Westphalia, Jerome Bonaparte. He lives here with the title of Prince
Montfort, conferred on him by his father-in-law, the king of
Wurtemburg. Americans are well received at this house also; and his
queen, as the prince still calls her, can never say enough in praise
of the family of Mr. H., our former secretary of legation at Paris. It
is a constantly recurring theme, and ends always with "_J'aime
beaucoup les Americains_." The prince resembles his brother, but has a
milder face, and his mouth is less firm and less beautiful than
Napoleon's. His second son is most remarkably like the emperor. He is
about ten years of age; but except his youth, you can detect no
difference between his head and the busts of his uncle. He has a
daughter of about twelve, and an elder son at the university of
Sienna. His family is large as his queen still keeps up her state,
with the ladies of honor and suite. He never goes out, but his house
is open every night, and the best society of Florence may be met there
almost at the _prima sera_, or early part of the evening.
The Grand Duke is about to be married, and the court is to be
unusually gay in the carnival. Our countryman, Mr. Thorn, was
presented some time since, and I am to have that honor in two or three
days. By the way, we feel exceedingly in Italy the want of a
_minister_. There is no accredited agent of our government in Tuscany,
and there are rarely less than three hundred Americans within its
dominions. Fortunately the Marquis Corsi, the grand chamberlain of the
duke, offers to act in the capacity of an ambassador, and neglects
nothing for our advantage in such matters, but he never fails to
express his regret that we should not have some _charge d'affaires_ at
his court. We have officers in many parts of the world where they are
much less needed.
FOOTNOTES:
[4] The name of a wooden frame by which a pot of coals is hung between
the sheets of a bed in Italy.
[5] As if everything should be poetical on the shores of the
Clitumnus, the beggars ran after us in quartettes, singing a chaunt,
and sustaining the four parts as they ran. Every child sings well in
Italy; and I have heard worse music in a church anthem, than was made
by these half-clothed and homeless wretches, running at full speed by
the carriage-wheels. I have never met the same thing elsewhere.
LETTER XLVII.
FLORENCE--GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY--THE GRAND CHAMBERLAIN--PRINCE
DE LIGNE--THE AUSTRIAN AMBASSADOR--THE MARQUIS
TORRIGIANI--LEOPOLD OF TUSCANY--VIEWS OF THE VAL
D'ARNO--SPLENDID BALL--TREES OF CANDLES--THE DUKE AND
DUCHESS--HIGHBORN ITALIAN AND ENGLISH BEAUTIES, ETC., ETC.
I was presented to the grand Duke of Tuscany yesterday morning, at a
private audience. As we have no minister at this court, I drove alone
to the ducal palace, and, passing through the body-guard of young
nobles, was met at the door of the ante-chamber by the Marquis Corsi,
the grand chamberlain. Around a blazing fire, in this room, stood five
or six persons, in splendid uniforms, to whom I was introduced on
entering. One was the Prince de Ligne--traveling at present in Italy,
and waiting to be presented by the Austrian ambassador--a young and
remarkably handsome man of twenty-five. He showed a knowledge of
America, in the course of a half hour's conversation, which rather
surprised me, inquiring particularly about the residences and
condition of the United States' ministers whom he had met at the
various courts of Europe. The Austrian ambassador, an old,
wily-looking man, covered with orders, joined in the conversation and
asked after our former minister at Paris, Mr. Brown, remarking that he
had done the United States great credit, during his embassy. He had
known Mr. Gallatin also, and spoke highly of him. Mr. Van Buren's
election to the vice-presidency, after his recall, seemed greatly to
surprise him.
The Prince was summoned to the presence of the Duke, and I remained
some fifteen minutes in conversation with a venerable and
noble-looking man, the Marquis Torrigiani, one of the chamberlains.
His eldest son has lately gone upon his travels in the United States,
in company with Mr. Thorn, an American gentleman living in Florence.
He seemed to think the voyage a great undertaking. Torrigiani is one
of the oldest of the Florentine nobles, and his family is in high
esteem.
