had quite forgotten about Zelphine's quest, when a voice at our side
exclaimed, triumphantly:
"I have solved the riddle. The palace on the Square of the Annunziata
was a Riccardi palace at the time of Mr. Browning's poem, and at
the window toward which Duke Ferdinand's eyes are turned there was a
bust of a lady as late as 1887. The present Palazzo Riccardi, now the
Prefettura, was once a Medici palace; it was sold many years later to
the Riccardi family. Here Duke Ferdinand made his feast on the night of
the wedding, the one and only time that the lovers met:
"'Face to face the lovers stood,
A single minute and no more,
While the bridegroom bent as a man subdued--
Bowed till his bonnet touched the floor--
For the Duke on the lady a kiss conferred,
As the courtly custom was of yore.'
"Cannot you see it all?" continued Zelphine, breathlessly, quite
regardless of the interest that her animated face and eager words were
exciting in the little group around us,
"'the pile which the mighty shadow makes,
For Via Largo is three-parts light,
But the palace overshadows one,
Because of a crime which may God requite!'
"This crime was the murder of Duke Alessandro by his distant cousin
Lorenzino, and this, you see, fixes the fact beyond dispute that the
feast was given by the Duke in this great Riccardi palace on the Square
of San Lorenzo. Isn't it all wonderful and thrilling, and is there any
place in the world so filled to the very brim with interest and romance
as Florence?"
"No place except Rome," said Angela, true to her first love.
"Yes, but the history seems less remote here; everything seems nearer
and closer, more intimate--you understand what I mean, Margaret."
When Zelphine appeared at the lunch table, flushed with the joy of
victory and quite ready to annihilate her scoffing adversary, whom
Angela disrespectfully designated as "Red-top," she found, to her
dismay, that the lady had left for Venice before noon. This is surely
one of the incompletenesses of life. To think of that misguided
woman proceeding on her way to scatter misinformation broadcast, when
Zelphine could have set her right in five minutes!
When Bertha heard of Zelphine's disappointment, she was most
sympathetic, and proposed, as a congenial and solacing occupation, that
we should return that afternoon to the Square of San Lorenzo and try to
find the old stall where Mr. Browning, on a memorable June day, bought
for a lira the little volume that contained the whole story of "The
Ring and the Book."
The piazza, a market for old clothes, old furniture, and all manner
of cooking-utensils, still answers to Mr. Browning's description,
and here, close to the statue, which is of Giovanni delle Bande Nere,
father of the first Cosimo, is just such a table full of nondescript
rubbish as the one upon which the poet found the parchment-covered
book which furnished him with his plot. Then at Bertha's suggestion,
to humor our fancies as to the associations of the time and place, we
followed in the poet's footsteps, as he described himself, walking and
reading,
"on, through street and street,
At the Strozzi, at the Pillar, at the Bridge;
Till, by the time I stood at home again
In Casa Guidi by Felice Church,
Under the doorway where the black begins
With the first stone-slab of the staircase cold,
I had mastered the contents, knew the whole truth
Gathered together, bound up in this book."
To my surprise, when we reached the doorway of the Casa Guidi, Bertha
also entered "where the black begins," and began to ascend "the
staircase cold."
"Where are you going?" we called after her, standing within the doorway.
"Follow me," said Bertha. "I have some friends who live in an apartment
in the Casa Guidi, and we are all invited to afternoon tea here."
"Why didn't you tell us before?" asked Angela, "so that we might have
made ourselves a little smart?"
"Because I wanted to give you all a surprise. My friend asked me to
bring you any afternoon, so I sent a messenger to tell her that we
were coming, to make sure of her being at home, as she often spends the
afternoon up in the Boboli Gardens with her baby."
Alas! Bertha's artist friends do not live in the Browning apartment,
as that, by some irony of fate, is in the possession of an Austrian
family; but as Zelphine said, with a rapturous look in her eyes, it was
worth much to pass over the stairs that had known the footsteps of the
two poets. Mr. and Mrs. Cobbe's apartment is on what we should call the
fourth floor, which here they more encouragingly designate the third.
