, and very essentially <i>German</i>: English society and English +education would never have produced two such women. Their conversation +prepared me to form correct ideas of what I was to see and hear, and +guarded me against the mistakes and hasty conclusions of vivacious +travellers. At + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page61" name="page61"></a>[61]</span> + + Bonn I also saw, for the first time, a specimen of the +fresco painting, lately revived in Germany with such brilliant success. +By command of the Prussian Board of Education the hall of the university +of Bonn is to be painted in fresco, and the work has been entrusted +to C. Hermann, Götzenberger, and Förster—all, I believe, pupils of +Cornelius. The three sides of the hall are to represent the three +faculties—Theology, Jurisprudence, and Philosophy; the first of these +is finished, and here is an engraving of it. You see Theology is throned +in the centre. The four evangelists, with St. Peter and St. Paul, stand +on the steps of the throne; around her are the fathers and doctors of +the church, and (which is the chief novelty of the composition) grouped +together with a very liberal disregard to all religious differences; +for there you see pope Gregory, and Ignatius Loyola, and St. Bernard, +and Abelard, and Dante; and here we have Luther, and Melanchthon, +and Calvin, and Wickliff, and Huss. On the opposite side of the hall, +Philosophy, under which head are comprised all science, poetry, and art, +is represented + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page62" name="page62"></a>[62]</span> + + surrounded by the great poets, philosophers, and artists, +from Homer, Aristotle, and Phideas, down to Shakspeare, Raffaelle, +Goethe, and Kant. Jurisprudence, which is not begun, is to occupy the +third side. The cartoons pleased me better than the paintings, for the +drawing and grouping are really fine; but the execution struck me as +somewhat hard and mannered. I shall have much to say hereafter of the +fresco painting in Germany; for the present, proceed we on our journey. +</p> +<p> +Tell me, had you a full moon while you were on the Rhine? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Truly, I forget. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Then you had <i>not</i>; for it would so have blended with your recollections, +that as a circumstance it could not have been forgotten; and take +my advice, when next you are off on your annual flight, consult the +calendar, and propitiate the fairest of all the fair Existences of +heaven to give + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page63" name="page63"></a>[63]</span> + + you the light of her countenance. If you never took a +solitary ramble, or, what is better, a <i>tête-à-tête</i> drive through the +villages and vineyards between Bonn and Plittersdorf, when the moon +hung over the Drachenfels, when the undulating outlines of the Seven +Mountains seemed to dissolve into the skies, and the Rhine was spread +out at their feet like a lake—so ample, and so still;—if you have +never seen the stars shine through the ruined arch of the Rolandseck, +and the height of Godesberg, with its single giant tower, stand out of +the plain,—black, and frowning against the silvery distance, then you +have not beheld one of the loveliest landscapes ever presented to a +thoughtful worshipper of nature. There is a story, too, connected with +the ruins of Godesberg:—one of those fine tragedies of real life, which +distance all fiction. It is not so popular as the celebrated legend +of the brave Roland, and his cloistered love; but it is at least +as authentic. You know that, according to tradition, the castle of +Godesberg was founded by Julian the Apostate; another, and a more +interesting apostate, was the cause of its destruction. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page64" name="page64"></a>[64]</span></p> + +<p> +Gerard<a href="#note-10" name="noteref-10"><small> 10</small></a> de Truchses, Count Waldbourg, who was archbishop and elector +of Cologne in 1583, scandalized his see, and all the Roman Catholic +powers, by turning Protestant. According to himself, his conversion was +owing to "the goodness of God, who had revealed to him the darkness and +the errors of popery;" but according to his enemies, it was owing to his +love for the beautiful Agnes de Mansfeld, canoness of Gersheim; she was +a daughter of one of the greatest Protestant houses in Germany; and her +two brothers, bigoted Calvinists, and jealous of the honour of their +family, conceived themselves insulted by the public homage which a +Catholic priest, bound by his vows, dared to pay to their sister. They +were yet more incensed on discovering that the love was mutual, and +loudly threatened vengeance to both. Gerard renounced the Catholic +faith, and the lovers were united. He was excommunicated and degraded, +of course; but he insisted on his right to retain his secular dominions +and privileges, and refused to resign the electorate, which the emperor, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page65" name="page65"></a>[65]</span> + + meantime, had awarded to Ernest of Bavaria, bishop of Liege. The contest +became desperate. The whole of that beautiful and fertile plain, from +the walls of Cologne to the Godesberg, grew "familiar with bloodshed as +the morn with dew;" and Gerard displayed qualities which showed him more +fitted to win and wear a bride, than to do honour to any priestly vows +of sanctity and temperance. Attacked on all sides,—by his subjects, who +had learned to detest him as an apostate, by the infuriated clergy, and +by the Duke of Bavaria, who had brought an army to enforce his brother's +claims,—he carried on the struggle for five years, and at last, reduced +to extremity, threw himself, with a few faithful friends, into the +castle of Godesberg. After a brave defence, the castle was stormed and +taken by the Bavarians, who left it nearly in the state we now see it—a +heap of ruins. +</p> +<p> +Gerard escaped with his wife, and fled to Holland, where Maurice, Prince +of Orange, granted him an asylum. Thence he sent his beautiful and +devoted wife to the court of Queen Elizabeth, to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page66" name="page66"></a>[66]</span> + + claim a former promise +of protection, and supplicate her aid, as the great support of the +Protestant cause, for the recovery of his rights. He could not have +chosen a more luckless ambassadress; for Agnes, though her beauty was +somewhat impaired by the persecutions and anxieties which had followed +her ill-fated union, was yet most lovely and stately, in all the pride +of womanhood; and her misfortunes and her charms, as well as the +peculiar circumstances of her marriage, excited the enthusiasm of all +the English chivalry. Unhappily the Earl of Essex was among the first to +espouse her cause with all the generous warmth of his character, and his +visits to her were so frequent, and his admiration so indiscreet, that +Elizabeth's jealousy was excited even to fury. Agnes was first driven +from the court, and then ordered to quit the kingdom. She took refuge in +the Netherlands, where she died soon afterwards; and Gerard, who never +recovered his dominions, retired to Strasbourg, where he died. So ends +this sad eventful history, which, methinks, would make a very pretty +romance. The tower + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page67" name="page67"></a>[67]</span> + + of Godesberg, lasting as their love and ruined as +their fortunes, still remains one of the most striking monuments in that +land, where almost every hill is crowned with its castle, and every +castle has its tale of terror, or of love.<a href="#note-11" name="noteref-11"><small> 11</small></a> +</p> +<p> +Another beautiful picture, which, merely as a picture, has dwelt on my +remembrance, was the city of Coblentz and the fort of Ehrenbreitstein, +as viewed from the bridge of boats under a cloudless moon. The city, +with its fantastic steeples and masses of building, relieved against +the clear deep blue of the summer sky—the lights which sparkled in the +windows reflected in the broad river, and the various forms and tall +masts of the craft anchored above and opposite—the huge hill, with its +tiara of fortifications, which, in the sunshine and in the broad day, +had disappointed me by its formality, now seen under the soft moonlight, +as its long lines of architecture and abrupt angles were projected in +brightness or receded in shadow, had altogether a most sublime effect. +But <i>apropos</i> to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page68" name="page68"></a>[68]</span> + + moonlights and pictures—of all the enchanted and +enchanting scenes ever lighted by the full round moon, give me +Heidelberg! Not the Colosseum of Rome—neither in itself, nor yet in +Lord Byron's description, and I have both by heart—can be more grand; +and in moral interest, in poetical associations, in varying and wondrous +beauty, the castle of Heidelberg has the advantage. In the course of +many visits, Heidelberg became to me familiar as the face of a friend, +and its remembrance still "haunts me as a passion." I have known it +under every changeful aspect which the seasons, and the hours, and the +changeful moods of my own mind, could lend it. I have seen it when the +sun, rising over the Geisberg, first kindled the vapours as they floated +away from the old towers, and when the ivy and the wreathed verdure on +the walls sparkled with dewy light: and I have seen it when its huge +black masses stood against the flaming sunset; and its enormous shadow, +flung down the chasm beneath, made it night there, while daylight +lingered around and above. I have seen it when mantled in all the bloom +and foliage of summer, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page69" name="page69"></a>[69]</span> + + and when the dead leaves were heaped on the paths, +and choked the entrance to many a favourite nook. I have seen it when +crowds of gay visitors flitted along its ruined terraces,<a href="#note-12" name="noteref-12"><small> 12</small></a> and music +sounded near; and with friends, whose presence endeared every pleasure; +and I have walked alone round its desolate precincts, with no companions +but my own sad and troubled thoughts. I have seen it when clothed in +calm and glorious moonlight. I have seen it when the winds rushed +shrieking through its sculptured halls, and when grey clouds came +rolling down the mountains, folding it in their ample skirts from the +view of the city below. And what have I seen to liken to it by night or +by day, in storm or in calm, in summer or in winter! Then its historical +and poetical associations— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +There now!—will you not leave the picture, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page70" name="page70"></a>[70]</span> + + perfect as it is, and not +for ever seek in every object something more than is there? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I do not seek it—I find it. You will say—I have <i>heard</i> you say—that +Heidelberg wants no beauty unborrowed of the eye; but if history had not +clothed it in recollections, fancy must have invested it in its own +dreams. It is true, that it is a mere modern edifice compared with all +the classic, and most of the gothic ruins; yet over Heidelberg there +hangs a terror and a mystery peculiar to itself: for the mind which +acquiesces in decay, recoils from destruction. Here ruin and desolation +make mocks with luxurious art and gay magnificence. Here it is not the +equal, gradual power of time, adorning and endearing what yet it spares +not, which has wrought this devastation, but savage war and elemental +rage. Twice blasted by the thunderbolt, three times consumed by fire, +ten times ravaged, plundered, desecrated by foes, and at last dismantled +and abandoned by its own princes, it is still strong to endure and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page71" name="page71"></a>[71]</span> + + mighty to resist all that time, and war, and the elements may do against +it—and, mutilated rather than decayed, may still defy centuries. The +very anomalies of architecture and fantastic incongruities of this +fortress-palace, are to me a fascination. Here are startling and +terrific contrasts. That huge round tower—the tower of Frederic the +Victorious—now "deep trenched with thunder fires," looks as if built +by the Titans or the Huns; and those delicate sculptures in the palace +of Otho-Henry, as if the genius of Raffaelle or Correggio had breathed +on the stone. What flowing grace of outline! what luxuriant life! what +endless variety and invention in those half-defaced fragments! These are +the work of Italian artists, whose very names have perished;—all traces +of their existence and of their destinies so utterly lost, that one +might almost believe, with the peasantry, that these exquisite remains +are not the work of mortal hands, but of fairies and spirits of air, +evoked to do the will of an enchanter. The old palatines, the lords of +Heidelberg, were a magnificent and magnanimous race. Louis III., +Frederic the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page72" name="page72"></a>[72]</span> + + Victorious, Frederic II., Otho-Henry, were all men who had +stepped in advance of their age. They could think as well as fight, in +days when fighting, not thinking, was the established fashion among +potentates and people. A liberal and enlightened spirit, and a love of +all the arts that humanise mankind, seem to have been hereditary in +this princely family. Frederic I. lay under the suspicion of heresy +and sorcery, in consequence of his tolerant opinions, and his love of +mathematics and astronomy. His personal prowess, and the circumstance +of his never having been vanquished in battle, gave rise to the report, +that he was assisted by evil demons; and for years, both before and +after his accession, he was under the ban of the secret tribunal. +Heidelberg was the scene of some of the mysterious attacks on his life, +but they were constantly frustrated by the fidelity of his friends, and +the watchful love of his wife. +</p> +<p> +It was at Heidelberg this prince celebrated a festival, renowned in +German history, and, for the age in which it occurred, most +extraordinary. He + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page73" name="page73"></a>[73]</span> + + invited to a banquet all the factious barons whom he +had vanquished at Seckingen, and who had previously ravaged and laid +waste great part of the palatinate. Among them were the Bishop of Metz +and the Margrave of Baden. The repast was plentiful and luxurious, but +there was no bread. The warrior guests looked round with surprise +and inquiry. "Do you ask for bread?" said Frederic, sternly; "you, +who have wasted the fruits of the earth, and destroyed those whose +industry cultivates it? There is no bread. Eat and be satisfied; and +learn henceforth mercy to those who put the bread into your mouths." +A singular lesson from the lips of an iron-clad warrior of the middle +ages. +</p> +<p> +It was Frederic II. and his nephew Otho-Henry, who enriched the library, +then the first in Europe next to the Vatican, with treasures of +learning, and who invited painters and sculptors from Italy to adorn +their noble palace with the treasures of art. In less than one hundred +years those beautiful creations were defaced or utterly destroyed, and +all the memorials and records of their authors + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page74" name="page74"></a>[74]</span> + + are supposed to have +perished at the time when the ruthless Tilly stormed the castle, and the +archives and part of the library of precious MSS. were taken to litter +his dragoons' horses, during a transient scarcity of straw.<a href="#note-13" name="noteref-13"><small> 13</small></a>—You +groan! +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +The anecdote is not new to me; but I was thinking, at the moment, of a +pretty phrase in the letters of the Prince de Ligne, "la guerre—c'est +un malheur—mais c'est le plus beau des malheurs." +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +O if there be any thing more terrific, more disgusting, than war and +its consequences, it is that perversion of all human intellect—that +depravation + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page75" name="page75"></a>[75]</span> + + of all human feeling—that contempt or misconception of every +Christian precept, which has permitted the great, and the good, and the +tenderhearted, to admire war as a splendid game—a part of the poetry +of life—and to defend it as a glorious evil, which the very nature and +passions of man have ever rendered, and will ever render, necessary and +inevitable. Perhaps the idea of human suffering—though when we think +of it in detail it makes the blood curdle—is not so bad as the general +loss to humanity, the interruption to the progress of thought in the +destruction of the works of wisdom or genius. Listen to this magnificent +sentence out of the volume now lying open before me—"Who kills a man, +kills a reasonable creature—God's image; but he who destroys a good +book, kills reason itself. Many a man lives a burthen to the earth, but +a good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit embalmed and +treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life. It is true, no age can +restore a life, whereof perhaps there is no great loss: and revolutions +of ages do not oft recover the loss of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page76" name="page76"></a>[76]</span> + + rejected truth, for the want of +which whole nations fare the worse; therefore we should be wary how we +spill the seasoned life of man preserved and stored up in books." +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +"Methinks we do know the fine Roman hand." Milton, is it not? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Yes; and after this, think of Milton's Areopagitica, or his Paradise +Lost, under the hoofs of Tilly's dragoon horses, or feeding the fishes +in the Baltic! It might have happened had he written in Germany instead +of England. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Do you forget that the cause of the thirty years war was a woman? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +A woman and religion; the two best or worst things in the world, +according as they are understood + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page77" name="page77"></a>[77]</span> + + and felt, used and abused. You allude +to Elizabeth of Bohemia, who was to Heidelberg what Helen was to Troy? +</p> +<p> +One of the most interesting monuments of Heidelberg, at least to an +English traveller, is the elegant triumphal arch raised by the palatine +Frederic V. in honour of his bride—this very Elizabeth Stuart. I well +remember with what self-complacency and enthusiasm our Chef walked about +in a heavy rain, examining, dwelling upon every trace of this celebrated +and unhappy woman. She had been educated at his country-seat, and one +of the avenues of his magnificent park yet bears her name. On her +fell a double portion of the miseries of her fated family. She had the +beauty and the wit, the gay spirits, the elegant tastes, the kindly +disposition, of her grandmother, Mary of Scotland. Her very virtues as +a wife and a woman, not less than her pride and feminine prejudices, +ruined herself, her husband, and her people. When Frederick hesitated to +accept the crown of Bohemia, his high-hearted wife exclaimed—"Let me +rather eat dry bread at + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page78" name="page78"></a>[78]</span> + + a king's table than feast at the board of an +elector;" and it seemed as if some avenging demon hovered in the air, +to take her literally at her word, for she and her family lived to +eat dry bread—aye, and to beg it before they ate it; but she <i>would</i> +be a queen. Blest as she was in love, in all good gifts of nature and +fortune, in all means of happiness, a kingly crown was wanting to +complete her felicity, and it was cemented to her brow with the blood of +two millions of men. And who was to blame? Was not her mode of thinking +the fashion of her time, the effect of her education? Who had +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "Put in her tender heart the aspiring flame </p> +<p class="i2"> Of golden sovereignty?" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +For how many ages will you men exclaim against the mischiefs and +miseries, caused by the influence of women; thus allowing the influence, +yet taking no thought how to make that influence a means of good, +instead of an instrument of evil! +</p> +<p> +Elizabeth had brought with her from England some luxurious tastes, as +yet unknown in the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page79" name="page79"></a>[79]</span> + + palatinate; she had been familiarized with the dramas +of Shakspeare and Fletcher, and she had figured in the masques of Ben +Jonson. To gratify her, Frederic added to the castle of Heidelberg the +theatre and banqueting-room, and all that beautiful group of buildings +at the western angle, the ruins of which are still called the <i>English +palace</i>. She had inherited from her grandmother, or had early imbibed +from education, a love of nature and of amusements in the open air, +and a passion for gardening; and it was to please her, and under her +auspices, that Frederic planned those magnificent gardens, which were +intended to unite within their bounds, all that nature could contribute +or art devise; had they been completed, they would have rendered +Heidelberg a pleasure-palace, fit for fairy-land. Nor were those designs +unworthy of a prosperous and pacific sovereign, whose treasury was +full, whose sway was just and mild, whose people had long enjoyed in +tranquillity the fruits of their own industry. When I had the pleasure +of spending a few days with the Schlossers, at their beautiful + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page80" name="page80"></a>[80]</span> + + seat +on the Necker, (Stift Neuburg,) I went over the ground with Madame de +Schlosser, who had seen and studied the original plans. Her description +of the magnitude and the sumptuous taste of these unfinished designs, +while we stood together amid a wilderness of ruins, was a commentary on +the vicissitudes of this world, worth fifty moral treatises, and as many +sermons. +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i8"> "For in the wreck of <small class="sc">IS</small> and <small class="sc">WAS</small>, </p> +<p class="i2"> Things incomplete and purposes betray'd, </p> +<p class="i2"> Make sadder transits o'er Truth's mystic glass, </p> +<p class="i2"> Than noblest objects utterly decay'd." </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +Close to the ruins of poor Elizabeth's palace, there where the effigies +of her handsome husband, and his bearded ancestor Louis V. look down +from the ivy-mantled wall, you remember the beautiful terrace towards +the west? It is still,—after four centuries of changes, of disasters, +of desolation,—the garden of Clara. When Frederic the Victorious +assumed the sovereignty, in a moment of danger and faction, he took, +at the same time, a solemn vow never to marry, that the rights of his +infant nephew, the son of the late + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page81" name="page81"></a>[81]</span> + + palatine, should not be prejudiced, +nor the peace of the country endangered by a disputed succession. He +kept his oath religiously, but at that very time he loved Clara Dettin +de Wertheim, a young girl of plebeian origin, and a native of Augsburg, +whose musical talents and melody of voice had raised her to a high +situation in the court of the late princess palatine. Frederick, with +the consent of his nephew, was united to Clara by a left-hand marriage, +an expedient still in use in Germany, and, I believe, peculiar to its +constitution; such a marriage is valid before God and man, yet the wife +has no acknowledged rights, and the offspring no supposed existence. +Clara is celebrated by the poets and chroniclers of her time, and +appears to have been a very extraordinary being in her way. In that age +of ignorance, she had devoted herself to study—she could sympathize in +her husband's pursuits, and share the toils of government—she collected +round her the wisest and most learned men of the time—she continued to +cultivate the beautiful voice which had won the heart of Frederic, and +her song and her lute + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page82" name="page82"></a>[82]</span> + + were always ready to soothe his cares. Tradition +points out the spot where it is said she loved to meditate, and, looking +down upon the little hamlet, on the declivity of the hill, to recall +her own humble origin; that little hamlet, embowered in foliage, and +the remembrance of Clara, have survived the glories of Heidelberg. Her +descendants became princes of the empire, and still exist in the family +of Lowenstein. +</p> +<p> +Then, for those who love the marvellous, there is the wild legend of +the witch Jetta, who still flits among the ruins, and bathes her golden +tresses in the Wolfsbrunnen; but why should I tell you of these +tales—you, whose head is a sort of black-letter library? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +True; but it is pleasant to have one's old recollections taken down +from their shelves and dusted, and placed in a new light; only do not +require, even if I again visit Heidelberg, that I should see it as you +have beheld it, with your quick spirit of association, and clothed in +the hues + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page83" name="page83"></a>[83]</span> + + of your own individual mind. While you speak, it is not so much +the places and objects you describe, as their reflection in your own +fancy, which I see before me; and every different mind will reflect them +under a different aspect. Then, where is truth? you say. If we want +information as to mere facts—the situation of a town, the measurement +of a church, the date of a ruin, the catalogue of a gallery—we can go +to our dictionaries and our <i>guides des voyageurs</i>. But if, besides form +and outline, we must have colouring too, we should remember that every +individual mind will paint the scene with its own proper hues; and if +we judge of the mind and the objects it represents relatively to each +other, we may come at the truth, not otherwise. I would ask nothing of +a traveller, but accuracy and sincerity in the expression of his +opinions and feelings. I have then a page out of the great book of human +nature—the portrait of a particular mind; when that is fairly before me +I have a standard by which to judge: I can draw my own inferences. Will +you not allow that it is possible to visit + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page84" name="page84"></a>[84]</span> + + Heidelberg, and to derive +the most intense pleasure from its picturesque beauty, without dreaming +over witches and warriors, palatines and princes? Can we not admire and +appreciate the sculpture in the palace of Otho-Henry, without losing +ourselves in vague, wondering reveries over the destinies of the +sculptors? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Yes; but it is amusing, and not less instructive, to observe the +manner in which the individual character and pursuits shall modify the +impressions of external things; only we should be prepared for this, as +the pilot makes allowance for the variation of the needle, and directs +his course accordingly. It is a mistake to suppose that those who cannot +see the imaginative aspect of things, see, therefore, the only true +aspect; they only see one aspect of the truth. <i>Vous étes orfêvre, +Monsieur Josse</i>, is as applicable to travellers as to every other +species of egotist. +</p> +<p> +Once, in an excursion to the north, I fell into conversation with a +Sussex farmer, one of that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page85" name="page85"></a>[85]</span> + + race of sturdy, rich, and independent +English yeomen, of which I am afraid few specimens remain: he was quite +a character in his way. I must sketch him for you; but only Miss Mitford +could do him justice. His coat was of the finest broad-cloth; his +shirt-frill, in which was stuck a huge agate pin, and his neckcloth, were +both white as the snow; his good beaver shone in all its pristine gloss, +and an enormous bunch of gold seals adorned his watch-chain; his voice +was loud and dictatorial, and his language surprisingly good and flowing, +though tinctured with a little coarseness and a few provincialisms. He +had made up his mind about the Reform Bill—the Catholic Question—the +Corn Laws—and about things in general, and things in particular; he +had doubts about nothing: it was evident that he was accustomed to lay +down the law in his own village—that he was the tyrant of his own +fire-side—that his wife was "his horse, his ox, his ass, his any thing," +while his sons went to college, and his daughters played on the piano. +London was to him merely a vast congregation of pestilential + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page86" name="page86"></a>[86]</span> + + vapours—a +receptacle of thieves, cut-throats and profligates—a place in which no +sensible man, who had a care for his life, his health, or his pockets, +would willingly set his foot; he thanked God that he never spent but two +nights in the metropolis, and at intervals of twenty-seven years: the +first night he had passed in the streets, in dread of fire and vermin; +and on the last occasion, he had not ventured beyond Smithfield. What he +did not know, was to him not worth knowing; and the word <i>French</i>, which +comprised all that was foreign, he used as a term, expressing the most +unbounded abhorrence, pity, and contempt. I should add, that though +rustic, and arrogant, and prejudiced, he was not vulgar. We were at +an inn, on the borders of Leicestershire, through which we had both +recently travelled; my farmer was enthusiastic in his admiration of +the country. "A fine country, madam—a beautiful country—a splendid +country!" +</p> +<p> +"Do you call it a fine country?" said I, absently, my head full of the +Alps and Appenines, the Pyrenean, and the river Po. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page87" name="page87"></a>[87]</span></p> + +<p> +"To be sure I do; and where would you see a finer?" +</p> +<p> +"I did not see any thing very picturesque," said I. +</p> +<p> +"<i>Picturesque!</i>" he repeated with some contempt; "I don't know what +<i>you</i> call picturesque; but <i>I</i> say, give me a soil, that when you turn +it up you have something for your pains; the fine soil makes the fine +country, madam!" +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page88" name="page88"></a>[88]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> + <big>SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE AND CHARACTER.</big> +</p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0006" id="h2H_4_0006"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<h2> + II. +</h2> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I observed the other evening, that in making a sort of imaginative bound +from Coblentz to Heidelberg, you either skipped over Frankfort, or left +it on one side. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Did I?—if I had done <i>either</i>, in my heart or my memory, I had been +most ungrateful; but I thought you knew Frankfort well. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I was there for two days, on my way to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page89" name="page89"></a>[89]</span> + + Switzerland, and it rained the +whole time from morning till night. I have a vision in my mind of +dirty streets, chilly houses, dull shops, dingy-looking Jews, dripping +umbrellas, luxurious hotels, and exorbitant charges,—and this is all +I can recollect of Frankfort. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Indeed!—I pity you. To me it was associated only with pleasant +feelings, and, in truth, it is a pleasant place. Life, there, appears in +a very attractive costume: not in a half-holiday, half-beggarly garb, as +at Rome and Naples; nor in a thin undress of superficial decency as at +Berlin; nor in a court domino, hiding, we know not what—as at Vienna +and Munich; nor half motley, half military, as at Paris; nor in rags +and embroidery, as in London; but at Frankfort all the outside at least +is fair, substantial, and consistent. The shops vie in splendour with +those of London and Paris; the principal streets are clean, the houses +spacious and airy, and there is a general appearance of cheerfulness and +tranquillity, mingled with the luxury of wealth and the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page90" name="page90"></a>[90]</span> + + bustle of +business, which, after the misery, and murmuring, and bitterness of +faction, we had left in London, was really a relief to the spirits. +It is true, that during my last two visits, this apparent tranquillity +concealed a good deal of political ferment. The prisons were filled +with those unfortunate wretches who had endeavoured to excite a popular +tumult against the Prussian and Austrian governments. The trials were +going forward every day, but not a syllable of the result transpired +beyond the walls of the Römer Saal. Although the most reasonable and +liberal of the citizens agreed in condemning the rashness and folly of +these young men, the tide of feeling was evidently in their favour: for +instance, it was not the <i>fashion</i> to invite the Prussian officers, and +I well remember that when Goethe's Egmont was announced at the theatre, +it was forbidden by the magistracy, from a fear that certain scenes and +passages in that play might call forth some open and decided expression +of the public feeling; in fact, only a few evenings before, some +passages in the Massaniello had been applied and applauded + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page91" name="page91"></a>[91]</span> + + by the +audience, in a manner so <i>ill-bred</i>, that the wife of one of the +ministers of the Holy Alliance, rose and left her box, followed by some +other old women,—male and female. The theatre is rather commodious than +splendid; the established company, both for the opera and the regular +drama, excellent, and often varied by temporary visits of great actors +and singers from the other theatres of Germany. On my first visit to +Frankfort, which was during the fair of 1829, Paganini, then in the +zenith of his glory, was giving a series of concerts; but do not ask +me any thing about him, for it is a worn-out subject, and you know I am +not one of the enthusiastic, or even the orthodox, with regard to his +merits. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You do not mean—you will not tell me—that with all your love of music, +you were insensible to the miraculous powers of that man? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I suppose they were miraculous, as I heard + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page92" name="page92"></a>[92]</span> + + every one say so round me; +but I listened to him as to any other musician, for the sake of the +pleasure to be derived from music, not for the sake of wondering at +difficulties overcome, and impossibilities made possible—they might +have remained impossibilities for me. But insensible I was <i>not</i> to +the wondrous charm of his tone and expression. I was thrilled, melted, +excited, at the moment, but it left no relish on the palate, if I may +use the expression. To throw me into such <i>convulsions</i> of enthusiasm, +as I saw this man excite here and on the continent, I must have the +orchestra with all its various mingling world of sound, or the <i>divine</i> +human voice breathing music and passion together; but this is a matter +of feeling, habit, education, like all other tastes in art. +</p> +<p> +I think it was during our third visit to Frankfort that Madame +Haitzinger-Neumann was playing the <i>gast-rolles</i>, for so they courteously +denominate the parts filled by occasional visitors, to whom, as guests, +the precedence is always given. Madame Haitzinger is the wife of +Haitzinger, the tenor singer, who was in London, and sung in the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page93" name="page93"></a>[93]</span> + + Fidelio, +with Madame Devrient-Schrœder. She is one of the most celebrated +actresses in Germany for light comedy, if any comedy in Germany can be +called light, in comparison with the same style of acting in France or +England. Her figure is rather large— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Like most of the German actresses—for I never yet saw one who had +attained to celebrity, who was not much too <i>embonpoint</i> for our ideas +of a youthful or sentimental heroine— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Not Devrient-Schrœder? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Devrient is all impassioned grace; but I think that in time even <i>she</i> +will be in danger of becoming a little—how shall I express it with +sufficient delicacy?—a <i>little</i> too substantial. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, not if a soul of music and fire, informing a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page94" name="page94"></a>[94]</span> + + feverish, excitable +temperament, which is to the mantling spirit within, what the +high-pitched instrument is to the breeze which sweeps over its +chords,—not if these can avert the catastrophe; but what if you had +seen Mademoiselle Lindner, with a figure like Mrs. Liston's—all but +spherical—enacting Fenella and Clärchen? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I should have said, that only a German imagination could stand it! It +is one of Madame de Staël's clever aphorisms, that on the stage, "Il +faut menager les caprices des yeux avec le plus grand scrupule, car ils +peuvent detruire, sans appel tout effet sérieux;" but the Germans do not +appear to be subject to these <i>caprices des yeux</i>; and have not these +fastidious scruples about corporeal grace; for them sentiment, however +clumsy, is still sentiment. Perhaps they are in the right. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And Mademoiselle Lindner <i>has</i> sentiment; she must have been a fine +actress, and is evidently a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page95" name="page95"></a>[95]</span> + + favourite with the audience. But to return +to Madame Haitzinger;—she is handsome, with a fair complexion, and no +very striking expression; but there is a heart and soul, and mellowness +in her acting, which is delicious. I could not give you an idea of her +manner by a comparison with any of our English actresses, for she is +essentially German; she never aimed at making points; she was never +broadly arch or comic, but the general effect was as rich as it was true +to nature. I saw her in some of her favourite parts: in the comedy of +"Stille Wasser sind tief;" (our Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, admirably +adapted to the German stage by Schrœder;) in the "Mirandolina," +(the famous Locandiera of Goldoni,) and in the pretty lively vaudeville +composed for her by Holtei, "Die Wiener in Berlin," in which the popular +waltzes and airs, sung in the genuine national spirit, and enjoyed by +the audience with a true national zest, delighted us <i>foreigners</i>. +Herr Becker is an excellent actor in tragedy and high comedy. Of their +singers I could not say so much—there were none I should + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page96" name="page96"></a>[96]</span> + + account +first-rate, except Dobler, whom you may remember in England. +</p> +<p> +One of the most delightful peculiarities of Frankfort, one that most +struck my fancy, is the public garden, planted on the site of the +ramparts; a girdle of verdure and shade—of trees and flowers circling +the whole city; accessible to all and on every side,—the promenade of +the rich, the solace of the poor. Fifty men are employed to keep it in +order, and it is forbidden to steal the flowers, or to kill the singing +birds which haunt the shrubberies. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And does this prohibition avail much in a population of sixty thousand +persons? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It does generally. A short time before we arrived some mischievous +wretch had shot a nightingale, and was caught in the fact. His +punishment was characteristic; his hands were tied behind him, and +a label setting forth his crime was + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page97" name="page97"></a>[97]</span> + + fixed on his breast: in this guise, +with a police officer on each side, he was marched all round the +gardens, and made the circuit of the city, pursued by the hisses of +the populace and the abhorrent looks of the upper classes; he was not +otherwise punished, but he never again made his appearance within the +walls of the city. This was the only instance which I could learn of +the infraction of a law which might seem at least nugatory. +</p> +<p> +Of the spacious, magnificent, well-arranged cemetery, its admirable +apparatus for restoring suspended animation, and all its beautiful +accompaniments and memorials of the dead, there was a long account +published in London, at the time that a cemetery was planned for this +great overgrown city; and in truth I know not where we could find a +better model than the one at Frankfort; it appeared to me perfection. +</p> +<p> +The institutions at Frankfort, both for charity and education, are +numerous as becomes a rich and free city; and those I had an opportunity +of examining appeared to me admirably managed. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page98" name="page98"></a>[98]</span> + + Besides the orphan schools, +and the Burger schule, and the school for female education, established +and maintained by the wives of the citizens, there are several infant +schools, where children of a year old and upwards are nursed, and fed, +and kept out of mischief and harm, while their parents are at work. +These are also maintained by subscription among the ladies, who take +upon them in turns the task of daily superintendence; and I shall not +easily forget the gentle-looking, elegant, well-dressed girl, who, +defended from the encroachments of dirty little paws by a large apron, +sat in the midst of a swarm of thirty or forty babies, (the eldest not +four years old,) the very personification of feminine charity! But +the hospital for the infirm poor—Das Versorgung Haus—pleased me +particularly; 'tis true, that the cost was not a third—what do I say? +not a sixth of the expense of some of our institutions for the same +purpose. There was no luxury of architecture, nor huge gates shutting +in wretchedness, and shutting out hope; nor grated windows; nor were the +arrangements on so large a scale as in that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page99" name="page99"></a>[99]</span> + + splendid edifice, the Hopital +des Vieillards, at Brussels;—a house for the poor need not be either a +prison or a palace. But here, I recollect, the door opened with a latch; +we entered unannounced, as unexpected. Here there was perfect neatness, +abundance of space, of air, of light, of water, and also of occupation. +I found that, besides the inmates of the place, many poor old creatures, +who could not have the facilities or materials for work in their own +dwellings, or whose relatives were busied in the daytime, might find +here employment of any kind suited to their strength or capacity,—for +which, observe, they were paid; thus leaving them to the last possible +moment the feeling of independence and usefulness. I observed that many +of those who seemed in the last stage of decrepitude had hung round +their beds sundry little prints and pictures, and slips of paper, on +which were written legibly, texts from scripture, moral sentences, and +scraps of poetry. The ward of the superannuated and the sick was at a +distance from the working and eating rooms; and all breathed around +that peace and quiet + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page100" name="page100"></a>[100]</span> + + which should accompany old age, instead of that +"life-consuming din" I <i>have</i> heard in such places. On the pillow of +one bed, there was laid by some chance a bouquet of flowers. +</p> +<p> +In this ward there was an old man nearly blind and lethargic; another +old man was reading to him. I remarked a poor bed-ridden woman, utterly +helpless, but not old, and with good and even refined features; and +another poor woman, seated by her, was employed in keeping the flies +from settling on her face. To one old woman, whose countenance struck +me, I said a few words in English—I could speak no German, unluckily. +She took my hand, kissed it, and turning away, burst into tears. No one +asked for any thing even by a look, nor apparently wanted any thing; and +I felt that from the unaffected good-nature of the lady who accompanied +us, we had not so much the appearance of coming to look at the poor +inmates as of paying them a kind visit;—and this was as it should +be. The mild, open countenances of the two persons who managed the +establishment, pleased me particularly; and the manner of the matron + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page101" name="page101"></a>[101]</span> + + superintendent, as she led us over the rooms, was so simple and kind, +that I was quite at ease: I experienced none of that awkward shyness +and reluctance I have felt when ostentatiously led over such places in +England—feeling ashamed to stare upon the misery I could not cure. In +such cases I have probably attributed to the sufferers a delicacy or a +sensibility, long blunted, if ever possessed; but I was in pain for them +and for myself. +</p> +<p> +One thing more: there was a neat chapel; and we were shown with some +pride the only piece of splendour in the establishment. The communion +plate of massy silver was the gift of two brothers, who had married +on the same day two sisters; and these two sisters had died nearly at +the same time—I believe it was actually on the same day. The widowed +husbands presented this plate in memory of their loss and the virtues +of their wives; and I am sorry I did not copy the simple and affecting +inscription in which this is attested. There was also a silver vase, +which had been presented as an offering by a poor miller whom + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page102" name="page102"></a>[102]</span> + + an +unexpected legacy had raised to independence. +</p> +<p> +I might give you similar sketches of other institutions, here and +elsewhere, but I did not bestow sufficient attention on the practical +details, and the comparative merits of the different methods adopted, +to render my observations useful. Though deeply interested, as any +feeling, thinking being must be on such subjects, I have not studied +them sufficiently. There are others, however, who are doing this better +than I could:—blessings be on them, and eternal praise!—My general +impression was, pleasure from the benevolence and simplicity of heart +with which these institutions were conducted and superintended, and +wonder, not to be expressed, at their extreme cheapness. +</p> +<p> +The day preceding my visit to the Versorgung Haus, I had been in a fever +of indignation at the fate of poor R——, one of the conspirators, who +had become insane from the severity of his confinement. I had descanted +with great complacency on our open tribunals and our trials by jury, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page103" name="page103"></a>[103]</span> + + yet I could not help thinking to myself, "Well, if <i>we</i> have not their +state-prisons, neither have <i>they</i> our poor-houses!" +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +It is plain that the rich, charitable, worldly prosperous, self-seeking, +Frankfort, would be your chosen residence after all! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No—as a fixed residence I should not prefer Frankfort. There is a +little too much of the pride of purse—too much of the aristocracy of +wealth—too much dressing and dinnering—and society is too much broken +up into sets and circles to please me: besides, it must be confessed, +that the arts do not flourish in this free imperial city. +</p> +<p> +The Städel Museum was opened just before our last visit to Frankfort. +A rich banker of that name bequeathed, in 1816, his collection of +prints and pictures, and nearly a million and a half of florins, for +the commencement and maintenance of this institution, and they have +certainly begun + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page104" name="page104"></a>[104]</span> + + on a splendid scale. The edifice in which the collection +is arranged is spacious, fitted up with great cost, and generally with +great taste, except the ceilings, which, being the glory and admiration +of the good people of Frankfort, I must endeavour to describe to you +particularly. The elaborate beauty of the arabesque ornaments, their +endless variety, and the vivid colouring and gilding, reminded me of some +of the illuminated manuscripts; but I was rather amused than pleased, +and rather surprised to see art and ornament so misplaced—invention, +labour, money, time, lavished to so little purpose. No effect was +aimed at—none produced. The strained and wearied eye wandered amid +a profusion of unmeaning forms, and of gorgeous colours, which never +harmonized into a whole: and after I had half broken my neck by looking +up at them through an opera glass, in order to perceive the elegant +interlacing of the minute patterns and exquisite finish of the +workmanship, I turned away laughing and provoked, and wondering at such +a strange perversion, or rather sacrifice, of taste. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page105" name="page105"></a>[105]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But the collection itself?— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It is not very interesting. It contains some curious old German +pictures; Städel having been, like others, smitten with the mania of +buying Van Eyks and Hemlings and Schoréels. Here, however, these old +masters, as part of a school, or history of art, are well placed. +There are a few fine Flemish paintings—and, in particular, a wondrous +portrait by Flinck, which you must see. It is a lady in black, on the +left side of the door—of—I forget which room—but you cannot miss +it: those soft eyes will look out at you, till you will feel inclined +to ask her name, and wonder the lips do not unclose to answer you. Of +first-rate pictures there are none—I mean none of the historical and +Italian schools: the collection of casts from the antique is splendid +and well-selected. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But Bethmann, the banker, had already set an + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page106" name="page106"></a>[106]</span> + + example of munificent +patronage of art: when he shamed kings, for instance, by purchasing +Dannecker's Ariadne—one of the chief lions of Frankfort, if fame +says true. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +How! have you not seen it? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +No—unhappily. The weather, as I have told you, was dreadful. I was +discouraged—I procrastinated. That flippant observation I had read in +some English traveller, that "Dannecker's Ariadne looked as if it had +been cut out of old Stilton cheese," was floating in my mind. In short, +I was careless, as we often are, when the means of gratifying curiosity +appear secure, and within our reach. I repent me now. I wish I had +settled to my own satisfaction, and with mine own eyes, the disputed +merits of this famous statue; but I will trust to you. It ought to be +something admirable. I do not know much of Dannecker, or his works, but +by all accounts he + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page107" name="page107"></a>[107]</span> + + has not to complain of the want of patronage. To him +cannot be applied the pathetic common-place, so familiar in the mouths +of our young artists, about "chill penury," the struggle to live, the +cares that "freeze the genial current of the soul," the efforts of +unassisted genius, and so forth. Want never came to him since he devoted +himself to art. He appears to have had leisure and freedom to give full +scope to his powers, and to work out his own creations. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Had he? Had he indeed? His own story would be different, I fancy. +Dannecker, like every patronized artist I ever met with, would execrate +patronage if he dared. Good old man! The thought of what he might have +done, and could have done, breaks out sometimes in the midst of all +his self-complacent <i>naïve</i> exultation over what he <i>has</i> done. I will +endeavour to give you a correct idea of the Ariadne, and then I will +tell you something of Dannecker himself. His history is a good +commentary upon royal patronage. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page108" name="page108"></a>[108]</span></p> + +<p> +I had heard so much of this statue, that my curiosity was strongly +excited. A part of its fame may be owing to its situation, and the +number of travellers who go to visit Bethmann's Museum, as a matter of +course. I used to observe that all travellers, who were on the road to +Italy, praised it, and all who were on their way home criticised it. +As I ascended the steps of the pavilion in which it is placed, the +enthusiasm of expectation faded away from my mind: I said to myself, +"I shall be disappointed!"—Yet I was not disappointed. +</p> +<p> +The Ariadne occupied the centre of a cabinet, hung with a dark grey +colour, and illuminated by a high lateral window, so that the light and +shade, and the relief of the figure, were perfectly well managed and +effective. Dannecker has not represented Ariadne in her more poetical +and picturesque character, as, when betrayed and forsaken by Theseus, +she stood alone on the wild shore of Naxos, "her hair blown by the +winds, and all about her expressing desolation." It is Ariadne, immortal +and triumphant, as the bride of Bacchus. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page109" name="page109"></a>[109]</span> + + The figure is larger than life. +She is seated, or rather reclined, on the back of a panther. The right +arm is carelessly extended: the left arm rests on the head of the +animal, and the hand supports the drapery, which appears to have just +dropped from her limbs. The head is turned a little upwards, as if she +already anticipated her starry home; and her tresses are braided with +the vine leaves. The grace and ease of the attitude, so firm, and yet +so light; the flowing beauty of the form, and the position of the head, +enchanted me. Perhaps the features are not sufficiently <i>Greek</i>: for, +though I am not one of those who think all beauty comprised in the +antique models, and that nothing can be orthodox but the straight nose +and short upper lip, still to Ariadne the pure <i>classical</i> ideal of +beauty, both in form and face, are properly in character. A cast from +that divine head, the Greek Ariadne, is placed in the same cabinet, and +I confess to you, that the contrast being immediately brought before the +eye, Dannecker's Ariadne seemed to want refinement, in comparison. It is +true, that the moment chosen by the German + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page110" name="page110"></a>[110]</span> + + sculptor required an expression +altogether different. In the Greek bust, though already circled by the +viny crown, and though all heaven seems to repose on the noble arch of +that expanded brow, yet the head is declined, and a tender melancholy +lingers round the all-perfect mouth, as if the remembrance of a mortal +love—a mortal sorrow—yet shaded her celestial bridal hours, and made +pale her immortality. But, Dannecker's Ariadne is the flushed queen +of the Bacchante, and, in the clash of the cymbals and the mantling +cup, she has already forgotten Theseus. There is a look of life, an +individual truth in the beauty of the form, which distinguishes it from +the long-limbed vapid pieces of elegance called nymphs and Venuses, which +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "Stretch their white arms, and bend their marble necks," </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="continued"> +in the galleries of our modern sculptors. One objection struck me, but +not till after a second or third view of the statue. The panther seemed +to me rather too bulky and ferocious. It is true, it is not a natural, +but a mythological panther, such as we see in the antique +basso-relievos, and the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page111" name="page111"></a>[111]</span> + + arabesques of Herculaneum: yet, methinks if he +appeared a little more conscious of his lovely burthen, more tamed +by the influence of beauty, it would have been better. However, the +sculptor may have had a design, a feeling, in this very point, which has +escaped me: I regret now that I did not ask him. One thing is certain, +that the extreme massiveness of the panther's limbs serves to give a +firmness to the support of the figure, and sets off to advantage its +lightness and delicacy. It is equally certain that if the head of the +animal had been ever so slightly turned, the pose of the right arm, and +with it the whole attitude, must have been altered. +</p> +<p> +The window of the cabinet is so contrived, that by drawing up a blind +of stained glass, a soft crimson tint is shed over the figure, as if +the marble blushed. This did not please me: partly from a dislike to all +trickery in art; partly because, to my taste, the pale colourless purity +of the marble is one of the beauties of a fine statue. +</p> +<p> +It is true that Dannecker has been unfortunate in his material. The +block from which he cut his figure is imperfect and streaky; but how it +could + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page112" name="page112"></a>[112]</span> + + possibly have suggested the idea of <i>Stilton cheese</i> I am at a loss +to conceive. It is not worse than Canova's Venus, in the Pitti palace, +who has a terrible black streak across her bosom. M. Passavant,<a href="#note-14" name="noteref-14"><small> 14</small></a> who +was standing by when I paid my last visit to the Ariadne, assured me, +that when the statue was placed on its pedestal, about sixteen years +ago, these black specks were scarcely visible, and that they seemed to +multiply and grow darker with time. This is a lamentable, and, to me, an +unaccountable fact. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And, I am afraid, past cure: but now tell me something of the sculptor +himself. After looking on a grand work of art, we naturally turn to look +into the mind which conceived and created it. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page113" name="page113"></a>[113]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Dannecker, like all the great modern sculptors, sprung from the people. +Thorwaldson, Flaxman, Chantrey, Canova, Schadow, Ranch—I believe we may +go farther back, to Cellini, Bandinelli, Bernini, Pigalle—all I can at +this moment recollect, were of plebeian origin. When I was at Dresden, +I was told of a young count, of noble family, who had adopted sculpture +as a profession. This, I think, is a solitary instance of any person of +noble birth devoting himself to this noblest of the arts. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Do you forget Mrs. Darner and Lady Dacre? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No; but I do not think that either the exquisite modelling of Lady +Dacre, or the meritorious <i>attempts</i> of Mrs. Damer, come under the head +of sculpture in its grand sense. By-the-bye, when Horace Walpole said +that Mrs. Damer was the first female sculptor who had attained any + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page114" name="page114"></a>[114]</span> + + celebrity, he forgot the Greek girl, Lala,<a href="#note-15" name="noteref-15"><small> 15</small></a> and the Properzia Rossi +of modern times. +</p> +<p> +Dannecker was born at Stuttgardt in 1758. On him descended no hereditary +mantle of genius; it was the immediate gift of Heaven, and apparently +heaven-directed. His father was a groom in the duke's stable, and +appears to have been merely an ill-tempered, thick-headed boor. How +young Dannecker picked up the rudiments of reading and writing, he does +not himself remember; nor by what circumstances the bent of his fancy +and genius was directed to the fine arts. Like other great men, who have +been led to trace the progress of their own minds, he attributed to his +mother the first promptings to the fair and good, the first softening +and elevating influences which his mind acknowledged. He had neither +paper nor pencils; but next door to his father there lived a +stone-cutter, whose blocks + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page115" name="page115"></a>[115]</span> + + of marble and free-stone were every day +scrawled over with rude imitations of natural objects in chalk or +charcoal—the first essays of the infant Dannecker. When he was beaten +by his father for this proof of idleness, his mother interfered to +protect or to encourage him. As soon as he was old enough, he assisted +his father in the stable; and while running about the precincts of the +palace, ragged and bare-foot, he appears to have attracted, by his +vivacity and alertness, the occasional notice of the duke himself. +</p> +<p> +Duke Charles, the grandfather of the present king of Wurtemburg, had +founded a military school, called the Karl Schüle, (Charles' School,) +annexed to the Hunting Palace of the Solitude. At this academy, music and +drawing were taught as well as military tactics. One day, when Dannecker +was about thirteen, his father returned home in a very ill-humour, and +informed his family that the duke intended to admit the children of his +domestics into his new military school. The boy, with joyful eagerness, +declared his intention of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page116" name="page116"></a>[116]</span> + + going immediately to present himself as a +candidate. The father, with a stare of astonishment, desired him to +remain at home, and mind his business; on his persisting, he resorted to +blows, and ended by locking him up. The boy escaped by jumping out of +the window; and, collecting several of his comrades, he made them a long +harangue in praise of the duke's beneficence, then placing himself at +their head, marched them up to the palace, where the whole court was +assembled for the Easter festivities. On being asked their business, +Dannecker replied as spokesman—"Tell his highness the duke we want to +go to the Karl-schüle." One of the attendants, amused, perhaps, with +this juvenile ardour, went and informed the duke, who had just risen +from table. He came out himself and mustered the little troop before +him. He first darted a rapid scrutinizing glance along the line, then +selecting one from the number, placed him on his right-hand; then +another, and another, till only young Dannecker and two others remained +on his left. Dannecker has since acknowledged that he suffered for + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page117" name="page117"></a>[117]</span> + + a few +moments such exquisite pain and shame at the idea of being rejected, +that his first impulse was to run away and hide himself; and that his +surprise and joy, when he found that he and his two companions were the +accepted candidates, had nearly overpowered him. The duke ordered them +to go the next morning to the Solitude, and then dismissed them. When +Dannecker returned home, his father, enraged at losing the services +of his son, turned him out of the house, and forbade him ever more to +enter it; but his mother (mother like) packed up his little bundle of +necessaries, accompanied him for some distance on his road, and parted +from him with blessings, and tears, and words of encouragement and love. +</p> +<p> +At the Karl-schüle Dannecker made but little progress in his studies. +Nothing could be worse managed than this royal establishment. The inferior +teachers were accustomed to employ the poorer boys in the most servile +offices, and in this, so called, academy, he was actually obliged to +learn by stealth: but here he formed a friendship with Schiller, who, +like himself, was an + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page118" name="page118"></a>[118]</span> + + ardent genius pining and writhing under a chilling +system; and the two boys, thrown upon one another for consolation, +became friends for life. Dannecker must have been about fifteen when +the Karl-schüle was removed from the Solitude to Stuttgard. He was then +placed under the tuition of Grubel, a professor of sculpture, and in the +following year he produced his first original composition. It was a Milo +of Crotona modelled in clay, and was judged worthy of the first prize. +Dannecker was at this time so unfriended and little known, that the +duke, who appears to have forgotten him, learnt with astonishment that +this nameless boy, the son of his groom, had carried off the highest +honours of the school from all his competitors. For a few years he +was employed in the duke's service in carving cornices, Cupids, and +caryatides, to ornament the new palaces at Stuttgard and Hohenheim: +this task-work, over which he often sighed, may possibly have assisted +in giving him that certainty and mechanical dexterity in the use of his +tools for which he is remarkable. About ten years were thus passed; + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page119" name="page119"></a>[119]</span> + + he +then obtained permission to travel for his improvement with an allowance +of three hundred florins a-year from the duke. With these slender means +Dannecker set off for Paris on foot. There, for the first time, he had +opportunities of studying the living model. His enthusiasm for his art +enabled him to endure extraordinary privations of every kind; for out +of his little pension of £23 a-year he had not only to feed and clothe +himself, but to purchase all the materials for his art, and the means +of instruction; and this in an expensive capital, surrounded with +temptations which an artist and an enthusiastic young man finds it +difficult to withstand. He told me himself that day after day he has +studied in the Louvre dinnerless, and dressed in a garb which scarce +retained even the appearance of decency. He left Paris, after a two +years' residence, as simple in mind and heart as when he entered it, and +considerably improved in his knowledge of anatomy and in the technical +part of his profession. The treasures of the Louvre, though far inferior +to what they now are, had let in a flood of ideas upon his mind, among + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page120" name="page120"></a>[120]</span> + + which (as he described his own feelings) he groped as one bewildered and +intoxicated, amazed rather than enlightened. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But Dannecker must have been poor in spirit as in pocket—simple, +indeed, if he did not profit by the opportunities which Paris afforded +of studying human nature, noting the passions and their physiognomy, and +gaining other experiences most useful to an artist. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +There I differ from you. Would you send a young artist—more particularly +a young sculptor—to study the human nature of London or Paris?—to +seek the ideal among shop-girls and opera-dancers? Or the sublime and +beautiful among the frivolous and degraded of one sex, the money-making +or the brutalized of the other? Is it from the man who has steeped his +youthful prime in vulgar dissipation, by way of "seeing life," as it is +called, who has courted patronage at the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page121" name="page121"></a>[121]</span> + + convivial board, that you shall +require that union of lofty enthusiasm and patient industry, which are +necessary, first to conceive the grand and the poetical, then consume +long years in shaping out his creation in the everlasting marble? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But how is the sculptor himself to live during those long years? It must +needs be a hard struggle. I have heard young artists say, that they have +been forced on a dissipated life merely as a means of "getting on in the +world," as the phrase is. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +So have I. It is so base a plea, that when I hear it, I generally regard +it as the excuse for dispositions already perverted. The men who talk +thus are doomed: they will either creep through life in mediocrity and +dependence to their grave; or, at the best, if they have parts, as well +as cunning and assurance, they may make themselves the fashion, and make +their fortune; they may be + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page122" name="page122"></a>[122]</span> + + clever portrait-painters and bust-makers, but +when they attempt to soar into the historical and ideal department of +their art, they move the laughter of gods and men; to them the higher, +holier fountains of inspiration are thenceforth sealed. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But think of the temptations of society! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I think of those who have overcome them. "Great men have been among us," +though they be rare. Have we not had a Flaxman? But the artist must +choose where he will worship. He cannot serve God and Mammon. That man +of genius who thinks he can tamper with his glorious gifts, and for a +season indulge in social excesses, stoop from his high calling to the +dregs of earth, abandon himself to the stream of common life, and trust +to his native powers to bring him up again;—O believe it, he plays a +desperate game!—one that in nearly ninety-nine cases out of a hundred +is fatal. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page123" name="page123"></a>[123]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I begin to see your drift; but you would find it difficult to prove that +the men who executed those works, on which we now look with wonder and +despair, lived like anchorites, or were unexceptionable moral characters. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Will you not allow that they worked in a different spirit? Or do you +suppose that it was by the possession of some sleight-of-hand that these +things were performed?—That it was by some knack of chiselling, some +secret of colouring now lost, that a Phidias or a Correggio still remain +unapproached, and, as people will tell you, unapproachable? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +They had a different nature to work from. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +A different modification of nature, but not a different nature. Nature +and truth are one, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page124" name="page124"></a>[124]</span> + + immutable, and inseparable as beauty and love. +I do maintain that, in these latter times, we have artists, who in +genius, in the power of looking at nature, and in manual skill, are +not beneath the great ancients, but their works are found wanting in +comparison; they have fallen short of the models their early ambition +set before them; and why?—because, having genius, they want the moral +grandeur that should accompany it, and have neglected the training of +their own minds from necessity, or from dissipation or from pride, so +that having imagination and skill, they have yet wanted the materials +out of which to work. Recollect that the great artists of old were +not mere painters or mere sculptors, who were nothing except with the +pencil or the chisel in their hand. They were philosophers, scholars, +poets, musicians, noble beings, whose eyes were not ever on themselves, +but who looked above, before, and after. Our modern artists turn +coxcombs, and then fancy themselves like Rafaelle; or they are greedy +of present praise, or greedy of gain; or they will not pay the price +for immortality; or they have sold their + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page125" name="page125"></a>[125]</span> + + glorious birthright of fame +for a mess of pottage. +</p> +<p> +Poor Dannecker found his mess of pottage bitter now and then, as you +shall hear. He set off for Italy, in 1783, with his pension raised to +four hundred florins a year, that is, about thirty pounds: he reached +Rome, on foot, and he told me that, for some months after his arrival, +he suffered from a terrible depression of spirits, and a painful sense +of loneliness: like Thorwaldson, when he too visited that city some +years afterwards, a friendless youth, he was often home-sick and +heart-sick. At this time he used to wander about among the ruins and +relics of almighty Rome, lost in the sense of their grandeur, depressed +by his own vague aspirations—ignorant, and without courage to apply +himself. Luckily for him, Herder and Goethe were then residing at Rome; +he became known to them, and their conversation directed him to higher +sources of inspiration in his art than he had yet contemplated—to the +very well-heads and mother-streams of poetry. They showed him the +distinction between the <i>spirit</i> and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page126" name="page126"></a>[126]</span> + + the <i>form</i> of ancient art. Dannecker +felt, and afterwards applied some of the grand revelations of these men, +who were at once profound critics and inspired poets. He might have +grasped at more, but that his early nurture was here against him, and +his subsequent destinies as a court sculptor seldom left him sufficient +freedom of thought or action to follow out his own conceptions. While at +Rome he also became acquainted with Canova, who, although only one year +older than himself, had already achieved great things. He was now at +work on the monument of the Pope Ganganelli. The courteous, kind-hearted +Italian would sometimes visit the poor German in his studio, and cheer +him by his remarks and encouragement. +</p> +<p> +Dannecker remained five years at Rome; he was then ordered to return to +Stuttgard. As he had already greatly distinguished himself, the Duke +of Wurtemburg received him with much kindness, and promised him his +protection. Now, the protection and the patronage which a sovereign +accords to an artist + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page127" name="page127"></a>[127]</span> + + generally amounts to this: he begins by carving or +painting the portrait of his patron, and of some of the various members +of his patron's family. If these are approved of, he is allowed to stick +a ribbon in his button-hole, and is appointed professor of fine arts, +with a certain stipend, and thenceforth his time, his labour, and his +genius belong as entirely to his master as those of a hired servant; his +path is marked out for him. It was thus with Dannecker; he received a +pension of eight hundred florins a year and his professorship, and upon +the strength of this he married Henrietta Rapp. From this period his +life has passed in a course of tranquil and uninterrupted occupation, +yet, though constantly employed, his works are not numerous; almost +every moment being taken up with the duties of his professorship, in +trying to teach what no man of genius can teach, and in making drawings +and designs after the fancies of the Grand Duke. He was required to +compose a basso-relievo for the duke's private cabinet. The subject which +he chose was as appropriate as it was beautifully treated—Alexander + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page128" name="page128"></a>[128]</span> + + pressing his seal upon the lips of Parmenio. He modelled this in +bas-relief, and the best judges pronounced it exquisite; but it did +not please the duke, and instead of receiving an order to finish it in +marble, he was obliged to throw it aside, and to execute some design +dictated by his master. The original model remained for many years +in his studio; but a short time before my last visit to him he had +presented it as a birth-day gift to a friend. The first great work which +gave him celebrity as a sculptor, was the mausoleum of Count Zeppelin, +the duke's favourite, in which the figure of Friendship has much +simplicity and grace: this is now at Louisberg. While he was modelling +this beautiful figure, the first idea of the Ariadne was suggested to +his fancy, but some years elapsed before it came into form. At this time +he was much employed in executing busts, for which his fine eye for +living nature and manly simplicity of taste peculiarly fitted him. In +this particular department of his art he has neither equal nor rival, +except our Chantrey. The best I have seen are those of Schiller, Gluck, +and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page129" name="page129"></a>[129]</span> + + Lavater. Never are the fine arts, never are great artists, better +employed than when they serve to illustrate and to immortalize each +other! About the year 1808, Dannecker was considered, beyond dispute, +the first sculptor in Germany; for as yet Rauch, Tieck, and Schwanthaler +had not worked their way up to their present high celebrity. He +received, in 1811, an intimation, that if he would enter the service of +the king of Bavaria, he should be placed at the head of the school of +sculpture at Munich, with a salary three times the amount of that which +he at present enjoyed.— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Which Dannecker declined? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +He did. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I could have sworn to it—<i>extempore</i>! What is more touching in the +history of men of genius than that deep and constant attachment they +have + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page130" name="page130"></a>[130]</span> + + shown to their early patrons! Not to go back to the days of Horace +and Mecænas, nor even to those of Ariosto and Tasso and the family of +Este, or Cellini and the Duke of Florence, or Lucas Kranach, and the +Elector John Frederic—<a href="#note-16" name="noteref-16"><small> 16</small></a> do you remember Mozart's exclamation, when +he was offered the most magnificent remuneration if he would quit the +service of Joseph II. for that of the Elector of Saxony—"Shall I leave +my good Emperor?" In the same manner Metastasio rejected every +inducement to quit the service of Maria Theresa,—— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Add Goethe and the Duke of Weimar, and a hundred other instances. The +difficulty would be to find <i>one</i>, in which the patronage of the great +has not been repaid ten thousand fold in gratitude and fame. Dannecker's +love for his native city, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page131" name="page131"></a>[131]</span> + + and his native princes, prevailed over his +self-interest; his decision was honourable to his heart; but it is +not less certain that at Munich he would have found more enlightened +patronage, and a wider scope for his talents. Frederic, the late king of +Wurtemburg, who had married our princess royal, was a man of a coarse +mind and profligate habits. Napoleon had gratified his vulgar ambition +by making him a king, and thereupon he stuck a huge, tawdry gilt +crown on the top of his palace, the impudent sign of his subservient +<i>majesty</i>. I never looked at it without thinking of an overgrown child +and its new toy; he also, to commemorate the acquisition of his kingly +titles, instituted the order of the Wurtemburg crown, and Dannecker +was gratified by this new order of merit, and a bit of ribbon in his +button-hole. +</p> +<p> +But in the mean time the model of the Ariadne remained in his studio, +and it was not till the year 1809 that he could afford to purchase a +block of marble, and begin the statue on speculation. It occupied him +for seven years, but in the interval + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page132" name="page132"></a>[132]</span> + + he completed other beautiful works. +The king ordered him to execute a Cupid in marble, for which he gave +him the design. It was a design which displeased the pure mind and high +taste of Dannecker; he would not so desecrate his divine art: "c'etait +travailler pour le diable!" said he to me, in telling the story. He +therefore only half fulfilled his commission; and changing the purpose +and sentiment of the figure, he represented the Greek Cupid at the +moment that he is waked by the drop of burning oil from Psyche's lamp. +An English general, I believe Sir John Murray, saw this charming statue, +in 1814, and immediately commanded a work from the sculptor's hands: he +wished, but did not absolutely require, a duplicate of the statue he so +admired. Dannecker, instead of repeating himself, produced his Psyche, +whom he has represented—not as the Greek allegorical Psyche, the +bride of Cupid, "with lucent fans, fluttering"—but as the abstract +personification of the human soul; or, to use Dannecker's own words, +"Ein rein, sittlich, sinniges Wesen,"—a pure, moral, intellectual +being. