and took up different positions by the canal. I walked backwards and
forwards between them, so as to leave the one whose turn it was to
sing, and to join the one who had just left off. Then it was that the
effect of the strain first opened upon me. As a voice from the distance
it sounds in the highest degree strange--as a lament without sadness:
it has an incredible effect, and is moving even to tears. I ascribed
this to my own state of mind, but my old boatman said: ‘È singolare,
come quel canto intenerisce, e molto piu quando è piu ben cantato.’
He wished that I could hear the women of the Lido, especially those
of Malamocco, and Pelestrina. These also, he told me, sang Tasso and
Ariosto to the same or similar melodies. He went on: ‘In the evening,
while their husbands are on the sea, fishing, they are accustomed to
sit on the beach, and with shrill and penetrating voice to make these
strains resound, until they catch from the distance the voices of their
partners, and in this way they keep up a communication with them.’ Is
not that beautiful? and yet, it is very possible that one who heard
them close by would take little pleasure in such tones which have to
vie with the waves of the sea. Human, however, and true becomes the
song in this way: thus is life given to the melody, on whose dead
elements we should otherwise have been sadly puzzled. It is the song
of one solitary, singing at a distance, in the hope that another of
kindred feelings and sentiments may hear and answer.
GOETHE.
THE GONDOLA
Boy, call the gondola; the sun is set.--
It came, and we embarked; but instantly,
As at the waving of a magic wand,
Though she had stept on board so light of foot,
So light of heart, laughing she knew not why,
Sleep overcame her; on my arm she slept.
From time to time I waked her; but the boat
Rocked her to sleep again. The moon was now
Rising full-orbed, but broken by a cloud.
The wind was hushed, and the sea mirror-like.
A single zephyr, as enamoured, played
With her loose tresses, and drew more and more
Her veil across her bosom. Long I lay
Contemplating that face so beautiful....
I went alone beneath the silent moon;
Thy square, St. Mark, thy churches, palaces,
Glittering and frost-like, and, as day drew on,
Melting away, an emblem of themselves.
Those porches passed, thro’ which the water-breeze
Plays, though no longer on the noble forms
That moved there, sable-vested--and the quay,
Silent, grass-grown--adventurer-like, I launched
Into the deep, ere long discovering
Isles such as cluster in the Southern seas,
All verdure....
In Venice, when again
In that strange place, so stirring and so still,
Where nothing comes to drown the human voice
But music, or the dashing of the tide,
Ceased I to wonder. Now a Jessica
Sung to her lute, her signal as she sate
At her half-open window. Then, methought,
A serenade broke silence, breathing hope
Thro’ walls of stone, and torturing the proud heart
Of some Priuli. Once, we could not err,
(It was before an old Palladian house,
As between night and day we floated by),
A gondolier lay singing: and he sung,
As in the time when Venice was herself,
Of Tancred and Erminia. On our oars,
We rested; and the verse was verse divine!
We could not err--perhaps he was the last--
For none took up the strain, none answered him;
And, when he ceased, he left upon my ear
A something like the dying voice of Venice!
The moon went down; and nothing now was seen
Save where the lamp of a Madonna shone
Faintly--or heard, but when he spoke, who stood
Over the lantern at the prow and cried,
Turning the corner of some reverend pile,
Some school or hospital of old renown,
Tho’ haply none were coming, none were near,
‘Hasten or slacken.’ But at length Night fled;
And with her fled, scattering, the sons of pleasure.
Star after star shot by, or, meteor-like,
Crossed me and vanished--lost at once among
Those hundred isles that tower majestically,
That rise abruptly from the water-mark,
Nor with rough crag, but marble, and the work
Of noblest architects.
SAMUEL ROGERS.
SING TO ME, GONDOLIER
Sing to me, Gondolier!
Sing words from Tasso’s lay;
While blue, and still, and clear,
Night seems but softer day.
The gale is gently falling,
As if it paused to hear
Some strain the past recalling--
Sing to me, Gondolier!
Oh, ask me not to wake
The memory of the brave;
Bid no high numbers break
The silence of the wave.
Gone are the noble-hearted,
Closed the bright pageants here;
And the glad song is departed
From the mournful Gondolier!
