But it is now the fashionable philosophy every where to consider this
creature as the original of our domestic friend, the dog. It was a long
time before my heart assented to its truth, yet surely their hunting
thus in packs confirms it; and the Jackall's willingness to connect with
either race, shews one that the species cannot be far removed, and that
he makes the shade between the wolf and rough haired shepherd's cur.
Of the longevity of man this district affords us no pleasing examples.
The peasants here are apparently unhealthy, and they say--short-lived.
We are told by travellers of former days, that there is a region of the
air so subtle as to extinguish the two powers of taste and smell; and
those who have crossed the Cordilleras of the Andes say, that situations
have been explored among their points in South America, where those
senses have been found to suffer a temporary suspension. Our _voyageurs
aeriens_[Footnote: Our aerostatic travellers] may now be useful to
settle that question among others, and Pambamarca's heights may remain
untrodden.
As for Mount Cenis, I never felt myself more hungry, or better enjoyed a
good dinner, than I did upon it's top: but the trout in the lake there
have been over praised; their pale colour allured me but little in the
first place, nor is their flavour equal to that of trout found in
running water. Going down the Italian side of the Alps is, after all, an
astonishing journey; and affords the most magnificent scenery in nature,
which varying at every step, gives new impression to the mind each
moment of one's passage; while the portion of terror excited either by
real or fancied dangers on the way, is just sufficient to mingle with
the pleasure, and make one feel the full effect of sublimity. To the
chairmen who carry one though, nothing can be new; it is observable that
the glories of these objects have never faded--I heard them speak to
each other of their beauties, and the change of light since they had
passed by last time, while a fellow who spoke English as well as a
native told us, that having lived in a gentleman's service twenty years
between London and Dublin, he at length begged his discharge, chusing to
retire and finish his days a peasant upon these mountains, where he
first opened his eyes upon scenes that made all other views of nature
insipid to his taste.
If impressions of beauty remain, however, those of danger die away by
frequent reiteration; the men who carried me seemed amazed that I should
feel any emotions of fear. _Qu'est ce donc, madame_?[Footnote: What's
the matter, my lady?] was the coldly-asked question to my repeated
injunction of _prenez garde_[Footnote: Take care.]: not very apparently
unnecessary neither, where the least slip must have been fatal both to
them and me.
Novalesa is the town we stopped at, upon entering Piedmont; where the
hollow sound of a heavy dashing torrent that has accompanied us
hitherto, first grows faint, and the ideas of common life catch hold of
one again; as the noise of it is heard from a greater distance, its
stream grows wider, and its course more tranquil. For compensation of
danger, ease should be administered; but one's quiet is here so
disturbed by insects, and polluted by dirt, that one recollects the
conduct of the Lapland rein-deer, who seeks the summit of the hill at
the hazard of his life, to avoid those gnats which sting him to madness
in the valley.
Suza shewed nothing that I took much interest in, except its name; and
nobody tells me why it is honoured with that old Asiatick appellation.
At the next town, called St. Andrè, or St. Ambroise, I forget which, we
got an admirable dinner; and saw our room decorated with a large map of
London, which I looked on with sensations different from those ever
before excited by the same object, Amsterdam and Constantinople covered
the other sides of the wall; and over the door of the chamber itself was
written, as our people write the Lamb or the Lion, "_Les trois Villes
Heretiques_[Footnote: The three Heretical Cities]."
The avenue to Turin, most magnificently planted, and drawn in a wide
straight line, shaded like the Bird-cage walk in St. James's Park, for
twelve miles in length, is a dull work, but very useful and convenient
in so hot a country; it has been completed by the taste, and at the sole
expence, of his Sardinian majesty, that he may enjoy a cool shady drive
from one of his palaces to the other. The town to which this long
approach conveys one does not disgrace its entrance. It is built in form
of a star, with a large stone in its centre, on which you are desired to
stand, and see the streets all branch regularly from it, each street
terminating with a beautiful view of the surrounding country, like spots
of ground seen in many of the old-fashioned parks in England, when the
etoile and vista were the mode. I think there is[5] still one
subsisting even now, if I remember right, in Kensington Gardens. Such
symmetry is really a soft repose for the eye, wearied with following a
soaring falcon through the half-sightless regions of the air, or darting
down immeasurable precipices, to examine if the human figure could be
discerned at such a depth below one. Model of elegance, exact Turin!
where Italian hospitality first consoled, and Italian arts first repaid,
the fatigues of my journey: how shall I bear to leave my new-obtained
acquaintance? how shall I consent to quit this lovely city? where, from
the box put into my possession by the Prince de la Cisterna, I first saw
an Italian opera acted in an Italian theatre; where the wonders of
Porporati's hand shewed me that our Bartolozzi was not without a
competitor; and where every pleasure which politeness can invent, and
kindness can bestow, was held out for my acceptance. Should we be
seduced, however, to waste time here, we should have reason in a future
day to repent our choice; like one who, enamoured of Lord Pembroke's
great hall at Wilton, should fail to afford himself leisure for looking
over the better-furnished apartments.
