FEBRUARY 6, 1880—JUNE 15, 1830
Serra Palace in Genoa.—Starts for Rome.—Rain in the mountains.—A brigand.—Carrara.—First mention of a railroad.—Pisa.—The leaning tower.—Rome at last.—Begins copying at once.—Notebooks.—Ceremonies at the Vatican.—Pope Pius VIII.—Academy of St. Luke's.—St Peter's.— Chiesa Nuova.—Painting at the Vatican.—Beggar monks.—Fata of the Annunciation.—Soirée at Palazzo Simbaldi.—Passion Sunday.—Horace Vernet.—Lying in state of a cardinal.—Miserere at Sistine Chapel.— Holy Thursday at St Peter's.—Third cardinal dies.—Meets Thorwaldsen at Signor Persianis's.—Manners of English, French, and Americans.—Landi's pictures.—Funeral of a young girl.—Trip to Tivoli, Subiaco.—Procession of the Corpus Domini.—Disagreeable experience.
The enthusiastic artist was now in Italy, the land of his dreams, and his notebooks are filled with short comments or longer descriptions of churches, palaces, and pictures in Genoa and in the other towns through which he passed on his way to Rome, or with pen-pictures of the wild country through which he and his fellow travellers journeyed.
In Genoa, where he stopped several days, he was delighted with the palaces and churches, and yet he found material for criticism:—
"The next place of interest was the Serra Palace, now inhabited by one of that family, who, we understood, was insane. After stopping a moment in the anteroom, the ceiling of which is painted in fresco by Somnio, we were ushered into the room called the most splendid in Europe, and, if carving and gilding and mirrors and chandeliers and costly colors can make a splendid room, this is certainly that room. The chandeliers and mirrored sides are so arranged as to create the illusion that the room is of indefinite extent. To me it appeared, on the whole, tawdry, seeing it in broad daylight. In the evening, when the chandeliers are lighted, I have no doubt of its being a most gorgeous exhibition, but, like some showy belle dressed and painted for evening effect, the daylight turns her gold into tinsel and her bloom into rouge.
"After having stayed nearly four days in Genoa, and after having made arrangements with our honest vetturino, Dominique, to take us to Rome, stopping at various places on the way long enough to see them, we retired late to bed to prepare for our journey in the morning.
"On Wednesday morning, February 10, we rose at five o'clock, and, after breakfast of coffee, etc., we set out at six on our journey towards Rome."
I shall not follow them every step of the way, but shall select only the more personal entries in the diary.
"A little after eleven o'clock we stopped at a single house upon a high hill overlooking the sea, to breakfast. It has the imposing title of 'Locanda della Gran Bretagna.' We expected little and got less, and had a specimen of the bad faith of these people. We enquired the price of our déjeuner before we ordered it, which is always necessary. We were told one franc each, but after our breakfast, we were told one and a half each, and no talking with the landlord would alter his determination to demand his price. There is no remedy for travellers; they must pay or be delayed.
"At one o'clock we left this hole of a place, where we were more beset with beggars and spongers than at any place since we had been in Italy."
Stopping overnight at Sestri, they set out again on the 11th at five o'clock in the morning:—
"It was as dark as the moon, obscured by thick clouds, would allow it to be, and, as we left the courtyard of the inn, it began to rain violently. Our road lay over precipitous mountains away from the shore, and the scenery became wild and grand. As the day dawned we found ourselves in the midst of stupendous mountains rising in cones from the valleys below. Deep basins were formed at the bottom by the meeting of the long slopes; clouds were seen far below us, some wasting away as they sailed over the steeps, and some gathering denseness as they were detained by the cold, snowy peaks which shot up beyond. Now and then a winding stream glittered at the bottom of some deep ravine amidst the darkness around it, and occasionally a light from the cottage of some peasant glimmered like a star through the clouds.
"As we labored up the steep ascent little brawling cascades without number, from the heights far above us, in milky streams, gathering power from innumerable rills, dashed at our feet, and, passing down through the artificial passages beneath the road, swept down into the valleys in torrents, and swelling the rivers, whose broad beds were seen through the openings, rushed with irresistible power to the sea.