MRS. HEMANS.
THE GONDOLIER’S CRY
Most persons are now well acquainted with the general aspect of the
Venetian gondola, but few have taken the pains to understand the cries
of warning uttered by its boatmen, although those cries are peculiarly
characteristic, and very impressive to a stranger.... It may perhaps be
interesting to the traveller in Venice to know the general method of
management of the boat to which he owes so many happy hours.
A gondola is in general rowed only by one man, _standing_ at the stern;
those of the upper classes having two or more boatmen, for greater
speed and magnificence. In order to raise the oar sufficiently, it
rests, not on the side of the boat, but on a piece of crooked timber
like the branch of a tree, rising about a foot from the boat’s side,
and called a ‘fórcola.’ The fórcola is of different forms, according to
the size and uses of the boat, and it is always somewhat complicated
in its parts and curvature, allowing the oar various kinds of rest
and catches on both its sides, but perfectly free play in all cases;
as the management of the boat depends on the gondolier’s being able
in an instant to place his oar in any position. The fórcola is set
on the right-hand side of the boat, some six feet from the stern: the
gondolier stands on a little flat platform or deck behind it, and
throws nearly the entire weight of his body upon the forward stroke.
The effect of this stroke would be naturally to turn the boat’s head
round to the left, as well as to send it forward; but this tendency is
corrected by keeping the blade of the oar under the water in the return
stroke, and raising it gradually, as a full spoon is raised out of any
liquid, so that the blade emerges from the water only an instant before
it again plunges. A _downward_ and lateral pressure upon the fórcola
is thus obtained, which entirely counteracts the tendency given by the
forward stroke; and the effort, after a little practice, becomes hardly
conscious, though, as it adds some labour to the back stroke, rowing a
gondola at speed is hard and breathless work, though it appears easy
and graceful to the looker-on.
If then the gondola is to be turned to the left, the forward impulse is
given without the return stroke; if it is to be turned to the right,
the plunged oar is brought forcibly up to the surface; in either case a
single strong stroke being enough to turn the light and flat-bottomed
boat. But as it has no keel, when the turn is made sharply, as out of
one canal into another very narrow one, the impetus of the boat in its
former direction gives it an enormous leeway, and it drifts laterally
up against the wall of the canal, and that so forcibly, that if it has
turned at speed, no gondolier can arrest the motion merely by strength
or rapidity of stroke of oar; but it is checked by a strong thrust
of the foot against the wall itself, the head of the boat being, of
course, turned for the moment almost completely round to the opposite
wall, and greater exertion made to give it, as quickly as possible,
impulse in the new direction.
The boat being thus guided, the cry ‘Premi’ is the order from one
gondolier to another that he should ‘press’ or thrust forward his oar,
without the back stroke, so as to send his boat’s head round _to the
left_; and the cry ‘Stali’ is the order that he should give the return
or upward stroke which sends the boat’s head round to the _right_.
Hence, if two gondoliers meet under any circumstances which render it
a matter of question on which side they should pass each other, the
gondolier who has at the moment the least power over his boat cries to
the other ‘Premi,’ if he wishes the boats to pass with their right-hand
sides to each other, and ‘Stali’ if with their left. Now, in turning
a corner, there is, of course, risk of collision between boats coming
from opposite sides, and warning is always clearly and loudly given on
approaching an angle of the canals. It is, of course, presumed that
the boat which gives the warning will be nearer the turn than the
one which receives and answers it; and, therefore, will not have so
much time to check itself or alter its course. Hence the advantage of
the turn--that is, the outside, which allows the fullest swing, and
greatest room for leeway--is always yielded to the boat which gives
warning. Therefore, if the warning boat is going to turn to the right,
as it is to have the outside position, it will keep its own right-hand
side to the boat which it meets, and the cry of warning is therefore
‘Premi,’ twice given; first as soon as it can be heard round the angle,
prolonged and loud, with the accent on the _e_, and another strongly
accented _e_ added, a kind of question, ‘Prémi-é,’ followed, at the
instant of turning, with ‘Ah Premí,’ with the accent sharp on the
final _i_. If, on the other hand, the warning boat is going to turn to
the left, it will pass with its left-hand side to the one it meets; and
the warning cry is, ‘Stálié, Ah Stalí.’ Hence the confused idea in the
mind of the traveller that Stali means ‘to the left,’ and ‘Premi’ to
the right; while they mean, in reality, the direct reverse: the Stali,
for instance, being the order to the unseen gondolier who may be behind
the corner, coming from the left-hand side, that he should hold as much
as possible _to his own right_; this being the only safe order for him,
whether he is going to turn the corner himself, or to go straight on;
for as the warning gondola will always swing right across the canal
in turning, a collision with it is only to be avoided by keeping well
within it, and close up to the corner which it turns.
