ON FOOT. II: THREE CHURCHES AND CARPACCIO AGAIN
The Ponte di Paglia--A gondolier's shrine--The modern
prison--Danieli's--A Canaletto--S. Zaccaria--A good Bellini--A funeral
service--Alessandro Vittorio--S. Giovanni in Bragora--A good Cima--The
best little room--A seamen's institute--Carpaccio at his best--The story
of the dragon--The saint triumphant--The story of S. George--S. Jerome
and the lion--S. Jerome and the dog--S. Tryphonius and the basilisk--S.
Francesco della Vigna--Brother Antonio's picture--The Giustiniani
reliefs--Cloisters--A Veronese--Doge Andrea Gritti--Doge Niccolò
Sagredo.
I propose that we should walk from the Molo to S. Francesco della Vigna.
Our first bridge is the Ponte di Paglia (or straw), the wide and easy
glistening bridge which spans the Rio del Palazzo at the Noah corner of
the Doges' Palace. Next to the Rialto, this is the busiest bridge in the
city. Beautiful in itself, it commands great beauty too, for on the
north side you see the Bridge of Sighs and on the south the lagoon. On
its lagoon façade is a relief of a primitive gondola and the Madonna and
Child, but I have never seen a gondolier recognizing the existence of
this symbol of celestial interest in his calling.
The stern building at the corner of this bridge is the prison, with
accommodation for over two hundred prisoners. Leaning one day over the
Ponte di Paglia I saw one being brought in, in a barca with a green
box--as we should say, a Black and Green Maria. I cannot resist quoting
Coryat's lyrical passage in praise of what to most of us is as sinister
a building as could be imagined. "There is near unto the Dukes Palace a
very faire prison, the fairest absolutely that ever I saw, being divided
from the Palace by a little channell of water, and againe joyned unto it
by a merveilous faire little gallery that is inserted aloft into the
middest of the Palace wall East-ward. [He means the Bridge of Sighs.] I
thinke there is not a fairer prison in all Christendome: it is built
with very faire white ashler stone, having a little walke without the
roomes of the prison which is forty paces long and seven broad.... It is
altogether impossible for the prisoners to get forth."
The next important building is the famous hotel known as Danieli's, once
a palace, which has its place in literature as having afforded a shelter
to those feverish and capricious lovers, George Sand and Alfred de
Musset. Every one else has stayed there too, but these are the classic
guests. If you want to see what Danieli's was like before it became a
hotel you have only to look at No. 940 in the National Gallery by
Canaletto. This picture tells us also that the arches of the Doges'
Palace on the canal side were used by stall-holders. To-day they are
merely a shelter from sun or rain and a resting-place, and often you may
see a gondolier eating his lunch there. In this picture of Canaletto's,
by the way, the loafers have gathered at the foot of the Lion's column
exactly as now they do, while the balcony of the great south window of
the palace has just such a little knot of people enjoying the prospect;
but whether they were there naturally or at the invitation of a
custodian eager for a tip (as now) we shall not know.
The first calle after Danieli's brings us to S. Zaccaria, one of the few
Venetian churches with any marble on its façade. S. Zaccaria has no
longer the importance it had when the Doge visited it in state every
Easter. It is now chiefly famous for its very beautiful Bellini
altar-piece, of which I give a reproduction on the opposite page. The
picture in its grouping is typical of its painter, and nothing from his
hand has a more pervading sweetness. The musical angel at the foot of
the throne is among his best and the bland old men are more righteous
than rectitude itself. To see this altar-piece aright one must go in the
early morning: as I did on my first visit, only to find the central
aisle given up to a funeral mass.
The coffin was in the midst, and about it, on their knees, were the
family, a typical gondolier all in black being the chief mourner. Such
prayers as he might have been uttering were constantly broken into by
the repeated calls of an attendant with a box for alms, and it was
interesting to watch the struggle going on in the simple fellow's mind
between native prudence and good form. How much he ought to give?
Whether it was quite the thing to bring the box so often and at such a
season? Whether shaking it so noisily was not peculiarly tactless? What
the spectators and church officials would think if he refused? Could he
refuse? and, However much were these obsequies going to cost?--these
questions one could discern revolving almost visibly beneath his
short-haired scalp. At last the priests left the high altar and came
down to the coffin, to sprinkle it and do whatever was now possible for
its occupant; and in a few minutes the church was empty save for the
undertaker's men, myself, and the Bellini. It is truly a lovely picture,
although perhaps a thought too mild, and one should go often to see it.
