At a small distance is the Porta San Sebastiano, the lower part of which is of squared blocks of marble, well put together. This projecting part of the present walls is far beyond the ancient circuit, and the character of the work is quite different from that of the Porta San Lorenzo, or Porta Maggiore, but has more affinity with that of the Porta del Popolo. Above the marble, the towers are carried up square, in brickwork, but the highest part is circular.
Between this and the Porta San Paolo, besides the usual, or perhaps more than the usual portion of included fragments, many of which were probably tombs, we have traces of more recent works, and of the fortifications of modern times. Beyond the Porta San Paolo, there is no road under the walls, and I did not attempt to find my way through the vineyards, to the shores of the Tiber. Inside, however, they exhibit a series of open arches towards Monte Testaccio, and the Prati del Popolo Romano.
LETTER XXXIII.
NEIGHBOURHOOD OF ROME.
Rome, May, 1817.
You perhaps imagine, from having heard of the dreary and desolate Campagna, that there are no agreeable walks about the city, but if you have formed any such notion, you are very much mistaken. The ground about Rome is exceedingly well disposed for pleasant scenery; the country being intersected by several valleys of no great width, each bounded by steep banks of moderate height, from the top of which you catch the gently varied line of Monte Albano, and the distant Apennines. One of these, Monte Velino, is still covered with snow. The Leonessa held it for a long while; but the highest summit of this part of the chain, which is the Gran Sasso, rising to an elevation of very nearly 9,000 feet, is not visible from any place near Rome. All these points of the Apennines are in the Neapolitan territory. Each valley has nearly a flat bottom, forming rich meadows, which in winter are very wet, and many of them are at times inundated. Wherever art has interfered to adorn these slopes, or where some natural patch of wood is suffered to grow, the effect is highly pleasing, especially if in addition, some picturesque ruin crown the summit. Sometimes when the eye is elevated above these slopes, such features enrich the nearer landscape, while the long lines of the ancient aqueducts give an interest to the middle distance; but it must be confessed that little advantage is made of this disposition of the ground, and that the general character of uncultivated nakedness is far from agreeable.
I will take you in this letter through the Porta del Popolo, and our first visit shall be to the house or casino, once inhabited by Raphael. It stands in a garden close by the walls, and is without architectural ornament, yet it forms a good object; to which the woods of the Villa Borghese extending behind it, contribute not a little. Within is a chamber adorned with the most beautiful little fancies, such as one may suppose would be floating in the mind of a Raphael, and which he might find pleasure in tracing as they occurred, without using any labour about them, or working on any predetermined plan. A parcel of delightful little cherubs have stolen the arrows of Cupid, who is represented asleep, and they are amusing themselves with shooting at a target; there are also four rounds with female heads, one of which is particularly beautiful. Other figures seated among the arabesques are highly graceful, and there is in all so much life and nature, that it is quite a pleasure to look at them.
Returning from this we pass into the Villa Borghese, through a gateway whose piers are copied from two sepulchres which have been supposed to mark the entrance to Adrian’s villa, near Tivoli. These are surmounted by two eagles of a fine, broad, noble character. The villa itself is a garden or pleasure ground, said to be three miles in circumference, with shady walks, which we found delightful as early as the 4th February, and tall stone pines scattered about the more open parts. These trees, and the Ilices are the most important circumstances in the beauty of the place. There is a pretty lake, and a considerable variety of ground and of scenery; and several buildings, not perhaps very beautiful in themselves, but assisting the general character of the place. Art appears everywhere, but not obtrusively, and without pretence. The upper casino, if not beautiful on the outside, produces at least a rich and magnificent effect. The general disposition is good, but the roofs are not well managed, and the middle is too high; it looks better, as do most of these over-ornamented fronts, in reality, than in a drawing or engraving, because the artist almost always makes the ornaments too prominent. The gallery within is a noble room, about 65 feet long, 30 broad, and 33 high; the enrichments are gold and white, on chocolate and blue. Here was once a superb collection of antiques, but it has been purchased by the French government, and now forms a large part of the collection of the Louvre. Bernini’s figures remain, but they are too affected to please; there are also some landscapes and other paintings of no great merit, in the different rooms, but the apartments themselves are of handsome proportions and well disposed. Returning almost to the Porta del Popolo, and thence keeping along the Via Flaminia, we find the Villa Poniatowski, very pleasant and containing a good many antiques, but not of great value; there are a great number of fancy capitals, variations of the Corinthian, some of which are good, but more bad or indifferent.