"We found, from the violence of the storm, that the road was heavy and much injured in some parts by the washing down of rocks from the heights. Some of great size lay at the sides recently thrown down, and now and then one of some hundred pounds' weight was found in the middle of the road.
"We continued to ascend about four hours until we came again from a region of summer into the region of snow, and the height from the sea was greater than we had at any time previously attained. The scenery around us, too, was wilder and more sterile. The Apennines here are very grand, assuming every variety of shape and color. Long slopes of clay color were interlocked with dark browns sprinkled with golden yellow; slate blue and grey, mixed with greens and purples, and the pure, deep ultramarine blue of distant peaks finished the background."
After breakfasting at Borghetto at a miserable inn, where they were much annoyed by beggars of all descriptions, they continued their journey through much the same character of country for the rest of the day, and towards dark they met with a slight adventure:—
"Our road was down a steep declivity winding much in the same way as at Finale. Precipices were at the side without a protecting barrier, and we felt some uneasiness at our situation, which was not decreased by suddenly finding our coach stopped and a man on horseback (or rather muleback) stopping by the side of the coach. It was but for a moment; our vetturino authoritatively ordered him to pass on, which he did with a 'buona sera,' and we never parted with a companion more gladly. From all the circumstances attending it we were inclined to believe that he had some design upon us, but, finding us so numerous, thought it best not to run the risk."
Spezia was their resting-place for that night, and, after an early start the next morning, they reached the banks of the Vara at nine o'clock.
"We had a singular time in passing the river in a boat. Many women of the lower orders crossed at the same time. The boat being unable to approach the shore, we were obliged to ride papoose-back upon the shoulders of the brawny watermen for some little distance; but what amused us much was the perfect sang-froid with which the women, with their bare legs, held up their clothes above the knees and waded to the boat before us….
"At half-past twelve we came in sight of Carrara. This place we went out of our course to see, and at one o'clock entered the celebrated village, prettily situated in a valley at the base of stupendous mountains. A deep ravine above the village contains the principal quarries of most exquisite marbles for which this place has for so many ages been famous. The clouds obscuring the highest peaks, and ascending from the valleys like smoke from the craters of many volcanoes, gave additional grandeur to a scene by nature so grand in itself.
"After stopping at the Hôtel de Nouvelle Paros, which we found a miserable inn with bad wine, scanty fare and high charges, we took a hasty breakfast, and procuring a guide we walked out to see the curiosities of the place. It rained hard and the road was excessively bad, sometimes almost ankle-deep in mud. Notwithstanding the forbidding weather and bad road, we labored up the deep ravine on the sides of which the excavations are made. Dark peaks frowned above us capped with clouds and snow; white patches midway the sides showed the veins of the marble, and immense heaps of detritus, the accumulation of ages, mountains themselves, sloped down on each side like masses of piled ice to the very edge of the road. The road itself, white with the material of which it is made, was composed of loose pieces of the white marble of every size…. Continuing the ascent by the side of a milky stream, which rushed down its rocky bed, and which here and there was diverted off into aqueducts to the various mills, we were pointed to the top of a high hill by the roadside where was the entrance to a celebrated grotto, and at the base close by, a cavern protected a beautiful, clear, crystal fountain, which gushed from up the bottom forming a liquid, transparent floor, and then glided to mingle its pure, unsullied waters with the cloudy stream that rushed by it.
"Climbing over piles of rock like refined sugar and passing several wagons carrying heavy blocks down the road, we arrived at the mouth of the principal quarry where the purest statuary marble is obtained. I could not but think how many exquisite statues here lay entombed for ages, till genius, at various times, called them from their slumbers and bid them live….
"On our return we again passed the wagons laden with blocks, and mules with slabs on each side sometimes like the roof of a house over the mule…. The wagons and oxen deserve notice. The former are very badly constructed; they are strong, but the wheels are small, in diameter about two feet and but about three inches wide, so sharp that the roads must suffer from them. The oxen are small and, without exception, mouse-colored. The driver, and there is usually one to each pair, sits on the yoke between them, and, like the oarsman of a boat, with his back towards the point towards which he is going. Two huge blocks were chained upon one of these wagons, and behind, dragging upon the ground by a chain, was another. Three yoke of these small oxen, apparently without fatigue, drew the load thus constructed over this wretched road. An enterprising company of Americans or English, by the construction of a railroad, which is more practicable than a canal, but which latter might be constructed, would, I should think, give great activity to the operations here and make it very profitable to themselves."
