At about half-past ten, Mr. —— called for us, and we walked up to the cathedral, which is a large unfinished stone building, standing on the brow of a hill, which is to be the fashionable quarter of the town, and where there are already some very nice-looking houses. The interior of the church is large and handsome, and has more the look of a church than any thing I have been inside of in this country yet. 'Tis full eight years since I was in a Catholic church; and the sensation with which I approached the high altar, with its golden crucifix, its marble entablatures, and its glimmering starry lights, savoured fully as much of sadness as devotion. I have not been in a Catholic place of worship since I was at school. How well I remember the beautiful music of the military mass, the pageants and processions of the feast days at high mass, and the evening service, not vespers, but the Salut.[82] They sang that exquisitely mournful and beautiful Et incarnatus est, of Haydn's, which made my blood all run backwards. One thing disgusted me dreadfully, though the priests who were officiating never passed or approached the altar without bending the knee to it, they kept spitting all over the carpet that surrounded and covered the steps to it, interrupting themselves in the middle of the service to do so, without the slightest hesitation. We had a very indifferent sermon: the service was of course in Latin. When it was over, Mr. —— insisted on showing me some paintings which hung on either side the grand entrance. These were a couple of pictures by Paulin Guerin; the one representing the descent from the cross, the other, the burying of the dead, by St. Charles, in the Holy Land. I do not understand much about bad pictures, but I know good ones when I see them; and I think these were not such. There was no beauty of imagination or poetical conception whatever in them, and there appeared to me to be manifold glaring faults in the execution. I could have sworn to their being French pictures. Was introduced to several people, coming out of church. A little way beyond the cathedral stands Washington's monument,—a neat and appropriate pillar,—which, together with a smaller one erected at the head of our street, to the memory of the North Point heroes, has given Baltimore the appellation of the monumental city, which never could have befallen it in any other country under heaven but this. At eight o'clock, we went to Mrs. ——'s. They are all in deep mourning, and the circle was very small. They are most agreeable pleasant people, with a peculiar gentleness of manner, like very high breeding, which I have often observed in Catholics of the better orders. Their conversation appeared to me totally divested of the disagreeable accent which seems almost universal in this country. Mrs. —— talked to me about my aunt Whitelock, and what a charming actress she was, and what an enchanting thrilling voice she had. I spent a delightful evening. Before we went away, Mr. —— showed us a picture of Lady ——, by Lawrence. It looked quite refreshing, with its lovely dark curls unfrizzed, and the form of the neck and arms undisguised by the hideousness of modern fashions. Saw a very good likeness, too, of the Duke of ——. 'Twas very like him, though many years younger.
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By the by, somebody said that —— had turned Roman Catholic, and very devout. Some of the Marys and Magdalens of the old Italian painters are very converting pictures, with their tearful melancholy eyes, and golden, glorious, billowy hair. Mrs. —— amused me very much by her account of the slaves on their estates, whom, she said, she found the best and most faithful servants in the world. Being born upon the land, there exists among them something of the old spirit of clanship, and "our house," "our family," are the terms by which they designate their owners. In the south, there are no servants but blacks; for the greater proportion of domestics being slaves, all species of servitude whatever is looked upon as a degradation; and the slaves themselves entertain the very highest contempt for white servants, whom they designate as "poor white trash."
Monday, 7th.
Young —— called, and stayed about an hour with us. At half-past five, took coffee, and off to the theatre. The play was Romeo and Juliet; the house was extremely full: they are a delightful audience. My Romeo had gotten on a pair of trunk breeches, that looked as if he had borrowed them from some worthy Dutchman of a hundred years ago. Had he worn them in New York, I could have understood it as a compliment to the ancestry of that good city; but here, to adopt such a costume in Romeo, was really perfectly unaccountable. They were of a most unhappy choice of colours, too,—dull, heavy-looking blue cloth, and offensive crimson satin, all be-puckered, and be-plaited, and be-puffed, till the young man looked like a magical figure growing out of a monstrous strange coloured-melon, beneath which descended his unfortunate legs, thrust into a pair of red slippers, for all the world like Grimaldi's legs en costume for clown. The play went off pretty smoothly, except that they broke one man's collar-bone, and nearly dislocated a woman's shoulder by flinging the scenery about. My bed was not made in time, and when the scene drew, half a dozen carpenters in patched trowsers and tattered shirt-sleeves were discovered smoothing down my pillows, and adjusting my draperies. The last scene is too good not to be given verbatim:—
Romeo. Rise, rise, my Juliet,
And from this cave of death, this house of horror,
Quick let me snatch thee to thy Romeo's arms.
Here he pounced upon me, plucked me up in his arms like an uncomfortable bundle, and staggered down the stage with me.
Juliet. (aside.) Oh, you've got me up horridly!—that'll never do; let me down, pray let me down.
Romeo. There, breathe a vital spirit on thy lips,
And call thee back, my soul, to life and love!Juliet. (aside.) Pray put me down; you'll certainly throw me down if you don't set me on the ground directly.