Amor s'asside alia mia Filli accanto,
Amor la segue ovunque i passi gira:
In lei parla, in lei tace, in lei sospira,
Anzi in lei vive, ond'ella ed ei può tanto.
Amore i vezzi, amor le insegna il canto;
E se mai duolsi, o se pur mai s'adira,
Da lei non parte amor, anzi se mira
Amor ne le belle ire, amor nel pianto.
Se avvien che danzi in regolato errore,
Darle il moto al bel piede, amor riveggio,
Come l'auretto quando muove un fiore.
Le veggio in fronte amor come in suo seggio,
Sul crin, negli occhi, su le labbra amore,
Sol d'intorno al suo cuore, amor non veggio.[I]
After being confined to the house for three days, partly by
indisposition, and partly by a vile sirocco, which brought, as usual,
vapours, clouds, and blue devils in its train--this most lovely day
tempted me out; and I walked with V. over the Monte Cavallo to the
Forum of Trajan. After admiring the view from the summit of the
pillar, we went on towards the Capitol, which presented a singular
scene: the square and street in front, as well as the immense flight
of steps, one hundred and fifty in number, which lead to the church of
the Ara Celi, were crowded with men, women, and children, all in their
holiday dresses. It was with difficulty we made our way through them,
though they very civilly made way for us, and we were nearly a quarter
of an hour mounting the steps, so dense was the multitude ascending
and descending, some on their hands and knees out of extra-devotion.
At last we reached the door of the church, where we understood, from
the exclamations and gesticulations of those of whom we inquired,
something extraordinary was to be seen. On one side of the entrance
was a puppet show, on the other a band of musicians, playing "Di tanti
palpati." The interior of the church was crowded to suffocation; and
all in darkness, except the upper end, where upon a stage brilliantly
and very artificially lighted by unseen lamps, there was an exhibition
in wax-work, as large as life, of the Adoration of the Shepherds. The
Virgin was habited in the court dress of the last century, as rich as
silk and satin, gold lace, and paste diamonds could make it, with a
flaxen wig, and high-heeled shoes. The infant Saviour lay in her lap,
his head encircled with rays of gilt wire, at least two yards long.
The shepherds were very well done, but the sheep and dogs best of all;
I believe they were the real animals stuffed. There was a distant
landscape, seen between the pasteboard trees, which was well painted,
and from the artful disposition of the light and perspective, was
almost a deception--but by a blunder very consistent with the rest of
the show, it represented a part of the Campagna of Rome. Above all was
a profane representation of that Being, whom I dare scarcely allude
to, in conjunction with such preposterous vanities, encircled with
saints, angels, and clouds; the whole got up very like a scene in a
pantomime, and accompanied by music from a concealed orchestra, which
was intended, I believe, to be sacred music, but sounded to me like
some of Rossini's airs. In front of the stage there was a narrow
passage divided off, admitting one person at a time, through which a
continued file of persons moved along, who threw down their
contributions as they passed, bowing and crossing themselves with
great devotion. It would be impossible to describe the ecstasies of
the multitude, the lifting up of hands and eyes, the string of
superlatives--the bellissimos, santissimos, gloriosissimos, and
maravigliosissimos, with which they expressed their applause and
delight. I stood in the back-ground of this strange scene, supported
on one of the long-legged chairs which V---- placed for me against a
pillar, at once amazed, diverted, and disgusted by this display of
profaneness and superstition, till the heat and crowd overcame me, and
I was obliged to leave the church. I shall never certainly forget the
"Bambino" of the Ara Celi: for though the exhibition I saw afterwards
at the San Luigi (where I went to look at Domenichino's fine pictures)
surpassed what I have just described, it did not so much surprise me.
Something in the same style is exhibited in almost every church,
between Christmas day and the Epiphany.
During our examination of Trajan's Forum to-day, I learnt nothing new,
except that Trajan levelled part of the Quirinal to make room for it.
The ground having lately been cleared to the depth of about twelve
feet, part of the ancient pavement has been discovered, and many
fragments of columns set upright: pieces of frieze and broken capitals
are scattered about. The pillar, which is now cleared to the base,
stands in its original place, but not, as it is supposed, at its
original level, for the Romans generally raised the substructure of
their buildings, in order to give them a more commanding appearance.
The antiquarians here are of opinion that both the pavement of the
Basilica and the base of the pillar were raised above the level of the
ancient street, and that there is a flight of steps, still concealed,
between the pillar and the pavement in front. The famous Ulpian
Library was on each side of the Basilica, and the Forum differed from
other Forums in not being an open space surrounded by buildings, but a
building surrounded by an open space.