It is rather curious to note that this is the first mention of a railroad made by Morse in his notes or letters, although he was evidently aware of the experiments which were being made at that time both in Europe and America, and these must have been of great interest to him. It is also well to bear in mind that the great development of transportation by rail could not occur until the invention of the telegraph had made it possible to send signals ahead, and, in other ways, to control the movement of traffic. At the present day the railroad at Carrara, which Morse saw in his visions of the future, has been built, but the ox teams are also still used, and linger as a reminder of more primitive days.
Continuing their journey, the travellers spent the night at Lucca, and in the morning explored the town, which they found most interesting as well as neat and clean. Leaving Lucca, "with much reluctance," on the 18th, the journal continues:—
"At half-past five, at sunset, Pisa with its leaning tower (the duomo of the cathedral and that of the baptistery being the principal objects in the view), was seen across the plain before us. Towards the west was a long line of horizon, unbroken, except here and there by a low-roofed tower or the little pyramidal spire of a village church. To the southeast the plain stretched away to the base of distant blue mountains, and to the east and the north the rude peaks through which we had travelled, their cold tops tinged with a warmer glow, glittered beyond the deep brown slopes, which were more advanced and confining the plain to narrower limits."
They found the Hôtel Royal de l'Hussar an excellent inn, and, the next day being Sunday, they attended an English service and heard an excellent sermon by the Reverend Mr. Ford, an Englishman.
"In the evening we walked to the famous leaning tower, the cathedral, the baptistery, and Campo Santo, which are clustered together in the northern part of the city. In going there we went some distance along the quay, which was filled with carriages and pedestrians, among whom were many masques and fancy dresses of the most grotesque kind. It is the season of Carnival, and all these fooleries are permitted at this time. We merely glanced at the exterior of the celebrated buildings, leaving till to-morrow a more thorough examination."
"Monday, February 16. We rose early and went again to the leaning tower and its associated buildings. The tower, which is the campanile of the cathedral and is about one hundred and ninety feet high, leans from its perpendicular thirteen feet. We ascended to the top by a winding staircase. One ascending feels the inclination every step he takes, and, when he reaches the top and perceives that that which should be horizontal is an inclined plane, the sensation is truly startling. It is difficult to persuade one's self that the tower is not actually falling, and I could not but imagine at intervals that it moved, reasoning myself momentarily into security from the fact that it had thus stood for ages. I could not but recur also to the fact that once it stood upright; that, although ages had been passed in assuming its present inclination to the earth, the time would probably come when it would actually fall, and the idea would suggest itself with appalling force that that time might be now. The reflection suggested by one of our company that it would be a glorious death, for one thus perishing would be sure of an imperishable name, however pleasing in romantic speculation, had no great power to dispel the shrinking fear produced by the vivid thought of the possibility when on the top of the tower…. The campanile is not the only leaning tower in Pisa. We observed that several varied from the perpendicular, and the sides of many of the buildings, even parts of the cathedral and the baptistery, inclined at a considerable angle. The soil is evidently unfavorable to the erection of high, heavy buildings."
After a side trip to Leghorn and further loitering along the way, stopping but a short time in Florence, which he purposed to visit and study at his leisure later on, he saw, at nine o'clock on the morning of February 20, the dome of St. Peter's in the distance, and, at two o'clock he and his companions entered Rome through the Porta del Popolo.
Taking lodgings at No. 17 Via de Prefetti, he spent the first few days in a cursory examination of the treasures by which he was surrounded, but he was eager to begin at once the work for which he had received commissions, and on March 7 he writes home:—
"I have begun to copy the 'School of Athens' from Raphael for Mr. R. Donaldson. The original is on the walls of one of the celebrated Camera of Raphael in the Vatican. It is in fresco and occupies one entire side of the room. It is a difficult picture to copy and will occupy five or six weeks certainly. Every moment of my time, from early in the morning until late at night, when not in the Vatican, is occupied in seeing the exhaustless stores of curiosities in art and antiquities with which this wonderful city abounds.
