are left unconnected above, in order that the tower-high car of S.
Rosalia may be able to pass through, on her famous festival, we were
driven into the city, and alighted, almost immediately, at a large
hotel on our left. The host, an old, decent person, long accustomed to
see strangers of every nation and tongue, conducted us into a large
room, the balcony of which commanded a view of the sea, with the
roadstead, where we recognised our ship, Monte Rosalia, and the beach,
and were enabled to form an idea of our whereabouts. Highly satisfied
with the position of our room, We did not for some time observe that,
at the farther end of it, was an alcove, slightly raised, and concealed
by curtains, in which was a most spacious bed, with a magnificent
canopy and curtains of silk, in perfect keeping with the other
stately, but old fashioned, furniture of our apartment. This display
of splendour made me uneasy; so, as my custom was, I wished to make an
agreement with my host. To this the old man replied that conditions
were unnecessary, and he trusted I should have nothing to complain of
in him. We were also at liberty to make use of the ante-room, which
was next to our apartment, and cool, airy, and agreeable from its many
balconies.
We amused ourselves with the endless variety of views, and endeavoured
to sketch them one by one in pencil, or in colours, for here the eye
fell upon a plentiful harvest for the artist.
[Sidenote: Sicily--Palermo.]
In the evening the lovely moonlight attracted us once more to the
roadstead, and even after our return riveted us for some time on the
balcony. The light was peculiar,--the repose and loveliness of the
scene were extreme.
* * * * *
_Palermo, Tuesday, April_ 3, 1787.
Our first business was to examine the city, which is easy enough to
survey, but difficult to know; easy, because a street a mile long, from
the lower to the upper gate, from the sea to the mountain, intersects
it, and is itself again crossed, nearly in its middle, by another.
Whatever lies on these two great lines is easily found; but in the
inner streets a stranger soon loses himself, and without a guide will
never extricate himself from their labyrinths.
Towards evening our attention was directed to the long line of
carriages, (of the well-known build,) in which the principal persons of
the neighbourhood were taking their evening drive from the city to the
beach, for the sake of the fresh air, amusement, and perhaps also for
intrigue.
It was full moon about two hours before midnight, and the evening
was in consequence indescribably glorious. The northerly position of
Palermo produces a very strange effect; as the city and shore come
between the sun and the harbour, its reflection is never observed on
the waves. On this account, though it was one of the very brightest
of days yesterday, I found the sea of a deep blue colour, solemn, and
oppressive; whereas, at Naples, after noon-day, it gets brighter and
brighter, and glitters with more airy lightness, and to a greater
distance.
Kniep has to-day left me to make my pilgrimages and observations by
myself, in order that he might accurately sketch the outline of Monte
Pellegrino, the most beautiful headland in the whole world.
* * * * *
_Palermo, April_ 3, 1787.
Here again I must put a few things together, something in the way of an
appendix, and with the carelessness of familiarity.
At sunset of the 29th of March we set sail for Naples, and at last,
after a passage of four days and three hours, cast anchor in the
harbour of Palermo. The little diary which I enclose, will give an
account of ourselves and our fortunes. I never entered upon a journey
so calmly as I did this, and never have I had a quieter time of it
than during our passage, which a constant headwind has unusually
prolonged, even though I passed the time chiefly on my bed, in a close
little berth, to which I was obliged to keep during the first day,
in consequence of a violent attack of sea-sickness. Now my thoughts
pass over towards you; for if ever anything has exercised a decided
influence on my mind, this voyage has certainly done so.
He who has never seen himself surrounded on all sides by the sea, can
never possess an idea of the world, and of his own relation to it. As
a landscape painter, this great simple line has given me entirely new
ideas.
During our voyage we had, as the diary records, many changes, and,
on a small scale, experienced all a sailor's fortunes. However, the
safety and convenience of the packet-boat cannot be sufficiently
commended. Our captain is a very brave and an extremely handsome man.