As the Austrian minister came out, the Grand Chamberlain came for me,
and I entered the presence of the Duke. He was standing quite alone in
a small, plain room, dressed in a simple white uniform, with a star
upon his breast--a slender, pale, scholar-like looking young man, of
perhaps thirty years. He received me with a pleasant smile, and
crossing his hands behind him, came close to me, and commenced
questioning me about America. The departure of young Torrigiani for
the United States pleased him, and he said he should like to go
himself--"but," said he, "a voyage of three thousand miles and
back--_comment faire!_" and he threw out his hands with a look of mock
despair that was very expressive. He assured me he felt great pleasure
at Mr. Thorn's having taken up his residence in Florence. He had sent
for his whole family a few days before, and promised them every
attention to their comfort during the absence of Mr. Thorn. He said
young Torrigiani was _bien instruit_, and would travel to advantage,
without doubt. At every pause of his inquiries, he looked me full in
the eyes, and seemed anxious to yield me the _parole_ and listen. He
bowed with a smile, after I had been with him perhaps half an hour,
and I took my leave with all the impressions of his character which
common report had given me, quite confirmed. He is said to be the best
monarch in Europe, and it is written most expressively in his mild,
amiable features.
The Duke is very unwilling to marry again, although the crown passes
from his family if he die without a male heir. He has two daughters,
lovely children, between five and seven, whose mother died not quite a
year since. She was unusually beloved, both by her husband and his
subjects, and is still talked of by the people, and never without the
deepest regret. She was very religious, and is said to have died of a
cold taken in doing a severe penance. The Duke watched with her day
and night, till she died; and I was told by the old Chamberlain, that
he cannot yet speak of her without tears.
With the new year, the Grand Duke of Tuscany threw off his mourning.
Not from his countenance, for the sadness of that is habitual; but his
equipages have laid off their black trappings, his grooms and
outriders are in drab and gold, and, more important to us strangers in
his capital, the ducal palace is aired with a weekly reception and
ball, as splendid and hospitable as money and taste can make them.
Leopold of Tuscany is said to be the richest individual in Europe. The
Palazzo Pitti, in which he lives, seems to confirm it. The exterior is
marked with the character of the times in which it was built, and
might be that of a fortress--its long, dark front of roughly-hewn
stone, with its two slight, out-curving wings, bearing a look of more
strength than beauty. The interior is incalculably rich. The suite of
halls on the front side is the home of the choicest and most extensive
gallery of pictures in the world. The tables of inlaid gems and
mosaic, the walls encrusted with relievos, the curious floors, the
drapery--all satiate the eye with sumptuousness. It is built against a
hill, and I was surprised, on the night of the ball, to find myself
alighting from the carriage upon the same floor to which I had mounted
from the front by tediously long staircases. The Duke thus rides in
his carriage to his upper story--an advantage which saves him no
little fatigue and exposure. The gardens of the Boboli, which cover
the hill behind, rise far above the turrets of the palace, and command
glorious views of the Val d'Arno.
The reception hour at the ball was from eight to nine. We were
received at the steps on the garden side of the palace, by a crowd of
servants, in livery, under the orders of a fat major-domo, and passing
through a long gallery, lined with exotics and grenadiers, we arrived
at the anteroom, where the Duke's body-guard of nobles were drawn up
in attendance. The band was playing delightfully in the saloon beyond.
I had arrived late, having been presented a few days before, and
desirous of avoiding the stiffness of the first hour of presentation.
The rooms were in a blaze of light from eight _trees_ of candles,
cypress-shaped, and reaching from the floor to the ceiling, and the
company entirely assembled, crowded them with a dazzling show of
jewels, flowers, feathers, and uniforms.
The Duke and the Grand Duchess (the widow of the late Duke) stood in
the centre of the room, and in the pauses of conversation, the
different ambassadors presented their countrymen. His highness was
dressed in a suit of plain black, probably the worst made clothes in
Florence. With his pale, timid face, his bent shoulders, an
inexpressibly ill-tied cravat, and rank, untrimmed whiskers, he was
the most uncourtly person present. His extreme popularity as a monarch
is certainly very independent of his personal address. His
mother-in-law is about his own age, with marked features, full of
talent, a pale, high forehead, and the bearing altogether of a queen.
She wore a small diadem of the purest diamonds, and with her height
and her flashing jewels, she was conspicuous from every part of the
room. She is a high Catholic, and is said to be bending all her powers
upon the re-establishment of the Jesuits in Florence.
