The Magi chapel must be assigned to some date between the years 1530 and 1539—I should say probably to about 1538, but I will return to this later on. Torrotti says that some of the figures on the Christ taken for the last time before Pilate (chapel No. 32) are by Gaudenzio, as also some paintings that were preserved when the Palazzo di Pilato was built, but I can see no sign of either one or the other now; nevertheless it is likely enough that several figures—transformed as we shall presently see that d’Enrico or his assistants knew very well how to transform them—are doing duty in the Caiaphas, Herod, Pilate, and Ecce Homo chapels. So cunningly did the workmen of that time disguise a figure when they wanted to alter its character and action that it would be no easy matter to find out exactly what was done; if they could turn an Eve, as they did, into a very passable Roman soldier assisting at the capture of Christ, they could make anything out of anything. A figure was a figure, and was not to be thrown away lightly.
Soon after the completion of the Magi chapel the work flagged in consequence of the wars then devastating the provinces of North Italy; nevertheless by the middle of the sixteenth century we learn from Torrotti that some nineteen chapels had been completed.
It is idle to spend much time in guessing which these chapels were, when Caccia’s work, published in 1565, is sure to be found some day and will settle the matter authoritatively, but the reader will not be far wrong if he sees the Sacro Monte by the year 1550 as consisting of the following chapels: Adam and Eve, Annunciation, Salutation (?), Magi, Adoration of the Infant Jesus by the Shepherds, Adoration by Joseph and Mary, Circumcision, (but not the present figures nor fresco background), Last Supper, Agony in the Garden, Capture, Flagellation, Crowning with thorns (?), Christ taken for the last time before Pilate, the Original journey to Calvary, Fainting Madonna, Crucifixion, Entombment, Ascension, and the old church of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary now removed. There were probably one or two others, but there cannot have been many.
In the 1586 edition of Caccia, a MS. copy of which I have before me, the chapels are given as follows: Adam and Eve, Annunciation, and Santa Casa di Loreto, Visit of Mary to Elizabeth, Magi, Joseph and Mary worshipping the Infant Christ, and the Adoration of Shepherds, [62] Circumcision, Joseph warned to fly, the chapel (but not the figures) of the Massacre of the Innocents, Flight into Egypt Baptism, Temptation in the Wilderness, Woman of Samaria, the chapel (but not the figures) of the Healing of the Paralytic, and the Raising of the Widow’s son at Nain, the Raising of Lazarus, Entry of Christ into Jerusalem, the Last Supper, Agony in the Garden, Capture, Flagellation, Crowning with Thorns, Christ carrying His cross to Calvary (doubtless Tabachetti’s chapel), the Fainting of the Virgin, the earlier Journey to Calvary by Gaudenzio (now dispersed or destroyed), Crucifixion, Pietà, Holy Sepulchre, Appearance to Mary Magdalene (now no longer existing).
I should say, however, that I find it impossible to reconcile the two accounts of the journeys to Calvary, given in the prose introduction to this work, and in the poetical description that follows it, or rather to understand the topography of the poetical version at all, for the prose account is plain enough. I shall place a MS. copy of the 1586 edition of Caccia’s book in the British Museum, before this present volume is published, and will leave other students of Valsesian history to be more fortunate if they can. Poetical descriptions are so far better than prose, inasmuch as there is generally less of them in a page, but on the whole prose has the advantage.
It would be interesting to see the 1565 and 1576 editions of Caccia, and note the changes and additions that can be found in them. The differences between the 1586 and 1590 editions (dated 1587 and 1591—the preface to the second being dated September 25, 1589), are enough to throw considerable additional light upon the history of the place, and if, as I believe likely, we find no mention of Tabachetti’s Calvary chapel in the edition of 1576, nor of his other chapels, we should be able to date his arrival at Varallo within a very few years, and settle a question which, until these two editions of Caccia are found, appears insoluble. I must be myself content with pointing out these libri desiderati to the future historian.
Some say that the work on the Sacro Monte was almost discontinued between the years 1540 and 1580. I cannot, however, find that this was so, though it appears to have somewhat flagged. I cannot tell whether Tabachetti came to Varallo before S. Carlo or after him. If before, then a good deal of the second impetus may be due to the sculptor rather than to the saint; if after, and as a consequence of S. Carlo’s visit, then indeed S. Carlo must be considered as the second founder of the place; but whatever view is taken about this, S. Carlo’s visit in 1578 is convenient as marking a new departure in the history of the Sacro Monte, and he may be fairly called its second founder.
Giussano gives the following account of his first visit, which makes us better understand the austere expression that reigns on S. Carlo’s face, as we see it represented in his portraits:—
“It was two o’clock in the day before St. Charles arrived at this place, and he had not broken his fast, but before taking anything he visited the different chapels for meditation, of which Father Adorno gave him the points. As evening drew on, he withdrew to take his refection of bread and water, and then returned again to the chapels till after midnight though the weather was very cold” [end of October or beginning of November]. “He then took two hours’ rest on a chair, and at five o’clock in the morning resumed his devotions; then, after having said his Mass, he again allowed himself a small portion of bread and water, and continued his journey to Milan, renewed in fervour of spirit, and with a firm determination to begin again to serve God with greater energy than ever.” [65]
Surely one may add “according to his lights” after the words “to serve God.” The second visit of St. Charles to Varallo, a few days before his death, is even more painful reading, and the reader may be referred for an account of it to chapter xi. of the second volume of the work last quoted from. He had a cell in the cloister, where he slept on a wooden bed, which is still shown and venerated, and used to spend hours in contemplating the various sacred mysteries, but most especially the Agony in the Garden, near which a little shelter was made for him, and in which he was praying when his impending death was announced to him by an angel. But this chapel, which was near the present Transfiguration Chapel, was destroyed and rebuilt on its present site after his death, as also the Cena Chapel, which originally contained frescoes by Bernardino Lanini. It was on the Sacro Monte that S. Carlo discharged his last public functions, after which, feeling that he had taken a chill, he left Varallo on the 29th of October 1584, and died at Milan six days afterwards.