"I find I can endure great fatigue, and my spirits are good, and I feel strong for the pleasant duties of my profession. I feel particularly anxious that every gentleman who has given me a commission shall be more than satisfied that he has received an equivalent for the sum generously advanced to me. But I find that, to accomplish this, I shall need all my strength and time for more than a year to come, and that will be little enough to do myself and them justice. I am delighted with my situation and more than ever convinced of the wisdom of my course in coming to Italy."
Morse's little notebooks and sketch-books are filled with short, abrupt notes on the paintings, religious ceremonies, and other objects of interest by which he is surrounded, but sometimes he goes more into detail. I shall select from these voluminous notes only those which seem to me to be of the greatest interest.
"March 17. Mr. Fenimore Cooper and family are here. I have passed many pleasant hours with them, particularly one beautiful moonlight evening visiting the Coliseum. After the Holy Week I shall visit Naples, probably with Mr. Theodore Woolsey, who is now in Rome.
"March 18. Ceremonies at the Consistory; delivery of the cardinals' hats. At nine o'clock went to the Vatican; two large fantails with ostrich feathers; ladies penned up; Pope; cardinals kiss his hand in rotation; address in Latin, tinkling, like water gurgling from a bottle. The English cardinal first appeared, went up and was embraced and kissed on each cheek by the Pope; then followed the others in the same manner; then each new cardinal embraced in succession all the other cardinals; after this, beginning with the English cardinal, each went to the Pope, and he, putting on their heads the cardinal's hat, blessed them in the name of the Trinity. They then kissed the ring on his hand and his toe and retired from the throne. The Pope then rose, blessed the assembly by making the sign of the cross three times in the air with his two fingers, and left the room. His dress was a plain mitre of gold tissue, a rich, garment of gold and crimson, embroidered, a splendid clasp of gold, about six inches long by four wide, set with precious stones, upon his breast. He is very decrepit, limping or tottering along, has a defect in one eye, and his countenance has an expression of pain, especially as the new cardinals approached his toe.[1]
[Footnote 1: This was Pope Pius VIII.]
"The cardinals followed the Pope two and two with their train-bearers. After a few minutes the doors opened again and a procession, headed by singers, entered chanting as they went. The cardinals followed them with their train-bearers; they passed through the Consistory, and thus closed the ceremony of presenting the cardinals' hats.
"A multitude of attendants, in various costumes, surrounded the pontiff's throne during the ceremony, among whom was Bishop Dubois of New York….
"Academy of St. Luke's: Raphael's skull; Harlow's picture of the making of a cardinal; said to have been painted in twelve days; I don't believe it. 'The Angels appearing to the Shepherds,' by Bassan—good for color; much trash in the way of portraits. Lower rooms contain the pictures for the premiums; some good; all badly colored. Third Room: Bas-reliefs for the premiums. Fourth Room: Smaller premium pictures; bad. Fifth Room: Drawings; the oldest best, modern bad.
"Friday, March 19. We went to St. Peter's to see the procession of cardinals singing in the Capella. Cardinals walked two and two through St. Peter's, knelt on purple velvet cushions before the Capella in prayer, then successively kissed the toe of the bronze image of St. Peter as they walked past it.
"This statue of St. Peter, as a work of art, is as execrable as possible. Part of the toe and foot is worn away and polished, not by the kisses, but by the wiping of the foot after the kisses by the next comer preparatory to kissing it; sometimes with the coat-sleeve by a beggar; with the corner of the cloak by the gentlemen; the shawl by the females; and with a nice cambric handkerchief by the attendant at the ceremony, who wiped the toe after each cardinal's performance. This ceremony is variously performed. Some give it a single kiss and go away; others kiss the toe and then touch the forehead to it and kiss the toe again, repeating the operation three times."
The ceremonies and ritual of the Roman Catholic Church, while appealing to the eye of the artist, were repugnant to his Puritan upbringing, and we find many scornful remarks among his notes. In fact he was, all his life, bitterly opposed to the doctrines of Rome, and in later years, as we shall see, he entered into a heated controversy with a prominent ecclesiastic of that faith in America.