[Illustration: MADONNA AND CHILD WITH SAINTS
FROM THE PAINTING BY GIOVANNI BELLINI
_In the Church of S. Zaccaria_]
The sculptor Alessandro Vittoria, who did so much to perpetuate the
features of great Venetians and was the friend of so many artists,
including Tintoretto and Paul Veronese, is buried here. The floor slabs
of red stone with beautiful lettering should be noticed; but all over
Venice such memorials have a noble dignity and simplicity.
It will be remembered that the site of this church was determined by the
vision of Bishop Magnus, S. John appearing to him and commanding it to
be built in honour of his father. The first structure probably dates
from the seventh century; the present is fifteenth century, and beneath
it is the ancient crypt adjoining the chapel of S. Tarasio, where in the
twelfth century a hundred nuns seeking refuge from a fire were
suffocated. In the chapel are ecclesiastical paintings, but no proper
provision is made for seeing them. Eight Doges lie in S. Zaccaria.
Outside I found a great crowd to see the embarcation of the corpse for
its last home, the Campo Santo. This, I may say, was rather a late
funeral. Most of them are at eight or even earlier.
It is best now to return to the Riva by the calle which comes out beside
Danieli's and then walk Lido-wards over two bridges and take the first
calle after them. This brings us to S. Giovanni in Bragora, S. John's
own church, built according to his instructions to Bishop Magnus, and it
has one of the keenest little sacristans in Venice. From altar to altar
he bustles, fixing you in the best positions for light. The great
picture here is the Cima behind the high altar, of which I give a
reproduction opposite page 136. A little perch has been made, the better
to see it. It represents "The Baptism of Christ," and must in its heyday
have been very beautiful. Christ stands at the edge of the water and the
Baptist holds a little bowl--very different scene from that mosaic
version in S. Mark's where Christ is half submerged. It has a sky full
of cherubs, delectable mountains and towns in the distance, and all
Cima's sweetness; and when the picture cleaning millionaire, of whom I
speak elsewhere, has done his work it will be a joy. There is also a
fine Bartolommeo Vivarini here, and the sacristan insists on your
admiring a very ornate font which he says is by Sansovino.
As you leave, ask him the way to S. Giorgio degli Schiavoni, which is
close by, and prepare to be very happy.
I have said something about the most beautiful spacious places in
Venice--S. Mark's, the Doges' Palace, the Scuola di S. Rocco, and so
forth; we now come to what is, without question, the most fascinating
small room in Venice. It is no bigger than a billiard-room and unhappily
very dark, with a wooden ceiling done in brown, gold, and blue; an altar
with a blue and gold canopy; rich panels on the walls; and as a frieze a
number of paintings by Vittore Carpaccio, which, in my opinion,
transcend in interest the S. Ursula series at the Accademia.
The story of the little precious room is this. In the multitude of
seafaring men who in the course of their trade came to Venice with
cargoes or for cargoes were a large number of Dalmatians, or
Sclavonians, whose ships lay as a rule opposite that part of the city
which is known as the Riva degli Schiavoni. Their lot being somewhat
noticeably hard, a few wealthy Dalmatian merchants decided in 1451 to
make a kind of Seamen's Institute (as we should now say), and a little
building was the result of this effort, the patron saints of the altar
in it being S. George and S. Tryphonius. Fifty years later the original
"Institute" was rebuilt and Carpaccio was called in to decorate it.
The most famous of the pictures are those on the left wall as you
enter--S. George attacking the dragon, S. George subduing the dragon,
and (on the end wall) S. George baptising the king and princess. These
are not only lovely autumnal schemes of colour, but they are perfect
illustrations to a fairy tale, for no artist has ever equalled this
Venetian in the art of being entertaining. Look at the spirit of the
first picture: the onset of both antagonists; and then examine the
detail--the remains of the dragon's victims, the half-consumed maidens;
the princess in despair; the ships on the sea; the adorable city
mounting up and up the hill, with spectators at every balcony. (I
reproduce it opposite page 212). And then in the next how Carpaccio must
have enjoyed his work on the costumes! Look at the crowds, the band in
full blast, the restless horses which like dragons no more than they
like bears.
