Part 8

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Carlo Dolce is not one of my favourite masters. There is a cloying sweetness in his style, a general want of power which wearies me: yet I brought away from the Corsini Palace to-day an impression of a head by Carlo Dolce (La Poesia), which I shall never forget. Now I recall the picture, I am at a loss to tell where lies the charm which has thus powerfully seized on my imagination. Here are no "eyes upturned like one inspired"--no distortion--no rapt enthusiasm--no Muse full of the God;--but it is a head so purely, so divinely intellectual, so heavenly sweet, and yet so penetrating,--so full of sensibility, and yet so unstained by earthly passion--so brilliant, and yet so calm--that if Carlo Dolce had lived in our days, I should have thought he intended it for the personified genius of Wordsworth's poetry. There is such an individual reality about this beautiful head, that I am inclined to believe the tradition, that it is the portrait of one of Carlo Dolce's daughters who died young:--and yet

"Did ever mortal mixture of earth's mould Breathe such divine, enchanting ravishment?"

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Nov. 15.--Our stay at Florence promises to be far gayer than either Milan or Venice, or even Paris; more diversified by society, as well as affording a wider field of occupation and amusement.

Sometimes in the long evenings, when fatigued and over-excited, I recline apart on the sofa, or bury myself in the recesses of a fauteuil; when I am aware that my mind is wandering away to forbidden themes, I force my attention to what is going forward; and often see and hear much that is entertaining, if not improving. People are so accustomed to my pale face, languid indifference and, what M---- calls, my impracticable silence, that after the first glance and introduction, I believe they are scarcely sensible of my presence: so I sit, and look, and listen, secure and harboured in my apparent dullness. The flashes of wit, the attempts at sentiment, the affectation of enthusiasm, the absurdities of folly, and the blunders of ignorance; the contrast of characters and the clash of opinions, the scandalous anecdotes of the day, related with sprightly malice, and listened to with equally malicious avidity,--all these, in my days of health and happiness, had power to surprise, or amuse, or provoke me. I could mingle then in the conflict of minds; and hear my part with smiles in the social circle; though the next moment, perhaps, I might contemn myself and others: and the personal scandal, the characteristic tale, the amusing folly, or the malignant wit, were effaced from my mind--

----"Like forms with chalk Painted on rich men's floors for one feast night."

Now it is different: I can smile yet, but my smile is in pity, rather than in mockery. If suffering has subdued my mind to seriousness, and perhaps enfeebled its powers, I may at least hope that it has not soured or imbittered my temper:--if what could once amuse, no longer amuses,--what could once provoke has no longer power to irritate: thus my loss may be improved into a gain--car tout est bien, quand tout est mal.

It is sorrow which makes our experience; it is sorrow which teaches us to feel properly for ourselves and for others. We must feel deeply, before we can think rightly. It is not in the tempest and storm of passions we can reflect,--but afterwards when the waters have gone over our soul; and like the precious gems and the rich merchandize which the wild wave casts on the shore out of the wreck it has made--such are the thoughts left by retiring passions.

Reflection is the result of feeling; from that absorbing, heart-rending compassion for oneself (the most painful sensation, almost, of which our nature is capable), springs a deeper sympathy for others; and from the sense of our own weakness, and our own self-upbraiding, arises a disposition to be indulgent--to forbear--and to forgive--so at least it ought to be. When once we have shed those inexpressibly bitter tears, which fall unregarded, and which we forget to wipe away, O how we shrink from inflicting pain! how we shudder at unkindness!--and think all harshness even in thought, only another name for cruelty! These are but common-place truths, I know, which have often been a thousand times better expressed. Formerly I heard them, read them, and thought I believed them: now I feel them; and feeling, I utter them as if they were something new.--Alas! the lessons of sorrow are as old as the world itself.

To-day we have seen nothing new. In the morning I was ill: in the afternoon we drove to the Cascina; and while the rest walked, I spread my shawl upon the bank and basked like a lizard in the sunshine. It was a most lovely day, a summer-day in England. In this paradise of a country, the common air, and earth, and skies, seem happiness enough. While I sat to-day, on my green bank--languid, indeed, but free from pain--and looked round upon a scene which has lost its novelty, but none of its beauty,--where Florence, with its glittering domes and its back-ground of sunny hills, terminated my view on one side, and the Apennines, tinted with rose colour and gold, bounded it on the other, I felt not only pleasure, but a deep thankfulness that such pleasures were yet left to me.