Charming airy rooms, at the top of many stairs, we found the home
of the two American artists, where a warm welcome awaited us. Later,
refreshments were served to us in the large room that corresponds to
Mrs. Browning's drawing-room on the floor below; but whether we ate and
drank ordinary cakes and tea, or were regaled with nectar and ambrosia,
Zelphine and I cannot tell you. It was all so delightfully homelike and
yet so filled with associations that this afternoon in the Casa Guidi
will always be one of our most cherished memories, and we parted with
our compatriots feeling that the old palace was an appropriate setting
for artist as well as for poet lovers.
PENSION C., FLORENCE, May 20th.
What will you say when I tell you that since writing my last letter
to you I have received a proposal of marriage? M. le Marquis de B. di
T., of ancient Roman lineage and irreproachable family connections,
laid his heart, his hand, and his fortune at my feet--for Angela. Are
you amused at my rôle? I assure you that it was not in the smallest
degree amusing at the time, and the fact that the _prétendant_ acted
in a highly honorable manner, and did not consult Angela definitively
before speaking to her stern guardian, added to the difficulties of
my position. I explained, at some length, that affairs of the heart
are arranged by the young people themselves in America, always, of
course, with the consent of their parents and guardians--for this last
unqualified statement I trust that I may be forgiven--to which I added
that if Miss Haldane returned the Count's affection, we would both
write to her father. After delivering myself of a series of appropriate
phrases I sent for Angela, and awaited the result of the interview
between the two young persons with some anxiety, as you may believe.
You will be laughing at me and reflecting upon the inconsistency
of women when I tell you that I felt quite disturbed over Angela's
absolute and unequivocal dismissal of the Count's suit. He has been
growing in favor with me ever since that fairy-like afternoon at the
Boboli Gardens, and when he came to take a solemn and ceremonious
farewell of me, assuring me that he had spent the happiest hours of his
life in _our_ society, and was so exquisitely courteous, so evidently
anxious to save me from embarrassment, I found myself liking him
almost as much as Ludovico. We shall miss him sadly, and, to add to our
sorrows, Ludovico, loyal friend that he is, has gone with the Count.
"Did you send him away, too, heartless one?" I asked Angela.
She looked at me reproachfully, her lovely blue eyes full of tears, and
replied, with gentle dignity, "How can you be so unkind, Margaret? You
know very well that I did not."
It appears that this is all that Zelphine and I are to hear on
this most exciting subject, although we are naturally devoured with
curiosity to know more. If only Count B. had not declared himself just
at this time, when we were all so happy together in this beautiful
Florence! I am quite sure that the affair was brought to a crisis by
Angela's charming appearance last Sunday in a ravishing costume of
pale blue muslin, her golden crescent of hair adorned with one of the
Tuscan hats that we buy for next to nothing at the Mercato Vecchio.
This particular hat was of silvery blue turned up with white roses,
and became her almost as well as a coronet--so I am sure the Count
thought. To-day there is nothing gay in the heavens above or on the
earth beneath, as the skies, suiting themselves to our mood, are heavy
and gray, and the Arno is dull green instead of lovely blue.
[Illustration: The Michael Angelo Well at the Certosa, Florence]
The Convent of San Marco was decided upon as an appropriate place in
which to spend this morning, and there, walking through the cloisters,
adorned with their exquisite frescoes, Zelphine and I to some extent
renewed our interest in life. Angela has gone off on a sketching trip
to Certosa with Katharine Clarke. She has been wishing ever since
she first saw it to get a sketch of the Michael Angelo well in the
convent garden, and then I think that she is glad to be away from our
questioning eyes for a day. Poor child! she looks pale and wan; the
excitement of the last weeks has been too much for her. We are thinking
seriously of leaving for Venice soon. Of course we have not seen half
the things we wish to see in Florence, but we can never be quite as
happy here as we have been, and Miss Morris writes from Venice, urging
us to join her there for the full o' the moon.
Zelphine and I talked over our plans as we strolled through the
cloisters, and in the little convent garden tried to fancy the great
preacher of San Marco sitting under the "damask rose-tree," with his
disciples gathered around him. The spirit of Savonarola dominates San
Marco as that of St. Francis holds one spellbound in Assisi.
Some of the little cells of the brothers are adorned with exquisite
frescoes by Fra Angelico, which must often have cheered their sad
hearts. We stood in Savonarola's own small room, which is marked by a
memorial tablet, and here in the adjoining chapel are his rosary and
the crucifix before which he knelt in prayer.