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page133" name="page133"></a>[133]</span> + + As he had an idea that Love had become moral and sentimental +after he had been waked by the drop of burning oil, so I could not +help asking him whether this was Psyche, grown reasonable after she +had beheld the wings of Love? He has not in this beautiful statue quite +accomplished his own idea. It has much girlish grace and simplicity, but +it wants elevation; it is not sufficiently ideal, and will not stand a +comparison either with the Psyche of Westmacott, or that of Canova. The +Ariadne was finished in 1816, but the sculptor was disappointed in his +hope that this, his masterpiece, would adorn his native city. The king +showed no desire to possess it, and it was purchased by M. Bethmann, +of Frankfort, for a sum equal to about one thousand pounds. Soon after +the Ariadne was finished, Dannecker conceived, in a moment of pious +enthusiasm, his famous statue of the Redeemer, which has caused a great +deal of discussion in Germany. This was standing in his work-room when +we paid our first visit to him. He told me what I had often heard, that +the figure had visited him in a dream three several + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page134" name="page134"></a>[134]</span> + + times; and the +good old man firmly believed that he had been divinely inspired, and +predestined to the work. While the visionary image was fresh in his +imagination, he first executed a small clay model, and placed it +before a child of five or six years old;—there were none of the usual +emblematical accompaniments—no cross—no crown of thorns to assist the +fancy—nothing but the simple figure roughly modelled; yet the child +immediately exclaimed, "The Redeemer!" and Dannecker was confirmed in +his design. Gradually the completion of this statue became the one +engrossing idea of his enthusiastic mind: for eight years it was his +dream by night, his thought by day; all things else, all the affairs and +duties of life, merged into this. He told me that he frequently felt as +if pursued, excited by some strong, irresistible power, which would even +visit him in sleep, and impel him to rise from his bed and work. He +explained to me some of the difficulties he encountered, and which he +was persuaded that he had perfectly overcome only through divine aid, +and the constant study of the Scriptures. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page135" name="page135"></a>[135]</span> + + They were not few nor trifling. +Physical power, majesty, and beauty, formed no part of the character of +the Saviour of the world: the glory that was around him was not of this +earth, nor visible to the eye; "there was nothing in him that he should +be desired;" therefore to throw into the impersonation of exceeding +humility and benignity a superhuman grace, and from material elements +work out a manifestation of abstract moral grandeur—this was surely +not only a new and difficult, but a bold and sublime enterprize. +</p> +<p> +You remember Michael Angelo's statue of Christ in the church of Santa +Maria sopra Minerva at Rome? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Perfectly; and I never looked at it without thinking of Neptune and +his trident. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +The same thought occurred to me, and must inevitably have occurred to +others. Dannecker is not certainly so great a man as Michael Angelo, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page136" name="page136"></a>[136]</span> + + but here he has surpassed him. Instead of emulating the antique models, +he has worked in the antique spirit—the spirit of faith and enthusiasm. +He has taken a new form in which to clothe a grand poetical conception. +Whether the being he has represented be a fit subject for the plastic +art, has been disputed; but it appears to me that Dannecker has more +nearly approached the christian ideal than any of his predecessors; +there is nothing to be compared to it, except Titian's Christo della +Moneta, and that is a head merely. The sentiment chosen by the sculptor +is expressed in the inscription on the pedestal: "Through me, to the +Father." The proportions of the figure are exceedingly slender and +delicate; the attitude a little drooping; one hand is pressed on the +bosom, the other extended; the lips are unclosed as in the act to speak. +In the head and facial line, by carefully throwing out every indication +of the animal propensities, and giving added importance and development +to all that indicates the moral and intellectual faculties, he has +succeeded in embodying a species of ideal, of which there is no other + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page137" name="page137"></a>[137]</span> + + example in art. I have heard, (not from Dannecker himself,) that when +the head of the Jupiter Tonans was placed beside the Christ, the merely +physical grandeur of the former, compared with the purely intellectual +expression of the latter, reminded every one present of a lion's head +erect and humanized. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But what were your own impressions? After all this eulogium, which +I believe to be just, tell me frankly, were you satisfied yourself? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No—not quite. The expression of the mouth in the last finished statue +(he has repeated the subject three times) is not so fine as in the +model, and the simplicity of the whole bordered on meagreness. This, +I think, is a general fault in all Dannecker's works. He has of course +avoided nudity, but the flowing robe, which completely envelopes the +figure, is so managed as to disclose the exact form of the limbs. One +little circumstance will give you an idea + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page138" name="page138"></a>[138]</span> + + of the attention and accuracy +with which he seized and embodied every touch of individual character +conveyed in Holy Writ. In the original model he had made the beard +rather full and thick, and a little curled, expressing the prime of +manhood; but recollecting that in the gospel the Saviour is represented +as sinking under the weight of the cross, which the first man they met +accidentally was able to carry, he immediately altered his first +conception, and gave to the beard that soft, flowing, downy texture +which is supposed to indicate a feeble and delicate temperament. +</p> +<p> +I shall not easily forget the countenance of the good and gifted old +man, as, leaning on the pedestal, with his cap in his hand, and his long +grey hair waving round his face, he looked up at his work with a mixture +of reverence and exultation, saying, in his imperfect and scarce +intelligible French, "Oui, quand on a fait comme cela, on reste sur la +terre!" meaning, I suppose, that this statue had ensured his immortality +on earth. He added, "They ask me often where are the models after which +I worked? and I answer, <i>here</i>, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page139" name="page139"></a>[139]</span> + + <i>here</i>;" laying his hand first on +his head, then on his heart. +</p> +<p> +I remember that when we first entered his room he was at work on one of +the figures for the tomb of the late Queen Catherine of Wurtemburg. You +perhaps recollect her in England when only Duchess of Oldenburg? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Yes; I remember, as a youngster, joining the mob who shouted before the +windows of the Pulteney-hotel, and hailed her and her brother Alexander +as if they had been a newly descended Jupiter and Juno! O verily, times +are changed! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +But in that woman there were the elements of a fine nature. She had +the talents, the strength of mind, and far-reaching ambition of her +grandmother, Catherine of Russia, but was not so perverted. During her +short reign as Queen of Wurtemburg, the influence of her active mind was + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page140" name="page140"></a>[140]</span> + + felt through the whole government. She founded, among other institutions, +a school for the daughters of the nobility connected with the court,—in +plain English, a charity-school for the nobility of Wurtemburg, who are +among the most indigent and most ignorant of Germany. There are a few, +very few, brilliant exceptions. One lady of rank said to me, "As to an +English governess, <i>that</i> is an advantage I can never hope to have for +my daughters. The princesses have an English governess, but <i>we</i> cannot +dream of such a thing." The late queen really deserved the regrets of +her people. The king, whose sluggish mind she ruled or stimulated, is +now devoted to his stables and hunting. He has married another wife, but +he has erected to the honour of Catherine a splendid mausoleum, on the +peak of a high hill, which can be seen from almost every part of the +city; and on the summer evenings when the red sun-set falls upon its +white columns it is a beautiful object. The figure on which Dannecker +was occupied, represented Prayer, or what he called, "La triomphe de +la Prière;" it recalled to my mind Flaxman's + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page141" name="page141"></a>[141]</span> + + lovely statue of the same +subject,—the "Our Father which art in Heaven," but suffered by the +involuntary comparison. On the rough base of the statue he had tried to +spell the name of Chantrey, but not very successfully. I took up a bit +of chalk and wrote underneath, in distinct characters, <span class="sc">Francis Chantrey</span>. +</p> +<p> +"I grow old," said he, looking from his work to the bust of the late +queen which stood opposite. "I have carved the effigies of three +generations of poets, and as many of princes. Twenty years ago I was +at work on the tomb of the Duke of Oldenburg, and now I am at work upon +<i>her's</i> who gave me that order. All die away: soon I shall be left +alone. Of my early friends none remain but Goethe. I shall die before +him, and perhaps he will write my epitaph." He spoke with a smile, not +foreseeing that he would be the survivor. +</p> +<p> +Three years afterwards<a href="#note-17" name="noteref-17"><small> 17</small></a> I again paid Dannecker a visit, but a change +had come over him: his feeble, trembling hand could no longer grasp the +mallet, or guide the chisel; his eyes were dim; his fine + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page142" name="page142"></a>[142]</span> + + benevolent +countenance wore a childish, vacant smile, now and then crossed by a +gleam of awakened memory or thought—and yet he seemed so perfectly +happy! He walked backwards and forwards, from his Christ to his bust +of Schiller, with an unwearied self-complacency, in which there was +something mournful, and yet delightful. While I sat looking at the +magnificent head of Schiller, the original of the multifarious casts +and copies which are dispersed through all Germany, he sat down beside +me, and taking my hands between his own, which trembled with age and +nervous emotion, he began to speak of his friend. "Nous etions amis dès +l'enfance; aussi j'y ai travaillé avec amour, avec douleur—on ne peut +pas plus faire." He then went on—"When Schiller came to Louisberg, he +sent to tell me that he was very ill—that he should not live very long, +and that he wished me to execute his bust. It was the first wish of my +own heart. I went immediately. When I entered the house, I found a lady +sitting on the <i>canapé</i>—it was Schiller's wife, and I did not know her; +but she knew me. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page143" name="page143"></a>[143]</span> + + She said, 'Ah! you are Dannecker!—Schiller expects +you;'—then she ran into the next room, where Schiller was lying down +on a couch, and in a moment after he came in, exclaiming as he entered, +'Where is he? where is Dannecker?' That was the moment—the expression +I caught—you see it here—the head raised, the countenance full of +inspiration, and affection, and bright hope! I told him that to keep up +this expression he must have some of his best friends to converse with +him while I took the model, for I could not talk and work too. O if +I could but remember what glorious things then fell from those lips! +Sometimes I stopped in my work—I could not go on—I could only listen." +And here the old man wept; then suddenly changing his mood, he said—"But +I must cut off that long hair; he never wore it so; it is not in the +fashion, you know!" I begged him for heaven's sake not to touch it; he +then, with a sad smile, turned up the sleeve of his coat and showed me +his wrist, swelled with the continual use of his implements—"You see +I <i>cannot</i>!" And I could not help wishing at the moment, that while his + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page144" name="page144"></a>[144]</span> + + mind was thus enfeebled, no transient return of physical strength might +enable him to put his wild threat in execution. What a noble bequest to +posterity is the effigy of a great man, when executed in such a spirit +as this of Schiller! I assure you I could not look at it, without +feeling my heart "overflow in silent worship" of moral and intellectual +power, till the deification of great men in the old times appeared to me +rather religion than idolatry. I have been affected in the same manner +by the busts of Goethe, Scott, Homer, Milton, Howard, Newton;—never by +the painted portraits of the same men, however perfect in resemblance +and admirable in execution. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Painting gives us the material, sculpture the abstract, ethical aspect +of the man. In the bust, whatever is common-place, familiar, and actual, +is thrown out or kept down: in a picture it is not only retained, but, +in most cases, it is necessarily obtrusive. Goethe, in a blue coat and +metal buttons, and a white neckcloth, would not recall + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page145" name="page145"></a>[145]</span> + + the author of the +"Iphigenia;" still less does that wrinkled, decrepit-looking face, in +the gallery at Hardwicke, portray Boyle, the philosopher. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Dannecker told me that he first modelled the head of Schiller the exact +size of life, and conscientiously rendered each, even the slightest, +individual trait; yet this head appeared to every one smaller than +nature, and to himself almost <i>mesquin</i>.<a href="#note-18" name="noteref-18"><small> 18</small></a> He was in despair. He +repeated the bust in a colossal size; and the development of the +intellectual organization, on a larger scale, immediately gave what was +wanting:—it appeared to the eye or to the mind's eye as only the size +of life. He showed me a beautiful basso-relievo of the Muse of Tragedy, +listening with an inspired look to the revelations of the Muse of +History. This admirable little group struck me the more, because long +ago I had clothed nearly the same idea in imperfect words. +</p> +<p> +I took leave of Dannecker with emotion: I + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page146" name="page146"></a>[146]</span> + + shall never see him again! +But he is one of those who cannot die; to use his own expression—"Quand +on a fait <i>comme cela</i>, on reste sur la terre." When Canova, then a +melancholy invalid, paid him a visit, he was so struck by the child-like +simplicity, the pure unworldly nature, the genuine goodness, and lively +happy temperament of the German sculptor, that he gave him the surname +of <i>il Beato</i>; and if the epithet <i>blessed</i> can, with propriety, be +bestowed on any mortal, it is on him whose long life has been one of +labour and of love; who has left behind him lasting memorials of his +genius; who has never profaned the talents which God has given him +to any unworthy purpose:—but in the midst of all the beautiful and +exciting influences of poetry and art, has kept from youth to age a soul +serene, a conscience and a life pure in the sight of God and man. Such +was our own Flaxman—such is Dannecker! +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Who are now the principal sculptors in Germany? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page147" name="page147"></a>[147]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Rauch, of Berlin; Christian Frederic Tieck, the brother of the +celebrated poet and critic, Ludwig Tieck; and Schwanthaler, of Munich. +Rauch is the court sculptor of Berlin. He has, like Dannecker,<a href="#note-19" name="noteref-19"><small> 19</small></a> his +professorship, his order of merit,<a href="#note-20" name="noteref-20"><small> 20</small></a> and, I believe, one or two places +under the government, besides constant employment in his art. He works +<i>by the piece</i>, as the labourers say. But though he too has yoked his +genius to the car of power and patronage, he has done great things. The +statue of the late queen of Prussia is reckoned his <i>chef-d'œuvre</i>, +and is not, perhaps, exceeded in modern sculpture. It was conceived and +worked out in all the inspiration of love and grief; as Dannecker would +say, "Mit Lieb und Schmerzen." He had been attached to the queen's +personal + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page148" name="page148"></a>[148]</span> + + service, and shared, in an intense degree, the enthusiastic, +devoted affection with which all her subjects regarded that beautiful +and amiable woman. This statue he executed at Carrara; and a living +eagle, which had been taken captive among the Appenines, was the +original of that magnificent eagle he has placed at her feet:—nothing, +you see, like going at once to nature! In the course of twenty-five +years Rauch has executed sixty-nine busts, of which twenty are colossal. +Among his numerous other works, designed or executed within the same +time, there is the colossal statue of Blucher, now at Breslau; this is +in bronze, upon a granite pedestal. There is another statue of Blucher +at Berlin, of which the pedestal, rich with bas-reliefs, is also in +bronze. Rauch has been employed for the last twenty years in modelling +field-marshals and generals, and has devoted his best powers to vanquish +the difficulties presented by monotonous faces, drilled figures, +military uniforms, and regimental boots and buttons; and all that man +<i>can</i> do, I am told he has done. I have seen some of his busts, which +are quite admirable. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page149" name="page149"></a>[149]</span> + + At Peterstein, near Munich, I saw his statue of a +little girl, about ten years old, which, in its simplicity, truth, and +elegance, reminded me of Chantrey's Lady Louisa Russell, though in +conception and <i>manner</i> as distinct as possible. The full length of +Goethe, in his dressing-gown, of which there is such an infinitude of +casts and copies throughout Germany, is also by Rauch. +</p> +<p> +Christian Tieck is the old and intimate friend of Rauch. They live, +or did live, under the same roof, and it is not known that a moment +of jealousy or rivalship ever disturbed the union between these two +celebrated and gifted men, who, starting nearly at the same time,<a href="#note-21" name="noteref-21"><small> 21</small></a> +have run their brilliant career together in the self-same path, and, +whatever judgment the world or posterity may form of their comparative +merits, seem determined to enter the temple of immortality hand in hand. +Tieck's works are dispersed from one end of Germany to the other. His +statue of Neckar; his busts of Madame de Staël, of her second husband + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page150" name="page150"></a>[150]</span> + + Rocca, of the Duke and Duchess de Broglie, and of A. W. Schlegel, +I have seen; and all, particularly the busts of Rocca and Schlegel are +exceedingly fine. At Munich, at Dresden, and at Weimar, I saw many of +his works; and at Manheim the bust of Madame de Heygendorf,<a href="#note-22" name="noteref-22"><small> 22</small></a> full of +beauty, and life, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page151" name="page151"></a>[151]</span> + + and expression. At Berlin, Tieck has been employed +for many years in designing and executing the sculptured ornaments of +the new theatre. There is a colossal Apollo; a Pegasus, striking the +fountain of Helicon from the rock, colossal Muses, and a variety of +other heathen perpetrations—all (as I am assured) exceedingly fine +in their way. I believe his seated statue of Iffland (the Garrick of +Germany) is considered one of his <i>chef-d'œuvres</i>. He also, like +Rauch, has been much employed in modelling generals and trophies, in +memory of the late war. +</p> +<p> +Schwanthaler, the son of a statuary of Munich, is still a young man; his +works first began to create a sensation in Germany in the year 1823. +In spirit and fire, and creative talent, in a fine classic feeling for +his art, he appeared to me to be treading in the steps of Flaxman, and +like <i>him</i>, he is a profound and accomplished scholar, who has sought +inspiration at the very fountain of Greek poetry. His basso-relievo of +the battle of the ships in the Iliad, his games of Greece, his designs +from the Theogony of Hesiod, and a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page152" name="page152"></a>[152]</span> + + variety of other works which I have +seen, appeared to me full of imagination, and in a pure and vigorous +style of art. Of him, and some other sculptors, you will find more +particulars in the note-book I kept at Munich; we will look over it +together one of these days. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Thank you; but I must needs ask you a question. In the works you have +enumerated, nothing has struck me as new, or in a new spirit, except +perhaps the Christ of Dannecker, and the statue of the queen of Prussia. +Now, why should not sculpture have its Gothic (or romantic) school, as +well as its antique, or classical school? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And has it not? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +If you allude to the sculpture of the middle ages, <i>that</i> has not become +a school of art, like their architecture and their painting: yet can it +be true + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page153" name="page153"></a>[153]</span> + + that there is something in our modern institutions, our northern +descent, our christian faith, inimical to the spirit of sculpture?—and, +while poetry in every other form is regenerate around us, that in +sculpture alone we are doomed to imitate, never to create?—doomed to +the servile reproduction of the same ideas? that this alone, of all +the fine arts, is to belong to some peculiar mode of existence, some +peculiar mode of thinking, feeling, and believing? "Qui me delivrera des +Grecs et des Remains?"—who will deliver me from gods and goddesses, and +from all these +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i4"> "Repetitions, wearisome of sense, </p> +<p class="i2"> Where soul is dead, and feeling hath no place?" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +You are little better than a heretic in these matters. But I will admit +thus much—that the classical and mythological sculpture of our modern +artists, is to the ancient marbles, what Racine's tragedies are to those +of Sophocles; that we are so far condemned to the "repetition wearisome +of <i>forms</i>," from which the ancient spirit has + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page154" name="page154"></a>[154]</span> + + evaporated; but that is +not the fault of the subjects, but of the manner of treating them, for +never can the beautiful mythology of ancient Greece, which has woven +itself into our earliest dreams of poetry, become a "creed out-worn." +Its forms, and its symbols, and its imagery, have mingled with every +branch of art, and become a universal language. It is the deification of +the material world; and therefore, that art, which in its perfection may +be called the apotheosis of form, finds there its proper region and +element. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You do not suppose that, with all my Gothic tastes, I am such a Goth +as not to feel the truth of what you say? But I am an enemy to the +exclusive in every thing; and—pardon me—your worship of the Elgin +marbles and the Niobe, is, I think, a little too exclusive. All I ask +is, that modern sculpture should be allowed, like painting and poetry, +to have its romantic, as well as its classical school. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page155" name="page155"></a>[155]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It has been otherwise decided. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But it has not been otherwise proved. There has been much theoretical +eloquence and criticism expended on the subject, but I deny that the +experiment has been fairly and practically brought before us. I know +very well you are ready with a thousand instances of attempt and +failure, but may we not seek the cause in the mistaken application of +certain classical, or, I should say, pedantic ideas on the subject? If +I ask for Milton's Satan, standing like a tower in his spiritual might, +his thunder-scarred brow wreathed with the diadem of hell, why am I to +be presented with an Athlete, or an Achilles? Why would Canova give us +for the head of Dante's Beatrice that of a muse, or an Aspasia? and for +Petrarch's Laura, a mere <i>tête de nymphe</i>? I contend that to apply the +forms suggested by the modern poetry demands a different spirit from +that of classic art. How to apply or modify the example bequeathed + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page156" name="page156"></a>[156]</span> + + to us +by the great masters of old, Flaxman has shown us in his Dante. And why +should we not have in sculpture a Lear as well as a Laocoon? a Constance +as well as a Niobe? a Gismunda as well as a Cleopatra?—— +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Or a Tam o'Shanter as well as a laughing Faun? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +When I am serious and poetical, which is not often, I will not allow you +to be perverse and ironical! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +See, here is a passage which I have just found among Mrs. Austin's +beautiful specimens of translation: "The critic of art ought to keep in +view, not only the capabilities, but the proper objects of art. Not all +that art can accomplish ought she to attempt. It is from this cause +alone, and because we have lost sight of these principles, that art + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page157" name="page157"></a>[157]</span> + + among us has become more extensive and difficult, and less effective and +perfect."<a href="#note-23" name="noteref-23"><small> 23</small></a> +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Very well,—and very true:—but who shall bring a rule and compass to +measure the capabilities of art, and define its proper objects? May +there not exist in the depths or heights of philosophy and art, truths +yet to be revealed, as there are stars in heaven, whose light has +not yet reached the naked eye? and why should not criticism have its +telescope for truth, as well as its microscope for error? Art may be +finite; but who shall fix its limits, and say, "thus far shalt thou go?" +There are those who regard the distant as the unattainable, the unknown +as the unexisting, the actual as the necessary;—are you one of such, +O you of little faith! For my own part, I look forward to a new era in +sculpture. I believe that the purely natural and the purely ideal are +<i>one</i>, and susceptible of forms and modifications as yet untried. For +Nature, the infinite, sits within her tabernacle, not made by + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page158" name="page158"></a>[158]</span> + + human +hands, and Genius and Love are the cherubim, to whom it is permitted +to look into her unveiled eyes, and reflect their light; Art is the +priestess of her divine mysteries, and Criticism, the door-keeper of +her temple, should be Janus-headed, looking forward as well as backward. +Reason estimates what has been done; Imagination alone divines what +<i>may</i> be done. But I am losing myself in these reveries. To attempt +something new,—perfectly new in style and conception—and spend, like +Dannecker, eight years in working out that conception—and then perhaps +eight years more waiting for a purchaser, and this in a country where +one must eat and pay taxes—truly, it is not easy. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page159" name="page159"></a>[159]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> + <big>SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER.</big> +</p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0008" id="h2H_4_0008"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<h2> + III. +</h2> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You have been frowning and musing in your chair for the last half-hour, +with your fore-finger between the leaves of your book—where were your +thoughts? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +They were far—very far! I am afraid that I appear very stupid? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +O not at all! you know there are stars which appear dim and fixed to +the eye, while they are + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page160" name="page160"></a>[160]</span> + + taking flights and making revolutions, which +imagination cannot follow nor science compute. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Upon my word, you are very sublimely ironical—my thoughts were not +quite so far. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +May one beg, or borrow them?—What is your book? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Mrs. Austin's "Characteristics of Goethe." I came upon a passage which +sent back my thoughts to Weimar. I was again in his house; the faces, +the voices of his grandchildren were around me; the room in which he +studied, the bed in which he slept, the old chair in which he died,—and, +above all, <i>her</i> in whose arms he died—from whose lips I heard the +detail of his last moments— +</p> +<hr /> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +What! all this emotion for Goethe? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page161" name="page161"></a>[161]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +For Goethe!—I should as soon think of weeping because the sun set +yesterday, which now is pouring its light around me! Our tears are for +those who suffer, for those who die, for those who are absent, for +those who are cold or lost—not for those who cannot die, who cannot +suffer,—who must be, to the end of time, a presence and an existence +among us! No. +</p> +<p> +But I was reading here, among the Characteristics of Goethe, who +certainly "knew all qualities, with a learned spirit in human dealings," +that he was not only the quick discerner and most cordial hater of all +affectation;—but even the unconscious affectation—the <i>nature de +convention</i>,—the taught, the artificial, the acquired in manner or +character, though it were meritorious in itself, he always detected, +and it appeared to impress him disagreeably. Stay, I will read you the +passage—here it is. +</p> +<p> +"Even virtue, laboriously and painfully acquired, was distasteful to +him. I might almost affirm, that a faulty but vigorous character, if +it + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page162" name="page162"></a>[162]</span> + + had any real native qualities as its basis, was regarded by him +with more indulgence and respect than one which, at no moment of its +existence, is genuine; which is incessantly under the most unamiable +constraint, and consequently imposes a painful constraint on others. +'Oh,' said he, sighing, on such occasions, 'if they had but the heart to +commit some absurdity, that would be something, and they would at least +be restored to their own natural soil, free from all hypocrisy and +acting: wherever that is the case, one may entertain the cheering hope +that something will spring from the germ of good which nature implants +in every individual. But on the ground they are now upon, nothing can +grow.' 'Pretty dolls,' was his common expression when speaking of them. +Another phrase was, 'That's a piece of nature,' (literally, <i>das ist +eine Natur</i>, that is a nature,) which from Goethe's lips was considerable +praise."<a href="#note-24" name="noteref-24"><small> 24</small></a> +</p> +<p> +This last phrase threw me back upon my remembrances. I thought of the +daughter-in-law of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page163" name="page163"></a>[163]</span> + + the poet,—the trusted friend, the constant companion, +the devoted and careful nurse of his last years. It accounted for the +unrivalled influence which apparently she possessed—I will not say +<i>over</i> his mind—but <i>in</i> his mind, in his affections; for in her he +found truly <i>eine Natur</i>—a piece of nature, which could bear even <i>his</i> +microscopic examination. All other beings who approached Goethe either +were, or had been, or might be, more or less modified by the action of +that universal and master spirit. Consciously, or unconsciously, in love +or in fear, they bowed down before him, and gave up their individuality, +or forgot it, in his presence; they took the bent he chose to impress, +or the colour he chose to throw upon them. Their minds, in presence of +his, were as opake bodies in the sun, absorbing in different degrees, +reflecting in various hues, his vital beams; but <small class="sc">HER'S</small> was, in comparison, +like a transparent medium, through which the rays of that luminary +passed,—pervading and enlightening, but leaving no other trace. +Conceive a woman, a young, accomplished, enthusiastic woman, who had +qualities to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page164" name="page164"></a>[164]</span> + + attach, talents to amuse, and capacity to appreciate, <span class="sc">Goethe</span>; +who, for fourteen or fifteen years, could exist in daily, hourly +communication with that gigantic spirit, yet retain, from first to +last, the most perfect simplicity of character, and this less from the +strength than from the purity and delicacy of the original texture. +Those oft-abused words, <i>naïve</i>, <i>naïveté</i>, were more applicable to her +in their fullest sense than to any other woman I ever met with. Her +conversation was the most untiring I ever enjoyed, because the stores +which fed that flowing eloquence were all native and unborrowed: you +were not borne along by it as by a torrent—<i>bongré</i>, <i>malgré</i>,—nor +dazzled as by an artificial <i>jet d'eau</i> set to play for your amusement. +There was the obvious wish to please—a little natural <i>coquetterie</i>—vivacity +without effort, sentiment without affectation, exceeding +mobility, which yet never looked like caprice; and the most consummate +refinement of thought, and feeling, and expression. From that really +elegant and highly-toned mind, nothing flippant nor harsh could ever +proceed; slander died away in her + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page165" name="page165"></a>[165]</span> + + presence; what was evil she would +not hear of; what was malicious she would not understand; what was +ridiculous she would not see. Sometimes there was a wild, artless +fervour in her impulses and feelings, which might have become a +feather-cinctured Indian on her savannah; then, the next moment, her +bearing reminded you of the court-bred lady of the bed-chamber. Quick +in perception, yet femininely confiding, uniting a sort of restless +vivacity with an indolent gracefulness, she appeared to me by far +the most poetical and genuine being of my own sex I ever knew in +highly-cultivated life: one to whom no wrong could teach mistrust; no +injury, bitterness; one to whom the common-place realities, the vulgar +necessary cares of existence, were but too indifferent;—who was, in +reality, all that other women try to appear, and betrayed, with a +careless independence, what they most wish to conceal. I draw from the +life,—now, what would you say to such a woman if you met with her in +the world? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I should say—she had no business there. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page166" name="page166"></a>[166]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +How? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I repeat that the woman you have just portrayed is hardly fit for +the world. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Say rather, the world is not fitted for her. As the Sabbath was made for +man, not man for the Sabbath, so the world was made for man, not man for +the world—still less woman. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Do you know what you mean? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I think I do, though I am afraid I can but ill-explain myself. By the +world, I mean that system of social life in all its complicate bearings +by which we are surrounded; which was, I suppose, devised at first with +a reference to the wants, the happiness, and the benefit of men, but +for which no <i>man</i> was specifically created; his being has + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page167" name="page167"></a>[167]</span> + + a high and +individual purpose beyond the world. Now, it seems to me one reason of +the low average of what we call <i>character</i>, that we judge a human soul, +not as it is abstractedly, but simply in relation to others, and to +the circumstances around it. If it be in harmony with the world, and +worldly, we praise it—it is a very respectable soul; if so constituted, +that it is in discord with a world, (which, observe, all our philosophers, +our pastors, and our masters, unite to assure us, is a sad wicked place, +and must be reformed or renounced forthwith,) then—I pray your attention +to this point—<i>then</i> the fault, the bitter penalty, lies not upon this +said wicked world,—O no!—but on that unlucky "piece of nature," which +in its power, its goodness, its purity, its truth, its faith, and its +tenderness, stands aloof from it. Is it not so? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Do you apply this personally? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, generally; but I return to her who + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page168" name="page168"></a>[168]</span> + + suggested the thought, and whom +I ought not, perhaps, to have made the subject of such a conversation as +this: it is against all my principles, contrary to my custom; and, in +truth, I speak of one in whom there is so much to love, that we cannot +praise without being accused of partiality; and so much to admire, that +we could not censure without being suspected of envy. I might as well +be silent therefore. Yet shall such a woman bear such a name, and hold +such a position as the mother of Goethe's posterity;<a href="#note-25" name="noteref-25"><small> 25</small></a>—shall she be +rendered by both a mark for observation, from one end of Europe to the +other;—shall she be "condemned to celebrity," and shall it be allowed +to ignorance, or ill-nature, or vanity, to prate of her;—and shall it +be forbidden to friendship even to speak?—that were hardly just. Of +those effusions of her creative and poetical talents, which charm her +friends, I say nothing, because in all probability neither you nor the +public will ever benefit + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page169" name="page169"></a>[169]</span> + + by them. I met with several other women in +Germany who possessed striking poetical genius, and whose compositions +were equally destined to remain unknown, except to the circle of their +immediate friends and relatives. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Mr. Hayward, in his notes to his translation of Faust, remarks on the +strong prejudice against female authorship, which still exists in +Germany; but he has hopes that it will not endure, and that something +may be done "to unlock the stores of fancy and feeling which the +Ottilies and the Adèles have hived up." Tell me—did you find this +prejudice entertained by the women themselves, or existing chiefly on +the part of the men? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It was expressed most strongly by the women, but it must have originated +with the men. All your prejudices you instil into us; and then we are +not satisfied with adopting them, we exaggerate + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page170" name="page170"></a>[170]</span> + + them—we mix them up with +our fancies and affections, and transmit them to your children. You are +"the mirrors in which we dress ourselves." +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +For which you dress yourselves! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Psha!—I mean that your minds and opinions are the mirrors in which we +form our own. You legislate for us, mould us, form us as you will. If +you prefer slaves and playthings to companions and helpmates, is that +our fault? In Germany I met with some men who, perhaps out of compliment, +descanted with enthusiasm on female talent, and in behalf of female +authorship; but the women almost uniformly spoke of the latter with +dread, as something formidable, or with contempt, as of something +beneath them: what is an unworthy prejudice in your sex, becomes, when +transplanted into ours, a <i>feeling</i>;—a mistaken, but a genuine, and +even a generous feeling. Many women, who have sufficient sense and +simplicity + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page171" name="page171"></a>[171]</span> + + of mind to rise above the mere <i>prejudice</i>, would not contend +with the <i>feeling</i>: they would not scruple to encounter the public +judgment in a cause approved by their own hearts, but they have not +courage to brave or to oppose the opinions of friends and kindred— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Or risk the loss of a lover. You remember the axiom of that clever +Frenchman,<a href="#note-26" name="noteref-26"><small> 26</small></a> who certainly spoke the existing opinions of his country +only a few years ago, when he said—"Imprimer, pour une femme de moins +de cinquante ans c'est mettre son bonheur à la plus terrible des +lotteries; si elle a un amant elle commencera par le perdre." +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I really believe that in Germany the latter catastrophe would be in most +cases inevitable; and where is the woman who knowingly would risk it? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page172" name="page172"></a>[172]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +All, however, have not lovers to lose, or husbands to displease, +or friends to affront; and if the women, in compliance with our +self-revolving egotism, affect to prostrate themselves, and undervalue +one another—do the men allow it to this extent? Do not the Germans most +justly boast, that in their land arose the first feeling of veneration +for women, the result of the Christian dispensation, grafted on the +old German manners? Do they not point to their literature and their +institutions, as more favourable to your sex than any other? Does not +even Madame de Staël exalt the fine earnestness of the German feeling +towards you, infinitely above the system of French gallantry?—that +flimsy veil of conventional good-breeding, under which we seek to +disguise the demoralization of one sex, and the virtual slavery of the +other? Have I not heard you say, that it is the present fashion among +the poets, artists, and writers of Germany, to defer in all things to +the middle ages? Are not the maxims and sentiments of chivalry ready on +their lips, the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page173" name="page173"></a>[173]</span> + + forms and symbols of the old chivalrous times to be +traced in every department of literature and art among them? +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +All this is true; and I will believe that all this is something more +than mere theory, when I see the Germans less slovenly in their +interior, and less egotistical in their domestic relations. The theme is +unwelcome, unpleasant, ungraceful,—in fact, I can scarcely persuade +myself to say one word against those high-minded, benevolent, admirable, +and "most-thinking people;" so I will not dwell upon it: but I must +confess that the personal negligence of the men, and the forbearance of +the women on this point, astonished me. I longed to remind these +worshippers of the age of chivalry of that advice of St. Louis to his +son—"Il faut être toujours propre et bien proprement habillé, afin +d'être <i>mieux aimé de sa femme</i>;" the really good-natured and well-bred +Germans will, I am sure, forgive this passing remark, and allow its +truth: they <i>did</i> at once agree + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page174" name="page174"></a>[174]</span> + + with me, that the tavern-life of the men, +more particularly the clever professional men in the south of Germany, +(another remnant, I presume, either of the age of chivalry, or the +Bürschen-sitten—I know not which,) was calculated to retard the social +improvement and refinement of both sexes. And, apropos to chivalry, +the fact is, that the institutions of a generous but barbarous period, +invented to shield our helplessness, when women were exposed to every +hardship, every outrage, have been much abused, and must be considerably +modified to suit a very different state of society. That affectation of +poetical homage, which your strength paid to our weakness, when the laws +were not sufficient to defend us, we would now gladly exchange for more +real honour, more real protection, more equal rights. I speak thus, +knowing that, however open to perversion these expressions may be, <i>you</i> +will not misapprehend me; you know that I am no vulgar, vehement arguer +about the "rights of women;" and, from my habitual tone of feeling and +thought, the last to covet any of your masculine privileges. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page175" name="page175"></a>[175]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +I do perfectly understand you; but, pray what are our strictly masculine +privileges, that you should covet them? Fighting! getting drunk! and +keeping a mistress!—I beg your pardon if I shock your delicacy; but +certainly, upon the score of masculine privileges, the less that is said +the better: there are nations in which it is a masculine privilege to +sit and smoke, while women draw the plough. It was some time ago,—and +now, in some countries, it is still a masculine privilege to cultivate +the mind at all; and in Germany, apparently, it is still a masculine +privilege to publish a book without losing <i>caste</i> in society; whereas +here, in England, we have fallen into the opposite extreme; female +authorship is in danger of becoming a fashion,—which Heaven avert! I +should be sorry to see you women taking the pen you have hitherto so +honoured, in the same spirit in which you used to make filigree, cobble +shoes, and paint velvet. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +It is too true that mere vanity and fashion have + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page176" name="page176"></a>[176]</span> + + lately made some women +authoresses;—more write for money, and by this employment of their +talents earn their own independence, add to the comforts of a parent, +or supply the extravagance of a husband. Some, who are unhappy in their +domestic relations, yet endowed with all that feminine craving after +sympathy, which was intended to be the charm of our sex, the blessing of +yours, and somehow or other has been turned to the bane of both, look +abroad for what they find not at home; fling into the wide world the +irrepressible activity of an overflowing mind and heart, which can +find no other unforbidden issue,—and to such "fame is love disguised." +Some write from the mere energy of intellect and will; some few from +the pure wish to do good, and to add to the stock of happiness and +the progress of thought; and many from all these motives combined in +different degrees. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And have none of these motives produced authoresses in Germany? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page177" name="page177"></a>[177]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Yes; but fashion and vanity, and the love of excitement, have not +as yet tempted the German women to print their effusions; their most +distinguished authoresses have become so, either from real enthusiasm or +from necessity; and in the lighter departments of literature they boast +at present some brilliant names. I will run over a few. +</p> +<p> +There is Helmina von Chezy—but before I speak of <i>her</i>, I should tell +you of her famous grandmother, Anna Louisa Karshin, though <i>she</i> +belonged to the last century. The Karshin was the daughter of a poor +innkeeper and brewer, in a little village of Silesia. She spent her +early years in herding cows. She learned to read by stealth, by stealth +she became a poetess; was first married to a boorish sulky weaver, +secondly to a drunken tailor, and suffered for years every extremity of +poverty and misery; at one time she travelled about the neighbouring +country, the first example of an itinerant poetess, declaiming her own +verses, and always ready with an ode or a sonnet to celebrate a wedding, +or hail + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page178" name="page178"></a>[178]</span> + + a birthday. In this strange profession she excited much +astonishment—went through some singular, but not disreputable +adventures—and earned considerable sums of money, which her husband +spent in drink and profligacy. Gifted with as much energy as genius, +she struggled through all, and gradually became known to several of the +critics and poets of the last century, particularly Count Stolberg and +Gleim, and obtained the title of the German Sappho. She found means to +reach Berlin, where she worked her way up to distinction, and supported +herself, two children, and an orphan brother, by her talents. She was +recommended to Frederick the Great as worthy of a pension, and—would +you believe it?—that <i>munificent</i> patron of his country's genius, sent +her a gratuity of two dollars, in a piece of paper. This extraordinary +and spirited woman, who had probably subsisted for half her life on +charity, instantly returned them to the niggardly despot, after writing +in the envelope four lines impromptu, which are yet repeated in Germany. +I am not quite sure that I remember + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page179" name="page179"></a>[179]</span> + + them accurately, and it is no matter, +for they have not much either of poetry or point. +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "Zwey Thaler sind zu wenig; </p> +<p class="i2"> Zwey Thaler macht kein Glück; </p> +<p class="i2"> Zwey Thaler gebt kein König; </p> +<p class="i2"> Fritz, hier send ich sie zurück." </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +She died in 1791, and a selection of her poems was published in the +following year. +</p> +<p> +The granddaughter of the Karshin, the more celebrated Helmina von Chezy, +is likewise a poetess; her principal work is a tale of chivalry, in +verse, <i>Die drei Weissen Rosen</i>, (The three White Roses) which was +published in 18—, and she wrote the opera of Euryanthe, for Weber to +set to music. Her songs and lighter poems are, I am told, exceedingly +beautiful. +</p> +<p> +Caroline Pichler, of Vienna, I need only mention. I believe her +historical romances have been translated into half-a-dozen languages. +The Siege of Vienna is reckoned her best. +</p> +<p> +Madame Schoppenhauer, the daughter of a senator of Dantzic, is +celebrated for her novels, travels, and works on art. She resided for +many years + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page180" name="page180"></a>[180]</span> + + at Weimar, where she drew round her a brilliant literary +circle, which the talents of her daughter farther adorned. Since +Goethe's death she has fixed her residence at Bonn, where it is probable +the remainder of her life will be spent. One of the best of her novels, +"Die Tante," has been translated by Madame de Montolieu, under the title +of "La Tante et la Nièce." Another very pretty little book of hers, +"Ausflucht an dem Rhein," I should like to see translated. Beside being +an excellent writer on art, Madame Schoppenhauer is herself no mean +artist. Moreover, she is a kind-hearted, excellent old lady, with a few +old lady-like prejudices about England and the English, which I forgave +her,—the more easily as I had to thank her in my own person for many +and kind attentions. +</p> +<p> +Madame von Helvig, of Weimar, (born Amalia von Imhoff,) was the friend +of Schiller, under whose auspices her first poems were published. Her +rare knowledge of languages, her learning and critical taste in works of +arts, have distinguished her almost as much as her genius for poetry. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page181" name="page181"></a>[181]</span></p> + +<p> +The second wife of the Baron de la Motte-Fouquet, was a very accomplished +woman, and the author of several poems and romances. +</p> +<p> +Frederica Brun, (born Münter,) the daughter of a learned ecclesiastic +of Gotha, is celebrated for her prose writings, and particularly her +travels in Italy, where she resided at different periods. Madame Brun +was a friend of Madame de Staël, who mentions her in her de l'Allemagne, +and describes the extraordinary talents for classical pantomime +possessed by her daughter Ida Brun. +</p> +<p> +Louisa Brachmann is, I believe, more renowned for her melancholy death +than her poetical talents; both together have procured her the name of +the "German Sappho." The wretched woman threw herself into the river +at Halle, and perished, as it was said, for the sake of some faithless +Phaon. This was in 1822, when she must have been between forty and +fifty; and pray observe, I do not notice this fact of her age in +ridicule. A woman's heart may overflow <i>inwardly</i> for long, long years, +till at last the accumulated sorrow bursts the bounds of reason, and +then all at once + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page182" name="page182"></a>[182]</span> + + we see the result of causes to which none gave heed, +and of secret agonies to which none gave comfort—in folly, madness, +destruction. Whatever might have been the cause,—thus she died. Her +works in prose and verse may be found in every bookseller's shop in +Germany. There is also a life of this unhappy and gifted woman by +professor Schutz. +</p> +<p> +Fanny Tarnow is one of the most remarkable and most fertile of all the +modern German authoresses. Her genius was developed by misfortune and +suffering: while yet an infant, she fell from a window two stories +high, and was taken up, to the amazement of the assistants, without +any apparent injury, except a few bruises; but all the vital functions +suffered, and during ten or twelve years she was extended on a couch, +</p> +<p> +neither joining in any of the amusements of childhood, nor subjected +to the usual routine of female education. She educated herself. She +read incessantly, and, as it was her only pleasure, books of every +description, good and bad, were furnished her without restraint. She +was about eleven years + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page183" name="page183"></a>[183]</span> + + old when she made her first <i>known</i> poetical +attempt, inspired by her own feelings and situation. It was a dialogue +between herself and the angel of death. In her seventeenth year she +was sufficiently recovered to take charge of her father's family, after +he had lost, by some sudden misfortune, his whole property. He held +subsequently, a small office under government, the duties of which were +principally performed by his admirable daughter. Her first writings were +anonymous, and for a long time her name was unknown. Her most celebrated +novel, the "Thekla," was published in 1815; and from this time she has +enjoyed a high and public reputation. Fanny Tarnow resides, or did +reside, in Dresden. +</p> +<p> +I have yet another name here, and not the least interesting, that of +Johanna von Weissenthurn, one of the most popular dramatic writers in +Germany. She was educated for the stage, even from infancy, her parents +and relations being, I believe, strolling players. She lived, for many +years, a various life of toil, and adventure, and excitement; such, +perhaps, as Goethe describes in + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page184" name="page184"></a>[184]</span> + + the Wilhelm Meister; a life which does +sometimes blunt the nicer feelings, but is sure to develop talent +where it exists. Johanna at length rose through all the grades of her +profession, and became the first actress at the principal theatre at +Vienna. She played in the "Phœdra," before Napoleon, when he occupied +the Austrian capital in 1806, and the conqueror sent to her, after the +performance, a complimentary message, and a gratuity of three thousand +francs; but her lasting reputation is founded on her dramatic works, +which are played in every theatre in Germany. The plots, which, I +am told, are remarkable for fancy and invention, have been borrowed, +without acknowledgment, both by French and English playwrights. I +was quite charmed with one of her pieces which I saw at Munich, (Die +Erben—the Heirs,) and with another which was represented at Frankfort. +Johanna von Weissenthurn has also written poems and tales. +</p> +<p> +I have come to the end of my memoranda on this subject, and regret it +much. I might easily give you more names, and quote second-hand the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page185" name="page185"></a>[185]</span> + + opinions I heard of the merits and characteristics of these authoresses; +but I speak of nothing but what I <i>know</i>, and not being able to form +any judgment myself, I will give none. Only it appears to me that the +Germans themselves assign to no female writer the same rank which here +we proudly give to Joanna Baillie and Mrs. Hemans. I could hear of none +who had ever exercised any thing like the moral influence possessed by +Maria Edgeworth and Harriet Martineau, in their respective departments; +nor could learn that any German woman had yet given <i>public</i> proof that +the most feminine qualities were reconcilable with the highest scientific +attainments—like Mrs. Marcet and Mrs. Somerville. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You said the other night, that you had not formed any opinion as to the +moral and social position of the women in Germany; but you must have +brought away some general impressions of manner and character;—frankly, +were they favourable or unfavourable? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page186" name="page186"></a>[186]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Frankly, they were most favourable. Remember that I am not prepared with +any general sweeping conclusions: I cannot assure you from my own +knowledge, that among my own sex the proportion of virtue and happiness +is greater in Germany than in England. On the contrary— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i18"> ——In every land </p> +<p class="i2"> I saw, wherever light illumineth, </p> +<p class="i4"> Beauty and anguish walking hand in hand, </p> +<p class="i2"> The downward slope to death. </p> +</div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> In every land I thought that, more or less, </p> +<p class="i4"> The stronger, sterner nature overbore </p> +<p class="i2"> The softer, uncontroll'd by gentleness, </p> +<p class="i4"> And selfish evermore!<a href="#note-27" name="noteref-27"><small> 27</small></a> </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +—Why do you smile? +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +You amuse me with the perseverance with which you ring the changes on +your favourite text, in prose and in verse; and yet, to adopt + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page187" name="page187"></a>[187]</span> + + Voltaire's +witty metaphor, <i>we</i> are the hammers and <i>you</i> the anvils all the world +over. But is that all? You need not have gone to Germany to verify that! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, sir; it is not <i>all</i>. In the first place, you know I have a +sufficient contempt for our English intolerance, with regard to +manners— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Why, yes; with reason. The influence of mere <i>manner</i> among our +fashionable people, and the stress laid upon it as a distinction, have +become so vulgarized and abused, that I should be relieved even by a +reaction which should throw us out of the insipidity of conventional +manner into primeval rudeness. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, no, no!—no extremes: but though so sensible to the ridicule of +referring the social habits, opinions, customs, of other nations, to the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page188" name="page188"></a>[188]</span> + + arbitrary standard of our own, still I could not help falling into +comparisons; certain distinctions between the German and the English +women struck me involuntarily. In the highest circles a stranger finds +society much alike every where. A court-ball—the <i>soirée</i> of an +ambassadress—a minister's dinner—present nearly the same physiognomy. +It is in the second class of society, which is also every where, and in +every sense, the best, that we behold the stamp of national character. +I was not condemned to see my German friends always <i>en grande +toilette</i>; I had better opportunities of judging and appreciating their +domestic habits and manners, than most travellers enjoy. +</p> +<p> +I thought the German women, of a certain rank, more <i>natural</i> than +we are. The moral education of an English girl is, for the most part, +<i>negative</i>; the whole system of duty is thus presented to the mind. +It is not "this you must do;" but always "you must not do this—you +must not say that—you must not think so;" and if by some hardy, +expanding nature, the question + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page189" name="page189"></a>[189]</span> + + be ventured, "Why?"—the mamma or the +governess are ready with the answer—"It is not the custom—it is not +lady-like—it is ridiculous!" But is it wrong?—why is it wrong?—and +then comes answer, pat—"My dear, you must not argue—young ladies +never argue." "But, mamma, I was thinking——" "My dear, you must not +think—go write your Italian exercise," and so on! The idea that certain +passions, powers, tempers, feelings, interwoven with our being by our +almighty and all-wise Creator, are to be put down by the fiat of a +governess, or the edict of fashion, is monstrous. Those who educate +us imagine that they have done every thing, if they have silenced +controversy, if they have suppressed all external demonstration of an +excess of temper or feeling; not knowing, or not reflecting, that unless +our nature be self-governed and self-directed by an appeal to those +higher faculties, which link us immediately with what is divine, their +labour is lost. +</p> +<p> +Now, in Germany the women are less educated to suit some particular +fashion; the cultivation + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page190" name="page190"></a>[190]</span> + + of the intellect, and the forming of the +manners, do not so generally supersede the training of the moral +sentiments—the affections—the impulses; the latter are not so +habitually crushed or disguised; consequently the women appeared to me +more natural, and to have more individual character. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +But the English women pique themselves on being natural, at least they +have the word continually in their mouths. Do you know that I once +overheard a well-meaning mother instructing her daughter how to be +natural? You laugh, but I assure you it is a simple fact. Now, I really +do not object to natural insipidity, but I do object to conventional +insipidity: I object to a rule of elegance which makes the negative the +test of the natural. It seems hard that those who have hearts and souls +must needs put them into a strait-waistcoat, in order to oblige those +who choose to have none; and be guilty of the grossest affectation, to +escape the imputation of being affected! +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page191" name="page191"></a>[191]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I think there is less of this among the Germans; more of the individual +character is brought into the daily intercourse of society—more of the +poetry of existence is brought to bear on the common realities of life. +I saw a freshness of feeling—a genuine (not a taught) simplicity, which +charmed me. Sometimes I have seen affectation, but it amused me; it +consisted in the exaggeration of what is in itself good, not in the +mean renunciation of our individuality—the immolation of our soul's +truth to a mere fashion of behaviour. As Rochefoucauld called hypocrisy, +(that last extreme of wickedness,) "<i>the homage which vice pays to +virtue</i>;" so the <i>nature de convention</i>, that last and worst excess of +affectation, is the homage which the artificial pays to the natural. +</p> +<p> +The German women are much more engrossed by the cares of housekeeping +than women of a similar rank of life in England. They carry this too far +in many instances, as we do the opposite extreme. In England, with our +false, conventional refinement, we attach an idea of vulgarity + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page192" name="page192"></a>[192]</span> + + to certain +cares and duties, in which there is nothing vulgar. To see the young and +beautiful daughter of a lady of rank running about, busied in household +matters, with the keys of the wine-cellar and the store-room suspended +to her sash, would certainly surprise a young Englishwoman, who, +meantime, is netting a purse, painting a rose, or warbling some "Dolce +mio Bene," or "Soavi Palpiti," with the air of a nun at penance. The +description of Werther's Charlotte, cutting bread and butter, has +been an eternal subject of laughter among the English, among whom fine +sentiment must be garnished out with something finer than itself; and no +princess can be suffered to go mad, or even be in love, except in white +satin. To any one who has lived in Germany, the union of sentiment +and bread and butter, or of poetry with household cares, excites no +laughter. The wife of a state minister once excused herself from going +with me to a picture gallery, because on that day she was obliged to +reckon up the household linen; she was one of the most charming, truly +elegant, and accomplished women + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page193" name="page193"></a>[193]</span> + + I ever met with. At another time, I +remember that a very accomplished woman, who had herself figured in a +court, could not do something or other—I forget what—because it was +the "grösse Wäsche," (the great wash,) an event by the way which I +often found very mal-a-propos, and which never failed to turn a German +household upside down. You must remember that I am not speaking of +tradesmen and mechanics, but of people of my own, or even a superior +rank of life. It is true that I met with cases in which the women had, +without necessity, sunk into mere domestic drudges—women whose souls +were in their kitchen and their household stuff—whose talk was of +dishes and of condiments; but then the same species of women in England +would have been, instead of busy with the idea of being useful, +frivolous and silly, without any idea at all. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And whether a woman put her soul into an apple tart, or a new bonnet, +signifies little, if there be no capacity there for any thing better. + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page194" name="page194"></a>[194]</span> + + I hate mere fine ladies; but equally avoid those who seem born to +"suckle fools and chronicle small beer." The accomplishments which +embellish social life—the cultivation which raises you to a companionship +with men—I cannot spare these to make mere nurses and housewifes, as I +conceive the generality of the German women aim to be, and which I have +been told the opinions of the men approve. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +As to what we term accomplishments, there was certainly much less +exhibition and parade of them in society; they formed less an established +and necessary part of education than with us; but, of really accomplished, +well-informed women, believe me I found no deficiency—far otherwise: +if the inclination or the talent existed, means and opportunity were +not wanting for mental culture of a very high species. I met with fewer +women who drew badly, sang tolerably, or rather intolerably, scratched +the harp, and quoted Metastasio; but I met with quite as many women who, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page195" name="page195"></a>[195]</span> + + without pretension, were finished musicians, painted like artists, +possessed an extensive acquaintance with their own literature, and an +uncommon knowledge of languages; and were, besides, very good housewives +after the German fashion. More or less acquaintance with the French +language was a matter of course, but English was preferred: every where +I met with women who had cultivated with success, not our language +merely, but our literature. Shakspeare, whether studied in English, or +in some of their excellent translations, I found a species of household +god, whose very name was breathed with reverence, as if it were that of +a supernatural being. Lord Byron, and Sir Walter Scott, and Campbell, +are familiar names. Wordsworth and Shelley are beginning to be known, +but they are pronounced more difficult of comprehension than Shakspeare +himself; yet I met with a German lady who could repeat Coleridge's +"Ancient Mariner" by heart. Of our great modern poets, Crabbe appeared +the least understood and appreciated in Germany, for the obvious reason, +that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page196" name="page196"></a>[196]</span> + + his subjects and portraits are almost exclusively national. There +are, however, several German editions of his works. The men read him as +a study. The only German lady I met with who had read his works through, +pronounced them "not poetry." Bulwer is exceedingly popular among the +women; so is Moore. Some of those who most admired the latter, gave as +one reason that "his English style was so easy." +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Of all our poets, Moore should seem the least allied to a German taste. +Shall I confess to you? He reminds me perpetually of Prince Potemkin's +larder, in which you could always have <i>petits-patés</i> and champagne, +<i>ad libitum</i>, but never a morsel of bread or a drop of water! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +The simile is e'en too wickedly just; but I except his Irish ballads: +by the way, I was pleased to find some of our beautiful Irish melodies +almost naturalized in Germany, and sung either + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page197" name="page197"></a>[197]</span> + + with Moore's words, or +German versions of them. I remember that at Stift-Neuberg I heard the +air of Ally Croker sung to an excellent translation of Moore's words,<a href="#note-28" name="noteref-28"><small> 28</small></a> +and with as much of the national spirit and feeling as if we had been on +the banks of the Shannon instead of the banks of the Neckar. The singer, +an amateur, and a most extraordinary musical genius, who had joined our +circle from Heidelberg, did not understand, or at least did not speak, +English; yet there was no Irish, or Scotch, or English air which he had +not at the ends of his fingers; and when he struck up, "Of noble race +was Shenkin," it was as if all the souls of all the Welsh harpers since +High-born Hoel had inspired him. This gifted person was, however, of your +sex, and our discourse, at present, is of mine. +</p> +<p> +I heard an English lady, who had resided for some time in Germany, +remark, that the "German mothers <i>spoiled</i> their children terribly;" in +other words, the children lived more habitually with the mothers, were +under little restraint, and behaved in the drawing-room much as if they +were + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page198" name="page198"></a>[198]</span> + + in the nursery, and were treated, as they grew up, on more equal +terms. +</p> +<p> +That high exterior polish, those brilliant conversational talents, which +I have seen in many English and French women, must be rare among the +Germans: they are too simple, and too much in earnest. The trifling +of a polished French woman is often most graceful; the trifling of an +Englishwoman gracious and graceful; but the trifling of a German woman +is, in comparison, heavy work; to use a common expression, it is not +<i>in them</i>. I met with <i>one</i> satirical woman. You know I once ventured +to assert that no woman is <i>naturally</i> satirical, and to touch upon the +causes which foster this artificial vice—and here was a case in point. +It was that of a mind which had originally been a piece of nature's +noblest handiwork, first bruised, then gradually festered by the action +of all evil influences. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +And, "lilies that fester are far worse than weeds," so singeth the poet; +but do you make the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page199" name="page199"></a>[199]</span> + + cause also the excuse? How many minds have endured +the most withering influences of misery and mischief, if not untouched, +at least uninjured—unembittered! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I grant you: but before we assume the power of judging, of computing the +degree of virtue in the latter case, of vice in the former, we should +look to the original conformation of the human being—the material +exposed to these influences. Fire hardens the clay and dissolves the +metal. This plate of tempered steel, on which I am going to etch, shall +corrode, effervesce, be absolutely decomposed by the action of a few +drops of nitrous acid, which has no effect whatever on this lump of wax. +Now, carry this analogy into the consideration of the human character—it +will spare us a long argument. +</p> +<p> +As to the chapter of coquettes— +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Ah! <i>glissez, mortel, n'appuyez pas!</i> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page200" name="page200"></a>[200]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +And why not?—Don't you know that I meditate, with the assistance of +certain <i>professorins</i>, a complete Natural History of Coquettes, (in +quarto,) which shall rival the famous Dutch treatise on Butterflies, +in heaven knows how many folio volumes? In the first part of this +stupendous work we intend to treat systematically of every known +species, from the <i>coquetterie instinctive</i>, which may be termed the +wild genus, indigenous in all females, up to the <i>coquetterie calculée +et philosophique</i>, the most refined specimen reared in the hot-bed of +artificial life. In the second part, we shall treat the whole history of +<i>Coquetterie</i>, from that first pretty experiment of dear Mamma Eve, when +she turned away from Adam, +</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "——As conscious of her worth, </p> +<p class="i2"> That would be woo'd and not unsought be won," </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="continued"> +down to—to—how shall I avoid being personal?—down to the Lady Adeline +Amundevilles of our own day. With some women <i>coquetterie</i> is an instinct; +with others, an amusement; with others, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page201" name="page201"></a>[201]</span> + + a pursuit; with others, a science. +With the German women it is a passion: they play the coquette as they do +every thing else, with sentiment, with good faith, with enthusiasm. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Why then it is no longer <i>coquetterie</i>—it is love! +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +I beg your pardon; it is something very different. True, perhaps, "that +thin partitions do the bounds divide;" but, to a nice observer, the +division is not the less complete. In short, you can imagine nothing +more distinct than an English coquette and a German coquette; in the +first case, one is reminded of Dryden's fanciful simile— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "So cold herself, while she such warmth express'd, </p> +<p class="i2"> 'Twas Cupid bathing in Diana's stream!" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +But, in the latter case, it is Diana bending the bow, and brandishing +the darts of Cupid; and with an unsuspicious <i>gaucherie</i>, which now and +then turns the point against her own bosom. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page202" name="page202"></a>[202]</span></p> + +<p> +I observed, and I verified my own observations, by the information of +some intelligent medical men, that there is less ill-health among the +superior rank of women, in Germany, than with us; all that class of +diseases, which we call nervous, which in England have increased, +and are increasing in such a fearful ratio, are far less prevalent; +doubtless, because the habits of social life are more natural. The use +of noxious stimulants among the better class of women is almost unknown, +and rare among the very lowest classes—would to heaven we could say +the same! No where, not even at Munich, one of the most profligate of +the German capitals, was I ever shocked by the exhibition of female +suffering and depravity in another form, as in the theatres and the +streets of London. +</p> +<p> +I have been asked twenty times since my return to England, whether the +German women are not very <i>exaltée</i>—very romantic? I could only answer, +that they appeared to me less calculating, less the slaves of artificial +manners and modes of thinking; more imaginative, more governed by + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page203" name="page203"></a>[203]</span> + + natural feeling, more enthusiastic in love and religion, than with us. +If this is what my English friends term <i>exaltée</i>, I certainly cannot +think the German women would have reason to be offended by the +application of the word to them, however satirically meant. Perhaps it +may be from necessity, that they are generally more simple in their +tastes, and more frugal in their expenses; they had certainly a most +formidable idea of the extravagance of fashionable English women, and +of our luxurious habits. I believe that they are sometimes difficult of +access, and apparently inhospitable, because they suspect us of scoffing +at their simplicity, at the homeliness of their accommodations, and +their housewively occupations. For my own part I slipped so quietly +and naturally into all their social and domestic habits, and cared so +little about the differences and distinctions, which some of the English +thought it fine to be always remarking and lamenting, that my German +friends used to express their surprise, by saying—"Savez vous, ma +chère, que vous ne me faites pas de tout l'effet d'une Anglaise!"