St. Michael’s figure is incomparable; those of Moses and St. Peter happily imagined; the spirit of composition, the manner of grouping and colouring, the general effect of the whole, prodigious! I know not why he has so fallen below himself in the Madonna’s character; perhaps not imitating Tintoret’s lovely Virgin in Paradise, he has done worse for fear of being servile. Tintoret’s idea of her is so very poetical! but those who shewed it me at Venice said the drawing was borrowed from Guariento, I remember.
Who however except Rubens would have thought so justly, so liberally, so wisely, about the Negro drawn up to heaven by the angels? who still retains the old terrestrial character, so far as to shew a disposition to laugh at their situation who on earth tormented him. When all is said, every body knows very well that Michael Angelo’s picture on this subject is by far the finest; and that neither Rubens nor Tintoret ever pretended, or even hoped to be thought as great artists as he: but though Dante is a sublimer poet than Tasso, and Milton a writer of more eminence than Pope, these last will have readers, reciters, and quoters, while the others must sit down contented with silent veneration and acknowledged superiority.
This day we saw the Rhine—what rivers these are! and what enormous inhabitants they do contain! a brace of bream, and eels of a magnitude and flavour very uncommon except in Germany, were our supper here. But the manners begin I see to fade away upon the borders; our soft feather beds are left behind; men too, sometimes sad, nasty, ill-looked fellows, come in one’s room to sweep, &c. and light the fire in the stove, which is now always made of lead, and the fumes are very offensive; no more tight maids to be seen: but we shall get good roads; at Liege, down in a dirty coal pit, the bad ones end I think; and that town may be said to finish all our difficulties. After passing through our last disagreeable resting-place then, one finds the manners take a tint of France, and begins to see again what one has often seen before. The forests too are fairly left behind, but neat agriculture, and comfortable cottages more than supply their loss. Broom, juniper, every English shrub, announce our proximity to Great Britain, while pots of mazerion in flower at the windows shew that we are arrived in a country where spring is welcomed with ceremony, as well as received with delight. The forwardness of the season is indeed surprising; though it freezes at night now and then, the general feel of the air is very mild; willows already give signs of resuscitation, while flights of yellowhammers, a bird never observed in Italy I think, enliven the fields, and look as if they expected food and felicity to be near.
Louvaine would have been a place well worth stopping at, they tell me; but we were in haste to finish our journey and arrive at
BRUSSELS.
Every step towards this comfortable city lies through a country too well known to need description, and too beautiful to be ever described as it deserves. Les Vues de Flandres are bought by the English, admired by the Italians, and even esteemed by the French, who like few things out of their own nation; but these places once belonged to Louis Quatorze, and the language has taken such root it will never more be eradicated. Here are very fine pictures in many private hands; Mr. Danot’s collection does not want me to celebrate its merits; and here is a lovely park, and a pleasing coterie of English, and a very gay carnival as can be, people running about the streets in crowds; but their theatre is a vile one: after Italy, it will doubtless be difficult to find masques that can amuse, or theatres that can strike one. But never did nation possess a family more charming than that of La Duchesse d’Arenberg, who, graced with every accomplishment of mind and person, devotes her time and thoughts wholly to the amusement of her amiable consort, calling round them all which has any power of alleviating his distressful condemnation to perpetual darkness, from an accident upon a shooting party that cost him his sight about six or seven years ago. Mean time her arm always guides, her elegant conversation always soothes him; and either from gaieté de cœur, philosophical resolution to bear what heaven ordains without repining, or a kind desire of corresponding with the Duchess’s intentions, he appears to lose no pleasure himself, nor power of pleasing others, by his misfortune; but dances, plays at cards, chats with his English friends, and listens delightedly (as who does not?) when charming Countess Cleri sings to the harpsichord’s accompaniment, with all Italian taste, and all German execution. By the Duke D’Aremberg we were introduced to Prince Albert of Saxony, and the Princesse Gouvernante, whose resemblance to her Imperial brother is very striking; her hand however, so eminently beautiful, is to be kissed no more; the abolition of that ceremony has taken place in all the Emperor’s family. The palace belonging to these princes is so entirely in the English taste, with pleasure grounds, shrubbery, lawn, and laid out water, that I thought myself at home, not because of the polite attentions received, for those I have found abroad, where no merits of mine could possibly have deserved, nor no services have purchased them. Spontaneous kindness, and friendship resulting merely from that innate worth that loves to energize its own affections on an object which some circumstances had casually rendered interesting, are the lasting comforts I have derived from a journey which has shewn me much variety, and impressed me with an esteem of many characters I have been both the happier and the wiser for having known. Such were the friends I left with regret, when, crossing the Tyrolese Alps, I sent my last kind wishes back to the dear state of Venice in a sigh; such too were my emotions, when we took leave last night at Lady Torrington’s; and resolving to quit Brussels to-morrow for Antwerp, determined to exchange the brilliant conversation of a Boyle, for the glowing pencil of a Rubens.
ANTWERP.
This is a dismal heavy looking town—so melancholy! the Scheld shut up! the grass growing in the streets! those streets so empty of inhabitants! and it was so famous once. Atuatum nobile Brabantiæ opidum in ripâ Schaldis flu. Europæ nationibus maximè frequentatum. Sumptuosis tam privatis quam publicis nitet ædificiis[54], say the not very old books of geography when speaking of this once stately city;