As soon as the presentations were over, the Grand Duke led out the
wife of the English ambassador, and opened the ball with a waltz. He
then danced a quadrille with the wife of the French ambassador, and
for his next partner selected an _American lady_--the daughter of
Colonel T----, of New York.
The supper rooms were opened early, and among the delicacies of a
table loaded with everything rare and luxurious, were a brace or two
of pheasants from the Duke's estates in Germany. Duly flavored with
_truffes_, and accompanied with Rhine wines, which deserved the
conspicuous place given them upon the royal table--and in this letter.
I hardly dare speak of the degree of _beauty_ in the assembly; it is
so difficult to compare a new impression with an old one, and the
thing itself is so indefinite. But there were two persons present
whose extreme loveliness, as it is not disputed even by admiring envy,
may be worth describing, for the sake of the comparison.
The Princess S---- may be twenty-four years of age. She is of the
middle height, with the slight stoop in her shoulders, which is rather
a grace than a fault. Her bust is exquisitely turned, her neck slender
but full, her arms, hands, and feet, those of a Psyche. Her face is
the abstraction of highborn Italian beauty--calm, almost to
indifference, of an indescribably _glowing paleness_--a complexion
that would be alabaster if it were not for the richness of the blood
beneath, betrayed in lips whose depth of color and fineness of curve
seem only too curiously beautiful to be the work of nature. Her eyes
are dark and large, and must have had an indolent expression in her
childhood, but are now the very seat and soul of feeling. A constant
trace of pain mars the beauty of her forehead. She dresses her hair
with a kind of characteristic departure from the mode, parting its
glossy flakes on her brow with nymph-like simplicity, a peculiarity
which one regrets not to see in the too Parisian dress of her person.
In her manner she is strikingly elegant, but without being absent, she
seems to give an unconscious attention to what is about her, and to be
gracious and winning without knowing or intending it, merely because
she could not listen or speak otherwise. Her voice is sweet, and, in
her own Italian, mellow and soft to a degree inconceivable by those
who have not heard this delicious language spoken in its native land.
With all these advantages, and a look of pride that nothing could
insult, there is an expression in her beautiful face that reminds you
of her sex and its temptations, and prepares you fully for the history
which you may hear from the first woman that stands at your elbow.
The other is that English girl of seventeen, shrinking timidly from
the crowd, and leaning with her hands clasped over her father's arm,
apparently listening only to the waltz, and unconscious that every eye
is fixed upon her in admiration. She has lived all her life in Italy,
but has been bred by an English mother, in a retired villa of the Val
d'Arno--her character and feelings are those of her race, and nothing
of Italy about her, but the glow of its sunny clime in the else
spotless snow of her complexion, and an enthusiasm in her downcast eye
that you may account for as you will--it is not English! Her form has
just ripened into womanhood. The bust still wants fullness, and the
step confidence. Her forehead is rather too intellectual to be
maidenly; but the droop of her singularly long eye-lashes over eyes
that elude the most guarded glance of your own, and the modest
expression of her lips closed but not pressed together, redeem her
from any look of conscious superiority, and convince you that she only
seeks to be unobserved. A single ringlet of golden brown hair falls
nearly to her shoulder, catching the light upon its glossy curves with
an effect that would enchant a painter. Lilies of the valley, the
first of the season, are in her bosom and her hair, and she might be
the personification of the flower for delicacy and beauty. You are
only disappointed in talking with her. She expresses herself with a
nerve and self-command, which, from a slight glance, you did not
anticipate. She shrinks from the general eye, but in conversation she
is the high-minded woman more than the timid child for which her
manner seems to mark her. In either light, she is the very presence of
purity. She stands by the side of her not less beautiful rival, like a
Madonna by a Magdalen--both seem not at home in the world, but only
one could have dropped from heaven.
LETTER XLVIII.
VALLOMBROSA--ITALIAN OXEN--CONVENT--SERVICE IN THE
CHAPEL--HOUSE OCCUPIED BY MILTON.
I left Florence for Vallombrosa at daylight on a warm summer's
morning, in company with four ladies. We drove along the northern bank
of the Arno for four or five miles, passing several beautiful villas,
belonging to the Florentine nobles; and, crossing the river by a
picturesque bridge, took the road to the village of Pelago, which lies
at the foot of the mountain, and is the farthest point to which a
carriage can mount. It is about fourteen miles from Florence, and the
ascent thence to the convent is nearly three.
