of paper covered with white linen, sat on a high bench, just under a
beautiful copy of the last supper of Da Vinci, in gobelin tapestry. It
was a small chapel, communicating with the Pope's private apartments.
Eleven of the pilgrims were as vulgar and brutal-looking men as could
have been found in the world; but of the two in the centre, one was
the personification of wild fanaticism. He was pale, emaciated, and
abstracted. His hair and beard were neglected, and of a singular
blackness. His lips were firmly set in an expression of severity. His
brows were gathered gloomily over his eyes, and his glances,
occasionally sent among the crowd, were as glaring and flashing as a
tiger's. With all this, his countenance was lofty, and if I had seen
the face on canvas, as a portrait of a martyr, I should have thought
it finely expressive of courage and devotion. The man on his left
wept, or pretended to weep, continually; but every person in the room
was struck with his extraordinary resemblance to _Judas_, as he is
drawn in the famous picture of the Last Supper. It was the same marked
face, the same treacherous, ruffian look, the same style of hair and
beard, to a wonder. It is possible that he might have been chosen on
purpose, the twelve pilgrims being intended to represent the twelve
apostles of whom Judas was one--but if accidental, it was the most
remarkable coincidence that ever came under my notice. He looked the
hypocrite and traitor complete, and his resemblance to the Judas in
the picture directly over his head, would have struck a child.
The Pope soon entered from his apartments, in a purple stole, with a
cape of dark crimson satin, and the mitre of silver-cloth, and,
casting the incense into the golden censer, the white smoke was flung
from side to side before him, till the delightful odor filled the
room. A short service was then chanted, and the choir sang a hymn. His
Holiness was then unrobed, and a fine napkin, trimmed with lace, was
tied about him by the servitors, and with a deacon before him, bearing
a splendid pitcher and basin, and a procession behind him, with large
bunches of flowers, he crossed to the pilgrims' bench. A priest, in a
snow-white tunic, raised and bared the foot of the first. The Pope
knelt, took water in his hand, and slightly rubbed the instep, and
then drying it well with a napkin, he kissed it.
The assistant-deacon gave a large bunch of flowers and a napkin to the
pilgrim, as the Pope left him, and another person in rich garments,
followed, with pieces of money presented in a wrapper of white paper.
The same ceremony took place with each--one foot only being honored
with a lavation. When his Holiness arrived at the "Judas," there was a
general stir, and every one was on tip-toe to watch his countenance.
He took his handkerchief from his eyes, and looked at the Pope very
earnestly, and when the ceremony was finished, he seized the sacred
hand, and, imprinting a kiss upon it, flung himself back, and buried
his face again in his handkerchief, quite overwhelmed with his
feelings. The other pilgrims took it very coolly, comparatively, and
one of them seemed rather amused than edified. The Pope returned to
his throne, and water was poured over his hands. A cardinal gave him a
napkin, his splendid cape was put again over his shoulders, and, with
a paternoster the ceremony was over.
Half an hour after, with much crowding and several losses of foothold
and temper, I had secured a place in the hall where the apostles, as
the pilgrims are called after the washing, were to dine, waited on by
the Pope and cardinals. With their gloomy faces and ghastly white caps
and white dresses, they looked more like criminals waiting for
execution, than guests at a feast. They stood while the Pope went
round with a gold pitcher and basin, to wash their hands, and then
seating themselves, his Holiness, with a good-natured smile, gave each
a dish of soup, and said something in his ear, which had the effect of
putting him at his ease. The table was magnificently set out with the
plate and provisions of a prince's table, and spite of the thousands
of eyes gazing on them, the pilgrims were soon deep in the delicacies
of every dish, even the lachrymose Judas himself, eating most
voraciously. We left them at their dessert.
LETTER LIX.
SEPULCHRE OF CAIUS CESTIUS--PROTESTANT BURYING GROUND--GRAVES
OF KEATS AND SHELLEY--SHELLEY'S LAMENT OVER KEATS--GRAVES OF
TWO AMERICANS--BEAUTY OF THE BURIAL PLACE--MONUMENTS OVER TWO
INTERESTING YOUNG FEMALES--INSCRIPTION ON KEATS' MONUMENT--THE
STYLE OF KEATS' POEMS--GRAVE OF DR. BELL--RESIDENCE AND
LITERARY UNDERTAKINGS OF HIS WIDOW.
