Finding the rock as damp as might be expected, I soon shifted my quarters, and followed the youngest father up to the Romitorio, a snug little hermitage, with a neat chapel, and altar-piece by Andrèa del Sarto, which I should have examined more minutely had not the wild and mountainous forest scenery possessed my whole attention. I just stayed to taste the holy fountain; and then, escaping from my conductors, ran eagerly down the path, leaping over the springs that crossed it, and entered a lawn of the smoothest turf grazed by sheep. Beyond this opening rises a second, hemmed in with thickets; and still higher, a third, whence a forest of young pines spires up into a lofty theatre terminated by peaks, half concealed by a thick mantle of beech tinged with ruddy brown. Pausing in the midst of the lawns, and looking upward to the sweeps of wood which surrounded me, I addressed my orisons to the genius of the place, and prayed that I might once more return into its bosom, and be permitted to bring you along with me, for surely such meads, such groves, were formed for our enjoyment!
This little rite performed, I walked on quite to the extremity of the pastures, traversed a thicket, and found myself on the edge of precipices, beneath whose base the whole Val d’Arno lies expanded. I listened to distant murmurings in the plain, saw wreaths of smoke rising from the cottages, and viewed a vast tract of grey barren country, which evening rendered still more desolate, bounded by the black mountain of Radicofani. Then, turning round, I beheld the whole extent of rock and forest, the groves of beech, and wilds above the convent, glowing with fiery red, for the sun, making a last effort to pierce the vapours, produced this effect; which was the more striking, as the sky was gloomy, and the rest of the prospect of a melancholy blue.
Returning slowly homeward, I marked the warm glow deserting the eminences, and heard the sullen toll of a bell. The young boys of the seminary were moving in a body to their dark enclosure, all dressed in black. Many of them looked pale and wan. I wished to ask them whether the solitude of Valombrosa suited their age and vivacity; but a tall spectre of a priest drove them along like a herd, and presently, the gates opening, I saw them no more.
The night was growing chill, the winds boisterous, and in the intervals of the gusts I had the addition of a lamentable screech owl to depress my spirits. Upon the whole, I was not at all concerned to meet the fathers, who came out to show me to my room, and entertain me with various gossipings, both sacred and profane, till supper appeared.
Next morning, the Padre Decano gave us chocolate in his apartment; and afterwards led us round the convent, insisting most unmercifully upon our viewing every cell and every dormitory. However, I was determined to make a full stop at the organ, one of the most harmonious I ever played upon; but placed in a deep recess, feebly lighted by lamps, not calculated to inspire triumphant voluntaries. The monks, who had all crowded into the loft in expectation of brisk jigs and lively overtures, soon retired upon hearing a strain ten times more sorrowful than that to which they were accustomed. I did not lament their departure, but played on till our horses came to the gate. We mounted, wound back through the grove of pines which protect Valombrosa from intrusion, descended the steeps, and, gaining the plains, galloped in a few hours to Florence.
LETTER XVIII.
Cathedral at Sienna.—A vaulted Chamber.—Leave Sienna.—Mountains round Radicofani.—Hunting Palace of the Grand Dukes.—A grim fraternity of Cats.—Dreary Apartment.
Sienna, October 27th, 1780.
HERE my duty of course was to see the cathedral, and I got up much earlier than I wished, in order to perform it. I wonder that our holy ancestors did not choose a mountain at once, scrape it into tabernacles, and chisel it into scripture stories. It would have cost them almost as little trouble as the building in question, which, by many of the Italian devotees to a purer style of architecture, is esteemed a masterpiece of ridiculous taste and elaborate absurdity. The front, encrusted with alabaster, is worked into a million of fretted arches and puzzling ornaments. There are statues without number, and relievos without end or meaning.
The church within is all of black and white marble alternately; the roof blue and gold, with a profusion of silken banners hanging from it; and a cornice running above the principal arcade, composed entirely of bustos representing the whole series of sovereign pontiffs, from the first Bishop of Rome to Adrian the Fourth. Pope Joan they say figured amongst them, between Leo the Fourth and Benedict the Third, till the year 1600, when some authors have asserted she was turned out, at the instance of Clement the Eighth, to make room for Zacharias the First.