There are several other cries necessary in the management of the
gondola, but less frequently, so that the reader will hardly care for
their interpretation; except only the ‘sciar,’ which is the order to
the opposite gondolier to stop the boat as suddenly as possible by
slipping his oar in front of the fórcola. The _cry_ is never heard
except when the boatmen have got into some unexpected position,
involving a risk of collision; but the action is seen constantly, when
the gondola is rowed by two or more men (for if performed by the single
gondolier it only swings the boat’s head sharp round to the right), in
bringing up at a landing-place, especially when there is any intent of
display, the boat being first urged to its full speed and then stopped
with as much foam about the oar-blades as possible, the effect being
much like that of stopping a horse at speed by pulling him on his
haunches.
JOHN RUSKIN.
GONDOLIERS
VENICE, _May 1, 1834_.
You always wish to seize boldly upon beauty, to feel and know what it
is, to know why and how nature is worthy of your admiration and love.
I was explaining these feelings to our friend the other evening, as
we were passing in a gondola under the sombre arcade of the Bridge of
Sighs. Do you remember the light which is seen at the end of the canal,
and which is reflected and multiplied in the old and shining marble of
the palace of Bianca Cappello? In all Venice there is no canalletto
more mysterious, more melancholy. This single light, glancing on all
surrounding objects but enlightening none, dancing on the water, and
appearing to play in the wake of the passing gondolas, as though it
were an _ignis fatuus_ attached to their course, made me remember that
long line of lamps which trembles in the Seine, and which in the water
looks like long crooked tracks of fire.... I was quite absorbed in my
customary fantasies, when I saw upon the canal of St. George, among the
other objects upon its surface, a black spot moving so rapidly as soon
to leave all the others behind. It was the new and brilliant gondola of
the young Catullo. When within sight, I recognized the flower of our
gondoliers, in his nankin vest.... In the interval of dipping the oar
into the tranquil mirror of the lake, from time to time, he threw a
glance of satisfaction upon his resplendent image, and charmed with his
appearance, and penetrated with gratitude towards the generous soul of
his patron, he managed the gondola with a vigorous hand, and made her
bound over the waters like a wild duck.
Giulio (Catullo’s brother) was at the other end of the barque, and
seconded his efforts with all the ease of a true child of the Adriatic.
Our friend Pietro was lying indolently on the carpet of the gondola,
and the beautiful Beppa, seated on the black morocco cushions, let
the wind play among her ebony tresses, parted on her noble brow,
and falling in two long loose curls upon her bosom.... The gondola
slackened its pace whilst one of the rowers took breath, and when it
neared the shady banks, it floated idly on the waves which caressed the
marble stairs of the garden. Pietro asked Beppa to sing. Giulio took
his guitar, and Beppa’s voice rose into the air full of passion as the
appeal of a syren. She sang a verse from a song which Pietro composed
for some fair lady, perhaps for Beppa herself:
‘Con lei sull’ onda placida
Errai dalla laguna,
Ella gli sguardi immobili
In te fissava o luna!
E a che pensava allor?
Era un morrente palpito?
Era un nascente amor?’
GEORGE SAND.