"March 21. Chiesa Nuova at seven o'clock in the evening; a sacred opera called 'The Death of Aaron.' Church dark; women not admitted; bell rings and a priest before the altar chants a prayer, after which a boy, about twelve years old apparently, addresses the assembly from the pulpit. I know not the drift of his discourse, but his utterance was like the same gurgling process which I noticed in the orator who addressed the Pope. It was precisely like the fitful tone of the Oneida interpreter.
"Tuesday, March 23. At the Vatican all the morning. While preparing my palette a monk, decently habited for a monk, who seemed to have come to the Vatican for the purpose of viewing the pictures, after a little time approached me and, with a very polite bow, offered me a pinch of snuff, which, of course, I took, bowing in return, when he instantly asked me alms. I gave him a bajocco for which he seemed very grateful. Truly this is a nation of beggars.
"Wednesday, March 24. Vatican all the morning. Saw in returning a great number of priests with a white bag over the left shoulder and begging of the persons they met. This is another instance of begging and robbing confined to one class.
"Thursday, March 25. Festa of the Annunciation; Vatican shut. Doors open at eight of the Chiesa di Minerva; obtained a good place for seeing the ceremony. At half-past nine the cardinals began to assemble; Cardinal Barberini officiated in robes, white embroidered with gold; singing; taking off and putting on mitres, etc.; jumping up and bowing; kissing the ring on the finger of the cardinal; putting incense into censers; monotonous reading, or rather whining, of a few lines of prayer in Latin; flirting censers at each cardinal in succession; cardinals bowing to one another; many attendants at the altar; cardinals embrace one another; after mass a contribution among the cardinals in rich silver plate. Enter the virgins in white, with crowns, two and two, and candles; they kiss the hem of the garment of one of the cardinals; they are accompanied by three officers and exit. Cardinals' dresses exquisitely plaited; sixty-two cardinals in attendance….
"Palazzo Simbaldi: At half-past eight the company began to assemble in the splendid saloon of this palace, to which I was invited. The singers, about forty in number, were upon a stage erected at the end of the room; white drapery hung behind festoons with laurel wreaths (the walls were painted in fresco). Four female statues standing on globes upheld seven long wax-lights; the instrumental musicians, about forty, were arranged at the foot of these statues; sala was lighted principally by six glass chandeliers; much female beauty in the room; dresses very various.
"Signora Luigia Tardi sang with much judgment and was received with great applause. A little girl, apparently about twelve years old, played upon the harp in a most exquisite manner, and called forth bravas of the Italians and of the foreigners bountifully.
"The manners of the audience were the same as those of fashionable society in our own country, and indeed in any other country; the display in dress, however, less tasteful than I have seen in New York. But, in truth, I have not seen more beauty and taste in any country, combined with cultivation of mind and delicacy of manner, than in our own. At one o'clock in the morning, or half-past six Italian time, the concert was over.
"Saturday, March 27. On returning to dinner I found at the post-office, to my great joy, the first letter from America since I left it.
"Sunday, March 28. Passion Sunday. Kept awake nearly all last night by a severe toothache; sent for a dentist and had the tooth extracted, for which he had the conscience to ask me three dollars—he took two. Was prevented by this circumstance from going to church this morning; went in the afternoon, and, after church, to St. Peter's; found all the crosses covered with black and all the pictures veiled. There were a great many in the church to hear the music which is considered very fine; some of it I was well pleased with, but it is by no means so impressive as the singing of the nuns at the Trinita di Monti, to which church we repaired at vespers.
"In St. Peter's we found a procession of about forty nuns; some of them were very pretty and their neat white headdresses, and kerchiefs, and hair dressed plain, gave a pleasing simplicity to their countenances. Some, looked arch enough and far from serious.
"Monday, March 29. Early this morning was introduced to the Chevalier Horace Vernet, principal of the French Academy; found him in the beautiful gardens of the Academy. He came in a négligé dress, a cap, or rather turban, of various colors, a parti-colored belt, and a cloak. He received me kindly, walked through the antique gallery of casts, a long room and a splendid collection selected with great judgment.
"Wednesday, March 31. Early this morning was waked by the roar of a cannon; learned that it was the anniversary of the present Pope's election. Went to the Vatican; the colonnade was filled with the carriages of the cardinals; that of the new English cardinal, Weld, was the most showy.
