After Waterloo: Reminiscences of European Travel 1815-1819

by William Edward Frye

Yesterday morning I went to see an Italian comedy represented at the Teatro Re. The piece was l'Ajo nell' imbarazzo—a very droll and humorous piece—but it was not well acted, from the simple circumstance of the actors not having their parts by heart, and the illusion of the stage is destroyed by hearing the prompter's voice full as loud as that of the actors, who follow his promptings something in the same way that the clerk follows the clergyman in that prayer of the Anglican liturgy which says "we have erred and strayed from our ways like lost sheep." An Italian audience is certainly very indulgent and good-natured, as they never hiss, however miserable the performance.

But in speaking of theatrical performances, no person should leave Milan without going to see the Teatro Girolamo, which is one of the "curiosities" of the place, peculiar to Milan, and more frequented, perhaps, than any other. This is a puppet theatre, but puppets so well contrived and so well worked as to make the spectacle well worth the attention of the traveller. It is the Nec plus ultra of Marionettism, in which Signer Girolamo, the proprietor, has made a revolution, which will form an epoch in the annals of puppetry; having driven from the stage entirely the graziosissima maschera d'Arlecchino, who used to be the hero of all the pieces represented by the puppets and substituted himself, or rather a puppet bearing his name, in the place of Harlequin, as the principal farceur of the performance. He has contrived to make the puppet Girolamo a little like himself, but so much caricatured and so monstrously ugly a likeness that the bare sight of it raises immediate laughter. The theatre itself is small, being something under the size of our old Haymarket little theatre, but is very neatly and tastefully fitted up. The puppets are about half of the natural size of man, and Girolamo, aided by one or two others, works them and gives them gesture, by means of strings, which are, however, so well contrived as to be scarcely visible; and Girolamo himself speaks for all, as, besides being a ventriloquist, he has a most astonishing faculty of varying his voice, and adapting it to the rôle of each puppet, so that the illusion is complete. The scenery and decorations are excellent. Sometimes he gives operas as well as dramas, and there is always a ballo, with transformation of one figure into another, which forms part of the performance. These transformations are really very curious and extremely well executed. Almost all the pieces acted on the theatre are of Girolamo's own composition, and he sometimes chooses a classical or mythological subject, in which the puppet Girolamo is sure to be introduced and charged with all the wit of the piece. He speaks invariably with the accent and patois of the country, and his jokes never fail to keep the audience in a roar of laughter; his mode of speech and slang phrases form an absurd contrast to the other figures, who speak in pure Italian and pompous versi sciolti. For instance, the piece I saw represented was the story of Alcestis and was entitled La scesa d'Ercole nell Inferno, to redeem the wife of Admetus. Hercules, before he commences this undertaking, wishes to hire a valet for the journey, has an interview with Girolamo, and engages him. Hercules speaks in blank verse and in a phrase, full of sesquipedalia verba, demands his country and lineage. Girolamo replies in the Piedmontese dialect and with a strong nasal accent: "De mi pais, de Piemong." Girolamo, however, though he professes to be as brave as Mars himself has a great repugnance to accompanying his master to the shades below, or to the "casa del diavolo," as he calls it; and while Hercules fights with Cerberus, he shakes and trembles all over, as he does likewise when he meets Madonna Morte.

All this is very absurd and ridiculous, but it is impossible not to laugh and be amused at it. An anecdote is related of the flesh and blood Girolamo, that he had a very pretty wife, who took it into her head one day to elope with a French officer; and that to revenge himself he dramatized the event and produced it on his own theatre under the title of Colombina scampata coll'uffiziale, having filled the piece with severe satire and sarcastic remarks against women in general and Colombina in particular.