* * * * *
_Dec 31.-Jan. 1._--That hour in which we pass from one year to
another, and begin a new account with ourselves, with our fellow
creatures, and with God, must surely bring some solemn and serious
thoughts to the bosoms of the most happy and most unreflecting among
the triflers on this earth. What then must it be to me? The first
hour, the first moment of the expiring year was spent in tears, in
distress, in bitterness of heart--as it began so it ends. Days, and
weeks, and months, and seasons, came and "passed like visions to
their viewless home," and brought no change. Through the compass of
the whole year I have not enjoyed one single day--I will not say of
happiness--but of health and peace; and what I have endured has left
me little to learn in the way of suffering. Would to heaven that as
the latest minutes now ebb away while I write, memory might also pass
away! Would to heaven that I could efface the last year from the
series of time, hide it from myself, bury it in oblivion, stamp it
into annihilation, that none of its dreary moments might ever rise up
again to haunt me, like spectres of pain and dismay! But this is
wrong--I feel it is--and I repent, I recall my wish. That great Being,
to whom the life of a human creature is a mere point, but who has
bestowed on his creatures such capacities of feeling and suffering, as
extend moments to hours and days to years, inflicts nothing in vain,
and if I have suffered much, I have also learned much. Now the last
hour is past--another year opens; may it bring to those I love all I
wish them in my heart! to me it can bring nothing. The only blessing I
hope from time is _forgetfulness_--my only prayer to heaven
is--_rest, rest, rest_.
_Jan. 4._--We _dispatched_, as L** would say, a good deal to-day: we
visited the Temple of Vesta, the Church of Santa Maria in Cosmadino,
the Temple of Fortune, the Ponte Rotto, and the house of Nicolo
Rienzi: all these lie together in a dirty, low, and disagreeable part
of Rome. Thence we drove to the Pyramid of Caius Cestus.--As we know
nothing of this Caius Cestus, but that he lived, died, and was buried,
it is not possible to attach any fanciful or classical interest to his
tomb, but it is an object of so much beauty in itself, and from its
situation so striking and picturesque, that it needs no additional
interest. It is close to the ancient walls of Rome, which stretch on
either side as far as the eye can reach in huge and broken masses of
brickwork, fragments of battlements and buttresses, overgrown in many
parts with shrubs and even trees. Around the base of the Pyramid lies
the burying-ground of strangers and heretics. Many of the monuments
are elegant, and their frail materials and diminutive forms are in
affecting contrast with the lofty and solid pile which towers above
them. The tombs lie around in a small space "amicably close," like
brothers in exile, and as I gazed I felt a kindred feeling with all;
for I, too, am a wanderer, a stranger and a heretic; and it is
probable that my place of rest may be among them. Be it so! for
methinks this earth could not afford a more lovely, a more tranquil,
or more sacred spot. I remarked one tomb, which is an exact model, and
in the same material with the sarcophagus of Cornelius Scipio, in the
Vatican. One small slab of white marble bore the name of a young girl,
an only child, who died at sixteen, and "left her parents
disconsolate:" another elegant and simple monument bore the name of a
young painter of genius and promise, and was erected "by his
companions and fellow students as a testimony of their affectionate
admiration and regret." This part of old Rome is beautiful beyond
description, and has a wild, desolate, and poetical grandeur, which
affects the imagination like a dream.--The very air disposes one to
reverie. I am not surprised that Poussin, Claude, and Salvator Rosa
made this part of Rome a favourite haunt, and studied here their
finest effects of colour, and their grandest combinations of
landscape. I saw a young artist seated on a pile of ruins with his
sketch book open on his knee, and his pencil in his hand--during the
whole time we were there he never changed his attitude, nor put his
pencil to the paper, but remained leaning on his elbow, like one lost
in ecstasy.