—an +odd species of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page204" name="page204"></a>[204]</span> + + compliment, but certainly meant as such. It is true +that I was sometimes a little tired of the everlasting knitting and +cross-stitch; and it is true I may at times have felt the want of +certain external luxuries, with which we are habitually pampered in this +prodigal land, till they become necessaries; but I would be well content +to exchange them all a thousand times over, for the cheap mental and +social pleasures—the easy intercourse of German life. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Apropos to German romance. I met with a striking instance of it even in +my short and rapid journey across part of the country. A lady of birth +and rank, who had been <i>dame d'honneur</i> in the court of a sovereign +princess, (a princess by the way of very equivocal reputation,) on +the death of a lover, to whom she had been betrothed, devoted herself +thenceforth to the service of the sick in the hospitals; she could not +enter a religious order, being a Protestant, but she fulfilled all the +offices of a vowed Sister of Charity. When + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page205" name="page205"></a>[205]</span> + + she applied to the physician +for leave to attend the hospital at ——, he used every endeavour to +dissuade her from her undertaking—all in vain! Then he tried to disgust +her by imposing, in the first instance, duties the most fearful and +revolting to a delicate woman; she stood this test, and persisted. It is +now five years since I saw her; perhaps she may by this time be tired of +her charitable, or rather her romantic, self-devotion. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +No, <i>that</i> she is not. I know to whom you allude. She follows steadily +and quietly the same pious vocation in which she has persevered for +fifteen years, and in which she seems resolved to die. +</p> +<p> +Now, in return for your story, though I knew it all before, I will tell +you another; but lest you should suspect me of absolute invention and +romancing, I must tell you how I came by it. +</p> +<p> +I was travelling from Weimar to Frankfort, and had stopped at a little +town, one or two + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page206" name="page206"></a>[206]</span> + + stages beyond Fulda; I was standing at the window of +the inn, which was opposite to the post-house, and looking at a crowd +of travellers who had just been disgorged from a huge Eil-wagen or +post-coach, which was standing there. Among them was one female, who, +before I was aware, fixed my attention. Although closely enveloped in a +winter dress from head to foot, her height, and the easy decision with +which she moved, showed that her figure was fine and well-proportioned; +and as the wind blew aside her black veil, I had a glimpse of features +which still farther excited my curiosity. I had time to consider her, +as she alighted and walked over to the inn alone. She entered at once +the room—it was a sort of public saloon—in which I was; summoned the +waiter, whom she addressed in a good-humoured, but rather familiar +style, and ordered breakfast; not a cup of chocolate or <i>caffee au +lait</i>, as became a heroine, for you see I was resolved that she should +be one, but a very substantial German breakfast—soup, a cutlet, and a +pint (eine halbe flasche) of good wine: it was then + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page207" name="page207"></a>[207]</span> + + about ten o'clock. +While this was preparing, she threw off her travelling accoutrements; +first a dark cloak, richly lined with fur; one or two shawls; a sort +of pelisse, or rather surtout, reaching to the knees, with long loose +sleeves, such as you may see in the prints of Tartar or Muscovite +costumes; this was made of beautiful Indian shawl, lined with blue +silk, and trimmed with sables: under these splendid and multifarious +coverings she wore a dress of deep mourning. Her figure, when displayed, +excited my admiration: it was one of the most perfect I ever beheld. +Her feet, hands, and head, were small in proportion to her figure; her +face was not so striking—it was pretty, rather than handsome; her small +mouth closed firmly, so as to give a marked and singular expression +of resolution and decision, to a physiognomy otherwise frank and +good-humoured. Her eyes, also small, were of a dark hazel, bright, +and with long blonde eyelashes. Her abundant fair hair was plaited in +several bands, and fastened on the top of her head, in the fashion of +the German peasant girls. Her voice would have been deemed + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page208" name="page208"></a>[208]</span> + + rather +high-pitched, for "ears polite," but it was not deficient in melody; and +though her expression was grave, and even sad, upon our first encounter, +I soon found that mirth, and not sadness, was the natural character of +her mind, as of her countenance. When any thing ridiculous occurred, +she burst at once into a laugh—such a merry, musical peal, that it was +impossible not to sympathize in it. Her whole appearance and manner gave +me the idea of a farmer's buxom daughter: nothing could be more distinct +from our notions of the lady-like, yet nothing could be more free from +impropriety, more expressive of native innocence and modesty; but the +splendour of her dress did not exactly suit with her deportment—it +puzzled me. I observed, when she drew off her glove, that she wore a +number of silver rings of a peculiar fashion, and among them a fine +diamond. She walked up and down while her breakfast was preparing, +seemingly lost in painful meditations; but when it appeared, she sat +down and did justice to it, as one who had been many hours without food. +While she was thus engaged, the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page209" name="page209"></a>[209]</span> + + conducteur of the Eil-wagen and one +of the passengers came in, and spoke to her with interest and respect. +Soon afterwards came the mistress of the inn, (who had never deigned to +notice me, for it is not the fashion in Germany;) she came with an offer +of particular services, and from the conversation I gathered, to my +astonishment, that this young creature—she seemed not more than two or +three and twenty—was on her way home, alone and unprotected, from—can +you imagine?—even from the wilds of Siberia! But then what had brought +her there? I listened, in hopes of discovering, but they all spoke so +fast that I could make out nothing more. Afterwards, I had occasion to +go over to a little shop to make some purchase. On my return, I found +her crying bitterly, and my maid, also in tears, was comforting her with +great volubility. Now, though my <i>having</i> in German, like Orlando's +beard, was not considerable, and my heroine spoke still less French, I +could not help assisting in the task of consolation—never, certainly, +were my curiosity and interest more strongly excited! Subsequently we + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page210" name="page210"></a>[210]</span> + + met at Frankfort, where she was lodged in the same hotel, and I was +enabled to offer her a seat in my vehicle to Mayence. Thus, I had +opportunities of hearing her whole history related at different times, +and in parts and parcels; and I will now endeavour to give it to you +in a connected form. I may possibly make some mistake with regard +to the order of events, but I promise you faithfully, that where my +recollection of names, or dates, or circumstances, may fail me, I will +not, like Mademoiselle de Montpensier, make use of my imagination +to supply the defects of my memory. You shall have, if not the whole +truth, at least as much of it as I can remember, and with no fictitious +interpolations and improvements. Of the animation of voice and manner, +the vivid eloquence, the graphic spirit, the quick transitions of +feeling, and the grace and vivacity of gesture and action with which +the relation was made to me by this fine untutored child of nature, +I can give you no idea—it was altogether a study of character, I shall +never forget. +</p> +<p> +My heroine—truly and in every sense does she + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page211" name="page211"></a>[211]</span> + + deserve the name—was the +daughter of a rich brewer and wine merchant of Deuxponts.<a href="#note-29" name="noteref-29"><small> 29</small></a> She was +one of five children, two much older and two much younger than herself. +Her eldest brother was called Henri: he had early displayed such +uncommon talents, and such a decided inclination for study, that his +father was determined to give him all the advantages of a learned +education, and sent him to the university of Erlangen, in Bavaria, +whence he returned to his family, with the highest testimonies of his +talents and good conduct. His father now destined him for the clerical +profession, with which his own wishes accorded. His sister fondly +dwelt upon his praises, and described him, perhaps with all a sister's +partiality, as being not only the pride of his family, but of all his +fellow-citizens, "tall, and handsome, and good," of a most benevolent +enthusiastic temper, and devoted to his studies. When he had been at +home for some time, he attracted the notice of one of the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page212" name="page212"></a>[212]</span> + + princes in the +north of Germany, with whom he travelled, I believe, in the capacity +of secretary. The name of the prince, and the particulars of this +part of his life, have escaped me; but it appeared that, through the +recommendation of this powerful patron, he became professor of theology +in a university of Courland, I think at Riga, or somewhere near it, for +the name of this city was continually recurring in her narrative. Henri +was at this time about eight-and-twenty. +</p> +<p> +While here, it was his fate to fall passionately in love with the +daughter of a rich Jew merchant. His religious zeal mingled with his +love; he was as anxious to convert his mistress as to possess her—and, +in fact, the first was a necessary preliminary to the second; the +consequences were all in the usual style of such matters. The relations +discovered the correspondence, and the young Jewess was forbidden to see +or to speak to her lover. They met in secret. What arguments he might +use to convert this modern Jessica, I know not, but they prevailed. She +declared herself convinced, and consented to fly with him beyond + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page213" name="page213"></a>[213]</span> + + the +frontiers, into Silesia, to be baptized, and to become his wife. +</p> +<p> +Apparently their plans were not well-arranged, or were betrayed; for +they were pursued by her relations and the police, and overtaken before +they reached the frontiers. The young man was accused of carrying off +his Jewish love by force, and this, I believe, at Riga, where the Jews +are protected, is a capital crime. The affair was brought before the +tribunal, and the accused defended himself by declaring that the girl +had fled with him by her own free will; that she was a Christian, and +his betrothed bride, as they had exchanged rings, or had gone through +some similar ceremony. The father Jew denied this on the part of his +daughter, and Henri desired to be confronted with the lady who was thus +said to have turned his accuser. Her family made many difficulties, but +by the order of the judge she was obliged to appear. She was brought +into the court of justice pale, trembling, and supported by her father +and others of her kindred. The judge demanded whether it was by her own +will that she + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page214" name="page214"></a>[214]</span> + + had fled with Henri Ambos? She answered in a faint voice, +"<i>No</i>." Had then violence been used to carry her off? "<i>Yes.</i>" Was she +a Christian? "<i>No.</i>" Did she regard Henri as her affianced husband? +"<i>No.</i>" +</p> +<p> +On hearing these replies, so different from the truth,—from all he +could have anticipated, the unfortunate young man appeared for a few +minutes stupified; then, as if seized with a sudden frenzy, he made a +desperate effort to rush upon the young Jewess. On being prevented, he +drew a knife from his pocket, which he attempted to plunge into his own +bosom, but it was wrested from him; in the scuffle he was wounded in +the hands and face, and the young lady swooned away. The sight of his +mistress insensible, and his own blood flowing, restored the lover to +his senses. He became sullenly calm, offered not another word in his own +defence, refused to answer any questions, and was immediately conveyed +to prison. +</p> +<p> +These particulars came to the knowledge of his family after the lapse of +many months, but of his subsequent fate they could learn nothing. Neither + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page215" name="page215"></a>[215]</span> + + his sentence nor his punishment could be ascertained; and although +one of his relations went to Riga, for the purpose of obtaining some +information—some redress—he returned without having effected either +of the purposes of his journey. Whether Henri had died of his wounds, +or languished in a perpetual dungeon, remained a mystery. +</p> +<p> +Six years thus passed away. His father died: his mother, who persisted +in hoping, while all others despaired, lingered on in heart-wearing +suspense. At length, in the beginning of last year, (1833,) a travelling +merchant passed through the city of Deuxponts, and inquired for the +family of Ambos. He informed them that in the preceding year he had +seen and spoken to a man in rags, with a long beard, who was working in +fetters with other criminals, near the fortress of Barinska, in Siberia; +who described himself as Henri Ambos, a pastor of the Lutheran church, +unjustly condemned, and besought him with tears, and the most urgent +supplications, to convey some tidings of him to his unhappy parents, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page216" name="page216"></a>[216]</span> + + beseech them to use every means to obtain his liberation. +</p> +<p> +You must imagine—for I cannot describe as she described—the feelings +which this intelligence excited. A family counsel was held, and it +was determined at once that application should be made to the police +authorities at St. Petersburgh, to ascertain beyond a doubt the fate +of poor Henri—that a petition in his favour must be presented to the +Emperor of Russia; but who was to present it? The second brother offered +himself, but he had a wife and two children; the wife protested that she +should die if her husband left her, and would not hear of his going; +besides, he was the only remaining hope of his mother's family. The +sister then said that she would undertake the journey, and argued that +as a woman she had more chance of success in such an affair than her +brother. The mother acquiesced. There was, in truth, no alternative; and +being amply furnished with the means, this generous, affectionate, and +strong-minded girl, set off alone, on her long and perilous journey. +"When my mother gave + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page217" name="page217"></a>[217]</span> + + me her blessing," said she, "I made a vow to God +and my own heart, that I would not return alive without the pardon of +my brother. I feared nothing; I had nothing to live for. I had health +and strength, and I had not a doubt of my own success, because I was +<i>resolved</i> to succeed; but ah! <i>liebe madame!</i> what a fate was mine! and +how am I returning to my mother!—my poor old mother!" Here she burst +into tears, and threw herself back in the carriage; after a few minutes +she resumed her narrative. +</p> +<p> +She reached the city of Riga without mischance. There she collected the +necessary documents relative to her brother's character and conduct, +with all the circumstances of his trial, and had them properly attested. +Furnished with these papers, she proceeded to St. Petersburgh, where she +arrived safely in the beginning of June, 1833. She had been furnished with +several letters of recommendation, and particularly with one to a German +ecclesiastic, of whom she spoke with the most grateful enthusiasm, by the +title of M. le Pasteur. She met with the utmost difficulty in obtaining +from the police the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page218" name="page218"></a>[218]</span> + + official return of her brother's condemnation, place +of exile, punishment, &c.; but at length, by almost incredible boldness, +perseverance, and address, she was in possession of these, and with the +assistance of her good friend the pastor, she drew up a petition to the +emperor. With this she waited on the minister of the interior, to whom, +with great difficulty, and after many applications, she obtained access. +He treated her with great harshness, and absolutely refused to deliver +the petition. She threw herself on her knees, and added tears to +entreaties; but he was inexorable, and added brutally—"Your brother +was a <i>mauvais sujet</i>; he <i>ought</i> not to be pardoned, and if I were the +emperor I would not pardon him." She rose from her knees, and stretching +her arms towards heaven, exclaimed with fervour—"I call God to witness +that my brother was innocent! and I thank God that you are not the +emperor, for I can still hope!" The minister, in a rage, said—"Do you +dare to speak thus to me! Do you know who I am?" "Yes," she replied; +"you are his excellency the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page219" name="page219"></a>[219]</span> + + minister C——; but what of that? you are +a cruel man! but I put my trust in God and the emperor; and then," said +she, "I left him, without even a curtsey, though he followed me to the +door, speaking very loud and very angrily." +</p> +<p> +Her suit being rejected by all the ministers, (for even those who were +most gentle, and who allowed the hardship of the case, still refused to +interfere, or deliver her petition,) she resolved to do, what she had +been dissuaded from attempting in the first instance—to appeal to the +emperor in person: but it was in vain she lavished hundreds of dollars +in bribes to the inferior officers; in vain she beset the imperial +suite, at reviews, at the theatre, on the way to the church: invariably +beaten back by the guards, or the attendants, she could not penetrate +to the emperor's presence. After spending six weeks in daily ineffectual +attempts of this kind, hoping every morning, and almost despairing +every evening—threatened by the police, and spurned by the officials—Providence +raised her up a friend in one of her own sex. Among some +ladies of rank, who became interested in her story, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page220" name="page220"></a>[220]</span> + + and invited her to +their houses, was a Countess Elise, something or other, whose name I am +sorry I did not write down. One day, on seeing her young <i>protegée</i> +overwhelmed with grief, and almost in despair, she said, with emotion, +"I cannot dare to present your petition myself, I might be sent off to +Siberia, or at least banished the court; but all I can do I will. I will +lend you my equipage and servants. I will dress you in one of my robes; +you shall drive to the palace the next levee day, and obtain an audience +under my name; when once in the presence of the emperor you must manage +for yourself. If I risk thus much, will you venture the rest?" "And what," +said I, "was your answer?" "Oh!" she replied, "I could not answer; but +I threw myself at her feet, and kissed the hem of her gown!" I asked her +whether she had not feared to risk the safety of her generous friend? +She replied, "That thought did strike me—but what would you have?—I +cast it from me. I was <i>resolved</i> to have my brother's pardon—I would +have sacrificed my own life to obtain it—and, God forgive + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page221" name="page221"></a>[221]</span> + + me, I thought +little of what it might cost another." +</p> +<p> +This plan was soon arranged, and at the time appointed my resolute +heroine drove up to the palace in a splendid equipage, preceded by a +running footman, with three laced laquais in full dress, mounted +behind. She was announced as the Countess Elise ——, who supplicated +a particular audience of his majesty. The doors flew open, and in a few +minutes she was in the presence of the emperor, who advanced one or +two steps to meet her, with an air of gallantry, but suddenly started +back—— +</p> +<p> +Here I could not help asking her, whether in that moment she did not +feel her heart sink? +</p> +<p> +"No," said she firmly; "on the contrary, I felt my heart beat quicker +and higher!—I sprang forward and knelt at his feet, exclaiming, with +clasped hands—'Pardon, imperial majesty!—Pardon!'" "Who are you?" said +the emperor, astonished; "and what can I do for you?" He spoke gently, +more gently than any of his ministers, and overcome, even by my own +hopes, I burst + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page222" name="page222"></a>[222]</span> + + into a flood of tears, and said—"May it please your +imperial majesty, I am not Countess Elise ——, I am only the sister of +the unfortunate Henri Ambos, who has been condemned on false accusation. +O pardon!—pardon! Here are the papers—the proofs. O imperial +majesty!—pardon my poor brother!" I held out the petition and the +papers, and at the same time, prostrate on my knees, I seized the skirt +of his embroidered coat, and pressed it to my lips. The emperor said, +"Rise—rise!" but I would not rise; I still held out my papers, resolved +not to rise till he had taken them. At last the emperor, who seemed much +moved, extended one hand towards me, and took the papers with the other, +saying—"Rise, mademoiselle—I command you to rise." I ventured to kiss +his hand, and said, with tears, "I pray of your majesty to read that +paper." He said, "I will read it." I then rose from the ground, and stood +watching him while he unfolded the petition and read it. His countenance +changed, and he exclaimed once or twice, "Is it possible?—This is +dreadful!" When he had + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page223" name="page223"></a>[223]</span> + + finished, he folded the paper, and without +any observation, said at once—"Mademoiselle Ambos, your brother is +pardoned." The words rung in my ears, and I again flung myself at his +feet, saying—and yet I scarce know what I said—"Your imperial majesty +is a god upon earth; do you indeed pardon my brother? Your ministers +would never suffer me to approach you; and even yet I fear——!" He +said, "Fear nothing: you have my promise." He then raised me from the +ground, and conducted me himself to the door. I tried to thank and bless +him, but could not; he held out his hand for me to kiss, and then bowed +his head as I left the room. "Ach ja! the emperor is a good man,—ein +schöner, feiner, Mann! but he does not know how cruel his ministers are, +and all the evil they do, and all the justice they refuse, in his name!" +</p> +<p> +I have given you this scene as nearly as possible in her own words. +She not only related it, but almost acted it over again; she imitated +alternately, her own and the emperor's voice and manner; and such was +the vivacity of her + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page224" name="page224"></a>[224]</span> + + description that I seemed to hear and behold both, +and was more profoundly moved than by any scenic representation I can +remember. +</p> +<p> +On her return she received the congratulations of her benefactress, the +Countess Elise, and of her good friend the pastor, but both advised her +to keep her audience and the emperor's promise a profound secret. She +was the more inclined to this; because, after the first burst of joyous +emotion, her spirits sank. Recollecting the pains that had been taken to +shut her from the emperor's presence, she feared some unforeseen obstacle, +or even some knavery on the part of the officers of government. She +described her sufferings during the next few days, as fearful; her +agitation, her previous fatigues, and the terrible suspense, apparently +threw her into a fever, or acted on her excited nerves so as to produce +a species of delirium, though, of course, she would not admit this. +After assuring me very gravely that she did not believe in ghosts, she +told me that one night, after her interview with the emperor, she was +reading in bed, being unable to sleep; + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page225" name="page225"></a>[225]</span> + + and on raising her eyes from her +book she saw the figure of her brother, standing at the other end of the +room; she exclaimed, "My God, Henri! is that you!" but without making +any reply, the form approached nearer and nearer to the bed, keeping +its melancholy eyes fixed on her's, till it came quite close to the bed +side, and laid a cold heavy hand upon her. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +The night-mare, evidently. +</p> +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Without doubt; but her own impression was as of a reality. The figure, +after looking at her sadly for some minutes, during which she had no +power either to move or speak, turned away; she then made a desperate +effort to call out to the daughter of her hostess, who slept in the next +room—"Luise! Luise!" Luise ran in to her. "Do you not see my brother +standing there?" she exclaimed with horror, and pointing to the other +end of the room, whither the image, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page226" name="page226"></a>[226]</span> + + conjured up by her excited fancy and +fevered nerves, appeared to have receded. The frightened, staring Luise, +answered, "Yes." "You see," said she, appealing to me—"that though I +might be cheated by my own senses, I could not doubt those of another. I +thought to myself, <i>then</i>, my poor Henri is dead, and God has permitted +him to visit me. This idea pursued me all that night, and the next day; +but on the following day, which was Monday, just five days after I had +seen the Emperor, a <i>laquais</i>, in the imperial livery, came to my lodging, +and put into my hands a packet, with the "Emperor's <i>compliments</i> to +Mademoiselle Ambos." It was the pardon for my brother, with the Emperor's +seal and signature: then I forgot every thing but joy!" +</p> +<p> +Those mean, official animals, who had before spurned her, now pressed +upon her with offers of service, and even the Minister C—— offered to +expedite the pardon himself to Siberia, <i>in order to save her trouble</i>; +but she would not suffer the precious paper out of her hands: she +determined to carry it herself—to be herself the bearer of glad + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page227" name="page227"></a>[227]</span> + + tidings:—she had resolved that none but herself should take off those +fetters, the very description of which had entered her soul; so, having +made her arrangements as quickly as possible, she set off for Moscow, +where she arrived in three days. According to her description, the +town in Siberia, to the governor of which she carried an official +recommendation, was nine thousand versts beyond Moscow; and the fortress +to which the wretched malefactors were exiled was at a great distance +beyond that. I could not well make out the situation of either, and, +unluckily, I had no map with me but a road map of Germany, and it was +evident that my heroine was no geographer. She told me that, after +leaving Moscow, she travelled post seven days and seven nights, only +sleeping in the carriage. She then reposed for two days, and then posted +on for another seven days and nights. +</p> +<p class="center"> +MEDON. +</p> +<p> +Alone? +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page228" name="page228"></a>[228]</span></p> + +<p class="center"> +ALDA. +</p> +<p> +Alone! and wholly unprotected, except by her own innocence and energy, +and a few lines of recommendation, which had been given to her at St. +Petersburgh. The roads were every where excellent, the post-houses at +regular distances, the travelling rapid; but often, for hundreds of miles, +</p> +<p> +there were no accommodations of any kind—scarce a human habitation. +She even suffered from hunger, not being prepared to travel for so many +hours together without meeting with any food she could touch without +disgust. She described, with great truth and eloquence, her own +sensations as she was whirled rapidly over those wide, silent, solitary, +and apparently endless plains. "Sometimes," said she, "my head seemed +to turn—I could not believe that it was a waking reality—I could not +believe that it was myself. Alone, in a strange land,—so many hundred +leagues from my own home, and driven along as if through the air, with a +rapidity so different from any thing I had been used to, that it almost +took away my breath." +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page229" name="page229"></a>[229]</span></p> + +<p> +"Did you ever feel fear?" I asked. +</p> +<p> +"Ach ja! when I waked sometimes in the carriage, in the middle of the +night, wondering at myself, and unable immediately to collect my thoughts. +Never at any other time." +</p> +<p> +I asked her if she had ever met with insult? She said she had twice met +with "wicked men;" but she had felt no alarm—she knew how to protect +herself; and as she said this, her countenance assumed an expression +which showed that it was not a mere boast. Altogether, she described her +journey as being <i>grausam</i>, (horrible,) in the highest degree, and, +indeed, even the recollection of it made her shudder; but at the time +there was the anticipation of an unspeakable happiness, which made all +fatigues light, and all dangers indifferent. +</p> +<p> +At length, in the beginning of August, she arrived at the end of her +journey, and was courteously received by the commandant of the fortress. +She presented the pardon with a hand which trembled with impatience and +joy, too great to be restrained, almost to be borne. The officer looked + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page230" name="page230"></a>[230]</span> + + very grave, and took, she thought, a long time to read the paper, which +consisted only of six or eight lines. At last he stammered out, "I am +sorry—but the Henri Ambos mentioned in this paper—<i>is dead</i>!" Poor +girl! she fell to the earth. +</p> +<p> +When she reached this part of her story she burst into a fresh flood +of tears, wrung her hands, and for some time could utter nothing but +passionate exclamations of grief. "Ach! lieber Gott! was für ein +schreckliches Schicksal war das meine!" "What a horrible fate was mine! +I had come thus far to find—not my brother—<i>nur ein Grab</i>!" (only a +grave!) she repeated several times, with an accent of despair. The +unfortunate man had died a year before. The fetters in which he worked +had caused an ulcer in his leg, which he neglected, and, after some +weeks of horrid suffering, death released him. The task-work, for nearly +five years, of this accomplished, and even learned man, in the prime of +his life and mental powers, had been to break stones upon the road, +chained hand and foot, and confounded with the lowest malefactors. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page231" name="page231"></a>[231]</span></p> + +<p> +In giving you thus conscientiously, the mere outline of this story, +I have spared you all comments. I see, by those indignant strides +majestical, that you are making comments to yourself; but sit down and +be quiet, if you can: I have not much more to tell! +</p> +<p> +She found, on inquiry, that some papers and letters, which her unhappy +brother had drawn up by stealth, in the hope of being able at some time +to convey them to his friends, were in the possession of one of the +officers, who readily gave them up to her; and with these she returned, +half broken-hearted, to St. Petersburgh. If her former journey, when +hope cheered her on the way, had been so fearful, what must have been +her return? I was not surprised to hear that, on her arrival, she was +seized with a dangerous illness, and was for many weeks confined to her +bed. +</p> +<p> +Her story excited much commiseration; and a very general interest and +curiosity was excited about herself. She told me that a great many +persons of rank invited her to their houses, and made her rich presents, +among which were the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page232" name="page232"></a>[232]</span> + + splendid shawls and the ring, which had caught my +attention, and excited my surprise, in the first instance. The Emperor +expressed a wish to see her, and very graciously spoke a few words of +condolence. "But they could not bring my brother back to life!" said +she, expressively. He even presented her to the Empress. "And what," +I asked, "did the Empress say to you?" "<i>Nothing</i>; but she looked +<i>so</i>,"—drawing herself up. +</p> +<p> +On receiving her brother's pardon from the Emperor, she had written +home to her family; but she confessed that since that time she had not +written—she had not courage to inflict a blow which might possibly +affect her mother's life; and yet the idea of being obliged to <i>tell</i> +what she dared not write, seemed to strike her with terror. +</p> +<p> +But the strangest event of this strange story remains to be told; and +I will try to give it in her own simple words. +</p> +<p> +She left Petersburgh in October, and proceeded to Riga, where those +who had known her brother received her with interest and kindness, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page233" name="page233"></a>[233]</span> + + and +sympathized in her affliction. "But," said she, "there was one thing +I had resolved to do, which yet remained undone. I was resolved to +see the woman who had been the original cause of all my poor brother's +misfortunes. I thought if once I could say to her, 'Your falsehood has +done this!' I should be satisfied; but my brother's friends dissuaded +me from this idea. They said it was better not; that it could do my +poor Henri no good; that it was wrong; that it was unchristian; and +I submitted. I left Riga with a voiturier. I had reached Pojer, on +the Prussian frontiers, and there I stopped at the Douane, to have my +packages searched. The chief officer looked at the address on my trunk, +and exclaimed, with surprise, 'Mademoiselle Ambos! Are you any relation +of the Professor Henri Ambos?'—'I am his sister.' 'Good God! I was the +intimate friend of your brother! What has become of him?' I then told +him all I have now told you, liebe madame!—and when I came to an end, +this good man burst into tears, and for some time we wept together. The +kutscher, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page234" name="page234"></a>[234]</span> + + (driver,) who was standing by, heard all this conversation, +and when I turned round, he was crying too. My brother's friend pressed +on me offers of service and hospitality, but I could not delay; for, +besides that my impatience to reach home increased every hour, I had +not much money in my purse. Of three thousand dollars, which I had +taken with me to St. Petersburgh, very little remained, so I bade him +farewell, and I proceeded. At the next town, where my kutscher stopped +to feed his horses, he came to the door of my calèche, and said, 'You +have just missed seeing the Jew lady, whom your brother was in love +with; that calèche which passed us by just now, and changed horses here, +contained Mademoiselle S——, her sister, and her sister's husband!' +Good God! imagine my surprise! I could not believe my fortune: it seemed +that Providence had delivered her into my hands, and I was resolved +that she should not escape me. I knew they would be delayed at the +Custom-house. I ordered the man to turn, and drive back as fast as +possible, promising him a reward of a dollar if he overtook + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page235" name="page235"></a>[235]</span> + + them. +On reaching the Custom-house, I saw a calèche standing at a little +distance. I felt myself tremble, and my heart beat so—but not with +fear. I went up to the calèche—two ladies were sitting in it. I +addressed the one who was the most beautiful, and said, 'Are you +Mademoiselle Emilie S——?' I suppose I must have looked very strange, +and wild, and resolute, for she replied, with a frightened manner—'I +am; who are you, and what do you want with me?' I said, 'I am the sister +of Henri Ambos, whom you murdered!' She shrieked out; the men came +running from the house; but I held fast the carriage-door, and said, +'I am not come to hurt you, but you are the murderess of my brother, +Henri Ambos. He loved you, and your falsehood has killed him. May God +punish you for it! May his ghost pursue you to the end of your life!' I +remember no more. I was like one mad. I have just a recollection of her +ghastly, terrified look, and her eyes wide open, staring at me. I fell +into fits; and they carried me into the house of my brother's friend, +and laid me on a + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page236" name="page236"></a>[236]</span> + + bed. When I recovered my senses, the calèche and +all were gone. When I reached Berlin, all this appeared to me so +miraculous—so like a dream—I could not trust to my own recollection, +and I wrote to the officer of Customs, to beg he would attest that it +was really true, and what I had said when I was out of my senses, and +what <i>she</i> had said; and at Leipsic I received his letter, which I will +show you." And at Mayence she showed me this letter, and a number of +other documents; her brother's pardon, with the Emperor's signature; +a letter of the Countess Elise ——; a most touching letter from her +unfortunate brother; (over this she wept much;) and a variety of other +papers, all proving the truth of her story, even to the minutest +particulars. The next morning we were to part. I was going down the +Rhine, and she was to proceed to Deuxponts, which she expected to reach +in two days. As she had travelled from Berlin almost without rest, +except the night we had spent at Frankfort, she appeared to me ready to +sink with fatigue; but she would not bid me farewell that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page237" name="page237"></a>[237]</span> + + night, although +I told her I should be obliged to set off at six the next morning; but +kissing my hand, with many expressions of gratitude, she said she would +be awake and visit me in my room to bid me a last adieu. As there was +only a very narrow passage between the two rooms, she left her door a +little open that she might hear me rise. However, on the following +morning she did not appear. When dressed, I went on tiptoe into her +room, and found her lying in a deep calm sleep, her arm over her head. +I looked at her for some minutes, and thought I had never seen a finer +creature. I then turned, with a whispered blessing and adieu, and went +on my way. +</p> +<p> +This is all I can tell you. If at the time I had not been travelling +<i>against</i> time, and with a mind most fully and painfully occupied, I +believe I should have been tempted to accompany my heroine to Deuxponts—at +least I should have retained her narrative more accurately. Not +having made any memoranda till many days afterwards, all the names have +escaped my recollection; but + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page238" name="page238"></a>[238]</span> + + if you have any doubts of the general truth +of this story, I will at least give you the means of verifying it. +Here is her name, in her own handwriting, on one of the leaves of my +pocket-book—you can read the German character; +</p> +<p class="center"> + <b>Bety Ambos von Zweibruken.</b> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page239" name="page239"></a>[239]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> +<big>SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER.</big> +</p> + +<h2> +PART II. +<br /> +<small> +MEMORANDA AT MUNICH, NUREMBURG, AND DRESDEN. +</small> +</h2> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page240" name="page240"></a>[240]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 2em;"><br /><br /></div> + +<p><!--[Blank Page]--><br /></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page241" name="page241"></a>[241]</span></p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0009" id="h2H_4_0009"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + I. +</h2> +<h3> + MEMORANDA AT MUNICH. +</h3> + +<p> +<span class="sc">Sept.</span> 28th.—A week at Munich! and nothing done! nothing seen! My first +<i>excursions</i> I made to-day—from my bed to the sofa—from the sofa to +the window. Every one told me to be prepared against the caprices of the +climate, but I did not imagine that it would take a week or a fortnight +to be <i>acclimatée</i>. +</p> +<p> +What could induce the princes of Bavaria to plant their capital in the +midst of these wide, marshy, bleak, barren plains, and upon this rough +unmanageable torrent,—"the Isar rolling rapidly,"—when they might have +seated themselves by the majestic Danube? The Tyrolean Alps stretching +south and west, either form a barrier + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page242" name="page242"></a>[242]</span> + + against the most genial airs of +heaven, or if a stray zephyr find his way from Italy, his poor little +wings are frozen to his back among the mountain snows, and he drops +shivering among us, wrapt in a misty cloud. I never saw such fogs: +they are as dense and as white as a fleece, and look, and feel too, +like rarefied snow;—but as no one else complains, I think it must be +indisposition which makes me so peevish and so chilly. Sitting at the +window being my best amusement, I do not like to find the only objects +which are to give me a foretaste of the splendour of Munich, quite +veiled from sight, and shrouded in mist, even for a few morning hours. +</p> +<p> +I am lodged in the Max-Joseph's-Platz, opposite to the theatre: a +situation at once airy, quiet, and cheerful. +</p> +<p> +The theatre is in itself a beautiful object; the portico, of the +Corinthian order, is supported by eight pillars; the ascent is by a +noble flight of steps, with four gigantic bronze candelabras at the +corners; and nothing, at least to my unlearned eyes, could be more +elegant—more purely classical + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page243" name="page243"></a>[243]</span> + + and Greek, than the whole, were it not +for the hideous roof <i>upon the roof</i>,—one pediment, as it were, riding +on the back of the other. Some internal arrangement of the theatre may +render this deformity necessary, but it <i>is</i> a deformity, and one that +annoys me whenever I look at it. +</p> +<p> +On the right, I have the new palace, which forms one side of the square: +a long range of plain, almost rustic, architecture; altogether a striking, +but rather a pleasing contrast, to the luxuriant grace of the theatre. +Just now, when I looked out, what a beautiful scene! The full moon, +rising over the theatre, lights up half the white columns, and half are +lost in shade. The performances are just over; (half-past nine!) crowds +of people emerging from the portico into the brilliant moonshine, (many +of them military, in glittering accoutrements,) descend the steps, and +spread themselves through the square, single, or in various groups; +carriages are drawing up and drawing off,—and all this gay confusion is +without the least noise or tumult. Except the occasional low roll of the +carriage-wheels over the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page244" name="page244"></a>[244]</span> + + well-gravelled road, I hear no sound, though +within a few yards of the spot. It looks like some lovely optical or +scenic illusion; a moving picture, magnified. +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 4th.</i>—To my great consternation—summoned in form before the +police, and condemned to pay a fine of ten florins for having omitted to +fill up specifically a certain paper which had been placed in my hands +on my arrival. In the first place, I did not understand it; secondly, +I never thought about it; and thirdly, I had been too ill to attend to +it. I made a show of resistance, but it was all in vain, of course;—my +permission to reside here is limited to six weeks, but may be renewed. +</p> +<p> +Last night I was induced, but only upon great persuasion, to venture +over to the theatre. I had been tantalised <i>so</i> long by looking at the +exterior! Then it was a pleasant evening—broad daylight; and the whole +theatre being heated by stoves to an even regulated warmth according to +the season, I was assured that once within the doors there would be no +danger of fresh indisposition from draughts or cold. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page245" name="page245"></a>[245]</span></p> + +<p> +Entering the box, my first glance was of course at the stage. The +drop-scene, or curtain, a well painted copy of Guido's Aurora, pleased +me infinitely more than the beautiful drop-curtain at Manheim: <i>that</i> +was very elegant, but this is more than elegant. It harmonized with the +place, and in my own mind it touched certain chords of association, +which had long been silent. It was as if the orchestre had suddenly +welcomed me with some delicious, often-heard, and well-remembered piece +of music: the effect upon the senses was similar—nor can I describe +it;—but, surprised and charmed, I kept my eyes fixed for some minutes +upon the picture: the light being thrown full upon it, while the rest +of the theatre was comparatively in deep shade, like all the foreign +theatres, rendered it more effective. The rest of the decorations +corresponded in splendour; the two colossal muses, as Caryatides +supporting the king's state box, the noble columns of white and gold, +and the Caryatides on each side of the proscenium, were all in fine +taste. The size and proportions of the interior seemed most happily + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page246" name="page246"></a>[246]</span> + + calculated for seeing and hearing. On the whole, I never beheld a +theatre which so entirely <i>satisfied</i> me—no one more easily pleased, +and no one less easily satisfied! +</p> +<p> +When I looked down on the <i>parterre</i>, I beheld a motley assemblage in +various costumes: there were a great number of the military; there were +the well-dressed daughters of people of some condition, in the French +fashion of two or three years back; there were girls in the Tyrolean +costume, with their scarlet boddices and silver chains; and the women of +Munich, with their odd little two-horned caps of rich gold or silver +brocade,—forming altogether a singular spectacle. As for the scenery, +it was very well, but would bear no comparison to Stanfield's glorious +illusions. +</p> +<p> +The inducement held out to me to-night was to see Ferdinand Eslair play +the Duke of Alva in "Egmont." Eslair, formerly one of the first actors +at Manheim, when Manheim boasted the first theatre in Germany, is +esteemed the finest tragedian here, and the Duke of Alva is one of his +best characters. It appeared to me a superb piece + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page247" name="page247"></a>[247]</span> + + of acting; so quietly +stern, so fearfully hard and composed: it was a fine conception cast in +bronze:—in this consisted its beauty and truth as a whole. Some of his +<i>silent</i> passages, and his by-play, were admirable. He gave us, in the +scene with Egmont, an exact living transcript of Titian's famous picture +of the Duke of Alva; the dress, the attitude, the position of the +helmet and the glove on the table beside him, every thing was so well +calculated, at once so unobtrusive and so unexpected, that it was like +a recognition. Egmont was well played by Racke, but did not strike me +so much. Mademoiselle Schöller, who plays the young heroines here, is a +pupil of Madame Schröder, (the German Siddons,) and promises well; but +she wants development; she wants the power, the passion, the tenderness, +the energy of Clärchen. Clärchen is a plebeian girl, but an impassioned +and devoted woman—she is a sort of Flemish Juliet. There is the same +truth of nature and passion, the same impress of intense and luxuriant +life—but then it is a different life—it is a Rubens compared to a +Titian—and such Clärchen ought to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page248" name="page248"></a>[248]</span> + + be. Now to give all the internal +power and poetry, yet preserve all the external simplicity and homeliness +of the character,—to give all the <i>abandon</i>, yet preserve all the +delicacy,—to give the delicacy, yet keep clear of all super-refinement, +and in the concentrated despair of her last scene (where she poisons +herself) to be calm without being cold, and profoundly tragic without +the usual tragedy airs, must be difficult—exceedingly difficult; in +short, to play Clärchen, as I conceive the character ought to be played, +would require a young actress, uniting sufficient genius to conceive +it aright, with sufficient delicacy and judgment not to colour it too +highly: there was no danger of the latter mistake with Mademoiselle +Schöller, in whose hands Clärchen became a mere pretty affectionate +girl. In that lovely scene with Egmont in the third act, which might +be contrasted with Juliet's balcony scene, as a test of the powers of a +young actress, Mademoiselle Schöller was timid even to feebleness; the +change of manner, when Clärchen substitutes the tender familiarity of +the second person singular (Du) for the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page249" name="page249"></a>[249]</span> + + tone of respect in which she +before addressed her lover, should have been felt and marked, so as to +have been <i>felt</i> and <i>remarked</i>: but this was not the case. In short, +I was disappointed by this scene. +</p> +<p> +The Flemish costumes were correct and beautiful. The Prince of Orange, +in particular, looked as if he had just walked out of one of Vandyke's +pictures. +</p> +<p> +After seeing this fine tragedy—surely enough for one evening's +amusement—I was at home and in bed by half-past ten. They manage these +things better here than in England. +</p> +<p> +<i>Friday.</i>—Dinner at the French ambassador's <i>five</i> o'clock. I mark +this, because extraordinarily late at Munich. The plebeian dinner hour +is twelve, or earlier; the general hour, one; the genteel hour, two; +the fashionable hour, <i>three</i>; but five is super-elegant—in the very +extreme of finery—like a nine o'clock dinner in London. There were +present some French and Austrians of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page250" name="page250"></a>[250]</span> + + high rank, who had all visited +England; and the conversation turning on our English aristocratic +society—the only society they knew any thing about—I had another proof +of the ridicule with which foreigners treat our assumption of superior +morality and domestic happiness. But the person who fixed my attention +was Leo von Klenze, the celebrated architect, and deservedly a favourite +of the king, who has, I believe, bestowed on him the superfluous honours +of nobility. With the others, I had no sympathies—with him a thousand, +though he knew it not. I looked at him with curiosity—with interest. +I liked his plain, but marked and clever countenance, and his easy +manners. I felt an unconscious desire to be agreeable, and longed to +make him talk; but I knew that this was not the place or the moment for +us to see each other to the greatest advantage. We had, however, some +little conversation—a kind of beginning. He told me at dinner that the +Glypthothek, (the gallery of sculpture here,) was planned and built by +the present king, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page251" name="page251"></a>[251]</span> + + when only prince royal, and the expenses liquidated +from his private purse, out of his yearly savings. He spoke with modesty +of himself—with gratitude and admiration of the king, of whose talent, +vivacity, impatience, and enthusiasm for art and artists I had already +heard some characteristic anecdotes. +</p> +<p> +After coffee, part of the company dispersed to the opera, or elsewhere; +others remained to lounge and converse. After the opera, we re-assembled +with additions, and then tea, and cards, and talk, till past eleven. +Madame de Vaudreuil receives almost every evening, and this seems to be +the general routine. +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 6.</i>—They are now celebrating here the <i>Volksfest</i>, (literally the +"<i>people's feast</i>,") or annual fair of Munich, and this has been a grand +day of festivity. There have been races, a military review, &c.; but, +except the race-horses in their embroidered trappings, which were led +past my window, and a long cavalcade of royal carriages and crowds of +people, in gay and grotesque costumes, hurrying by, I have seen nothing, +being + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page252" name="page252"></a>[252]</span> + + obliged to keep my room; so I listened to the firing of the cannon, +and the shouts of the populace, and thought. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +<i>Oct. 8.</i>—First visit to the Glypthothek—just returned—my imagination, +still filled with "the blaze, the splendour, and the symmetry,"—excited +as I never thought it could be again excited after seeing the Vatican; +but this is the Vatican in miniature. Can it be possible that this +glorious edifice was planned by a young prince, and erected out of his +yearly savings? I am wonder-struck! I was not prepared for any thing so +spacious, so magnificent, so perfect in taste and arrangement. +</p> +<p> +I do not yet know the exact measurement of the building; but it contains +twelve galleries, the smallest about fifty, and the largest about one +hundred and thirty feet in length. It consists of a square, built round +an open central court, and the approach is by a noble portico of eight +Ionic columns, raised on a flight of steps. As it stands in an open +space, a little out of the town, with trees planted on either side, the +effect is very + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page253" name="page253"></a>[253]</span> + + imposing and beautiful. There are no exterior windows, +they all open into the central court. +</p> +<p> +From the portico we enter a hall, paved with marble. Over the principal +door is the name of the king, and the date of the erection. Two side +doors lead to the galleries. Over the door on the left there is an +inscription to the honour of Leo von Klenze, the architect of the +building. Over the door on the right, is the name of Peter Cornelius, +the painter, by whom the frescos were designed and chiefly executed. +Thus the king, with a noble magnanimity, uniting truth and justice, +has associated in his glory those to whom he chiefly owes it—and this +charmed me. It is in much finer feeling, much higher taste, than those +eternal (no, not <i>eternal</i>!) great N's of that imperial egotist, Napoleon, +whose vulgar appetite for vulgar fame would allow no participation. +</p> +<p> +I walked slowly through the galleries so excited by the feeling of +admiration, that I could make no minute or particular observations. The +floors are all paved with marbles of various colours—the walls, to a +certain height, are stuccoed in imitation + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page254" name="page254"></a>[254]</span> + + of grey or dark green marble, +so as to throw out the sculpture, and give it the full effect. The +utmost luxury of ornament has been lavished on the walls and ceilings, +some in painting, some in relief; but in each, the subjects and +ornaments are appropriate to the situation, and as each gallery has +been originally adapted to its destination, every where the effect to be +produced has been judiciously studied. The light is not too great, nor +too generally diffused—it is poured in from high semicircular windows +on one side only, so as to throw the sculpture into beautiful relief. +Two lofty and spacious halls are richly painted in fresco, with subjects +from the Greek mythology, and the whole building would contain, I +suppose, six times, or ten times, the number of works of art now there; +at the same time all are so arranged that there appears no obvious +deficiency. The collection was begun only in 1808, and since that time +the king has contrived to make some invaluable acquisitions. I found +here many of the most far-famed relics of ancient art, many that I had +already seen in Italy; for instance, the Egina + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page255" name="page255"></a>[255]</span> + + marbles, the Barberini +Faun, the Barberini Muse, or Apollo, the Leucothoë, the Medusa Rondanini +above all, the Ilioneus; but I cannot now dwell on these. I must go +again and again before I can methodise my impressions and recollections. +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 11.</i>—Yesterday and to-day, at the Glypthothek, where the cushioned +seats, though rather more classical than comfortable, enabled me to +lounge away the time, unwearied in body as in mind. +</p> +<p> +The arrangement of the galleries is such as to form not only a splendid +exhibition and school of art, but a regular progressive history of the +rise and decline of sculpture. Thus we step from the vestibule into +the Egyptian gallery, of which the principal treasure is the colossal +Antinous of Rossoantico, with the attributes of Osiris. +</p> +<p> +I admired in this room the exquisite beauty and propriety of the +basso-relievo over the door, designed and modelled by Schwanthaler. It +is of course intended to be symbolical of the birth of art among the +Egyptians. Isis discovers the body of her lost husband Osiris, concealed +in a sarcophagus: + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page256" name="page256"></a>[256]</span> + + she strikes it with the mystic wand, and he stands +revealed, and restored to her. The imitation of the Egyptian style +is perfect. +</p> +<p> +From the Egyptian, we step into the Etruscan gallery, of which the +ceiling is painted in the most vivid and beautiful colours. The third +room contains the famous Egina marbles, which I had seen at Rome when +Thorwaldson was engaged in restoring them. To appreciate the classical +beauty and propriety of the arrangement of these singular relics, we +must call to mind their history, their subject, and their original +destination. Thus Æacus, the first king of the Island of Ægina, was +the son of Jupiter, or rather Zeus, (for the Greek designations are +infinitely more elegant and expressive than the Roman.) The temple +was dedicated to Zeus, and the groups which adorned the pediments +represented the history of the two branches of the Æacidæ, descended +from Telamon and Peleus, sons of Æacus. On two long tables or stands +of marble, supported by griffins, imitated from those which originally +ornamented the temple, are ranged the two groups of figures: + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page257" name="page257"></a>[257]</span> + + neither +group is quite entire. Of that which represents the fight of Telamon +and Hercules with Laomedon, King of Troy, there are only five figures +remaining; and of the other group, the conflict for the body of +Patroclus, there are ten figures. Along the walls, on tables of marble, +are ranged a variety of fragments from the same temple, which must have +been splendidly rich in sculpture, within and without. On the ceiling of +this room, the four Æacidæ, Æacus, Peleus, Achilles, and Neoptolemus, +are represented in relief, by Schwanthaler. There is also a small model +of the western front of the temple restored, and painted as it is proved +to have been originally; (for instance, the field of the Tympanum was of +a sky blue.) This model is fixed in the wall opposite to the window. It +is extremely curious and interesting, but I thought not well placed as +an ornament.<a href="#note-30" name="noteref-30"><small> 30</small></a> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page258" name="page258"></a>[258]</span></p> + +<p> +I remember asking W——, who has been in every part of the world, what +was the most beautiful scene he had ever beheld, taking natural beauty +and poetical associations together? He replied, after a little thought, +"A sunset from the temple of Ægina;"—and I can conceive this. Lord +Byron introduces it into his Grecian Sunset—but as an object— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "On old Ægina's steep and Idra's Isle, </p> +<p class="i2"> The god of gladness sheds his parting smile." </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p> +From the Ægina gallery we enter the Hall of Apollo. The ceiling of this +room, splendidly decorated in white and gold, represents the emblems +of the four principal cities of Greece, viz. the Athenian owl, the +winged-horse of Corinth, the Chimera of Sicyon, and the wolf of Argos. +</p> +<p> +The chief glory of this apartment is that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page259" name="page259"></a>[259]</span> + + celebrated colossal statue, +once known as the Barberini muse, now considered by antiquarians as an +Apollo, and supposed to be the work of Ageladas, the master of Phidias. +It is certainly older than the sculptures of the Parthenon. In its +severe massy grandeur, there is something of the heaviness and formality +of the most ancient Greek school, and in point of style it forms a link +between the Ægina marbles and the Elgin marbles. It should seem that the +eyes of this statue were once represented by gems—the orifices remain, +surrounded by a ring of bronze. +</p> +<p> +In the same room are those two sublime busts which almost take away +one's breath—the colossal head of Pallas, resembling that of the +Minerva of Velletri, now in the Vatican; and the Achilles. +</p> +<p> +The next room is the Hall of Bacchus. The ceiling is richly ornamented +with all the festive emblems of the god, in white and gold relief. In +the centre we have that wondrous statue, the gigantic Sleeping Satyr, +called by some the Barberini Faun. Antiquaries and connoisseurs refer +this work either to Scopas or Praxiteles, and, from + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page260" name="page260"></a>[260]</span> + + the situation in +which it was discovered, suppose it to have once ornamented the tomb +of Adrian. I cannot tell how this may be, but here we behold with +astonishment the grotesque, the elegant, and the sublime mingled +together, and each in perfection: <i>how</i>, I know not; but I feel it +is so. I once saw a drawing of this statue, which gave me the idea of +something coarse and heavy; whereas, in the original, the delicate beauty +of the workmanship, and the inimitable sleepy abandonment of the attitude, +soften the effect of the colossal forms. I would place this statue +immediately after the Elgin marbles; it is, with all its excellence, +a degree lower in style. +</p> +<p> +In this gallery I found the famous head of the laughing faun, called +from the greenish stain on the cheek, the fauno colla macchia, and +also a sarcophagus, representing in the most exquisite sculpture, the +marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne. The blending of the idea of death with +the fullness of life, and even with the most luxuriant and festive +associations of life, is common among the Greeks, and, from one or two +known instances, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page261" name="page261"></a>[261]</span> + + appears to have been carried to an extreme which makes +one shrink; still, any thing rather than our detestable death's head and +cross bones! In nature, and in poetry, death is beautiful. It is the +diseases and vices of artificial life which have rendered it lamentable, +terrible, disgusting. +</p> +<p> +Fixed in the wall, opposite to the window, there is a bas relief of +amazing beauty—the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite. It is a piece +of lyric poetry. +</p> +<p> +The Hall of Niobe contains few objects; but among them some of the most +perfect specimens of Grecian art; and first, the <span class="sc">Ilioneus</span>. +</p> +<p> +It was because the Grecian sculptors were themselves poets and creators, +that "marble grew divine" beneath their hands, and became so instinct +with the indestructible spirit of life, that their half-defaced ruins +retain their immortality: else how should we stand shivering with +awe before those tremendous fragments—the sister Fates in the Elgin +marbles! Or, how should I, who am incapable of estimating the technical +perfection of art, stand entranced—as to-day I stood—before the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page262" name="page262"></a>[262]</span> + + Ilioneus? It was not merely admiration; it was the overpowering +sentiment of harmonious and pathetic beauty running along every +nerve—such a feeling as music has sometimes awakened. I suppose the +Ilioneus stands alone, like the Torso of the Vatican—the <i>ne plus +ultra</i> of grace, as the latter is of grandeur. +</p> +<p> +The first time I ever saw a cast of this divine statue was in the +vestibule of Goethe's house, at Weimar. It immediately fixed my +attention. Afterwards I saw another in Dannecker's studio, and from him +I learned its history. It was discovered about ten years ago at Prague, +in the possession of a stone-mason, and is supposed to have formed part +of the collection of ancient works of art which the Emperor Rodolph +collected in Italy about 1600.<a href="#note-31" name="noteref-31"><small> 31</small></a> A certain Dr. Barth purchased it + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page263" name="page263"></a>[263]</span> + + for a trifle, and brought it to Vienna, where Dannecker happened to +be at that time, and was called upon with others to pronounce on its +merits and value. It was at once attributed to the hand, either of +Praxiteles or Scopas, and on farther and minute examination, the style, +the proportions, and the evident purport of the figure, have decided +that it belongs to the group of Niobe and her children. It has attained +the appellation of Ilioneus, which Ovid gives to the youngest of her +sons. It represents a youth kneeling. The head and arms are wanting; +but the supplicatory expression of the attitude, the turn of the body, +so deprecating, so imploring; the bloom of adolescence, which seems +absolutely shed over the cold marble, the unequalled delicacy and +elegance of the whole, touched me unspeakably. +</p> +<p> +The King of Bavaria is said to have paid for this exquisite relic 15,000 +florins—a large sum for a little potentate; but for the object itself, +its value is not to be computed by money. Its weight in gold were poor +in comparison. +</p> +<p> +In the same room is the Medusa Rondanini, the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page264" name="page264"></a>[264]</span> + + common model of almost all +the Medusa heads, but certainly not equal to the sublime colossal mask +at Cologne. There is also an antique duplicate of the Mercury of the +Belvidere; another of the Venus of Cnidos; another (most beautiful) +of one of the sons of Niobe, recumbent, lifeless; and some other +master-pieces. +</p> +<p> +These six rooms occupy one side of the building, and contain altogether +one hundred and forty-seven specimens of ancient art. +</p> +<p> +I do not quite understand Flaxman's division of ancient art into three +periods—the heroic age, the philosophic age, and the age of perfection. +Perhaps if he had lived to correct his essays, he would have made +this more clear. According to his distinction, would not the group of +the Niobe belong to the age of perfection?—and the Parthenon to the +philosophic age? which, allowing his definition of the two styles, I +cannot grant. I suppose these six galleries include a period of about +seven hundred years; (putting the dateless antiquity of some of the +Egyptian relics out of the question.) We begin with the heavy motionless +forms, "looking + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page265" name="page265"></a>[265]</span> + + tranquillity," which yet have often a certain dignity; +then the stiff hard elaborate figures of the earliest Greek school, with +their curled heads and perpendicular draperies, in some of which dawns +the first feeling of vigour and grace, as in the Ægina marbles; the +next is the union of grandeur and elegance; and the next is the utmost +poetical refinement. I recollect that somewhere in Boswell's life of +Johnson, a conversation is recorded as taking place at the table of Sir +Joshua Reynolds; in the course of which Sir Joshua remarked, that it +was impossible to conceive what the ancient writers meant, when they +represented sculpture as having passed its zenith when the Apollo and +the Laocoon were produced. None of the great scholars or artists then +present could explain the mystery—now no longer a mystery. When Sir +Joshua made this remark, the Elgin marbles were unknown in England. +</p> +<p> +Between this range of galleries, and a corresponding range on the +opposite side, are two immense halls, called the Fest-Saale, or banqueting +halls, and as yet containing no sculpture. Here + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page266" name="page266"></a>[266]</span> + + the painter Cornelius +has found "ample space and verge enough" for his grand conceptions, and +the subjects are appropriate to the general destination of the whole +building. The frescos in the first hall, (Götter-Saal, or hall of the +gods,) present a magnificent view of the whole Greek mythology. +</p> +<p> +Whatever may be thought of the conception and execution of certain +parts, on minute examination the grand, yet simple arrangement of the +whole design addresses itself to the understanding, while the splendour +of colour, and variety of the grouping, seize on the imagination: +certainly, when we look round, the first feeling is not critical. But +this beautiful, progressive, and pictorial development of the old +mythology, as it must have been the result of profound learning and +study, ought to be considered methodically to understand all its merit; +for instance, in the centre of the roof we have the primeval god, Eros, +in four compartments; first, with the dolphin, representing water; +secondly, with the eagle, representing light or fire; thirdly, with the +peacock, representing air; and lastly, with Cerberus, representing +earth. Disposed around these + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page267" name="page267"></a>[267]</span> + + primeval elements, we have the seasons of +the year, and the day. The spring, as Psyche, is followed by the history +of Aurora, (the morning,) in four compartments. The summer, as Ceres, +is followed by the noon, i. e. the history of Helios or Apollo, in four +compartments. The autumn, as Bacchus; and then evening, expressed in the +history of Diana. Winter, as Saturn, and the history of night, and the +divinities which preside over it. These twenty-four compartments, of +various forms and sizes, compose the ceiling, intermingled with ornaments +of rich and rare device, and appropriate arabesques, combining, with +much fancy and invention, all the classical emblems and allegories, such +as satyrs, fauns, syrens, dryads, Graces, Furies, &c. &c. +</p> +<p> +But the grand summary is reserved for the walls. On one side is +represented the kingdom of Olympus, with Jove in his state, the assemblage +of the gods, and the apotheosis of Psyche. The opposite side represents +the domain of Pluto, with the infernal gods, and the story of Orpheus. +The third side, over against the window, is the triumph + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page268" name="page268"></a>[268]</span> + + of Neptune and +Amphitrite, surrounded by the sea-gods. +</p> +<p> +The figures in these three frescos are colossal, about eight feet in +height. The colouring of the flesh is a little too red and dingy, and +in some of the attitudes I thought that the energy was strained into +contortion; but through the whole there is a grand poetic feeling. All +the designs are by Peter Cornelius, executed by himself, with the aid of +professor Zimmerman, Schlotthauer, Heinrich Hess, and a number of pupils +and assistants. +</p> +<p> +There are also along the frieze some beautiful bas-reliefs; and over the +two doors are two alto-relievos by Schwanthaler, the one representing +Cupid and Psyche in each others arms, the symbol of immortal love: the +other, the re-union of Ceres and Proserpine, emblematical of eternal +life after death. This is all I can remember, except that the painting +of this hall occupied six years, and was finished in 1826. +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 11.</i>—A small vestibule divides the two great halls. This is +painted with the history of Prometheus and Pandora; but, owing to the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page269" name="page269"></a>[269]</span> + + unavoidable disposition of the light, much of the beauty is lost. +</p> +<p> +From this vestibule we enter the second great banqueting hall, or the +Hall of the Trojans, painted like the former in fresco, and on the +same enormous scale, but with a different distribution of the parts. +It represents chiefly the history of those demigods and heroes who +contended in the Trojan war. Thus, in the centre of the ceiling we have +first the original cause of the war, the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, +and the appearance of the goddess of Discord, with her fatal apple. +Around this are the twelve gods who were present at the feast, modelled +in relief by Schwanthaler. Then follow twelve compartments, containing +the most striking scenes of the Iliad, divided and adorned by the most +rich and fanciful arabesques, combining the exploits or histories of +the Grecian heroes, which are not included in the Iliad. The figures in +these compartments are the size of life. On the walls we have the three +principal incidents of the Trojan war; first, the wrath of Achilles; +secondly, opposite to the window, the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page270" name="page270"></a>[270]</span> + + fight for the body of Patrocles, +and Achilles shouting to the warriors. There is wonderful energy and +movement in this picture. The third is the destruction of Troy. The +figure of Hecuba sitting in motionless horror and despair, with her +dishevelled grey hair, her daughters clinging to her;—the beautiful +attitudes of Polyxena and Cassandra; the silent remorse of Helen; the +wild fury of the conquerors, and the vigour and splendour of the whole +painting, render this composition exceedingly striking:—I did not +quite like the figure of Priam. All these designs are by Cornelius, and +executed partly by him, and partly under his direction by Zimmermann, +Schlotthauer, and their pupils. The arabesques are by Eugene Neureuther: +and there are two admirable and spirited bas-reliefs by Schwanthaler—one +representing the battle of the ships, and the other the combat of Achilles +with the river gods. +</p> +<p> +The paintings in this hall were finished in 1830. +</p> +<p> +We then enter the range of galleries, devoted to the later Greek, and +the Roman sculpture. The first, corresponding in size and situation with +the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page271" name="page271"></a>[271]</span> + + Hall of Niobe, contains nothing peculiarly interesting, except the +famous figure of the young warrior anointing himself after the bath, and +called the Alexander. +</p> +<p> +The next gallery is the Roman Hall, about one hundred and thirty feet +in length, and forms a glorious <i>coup d'œil</i>. The utmost luxury of +architectural decoration has been lavished on the ceilings; and the +effect of the marble pavement, with the disposition of the busts, +candelabræ, altars, as seen in perspective, is truly and tastefully +magnificent. I particularly admired the ceiling, which is divided into +three domes, adorned with bas-reliefs, taken from the Roman history and +manners: these were designed by Schwanthaler. I cannot remember any +thing remarkable in this gallery; or rather, there were too many things +deserving of notice, for me to note all. The standing Agrippina has, +however, dwelt on my mind; and an exceeding fine bust of Octavius Cæsar, +crowned with the oak leaves. +</p> +<p> +A small room contains the sculpture in coloured marble, porphyry, and +bronze; and the last is the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page272" name="page272"></a>[272]</span> + + hall of modern sculpture. In the centre of +the ceiling is a phœnix, rising from its ashes, and around it the heads +of four distinguished sculptors—Nicolo da Pisa, the restorer of the art +in the fourteenth century; Michael Angelo, Canova, and Thorwaldson. +</p> +<p> +Two of the most celebrated productions of modern sculpture are +here:—the Paris of Canova, and the Adonis of Thorwaldson. As they are +placed near to each other, and the aim is alike in both to exhibit the +utmost perfection of youthful and effeminate beauty, the merits of the +two artists were fairly brought into comparison. Thorwaldson's statue +reminded me of the Antinous; Canova's recalled the young Apollo. I +hardly know which to prefer as a conception; but the material and +workmanship of the Paris pleased me most. The marble of Thorwaldson's +statue, though faultless in purity of tint, has a coarse <i>gritty</i> grain, +and glitters disagreeably in certain lights, as if it were spar or +lump-sugar; whereas the smooth close compact grain of Canova's marble, +which is something of a creamy white, seemed to me + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page273" name="page273"></a>[273]</span> + + infinitely preferable +to the eye. This, however, is hyper-criticism: in both, the feeling is +classically and beautifully true. The soft melancholy of the countenance +and attitude of Adonis, as if anticipative of his early death, and the +languid self-sufficiency of Paris, appeared to me equally admirable. +There is also in this room a duplicate by Canova of his Venus, in the +Pitti palace; a girl tying her sandal, by Rodolph Schadow—a pendant, +I presume, to his charming Filatrice, now at Chatsworth; and some fine +busts. I looked round in vain for a single specimen of English art. +I thought it just possible that some work of Flaxman, or Chantrey, or +Gibson, might have found its way hither—but no!— +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 12.</i>—Last night to the opera with a pleasant party; but, tired +and over-excited with my morning at the Glyptothek, I wanted soothing, +and was not in a humour for the noisy florid music of Wilhelm Tell. +It is an opera which, as it becomes familiar, tires, and does not +attach—just like some clever people I have met with. Pellegrini (not +the Pelligrini we had in England, but a fixture + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page274" name="page274"></a>[274]</span> + + here, and their best +male singer—a fine <i>basso cantante</i>) acted Tell. I say <i>acted</i>, because +he did not merely sing his part—he acted it, and well; so well, that +once I felt my eyes moisten. Madame Spitzeder sang in Matilda von +Hapsburg tolerably. Their first tenor, Bayer, I do not like; his +intonation is defective. The decorations and dresses are beautiful. As +for the dancing, it is not fair to say any thing about it. Unfortunately +the first bars of the Tyrolienne brought Taglioni before my mind's eye, +and who or what could stand the comparison? How she leapt like a stag! +bounded like a young faun! floated like the swan-down on the air! Yet +even Taglioni, though she makes the nearest approach to it, does not +complete my idea of a poetical dancer; but as she improved upon Herbelet, +we may find another to improve upon <i>her</i>. One more such <i>artist</i>—I use +the word in the general and German sense, not in the French meaning—one +more such artist, who should bring modesty, and sense, and feeling, into +this lovely and most desecrated art, might do something to retrieve +it—might introduce the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page275" name="page275"></a>[275]</span> + + necessity for dancers having heads as well as +heels, and in time revolutionize the whole <i>corps de ballet</i>. +</p> +<p> +<i>Wednesday.