MEMORANDA AT MUNICH.
Sept. 28th.—A week at Munich! and nothing done! nothing seen! My first excursions I made to-day—from my bed to the sofa—from the sofa to the window. Every one told me to be prepared against the caprices of the climate, but I did not imagine that it would take a week or a fortnight to be acclimatée.
What could induce the princes of Bavaria to plant their capital in the midst of these wide, marshy, bleak, barren plains, and upon this rough unmanageable torrent,—"the Isar rolling rapidly,"—when they might have seated themselves by the majestic Danube? The Tyrolean Alps stretching south and west, either form a barrier against the most genial airs of heaven, or if a stray zephyr find his way from Italy, his poor little wings are frozen to his back among the mountain snows, and he drops shivering among us, wrapt in a misty cloud. I never saw such fogs: they are as dense and as white as a fleece, and look, and feel too, like rarefied snow;—but as no one else complains, I think it must be indisposition which makes me so peevish and so chilly. Sitting at the window being my best amusement, I do not like to find the only objects which are to give me a foretaste of the splendour of Munich, quite veiled from sight, and shrouded in mist, even for a few morning hours.
I am lodged in the Max-Joseph's-Platz, opposite to the theatre: a situation at once airy, quiet, and cheerful.
The theatre is in itself a beautiful object; the portico, of the Corinthian order, is supported by eight pillars; the ascent is by a noble flight of steps, with four gigantic bronze candelabras at the corners; and nothing, at least to my unlearned eyes, could be more elegant—more purely classical and Greek, than the whole, were it not for the hideous roof upon the roof,—one pediment, as it were, riding on the back of the other. Some internal arrangement of the theatre may render this deformity necessary, but it is a deformity, and one that annoys me whenever I look at it.
On the right, I have the new palace, which forms one side of the square: a long range of plain, almost rustic, architecture; altogether a striking, but rather a pleasing contrast, to the luxuriant grace of the theatre. Just now, when I looked out, what a beautiful scene! The full moon, rising over the theatre, lights up half the white columns, and half are lost in shade. The performances are just over; (half-past nine!) crowds of people emerging from the portico into the brilliant moonshine, (many of them military, in glittering accoutrements,) descend the steps, and spread themselves through the square, single, or in various groups; carriages are drawing up and drawing off,—and all this gay confusion is without the least noise or tumult. Except the occasional low roll of the carriage-wheels over the well-gravelled road, I hear no sound, though within a few yards of the spot. It looks like some lovely optical or scenic illusion; a moving picture, magnified.
Oct. 4th.—To my great consternation—summoned in form before the police, and condemned to pay a fine of ten florins for having omitted to fill up specifically a certain paper which had been placed in my hands on my arrival. In the first place, I did not understand it; secondly, I never thought about it; and thirdly, I had been too ill to attend to it. I made a show of resistance, but it was all in vain, of course;—my permission to reside here is limited to six weeks, but may be renewed.
Last night I was induced, but only upon great persuasion, to venture over to the theatre. I had been tantalised so long by looking at the exterior! Then it was a pleasant evening—broad daylight; and the whole theatre being heated by stoves to an even regulated warmth according to the season, I was assured that once within the doors there would be no danger of fresh indisposition from draughts or cold.
Entering the box, my first glance was of course at the stage. The drop-scene, or curtain, a well painted copy of Guido's Aurora, pleased me infinitely more than the beautiful drop-curtain at Manheim: that was very elegant, but this is more than elegant. It harmonized with the place, and in my own mind it touched certain chords of association, which had long been silent. It was as if the orchestre had suddenly welcomed me with some delicious, often-heard, and well-remembered piece of music: the effect upon the senses was similar—nor can I describe it;—but, surprised and charmed, I kept my eyes fixed for some minutes upon the picture: the light being thrown full upon it, while the rest of the theatre was comparatively in deep shade, like all the foreign theatres, rendered it more effective. The rest of the decorations corresponded in splendour; the two colossal muses, as Caryatides supporting the king's state box, the noble columns of white and gold, and the Caryatides on each side of the proscenium, were all in fine taste. The size and proportions of the interior seemed most happily calculated for seeing and hearing. On the whole, I never beheld a theatre which so entirely satisfied me—no one more easily pleased, and no one less easily satisfied!
When I looked down on the parterre, I beheld a motley assemblage in various costumes: there were a great number of the military; there were the well-dressed daughters of people of some condition, in the French fashion of two or three years back; there were girls in the Tyrolean costume, with their scarlet boddices and silver chains; and the women of Munich, with their odd little two-horned caps of rich gold or silver brocade,—forming altogether a singular spectacle. As for the scenery, it was very well, but would bear no comparison to Stanfield's glorious illusions.
The inducement held out to me to-night was to see Ferdinand Eslair play the Duke of Alva in "Egmont." Eslair, formerly one of the first actors at Manheim, when Manheim boasted the first theatre in Germany, is esteemed the finest tragedian here, and the Duke of Alva is one of his best characters. It appeared to me a superb piece of acting; so quietly stern, so fearfully hard and composed: it was a fine conception cast in bronze:—in this consisted its beauty and truth as a whole. Some of his silent passages, and his by-play, were admirable. He gave us, in the scene with Egmont, an exact living transcript of Titian's famous picture of the Duke of Alva; the dress, the attitude, the position of the helmet and the glove on the table beside him, every thing was so well calculated, at once so unobtrusive and so unexpected, that it was like a recognition. Egmont was well played by Racke, but did not strike me so much. Mademoiselle Schöller, who plays the young heroines here, is a pupil of Madame Schröder, (the German Siddons,) and promises well; but she wants development; she wants the power, the passion, the tenderness, the energy of Clärchen. Clärchen is a plebeian girl, but an impassioned and devoted woman—she is a sort of Flemish Juliet. There is the same truth of nature and passion, the same impress of intense and luxuriant life—but then it is a different life—it is a Rubens compared to a Titian—and such Clärchen ought to be. Now to give all the internal power and poetry, yet preserve all the external simplicity and homeliness of the character,—to give all the abandon, yet preserve all the delicacy,—to give the delicacy, yet keep clear of all super-refinement, and in the concentrated despair of her last scene (where she poisons herself) to be calm without being cold, and profoundly tragic without the usual tragedy airs, must be difficult—exceedingly difficult; in short, to play Clärchen, as I conceive the character ought to be played, would require a young actress, uniting sufficient genius to conceive it aright, with sufficient delicacy and judgment not to colour it too highly: there was no danger of the latter mistake with Mademoiselle Schöller, in whose hands Clärchen became a mere pretty affectionate girl. In that lovely scene with Egmont in the third act, which might be contrasted with Juliet's balcony scene, as a test of the powers of a young actress, Mademoiselle Schöller was timid even to feebleness; the change of manner, when Clärchen substitutes the tender familiarity of the second person singular (Du) for the tone of respect in which she before addressed her lover, should have been felt and marked, so as to have been felt and remarked: but this was not the case. In short, I was disappointed by this scene.
The Flemish costumes were correct and beautiful. The Prince of Orange, in particular, looked as if he had just walked out of one of Vandyke's pictures.
After seeing this fine tragedy—surely enough for one evening's amusement—I was at home and in bed by half-past ten. They manage these things better here than in England.