The atelier of the famous artist in mosaic Rafaelli is well worth inspecting; and here I had an opportunity of beholding a copy in mosaic and nearly finished of the celebrated picture of Leonardo da Vinci representing the Caena Domini. What a useful as well as admirable art is the mosaic to perpetuate the paintings of the greatest masters! I recollected on beholding this work that Eustace, in his Tour thro' Italy,[55] relates with a pious horror that the French soldiers used the original picture as a target to practise at with ball cartridge, and that Christ's head was singled out as the mark. This absurd tale, which had not the least shadow of truth in it, has, it appears, gained some credit among weak-minded people; and I therefore beg leave to contradict it in the most formal manner. It was Buonaparte who, the moment the picture was discovered, ordered it to be put in mosaic. No! the French were the protectors and encouragers, and by no means the destroyers of the works of art; and this ridiculous story of the picture being used as a target was probably invented by the priesthood, who seemed to have taken great delight in imposing on poor Eustace's credulity. To me it seems that such a story could only have been invented by a monk, and believed and repeated by an old woman or a bigot. The priests and French emigrants have invented and spread the most shameful and improbable calumnies against the French republicans and against Napoleon, and that credulous gull John Bull has been silly enough to give full credence to all these tales, and stand staring with his eyes and mouth open at the recital, while a vulgar jobbing ministry (as Cobbet would say) picked his pockets.

Quite of a piece with this is the said Mr Eustace's bigotry, in not chusing to call Lombardy by its usual appellation "Lombardy," and affectedly terming it "the plain of the Po." Why so, will be asked? Why because Mr Eustace hates the ancient Lombards, and holds them very nearly in as much horror as he does the modern French; because, as he says, they were the enemies of the Church and made war on and despoiled the Holy See. The fact is that the Lombard princes were the most enlightened of all the monarchs of their time; they were the first who began to resist the encroachments of the clergy and to shake off that abject submission to the Holy See which was the characteristic of the age. The Lombards were a fine gallant race of men and not so bigoted as the other nations of Europe. Where has there ever reigned a better and more enlightened and more just and humane prince than Theodoric?[56] But Theodoric was an Arian, hence Mr Eustace's aversion, for he, with the most servile devotion, rejects, condemns and anathematizes whatever the Church rejects, condemns and anathematizes. For myself I look on the extinction of the Lombard power by Charlemagne to have been a great calamity; had it lasted, the reformation and deliverance of Europe from Papal and ecclesiastical tyranny would have happened probably three hundred years sooner and the Inquisition never have been planted in Spain. I have made this digression from a love of justice and from a wish to vindicate the French Republic and Napoleon from one at least of the many unjust aspersions cast on them. I feel it also my duty to state on every occasion that I, belonging to an army sent to Egypt in order to expel them from that country, have been an eyewitness of the good and beneficial reforms and improvements that the French made in Egypt during a period of only three years. They did more for the good of that country in this short period, than we have done for India in fifty years.

Being obliged to be in London on the 24th December I took leave of the agreeable city of Milan with much regret on the 19th of October and engaged a place in a Swiss voiture going to Lausanne. My fellow travellers were two Brunswick officers in the service of the Princess of Wales, who were returning to their native country; and a Hungarian and his son settled in Domo d'Ossola. Nothing occurred till we arrived at Arona, where we were detained a whole day, in consequence of some informality in the passport of the two Germans, viz., that of its not having been visé by the Sardinian Chargé d'Affaires at Milan.

During our detention at Arona, I fell in with a young Frenchman who was going to Milan in company of some Swiss friends. The Swiss were permitted to proceed, but the other was not, for no other reason than because he was a Frenchman; so that he took a place in our carriage in order to return to Switzerland. I found him a very agreeable companion, for tho' much chagrined and vexed at this harsh and ungenerous treatment on the part of the Piedmontese authorities, he soon recovered his good humour, and contributed much to the pleasure of our journey. The Germans came back to Arona very late at night, and during the rest of the journey gave vent to their feelings with many an execration such as verfluchter Spitzbube, Hundsfott, on the heads of the inexorable police officers of Arona. The next day, on passing by Belgirate, we took a boat to visit the Borromean islands, and afterwards returned to rejoin our carriage at Fariolo. The first of these islands that we visited was the Isola Bella, where there is a large and splendid villa, belonging to the Borromean family. The rooms are of excellent and solid structure, and there are some good family pictures. The furniture is ancient, but costly. The rez de chaussée or lower part of the house, which is completely à fleur d'eau with the lake, is tastefully paved, and the walls decorated with a mosaic of shells. One would imagine it the abode of a sea nymph. I thought of Calypso and Galatea. There are in these apartments à fleur d'eau two or three exquisite statues.

