Things really look so threatening in the Neapolitan kingdom that we begin to think ourselves fortunate in having got our visit done. Tuscany is in the highest political spirits for the moment, and of course Victor Emanuel stares at us at every turn here, with the most loyal exaggeration of mustache and intelligent meaning. But we are selfishly careless about dynasties just now, caring more for the doings of Giotto and Brunelleschi than for those of Count Cavour. On a first journey to the greatest centres of art one must be excused for letting one's public spirit go to sleep a little. As for me, I am thrown into a state of humiliating passivity by the sight of the great things done in the far past—it seems as if life were not long enough to learn, and as if my own activity were so completely dwarfed by comparison that I should never have courage for more creation of my own. There is only one thing that has an opposite and stimulating effect: it is the comparative rarity, even here, of great and truthful art, and the abundance of wretched imitation and falsity. Every hand is wanted in the world that can do a little genuine, sincere work.
We are at the quietest hotel in Florence, having sought it out for the sake of getting clear of the stream of English and Americans, in which one finds one's self in all the main tracks of travel, so that one seems at last to be in a perpetual, noisy picnic, obliged to be civil, though with a strong inclination to be sullen. My philanthropy rises several degrees as soon as we are alone.
Letter to Major Blackwood, 27th May, 1860.
I am much obliged to you for writing at once, and so scattering some clouds which had gathered over my mind in consequence of an indication or two in Mr. John Blackwood's previous letter. The Times article arrived on Sunday. It is written in a generous spirit, and with so high a degree of intelligence that I am rather alarmed lest the misapprehensions it exhibits should be due to my defective presentation, rather than to any failure on the part of the critic. I have certainly fulfilled my intention very badly if I have made the Dodson honesty appear "mean and uninteresting," or made the payment of one's debts appear a contemptible virtue in comparison with any sort of "Bohemian" qualities. So far as my own feeling and intention are concerned, no one class of persons or form of character is held up to reprobation or to exclusive admiration. Tom is painted with as much love and pity as Maggie; and I am so far from hating the Dodsons myself that I am rather aghast to find them ticketed with such very ugly adjectives. We intend to leave this place on Friday (3d), and in four days after that we shall be at Venice, in a few days from that time at Milan, and then, by a route at present uncertain, at Berne, where we take up Mr. Lewes's eldest boy, to bring him home with us.
We are particularly happy in our weather, which is unvaryingly fine without excessive heat. There has been a crescendo of enjoyment in our travels; for Florence, from its relation to the history of modern art, has roused a keener interest in us even than Rome, and has stimulated me to entertain rather an ambitious project, which I mean to be a secret from every one but you and Mr. John Blackwood.
Any news of "Clerical Scenes" in its third edition? Or has its appearance been deferred? The smallest details are acceptable to ignorant travellers. We are wondering what was the last good article in Blackwood, and whether Thackeray has gathered up his slack reins in the Cornhill. Literature travels slowly even to this Italian Athens. Hawthorne's book is not to be found here yet in the Tauchnitz edition.
Italy, 1860.
We left Florence on the evening of the 1st of June, by diligence, travelling all night and until eleven the next morning to get to Bologna. I wish we could have made that journey across the Apennines by daylight, though in that case I should have missed certain grand, startling effects that came to me in my occasional wakings. Wonderful heights and depths I saw on each side of us by the fading light of the evening. Then, in the middle of the night, while the lightning was flashing and the sky was heavy with threatening storm-clouds, I waked to find the six horses resolutely refusing or unable to move the diligence—till, at last, two meek oxen were tied to the axle, and their added strength dragged us up the hill. But one of the strangest effects I ever saw was just before dawn, when we seemed to be high up on mighty mountains, which fell precipitously, and showed us the awful, pale horizon far, far below.
The first thing we did at Bologna was to go to the Accademia, where I confirmed myself in my utter dislike of the Bolognese school—the Caraccis and Domenichino et id genus omne—and felt some disappointment in Raphael's St. Cecilia. The pictures of Francia here, to which I had looked forward as likely to give me a fuller and higher idea of him, were less pleasing to me than the smaller specimens of him that I had seen in the Dresden and other galleries. He seems to me to be more limited even than Perugino; but he is a faithful, painstaking painter, with a religious spirit. Agostino Caracci's Communion of St. Jerome is a remarkable picture, with real feeling in it—an exception among all the great pieces of canvas that hang beside it. Domenichino's figure of St. Jerome is a direct plagiarism from that of Agostino; but in other points the two pictures are quite diverse.