Friday.—Dinner at the French ambassador's five o'clock. I mark this, because extraordinarily late at Munich. The plebeian dinner hour is twelve, or earlier; the general hour, one; the genteel hour, two; the fashionable hour, three; but five is super-elegant—in the very extreme of finery—like a nine o'clock dinner in London. There were present some French and Austrians of high rank, who had all visited England; and the conversation turning on our English aristocratic society—the only society they knew any thing about—I had another proof of the ridicule with which foreigners treat our assumption of superior morality and domestic happiness. But the person who fixed my attention was Leo von Klenze, the celebrated architect, and deservedly a favourite of the king, who has, I believe, bestowed on him the superfluous honours of nobility. With the others, I had no sympathies—with him a thousand, though he knew it not. I looked at him with curiosity—with interest. I liked his plain, but marked and clever countenance, and his easy manners. I felt an unconscious desire to be agreeable, and longed to make him talk; but I knew that this was not the place or the moment for us to see each other to the greatest advantage. We had, however, some little conversation—a kind of beginning. He told me at dinner that the Glypthothek, (the gallery of sculpture here,) was planned and built by the present king, when only prince royal, and the expenses liquidated from his private purse, out of his yearly savings. He spoke with modesty of himself—with gratitude and admiration of the king, of whose talent, vivacity, impatience, and enthusiasm for art and artists I had already heard some characteristic anecdotes.
After coffee, part of the company dispersed to the opera, or elsewhere; others remained to lounge and converse. After the opera, we re-assembled with additions, and then tea, and cards, and talk, till past eleven. Madame de Vaudreuil receives almost every evening, and this seems to be the general routine.
Oct. 6.—They are now celebrating here the Volksfest, (literally the "people's feast,") or annual fair of Munich, and this has been a grand day of festivity. There have been races, a military review, &c.; but, except the race-horses in their embroidered trappings, which were led past my window, and a long cavalcade of royal carriages and crowds of people, in gay and grotesque costumes, hurrying by, I have seen nothing, being obliged to keep my room; so I listened to the firing of the cannon, and the shouts of the populace, and thought.
Oct. 8.—First visit to the Glypthothek—just returned—my imagination, still filled with "the blaze, the splendour, and the symmetry,"—excited as I never thought it could be again excited after seeing the Vatican; but this is the Vatican in miniature. Can it be possible that this glorious edifice was planned by a young prince, and erected out of his yearly savings? I am wonder-struck! I was not prepared for any thing so spacious, so magnificent, so perfect in taste and arrangement.
I do not yet know the exact measurement of the building; but it contains twelve galleries, the smallest about fifty, and the largest about one hundred and thirty feet in length. It consists of a square, built round an open central court, and the approach is by a noble portico of eight Ionic columns, raised on a flight of steps. As it stands in an open space, a little out of the town, with trees planted on either side, the effect is very imposing and beautiful. There are no exterior windows, they all open into the central court.
From the portico we enter a hall, paved with marble. Over the principal door is the name of the king, and the date of the erection. Two side doors lead to the galleries. Over the door on the left there is an inscription to the honour of Leo von Klenze, the architect of the building. Over the door on the right, is the name of Peter Cornelius, the painter, by whom the frescos were designed and chiefly executed. Thus the king, with a noble magnanimity, uniting truth and justice, has associated in his glory those to whom he chiefly owes it—and this charmed me. It is in much finer feeling, much higher taste, than those eternal (no, not eternal!) great N's of that imperial egotist, Napoleon, whose vulgar appetite for vulgar fame would allow no participation.
I walked slowly through the galleries so excited by the feeling of admiration, that I could make no minute or particular observations. The floors are all paved with marbles of various colours—the walls, to a certain height, are stuccoed in imitation of grey or dark green marble, so as to throw out the sculpture, and give it the full effect. The utmost luxury of ornament has been lavished on the walls and ceilings, some in painting, some in relief; but in each, the subjects and ornaments are appropriate to the situation, and as each gallery has been originally adapted to its destination, every where the effect to be produced has been judiciously studied. The light is not too great, nor too generally diffused—it is poured in from high semicircular windows on one side only, so as to throw the sculpture into beautiful relief. Two lofty and spacious halls are richly painted in fresco, with subjects from the Greek mythology, and the whole building would contain, I suppose, six times, or ten times, the number of works of art now there; at the same time all are so arranged that there appears no obvious deficiency. The collection was begun only in 1808, and since that time the king has contrived to make some invaluable acquisitions. I found here many of the most far-famed relics of ancient art, many that I had already seen in Italy; for instance, the Egina marbles, the Barberini Faun, the Barberini Muse, or Apollo, the Leucothoë, the Medusa Rondanini above all, the Ilioneus; but I cannot now dwell on these. I must go again and again before I can methodise my impressions and recollections.
Oct. 11.—Yesterday and to-day, at the Glypthothek, where the cushioned seats, though rather more classical than comfortable, enabled me to lounge away the time, unwearied in body as in mind.
The arrangement of the galleries is such as to form not only a splendid exhibition and school of art, but a regular progressive history of the rise and decline of sculpture. Thus we step from the vestibule into the Egyptian gallery, of which the principal treasure is the colossal Antinous of Rossoantico, with the attributes of Osiris.
I admired in this room the exquisite beauty and propriety of the basso-relievo over the door, designed and modelled by Schwanthaler. It is of course intended to be symbolical of the birth of art among the Egyptians. Isis discovers the body of her lost husband Osiris, concealed in a sarcophagus: she strikes it with the mystic wand, and he stands revealed, and restored to her. The imitation of the Egyptian style is perfect.
From the Egyptian, we step into the Etruscan gallery, of which the ceiling is painted in the most vivid and beautiful colours. The third room contains the famous Egina marbles, which I had seen at Rome when Thorwaldson was engaged in restoring them. To appreciate the classical beauty and propriety of the arrangement of these singular relics, we must call to mind their history, their subject, and their original destination. Thus Æacus, the first king of the Island of Ægina, was the son of Jupiter, or rather Zeus, (for the Greek designations are infinitely more elegant and expressive than the Roman.) The temple was dedicated to Zeus, and the groups which adorned the pediments represented the history of the two branches of the Æacidæ, descended from Telamon and Peleus, sons of Æacus. On two long tables or stands of marble, supported by griffins, imitated from those which originally ornamented the temple, are ranged the two groups of figures: neither group is quite entire. Of that which represents the fight of Telamon and Hercules with Laomedon, King of Troy, there are only five figures remaining; and of the other group, the conflict for the body of Patroclus, there are ten figures. Along the walls, on tables of marble, are ranged a variety of fragments from the same temple, which must have been splendidly rich in sculpture, within and without. On the ceiling of this room, the four Æacidæ, Æacus, Peleus, Achilles, and Neoptolemus, are represented in relief, by Schwanthaler. There is also a small model of the western front of the temple restored, and painted as it is proved to have been originally; (for instance, the field of the Tympanum was of a sky blue.) This model is fixed in the wall opposite to the window. It is extremely curious and interesting, but I thought not well placed as an ornament.[ 30]
I remember asking W——, who has been in every part of the world, what was the most beautiful scene he had ever beheld, taking natural beauty and poetical associations together? He replied, after a little thought, "A sunset from the temple of Ægina;"—and I can conceive this. Lord Byron introduces it into his Grecian Sunset—but as an object—
"On old Ægina's steep and Idra's Isle,
The god of gladness sheds his parting smile."
From the Ægina gallery we enter the Hall of Apollo. The ceiling of this room, splendidly decorated in white and gold, represents the emblems of the four principal cities of Greece, viz. the Athenian owl, the winged-horse of Corinth, the Chimera of Sicyon, and the wolf of Argos.
The chief glory of this apartment is that celebrated colossal statue, once known as the Barberini muse, now considered by antiquarians as an Apollo, and supposed to be the work of Ageladas, the master of Phidias. It is certainly older than the sculptures of the Parthenon. In its severe massy grandeur, there is something of the heaviness and formality of the most ancient Greek school, and in point of style it forms a link between the Ægina marbles and the Elgin marbles. It should seem that the eyes of this statue were once represented by gems—the orifices remain, surrounded by a ring of bronze.
In the same room are those two sublime busts which almost take away one's breath—the colossal head of Pallas, resembling that of the Minerva of Velletri, now in the Vatican; and the Achilles.