Curious and unexpected, savoring more of the pride of life than of
the humility of the spirit, in one of the cells of San Marco is an
elaborate genealogical tree giving the descent of the monks. It was
with some difficulty that we deciphered the name of Savonarola, now
almost obliterated by the kisses of the faithful.
One of the most beautiful paintings in the convent is a Last Supper,
by Ghirlandajo, in the smaller refectory. This picture, with its
lovely details, decorated background, and well-spread board, does
not represent poor men or fishermen at meat; but in Italy one becomes
accustomed to the rich surroundings of Madonnas, saints, and apostles.
Realism is not demanded; it is enough if one finds reverence and
devotion; and as Mr. Henry James says of this picture, "the figures
in their varied naturalness have a dignity and sweetness of attitude
which admits of numberless reverential constructions." The grouping
is charming, and through open arcades one looks beyond at a garden of
full-fruited orange-trees, clusters of fruit are scattered over the
table, strange birds fly through the air, and a peacock perched on
the wall looks down upon the sacred feast. I shall always recall this
painting, so lovely in composition, so rich in color, when I think of
San Marco--this and Fra Angelico's beautiful Annunciation, which is
familiar to us all. We shall not see them soon again, or any of the
other pictures that we love so well in the Uffizi and the Pitti and the
Belle Arti; instead, we shall be studying the Carpaccios in Venice.
May 23d.
The skies have cleared to-day and life looks brighter, yet this is
the anniversary of a most tragic event, the execution of Savonarola.
The great Piazza della Signoria has been crowded with people all
morning; there have been processions, and services in the churches,
and hundreds of men and women going to offer their tribute of flowers
to the memory of the great martyr for conscience' sake, until the
tablet that marks the spot where Savonarola's body was burned is
heaped with wreaths, crosses, and bunches of roses of various colors.
Some of these offerings have cards attached to them with Savonarola's
name written on them; upon others are inscriptions and sentiments,
the one that most impressed us being "To Savonarola, a Martyr to
Democratic Christianity." If time has its revenges, it has also its
justifications!
XVII
HAPS AND HAPPENINGS
BEAU RIVAGE, VENICE, May 25th.
As we first saw Venice from the train, across a stretch of green
marsh, its domes, spires, churches, and bridges seemed to rise out
of the water just as you see them in Turner's pictures, with such an
atmosphere as that great artist knew how to paint, veiling the delicate
ethereal beauty of this bride of the sea. We were aroused from our rapt
contemplation of the scene before us by the bustle and commotion of
the arrival of the train and questions about luggage, hotels, and the
proper fees to be given to the men who pushed our gondola off from the
landing. If ever trunks are endurable it is when, as in Venice, one
glides away with them in a gondola over summer seas.
There was some sort of a celebration last night, something special,
I mean, for Venice must always appear more or less _en fête_. When
we stepped into a gondola after dinner, the many boats with their gay
pennons of all colors and the skiffs with their rich brown and yellow
sails made the Grand Canal appear like a carnival of nations. And what
a background for a carnival is the Canalazzo, as the Venetians call it,
with its long vista of palaces, their _pali_ painted in various colors,
the Dogana surmounted by its curious weathercock, Fortune, aptly
typifying the vicissitudes of Venice, Santa Maria della Salute glowing
in the evening light with the shades of a bride rose, San Giorgio of
a deep red, the Doge's Palace with its long, low water-front, the
Bridge of Sighs spanning the dark canal that lies between a palace
and a prison, and out on the open Piazzetta the two huge granite
pillars which we see in so many pictures! One of these pillars is
surmounted by the statue of St. Theodore, an ancient and now deposed
patron saint of Venice, the other by the Lion of St. Mark, eager,
watchful, dominant, clearly defined against the blue of the sky--for
here the twilight lasts long, and far into the night the sky is of an
exquisite, translucent blue such as one usually sees far north, much
farther north than Venice. This is a part of the atmospheric charm,
which makes it as impossible to describe this city of pearl and opaline
tints and golden and crimson glows as it is to put the colors of a
sunset on paper. Later the moon rose, and we floated over a silver sea,
while strains of music, the cries of the gondoliers, and the songs of
pleasure-parties were wafted to us across the water. Zelphine's eyes
shone with rapturous delight; the excitement of the stimulating air
and the beauty of the scene sent the red blood to Angela's cheeks until
they flushed to as deep a rose as under the fire of the Count de B.'s
most extravagant compliments, and I--well, I have no idea of how I
looked, I only know that I felt as if every craving for beauty that I
had known in all my life was satisfied entirely.