My fellow-passengers consisted of a whole theatrical troop, well
mannered, tolerable, and agreeable. My artist, who accompanies me, is a
merry true-hearted fellow. In order to shorten the weary hours of the
passage, he has explained to me all the mechanical part of _aquarell_,
or painting in water colours,--an art which has been carried to a great
height of perfection in Italy. He thoroughly understands the effect
of particular colours in effecting certain tones, to produce which,
without knowing the secret, one might go on mixing for ever. I had,
it is true, learned a good deal of it in Rome, but never before so
systematically. The artists must have studied and perfected the art in
a country like Italy or this. No words can express the hazy brilliancy
which hung around the coasts, as on a most beautiful noon we neared
Palermo. He who has once seen it will never forget it. Now, at last, I
can understand Claude Lorraine, and can cherish a hope that hereafter,
in the north, I shall be able to produce, from my soul, at least a
faint idea of these glorious abodes. Oh! that only all littleness had
departed from it as entirely as the little charm of thatched roofs has
vanished from among my ideas of what a drawing should be. We shall see
what this "Queen of Islands" can do.
[Sidenote: Sicily-Palermo.]
No words can express the welcome--with its fresh green mulberry trees,
evergreen oleanders, and hedges of citron, &c. In the open gardens you
see large beds of ranunculuses and anemones. The air is mild, warm, and
fragrant; the wind refreshing. The full moon, too, rose from behind a
promontory, and shone upon the sea;--and this joyous scene after being
tossed about four days and nights on the waves!
Forgive me if, with a stump of a pen and the Indian-ink my
fellow-traveller uses for his sketches, I scribble down these remarks.
I send them to you as a faint lisping murmur; since I am preparing for
all that love me another record of these, my happy hours. What it is to
be I say not; and when you will receive it, that also it is out of my
power to tell.
* * * * *
_Palermo, Tuesday, April_ 3.
This letter must, as far as possible, impart to you, my dearest
friends, a high treat; it is intended to convey to you a description
of an unrivalled bay, embracing a vast mass of waters. Beginning from
the east, where a flattish headland runs far out into the sea, it is
dotted with many rugged, beautifully-shaped, wood-crowned rocks, until
it reaches the fishing-huts of the suburbs; then the town itself, whose
foremost houses (and among them our own hotel) all look towards the
harbour and to the great gate by which we entered.
Then it stretches westwards, and passing the usual landing-place, where
vessels of smaller burden can lie to, comes next to what is properly
the harbour, near the Mole, which is the station of all larger vessels;
and then, at the western point, to protect the shipping, rises Monte
Pellegrino, with its beautiful contour, after leaving between it and
the mainland a lovely fertile valley, which at its other end again
reaches the sea.
Kniep sketched away. I took, with my mind's eye, the plan of the
country--(_ich schematisirte_)--with great delight; and now, glad
to have reached home again, we feel neither strength nor energy to
tell a long story, and to go into particulars. Our endeavours must,
therefore, be reserved for a future occasion; and this sheet must serve
to convince you of our inability adequately to seize these objects, or
rather of our presumption in thinking to grasp and master them in so
short a time.
* * * * *
_Palermo, Wednesday April_ 4, 1787.
In the afternoon we paid a visit to the fertile and delightful valley
at the foot of the Southern Mountains, running by Palermo, and through
which the Oreto meanders. Here, too, is a call for the painter's eye,
and a practised hand to convey an idea of it. Kniep, however, hastily
seized an excellent point of view at a spot where the pent-up water was
dashing down from a half-broken weir, and was shaded by a lovely group
of trees, behind which an uninterrupted prospect opened up the valley,
affording a view of several farm buildings.
Beautiful spring weather, and a budding luxuriance, diffused over the
whole valley a refreshing feeling of peace, which our stupid guide
marred by his ill-timed erudition, telling us that in former days,
Hannibal had fought a battle here, and circumstantially detailing all
the dreadful feats of war which had been perpetrated on the spot. In
no friendly mood I reproved him for thus fatally calling up again such
departed spectres. It was bad enough, I said, that from time to time
the crops should be trodden down, if not by elephants, yet by men and
horses. At any rate, it was not right to scare away the peaceful dreams
of imagination by reviving such tumults and horrors.