The next room is the Hall of Bacchus. The ceiling is richly ornamented with all the festive emblems of the god, in white and gold relief. In the centre we have that wondrous statue, the gigantic Sleeping Satyr, called by some the Barberini Faun. Antiquaries and connoisseurs refer this work either to Scopas or Praxiteles, and, from the situation in which it was discovered, suppose it to have once ornamented the tomb of Adrian. I cannot tell how this may be, but here we behold with astonishment the grotesque, the elegant, and the sublime mingled together, and each in perfection: how, I know not; but I feel it is so. I once saw a drawing of this statue, which gave me the idea of something coarse and heavy; whereas, in the original, the delicate beauty of the workmanship, and the inimitable sleepy abandonment of the attitude, soften the effect of the colossal forms. I would place this statue immediately after the Elgin marbles; it is, with all its excellence, a degree lower in style.
In this gallery I found the famous head of the laughing faun, called from the greenish stain on the cheek, the fauno colla macchia, and also a sarcophagus, representing in the most exquisite sculpture, the marriage of Bacchus and Ariadne. The blending of the idea of death with the fullness of life, and even with the most luxuriant and festive associations of life, is common among the Greeks, and, from one or two known instances, appears to have been carried to an extreme which makes one shrink; still, any thing rather than our detestable death's head and cross bones! In nature, and in poetry, death is beautiful. It is the diseases and vices of artificial life which have rendered it lamentable, terrible, disgusting.
Fixed in the wall, opposite to the window, there is a bas relief of amazing beauty—the marriage of Neptune and Amphitrite. It is a piece of lyric poetry.
The Hall of Niobe contains few objects; but among them some of the most perfect specimens of Grecian art; and first, the Ilioneus.
It was because the Grecian sculptors were themselves poets and creators, that "marble grew divine" beneath their hands, and became so instinct with the indestructible spirit of life, that their half-defaced ruins retain their immortality: else how should we stand shivering with awe before those tremendous fragments—the sister Fates in the Elgin marbles! Or, how should I, who am incapable of estimating the technical perfection of art, stand entranced—as to-day I stood—before the Ilioneus? It was not merely admiration; it was the overpowering sentiment of harmonious and pathetic beauty running along every nerve—such a feeling as music has sometimes awakened. I suppose the Ilioneus stands alone, like the Torso of the Vatican—the ne plus ultra of grace, as the latter is of grandeur.
The first time I ever saw a cast of this divine statue was in the vestibule of Goethe's house, at Weimar. It immediately fixed my attention. Afterwards I saw another in Dannecker's studio, and from him I learned its history. It was discovered about ten years ago at Prague, in the possession of a stone-mason, and is supposed to have formed part of the collection of ancient works of art which the Emperor Rodolph collected in Italy about 1600.[ 31] A certain Dr. Barth purchased it for a trifle, and brought it to Vienna, where Dannecker happened to be at that time, and was called upon with others to pronounce on its merits and value. It was at once attributed to the hand, either of Praxiteles or Scopas, and on farther and minute examination, the style, the proportions, and the evident purport of the figure, have decided that it belongs to the group of Niobe and her children. It has attained the appellation of Ilioneus, which Ovid gives to the youngest of her sons. It represents a youth kneeling. The head and arms are wanting; but the supplicatory expression of the attitude, the turn of the body, so deprecating, so imploring; the bloom of adolescence, which seems absolutely shed over the cold marble, the unequalled delicacy and elegance of the whole, touched me unspeakably.
The King of Bavaria is said to have paid for this exquisite relic 15,000 florins—a large sum for a little potentate; but for the object itself, its value is not to be computed by money. Its weight in gold were poor in comparison.
In the same room is the Medusa Rondanini, the common model of almost all the Medusa heads, but certainly not equal to the sublime colossal mask at Cologne. There is also an antique duplicate of the Mercury of the Belvidere; another of the Venus of Cnidos; another (most beautiful) of one of the sons of Niobe, recumbent, lifeless; and some other master-pieces.
These six rooms occupy one side of the building, and contain altogether one hundred and forty-seven specimens of ancient art.
I do not quite understand Flaxman's division of ancient art into three periods—the heroic age, the philosophic age, and the age of perfection. Perhaps if he had lived to correct his essays, he would have made this more clear. According to his distinction, would not the group of the Niobe belong to the age of perfection?—and the Parthenon to the philosophic age? which, allowing his definition of the two styles, I cannot grant. I suppose these six galleries include a period of about seven hundred years; (putting the dateless antiquity of some of the Egyptian relics out of the question.) We begin with the heavy motionless forms, "looking tranquillity," which yet have often a certain dignity; then the stiff hard elaborate figures of the earliest Greek school, with their curled heads and perpendicular draperies, in some of which dawns the first feeling of vigour and grace, as in the Ægina marbles; the next is the union of grandeur and elegance; and the next is the utmost poetical refinement. I recollect that somewhere in Boswell's life of Johnson, a conversation is recorded as taking place at the table of Sir Joshua Reynolds; in the course of which Sir Joshua remarked, that it was impossible to conceive what the ancient writers meant, when they represented sculpture as having passed its zenith when the Apollo and the Laocoon were produced. None of the great scholars or artists then present could explain the mystery—now no longer a mystery. When Sir Joshua made this remark, the Elgin marbles were unknown in England.
Between this range of galleries, and a corresponding range on the opposite side, are two immense halls, called the Fest-Saale, or banqueting halls, and as yet containing no sculpture. Here the painter Cornelius has found "ample space and verge enough" for his grand conceptions, and the subjects are appropriate to the general destination of the whole building. The frescos in the first hall, (Götter-Saal, or hall of the gods,) present a magnificent view of the whole Greek mythology.
Whatever may be thought of the conception and execution of certain parts, on minute examination the grand, yet simple arrangement of the whole design addresses itself to the understanding, while the splendour of colour, and variety of the grouping, seize on the imagination: certainly, when we look round, the first feeling is not critical. But this beautiful, progressive, and pictorial development of the old mythology, as it must have been the result of profound learning and study, ought to be considered methodically to understand all its merit; for instance, in the centre of the roof we have the primeval god, Eros, in four compartments; first, with the dolphin, representing water; secondly, with the eagle, representing light or fire; thirdly, with the peacock, representing air; and lastly, with Cerberus, representing earth. Disposed around these primeval elements, we have the seasons of the year, and the day. The spring, as Psyche, is followed by the history of Aurora, (the morning,) in four compartments. The summer, as Ceres, is followed by the noon, i. e. the history of Helios or Apollo, in four compartments. The autumn, as Bacchus; and then evening, expressed in the history of Diana. Winter, as Saturn, and the history of night, and the divinities which preside over it. These twenty-four compartments, of various forms and sizes, compose the ceiling, intermingled with ornaments of rich and rare device, and appropriate arabesques, combining, with much fancy and invention, all the classical emblems and allegories, such as satyrs, fauns, syrens, dryads, Graces, Furies, &c. &c.
But the grand summary is reserved for the walls. On one side is represented the kingdom of Olympus, with Jove in his state, the assemblage of the gods, and the apotheosis of Psyche. The opposite side represents the domain of Pluto, with the infernal gods, and the story of Orpheus. The third side, over against the window, is the triumph of Neptune and Amphitrite, surrounded by the sea-gods.
The figures in these three frescos are colossal, about eight feet in height. The colouring of the flesh is a little too red and dingy, and in some of the attitudes I thought that the energy was strained into contortion; but through the whole there is a grand poetic feeling. All the designs are by Peter Cornelius, executed by himself, with the aid of professor Zimmerman, Schlotthauer, Heinrich Hess, and a number of pupils and assistants.
There are also along the frieze some beautiful bas-reliefs; and over the two doors are two alto-relievos by Schwanthaler, the one representing Cupid and Psyche in each others arms, the symbol of immortal love: the other, the re-union of Ceres and Proserpine, emblematical of eternal life after death. This is all I can remember, except that the painting of this hall occupied six years, and was finished in 1826.