LAUSANNE, 11th November.

I have been now nearly three weeks at Lausanne and am much pleased both with the inhabitants, who are extremely affable and well-informed, and with the beautiful sites that environ this city, the capital of the Canton de Vaud. The sentiments of the Vaudois, with the exception of a few absurd families among the noblesse, who from ignorance or prejudice are sticklers for the old times, are highly liberal; and as they acquired their freedom and emancipated themselves from the yoke of the Bernois, thro' the means of the French Revolution, they are grateful to that nation and receive with hospitality those who are proscribed by the present French Government; their behaviour thus forming a noble contrast to the servility of the Genevese. The Government of the Canton de Vaud is wholly democratic and is composed of a Landamman and grand and petty council, all bourgeois, or of the most intelligent among the agricultural class, who know the interests of their country right well, and are not likely to betray them, as the noblesse are but too often induced to do, for the sake of some foolish ribband, rank, or title. The noblesse are in a manner self-exiled (so they say) from all participation in the legislative and executive power; for they have too much morgue to endure to share the government with those whom they regard as roturiers; but the real state of the case is that the people will not elect them, and the people are perfectly in the right, for at the glorious epoch when, without bloodshed, the burghers and plebeians upset the despotism of Bern, the conduct of the noblesse was very equivocal. La Harpe was the leader of this beneficial Revolution, for which, however, the public mind was fully prepared and disposed; and La Harpe was a virtuous, ardent and incorruptible patriot.

This canton had been for a long period of years in a state of vassalage to that of Bern; all the posts and offices of Government were filled by Bernois and the Vaudois were excluded from all share in the government, and from all public employments of consequence. When the Sun of Revolution, after gloriously rising in America, had shone in splendour on France, and had successfully dissipated the mists of tyranny, feudality, priestcraft and prejudice, it was natural that those states which had languished for so many years in a humiliating situation should begin to look about them and enquire into the origin of all the shackles and restraints imposed on them; and no doubt the Vaudois soon discovered that it was an anomaly in politics as well as in reason that two states of such different origin, the one being a Latin and the other a Teutonic people, with language, customs, and manners so different, should be blended together in a system in which all the advantages were on the side of Bern, and nought but vassalage on the part of Vaud. A chief was alone wanting to give the impulse; he was soon found; the business was settled in forty-eight hours; and by the mediation of the French Government, Vaud was declared and acknowledged an independent state and for ever released from the dominion of Bern. The federative constitution was then abolished throughout the union, and a general Government, called the Helvetic Republic, substituted in its place; but this constitution not suiting the genius and habits of the people, nor the locality of the country, was not of long duration; troubles broke out and insurrections, which were fomented and encouraged by the adherents of the old régime. But Napoleon, by a wise and salutary mediation, stepped in between them, and prevented the effusion of blood, by restoring the old confederation, modified by a variety of ameliorations. In the act of mediation, Napoleon contented himself with separating the Valais entirely from the confederation, and shortly after annexing it to France, on account of the high road into Italy across the Simplon running thro' that territory, and which it became of the utmost importance to him to be master of. The new Helvetic Confederation was inviolably respected and protected by Napoleon; for never after the act of mediation did any French troops enter in the Canton de Vaud, or any part of the Union to pass into Italy. They always moved on the Savoy side of the Lake to enter into the Valais. This act of mediation saved probably a good deal of bloodshed and in a very short time gave such general satisfaction, and was in every respect so useful and beneficial to the Helvetic Union, that in spite of the intrigues of the Senate of Bern, who have never been able to digest the loss of Vaud, the Allied Powers in the year 1814 solemnly guaranteed the Helvetic Confederation as established by the Act of Mediation, merely restoring the Valais to its independence and aggregating it as an independent Canton to the general Union. Geneva, on its being severed from the French Empire, and recovering its independence, solicited the Helvetic Union to be admitted as a member and component part of that Confederacy; which was agreed to, and it was and remains aggregated to it also.