The guide was greatly surprised that I could, on such a spot, despise
classical reminiscences; and I, too, could not make him understand how
greatly such a mingling of the past with the present displeased me.
Still more singular did our guide deem me, when at all the shallow
places, of which many were left quite dry by the stream, I searched
for pebbles, and carried off with me specimens of each sort. I again
found it difficult to make him understand that there was no readier
way of forming an idea of a mountainous district like that before us,
than by examining the nature of the stones which are washed down by
the streams, and that in so doing, the purpose was to acquire a right
notion of those eternally classic heights of the ancient world.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Sicily-Palermo.]
And, indeed, my gains from this stream were large enough: I carried
away nearly forty specimens, which, however, may be comprised under
a few classes. Most of these were of a species of rock, which, in
one respect, might be regarded as a sort of jasper or hornblende; in
another, looked like clay-slate. I found some pebbles rounded, others
of a rhomboidal shape, others of irregular forms, and of various
colours. Moreover, many varieties of the primeval limestone, not a few
specimens of breccia, of which the substratum was lime, and holding
jasper, or modifications of limestone. Rubbles of muschelkalk also were
not wanting.
* * * * *
The horses here are fed on barley, chaff, (_hackerling_) and clover. In
spring they give them the green barley, in order to refresh them--_per
rinfrescar_ is the phrase. As there are no meadows here, they have no
hay. On the hill-sides there are some pasture-lands, and also in the
corn-fields, as a third is always left fallow. They keep but few sheep,
and these are of a breed from Barbary. On the whole they have more
mules than horses, because the hot food suits the former better than
the latter.
* * * * *
The plain on which Palermo lies, as well as the districts of Ai Colli,
which lie without the city, and a part also of Baggaria, have for their
basis the muschelkalk, of which the city is built. There are, for this
purpose, extensive quarries of it in the neighbourhood. In one place,
near Monte Pellegrino, they are more than fifty feet deep, The lower
layers are of a whiter hue. In it are found many petrified corals and
other shell-fish, but principally great scallops. The upper stratum is
mixed with red marl, and contains but few, if any, fossils. Right above
it lies the red marl, of which, however, the layer is not very stiff.
Monte Pellegrino, however, rises out of all this; it is a primary
limestone, has many hollows and fissures, which, although very
irregular, when closely observed are found to follow the order of the
strata. The stone is close, and rings when struck.
* * * * *
_Palermo, Thursday, April_ 5, 1787.
We have gone carefully through, the city. The style of architecture
resembles for the most part that of Naples; but the public buildings,
for instance the fountains, are still further removed from good taste.
Here there is no artistic mind to regulate the public works; the
edifices owe both their shape and existence to chance accidents. A
fountain, which is the admiration of the whole island, would, perhaps,
never have existed, had not Sicily furnished a beautiful variegated
marble, and had not a sculptor, well practised in animal shapes
happened to be in favour precisely at the time. It would be a difficult
matter to describe this fountain. In a moderately-sized site stands
a round piece of masonry, not quite a staff high (_Stock hoch_). The
socle, the wall, and the cornice are of variegated marble. In the wall
are several niches in a row, from which animals of all kinds in white
marble, are looking with stretched-out necks. Horses, lions, camels,
and elephants, are interchanged one with another; and one scarcely
expects to find, within the circle of this menagerie, a fountain, to
which, through four openings, marble steps lead you down to draw from
the water, which flows in rich abundance.
The same nearly may be said of the churches, in which even the Jesuits'
love of show and finery is surpassed--but not from design or plan, but
by accident--just as artist after artist, whether sculptor or carver,
gilder, lackerer, or worker in marble chose, without taste or rule, to
display on each vacant spot his own abilities.