</i>—This morning, M. Herman Stuntz, the King's chapel-master, +called on me. I had heard of him as a fine composer, and also much of +his opera, produced for the Scala at Milan, the Costantino il Grande. +I was pleased to find him not a musician only, like most musicians, but +intelligent and enthusiastic on other subjects, and with that childlike +simplicity of mind and manner, so often combined with talent. We touched +upon every thing from the high sublime to the deep absurd—ran round the +whole circle of art in a sort of touch-and-go style, and his <i>naïveté</i> +and originality pleased me more and more. He said some true and +delightful things about music; but would insist that of all languages +the English is the most difficult to ally to musical sounds—infinitely +worse than German. He complained of the shut mouth, the <i>claquement +des dents</i>, and the predominance of aspirates in our pronunciation. +I objected to the guttural sounds, and the open mouths, and the <i>yaw +yaw</i> of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page276" name="page276"></a>[276]</span> + + the Germans. Then followed an animated discussion on vocal sounds +and musical expression, and we parted, I believe, mutually pleased. +</p> +<p> +The father of Stuntz is a Swiss—a man of letters, an enthusiast, a +philosopher, an artist; in short, a most extraordinary and eccentric +character. He entirely educated his two children, of whom the son, +Herman Stuntz, takes a high rank as a composer; and the daughter is a +distinguished female artist, but, being nobly married, she now only +paints pictures to give them away, and those who possess them are, with +reason, extremely proud of the possession. +</p> +<p> +In the evening, Madame Meric, <i>prima-donna aus London</i>, as the +play-bills set forth, made her first appearance in the Gazza Ladra. She +is engaged here for a limited time, and takes the <i>gast-rolles</i>—that +is, she plays the first parts as a matter of course—in short, she is a +<small class="sc">STAR</small>. The regular prima-donna is Madame Scheckner-Wagen. Meric has talent, +voice, style, and unwearied industry; but she has not <i>genius</i>, neither +is her organ first-rate. Comparisons in some cases are unjust as + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page277" name="page277"></a>[277]</span> + + well as +odious. Yet was it my fault that I remembered in the same part the syren +Sontag, and the enchantress Malibran? Meric, besides being a fine singer, +is an amiable woman;—married to an extravagant, dissipated husband, and +working to provide for her child—a common fate among the women of her +profession. +</p> +<hr /> +<p> +——Sat up late reading, for the third or fourth time, a chance volume +of Madame Roland's works. What a complete French woman! but then, what +a mind! how large in capacity! how stored with knowledge! how strong +in conscious truth! how finely toned! how soft, and yet how firm! What +wonderful industry united to the quickest talent! Some things written +at eighteen and twenty have most surprised me; some passages in the +"Vie privée," and the "Appel," have most charmed me. She is not very +eloquent, and I should think had not a playful or poetic fancy. There +is an almost total want of imagery in her style; but great power, +unaffected elegance, with a sort of negligence at times, which adds to +its beauty. Then, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page278" name="page278"></a>[278]</span> + + to remember that all I have just read was written in +a prison, in daily, hourly expectation of death! but <i>that</i> excites more +interest than surprise, for a situation of strong excitement of mind +and passion, with external repose and solitude, must be favourable to +this development of the faculties, where there is character as well as +talent. Some of her disclosures are a little too <i>naïve</i>. I am amused +by the quantity of feminine vanity which is mixed up with all this +loftiness of spirit, this real independence of soul. Madame de Staël had +not <i>more</i> vanity, whatever they may say; but it was less balanced by +self-esteem—it required more sympathy. Then we have those two admirable +women * * and * *. What exquisite feminine vanity is there! Yet, happily, +in both instances how far removed from all ill-nature and presumption, +and how unconsciously betrayed! I should think Joanna Baillie, among our +great women, must be most exempt from this failing, perhaps, because, of +all the five, she has the most profound sense of religion. Lavater said, +that "the characteristic of <i>every</i> woman's physiognomy was + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page279" name="page279"></a>[279]</span> + + vanity." +A phrenologist would say that it was the characteristic of every woman's +head. How far, then, may a woman be vain with a good grace and betray +it without ridicule? By vanity, I mean <i>now</i>, a great wish to please, +mingled with a consciousness of the powers of pleasing, and not what +Madame Roland describes,—"cette ambition constante, ce soin perpetuel +d'occuper de soi, et de paraitre autre ou meilleur que l'on n'est en +effet," for this is diseased vanity. +</p> +<hr /> +<p> +Dr. Martius<a href="#note-32" name="noteref-32"><small> 32</small></a> lent me two pretty little volumes of "Poems, by Louis +I. king of Bavaria," the present king—the first royal author we have +had, I believe, since Frederic of Prussia—the best since James I. of +Scotland. These poems are chiefly lyrical, consisting of odes, sonnets, +epigrams. Some are addressed to the queen, others to his children, others +to different ladies of the court, whom he is said to have particularly +admired, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page280" name="page280"></a>[280]</span> + + a great number were composed during his tour in Italy in +1817. Of the merit of these poems I cannot judge; and when I appealed to +two different critics, both accomplished men, one assured me they were +admirable; the other shrugged up his shoulders—"Que voulez vous? c'est +un Roi!" The earnest feeling and taste in some of these little poems +pleased me exceedingly—of that alone I could judge: for instance, there +is an address to the German artists, which contains the following +beautiful lines: he is speaking of art— +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> "In der Stille muss es sich gestalten, </p> +<p class="i2"> Wenn es kräftig wirkend soll ersteh'n; </p> +<p class="i2"> Aus dem Herzen nur kann sich entfalten, </p> +<p class="i2"> Das was wahrhaft wird zum Herzen geh'n. </p> +</div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> Ja! ihr nehmet es aus reinen Tiefen, </p> +<p class="i2"> Fromm und einfach, wie die Vorweit war, </p> +<p class="i2"> Weckend die Gefühle, welche schliefen, </p> +<p class="i2"> Ehrend zeugt's von Euch und immerdar. </p> +</div> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> Sklavisch an das Alte euch zu halten, </p> +<p class="i2"> Eures Strebens Zweck ist dieses nicht </p> +<p class="i2"> Seyd gefasst von himmlischen Gewalten, </p> +<p class="i2"> Dringet rastlos zu dem hehren Licht!" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page281" name="page281"></a>[281]</span></p> + +<p> +Which may be thus literally rendered— +</p> +<p class="quote"> + "To rise into vigorous, active influence, it (art) must spring + up and develop itself in secrecy and in silence; out of the + heart alone can that unfold itself which shall truly go to the + heart again. +</p> +<p class="quote"> + "Yes! pious and simple as the old world was, ye draw it (art) + from the same pure depths, awakening the feelings which slumber! + and it shall bear honourable witness of ye—and for ever! +</p> +<p class="quote"> + "Slavishly to cling to antiquity, this is not the end of your + labours! Be ye, therefore, upheld by heavenly power; press on, + and rest not, to the high and holy light!" +</p> +<p> +Methinks this magnificent prince deserves, even more than his ancestor, +Maximilian I., to be styled the Lorenzo de' Medici of Bavaria. The power +to patronize, the sentiment to feel, the genius to celebrate art, are +rarely united, even in individuals. He must be a noble being—a genius +<i>born in the purple</i>, on whose laurels there rests not a bloodstain, +perhaps not even a tear! +</p> +<p> +This is a holiday. I was sitting at my window, translating some of these +poems, when I saw a crowd round the doors of the new palace; for it is + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page282" name="page282"></a>[282]</span> + + a day of public admission. Curiosity tempted me to join this crowd;—no +sooner thought than done. I had M. de Klenze's general order for +admittance in my pocket-book, but wished to see how this was managed, +and mingled with the crowd, which was waiting to be admitted <i>en masse</i>. +I was at once recognized as a stranger, and every one with simple +civility made way for me. Groups of about twenty or thirty people were +admitted at a time, at intervals of a quarter of an hour, and each group +placed under the guidance of one of the workmen as cicerone. He led +them through the unfinished apartments, explaining to his open-mouthed +auditors the destination of each room, the subjects of the pictures on +the walls and ceilings, &c. &c. There were peasants from the south, +in their singular dresses, mechanics and girls of Munich, soldiers, +travelling students. I was much amused. While the cicerone held +forth, some merely wondered with foolish faces, some admired, some +looked intelligent, and asked various questions, which were readily +answered—all seemed pleased. Every thing was done in order: two + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page283" name="page283"></a>[283]</span> + + groups were never in the same apartment; but as one went out, another +entered. Thus many hundreds of these poor people were gratified in the +course of the day. It seemed to me a wise as well as benevolent policy +in the king thus to appeal to the sympathy, and gratify the pride, of +his subjects of all classes, by allowing them—inviting them, to take an +interest in his magnificent undertakings, to consider them <i>national</i> +as well as royal. I am informed that these works are carried on without +any demands on the Staatskasse, (the public treasury,) and without +any additional taxes: so far from it, that the Bavarian House of +Representatives curtailed the supplies by 300,000 florins only last +year, and refused the king an addition to the civil list, which he had +requested for the travelling expenses of two of his sons. The king is +said to be economical in the <i>extreme</i> in his domestic expenses, and not +very generous in money to those around him—unlike his open-hearted, +open-handed father, Max-Joseph; in short, there are grumblers here as +elsewhere, but strangers and posterity will not sympathize with them. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page284" name="page284"></a>[284]</span></p> + +<p> +This is the fourth time I have seen this splendid and truly royal +palace, but will make no memoranda till I have gone over the whole with +Leo von Klenze. He has promised to be my cicerone himself, and I feel +the full value of the compliment. Count V—— told me last night, that +he (De Klenze) has made for this building alone upwards of seven hundred +drawings and designs with his own hand. +</p> +<p> +<i>Oct. 13.</i>—Called on my English friends, the C * * s, and found them +pleasantly settled in a beautiful furnished lodging near the Hofgarten, +for which they pay twenty-four florins (or about two pounds) a month. +We had some conversation about music, (they are all musicians,) and the +opera, and Malibran, whom they have lately seen in Italy; and Pasta, +whom they had visited at Como; and they confirmed what Mr. J. M. Stuntz +and M. K. had all told me of her benevolence and excellent character. +I could not find that any new genius had arisen in Italy to share the +glory of our three queens of the lyrical drama,—Pasta, Malibran, and +Schröder Devrient. Other singers have more or less talent and feeling, +more + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page285" name="page285"></a>[285]</span> + + or less compass of voice, facility, or agility; but these three +women possess <i>genius</i>, and stamp on every thing they do their own +individual character. Of the three, Pasta is the grandest and most +finished artist; Malibran the most versatile in power and passion; while +Schröder Devrient has that energy of heart and soul—that capacity for +exciting, and being excited, which gives her such unbounded command +over the feelings and senses of her audience.<a href="#note-33" name="noteref-33"><small> 33</small></a> So far we were agreed; +but as the conversation went on, I was doomed to listen to a torrent +of commonplace and sarcastic criticism on the private habits of these +and other women of the same profession: one was accused of vulgarity, +another of bad temper, and another of violence and caprice: one was +suspected of a <i>penchant</i> for porter, another had been heard to swear, +or—something very like it. Even pretty lady-like Sontag was reproached +with some trifling breach of mere conventional manner,—she had + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page286" name="page286"></a>[286]</span> + + used her +fingers where she should have taken a spoon, or some such nonsense. +My God! to think of the situation of these women! and then to look +upon <i>those</i> women, who, fenced in from infancy by all the restraints, +the refinements, the comforts, the precepts of good society,—the one +arranging a new cap, the other embroidering a purse, the third reading +a novel, all satisfied with petty occupations and amusements, "far, far +removed from want and grief and fear,"—now sitting in judgment, and +passing sentence of excommunication on others of their sex, who have +been steeped in excitement from childhood, their nerves for ever in a +state of tension between severest application and maddening flattery; +cast on the world without chart or compass—with energies misdirected, +passions uncontrolled, and all the inflammable and imaginative part of +their being cultivated into excess as a part of their profession—of +their material! O when will there be charity in the world? When will +human beings, women especially, show mercy and justice to each other, +and not judge of results, without a reference to + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page287" name="page287"></a>[287]</span> + + causes? and when will +reflection upon these causes lead to their removal? They are evils which +press upon few, but are reflected on many, inasmuch as they degrade art +and the pursuit of art;—but all can sneer, and few can think. +</p> +<hr /> +<p> +I begin at length to feel my way among the pictures here. Hitherto +I have been bewildered. I have lounged away morning after morning +at the gallery of the Hofgarten, at Schleissheim, and at the Duc +de Leuchtenberg's; and returned home with dazzled eyes and a mind +overflowing, like one "oppressed with wealth, and with abundance +sad," unable to recall or to methodize my own impressions. +</p> +<p> +Professor Zimmermann tells me that the king of Bavaria possesses +upwards of three thousand pictures: of these about seventeen hundred +are at Schleissheim; nine hundred in the Munich gallery; and the rest +distributed through various palaces. The national gallery, or Pinakothek, +which is now building under the direction of Leo von Klenze, is destined +to contain a selection from + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page288" name="page288"></a>[288]</span> + + these multifarious treasures, of which the +present arrangement is only temporary. +</p> +<p> +The king of Bavaria unites in his own person the three branches of +the House of Wittelsbach: the palatines of the Rhine, the dukes of +Deuxponts, and the electors of Bavaria, all sovereign houses, and +descended from Otto von Wittelsbach, who received the investiture of the +dukedom of Bavaria in 1180. Thus it is that the celebrated gallery once +at Dusseldorf, formed under the auspices of the elector John William; +the various collections at Manheim, Deuxponts, and Heidelberg, are now +concentrated at Munich, where, from the days of Duke Albert V. (1550) +up to the present time, works of art have been gradually accumulated +by successive princes. +</p> +<p> +Somebody calls the gallery at Munich, the court of Rubens; and Sir +Joshua Reynolds says that no one should judge of Rubens who had not +studied him at Antwerp and Dusseldorf. I begin to feel the truth of +this. My devoted worship of the Italian school of art rendered me +long—I will not say <i>blind</i> to the merits of the Flemish painters—for + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page289" name="page289"></a>[289]</span> + + that were to be "sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing!" but, in +truth, without that full feeling of their power which I have since +acquired. +</p> +<p> +Certainly we have in these days mean ideas about painting—mean and +false ideas! It has become a mere object of luxury and connoisseurship, +or <i>virtù</i>: unless it be addressed to our personal vanity, or to the +puerile taste for ornament, show, furniture,—it is nothing. The noble +art which was once recognized as the priestess of nature, as a great +moral power capable of acting on the senses and the imagination of +assembled human beings—as such applied by the lawgivers of Greece, and +by the clergy of the Roman Catholic church,—how is it now vulgarized +in its objects! how narrowed in its application! And if it be said, +that in the present state of society, in these calculating, money-making, +political, intellectual times, we are acted upon by far different +influences, rendering us infinitely less sensible to the power of +painting, then I think it is <i>not true</i>, and that the cultivated +susceptibility to other moral or poetical excitements—as politics or +literature—does + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page290" name="page290"></a>[290]</span> + + not render us less sensible to the moral influence +of painting; on the contrary: but she has fallen from her high estate, +and there are none to raise her. The public—the national spirit, is +wanting; individual patronage is confined, is misdirected, is arbitrary, +demanding of the artist any thing rather than the highest and purest +intellectual application of his art, and affording nor space nor +opportunity for him to address himself to the grand universal passions, +principles, and interests of human nature! Suppose a Michael Angelo +to be born to us in England: we should not, perhaps, set him to make +a statue of snow, but where or how would his gigantic genius, which +revelled in the great deeps of passion and imagination, find scope for +action? He would struggle and gasp like a stranded Leviathan! +</p> +<p> +But this is digressing: the question is, may not the moral effect of +painting be still counted on, if the painter be himself imbued with the +right spirit?<a href="#note-34" name="noteref-34"><small> 34</small></a> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page291" name="page291"></a>[291]</span></p> + +<p> +There is, in the academy at Antwerp, a picture by Rubens, which represents +St. Theresa kneeling before Christ, and interceding for the souls in +purgatory. The treatment of the subject is exceedingly simple; the +upper part of the picture is occupied by the Redeemer, with his usual +attributes, and the saint, habited as a nun. In the lower part of the +picture, instead of a confused mob of tormented souls, and flames, and +devils with pitchforks, the painter has represented a few heads as if +rising from below. I remember those of Adam, Eve, and Mary Magdalene. I +remember—and never shall forget—the expression of each! The extremity +of misery in the countenance of Adam; the averted, disconsolate, repentant +wretchedness of Eve, who hides her face in her hair; the mixture of agony, +supplication, hope, in the face of the Magdalene, while a cherub of pity +extends + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page292" name="page292"></a>[292]</span> + + his hand to her, as if to aid her to rise, and at the same +time turns an imploring look towards the Saviour. As I gazed upon this +picture, a feeling sank deep into my heart, which did not pass away with +the tears it made to flow, but has ever since remained there, and has +become an abiding principle of action. This is only one instance out of +many, of the <i>moral</i> effect which has been produced by painting. +</p> +<p> +To me it is amusing, and it cannot but be interesting and instructive to +the philosopher and artist, to observe how various people, uninitiated +into any of the technicalities of art, unable to appreciate the amount +of difficulties overcome, are affected by pictures and sculpture. But +in forming our judgment, our taste in art, it is unsafe to listen to +opinions springing from this vague kind of enthusiasm; for in painting, +as in music—"just as the soul is pitched, the <i>eye</i> is pleased." +</p> +<p> +I amuse myself in the gallery here with watching the countenances of +those who look at the pictures. I see that the uneducated eye is caught +by subjects in which the individual mind + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page293" name="page293"></a>[293]</span> + + sympathizes, and the educated +taste seeks abstract excellence. Which has the most enjoyment? The last, +I think. Sensibility, imagination, and quick perception of form and +colour, are not alone necessary to feel a work of art; there must be the +power of association; the mind trained to habitual sympathy with the +beautiful and the good; the knowledge of the meaning, and the +comprehension of the object of the artist. +</p> +<p> +In the gallery here there are eighty-eight pictures of Rubens—some +among the very finest he ever painted; for instance, that splendid +picture, Castor and Pollux carrying off the daughters of Leucippus, so +full of rich life and movement; the destruction of Sennacherib's host; +Rubens and his wife, full lengths, seated in a garden; that wonderful +picture of the defeat of the Amazons; the meeting of Jacob and Laban; +the picture of the Earl of Arundel and his wife, with other figures, +full lengths;<a href="#note-35" name="noteref-35"><small> 35</small></a> and a series of the designs for the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page294" name="page294"></a>[294]</span> + + large paintings +of the history of Marie de' Medici, now in the Louvre. His group of boys +with fruits and flowers, exhibits the richest, loveliest combination +of colours ever presented to the eye; and on that wonderful picture of +the fallen (or rather <i>falling</i>) angels, he has lavished such endless +variety of form, attitude, and expression, that it would take a day to +study it. It is not a large picture: the eye, or rather the imagination, +easily takes in the general effect of tumult, horror, destruction, but +the understanding dwells on the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page295" name="page295"></a>[295]</span> + + detail with still increasing astonishment +and admiration. These are a few that struck me, but it is quite in vain +to attempt to particularize. +</p> +<p> +One may begin by disliking Rubens in general, (I think I did,) but one +must end by standing before him in ecstacy and wonder. It is true, that +always luxuriant, he is often gross and sensual—he can sometimes be +brutally so. His bacchanalian scenes are not like those of Poussin, +classical, godlike debauchery, but the abandoned drunken revelry of +animals—the very sublime of brute licentiousness; and painted with a +breadth of style, a magnificent luxuriance of colour, which renders them +more revolting. The <i>physique</i> predominates in all his pictures, and not +only to grossness, even to ferocity. His picture here of the slaughter +of the Innocents, makes me sick—it has absolutely polluted my +imagination. Surely this is not the vocation of high art.—And as for +his martyrdoms—they are worse than Spagnoletto's. +</p> +<p> +For all this, he is the <span class="sc">Titan</span> of painting: his creations are "of the earth +and earthy," but he + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page296" name="page296"></a>[296]</span> + + has called down fire and light from heaven, wherewith +to animate and to illumine them. +</p> +<p> +Rubens is just such a painter as Dryden is a poet, and <i>vice versâ</i>: +his women are just like Dryden's women, gross, exaggerated, unrefined +animals: his men, like Dryden's men, grand, thinking, acting animals. +Like Dryden, he could clothe his genius in thunder, dip his pencil in +the lightning and the sunbeams of heaven, and rush fearlessly upon a +subject which others had trembled to approach. In both we see a singular +and extraordinary combination of the plainest, coarsest realities of +life, with the loftiest imagery, the most luxurious tints of poetry. +Both had the same passion for allegory, and managed it with equal +success. "The thoughts that breathe and words that burn" of Dryden, may +be compared to the living, moving forms, the glowing, melting, dazzling +hues of Rubens, under whose pencil +</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i16"> "Desires and adorations, </p> +<p class="i2"> Winged persuasions and wild destinies, </p> +<p class="i2"> Splendours, and glooms, and glimmering incarnations </p> +<p class="i2"> Of hopes, and fears, and twilight fantasies,—" </p> +</div> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page297" name="page297"></a>[297]</span></p> + +<p class="continued"> + took form and being—became palpable +existences: and yet with all this inventive power, this love of +allegorical fiction, it is <i>life</i>, the spirit of animal life, diffused +through and over their works; it is the blending of the plain reasoning +with splendid creative powers;—of wonderful fertility of conception +with more wonderful facility of execution; it is the combination of +truth, and grandeur, and masculine vigour, with a general coarseness of +taste, which may be said to characterise both these great men. Neither +are, or can be, favourites of the women, for the same reasons. +</p> +<p> +There must have been something analogous in the genius of Rubens and +Titian. The distinction was of climate and country. They appear to +have looked at nature under the same aspect, but it was a different +nature,—the difference between Flanders and Venice. They were both +painters of flesh and blood: by nature, poets; by conformation, +colourists; by temperament and education, magnificent spirits, scholars, +and gentlemen, lovers of pleasure and of fame. The superior sentiment +and grace, the refinement and elevation of Titian + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page298" name="page298"></a>[298]</span> + + he owed to the poetical +and chivalrous spirit of his age and country. The delicacy of taste +which reigned in the Italian literature of that period influenced the +arts of design. As to the colouring—we see in the pictures of Rubens +the broad daylight effects of a northern climate, and in those of +Titian, the burning fervid sun of a southern clime, necessarily modified +by shade, before the objects could be seen: hence the difference between +the <i>glow</i> of Rubens, and the <i>glow</i> of Titian: the first "i' the colours +of the rainbow lived," and the other bathed himself in the evening sky; +the one dazzles, the other warms. I can bring before my fancy at this +moment, the Helen Forman of Rubens, and Titian's "La Manto;" the "man +with a hawk" of Rubens, and Titian's "Falconer;" can any thing in heaven +or earth be more opposed? Yet in all alike, is it not the intense feeling +of life and individual nature which charms, which fixes us? I know not +which I admire most; but I adore Titian—his men are all made for power, +and his women for love. +</p> +<p> +And Rembrandt—king of shadows! +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page299" name="page299"></a>[299]</span></p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i16"> ——Earth-born </span><br /> +<span class="i2"> And sky-engendered—son of mysteries! </span> +</div> +</div> + +<p class="continued"> + was not he a poet? He reminds me often of the Prince Sorcerer, nurtured +"in the cave of Domdaniel, under the roots of the sea."<a href="#note-36" name="noteref-36"><small> 36</small></a> Such an +enchanted "den of darkness" was his mill and its skylight to him; +and there, magician-like, he brooded over half-seen forms, and his +imagination framed strange spells out of elemental light and shade. +Thence he brought his unearthly shadows; his dreamy splendours; his +supernatural gleams; his gems flashing and sparkling with internal +light; his lustrous glooms; his wreaths of flaming and embossed gold; +his wicked wizard-like heads—turbaned, wrinkled, seared, dusky; pale +with forbidden studies—solemn with thoughtful pain—keen with the +hunger of avarice—and furrowed with an eternity of years! I have seen +pictures of his in which the shadowy background is absolutely peopled +with life. At first all seems palpable darkness, apparent vacancy; but +figure after figure emerges—another and another; they glide into + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page300" name="page300"></a>[300]</span> + + view, +they take shape and colour, as if they grew out of the canvass even +while we gaze; we rub our eyes, and wonder whether it be the painter's +work or our own fancy! +</p> +<p> +Of all the great painters Rembrandt is perhaps least understood; the +admiration bestowed on him, the enormous prices given for his pictures, +is in general a fashion—a mere matter of convention—like the price of +a diamond. To feel Rembrandt truly, it is not enough to be an artist or +an amateur picture-fancier—one should be something of a poet too. +</p> +<p> +There are nineteen of his pictures here; of these "Jesus teaching the +doctors in the temple," though a small picture, impressed me with +awe,—the portraits of the painter Flinck and his wife, with wonder. +All are ill-hung, with their backs against the light—for them the worst +possible situation. +</p> +<p> +Van Dyck is here in all his glory: there are thirty-nine of his pictures. +The celebrated full-length, "the burgomaster's wife in black," so often +engraved, does not equal, in its inexpressible, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page301" name="page301"></a>[301]</span> + + unobtrusive elegance, +the "Lady Wharton," at Devonshire House.<a href="#note-37" name="noteref-37"><small> 37</small></a> Then we have Wallenstein +with his ample kingly brow; fierce Tilly; the head of Snyders; the lovely +head of the painter's wife, Maria Ruthven,—sweet-looking, delicate, +golden-haired, and holding the theorbo, (she excelled in music, I +believe,) and virgins, holy families, and other scriptural subjects. +His famous picture of Susanna does not strike me much. +</p> +<p> +The four apostles of Albert Durer—wonderful! In expression, in calm +religious majesty, in suavity of pencilling, and the grand, pure style +of the heads and drapery, quite like Raffaelle. I compared, yesterday, +the three portraits—that of Raffaelle, by himself; (the famous head +once in the Altaviti palace, and engraved by Morghen;) Albert Durer, by +himself; and Giorgione, by himself. Raffaelle is the least handsome, and +rather disappointed me; the eyes, in particular, rather project, and +have an expression which is not pleasing; the mouth and the brow are +full of power and passion. Albert Durer is beautiful, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page302" name="page302"></a>[302]</span> + + like the old +heads of our Saviour; and the predominant expression is calm, dignified, +intellectual, with a tinge of melancholy. This picture was painted +at the age of twenty-eight: he was then suffering from that bitter +domestic curse, a shrewish, avaricious wife, who finally broke his heart. +Giorgione is not handsome, but it is a sublime head, with such a large +intellectual development, such a profound expression of sentiment! +Giorgione died of a faithless mistress, as Albert Durer died of a +scolding wife.<a href="#note-38" name="noteref-38"><small> 38</small></a> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page303" name="page303"></a>[303]</span></p> + +<p> +By Paris Bordone, of Trevigi, there is a head of a Venetian lady, in +a dress of crimson velvet, with dark splendid eyes which tell a whole +history. By Murillo, there are eight pictures—not one in his most +elevated style, but all perfect miracles of painting and of nature. +There are thirty-three pictures of Vander Werff, a number sufficient to +make one's blood run cold. One, a Magdalene, is of the size of life; the +only large picture by this elegant, elaborate, soulless painter I ever +saw: he is to me detestable. +</p> +<p> +By Joseph Vernet there are two delicious landscapes, a morning and an +evening. I cannot farther particularize; but there are specimens of +almost every known painter; those, however, of Titian, Correggio, Julio +Romano, and Nicolo Poussin, are very few and not of a very high class, +while those of the early German painters, and the Dutch, and the Flemish +schools, are first-rate. +</p> +<p> +There is one English picture—Wilkie's "Opening of the Will:" it is very +much admired here, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page304" name="page304"></a>[304]</span> + + and looked upon as a sort of curiosity. I wish the +artists of the two countries were better known to each other: both would +benefit by such an intercourse. +</p> +<p> +At the palace of Schleissheim<a href="#note-39" name="noteref-39"><small> 39</small></a> there are nearly two thousand pictures: +of these some hundreds are positively <i>bad</i>; some hundreds are curious +and valuable, as illustrating the history and progress of art; some few +are really and intrinsically admirable. +</p> +<p> +But the grand attraction here is the far-famed Boisserée Gallery, which +is arranged at Schleissheim, until the Pinakothek is ready for its +reception. This is the collection about which so many volumes have been +written, and which has excited such a general enthusiasm throughout +Germany. This enthusiasm, as a fashion, a mania, is beginning to subside, +but the impress it has left upon art, and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page305" name="page305"></a>[305]</span> + + the tone it has given to the +pursuit, the feeling of art, will not so soon pass away. The gallery +derives its name from two brothers, Sulpitz and Melchior Boisserée,<a href="#note-40" name="noteref-40"><small> 40</small></a> +who, with a friend (Bertram) were employed for many years in collecting +from various convents, and old churches, and obscure collections of +family relics, the productions of the early painters of Germany, from +William of Cologne, called by the Germans "Meister Wilhelm," down to +Albert Durer and Holbein. +</p> +<p> +The productions of the Greek or Byzantine painters found their way +into Germany, as into Italy, in the thirteenth century, and Wilhelm of +Cologne appeared to have been the Cimabue of the north—the founder of +that school of painting called the <i>Byzantine-Niederrheinische</i>, or +Flemish school, and the precursor of Rubens, as Cimabue was the +precursor of Michael Angelo. +</p> +<p> +Out of this stiff, and rude, and barbarous style of art, arose and +spread the Alt-Deutsche, or Gothic school of painting, which produced +successively, + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page306" name="page306"></a>[306]</span> + + Van Eyck, (1370,) Hemling, Wohlgemuth,<a href="#note-41" name="noteref-41"><small> 41</small></a> Martin Schoen, +Mabuse, Johan Schoreel, Lucas Kranach, Kulmbach, Albert Altorffer, Hans +Asper, Johan von Mechlem, Behem, Albert Durer, and the two Holbeins. I +mention here only those artists whose pictures fixed my attention; there +are many others, and many pictures by unknown authors. Albert Durer was +born exactly one hundred years after Van Eyck. +</p> +<p> +The Boisserée gallery contains about three hundred and fifty pictures; +but I did not count them; and no official catalogue has yet been +published. The subjects are generally sacred; the figures are heads of +saints, and scenes from Scripture. A few are portraits; and there are +a few, but very few, subjects from profane history. The painters whose +works I at once distinguished from all others, were Van Eyck, Johan +Schoreel, Hemling, and Lucas Kranach. I can truly say that the two +pictures of Van Eyck, representing St. Luke painting the portrait of +the Virgin, and the offering of the three + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page307" name="page307"></a>[307]</span> + + kings; and that of Johan +Schoreel, representing the death of the Virgin Mary, perfectly amazed +me. I remember also several wondrous heads by Lucas Kranach; one by +Behem, called, I know not why, "Helena:" and a picture of Christ and the +little children, differing from all the rest in style, with something of +the Italian grace of drawing, and suavity of colour. The artist, Sedlar, +had studied in Lombardy, probably under Correggio; (one of the children +certainly might call Correggio father.) The date on this extraordinary +production is 1530. Of the painter I know nothing. The general and +striking faults, or rather deficiencies of the old German school of +art, are easily enumerated. The most flagrant violations of taste and +costume,<a href="#note-42" name="noteref-42"><small> 42</small></a> bad drawing of the figure + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page308" name="page308"></a>[308]</span> + + and extremities, faulty perspective; +stiff, hard meagre composition, negligence or ignorance of all effect of +chiaro-scuro. But what, then, is the secret of the interest which these +old painters inspire, of the enthusiasm they excite, even in these +cultivated days? It arises from a perception of the <i>mind</i> they brought +to bear upon their subjects, the simplicity and integrity of feeling +with which they worked, and the elaborate marvellous beauty of the +execution of parts. I could give no idea in words of the intense nature +and expression in some of the heads, of the grand feeling united to the +most finished delicacy in the conception and painting of <i>countenance</i>, +of the dazzling splendour of colouring in the draperies, and the richness +of fancy in the ornaments and accessories. +</p> +<p> +But I <i>do</i> fear that the just admiration excited by this kind of +excellence, and a great deal of national enthusiasm, has misled the +modern German artists to a false, at least an exaggerated estimate, and +an injudicious imitation, of their favourite models. It has produced or +encouraged that + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page309" name="page309"></a>[309]</span> + + general hardness of manner, that tendency to violent +colour, and high glazy finish, which interfere too often with the +beauty, and feeling, and effect of their compositions, at least in the +eyes of those who are accustomed to the free broad style of English +art.<a href="#note-43" name="noteref-43"><small> 43</small></a> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page310" name="page310"></a>[310]</span></p> + +<p> +<i>Thursday Evening.</i>—At the theatre. Schiller's "Braut von Messina." +This was the first time I had ever seen the tragic choruses brought on +the stage, in the genuine style of the Greek drama; + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page311" name="page311"></a>[311]</span> + + and the deep sonorous +voice and measured recitation (I could almost say <i>recitative</i>) of +Eslair, who was at the head of the chorus of Don Manuel—the emphatic +lines being repeated or echoed by his followers—as well as the peculiar +style of the whole representation, impressed me with a kind of + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page312" name="page312"></a>[312]</span> + + solemn +terror. It was wholly different from any thing I had ever witnessed, +and was rather like a poem declaimed on the stage, than what we are +accustomed to call a play. I was fortunate in seeing Madame Schröder +in Donna Isabella, for she does not often perform, and it is one of +the finest parts of this grand actress. Don Manuel and Don Cæsar were +played by Forst and Schunke—both were young, very well looking, and +good actors. Beatrice was played by Madll. Shöller. The costumes were +beautiful, and all the arrangements of the stage contrived with the most +poetical effect. One scene in the first act, where Donna Isabella stands +between her two sons, a hand on the shoulder of each, beseeching them to +be reconciled; while they remain silent, turning from each other with +folded arms, and dark averted faces;—the chorusses drawn up on each +side, all dressed alike, all precisely in the same attitude, leaning on +their shields, with lowering looks fixed on the group in the centre, was +admirably managed; and, from the effect that it produced, made me feel +that uniformity may be one + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page313" name="page313"></a>[313]</span> + + element of the sublime. Afterwards, a very +lively soirée. +</p> +<hr /> +<p> +<i>Friday.</i>—The Hofgarten at Munich is a square, planted with trees, and +gravelled, and serving as a public promenade. On one side is the royal +palace; opposite to it, the picture gallery; on the east, the king's +riding house, and on the west, a long arcade, open towards the garden +which connects the palace and the picture gallery; under this arcade are +shops, cafés, restaurateurs, &c. as in the <i>Palais Royal</i> at Paris. +</p> +<p> +But what distinguishes this arcade from all others, is the peculiar style +of decoration. It is painted in fresco by the young artists who studied +under Cornelius. There is, first, a series of sixteen compartments, about +eleven feet in length, containing subjects from the history of Bavaria. +They are all by various artists, and of course of different degrees of +merit, generally better in the composition than the painting, but some +have great vigour and animation in both respects. +</p> +<p> +For instance, Otho von Wittelsbach receiving + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page314" name="page314"></a>[314]</span> + + from the emperor, Frederic +Barbarossa, the investiture of the dukedom of Bavaria in 1180, painted +by Zimmermann. +</p> +<p> +The marriage of Otho the Illustrious, to Agnes, Countess Palatine of the +Rhine, in 1225, painted by my friend, Wilhelm Röckel, of Schleissheim, +to whom I am indebted for many polite attentions. +</p> +<p> +The engagement between Louis the Severe, of Bavaria, and the fierce +fiery Ottocar, king of Bohemia, upon the bridge at Mühldorf, in 1258, +painted by Stürmer of Berlin. This is very animated and terrific. I +think the artist had Rubens' defeat of the Amazons full in his mind. +</p> +<p> +The victory of the emperor, Louis of Bavaria, over Frederic of Austria, +his competitor for the empire in 1322, painted by Hermann of Dresden. +</p> +<p> +The storming of Godesberg, when the unfortunate Archbishop Gerard, and +Agnes of Mansfield had taken refuge there in 1583,<a href="#note-44" name="noteref-44"><small> 44</small></a> painted by Gassen +of Coblentz. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page315" name="page315"></a>[315]</span></p> + +<p> +Maximilian I. in 1623, invested with the forfeit electorate of the +Palatine Frederic V.<a href="#note-45" name="noteref-45"><small> 45</small></a> painted by Eberle of Dusseldorf. +</p> +<p> +Maximilian Joseph I. father of the present king, bestowing on his people +a new constitution and representative government in 1818, painted by +Monten of Dusseldorf. +</p> +<p> +These have dwelt on my memory. Over all the pictures, the name of the +subject and the date are inscribed in large gold letters, so that those +who walk may read. The costumes and manners of each epoch have been +attended to with the most scrupulous accuracy; and I see every day +groups of soldiers, and of the common people, with their children, +standing before these paintings, spelling the titles, and discussing +the various subjects represented. The further end of the arcade is +painted with a series of Italian scenes, selected by the king after +his return from Italy, and executed by Rottmann of Heidelberg, a young +landscape-painter of great merit, as De Klenze assures me, and he is +a judge of <i>genius</i>. Under each picture + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page316" name="page316"></a>[316]</span> + + is a distich, composed by the +king himself. These are in distemper, I believe: freely, but rather +hastily executed, and cold and ineffective in colour, perhaps the fault +of the vehicle. The ceilings and pillars are also gaily painted with +arabesques, and other ornaments; and at the upper end there is a grand +seated figure, looking magnificent and contemplative, and calling +herself <span class="sc">Bavaria</span>. This is well painted by Kaulbach. +</p> +<p> +I walk through these arcades once or twice every day, as I have several +friends lodged over them; and can seldom arrive at the end without +pausing two or three times. +</p> +<p> +I learn that the king's passion for building, and the forced +encouragement given to the enlargement and decoration of his capital, +has been carried to an excess, and, like all extremes, has proved +mischievous, at least for the time. He has rendered it too much a +fashion among his subjects, who are suffering from rash speculations +of this kind. Many beautiful edifices in the Ludwig's Strasse, and the +neighbourhood of the Maximilian's Platz, and the Karoline's Platz, +remain + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page317" name="page317"></a>[317]</span> + + untenanted. A suite of beautiful unfurnished apartments, and even +a pretty house in the finest part of Munich may be had for a trifle. +Some of these new houses are enormous. Madame M. told me that she has +her whole establishment on one floor, but then she has twenty-three +rooms. +</p> +<p> +Though the country round Munich is flat and ugly, a few hours' journey +brings us into the very midst of the Tyrolian Alps. In June or July all +the people fly to the mountains, and baths, and lakes in South Bavaria, +and rusticate among the most glorious scenery in the world. "Come to +us," said my friend, Luise K——; "come to us in the summer months, +<i>and we will play at Arcadia</i>." +</p> +<p> +And truly, when I listened to her description of her mountain life, and +all its tranquil, primitive pleasures, and all the beauty and grandeur +which lie beyond that giant-barrier which lifts itself against the +evening sky, and when I looked into those clear affectionate eyes—"dieser +Blick voll Treu und Gute," and beheld the expression of a settled +happiness, the light of a heart at peace with itself and all the world, +reflected on the + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page318" name="page318"></a>[318]</span> + + countenances of her children—a recollection of the +unquiet destiny which drives me in an opposite direction came over me— +</p> +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<p class="i2"> Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound </p> +<p class="i2"> Upon a wheel of fire, which mine own tears </p> +<p class="i2"> Do scald like molten lead. </p> +</div> +</div> + +<div class="figure"> +<a name="image-0003"><!--IMG--></a> +<a href="images/ill-3.jpg"><img src="images/ill-3s.png" width="300" height="250" +alt="(a medusa mask)" /></a> +</div> + +<h3> +END OF VOL. I. +</h3> + +<p class="center"> +LONDON: +<br /> +<small> +IBOTSON & PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. +</small> +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page319" name="page319"></a>[319]</span></p> + +<div><a name="h2H_4_0010" id="h2H_4_0010"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + ADDENDA +</h2> + +<p class="center"> + <i>To Page 179, Vol.</i> i. +</p> + +<p> +Therese Huber, who died in 1829, was a woman every way remarkable, in +her domestic history, in her position, her writings, and her character. +She was employed by Cotta to edit his famous "Morgenblatt," in her time +the most esteemed and the most influential of the literary periodicals +of Germany, and which she conducted for many years with extraordinary +energy and success; she wrote also several romances, published under her +husband's name, and long attributed to him even by her most intimate +friends. Therese Huber is distinguished by a profound knowledge of her +own sex, and by her just and admirable views of our destination and + +<span class="pagenum"><a id="page320" name="page320"></a>[320]</span> + + situation in society. Some of her private letters have been published, +since her death, with those of Caroline Woltmann, in the "Deutsche +Briefe," and they place in yet stronger light the fine original powers +of this gifted woman. +</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="page321" name="page321"></a>[321]</span></p> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="center"> +VOL. I. +</p> + +<table summary="List of Errata"> +<tr><td> Page</td><td> 2,</td><td>line</td><td>16,</td><td><i>for</i> great, <i>read</i> green. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 43 </td><td>— </td><td>14,</td><td><i>for</i> altamen, <i>read</i> attamen. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 46 </td><td>— </td><td> 5,</td><td>omit <i>patrician</i>. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 47 </td><td>— </td><td> 2,</td><td><i>for</i> 'vengeful, <i>read</i> revengeful. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 95 </td><td>— </td><td> 2,</td><td><i>for</i> Haitsinger, <i>read</i> Haitzinger. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 95 </td><td>— </td><td>12,</td><td><i>for</i> tiefe, <i>read</i> tief. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td> 95 </td><td>— </td><td>21,</td><td><i>for</i> Becher, <i>read</i> Becker. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>147 </td><td>— </td><td> 2,</td><td>in the note, <i>for</i> Hienrich, <i>read</i> Heinrich. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>147 </td><td>— </td><td> 3,</td><td>in the note, <i>for</i> Wladimer, <i>read</i> Wladimir. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>181 </td><td>— </td><td> 1,</td><td><i>for</i> first, <i>read</i> second. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>184 </td><td>— </td><td>17,</td><td><i>for</i> Erden, <i>read</i> Erben. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>193 </td><td>— </td><td> 5,</td><td><i>for</i> wsäche, <i>read</i> wäsche. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>197 </td><td>— </td><td>14,</td><td><i>after</i> since, <i>insert</i> "High-born Hoel." </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>211 </td><td>— </td><td> 9,</td><td><i>for</i> Elangau, <i>read</i> Erlangen. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>230 </td><td>— </td><td>10,</td><td><i>for</i> liebe, <i>read</i> lieber. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>230 </td><td>— </td><td>11,</td><td><i>for</i> schrecklich Schichsal, <i>read</i> schreckliches Schicksal. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>230 </td><td>— </td><td>13,</td><td><i>for</i> grab, <i>read</i> Grab. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>252 </td><td>— </td><td>19,</td><td><i>for</i> twelve, <i>read</i> eight. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>270 </td><td>— </td><td>16,</td><td><i>for</i> Neurather, <i>read</i> Neureuther. </td></tr> +<tr><td> </td><td>291 </td><td>— </td><td> 1,</td><td>in the note, <i>for</i> par, <i>read</i> pas; and <i>for</i> pas <i>read</i> par. </td></tr> + +</table> + +<hr class="full" /> + +<div><a name="h2H_FOOT" id="h2H_FOOT"><!-- H2 anchor --></a></div> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<h2> + FOOTNOTES: +</h2> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-1"><!--Note--></a> +1 (<a href="#noteref-1"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +In Goethe's Iphigenia. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-2"><!--Note--></a> +2 (<a href="#noteref-2"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Over another iron door was writt,</p> + +<div class="poem"> +<div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2"> <i>Be not too bold.</i> </span><br /> +<span class="sc">Fairy Queen</span>, Book iii. Canto XI. +</div> +</div> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-3"><!--Note--></a> +3 (<a href="#noteref-3"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +See Wordsworth's Poems. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-4"><!--Note--></a> +4 (<a href="#noteref-4"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Two celebrated antique gems which adorn the relics of the +Three Kings. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-5"><!--Note--></a> +5 (<a href="#noteref-5"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +It is nearly twice the size of the famous and well known +Medusa Rondinelli, now in the Glyptothek at Munich. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-6"><!--Note--></a> +6 (<a href="#noteref-6"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Professor Wallraff died on the 18th of March, 1824. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-7"><!--Note--></a> +7 (<a href="#noteref-7"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Amongst others, Jean Paul, in the "Heidelberger Jahrbücher +der Literatur," 1815. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-8"><!--Note--></a> +8 (<a href="#noteref-8"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Since the above passage was written, Mrs. Austin has +favoured me with the following note: "Goëthe admired, but did not like, +still less esteem, Madame de Staël. He begins a sentence about her +thus—'As she had no idea what duty meant,' &c. +</p> +<p class="foot"><br /> +"However, after relating a scene which took place at Weimar, he adds, +'Whatever we may say or think of her, her visit was certainly followed +by very important results. Her work upon Germany, which owed its rise +to social conversations, is to be regarded as a mighty engine which at +once made a wide breach in that Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices, +which divided us from France; so that the people across the Rhine, +and afterwards those across the channel, at length came to a nearer +knowledge of us; whence we may look to obtain a living influence over +the distant west. Let us, therefore, bless that conflict of national +peculiarities which annoyed us at the time, and seemed by no means +profitable.'"—<i>Tag- und Jahres Hefte</i>, vol. 31, last edit. +</p> +<p class="foot"><br /> +To that <small class="sc">WOMAN</small> who had sufficient strength of mind to break through a +"Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices," surely something may be +forgiven. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-9"><!--Note--></a> +9 (<a href="#noteref-9"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Johanna Schopenhauer, well known in Germany for her +romances and her works on art. Her little book, "Johan van Eyk und seine +Nachfolger," has become the manual of those who study the old German +schools of painting. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-10"><!--Note--></a> +10 (<a href="#noteref-10"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Or Gebhard, for so the name is spelt in the German +histories. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-11"><!--Note--></a> +11 (<a href="#noteref-11"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +For the story of Archbishop Gebhard and Agnes de Mansfeld, +see Schiller's History of the Thirty Years' War, and Coxe's History of +the House of Austria. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-12"><!--Note--></a> +12 (<a href="#noteref-12"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +The gardens and plantations round the castle are a +favourite promenade of the citizens of Heidelberg, and there are in +summer bands of music, &c. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-13"><!--Note--></a> +13 (<a href="#noteref-13"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +When Gustavus Adolphus took Mayence, during the same +war, he presented the whole of the valuable library to his chancellor, +Oxenstiern; the chancellor sent it to Sweden, intending to bestow it on +one of the colleges; but the vessel in which it was embarked foundered +in the Baltic sea, and the whole went to the bottom. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-14"><!--Note--></a> +14 (<a href="#noteref-14"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +M. Passavant is a landscape-painter of Frankfort, an +intelligent, accomplished man, and one of the few German artists who +had a tolerably correct idea of the state of art in England. He is the +author of "Kunstreise durch England und Belgium." +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-15"><!--Note--></a> +15 (<a href="#noteref-15"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +She was cotemporary with Cleopatra, (B. C. 33,) and was +particularly celebrated for her busts in ivory. The Romans raised a +statue to her honour, which was in the Guistiniani collection.—<span class="sc">V. Pliny.</span> +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-16"><!--Note--></a> +16 (<a href="#noteref-16"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Lucas Kranach (1472) was one of the most celebrated of the +old German painters; from a principle of gratitude and attachment, he +shared the imprisonment of the elector John Frederic, during five years. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-17"><!--Note--></a> +17 (<a href="#noteref-17"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +In September, 1833. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-18"><!--Note--></a> +18 (<a href="#noteref-18"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +His own expression. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-19"><!--Note--></a> +19 (<a href="#noteref-19"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Dannecker has been ennobled; his proper titles run +thus—Johan Heinrich von Dannecker, Hofrath, (court counsellor,) knight +of the orders of the Wurtemburg crown, and of Wladimir, and professor +of sculpture at Stuttgardt. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-20"><!--Note--></a> +20 (<a href="#noteref-20"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Rauch is knight of the Red Eagle, and member of the +senate. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-21"><!--Note--></a> +21 (<a href="#noteref-21"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Christian Rauch was born in 1777, and Christian Frederic +Tieck in 1776. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-22"><!--Note--></a> +22 (<a href="#noteref-22"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Formerly Madame Jageman, the principal actress of the +theatre at Weimar. Her talents were developed under the auspices of +Goethe and Schiller. She was the original Thekla of the Wallenstein, and +the original Princess Leonora of the Tasso. In these two characters she +has never yet been equalled. The quietness, amounting to passiveness, in +the <i>external</i> delineation of the Princess in Tasso, affords so little +<i>material</i> for the stage, that Madame Wolff, then the first actress, +preferred the character of Leonora Sanvitale, and Madame Jageman was +supposed to derogate in accepting that of the Princess. Such is the +consummate, but evanescent delicacy of the conception, that Goethe never +expected to see it developed on the stage; and at the rehearsal he threw +himself back in his chair, and shut his eyes, that the image which lived +in his imagination might not be profaned by any tasteless exaggeration +of action or expression. He soon opened them, however, and before the +rehearsal was finished, started off the chair, and nearly embraced the +actress. She looked and felt the part as only a woman of exceeding +taste and delicacy would have done; the very tone of her mind, and the +character of her beauty, fitted her to represent the fair, gentle, +fragile, but dignified Leonora. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-23"><!--Note--></a> +23 (<a href="#noteref-23"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Lessing. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-24"><!--Note--></a> +24 (<a href="#noteref-24"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Characteristics of Goethe, vol. i. p. 29. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-25"><!--Note--></a> +25 (<a href="#noteref-25"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +I believe it was in allusion to this distinction, and her +own noble birth, that her father-in-law used to call her playfully, +"<i>die kleine Ahnfrau</i>," (the little ancestress.) +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-26"><!--Note--></a> +26 (<a href="#noteref-26"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +M. Besle, otherwise the Comte de Stendhal, and, I believe, +he has half a dozen other <i>aliases</i>. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-27"><!--Note--></a> +27 (<a href="#noteref-27"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Alfred Tennyson. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-28"><!--Note--></a> +28 (<a href="#noteref-28"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +"Thro' Erin's isle, to sport awhile," &c. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-29"><!--Note--></a> +29 (<a href="#noteref-29"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +In the German maps, Zweibrücken; the capital of those +provinces of the kingdom of Bavaria, which lie on the left bank of +the Rhine. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-30"><!--Note--></a> +30 (<a href="#noteref-30"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +The entire grouping of these figures is from the design +of Mr. Robert Cockerell, one of the original discoverers, who in +ascertaining their relative position has been guided in some measure +by the situation in which their fragments were found strewed in front +of the temple, and overwhelmed with masses of the frieze and pediment; +but has been much more indebted to his own artist-like feeling, and +architectural skill. He is of opinion that the western pediment +contained several other figures besides the ten which have been +restored. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-31"><!--Note--></a> +31 (<a href="#noteref-31"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +The character of the Emperor Rodolph would be one of the +most interesting speculations in philosophical history. He was evidently +a fine artist, degraded into a bad sovereign—a man whose constructive +and imaginative genius was misplaced upon a throne. The melancholy, and +incipient madness which hovered over him, was possibly the result of the +natural faculties suppressed or perverted. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-32"><!--Note--></a> +32 (<a href="#noteref-32"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +The celebrated traveller, natural philosopher, and botanist. +He has the direction of most of the scientific institutions at +Munich. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-33"><!--Note--></a> +33 (<a href="#noteref-33"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +I remember Madame Devrient, in describing the effect which +music had upon herself, pressing her hand upon her bosom, and saying, +with simple but profound feeling, "<i>Ah! cela use la vie!</i>" +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-34"><!--Note--></a> +34 (<a href="#noteref-34"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +"A l'exposition de Paris (1822) on a vu un millier de +tableaux représentant des sujets de l'Ecritoire Sainte, peints par des +peintres qui n'y croient pas du tout: admirés et jugés par des gens qui +n'y croient pas beaucoup, et enfin payés par des gens qui, apparemment, +n'y croient pas, non plus. +</p> +<p class="foot"><br /> +"L'on cherche après cela le pourquoi de la décadence de l'art!" +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-35"><!--Note--></a> +35 (<a href="#noteref-35"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Of this celebrated picture, Sir Joshua Reynolds says, +that it is miscalled, and certainly does <i>not</i> contain the portraits +of the Earl and Countess of Arundel. Perhaps he is mistaken. It appears +that the Earl of Arundel, of James the First's time, (the collector of +the Arundelian marbles,) with his Countess, sat to Rubens in 1620, and +that "Robin the Dwarf" was introduced into this picture, which was not +painted in England, but at Brussels. Rubens was at this time at the +height of his reputation, and when requested to paint the portrait of +the Countess of Arundel, he replied, "Although I have refused to execute +the portraits of many princes and noblemen, especially of his lordship's +rank yet from the Earl I am bound to receive the honour he does me +in commanding my services, regarding him as I do, in the light of +an evangelist to the world of art, and the great supporter of our +profession."—(See Tierney's History and Antiquities of the Castle and +Town of Arundel.) +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-36"><!--Note--></a> +36 (<a href="#noteref-36"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +In Southey's Thalaba. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-37"><!--Note--></a> +37 (<a href="#noteref-37"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Now removed with the other Vandykes to Chatsworth. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-38"><!--Note--></a> +38 (<a href="#noteref-38"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +See a curious letter of Pirkheimer on the death of Albert +Durer, quoted in the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 21. "In Albert I have +truly lost one of the best friends I had in the whole world, and nothing +grieves me deeper than that he should have died so painful a death, +which, under God's providence, I can ascribe to nobody but his huswife, +who gnawed into his very heart, and so tormented him that he departed +hence the sooner; for he was dried up to a faggot, and might nowhere +seek him a jovial humour or go to his friends." (After much more, +reflecting on this intolerable woman, he concludes with edifying +<i>naïveté</i>;) "She and her sister are not queans; they are, I doubt not, +in the number of honest, devout, and altogether God-fearing women, but +a man might better have a quean who was otherwise kindly, than such a +gnawing, suspicious, quarrelsome, <i>good</i> woman, with whom he can have +no peace or quiet neither by day nor by night." +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-39"><!--Note--></a> +39 (<a href="#noteref-39"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Schleissheim is a country palace of the king of Bavaria, +about six miles from Munich; it has originally been a beautiful +building, but is not now inhabited, and looks forlorn and dilapidated. +The pictures are distributed, without any attempt at arrangement, +through forty-five rooms. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-40"><!--Note--></a> +40 (<a href="#noteref-40"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Natives, I believe, of Cologne. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-41"><!--Note--></a> +41 (<a href="#noteref-41"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +Albert Durer was the scholar of Wohlgemuth. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-42"><!--Note--></a> +42 (<a href="#noteref-42"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +I particularly recollect a picture, containing many +hundred figures, all painted with the elaborate finish of a miniature, +and representing the victory of Alexander over Darius. All the Persians +are dressed like Turks, while Alexander and his host are armed to the +teeth, in the full costume of chivalry, with heraldic banners, displaying +the different devices of the old Germanic nobles, the cross, the black +eagle, &c. &c. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-43"><!--Note--></a> +43 (<a href="#noteref-43"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +The observations of Mr. Phillips, (Lectures on the History +and Principles of Painting,) on Giotto, and the earliest Italian school, +apply in a great measure to the early German painters, and I cannot +refuse myself the pleasure of quoting them.—"As it appears to me, that +painting at the present time, is swerving among us from the true point +of interest, tending to ornament, to the loss of truth and sentiment, I +think I cannot do better than endeavour to restrain the encroachment of +so insidious a foe, to prevent, if possible, our advance in so erroneous +and fatal a course, by showing how strong is the influence of art +where truth and simplicity prevail; and that, where no ornament is +to be found—nay, where imperfections are numerous; where drawing is +frequently defective, perspective violated, colouring employed without +science, and chiaro-scuro rarely, if ever thought of. The natural +question then is, what can excite so much interest in pictures, where +so much is wanting to render them perfect? I answer, that which leads +to the forgetfulness of the want of those interesting and desirable +qualities in the pictures of Giotto, is the excitation caused by their +fulness of feeling—well-directed, ardent, concentrated feeling! by +which his mind was engaged in comprehending the points most worthy of +display in the subject he undertook to represent, and led to the +clearness and intelligence with which he has selected them; add to this +the simplicity and ability with which he has displayed that feeling." +* * * "This is the first true step in the natural system of the art, or +of the application of it, and this was Giotto's more especially. The rest +is useful, as it assists the influence of this, the <i>indispensable</i>. +This, to continue the figure, taken from the stage, (in a previous part +of the Lecture,) is as Garrick acting Macbeth or Lear in a tie-wig and +a general's uniform of his day; the passion and the character reaching +men's hearts, notwithstanding the absurd costume. If the art be found +thus strong to attract the mind, to excite feeling and thought, and to +engage the heart, by the mere force of unadorned truth in the important +points, and without the aid of the valuable auxiliaries I have above +alluded to, is it not manifest that in its basis it is correct? and that +the utmost force of historical painting is to be sought by continual +emendation of this system, maintaining the spirit of its simplicity, +supplying its wants, calling in the aid of those auxiliaries within +reasonable bounds, not permitting them to usurp the throne of taste and +attraction, but rather requiring them to assist in humbler guise to +maintain and strengthen the legitimate authority of feeling. +</p> +<p class="foot"><br /> +After reading these beautiful passages, written by a man who unites +the acute discriminative judgment of a practical artist with the finest +feeling of the ultimate object and aim of high poetical art, I felt +almost tempted to expunge my own superficial and imperfect notes, (above +written,) and should have done so, but for the hope that my deficiencies +will induce some one more competent in taste and knowledge to take up +the subject of the early German painters. It is certain that the modern +historical painters of Germany are working on the principle here +laid down by Mr. Phillips, particularly Overbeck and Wach, which they +have derived from a study of their national school of art; but other +enthusiasts should remember that the redeeming excellence of this school +was feeling, and that feeling can never be a matter of mere imitation. +I cannot understand why the omissions of ignorance should be confounded +with the achievements of native genius, by those for whom "knowledge +has unlocked her ample stores," and to whom the recovery of those +"rich spoils of time," the antique marbles, must have revealed the wide +difference between "the simplicity of elegance" and "the simplicity of +indigence." +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-44"><!--Note--></a> +44 (<a href="#noteref-44"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +See p. <a href="#page56">56</a>. +</p> + +<p class="foot"> +<a name="note-45"><!--Note--></a> +45 (<a href="#noteref-45"><small>return</small></a>)<br /> +See p. <a href="#page66">66</a>. +</p> + +<hr class="full" /> + +<div style="height: 4em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + +<p class="quote"> +<b>Transcriber's Note:</b> Errata as given in the original have been applied to +the text. Other than the most exceedingly obvious typographical errors, +all inconsistent spelling, hyphenation, diacriticals, archaic usage, etc. +have been preserved as printed in the original. The boldface used for the +signature on <a href="#page238">page 238</a> indicates characters in a +Fraktur typeface. +</p> + +<div style="height: 6em;"><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /></div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad +with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected, by Anna Jameson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + +***** This file should be named 36818-h.htm or 36818-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/8/1/36818/ + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected + Vol. I (of 3) + +Author: Anna Jameson + +Release Date: July 23, 2011 [EBook #36818] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + + + + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + +VISITS AND SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD. + +VOL. I. + + +[Illustration: SIGFRIED KRIMHILDE + + _Engraved by C. E. Wagstaff._ + + _Group from the Fresco in the King of Bavaria's Palace at Munich. + Painted by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld._ + + _Published by Saunders & Otley 1834._] + + + + + + +VISITS AND SKETCHES AT HOME AND ABROAD + +WITH TALES AND MISCELLANIES NOW FIRST COLLECTED. + +BY MRS. JAMESON, + +AUTHOR OF THE "CHARACTERISTICS OF WOMEN," "LIVES OF CELEBRATED FEMALE +SOVEREIGNS," &c. + +IN THREE VOLUMES. + +VOL. I. + +SECOND EDITION. + + + LONDON + SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. + 1835. + + + LONDON: + IBOTSON AND PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. I. + + + PAGE + + Preface vii + + + SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER, + PART I. IN THREE DIALOGUES. + + +I. A Scene in a Steam Boat 4 + A Singular Character 20 + Gallery at Ghent 25 + The Prince of Orange's Pictures 27 + A Female Gambler 38 + Cologne--the Medusa 44 + Professor Walraf 51 + Schlegel and Madame de Stael 55 + Story of Archbishop Gerard 64 + Heidelberg--Elizabeth Stuart 68 + An English Fanner's idea of the Picturesque 85 + + +II. Frankfort 88 + The Theatre, Madame Haitzinger 92 + The Versorgung Haus 98 + The Staedel Museum 103 + Dannecker, Memoir of his Life and Works 106 + German Sculpture--Rauch, Tieck, Schwanthaler 147 + + +III. Goethe and his daughter-in-law 160 + The German Women 167 + German Authoresses 177 + German Domestic Life and Manners 187 + German Coquetterie and German Romance 199 + The Story of a Devoted Sister 205 + + SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER, + PART II. + + _Memoranda at Munich, Nuremberg, and Dresden._ + + +I. MUNICH 241 + + The Theatre--representation of "Egmont" 245 + Leo von Klenze 250 + The Glyptothek--its general arrangement--Egina + Marbles--Account of the Frescos of Cornelius--Canova's + Paris and Thorwaldson's Adonis 252-273 + The Opera at Munich, the Kapel Meister Stuntz 274 + The Poems of the King of Bavaria 279 + A public day at the New Palace 281 + Thoughts on Female Singers--Their condition and destiny 284 + The Munich Gallery--Thoughts on Pictures--their moral + influence 287 + Rubens and the Flemish Masters 295 + The Gallery of Schleissheim 304 + The Boisseree Gallery--The old German School of Painting--Its + Effects on the Modern German School of Art 304 + Representation of the Braut von Messina 310 + The Hofgarten at Munich 313 + The King's passion for Building 316 + + + + +THE AUTHOR TO THE READER. + + +It seems a foolish thing to send into the world a book requiring +a preface of apologies; and yet more absurd, to presume that any +deprecation on the part of the author could possibly win indulgence +for what should be in itself worthless. + +For this reason, and with a very deep feeling of the kindness I have +already experienced from the public, I should now abandon these little +volumes to their destiny without one word of preface or remark, but +that a certain portion of their contents seems to require a little +explanation. + +It was the wish and request of my friends, many months ago, that I +should collect various literary trifles which were scattered about in +print or in manuscript, and allow them to be published together. My +departure for the continent set aside this intention for the time. I had +other and particular objects in view, which still keep full possession +of my mind, and which have been suspended not without reluctance, in +order to prepare these volumes for the press;--neither had I, while +travelling in Germany, the slightest idea of writing any thing of that +country: so far from it, that except during the last few weeks at +Munich, I kept no regular notes: but finding on my return to England, +that many particulars which had strongly excited my interest, with +regard to the relative state of art and social existence in the two +countries, appeared new to those with whom I conversed,--after some +hesitation, I was induced to throw into form the few memoranda I had +made on the spot. They are now given to the public in the first and +second volumes of this little collection, with a very sincere feeling +of their many imperfections, and much anxiety with regard to the +reception they are likely to meet with; yet in the earnest hope that +what has been written in perfect simplicity of heart, may be perused +both by my English and German friends, particularly the artists, with +indulgence; that those who read and doubt may be awakened to inquiry, +and those who read and believe may be led to reflection; and that those +who differ from, and those who agree with the writer, may both find some +interest and amusement in the literal truth of the facts and impressions +she has ventured to record. + +It was difficult to give sketches of art, literature, and character, +without making now and then some _personal_ allusions; but though I +have often sketched from the life, I have adhered throughout to this +principle--never to give publicity to any name not already before the +public, and in a manner public property. + +Two of the tales of the third volume, "The False One," and "The Indian +Mother," were written at different times, to prove that I could write +in a style which should not be recognised as mine even by my most +intimate friends, and the _ruse_ so far succeeded, that both, as I am +informed, have been attributed to other writers. + + A. J. + +May 1834. + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + +PART I. + +IN THREE DIALOGUES. