‘Shortly after, a very rich cardinal, whose name is not recorded, called on Salvator to purchase some pictures; and as his Eminence walked up and down the gallery, he always paused before some certain quadretti, and never before the historical subjects, while Salvator muttered from time to time between his clenched teeth, “Sempre, sempre, pæsi piccoli.” When at last the Cardinal glanced his eye over some great historical picture, and carelessly asked the price as a sort of company question, Salvator bellowed forth “Un milione.” His Eminence, stunned or offended, hurried away, and returned no more.’
Other stories are told of the like import. And yet if Salvator had been more satisfied in his own mind of the superiority of his historical pictures, he would have been less anxious to make others converts to his opinion. So shrewd a man ought to have been aware of the force of the proverb about nursing the ricketty child.
One of the most creditable traits in the character of Salvator is the friendship of Carlo Rossi, a wealthy Roman citizen, who raised his prices and built a chapel to his memory; and one of the most pleasant and flattering to his talents is the rivalry of Messer Agli, an old Bolognese merchant, who came all the way to Florence (while Salvator was residing there) to enter the lists with him as the clown and quack-doctor of the commedia della arte.
We loiter on the way with Lady Morgan—which is a sign that we do not dislike her company, and that our occasional severity is less real than affected. She opens many pleasant vistas, and calls up numerous themes of never-failing interest. Would that we could wander with her under the azure skies and golden sunsets of Claude Lorraine, amidst classic groves and temples, and flocks, and herds, and winding streams, and distant hills and glittering sunny vales,
——‘Where universal Pan,
Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance,
Leads on the eternal spring;’—
or repose in Gaspar Poussin’s cool grottos, or on his breezy summits, or by his sparkling waterfalls!—but we must not indulge too long in these delightful dreams. Time presses, and we must on. It is mentioned in this part of the narrative which treats of Salvator’s contemporaries and great rivals in landscape, that Claude Lorraine, besides his natural stupidity in all other things, was six-and-thirty before he began to paint (almost the age at which Raphael died), and in ten years after was—what no other human being ever was or will be. The lateness of the period at which he commenced his studies, render those unrivalled masterpieces which he has left behind him to all posterity a greater miracle than they would otherwise be. One would think that perfection required at least a whole life to attain it. Lady Morgan has described this divine artist very prettily and poetically; but her description of Gaspar Poussin is as fine, and might in some places be mistaken for that of his rival. This is not as it should be; since the distance is immeasurable between the productions of Claude Lorraine and all other landscapes whatever—with the single exception of Titian’s backgrounds.[[27]] Sir Joshua Reynolds used to say (such was his opinion of the faultless beauty of his style), that ‘there would be another Raphael before there was another Claude!’
The first volume of the present work closes with a spirited account of the short-lived revolution at Naples, brought about by the celebrated Massaniello. Salvator contrived to be present at one of the meetings of the patriotic conspirators by torchlight, and has left a fine sketch of the unfortunate leader. An account of this memorable transaction will be found in Robertson, and a still more striking and genuine one in the Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz.
We must hasten through the second volume with more rapid strides. Salvator, after the failure and death of Massaniello, returned to Rome, disappointed, disheartened, and gave vent to his feelings on this occasion by his two poems, La Babilonia, and La Guerra, which are full of the spirit of love and hatred, of enthusiasm and bitterness.[[28]] About the same time, he painted his two allegorical pictures of ‘Human Frailty,’ and ‘Fortune.’ These were exhibited in the Pantheon; and from the sensation they excited, and the sinister comments that were made on them, had nearly conducted Salvator to the Inquisition. In the picture of ‘Fortune,’ more particularly, ‘the nose of one powerful ecclesiastic, and the eye of another, were detected in the brutish physiognomy of the swine who were treading pearls and flowers under their feet; a Cardinal was recognised in an ass scattering with his hoof the laurel and myrtle which lay in his path, and in an old goat reposing on roses. Some there were who even fancied the infallible lover of Donna Olympia, the Sultana Queen of the Quirinal! The cry of atheism and sedition—of contempt of established authorities—was thus raised under the influence of private pique and long-cherished envy. It soon found an echo in the painted walls where the Conclave sat “in close divan,” and it was bandied about from mouth to mouth till it reached the ears of the Inquisitor, within the dark recesses of his house of terrors.’ II. 20.