_Jan 5._--To-day we drove through the quarter of the Jews, called the
Ghetta degli Ebrei. It is a long street enclosed at each end with a
strong iron gate, which is locked by the police at a certain hour
every evening (I believe at ten o'clock); and any Jew found without
its precincts after that time, is liable to punishment and a heavy
fine. The street is narrow and dirty, the houses wretched and ruinous,
and the appearance of the inhabitants squalid, filthy, and
miserable--on the whole, it was a painful scene, and one I should have
avoided, had I followed my own inclinations. If this specimen of the
effects of superstition and ignorance was depressing, the next was not
less ridiculous. We drove to the Lateran: I had frequently visited
this noble Basilica before, but on the present occasion we were to go
over it _in form_, with the usual torments of laquais and ciceroni. I
saw nothing new but the cloisters, which remain exactly as in the time
of Constantine. They are in the very vilest style of architecture, and
decorated with Mosaic in a very elaborate manner: but what most amused
us was the collection of relics, said to have been brought by
Constantine from the Holy Land, and which our cicerone exhibited with
a sneering solemnity which made it very doubtful whether he believed
himself in their miraculous sanctity. Here is the stone on which the
cock was perched when it crowed to St. Peter, and a pillar from the
Temple of Jerusalem, split asunder at the time of the crucifixion; it
looks as if it had been _sawed_ very accurately in half from top to
bottom; but this of course only renders it more miraculous. Here is
also the column in front of Pilate's house, to which our Saviour was
bound, and the very well where he met the woman of Samaria. All these,
and various other relics, supposed to be consecrated by our Saviour's
Passion, are carelessly thrown into the cloisters--not so the heads of
St. Peter and St. Paul, which are considered as the chief treasures in
the Lateran, and are deposited in the body of the church in a rich
shrine. The beautiful sarcophagus of red porphyry, which once stood
in the Portico of the Pantheon, and contained the ashes of Agrippa,
is now in the Corsini chapel here, and encloses the remains of some
Pope Clement. The bronze equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, which
stands on the Capitol, was dug from the cloisters of the Lateran. The
statue of Constantine in the portico was found in the baths of
Constantine: it is in a style of sculpture worthy the architecture of
the cloisters.--Constantine was the first Christian emperor, a glory
which has served to cover a multitude of sins; it is indeed impossible
to forget that he was the chosen instrument of a great and blessed
revolution; but in other respects it is as impossible to look back to
the period of Constantine without horror--an era when bloodshed and
barbarism, and the general depravity of morals and taste seemed to
have reached their climax.
On leaving the Lateran, we walked to the Scala Santa, said to be the
very flights of steps which led to the judgment hall at Jerusalem, and
transported hither by the Emperor Constantine; but while the other
relics which his pious benevolence bestowed on the city of Rome have
apparently lost some of their efficacy, the Scala Santa is still
regarded with the most devout veneration. At the moment of our
approach, an elegant barouche drove up to the portico, from which two
well-dressed women alighted, and pulling out their rosaries, began to
crawl up the steps on their hands and knees, repeating a Paternoster
and an Ave Maria on every step. A poor diseased beggar had just gone
up before them, and was a few steps in advance. This exercise, as we
are assured, purchases a thousand years of indulgence. The morning was
concluded by a walk on the Mont Pincio.
I did not know on that first morning after our arrival, when I ran up
the Scalla della Trinità to the top of the Pincian hill, and looked
around me with such transport, that I stood by mere chance on that
very spot from which Claude used to study his sun sets, and his
beautiful effects of evening. His house was close to me on the left,
and those of Nicolo Poussin and Salvator Rosa a little beyond. Since
they have been pointed out to me, I never pass from the Monte Pincio
along the Via Felice without looking up at them with interest: such
power has genius, "to hallow in the core of human hearts even the ruin
of a wall."
* * * * *
_Jan. 6._--Sunday, at the English chapel, which was crowded to excess,
and where it was at once cold and suffocating. We had a plain but
excellent sermon, and the officiating clergyman, Mr. W., exhorted the
congregation to conduct themselves with more decorum at St. Peter's,
and to remember what was due to the temple of that God who was equally
the God of all Christians. We afterwards went to St. Peter's; where
the anthem was performed at vespers as usual, and the tenor of the
Argentino sung. The music was indeed heavenly--but I did not enjoy it:
for though the behaviour of the English was much more decent than I
have yet seen it, the crowd round the chapel, the talking, pushing,
whispering, and movement, were enough to disquiet and discomfort me; I
withdrew, therefore, and walked about at a little distance, where I
could just hear the swell of the organ. Such is the immensity of the
building, that at the other side of the aisle the music is perfectly
inaudible.
7.--Visited the Falconieri Palace to see Cardinal Fesche's gallery.
The collection is large and contains many fine pictures, but there is
such a _mélange_ of good, bad, and indifferent, that on the whole I
was disappointed. L** attached himself to my side the whole
morning--to benefit, as he said, by my "tasty remarks;" he hung so
dreadfully heavy on my hands, and I was so confounded by the
interpretations and explanations his ignorance required, that I at
last found my patience nearly at an end. Pity he is so good-natured
and so good-tempered, that one can neither have the comfort of
heartily disliking him, nor find nor make the shadow of an excuse to
shake him off!
In the evening we had a gay party of English and foreigners: among
them----
* * * * *