“‘Confino i tuoi servitori,
Quelli che ti aiut avanno
A discacciar sui, o
Diventare della forma,
Mezze bestie, mezzi uomini,
E tu o Biancone,
Che tanto grande siei,
Ti confino a stare sempre,
Sempre ritto e non potrete
Mai ragionare, ne camminare
Solo quando sara luna,
Luna piena, passero io
Ti vedro, e mi vedrai,
Ma parlarmi non potrai.“‘Quando sara luna piena,
E che sara una notte,
Che sara mezza nuvola,
E mezza serena s’enderai,
Della tua carozza nei,
Nei momenti che la Luna
Resta sotto le nuvole,
E cosi potrei favellare,
Con tutte le statue, che ai
Attorno, allor tua carozza,
E col mio permesso potrai
Andare anche dai tuoi amici!’“‘I hereby compel thy servants,
Those who aided thee, to vanish,
Or take forms half brute, half human. [158]
As for thee, O Biancone!
Thou who art so tall and stately,
Thou shalt stand erect for ever,
Without power to speak or wander,
Only when the full moon shining
Falls upon thee, I will pass thee,
I shall see thee; thou will see me,
Without power to address me!“‘When the moon in full is shining,
Yet when clouds begin to gather;
Half in light and half in darkness,
Thou may’st only in the moment
When the moon is overclouded,
Leave thy chariot, and have converse
With the statues who are round thee,
Then thou may’st, by my permission,
Go among thy friends, then only.’”
I may here explain to the reader that this tale with its elaborate invocations is not current as here given among the people. Such forms and formulas are confined to the witches, who, as in all countries, are the keepers of mysterious traditions. All that is generally heard as regards this subject is, that when the full moon shines on Biancone at midnight, he becomes animated, and walks about the Signoria conversing with the other statues.
The Neptune was, with horses and all, produced by Bartolommeo Ammanati between 1564 and 1565. It has a certain merit of grandeur, but in lesser degree is like its neighbour Cacus, by Baccio Bandinelli, which Benvenuto Cellini justly regarded as resembling a mere bag of fat. When Michael Angelo saw the Neptune he exclaimed: “Ammanato! Ammanato! che bel blocco che hai sciupato!”—“Ammanato, what a fine block of marble thou hast spoiled!”
The Italians say that the satyr at the corner of the Palazzo Vecchio is a copy, because the original was stolen
one night in January in 1821, “and is now one of the finest bronzes in the British Museum of London.” It may be so; there was a great deal of fine stealing in those days. I suspect, however, that the truth is that as these images return to life now and then, the satyr availed himself of his revivification to set forth on his travels, and coming to London and finding good company in the British Museum, settled down there. But truly, when I think of the wanton and heartless destruction of beautiful and valuable old relics which has gone on of late years in Florence, to no earthly purpose, and to no profit whatever, I feel as if all the tales of such things being stolen or sold away to foreign museums were supremely silly, and as if it were all just so much saved from ruin—in case the tales are true.
“Hæc fabula docet,” wrote Flaxius, “a strange lesson. For as it was anciently forbidden to make images, because it was an imitation of God’s work; and secondly, because men believed that spirits would enter into them—even so doth it become all novel-writers, romancers, and poets, to take good heed how they portray satyrs, free-love nymphs, and all such deviltry, because they may be sure that into these models or types there will enter many a youthful soul, who will be led away thereby to madness and ruin. Which is, I take it, the most practical explanation for commandment, which hath been as yet set coram populo.”
THE RED GOBLIN OF THE BARGELLO
“Lord Foulis in his castle sat,
And beside him old Red-cap sly;
‘Now tell me, thou sprite, who art mickle of might,
The death which I shall die?’”—Scott’s Border Minstrelsy.
The Bargello has been truly described as one of the most interesting historical monuments of Florence, and it is a very picturesque type of a towered mediæval palace. It was partly burned down in 1322, and rebuilt in its present form by Neri di Fioravanti, after which it served as a prison. Restored, or modernised, it is now a museum. As I conjectured, there was some strange legend connected with it, and this was given to me as follows:
Il Folletto Rosso.