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +I. + +MEDON--ALDA. + + +MEDON. + +And so we are to have no "_Sentimental Travels in Germany_" on +hot-pressed paper, illustrated with views taken on the spot? + +ALDA. + +No. + +MEDON. + +You have unloaded Time of his wallet only to deal out his "scraps of +things past," his shreds of remembrance, in beggarly, indolent fashion, +over your own fire-side? You are afraid of being termed an egotist; you, +who within these ten minutes have assured me that not any opinion of any +human being should prevent you from doing, saying, writing--any thing-- + +ALDA. + +Finish the sentence--any thing, _for truth's sake_. But how is the cause +of truth to be advanced by the insolent publication of a mass of crude +thoughts and hasty observations picked up here and there, "as pigeons +pick up peas," and which now lie safe within the clasps of those little +green books? You need not look at them; they do not contain another +Diary of an Ennuyee, thank Heaven! nor do I feel much inclined to play +the _Ennuyeuse_ in public. + +MEDON. + +"Take any form but _that_, and my firm nerves shall never tremble;" +but with eyes to see, a heart to feel, a mind to observe, and a pen +to record those observations, I do not perceive why you should not +contribute one drop to that great ocean of thought which is weltering +round the world! + +ALDA. + +If I could. + +MEDON. + +There are people, who when they travel open their eyes and their ears, +(aye, and their mouths to some purpose,) and shut up their hearts and +souls. I have heard such persons make it their boast, that they have +returned to old England with all their old prejudices thick upon +them; they have come back, to use their own phrase, "with no foreign +ideas--just the same as they went:" they are much to be congratulated! +I hope you are not one of these? + +ALDA. + +I hope not; it is this cold impervious pride which is the perdition +of us English, and of England. I remember that in one of my several +excursions on the Rhine, we had, on board the steamboat, an English +family of high rank. There was the lordly papa, plain and shy, who never +spoke to any one except his own family, and then only in the lowest +whisper. There was the lady mamma, so truly lady-like, with fine-cut +patrician features, and in her countenance a kind of passive _hauteur_, +softened by an appearance of suffering, and ill-health. There were two +daughters, proud, pale, fine-looking girls, dressed _a ravir_, with +that indescribable air of high pretension, so elegantly impassive--so +self-possessed--which some people call _l'air distingue_, but which, +as extremes meet, I would rather call the refinement of vulgarity--the +polish we see bestowed on debased material--the plating over the +steel--the stucco over the brick-work! + +MEDON. + +Good; you _can_ be severe then! + +ALDA. + +I spoke generally: bear witness to the general truth of the picture, +for it will fit others as well as the personages I have brought before +you, who are, indeed, but specimens of a species. This group, then, had +designedly or instinctively entrenched themselves in a corner to the +right of the steersman, within a fortification of tables and benches, so +arranged as to forbid all approach within two or three yards; the young +ladies had each their sketch-book, and wielded pencil and Indian rubber, +I know not with what effect,--but I know that I never saw either +countenance once relax or brighten, in the midst of the divine scenery +through which we glided. Two female attendants, seated on the outer +fortifications, formed a kind of piquet guard; and two footmen at the +other end kept watch over the well-appointed carriages, and came and +went as their attendance was required. No one else ventured to approach +this aristocratic Olympus; the celestials within its precincts, though +not exactly seated "on golden stools at golden tables," like the +divinities in the song of the Parcae,[1] showed as supreme, as godlike +an indifference to the throng of mortals in the nether sphere: no word +was exchanged during the whole day with any of the fifty or sixty human +beings who were round them; nay, when the rain drove us down to the +pavilion, even there, amid twelve or fourteen others, they contrived to +keep themselves aloof from contact and conversation. In this fashion +they probably pursued their tour, exchanging the interior of their +travelling carriage for the interior of an hotel; and every where +associating only with those of their own caste. What do they see of all +that is to be seen? What can they know of what is to be known? What do +they endure of what is to be endured? I can speak from experience--I +have travelled in that same style. As they went, so they return; +happily, or rather pitifully, unconscious of the narrow circle in which +move their factitious enjoyments, their confined experience, their +half-awakened sympathies! And I should tell you, that in the same +steam-boat were two German girls, under the care of an elderly relative, +I think an aunt, and a brother, who was a celebrated _jurisconsulte_ +and judge: their rank was equal to that of my countrywomen; their blood, +perhaps, more purely noble, that is, older by some centuries; and +their family more illustrious, by God knows how many quarterings; +moreover, their father was a minister of state. Both these girls were +beautiful;--fair, and fair-haired, with complexions on which "the rose +stood ready with a blush;" and one, the youngest sister, was exquisitely +lovely--in truth, she might have sat for one of Guido's angels. +They walked up and down the deck, neither seeking nor avoiding the +proximity of others. They accepted the telescopes which the gentlemen, +particularly some young Englishmen, pressed on them when any distant or +remarkable object came in view, and repaid the courtesy with a bright +kindly smile; they were natural and easy, and did not deem it necessary +to mount guard over their own dignity. Do you think I did not observe +and feel the contrast? + +MEDON. + +If nations begin at last to understand each other's true +interests--morally and politically, it will be through the agency of +gifted men; but if ever they learn to love and sympathize with each +other, it will be through the medium of you women. You smile, and +shake your head; but in spite of a late example, which might seem to +controvert this idea, I still think so;--our prejudices are stronger +and bitterer than yours, because they are those which perverted reason +builds up on a foundation of pride; but yours, which are generally +those of fancy and association, soon melt away before your own kindly +affections. More mobile, more impressible, more easily yielding to +external circumstances, more easily lending yourselves to different +manners and habits, more quick to perceive, more gentle to judge;--yes, +it is to you we must look, to break down the outworks of prejudice--you, +the advanced guard of humanity and civilization! + + "The gentle race and dear, + By whom alone the world is glorified!" + + +Every feeling, well educated, generous, and truly refined woman, who +travels, is as a dove sent out on a mission of peace; and should bring +back at least an olive-leaf in her hand, if she bring nothing else. +It is her part to soften the intercourse between rougher and stronger +natures; to aid in the interfusion of the gentler sympathies; to speed +the interchange of art and literature from pole to pole: not to pervert +wit, and talent, and eloquence, and abuse the privileges of her sex, to +sow the seeds of hatred where she might plant those of love--to embitter +national discord and aversion, and disseminate individual prejudice and +error. + +ALDA. + +Thank you! I need not say how entirely I agree with you. + +MEDON. + +Then tell me, what have _you_ brought home? if but an olive-leaf, let us +have it; come, unpack your budget. Have you collected store of anecdotes, +private, literary, scandalous, abundantly interspersed with proper names +of grand-dukes and little dukes, counts, barons, ministers, poets, +authors, actors, and opera dancers? + +ALDA. + +Me? + +MEDON. + +Cry you mercy!--I did but jest, so do not look so indignant! But have +you then traced the cause and consequences of that undercurrent of +opinion which is slowly but surely sapping the foundations of empires? +Have you heard the low booming of that mighty ocean which approaches, +wave after wave, to break up the dikes and boundaries of ancient power? + +ALDA. + +I? no; how should I--skimming over the surface of society with perpetual +sunshine and favouring airs--how should I sound the gulfs and shoals +which lie below? + +MEDON. + +Have you, then, analysed that odd combination of poetry, metaphysics, +and politics, which, like the three primeval colours, tinge in various +tints and shades, simple and complex, all literature, morals, art, and +even conversation, through Germany? + +ALDA. + +No, indeed! + +MEDON. + +Have you decided between the different systems of Jacobi and Schelling? + +ALDA. + +You know I am a poor philosopher; but when Schelling was introduced +to me at Munich, I remember I looked up at him with inexpressible +admiration, as one whose giant arm had cut through an isthmus, and +whose giant mind had new modelled the opinions of minds as gigantic +as his own. + +MEDON. + +Then you are of this new school, which reveals the union of faith and +philosophy? + +ALDA. + +If I am, it is by instinct. + +MEDON. + +Well, to descend to your own peculiar sphere, have you satisfied +yourself as to the moral and social position of the women in Germany? + +ALDA. + +No, indeed!--at least, not yet. + +MEDON. + +Have you examined and noted down the routine of the _domestic_ education +of their children? (we know something of the public and national +systems.) Can you give some accurate notion of the ideas which generally +prevail on this subject? + +ALDA. + +O no! you have mentioned things which would require a life to study. +Merely to have thought upon them, to have glanced at them, gives me no +right to discuss them, unless I could bring my observations to some +tangible form, and derive from them some useful result. + +MEDON. + +Yet in this last journey you had an object--a purpose? + +ALDA. + +I had--a purpose which has long been revolving in my mind--an object +never lost sight of;--but give me time!--time! + +MEDON. + +I see;--but are you prepared for consequences? Can you task your +sensitive mind to stand reproach and ridicule? Remember your own story +of Runckten the traveller, who, when about to commence his expedition +into the desarts of Africa, prepared himself, by learning beforehand +to digest poisons; to swallow without disgust reptiles, spiders, +vermin---- + +ALDA. + +"Thou hast the most unsavoury similes!" + +MEDON. + +Take a proverb then--"Bisogna coprirsi bene il viso innanzi di +struzzicare il vespaio." + +ALDA. + +I will _not_ hide my face; nor can I answer you in this jesting vein, +for to me it is a serious thought. There is in the kindly feeling, the +spontaneous sympathy of the public towards me, something which fills me +with gratitude and respect, and tells me to respect myself; which I +would not exchange for the greater _eclat_ which hangs round greater +names;--which I will not forfeit by writing one line from an unworthy +motive; nor flatter, nor invite, by withholding one thought, opinion, +or sentiment, which I believe to be true, and to which I can put the +seal of my heart's conviction. + +MEDON. + +Good! I love a little enthusiasm now and then; so like Britomart in the +enchanter's palace, the motto is, + + "Be bold, be bold, and every where be bold!" + +ALDA. + +I should rather say, be gentle, be gentle, every where be gentle; and +then we cannot _be too bold_.[2] + +MEDON. + +Well, then, I return once more to the charge. Have you been rambling +about the world for these six months--yet learned nothing? + +ALDA. + +On the contrary. + +MEDON. + +Then what, in Heaven's name, _have_ you learned? + +ALDA. + +Not much; but I have learned to sweep my mind of some ill-conditioned +cobwebs. I have learned to consider my own acquired knowledge but as a +torch flung into an abyss, making the darkness visible, and showing me +the extent of my own ignorance. + +MEDON. + +Then give us--give _me_, at least--the benefit of your ignorance; only +let it be all your own. I honour a profession of ignorance--if only for +its rarity--in these all-knowing times. Let me tell you, the ignorance +of a candid and not uncultivated mind is better than the second-hand +wisdom of those who take all things for granted; who are the echoes of +others' opinions, the utterers of others' words; who _think_ they know, +and who _think_ they think: I am sick of them all. Come, refresh me with +a little ignorance--and be serious. + +ALDA. + +You make me smile; after all, 'tis only going over old ground, and I +know not what pleasure, what interest it can impart, beyond half an +hour's amusement. + +MEDON. + +Sceptic! is that nothing? In this harsh, cold, working-day world, is +half an hour's amusement nothing? Old ground!--as if you did not know +the pleasure of going over old ground with a new companion to refresh +half-faded recollections--to compare impressions--to correct old ideas +and acquire new ones? O I can suck knowledge out of ignorance, as a +weazel sucks eggs!--Begin. + +ALDA. + +Where shall I begin? + +MEDON. + +Where, but at the beginning? and then diverge as you will. Your first +journey was one of mere amusement? + +ALDA. + +Merely, and it answered its purpose; we travelled _a la milor +Anglais_--a _partie carree_--a barouche hung on the most approved +principle--double-cushioned--luxurious--rising and sinking on its +springs like a swan on the wave--the pockets stuffed with new +publications--maps and guides _ad infinitum_; English servants for +comfort, foreign servants for use; a chess-board, backgammon tables--in +short, surrounded with all that could render us entirely independent of +the amusements we had come to seek, and of the people among whom we had +come to visit. + +MEDON. + +Admirable--and English! + +ALDA. + +Yes, and pleasant. I thought, not without gratitude, of the contrast +between present feelings and those of a former journey. To abandon +oneself to the quickening influence of new objects without care or +thought of to-morrow, with a mind awake in all its strength; with +restored health and cheerfulness; with sensibility tamed, not dead; +possessing one's soul in quiet; not seeking, nor yet shrinking from +excitement; not self-engrossed, nor yet pining for sympathy; was not +this much? Not so interesting, perhaps, as playing the _Ennuyee_; +but, oh! you know not how sad it is to look upon the lovely through +tearful eyes, and walk among the loving and the kind, wrapped as in +a death-shroud; to carry into the midst of the most glorious scenes +of nature, and the divinest creations of art, perceptions dimmed and +troubled with sickness and anguish: to move in the morning with aching +and reluctance--to faint in the evening with weariness and pain; to feel +all change, all motion, a torment to the dying heart; all rest, all +delay, a burthen to the impatient spirit; to shiver in the presence of +joy, like a ghost in the sunshine, yet have no sympathy to spare for +suffering. How could I remember that all this _had been_, and not bless +the miracle-worker--Time? And _apropos_ to the miracles of time--I had +on this first journey, one source of amusement, which I am sorry I +cannot share with you at full length; it was the near contemplation +of a very singular character, of which I can only afford you a sketch. +Our CHEF _de voyage_, for so we chose to entitle him who was the planner +and director of our excursion, was one of the most accomplished and most +eccentric of human beings: even courtesy might have termed him old, at +seventy; but old age and he were many miles asunder, and it seemed as +though he had made some compact with Time, like that of Faust with the +devil, and was not to surrender to his inevitable adversary till the +very last moment. Years could not quench his vivacity, nor "stale his +infinite variety." He had been one of the prince's wild companions in +the days of Sheridan and Fox, and could play alternately blackguard and +gentleman, and both in perfection; but the high-born gentleman ever +prevailed. He had been heir to an enormous income, most of which had +slipped through his fingers _unknownst_, as the Irish say, and had stood +in the way of a coronet, which, somehow or other, had slipped over his +head to light on that of his eldest son. He had lived a life which would +have ruined twenty iron constitutions, and had suffered what might well +have broken twenty hearts of common stuff; but his self-complacency +was invulnerable, his animal spirits inexhaustible, his activity +indefatigable. The eccentricities of this singular man have been matter +of celebrity; but against each of these stories it would be easy to +place some act of benevolence, some trait of lofty gentlemanly feeling, +which would at least neutralize their effect. He often told me that he +had early in life selected three models, after which to form his own +conduct and character; namely, De Grammont, Hotspur, and Lord Herbert of +Cherbury; and he certainly _did_ unite, in a greater degree than he knew +himself, the characteristics of all three. Such was our CHEF, and thus +led, thus appointed, away we posted on, from land to land, from city +to city-- + +MEDON. + +Stay--stay. This is galloping on at the rate of Lenora, and her phantom +lover-- + + "Tramp, tramp across the land we go, + Splash, splash across the sea!" + + +Take me with you, and a little more leisurely. + +ALDA. + +I think Bruges was the first place which interested me, perhaps from +its historical associations. Bruges, where monarchs kissed the hand +to merchants, now emptied of its former splendour, reminded me of the +improvident steward in scripture, that could not dig, and to beg was +ashamed. It had an air of grave idleness and threadbare dignity; and its +listless, thinly-scattered inhabitants looked as if they had gone astray +among the wide streets and huge tenantless edifices. There is one thing +here which you must see--the tomb of Charles the Bold, and his daughter, +Mary of Burgundy. The tomb is of the most exquisite workmanship, +composed of polished brass and enamelled escutcheons; and there the +fiery father and the gentle daughter lie, side by side, in sculptured +bronze, equally still, cold, and silent. I remember that I stood long +gazing on the inscription, which made me smile, and made me think. There +was no mention of defeat and massacre, disgraceful flight, or obscure +death. "But," says the epitaph, after enumerating his titles, his +exploits, and his virtues, "fortune, who had hitherto been his good lady, +ungently turned her back upon him on such a day of such a year, and +_oppressed_ him"--an amusing instance of mingled courtesy and _naivete_. +Ghent was our next resting place. The aspect of Ghent, so familiarized +to us of late by our travelled artists, made a strong impression upon +me, and I used to walk about for hours together, looking at the strange +picturesque old buildings coeval with the Spanish dominion, with their +ornamented fronts and peaked roofs. There is much trade here, many +flourishing manufactories, and the canals and quays often exhibited a +lively scene of bustle, of which the form, at least, was new to us. The +first exposition, or exhibition, of the newly-founded Royal Academy +of the Netherlands was at this season open. You will allow it was a +fair opportunity of judging of the present state of painting, in the +self-same land, where she had once found, if not a temple, at least +a home. + +MEDON. + +And learned to be homely--but the result? + +ALDA. + +I can scarce express the surprise I felt at the time, though it has +since diminished on reflection. All the attempts at historical painting +were bad, without exception. There was the usual assortment of Virgins, +St. Cecilias, Cupids and Psyches, Zephyrs and Floras;--but such +incomparable atrocities! There were some cabinet pictures in the same +style in which their Flemish ancestors excelled--such as small interior +conversation pieces, battle pieces, and flowers and fruit; some of these +were really excellent, but the proportion of bad to good was certainly +fifty to one. + +MEDON. + +Something like our own Royal Academy. + +ALDA. + +No; because with much which was quite as bad, quite as insipid, as +coarse in taste, as stupidly presumptuous in attempt, and ridiculous +in failure, as ever shocked me on the walls of Somerset House, there +was nothing to be compared to the best pictures I have seen there. As I +looked and listened to the remarks of the crowd around me, I perceived +that the taste for art is even as low in the Netherlands as it is here +and elsewhere. + +MEDON. + +And, surely, not from the want of models, nor from the want of facility +in the means of studying them. You visited, of course, Schamp's +collection? + +ALDA. + +Surely; there were miracles of art crowded together like goods in a +counting-house, with wondrous economy of space, and more lamentable +economy of light. Some were nailed against doors, inside and out, or +suspended from screens and window-shutters. Here I saw Rubens' picture +of Father Rutseli, the confessor of Albert and Isabella: one of those +heads more suited to the crown than to the cowl--grand, sagacious, +intellectual, with such a world of meaning in the eye, that one almost +shrunk away from the expression. Here, too, I found that remarkable +picture of Charles the First, painted by Lely during the king's +imprisonment at Windsor--the only one for which he sat between his +dethronement and his death: he is still melancholy and gentlemanlike, +but not quite so dignified as on the canvass of Vandyke. This is the +very picture that Horace Walpole mentions as lost or abstracted from the +collection at Windsor. How it came into Schamp's collection, I could +not learn. A very small head of an Italian girl by Correggio, or in his +manner, hung close beside a Dutch girl by Mieris: equally exquisite as +paintings, they gave me an opportunity of contrasting two styles, both +founded in nature--but the nature, how different! the one all life, +the other life and soul. Schamp's collection is liberally open to the +public, as well as many others; if artists fail, it is not for want +of models. + +MEDON. + +Perhaps for want of patronage? Yet I hear that the late king of the +Netherlands sent several young artists to Italy at his own expense, +and that the Prince of Orange was liberal and even munificent in his +purchases--particularly of the old masters. + +ALDA. + +When I went to see the collection of the Prince of Orange at Brussels, +I stepped from the room in which hung the glorious Vandykes, perhaps +unequalled in the world, into the adjoining apartment, in which were two +unfinished portraits disposed upon easels. They represented members of +the prince's family; and were painted by a native artist of fashionable +fame, and royally patronised. These were pointed out to my admiration as +universally approved. What shall I say of them? Believe me, that they +were contemptible beyond all terms of contempt! Can you tell me why the +Prince of Orange should have sufficient taste to select and appropriate +the finest specimens of art, and yet purchase and patronize the vilest +daubs ever perpetrated by imbecility and presumption? + +MEDON. + +I know not, unless it be that in the former case he made use of others' +eyes and judgment, and in the latter, of his own. + +ALDA. + +I might have anticipated the answer; but be that as it may, of all the +galleries I saw in the Netherlands, the small but invaluable collection +he had formed in his palace pleased me most. I remember a portrait of +Sir Thomas More, by Holbein. A female head, by Leonardo da Vinci, said +to be one of the mistresses of Francis I., but this is doubtful; that +most magnificent group, Christ delivering the keys to St. Peter, by +Rubens, once in England; about eight or ten Vandykes, masterpieces--for +instance, Philip IV. and his minister Olivarez, and a Chevalier le Roy +and his wife: all that you can imagine of chivalrous dignity, and +lady-like grace. But there was one picture, a family group, by Gonsalez, +which struck me more than all the rest put together. I had never seen +any production of this painter, whose works are scarcely known out of +Spain; and I looked upon this with equal astonishment and admiration. +There was also a small, but most curious collection of pictures, of +the ancient Flemish and German schools, which it is now the fashion +to admire, and, what is worse, to imitate. The word _fashion_ does +not express the national enthusiasm on this subject which prevails in +Germany. I can understand that these pictures are often most interesting +as historic documents, and often admirable for their literal transcripts +of nature and expression, but they can only possess comparative +excellence and relative value; and where the feeling of ideal beauty and +classic grace has been highly cultivated, the eye shrinks involuntarily +from these hard, grotesque, and glaring productions of an age when +genius was blindly groping amid the darkness of ignorance. To confess +the truth, I was sometimes annoyed, and sometimes amused, by the cant I +heard in Germany about those schools of painting which preceded Albert +Durer. Perhaps I should not say _cant_--it is a vile expression; and in +German affectation there is something so very peculiar--so poetical, +so--so _natural_, if I might say so, that I would give it another name +if I could find one. In this worship of their old painters, I really +could sympathize sometimes, even when it most provoked me. Retzsch, whom +I had the delight of knowing at Dresden, showed me a sketch, in which he +had ridiculed this mania with the most exquisite humour: it represented +the torso of an antique Apollo (emblematical of ideal grace), mutilated +and half buried in the earth, and subject to every species of profanation; +it serves as a stool for a German student, who, with his shirt-collar +turned down, and his hair dishevelled, and his cap stuck on one side, +_a la_ Rafaelle, is intently copying a stiff, hard, sour-looking old +Madonna, while Ignorance looks on, gaping with admiration. No one knows +better than Retzsch the value of these ancient masters--no one has a +more genuine feeling for all that is admirable in them; but no one feels +more sensibly the gross perversion and exaggeration of the worship paid +to them. I wish he would publish this good-humoured little bit of satire, +which is too just and too graceful to be called a caricature. + +I must tell you, however, that there were two most curious old pictures +in the Orange Gallery, which arrested my attention, and of which I have +retained a very distinct and vivid recollection; and that is more than I +can say of many better pictures. They tell, in a striking manner, a very +interesting story: the circumstances are said to have occurred about +the year 985, but I cannot say that they rest on any very credible +authority. + +Of these two pictures, each exhibits two scenes. A certain nobleman, a +favourite of the Emperor Otho, is condemned to death by his master on +the false testimony of the Empress (a sort of Potiphar's wife), who has +accused him of having tempted her to break her marriage vow. In the +back-ground we see the unfortunate man led to judgment; he is in his +shirt, bare-footed and bare-headed. His wife walks at his side, to whom +he appears to be speaking earnestly, and endeavouring to persuade her +of his innocence. A friar precedes them, and a crowd of people follow +after. On the walls of the city stand the Emperor and his wicked +Empress, looking down on the melancholy procession. In the foreground, +we have the dead body of the victim, stretched upon the earth, and the +executioner is in the act of delivering the head to his wife, who looks +grim with despair. The severed head and flowing blood are painted with +such a horrid and literal fidelity to nature, that it has been found +advisable to cover this portion of the picture. + +In the foreground of the second picture, the Emperor Otho is represented +on his throne surrounded by his counsellors and courtiers. Before him +kneels the widow of the Count: she has the ghastly head of her husband +in her lap, and in her left-hand she holds firmly and unhurt the +red-hot iron, the fiery ordeal by which she proves to the satisfaction +of all present the innocence of her murdered lord. The Emperor looks +thunderstruck; the Empress stands convicted, and is condemned to death; +and in the back-ground, we have the catastrophe. She is bound to a +stake, the fire is kindled, and she suffers the terrible penalty of +her crime. These pictures, in subject and execution, might be termed +tragico-comico-historical; but in spite of the harshness of the drawing, +and the thousand defects of style and taste, they fix the attention by +the vigour of the colouring and the expression of the heads, many of +which are evidently from the life. The story is told in a very complete +though very inartificial manner. The painter, Derick Steuerbout, was one +of the very earliest of the Flemish masters, and lived about 1468, many +years before Albert Durer and Holbein. I have heard that they were +painted for the city of Lorraine, and until the invasion of the French, +they remained undisturbed, and almost unnoticed, in the Hotel-de-Ville. + +MEDON. + +Does this collection of the Prince of Orange still exist at Brussels? + +ALDA. + +I am told that it does--that the whole palace, the furniture, the +pictures, remain precisely as the prince and his family left them: that +even down to the princess's work-box, and the portraits of her children +which hang in her boudoir, nothing has been touched. This does not speak +well for king Leopold's gallantry; and, in his place, I think I would +have sent the private property of my rival after him. + +MEDON. + +So would not I, for this is not the age of chivalry, but of common +sense. As to the pictures, the Belgians might plead that they were +purchased with the public money, therefore justly public property. No, +no; he should not have a picture of them--"If a Vandyke would save his +soul, he should not; I'd keep them, by this hand!" that is, as long as +I had a plausible excuse for keeping them; but the princess should have +had her work-box and her children by the first courier. What more at +Brussels? + +ALDA. + +I can recollect no more. The weather was sultry: we dressed, and dined, +and ate ices, and drove up and down the Allee Verte, and saw I believe +all that is to be seen--churches, palaces, hospitals, and so forth. We +went from thence to Aix-la-Chapelle and Spa. As it was the height of the +season, and both places were crowded with gay invalids, perhaps I ought +to have been very much amused, but I confess I was _ennuyee_ to death. + +MEDON. + +This I can hardly conceive; for though there might have been little to +amuse one of your turn of mind, there should have been much to observe. + +ALDA. + +There might have been matter for observation, or ridicule, or reflexion, +at the moment, but nothing that I remember with pleasure. Spa I disliked +particularly. I believe I am not in my nature cold or stern; but there +was something in the shallow, tawdry, vicious gaiety of this place, +which disgusted me. In all watering-places extremes meet; sickness and +suffering, youth and dissipation, beggary and riches, collect together; +but Spa being a very small town, a mere village, the approximation is +brought immediately under the eye at every hour, every moment; and the +beauty of the scenery around only rendered it more disagreeable: to me, +even the hill of Annette and Lubin was polluted. Our Chef de voyage, who +had visited Spa fifty years before, when on his _grand tour_, walked +about with great complacency, recalling his youthful pleasures, and +the days when he used to gallant his beautiful cousin, the Duchess of +Rutland, of divine memory. While the rest of the party were amused, I +fell into my old, habit of thinking and observing, and my contemplations +were not agreeable. But instead of dealing in these general remarks, +I will sketch you one or two pictures which have dwelt upon my memory. +We had a well-dressed laquais-de-place, whose honesty and good-humour +rendered him an especial favourite. His wife being ill, I went to see +her; to my great surprise he conducted me to a little mud hovel, worse +than the worst Irish cabin I ever heard described, where his wife lay +stretched upon some straw, covered with a rug, and a little neglected +ragged child was crawling about the floor, and about her bed. It seems +then, that, this poor man, who every day waited at our luxurious table, +dressed in smiles, and must habitually have witnessed the wasteful +expenditure of the rich, returned every night to his miserable home, +if home it could be called, to feel the stings of want with double +bitterness. He told me that he and his wife lived the greater part of +the year upon water-gruel, and that the row of wretched cabins, of which +his own formed one, was inhabited by those who, like himself, were +dependent upon the rich, extravagant, and dissipated strangers for the +little pittance which was to support them for a twelvemonth. Was not +this a fearful contrast? I should tell you that the benevolence of our +Chef rendered this poor couple independent of change or chance for the +next year. My other picture is in a different style. You know that +at Spa the theatre immediately joins the ball-room. As soon as the +performances are over, the parterre is laid down with boards, and in a +few minutes metamorphosed into a gambling saloon. One night curiosity +led me to be a spectator at one of the _rouge et noir_ tables. While I +was there, a Flemish lady of rank, the Baroness B----, came in, hanging +on the arm of a gentleman; she was not young, but still handsome. I had +often met her in our walks, and had been struck by her fine eyes, and +the amiable expression of her countenance. After one or two turns up +and down the room, laughing and talking, she carelessly, and as if from +a sudden thought, seated herself at the table. By degrees she became +interested in the game, her stakes became deeper, her countenance became +agitated, and her brow clouded. I left her playing. The next evening +when I entered, I found her already seated at the table, as indeed I had +anticipated. I watched her for some time with a painful interest. It was +evident that she was not an habitual gambler, like several others at the +same table, whose hard impassive features never varied with the variations +of the game. There was one little old withered skeleton of a woman, like +a death's head in artificial flowers, who stretched out her harpy claws +upon the rouleaus of gold and silver, without moving a muscle or a +wrinkle of her face,--with hardly an additional twinkle in her dull grey +eye. Not so my poor baroness, who became every moment more agitated and +more eager: her eyes sparkled with an unnatural keenness, her teeth +became set, and her lips drawn away from them, wore, instead of the +sweet smile which had at first attracted my attention, a grin of +desperation. Gradually, as I looked at her, her countenance assumed so +hideous, and, I may add, so vile an expression, that I could no longer +endure the spectacle. I hastened from the room--more moved, more shocked +than I can express; and often, since that time, her face has risen upon +my day and night dreams like a horrid supernatural mask. Her husband, +for this wretched woman was a wife and a mother, came to meet her a few +days afterwards, and accompany her home; but I heard that in the interval +she had attempted self-destruction, and failed. + +MEDON. + +The case is but too common; and even you, who are always seeking reasons +and excuses for the delinquencies of your sex, would hardly find them +here. + +ALDA. + +And unless I could know what were the previous habits and education +of the victim, through what influences, blest or unblest, her mind +had been trained, her moral existence built up--should I condemn? Who +had taught this woman self-knowledge?--who had instructed her in the +elements of her own being, and guarded her against her own excitable +temperament?--what friendly voice had warned her ignorance?--what secret +burden of misery--what joyless emptiness of heart--what fever of the +nerves--what weariness of spirit--what "thankless husband or faithless +lover" had driven her to the edge of the precipice? In this particular +case I know that the husband bore the character of being both negligent +and dissipated; and where was _he_,--what were his haunts and his +amusements, while his wife staked with her gold, her honour, her reason, +and her life? Tell me all this before we dare to pass judgment. O it is +easy to compute what is done! and yet, who but the Being above us all, +can know what is resisted? + +MEDON. + +You would plead then for a _female_ gambler? + +ALDA. + +Why do you lay such an emphasis upon _female_ gambler? In what respect +is a female gambler worse than one of your sex? The case is more +pitiable;--more rare--therefore, perhaps, more shocking; but why more +hateful? + +MEDON. + +You pose me. + +ALDA. + +Then I will leave you to think;--or shall I go on? for at this rate we +shall never arrive at the end of our journey. I was at Aix-la-Chapelle, +was I not? Well, I spare you the relics of Charlemagne, and if you have +any dear or splendid associations with that great name, spare your +imagination the shock it may receive in the cathedral at Aix, and leave +"Yarrow unvisited."[3] Luckily the theatre at Aix is beautiful, and +there was a fine opera, and a very perfect orchestra; the singers +tolerable. It was here I first heard the Don Juan and the Freyschutz +performed in the German fashion, and with German words. The Freyschutz +gave me unmixed pleasure. In the Don Juan I missed the recitative, +and the soft Italian flow of syllables, from which the music had been +divorced; so that the ear, long habituated to that marriage of sweet +sounds, was disappointed; but to listen without pleasure and excitement +was impossible. I remember that on looking round, after Donna Anna's +song, I was surprised to see our Chef de voyage bathed in tears; but, +no whit disconcerted, he merely wiped them away, saying, with a smile, +"It is the very prettiest, softest thing to cry to one's self!" +Afterwards, when we were in the carriage, he expressed his surprise that +any man should be ashamed of tears. "For my own part," he added, "when +I wish to enjoy the very high sublime of luxury, I dine alone, order a +mutton cutlet, _cuite a point_, with a bottle of Burgundy on one side, +and Ovid's epistle of Penelope to Ulysses on the other; and so I read, +and eat, and cry to myself. And then he repeated with enthusiasm-- + + "Hanc tua Penelope lento tibi mittit Ulysse: + Nil mihi rescribas attamen ipse veni;" + + +his eyes glistening as he recited the lines; he made me feel their +beauty without understanding a word of their sense. "Strangest, and +happiest of men!" I thought as I looked at him, "that after living +seventy years in this world, can still have tears to spare for the +sorrows of Penelope!" Well, our next resting place was Cologne. + +MEDON. + +You pause?--you have nothing to say of Cologne? No English traveller, +except your professed tourists and guide-book makers, ever has; of the +crowds who pass through the place, on their way up or down the Rhine, +how few spend more than a night or a day there! their walk is between +the Rheinberg and the cathedral; they look, perhaps, with a sneering +curiosity at the shrine of the Three Kings; cut the usual jests on the +Leda and the Cupid and Psyche;[4] glance at the St. Peter of Rubens; +lounge on the bridge of boats; stock themselves with eau-de-Cologne, and +then away! And yet this strange old city, which a bigoted priesthood, +a jealous magistracy, and a variety of historical causes, have so +long kept isolated in the midst of Europe, with its Roman origin, its +classical associations, the wild gothic superstitions of which it has +been the theatre; its legion of martyrs, its three kings and eleven +thousand virgins, and the peculiar manners and physiognomy of the people, +strangely take the fancy. What has become of its three hundred and fifty +churches, and its thirty thousand beggars?--Thirty thousand beggars! +Was there ever such a splendid establishment of licensed laziness, +and consecrated rags and wallets! What a magnificent idea does it give +one of the inexhaustible charity, and the incalculable riches of the +inhabitants! but the French came with their besom of purification +and destruction; and lo! the churches were turned into arsenals, the +convents into barracks; and from its old-accustomed haunts, "the genius +of beggary was with sighing sent." I really believe, that were I again +to visit Cologne, I would not be content with a mere superficial glance, +as heretofore. + +ALDA. + +And you would do well. To confess the truth, our first impressions of +the place were exceedingly disagreeable; it appeared a huge, rambling, +gloomy old city, whose endless narrow dirty streets, and dull +dingy-looking edifices, were any thing but inviting. Nor on a second +and a third visit were we tempted to prolong our stay. Yet Cologne has +since become most interesting to me from a friendship I formed with +a Colonese, a descendant of one of the oldest families of the place. +How she loved her old city!--how she worshipped every relic with the +most poetical, if not the most pious veneration!--how she looked +down upon Berlin with scorn, as an upstart city, "_une ville ma chere, +qui n'a ni histoire, ni antiquite_." The cathedral she used to call +"_mon Berceau_," and the three kings "_mes trois peres_." Her profound +knowledge of general history, her minute acquaintance with the local +antiquities, the peculiar customs, the wild legends, the solemn +superstitions of her birth-place, added to the most lively imagination +and admirable descriptive powers, were to me an inexhaustible source +of delight and information. It appears that the people of Cologne have +a distinct character, but little modified by intercourse with the +surrounding country, and preserved by continual intermarriages among +themselves. They have a dialect, and songs, and ballads, and music, +peculiar to their city; and are remarkable for an original vein of +racy humour, a revengeful spirit, an exceeding superstition, a blind +attachment to their native customs, a very decided contempt for +other people, and a surpassing hatred of all innovations. They never +admitted the jurisdiction of the electors of Cologne, and, although +the most bigoted people in the world, were generally at war with +their archbishops. Even Napoleon could not make them comformable. +The city is now attached to Prussia, but still retains most of its +ancient privileges, and all its ancient spirit of insubordination and +independence. When, in 1828, the king of Prussia wished to force upon +them an unpopular magistrate, the whole city rose, and obliged the +obnoxious president to resign; the government, armed with all its legal +and military terrors, could do nothing against the determined spirit +of this half-civilized, fearless, reckless, yet merry, good-humoured +populace. A history of this grotesque revolution, which had the same +duration as the celebrated _trois jours de Paris_, and exhibited in +its progress and issue some of the most striking, most characteristic, +most farcical scenes you can imagine, were worthy of a Colonese Walter +Scott. How I wish I could give you some of my friend's rich graphic +sketches and humorous pictures of popular manner! but I feel that their +peculiar spirit would evaporate in my hands. The event is celebrated in +their local history as "_la Revolution du Carnaval_:" and this reminds +me of another peculiarity of Cologne. The carnival is still celebrated +there with a degree of splendour and fantastic humour, exceeding even +the festivities of Rome and Naples in the present day; but as the season +of the carnival is not the season for flight with our English birds of +passage, few have ever witnessed these extraordinary Saturnalia. Such is +the general ignorance or indifference relative to Cologne, that I met +the other day with a very accomplished man, and a lover of art, who had +frequently visited the place, and yet he had never seen the Medusa. + +MEDON. + +Nor I, by this good light!--I never even heard of it! + +ALDA. + +And how shall I attempt to describe it? Unless I had the "large +utterance of the early gods," or could pour forth a string of Greek or +German compounds, I know not in what words I could do justice to the +effect it produced upon me. This wondrous mask measures about two feet +and a half in height;[5] the colossal features, and I may add, the +colossal expression, grand without exaggeration--so awfully vast, and +yet so gloriously beautiful; the full rich lips curled with disdain--the +mighty wings overshadowing the knit and tortured brow--the madness in +the large dilated eyes--the wreathing and recoiling snakes, came upon me +like something supernatural, and impressed me at once with astonishment, +horror, and admiration. I was quite unprepared for what I beheld. As I +stood before it my mind seemed to elevate and enlarge itself to admit +this new vision of grandeur. Nothing but the two Fates in the Elgin +marbles, and the Torso of the Vatican, ever affected me with the same +inexpressible sense of the sublime: and this is not a fragment of some +grand mystery, of which the remainder has been "to night and chaos +hurled;" it is entire, in admirable preservation, and the workmanship as +perfect as the conception is magnificent. I know not if it would have +affected another in the same manner. For me, the ghastly allegory of the +Medusa has a peculiar fascination. I confess that I have never wholly +understood it, nor have any of the usual explanations satisfied me; +it appears to me, that the Greeks, in thus blending the extremes of +loveliness and terror, had a meaning, a purpose, more than is dreamt +of by our philosophy. + +MEDON. + +But, how came this wonderful relic to Cologne, of all places in the +world? + +ALDA. + +It stopped there on its road to England. + +MEDON. + +By what perverse destiny?--was it avarice on our part, or force or fraud +on that of others? + +ALDA. + +It was, as Desdemona says, "our wretched fortune:" but the story, with +all its circumstances, does so much honour to human nature, that it +has half reconciled me to our loss. You must have heard of Professor +Wallraf of Cologne, one of the canons of the cathedral, who, with his +professorship and his canonship together, may have possessed from +five to seven hundred francs a year. He was one of those wonderful +and universal scholars, of whom we read in former times--men who +concentrated all their powers and passions, and intellectual faculties, +in the acquirement and advancement of knowledge, without any selfish aim +or object, and from the mere abstract love of science. Early in life +this man formed the resolution to remove from his native city the reproach +of self-satisfied ignorance and monastic prejudices, which had hitherto +characterized it; and in the course of a long existence of labour and +privation, as professor and teacher, he contrived to collect together +books, manuscripts, pictures, gems, works of art, and objects of natural +history, to an immense amount. In the year 1818, on recovering from +a dangerous illness, he presented his whole collection to his native +city; and the magistracy, in return, bestowed on him a pension of three +thousand francs for the remainder of his life. He was then more than +seventy. About the same time a dealer in antiquities arrived from Rome, +bringing with him this divine Medusa, with various other busts and +fragments: he was on his way to England, where he hoped to dispose of +them. He asked for his whole collection twelve thousand francs, and +refused to sell any part of it separately. The city refused to make the +purchase, thinking it too dear, and Wallraf, in despair at the idea +of this glorious relic being consigned to other lands, mortgaged his +yearly pension in order to raise the money, purchased the Medusa, +presented it to the city, and then cheerfully resumed his accustomed +life of self-denial and frugality. His only dread was lest he should die +before the period was expired. He lived, however, to pay off his debt, +and in three months afterwards he died.[6] Was not this admirable? The +first time I saw the Medusa I did not know this anecdote; the second +time, as I looked at it, I thought of Wallraf, and felt how much a moral +interest can add to the charm of what is in itself most perfect. + +MEDON. + +I will certainly make a pilgrimage to this Medusa. She must be worth +all the eleven thousand virgins together. What next? + +ALDA. + +Instead of embarking in the steam-boat, we posted along the left +bank of the Rhine, spending a few days at Bonn, at Godesberg, and at +Ehrenbreitstein; but I should tell you, as you allow me to diverge, that +on my second journey, I owed much to a residence of some weeks at Bonn. +There I became acquainted with the celebrated Schlegel, or I should +rather say, M. le Chevalier de Schlegel, for I believe his titles and +his "starry honours" are not indifferent to him; and in truth he wears +them very gracefully. I was rather surprised to find in this sublime +and eloquent critic, this awful scholar, whose comprehensive mind has +grasped the whole universe of art, a most agreeable, lively, social +being. Of the judgments passed on him in his own country, I know little, +and understand less; I am not deep in German literary polemics. To me +he was the author of the lectures on "Dramatic Literature," and the +translator of Shakspeare, and, moreover, all that was amiable and +polite: and was not this enough? + +MEDON. + +Enough for you, certainly; but, I believe that at this time Schlegel +would rather found his fame on being one of the greatest oriental +critics of the age, than on being the interpreter of the beauties of +Calderon and Shakspeare. + +ALDA. + +I believe so; but for my own part, I would rather hear him talk of +Romeo and Juliet, and of Madame de Stael, than of the Ramayana, the +Bhagvat-Gita, or even the "eastern Con-fut-zee." This, of course, is +only a proof of my own ignorance. Conversation may be compared to a lyre +with seven chords--philosophy, art, poetry, politics, love, scandal, +and the weather. There are some professors, who, like Paganini, "can +discourse most eloquent music" upon one string only; and some who can +grasp the whole instrument, and with a master's hand sound it from the +top to the bottom of its compass. Now, Schlegel is one of the latter: +he can thunder in the bass or caper in the treble; he can be a whole +concert in himself. No man can trifle like him, nor, like him, blend in +a few hours' converse, the critic, philologist, poet, philosopher, and +man of the world--no man narrates more gracefully, nor more happily +illustrates a casual thought. He told me many interesting things. "Do +you know," said he one morning, as I was looking at a beautiful edition +of Corinne, bound in red morocco, the gift of Madame de Stael; "do you +know that I figure in that book?" I asked eagerly in what character? +He bid me guess. I guessed playfully, the Comte d'Erfeuil. "No! no!" +said he, laughing, "I am immortalized in the Prince Castel-Forte, the +faithful, humble, unaspiring, friend of Corinne." + +MEDON. + +To any man but Schlegel, such an immortality were worth a life. Nay, +there is no man, though his fame extended to the ends of the earth, whom +the pen of Madame de Stael could not honour. + +ALDA. + +He seemed to think so, and I liked him for the self-complacency with +which he twined her little myrtle leaf with his own palmy honours. Nor +did he once refer to what I believe every body knows, her obligations to +him in her De l'Allemagne. + +MEDON. + +Apropos--do tell me what is the general opinion of that book among the +Germans themselves. + +ALDA. + +I think they do not judge it fairly. Some speak of it as eloquent, but +superficial:[7] others denounce it altogether as a work full of mistakes +and flippant, presumptuous criticism: others again affect to speak of +it, and even of Madame de Stael herself, as things of another era, quite +gone by and forgotten; this appeared to me too ridiculous. They forget, +or do not know, what _we_ know, that her De l'Allemagne was the first +book which awakened in France and England a lively and general interest +in German art and literature. It is now five-and-twenty years since it +was published. The march of opinion, and criticism, and knowledge of +every kind, has been so rapid, that much has become old which then was +new; but this does not detract from its merit. Once or twice I tried to +convince my German friends that they were exceedingly ungrateful in +abusing Madame de Stael, but it was all in vain; so I sat swelling with +indignation to hear my idol traduced, and called--O profanation!-- +"_cette Stael_." + +MEDON. + +But do you think the Germans could at all appreciate or understand such +a phenomenon as Madame de Stael must have appeared in those days? She +whisked through their skies like a meteor, before they could bring the +telescope of their wits to a right focus for observation. How she must +have made them open their eyes!--and you see in the correspondence +between Goethe and Schiller what _they_ thought of her. + +ALDA. + +Yes, I know that with her lively egotism and Parisian volubility, +she stunned Schiller and teased Goethe: but while our estimate of +_manner_ may be allowed to be relative and comparative, our estimate +of _character_ should be positive and abstract. Madame de Stael was +in manner the Frenchwoman, accustomed to be the cynosure of a salon, +but she was not ridiculous or egoiste in character. She was, to use +Schlegel's expression, "femme grande et magnanime jusque dans les replis +de son ame." The best proof is the very spirit in which she viewed +Germany, in spite of all her natural and national prejudices. To apply +your own expression, she went forth, in the spirit of peace, and brought +back, not only an olive leaf, but a whole tree, and it has flourished. +She had a universal mind. I believe she never thought, and still less +_made_, any one ridiculous in her life.[8] + +At Bonn much of my time was spent in intimate and almost hourly +intercourse with two friends, one of whom I have already mentioned to +you--a rare creature!--the other, who was herself the daughter of a +distinguished authoress,[9] was one of the most generally accomplished +women I ever met with. Opposed to each other in the constitution of +their minds--in all their views of literature and art, and all their +experience of life--in their tastes, and habits, and feelings--yet +mutually appreciating each other: both were distinguished by talents of +the highest order and by great originality of character, and both were +German, and very essentially _German_: English society and English +education would never have produced two such women. Their conversation +prepared me to form correct ideas of what I was to see and hear, and +guarded me against the mistakes and hasty conclusions of vivacious +travellers. At Bonn I also saw, for the first time, a specimen of the +fresco painting, lately revived in Germany with such brilliant success. +By command of the Prussian Board of Education the hall of the university +of Bonn is to be painted in fresco, and the work has been entrusted +to C. Hermann, Goetzenberger, and Foerster--all, I believe, pupils of +Cornelius. The three sides of the hall are to represent the three +faculties--Theology, Jurisprudence, and Philosophy; the first of these +is finished, and here is an engraving of it. You see Theology is throned +in the centre. The four evangelists, with St. Peter and St. Paul, stand +on the steps of the throne; around her are the fathers and doctors of +the church, and (which is the chief novelty of the composition) grouped +together with a very liberal disregard to all religious differences; +for there you see pope Gregory, and Ignatius Loyola, and St. Bernard, +and Abelard, and Dante; and here we have Luther, and Melanchthon, +and Calvin, and Wickliff, and Huss. On the opposite side of the hall, +Philosophy, under which head are comprised all science, poetry, and art, +is represented surrounded by the great poets, philosophers, and artists, +from Homer, Aristotle, and Phideas, down to Shakspeare, Raffaelle, +Goethe, and Kant. Jurisprudence, which is not begun, is to occupy the +third side. The cartoons pleased me better than the paintings, for the +drawing and grouping are really fine; but the execution struck me as +somewhat hard and mannered. I shall have much to say hereafter of the +fresco painting in Germany; for the present, proceed we on our journey. + +Tell me, had you a full moon while you were on the Rhine? + +MEDON. + +Truly, I forget. + +ALDA. + +Then you had _not_; for it would so have blended with your recollections, +that as a circumstance it could not have been forgotten; and take +my advice, when next you are off on your annual flight, consult the +calendar, and propitiate the fairest of all the fair Existences of +heaven to give you the light of her countenance. If you never took a +solitary ramble, or, what is better, a _tete-a-tete_ drive through the +villages and vineyards between Bonn and Plittersdorf, when the moon +hung over the Drachenfels, when the undulating outlines of the Seven +Mountains seemed to dissolve into the skies, and the Rhine was spread +out at their feet like a lake--so ample, and so still;--if you have +never seen the stars shine through the ruined arch of the Rolandseck, +and the height of Godesberg, with its single giant tower, stand out of +the plain,--black, and frowning against the silvery distance, then you +have not beheld one of the loveliest landscapes ever presented to a +thoughtful worshipper of nature. There is a story, too, connected with +the ruins of Godesberg:--one of those fine tragedies of real life, which +distance all fiction. It is not so popular as the celebrated legend +of the brave Roland, and his cloistered love; but it is at least +as authentic. You know that, according to tradition, the castle of +Godesberg was founded by Julian the Apostate; another, and a more +interesting apostate, was the cause of its destruction. + +Gerard[10] de Truchses, Count Waldbourg, who was archbishop and elector +of Cologne in 1583, scandalized his see, and all the Roman Catholic +powers, by turning Protestant. According to himself, his conversion was +owing to "the goodness of God, who had revealed to him the darkness and +the errors of popery;" but according to his enemies, it was owing to his +love for the beautiful Agnes de Mansfeld, canoness of Gersheim; she was +a daughter of one of the greatest Protestant houses in Germany; and her +two brothers, bigoted Calvinists, and jealous of the honour of their +family, conceived themselves insulted by the public homage which a +Catholic priest, bound by his vows, dared to pay to their sister. They +were yet more incensed on discovering that the love was mutual, and +loudly threatened vengeance to both. Gerard renounced the Catholic +faith, and the lovers were united. He was excommunicated and degraded, +of course; but he insisted on his right to retain his secular dominions +and privileges, and refused to resign the electorate, which the emperor, +meantime, had awarded to Ernest of Bavaria, bishop of Liege. The contest +became desperate. The whole of that beautiful and fertile plain, from +the walls of Cologne to the Godesberg, grew "familiar with bloodshed as +the morn with dew;" and Gerard displayed qualities which showed him more +fitted to win and wear a bride, than to do honour to any priestly vows +of sanctity and temperance. Attacked on all sides,--by his subjects, who +had learned to detest him as an apostate, by the infuriated clergy, and +by the Duke of Bavaria, who had brought an army to enforce his brother's +claims,--he carried on the struggle for five years, and at last, reduced +to extremity, threw himself, with a few faithful friends, into the +castle of Godesberg. After a brave defence, the castle was stormed and +taken by the Bavarians, who left it nearly in the state we now see it--a +heap of ruins. + +Gerard escaped with his wife, and fled to Holland, where Maurice, Prince +of Orange, granted him an asylum. Thence he sent his beautiful and +devoted wife to the court of Queen Elizabeth, to claim a former promise +of protection, and supplicate her aid, as the great support of the +Protestant cause, for the recovery of his rights. He could not have +chosen a more luckless ambassadress; for Agnes, though her beauty was +somewhat impaired by the persecutions and anxieties which had followed +her ill-fated union, was yet most lovely and stately, in all the pride +of womanhood; and her misfortunes and her charms, as well as the +peculiar circumstances of her marriage, excited the enthusiasm of all +the English chivalry. Unhappily the Earl of Essex was among the first to +espouse her cause with all the generous warmth of his character, and his +visits to her were so frequent, and his admiration so indiscreet, that +Elizabeth's jealousy was excited even to fury. Agnes was first driven +from the court, and then ordered to quit the kingdom. She took refuge in +the Netherlands, where she died soon afterwards; and Gerard, who never +recovered his dominions, retired to Strasbourg, where he died. So ends +this sad eventful history, which, methinks, would make a very pretty +romance. The tower of Godesberg, lasting as their love and ruined as +their fortunes, still remains one of the most striking monuments in that +land, where almost every hill is crowned with its castle, and every +castle has its tale of terror, or of love.[11] + +Another beautiful picture, which, merely as a picture, has dwelt on my +remembrance, was the city of Coblentz and the fort of Ehrenbreitstein, +as viewed from the bridge of boats under a cloudless moon. The city, +with its fantastic steeples and masses of building, relieved against +the clear deep blue of the summer sky--the lights which sparkled in the +windows reflected in the broad river, and the various forms and tall +masts of the craft anchored above and opposite--the huge hill, with its +tiara of fortifications, which, in the sunshine and in the broad day, +had disappointed me by its formality, now seen under the soft moonlight, +as its long lines of architecture and abrupt angles were projected in +brightness or receded in shadow, had altogether a most sublime effect. +But _apropos_ to moonlights and pictures--of all the enchanted and +enchanting scenes ever lighted by the full round moon, give me +Heidelberg! Not the Colosseum of Rome--neither in itself, nor yet in +Lord Byron's description, and I have both by heart--can be more grand; +and in moral interest, in poetical associations, in varying and wondrous +beauty, the castle of Heidelberg has the advantage. In the course of +many visits, Heidelberg became to me familiar as the face of a friend, +and its remembrance still "haunts me as a passion." I have known it +under every changeful aspect which the seasons, and the hours, and the +changeful moods of my own mind, could lend it. I have seen it when the +sun, rising over the Geisberg, first kindled the vapours as they floated +away from the old towers, and when the ivy and the wreathed verdure on +the walls sparkled with dewy light: and I have seen it when its huge +black masses stood against the flaming sunset; and its enormous shadow, +flung down the chasm beneath, made it night there, while daylight +lingered around and above. I have seen it when mantled in all the bloom +and foliage of summer, and when the dead leaves were heaped on the paths, +and choked the entrance to many a favourite nook. I have seen it when +crowds of gay visitors flitted along its ruined terraces,[12] and music +sounded near; and with friends, whose presence endeared every pleasure; +and I have walked alone round its desolate precincts, with no companions +but my own sad and troubled thoughts. I have seen it when clothed in +calm and glorious moonlight. I have seen it when the winds rushed +shrieking through its sculptured halls, and when grey clouds came +rolling down the mountains, folding it in their ample skirts from the +view of the city below. And what have I seen to liken to it by night or +by day, in storm or in calm, in summer or in winter! Then its historical +and poetical associations-- + +MEDON. + +There now!--will you not leave the picture, perfect as it is, and not +for ever seek in every object something more than is there? + +ALDA. + +I do not seek it--I find it. You will say--I have _heard_ you say--that +Heidelberg wants no beauty unborrowed of the eye; but if history had not +clothed it in recollections, fancy must have invested it in its own +dreams. It is true, that it is a mere modern edifice compared with all +the classic, and most of the gothic ruins; yet over Heidelberg there +hangs a terror and a mystery peculiar to itself: for the mind which +acquiesces in decay, recoils from destruction. Here ruin and desolation +make mocks with luxurious art and gay magnificence. Here it is not the +equal, gradual power of time, adorning and endearing what yet it spares +not, which has wrought this devastation, but savage war and elemental +rage. Twice blasted by the thunderbolt, three times consumed by fire, +ten times ravaged, plundered, desecrated by foes, and at last dismantled +and abandoned by its own princes, it is still strong to endure and +mighty to resist all that time, and war, and the elements may do against +it--and, mutilated rather than decayed, may still defy centuries. The +very anomalies of architecture and fantastic incongruities of this +fortress-palace, are to me a fascination. Here are startling and +terrific contrasts. That huge round tower--the tower of Frederic the +Victorious--now "deep trenched with thunder fires," looks as if built +by the Titans or the Huns; and those delicate sculptures in the palace +of Otho-Henry, as if the genius of Raffaelle or Correggio had breathed +on the stone. What flowing grace of outline! what luxuriant life! what +endless variety and invention in those half-defaced fragments! These are +the work of Italian artists, whose very names have perished;--all traces +of their existence and of their destinies so utterly lost, that one +might almost believe, with the peasantry, that these exquisite remains +are not the work of mortal hands, but of fairies and spirits of air, +evoked to do the will of an enchanter. The old palatines, the lords of +Heidelberg, were a magnificent and magnanimous race. Louis III., +Frederic the Victorious, Frederic II., Otho-Henry, were all men who had +stepped in advance of their age. They could think as well as fight, in +days when fighting, not thinking, was the established fashion among +potentates and people. A liberal and enlightened spirit, and a love of +all the arts that humanise mankind, seem to have been hereditary in +this princely family. Frederic I. lay under the suspicion of heresy +and sorcery, in consequence of his tolerant opinions, and his love of +mathematics and astronomy. His personal prowess, and the circumstance +of his never having been vanquished in battle, gave rise to the report, +that he was assisted by evil demons; and for years, both before and +after his accession, he was under the ban of the secret tribunal. +Heidelberg was the scene of some of the mysterious attacks on his life, +but they were constantly frustrated by the fidelity of his friends, and +the watchful love of his wife. + +It was at Heidelberg this prince celebrated a festival, renowned +in German history, and, for the age in which it occurred, most +extraordinary. He invited to a banquet all the factious barons whom he +had vanquished at Seckingen, and who had previously ravaged and laid +waste great part of the palatinate. Among them were the Bishop of Metz +and the Margrave of Baden. The repast was plentiful and luxurious, but +there was no bread. The warrior guests looked round with surprise +and inquiry. "Do you ask for bread?" said Frederic, sternly; "you, +who have wasted the fruits of the earth, and destroyed those whose +industry cultivates it? There is no bread. Eat and be satisfied; and +learn henceforth mercy to those who put the bread into your mouths." +A singular lesson from the lips of an iron-clad warrior of the middle +ages. + +It was Frederic II. and his nephew Otho-Henry, who enriched the library, +then the first in Europe next to the Vatican, with treasures of +learning, and who invited painters and sculptors from Italy to adorn +their noble palace with the treasures of art. In less than one hundred +years those beautiful creations were defaced or utterly destroyed, and +all the memorials and records of their authors are supposed to have +perished at the time when the ruthless Tilly stormed the castle, and the +archives and part of the library of precious MSS. were taken to litter +his dragoons' horses, during a transient scarcity of straw.[13]--You +groan! + +MEDON. + +The anecdote is not new to me; but I was thinking, at the moment, of a +pretty phrase in the letters of the Prince de Ligne, "la guerre--c'est +un malheur--mais c'est le plus beau des malheurs." + +ALDA. + +O if there be any thing more terrific, more disgusting, than war and +its consequences, it is that perversion of all human intellect--that +depravation of all human feeling--that contempt or misconception of every +Christian precept, which has permitted the great, and the good, and the +tenderhearted, to admire war as a splendid game--a part of the poetry +of life--and to defend it as a glorious evil, which the very nature and +passions of man have ever rendered, and will ever render, necessary and +inevitable. Perhaps the idea of human suffering--though when we think +of it in detail it makes the blood curdle--is not so bad as the general +loss to humanity, the interruption to the progress of thought in the +destruction of the works of wisdom or genius. Listen to this magnificent +sentence out of the volume now lying open before me--"Who kills a man, +kills a reasonable creature--God's image; but he who destroys a good +book, kills reason itself. Many a man lives a burthen to the earth, but +a good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit embalmed and +treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life. It is true, no age can +restore a life, whereof perhaps there is no great loss: and revolutions +of ages do not oft recover the loss of rejected truth, for the want of +which whole nations fare the worse; therefore we should be wary how we +spill the seasoned life of man preserved and stored up in books." + +MEDON. + +"Methinks we do know the fine Roman hand." Milton, is it not? + +ALDA. + +Yes; and after this, think of Milton's Areopagitica, or his Paradise +Lost, under the hoofs of Tilly's dragoon horses, or feeding the fishes +in the Baltic! It might have happened had he written in Germany instead +of England. + +MEDON. + +Do you forget that the cause of the thirty years war was a woman? + +ALDA. + +A woman and religion; the two best or worst things in the world, +according as they are understood and felt, used and abused. You allude +to Elizabeth of Bohemia, who was to Heidelberg what Helen was to Troy? + +One of the most interesting monuments of Heidelberg, at least to an +English traveller, is the elegant triumphal arch raised by the palatine +Frederic V. in honour of his bride--this very Elizabeth Stuart. I well +remember with what self-complacency and enthusiasm our Chef walked about +in a heavy rain, examining, dwelling upon every trace of this celebrated +and unhappy woman. She had been educated at his country-seat, and one +of the avenues of his magnificent park yet bears her name. On her +fell a double portion of the miseries of her fated family. She had the +beauty and the wit, the gay spirits, the elegant tastes, the kindly +disposition, of her grandmother, Mary of Scotland. Her very virtues as +a wife and a woman, not less than her pride and feminine prejudices, +ruined herself, her husband, and her people. When Frederick hesitated to +accept the crown of Bohemia, his high-hearted wife exclaimed--"Let me +rather eat dry bread at a king's table than feast at the board of an +elector;" and it seemed as if some avenging demon hovered in the air, +to take her literally at her word, for she and her family lived to +eat dry bread--aye, and to beg it before they ate it; but she _would_ +be a queen. Blest as she was in love, in all good gifts of nature and +fortune, in all means of happiness, a kingly crown was wanting to +complete her felicity, and it was cemented to her brow with the blood of +two millions of men. And who was to blame? Was not her mode of thinking +the fashion of her time, the effect of her education? Who had + + "Put in her tender heart the aspiring flame + Of golden sovereignty?" + + +For how many ages will you men exclaim against the mischiefs and +miseries, caused by the influence of women; thus allowing the influence, +yet taking no thought how to make that influence a means of good, +instead of an instrument of evil! + +Elizabeth had brought with her from England some luxurious tastes, as +yet unknown in the palatinate; she had been familiarized with the dramas +of Shakspeare and Fletcher, and she had figured in the masques of Ben +Jonson. To gratify her, Frederic added to the castle of Heidelberg the +theatre and banqueting-room, and all that beautiful group of buildings +at the western angle, the ruins of which are still called the _English +palace_. She had inherited from her grandmother, or had early imbibed +from education, a love of nature and of amusements in the open air, +and a passion for gardening; and it was to please her, and under her +auspices, that Frederic planned those magnificent gardens, which were +intended to unite within their bounds, all that nature could contribute +or art devise; had they been completed, they would have rendered +Heidelberg a pleasure-palace, fit for fairy-land. Nor were those designs +unworthy of a prosperous and pacific sovereign, whose treasury was +full, whose sway was just and mild, whose people had long enjoyed in +tranquillity the fruits of their own industry. When I had the pleasure +of spending a few days with the Schlossers, at their beautiful seat +on the Necker, (Stift Neuburg,) I went over the ground with Madame de +Schlosser, who had seen and studied the original plans. Her description +of the magnitude and the sumptuous taste of these unfinished designs, +while we stood together amid a wilderness of ruins, was a commentary on +the vicissitudes of this world, worth fifty moral treatises, and as many +sermons. + + "For in the wreck of IS and WAS, + Things incomplete and purposes betray'd, + Make sadder transits o'er Truth's mystic glass, + Than noblest objects utterly decay'd." + + +Close to the ruins of poor Elizabeth's palace, there where the effigies +of her handsome husband, and his bearded ancestor Louis V. look down +from the ivy-mantled wall, you remember the beautiful terrace towards +the west? It is still,--after four centuries of changes, of disasters, +of desolation,--the garden of Clara. When Frederic the Victorious +assumed the sovereignty, in a moment of danger and faction, he took, +at the same time, a solemn vow never to marry, that the rights of his +infant nephew, the son of the late palatine, should not be prejudiced, +nor the peace of the country endangered by a disputed succession. He +kept his oath religiously, but at that very time he loved Clara Dettin +de Wertheim, a young girl of plebeian origin, and a native of Augsburg, +whose musical talents and melody of voice had raised her to a high +situation in the court of the late princess palatine. Frederick, with +the consent of his nephew, was united to Clara by a left-hand marriage, +an expedient still in use in Germany, and, I believe, peculiar to its +constitution; such a marriage is valid before God and man, yet the wife +has no acknowledged rights, and the offspring no supposed existence. +Clara is celebrated by the poets and chroniclers of her time, and +appears to have been a very extraordinary being in her way. In that age +of ignorance, she had devoted herself to study--she could sympathize in +her husband's pursuits, and share the toils of government--she collected +round her the wisest and most learned men of the time--she continued to +cultivate the beautiful voice which had won the heart of Frederic, and +her song and her lute were always ready to soothe his cares. Tradition +points out the spot where it is said she loved to meditate, and, looking +down upon the little hamlet, on the declivity of the hill, to recall +her own humble origin; that little hamlet, embowered in foliage, and +the remembrance of Clara, have survived the glories of Heidelberg. Her +descendants became princes of the empire, and still exist in the family +of Lowenstein. + +Then, for those who love the marvellous, there is the wild legend of +the witch Jetta, who still flits among the ruins, and bathes her golden +tresses in the Wolfsbrunnen; but why should I tell you of these +tales--you, whose head is a sort of black-letter library? + +MEDON. + +True; but it is pleasant to have one's old recollections taken down +from their shelves and dusted, and placed in a new light; only do not +require, even if I again visit Heidelberg, that I should see it as you +have beheld it, with your quick spirit of association, and clothed in +the hues of your own individual mind. While you speak, it is not so much +the places and objects you describe, as their reflection in your own +fancy, which I see before me; and every different mind will reflect them +under a different aspect. Then, where is truth? you say. If we want +information as to mere facts--the situation of a town, the measurement +of a church, the date of a ruin, the catalogue of a gallery--we can go +to our dictionaries and our _guides des voyageurs_. But if, besides form +and outline, we must have colouring too, we should remember that every +individual mind will paint the scene with its own proper hues; and if +we judge of the mind and the objects it represents relatively to each +other, we may come at the truth, not otherwise. I would ask nothing of +a traveller, but accuracy and sincerity in the expression of his +opinions and feelings. I have then a page out of the great book of human +nature--the portrait of a particular mind; when that is fairly before me +I have a standard by which to judge: I can draw my own inferences. Will +you not allow that it is possible to visit Heidelberg, and to derive +the most intense pleasure from its picturesque beauty, without dreaming +over witches and warriors, palatines and princes? Can we not admire and +appreciate the sculpture in the palace of Otho-Henry, without losing +ourselves in vague, wondering reveries over the destinies of the +sculptors? + +ALDA. + +Yes; but it is amusing, and not less instructive, to observe the +manner in which the individual character and pursuits shall modify the +impressions of external things; only we should be prepared for this, as +the pilot makes allowance for the variation of the needle, and directs +his course accordingly. It is a mistake to suppose that those who cannot +see the imaginative aspect of things, see, therefore, the only true +aspect; they only see one aspect of the truth. _Vous etes orfevre, +Monsieur Josse_, is as applicable to travellers as to every other +species of egotist. + +Once, in an excursion to the north, I fell into conversation with a +Sussex farmer, one of that race of sturdy, rich, and independent +English yeomen, of which I am afraid few specimens remain: he was quite +a character in his way. I must sketch him for you; but only Miss Mitford +could do him justice. His coat was of the finest broad-cloth; his +shirt-frill, in which was stuck a huge agate pin, and his neckcloth, were +both white as the snow; his good beaver shone in all its pristine gloss, +and an enormous bunch of gold seals adorned his watch-chain; his voice +was loud and dictatorial, and his language surprisingly good and flowing, +though tinctured with a little coarseness and a few provincialisms. He +had made up his mind about the Reform Bill--the Catholic Question--the +Corn Laws--and about things in general, and things in particular; he +had doubts about nothing: it was evident that he was accustomed to lay +down the law in his own village--that he was the tyrant of his own +fire-side--that his wife was "his horse, his ox, his ass, his any thing," +while his sons went to college, and his daughters played on the piano. +London was to him merely a vast congregation of pestilential vapours--a +receptacle of thieves, cut-throats and profligates--a place in which no +sensible man, who had a care for his life, his health, or his pockets, +would willingly set his foot; he thanked God that he never spent but two +nights in the metropolis, and at intervals of twenty-seven years: the +first night he had passed in the streets, in dread of fire and vermin; +and on the last occasion, he had not ventured beyond Smithfield. What he +did not know, was to him not worth knowing; and the word _French_, which +comprised all that was foreign, he used as a term, expressing the most +unbounded abhorrence, pity, and contempt. I should add, that though +rustic, and arrogant, and prejudiced, he was not vulgar. We were at +an inn, on the borders of Leicestershire, through which we had both +recently travelled; my farmer was enthusiastic in his admiration of +the country. "A fine country, madam--a beautiful country--a splendid +country!" + +"Do you call it a fine country?" said I, absently, my head full of the +Alps and Appenines, the Pyrenean, and the river Po. + +"To be sure I do; and where would you see a finer?" + +"I did not see any thing very picturesque," said I. + +"_Picturesque!_" he repeated with some contempt; "I don't know what +_you_ call picturesque; but _I_ say, give me a soil, that when you turn +it up you have something for your pains; the fine soil makes the fine +country, madam!" + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE AND CHARACTER. + + + + +II. + + +MEDON. + +I observed the other evening, that in making a sort of imaginative bound +from Coblentz to Heidelberg, you either skipped over Frankfort, or left +it on one side. + +ALDA. + +Did I?