A beautiful pyramid, a hundred and thirteen feet high, built into the
ancient wall of Rome, is the proud _Sepulchre of Caius Cestius_. It is
the most imperishable of the antiquities, standing as perfect after
eighteen hundred years as if it were built but yesterday. Just beyond
it, on the declivity of a hill, over the ridge of which the wall
passes, crowning it with two mouldering towers, lies the _Protestant
burying-ground_. It looks toward Rome, which appears in the distance,
between Mount Aventine and a small hill called Mont Testaccio, and
leaning to the southeast, the sun lies warm and soft upon its banks,
and the grass and wild flowers are there the earliest and tallest of
the Campagna. I have been here to-day, to see the graves of _Keats_
and _Shelley_. With a cloudless sky and the most delicious air ever
breathed, we sat down upon the marble slab laid over the ashes of poor
Shelley, and read his own lament over Keats, who sleeps just below, at
the foot of the hill. The cemetery is rudely formed into three
terraces, with walks between, and Shelley's grave and one other,
without a name, occupy a small nook above, made by the projections of
a mouldering wall-tower, and crowded with ivy and shrubs, and a
peculiarly fragrant yellow flower, which perfumes the air around for
several feet. The avenue by which you ascend from the gate is lined
with high bushes of the marsh-rose in the most luxuriant bloom, and
all over the cemetery the grass is thickly mingled with flowers of
every die. In his preface to his lament over Keats, Shelley says, "he
was buried in the romantic and lonely cemetery of the Protestants,
under the pyramid which is the tomb of Cestius, and the massy walls
and towers, now mouldering and desolate, which formed the circuit of
ancient Rome." It is an open space among the ruins, covered in winter
with violets and daisies. "_It might make one in love with death, to
think that one should be buried in so sweet a place._" If Shelley had
chosen his own grave at the time, he would have selected the very spot
where he has since been laid--the most sequestered and flowery nook of
the place he describes so feelingly. In the last verses of the elegy,
he speaks of it again with the same feeling of its beauty:--
"The spirit of the spot shall lead
Thy footsteps to a slope of green access,
Where, like an infant's smile, over the dead,
A light of laughing flowers along the grass is spread.
"And gray walls moulder round, on which dull time
Feeds like slow fire upon a hoary brand:
And one keen pyramid, with wedge sublime,
Pavilioning the dust of him who planned
This refuge for his memory, doth stand
Like flame transformed to marble; and _beneath
A field is spread, on which a newer band
Have pitched, in heaven's smile, their camp of death_,
Welcoming him we lose, with scarce extinguished breath.
"Here pause: these graves are all _too young as yet
To have outgrown the sorrow which consigned
Its charge to each_."
Shelley has left no poet behind, who could write so touchingly of his
burial-place in turn. He was, indeed, as they have graven on his
tombstone, "_cor cordium_"--the heart of hearts. Dreadfully mistaken
as he was in his principles, he was no less the soul of genius than
the model of a true heart and of pure intentions. Let who will cast
reproach upon his memory, I believe, for one, that his errors were of
the kind most venial in the eye of Heaven, and I read, almost like a
prophesy, the last lines of his elegy on one he believed had gone
before him to a happier world:
"Burning through the inmost veil of heaven,
The soul of Adonais, like a star,
Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are."
On the second terrace of the declivity, are ten or twelve graves, two
of which bear the names of Americans who have died in Rome. A portrait
carved in bas-relief, upon one of the slabs, told me, without the
inscription, that one whom I had known was buried beneath.[9] The
slightly rising mound was covered with small violets, half hidden by
the grass. It takes away from the pain with which one stands over the
grave of an acquaintance or a friend, to see the sun lying so warm
upon it, and the flowers springing so profusely and cheerfully. Nature
seems to have cared for those who have died so far from home, binding
the earth gently over them with grass, and decking it with the most
delicate flowers.
A little to the left, on the same bank, is the new-made grave of a
very young man, Mr. Elliot. He came abroad for health, and died at
Rome, scarce two months since. Without being disgusted with life, one
feels, in a place like this, a certain reconciliation, if I may so
express it, with the thought of a burial--an almost willingness, if
his bed could be laid amid such loveliness, to be brought and left
here to his repose. Purely imaginary as any difference in this
circumstance is, it must, at least, always affect the sick powerfully;
and with the common practice of sending the dying to Italy, as a last
hope, I consider the exquisite beauty of this place of burial, as more
than a common accident of happiness.
