CELENTANO.
The first days after my arrival at Naples were very sad. The noises and voices in that immense city nearly drove me out of my mind, added to which the weather was wretched—for we had nearly a month of rain—so there were no walks to be taken, and nothing to distract me. Fortunately I had all my family with me, and my thoughts were not in Florence, as they had been during my former visit. I gave no thought to my studio, and only, as if in a vision, the head of my Madonna appeared to me in the sad pose in which I had left her, fearing that I should never see her again. In vain Mancinelli and his family, and my friends Morelli, Aloysio, Maldarelli, Palizzi, and others, tried to rouse me out of my despondency. How well I remember with what pains poor Celentano, whom I then knew for the first time, tried to cheer me up! Poor Celentano! brightest light of that fine school that searches for and finds material in the universe of nature to embody the fantasies of the brain, how soon, and in what a manner, your light was extinguished!
Enough—enough of the dead, otherwise I shall fall into the elegiac, which would be ridiculous in these simple memoirs! But if it be true that every thought must be clothed in its own special garb, how sad is that of death, although through her veils shines the hope of heaven!
CHAPTER XIX.
A PROPHETIC DREAM—GIOVANNI STRAZZA—SIGNOR VONWILLER AND SOCIETIES FOR PROMOTING ART—RETURN FROM NAPLES TO ROME, AND MY DAUGHTER LUISINA'S ILLNESS—OUR RETURN TO FLORENCE—DEATH OF TRIA THE MODEL—THE MOSSOTTI MONUMENT AT PISA—HOW IT WAS THAT I DID NOT MAKE THE PORTRAIT OF HIS MAJESTY THE KING—THE COMPETITION FOR CAVOUR'S MONUMENT—I GO TO TURIN TO PASS JUDGMENT ON IT—THE "CHRIST AFTER THE RESURRECTION," A COMMISSION OF SIGNOR FILIPPI DI BUTI—RELIGIOUS ART AND ALESSANDRO MANZONI AND GINO CAPPONI—THOUGHT IS NOT FREE—CAVOUR'S MONUMENT—THE DESCRIPTION OF IT.
VISCONTI THE PAINTER.
And yet I do not feel in the vein to stop talking of the dead. It is so sweet to go back in memory to those dear persons that we have loved and esteemed, and who have returned our love. One day in Rome—it was in the summer of 1864—a young painter of the brightest promise had received a letter from his betrothed, who was a long way off. In it she expressed the great anxiety she had been suffering on account of a dream she had had, in which she had seen her dear one drowning; and she beseeched him in the warmest manner to pay attention and not expose himself to danger. The ingenuousness and affection in this letter made the young painter smile, and in his answer he jokingly expressed himself as follows: "With regard to your dream, set your mind at rest, because if I don't drown myself in wine, I shall certainly not drown in water." A few days after this some of his friends proposed to him to go and bathe, but he refused decidedly, and said, "Go, the rest of you; I don't want to bathe, and shall go home," and he left them. Shortly after this his friends went, as they had decided, to bathe, and they saw a young fellow struggling in the water; recognising him, they at once undressed and ran to his rescue, as it was evident that he did not know how to swim. Their attempt, as well as that of others, was vain, for the poor young man went down and was carried away by the current of the Tiber to a great distance from the spot where he had thrown himself in. This young man was universally and sincerely regretted. Painting lost in him one of her brightest geniuses, and Siena, his birthplace, a son that would have been a very great honour to her. Some studies sent by him to Siena, and a picture of San Luigi in the Church of the Madonna del Soccorso at Leghorn, bear witness to Visconti's talent, a name dear and revered amongst all artists. He studied at the Sienese Academy, under Luigi Mussini, who, besides his sound principles in art, had the power of being able to communicate them, and carried persuasion and conviction through the weight of example. Visconti was buried in Rome in the Church of San Bartolommeo all'Isola,[15] a short distance from the place where his body was found, and Siena honoured him by having a modest but touching monument made by his friend Tito Sarrocchi and placed for him in the Church of San Domenico. Visconti was a handsome young man, healthy and strong, of olive complexion, black hair and beard, endowed with an open, frank, loyal, and at the same time modest, nature.
GIOVANNI STRAZZA.