--if I had done _either_, in my heart or my memory, I had been +most ungrateful; but I thought you knew Frankfort well. + +MEDON. + +I was there for two days, on my way to Switzerland, and it rained the +whole time from morning till night. I have a vision in my mind of +dirty streets, chilly houses, dull shops, dingy-looking Jews, dripping +umbrellas, luxurious hotels, and exorbitant charges,--and this is all +I can recollect of Frankfort. + +ALDA. + +Indeed!--I pity you. To me it was associated only with pleasant +feelings, and, in truth, it is a pleasant place. Life, there, appears in +a very attractive costume: not in a half-holiday, half-beggarly garb, as +at Rome and Naples; nor in a thin undress of superficial decency as at +Berlin; nor in a court domino, hiding, we know not what--as at Vienna +and Munich; nor half motley, half military, as at Paris; nor in rags +and embroidery, as in London; but at Frankfort all the outside at least +is fair, substantial, and consistent. The shops vie in splendour with +those of London and Paris; the principal streets are clean, the houses +spacious and airy, and there is a general appearance of cheerfulness and +tranquillity, mingled with the luxury of wealth and the bustle of +business, which, after the misery, and murmuring, and bitterness of +faction, we had left in London, was really a relief to the spirits. +It is true, that during my last two visits, this apparent tranquillity +concealed a good deal of political ferment. The prisons were filled +with those unfortunate wretches who had endeavoured to excite a popular +tumult against the Prussian and Austrian governments. The trials were +going forward every day, but not a syllable of the result transpired +beyond the walls of the Roemer Saal. Although the most reasonable and +liberal of the citizens agreed in condemning the rashness and folly of +these young men, the tide of feeling was evidently in their favour: for +instance, it was not the _fashion_ to invite the Prussian officers, and +I well remember that when Goethe's Egmont was announced at the theatre, +it was forbidden by the magistracy, from a fear that certain scenes and +passages in that play might call forth some open and decided expression +of the public feeling; in fact, only a few evenings before, some +passages in the Massaniello had been applied and applauded by the +audience, in a manner so _ill-bred_, that the wife of one of the +ministers of the Holy Alliance, rose and left her box, followed by some +other old women,--male and female. The theatre is rather commodious than +splendid; the established company, both for the opera and the regular +drama, excellent, and often varied by temporary visits of great actors +and singers from the other theatres of Germany. On my first visit to +Frankfort, which was during the fair of 1829, Paganini, then in the +zenith of his glory, was giving a series of concerts; but do not ask +me any thing about him, for it is a worn-out subject, and you know I am +not one of the enthusiastic, or even the orthodox, with regard to his +merits. + +MEDON. + +You do not mean--you will not tell me--that with all your love of music, +you were insensible to the miraculous powers of that man? + +ALDA. + +I suppose they were miraculous, as I heard every one say so round me; +but I listened to him as to any other musician, for the sake of the +pleasure to be derived from music, not for the sake of wondering at +difficulties overcome, and impossibilities made possible--they might +have remained impossibilities for me. But insensible I was _not_ to +the wondrous charm of his tone and expression. I was thrilled, melted, +excited, at the moment, but it left no relish on the palate, if I may +use the expression. To throw me into such _convulsions_ of enthusiasm, +as I saw this man excite here and on the continent, I must have the +orchestra with all its various mingling world of sound, or the _divine_ +human voice breathing music and passion together; but this is a matter +of feeling, habit, education, like all other tastes in art. + +I think it was during our third visit to Frankfort that Madame +Haitzinger-Neumann was playing the _gast-rolles_, for so they courteously +denominate the parts filled by occasional visitors, to whom, as guests, +the precedence is always given. Madame Haitzinger is the wife of +Haitzinger, the tenor singer, who was in London, and sung in the Fidelio, +with Madame Devrient-Schroeder. She is one of the most celebrated +actresses in Germany for light comedy, if any comedy in Germany can be +called light, in comparison with the same style of acting in France or +England. Her figure is rather large-- + +MEDON. + +Like most of the German actresses--for I never yet saw one who had +attained to celebrity, who was not much too _embonpoint_ for our ideas +of a youthful or sentimental heroine-- + +ALDA. + +Not Devrient-Schroeder? + +MEDON. + +Devrient is all impassioned grace; but I think that in time even _she_ +will be in danger of becoming a little--how shall I express it with +sufficient delicacy?--a _little_ too substantial. + +ALDA. + +No, not if a soul of music and fire, informing a feverish, excitable +temperament, which is to the mantling spirit within, what the +high-pitched instrument is to the breeze which sweeps over its +chords,--not if these can avert the catastrophe; but what if you had +seen Mademoiselle Lindner, with a figure like Mrs. Liston's--all but +spherical--enacting Fenella and Claerchen? + +MEDON. + +I should have said, that only a German imagination could stand it! It +is one of Madame de Stael's clever aphorisms, that on the stage, "Il +faut menager les caprices des yeux avec le plus grand scrupule, car ils +peuvent detruire, sans appel tout effet serieux;" but the Germans do not +appear to be subject to these _caprices des yeux_; and have not these +fastidious scruples about corporeal grace; for them sentiment, however +clumsy, is still sentiment. Perhaps they are in the right. + +ALDA. + +And Mademoiselle Lindner _has_ sentiment; she must have been a fine +actress, and is evidently a favourite with the audience. But to return +to Madame Haitzinger;--she is handsome, with a fair complexion, and no +very striking expression; but there is a heart and soul, and mellowness +in her acting, which is delicious. I could not give you an idea of her +manner by a comparison with any of our English actresses, for she is +essentially German; she never aimed at making points; she was never +broadly arch or comic, but the general effect was as rich as it was true +to nature. I saw her in some of her favourite parts: in the comedy of +"Stille Wasser sind tief;" (our Rule a Wife and Have a Wife, admirably +adapted to the German stage by Schroeder;) in the "Mirandolina," +(the famous Locandiera of Goldoni,) and in the pretty lively vaudeville +composed for her by Holtei, "Die Wiener in Berlin," in which the popular +waltzes and airs, sung in the genuine national spirit, and enjoyed by +the audience with a true national zest, delighted us _foreigners_. +Herr Becker is an excellent actor in tragedy and high comedy. Of their +singers I could not say so much--there were none I should account +first-rate, except Dobler, whom you may remember in England. + +One of the most delightful peculiarities of Frankfort, one that most +struck my fancy, is the public garden, planted on the site of the +ramparts; a girdle of verdure and shade--of trees and flowers circling +the whole city; accessible to all and on every side,--the promenade of +the rich, the solace of the poor. Fifty men are employed to keep it in +order, and it is forbidden to steal the flowers, or to kill the singing +birds which haunt the shrubberies. + +MEDON. + +And does this prohibition avail much in a population of sixty thousand +persons? + +ALDA. + +It does generally. A short time before we arrived some mischievous +wretch had shot a nightingale, and was caught in the fact. His +punishment was characteristic; his hands were tied behind him, and +a label setting forth his crime was fixed on his breast: in this guise, +with a police officer on each side, he was marched all round the +gardens, and made the circuit of the city, pursued by the hisses of +the populace and the abhorrent looks of the upper classes; he was not +otherwise punished, but he never again made his appearance within the +walls of the city. This was the only instance which I could learn of +the infraction of a law which might seem at least nugatory. + +Of the spacious, magnificent, well-arranged cemetery, its admirable +apparatus for restoring suspended animation, and all its beautiful +accompaniments and memorials of the dead, there was a long account +published in London, at the time that a cemetery was planned for this +great overgrown city; and in truth I know not where we could find a +better model than the one at Frankfort; it appeared to me perfection. + +The institutions at Frankfort, both for charity and education, are +numerous as becomes a rich and free city; and those I had an opportunity +of examining appeared to me admirably managed. Besides the orphan schools, +and the Burger schule, and the school for female education, established +and maintained by the wives of the citizens, there are several infant +schools, where children of a year old and upwards are nursed, and fed, +and kept out of mischief and harm, while their parents are at work. +These are also maintained by subscription among the ladies, who take +upon them in turns the task of daily superintendence; and I shall not +easily forget the gentle-looking, elegant, well-dressed girl, who, +defended from the encroachments of dirty little paws by a large apron, +sat in the midst of a swarm of thirty or forty babies, (the eldest not +four years old,) the very personification of feminine charity! But +the hospital for the infirm poor--Das Versorgung Haus--pleased me +particularly; 'tis true, that the cost was not a third--what do I say? +not a sixth of the expense of some of our institutions for the same +purpose. There was no luxury of architecture, nor huge gates shutting +in wretchedness, and shutting out hope; nor grated windows; nor were the +arrangements on so large a scale as in that splendid edifice, the Hopital +des Vieillards, at Brussels;--a house for the poor need not be either a +prison or a palace. But here, I recollect, the door opened with a latch; +we entered unannounced, as unexpected. Here there was perfect neatness, +abundance of space, of air, of light, of water, and also of occupation. +I found that, besides the inmates of the place, many poor old creatures, +who could not have the facilities or materials for work in their own +dwellings, or whose relatives were busied in the daytime, might find +here employment of any kind suited to their strength or capacity,--for +which, observe, they were paid; thus leaving them to the last possible +moment the feeling of independence and usefulness. I observed that many +of those who seemed in the last stage of decrepitude had hung round +their beds sundry little prints and pictures, and slips of paper, on +which were written legibly, texts from scripture, moral sentences, and +scraps of poetry. The ward of the superannuated and the sick was at a +distance from the working and eating rooms; and all breathed around +that peace and quiet which should accompany old age, instead of that +"life-consuming din" I _have_ heard in such places. On the pillow of +one bed, there was laid by some chance a bouquet of flowers. + +In this ward there was an old man nearly blind and lethargic; another +old man was reading to him. I remarked a poor bed-ridden woman, utterly +helpless, but not old, and with good and even refined features; and +another poor woman, seated by her, was employed in keeping the flies +from settling on her face. To one old woman, whose countenance struck +me, I said a few words in English--I could speak no German, unluckily. +She took my hand, kissed it, and turning away, burst into tears. No one +asked for any thing even by a look, nor apparently wanted any thing; and +I felt that from the unaffected good-nature of the lady who accompanied +us, we had not so much the appearance of coming to look at the poor +inmates as of paying them a kind visit;--and this was as it should +be. The mild, open countenances of the two persons who managed the +establishment, pleased me particularly; and the manner of the matron +superintendent, as she led us over the rooms, was so simple and kind, +that I was quite at ease: I experienced none of that awkward shyness +and reluctance I have felt when ostentatiously led over such places in +England--feeling ashamed to stare upon the misery I could not cure. In +such cases I have probably attributed to the sufferers a delicacy or a +sensibility, long blunted, if ever possessed; but I was in pain for them +and for myself. + +One thing more: there was a neat chapel; and we were shown with some +pride the only piece of splendour in the establishment. The communion +plate of massy silver was the gift of two brothers, who had married +on the same day two sisters; and these two sisters had died nearly at +the same time--I believe it was actually on the same day. The widowed +husbands presented this plate in memory of their loss and the virtues +of their wives; and I am sorry I did not copy the simple and affecting +inscription in which this is attested. There was also a silver vase, +which had been presented as an offering by a poor miller whom an +unexpected legacy had raised to independence. + +I might give you similar sketches of other institutions, here and +elsewhere, but I did not bestow sufficient attention on the practical +details, and the comparative merits of the different methods adopted, +to render my observations useful. Though deeply interested, as any +feeling, thinking being must be on such subjects, I have not studied +them sufficiently. There are others, however, who are doing this better +than I could:--blessings be on them, and eternal praise!--My general +impression was, pleasure from the benevolence and simplicity of heart +with which these institutions were conducted and superintended, and +wonder, not to be expressed, at their extreme cheapness. + +The day preceding my visit to the Versorgung Haus, I had been in a fever +of indignation at the fate of poor R----, one of the conspirators, who +had become insane from the severity of his confinement. I had descanted +with great complacency on our open tribunals and our trials by jury, and +yet I could not help thinking to myself, "Well, if _we_ have not their +state-prisons, neither have _they_ our poor-houses!" + +MEDON. + +It is plain that the rich, charitable, worldly prosperous, self-seeking, +Frankfort, would be your chosen residence after all! + +ALDA. + +No--as a fixed residence I should not prefer Frankfort. There is a +little too much of the pride of purse--too much of the aristocracy of +wealth--too much dressing and dinnering--and society is too much broken +up into sets and circles to please me: besides, it must be confessed, +that the arts do not flourish in this free imperial city. + +The Staedel Museum was opened just before our last visit to Frankfort. +A rich banker of that name bequeathed, in 1816, his collection of +prints and pictures, and nearly a million and a half of florins, for +the commencement and maintenance of this institution, and they have +certainly begun on a splendid scale. The edifice in which the collection +is arranged is spacious, fitted up with great cost, and generally with +great taste, except the ceilings, which, being the glory and admiration +of the good people of Frankfort, I must endeavour to describe to you +particularly. The elaborate beauty of the arabesque ornaments, their +endless variety, and the vivid colouring and gilding, reminded me of some +of the illuminated manuscripts; but I was rather amused than pleased, +and rather surprised to see art and ornament so misplaced--invention, +labour, money, time, lavished to so little purpose. No effect was +aimed at--none produced. The strained and wearied eye wandered amid +a profusion of unmeaning forms, and of gorgeous colours, which never +harmonized into a whole: and after I had half broken my neck by looking +up at them through an opera glass, in order to perceive the elegant +interlacing of the minute patterns and exquisite finish of the +workmanship, I turned away laughing and provoked, and wondering at such +a strange perversion, or rather sacrifice, of taste. + +MEDON. + +But the collection itself?-- + +ALDA. + +It is not very interesting. It contains some curious old German +pictures; Staedel having been, like others, smitten with the mania of +buying Van Eyks and Hemlings and Schoreels. Here, however, these old +masters, as part of a school, or history of art, are well placed. +There are a few fine Flemish paintings--and, in particular, a wondrous +portrait by Flinck, which you must see. It is a lady in black, on the +left side of the door--of--I forget which room--but you cannot miss +it: those soft eyes will look out at you, till you will feel inclined +to ask her name, and wonder the lips do not unclose to answer you. Of +first-rate pictures there are none--I mean none of the historical and +Italian schools: the collection of casts from the antique is splendid +and well-selected. + +MEDON. + +But Bethmann, the banker, had already set an example of munificent +patronage of art: when he shamed kings, for instance, by purchasing +Dannecker's Ariadne--one of the chief lions of Frankfort, if fame +says true. + +ALDA. + +How! have you not seen it? + +MEDON. + +No--unhappily. The weather, as I have told you, was dreadful. I was +discouraged--I procrastinated. That flippant observation I had read in +some English traveller, that "Dannecker's Ariadne looked as if it had +been cut out of old Stilton cheese," was floating in my mind. In short, +I was careless, as we often are, when the means of gratifying curiosity +appear secure, and within our reach. I repent me now. I wish I had +settled to my own satisfaction, and with mine own eyes, the disputed +merits of this famous statue; but I will trust to you. It ought to be +something admirable. I do not know much of Dannecker, or his works, but +by all accounts he has not to complain of the want of patronage. To him +cannot be applied the pathetic common-place, so familiar in the mouths +of our young artists, about "chill penury," the struggle to live, the +cares that "freeze the genial current of the soul," the efforts of +unassisted genius, and so forth. Want never came to him since he devoted +himself to art. He appears to have had leisure and freedom to give full +scope to his powers, and to work out his own creations. + +ALDA. + +Had he? Had he indeed? His own story would be different, I fancy. +Dannecker, like every patronized artist I ever met with, would execrate +patronage if he dared. Good old man! The thought of what he might have +done, and could have done, breaks out sometimes in the midst of all +his self-complacent _naive_ exultation over what he _has_ done. I will +endeavour to give you a correct idea of the Ariadne, and then I will +tell you something of Dannecker himself. His history is a good +commentary upon royal patronage. + +I had heard so much of this statue, that my curiosity was strongly +excited. A part of its fame may be owing to its situation, and the +number of travellers who go to visit Bethmann's Museum, as a matter of +course. I used to observe that all travellers, who were on the road to +Italy, praised it, and all who were on their way home criticised it. +As I ascended the steps of the pavilion in which it is placed, the +enthusiasm of expectation faded away from my mind: I said to myself, +"I shall be disappointed!"--Yet I was not disappointed. + +The Ariadne occupied the centre of a cabinet, hung with a dark grey +colour, and illuminated by a high lateral window, so that the light and +shade, and the relief of the figure, were perfectly well managed and +effective. Dannecker has not represented Ariadne in her more poetical +and picturesque character, as, when betrayed and forsaken by Theseus, +she stood alone on the wild shore of Naxos, "her hair blown by the +winds, and all about her expressing desolation." It is Ariadne, immortal +and triumphant, as the bride of Bacchus. The figure is larger than life. +She is seated, or rather reclined, on the back of a panther. The right +arm is carelessly extended: the left arm rests on the head of the +animal, and the hand supports the drapery, which appears to have just +dropped from her limbs. The head is turned a little upwards, as if she +already anticipated her starry home; and her tresses are braided with +the vine leaves. The grace and ease of the attitude, so firm, and yet +so light; the flowing beauty of the form, and the position of the head, +enchanted me. Perhaps the features are not sufficiently _Greek_: for, +though I am not one of those who think all beauty comprised in the +antique models, and that nothing can be orthodox but the straight nose +and short upper lip, still to Ariadne the pure _classical_ ideal of +beauty, both in form and face, are properly in character. A cast from +that divine head, the Greek Ariadne, is placed in the same cabinet, and +I confess to you, that the contrast being immediately brought before the +eye, Dannecker's Ariadne seemed to want refinement, in comparison. It is +true, that the moment chosen by the German sculptor required an expression +altogether different. In the Greek bust, though already circled by the +viny crown, and though all heaven seems to repose on the noble arch of +that expanded brow, yet the head is declined, and a tender melancholy +lingers round the all-perfect mouth, as if the remembrance of a mortal +love--a mortal sorrow--yet shaded her celestial bridal hours, and made +pale her immortality. But, Dannecker's Ariadne is the flushed queen +of the Bacchante, and, in the clash of the cymbals and the mantling +cup, she has already forgotten Theseus. There is a look of life, an +individual truth in the beauty of the form, which distinguishes it from +the long-limbed vapid pieces of elegance called nymphs and Venuses, which + + "Stretch their white arms, and bend their marble necks," + + +in the galleries of our modern sculptors. One objection struck me, +but not till after a second or third view of the statue. The panther +seemed to me rather too bulky and ferocious. It is true, it is not a +natural, but a mythological panther, such as we see in the antique +basso-relievos, and the arabesques of Herculaneum: yet, methinks if +he appeared a little more conscious of his lovely burthen, more tamed +by the influence of beauty, it would have been better. However, the +sculptor may have had a design, a feeling, in this very point, which has +escaped me: I regret now that I did not ask him. One thing is certain, +that the extreme massiveness of the panther's limbs serves to give a +firmness to the support of the figure, and sets off to advantage its +lightness and delicacy. It is equally certain that if the head of the +animal had been ever so slightly turned, the pose of the right arm, and +with it the whole attitude, must have been altered. + +The window of the cabinet is so contrived, that by drawing up a blind +of stained glass, a soft crimson tint is shed over the figure, as if +the marble blushed. This did not please me: partly from a dislike to all +trickery in art; partly because, to my taste, the pale colourless purity +of the marble is one of the beauties of a fine statue. + +It is true that Dannecker has been unfortunate in his material. The +block from which he cut his figure is imperfect and streaky; but how it +could possibly have suggested the idea of _Stilton cheese_ I am at a loss +to conceive. It is not worse than Canova's Venus, in the Pitti palace, +who has a terrible black streak across her bosom. M. Passavant,[14] who +was standing by when I paid my last visit to the Ariadne, assured me, +that when the statue was placed on its pedestal, about sixteen years +ago, these black specks were scarcely visible, and that they seemed to +multiply and grow darker with time. This is a lamentable, and, to me, an +unaccountable fact. + +MEDON. + +And, I am afraid, past cure: but now tell me something of the sculptor +himself. After looking on a grand work of art, we naturally turn to look +into the mind which conceived and created it. + +ALDA. + +Dannecker, like all the great modern sculptors, sprung from the people. +Thorwaldson, Flaxman, Chantrey, Canova, Schadow, Ranch--I believe we may +go farther back, to Cellini, Bandinelli, Bernini, Pigalle--all I can at +this moment recollect, were of plebeian origin. When I was at Dresden, +I was told of a young count, of noble family, who had adopted sculpture +as a profession. This, I think, is a solitary instance of any person of +noble birth devoting himself to this noblest of the arts. + +MEDON. + +Do you forget Mrs. Darner and Lady Dacre? + +ALDA. + +No; but I do not think that either the exquisite modelling of Lady +Dacre, or the meritorious _attempts_ of Mrs. Damer, come under the head +of sculpture in its grand sense. By-the-bye, when Horace Walpole said +that Mrs. Damer was the first female sculptor who had attained any +celebrity, he forgot the Greek girl, Lala,[15] and the Properzia Rossi +of modern times. + +Dannecker was born at Stuttgardt in 1758. On him descended no hereditary +mantle of genius; it was the immediate gift of Heaven, and apparently +heaven-directed. His father was a groom in the duke's stable, and +appears to have been merely an ill-tempered, thick-headed boor. How +young Dannecker picked up the rudiments of reading and writing, he does +not himself remember; nor by what circumstances the bent of his fancy +and genius was directed to the fine arts. Like other great men, who have +been led to trace the progress of their own minds, he attributed to his +mother the first promptings to the fair and good, the first softening +and elevating influences which his mind acknowledged. He had neither +paper nor pencils; but next door to his father there lived a +stone-cutter, whose blocks of marble and free-stone were every day +scrawled over with rude imitations of natural objects in chalk or +charcoal--the first essays of the infant Dannecker. When he was beaten +by his father for this proof of idleness, his mother interfered to +protect or to encourage him. As soon as he was old enough, he assisted +his father in the stable; and while running about the precincts of the +palace, ragged and bare-foot, he appears to have attracted, by his +vivacity and alertness, the occasional notice of the duke himself. + +Duke Charles, the grandfather of the present king of Wurtemburg, had +founded a military school, called the Karl Schuele, (Charles' School,) +annexed to the Hunting Palace of the Solitude. At this academy, music and +drawing were taught as well as military tactics. One day, when Dannecker +was about thirteen, his father returned home in a very ill-humour, and +informed his family that the duke intended to admit the children of his +domestics into his new military school. The boy, with joyful eagerness, +declared his intention of going immediately to present himself as a +candidate. The father, with a stare of astonishment, desired him to +remain at home, and mind his business; on his persisting, he resorted to +blows, and ended by locking him up. The boy escaped by jumping out of +the window; and, collecting several of his comrades, he made them a long +harangue in praise of the duke's beneficence, then placing himself at +their head, marched them up to the palace, where the whole court was +assembled for the Easter festivities. On being asked their business, +Dannecker replied as spokesman--"Tell his highness the duke we want to +go to the Karl-schuele." One of the attendants, amused, perhaps, with +this juvenile ardour, went and informed the duke, who had just risen +from table. He came out himself and mustered the little troop before +him. He first darted a rapid scrutinizing glance along the line, then +selecting one from the number, placed him on his right-hand; then +another, and another, till only young Dannecker and two others remained +on his left. Dannecker has since acknowledged that he suffered for a few +moments such exquisite pain and shame at the idea of being rejected, +that his first impulse was to run away and hide himself; and that his +surprise and joy, when he found that he and his two companions were the +accepted candidates, had nearly overpowered him. The duke ordered them +to go the next morning to the Solitude, and then dismissed them. When +Dannecker returned home, his father, enraged at losing the services +of his son, turned him out of the house, and forbade him ever more to +enter it; but his mother (mother like) packed up his little bundle of +necessaries, accompanied him for some distance on his road, and parted +from him with blessings, and tears, and words of encouragement and love. + +At the Karl-schuele Dannecker made but little progress in his studies. +Nothing could be worse managed than this royal establishment. The inferior +teachers were accustomed to employ the poorer boys in the most servile +offices, and in this, so called, academy, he was actually obliged to +learn by stealth: but here he formed a friendship with Schiller, who, +like himself, was an ardent genius pining and writhing under a chilling +system; and the two boys, thrown upon one another for consolation, +became friends for life. Dannecker must have been about fifteen when +the Karl-schuele was removed from the Solitude to Stuttgard. He was then +placed under the tuition of Grubel, a professor of sculpture, and in the +following year he produced his first original composition. It was a Milo +of Crotona modelled in clay, and was judged worthy of the first prize. +Dannecker was at this time so unfriended and little known, that the +duke, who appears to have forgotten him, learnt with astonishment that +this nameless boy, the son of his groom, had carried off the highest +honours of the school from all his competitors. For a few years he +was employed in the duke's service in carving cornices, Cupids, and +caryatides, to ornament the new palaces at Stuttgard and Hohenheim: +this task-work, over which he often sighed, may possibly have assisted +in giving him that certainty and mechanical dexterity in the use of his +tools for which he is remarkable. About ten years were thus passed; he +then obtained permission to travel for his improvement with an allowance +of three hundred florins a-year from the duke. With these slender means +Dannecker set off for Paris on foot. There, for the first time, he had +opportunities of studying the living model. His enthusiasm for his art +enabled him to endure extraordinary privations of every kind; for out +of his little pension of L23 a-year he had not only to feed and clothe +himself, but to purchase all the materials for his art, and the means +of instruction; and this in an expensive capital, surrounded with +temptations which an artist and an enthusiastic young man finds it +difficult to withstand. He told me himself that day after day he has +studied in the Louvre dinnerless, and dressed in a garb which scarce +retained even the appearance of decency. He left Paris, after a two +years' residence, as simple in mind and heart as when he entered it, and +considerably improved in his knowledge of anatomy and in the technical +part of his profession. The treasures of the Louvre, though far inferior +to what they now are, had let in a flood of ideas upon his mind, among +which (as he described his own feelings) he groped as one bewildered and +intoxicated, amazed rather than enlightened. + +MEDON. + +But Dannecker must have been poor in spirit as in pocket--simple, +indeed, if he did not profit by the opportunities which Paris afforded +of studying human nature, noting the passions and their physiognomy, and +gaining other experiences most useful to an artist. + +ALDA. + +There I differ from you. Would you send a young artist--more particularly +a young sculptor--to study the human nature of London or Paris?--to +seek the ideal among shop-girls and opera-dancers? Or the sublime and +beautiful among the frivolous and degraded of one sex, the money-making +or the brutalized of the other? Is it from the man who has steeped his +youthful prime in vulgar dissipation, by way of "seeing life," as it is +called, who has courted patronage at the convivial board, that you shall +require that union of lofty enthusiasm and patient industry, which are +necessary, first to conceive the grand and the poetical, then consume +long years in shaping out his creation in the everlasting marble? + +MEDON. + +But how is the sculptor himself to live during those long years? It must +needs be a hard struggle. I have heard young artists say, that they have +been forced on a dissipated life merely as a means of "getting on in the +world," as the phrase is. + +ALDA. + +So have I. It is so base a plea, that when I hear it, I generally regard +it as the excuse for dispositions already perverted. The men who talk +thus are doomed: they will either creep through life in mediocrity and +dependence to their grave; or, at the best, if they have parts, as well +as cunning and assurance, they may make themselves the fashion, and make +their fortune; they may be clever portrait-painters and bust-makers, but +when they attempt to soar into the historical and ideal department of +their art, they move the laughter of gods and men; to them the higher, +holier fountains of inspiration are thenceforth sealed. + +MEDON. + +But think of the temptations of society! + +ALDA. + +I think of those who have overcome them. "Great men have been among us," +though they be rare. Have we not had a Flaxman? But the artist must +choose where he will worship. He cannot serve God and Mammon. That man +of genius who thinks he can tamper with his glorious gifts, and for a +season indulge in social excesses, stoop from his high calling to the +dregs of earth, abandon himself to the stream of common life, and trust +to his native powers to bring him up again;--O believe it, he plays a +desperate game!--one that in nearly ninety-nine cases out of a hundred +is fatal. + +MEDON. + +I begin to see your drift; but you would find it difficult to prove that +the men who executed those works, on which we now look with wonder and +despair, lived like anchorites, or were unexceptionable moral characters. + +ALDA. + +Will you not allow that they worked in a different spirit? Or do you +suppose that it was by the possession of some sleight-of-hand that these +things were performed?--That it was by some knack of chiselling, some +secret of colouring now lost, that a Phidias or a Correggio still remain +unapproached, and, as people will tell you, unapproachable? + +MEDON. + +They had a different nature to work from. + +ALDA. + +A different modification of nature, but not a different nature. Nature +and truth are one, and immutable, and inseparable as beauty and love. +I do maintain that, in these latter times, we have artists, who in +genius, in the power of looking at nature, and in manual skill, are +not beneath the great ancients, but their works are found wanting in +comparison; they have fallen short of the models their early ambition +set before them; and why?--because, having genius, they want the moral +grandeur that should accompany it, and have neglected the training of +their own minds from necessity, or from dissipation or from pride, so +that having imagination and skill, they have yet wanted the materials +out of which to work. Recollect that the great artists of old were +not mere painters or mere sculptors, who were nothing except with the +pencil or the chisel in their hand. They were philosophers, scholars, +poets, musicians, noble beings, whose eyes were not ever on themselves, +but who looked above, before, and after. Our modern artists turn +coxcombs, and then fancy themselves like Rafaelle; or they are greedy +of present praise, or greedy of gain; or they will not pay the price +for immortality; or they have sold their glorious birthright of fame +for a mess of pottage. + +Poor Dannecker found his mess of pottage bitter now and then, as you +shall hear. He set off for Italy, in 1783, with his pension raised to +four hundred florins a year, that is, about thirty pounds: he reached +Rome, on foot, and he told me that, for some months after his arrival, +he suffered from a terrible depression of spirits, and a painful sense +of loneliness: like Thorwaldson, when he too visited that city some +years afterwards, a friendless youth, he was often home-sick and +heart-sick. At this time he used to wander about among the ruins and +relics of almighty Rome, lost in the sense of their grandeur, depressed +by his own vague aspirations--ignorant, and without courage to apply +himself. Luckily for him, Herder and Goethe were then residing at Rome; +he became known to them, and their conversation directed him to higher +sources of inspiration in his art than he had yet contemplated--to the +very well-heads and mother-streams of poetry. They showed him the +distinction between the _spirit_ and the _form_ of ancient art. Dannecker +felt, and afterwards applied some of the grand revelations of these men, +who were at once profound critics and inspired poets. He might have +grasped at more, but that his early nurture was here against him, and +his subsequent destinies as a court sculptor seldom left him sufficient +freedom of thought or action to follow out his own conceptions. While at +Rome he also became acquainted with Canova, who, although only one year +older than himself, had already achieved great things. He was now at +work on the monument of the Pope Ganganelli. The courteous, kind-hearted +Italian would sometimes visit the poor German in his studio, and cheer +him by his remarks and encouragement. + +Dannecker remained five years at Rome; he was then ordered to return to +Stuttgard. As he had already greatly distinguished himself, the Duke +of Wurtemburg received him with much kindness, and promised him his +protection. Now, the protection and the patronage which a sovereign +accords to an artist generally amounts to this: he begins by carving or +painting the portrait of his patron, and of some of the various members +of his patron's family. If these are approved of, he is allowed to stick +a ribbon in his button-hole, and is appointed professor of fine arts, +with a certain stipend, and thenceforth his time, his labour, and his +genius belong as entirely to his master as those of a hired servant; his +path is marked out for him. It was thus with Dannecker; he received a +pension of eight hundred florins a year and his professorship, and upon +the strength of this he married Henrietta Rapp. From this period his +life has passed in a course of tranquil and uninterrupted occupation, +yet, though constantly employed, his works are not numerous; almost +every moment being taken up with the duties of his professorship, in +trying to teach what no man of genius can teach, and in making drawings +and designs after the fancies of the Grand Duke. He was required to +compose a basso-relievo for the duke's private cabinet. The subject which +he chose was as appropriate as it was beautifully treated--Alexander +pressing his seal upon the lips of Parmenio. He modelled this in +bas-relief, and the best judges pronounced it exquisite; but it did +not please the duke, and instead of receiving an order to finish it in +marble, he was obliged to throw it aside, and to execute some design +dictated by his master. The original model remained for many years +in his studio; but a short time before my last visit to him he had +presented it as a birth-day gift to a friend. The first great work which +gave him celebrity as a sculptor, was the mausoleum of Count Zeppelin, +the duke's favourite, in which the figure of Friendship has much +simplicity and grace: this is now at Louisberg. While he was modelling +this beautiful figure, the first idea of the Ariadne was suggested to +his fancy, but some years elapsed before it came into form. At this time +he was much employed in executing busts, for which his fine eye for +living nature and manly simplicity of taste peculiarly fitted him. In +this particular department of his art he has neither equal nor rival, +except our Chantrey. The best I have seen are those of Schiller, Gluck, +and Lavater. Never are the fine arts, never are great artists, better +employed than when they serve to illustrate and to immortalize each +other! About the year 1808, Dannecker was considered, beyond dispute, +the first sculptor in Germany; for as yet Rauch, Tieck, and Schwanthaler +had not worked their way up to their present high celebrity. He +received, in 1811, an intimation, that if he would enter the service of +the king of Bavaria, he should be placed at the head of the school of +sculpture at Munich, with a salary three times the amount of that which +he at present enjoyed.-- + +MEDON. + +Which Dannecker declined? + +ALDA. + +He did. + +MEDON. + +I could have sworn to it--_extempore_! What is more touching in the +history of men of genius than that deep and constant attachment they +have shown to their early patrons! Not to go back to the days of Horace +and Mecaenas, nor even to those of Ariosto and Tasso and the family of +Este, or Cellini and the Duke of Florence, or Lucas Kranach, and the +Elector John Frederic--[16] do you remember Mozart's exclamation, when +he was offered the most magnificent remuneration if he would quit the +service of Joseph II. for that of the Elector of Saxony--"Shall I leave +my good Emperor?" In the same manner Metastasio rejected every +inducement to quit the service of Maria Theresa,---- + +ALDA. + +Add Goethe and the Duke of Weimar, and a hundred other instances. The +difficulty would be to find _one_, in which the patronage of the great +has not been repaid ten thousand fold in gratitude and fame. Dannecker's +love for his native city, and his native princes, prevailed over his +self-interest; his decision was honourable to his heart; but it is +not less certain that at Munich he would have found more enlightened +patronage, and a wider scope for his talents. Frederic, the late king of +Wurtemburg, who had married our princess royal, was a man of a coarse +mind and profligate habits. Napoleon had gratified his vulgar ambition +by making him a king, and thereupon he stuck a huge, tawdry gilt +crown on the top of his palace, the impudent sign of his subservient +_majesty_. I never looked at it without thinking of an overgrown child +and its new toy; he also, to commemorate the acquisition of his kingly +titles, instituted the order of the Wurtemburg crown, and Dannecker +was gratified by this new order of merit, and a bit of ribbon in his +button-hole. + +But in the mean time the model of the Ariadne remained in his studio, +and it was not till the year 1809 that he could afford to purchase a +block of marble, and begin the statue on speculation. It occupied him +for seven years, but in the interval he completed other beautiful works. +The king ordered him to execute a Cupid in marble, for which he gave +him the design. It was a design which displeased the pure mind and high +taste of Dannecker; he would not so desecrate his divine art: "c'etait +travailler pour le diable!" said he to me, in telling the story. He +therefore only half fulfilled his commission; and changing the purpose +and sentiment of the figure, he represented the Greek Cupid at the +moment that he is waked by the drop of burning oil from Psyche's lamp. +An English general, I believe Sir John Murray, saw this charming statue, +in 1814, and immediately commanded a work from the sculptor's hands: he +wished, but did not absolutely require, a duplicate of the statue he so +admired. Dannecker, instead of repeating himself, produced his Psyche, +whom he has represented--not as the Greek allegorical Psyche, the +bride of Cupid, "with lucent fans, fluttering"--but as the abstract +personification of the human soul; or, to use Dannecker's own words, +"Ein rein, sittlich, sinniges Wesen,"--a pure, moral, intellectual +being. As he had an idea that Love had become moral and sentimental +after he had been waked by the drop of burning oil, so I could not +help asking him whether this was Psyche, grown reasonable after she +had beheld the wings of Love? He has not in this beautiful statue quite +accomplished his own idea. It has much girlish grace and simplicity, but +it wants elevation; it is not sufficiently ideal, and will not stand a +comparison either with the Psyche of Westmacott, or that of Canova. The +Ariadne was finished in 1816, but the sculptor was disappointed in his +hope that this, his masterpiece, would adorn his native city. The king +showed no desire to possess it, and it was purchased by M. Bethmann, +of Frankfort, for a sum equal to about one thousand pounds. Soon after +the Ariadne was finished, Dannecker conceived, in a moment of pious +enthusiasm, his famous statue of the Redeemer, which has caused a great +deal of discussion in Germany. This was standing in his work-room when +we paid our first visit to him. He told me what I had often heard, that +the figure had visited him in a dream three several times; and the +good old man firmly believed that he had been divinely inspired, and +predestined to the work. While the visionary image was fresh in his +imagination, he first executed a small clay model, and placed it +before a child of five or six years old;--there were none of the usual +emblematical accompaniments--no cross--no crown of thorns to assist the +fancy--nothing but the simple figure roughly modelled; yet the child +immediately exclaimed, "The Redeemer!" and Dannecker was confirmed in +his design. Gradually the completion of this statue became the one +engrossing idea of his enthusiastic mind: for eight years it was his +dream by night, his thought by day; all things else, all the affairs and +duties of life, merged into this. He told me that he frequently felt as +if pursued, excited by some strong, irresistible power, which would even +visit him in sleep, and impel him to rise from his bed and work. He +explained to me some of the difficulties he encountered, and which he +was persuaded that he had perfectly overcome only through divine aid, +and the constant study of the Scriptures. They were not few nor trifling. +Physical power, majesty, and beauty, formed no part of the character of +the Saviour of the world: the glory that was around him was not of this +earth, nor visible to the eye; "there was nothing in him that he should +be desired;" therefore to throw into the impersonation of exceeding +humility and benignity a superhuman grace, and from material elements +work out a manifestation of abstract moral grandeur--this was surely +not only a new and difficult, but a bold and sublime enterprize. + +You remember Michael Angelo's statue of Christ in the church of Santa +Maria sopra Minerva at Rome? + +MEDON. + +Perfectly; and I never looked at it without thinking of Neptune and +his trident. + +ALDA. + +The same thought occurred to me, and must inevitably have occurred to +others. Dannecker is not certainly so great a man as Michael Angelo, +but here he has surpassed him. Instead of emulating the antique models, +he has worked in the antique spirit--the spirit of faith and enthusiasm. +He has taken a new form in which to clothe a grand poetical conception. +Whether the being he has represented be a fit subject for the plastic +art, has been disputed; but it appears to me that Dannecker has more +nearly approached the christian ideal than any of his predecessors; +there is nothing to be compared to it, except Titian's Christo della +Moneta, and that is a head merely. The sentiment chosen by the sculptor +is expressed in the inscription on the pedestal: "Through me, to the +Father." The proportions of the figure are exceedingly slender and +delicate; the attitude a little drooping; one hand is pressed on the +bosom, the other extended; the lips are unclosed as in the act to speak. +In the head and facial line, by carefully throwing out every indication +of the animal propensities, and giving added importance and development +to all that indicates the moral and intellectual faculties, he has +succeeded in embodying a species of ideal, of which there is no other +example in art. I have heard, (not from Dannecker himself,) that when +the head of the Jupiter Tonans was placed beside the Christ, the merely +physical grandeur of the former, compared with the purely intellectual +expression of the latter, reminded every one present of a lion's head +erect and humanized. + +MEDON. + +But what were your own impressions? After all this eulogium, which +I believe to be just, tell me frankly, were you satisfied yourself? + +ALDA. + +No--not quite. The expression of the mouth in the last finished statue +(he has repeated the subject three times) is not so fine as in the +model, and the simplicity of the whole bordered on meagreness. This, +I think, is a general fault in all Dannecker's works. He has of course +avoided nudity, but the flowing robe, which completely envelopes the +figure, is so managed as to disclose the exact form of the limbs. One +little circumstance will give you an idea of the attention and accuracy +with which he seized and embodied every touch of individual character +conveyed in Holy Writ. In the original model he had made the beard +rather full and thick, and a little curled, expressing the prime of +manhood; but recollecting that in the gospel the Saviour is represented +as sinking under the weight of the cross, which the first man they met +accidentally was able to carry, he immediately altered his first +conception, and gave to the beard that soft, flowing, downy texture +which is supposed to indicate a feeble and delicate temperament. + +I shall not easily forget the countenance of the good and gifted old +man, as, leaning on the pedestal, with his cap in his hand, and his long +grey hair waving round his face, he looked up at his work with a mixture +of reverence and exultation, saying, in his imperfect and scarce +intelligible French, "Oui, quand on a fait comme cela, on reste sur la +terre!" meaning, I suppose, that this statue had ensured his immortality +on earth. He added, "They ask me often where are the models after which +I worked? and I answer, _here_, and _here_;" laying his hand first on +his head, then on his heart. + +I remember that when we first entered his room he was at work on one of +the figures for the tomb of the late Queen Catherine of Wurtemburg. You +perhaps recollect her in England when only Duchess of Oldenburg? + +MEDON. + +Yes; I remember, as a youngster, joining the mob who shouted before the +windows of the Pulteney-hotel, and hailed her and her brother Alexander +as if they had been a newly descended Jupiter and Juno! O verily, times +are changed! + +ALDA. + +But in that woman there were the elements of a fine nature. She had +the talents, the strength of mind, and far-reaching ambition of her +grandmother, Catherine of Russia, but was not so perverted. During her +short reign as Queen of Wurtemburg, the influence of her active mind was +felt through the whole government. She founded, among other institutions, +a school for the daughters of the nobility connected with the court,--in +plain English, a charity-school for the nobility of Wurtemburg, who are +among the most indigent and most ignorant of Germany. There are a few, +very few, brilliant exceptions. One lady of rank said to me, "As to an +English governess, _that_ is an advantage I can never hope to have for +my daughters. The princesses have an English governess, but _we_ cannot +dream of such a thing." The late queen really deserved the regrets of +her people. The king, whose sluggish mind she ruled or stimulated, is +now devoted to his stables and hunting. He has married another wife, but +he has erected to the honour of Catherine a splendid mausoleum, on the +peak of a high hill, which can be seen from almost every part of the +city; and on the summer evenings when the red sun-set falls upon its +white columns it is a beautiful object. The figure on which Dannecker +was occupied, represented Prayer, or what he called, "La triomphe de +la Priere;" it recalled to my mind Flaxman's lovely statue of the same +subject,--the "Our Father which art in Heaven," but suffered by the +involuntary comparison. On the rough base of the statue he had tried to +spell the name of Chantrey, but not very successfully. I took up a bit +of chalk and wrote underneath, in distinct characters, FRANCIS CHANTREY. + +"I grow old," said he, looking from his work to the bust of the late +queen which stood opposite. "I have carved the effigies of three +generations of poets, and as many of princes. Twenty years ago I was +at work on the tomb of the Duke of Oldenburg, and now I am at work upon +_her's_ who gave me that order. All die away: soon I shall be left +alone. Of my early friends none remain but Goethe. I shall die before +him, and perhaps he will write my epitaph." He spoke with a smile, not +foreseeing that he would be the survivor. + +Three years afterwards[17] I again paid Dannecker a visit, but a change +had come over him: his feeble, trembling hand could no longer grasp the +mallet, or guide the chisel; his eyes were dim; his fine benevolent +countenance wore a childish, vacant smile, now and then crossed by a +gleam of awakened memory or thought--and yet he seemed so perfectly +happy! He walked backwards and forwards, from his Christ to his bust +of Schiller, with an unwearied self-complacency, in which there was +something mournful, and yet delightful. While I sat looking at the +magnificent head of Schiller, the original of the multifarious casts +and copies which are dispersed through all Germany, he sat down beside +me, and taking my hands between his own, which trembled with age and +nervous emotion, he began to speak of his friend. "Nous etions amis des +l'enfance; aussi j'y ai travaille avec amour, avec douleur--on ne peut +pas plus faire." He then went on--"When Schiller came to Louisberg, he +sent to tell me that he was very ill--that he should not live very long, +and that he wished me to execute his bust. It was the first wish of my +own heart. I went immediately. When I entered the house, I found a lady +sitting on the _canape_--it was Schiller's wife, and I did not know her; +but she knew me. She said, 'Ah! you are Dannecker!--Schiller expects +you;'--then she ran into the next room, where Schiller was lying down +on a couch, and in a moment after he came in, exclaiming as he entered, +'Where is he? where is Dannecker?' That was the moment--the expression +I caught--you see it here--the head raised, the countenance full of +inspiration, and affection, and bright hope! I told him that to keep up +this expression he must have some of his best friends to converse with +him while I took the model, for I could not talk and work too. O if +I could but remember what glorious things then fell from those lips! +Sometimes I stopped in my work--I could not go on--I could only listen." +And here the old man wept; then suddenly changing his mood, he said--"But +I must cut off that long hair; he never wore it so; it is not in the +fashion, you know!" I begged him for heaven's sake not to touch it; he +then, with a sad smile, turned up the sleeve of his coat and showed me +his wrist, swelled with the continual use of his implements--"You see +I _cannot_!" And I could not help wishing at the moment, that while his +mind was thus enfeebled, no transient return of physical strength might +enable him to put his wild threat in execution. What a noble bequest to +posterity is the effigy of a great man, when executed in such a spirit +as this of Schiller! I assure you I could not look at it, without +feeling my heart "overflow in silent worship" of moral and intellectual +power, till the deification of great men in the old times appeared to me +rather religion than idolatry. I have been affected in the same manner +by the busts of Goethe, Scott, Homer, Milton, Howard, Newton;--never by +the painted portraits of the same men, however perfect in resemblance +and admirable in execution. + +MEDON. + +Painting gives us the material, sculpture the abstract, ethical aspect +of the man. In the bust, whatever is common-place, familiar, and actual, +is thrown out or kept down: in a picture it is not only retained, but, +in most cases, it is necessarily obtrusive. Goethe, in a blue coat and +metal buttons, and a white neckcloth, would not recall the author of the +"Iphigenia;" still less does that wrinkled, decrepit-looking face, in +the gallery at Hardwicke, portray Boyle, the philosopher. + +ALDA. + +Dannecker told me that he first modelled the head of Schiller the exact +size of life, and conscientiously rendered each, even the slightest, +individual trait; yet this head appeared to every one smaller than +nature, and to himself almost _mesquin_.[18] He was in despair. He +repeated the bust in a colossal size; and the development of the +intellectual organization, on a larger scale, immediately gave what was +wanting:--it appeared to the eye or to the mind's eye as only the size +of life. He showed me a beautiful basso-relievo of the Muse of Tragedy, +listening with an inspired look to the revelations of the Muse of +History. This admirable little group struck me the more, because long +ago I had clothed nearly the same idea in imperfect words. + +I took leave of Dannecker with emotion: I shall never see him again! +But he is one of those who cannot die; to use his own expression--"Quand +on a fait _comme cela_, on reste sur la terre." When Canova, then a +melancholy invalid, paid him a visit, he was so struck by the child-like +simplicity, the pure unworldly nature, the genuine goodness, and lively +happy temperament of the German sculptor, that he gave him the surname +of _il Beato_; and if the epithet _blessed_ can, with propriety, be +bestowed on any mortal, it is on him whose long life has been one of +labour and of love; who has left behind him lasting memorials of his +genius; who has never profaned the talents which God has given him +to any unworthy purpose:--but in the midst of all the beautiful and +exciting influences of poetry and art, has kept from youth to age a soul +serene, a conscience and a life pure in the sight of God and man. Such +was our own Flaxman--such is Dannecker! + +MEDON. + +Who are now the principal sculptors in Germany? + +ALDA. + +Rauch, of Berlin; Christian Frederic Tieck, the brother of the +celebrated poet and critic, Ludwig Tieck; and Schwanthaler, of Munich. +Rauch is the court sculptor of Berlin. He has, like Dannecker,[19] his +professorship, his order of merit,[20] and, I believe, one or two places +under the government, besides constant employment in his art. He works +_by the piece_, as the labourers say. But though he too has yoked his +genius to the car of power and patronage, he has done great things. The +statue of the late queen of Prussia is reckoned his _chef-d'oeuvre_, +and is not, perhaps, exceeded in modern sculpture. It was conceived and +worked out in all the inspiration of love and grief; as Dannecker would +say, "Mit Lieb und Schmerzen." He had been attached to the queen's +personal service, and shared, in an intense degree, the enthusiastic, +devoted affection with which all her subjects regarded that beautiful +and amiable woman. This statue he executed at Carrara; and a living +eagle, which had been taken captive among the Appenines, was the +original of that magnificent eagle he has placed at her feet:--nothing, +you see, like going at once to nature! In the course of twenty-five +years Rauch has executed sixty-nine busts, of which twenty are colossal. +Among his numerous other works, designed or executed within the same +time, there is the colossal statue of Blucher, now at Breslau; this is +in bronze, upon a granite pedestal. There is another statue of Blucher +at Berlin, of which the pedestal, rich with bas-reliefs, is also in +bronze. Rauch has been employed for the last twenty years in modelling +field-marshals and generals, and has devoted his best powers to vanquish +the difficulties presented by monotonous faces, drilled figures, +military uniforms, and regimental boots and buttons; and all that man +_can_ do, I am told he has done. I have seen some of his busts, which +are quite admirable. At Peterstein, near Munich, I saw his statue of a +little girl, about ten years old, which, in its simplicity, truth, and +elegance, reminded me of Chantrey's Lady Louisa Russell, though in +conception and _manner_ as distinct as possible. The full length of +Goethe, in his dressing-gown, of which there is such an infinitude of +casts and copies throughout Germany, is also by Rauch. + +Christian Tieck is the old and intimate friend of Rauch. They live, +or did live, under the same roof, and it is not known that a moment +of jealousy or rivalship ever disturbed the union between these two +celebrated and gifted men, who, starting nearly at the same time,[21] +have run their brilliant career together in the self-same path, and, +whatever judgment the world or posterity may form of their comparative +merits, seem determined to enter the temple of immortality hand in hand. +Tieck's works are dispersed from one end of Germany to the other. His +statue of Neckar; his busts of Madame de Stael, of her second husband +Rocca, of the Duke and Duchess de Broglie, and of A. W. Schlegel, +I have seen; and all, particularly the busts of Rocca and Schlegel are +exceedingly fine. At Munich, at Dresden, and at Weimar, I saw many of +his works; and at Manheim the bust of Madame de Heygendorf,[22] full of +beauty, and life, and expression. At Berlin, Tieck has been employed +for many years in designing and executing the sculptured ornaments of +the new theatre. There is a colossal Apollo; a Pegasus, striking the +fountain of Helicon from the rock, colossal Muses, and a variety of +other heathen perpetrations--all (as I am assured) exceedingly fine +in their way. I believe his seated statue of Iffland (the Garrick of +Germany) is considered one of his _chef-d'oeuvres_. He also, like +Rauch, has been much employed in modelling generals and trophies, in +memory of the late war. + +Schwanthaler, the son of a statuary of Munich, is still a young man; his +works first began to create a sensation in Germany in the year 1823. +In spirit and fire, and creative talent, in a fine classic feeling for +his art, he appeared to me to be treading in the steps of Flaxman, and +like _him_, he is a profound and accomplished scholar, who has sought +inspiration at the very fountain of Greek poetry. His basso-relievo of +the battle of the ships in the Iliad, his games of Greece, his designs +from the Theogony of Hesiod, and a variety of other works which I have +seen, appeared to me full of imagination, and in a pure and vigorous +style of art. Of him, and some other sculptors, you will find more +particulars in the note-book I kept at Munich; we will look over it +together one of these days. + +MEDON. + +Thank you; but I must needs ask you a question. In the works you have +enumerated, nothing has struck me as new, or in a new spirit, except +perhaps the Christ of Dannecker, and the statue of the queen of Prussia. +Now, why should not sculpture have its Gothic (or romantic) school, as +well as its antique, or classical school? + +ALDA. + +And has it not? + +MEDON. + +If you allude to the sculpture of the middle ages, _that_ has not become +a school of art, like their architecture and their painting: yet can it +be true that there is something in our modern institutions, our northern +descent, our christian faith, inimical to the spirit of sculpture?--and, +while poetry in every other form is regenerate around us, that in +sculpture alone we are doomed to imitate, never to create?--doomed to +the servile reproduction of the same ideas? that this alone, of all +the fine arts, is to belong to some peculiar mode of existence, some +peculiar mode of thinking, feeling, and believing? "Qui me delivrera des +Grecs et des Remains?"--who will deliver me from gods and goddesses, and +from all these + + "Repetitions, wearisome of sense, + Where soul is dead, and feeling hath no place?" + + +ALDA. + +You are little better than a heretic in these matters. But I will admit +thus much--that the classical and mythological sculpture of our modern +artists, is to the ancient marbles, what Racine's tragedies are to those +of Sophocles; that we are so far condemned to the "repetition wearisome +of _forms_," from which the ancient spirit has evaporated; but that is +not the fault of the subjects, but of the manner of treating them, for +never can the beautiful mythology of ancient Greece, which has woven +itself into our earliest dreams of poetry, become a "creed out-worn." +Its forms, and its symbols, and its imagery, have mingled with every +branch of art, and become a universal language. It is the deification of +the material world; and therefore, that art, which in its perfection may +be called the apotheosis of form, finds there its proper region and +element. + +MEDON. + +You do not suppose that, with all my Gothic tastes, I am such a Goth +as not to feel the truth of what you say? But I am an enemy to the +exclusive in every thing; and--pardon me--your worship of the Elgin +marbles and the Niobe, is, I think, a little too exclusive. All I ask +is, that modern sculpture should be allowed, like painting and poetry, +to have its romantic, as well as its classical school. + +ALDA. + +It has been otherwise decided. + +MEDON. + +But it has not been otherwise proved. There has been much theoretical +eloquence and criticism expended on the subject, but I deny that the +experiment has been fairly and practically brought before us. I know +very well you are ready with a thousand instances of attempt and +failure, but may we not seek the cause in the mistaken application of +certain classical, or, I should say, pedantic ideas on the subject? If +I ask for Milton's Satan, standing like a tower in his spiritual might, +his thunder-scarred brow wreathed with the diadem of hell, why am I to +be presented with an Athlete, or an Achilles? Why would Canova give us +for the head of Dante's Beatrice that of a muse, or an Aspasia? and for +Petrarch's Laura, a mere _tete de nymphe_? I contend that to apply the +forms suggested by the modern poetry demands a different spirit from +that of classic art. How to apply or modify the example bequeathed to us +by the great masters of old, Flaxman has shown us in his Dante. And why +should we not have in sculpture a Lear as well as a Laocoon? a Constance +as well as a Niobe? a Gismunda as well as a Cleopatra?---- + +ALDA. + +Or a Tam o'Shanter as well as a laughing Faun? + +MEDON. + +When I am serious and poetical, which is not often, I will not allow you +to be perverse and ironical! + +ALDA. + +See, here is a passage which I have just found among Mrs. Austin's +beautiful specimens of translation: "The critic of art ought to keep in +view, not only the capabilities, but the proper objects of art. Not all +that art can accomplish ought she to attempt. It is from this cause +alone, and because we have lost sight of these principles, that art +among us has become more extensive and difficult, and less effective and +perfect."[23] + +MEDON. + +Very well,--and very true:--but who shall bring a rule and compass to +measure the capabilities of art, and define its proper objects? May +there not exist in the depths or heights of philosophy and art, truths +yet to be revealed, as there are stars in heaven, whose light has +not yet reached the naked eye? and why should not criticism have its +telescope for truth, as well as its microscope for error? Art may be +finite; but who shall fix its limits, and say, "thus far shalt thou go?" +There are those who regard the distant as the unattainable, the unknown +as the unexisting, the actual as the necessary;--are you one of such, +O you of little faith! For my own part, I look forward to a new era in +sculpture. I believe that the purely natural and the purely ideal are +_one_, and susceptible of forms and modifications as yet untried. For +Nature, the infinite, sits within her tabernacle, not made by human +hands, and Genius and Love are the cherubim, to whom it is permitted +to look into her unveiled eyes, and reflect their light; Art is the +priestess of her divine mysteries, and Criticism, the door-keeper of +her temple, should be Janus-headed, looking forward as well as backward. +Reason estimates what has been done; Imagination alone divines what +_may_ be done. But I am losing myself in these reveries. To attempt +something new,--perfectly new in style and conception--and spend, like +Dannecker, eight years in working out that conception--and then perhaps +eight years more waiting for a purchaser, and this in a country where +one must eat and pay taxes--truly, it is not easy. + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + + + + +III. + + +MEDON. + +You have been frowning and musing in your chair for the last half-hour, +with your fore-finger between the leaves of your book--where were your +thoughts? + +ALDA. + +They were far--very far! I am afraid that I appear very stupid? + +MEDON. + +O not at all! you know there are stars which appear dim and fixed to +the eye, while they are taking flights and making revolutions, which +imagination cannot follow nor science compute. + +ALDA. + +Upon my word, you are very sublimely ironical--my thoughts were not +quite so far. + +MEDON. + +May one beg, or borrow them?--What is your book? + +ALDA. + +Mrs. Austin's "Characteristics of Goethe." I came upon a passage which +sent back my thoughts to Weimar. I was again in his house; the faces, +the voices of his grandchildren were around me; the room in which he +studied, the bed in which he slept, the old chair in which he died,--and, +above all, _her_ in whose arms he died--from whose lips I heard the +detail of his last moments-- + + * * * * * + +MEDON. + +What! all this emotion for Goethe? + +ALDA. + +For Goethe!--I should as soon think of weeping because the sun set +yesterday, which now is pouring its light around me! Our tears are for +those who suffer, for those who die, for those who are absent, for +those who are cold or lost--not for those who cannot die, who cannot +suffer,--who must be, to the end of time, a presence and an existence +among us! No. + +But I was reading here, among the Characteristics of Goethe, who +certainly "knew all qualities, with a learned spirit in human dealings," +that he was not only the quick discerner and most cordial hater of all +affectation;--but even the unconscious affectation--the _nature de +convention_,--the taught, the artificial, the acquired in manner or +character, though it were meritorious in itself, he always detected, +and it appeared to impress him disagreeably. Stay, I will read you the +passage--here it is. + +"Even virtue, laboriously and painfully acquired, was distasteful to +him. I might almost affirm, that a faulty but vigorous character, if +it had any real native qualities as its basis, was regarded by him +with more indulgence and respect than one which, at no moment of its +existence, is genuine; which is incessantly under the most unamiable +constraint, and consequently imposes a painful constraint on others. +'Oh,' said he, sighing, on such occasions, 'if they had but the heart to +commit some absurdity, that would be something, and they would at least +be restored to their own natural soil, free from all hypocrisy and +acting: wherever that is the case, one may entertain the cheering hope +that something will spring from the germ of good which nature implants +in every individual. But on the ground they are now upon, nothing can +grow.' 'Pretty dolls,' was his common expression when speaking of them. +Another phrase was, 'That's a piece of nature,' (literally, _das ist +eine Natur_, that is a nature,) which from Goethe's lips was considerable +praise."[24] + +This last phrase threw me back upon my remembrances. I thought of the +daughter-in-law of the poet,--the trusted friend, the constant companion, +the devoted and careful nurse of his last years. It accounted for the +unrivalled influence which apparently she possessed--I will not say +_over_ his mind--but _in_ his mind, in his affections; for in her he +found truly _eine Natur_--a piece of nature, which could bear even _his_ +microscopic examination. All other beings who approached Goethe either +were, or had been, or might be, more or less modified by the action of +that universal and master spirit. Consciously, or unconsciously, in love +or in fear, they bowed down before him, and gave up their individuality, +or forgot it, in his presence; they took the bent he chose to impress, +or the colour he chose to throw upon them. Their minds, in presence of +his, were as opake bodies in the sun, absorbing in different degrees, +reflecting in various hues, his vital beams; but HER'S was, in comparison, +like a transparent medium, through which the rays of that luminary +passed,--pervading and enlightening, but leaving no other trace. +Conceive a woman, a young, accomplished, enthusiastic woman, who had +qualities to attach, talents to amuse, and capacity to appreciate, GOETHE; +who, for fourteen or fifteen years, could exist in daily, hourly +communication with that gigantic spirit, yet retain, from first to +last, the most perfect simplicity of character, and this less from the +strength than from the purity and delicacy of the original texture. +Those oft-abused words, _naive_, _naivete_, were more applicable to her +in their fullest sense than to any other woman I ever met with. Her +conversation was the most untiring I ever enjoyed, because the stores +which fed that flowing eloquence were all native and unborrowed: you +were not borne along by it as by a torrent--_bongre_, _malgre_,--nor +dazzled as by an artificial _jet d'eau_ set to play for your amusement. +There was the obvious wish to please--a little natural _coquetterie_-- +vivacity without effort, sentiment without affectation, exceeding +mobility, which yet never looked like caprice; and the most consummate +refinement of thought, and feeling, and expression. From that really +elegant and highly-toned mind, nothing flippant nor harsh could ever +proceed; slander died away in her presence; what was evil she would +not hear of; what was malicious she would not understand; what was +ridiculous she would not see. Sometimes there was a wild, artless +fervour in her impulses and feelings, which might have become a +feather-cinctured Indian on her savannah; then, the next moment, her +bearing reminded you of the court-bred lady of the bed-chamber. Quick +in perception, yet femininely confiding, uniting a sort of restless +vivacity with an indolent gracefulness, she appeared to me by far +the most poetical and genuine being of my own sex I ever knew in +highly-cultivated life: one to whom no wrong could teach mistrust; no +injury, bitterness; one to whom the common-place realities, the vulgar +necessary cares of existence, were but too indifferent;--who was, in +reality, all that other women try to appear, and betrayed, with a +careless independence, what they most wish to conceal. I draw from the +life,--now, what would you say to such a woman if you met with her in +the world? + +MEDON. + +I should say--she had no business there. + +ALDA. + +How? + +MEDON. + +I repeat that the woman you have just portrayed is hardly fit for +the world. + +ALDA. + +Say rather, the world is not fitted for her. As the Sabbath was made for +man, not man for the Sabbath, so the world was made for man, not man for +the world--still less woman. + +MEDON. + +Do you know what you mean? + +ALDA. + +I think I do, though I am afraid I can but ill-explain myself. By the +world, I mean that system of social life in all its complicate bearings +by which we are surrounded; which was, I suppose, devised at first with +a reference to the wants, the happiness, and the benefit of men, but +for which no _man_ was specifically created; his being has a high and +individual purpose beyond the world. Now, it seems to me one reason of +the low average of what we call _character_, that we judge a human soul, +not as it is abstractedly, but simply in relation to others, and to +the circumstances around it. If it be in harmony with the world, and +worldly, we praise it--it is a very respectable soul; if so constituted, +that it is in discord with a world, (which, observe, all our philosophers, +our pastors, and our masters, unite to assure us, is a sad wicked place, +and must be reformed or renounced forthwith,) then--I pray your attention +to this point--_then_ the fault, the bitter penalty, lies not upon this +said wicked world,--O no!--but on that unlucky "piece of nature," which +in its power, its goodness, its purity, its truth, its faith, and its +tenderness, stands aloof from it. Is it not so? + +MEDON. + +Do you apply this personally? + +ALDA. + +No, generally; but I return to her who suggested the thought, and whom +I ought not, perhaps, to have made the subject of such a conversation as +this: it is against all my principles, contrary to my custom; and, in +truth, I speak of one in whom there is so much to love, that we cannot +praise without being accused of partiality; and so much to admire, that +we could not censure without being suspected of envy. I might as well +be silent therefore. Yet shall such a woman bear such a name, and hold +such a position as the mother of Goethe's posterity;[25]--shall she be +rendered by both a mark for observation, from one end of Europe to the +other;--shall she be "condemned to celebrity," and shall it be allowed +to ignorance, or ill-nature, or vanity, to prate of her;--and shall it +be forbidden to friendship even to speak?--that were hardly just. Of +those effusions of her creative and poetical talents, which charm her +friends, I say nothing, because in all probability neither you nor the +public will ever benefit by them. I met with several other women in +Germany who possessed striking poetical genius, and whose compositions +were equally destined to remain unknown, except to the circle of their +immediate friends and relatives. + +MEDON. + +Mr. Hayward, in his notes to his translation of Faust, remarks on the +strong prejudice against female authorship, which still exists in +Germany; but he has hopes that it will not endure, and that something +may be done "to unlock the stores of fancy and feeling which the +Ottilies and the Adeles have hived up." Tell me--did you find this +prejudice entertained by the women themselves, or existing chiefly on +the part of the men? + +ALDA. + +It was expressed most strongly by the women, but it must have originated +with the men. All your prejudices you instil into us; and then we are +not satisfied with adopting them, we exaggerate them--we mix them up with +our fancies and affections, and transmit them to your children. You are +"the mirrors in which we dress ourselves." + +MEDON. + +For which you dress yourselves! + +ALDA. + +Psha!--I mean that your minds and opinions are the mirrors in which we +form our own. You legislate for us, mould us, form us as you will. If +you prefer slaves and playthings to companions and helpmates, is that +our fault? In Germany I met with some men who, perhaps out of compliment, +descanted with enthusiasm on female talent, and in behalf of female +authorship; but the women almost uniformly spoke of the latter with +dread, as something formidable, or with contempt, as of something +beneath them: what is an unworthy prejudice in your sex, becomes, when +transplanted into ours, a _feeling_;--a mistaken, but a genuine, and +even a generous feeling. Many women, who have sufficient sense and +simplicity of mind to rise above the mere _prejudice_, would not contend +with the _feeling_: they would not scruple to encounter the public +judgment in a cause approved by their own hearts, but they have not +courage to brave or to oppose the opinions of friends and kindred-- + +MEDON. + +Or risk the loss of a lover. You remember the axiom of that clever +Frenchman,[26] who certainly spoke the existing opinions of his country +only a few years ago, when he said--"Imprimer, pour une femme de moins +de cinquante ans c'est mettre son bonheur a la plus terrible des +lotteries; si elle a un amant elle commencera par le perdre." + +ALDA. + +I really believe that in Germany the latter catastrophe would be in most +cases inevitable; and where is the woman who knowingly would risk it? + +MEDON. + +All, however, have not lovers to lose, or husbands to displease, +or friends to affront; and if the women, in compliance with our +self-revolving egotism, affect to prostrate themselves, and undervalue +one another--do the men allow it to this extent? Do not the Germans most +justly boast, that in their land arose the first feeling of veneration +for women, the result of the Christian dispensation, grafted on the +old German manners? Do they not point to their literature and their +institutions, as more favourable to your sex than any other? Does not +even Madame de Stael exalt the fine earnestness of the German feeling +towards you, infinitely above the system of French gallantry?