Oct. 11.—A small vestibule divides the two great halls. This is painted with the history of Prometheus and Pandora; but, owing to the unavoidable disposition of the light, much of the beauty is lost.
From this vestibule we enter the second great banqueting hall, or the Hall of the Trojans, painted like the former in fresco, and on the same enormous scale, but with a different distribution of the parts. It represents chiefly the history of those demigods and heroes who contended in the Trojan war. Thus, in the centre of the ceiling we have first the original cause of the war, the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, and the appearance of the goddess of Discord, with her fatal apple. Around this are the twelve gods who were present at the feast, modelled in relief by Schwanthaler. Then follow twelve compartments, containing the most striking scenes of the Iliad, divided and adorned by the most rich and fanciful arabesques, combining the exploits or histories of the Grecian heroes, which are not included in the Iliad. The figures in these compartments are the size of life. On the walls we have the three principal incidents of the Trojan war; first, the wrath of Achilles; secondly, opposite to the window, the fight for the body of Patrocles, and Achilles shouting to the warriors. There is wonderful energy and movement in this picture. The third is the destruction of Troy. The figure of Hecuba sitting in motionless horror and despair, with her dishevelled grey hair, her daughters clinging to her;—the beautiful attitudes of Polyxena and Cassandra; the silent remorse of Helen; the wild fury of the conquerors, and the vigour and splendour of the whole painting, render this composition exceedingly striking:—I did not quite like the figure of Priam. All these designs are by Cornelius, and executed partly by him, and partly under his direction by Zimmermann, Schlotthauer, and their pupils. The arabesques are by Eugene Neureuther: and there are two admirable and spirited bas-reliefs by Schwanthaler—one representing the battle of the ships, and the other the combat of Achilles with the river gods.
The paintings in this hall were finished in 1830.
We then enter the range of galleries, devoted to the later Greek, and the Roman sculpture. The first, corresponding in size and situation with the Hall of Niobe, contains nothing peculiarly interesting, except the famous figure of the young warrior anointing himself after the bath, and called the Alexander.
The next gallery is the Roman Hall, about one hundred and thirty feet in length, and forms a glorious coup d'œil. The utmost luxury of architectural decoration has been lavished on the ceilings; and the effect of the marble pavement, with the disposition of the busts, candelabræ, altars, as seen in perspective, is truly and tastefully magnificent. I particularly admired the ceiling, which is divided into three domes, adorned with bas-reliefs, taken from the Roman history and manners: these were designed by Schwanthaler. I cannot remember any thing remarkable in this gallery; or rather, there were too many things deserving of notice, for me to note all. The standing Agrippina has, however, dwelt on my mind; and an exceeding fine bust of Octavius Cæsar, crowned with the oak leaves.
A small room contains the sculpture in coloured marble, porphyry, and bronze; and the last is the hall of modern sculpture. In the centre of the ceiling is a phœnix, rising from its ashes, and around it the heads of four distinguished sculptors—Nicolo da Pisa, the restorer of the art in the fourteenth century; Michael Angelo, Canova, and Thorwaldson.
Two of the most celebrated productions of modern sculpture are here:—the Paris of Canova, and the Adonis of Thorwaldson. As they are placed near to each other, and the aim is alike in both to exhibit the utmost perfection of youthful and effeminate beauty, the merits of the two artists were fairly brought into comparison. Thorwaldson's statue reminded me of the Antinous; Canova's recalled the young Apollo. I hardly know which to prefer as a conception; but the material and workmanship of the Paris pleased me most. The marble of Thorwaldson's statue, though faultless in purity of tint, has a coarse gritty grain, and glitters disagreeably in certain lights, as if it were spar or lump-sugar; whereas the smooth close compact grain of Canova's marble, which is something of a creamy white, seemed to me infinitely preferable to the eye. This, however, is hyper-criticism: in both, the feeling is classically and beautifully true. The soft melancholy of the countenance and attitude of Adonis, as if anticipative of his early death, and the languid self-sufficiency of Paris, appeared to me equally admirable. There is also in this room a duplicate by Canova of his Venus, in the Pitti palace; a girl tying her sandal, by Rodolph Schadow—a pendant, I presume, to his charming Filatrice, now at Chatsworth; and some fine busts. I looked round in vain for a single specimen of English art. I thought it just possible that some work of Flaxman, or Chantrey, or Gibson, might have found its way hither—but no!—
Oct. 12.—Last night to the opera with a pleasant party; but, tired and over-excited with my morning at the Glyptothek, I wanted soothing, and was not in a humour for the noisy florid music of Wilhelm Tell. It is an opera which, as it becomes familiar, tires, and does not attach—just like some clever people I have met with. Pellegrini (not the Pelligrini we had in England, but a fixture here, and their best male singer—a fine basso cantante) acted Tell. I say acted, because he did not merely sing his part—he acted it, and well; so well, that once I felt my eyes moisten. Madame Spitzeder sang in Matilda von Hapsburg tolerably. Their first tenor, Bayer, I do not like; his intonation is defective. The decorations and dresses are beautiful. As for the dancing, it is not fair to say any thing about it. Unfortunately the first bars of the Tyrolienne brought Taglioni before my mind's eye, and who or what could stand the comparison? How she leapt like a stag! bounded like a young faun! floated like the swan-down on the air! Yet even Taglioni, though she makes the nearest approach to it, does not complete my idea of a poetical dancer; but as she improved upon Herbelet, we may find another to improve upon her. One more such artist—I use the word in the general and German sense, not in the French meaning—one more such artist, who should bring modesty, and sense, and feeling, into this lovely and most desecrated art, might do something to retrieve it—might introduce the necessity for dancers having heads as well as heels, and in time revolutionize the whole corps de ballet.
Wednesday.—This morning, M. Herman Stuntz, the King's chapel-master, called on me. I had heard of him as a fine composer, and also much of his opera, produced for the Scala at Milan, the Costantino il Grande. I was pleased to find him not a musician only, like most musicians, but intelligent and enthusiastic on other subjects, and with that childlike simplicity of mind and manner, so often combined with talent. We touched upon every thing from the high sublime to the deep absurd—ran round the whole circle of art in a sort of touch-and-go style, and his naïveté and originality pleased me more and more. He said some true and delightful things about music; but would insist that of all languages the English is the most difficult to ally to musical sounds—infinitely worse than German. He complained of the shut mouth, the claquement des dents, and the predominance of aspirates in our pronunciation. I objected to the guttural sounds, and the open mouths, and the yaw yaw of the Germans. Then followed an animated discussion on vocal sounds and musical expression, and we parted, I believe, mutually pleased.
The father of Stuntz is a Swiss—a man of letters, an enthusiast, a philosopher, an artist; in short, a most extraordinary and eccentric character. He entirely educated his two children, of whom the son, Herman Stuntz, takes a high rank as a composer; and the daughter is a distinguished female artist, but, being nobly married, she now only paints pictures to give them away, and those who possess them are, with reason, extremely proud of the possession.
In the evening, Madame Meric, prima-donna aus London, as the play-bills set forth, made her first appearance in the Gazza Ladra. She is engaged here for a limited time, and takes the gast-rolles—that is, she plays the first parts as a matter of course—in short, she is a STAR. The regular prima-donna is Madame Scheckner-Wagen. Meric has talent, voice, style, and unwearied industry; but she has not genius, neither is her organ first-rate. Comparisons in some cases are unjust as well as odious. Yet was it my fault that I remembered in the same part the syren Sontag, and the enchantress Malibran? Meric, besides being a fine singer, is an amiable woman;—married to an extravagant, dissipated husband, and working to provide for her child—a common fate among the women of her profession.