Farther on, upon the same terrace, are two monuments that interested
me. One marks the grave of a young English girl,[10] the pride of a
noble family, and, as a sculptor told me, who had often seen and
admired her, a model of high-born beauty. She was riding with a party
on the banks of the Tiber, when her horse became unmanageable, and
backed into the river. She sank instantly, and was swept so rapidly
away by the current, that her body was not found for many months. Her
tombstone is adorned with a bas-relief, representing an angel
receiving her from the waves.
The other is the grave of a young lady of twenty, who was at the baths
of Lucca, last summer, in pursuit of health. She died at the first
approach of winter. I had the melancholy pleasure of knowing her
slightly, and we used to meet her in the winding path upon the bank of
the romantic river Lima, at evening, borne in a sedan, with her mother
and sister walking at her side, the fairest victim consumption ever
seized. She had all the peculiar beauty of the disease, the
transparent complexion, and the unnaturally bright eye, added to
features cast in the clearest and softest mould of female loveliness.
She excited general interest even among the gay and dissipated crowd
of a watering place; and if her sedan was missed in the evening
promenade, the inquiry for her was anxious and universal. She is
buried in a place that seems made for such as herself.
We descended to the lower enclosure at the foot of the slight
declivity. The first grave here is that of _Keats_. The inscription on
his monument runs thus: "_This grave contains all that was mortal of a
young English poet, who, on his death-bed, in the bitterness of his
heart at the malicious power of his enemies, desired these words to be
engraved on his tomb_: HERE LIES ONE WHOSE NAME WAS WRITTEN IN WATER."
He died at Rome in 1821. Every reader knows his history and the cause
of his death. Shelley says, in the preface to his elegy, "The savage
criticism on his poems, which appeared in the Quarterly Review,
produced the most violent effect on his susceptible mind; the
agitation thus originated ended in a rupture of a blood-vessel in the
lungs; a rapid consumption ensued, and the succeeding acknowledgments,
from more candid critics, of the true greatness of his powers, were
ineffectual to heal the wound thus wantonly inflicted." Keats was, no
doubt, a poet of very uncommon promise. He had all the wealth of
genius within him, but he had not learned, before he was killed by
criticism, the received, and, therefore, the best manner of producing
it for the eye of the world. Had he lived longer, the strength and
richness which break continually through the affected style of
Endymion and Lamia and his other poems, must have formed themselves
into some noble monuments of his powers. As it is, there is not a poet
living who could surpass the material of his "Endymion"--a poem, with
all its faults, far more full of beauties. But this is not the place
for criticism. He is buried fitly for a poet, and sleeps beyond
criticism now. Peace to his ashes!
Close to the grave of Keats is that of Dr. Bell, the author of
"Observations on Italy." This estimable man, whose comments on the
fine arts are, perhaps, as judicious and high-toned as any ever
written, has left behind him, in Naples (where he practised his
profession for some years), a host of friends, who remember and speak
of him as few are remembered and spoken of in this changing and
crowded portion of the world. His widow, who edited his works so ably
and judiciously, lives still at Naples, and is preparing just now a
new edition of his book on Italy. Having known her, and having heard
from her own lips many particulars of his life, I felt an additional
interest in visiting his grave. Both his monument and Keats's are
almost buried in the tall flowering clover of this beautiful place.
FOOTNOTES:
[9] Mr. John Hone, of New York.
[10] An interesting account of this ill-fated young lady, who was on
the eve of marriage, has appeared in the Mirror.
LETTER LX.
PRESENTATION AT THE PAPAL COURT--PILGRIMS GOING TO
VESPERS--PERFORMANCE OF THE MISERERE--TARPEIAN ROCK--THE
FORUM--PALACE OF THE CESARS--COLISEUM.
I have been presented to the Pope this morning, in company with
several Americans--Mr. and Mrs. Gray, of Boston, Mr. Atherton and
daughters, and Mr. Walsh of Philadelphia, and Mr. Mayer of Baltimore.