We alighted in the centre of the village, in the midst of a ragged
troop of women and children, among whom were two idiot beggars; and,
while the preparations were making for our ascent, we took chairs in
the open square around a basket of cherries, and made a delicious
luncheon of fruit and bread, very much to the astonishment of some two
hundred spectators.
Our conveyances appeared in the course of half an hour, consisting of
two large baskets, each drawn by a pair of oxen and containing two
persons, and a small Sardinian pony. The ladies seated themselves with
some hesitation in their singular sledges; I mounted the pony, and we
made a dusty exit from Pelago, attended to the gate by our gaping
friends, who bowed, and wished us the _bon viaggio_ with more
gratitude than three Tuscan _crazie_ would buy, I am sure, in any
other part of the world.
The gray oxen of Italy are quite a different race from ours, much
lighter and quicker, and in a small vehicle they will trot off five or
six miles in the hour as freely as a horse. They are exceedingly
beautiful. The hide is very fine, of a soft squirrel gray, and as
sleek and polished often as that of a well-groomed courser. With their
large, bright, intelligent eyes, high-lifted heads, and open nostrils,
they are among the finest-looking animals in the world in motion. We
soon came to the steep path, and the facility with which our singular
equipages mounted was surprising. I followed, as well as I could, on
my diminutive pony, my feet touching the ground, and my balance
constantly endangered by the contact of stumps and stones--the
hard-mouthed little creature taking his own way, in spite of every
effort of mine to the contrary.
We stopped to breathe in a deep, cool glen, which lay across our path,
the descent into which was very difficult. The road through the bottom
of it ran just above the bank of a brook, into which poured a pretty
fall of eight or ten feet, and with the spray-wet grass beneath, and
the full-leaved chestnuts above, it was as delicious a spot for a rest
in a summer noontide as I ever saw. The ladies took out their pencils
and sketched it, making a group themselves the while, which added all
the picture wanted.
The path wound continually about in the deep woods, with which the
mountain is covered, and occasionally from an opening we obtained a
view back upon the valley of the Arno, which was exceedingly fine. We
came in sight of the convent in about two hours, emerging from the
shade of the thick chestnuts into a cultivated lawn, fenced and mown
with the nicety of the grass-plot before a cottage, and entering upon
a smooth, well-swept pavement, approached the gate of the
venerable-looking pile, as anxious for the refreshment of its
far-famed hospitality as ever pilgrims were.
An old cheerful-looking monk came out to meet us, and shaking hands
with the ladies very cordially, assisted in extracting them from their
cramped conveyances. He then led the way to a small stone cottage, a
little removed from the convent, quoting gravely by the way the law of
the order against the entrance of females over the monastic threshold.
We were ushered into a small, neat parlor, with two bedrooms
communicating, and two of the servants of the monastery followed, with
water and snow-white napkins, the _padre degli forestieri_, as they
called the old monk, who received us, talking most volubly all the
while.
The cook appeared presently with a low reverence, and asked what we
would like for dinner. He ran over the contents of the larder before
we had time to answer his question, enumerating half a dozen kinds of
game, and a variety altogether that rather surprised our ideas of
monastical severity. His own rosy gills bore testimony that it was not
the kitchen of Dennis Bulgruddery.
While dinner was preparing, Father Gasparo proposed a walk. An avenue
of the most majestic trees opened immediately away from the little
lawn before the cottage door. We followed it perhaps half a mile round
the mountain, threading a thick pine forest, till we emerged on the
edge of a shelf of greensward, running just under the summit of the
hill. From this spot the view was limited only by the power of the
eye. The silver line of the Mediterranean off Leghorn is seen hence on
a clear day, between which and the mountain lie sixty or seventy
miles, wound into the loveliest undulations by the course of the Arno.
The vale of this beautiful river, in which Florence stands, was just
distinguishable as a mere dell in the prospect. It was one of the
sultriest days of August, but the air was vividly fresh, and the sun,
with all the strength of the climate of Italy, was unoppressive. We
seated ourselves on the small fine grass of the hillside, and with the
good old monk narrating passages of his life, enjoyed the glorious
scene till the cook's messenger summoned us back to dinner.
