It may be observed that Eurydice has become Auradice in the incantation, in which there is probably an intimation of Aura, a light wind or zephyr. Air is so naturally associated with music. This, by a very singular coincidence, yet certainly due to mere chance, recalls the invocation to the Spirit of the Air, given by Bulwer in “The Last Days of Pompeii”:
“Spectre of the viewless air,
Hear the blind Thessalian’s prayer,
By Erichtho’s art that shed
Dews of life when life was fled,
By lone Ithaca’s wise king,
Who could wake the crystal spring
To the voice of prophecy
By the lost Eurydice!
Summoned from the shadowy throng,
At the muse-son’s magic song:
Come, wild Demon of the Air,
Answer to thy votary’s prayer.”
It is indeed very remarkable that in the call to the God of Music, who is in certain wise a spirit of the air, as in that to the Spirit of the Air himself, both are invoked:
“By the lost Eurydice!”
If it could be shown that Bulwer owed this poem and allusion to any ancient work or tradition, I should be tempted to believe that the popular invocation was derived from some source in common with the latter. There is indeed a quaint naïve drollery in the word Auradice—“Air-tell!” or “Air-declare!” which adapts it better to the spirit of Bulwer’s poem, in which the air is begged to
tell something, than to the Orphean or Orphic spell. It may be that the Orphic oracles were heard in the voice of the wind, apropos of which latter there is a strange Italian legend and an incantation to be addressed to all such mystic voices of the night, which almost seems re-echoed in “Lucia”:
“Verrano a te sull’ aure,
I miei sospiri ardenti,
Udrai nell mar che mormora
L’eco de miei lamenti!”
It is worth observing that this tradition, though derived from the Romagna, was given to me in Florence, and that one of the sculptures on the Campanile represents Orpheus playing the pipe to wild beasts. It is said that in the Middle Ages the walls of churches were the picture-books of the people, where they learned all they knew of Bible legends, but not unfrequently gathered many strange tales from other sources. The sculptors frequently chose of their own will scenes or subjects which were well known to the multitude, who would naturally be pleased with the picturing what they liked, and it may be that Orpheus was familiar then to all. In any case, the finding him in a witch incantation is singularly in accordance with the bas-relief of the Cathedral of Florence, which again fits in marvellously well with Byron’s verse:
“Florence! whom I will love as well
As ever yet was said or sung,
Since Orpheus sang his spouse from hell,
Whilst thou art fair and I am young.“Sweet Florence! those were pleasant times,
When worlds were staked for ladies’ eyes.
Had bards as many realms as rhymes,
Thy charms might raise new Antonies!”
True it is that this Florence seems to have had dazzling eyes and ringlets curled; and it is on the other hand not true that Orpheus sang his spouse from hell—he only