And haunts his victim wheresoe’er he wends,
On foreign shores the exile tries, in vain,
To banish thought, and fly from mental pain.
[2] A gentleman, to whom I was remarking on the universal desire for change, evinced by passengers of every kind of politics and religion, observed that he, at least, was an exception. “I am going (said he) to cross the Pontine Marshes by the ancient road—the Via Romana. Now it must be admitted that, in so doing, I am holding to the grand principle of the conservatives and Chinese—‘STARE SUPER VIAS ANTIQUAS.’” I acknowledged the ingenuity of the argument; but questioned the policy of the measure. I counselled him not to “stare” it too long on the “Vias Antiquas” of the Pontine fens, but rather to keep moving there, lest his own constitution should shortly afterwords come in need of reform.
[3] Mr. Chambers alludes to a curious custom in Holland—that of the females sitting on chafing-dishes or, in fact, warming-pans. This custom is prevalent in many parts of Germany, and is universal among the better classes of women in Italy. It is not on account of the dampness of the climate that it is adopted; but because there are no fire-places, where a female can have the luxury of putting her feet on the fender, by a cheerful fire, while conversing with her friend or reading a novel. The atmosphere of a continental apartment, already vitiated by the vile German stove, is rendered still farther malodorous as well as malarious by the fumes from the foot-stool or warming-pan.
[4] With another painting I was more at home—Rembrandt’s “Dissection.” It has been said by a connoisseur that—“the corpse is less an image of death than a vehicle of colour. It adjusts the equilibrium of warmth and coolness, and supplies a focus of brilliancy which irradiates the whole scene.” I doubt whether this picture was painted from life (I see I am infected by the neighbouring bull), for such a corpse has never come before me in the various dissecting-rooms which I have visited.
[5] The Mer de Glace, for instance, is perpetually bearing on its surface enormous blocks of rock detached from the sides of Mont Blanc, and travelling onward, however slowly, to the Rhone, and to the Sea.
[6] “Its ample volume (Rhine) of water from bank to bank, bearing a greater resemblance to the Thames at Westminster, than any river with which I am acquainted.”—Chambers, p. 49.
[7] Leigh’s Rhenish Album, 1840.
[8] I have attempted a liberal rather than a literal translation of this remarkable passage in Horace.