--that +flimsy veil of conventional good-breeding, under which we seek to +disguise the demoralization of one sex, and the virtual slavery of the +other? Have I not heard you say, that it is the present fashion among +the poets, artists, and writers of Germany, to defer in all things to +the middle ages? Are not the maxims and sentiments of chivalry ready on +their lips, the forms and symbols of the old chivalrous times to be +traced in every department of literature and art among them? + +ALDA. + +All this is true; and I will believe that all this is something more +than mere theory, when I see the Germans less slovenly in their +interior, and less egotistical in their domestic relations. The theme is +unwelcome, unpleasant, ungraceful,--in fact, I can scarcely persuade +myself to say one word against those high-minded, benevolent, admirable, +and "most-thinking people;" so I will not dwell upon it: but I must +confess that the personal negligence of the men, and the forbearance of +the women on this point, astonished me. I longed to remind these +worshippers of the age of chivalry of that advice of St. Louis to his +son--"Il faut etre toujours propre et bien proprement habille, afin +d'etre _mieux aime de sa femme_;" the really good-natured and well-bred +Germans will, I am sure, forgive this passing remark, and allow its +truth: they _did_ at once agree with me, that the tavern-life of the men, +more particularly the clever professional men in the south of Germany, +(another remnant, I presume, either of the age of chivalry, or the +Buerschen-sitten--I know not which,) was calculated to retard the social +improvement and refinement of both sexes. And, apropos to chivalry, +the fact is, that the institutions of a generous but barbarous period, +invented to shield our helplessness, when women were exposed to every +hardship, every outrage, have been much abused, and must be considerably +modified to suit a very different state of society. That affectation of +poetical homage, which your strength paid to our weakness, when the laws +were not sufficient to defend us, we would now gladly exchange for more +real honour, more real protection, more equal rights. I speak thus, +knowing that, however open to perversion these expressions may be, _you_ +will not misapprehend me; you know that I am no vulgar, vehement arguer +about the "rights of women;" and, from my habitual tone of feeling and +thought, the last to covet any of your masculine privileges. + +MEDON. + +I do perfectly understand you; but, pray what are our strictly masculine +privileges, that you should covet them? Fighting! getting drunk! and +keeping a mistress!--I beg your pardon if I shock your delicacy; but +certainly, upon the score of masculine privileges, the less that is said +the better: there are nations in which it is a masculine privilege to +sit and smoke, while women draw the plough. It was some time ago,--and +now, in some countries, it is still a masculine privilege to cultivate +the mind at all; and in Germany, apparently, it is still a masculine +privilege to publish a book without losing _caste_ in society; whereas +here, in England, we have fallen into the opposite extreme; female +authorship is in danger of becoming a fashion,--which Heaven avert! I +should be sorry to see you women taking the pen you have hitherto so +honoured, in the same spirit in which you used to make filigree, cobble +shoes, and paint velvet. + +ALDA. + +It is too true that mere vanity and fashion have lately made some women +authoresses;--more write for money, and by this employment of their +talents earn their own independence, add to the comforts of a parent, +or supply the extravagance of a husband. Some, who are unhappy in their +domestic relations, yet endowed with all that feminine craving after +sympathy, which was intended to be the charm of our sex, the blessing of +yours, and somehow or other has been turned to the bane of both, look +abroad for what they find not at home; fling into the wide world the +irrepressible activity of an overflowing mind and heart, which can +find no other unforbidden issue,--and to such "fame is love disguised." +Some write from the mere energy of intellect and will; some few from +the pure wish to do good, and to add to the stock of happiness and +the progress of thought; and many from all these motives combined in +different degrees. + +MEDON. + +And have none of these motives produced authoresses in Germany? + +ALDA. + +Yes; but fashion and vanity, and the love of excitement, have not +as yet tempted the German women to print their effusions; their most +distinguished authoresses have become so, either from real enthusiasm or +from necessity; and in the lighter departments of literature they boast +at present some brilliant names. I will run over a few. + +There is Helmina von Chezy--but before I speak of _her_, I should tell +you of her famous grandmother, Anna Louisa Karshin, though _she_ +belonged to the last century. The Karshin was the daughter of a poor +innkeeper and brewer, in a little village of Silesia. She spent her +early years in herding cows. She learned to read by stealth, by stealth +she became a poetess; was first married to a boorish sulky weaver, +secondly to a drunken tailor, and suffered for years every extremity of +poverty and misery; at one time she travelled about the neighbouring +country, the first example of an itinerant poetess, declaiming her own +verses, and always ready with an ode or a sonnet to celebrate a wedding, +or hail a birthday. In this strange profession she excited much +astonishment--went through some singular, but not disreputable +adventures--and earned considerable sums of money, which her husband +spent in drink and profligacy. Gifted with as much energy as genius, +she struggled through all, and gradually became known to several of the +critics and poets of the last century, particularly Count Stolberg and +Gleim, and obtained the title of the German Sappho. She found means to +reach Berlin, where she worked her way up to distinction, and supported +herself, two children, and an orphan brother, by her talents. She was +recommended to Frederick the Great as worthy of a pension, and--would +you believe it?--that _munificent_ patron of his country's genius, sent +her a gratuity of two dollars, in a piece of paper. This extraordinary +and spirited woman, who had probably subsisted for half her life on +charity, instantly returned them to the niggardly despot, after writing +in the envelope four lines impromptu, which are yet repeated in Germany. +I am not quite sure that I remember them accurately, and it is no matter, +for they have not much either of poetry or point. + + "Zwey Thaler sind zu wenig; + Zwey Thaler macht kein Glueck; + Zwey Thaler gebt kein Koenig; + Fritz, hier send ich sie zurueck." + + +She died in 1791, and a selection of her poems was published in the +following year. + +The granddaughter of the Karshin, the more celebrated Helmina von Chezy, +is likewise a poetess; her principal work is a tale of chivalry, in +verse, _Die drei Weissen Rosen_, (The three White Roses) which was +published in 18--, and she wrote the opera of Euryanthe, for Weber to +set to music. Her songs and lighter poems are, I am told, exceedingly +beautiful. + +Caroline Pichler, of Vienna, I need only mention. I believe her +historical romances have been translated into half-a-dozen languages. +The Siege of Vienna is reckoned her best. + +Madame Schoppenhauer, the daughter of a senator of Dantzic, is +celebrated for her novels, travels, and works on art. She resided for +many years at Weimar, where she drew round her a brilliant literary +circle, which the talents of her daughter farther adorned. Since +Goethe's death she has fixed her residence at Bonn, where it is probable +the remainder of her life will be spent. One of the best of her novels, +"Die Tante," has been translated by Madame de Montolieu, under the title +of "La Tante et la Niece." Another very pretty little book of hers, +"Ausflucht an dem Rhein," I should like to see translated. Beside being +an excellent writer on art, Madame Schoppenhauer is herself no mean +artist. Moreover, she is a kind-hearted, excellent old lady, with a few +old lady-like prejudices about England and the English, which I forgave +her,--the more easily as I had to thank her in my own person for many +and kind attentions. + +Madame von Helvig, of Weimar, (born Amalia von Imhoff,) was the friend +of Schiller, under whose auspices her first poems were published. Her +rare knowledge of languages, her learning and critical taste in works of +arts, have distinguished her almost as much as her genius for poetry. + +The second wife of the Baron de la Motte-Fouquet, was a very accomplished +woman, and the author of several poems and romances. + +Frederica Brun, (born Muenter,) the daughter of a learned ecclesiastic +of Gotha, is celebrated for her prose writings, and particularly her +travels in Italy, where she resided at different periods. Madame Brun +was a friend of Madame de Stael, who mentions her in her de l'Allemagne, +and describes the extraordinary talents for classical pantomime +possessed by her daughter Ida Brun. + +Louisa Brachmann is, I believe, more renowned for her melancholy death +than her poetical talents; both together have procured her the name of +the "German Sappho." The wretched woman threw herself into the river +at Halle, and perished, as it was said, for the sake of some faithless +Phaon. This was in 1822, when she must have been between forty and +fifty; and pray observe, I do not notice this fact of her age in +ridicule. A woman's heart may overflow _inwardly_ for long, long years, +till at last the accumulated sorrow bursts the bounds of reason, and +then all at once we see the result of causes to which none gave heed, +and of secret agonies to which none gave comfort--in folly, madness, +destruction. Whatever might have been the cause,--thus she died. Her +works in prose and verse may be found in every bookseller's shop in +Germany. There is also a life of this unhappy and gifted woman by +professor Schutz. + +Fanny Tarnow is one of the most remarkable and most fertile of all the +modern German authoresses. Her genius was developed by misfortune and +suffering: while yet an infant, she fell from a window two stories +high, and was taken up, to the amazement of the assistants, without +any apparent injury, except a few bruises; but all the vital functions +suffered, and during ten or twelve years she was extended on a couch, +neither joining in any of the amusements of childhood, nor subjected +to the usual routine of female education. She educated herself. She +read incessantly, and, as it was her only pleasure, books of every +description, good and bad, were furnished her without restraint. She +was about eleven years old when she made her first _known_ poetical +attempt, inspired by her own feelings and situation. It was a dialogue +between herself and the angel of death. In her seventeenth year she +was sufficiently recovered to take charge of her father's family, after +he had lost, by some sudden misfortune, his whole property. He held +subsequently, a small office under government, the duties of which were +principally performed by his admirable daughter. Her first writings were +anonymous, and for a long time her name was unknown. Her most celebrated +novel, the "Thekla," was published in 1815; and from this time she has +enjoyed a high and public reputation. Fanny Tarnow resides, or did +reside, in Dresden. + +I have yet another name here, and not the least interesting, that of +Johanna von Weissenthurn, one of the most popular dramatic writers in +Germany. She was educated for the stage, even from infancy, her parents +and relations being, I believe, strolling players. She lived, for many +years, a various life of toil, and adventure, and excitement; such, +perhaps, as Goethe describes in the Wilhelm Meister; a life which does +sometimes blunt the nicer feelings, but is sure to develop talent +where it exists. Johanna at length rose through all the grades of her +profession, and became the first actress at the principal theatre at +Vienna. She played in the "Phoedra," before Napoleon, when he occupied +the Austrian capital in 1806, and the conqueror sent to her, after the +performance, a complimentary message, and a gratuity of three thousand +francs; but her lasting reputation is founded on her dramatic works, +which are played in every theatre in Germany. The plots, which, I +am told, are remarkable for fancy and invention, have been borrowed, +without acknowledgment, both by French and English playwrights. I +was quite charmed with one of her pieces which I saw at Munich, (Die +Erben--the Heirs,) and with another which was represented at Frankfort. +Johanna von Weissenthurn has also written poems and tales. + +I have come to the end of my memoranda on this subject, and regret it +much. I might easily give you more names, and quote second-hand the +opinions I heard of the merits and characteristics of these authoresses; +but I speak of nothing but what I _know_, and not being able to form +any judgment myself, I will give none. Only it appears to me that the +Germans themselves assign to no female writer the same rank which here +we proudly give to Joanna Baillie and Mrs. Hemans. I could hear of none +who had ever exercised any thing like the moral influence possessed by +Maria Edgeworth and Harriet Martineau, in their respective departments; +nor could learn that any German woman had yet given _public_ proof that +the most feminine qualities were reconcilable with the highest scientific +attainments--like Mrs. Marcet and Mrs. Somerville. + +MEDON. + +You said the other night, that you had not formed any opinion as to the +moral and social position of the women in Germany; but you must have +brought away some general impressions of manner and character;--frankly, +were they favourable or unfavourable? + +ALDA. + +Frankly, they were most favourable. Remember that I am not prepared with +any general sweeping conclusions: I cannot assure you from my own +knowledge, that among my own sex the proportion of virtue and happiness +is greater in Germany than in England. On the contrary-- + + ----In every land + I saw, wherever light illumineth, + Beauty and anguish walking hand in hand, + The downward slope to death. + + In every land I thought that, more or less, + The stronger, sterner nature overbore + The softer, uncontroll'd by gentleness, + And selfish evermore![27] + + +--Why do you smile? + +MEDON. + +You amuse me with the perseverance with which you ring the changes on +your favourite text, in prose and in verse; and yet, to adopt Voltaire's +witty metaphor, _we_ are the hammers and _you_ the anvils all the world +over. But is that all? You need not have gone to Germany to verify that! + +ALDA. + +No, sir; it is not _all_. In the first place, you know I have a +sufficient contempt for our English intolerance, with regard to +manners-- + +MEDON. + +Why, yes; with reason. The influence of mere _manner_ among our +fashionable people, and the stress laid upon it as a distinction, have +become so vulgarized and abused, that I should be relieved even by a +reaction which should throw us out of the insipidity of conventional +manner into primeval rudeness. + +ALDA. + +No, no, no!--no extremes: but though so sensible to the ridicule of +referring the social habits, opinions, customs, of other nations, to the +arbitrary standard of our own, still I could not help falling into +comparisons; certain distinctions between the German and the English +women struck me involuntarily. In the highest circles a stranger finds +society much alike every where. A court-ball--the _soiree_ of an +ambassadress--a minister's dinner--present nearly the same physiognomy. +It is in the second class of society, which is also every where, and in +every sense, the best, that we behold the stamp of national character. +I was not condemned to see my German friends always _en grande +toilette_; I had better opportunities of judging and appreciating their +domestic habits and manners, than most travellers enjoy. + +I thought the German women, of a certain rank, more _natural_ than +we are. The moral education of an English girl is, for the most part, +_negative_; the whole system of duty is thus presented to the mind. +It is not "this you must do;" but always "you must not do this--you +must not say that--you must not think so;" and if by some hardy, +expanding nature, the question be ventured, "Why?"--the mamma or the +governess are ready with the answer--"It is not the custom--it is not +lady-like--it is ridiculous!" But is it wrong?--why is it wrong?--and +then comes answer, pat--"My dear, you must not argue--young ladies +never argue." "But, mamma, I was thinking----" "My dear, you must not +think--go write your Italian exercise," and so on! The idea that certain +passions, powers, tempers, feelings, interwoven with our being by our +almighty and all-wise Creator, are to be put down by the fiat of a +governess, or the edict of fashion, is monstrous. Those who educate +us imagine that they have done every thing, if they have silenced +controversy, if they have suppressed all external demonstration of an +excess of temper or feeling; not knowing, or not reflecting, that unless +our nature be self-governed and self-directed by an appeal to those +higher faculties, which link us immediately with what is divine, their +labour is lost. + +Now, in Germany the women are less educated to suit some particular +fashion; the cultivation of the intellect, and the forming of the +manners, do not so generally supersede the training of the moral +sentiments--the affections--the impulses; the latter are not so +habitually crushed or disguised; consequently the women appeared to me +more natural, and to have more individual character. + +MEDON. + +But the English women pique themselves on being natural, at least they +have the word continually in their mouths. Do you know that I once +overheard a well-meaning mother instructing her daughter how to be +natural? You laugh, but I assure you it is a simple fact. Now, I really +do not object to natural insipidity, but I do object to conventional +insipidity: I object to a rule of elegance which makes the negative the +test of the natural. It seems hard that those who have hearts and souls +must needs put them into a strait-waistcoat, in order to oblige those +who choose to have none; and be guilty of the grossest affectation, to +escape the imputation of being affected! + +ALDA. + +I think there is less of this among the Germans; more of the individual +character is brought into the daily intercourse of society--more of the +poetry of existence is brought to bear on the common realities of life. +I saw a freshness of feeling--a genuine (not a taught) simplicity, which +charmed me. Sometimes I have seen affectation, but it amused me; it +consisted in the exaggeration of what is in itself good, not in the +mean renunciation of our individuality--the immolation of our soul's +truth to a mere fashion of behaviour. As Rochefoucauld called hypocrisy, +(that last extreme of wickedness,) "_the homage which vice pays to +virtue_;" so the _nature de convention_, that last and worst excess of +affectation, is the homage which the artificial pays to the natural. + +The German women are much more engrossed by the cares of housekeeping +than women of a similar rank of life in England. They carry this too far +in many instances, as we do the opposite extreme. In England, with our +false, conventional refinement, we attach an idea of vulgarity to certain +cares and duties, in which there is nothing vulgar. To see the young and +beautiful daughter of a lady of rank running about, busied in household +matters, with the keys of the wine-cellar and the store-room suspended +to her sash, would certainly surprise a young Englishwoman, who, +meantime, is netting a purse, painting a rose, or warbling some "Dolce +mio Bene," or "Soavi Palpiti," with the air of a nun at penance. The +description of Werther's Charlotte, cutting bread and butter, has +been an eternal subject of laughter among the English, among whom fine +sentiment must be garnished out with something finer than itself; and no +princess can be suffered to go mad, or even be in love, except in white +satin. To any one who has lived in Germany, the union of sentiment +and bread and butter, or of poetry with household cares, excites no +laughter. The wife of a state minister once excused herself from going +with me to a picture gallery, because on that day she was obliged to +reckon up the household linen; she was one of the most charming, truly +elegant, and accomplished women I ever met with. At another time, I +remember that a very accomplished woman, who had herself figured in a +court, could not do something or other--I forget what--because it was +the "groesse Waesche," (the great wash,) an event by the way which I +often found very mal-a-propos, and which never failed to turn a German +household upside down. You must remember that I am not speaking of +tradesmen and mechanics, but of people of my own, or even a superior +rank of life. It is true that I met with cases in which the women had, +without necessity, sunk into mere domestic drudges--women whose souls +were in their kitchen and their household stuff--whose talk was of +dishes and of condiments; but then the same species of women in England +would have been, instead of busy with the idea of being useful, +frivolous and silly, without any idea at all. + +MEDON. + +And whether a woman put her soul into an apple tart, or a new bonnet, +signifies little, if there be no capacity there for any thing better. +I hate mere fine ladies; but equally avoid those who seem born to +"suckle fools and chronicle small beer." The accomplishments which +embellish social life--the cultivation which raises you to a companionship +with men--I cannot spare these to make mere nurses and housewifes, as I +conceive the generality of the German women aim to be, and which I have +been told the opinions of the men approve. + +ALDA. + +As to what we term accomplishments, there was certainly much less +exhibition and parade of them in society; they formed less an established +and necessary part of education than with us; but, of really accomplished, +well-informed women, believe me I found no deficiency--far otherwise: +if the inclination or the talent existed, means and opportunity were +not wanting for mental culture of a very high species. I met with fewer +women who drew badly, sang tolerably, or rather intolerably, scratched +the harp, and quoted Metastasio; but I met with quite as many women who, +without pretension, were finished musicians, painted like artists, +possessed an extensive acquaintance with their own literature, and an +uncommon knowledge of languages; and were, besides, very good housewives +after the German fashion. More or less acquaintance with the French +language was a matter of course, but English was preferred: every where +I met with women who had cultivated with success, not our language +merely, but our literature. Shakspeare, whether studied in English, or +in some of their excellent translations, I found a species of household +god, whose very name was breathed with reverence, as if it were that of +a supernatural being. Lord Byron, and Sir Walter Scott, and Campbell, +are familiar names. Wordsworth and Shelley are beginning to be known, +but they are pronounced more difficult of comprehension than Shakspeare +himself; yet I met with a German lady who could repeat Coleridge's +"Ancient Mariner" by heart. Of our great modern poets, Crabbe appeared +the least understood and appreciated in Germany, for the obvious reason, +that his subjects and portraits are almost exclusively national. There +are, however, several German editions of his works. The men read him as +a study. The only German lady I met with who had read his works through, +pronounced them "not poetry." Bulwer is exceedingly popular among the +women; so is Moore. Some of those who most admired the latter, gave as +one reason that "his English style was so easy." + +MEDON. + +Of all our poets, Moore should seem the least allied to a German taste. +Shall I confess to you? He reminds me perpetually of Prince Potemkin's +larder, in which you could always have _petits-pates_ and champagne, +_ad libitum_, but never a morsel of bread or a drop of water! + +ALDA. + +The simile is e'en too wickedly just; but I except his Irish ballads: +by the way, I was pleased to find some of our beautiful Irish melodies +almost naturalized in Germany, and sung either with Moore's words, or +German versions of them. I remember that at Stift-Neuberg I heard the +air of Ally Croker sung to an excellent translation of Moore's words,[28] +and with as much of the national spirit and feeling as if we had been on +the banks of the Shannon instead of the banks of the Neckar. The singer, +an amateur, and a most extraordinary musical genius, who had joined our +circle from Heidelberg, did not understand, or at least did not speak, +English; yet there was no Irish, or Scotch, or English air which he had +not at the ends of his fingers; and when he struck up, "Of noble race +was Shenkin," it was as if all the souls of all the Welsh harpers since +High-born Hoel had inspired him. This gifted person was, however, of your +sex, and our discourse, at present, is of mine. + +I heard an English lady, who had resided for some time in Germany, +remark, that the "German mothers _spoiled_ their children terribly;" in +other words, the children lived more habitually with the mothers, were +under little restraint, and behaved in the drawing-room much as if they +were in the nursery, and were treated, as they grew up, on more equal +terms. + +That high exterior polish, those brilliant conversational talents, which +I have seen in many English and French women, must be rare among the +Germans: they are too simple, and too much in earnest. The trifling +of a polished French woman is often most graceful; the trifling of an +Englishwoman gracious and graceful; but the trifling of a German woman +is, in comparison, heavy work; to use a common expression, it is not +_in them_. I met with _one_ satirical woman. You know I once ventured +to assert that no woman is _naturally_ satirical, and to touch upon the +causes which foster this artificial vice--and here was a case in point. +It was that of a mind which had originally been a piece of nature's +noblest handiwork, first bruised, then gradually festered by the action +of all evil influences. + +MEDON. + +And, "lilies that fester are far worse than weeds," so singeth the poet; +but do you make the cause also the excuse? How many minds have endured +the most withering influences of misery and mischief, if not untouched, +at least uninjured--unembittered! + +ALDA. + +I grant you: but before we assume the power of judging, of computing the +degree of virtue in the latter case, of vice in the former, we should +look to the original conformation of the human being--the material +exposed to these influences. Fire hardens the clay and dissolves the +metal. This plate of tempered steel, on which I am going to etch, shall +corrode, effervesce, be absolutely decomposed by the action of a few +drops of nitrous acid, which has no effect whatever on this lump of wax. +Now, carry this analogy into the consideration of the human character--it +will spare us a long argument. + +As to the chapter of coquettes-- + +MEDON. + +Ah! _glissez, mortel, n'appuyez pas!_ + +ALDA. + +And why not?--Don't you know that I meditate, with the assistance of +certain _professorins_, a complete Natural History of Coquettes, (in +quarto,) which shall rival the famous Dutch treatise on Butterflies, +in heaven knows how many folio volumes? In the first part of this +stupendous work we intend to treat systematically of every known +species, from the _coquetterie instinctive_, which may be termed the +wild genus, indigenous in all females, up to the _coquetterie calculee +et philosophique_, the most refined specimen reared in the hot-bed of +artificial life. In the second part, we shall treat the whole history of +_Coquetterie_, from that first pretty experiment of dear Mamma Eve, when +she turned away from Adam, + + "----As conscious of her worth, + That would be woo'd and not unsought be won," + + +down to--to--how shall I avoid being personal?--down to the Lady Adeline +Amundevilles of our own day. With some women _coquetterie_ is an instinct; +with others, an amusement; with others, a pursuit; with others, a science. +With the German women it is a passion: they play the coquette as they do +every thing else, with sentiment, with good faith, with enthusiasm. + +MEDON. + +Why then it is no longer _coquetterie_--it is love! + +ALDA. + +I beg your pardon; it is something very different. True, perhaps, "that +thin partitions do the bounds divide;" but, to a nice observer, the +division is not the less complete. In short, you can imagine nothing +more distinct than an English coquette and a German coquette; in the +first case, one is reminded of Dryden's fanciful simile-- + + "So cold herself, while she such warmth express'd, + 'Twas Cupid bathing in Diana's stream!" + + +But, in the latter case, it is Diana bending the bow, and brandishing +the darts of Cupid; and with an unsuspicious _gaucherie_, which now and +then turns the point against her own bosom. + +I observed, and I verified my own observations, by the information of +some intelligent medical men, that there is less ill-health among the +superior rank of women, in Germany, than with us; all that class of +diseases, which we call nervous, which in England have increased, +and are increasing in such a fearful ratio, are far less prevalent; +doubtless, because the habits of social life are more natural. The use +of noxious stimulants among the better class of women is almost unknown, +and rare among the very lowest classes--would to heaven we could say +the same! No where, not even at Munich, one of the most profligate of +the German capitals, was I ever shocked by the exhibition of female +suffering and depravity in another form, as in the theatres and the +streets of London. + +I have been asked twenty times since my return to England, whether the +German women are not very _exaltee_--very romantic? I could only answer, +that they appeared to me less calculating, less the slaves of artificial +manners and modes of thinking; more imaginative, more governed by +natural feeling, more enthusiastic in love and religion, than with us. +If this is what my English friends term _exaltee_, I certainly cannot +think the German women would have reason to be offended by the +application of the word to them, however satirically meant. Perhaps it +may be from necessity, that they are generally more simple in their +tastes, and more frugal in their expenses; they had certainly a most +formidable idea of the extravagance of fashionable English women, and +of our luxurious habits. I believe that they are sometimes difficult of +access, and apparently inhospitable, because they suspect us of scoffing +at their simplicity, at the homeliness of their accommodations, and +their housewively occupations. For my own part I slipped so quietly +and naturally into all their social and domestic habits, and cared so +little about the differences and distinctions, which some of the English +thought it fine to be always remarking and lamenting, that my German +friends used to express their surprise, by saying--"Savez vous, ma +chere, que vous ne me faites pas de tout l'effet d'une Anglaise!"--an +odd species of compliment, but certainly meant as such. It is true +that I was sometimes a little tired of the everlasting knitting and +cross-stitch; and it is true I may at times have felt the want of +certain external luxuries, with which we are habitually pampered in this +prodigal land, till they become necessaries; but I would be well content +to exchange them all a thousand times over, for the cheap mental and +social pleasures--the easy intercourse of German life. + +MEDON. + +Apropos to German romance. I met with a striking instance of it even in +my short and rapid journey across part of the country. A lady of birth +and rank, who had been _dame d'honneur_ in the court of a sovereign +princess, (a princess by the way of very equivocal reputation,) on +the death of a lover, to whom she had been betrothed, devoted herself +thenceforth to the service of the sick in the hospitals; she could not +enter a religious order, being a Protestant, but she fulfilled all the +offices of a vowed Sister of Charity. When she applied to the physician +for leave to attend the hospital at ----, he used every endeavour to +dissuade her from her undertaking--all in vain! Then he tried to disgust +her by imposing, in the first instance, duties the most fearful and +revolting to a delicate woman; she stood this test, and persisted. It is +now five years since I saw her; perhaps she may by this time be tired of +her charitable, or rather her romantic, self-devotion. + +ALDA. + +No, _that_ she is not. I know to whom you allude. She follows steadily +and quietly the same pious vocation in which she has persevered for +fifteen years, and in which she seems resolved to die. + +Now, in return for your story, though I knew it all before, I will tell +you another; but lest you should suspect me of absolute invention and +romancing, I must tell you how I came by it. + +I was travelling from Weimar to Frankfort, and had stopped at a little +town, one or two stages beyond Fulda; I was standing at the window of +the inn, which was opposite to the post-house, and looking at a crowd +of travellers who had just been disgorged from a huge Eil-wagen or +post-coach, which was standing there. Among them was one female, who, +before I was aware, fixed my attention. Although closely enveloped in a +winter dress from head to foot, her height, and the easy decision with +which she moved, showed that her figure was fine and well-proportioned; +and as the wind blew aside her black veil, I had a glimpse of features +which still farther excited my curiosity. I had time to consider her, +as she alighted and walked over to the inn alone. She entered at once +the room--it was a sort of public saloon--in which I was; summoned the +waiter, whom she addressed in a good-humoured, but rather familiar +style, and ordered breakfast; not a cup of chocolate or _caffee au +lait_, as became a heroine, for you see I was resolved that she should +be one, but a very substantial German breakfast--soup, a cutlet, and a +pint (eine halbe flasche) of good wine: it was then about ten o'clock. +While this was preparing, she threw off her travelling accoutrements; +first a dark cloak, richly lined with fur; one or two shawls; a sort +of pelisse, or rather surtout, reaching to the knees, with long loose +sleeves, such as you may see in the prints of Tartar or Muscovite +costumes; this was made of beautiful Indian shawl, lined with blue +silk, and trimmed with sables: under these splendid and multifarious +coverings she wore a dress of deep mourning. Her figure, when displayed, +excited my admiration: it was one of the most perfect I ever beheld. +Her feet, hands, and head, were small in proportion to her figure; her +face was not so striking--it was pretty, rather than handsome; her small +mouth closed firmly, so as to give a marked and singular expression +of resolution and decision, to a physiognomy otherwise frank and +good-humoured. Her eyes, also small, were of a dark hazel, bright, +and with long blonde eyelashes. Her abundant fair hair was plaited in +several bands, and fastened on the top of her head, in the fashion +of the German peasant girls. Her voice would have been deemed rather +high-pitched, for "ears polite," but it was not deficient in melody; and +though her expression was grave, and even sad, upon our first encounter, +I soon found that mirth, and not sadness, was the natural character of +her mind, as of her countenance. When any thing ridiculous occurred, +she burst at once into a laugh--such a merry, musical peal, that it was +impossible not to sympathize in it. Her whole appearance and manner gave +me the idea of a farmer's buxom daughter: nothing could be more distinct +from our notions of the lady-like, yet nothing could be more free from +impropriety, more expressive of native innocence and modesty; but the +splendour of her dress did not exactly suit with her deportment--it +puzzled me. I observed, when she drew off her glove, that she wore a +number of silver rings of a peculiar fashion, and among them a fine +diamond. She walked up and down while her breakfast was preparing, +seemingly lost in painful meditations; but when it appeared, she sat +down and did justice to it, as one who had been many hours without food. +While she was thus engaged, the conducteur of the Eil-wagen and one +of the passengers came in, and spoke to her with interest and respect. +Soon afterwards came the mistress of the inn, (who had never deigned to +notice me, for it is not the fashion in Germany;) she came with an offer +of particular services, and from the conversation I gathered, to my +astonishment, that this young creature--she seemed not more than two or +three and twenty--was on her way home, alone and unprotected, from--can +you imagine?--even from the wilds of Siberia! But then what had brought +her there? I listened, in hopes of discovering, but they all spoke so +fast that I could make out nothing more. Afterwards, I had occasion to +go over to a little shop to make some purchase. On my return, I found +her crying bitterly, and my maid, also in tears, was comforting her with +great volubility. Now, though my _having_ in German, like Orlando's +beard, was not considerable, and my heroine spoke still less French, I +could not help assisting in the task of consolation--never, certainly, +were my curiosity and interest more strongly excited! Subsequently we +met at Frankfort, where she was lodged in the same hotel, and I was +enabled to offer her a seat in my vehicle to Mayence. Thus, I had +opportunities of hearing her whole history related at different times, +and in parts and parcels; and I will now endeavour to give it to you +in a connected form. I may possibly make some mistake with regard +to the order of events, but I promise you faithfully, that where my +recollection of names, or dates, or circumstances, may fail me, I will +not, like Mademoiselle de Montpensier, make use of my imagination +to supply the defects of my memory. You shall have, if not the whole +truth, at least as much of it as I can remember, and with no fictitious +interpolations and improvements. Of the animation of voice and manner, +the vivid eloquence, the graphic spirit, the quick transitions of +feeling, and the grace and vivacity of gesture and action with which +the relation was made to me by this fine untutored child of nature, +I can give you no idea--it was altogether a study of character, I shall +never forget. + +My heroine--truly and in every sense does she deserve the name--was the +daughter of a rich brewer and wine merchant of Deuxponts.[29] She was +one of five children, two much older and two much younger than herself. +Her eldest brother was called Henri: he had early displayed such +uncommon talents, and such a decided inclination for study, that his +father was determined to give him all the advantages of a learned +education, and sent him to the university of Erlangen, in Bavaria, +whence he returned to his family, with the highest testimonies of his +talents and good conduct. His father now destined him for the clerical +profession, with which his own wishes accorded. His sister fondly +dwelt upon his praises, and described him, perhaps with all a sister's +partiality, as being not only the pride of his family, but of all his +fellow-citizens, "tall, and handsome, and good," of a most benevolent +enthusiastic temper, and devoted to his studies. When he had been at +home for some time, he attracted the notice of one of the princes in the +north of Germany, with whom he travelled, I believe, in the capacity +of secretary. The name of the prince, and the particulars of this +part of his life, have escaped me; but it appeared that, through the +recommendation of this powerful patron, he became professor of theology +in a university of Courland, I think at Riga, or somewhere near it, for +the name of this city was continually recurring in her narrative. Henri +was at this time about eight-and-twenty. + +While here, it was his fate to fall passionately in love with the +daughter of a rich Jew merchant. His religious zeal mingled with his +love; he was as anxious to convert his mistress as to possess her--and, +in fact, the first was a necessary preliminary to the second; the +consequences were all in the usual style of such matters. The relations +discovered the correspondence, and the young Jewess was forbidden to see +or to speak to her lover. They met in secret. What arguments he might +use to convert this modern Jessica, I know not, but they prevailed. She +declared herself convinced, and consented to fly with him beyond the +frontiers, into Silesia, to be baptized, and to become his wife. + +Apparently their plans were not well-arranged, or were betrayed; for +they were pursued by her relations and the police, and overtaken before +they reached the frontiers. The young man was accused of carrying off +his Jewish love by force, and this, I believe, at Riga, where the Jews +are protected, is a capital crime. The affair was brought before the +tribunal, and the accused defended himself by declaring that the girl +had fled with him by her own free will; that she was a Christian, and +his betrothed bride, as they had exchanged rings, or had gone through +some similar ceremony. The father Jew denied this on the part of his +daughter, and Henri desired to be confronted with the lady who was thus +said to have turned his accuser. Her family made many difficulties, but +by the order of the judge she was obliged to appear. She was brought +into the court of justice pale, trembling, and supported by her father +and others of her kindred. The judge demanded whether it was by her own +will that she had fled with Henri Ambos? She answered in a faint voice, +"_No_." Had then violence been used to carry her off? "_Yes._" Was she +a Christian? "_No._" Did she regard Henri as her affianced husband? +"_No._" + +On hearing these replies, so different from the truth,--from all he +could have anticipated, the unfortunate young man appeared for a few +minutes stupified; then, as if seized with a sudden frenzy, he made a +desperate effort to rush upon the young Jewess. On being prevented, he +drew a knife from his pocket, which he attempted to plunge into his own +bosom, but it was wrested from him; in the scuffle he was wounded in +the hands and face, and the young lady swooned away. The sight of his +mistress insensible, and his own blood flowing, restored the lover to +his senses. He became sullenly calm, offered not another word in his own +defence, refused to answer any questions, and was immediately conveyed +to prison. + +These particulars came to the knowledge of his family after the lapse of +many months, but of his subsequent fate they could learn nothing. Neither +his sentence nor his punishment could be ascertained; and although +one of his relations went to Riga, for the purpose of obtaining some +information--some redress--he returned without having effected either +of the purposes of his journey. Whether Henri had died of his wounds, +or languished in a perpetual dungeon, remained a mystery. + +Six years thus passed away. His father died: his mother, who persisted +in hoping, while all others despaired, lingered on in heart-wearing +suspense. At length, in the beginning of last year, (1833,) a travelling +merchant passed through the city of Deuxponts, and inquired for the +family of Ambos. He informed them that in the preceding year he had +seen and spoken to a man in rags, with a long beard, who was working in +fetters with other criminals, near the fortress of Barinska, in Siberia; +who described himself as Henri Ambos, a pastor of the Lutheran church, +unjustly condemned, and besought him with tears, and the most urgent +supplications, to convey some tidings of him to his unhappy parents, and +beseech them to use every means to obtain his liberation. + +You must imagine--for I cannot describe as she described--the feelings +which this intelligence excited. A family counsel was held, and it +was determined at once that application should be made to the police +authorities at St. Petersburgh, to ascertain beyond a doubt the fate +of poor Henri--that a petition in his favour must be presented to the +Emperor of Russia; but who was to present it? The second brother offered +himself, but he had a wife and two children; the wife protested that she +should die if her husband left her, and would not hear of his going; +besides, he was the only remaining hope of his mother's family. The +sister then said that she would undertake the journey, and argued that +as a woman she had more chance of success in such an affair than her +brother. The mother acquiesced. There was, in truth, no alternative; and +being amply furnished with the means, this generous, affectionate, and +strong-minded girl, set off alone, on her long and perilous journey. +"When my mother gave me her blessing," said she, "I made a vow to God +and my own heart, that I would not return alive without the pardon of +my brother. I feared nothing; I had nothing to live for. I had health +and strength, and I had not a doubt of my own success, because I was +_resolved_ to succeed; but ah! _liebe madame!_ what a fate was mine! and +how am I returning to my mother!--my poor old mother!" Here she burst +into tears, and threw herself back in the carriage; after a few minutes +she resumed her narrative. + +She reached the city of Riga without mischance. There she collected the +necessary documents relative to her brother's character and conduct, +with all the circumstances of his trial, and had them properly attested. +Furnished with these papers, she proceeded to St. Petersburgh, where she +arrived safely in the beginning of June, 1833. She had been furnished with +several letters of recommendation, and particularly with one to a German +ecclesiastic, of whom she spoke with the most grateful enthusiasm, by the +title of M. le Pasteur. She met with the utmost difficulty in obtaining +from the police the official return of her brother's condemnation, place +of exile, punishment, &c.; but at length, by almost incredible boldness, +perseverance, and address, she was in possession of these, and with the +assistance of her good friend the pastor, she drew up a petition to the +emperor. With this she waited on the minister of the interior, to whom, +with great difficulty, and after many applications, she obtained access. +He treated her with great harshness, and absolutely refused to deliver +the petition. She threw herself on her knees, and added tears to +entreaties; but he was inexorable, and added brutally--"Your brother +was a _mauvais sujet_; he _ought_ not to be pardoned, and if I were the +emperor I would not pardon him." She rose from her knees, and stretching +her arms towards heaven, exclaimed with fervour--"I call God to witness +that my brother was innocent! and I thank God that you are not the +emperor, for I can still hope!" The minister, in a rage, said--"Do you +dare to speak thus to me! Do you know who I am?" "Yes," she replied; +"you are his excellency the minister C----; but what of that? you are +a cruel man! but I put my trust in God and the emperor; and then," said +she, "I left him, without even a curtsey, though he followed me to the +door, speaking very loud and very angrily." + +Her suit being rejected by all the ministers, (for even those who +were most gentle, and who allowed the hardship of the case, still +refused to interfere, or deliver her petition,) she resolved to do, +what she had been dissuaded from attempting in the first instance--to +appeal to the emperor in person: but it was in vain she lavished +hundreds of dollars in bribes to the inferior officers; in vain she +beset the imperial suite, at reviews, at the theatre, on the way to +the church: invariably beaten back by the guards, or the attendants, +she could not penetrate to the emperor's presence. After spending six +weeks in daily ineffectual attempts of this kind, hoping every morning, +and almost despairing every evening--threatened by the police, and +spurned by the officials--Providence raised her up a friend in one of +her own sex. Among some ladies of rank, who became interested in her +story, and invited her to their houses, was a Countess Elise, something +or other, whose name I am sorry I did not write down. One day, on seeing +her young _protegee_ overwhelmed with grief, and almost in despair, she +said, with emotion, "I cannot dare to present your petition myself, I +might be sent off to Siberia, or at least banished the court; but all I +can do I will. I will lend you my equipage and servants. I will dress +you in one of my robes; you shall drive to the palace the next levee +day, and obtain an audience under my name; when once in the presence of +the emperor you must manage for yourself. If I risk thus much, will you +venture the rest?" "And what," said I, "was your answer?" "Oh!" she +replied, "I could not answer; but I threw myself at her feet, and kissed +the hem of her gown!" I asked her whether she had not feared to risk the +safety of her generous friend? She replied, "That thought did strike +me--but what would you have?--I cast it from me. I was _resolved_ to +have my brother's pardon--I would have sacrificed my own life to obtain +it--and, God forgive me, I thought little of what it might cost another." + +This plan was soon arranged, and at the time appointed my resolute +heroine drove up to the palace in a splendid equipage, preceded by a +running footman, with three laced laquais in full dress, mounted +behind. She was announced as the Countess Elise ----, who supplicated +a particular audience of his majesty. The doors flew open, and in a few +minutes she was in the presence of the emperor, who advanced one or +two steps to meet her, with an air of gallantry, but suddenly started +back---- + +Here I could not help asking her, whether in that moment she did not +feel her heart sink? + +"No," said she firmly; "on the contrary, I felt my heart beat quicker +and higher!--I sprang forward and knelt at his feet, exclaiming, with +clasped hands--'Pardon, imperial majesty!--Pardon!'" "Who are you?" said +the emperor, astonished; "and what can I do for you?" He spoke gently, +more gently than any of his ministers, and overcome, even by my own +hopes, I burst into a flood of tears, and said--"May it please your +imperial majesty, I am not Countess Elise ----, I am only the sister of +the unfortunate Henri Ambos, who has been condemned on false accusation. +O pardon!--pardon! Here are the papers--the proofs. O imperial +majesty!--pardon my poor brother!" I held out the petition and the +papers, and at the same time, prostrate on my knees, I seized the skirt +of his embroidered coat, and pressed it to my lips. The emperor said, +"Rise--rise!" but I would not rise; I still held out my papers, resolved +not to rise till he had taken them. At last the emperor, who seemed much +moved, extended one hand towards me, and took the papers with the other, +saying--"Rise, mademoiselle--I command you to rise." I ventured to kiss +his hand, and said, with tears, "I pray of your majesty to read that +paper." He said, "I will read it." I then rose from the ground, and stood +watching him while he unfolded the petition and read it. His countenance +changed, and he exclaimed once or twice, "Is it possible?--This is +dreadful!" When he had finished, he folded the paper, and without +any observation, said at once--"Mademoiselle Ambos, your brother is +pardoned." The words rung in my ears, and I again flung myself at his +feet, saying--and yet I scarce know what I said--"Your imperial majesty +is a god upon earth; do you indeed pardon my brother? Your ministers +would never suffer me to approach you; and even yet I fear----!" He +said, "Fear nothing: you have my promise." He then raised me from the +ground, and conducted me himself to the door. I tried to thank and bless +him, but could not; he held out his hand for me to kiss, and then bowed +his head as I left the room. "Ach ja! the emperor is a good man,--ein +schoener, feiner, Mann! but he does not know how cruel his ministers are, +and all the evil they do, and all the justice they refuse, in his name!" + +I have given you this scene as nearly as possible in her own words. +She not only related it, but almost acted it over again; she imitated +alternately, her own and the emperor's voice and manner; and such was +the vivacity of her description that I seemed to hear and behold both, +and was more profoundly moved than by any scenic representation I can +remember. + +On her return she received the congratulations of her benefactress, the +Countess Elise, and of her good friend the pastor, but both advised her +to keep her audience and the emperor's promise a profound secret. She +was the more inclined to this; because, after the first burst of joyous +emotion, her spirits sank. Recollecting the pains that had been taken to +shut her from the emperor's presence, she feared some unforeseen obstacle, +or even some knavery on the part of the officers of government. She +described her sufferings during the next few days, as fearful; her +agitation, her previous fatigues, and the terrible suspense, apparently +threw her into a fever, or acted on her excited nerves so as to produce +a species of delirium, though, of course, she would not admit this. +After assuring me very gravely that she did not believe in ghosts, she +told me that one night, after her interview with the emperor, she was +reading in bed, being unable to sleep; and on raising her eyes from her +book she saw the figure of her brother, standing at the other end of the +room; she exclaimed, "My God, Henri! is that you!" but without making +any reply, the form approached nearer and nearer to the bed, keeping +its melancholy eyes fixed on her's, till it came quite close to the bed +side, and laid a cold heavy hand upon her. + +MEDON. + +The night-mare, evidently. + +ALDA. + +Without doubt; but her own impression was as of a reality. The figure, +after looking at her sadly for some minutes, during which she had no +power either to move or speak, turned away; she then made a desperate +effort to call out to the daughter of her hostess, who slept in the next +room--"Luise! Luise!" Luise ran in to her. "Do you not see my brother +standing there?" she exclaimed with horror, and pointing to the other +end of the room, whither the image, conjured up by her excited fancy and +fevered nerves, appeared to have receded. The frightened, staring Luise, +answered, "Yes." "You see," said she, appealing to me--"that though I +might be cheated by my own senses, I could not doubt those of another. I +thought to myself, _then_, my poor Henri is dead, and God has permitted +him to visit me. This idea pursued me all that night, and the next day; +but on the following day, which was Monday, just five days after I had +seen the Emperor, a _laquais_, in the imperial livery, came to my lodging, +and put into my hands a packet, with the "Emperor's _compliments_ to +Mademoiselle Ambos." It was the pardon for my brother, with the Emperor's +seal and signature: then I forgot every thing but joy!" + +Those mean, official animals, who had before spurned her, now pressed +upon her with offers of service, and even the Minister C---- offered to +expedite the pardon himself to Siberia, _in order to save her trouble_; +but she would not suffer the precious paper out of her hands: she +determined to carry it herself--to be herself the bearer of glad + tidings:--she had resolved that none but herself should take off those +fetters, the very description of which had entered her soul; so, having +made her arrangements as quickly as possible, she set off for Moscow, +where she arrived in three days. According to her description, the +town in Siberia, to the governor of which she carried an official +recommendation, was nine thousand versts beyond Moscow; and the fortress +to which the wretched malefactors were exiled was at a great distance +beyond that. I could not well make out the situation of either, and, +unluckily, I had no map with me but a road map of Germany, and it was +evident that my heroine was no geographer. She told me that, after +leaving Moscow, she travelled post seven days and seven nights, only +sleeping in the carriage. She then reposed for two days, and then posted +on for another seven days and nights. + +MEDON. + +Alone? + +ALDA. + +Alone! and wholly unprotected, except by her own innocence and energy, +and a few lines of recommendation, which had been given to her at St. +Petersburgh. The roads were every where excellent, the post-houses at +regular distances, the travelling rapid; but often, for hundreds of miles, + +there were no accommodations of any kind--scarce a human habitation. +She even suffered from hunger, not being prepared to travel for so many +hours together without meeting with any food she could touch without +disgust. She described, with great truth and eloquence, her own +sensations as she was whirled rapidly over those wide, silent, solitary, +and apparently endless plains. "Sometimes," said she, "my head seemed +to turn--I could not believe that it was a waking reality--I could not +believe that it was myself. Alone, in a strange land,--so many hundred +leagues from my own home, and driven along as if through the air, with a +rapidity so different from any thing I had been used to, that it almost +took away my breath." + +"Did you ever feel fear?" I asked. + +"Ach ja! when I waked sometimes in the carriage, in the middle of the +night, wondering at myself, and unable immediately to collect my thoughts. +Never at any other time." + +I asked her if she had ever met with insult? She said she had twice met +with "wicked men;" but she had felt no alarm--she knew how to protect +herself; and as she said this, her countenance assumed an expression +which showed that it was not a mere boast. Altogether, she described her +journey as being _grausam_, (horrible,) in the highest degree, and, +indeed, even the recollection of it made her shudder; but at the time +there was the anticipation of an unspeakable happiness, which made all +fatigues light, and all dangers indifferent. + +At length, in the beginning of August, she arrived at the end of her +journey, and was courteously received by the commandant of the fortress. +She presented the pardon with a hand which trembled with impatience and +joy, too great to be restrained, almost to be borne. The officer looked +very grave, and took, she thought, a long time to read the paper, which +consisted only of six or eight lines. At last he stammered out, "I am +sorry--but the Henri Ambos mentioned in this paper--_is dead_!" Poor +girl! she fell to the earth. + +When she reached this part of her story she burst into a fresh flood +of tears, wrung her hands, and for some time could utter nothing but +passionate exclamations of grief. "Ach! lieber Gott! was fuer ein +schreckliches Schicksal war das meine!" "What a horrible fate was mine! +I had come thus far to find--not my brother--_nur ein Grab_!" (only a +grave!) she repeated several times, with an accent of despair. The +unfortunate man had died a year before. The fetters in which he worked +had caused an ulcer in his leg, which he neglected, and, after some +weeks of horrid suffering, death released him. The task-work, for nearly +five years, of this accomplished, and even learned man, in the prime of +his life and mental powers, had been to break stones upon the road, +chained hand and foot, and confounded with the lowest malefactors. + +In giving you thus conscientiously, the mere outline of this story, +I have spared you all comments. I see, by those indignant strides +majestical, that you are making comments to yourself; but sit down and +be quiet, if you can: I have not much more to tell! + +She found, on inquiry, that some papers and letters, which her unhappy +brother had drawn up by stealth, in the hope of being able at some time +to convey them to his friends, were in the possession of one of the +officers, who readily gave them up to her; and with these she returned, +half broken-hearted, to St. Petersburgh. If her former journey, when +hope cheered her on the way, had been so fearful, what must have been +her return? I was not surprised to hear that, on her arrival, she was +seized with a dangerous illness, and was for many weeks confined to her +bed. + +Her story excited much commiseration; and a very general interest and +curiosity was excited about herself. She told me that a great many +persons of rank invited her to their houses, and made her rich presents, +among which were the splendid shawls and the ring, which had caught my +attention, and excited my surprise, in the first instance. The Emperor +expressed a wish to see her, and very graciously spoke a few words of +condolence. "But they could not bring my brother back to life!" said +she, expressively. He even presented her to the Empress. "And what," +I asked, "did the Empress say to you?" "_Nothing_; but she looked +_so_,"--drawing herself up. + +On receiving her brother's pardon from the Emperor, she had written +home to her family; but she confessed that since that time she had not +written--she had not courage to inflict a blow which might possibly +affect her mother's life; and yet the idea of being obliged to _tell_ +what she dared not write, seemed to strike her with terror. + +But the strangest event of this strange story remains to be told; and +I will try to give it in her own simple words. + +She left Petersburgh in October, and proceeded to Riga, where those +who had known her brother received her with interest and kindness, and +sympathized in her affliction. "But," said she, "there was one thing +I had resolved to do, which yet remained undone. I was resolved to +see the woman who had been the original cause of all my poor brother's +misfortunes. I thought if once I could say to her, 'Your falsehood has +done this!' I should be satisfied; but my brother's friends dissuaded +me from this idea. They said it was better not; that it could do my +poor Henri no good; that it was wrong; that it was unchristian; and +I submitted. I left Riga with a voiturier. I had reached Pojer, on +the Prussian frontiers, and there I stopped at the Douane, to have my +packages searched. The chief officer looked at the address on my trunk, +and exclaimed, with surprise, 'Mademoiselle Ambos! Are you any relation +of the Professor Henri Ambos?'--'I am his sister.' 'Good God! I was the +intimate friend of your brother! What has become of him?' I then told +him all I have now told you, liebe madame!--and when I came to an end, +this good man burst into tears, and for some time we wept together. The +kutscher, (driver,) who was standing by, heard all this conversation, +and when I turned round, he was crying too. My brother's friend pressed +on me offers of service and hospitality, but I could not delay; for, +besides that my impatience to reach home increased every hour, I had +not much money in my purse. Of three thousand dollars, which I had +taken with me to St. Petersburgh, very little remained, so I bade him +farewell, and I proceeded. At the next town, where my kutscher stopped +to feed his horses, he came to the door of my caleche, and said, 'You +have just missed seeing the Jew lady, whom your brother was in love +with; that caleche which passed us by just now, and changed horses here, +contained Mademoiselle S----, her sister, and her sister's husband!' +Good God! imagine my surprise! I could not believe my fortune: it seemed +that Providence had delivered her into my hands, and I was resolved +that she should not escape me. I knew they would be delayed at the +Custom-house. I ordered the man to turn, and drive back as fast as +possible, promising him a reward of a dollar if he overtook them. +On reaching the Custom-house, I saw a caleche standing at a little +distance. I felt myself tremble, and my heart beat so--but not with +fear. I went up to the caleche--two ladies were sitting in it. I +addressed the one who was the most beautiful, and said, 'Are you +Mademoiselle Emilie S----?' I suppose I must have looked very strange, +and wild, and resolute, for she replied, with a frightened manner--'I +am; who are you, and what do you want with me?' I said, 'I am the sister +of Henri Ambos, whom you murdered!' She shrieked out; the men came +running from the house; but I held fast the carriage-door, and said, +'I am not come to hurt you, but you are the murderess of my brother, +Henri Ambos. He loved you, and your falsehood has killed him. May God +punish you for it! May his ghost pursue you to the end of your life!' I +remember no more. I was like one mad. I have just a recollection of her +ghastly, terrified look, and her eyes wide open, staring at me. I fell +into fits; and they carried me into the house of my brother's friend, +and laid me on a bed. When I recovered my senses, the caleche and +all were gone. When I reached Berlin, all this appeared to me so +miraculous--so like a dream--I could not trust to my own recollection, +and I wrote to the officer of Customs, to beg he would attest that it +was really true, and what I had said when I was out of my senses, and +what _she_ had said; and at Leipsic I received his letter, which I will +show you." And at Mayence she showed me this letter, and a number of +other documents; her brother's pardon, with the Emperor's signature; +a letter of the Countess Elise ----; a most touching letter from her +unfortunate brother; (over this she wept much;) and a variety of other +papers, all proving the truth of her story, even to the minutest +particulars. The next morning we were to part. I was going down the +Rhine, and she was to proceed to Deuxponts, which she expected to reach +in two days. As she had travelled from Berlin almost without rest, +except the night we had spent at Frankfort, she appeared to me ready to +sink with fatigue; but she would not bid me farewell that night, although +I told her I should be obliged to set off at six the next morning; but +kissing my hand, with many expressions of gratitude, she said she would +be awake and visit me in my room to bid me a last adieu. As there was +only a very narrow passage between the two rooms, she left her door a +little open that she might hear me rise. However, on the following +morning she did not appear. When dressed, I went on tiptoe into her +room, and found her lying in a deep calm sleep, her arm over her head. +I looked at her for some minutes, and thought I had never seen a finer +creature. I then turned, with a whispered blessing and adieu, and went +on my way. + +This is all I can tell you. If at the time I had not been travelling +_against_ time, and with a mind most fully and painfully occupied, +I believe I should have been tempted to accompany my heroine to +Deuxponts--at least I should have retained her narrative more accurately. +Not having made any memoranda till many days afterwards, all the names +have escaped my recollection; but if you have any doubts of the general +truth of this story, I will at least give you the means of verifying it. +Here is her name, in her own handwriting, on one of the leaves of my +pocket-book--you can read the German character; + + =Bety Ambos von Zweibruken.= + + + + +SKETCHES OF ART, LITERATURE, AND CHARACTER. + + +PART II. + +MEMORANDA AT MUNICH, NUREMBURG, AND DRESDEN. + + + + +I. + +MEMORANDA AT MUNICH. + + +SEPT. 28th.--A week at Munich! and nothing done! nothing seen! My first +_excursions_ I made to-day--from my bed to the sofa--from the sofa to +the window. Every one told me to be prepared against the caprices of the +climate, but I did not imagine that it would take a week or a fortnight +to be _acclimatee_. + +What could induce the princes of Bavaria to plant their capital in the +midst of these wide, marshy, bleak, barren plains, and upon this rough +unmanageable torrent,--"the Isar rolling rapidly,"--when they might have +seated themselves by the majestic Danube? The Tyrolean Alps stretching +south and west, either form a barrier against the most genial airs of +heaven, or if a stray zephyr find his way from Italy, his poor little +wings are frozen to his back among the mountain snows, and he drops +shivering among us, wrapt in a misty cloud. I never saw such fogs: +they are as dense and as white as a fleece, and look, and feel too, +like rarefied snow;--but as no one else complains, I think it must be +indisposition which makes me so peevish and so chilly. Sitting at the +window being my best amusement, I do not like to find the only objects +which are to give me a foretaste of the splendour of Munich, quite +veiled from sight, and shrouded in mist, even for a few morning hours. + +I am lodged in the Max-Joseph's-Platz, opposite to the theatre: a +situation at once airy, quiet, and cheerful. + +The theatre is in itself a beautiful object; the portico, of the +Corinthian order, is supported by eight pillars; the ascent is by a +noble flight of steps, with four gigantic bronze candelabras at the +corners; and nothing, at least to my unlearned eyes, could be more +elegant--more purely classical and Greek, than the whole, were it not +for the hideous roof _upon the roof_,--one pediment, as it were, riding +on the back of the other. Some internal arrangement of the theatre may +render this deformity necessary, but it _is_ a deformity, and one that +annoys me whenever I look at it. + +On the right, I have the new palace, which forms one side of the square: +a long range of plain, almost rustic, architecture; altogether a striking, +but rather a pleasing contrast, to the luxuriant grace of the theatre. +Just now, when I looked out, what a beautiful scene! The full moon, +rising over the theatre, lights up half the white columns, and half are +lost in shade. The performances are just over; (half-past nine!) crowds +of people emerging from the portico into the brilliant moonshine, (many +of them military, in glittering accoutrements,) descend the steps, and +spread themselves through the square, single, or in various groups; +carriages are drawing up and drawing off,--and all this gay confusion is +without the least noise or tumult. Except the occasional low roll of the +carriage-wheels over the well-gravelled road, I hear no sound, though +within a few yards of the spot. It looks like some lovely optical or +scenic illusion; a moving picture, magnified. + +_Oct. 4th._--To my great consternation--summoned in form before the +police, and condemned to pay a fine of ten florins for having omitted to +fill up specifically a certain paper which had been placed in my hands +on my arrival. In the first place, I did not understand it; secondly, +I never thought about it; and thirdly, I had been too ill to attend to +it. I made a show of resistance, but it was all in vain, of course;--my +permission to reside here is limited to six weeks, but may be renewed. + +Last night I was induced, but only upon great persuasion, to venture +over to the theatre. I had been tantalised _so_ long by looking at the +exterior! Then it was a pleasant evening--broad daylight; and the whole +theatre being heated by stoves to an even regulated warmth according to +the season, I was assured that once within the doors there would be no +danger of fresh indisposition from draughts or cold. + +Entering the box, my first glance was of course at the stage. The +drop-scene, or curtain, a well painted copy of Guido's Aurora, pleased +me infinitely more than the beautiful drop-curtain at Manheim: _that_ +was very elegant, but this is more than elegant. It harmonized with the +place, and in my own mind it touched certain chords of association, +which had long been silent. It was as if the orchestre had suddenly +welcomed me with some delicious, often-heard, and well-remembered piece +of music: the effect upon the senses was similar--nor can I describe +it;--but, surprised and charmed, I kept my eyes fixed for some minutes +upon the picture: the light being thrown full upon it, while the rest +of the theatre was comparatively in deep shade, like all the foreign +theatres, rendered it more effective. The rest of the decorations +corresponded in splendour; the two colossal muses, as Caryatides +supporting the king's state box, the noble columns of white and gold, +and the Caryatides on each side of the proscenium, were all in fine +taste. The size and proportions of the interior seemed most happily +calculated for seeing and hearing. On the whole, I never beheld a +theatre which so entirely _satisfied_ me--no one more easily pleased, +and no one less easily satisfied! + +When I looked down on the _parterre_, I beheld a motley assemblage in +various costumes: there were a great number of the military; there were +the well-dressed daughters of people of some condition, in the French +fashion of two or three years back; there were girls in the Tyrolean +costume, with their scarlet boddices and silver chains; and the women of +Munich, with their odd little two-horned caps of rich gold or silver +brocade,--forming altogether a singular spectacle. As for the scenery, +it was very well, but would bear no comparison to Stanfield's glorious +illusions. + +The inducement held out to me to-night was to see Ferdinand Eslair play +the Duke of Alva in "Egmont." Eslair, formerly one of the first actors +at Manheim, when Manheim boasted the first theatre in Germany, is +esteemed the finest tragedian here, and the Duke of Alva is one of his +best characters. It appeared to me a superb piece of acting; so quietly +stern, so fearfully hard and composed: it was a fine conception cast in +bronze:--in this consisted its beauty and truth as a whole. Some of his +_silent_ passages, and his by-play, were admirable. He gave us, in the +scene with Egmont, an exact living transcript of Titian's famous picture +of the Duke of Alva; the dress, the attitude, the position of the +helmet and the glove on the table beside him, every thing was so well +calculated, at once so unobtrusive and so unexpected, that it was like +a recognition. Egmont was well played by Racke, but did not strike me +so much. Mademoiselle Schoeller, who plays the young heroines here, is a +pupil of Madame Schroeder, (the German Siddons,) and promises well; but +she wants development; she wants the power, the passion, the tenderness, +the energy of Claerchen. Claerchen is a plebeian girl, but an impassioned +and devoted woman--she is a sort of Flemish Juliet. There is the same +truth of nature and passion, the same impress of intense and luxuriant +life--but then it is a different life--it is a Rubens compared to a +Titian--and such Claerchen ought to be. Now to give all the internal +power and poetry, yet preserve all the external simplicity and homeliness +of the character,--to give all the _abandon_, yet preserve all the +delicacy,--to give the delicacy, yet keep clear of all super-refinement, +and in the concentrated despair of her last scene (where she poisons +herself) to be calm without being cold, and profoundly tragic without +the usual tragedy airs, must be difficult--exceedingly difficult; in +short, to play Claerchen, as I conceive the character ought to be played, +would require a young actress, uniting sufficient genius to conceive +it aright, with sufficient delicacy and judgment not to colour it too +highly: there was no danger of the latter mistake with Mademoiselle +Schoeller, in whose hands Claerchen became a mere pretty affectionate +girl. In that lovely scene with Egmont in the third act, which might +be contrasted with Juliet's balcony scene, as a test of the powers of a +young actress, Mademoiselle Schoeller was timid even to feebleness; the +change of manner, when Claerchen substitutes the tender familiarity of +the second person singular (Du) for the tone of respect in which she +before addressed her lover, should have been felt and marked, so as to +have been _felt_ and _remarked_: but this was not the case. In short, +I was disappointed by this scene. + +The Flemish costumes were correct and beautiful. The Prince of Orange, +in particular, looked as if he had just walked out of one of Vandyke's +pictures. + +After seeing this fine tragedy--surely enough for one evening's +amusement--I was at home and in bed by half-past ten. They manage these +things better here than in England. + +_Friday._--Dinner at the French ambassador's _five_ o'clock. I mark +this, because extraordinarily late at Munich. The plebeian dinner hour +is twelve, or earlier; the general hour, one; the genteel hour, two; +the fashionable hour, _three_; but five is super-elegant--in the very +extreme of finery--like a nine o'clock dinner in London. There were +present some French and Austrians of high rank, who had all visited +England; and the conversation turning on our English aristocratic +society--the only society they knew any thing about--I had another proof +of the ridicule with which foreigners treat our assumption of superior +morality and domestic happiness. But the person who fixed my attention +was Leo von Klenze, the celebrated architect, and deservedly a favourite +of the king, who has, I believe, bestowed on him the superfluous honours +of nobility. With the others, I had no sympathies--with him a thousand, +though he knew it not. I looked at him with curiosity--with interest. +I liked his plain, but marked and clever countenance, and his easy +manners. I felt an unconscious desire to be agreeable, and longed to +make him talk; but I knew that this was not the place or the moment for +us to see each other to the greatest advantage. We had, however, some +little conversation--a kind of beginning. He told me at dinner that the +Glypthothek, (the gallery of sculpture here,) was planned and built by +the present king, when only prince royal, and the expenses liquidated +from his private purse, out of his yearly savings. He spoke with modesty +of himself--with gratitude and admiration of the king, of whose talent, +vivacity, impatience, and enthusiasm for art and artists I had already +heard some characteristic anecdotes. + +After coffee, part of the company dispersed to the opera, or elsewhere; +others remained to lounge and converse. After the opera, we re-assembled +with additions, and then tea, and cards, and talk, till past eleven. +Madame de Vaudreuil receives almost every evening, and this seems to be +the general routine. + +_Oct. 6._--They are now celebrating here the _Volksfest_, (literally the +"_people's feast_,") or annual fair of Munich, and this has been a grand +day of festivity. There have been races, a military review, &c.; but, +except the race-horses in their embroidered trappings, which were led +past my window, and a long cavalcade of royal carriages and crowds of +people, in gay and grotesque costumes, hurrying by, I have seen nothing, +being obliged to keep my room; so I listened to the firing of the cannon, +and the shouts of the populace, and thought. + + * * * * * + +_Oct. 8._--First visit to the Glypthothek--just returned--my imagination, +still filled with "the blaze, the splendour, and the symmetry,"--excited +as I never thought it could be again excited after seeing the Vatican; +but this is the Vatican in miniature. Can it be possible that this +glorious edifice was planned by a young prince, and erected out of his +yearly savings? I am wonder-struck! I was not prepared for any thing so +spacious, so magnificent, so perfect in taste and arrangement. + +I do not yet know the exact measurement of the building; but it contains +twelve galleries, the smallest about fifty, and the largest about one +hundred and thirty feet in length. It consists of a square, built round +an open central court, and the approach is by a noble portico of eight +Ionic columns, raised on a flight of steps. As it stands in an open +space, a little out of the town, with trees planted on either side, the +effect is very imposing and beautiful. There are no exterior windows, +they all open into the central court. + +From the portico we enter a hall, paved with marble. Over the principal +door is the name of the king, and the date of the erection. Two side +doors lead to the galleries. Over the door on the left there is an +inscription to the honour of Leo von Klenze, the architect of the +building. Over the door on the right, is the name of Peter Cornelius, +the painter, by whom the frescos were designed and chiefly executed. +Thus the king, with a noble magnanimity, uniting truth and justice, +has associated in his glory those to whom he chiefly owes it--and this +charmed me. It is in much finer feeling, much higher taste, than those +eternal (no, not _eternal_!) great N's of that imperial egotist, Napoleon, +whose vulgar appetite for vulgar fame would allow no participation. + +I walked slowly through the galleries so excited by the feeling of +admiration, that I could make no minute or particular observations. The +floors are all paved with marbles of various colours--the walls, to a +certain height, are stuccoed in imitation of grey or dark green marble, +so as to throw out the sculpture, and give it the full effect. The +utmost luxury of ornament has been lavished on the walls and ceilings, +some in painting, some in relief; but in each, the subjects and +ornaments are appropriate to the situation, and as each gallery has +been originally adapted to its destination, every where the effect to be +produced has been judiciously studied. The light is not too great, nor +too generally diffused--it is poured in from high semicircular windows +on one side only, so as to throw the sculpture into beautiful relief. +Two lofty and spacious halls are richly painted in fresco, with subjects +from the Greek mythology, and the whole building would contain, I +suppose, six times, or ten times, the number of works of art now there; +at the same time all are so arranged that there appears no obvious +deficiency. The collection was begun only in 1808, and since that time +the king has contrived to make some invaluable acquisitions. I found +here many of the most far-famed relics of ancient art, many that I had +already seen in Italy; for instance, the Egina marbles, the Barberini +Faun, the Barberini Muse, or Apollo, the Leucothoe, the Medusa Rondanini +above all, the Ilioneus; but I cannot now dwell on these. I must go +again and again before I can methodise my impressions and recollections. + +_Oct. 11._--Yesterday and to-day, at the Glypthothek, where the cushioned +seats, though rather more classical than comfortable, enabled me to +lounge away the time, unwearied in body as in mind. + +The arrangement of the galleries is such as to form not only a splendid +exhibition and school of art, but a regular progressive history of the +rise and decline of sculpture. Thus we step from the vestibule into +the Egyptian gallery, of which the principal treasure is the colossal +Antinous of Rossoantico, with the attributes of Osiris. + +I admired in this room the exquisite beauty and propriety of the +basso-relievo over the door, designed and modelled by Schwanthaler. It +is of course intended to be symbolical of the birth of art among the +Egyptians. Isis discovers the body of her lost husband Osiris, concealed +in a sarcophagus: she strikes it with the mystic wand, and he stands +revealed, and restored to her. The imitation of the Egyptian style +is perfect. + +From the Egyptian, we step into the Etruscan gallery, of which the +ceiling is painted in the most vivid and beautiful colours. The third +room contains the famous Egina marbles, which I had seen at Rome when +Thorwaldson was engaged in restoring them. To appreciate the classical +beauty and propriety of the arrangement of these singular relics, we +must call to mind their history, their subject, and their original +destination. Thus AEacus, the first king of the Island of AEgina, was +the son of Jupiter, or rather Zeus, (for the Greek designations are +infinitely more elegant and expressive than the Roman.) The temple +was dedicated to Zeus, and the groups which adorned the pediments +represented the history of the two branches of the AEacidae, descended +from Telamon and Peleus, sons of AEacus. On two long tables or stands +of marble, supported by griffins, imitated from those which originally +ornamented the temple, are ranged the two groups of figures: neither +group is quite entire. Of that which represents the fight of Telamon +and Hercules with Laomedon, King of Troy, there are only five figures +remaining; and of the other group, the conflict for the body of +Patroclus, there are ten figures. Along the walls, on tables of marble, +are ranged a variety of fragments from the same temple, which must have +been splendidly rich in sculpture, within and without. On the ceiling of +this room, the four AEacidae, AEacus, Peleus, Achilles, and Neoptolemus, +are represented in relief, by Schwanthaler. There is also a small model +of the western front of the temple restored, and painted as it is proved +to have been originally; (for instance, the field of the Tympanum was of +a sky blue.) This model is fixed in the wall opposite to the window. It +is extremely curious and interesting, but I thought not well placed as +an ornament.