——Sat up late reading, for the third or fourth time, a chance volume of Madame Roland's works. What a complete French woman! but then, what a mind! how large in capacity! how stored with knowledge! how strong in conscious truth! how finely toned! how soft, and yet how firm! What wonderful industry united to the quickest talent! Some things written at eighteen and twenty have most surprised me; some passages in the "Vie privée," and the "Appel," have most charmed me. She is not very eloquent, and I should think had not a playful or poetic fancy. There is an almost total want of imagery in her style; but great power, unaffected elegance, with a sort of negligence at times, which adds to its beauty. Then, to remember that all I have just read was written in a prison, in daily, hourly expectation of death! but that excites more interest than surprise, for a situation of strong excitement of mind and passion, with external repose and solitude, must be favourable to this development of the faculties, where there is character as well as talent. Some of her disclosures are a little too naïve. I am amused by the quantity of feminine vanity which is mixed up with all this loftiness of spirit, this real independence of soul. Madame de Staël had not more vanity, whatever they may say; but it was less balanced by self-esteem—it required more sympathy. Then we have those two admirable women * * and * *. What exquisite feminine vanity is there! Yet, happily, in both instances how far removed from all ill-nature and presumption, and how unconsciously betrayed! I should think Joanna Baillie, among our great women, must be most exempt from this failing, perhaps, because, of all the five, she has the most profound sense of religion. Lavater said, that "the characteristic of every woman's physiognomy was vanity." A phrenologist would say that it was the characteristic of every woman's head. How far, then, may a woman be vain with a good grace and betray it without ridicule? By vanity, I mean now, a great wish to please, mingled with a consciousness of the powers of pleasing, and not what Madame Roland describes,—"cette ambition constante, ce soin perpetuel d'occuper de soi, et de paraitre autre ou meilleur que l'on n'est en effet," for this is diseased vanity.
Dr. Martius[ 32] lent me two pretty little volumes of "Poems, by Louis I. king of Bavaria," the present king—the first royal author we have had, I believe, since Frederic of Prussia—the best since James I. of Scotland. These poems are chiefly lyrical, consisting of odes, sonnets, epigrams. Some are addressed to the queen, others to his children, others to different ladies of the court, whom he is said to have particularly admired, and a great number were composed during his tour in Italy in 1817. Of the merit of these poems I cannot judge; and when I appealed to two different critics, both accomplished men, one assured me they were admirable; the other shrugged up his shoulders—"Que voulez vous? c'est un Roi!" The earnest feeling and taste in some of these little poems pleased me exceedingly—of that alone I could judge: for instance, there is an address to the German artists, which contains the following beautiful lines: he is speaking of art—
"In der Stille muss es sich gestalten,
Wenn es kräftig wirkend soll ersteh'n;
Aus dem Herzen nur kann sich entfalten,
Das was wahrhaft wird zum Herzen geh'n.
Ja! ihr nehmet es aus reinen Tiefen,
Fromm und einfach, wie die Vorweit war,
Weckend die Gefühle, welche schliefen,
Ehrend zeugt's von Euch und immerdar.
Sklavisch an das Alte euch zu halten,
Eures Strebens Zweck ist dieses nicht
Seyd gefasst von himmlischen Gewalten,
Dringet rastlos zu dem hehren Licht!"
Which may be thus literally rendered—
"To rise into vigorous, active influence, it (art) must spring up and develop itself in secrecy and in silence; out of the heart alone can that unfold itself which shall truly go to the heart again.
"Yes! pious and simple as the old world was, ye draw it (art) from the same pure depths, awakening the feelings which slumber! and it shall bear honourable witness of ye—and for ever!
"Slavishly to cling to antiquity, this is not the end of your labours! Be ye, therefore, upheld by heavenly power; press on, and rest not, to the high and holy light!"
Methinks this magnificent prince deserves, even more than his ancestor, Maximilian I., to be styled the Lorenzo de' Medici of Bavaria. The power to patronize, the sentiment to feel, the genius to celebrate art, are rarely united, even in individuals. He must be a noble being—a genius born in the purple, on whose laurels there rests not a bloodstain, perhaps not even a tear!
This is a holiday. I was sitting at my window, translating some of these poems, when I saw a crowd round the doors of the new palace; for it is a day of public admission. Curiosity tempted me to join this crowd;—no sooner thought than done. I had M. de Klenze's general order for admittance in my pocket-book, but wished to see how this was managed, and mingled with the crowd, which was waiting to be admitted en masse. I was at once recognized as a stranger, and every one with simple civility made way for me. Groups of about twenty or thirty people were admitted at a time, at intervals of a quarter of an hour, and each group placed under the guidance of one of the workmen as cicerone. He led them through the unfinished apartments, explaining to his open-mouthed auditors the destination of each room, the subjects of the pictures on the walls and ceilings, &c. &c. There were peasants from the south, in their singular dresses, mechanics and girls of Munich, soldiers, travelling students. I was much amused. While the cicerone held forth, some merely wondered with foolish faces, some admired, some looked intelligent, and asked various questions, which were readily answered—all seemed pleased. Every thing was done in order: two groups were never in the same apartment; but as one went out, another entered. Thus many hundreds of these poor people were gratified in the course of the day. It seemed to me a wise as well as benevolent policy in the king thus to appeal to the sympathy, and gratify the pride, of his subjects of all classes, by allowing them—inviting them, to take an interest in his magnificent undertakings, to consider them national as well as royal. I am informed that these works are carried on without any demands on the Staatskasse, (the public treasury,) and without any additional taxes: so far from it, that the Bavarian House of Representatives curtailed the supplies by 300,000 florins only last year, and refused the king an addition to the civil list, which he had requested for the travelling expenses of two of his sons. The king is said to be economical in the extreme in his domestic expenses, and not very generous in money to those around him—unlike his open-hearted, open-handed father, Max-Joseph; in short, there are grumblers here as elsewhere, but strangers and posterity will not sympathize with them.
This is the fourth time I have seen this splendid and truly royal palace, but will make no memoranda till I have gone over the whole with Leo von Klenze. He has promised to be my cicerone himself, and I feel the full value of the compliment. Count V—— told me last night, that he (De Klenze) has made for this building alone upwards of seven hundred drawings and designs with his own hand.
Oct. 13.—Called on my English friends, the C * * s, and found them pleasantly settled in a beautiful furnished lodging near the Hofgarten, for which they pay twenty-four florins (or about two pounds) a month. We had some conversation about music, (they are all musicians,) and the opera, and Malibran, whom they have lately seen in Italy; and Pasta, whom they had visited at Como; and they confirmed what Mr. J. M. Stuntz and M. K. had all told me of her benevolence and excellent character. I could not find that any new genius had arisen in Italy to share the glory of our three queens of the lyrical drama,—Pasta, Malibran, and Schröder Devrient. Other singers have more or less talent and feeling, more or less compass of voice, facility, or agility; but these three women possess genius, and stamp on every thing they do their own individual character. Of the three, Pasta is the grandest and most finished artist; Malibran the most versatile in power and passion; while Schröder Devrient has that energy of heart and soul—that capacity for exciting, and being excited, which gives her such unbounded command over the feelings and senses of her audience.[ 33] So far we were agreed; but as the conversation went on, I was doomed to listen to a torrent of commonplace and sarcastic criticism on the private habits of these and other women of the same profession: one was accused of vulgarity, another of bad temper, and another of violence and caprice: one was suspected of a penchant for porter, another had been heard to swear, or—something very like it. Even pretty lady-like Sontag was reproached with some trifling breach of mere conventional manner,—she had used her fingers where she should have taken a spoon, or some such nonsense. My God! to think of the situation of these women! and then to look upon those women, who, fenced in from infancy by all the restraints, the refinements, the comforts, the precepts of good society,—the one arranging a new cap, the other embroidering a purse, the third reading a novel, all satisfied with petty occupations and amusements, "far, far removed from want and grief and fear,"—now sitting in judgment, and passing sentence of excommunication on others of their sex, who have been steeped in excitement from childhood, their nerves for ever in a state of tension between severest application and maddening flattery; cast on the world without chart or compass—with energies misdirected, passions uncontrolled, and all the inflammable and imaginative part of their being cultivated into excess as a part of their profession—of their material! O when will there be charity in the world? When will human beings, women especially, show mercy and justice to each other, and not judge of results, without a reference to causes? and when will reflection upon these causes lead to their removal? They are evils which press upon few, but are reflected on many, inasmuch as they degrade art and the pursuit of art;—but all can sneer, and few can think.