"Thursday, April 1. Went in the evening to the soirée of the Chevalier Vernet, director of the French Academy. He is a gentleman of elegant manners and sees at his soirées the first society in Rome. His wife is highly accomplished and his daughter is a beautiful girl, full of vivacity, and speaks English fluently…. During the evening there was music; his daughter played on the piano and others sang. There was chess, and, at a sideboard, a few played cards. The style was simple, every one at ease like our soirées in America. Several noblemen and dignitaries of the Church were present."
On April 4, Palm Sunday, he attended the services at the Sistine Chapel, which he found rather tedious, with much mummery. Going from there to the cancellerie he describes the following scene:—
"Cardinal Giulio Maria della Somaglia in state on an elevated bed of cloth-of-gold and black embroidered with gold, his head on a black velvet cushion embroidered with gold, dressed in his robes as when alive. He officiated, I was told, on Ash Wednesday. Four wax-lights, two on each side of the bed; great throng of people of all grades through the suite of apartments—the cancellerie—in which he lived; they were very splendid, chiefly of crimson and gold. The cardinal has died unpopular, for he has left nothing to his servants by his will; he directed, however, that no expense should be spared in his funeral, wishing that it might be splendid, but, unfortunately for him, he has died precisely at that season of the year (the Holy Week) when alone it is impossible, according to the church customs, to give him a splendid burial."
"Wednesday, April 7. Went to the Piazza Navone, being market-day, in search of prints. The scene here is very amusing; the variety of wares exposed, and the confusion of noises and tongues, and now and then a jackass swelling the chorus with his most exquisite tones.
"At three o'clock went to St. Peter's to see ceremonies at the Sistine Chapel. Cardinals asleep; monotonous bawling, long and tedious; candles put out one by one, fifteen in number; no ceremonies at the altar; cardinals present nineteen in number; seven yawns from the cardinals; tiresome and monotonous beyond description.
"After three hours of this most tiresome chant, all the candles having been extinguished, the celebrated Miserere commenced. It is, indeed, sublime, but I think loses much of its effect from the fatigue of body, and mind, too, in which it is heard by the auditors. The Miserere is the composition of the celebrated Allegri, and for giving the effect of wailing and lamentation, without injury to harmony, it is one of the most perfect of compositions. The manner of sustaining a strain of concord by new voices, now swelling high, now gradually dying away, now sliding imperceptibly into discord and suddenly breaking into harmony, is admirable. The imagination is alive and fancies thousands of people in the deepest contrition. It closed by the cardinals clapping their hands for the earthquake."
On April 8 (Holy Thursday), Morse went early with Mr. Fenimore Cooper and other Americans to St. Peter's. After describing some of the preliminary ceremonies he continues:—
"Having examined the splendid chair in which he was to be borne, and while he was robing in another apartment, we found that, although we might have a complete view of the Pope and the ceremonies before and after the benediction, yet the principal effect was to be seen below. We therefore left our place at the balcony, where we could see nothing but the crowd, and hastened below. On passing into the hall we were so fortunate as to be just in season for the procession from the Sistine Chapel to the Pauline. The cardinals walked in procession, two and two, and one bore the host, while eight bearers held over him a rich canopy of silver tissue embroidered with gold.
"Thence we hastened to the front of St. Peter's, where, in the centre upon the highest step, we had an excellent view of the balcony, and, turning round, could see the immense crowd which had assembled in the piazza and the splendid square of troops which were drawn up before the steps of the church. Here I had scarcely time to make a hasty sketch, in the broiling sun, of the window and its decorations, before the precursors of the Pope, the two large feather fans, made their appearance on each side of the balcony, which was decorated with crimson and gold, and immediately after the Pope, with his mitre of gold tissue and his splendid robes of gold and jewels, was borne forward, relieving finely from the deep crimson darkness behind him. He made the usual sign of blessing, with his two fingers raised. A book was then held before him in which he read, with much motion of his head, for a minute. He then rose, extending both his arms—this was the benediction—while at the same moment the soldiers and crowd all knelt; the cannon from the Castle of St. Angelo was discharged, and the bells in all the churches rang a simultaneous peal.