With the latter gentleman, I arrived rather late, and found that the
rest of the party had been already received, and that his Holiness was
giving audience, at the moment, to some Russian ladies of rank. Bishop
England, of Charleston, however, was good enough to send in once more,
and, in the course of a few minutes, the chamberlain in waiting
announced to us that _Il Padre Santo_ would receive us. The ante-room
was a picturesque and rather peculiar scene. Clusters of priests, of
different rank, were scattered about in the corners, dressed in a
variety of splendid costumes, white, crimson, and ermine, one or two
monks, with their picturesque beards and flowing dresses of gray or
brown, were standing near one of the doors, in their habitually humble
attitudes; two gentlemen mace-bearers guarded the door of the entrance
to the Pope's presence, their silver batons under their arms, and
their open breasted cassocks covered with fine lace; the deep bend of
the window was occupied by the American party of ladies, in the
required black veils; and around the outer door stood the helmeted
guard, a dozen stout men-at-arms, forming a forcible contrast to the
mild faces and priestly company within.
The mace-bearers lifted the curtain, and the Pope stood before us, in
a small plain room. The Irish priest who accompanied us prostrated
himself on the floor, and kissed the embroidered slipper, and Bishop
England hastily knelt and kissed his hand, turning to present us as he
rose. His Holiness smiled, and stepped forward, with a gesture of his
hand, as if to prevent our kneeling, and, as the bishop mentioned our
names, he looked at us and nodded smilingly, but without speaking to
us. Whether he presumed we did not speak the language, or whether he
thought us too young to answer for ourselves, he confined his
inquiries about us entirely to the good bishop, leaving me, as I
wished, at leisure to study his features and manner. It was easy to
conceive that the father of the Catholic church stood before me, but I
could scarcely realize that it was a sovereign of Europe, and the
temporal monarch of millions. He was dressed in a long vesture of
snow-white flannel, buttoned together in front, with a large crimson
velvet cape over his shoulders, and band and tassels of silver cloth
hanging from beneath. A small white scull-cap covered the crown of his
head, and his hair, slightly grizzled, fell straight toward a low
forehead, expressive of good-nature merely. A large emerald on his
finger, and slippers wrought in gold, with a cross on the instep,
completed his dress. His face is heavily moulded, but unmarked, and
expressive mainly of sloth and kindness; his nose is uncommonly large,
rather pendant than prominent, and an incipient double chin, slightly
hanging cheeks, and eyes, over which the lids drop, as if in sleep, at
the end of every sentence, confirm the general impression of his
presence--that of an indolent and good old man. His inquiries were
principally of the Catholic church in Baltimore (mentioned by the
bishop as the city of Mr. Mayer's residence), of its processions, its
degree of state, and whether it was recognised by the government. At
the first pause in the conversation, his Holiness smiled and bowed,
the Irish priest prostrated himself again, and kissed his foot, and,
with a blessing from the father of the church, we retired.
On the evening of holy Thursday, as I was on my way to St. Peter's to
hear the _miserere_ once more, I overtook the procession of pilgrims
going up to vespers. The men went first in couples, following a cross,
and escorted by gentlemen penitents covered conveniently with
sackcloth, their eyes peeping through two holes, and their
well-polished boots beneath, being the only indications by which their
penance could be betrayed to the world. The pilgrims themselves,
perhaps a hundred in all, were the dirtiest collection of beggars
imaginable, distinguished from the lazars in the street, only by a
long staff with a faded bunch of flowers attached to it, and an
oil-cloth cape stitched over with scallop-shells. Behind came the
female pilgrims, and these were led by the first ladies of rank in
Rome. It was really curious to see the mixture of humility and pride.
There were, perhaps, fifty ladies of all ages, from sixteen to fifty,
walking each between two filthy old women who supported themselves by
her arms, while near them, on either side of the procession, followed
their splendid equipages, with numerous servants, in livery, on foot,
as if to contradict to the world their temporary degradation. The
lady penitents, unlike the gentlemen, walked in their ordinary dress.
I had several acquaintances among them; and it was inconceivable, to
me, how the gay, thoughtless, fashionable creatures I had met in the
most luxurious drawing-rooms of Rome, could be prevailed upon to
become a part in such a ridiculous parade of humility. The chief
penitent, who carried a large, heavy crucifix at the head of the
procession, was the Princess ----, at whose weekly soirees and balls
assemble all that is gay and pleasure-loving in Rome. Her two nieces,
elegant girls of eighteen or twenty, walked at her side, carrying
lighted candles, of four or five feet in length, in broad day-light,
through the streets!