I begin at length to feel my way among the pictures here. Hitherto I have been bewildered. I have lounged away morning after morning at the gallery of the Hofgarten, at Schleissheim, and at the Duc de Leuchtenberg's; and returned home with dazzled eyes and a mind overflowing, like one "oppressed with wealth, and with abundance sad," unable to recall or to methodize my own impressions.
Professor Zimmermann tells me that the king of Bavaria possesses upwards of three thousand pictures: of these about seventeen hundred are at Schleissheim; nine hundred in the Munich gallery; and the rest distributed through various palaces. The national gallery, or Pinakothek, which is now building under the direction of Leo von Klenze, is destined to contain a selection from these multifarious treasures, of which the present arrangement is only temporary.
The king of Bavaria unites in his own person the three branches of the House of Wittelsbach: the palatines of the Rhine, the dukes of Deuxponts, and the electors of Bavaria, all sovereign houses, and descended from Otto von Wittelsbach, who received the investiture of the dukedom of Bavaria in 1180. Thus it is that the celebrated gallery once at Dusseldorf, formed under the auspices of the elector John William; the various collections at Manheim, Deuxponts, and Heidelberg, are now concentrated at Munich, where, from the days of Duke Albert V. (1550) up to the present time, works of art have been gradually accumulated by successive princes.
Somebody calls the gallery at Munich, the court of Rubens; and Sir Joshua Reynolds says that no one should judge of Rubens who had not studied him at Antwerp and Dusseldorf. I begin to feel the truth of this. My devoted worship of the Italian school of art rendered me long—I will not say blind to the merits of the Flemish painters—for that were to be "sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing!" but, in truth, without that full feeling of their power which I have since acquired.
Certainly we have in these days mean ideas about painting—mean and false ideas! It has become a mere object of luxury and connoisseurship, or virtù: unless it be addressed to our personal vanity, or to the puerile taste for ornament, show, furniture,—it is nothing. The noble art which was once recognized as the priestess of nature, as a great moral power capable of acting on the senses and the imagination of assembled human beings—as such applied by the lawgivers of Greece, and by the clergy of the Roman Catholic church,—how is it now vulgarized in its objects! how narrowed in its application! And if it be said, that in the present state of society, in these calculating, money-making, political, intellectual times, we are acted upon by far different influences, rendering us infinitely less sensible to the power of painting, then I think it is not true, and that the cultivated susceptibility to other moral or poetical excitements—as politics or literature—does not render us less sensible to the moral influence of painting; on the contrary: but she has fallen from her high estate, and there are none to raise her. The public—the national spirit, is wanting; individual patronage is confined, is misdirected, is arbitrary, demanding of the artist any thing rather than the highest and purest intellectual application of his art, and affording nor space nor opportunity for him to address himself to the grand universal passions, principles, and interests of human nature! Suppose a Michael Angelo to be born to us in England: we should not, perhaps, set him to make a statue of snow, but where or how would his gigantic genius, which revelled in the great deeps of passion and imagination, find scope for action? He would struggle and gasp like a stranded Leviathan!
But this is digressing: the question is, may not the moral effect of painting be still counted on, if the painter be himself imbued with the right spirit?[ 34]
There is, in the academy at Antwerp, a picture by Rubens, which represents St. Theresa kneeling before Christ, and interceding for the souls in purgatory. The treatment of the subject is exceedingly simple; the upper part of the picture is occupied by the Redeemer, with his usual attributes, and the saint, habited as a nun. In the lower part of the picture, instead of a confused mob of tormented souls, and flames, and devils with pitchforks, the painter has represented a few heads as if rising from below. I remember those of Adam, Eve, and Mary Magdalene. I remember—and never shall forget—the expression of each! The extremity of misery in the countenance of Adam; the averted, disconsolate, repentant wretchedness of Eve, who hides her face in her hair; the mixture of agony, supplication, hope, in the face of the Magdalene, while a cherub of pity extends his hand to her, as if to aid her to rise, and at the same time turns an imploring look towards the Saviour. As I gazed upon this picture, a feeling sank deep into my heart, which did not pass away with the tears it made to flow, but has ever since remained there, and has become an abiding principle of action. This is only one instance out of many, of the moral effect which has been produced by painting.
To me it is amusing, and it cannot but be interesting and instructive to the philosopher and artist, to observe how various people, uninitiated into any of the technicalities of art, unable to appreciate the amount of difficulties overcome, are affected by pictures and sculpture. But in forming our judgment, our taste in art, it is unsafe to listen to opinions springing from this vague kind of enthusiasm; for in painting, as in music—"just as the soul is pitched, the eye is pleased."
I amuse myself in the gallery here with watching the countenances of those who look at the pictures. I see that the uneducated eye is caught by subjects in which the individual mind sympathizes, and the educated taste seeks abstract excellence. Which has the most enjoyment? The last, I think. Sensibility, imagination, and quick perception of form and colour, are not alone necessary to feel a work of art; there must be the power of association; the mind trained to habitual sympathy with the beautiful and the good; the knowledge of the meaning, and the comprehension of the object of the artist.
In the gallery here there are eighty-eight pictures of Rubens—some among the very finest he ever painted; for instance, that splendid picture, Castor and Pollux carrying off the daughters of Leucippus, so full of rich life and movement; the destruction of Sennacherib's host; Rubens and his wife, full lengths, seated in a garden; that wonderful picture of the defeat of the Amazons; the meeting of Jacob and Laban; the picture of the Earl of Arundel and his wife, with other figures, full lengths;[ 35] and a series of the designs for the large paintings of the history of Marie de' Medici, now in the Louvre. His group of boys with fruits and flowers, exhibits the richest, loveliest combination of colours ever presented to the eye; and on that wonderful picture of the fallen (or rather falling) angels, he has lavished such endless variety of form, attitude, and expression, that it would take a day to study it. It is not a large picture: the eye, or rather the imagination, easily takes in the general effect of tumult, horror, destruction, but the understanding dwells on the detail with still increasing astonishment and admiration. These are a few that struck me, but it is quite in vain to attempt to particularize.
One may begin by disliking Rubens in general, (I think I did,) but one must end by standing before him in ecstacy and wonder. It is true, that always luxuriant, he is often gross and sensual—he can sometimes be brutally so. His bacchanalian scenes are not like those of Poussin, classical, godlike debauchery, but the abandoned drunken revelry of animals—the very sublime of brute licentiousness; and painted with a breadth of style, a magnificent luxuriance of colour, which renders them more revolting. The physique predominates in all his pictures, and not only to grossness, even to ferocity. His picture here of the slaughter of the Innocents, makes me sick—it has absolutely polluted my imagination. Surely this is not the vocation of high art.—And as for his martyrdoms—they are worse than Spagnoletto's.
For all this, he is the Titan of painting: his creations are "of the earth and earthy," but he has called down fire and light from heaven, wherewith to animate and to illumine them.
Rubens is just such a painter as Dryden is a poet, and vice versâ: his women are just like Dryden's women, gross, exaggerated, unrefined animals: his men, like Dryden's men, grand, thinking, acting animals. Like Dryden, he could clothe his genius in thunder, dip his pencil in the lightning and the sunbeams of heaven, and rush fearlessly upon a subject which others had trembled to approach. In both we see a singular and extraordinary combination of the plainest, coarsest realities of life, with the loftiest imagery, the most luxurious tints of poetry. Both had the same passion for allegory, and managed it with equal success. "The thoughts that breathe and words that burn" of Dryden, may be compared to the living, moving forms, the glowing, melting, dazzling hues of Rubens, under whose pencil
"Desires and adorations,
Winged persuasions and wild destinies,
Splendours, and glooms, and glimmering incarnations
Of hopes, and fears, and twilight fantasies,—"
took form and being—became palpable existences: and yet with all this inventive power, this love of allegorical fiction, it is life, the spirit of animal life, diffused through and over their works; it is the blending of the plain reasoning with splendid creative powers;—of wonderful fertility of conception with more wonderful facility of execution; it is the combination of truth, and grandeur, and masculine vigour, with a general coarseness of taste, which may be said to characterise both these great men. Neither are, or can be, favourites of the women, for the same reasons.
