III
After much rain the end of November brought sunny days, never so beautiful as in Rome, where the decaying splendour of autumn harmonises well with the ruined glories of the Eternal City.
One morning Leonardo went with Francesco to see the Sistine Chapel and the frescoes of Michelangelo; a visit long purposed, but deferred as if from a secret sense of fear.
The chapel is a long, narrow, very lofty building, with plain walls and Gothic windows. Buonarroti had covered the ceiling and arches with biblical scenes. Leonardo looked, and staggered, as if faint; whatever his secret expectation, he had never thought to behold such potency of art.
In face of the colossal figures, sublime as the visions of delirium—the God of Sabaoth dividing light from darkness in the bosom of Chaos, blessing the waters and plants, creating Adam from the earth, and Eve from Adam's rib—in face of the representations of the Fall, the Redemption and all the incidents of Scripture history; in face of the beautiful nude youths, spirits of the elements accompanying the tragedy of the Universe, the conflict of God and Man, with eternal dancing and song; prophets and sibyls, terrible giants that seemed weighed down with more than human wisdom and with more than human woe; the ancestors of the Messiah, a long file of obscure patriarchs passing on from one to the other the purposeless burden of life, awaiting in darkness the coming of the unknown Redeemer;—in face of these stupendous creations of his rival Leonardo did not measure, nor compare nor judge; he felt himself and his work annihilated.
He enumerated his own productions; the Cenacolo, which was perishing, the Colossus, which had been destroyed, the 'Battle of Anghiari,' and an endless number of other unfinished paintings; a succession of vain endeavours, ridiculous failures, inglorious defeats. He had spent his life in beginning, intending, making ready; he had achieved nothing. Why deceive himself? It was too late now; he would never accomplish anything. His life had been expended in incredible labour; yet now at its close he felt like the slothful servant in the parable who had buried his talent in the earth.
Yet he was conscious that he had aimed at something higher than this other man; to Michelangelo all was turmoil, chaos; Leonardo had seen, and had tried to show, the eternal harmony. He remembered Monna Lisa's parable of the mighty wind, and of the still small voice where the Lord was; he felt that she had discerned a truth, that sooner or later the human mind would return to the path he had shown, the path from discord to harmony, from division to unity, from storm to quietness. The consciousness of how entirely right he had been in theory made still more painful to him, the consciousness of impotence in action.
They left the chapel in silence. Francesco ventured no questions; but he fancied that the Master had suddenly aged, had become feeble and broken. Years had apparently passed since they had entered the chapel.
Crossing the Piazza of St. Peter's, they went by the Borgo Nuovo towards the bridge of St. Angelo. Leonardo was thinking of another rival whom he had perhaps no less reason to fear, Raphael Sanzio. He had seen the young painter's newly finished frescoes in the Stanze of the Vatican, and had felt unable to decide whether the greatness of the execution were not equalled by the poverty of the conception, the perfection of eye and hand by the servile flattery of the princes of this world. Julius II. had dreamed of expelling the French from Italy; therefore Raphael had shown him watching the expulsion of Heliogabalus from the profaned temple of the most high God. Leo X. posed as a great orator; therefore Raphael celebrated him in the person of Leo the Great, warning Attila to retreat from Rome. He had been taken prisoner by the French and had escaped; Raphael represented this by the miraculous deliverance of St. Peter. Thus he degraded his art into the nauseous incense of a courtier's flattery.
This stranger from Urbino, this dreamy youth with the face of a sinless angel, had managed his mundane affairs to the best advantage. He painted the stables of Chigi the banker; made designs for the table-service of gold which, after the entertaining of the Holy Father, the banker threw into the Tiber, that it might never be used by any one less illustrious. The 'fortunate boy,' as Francia called the young painter, acquired fame and wealth as if by play. He disarmed his worst enemies by kindliness; he was what he appeared to be, the friend of all. In everything he succeeded. The gifts of Fortune dropped unsought into his hands. He replaced Bramante on the architectural conclave for the building of the new cathedral; Cardinal Bibbiena offered him his niece in marriage; it was said he had been promised a cardinal's hat. He built a dainty mansion in the Borgo, and furnished it with regal splendour. His ante-chamber was crowded with official personages, and with envoys from abroad, who either wanted their portraits painted, or desired to take home some specimen of the great man's art. He was overwhelmed with patrons and refused new ones. They insisted. Time was wanting to execute his innumerable orders, and many of his pictures were chiefly painted by his pupils. His studio became a factory where such skilful workmen as Giulio Romano turned canvas and paint into ready-money with amazing facility. He himself apparently desisted from the search after perfection, and was content with popularity. He served the people, and they accepted him enthusiastically as their chosen, their beloved, bone of their bone, flesh of their flesh, the incarnation of their own spirit.
The worst of it was, that in his fall he was still great; a seduction not only to the vulgar herd, but also to the elect. He seemed unspoiled by the glittering baubles showered on him by Fortune. He remained innocent and pure. The fortunato garzone had no consciousness of the danger for himself and for art. For in this superficial harmony, in this pseudo-reconciliation of discordant elements, there was greater danger for the future than in the chaos and contradictions and wars introduced by Michelangelo. Leonardo could see nothing beyond the work of these two painters; after them, all seemed abysmal and void. He felt how much both owed to himself. From him they had had their science of light and shade, their anatomy, their perspective, their knowledge of Nature and of man. Yes, they had grown out of him; and now the two of them, they had destroyed him! Leonardo walked silently beside his young companion, his eyes downcast, his head bent, his face intensely sorrowful and old: he seemed in a trance.