Miss Morris, who had already experienced her first thrills of delight
"upon such a night as this," watched us in silence and we were thus
spared the distraction of voluble enthusiasm; of deep, restrained
enthusiasm there was quite enough for one gondola.
May 27th.
We are lodged in a pleasant, airy hotel on the Grand Canal where it
begins to widen out toward the sea, and opposite the Island of San
Giorgio Maggiore. This hotel is not absolutely in the canal, like most
of the houses of this "water-logged town," as some Western traveller
dubbed it, but has a strip of pavement in front, just enough dry
land to make us realize that we still belong to the earth. On general
principles I should say that the Venetians never sleep, for over the
stone flagging between our hotel and the Canalazzo people are tramping
all night, laughing, chatting, and singing. And we, in sympathy with
them, sit by the windows for hours, feeling that the nights are too
radiantly beautiful to be devoted to so prosaic a business as sleeping,
which, as Angela remarks, "can be done in any old place." The child has
so considerately refrained from having "the time of her life" in Italy
and from measuring things generally by "galores," that we occasionally
allow her to indulge in an innocent bit of slang.
May 28th.
Our days glide by as swiftly as those of the "pilgrim stranger" in
the hymn that we used to sing at Sunday School. We spend our mornings
in churches or at the Accademia, revelling in the gorgeous canvases
of Tintoretto, Titian, Paul Veronese, and Carpaccio. The color in
Carpaccio's Presentation of Christ in the Temple is beautiful, and as
vivid as if it had been painted yesterday, quite equal to Ghirlandajo's
in his Adoration of the Magi, which we saw at the Foundling Hospital
in Florence. The Child in Carpaccio's Presentation is a happy,
smiling human baby, and the three little angels playing upon musical
instruments are charming. The most fascinating of these cherubs,
however, are in Giovanni Bellini's Madonnas at the Church of the
Redentore and at the Frari. Zelphine has bought a dozen photographs
of her favorite cherub in the picture in which the Madonna holds the
sleeping Babe upon her lap, while the two darling cherubs play to
him on mandolins. The little fellow on the right is not as pretty and
chubby as his brother; but to prevent jealousy between the two I have
bought some of his pictures for my collection.
Of course we spend many hours in and around St. Mark's, for, like the
bride of the Scriptures, this church is beautiful within and without.
The day after our arrival, on our way home from the Posta and the
Rialto, through the Merceria, a part of Venice in which one may really
walk a considerable distance, we suddenly stepped into the Piazza of
San Marco, with its fluttering pigeons, its arcades, its Clock-tower,
and at the end the marvellous façade of the church, rich in color, its
gilded mosaics glittering in the sun and the "glorious team of horses"
dashing toward us. Since then, wherever we may be going, we always
seem to cross the Square of St. Mark, and by sunlight or twilight
or moonlight, or even electric light, by which we saw San Marco last
night when we went to Florian's for ices, it is always bewilderingly
beautiful. Rich and varied, "gorgeous in the wild, luxurious fancies
of the East," is St. Mark's; almost too gorgeous it would be, had not
time softened and mellowed its vivid colors, and if its setting were
not against a sea and sky of surpassing brilliancy.
[Illustration: Palazzo Rezzonico]
Our afternoons and evenings are spent on the water or at the Lido,
where we have tea in the garden, or with one of our Philadelphia
friends who has a cabin, after the Venetian fashion, on this narrow
strip of land that runs out into the ocean. It is hot now at mid-day,
and one needs to keep out of the sun between the hours of one and four;
but after that there is usually a breeze and always coolness at the
Lido.
We spent some hours to-day in the Palazzo Rezzonico, which now belongs
to Mr. Robert Barrett Browning. One large room on the second floor is
filled with furniture and pictures from the Casa Guidi in Florence,
among other things Mrs. Browning's little table upon which she wrote
her songs for Italy, and her small, old-fashioned, green leather
writing-desk, which looked as if she had left it but yesterday, with
pen and paper and some pressed flowers inside. On one side of the room,
toward the canal, in a recess in the wall, is a little shrine that the
poet's son has placed here in memory of his mother. In gold letters on
a white ground are the well-known lines from the tablet upon the Casa
Guidi.