GONDOLIERS’ MUSIC
The gondolier, stationed at the _traghetto_, invites passengers by
the most miraculous offers: ‘Will you go to Trieste this afternoon,
monseigneur? Here is a beautiful gondola, that does not fear the
tempest in the open sea, and a gondolier ready to row you, without
stopping, to Constantinople.’ Unexpected pleasures are the only
pleasures in the world. Yesterday I wished to go and see the moon rise
over the Adriatic; I had never been able to decide Catullo to conduct
me to the Lido. He pretended, what they all pretend when they do not
wish to obey, that the water or the wind was contrary.... I was in
desperate ill-humour when we met, just opposite La Salute, a barque
which was floating gently towards the Grand Canal, leaving behind it,
like a perfume, the sounds of a delightful serenade. ‘Turn the prow,’
said I to old Catullo; ‘I hope you are strong enough to follow that
gondola.’ Another barque floating idly by, imitated my example, then a
second, then another; at last all those who were enjoying the fresh air
on the canal, and several even which were vacant, and whose gondoliers
surrounded us, crying, ‘Music, music,’ with an air, hungry as the
Israelites in the desert for the manna. In ten minutes a flotilla
was formed round these dilettanti; all the oars were silent, and the
barques were left at the will of the current.
The harmony floated softly in the breeze and the hautbois sighed so
sweetly that each one held his breath for fear of interrupting its
accents so full of tenderness and love. The violin mingled its voice
so sad,--with such sympathetic yearnings.... Then the harp gave forth
two or three chords of harmonious sounds, which seemed to descend from
heaven, and promise the caresses and consolation of its angels to all
souls suffering on this earth. Then came the horn as from the depths
of a wood, and each of us might fancy he saw his first love advance
from the forests of Friuli, and approach with these sounds of joy. The
hautbois replied with sounds more full of passion than those uttered by
the dove seeking her mate in the air. The violin exhaled its sobs of
convulsive joy, the harp gave forth its full and generous vibrations,
like the palpitations of an ardent breast, and then the sounds of the
four instruments mingled like happy souls embracing each other before
their departure for a better world. I drank in their accents, and my
imagination heard them after they had ceased to exist. Their passage
left a magic warmth in the atmosphere, as though Love had agitated it
with his wings.
There was some minutes’ silence, which no one dared to break. The
melodious barque began to flee before us as though it wished to make
its escape, but we quickly followed in its track; we might have been
compared to a flock of petrels disputing the possession of a goldfish.
We pressed upon its flight with our prows, like large steel scythes in
the moon’s beams, shining like the fiery teeth of Ariosto’s dragons.
The fugitive achieved its deliverance in the same way as Orpheus: some
chords from the harp reduced us all to order and silence. At the sound
of its light _arpeggios_, three barques ranged themselves on each side
of the one bearing the music, and followed the _adagio_ with the most
religious slowness. The others remained behind like a cortège, and this
was perhaps the best situation for hearing. This long file of silent
gondolas, floating gently with the wind on the magnificent Grand Canal
of Venice, was a _coup-d’œil_ which realized the most lovely dreams.
Every undulation of the water, every slight movement of the oars,
seemed to respond sympathetically to the sentiment of each musical
passage, extracted from the harmonious themes of Oberon and Guillaume
Tell. The gondoliers, erect on the poop, their bold attitudes clearly
defined against the blue atmosphere, seemed to form a background of
dark spectres behind the groups of friends and lovers they were
conducting. The moon rose slowly, and peeping curiously over the roofs,
seemed also to listen and love the music. A palace on one side of
the canal, yet plunged in obscurity, defined upon the clear sky its
enormous Moorish outlines, darker than the gates of hell.
The other shore, illumined by the rays of the full moon, at that time
as large and brilliant as a silver shield, received the light upon its
silent and serene arcades. These immense piles of fairy-like buildings,
lighted only by the stars, wore an aspect of solitude, repose, and
immobility truly sublime. The slender statues rising by hundreds into
the air seemed mysterious spirits watching the repose of the quiet
city, slumbering like the Sleeping Beauty in the Wood, and condemned,
like her, to slumber for a hundred years or more.
GEORGE SAND.
THE GONDOLIERS OF VENICE
In Venice the gondoliers know by heart long passages from Ariosto and
Tasso, and often chant them with a peculiar melody. But this talent
seems at present on the decline:--at least, after taking some pains,
I could find no more than two persons who delivered to me in this
way a passage from Tasso. Goldoni, in his life, however, notices the
gondolier returning with him to the city: ‘He turned the prow of the
gondola towards the city, singing all the way the twenty-sixth stanza
of the sixteenth canto of the “Jerusalem Delivered.”’ ... Lord Byron
has told us that with the independence of Venice the song of the
gondoliers has died away.