Amidst all this, however, one cannot fail to recognize a certain talent
in imitating natural objects; for instance, the heads of the animals
around the fountains are very well executed. By this means it is, in
truth, that the admiration of the multitude is excited, whose artistic
gratification consists chiefly in comparing the imitation with its
living prototype.
Towards evening I made a merry acquaintance, as I entered the house of
a small dealer in the Long Street, in order to purchase some trifles.
As I stood before the window to look at the wares, a slight breeze
arose, which eddying along the whole, street, at last distributed
through all the windows and doors the immense cloud of dust which
it had raised. "By all the saints," I cried, "whence comes till the
dust of your town--is there no helping it? In its length and beauty,
this street vies with any in the Corso in Rome. On both sides a fine
pavement, which each stall and shop-holder keeps clean by interminable
sweeping, but brushes everything into the middle of the street, which
is, in consequence, so much the dirtier, and with every breath of wind
sends back to you the filth which has just before been swept into the
roadway. In Naples busy donkeys carry off day by day the rubbish to the
gardens and farms. Why should you not here contrive and establish some
similar regulation?"
[Sidenote: Sicily--Palermo.]
"Things with us are as they are," he replied; "we throw everything out
of the house, and it rots before the door; you see here horse-dung and
filth of all kinds--it lies there and dries, and returns to us again in
the shape of dust. Against it we are taking precautions all day long.
But look, our pretty little and ever-busy brooms, worn out at last,
only go to increase the heap of filth before our doors."
And oddly enough it was actually so. They had nothing but very little
besoms of palm-branches, which, slightly altered, might have been
really useful; but as it was, they broke off easily, and the stumps
were lying by thousands in the streets. To my repeated questioning,
whether there was no board or regulations to prevent all this; he
replied, "A story is current among the people that those whose duty it
was to provide for the cleansing of our streets, being men of great
power and influence, could not be compelled to disburse the money on
its lawful objects; and besides that there was also the strange fact
that certain parties feared that if the dirty straw and dung were swept
away, every one would see how badly the pavement beneath was laid
down." And so the dishonesty of a second body would be thereby exposed.
"All this, however," he remarked, with a most humorous expression, "is
merely the interpretation which the ill-disposed put upon it." For his
part, he was of the opinion of those who maintained that the nobles
preserved this soft litter for their carriages, in order that, when
they take their drive for amusement in the evening, they might ride at
ease over the elastic ground. And as the man was now in the humour, he
joked away at many of the abuses of the police,--a consolatory proof to
me that man has always humour enough to make merry with what he cannot
help.
S. Rosalia, the patron saint of Palermo, is so universally known, from
the description which Brydone has given of her festival, that it must
assuredly be agreeable to my friends to read some account of the place
and the spot where she is most particularly worshipped.
Monte Pellegrino, a vast mass of rocks, of which the breadth is
greater than the height, lies on the north-west extremity of the Bay
of Palermo. Its beautiful form admits not of being described by words;
a most excellent view of it may be seen in the _Voyage Pittoresque de
la Sicile._ It consists of a gray limestone of the earlier epoch. The
rocks are quite barren, not a tree nor a bush will grow on them; even
the more smooth and level portions are but barely covered with grasses
or mosses.
In a cavern of this mountain, the bones of the saint were discovered,
at the beginning of the last century, and brought to Palermo. The
presence of them delivered the city from a pestilence, and ever since
S. Rosalia has been the Patron Saint of the people. Chapels have been
built in her honour, splendid festivals have been instituted.
The pious and devout frequently made pilgrimages to the mountain; and
in consequence a road has been made to it, which, like an ancient
aqueduct, rests on arches and columns, and ascends zigzag between the
rocks.
The place of worship is far more suitable to the humility of the saint
who retired thither, than are the splendid festivities which have
been instituted in honour of her total renunciation of the world. And
perhaps the whole of Christendom, which now, for eighteen hundred
years, has based its riches, pomps, and festival amusements, on the
memory of its first founders and most zealous confessors, cannot point
out a holy spot which has been adorned and rendered venerable in so
eminent and delightful a way.