We were waited upon at table by two young servitors of the convent,
with shaven crowns and long black cassocks, under the direction of
Father Gasparo, who sat at a little distance, entertaining us with his
inexhaustible stories till the bell rung for the convent supper. The
dinner would have graced the table of an emperor. Soup, beef, cutlets,
ducks, woodcocks, followed each other, cooked in the most approved
manner, with all the accompaniments established by taste and usage;
and better wine, white and red, never was pressed from the Tuscan
grape. The dessert was various and plentiful; and while we were
sitting, after the good father's departure, wondering at the luxuries
we had found on a mountain-top, strong coffee and _liqueurs_ were set
before us, both of the finest flavor.
I was to sleep myself in the convent. Father Gasparo joined us upon
the wooden bench in the avenue, where we were enjoying a brilliant
sunset, and informed me that the gates shut at eight. The vesper-bell
soon rung, echoing round from the rocks, and I bade my four companions
good night, and followed the monk to the cloisters. As we entered the
postern, he asked me whether I would go directly to the cell, or
attend first the service in the chapel, assisting my decision at the
same time by gently slipping his arm through mine and drawing me
toward the cloth door, from which a strong peal of the organ was
issuing.
We lifted the suspended curtain, and entered a chapel so dimly lit,
that I could only judge of its extent from the reverberations of the
music. The lamps were all in the choir, behind the altar, and the
shuffling footsteps of the gathering monks approached it from every
quarter. Father Gasparo led me to the base of a pillar, and telling me
to kneel, left me and entered the choir, where he was lost in the
depth of one of the old richly-carved seats for a few minutes,
appearing again with thirty or forty others, who rose and joined in
the chorus of the chant, making the hollow roof ring with the deep
unmingled base of their voices.
I stood till I was chilled, listening to the service, and looking at
the long line of monks rising and sitting, with their monotonous
changes of books and positions, and not knowing which way to go for
warmth or retirement. I wandered up and down the dim church during the
remaining hour, an unwilling, but not altogether an unamused spectator
of the scene. The performers of the service, with the exception of
Father Gasparo, were young men from sixteen to twenty; but during my
slow turns to and fro on the pavement of the church, fifteen or twenty
old monks entered, and, with a bend of the knee before the altar went
off into the obscure corners, and knelt motionless at prayer, for
almost an hour. I could just distinguish the dark outline of their
figures when my eye became accustomed to the imperfect light, and I
never saw a finer spectacle of religious devotion.
The convent clock struck ten, and shutting up their "clasped missals,"
the young monks took their cloaks about them, bent their knees in
passing the altar, and disappeared by different doors. Father Gasparo
was the last to depart, and our footsteps echoed as we passed through
the long cloisters to the cell appropriated for me. We opened one of
some twenty small doors, and I was agreeably surprised to find a
supper of cold game upon the table, with a bottle of wine, and two
plates--the monk intending to give me his company at supper. The cell
was hung round with bad engravings of the Virgin, the death of
martyrs, crosses, &c., and a small oaken desk stood against the wall
beneath a large crucifix, with a prayer-book upon it. The bed was
high, ample, and spotlessly white, and relieved the otherwise
comfortless look of a stone floor and white-washed walls. I felt the
change from summer heat to the keen mountain air, and as I shivered
and buttoned my coat, my gay guest threw over me his heavy black cowl
of cloth--a dress that, with its closeness and numerous folds, would
keep one warm in Siberia. Adding to it his little black scull-cap, he
told me, with a hearty laugh, that but for a certain absence of
sanctity in the expression of my face, and the uncanonical length of
my hair, I looked the monk complete. We had a merry supper. The wine
was of a choicer vintage than that we had drank at dinner, and the
father answered, upon my discovery of its merits, that he _never
wasted it upon women_.
In the course of the conversation, I found out that my entertainer was
a kind of butler, or head-servitor of the convent, and that the great
body of the monks were of noble lineage. The feeling of pride still
remains among them from the days when the Certosa of Vallombrosa was a
residence for princes, before its splendid pictures were pillaged by a
foreign army, its wealth scattered, and its numbers diminished. "In
those days," said the monk, "we received nothing for our hospitality
but the pleasure it gave us"--relieving my mind, by the remark, of
what I looked forward to at parting as a delicate point.