The poet Browning spent the last weeks of his life in a suite of rooms
on the lower floor of the Palazzo Rezzonico, and here he died, which
fact is recorded upon a tablet on the outside wall. We stopped to
reread the inscription upon the gray palace wall. A young girl who was
with her mother in a gondola quite near was reading aloud in English
the Italian words upon the tablet, "Robert Browning died in this
house, December 12, 1889," and the impressive and quite untranslatable
"Venezia pose." With a questioning look at us she repeated the familiar
lines from "De Gustibus":
"Open my heart and you will see,
Graven inside of it, 'Italy,'"
adding, "But I don't see where the poetry comes in."
Although Zelphine, amiable as she is, is quite capable of withering
and shrivelling with a glance any one who speaks slightingly of Robert
Browning's poetry, she turned to the girl and said quite pleasantly,
"No, there are no rhymes or jingles, only the deep thought of a great
poet who loved Italy truly."
"Oh," exclaimed the girl, "I did not understand."
"Evidently," said Zelphine, as we rowed out into the Grand Canal, "and
for the same reason that Kipling's girl of 'the rag and the bone and
the hank of hair' did not understand."
We really should have become used to people who do not understand, we
meet so many of them.
RIVA SAN LORENZO, VERONA,
Sunday, June 5th.
You will be surprised to learn that we have quitted our beloved Venice,
and quite suddenly, which is, I believe, the only way that we could
have disentangled ourselves from the allurements of that fairy city.
In the last week quite a number of our friends arrived from Florence
and elsewhere, and there have been afternoon teas at the Lido and at
Mrs. Allen's little apartment on the Grand Canal nearly opposite the
palace of his superseded majesty, Don Carlos of Spain, water-parties
every night, and just as we were stepping into a gondola yesterday
morning, _en route_ for Padua, a note was handed to Zelphine containing
a charming invitation from Mrs. B., to take tea and spend the afternoon
with her at the Palazzino Tasso. She has been at Borca in the Dolomites
for a fortnight, and wrote that she would be at home in time to receive
us on Monday afternoon. So you see how difficult it was for us to
get away from this fascinating place; but having planned to take this
little _giro_ with Miss Morris, we set our faces resolutely westward.
We spent a day at Padua, which is on the way to Verona, as there are
some frescoes by Mantegna, Titian, Giotto, and Palma Vecchio that Miss
Morris was particularly anxious to see. Our visit to the Basilica
of St. Anthony of Padua, which with its seven domes is larger than
San Marco, was not entirely satisfactory, as a high mass was being
celebrated before the altar above which are the Donatello bronzes,
and we were obliged to return in the afternoon or give up all thought
of seeing those superb reliefs. At the Scuola del Carmine we were
abundantly compensated for all other disappointments, as here we found
a series of frescoes representing events in the life of the parents of
the Blessed Virgin, as realistic in design and as frank in execution
as the Giotto paintings in Assisi. We wondered in what fertile brain
had originated the pathetic story here represented by Giotto and his
pupils. Miss Morris says that she intends to look up the story of
Joachim and Anna in the lives of the saints, assuring us that we shall
find a continuation of their domestic trials and experiences on the
walls of the Brera at Milan. No frescoes except those at Assisi have
interested us as much as these, not on account of their beauty, but for
their human feeling. These early Paduan masters treated sacred subjects
with realistic simplicity and yet with perfect reverence and devotional
spirit.
On the piazza of the Cappella San Giorgio is Donatello's fine bronze
statue of General Gattamelata. This statue, the Marcus Aurelius in
Rome, and the Colleoni in Venice are considered the greatest equestrian
statues in the world. Beautiful as is this Gattamelata, which possesses
all the spirit and grace of Donatello, it does not compare with the
Colleoni. No man of bronze or marble ever sat his horse with the
strength and ease with which the grand, dominant figure of the Italian
_condottiere_ sits his superb charger and rides out boldly into space.
Miss Morris says that we may be pleased to know that Mr. Ruskin quite
agreed with us about the Colleoni.