"The effect was exceedingly grand, the most imposing of all the ceremonies I have witnessed. The Pope was then borne back again. Two papers were thrown from the balcony for which there was a great scramble among the crowd."
On Friday, April 9 (Good Friday), many of the ceremonies so familiar to visitors to Rome during Holy Week are described at length in the notebooks, but I shall omit most of these. The following note, however, seems worthy of being recorded:—
"On our way to St. Peter's I ought to have noticed our visit to a palace in which another cardinal (the third who has died within a few days) was lying in state—Cardinal Bertazzoli.
"It is a singular fact, of which I was informed, that about the same time last year three cardinals died, and that it was a common remark that when one died two more soon followed, and the Pope always created three cardinals at a time."
"Friday, April 16. At the Vatican all day. I went to the soirée of the Signor Persianis in the evening. Here I had the pleasure of meeting for the first line with the Chevalier Thorwaldsen, the great Danish sculptor, the first now living. He is an old man in appearance having a profusion of grey hair, wildly hanging over his forehead and ears. His face has a strong Northern character, his eyes are light grey, and his complexion sandy; he is a large man of perfectly unassuming manners and of most amiable deportment. Daily receiving homage from all the potentates of Europe, he is still without the least appearance of ostentation. He readily assented to a request to sit for his portrait which I hope soon to take.
"Tuesday, April 27. My birthday. How time flies and to how little purpose have I lived!!
"Wednesday, April 28. I have noticed a difference in manners between the English, French, and Americans. If you are at the house of a friend and should happen to meet Englishmen who are strangers to you, no introduction takes place unless specially requested. The most perfect indifference is shown towards you by these strangers, quite as much as towards a chair or table. Should you venture a word in the general conversation, they might or might not, as the case may be, take notice of it casually, but coldly and distantly, and even if they should so far relax as to hold a conversation with you through the evening, the moment they rise to go all recognition ceases; they will take leave of every one else, but as soon think of bowing to the chair they had left as to you.
"A Frenchman, on the contrary, respectfully salutes all in the room, friends and strangers alike. He seems to take it for granted that the friends of his friend are at least entitled to respect if not to confidence, and without reserve he freely enters into conversation with you, and, when he goes, he salutes all alike, but no acquaintance ensues.
"An American carries his civility one step further; if he meets you afterwards, in other company, the fact that he has seen you at this friend's and had an agreeable chit-chat is introduction enough, and, unless there is something peculiar in your case, he will ever after know you and be your friend. This is not the case with the two former.
"The American is in this, perhaps, too unsuspicious and the others may have good reasons for their mode, but that of the Americans has more of generous sincerity and frankness and kindness in it.
"Friday, April 30. Painting all day except two hours at the Colonna Palace—Landi's pictures—horrible!! How I was disappointed. I had heard Landi, the Chevalier Landi, lauded to the skies by the Italians as the greatest modern colorist. He was made a chevalier, elected a member of the Academy at Florence and of the Academy of St. Luke in Rome, and there were his pictures which I was told I must by all means see. They are not merely bad, they are execrable. There is not a redeeming point in a single picture that I saw, not one that would have placed him on a level with the commonest sign-painter in America. His largest work in his rooms at present is the 'Departure of Mary Queen of Scots from Paris.' The story is not told; the figures are not grouped but huddled together; they are not well-drawn individually; the character is vulgar and tame; there is no taste in the disposal of the drapery and ornaments, no effect of chiaroscuro. It is flimsy and misty, and, as to color, the quality to which I was specially directed, if total disregard of arrangement, if the scattering of tawdry reds and blues and yellows over the picture, all quarrelling for the precedence; if leather complexions varied by those of chalk, without truth or depth or tone, constitute good color, then are they finely colored. But, if Landi is a colorist, then are Titian and Veronese never more to be admired. In short, I have never met with the works of an artist who had a name like Landi's so utterly destitute of even the shadow of merit. There is but one word which can express their character, they are execrable!
"It is astonishing that with such works of the old masters before them as the Italians have, they should not perceive the defects of their own painters in this particular. Cammuccini is the only one among them who possesses genius in the higher departments, and he only in drawing; his color is very bad.