‘In Venice Tasso’s echoes are no more.’
There are always two concerned, who alternately sing the strophes. We
know the melody eventually by Rousseau, to whose songs it is printed;
it has properly no melodious movement, and is a sort of medium between
the _canto fermo_ and the _canto figurato_; it approaches to the former
by recitativical declamation, and to the latter by passages and course,
by which one syllable is detained and embellished.
I entered a gondola by moonlight: one singer placed himself forwards
and the other aft, and thus proceeded to St. Georgio. One began the
song: when he had ended his strophe the other took up the lay, and so
continued the song alternately. Throughout the whole of it, the same
notes invariably returned, but, according to the subject-matter of the
strophe, they laid a greater or a smaller stress, sometimes on one and
sometimes on another note, and indeed changed the enunciation of the
whole strophe, as the object of the poems altered....
We got out upon the shore, leaving one of the singers in the gondola,
while the other went to the distance of some hundred paces. They now
began to sing against one another, and I kept walking up and down
between them both, so as to leave him who was to begin his part. I
frequently stood still and hearkened to the one and to the other.
Here the scene was properly introduced. The strong declamatory, and,
as it were, shrieking sound, met the ear from far, and called forth
the attention; the quickly succeeding transitions, which necessarily
required to be sung in a lower tone, seemed like plaintive strains
succeeding the vociferations of emotions or of pain. The other,
who listened attentively, immediately began where the former left
off, answering him in milder or more vehement notes, according as
the purport of the strophe required. The sleepy canals, the lofty
buildings, the splendour of the moon, the deep shadows of the few
gondolas that moved like spirits hither and thither, increased the
striking peculiarity of the scene, and amidst all these circumstances
it was easy to confess the character of this wonderful harmony.
It suits perfectly well with an idle solitary mariner, lying at
length in his vessel at rest on one of these canals, waiting for his
company, or for a fare; the tiresomeness of which situation is somewhat
alleviated by the songs and poetical stories he has in memory. He often
raises his voice as loud as he can, which extends itself to a vast
distance over the tranquil mirror; and as all is still around, he is
as it were in a solitude in the midst of a large and populous town.
Here is no rattling of carriages, no noise of foot passengers: a silent
gondola glides now and then by him, of which the splashing of oars is
scarcely to be heard.
At a distance he hears another, perhaps utterly unknown to him.
Melody and verse immediately attach the two strangers: he becomes the
responsive echo to the former, and exerts himself to be heard as he had
heard the other. By a tacit convention they alternate verse for verse;
though the song should last the whole night through, they entertain
themselves without fatigue; the hearers, who are passing between the
two, take part in the amusement.
This vocal performance sounds best at a great distance, and is then
inexpressibly charming, as it only fulfils its design in the sentiment
of remoteness. It is plaintive, but not dismal in its sound, and at
times it is scarcely possible to refrain from tears....
I was told that the women of Lido, the long row of islands that divides
the Adriatic from the lagoons, particularly the women of the extreme
districts of Malamocco and Pelestrina, sing in like manner the works of
Tasso to these and similar tunes.
They have a custom, when their husbands are fishing out at sea, to
sit along the shore in the evenings and vociferate these songs,
and continue to do so with great violence, till each of them can
distinguish the responses of her own husband at a distance.
How much more delightful and more appropriate does this song show
itself here, than the call of a solitary person uttered far and wide,
till another equally disposed shall hear and answer him! It is the
expression of a vehement and hearty longing, which yet is every moment
nearer to the happiness of satisfaction.
ISAAC D’ISRAELI.
GONDOLIERS AND THEIR SONGS
The gondolas, which everybody knows are black, and give an air of
melancholy at first sight, yet are nothing less than sorrowful; it is
like painting the lively Mrs. Cholmondeley in the character of Milton’s
‘Pensive nun, devout and pure,
Sober, steadfast, and demure’--