The third, although the subject is less entertaining, shows no decrease
of liveliness. Carpaccio's humour underlies every touch of colour. The
dog's averted face is one of the funniest things in art--a dog with
sceptical views as to baptism!--and the band is hard at it, even though
the ceremony, which, from the size of the vase, promises to be very
thorough, is beginning.
S. George is a link between Venice and England, for we both honour him
as a patron. He is to be seen in pictures again and again in Venetian
churches, but these three scenes by Carpaccio are the finest. The Saint
was a Cappadocian gentleman and the dragon ranged and terrorized the
Libyan desert. Every day the people of the city which the dragon most
affected bribed him away with two sheep. When the sheep gave out a man
was substituted. Then children and young people, to be selected by lot,
and the lot in time fell on the king's daughter. The king in despair
offered his subjects gold and silver instead, but they refused saying
that it was his own law and must be obeyed. They gave her, however
(this, though from the lives of the saints, is sheer fairy tale, isn't
it?) eight days grace, in which anything might happen; but nothing
happened, and so she was led out to the dragon's lair.
As she stood there waiting to be devoured, S. George passed by. He asked
her what she was doing, and she replied by imploring him to run or the
dragon would eat him too. But S. George refused, and instead swore to
rescue her and the city in the name (and here the fairy tale disappears)
of Jesus Christ. The dragon then advancing, S. George spurred his horse,
charged and wounded him grievously with his spear. (On English gold
coins, as we all know to our shame, he is given nothing but a short
dagger which could not reach the enemy at all; Carpaccio knew better.)
Most of the painters make this stroke of the saint decisive; according
to them, S. George thrust at the dragon and all was over. But the true
story, as Caxton and Carpaccio knew, is, that having wounded the dragon,
S. George took the maiden's girdle and tied it round the creature's
neck, and it became "a meek beast and debonair," and she led it into the
city. (Carpaccio makes the saint himself its leader.) The people were
terrified and fled, but S. George reassured them, and promised that if
they would be baptised and believe in Jesus Christ he would slay the
dragon once and for all. They promised, and he smote off its head; and
in the third picture we see him baptising.
I have given the charming story as _The Golden Legend_ tells it; but one
may also hold the opinion, more acceptable to the orthodox hagiologist,
that the dreadful monster was merely symbolical of sin.
[Illustration: S. GEORGE AND THE DRAGON
FROM THE PAINTING BY CARPACCIO
_At S. Giorgio dei Schiavoni_]
As for S. George himself, the most picturesque and comely of all the
saints and one whom all the nations reverence, he was born in
Cappadocia, in the third century, of noble Christian parents. Becoming a
soldier in Diocletian's army he was made a tribune or colonel. The
Emperor showed him marks of especial favour, but when the imperial
forces were turned against the Christians, George remonstrated and
refused. He was therefore beheaded.
For broad comedy the picture of S. Jerome and the lion on the right wall
is the best. The story tells us that S. Jerome was one day sitting with
the brethren listening to a holy lesson when a lion came hobbling
painfully into the monastery. The brethren fled, but S. Jerome, like
Androcles, approached the beast, and finding that it had a sore foot,
commanded the others to return and minister to it. This they did, and
the lion was ever attached to the monastery, one of its duties being to
take care of an ass. Carpaccio has not spared the monks: he makes their
terror utterly absurd in the presence of so puzzled and gentle a
man-eater. In the next picture, the death of the saint, we see the lion
again, asleep on the right, and the donkey quietly grazing at the back.
As an impressive picture of the death of a good man it can hardly be
called successful; but how could it be, coming immediately after the
comic Jerome whom we have just seen? Carpaccio's mischief was a little
too much for him--look at the pince-nez of the monk on the right reading
the service.
Then we have S. Jerome many years younger, busy at his desk. He is just
thinking of a word when (the camera, I almost said) when Carpaccio
caught him. His tiny dog gazes at him with fascination. Not bad
surroundings for a saint, are they? A comfortable study, with a more
private study leading from it; books; scientific instruments; music;
works of art (note the little pagan bronze on the shelf); and an
exceedingly amusing dog. I reproduce the picture opposite page 82.
