The rocks here formed a spacious terrace; along which I continued surveying the distant groves, and marking the solemn approach of night. The sky was hung with storms, and a pale moon seemed to advance with difficulty amongst broken and tempestuous clouds. It was an hour to reap plants with brazen sickles, and to meditate upon revenge.
A chill wind blew from the highest peak of the Apennines, inspiring evil, and making a dismal rustle amongst the woods of chestnut that hung on the mountain’s side, through which we were forced to pass. I never heard such fatal murmurs; nor felt myself so gloomily. I walked out of the sound of the carriage, where the glimmering moonlight prevailed, and began interpreting the language of the leaves, not greatly to my own advantage or that of any being in the universe. I was no prophet of good, but full of melancholy bodings, and something that bordered upon despair. Had I but commanded an oracle, as ancient visionaries were wont, I should have thrown whole nations into dismay.
How long I continued in this strange temper I cannot pretend to say, but believe it was midnight before we emerged from the oracular forest, and saw faintly before us the huts of Lognone, where we were to sleep. This blessed hamlet is suspended on the brow of a bleak mountain, and every gust that stirs shakes the whole village to its foundations. At our approach two hags stalked forth with lanterns and invited us with a grin, which I shall always remember, to a dish of mustard and crow’s gizzards, a dish I was more than half afraid of tasting, lest it should change me to some bird of darkness, condemned to mope eternally on the black rafters of the cottage.
After repeated supplications we procured a few eggs, and some faggots to make a fire. Its blaze gave me courage to hear the hollow blasts that whistled in the crevices; and pitching my bed in a warm corner, I soon fell asleep, and forgot all my cares and inquietudes.
September 14th.—The sun had not been long above the horizon, before we set forward upon a craggy pavement hewn out of the rough bosom of the cliffs and precipices. Scarce a tree was visible, and the few that presented themselves began already to shed their leaves. The raw nipping air of this desert with difficulty spares a blade of vegetation; and in the whole range of these extensive eminences I could not discover a single corn-field or pasture. Inhabitants, you may guess, there were none. I would defy even a Scotch highlander to find means of subsistence in so rude a soil.
Towards midday, we had surmounted the dreariest part of our journey, and began to perceive a milder landscape. The climate improved as well as the prospect, and after a continual descent of several hours, we saw groves and villages in the dips of the hills, and met a string of mules and horses laden with fruit. I purchased some figs and peaches from this little caravan, and spreading my repast upon a bank, baked in the sunshine, and gathered large spikes of lavender in full bloom.
Continuing our route, we bid adieu to the realms of poverty and barrenness, and entered a cultivated vale sheltered by woody acclivities. Among these we wound along, the peasants singing upon the hill, and driving their cattle to springs by the road’s side; near one of which we dined in a patriarchal manner, and afterwards pursued our course through a grove of taper cypresses, waving with the cool gales of the evening. The heights were suffused with a ruddy glow, proceeding from the light pink clouds which floated on the horizon. No others were to be seen. All nature seemed in a happy tranquil state; the herds penned in their folds, and every rustic going to repose. I shared the general calm for the first time this many a tedious hour; and traversed the dales in peace, abandoned to flattering hopes and gay illusions. The full moon shone propitiously upon me as I ascended a hill, and discovered Florence at a distance, surrounded with gardens and terraces, rising one above another. The serene moonlight on the pale grey tints of the olive, gave an Elysian, visionary appearance to the landscape. I never beheld so mild a sky, nor such soft gleams: the mountains were veiled in azure mists, which concealed their rugged summits; and the plains in vapours, that smoothed their irregularities, and diffused a faint aërial hue, to which no description can render justice. I could have contemplated such scenery for hours, and was sorry when I found myself shut up from it by the gates of Florence. We passed several lofty palaces of the true Tuscan order, with rustic arcades and stout columns, whose solidity and magnificence were not diminished by the shades of midnight. Whilst these grand masses lay dark and solemn, the smooth flagstone, with which every street is paved, received a chequered gleam, and the Arno, the brightest radiance. Though tired with my jumble over the Apennines, I could not resist the temptation of walking upon the banks of so celebrated a river, and crossing its bridges, which still echoed with music and conversation. Having gratified the first impulse of curiosity, I returned to Vaninis, and slept as well as my impatience would allow, till it was time next morning (September 15th), to visit the gallery, and worship the Venus de Medicis. I felt, upon entering this world of taste and elegance, as if I could have taken up my abode in it for ever; but confused with the multitude of objects, I knew not where to turn myself, and ran childishly by the ample ranks of sculptures, like a butterfly in a parterre, that skims before it fixes, over ten thousand flowers.
Having taken my course down one side of the gallery, I turned the angle and discovered another long perspective, equally stored with prodigies of bronze and marble; paintings on the walls, on the ceilings, in short, everywhere. A minute brought me, vast as it was, to the extremity of this range; then, flying down a third, adorned in the same delightful manner, I paused under the bust of Jupiter Olympius; and began to reflect a little more maturely upon the company in which I found myself. Opposite, appeared the majestic features of Minerva, breathing divinity; and Cybele, the mother of the gods.
I bowed low to these awful powers, but seeing a black figure just by, whose attitude seemed to announce the deity of sleep, I made immediately up to it. You know my fondness for this drowsy personage, and that it is not the first time I have quitted the most splendid society for him. I found him, at present, of touchstone, with the countenance of a towardly brat, sleeping ill through indigestion. The artist had not conceived such high ideas of the god as live in my bosom, or else he never would have represented him with so little grace or dignity.
Displeased at finding my favourite subject profaned, I perceived the lively transports of enthusiasm began in some degree to be dissipated, and I felt myself calm enough to follow the herd of guides and spectators from chamber to chamber and cabinet to cabinet, without falling into errors of rapture and inspiration. We were led slowly and moderately through the large rooms, containing the portraits of painters, good, bad, and indifferent, from Raffaelle to Liotard; then into a museum of bronzes, which would afford both amusement and instruction for years.