A little farther is the Villa Giulia, which I have already described; and there is another edifice of simple and not unpleasing architecture, attributed to Antonio Sangallo, also belonging to a villa or vigna Giulia. By these, a lane called Via dell’ Arco Scuro, leads to the Aqua Acetosa, a mineral spring on the banks of the Tiber, having very much the taste of ink. I have also mentioned the chapel of St. Andrew, by Vignola, which is the next object in following the road. A little before arriving at the Ponte Molle, we find another chapel of St. Andrew, or rather a monument erected on the spot, where according to tradition, Pius II., in 1463, met the head of the apostle on its arrival at Rome. Upon a square basement, whose height is probably rather greater than its width, is a little edifice with a column in each angle, a doorway between them in each face, and a pediment above; the four fronts being all precisely alike. Over this is an octagonal drum of very small height, and a little, scaly cupola, surmounted by a cross. The composition is simple and pleasing, for a little thing, but it would not do for a large one.
The Ponte Molle, the ancient Pons Milvius, is the uppermost of the ancient bridges about Rome over the Tiber. It was originally built in the year of Rome 645; but it is doubtful if anything we see remaining be of that period. Yet there is some ancient work in the piers, which is easily distinguished from the later masonry of the arches, attributed to Nicolas V. Till 1805 it was encumbered by an inconvenient tower at one end; but being at that time damaged by an inundation, the road was straightened, and made more commodious, and the tower converted into a sort of triumphal arch; but it boasts no beauty. After crossing the bridge we will take the right hand road up the hill, which coasts the valley of the Tiber. At the distance of about two miles, we again descend, and the road is cut into the hill, shewing it to consist of a gravel principally composed of rounded pebbles of an argillaceous limestone; near the bottom is the Torre di Quinto, standing, not upon this gravel, but upon a fresh water limestone, like the travertine, or the deposit of the Tartar lake, with similar indications of having been formed on reeds, twigs, &c. This again rests on a volcanic tufo, very unequal in substance and surface. The lower part of the limestone includes numerous fragments of this tufo, but there are none of them in the upper part of the bed. The tower itself is of the middle ages.
Beyond the little valley which succeeds, we find a spur of similar limestone, resting on tufo. We cannot distinctly see this pass under the mass of lava, or peperino, or tufo, which forms the next hill, but from its position we may suppose this to be the case. This mass forms a precipice perhaps in some parts 100 feet high, immediately above the road, which here keeps the valley; it exhibits considerable tendency to perpendicular fissures. The bottom of this bed is exhibited in three different places; in the first it rests upon a calcareous gravel, like that of the opposite hill; in the second, on a softish uniform sandstone, which, whether it be volcanic or not, I cannot tell; in the third, on a soft peperino, very different from the mass above, or from anything else in the neighbourhood. In all these, the line of separation is perfectly distinct. A grotto, the tomb of the family of Naso, usually called the tomb of Ovid, is worked in the sandstone. It is adorned with ancient paintings on stucco. A little farther are some other tombs of considerable magnitude; one of them appears to have been a pyramid, or cone, on a square basement. Another was circular externally, with twelve niches, or perhaps eleven niches and a door, and a Greek cross within. A third exhibits merely foundations, nearly level with the plain. Still farther is another pyramidal tomb, which I did not visit.