As they approached the bridge, they had to draw aside to give room to a cavalcade—some great man, a cardinal, perhaps, or an ambassador, escorted by sixteen horsemen richly attired. The personage proved a young man, sumptuously clad, riding a grey Arab with gilded and jewelled trappings. His face seemed familiar; and suddenly Leonardo remembered the pale shy youth in the girlish frock, daubed with paint and worn into holes at the elbow, who eight years before had said, 'Michelangelo is not worthy to tie the latchet of your shoe!'
Now this boy was the rival both of Leonardo and Michelangelo, and was called 'the God of Painting'!
His face, though still boyish, innocent, and unseared by emotion, was somewhat less of a seraph's. He was a man of the great world now; riding from his villa in the Borgo to an interview with the pope, he was accompanied by a troop of pupils, admirers, and friends. Indeed he never went out with an escort of less than fifteen. His every ride seemed a triumphal procession.
He recognised Leonardo; flushed slightly, and with quick, even exaggerated respect, doffed his cap and bowed. His younger pupils looked wonderingly at the old man to whom the 'Divine One' showed so much respect; the quiet shabby old man, hugging the wall to let the cavalcade dash by.
Leonardo's attention was caught by the man riding at Raphael's side, apparently the most favoured of his pupils. It was Cesare da Sesto. Leonardo gazed in amazement, scarce able to believe his eyes. Now he understood Cesare's long absence, Francesco's clumsy explanation. The last of his disciples, he whom he had trusted to follow in his footsteps and carry on his method, had deserted and betrayed him. Cesare braved his gaze without flinching; nay, it was Leonardo whose eyes fell in confusion, as if guilty before the other of some unintended crime.
The cavalcade passed on, and the old man, leaning upon Francesco, went his way. They crossed Hadrian's bridge, and went by the Via dei Coronari to the Piazza Navona, where was the bird fair. Leonardo bought magpies, finches, thrushes, pigeons, a falcon, and a young wild swan. He spent all the money he had with him, and borrowed also of Francesco. Slung from head to foot with cages, the quaint pair attracted general attention. The passers-by stared curiously, the little boys ran after them. They walked past the Pantheon and Trajan's Forum, crossed the Esquiline, and left the town by the Porta Maggiore, following the ancient Roman road called the Via Labicana. Presently they turned into a narrow footpath leading into the solitude of the wild country. Before them spread the boundless, the silent, the monotonous Campagna; through the arches of the Claudian Aqueduct, low hills were seen, uniform grey-green, like sea waves in the light of evening; here and there was a solitary tower, the deserted nest of robber knights; misty blue mountains surrounded the great plain, like the tiers of a colossal amphitheatre.
Over the city brooded the great peace of autumn twilight. The last rays of the sun, streaming from between heavy clouds, lay across the landscape in broad zones of brilliance, and shone on a herd of white cattle, which scarce turned their heads at the sound of footsteps. The chirp of the grasshopper, the rustle of the breeze in the stalks of the withered summer flowers, the dull sound of the distant bells, but enforced the stillness; it seemed that here in this immense plain, so desolate so solemn, had already been fulfilled the prophecy of the angel who swore by him that liveth for ever and ever, there should be time no longer. They chose a convenient hillock, and relieved themselves of the cages; then Leonardo set the birds free.
As they flew away, with the joyous flutter and rustle of their wings, he followed them with loving eyes. He smiled, he forgot his griefs, and was happy as in his childhood. Only the falcon and the swan were still in their cages; their emancipation was reserved for a later hour.
Now he and Francesco ate a frugal supper of bread, chestnuts, dried cherries, cheese, a flask of the golden Orvieto wine. They were still silent. Francesco glanced at his master from time to time. Leonardo's hair was silvered and thin, his forehead lined, his deep-set eyes were still luminous and thoughtful, but weary. Age had set its effacing finger on the beauty of every feature. It was the face of an enfeebled, patient Titan.
Francesco pitied him, as he pitied all persons who were lonely and sorrowful. The Master, whom of all men he admired and loved, whom he set above the Michelangelo and the Raphael of the people's applause, was but a lonely and poor and despised old man, sitting on the grass among empty bird-cages, cutting his cheese with an old broken clasp-knife, chewing his bread with an effort because his jaws were weakened by age, his appetite lost by recent illness. A lump rose in Francesco's throat, and he would gladly have knelt and assured his friend of his devotion, but he did not do so—he lacked the courage. At all times, even to those who loved him the best, Leonardo showed something alien and unapproachable.
The modest supper ended, Leonardo rose, let loose the hawk, then opened the last and largest cage, that one containing the wild swan. The great white bird came out noisily, stood dazzled for a minute flapping its wings, then flew straight towards the sun. Leonardo watched it with eyes full of unspoken grief. It was grief for the idle dream of his whole life, for the human wings, for the 'Great Bird' of which he had written in his diary: 'Man shall fly like a mighty swan.'