"A funeral procession passed the house to-day. On the bier, exposed as is customary here, was a beautiful young girl, apparently of fifteen, dressed in rich laces and satins embroidered with gold and silver and flowers tastefully arranged, and sprinkled also with real flowers, and at her head was placed a coronet of flowers. She had more the appearance of sleep than of death. No relative appeared near her; the whole seemed to be conducted by the priests and monks and those hideous objects in white hoods, with faces covered except two holes for the eyes."
In early May, Morse, in company with other artists, went on a sketching trip to Tivoli, Subiaco, Vico, and Vara. This must have been one of the happiest periods of his life. He was in Italy, the cradle of the art he loved; he was surrounded by beauty, both natural and that wrought by the hand of man; he had daily intercourse with congenial souls, and home, with its cares and struggles, seemed far away. His notebooks are largely filled with simple descriptions of the places visited, but now and then he indulges in rhapsody. At Subiaco he comes upon this scene:—
"Upon a solitary seat (a fit place for meditation and study), by a gate which shut the part of the terrace near the convent from that which goes round the hill, sat a monk with his book. He seemed no further disturbed by my passing than to give me the usual salutation.
"I stopped at a little distance from him to look around and down into the chasm below. It was enchanting in spite of the atmosphere of the sirocco. The hills covered with woods, at a distance, reminded me of my own country, fresh and variegated; the high peaks beyond were grey from distance, and the sides of the nearer mountains were marked with many a winding track, down one of which a shepherd and his sheep were descending, looking like a moving pathway. No noise disturbed the silence but the distant barking of the shepherd's dog (as he, like a busy marshal, kept the order of his procession unbroken) mixing with the faint murmuring of the waterfall and the song of the birds that inhabited the ilex grove. It was altogether a place suited to meditation, and, were it consistent with those duties which man owes his fellow man, here would be the spot to which one, fond of study and averse to the noise and bustle of the world, would love to retire."
Returning to Rome on June 3, after enjoying to the full this excursion, from which he brought back many sketches, he found the city given over to ceremony after ceremony connected with the Church. Saint's day followed saint's day, each with its appropriate (or, from the point of view of the New Englander, inappropriate) pageant; or some new church was dedicated and the nights made brilliant with wonderful pyrotechnical displays. He went often with pleasure to the Trinita di Monti, where the beautiful singing of the nuns gave him special pleasure.
Commenting sarcastically on a display of fireworks in honor of St.
Francesco Caracciolo, he says:—
"As far as whizzing serpents, wheels, port-fires, rockets, and other varieties of pyrotechnic art could set forth the humility of the saint, it was this night brilliantly displayed."
And again, in describing the procession of the Corpus Domini, "the most splendid of all the church ceremonies," it is this which particularly impresses him:—
"Next came monks of the Franciscan and Capuchin orders, with their brown dresses and heads shaved and such a set of human faces I never beheld. They seemed, many of them, like disinterred corpses, for a moment reanimated to go through this ceremony, and then to sink back again into their profound sleep. Pale and haggard and unearthly, the wild eye of the visionary and the stupid stare of the idiot were seen among them, and it needed no stretch of the imagination to find in most the expression of the worst passions of our nature. They chanted as they went, their sepulchral voices echoing through the vaulted piazza, while the bell of St. Peter's, tolling a deep bass drone, seemed a fitting accompaniment for their hymns."
Later, on this same day, while watching a part of the ceremonies on the
Gorso, he has this rather disagreeable experience:—
"I was standing close to the side of the house when, in an instant, without the slightest notice, my hat was struck off to the distance of several yards by a soldier, or rather a poltroon in a soldier's costume, and this courteous manoeuvre was performed with his gun and bayonet, accompanied with curses and taunts and the expression of a demon in his countenance.
"In cases like this there is no redress. The soldier receives his orders to see that all hats are off in this religion of force, and the manner is left to his discretion. If he is a brute, as was the case in this instance, he may strike it off; or, as in some other instances, if the soldier be a gentleman, he may ask to have it taken off. There was no excuse for this outrage on all decency, to which every foreigner is liable and which is not of infrequent occurrence. The blame lies after all, not so much with the pitiful wretch who perpetrates this outrage, as it does with those who gave him such base and indiscriminate orders."