Two pictures with scriptural subjects represent Christ in the garden of
Gethsemane, and Matthew (an Evangelist rarely painted in Venice, where
his colleague Mark has all the attention) being called from the receipt
of custom. And finally there is the delightful and vivid representation
of S. Tryphonius and the basilisk. This picture, of which I give a
reproduction opposite page 76, is both charming and funny. The basilisk
is surely in the highest rank of the comic beasts of art. It seems to be
singing, but that is improbable; what it is unmistakably not doing is
basilisking. The little saint stands by in an attitude of prayer, and
all about are comely courtiers of the king. In the distance are
delightful palaces in the Carpaccio style of architecture, cool marble
spaces, and crowded windows and stairs. The steps of the raised temple
in which the saint and the basilisk perform have a beautiful intarsia of
foliage similar to that on the Giants' Staircase at the Doges' Palace.
So much for the ingredients of this bewitching picture; but as to what
it is all about I have no knowledge, for I have looked in vain among
books for any information. I find a S. Tryphonius, but only as a grown
man; not a word of his tender years and his grotesque attendant. How
amusing it would be to forget the halo and set the picture as a theme
among a class of fanciful fantastic writers, to fit it with an
appropriate fairy story! For of course it is as absolute a fairy tale
illustration as the dragon pictures on the other wall.
It is now well to ask the way to S. Francesco della Vigna, where we
shall find S. Jerome and his lion again. This vast church, with its
pretentious and very unwelcoming façade by Palladio covering the
friendly red brick, is at the first sight unattractive, so huge and
cold and deserted is it. But it has details. It has, for example, just
inside the door on the entrance wall, high up, a very beautiful early
Christian coloured relief of the Madonna and Child: white on blue, but
far earlier than the Delia Robbias. The Madonna is slender as a pole but
memorably sweet. It has also a curious great altar picture on wood by a
strange painter, Frater Antonius da Negropoñ, as he signs himself--this
in a little chapel in the right transept--with most charming details of
birds, and flowers, and scrolls, and monochrome reliefs surrounding a
Madonna and Child who beam comfort and assurance of joy. The date is
supposed to be about 1450 and the source of Brother Antonio's
inspiration must have been similar to that of the great Mantegna's.
There are also the very delightful marble pictures in the chapel of the
Giustiniani family to the left of the choir, the work of the Lombardi.
About the walls are the evangelists and prophets (S. John no more than a
beautiful and sensitive boy), while over the altar are scenes in the
life of S. Jerome, whom we again see with his lion. In one relief he
extracts the thorn from its foot; in another the lion assists in holding
up the theological work which the saint is perusing, while in his other
hand the saint poises a model of the church and campanile of S.
Zaccaria. Below, on the altar cloth, is a Last Judgment, with the
prettiest little angel boys to sound the dreadful trumps. To these must
be added two pictures by Paul Veronese, one with a kneeling woman in it
who at once brings to mind the S. Helena in our National Gallery.
Furthermore, in the little Cappella Santa is a rich and lovely Giovanni
Bellini, with sacred relics in jars above and below it, and outside is
the gay little cloistered garden of the still existing monastery, with
a figure of S. Francis in the midst of its greenery.
So much for the more ingratiating details of this great church, which
are displayed with much spirit by a young sacristan who is something of
a linguist: his English consisting of the three phrases: "Good morning,"
"Very nice," and "Come on!"
The great church has also various tombs of Doges, the most splendid
being that noble floor slab in front of the high altar, beneath which
repose the bones of Marcantonio Trevisan (1553-1554). What Trevisan was
like may be learned from the relief over the sacristy entrance, where he
kneels to the crucifix. He made no mark on his times. Andrea Gritti
(1523-1538), who also is buried here, was a more noticeable ruler, a
born monarch who had a good diplomatic and fighting training abroad
before he came to the throne. He was generous, long-memoried, astute,
jovial, angry, healthy, voluptuous and an enthusiast for his country. He
not only did all that he could for Venice (and one of his unfulfilled
projects was to extend the Ducal Palace to absorb the prison) but he was
quite capable of single-handed negotiations with foreign rulers.
Other Doges who lie here are the two Contarini, Francesco (1623-1624)
and Alvise (1676-1684), but neither was of account; and here, too, in
his own chapel lies Alvise's predecessor, Niccolò Sagredo (1674-1676)
who had trouble in Candia for his constant companion. Of the Giustiniani
only Marcantonio became a Doge and he succeeded Alvise Contarini not
only to the throne but to the Candia difficulty, giving way after four
years, in 1688, to the great soldier who solved it--Francesco Morosini.