This charming town is the _salon_ of Italy; but it is a
finely-proportioned and well-ornamented _salon_ happily constructed to
call in the fresh air at the end of every street, through which a rapid
stream is directed, that _ought_ to carry off all nuisances, which here
have no apology from want of any convenience purchasable by money; and
which must for that reason be the choice of inhabitants, who would
perhaps be too happy, had they a natural taste for that neatness which
might here be enjoyed in its purity. The arches formed to defend
passengers from the rain and sun, which here might have even serious
effects from their violence, deserve much praise; while their
architecture, uniting our ideas of comfort and beauty together, form a
traveller's taste, and teach him to admire that perfection, of which a
miniature may certainly be found at Turin, when once a police shall be
established there to prevent such places being used for the very
grossest purposes, and polluted with smells that poison all one's
pleasure.
It is said, that few European palaces exceed in splendour that of
Sardinia's king; I found it very fine indeed, and the pictures
dazzling. The death of a dropsical woman well known among all our
connoisseurs detained my attention longest: the value set on it here is
ten thousand pounds. The horse cut out of a block of marble at the
stairs-foot attracted me not a little; but we are told that the
impression it makes will soon be effaced by the sight of greater
wonders. Mean time I go about like Stephano and his ignorant companions,
who longed for all the glittering furniture of Prospero's cell in the
Tempest, while those who know the place better are vindicated in crying,
"_Let it alone, thou fool, it is but trash_."
Some letters from home directed me to enquire in this town for Doctor
Charles Allioni, who kindly received, and permitted me to examine the
rarities, of which he has a very capital collection. His fossil fish in
slate--blue slate, are surprisingly well preserved; but there is in the
world, it seems, a chrystalized trout, not flat, nor the flesh eaten
away, as I understand, but round; and, as it were, cased in chrystal
like our _aspiques_, or _fruit in jelly_: the colour still so perfect
that you may plainly perceive the spots upon it, he says. To my
enquiries after this wonderful petrefaction, he replied, "That it might
be bought for a thousand pounds;" and added, "that if he were a _Ricco
Inglese_[Footnote: Rich Englishman], he would not hesitate for the
price:" "Where may I see it, Sir?" said I; but to that question no
intreaties could produce an answer, after he once found I had no mind to
buy.
That fresh-water fish have been known to remain locked in the flinty
bosom of Monte Uda in Carnia, the Academical Discourse of Cyrillo de
Cremona, pronounced there in the year 1749, might have informed us; and
we are all familiar, I suppose, with the anchor named in the fifteenth
book of Ovid's Metamorphoses. Strabo mentions pieces of a galley found
three thousand stadii from any sea; and Dr. Allioni tells me, that Monte
Bolca has been long acknowledged to contain the fossils, now diligently
digging out under the patronage of some learned naturalists at
Verona.--The trout, however, is of value much beyond these productions
certainly, as it is closed round as if in a transparent case we find,
hermetically sealed by the soft hand of Nature, who spoiled none of her
own ornaments in preserving them for the inspection of her favourite
students.
The amiable old professor from whom these particulars were obtained, and
who endured my teizing him in bad Italian for intelligence he cared not
to communicate, with infinite sweetness and patience grew kinder to me
as I became more troublesome to him: and shewing me the book upon botany
to which he had just then put the last line; turned his dim eyes from
me, and said, as they filled with tears, "You, Madam, are the last
visitor I shall ever more admit to talk upon earthly subjects; my work
is done; I finished it as you were entering:--my business now is but to
wait the will of God, and die; do you, who I hope will live long and
happily, seek out your own salvation, and pray for mine." Poor dear
Doctor Allioni! My enquiries concerning this truly venerable mortal
ended in being told that his relations and heirs teized him cruelly to
sell his manuscripts, insects, &c. and divide the money amongst _them_
before he died. An English scholar of the same abilities would be apt
enough to despise such admonitions, and dispose at his own liking and
leisure of what his industry alone had gained, his learning only
collected; but there seems to be much more family fondness on the
Continent than in our island; more attention to parents, more care for
uncles, and nephews, and sisters, and aunts, than in a commercial
country like ours, where, for the most part, each one makes his own way
separate; and having received little assistance at the beginning of
life, considers himself as little indebted at the close of it.
Whoever takes a long journey, however he may at his first commencement
be tempted to accumulate schemes of convenience and combinations of
travelling niceties, will cast them off in the course of his travels as
incumbrances; and whoever sets out in life, I believe, with a crowd of
relations round him, will, on the same principle, feel disposed to drop
one or two of them at every turn, as they hang about and impede his
progress, and make his own game single-handed. I speak of _Englishmen_,
whose religion and government inspire rather a spirit of public
benevolence, than contract the social affections to a point; and
co-operate, besides, to prompt that genius for adventure, and taste of
general knowledge, which has small chance to spring up in the
inhabitants of a feudal state; where each considers his family as
himself, and having derived all the comfort he has ever enjoyed from his
relations, resolves to return their favours at the end of a life, which
they make happy, in proportion as it _is_ so: and this accounts for the
equality required in continental marriages, which are avowedly made here
without regard to inclination, as the keeping up a family, not the
choice of a companion, is considered as important; while the lady bred
up in the same notions, complies with her _first_ duties, and considers
the _second_ as infinitely more dispensable.