There must have been something analogous in the genius of Rubens and Titian. The distinction was of climate and country. They appear to have looked at nature under the same aspect, but it was a different nature,—the difference between Flanders and Venice. They were both painters of flesh and blood: by nature, poets; by conformation, colourists; by temperament and education, magnificent spirits, scholars, and gentlemen, lovers of pleasure and of fame. The superior sentiment and grace, the refinement and elevation of Titian he owed to the poetical and chivalrous spirit of his age and country. The delicacy of taste which reigned in the Italian literature of that period influenced the arts of design. As to the colouring—we see in the pictures of Rubens the broad daylight effects of a northern climate, and in those of Titian, the burning fervid sun of a southern clime, necessarily modified by shade, before the objects could be seen: hence the difference between the glow of Rubens, and the glow of Titian: the first "i' the colours of the rainbow lived," and the other bathed himself in the evening sky; the one dazzles, the other warms. I can bring before my fancy at this moment, the Helen Forman of Rubens, and Titian's "La Manto;" the "man with a hawk" of Rubens, and Titian's "Falconer;" can any thing in heaven or earth be more opposed? Yet in all alike, is it not the intense feeling of life and individual nature which charms, which fixes us? I know not which I admire most; but I adore Titian—his men are all made for power, and his women for love.
And Rembrandt—king of shadows!
——Earth-born
And sky-engendered—son of mysteries!
was not he a poet? He reminds me often of the Prince Sorcerer, nurtured "in the cave of Domdaniel, under the roots of the sea."[ 36] Such an enchanted "den of darkness" was his mill and its skylight to him; and there, magician-like, he brooded over half-seen forms, and his imagination framed strange spells out of elemental light and shade. Thence he brought his unearthly shadows; his dreamy splendours; his supernatural gleams; his gems flashing and sparkling with internal light; his lustrous glooms; his wreaths of flaming and embossed gold; his wicked wizard-like heads—turbaned, wrinkled, seared, dusky; pale with forbidden studies—solemn with thoughtful pain—keen with the hunger of avarice—and furrowed with an eternity of years! I have seen pictures of his in which the shadowy background is absolutely peopled with life. At first all seems palpable darkness, apparent vacancy; but figure after figure emerges—another and another; they glide into view, they take shape and colour, as if they grew out of the canvass even while we gaze; we rub our eyes, and wonder whether it be the painter's work or our own fancy!
Of all the great painters Rembrandt is perhaps least understood; the admiration bestowed on him, the enormous prices given for his pictures, is in general a fashion—a mere matter of convention—like the price of a diamond. To feel Rembrandt truly, it is not enough to be an artist or an amateur picture-fancier—one should be something of a poet too.
There are nineteen of his pictures here; of these "Jesus teaching the doctors in the temple," though a small picture, impressed me with awe,—the portraits of the painter Flinck and his wife, with wonder. All are ill-hung, with their backs against the light—for them the worst possible situation.
Van Dyck is here in all his glory: there are thirty-nine of his pictures. The celebrated full-length, "the burgomaster's wife in black," so often engraved, does not equal, in its inexpressible, unobtrusive elegance, the "Lady Wharton," at Devonshire House.[ 37] Then we have Wallenstein with his ample kingly brow; fierce Tilly; the head of Snyders; the lovely head of the painter's wife, Maria Ruthven,—sweet-looking, delicate, golden-haired, and holding the theorbo, (she excelled in music, I believe,) and virgins, holy families, and other scriptural subjects. His famous picture of Susanna does not strike me much.
The four apostles of Albert Durer—wonderful! In expression, in calm religious majesty, in suavity of pencilling, and the grand, pure style of the heads and drapery, quite like Raffaelle. I compared, yesterday, the three portraits—that of Raffaelle, by himself; (the famous head once in the Altaviti palace, and engraved by Morghen;) Albert Durer, by himself; and Giorgione, by himself. Raffaelle is the least handsome, and rather disappointed me; the eyes, in particular, rather project, and have an expression which is not pleasing; the mouth and the brow are full of power and passion. Albert Durer is beautiful, like the old heads of our Saviour; and the predominant expression is calm, dignified, intellectual, with a tinge of melancholy. This picture was painted at the age of twenty-eight: he was then suffering from that bitter domestic curse, a shrewish, avaricious wife, who finally broke his heart. Giorgione is not handsome, but it is a sublime head, with such a large intellectual development, such a profound expression of sentiment! Giorgione died of a faithless mistress, as Albert Durer died of a scolding wife.[ 38]
By Paris Bordone, of Trevigi, there is a head of a Venetian lady, in a dress of crimson velvet, with dark splendid eyes which tell a whole history. By Murillo, there are eight pictures—not one in his most elevated style, but all perfect miracles of painting and of nature. There are thirty-three pictures of Vander Werff, a number sufficient to make one's blood run cold. One, a Magdalene, is of the size of life; the only large picture by this elegant, elaborate, soulless painter I ever saw: he is to me detestable.
By Joseph Vernet there are two delicious landscapes, a morning and an evening. I cannot farther particularize; but there are specimens of almost every known painter; those, however, of Titian, Correggio, Julio Romano, and Nicolo Poussin, are very few and not of a very high class, while those of the early German painters, and the Dutch, and the Flemish schools, are first-rate.
There is one English picture—Wilkie's "Opening of the Will:" it is very much admired here, and looked upon as a sort of curiosity. I wish the artists of the two countries were better known to each other: both would benefit by such an intercourse.
At the palace of Schleissheim[ 39] there are nearly two thousand pictures: of these some hundreds are positively bad; some hundreds are curious and valuable, as illustrating the history and progress of art; some few are really and intrinsically admirable.
But the grand attraction here is the far-famed Boisserée Gallery, which is arranged at Schleissheim, until the Pinakothek is ready for its reception. This is the collection about which so many volumes have been written, and which has excited such a general enthusiasm throughout Germany. This enthusiasm, as a fashion, a mania, is beginning to subside, but the impress it has left upon art, and the tone it has given to the pursuit, the feeling of art, will not so soon pass away. The gallery derives its name from two brothers, Sulpitz and Melchior Boisserée,[ 40] who, with a friend (Bertram) were employed for many years in collecting from various convents, and old churches, and obscure collections of family relics, the productions of the early painters of Germany, from William of Cologne, called by the Germans "Meister Wilhelm," down to Albert Durer and Holbein.
The productions of the Greek or Byzantine painters found their way into Germany, as into Italy, in the thirteenth century, and Wilhelm of Cologne appeared to have been the Cimabue of the north—the founder of that school of painting called the Byzantine-Niederrheinische, or Flemish school, and the precursor of Rubens, as Cimabue was the precursor of Michael Angelo.
Out of this stiff, and rude, and barbarous style of art, arose and spread the Alt-Deutsche, or Gothic school of painting, which produced successively, Van Eyck, (1370,) Hemling, Wohlgemuth,[ 41] Martin Schoen, Mabuse, Johan Schoreel, Lucas Kranach, Kulmbach, Albert Altorffer, Hans Asper, Johan von Mechlem, Behem, Albert Durer, and the two Holbeins. I mention here only those artists whose pictures fixed my attention; there are many others, and many pictures by unknown authors. Albert Durer was born exactly one hundred years after Van Eyck.