[30] + +I remember asking W----, who has been in every part of the world, what +was the most beautiful scene he had ever beheld, taking natural beauty +and poetical associations together? He replied, after a little thought, +"A sunset from the temple of AEgina;"--and I can conceive this. Lord +Byron introduces it into his Grecian Sunset--but as an object-- + + "On old AEgina's steep and Idra's Isle, + The god of gladness sheds his parting smile." + + +From the AEgina gallery we enter the Hall of Apollo. The ceiling of this +room, splendidly decorated in white and gold, represents the emblems +of the four principal cities of Greece, viz. the Athenian owl, the +winged-horse of Corinth, the Chimera of Sicyon, and the wolf of Argos. + +The chief glory of this apartment is that celebrated colossal statue, +once known as the Barberini muse, now considered by antiquarians as an +Apollo, and supposed to be the work of Ageladas, the master of Phidias. +It is certainly older than the sculptures of the Parthenon. In its +severe massy grandeur, there is something of the heaviness and formality +of the most ancient Greek school, and in point of style it forms a link +between the AEgina marbles and the Elgin marbles. It should seem that the +eyes of this statue were once represented by gems--the orifices remain, +surrounded by a ring of bronze. + +In the same room are those two sublime busts which almost take away +one's breath--the colossal head of Pallas, resembling that of the +Minerva of Velletri, now in the Vatican; and the Achilles. + +The next room is the Hall of Bacchus. The ceiling is richly ornamented +with all the festive emblems of the god, in white and gold relief. In +the centre we have that wondrous statue, the gigantic Sleeping Satyr, +called by some the Barberini Faun. Antiquaries and connoisseurs refer +this work either to Scopas or Praxiteles, and, from the situation in +which it was discovered, suppose it to have once ornamented the tomb +of Adrian. I cannot tell how this may be, but here we behold with +astonishment the grotesque, the elegant, and the sublime mingled +together, and each in perfection: _how_, I know not; but I feel it +is so. I once saw a drawing of this statue, which gave me the idea of +something coarse and heavy; whereas, in the original, the delicate beauty +of the workmanship, and the inimitable sleepy abandonment of the attitude, +soften the effect of the colossal forms. I would place this statue +immediately after the Elgin marbles; it is, with all its excellence, +a degree lower in style. + +In this gallery I found the famous head of the laughing faun, called +from the greenish stain on the cheek, the fauno colla macchia, and +also a sarcophagus, representing in the most exquisite sculpture, the +marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne. The blending of the idea of death with +the fullness of life, and even with the most luxuriant and festive +associations of life, is common among the Greeks, and, from one or two +known instances, appears to have been carried to an extreme which makes +one shrink; still, any thing rather than our detestable death's head and +cross bones! In nature, and in poetry, death is beautiful. It is the +diseases and vices of artificial life which have rendered it lamentable, +terrible, disgusting. + +Fixed in the wall, opposite to the window, there is a bas relief of +amazing beauty--the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite. It is a piece +of lyric poetry. + +The Hall of Niobe contains few objects; but among them some of the most +perfect specimens of Grecian art; and first, the ILIONEUS. + +It was because the Grecian sculptors were themselves poets and creators, +that "marble grew divine" beneath their hands, and became so instinct +with the indestructible spirit of life, that their half-defaced ruins +retain their immortality: else how should we stand shivering with +awe before those tremendous fragments--the sister Fates in the Elgin +marbles! Or, how should I, who am incapable of estimating the technical +perfection of art, stand entranced--as to-day I stood--before the +Ilioneus? It was not merely admiration; it was the overpowering +sentiment of harmonious and pathetic beauty running along every +nerve--such a feeling as music has sometimes awakened. I suppose the +Ilioneus stands alone, like the Torso of the Vatican--the _ne plus +ultra_ of grace, as the latter is of grandeur. + +The first time I ever saw a cast of this divine statue was in the +vestibule of Goethe's house, at Weimar. It immediately fixed my +attention. Afterwards I saw another in Dannecker's studio, and from him +I learned its history. It was discovered about ten years ago at Prague, +in the possession of a stone-mason, and is supposed to have formed part +of the collection of ancient works of art which the Emperor Rodolph +collected in Italy about 1600.[31] A certain Dr. Barth purchased it +for a trifle, and brought it to Vienna, where Dannecker happened to +be at that time, and was called upon with others to pronounce on its +merits and value. It was at once attributed to the hand, either of +Praxiteles or Scopas, and on farther and minute examination, the style, +the proportions, and the evident purport of the figure, have decided +that it belongs to the group of Niobe and her children. It has attained +the appellation of Ilioneus, which Ovid gives to the youngest of her +sons. It represents a youth kneeling. The head and arms are wanting; +but the supplicatory expression of the attitude, the turn of the body, +so deprecating, so imploring; the bloom of adolescence, which seems +absolutely shed over the cold marble, the unequalled delicacy and +elegance of the whole, touched me unspeakably. + +The King of Bavaria is said to have paid for this exquisite relic 15,000 +florins--a large sum for a little potentate; but for the object itself, +its value is not to be computed by money. Its weight in gold were poor +in comparison. + +In the same room is the Medusa Rondanini, the common model of almost all +the Medusa heads, but certainly not equal to the sublime colossal mask +at Cologne. There is also an antique duplicate of the Mercury of the +Belvidere; another of the Venus of Cnidos; another (most beautiful) +of one of the sons of Niobe, recumbent, lifeless; and some other +master-pieces. + +These six rooms occupy one side of the building, and contain altogether +one hundred and forty-seven specimens of ancient art. + +I do not quite understand Flaxman's division of ancient art into three +periods--the heroic age, the philosophic age, and the age of perfection. +Perhaps if he had lived to correct his essays, he would have made +this more clear. According to his distinction, would not the group of +the Niobe belong to the age of perfection?--and the Parthenon to the +philosophic age? which, allowing his definition of the two styles, I +cannot grant. I suppose these six galleries include a period of about +seven hundred years; (putting the dateless antiquity of some of the +Egyptian relics out of the question.) We begin with the heavy motionless +forms, "looking tranquillity," which yet have often a certain dignity; +then the stiff hard elaborate figures of the earliest Greek school, with +their curled heads and perpendicular draperies, in some of which dawns +the first feeling of vigour and grace, as in the AEgina marbles; the +next is the union of grandeur and elegance; and the next is the utmost +poetical refinement. I recollect that somewhere in Boswell's life of +Johnson, a conversation is recorded as taking place at the table of Sir +Joshua Reynolds; in the course of which Sir Joshua remarked, that it +was impossible to conceive what the ancient writers meant, when they +represented sculpture as having passed its zenith when the Apollo and +the Laocoon were produced. None of the great scholars or artists then +present could explain the mystery--now no longer a mystery. When Sir +Joshua made this remark, the Elgin marbles were unknown in England. + +Between this range of galleries, and a corresponding range on the +opposite side, are two immense halls, called the Fest-Saale, or banqueting +halls, and as yet containing no sculpture. Here the painter Cornelius +has found "ample space and verge enough" for his grand conceptions, and +the subjects are appropriate to the general destination of the whole +building. The frescos in the first hall, (Goetter-Saal, or hall of the +gods,) present a magnificent view of the whole Greek mythology. + +Whatever may be thought of the conception and execution of certain +parts, on minute examination the grand, yet simple arrangement of the +whole design addresses itself to the understanding, while the splendour +of colour, and variety of the grouping, seize on the imagination: +certainly, when we look round, the first feeling is not critical. But +this beautiful, progressive, and pictorial development of the old +mythology, as it must have been the result of profound learning and +study, ought to be considered methodically to understand all its merit; +for instance, in the centre of the roof we have the primeval god, Eros, +in four compartments; first, with the dolphin, representing water; +secondly, with the eagle, representing light or fire; thirdly, with the +peacock, representing air; and lastly, with Cerberus, representing +earth. Disposed around these primeval elements, we have the seasons of +the year, and the day. The spring, as Psyche, is followed by the history +of Aurora, (the morning,) in four compartments. The summer, as Ceres, +is followed by the noon, i. e. the history of Helios or Apollo, in four +compartments. The autumn, as Bacchus; and then evening, expressed in the +history of Diana. Winter, as Saturn, and the history of night, and the +divinities which preside over it. These twenty-four compartments, of +various forms and sizes, compose the ceiling, intermingled with ornaments +of rich and rare device, and appropriate arabesques, combining, with +much fancy and invention, all the classical emblems and allegories, such +as satyrs, fauns, syrens, dryads, Graces, Furies, &c. &c. + +But the grand summary is reserved for the walls. On one side is +represented the kingdom of Olympus, with Jove in his state, the assemblage +of the gods, and the apotheosis of Psyche. The opposite side represents +the domain of Pluto, with the infernal gods, and the story of Orpheus. +The third side, over against the window, is the triumph of Neptune and +Amphitrite, surrounded by the sea-gods. + +The figures in these three frescos are colossal, about eight feet in +height. The colouring of the flesh is a little too red and dingy, and +in some of the attitudes I thought that the energy was strained into +contortion; but through the whole there is a grand poetic feeling. All +the designs are by Peter Cornelius, executed by himself, with the aid of +professor Zimmerman, Schlotthauer, Heinrich Hess, and a number of pupils +and assistants. + +There are also along the frieze some beautiful bas-reliefs; and over the +two doors are two alto-relievos by Schwanthaler, the one representing +Cupid and Psyche in each others arms, the symbol of immortal love: the +other, the re-union of Ceres and Proserpine, emblematical of eternal +life after death. This is all I can remember, except that the painting +of this hall occupied six years, and was finished in 1826. + +_Oct. 11._--A small vestibule divides the two great halls. This is +painted with the history of Prometheus and Pandora; but, owing to the +unavoidable disposition of the light, much of the beauty is lost. + +From this vestibule we enter the second great banqueting hall, or the +Hall of the Trojans, painted like the former in fresco, and on the +same enormous scale, but with a different distribution of the parts. +It represents chiefly the history of those demigods and heroes who +contended in the Trojan war. Thus, in the centre of the ceiling we have +first the original cause of the war, the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, +and the appearance of the goddess of Discord, with her fatal apple. +Around this are the twelve gods who were present at the feast, modelled +in relief by Schwanthaler. Then follow twelve compartments, containing +the most striking scenes of the Iliad, divided and adorned by the most +rich and fanciful arabesques, combining the exploits or histories of +the Grecian heroes, which are not included in the Iliad. The figures in +these compartments are the size of life. On the walls we have the three +principal incidents of the Trojan war; first, the wrath of Achilles; +secondly, opposite to the window, the fight for the body of Patrocles, +and Achilles shouting to the warriors. There is wonderful energy and +movement in this picture. The third is the destruction of Troy. The +figure of Hecuba sitting in motionless horror and despair, with her +dishevelled grey hair, her daughters clinging to her;--the beautiful +attitudes of Polyxena and Cassandra; the silent remorse of Helen; the +wild fury of the conquerors, and the vigour and splendour of the whole +painting, render this composition exceedingly striking:--I did not +quite like the figure of Priam. All these designs are by Cornelius, and +executed partly by him, and partly under his direction by Zimmermann, +Schlotthauer, and their pupils. The arabesques are by Eugene Neureuther: +and there are two admirable and spirited bas-reliefs by Schwanthaler--one +representing the battle of the ships, and the other the combat of Achilles +with the river gods. + +The paintings in this hall were finished in 1830. + +We then enter the range of galleries, devoted to the later Greek, and +the Roman sculpture. The first, corresponding in size and situation with +the Hall of Niobe, contains nothing peculiarly interesting, except the +famous figure of the young warrior anointing himself after the bath, and +called the Alexander. + +The next gallery is the Roman Hall, about one hundred and thirty feet +in length, and forms a glorious _coup d'oeil_. The utmost luxury of +architectural decoration has been lavished on the ceilings; and the +effect of the marble pavement, with the disposition of the busts, +candelabrae, altars, as seen in perspective, is truly and tastefully +magnificent. I particularly admired the ceiling, which is divided into +three domes, adorned with bas-reliefs, taken from the Roman history and +manners: these were designed by Schwanthaler. I cannot remember any +thing remarkable in this gallery; or rather, there were too many things +deserving of notice, for me to note all. The standing Agrippina has, +however, dwelt on my mind; and an exceeding fine bust of Octavius Caesar, +crowned with the oak leaves. + +A small room contains the sculpture in coloured marble, porphyry, and +bronze; and the last is the hall of modern sculpture. In the centre of +the ceiling is a phoenix, rising from its ashes, and around it the heads +of four distinguished sculptors--Nicolo da Pisa, the restorer of the art +in the fourteenth century; Michael Angelo, Canova, and Thorwaldson. + +Two of the most celebrated productions of modern sculpture are +here:--the Paris of Canova, and the Adonis of Thorwaldson. As they are +placed near to each other, and the aim is alike in both to exhibit the +utmost perfection of youthful and effeminate beauty, the merits of the +two artists were fairly brought into comparison. Thorwaldson's statue +reminded me of the Antinous; Canova's recalled the young Apollo. I +hardly know which to prefer as a conception; but the material and +workmanship of the Paris pleased me most. The marble of Thorwaldson's +statue, though faultless in purity of tint, has a coarse _gritty_ grain, +and glitters disagreeably in certain lights, as if it were spar or +lump-sugar; whereas the smooth close compact grain of Canova's marble, +which is something of a creamy white, seemed to me infinitely preferable +to the eye. This, however, is hyper-criticism: in both, the feeling is +classically and beautifully true. The soft melancholy of the countenance +and attitude of Adonis, as if anticipative of his early death, and the +languid self-sufficiency of Paris, appeared to me equally admirable. +There is also in this room a duplicate by Canova of his Venus, in the +Pitti palace; a girl tying her sandal, by Rodolph Schadow--a pendant, +I presume, to his charming Filatrice, now at Chatsworth; and some fine +busts. I looked round in vain for a single specimen of English art. +I thought it just possible that some work of Flaxman, or Chantrey, or +Gibson, might have found its way hither--but no!-- + +_Oct. 12._--Last night to the opera with a pleasant party; but, tired +and over-excited with my morning at the Glyptothek, I wanted soothing, +and was not in a humour for the noisy florid music of Wilhelm Tell. +It is an opera which, as it becomes familiar, tires, and does not +attach--just like some clever people I have met with. Pellegrini (not +the Pelligrini we had in England, but a fixture here, and their best +male singer--a fine _basso cantante_) acted Tell. I say _acted_, because +he did not merely sing his part--he acted it, and well; so well, that +once I felt my eyes moisten. Madame Spitzeder sang in Matilda von +Hapsburg tolerably. Their first tenor, Bayer, I do not like; his +intonation is defective. The decorations and dresses are beautiful. As +for the dancing, it is not fair to say any thing about it. Unfortunately +the first bars of the Tyrolienne brought Taglioni before my mind's eye, +and who or what could stand the comparison? How she leapt like a stag! +bounded like a young faun! floated like the swan-down on the air! Yet +even Taglioni, though she makes the nearest approach to it, does not +complete my idea of a poetical dancer; but as she improved upon Herbelet, +we may find another to improve upon _her_. One more such _artist_--I use +the word in the general and German sense, not in the French meaning--one +more such artist, who should bring modesty, and sense, and feeling, into +this lovely and most desecrated art, might do something to retrieve +it--might introduce the necessity for dancers having heads as well as +heels, and in time revolutionize the whole _corps de ballet_. + +_Wednesday._--This morning, M. Herman Stuntz, the King's chapel-master, +called on me. I had heard of him as a fine composer, and also much of +his opera, produced for the Scala at Milan, the Costantino il Grande. +I was pleased to find him not a musician only, like most musicians, but +intelligent and enthusiastic on other subjects, and with that childlike +simplicity of mind and manner, so often combined with talent. We touched +upon every thing from the high sublime to the deep absurd--ran round the +whole circle of art in a sort of touch-and-go style, and his _naivete_ +and originality pleased me more and more. He said some true and +delightful things about music; but would insist that of all languages +the English is the most difficult to ally to musical sounds--infinitely +worse than German. He complained of the shut mouth, the _claquement +des dents_, and the predominance of aspirates in our pronunciation. +I objected to the guttural sounds, and the open mouths, and the _yaw +yaw_ of the Germans. Then followed an animated discussion on vocal sounds +and musical expression, and we parted, I believe, mutually pleased. + +The father of Stuntz is a Swiss--a man of letters, an enthusiast, a +philosopher, an artist; in short, a most extraordinary and eccentric +character. He entirely educated his two children, of whom the son, +Herman Stuntz, takes a high rank as a composer; and the daughter is a +distinguished female artist, but, being nobly married, she now only +paints pictures to give them away, and those who possess them are, with +reason, extremely proud of the possession. + +In the evening, Madame Meric, _prima-donna aus London_, as the +play-bills set forth, made her first appearance in the Gazza Ladra. She +is engaged here for a limited time, and takes the _gast-rolles_--that +is, she plays the first parts as a matter of course--in short, she is a +STAR. The regular prima-donna is Madame Scheckner-Wagen. Meric has talent, +voice, style, and unwearied industry; but she has not _genius_, neither +is her organ first-rate. Comparisons in some cases are unjust as well as +odious. Yet was it my fault that I remembered in the same part the syren +Sontag, and the enchantress Malibran? Meric, besides being a fine singer, +is an amiable woman;--married to an extravagant, dissipated husband, and +working to provide for her child--a common fate among the women of her +profession. + + * * * * * + +----Sat up late reading, for the third or fourth time, a chance volume +of Madame Roland's works. What a complete French woman! but then, what +a mind! how large in capacity! how stored with knowledge! how strong +in conscious truth! how finely toned! how soft, and yet how firm! What +wonderful industry united to the quickest talent! Some things written +at eighteen and twenty have most surprised me; some passages in the +"Vie privee," and the "Appel," have most charmed me. She is not very +eloquent, and I should think had not a playful or poetic fancy. There +is an almost total want of imagery in her style; but great power, +unaffected elegance, with a sort of negligence at times, which adds to +its beauty. Then, to remember that all I have just read was written in +a prison, in daily, hourly expectation of death! but _that_ excites more +interest than surprise, for a situation of strong excitement of mind +and passion, with external repose and solitude, must be favourable to +this development of the faculties, where there is character as well as +talent. Some of her disclosures are a little too _naive_. I am amused +by the quantity of feminine vanity which is mixed up with all this +loftiness of spirit, this real independence of soul. Madame de Stael had +not _more_ vanity, whatever they may say; but it was less balanced by +self-esteem--it required more sympathy. Then we have those two admirable +women * * and * *. What exquisite feminine vanity is there! Yet, happily, +in both instances how far removed from all ill-nature and presumption, +and how unconsciously betrayed! I should think Joanna Baillie, among our +great women, must be most exempt from this failing, perhaps, because, of +all the five, she has the most profound sense of religion. Lavater said, +that "the characteristic of _every_ woman's physiognomy was vanity." +A phrenologist would say that it was the characteristic of every woman's +head. How far, then, may a woman be vain with a good grace and betray +it without ridicule? By vanity, I mean _now_, a great wish to please, +mingled with a consciousness of the powers of pleasing, and not what +Madame Roland describes,--"cette ambition constante, ce soin perpetuel +d'occuper de soi, et de paraitre autre ou meilleur que l'on n'est en +effet," for this is diseased vanity. + + * * * * * + +Dr. Martius[32] lent me two pretty little volumes of "Poems, by Louis +I. king of Bavaria," the present king--the first royal author we have +had, I believe, since Frederic of Prussia--the best since James I. of +Scotland. These poems are chiefly lyrical, consisting of odes, sonnets, +epigrams. Some are addressed to the queen, others to his children, others +to different ladies of the court, whom he is said to have particularly +admired, and a great number were composed during his tour in Italy in +1817. Of the merit of these poems I cannot judge; and when I appealed to +two different critics, both accomplished men, one assured me they were +admirable; the other shrugged up his shoulders--"Que voulez vous? c'est +un Roi!" The earnest feeling and taste in some of these little poems +pleased me exceedingly--of that alone I could judge: for instance, there +is an address to the German artists, which contains the following +beautiful lines: he is speaking of art-- + + "In der Stille muss es sich gestalten, + Wenn es kraeftig wirkend soll ersteh'n; + Aus dem Herzen nur kann sich entfalten, + Das was wahrhaft wird zum Herzen geh'n. + + Ja! ihr nehmet es aus reinen Tiefen, + Fromm und einfach, wie die Vorweit war, + Weckend die Gefuehle, welche schliefen, + Ehrend zeugt's von Euch und immerdar. + + Sklavisch an das Alte euch zu halten, + Eures Strebens Zweck ist dieses nicht + Seyd gefasst von himmlischen Gewalten, + Dringet rastlos zu dem hehren Licht!" + + +Which may be thus literally rendered-- + + "To rise into vigorous, active influence, it (art) must spring + up and develop itself in secrecy and in silence; out of the + heart alone can that unfold itself which shall truly go to the + heart again. + + "Yes! pious and simple as the old world was, ye draw it (art) + from the same pure depths, awakening the feelings which slumber! + and it shall bear honourable witness of ye--and for ever! + + "Slavishly to cling to antiquity, this is not the end of your + labours! Be ye, therefore, upheld by heavenly power; press on, + and rest not, to the high and holy light!" + + +Methinks this magnificent prince deserves, even more than his ancestor, +Maximilian I., to be styled the Lorenzo de' Medici of Bavaria. The power +to patronize, the sentiment to feel, the genius to celebrate art, are +rarely united, even in individuals. He must be a noble being--a genius +_born in the purple_, on whose laurels there rests not a bloodstain, +perhaps not even a tear! + +This is a holiday. I was sitting at my window, translating some of these +poems, when I saw a crowd round the doors of the new palace; for it is +a day of public admission. Curiosity tempted me to join this crowd;--no +sooner thought than done. I had M. de Klenze's general order for +admittance in my pocket-book, but wished to see how this was managed, +and mingled with the crowd, which was waiting to be admitted _en masse_. +I was at once recognized as a stranger, and every one with simple +civility made way for me. Groups of about twenty or thirty people were +admitted at a time, at intervals of a quarter of an hour, and each group +placed under the guidance of one of the workmen as cicerone. He led +them through the unfinished apartments, explaining to his open-mouthed +auditors the destination of each room, the subjects of the pictures on +the walls and ceilings, &c. &c. There were peasants from the south, +in their singular dresses, mechanics and girls of Munich, soldiers, +travelling students. I was much amused. While the cicerone held +forth, some merely wondered with foolish faces, some admired, some +looked intelligent, and asked various questions, which were readily +answered--all seemed pleased. Every thing was done in order: two +groups were never in the same apartment; but as one went out, another +entered. Thus many hundreds of these poor people were gratified in the +course of the day. It seemed to me a wise as well as benevolent policy +in the king thus to appeal to the sympathy, and gratify the pride, of +his subjects of all classes, by allowing them--inviting them, to take an +interest in his magnificent undertakings, to consider them _national_ +as well as royal. I am informed that these works are carried on without +any demands on the Staatskasse, (the public treasury,) and without +any additional taxes: so far from it, that the Bavarian House of +Representatives curtailed the supplies by 300,000 florins only last +year, and refused the king an addition to the civil list, which he had +requested for the travelling expenses of two of his sons. The king is +said to be economical in the _extreme_ in his domestic expenses, and not +very generous in money to those around him--unlike his open-hearted, +open-handed father, Max-Joseph; in short, there are grumblers here as +elsewhere, but strangers and posterity will not sympathize with them. + +This is the fourth time I have seen this splendid and truly royal +palace, but will make no memoranda till I have gone over the whole with +Leo von Klenze. He has promised to be my cicerone himself, and I feel +the full value of the compliment. Count V---- told me last night, that +he (De Klenze) has made for this building alone upwards of seven hundred +drawings and designs with his own hand. + +_Oct. 13._--Called on my English friends, the C * * s, and found them +pleasantly settled in a beautiful furnished lodging near the Hofgarten, +for which they pay twenty-four florins (or about two pounds) a month. +We had some conversation about music, (they are all musicians,) and the +opera, and Malibran, whom they have lately seen in Italy; and Pasta, +whom they had visited at Como; and they confirmed what Mr. J. M. Stuntz +and M. K. had all told me of her benevolence and excellent character. +I could not find that any new genius had arisen in Italy to share the +glory of our three queens of the lyrical drama,--Pasta, Malibran, and +Schroeder Devrient. Other singers have more or less talent and feeling, +more or less compass of voice, facility, or agility; but these three +women possess _genius_, and stamp on every thing they do their own +individual character. Of the three, Pasta is the grandest and most +finished artist; Malibran the most versatile in power and passion; while +Schroeder Devrient has that energy of heart and soul--that capacity for +exciting, and being excited, which gives her such unbounded command +over the feelings and senses of her audience.[33] So far we were agreed; +but as the conversation went on, I was doomed to listen to a torrent +of commonplace and sarcastic criticism on the private habits of these +and other women of the same profession: one was accused of vulgarity, +another of bad temper, and another of violence and caprice: one was +suspected of a _penchant_ for porter, another had been heard to swear, +or--something very like it. Even pretty lady-like Sontag was reproached +with some trifling breach of mere conventional manner,--she had used her +fingers where she should have taken a spoon, or some such nonsense. +My God! to think of the situation of these women! and then to look +upon _those_ women, who, fenced in from infancy by all the restraints, +the refinements, the comforts, the precepts of good society,--the one +arranging a new cap, the other embroidering a purse, the third reading +a novel, all satisfied with petty occupations and amusements, "far, far +removed from want and grief and fear,"--now sitting in judgment, and +passing sentence of excommunication on others of their sex, who have +been steeped in excitement from childhood, their nerves for ever in a +state of tension between severest application and maddening flattery; +cast on the world without chart or compass--with energies misdirected, +passions uncontrolled, and all the inflammable and imaginative part of +their being cultivated into excess as a part of their profession--of +their material! O when will there be charity in the world? When will +human beings, women especially, show mercy and justice to each other, +and not judge of results, without a reference to causes? and when will +reflection upon these causes lead to their removal? They are evils which +press upon few, but are reflected on many, inasmuch as they degrade art +and the pursuit of art;--but all can sneer, and few can think. + + * * * * * + +I begin at length to feel my way among the pictures here. Hitherto +I have been bewildered. I have lounged away morning after morning +at the gallery of the Hofgarten, at Schleissheim, and at the Duc +de Leuchtenberg's; and returned home with dazzled eyes and a mind +overflowing, like one "oppressed with wealth, and with abundance +sad," unable to recall or to methodize my own impressions. + +Professor Zimmermann tells me that the king of Bavaria possesses +upwards of three thousand pictures: of these about seventeen hundred +are at Schleissheim; nine hundred in the Munich gallery; and the rest +distributed through various palaces. The national gallery, or Pinakothek, +which is now building under the direction of Leo von Klenze, is destined +to contain a selection from these multifarious treasures, of which the +present arrangement is only temporary. + +The king of Bavaria unites in his own person the three branches of +the House of Wittelsbach: the palatines of the Rhine, the dukes of +Deuxponts, and the electors of Bavaria, all sovereign houses, and +descended from Otto von Wittelsbach, who received the investiture of the +dukedom of Bavaria in 1180. Thus it is that the celebrated gallery once +at Dusseldorf, formed under the auspices of the elector John William; +the various collections at Manheim, Deuxponts, and Heidelberg, are now +concentrated at Munich, where, from the days of Duke Albert V. (1550) +up to the present time, works of art have been gradually accumulated +by successive princes. + +Somebody calls the gallery at Munich, the court of Rubens; and Sir +Joshua Reynolds says that no one should judge of Rubens who had not +studied him at Antwerp and Dusseldorf. I begin to feel the truth of +this. My devoted worship of the Italian school of art rendered me +long--I will not say _blind_ to the merits of the Flemish painters--for +that were to be "sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing!" but, in +truth, without that full feeling of their power which I have since +acquired. + +Certainly we have in these days mean ideas about painting--mean and +false ideas! It has become a mere object of luxury and connoisseurship, +or _virtu_: unless it be addressed to our personal vanity, or to the +puerile taste for ornament, show, furniture,--it is nothing. The noble +art which was once recognized as the priestess of nature, as a great +moral power capable of acting on the senses and the imagination of +assembled human beings--as such applied by the lawgivers of Greece, and +by the clergy of the Roman Catholic church,--how is it now vulgarized +in its objects! how narrowed in its application! And if it be said, +that in the present state of society, in these calculating, money-making, +political, intellectual times, we are acted upon by far different +influences, rendering us infinitely less sensible to the power of +painting, then I think it is _not true_, and that the cultivated +susceptibility to other moral or poetical excitements--as politics or +literature--does not render us less sensible to the moral influence +of painting; on the contrary: but she has fallen from her high estate, +and there are none to raise her. The public--the national spirit, is +wanting; individual patronage is confined, is misdirected, is arbitrary, +demanding of the artist any thing rather than the highest and purest +intellectual application of his art, and affording nor space nor +opportunity for him to address himself to the grand universal passions, +principles, and interests of human nature! Suppose a Michael Angelo +to be born to us in England: we should not, perhaps, set him to make +a statue of snow, but where or how would his gigantic genius, which +revelled in the great deeps of passion and imagination, find scope for +action? He would struggle and gasp like a stranded Leviathan! + +But this is digressing: the question is, may not the moral effect of +painting be still counted on, if the painter be himself imbued with the +right spirit?[34] + +There is, in the academy at Antwerp, a picture by Rubens, which represents +St. Theresa kneeling before Christ, and interceding for the souls in +purgatory. The treatment of the subject is exceedingly simple; the +upper part of the picture is occupied by the Redeemer, with his usual +attributes, and the saint, habited as a nun. In the lower part of the +picture, instead of a confused mob of tormented souls, and flames, and +devils with pitchforks, the painter has represented a few heads as if +rising from below. I remember those of Adam, Eve, and Mary Magdalene. I +remember--and never shall forget--the expression of each! The extremity +of misery in the countenance of Adam; the averted, disconsolate, repentant +wretchedness of Eve, who hides her face in her hair; the mixture of agony, +supplication, hope, in the face of the Magdalene, while a cherub of pity +extends his hand to her, as if to aid her to rise, and at the same +time turns an imploring look towards the Saviour. As I gazed upon this +picture, a feeling sank deep into my heart, which did not pass away with +the tears it made to flow, but has ever since remained there, and has +become an abiding principle of action. This is only one instance out of +many, of the _moral_ effect which has been produced by painting. + +To me it is amusing, and it cannot but be interesting and instructive to +the philosopher and artist, to observe how various people, uninitiated +into any of the technicalities of art, unable to appreciate the amount +of difficulties overcome, are affected by pictures and sculpture. But +in forming our judgment, our taste in art, it is unsafe to listen to +opinions springing from this vague kind of enthusiasm; for in painting, +as in music--"just as the soul is pitched, the _eye_ is pleased." + +I amuse myself in the gallery here with watching the countenances of +those who look at the pictures. I see that the uneducated eye is caught +by subjects in which the individual mind sympathizes, and the educated +taste seeks abstract excellence. Which has the most enjoyment? The last, +I think. Sensibility, imagination, and quick perception of form and +colour, are not alone necessary to feel a work of art; there must be the +power of association; the mind trained to habitual sympathy with the +beautiful and the good; the knowledge of the meaning, and the +comprehension of the object of the artist. + +In the gallery here there are eighty-eight pictures of Rubens--some +among the very finest he ever painted; for instance, that splendid +picture, Castor and Pollux carrying off the daughters of Leucippus, so +full of rich life and movement; the destruction of Sennacherib's host; +Rubens and his wife, full lengths, seated in a garden; that wonderful +picture of the defeat of the Amazons; the meeting of Jacob and Laban; +the picture of the Earl of Arundel and his wife, with other figures, +full lengths;[35] and a series of the designs for the large paintings +of the history of Marie de' Medici, now in the Louvre. His group of boys +with fruits and flowers, exhibits the richest, loveliest combination +of colours ever presented to the eye; and on that wonderful picture of +the fallen (or rather _falling_) angels, he has lavished such endless +variety of form, attitude, and expression, that it would take a day to +study it. It is not a large picture: the eye, or rather the imagination, +easily takes in the general effect of tumult, horror, destruction, but +the understanding dwells on the detail with still increasing astonishment +and admiration. These are a few that struck me, but it is quite in vain +to attempt to particularize. + +One may begin by disliking Rubens in general, (I think I did,) but one +must end by standing before him in ecstacy and wonder. It is true, that +always luxuriant, he is often gross and sensual--he can sometimes be +brutally so. His bacchanalian scenes are not like those of Poussin, +classical, godlike debauchery, but the abandoned drunken revelry of +animals--the very sublime of brute licentiousness; and painted with a +breadth of style, a magnificent luxuriance of colour, which renders them +more revolting. The _physique_ predominates in all his pictures, and not +only to grossness, even to ferocity. His picture here of the slaughter +of the Innocents, makes me sick--it has absolutely polluted my +imagination. Surely this is not the vocation of high art.--And as for +his martyrdoms--they are worse than Spagnoletto's. + +For all this, he is the TITAN of painting: his creations are "of the earth +and earthy," but he has called down fire and light from heaven, wherewith +to animate and to illumine them. + +Rubens is just such a painter as Dryden is a poet, and _vice versa_: +his women are just like Dryden's women, gross, exaggerated, unrefined +animals: his men, like Dryden's men, grand, thinking, acting animals. +Like Dryden, he could clothe his genius in thunder, dip his pencil in +the lightning and the sunbeams of heaven, and rush fearlessly upon a +subject which others had trembled to approach. In both we see a singular +and extraordinary combination of the plainest, coarsest realities of +life, with the loftiest imagery, the most luxurious tints of poetry. +Both had the same passion for allegory, and managed it with equal +success. "The thoughts that breathe and words that burn" of Dryden, may +be compared to the living, moving forms, the glowing, melting, dazzling +hues of Rubens, under whose pencil + + "Desires and adorations, + Winged persuasions and wild destinies, + Splendours, and glooms, and glimmering incarnations + Of hopes, and fears, and twilight fantasies,--" + + +took form and being--became palpable existences: and yet with all this +inventive power, this love of allegorical fiction, it is _life_, the +spirit of animal life, diffused through and over their works; it is the +blending of the plain reasoning with splendid creative powers;--of +wonderful fertility of conception with more wonderful facility of +execution; it is the combination of truth, and grandeur, and masculine +vigour, with a general coarseness of taste, which may be said to +characterise both these great men. Neither are, or can be, favourites +of the women, for the same reasons. + +There must have been something analogous in the genius of Rubens and +Titian. The distinction was of climate and country. They appear to +have looked at nature under the same aspect, but it was a different +nature,--the difference between Flanders and Venice. They were both +painters of flesh and blood: by nature, poets; by conformation, +colourists; by temperament and education, magnificent spirits, scholars, +and gentlemen, lovers of pleasure and of fame. The superior sentiment +and grace, the refinement and elevation of Titian he owed to the poetical +and chivalrous spirit of his age and country. The delicacy of taste +which reigned in the Italian literature of that period influenced the +arts of design. As to the colouring--we see in the pictures of Rubens +the broad daylight effects of a northern climate, and in those of +Titian, the burning fervid sun of a southern clime, necessarily modified +by shade, before the objects could be seen: hence the difference between +the _glow_ of Rubens, and the _glow_ of Titian: the first "i' the colours +of the rainbow lived," and the other bathed himself in the evening sky; +the one dazzles, the other warms. I can bring before my fancy at this +moment, the Helen Forman of Rubens, and Titian's "La Manto;" the "man +with a hawk" of Rubens, and Titian's "Falconer;" can any thing in heaven +or earth be more opposed? Yet in all alike, is it not the intense feeling +of life and individual nature which charms, which fixes us? I know not +which I admire most; but I adore Titian--his men are all made for power, +and his women for love. + +And Rembrandt--king of shadows! + + ----Earth-born + And sky-engendered--son of mysteries! + + +was not he a poet? He reminds me often of the Prince Sorcerer, nurtured +"in the cave of Domdaniel, under the roots of the sea."[36] Such an +enchanted "den of darkness" was his mill and its skylight to him; +and there, magician-like, he brooded over half-seen forms, and his +imagination framed strange spells out of elemental light and shade. +Thence he brought his unearthly shadows; his dreamy splendours; his +supernatural gleams; his gems flashing and sparkling with internal +light; his lustrous glooms; his wreaths of flaming and embossed gold; +his wicked wizard-like heads--turbaned, wrinkled, seared, dusky; pale +with forbidden studies--solemn with thoughtful pain--keen with the +hunger of avarice--and furrowed with an eternity of years! I have seen +pictures of his in which the shadowy background is absolutely peopled +with life. At first all seems palpable darkness, apparent vacancy; but +figure after figure emerges--another and another; they glide into view, +they take shape and colour, as if they grew out of the canvass even +while we gaze; we rub our eyes, and wonder whether it be the painter's +work or our own fancy! + +Of all the great painters Rembrandt is perhaps least understood; the +admiration bestowed on him, the enormous prices given for his pictures, +is in general a fashion--a mere matter of convention--like the price of +a diamond. To feel Rembrandt truly, it is not enough to be an artist or +an amateur picture-fancier--one should be something of a poet too. + +There are nineteen of his pictures here; of these "Jesus teaching the +doctors in the temple," though a small picture, impressed me with +awe,--the portraits of the painter Flinck and his wife, with wonder. +All are ill-hung, with their backs against the light--for them the worst +possible situation. + +Van Dyck is here in all his glory: there are thirty-nine of his pictures. +The celebrated full-length, "the burgomaster's wife in black," so often +engraved, does not equal, in its inexpressible, unobtrusive elegance, +the "Lady Wharton," at Devonshire House.[37] Then we have Wallenstein +with his ample kingly brow; fierce Tilly; the head of Snyders; the lovely +head of the painter's wife, Maria Ruthven,--sweet-looking, delicate, +golden-haired, and holding the theorbo, (she excelled in music, I +believe,) and virgins, holy families, and other scriptural subjects. +His famous picture of Susanna does not strike me much. + +The four apostles of Albert Durer--wonderful! In expression, in calm +religious majesty, in suavity of pencilling, and the grand, pure style +of the heads and drapery, quite like Raffaelle. I compared, yesterday, +the three portraits--that of Raffaelle, by himself; (the famous head +once in the Altaviti palace, and engraved by Morghen;) Albert Durer, by +himself; and Giorgione, by himself. Raffaelle is the least handsome, and +rather disappointed me; the eyes, in particular, rather project, and +have an expression which is not pleasing; the mouth and the brow are +full of power and passion. Albert Durer is beautiful, like the old +heads of our Saviour; and the predominant expression is calm, dignified, +intellectual, with a tinge of melancholy. This picture was painted +at the age of twenty-eight: he was then suffering from that bitter +domestic curse, a shrewish, avaricious wife, who finally broke his heart. +Giorgione is not handsome, but it is a sublime head, with such a large +intellectual development, such a profound expression of sentiment! +Giorgione died of a faithless mistress, as Albert Durer died of a +scolding wife.[38] + +By Paris Bordone, of Trevigi, there is a head of a Venetian lady, in +a dress of crimson velvet, with dark splendid eyes which tell a whole +history. By Murillo, there are eight pictures--not one in his most +elevated style, but all perfect miracles of painting and of nature. +There are thirty-three pictures of Vander Werff, a number sufficient to +make one's blood run cold. One, a Magdalene, is of the size of life; the +only large picture by this elegant, elaborate, soulless painter I ever +saw: he is to me detestable. + +By Joseph Vernet there are two delicious landscapes, a morning and an +evening. I cannot farther particularize; but there are specimens of +almost every known painter; those, however, of Titian, Correggio, Julio +Romano, and Nicolo Poussin, are very few and not of a very high class, +while those of the early German painters, and the Dutch, and the Flemish +schools, are first-rate. + +There is one English picture--Wilkie's "Opening of the Will:" it is very +much admired here, and looked upon as a sort of curiosity. I wish the +artists of the two countries were better known to each other: both would +benefit by such an intercourse. + +At the palace of Schleissheim[39] there are nearly two thousand pictures: +of these some hundreds are positively _bad_; some hundreds are curious +and valuable, as illustrating the history and progress of art; some few +are really and intrinsically admirable. + +But the grand attraction here is the far-famed Boisseree Gallery, which +is arranged at Schleissheim, until the Pinakothek is ready for its +reception. This is the collection about which so many volumes have been +written, and which has excited such a general enthusiasm throughout +Germany. This enthusiasm, as a fashion, a mania, is beginning to subside, +but the impress it has left upon art, and the tone it has given to the +pursuit, the feeling of art, will not so soon pass away. The gallery +derives its name from two brothers, Sulpitz and Melchior Boisseree,[40] +who, with a friend (Bertram) were employed for many years in collecting +from various convents, and old churches, and obscure collections of +family relics, the productions of the early painters of Germany, from +William of Cologne, called by the Germans "Meister Wilhelm," down to +Albert Durer and Holbein. + +The productions of the Greek or Byzantine painters found their way +into Germany, as into Italy, in the thirteenth century, and Wilhelm of +Cologne appeared to have been the Cimabue of the north--the founder of +that school of painting called the _Byzantine-Niederrheinische_, or +Flemish school, and the precursor of Rubens, as Cimabue was the +precursor of Michael Angelo. + +Out of this stiff, and rude, and barbarous style of art, arose and +spread the Alt-Deutsche, or Gothic school of painting, which produced +successively, Van Eyck, (1370,) Hemling, Wohlgemuth,[41] Martin Schoen, +Mabuse, Johan Schoreel, Lucas Kranach, Kulmbach, Albert Altorffer, Hans +Asper, Johan von Mechlem, Behem, Albert Durer, and the two Holbeins. I +mention here only those artists whose pictures fixed my attention; there +are many others, and many pictures by unknown authors. Albert Durer was +born exactly one hundred years after Van Eyck. + +The Boisseree gallery contains about three hundred and fifty pictures; +but I did not count them; and no official catalogue has yet been +published. The subjects are generally sacred; the figures are heads of +saints, and scenes from Scripture. A few are portraits; and there are +a few, but very few, subjects from profane history. The painters whose +works I at once distinguished from all others, were Van Eyck, Johan +Schoreel, Hemling, and Lucas Kranach. I can truly say that the two +pictures of Van Eyck, representing St. Luke painting the portrait of +the Virgin, and the offering of the three kings; and that of Johan +Schoreel, representing the death of the Virgin Mary, perfectly amazed +me. I remember also several wondrous heads by Lucas Kranach; one by +Behem, called, I know not why, "Helena:" and a picture of Christ and the +little children, differing from all the rest in style, with something of +the Italian grace of drawing, and suavity of colour. The artist, Sedlar, +had studied in Lombardy, probably under Correggio; (one of the children +certainly might call Correggio father.) The date on this extraordinary +production is 1530. Of the painter I know nothing. The general and +striking faults, or rather deficiencies of the old German school of +art, are easily enumerated. The most flagrant violations of taste and +costume,[42] bad drawing of the figure and extremities, faulty perspective; +stiff, hard meagre composition, negligence or ignorance of all effect of +chiaro-scuro. But what, then, is the secret of the interest which these +old painters inspire, of the enthusiasm they excite, even in these +cultivated days? It arises from a perception of the _mind_ they brought +to bear upon their subjects, the simplicity and integrity of feeling +with which they worked, and the elaborate marvellous beauty of the +execution of parts. I could give no idea in words of the intense nature +and expression in some of the heads, of the grand feeling united to the +most finished delicacy in the conception and painting of _countenance_, +of the dazzling splendour of colouring in the draperies, and the richness +of fancy in the ornaments and accessories. + +But I _do_ fear that the just admiration excited by this kind of +excellence, and a great deal of national enthusiasm, has misled the +modern German artists to a false, at least an exaggerated estimate, and +an injudicious imitation, of their favourite models. It has produced or +encouraged that general hardness of manner, that tendency to violent +colour, and high glazy finish, which interfere too often with the +beauty, and feeling, and effect of their compositions, at least in the +eyes of those who are accustomed to the free broad style of English +art.[43] + +_Thursday Evening._--At the theatre. Schiller's "Braut von Messina." +This was the first time I had ever seen the tragic choruses brought on +the stage, in the genuine style of the Greek drama; and the deep sonorous +voice and measured recitation (I could almost say _recitative_) of +Eslair, who was at the head of the chorus of Don Manuel--the emphatic +lines being repeated or echoed by his followers--as well as the peculiar +style of the whole representation, impressed me with a kind of solemn +terror. It was wholly different from any thing I had ever witnessed, +and was rather like a poem declaimed on the stage, than what we are +accustomed to call a play. I was fortunate in seeing Madame Schroeder +in Donna Isabella, for she does not often perform, and it is one of +the finest parts of this grand actress. Don Manuel and Don Caesar were +played by Forst and Schunke--both were young, very well looking, and +good actors. Beatrice was played by Madll. Shoeller. The costumes were +beautiful, and all the arrangements of the stage contrived with the most +poetical effect. One scene in the first act, where Donna Isabella stands +between her two sons, a hand on the shoulder of each, beseeching them to +be reconciled; while they remain silent, turning from each other with +folded arms, and dark averted faces;--the chorusses drawn up on each +side, all dressed alike, all precisely in the same attitude, leaning on +their shields, with lowering looks fixed on the group in the centre, was +admirably managed; and, from the effect that it produced, made me feel +that uniformity may be one element of the sublime. Afterwards, a very +lively soiree. + + * * * * * + +_Friday._--The Hofgarten at Munich is a square, planted with trees, and +gravelled, and serving as a public promenade. On one side is the royal +palace; opposite to it, the picture gallery; on the east, the king's +riding house, and on the west, a long arcade, open towards the garden +which connects the palace and the picture gallery; under this arcade are +shops, cafes, restaurateurs, &c. as in the _Palais Royal_ at Paris. + +But what distinguishes this arcade from all others, is the peculiar style +of decoration. It is painted in fresco by the young artists who studied +under Cornelius. There is, first, a series of sixteen compartments, about +eleven feet in length, containing subjects from the history of Bavaria. +They are all by various artists, and of course of different degrees of +merit, generally better in the composition than the painting, but some +have great vigour and animation in both respects. + +For instance, Otho von Wittelsbach receiving from the emperor, Frederic +Barbarossa, the investiture of the dukedom of Bavaria in 1180, painted +by Zimmermann. + +The marriage of Otho the Illustrious, to Agnes, Countess Palatine of the +Rhine, in 1225, painted by my friend, Wilhelm Roeckel, of Schleissheim, +to whom I am indebted for many polite attentions. + +The engagement between Louis the Severe, of Bavaria, and the fierce +fiery Ottocar, king of Bohemia, upon the bridge at Muehldorf, in 1258, +painted by Stuermer of Berlin. This is very animated and terrific. I +think the artist had Rubens' defeat of the Amazons full in his mind. + +The victory of the emperor, Louis of Bavaria, over Frederic of Austria, +his competitor for the empire in 1322, painted by Hermann of Dresden. + +The storming of Godesberg, when the unfortunate Archbishop Gerard, and +Agnes of Mansfield had taken refuge there in 1583,[44] painted by Gassen +of Coblentz. + +Maximilian I. in 1623, invested with the forfeit electorate of the +Palatine Frederic V.[45] painted by Eberle of Dusseldorf. + +Maximilian Joseph I. father of the present king, bestowing on his people +a new constitution and representative government in 1818, painted by +Monten of Dusseldorf. + +These have dwelt on my memory. Over all the pictures, the name of the +subject and the date are inscribed in large gold letters, so that those +who walk may read. The costumes and manners of each epoch have been +attended to with the most scrupulous accuracy; and I see every day +groups of soldiers, and of the common people, with their children, +standing before these paintings, spelling the titles, and discussing +the various subjects represented. The further end of the arcade is +painted with a series of Italian scenes, selected by the king after +his return from Italy, and executed by Rottmann of Heidelberg, a young +landscape-painter of great merit, as De Klenze assures me, and he is +a judge of _genius_. Under each picture is a distich, composed by the +king himself. These are in distemper, I believe: freely, but rather +hastily executed, and cold and ineffective in colour, perhaps the fault +of the vehicle. The ceilings and pillars are also gaily painted with +arabesques, and other ornaments; and at the upper end there is a grand +seated figure, looking magnificent and contemplative, and calling +herself BAVARIA. This is well painted by Kaulbach. + +I walk through these arcades once or twice every day, as I have several +friends lodged over them; and can seldom arrive at the end without +pausing two or three times. + +I learn that the king's passion for building, and the forced +encouragement given to the enlargement and decoration of his capital, +has been carried to an excess, and, like all extremes, has proved +mischievous, at least for the time. He has rendered it too much a +fashion among his subjects, who are suffering from rash speculations +of this kind. Many beautiful edifices in the Ludwig's Strasse, and the +neighbourhood of the Maximilian's Platz, and the Karoline's Platz, +remain untenanted. A suite of beautiful unfurnished apartments, and even +a pretty house in the finest part of Munich may be had for a trifle. +Some of these new houses are enormous. Madame M. told me that she has +her whole establishment on one floor, but then she has twenty-three +rooms. + +Though the country round Munich is flat and ugly, a few hours' journey +brings us into the very midst of the Tyrolian Alps. In June or July all +the people fly to the mountains, and baths, and lakes in South Bavaria, +and rusticate among the most glorious scenery in the world. "Come to +us," said my friend, Luise K----; "come to us in the summer months, +_and we will play at Arcadia_." + +And truly, when I listened to her description of her mountain life, and +all its tranquil, primitive pleasures, and all the beauty and grandeur +which lie beyond that giant-barrier which lifts itself against the +evening sky, and when I looked into those clear affectionate eyes--"dieser +Blick voll Treu und Gute," and beheld the expression of a settled +happiness, the light of a heart at peace with itself and all the world, +reflected on the countenances of her children--a recollection of the +unquiet destiny which drives me in an opposite direction came over me-- + + Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound + Upon a wheel of fire, which mine own tears + Do scald like molten lead. + + +[Illustration] + + +END OF VOL. I. + + +LONDON: + +IBOTSON & PALMER, PRINTERS, SAVOY STREET, STRAND. + + + + +ADDENDA + +_To Page 179, Vol._ i. + + +Therese Huber, who died in 1829, was a woman every way remarkable, in +her domestic history, in her position, her writings, and her character. +She was employed by Cotta to edit his famous "Morgenblatt," in her time +the most esteemed and the most influential of the literary periodicals +of Germany, and which she conducted for many years with extraordinary +energy and success; she wrote also several romances, published under her +husband's name, and long attributed to him even by her most intimate +friends. Therese Huber is distinguished by a profound knowledge of her +own sex, and by her just and admirable views of our destination and +situation in society. Some of her private letters have been published, +since her death, with those of Caroline Woltmann, in the "Deutsche +Briefe," and they place in yet stronger light the fine original powers +of this gifted woman. + + +VOL. I. + + + Page 2, line 16, _for_ great, _read_ green. + 43 -- 14, _for_ altamen, _read_ attamen. + 46 -- 5, omit _patrician_. + 47 -- 2, _for_ 'vengeful, _read_ revengeful. + 95 -- 2, _for_ Haitsinger, _read_ Haitzinger. + 95 -- 12, _for_ tiefe, _read_ tief. + 95 -- 21, _for_ Becher, _read_ Becker. + 147 -- 2, in the note, _for_ Hienrich, _read_ Heinrich. + 147 -- 3, in the note, _for_ Wladimer, _read_ Wladimir. + 181 -- 1, _for_ first, _read_ second. + 184 -- 17, _for_ Erden, _read_ Erben. + 193 -- 5, _for_ wsaeche, _read_ waesche. + 197 -- 14, _after_ since, _insert_ "High-born Hoel." + 211 -- 9, _for_ Elangau, _read_ Erlangen. + 230 -- 10, _for_ liebe, _read_ lieber. + 230 -- 11, _for_ schrecklich Schichsal, _read_ schreckliches + Schicksal. + 230 -- 13, _for_ grab, _read_ Grab. + 252 -- 19, _for_ twelve, _read_ eight. + 270 -- 16, _for_ Neurather, _read_ Neureuther. + 291 -- 1, in the note, _for_ par, _read_ pas; and _for_ pas + _read_ par. + + * * * * * + + + + +FOOTNOTES: + + +[Footnote 1: In Goethe's Iphigenia.] + +[Footnote 2: Over another iron door was writt, + + _Be not too bold._ + +FAIRY QUEEN, Book iii. Canto XI.] + +[Footnote 3: See Wordsworth's Poems.] + +[Footnote 4: Two celebrated antique gems which adorn the relics of the +Three Kings.] + +[Footnote 5: It is nearly twice the size of the famous and well known +Medusa Rondinelli, now in the Glyptothek at Munich.] + +[Footnote 6: Professor Wallraff died on the 18th of March, 1824.] + +[Footnote 7: Amongst others, Jean Paul, in the "Heidelberger Jahrbuecher +der Literatur," 1815.] + +[Footnote 8: Since the above passage was written, Mrs. Austin has +favoured me with the following note: "Goethe admired, but did not like, +still less esteem, Madame de Stael. He begins a sentence about her +thus--'As she had no idea what duty meant,' &c. + +"However, after relating a scene which took place at Weimar, he adds, +'Whatever we may say or think of her, her visit was certainly followed +by very important results. Her work upon Germany, which owed its rise +to social conversations, is to be regarded as a mighty engine which at +once made a wide breach in that Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices, +which divided us from France; so that the people across the Rhine, +and afterwards those across the channel, at length came to a nearer +knowledge of us; whence we may look to obtain a living influence over +the distant west. Let us, therefore, bless that conflict of national +peculiarities which annoyed us at the time, and seemed by no means +profitable.'"--_Tag- und Jahres Hefte_, vol. 31, last edit. + +To that WOMAN who had sufficient strength of mind to break through a +"Chinese wall of antiquated prejudices," surely something may be +forgiven.] + +[Footnote 9: Johanna Schopenhauer, well known in Germany for her +romances and her works on art. Her little book, "Johan van Eyk und seine +Nachfolger," has become the manual of those who study the old German +schools of painting.] + +[Footnote 10: Or Gebhard, for so the name is spelt in the German +histories.] + +[Footnote 11: For the story of Archbishop Gebhard and Agnes de Mansfeld, +see Schiller's History of the Thirty Years' War, and Coxe's History of +the House of Austria.] + +[Footnote 12: The gardens and plantations round the castle are a +favourite promenade of the citizens of Heidelberg, and there are in +summer bands of music, &c.] + +[Footnote 13: When Gustavus Adolphus took Mayence, during the same +war, he presented the whole of the valuable library to his chancellor, +Oxenstiern; the chancellor sent it to Sweden, intending to bestow it on +one of the colleges; but the vessel in which it was embarked foundered +in the Baltic sea, and the whole went to the bottom.] + +[Footnote 14: M. Passavant is a landscape-painter of Frankfort, an +intelligent, accomplished man, and one of the few German artists who +had a tolerably correct idea of the state of art in England. He is the +author of "Kunstreise durch England und Belgium."] + +[Footnote 15: She was cotemporary with Cleopatra, (B. C. 33,) and was +particularly celebrated for her busts in ivory. The Romans raised a +statue to her honour, which was in the Guistiniani collection.--V. PLINY.] + +[Footnote 16: Lucas Kranach (1472) was one of the most celebrated of the +old German painters; from a principle of gratitude and attachment, he +shared the imprisonment of the elector John Frederic, during five years.] + +[Footnote 17: In September, 1833.] + +[Footnote 18: His own expression.] + +[Footnote 19: Dannecker has been ennobled; his proper titles run +thus--Johan Heinrich von Dannecker, Hofrath, (court counsellor,) knight +of the orders of the Wurtemburg crown, and of Wladimir, and professor +of sculpture at Stuttgardt.] + +[Footnote 20: Rauch is knight of the Red Eagle, and member of the +senate.] + +[Footnote 21: Christian Rauch was born in 1777, and Christian Frederic +Tieck in 1776.] + +[Footnote 22: Formerly Madame Jageman, the principal actress of the +theatre at Weimar. Her talents were developed under the auspices of +Goethe and Schiller. She was the original Thekla of the Wallenstein, and +the original Princess Leonora of the Tasso. In these two characters she +has never yet been equalled. The quietness, amounting to passiveness, in +the _external_ delineation of the Princess in Tasso, affords so little +_material_ for the stage, that Madame Wolff, then the first actress, +preferred the character of Leonora Sanvitale, and Madame Jageman was +supposed to derogate in accepting that of the Princess. Such is the +consummate, but evanescent delicacy of the conception, that Goethe never +expected to see it developed on the stage; and at the rehearsal he threw +himself back in his chair, and shut his eyes, that the image which lived +in his imagination might not be profaned by any tasteless exaggeration +of action or expression. He soon opened them, however, and before the +rehearsal was finished, started off the chair, and nearly embraced the +actress. She looked and felt the part as only a woman of exceeding +taste and delicacy would have done; the very tone of her mind, and the +character of her beauty, fitted her to represent the fair, gentle, +fragile, but dignified Leonora.] + +[Footnote 23: Lessing.] + +[Footnote 24: Characteristics of Goethe, vol. i. p. 29.] + +[Footnote 25: I believe it was in allusion to this distinction, and her +own noble birth, that her father-in-law used to call her playfully, +"_die kleine Ahnfrau_," (the little ancestress.)] + +[Footnote 26: M. Besle, otherwise the Comte de Stendhal, and, I believe, +he has half a dozen other _aliases_.] + +[Footnote 27: Alfred Tennyson.] + +[Footnote 28: "Thro' Erin's isle, to sport awhile," &c.] + +[Footnote 29: In the German maps, Zweibruecken; the capital of those +provinces of the kingdom of Bavaria, which lie on the left bank of +the Rhine.] + +[Footnote 30: The entire grouping of these figures is from the design +of Mr. Robert Cockerell, one of the original discoverers, who in +ascertaining their relative position has been guided in some measure +by the situation in which their fragments were found strewed in front +of the temple, and overwhelmed with masses of the frieze and pediment; +but has been much more indebted to his own artist-like feeling, and +architectural skill. He is of opinion that the western pediment +contained several other figures besides the ten which have been +restored.] + +[Footnote 31: The character of the Emperor Rodolph would be one of the +most interesting speculations in philosophical history. He was evidently +a fine artist, degraded into a bad sovereign--a man whose constructive +and imaginative genius was misplaced upon a throne. The melancholy, and +incipient madness which hovered over him, was possibly the result of the +natural faculties suppressed or perverted.] + +[Footnote 32: The celebrated traveller, natural philosopher, and botanist. +He has the direction of most of the scientific institutions at +Munich.] + +[Footnote 33: I remember Madame Devrient, in describing the effect which +music had upon herself, pressing her hand upon her bosom, and saying, +with simple but profound feeling, "_Ah! cela use la vie!_"] + +[Footnote 34: "A l'exposition de Paris (1822) on a vu un millier de +tableaux representant des sujets de l'Ecritoire Sainte, peints par des +peintres qui n'y croient pas du tout: admires et juges par des gens qui +n'y croient pas beaucoup, et enfin payes par des gens qui, apparemment, +n'y croient pas, non plus. + +"L'on cherche apres cela le pourquoi de la decadence de l'art!"] + +[Footnote 35: Of this celebrated picture, Sir Joshua Reynolds says, +that it is miscalled, and certainly does _not_ contain the portraits +of the Earl and Countess of Arundel. Perhaps he is mistaken. It appears +that the Earl of Arundel, of James the First's time, (the collector of +the Arundelian marbles,) with his Countess, sat to Rubens in 1620, and +that "Robin the Dwarf" was introduced into this picture, which was not +painted in England, but at Brussels. Rubens was at this time at the +height of his reputation, and when requested to paint the portrait of +the Countess of Arundel, he replied, "Although I have refused to execute +the portraits of many princes and noblemen, especially of his lordship's +rank yet from the Earl I am bound to receive the honour he does me +in commanding my services, regarding him as I do, in the light of +an evangelist to the world of art, and the great supporter of our +profession."--(See Tierney's History and Antiquities of the Castle and +Town of Arundel.)] + +[Footnote 36: In Southey's Thalaba.] + +[Footnote 37: Now removed with the other Vandykes to Chatsworth.] + +[Footnote 38: See a curious letter of Pirkheimer on the death of Albert +Durer, quoted in the Foreign Quarterly Review, No. 21. "In Albert I have +truly lost one of the best friends I had in the whole world, and nothing +grieves me deeper than that he should have died so painful a death, +which, under God's providence, I can ascribe to nobody but his huswife, +who gnawed into his very heart, and so tormented him that he departed +hence the sooner; for he was dried up to a faggot, and might nowhere +seek him a jovial humour or go to his friends." (After much more, +reflecting on this intolerable woman, he concludes with edifying +_naivete_;) "She and her sister are not queans; they are, I doubt not, +in the number of honest, devout, and altogether God-fearing women, but +a man might better have a quean who was otherwise kindly, than such a +gnawing, suspicious, quarrelsome, _good_ woman, with whom he can have +no peace or quiet neither by day nor by night."] + +[Footnote 39: Schleissheim is a country palace of the king of Bavaria, +about six miles from Munich; it has originally been a beautiful +building, but is not now inhabited, and looks forlorn and dilapidated. +The pictures are distributed, without any attempt at arrangement, +through forty-five rooms.] + +[Footnote 40: Natives, I believe, of Cologne.] + +[Footnote 41: Albert Durer was the scholar of Wohlgemuth.] + +[Footnote 42: I particularly recollect a picture, containing many +hundred figures, all painted with the elaborate finish of a miniature, +and representing the victory of Alexander over Darius. All the Persians +are dressed like Turks, while Alexander and his host are armed to the +teeth, in the full costume of chivalry, with heraldic banners, displaying +the different devices of the old Germanic nobles, the cross, the black +eagle, &c. &c.] + +[Footnote 43: The observations of Mr. Phillips, (Lectures on the History +and Principles of Painting,) on Giotto, and the earliest Italian school, +apply in a great measure to the early German painters, and I cannot +refuse myself the pleasure of quoting them.--"As it appears to me, that +painting at the present time, is swerving among us from the true point +of interest, tending to ornament, to the loss of truth and sentiment, I +think I cannot do better than endeavour to restrain the encroachment of +so insidious a foe, to prevent, if possible, our advance in so erroneous +and fatal a course, by showing how strong is the influence of art +where truth and simplicity prevail; and that, where no ornament is +to be found--nay, where imperfections are numerous; where drawing is +frequently defective, perspective violated, colouring employed without +science, and chiaro-scuro rarely, if ever thought of. The natural +question then is, what can excite so much interest in pictures, where +so much is wanting to render them perfect? I answer, that which leads +to the forgetfulness of the want of those interesting and desirable +qualities in the pictures of Giotto, is the excitation caused by their +fulness of feeling--well-directed, ardent, concentrated feeling! by +which his mind was engaged in comprehending the points most worthy of +display in the subject he undertook to represent, and led to the +clearness and intelligence with which he has selected them; add to this +the simplicity and ability with which he has displayed that feeling." +* * * "This is the first true step in the natural system of the art, or +of the application of it, and this was Giotto's more especially. The rest +is useful, as it assists the influence of this, the _indispensable_. +This, to continue the figure, taken from the stage, (in a previous part +of the Lecture,) is as Garrick acting Macbeth or Lear in a tie-wig and +a general's uniform of his day; the passion and the character reaching +men's hearts, notwithstanding the absurd costume. If the art be found +thus strong to attract the mind, to excite feeling and thought, and to +engage the heart, by the mere force of unadorned truth in the important +points, and without the aid of the valuable auxiliaries I have above +alluded to, is it not manifest that in its basis it is correct? and that +the utmost force of historical painting is to be sought by continual +emendation of this system, maintaining the spirit of its simplicity, +supplying its wants, calling in the aid of those auxiliaries within +reasonable bounds, not permitting them to usurp the throne of taste and +attraction, but rather requiring them to assist in humbler guise to +maintain and strengthen the legitimate authority of feeling. + +After reading these beautiful passages, written by a man who unites +the acute discriminative judgment of a practical artist with the finest +feeling of the ultimate object and aim of high poetical art, I felt +almost tempted to expunge my own superficial and imperfect notes, (above +written,) and should have done so, but for the hope that my deficiencies +will induce some one more competent in taste and knowledge to take up +the subject of the early German painters. It is certain that the modern +historical painters of Germany are working on the principle here +laid down by Mr. Phillips, particularly Overbeck and Wach, which they +have derived from a study of their national school of art; but other +enthusiasts should remember that the redeeming excellence of this school +was feeling, and that feeling can never be a matter of mere imitation. +I cannot understand why the omissions of ignorance should be confounded +with the achievements of native genius, by those for whom "knowledge +has unlocked her ample stores," and to whom the recovery of those +"rich spoils of time," the antique marbles, must have revealed the wide +difference between "the simplicity of elegance" and "the simplicity of +indigence."] + +[Footnote 44: See p. 56.] + +[Footnote 45: See p. 66.] + + * * * * * + +[Transcriber's Note: Errata as given in the original have been applied to +the text. Other than the most exceedingly obvious typographical errors, +all inconsistent spelling, hyphenation, diacriticals, archaic usage, etc. +have been preserved as printed in the original. The equals signs used +to bracket the signature at the end of part I indicate characters in a +Fraktur typeface.] + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Visits and Sketches at Home and Abroad +with Tales and Miscellanies Now First Collected, by Anna Jameson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK VISITS AND SKETCHES, VOL I *** + +***** This file should be named 36818.txt or 36818.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/6/8/1/36818/ + +Produced by Julia Miller, David Garcia and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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