When you have ascended the mountain, you proceed to the corner of a
rock, over against which there rises a high wall of stone. On this the
Church and the monastery are very finely situated.
The exterior of the church has nothing promising or inviting; you open
its door without any high expectation, but on entering are ravished
with wonder. You find yourself in a vast vestibule, which extends to
the whole breadth of the church, and is open towards the nave. You see
here the usual vessel of holy water and some confessionals. The nave is
an open space, which on the right is bounded by the native rock, and on
the left by the continuation of the vestibule. It is paved with flat
stones on a slight inclination, in order that the rain water may run
off. A small well stands nearly in the centre.
[Sidenote: Palermo--S. Rosalia.]
The cave itself has been transformed into the choir, without, however,
any of its rough natural shape being altered. Descending a few steps,
close upon them stands the choristers' desk with the choir books, and
on each side are the seats of the choristers. The whole is lighted by
the daylight, which is admitted from the court or nave. Deep within, in
the dark recesses of the cave, stands the high-altar.
As already stated, no change has been made in the cave; only, as the
rocks drop incessantly with water, it was necessary to keep the place
dry. This has been effected by means of tin tubes, which are fastened
to every projection of the rock, and are in various ways connected
together. As they are broad above and come to a narrow edge below, and
are painted of a dull green colour, they give to the rock an appearance
of being overgrown with a species of cactus. The water is conducted
into a clear reservoir, out of which it is taken by the faithful as a
remedy and preventative for every kind of ill.
As I was narrowly observing all this, an ecclesiastic came up to me and
asked whether I was a Genoese, and wished a mass or so to be said? I
replied upon this that I had come to Palermo with a Genoese, who would
to-morrow, as it was a festival, come up to the shrine; but, as one
of us must always be at home, I had come up to day in order to look
about me. Upon this he observed, I was at perfect liberty to look at
everything at my leisure, and to perform my devotions. In particular he
pointed out to me a little altar which stood on the left as especially
holy, and then left me.
Through the openings of a large trellis work of lattice, lamps appeared
burning before an altar. I knelt down close to the gratings and peeped
through. Further in, however, another lattice of brass wire was drawn
across, so that one looked as it were through gauze at the objects
within. By the light of some dull lamps I caught sight of a lovely
female form.
She lay seemingly in a state of ecstasy--the eyes half-closed, the
head leaning carelessly on her right hand, which was adorned with many
rings. I could not sufficiently discern her face, but it seemed to be
peculiarly charming. Her robe was made of gilded metal, which imitated
excellently a texture wrought with gold. The head and hands were of
white marble. I cannot say that the whole was in the lofty style, still
it was executed so naturally and so pleasingly that one almost fancied
it must breathe and move. A little angel stands near her, and with a
bunch of lilies in his hand appears to be fanning her.
In the meanwhile the clergy had come into the cave, taken their places,
and began to chant the Vespers.
I took my seat right before the altar, and listened to them for a
while; then I again approached the altar, knelt down and attempted to
obtain a still more distinct view of the beautiful image. I resigned
myself without reserve to the charming illusion of the statue and the
locality.
The chant of the priests now resounded through the cave; the water was
trickling into the reservoir near the altar; while the over-hanging
rocks of the vestibule--the proper nave of the church--shut in the
scene. There was a deep stillness in this waste spot, whose inhabitants
seemed to be all dead-a singular neatness in a wild cave: the
tinsel and tawdry pomp of the Roman Catholic ceremonial, especially
as it is vividly decked out in Sicily, had here reverted to its
original simplicity. The illusion produced by the statue of the fair
sleeper--which had a charm even for the most practised eye:--enough, it
was with the greatest difficulty that I tore myself from the spot, and
it was late at night before I got back to Palermo.
* * * * *
_Palermo, Saturday, April_ 7, 1787.