The Boisserée gallery contains about three hundred and fifty pictures; but I did not count them; and no official catalogue has yet been published. The subjects are generally sacred; the figures are heads of saints, and scenes from Scripture. A few are portraits; and there are a few, but very few, subjects from profane history. The painters whose works I at once distinguished from all others, were Van Eyck, Johan Schoreel, Hemling, and Lucas Kranach. I can truly say that the two pictures of Van Eyck, representing St. Luke painting the portrait of the Virgin, and the offering of the three kings; and that of Johan Schoreel, representing the death of the Virgin Mary, perfectly amazed me. I remember also several wondrous heads by Lucas Kranach; one by Behem, called, I know not why, "Helena:" and a picture of Christ and the little children, differing from all the rest in style, with something of the Italian grace of drawing, and suavity of colour. The artist, Sedlar, had studied in Lombardy, probably under Correggio; (one of the children certainly might call Correggio father.) The date on this extraordinary production is 1530. Of the painter I know nothing. The general and striking faults, or rather deficiencies of the old German school of art, are easily enumerated. The most flagrant violations of taste and costume,[ 42] bad drawing of the figure and extremities, faulty perspective; stiff, hard meagre composition, negligence or ignorance of all effect of chiaro-scuro. But what, then, is the secret of the interest which these old painters inspire, of the enthusiasm they excite, even in these cultivated days? It arises from a perception of the mind they brought to bear upon their subjects, the simplicity and integrity of feeling with which they worked, and the elaborate marvellous beauty of the execution of parts. I could give no idea in words of the intense nature and expression in some of the heads, of the grand feeling united to the most finished delicacy in the conception and painting of countenance, of the dazzling splendour of colouring in the draperies, and the richness of fancy in the ornaments and accessories.
But I do fear that the just admiration excited by this kind of excellence, and a great deal of national enthusiasm, has misled the modern German artists to a false, at least an exaggerated estimate, and an injudicious imitation, of their favourite models. It has produced or encouraged that general hardness of manner, that tendency to violent colour, and high glazy finish, which interfere too often with the beauty, and feeling, and effect of their compositions, at least in the eyes of those who are accustomed to the free broad style of English art.[ 43]
Thursday Evening.—At the theatre. Schiller's "Braut von Messina." This was the first time I had ever seen the tragic choruses brought on the stage, in the genuine style of the Greek drama; and the deep sonorous voice and measured recitation (I could almost say recitative) of Eslair, who was at the head of the chorus of Don Manuel—the emphatic lines being repeated or echoed by his followers—as well as the peculiar style of the whole representation, impressed me with a kind of solemn terror. It was wholly different from any thing I had ever witnessed, and was rather like a poem declaimed on the stage, than what we are accustomed to call a play. I was fortunate in seeing Madame Schröder in Donna Isabella, for she does not often perform, and it is one of the finest parts of this grand actress. Don Manuel and Don Cæsar were played by Forst and Schunke—both were young, very well looking, and good actors. Beatrice was played by Madll. Shöller. The costumes were beautiful, and all the arrangements of the stage contrived with the most poetical effect. One scene in the first act, where Donna Isabella stands between her two sons, a hand on the shoulder of each, beseeching them to be reconciled; while they remain silent, turning from each other with folded arms, and dark averted faces;—the chorusses drawn up on each side, all dressed alike, all precisely in the same attitude, leaning on their shields, with lowering looks fixed on the group in the centre, was admirably managed; and, from the effect that it produced, made me feel that uniformity may be one element of the sublime. Afterwards, a very lively soirée.
Friday.—The Hofgarten at Munich is a square, planted with trees, and gravelled, and serving as a public promenade. On one side is the royal palace; opposite to it, the picture gallery; on the east, the king's riding house, and on the west, a long arcade, open towards the garden which connects the palace and the picture gallery; under this arcade are shops, cafés, restaurateurs, &c. as in the Palais Royal at Paris.
But what distinguishes this arcade from all others, is the peculiar style of decoration. It is painted in fresco by the young artists who studied under Cornelius. There is, first, a series of sixteen compartments, about eleven feet in length, containing subjects from the history of Bavaria. They are all by various artists, and of course of different degrees of merit, generally better in the composition than the painting, but some have great vigour and animation in both respects.
For instance, Otho von Wittelsbach receiving from the emperor, Frederic Barbarossa, the investiture of the dukedom of Bavaria in 1180, painted by Zimmermann.
The marriage of Otho the Illustrious, to Agnes, Countess Palatine of the Rhine, in 1225, painted by my friend, Wilhelm Röckel, of Schleissheim, to whom I am indebted for many polite attentions.
The engagement between Louis the Severe, of Bavaria, and the fierce fiery Ottocar, king of Bohemia, upon the bridge at Mühldorf, in 1258, painted by Stürmer of Berlin. This is very animated and terrific. I think the artist had Rubens' defeat of the Amazons full in his mind.
The victory of the emperor, Louis of Bavaria, over Frederic of Austria, his competitor for the empire in 1322, painted by Hermann of Dresden.
The storming of Godesberg, when the unfortunate Archbishop Gerard, and Agnes of Mansfield had taken refuge there in 1583,[ 44] painted by Gassen of Coblentz.
Maximilian I. in 1623, invested with the forfeit electorate of the Palatine Frederic V.[ 45] painted by Eberle of Dusseldorf.
Maximilian Joseph I. father of the present king, bestowing on his people a new constitution and representative government in 1818, painted by Monten of Dusseldorf.
These have dwelt on my memory. Over all the pictures, the name of the subject and the date are inscribed in large gold letters, so that those who walk may read. The costumes and manners of each epoch have been attended to with the most scrupulous accuracy; and I see every day groups of soldiers, and of the common people, with their children, standing before these paintings, spelling the titles, and discussing the various subjects represented. The further end of the arcade is painted with a series of Italian scenes, selected by the king after his return from Italy, and executed by Rottmann of Heidelberg, a young landscape-painter of great merit, as De Klenze assures me, and he is a judge of genius. Under each picture is a distich, composed by the king himself. These are in distemper, I believe: freely, but rather hastily executed, and cold and ineffective in colour, perhaps the fault of the vehicle. The ceilings and pillars are also gaily painted with arabesques, and other ornaments; and at the upper end there is a grand seated figure, looking magnificent and contemplative, and calling herself Bavaria. This is well painted by Kaulbach.
I walk through these arcades once or twice every day, as I have several friends lodged over them; and can seldom arrive at the end without pausing two or three times.
I learn that the king's passion for building, and the forced encouragement given to the enlargement and decoration of his capital, has been carried to an excess, and, like all extremes, has proved mischievous, at least for the time. He has rendered it too much a fashion among his subjects, who are suffering from rash speculations of this kind. Many beautiful edifices in the Ludwig's Strasse, and the neighbourhood of the Maximilian's Platz, and the Karoline's Platz, remain untenanted. A suite of beautiful unfurnished apartments, and even a pretty house in the finest part of Munich may be had for a trifle. Some of these new houses are enormous. Madame M. told me that she has her whole establishment on one floor, but then she has twenty-three rooms.
Though the country round Munich is flat and ugly, a few hours' journey brings us into the very midst of the Tyrolian Alps. In June or July all the people fly to the mountains, and baths, and lakes in South Bavaria, and rusticate among the most glorious scenery in the world. "Come to us," said my friend, Luise K——; "come to us in the summer months, and we will play at Arcadia."
And truly, when I listened to her description of her mountain life, and all its tranquil, primitive pleasures, and all the beauty and grandeur which lie beyond that giant-barrier which lifts itself against the evening sky, and when I looked into those clear affectionate eyes—"dieser Blick voll Treu und Gute," and beheld the expression of a settled happiness, the light of a heart at peace with itself and all the world, reflected on the countenances of her children—a recollection of the unquiet destiny which drives me in an opposite direction came over me—
Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound
Upon a wheel of fire, which mine own tears
Do scald like molten lead.