The procession crept slowly up to the church, and I left them kneeling
at the tomb of St. Peter, and went to the side chapel, to listen to
the _miserere_. The choir here is said to be inferior to that in the
Sistine chapel, but the circumstances more than make up for the
difference, which, after all, it takes a nice ear to detect. I could
not but congratulate myself, as I sat down upon the base of a pillar,
in the vast aisle, without the chapel where the choir were chanting,
with the twilight gathering in the lofty arches, and the candles of
the various processions creeping to the consecrated sepulchre from the
distant parts of the church. It was so different in that crowded and
suffocating chapel of the Vatican, where, fine as was the music, I
vowed positively never to subject myself to such annoyance again.
It had become almost dark, when the last candle but one was
extinguished in the symbolical pyramid, and the first almost painful
note of the _miserere_ wailed out into the vast church of St. Peter.
For the next half hour, the kneeling listeners, around the door of the
chapel, seemed spell-bound in their motionless attitudes. The darkness
thickened, the hundred lamps at the far-off sepulchre of the saint,
looked like a galaxy of twinkling points of fire, almost lost in the
distance; and from the now perfectly obscured choir, poured, in
ever-varying volume, the dirge-like music, in notes inconceivably
plaintive and affecting. The power, the mingled mournfulness and
sweetness, the impassioned fulness, at one moment, and the lost,
shrieking wildness of one solitary voice, at another, carry away the
soul like a whirlwind. I have never been so moved by anything. It is
not in the scope of language to convey an idea to another of the
effect of the _miserere_.
It was not till several minutes after the music had ceased, that the
dark figures rose up from the floor about me. As we approached the
door of the church, the full moon, about three hours risen, poured
broadly under the arch of the portico, inundating the whole front of
the lofty dome with a flood of light, such as falls only on Italy.
There seemed to be no atmosphere between. Daylight is scarce more
intense. The immense square, with its slender obelisk and embracing
crescents of colonnade, lay spread out as definitely to the eye as at
noon, and the two famous fountains shot up their clear waters to the
sky, the moonlight streamed through the spray, and every drop as
visible and bright as a diamond.
I got out of the press of carriages, and took a by-street along the
Tiber, to the Coliseum. Passing the Jews' quarter, which shuts at dark
by heavy gates, I found myself near the Tarpeian rock, and entered the
Forum, behind the ruins of the temple of Fortune. I walked toward the
palace of the Cesars, stopping to gaze on the columns, whose shadows
have fallen on the same spot, where I now saw them, for sixteen or
seventeen centuries. It checks the blood at one's heart, to stand on
the spot and remember it. There was not the sound of a footstep
through the whole wilderness of the Forum. I traversed it to the arch
of Titus in a silence, which, with the majestic ruins around, seemed
almost supernatural--the mind was left so absolutely to the powerful
associations of the place.
Ten minutes more brought me to the Coliseum. Its gigantic walls,
arches on arches, almost to the very clouds, lay half in shadow, half
in light, the ivy hung trembling in the night air, from between the
cracks of the ruin, and it looked like some mighty wreck in a desert.
I entered, and a hundred voices announced to me the presence of half
the fashion of Rome. I had forgotten that it was _the mode_ "to go to
the Coliseum by moonlight." Here they were dancing and laughing about
the arena where thousands of Christians had been torn by wild beasts,
for the amusement of the emperors of Rome; where gladiators had fought
and died; where the sands beneath their feet were more eloquent of
blood than any other spot on the face of the earth--and one sweet
voice proposed a dance, and another wished she could have music and
supper, and the solemn old arches re-echoed with shouts and laughter.
The travestie of the thing was amusing. I mingled in the crowd, and
found acquaintances of every nation, and an hour I had devoted to
romantic solitude and thought passed away, perhaps, quite as
agreeably, in the nonsense of the most thoughtless triflers in
society.
LETTER LXI.
VIGILS OVER THE HOST--CEREMONIES OF EASTER SUNDAY--THE
PROCESSION--HIGH MASS--THE POPE BLESSING THE PEOPLE--CURIOUS
ILLUMINATION--RETURN TO FLORENCE--RURAL FESTA--HOSPITALITY OF
THE FLORENTINES--EXPECTED MARRIAGE OF THE GRAND DUKE.