Among the gay figures who passed and repassed before me, I remarked a benevolent but rather heavy-looking old gentleman, with a shawl hanging over his arm, and holding a parasol, with which he was gallantly shading a little plain old woman from the November sun. After them walked two young ladies, simply dressed; and then followed a tall and very handsome young man, with a plain but elegant girl hanging on his arm. This was the Grand Duke and his family; with the Prince of Carignano, who has lately married one of his daughters. Two servants in plain drab liveries, followed at a considerable distance. People politely drew on one side as they approached; but no other homage was paid to the sovereign, who thus takes his walk in public almost every day. Lady Morgan is merry at the expense of the Grand Duke's taste for brick and mortar: but monarchs, like other men, must have their amusements; some invent uniforms, some stitch embroidery;--and why should not this good-natured Grand Duke amuse himself with his trowel if he likes it? As to the Prince of Carignano, I give him up to her lash--le traitre--but perhaps he thought he was doing right: and at all events there are not flatterers wanting, to call his perfidy patriotism.

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I am told that Florence retains its reputation of being the most devout capital in Italy, and that here love, music, and devotion hold divided empire, or rather are tria juncta in uno. The liberal patronage and taste of Lord Burghersh, contribute perhaps to make music so much a passion as it is at present. Magnelli, the Grand Duke's Maestra di Cappella, and director of the Conservatorio, is the finest tenor in Italy. I have the pleasure of hearing him frequently, and think the purity of his taste at least equal to the perfection of his voice; rare praise for a singer in these "most brisk and giddy-paced times." He gave us last night the beautiful recitative which introduces Desdemona's song in Othello--

"Nessun maggior dolore, Che ricordarsi del tempo felice Nella miseria!"

and the words, the music, and the divine pathos of the man's voice combined, made me feel--as I thought I never could have felt again.

TO ----

As sounds of sweetest music, heard at eve, When summer dews weep over languid flowers, When the still air conveys each touch, each tone, However faint--and breathes it on the ear With a distinct and thrilling power, that leaves Its memory long within the raptur'd soul.-- --Even such thou art to me!--and thus I sit And feel the harmony that round thee lives, And breathes from every feature. Thus I sit-- And when most quiet--cold--or silent--then Even then, I feel each word, each look, each tone! There's not an accent of that tender voice, There's not a day-beam of those sunbright eyes, Nor passing smile, nor melancholy grace, Nor thought half utter'd, feeling half betray'd Nor glance of kindness,--no, nor gentlest touch Of that dear hand, in amity extended, That e'er was lost to me;--that treasur'd well, And oft recall'd, dwells not upon my soul Like sweetest music heard at summer's eve!

Yesterday we visited the church of San Lorenzo, the Laurentian library, and the Pietra Dura manufactory, and afterwards spent an hour in the Tribune.

In a little chapel in the San Lorenzo are Michel Angelo's famous statues, the Morning, the Noon, the Evening, and the Night. I looked at them with admiration rather than with pleasure; for there is something in the severe and overpowering style of this master, which affects me disagreeably, as beyond my feeling, and above my comprehension. These statues are very ill disposed for effect: the confined cell (such it seemed) in which they are placed is so strangely disproportioned to the awful and massive grandeur of their forms.

There is a picture by Michel Angelo, considered a chef-d'oeuvre, which hangs in the Tribune, to the right of the Venus: now if all the connaisseurs in the world, with Vasari at their head, were to harangue for an hour together on the merits of this picture, I might submit in silence, for I am no connoisseur; but that it is a disagreeable, a hateful picture, is an opinion which fire could not melt out of me. In spite of Messieurs les Connaisseurs, and Michel Angelo's fame, I would die in it at the stake: for instance, here is the Blessed Virgin, not the "Vergine Santa, d'ogni grazia piena," but a Virgin, whose brick-dust coloured face, harsh unfeminine features, and muscular, masculine arms, give me the idea of a washerwoman, (con rispetto parlando!) an infant Saviour with the proportions of a giant: and what shall we say of the nudity of the figures in the back-ground; profaning the subject and shocking at once good taste and good sense? A little farther on, the eye rests on the divine Madre di Dio of Correggio: what beauty, what sweetness, what maternal love, and humble adoration are blended in the look and attitude with which she bends over her infant! Beyond it hangs the Madonna del Cardellino of Raffaelle: what heavenly grace, what simplicity, what saint-like purity, in the expression of that face, and that exquisite mouth! And from these must I turn back, on pain of being thought an ignoramus, to admire the coarse perpetration of Michel Angelo--because it is Michel Angelo's? But I speak in ignorance.

To return to San Lorenzo. The chapel of the Medici, begun by Ferdinand the First, where coarse brickwork and plaster mingle with marble and gems, is still unfinished and likely to remain so: it did not interest me. The fine bronze sarcophagus, which encloses the ashes of Lorenzo the Magnificent, and of his brother Giuliano, assassinated by the Pazzi, interested me far more. While I was standing carelessly in front of the high altar, I happened to look down, and under my feet were these words, "TO COSMO THE VENERABLE, THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY." I moved away in haste, and before I had decided to my own satisfaction upon Cosmo's claims to the gratitude and veneration of posterity, we left the church.

At the Laurentian library we were edified by the sight of some famous old manuscripts, invaluable to classical scholars. To my unlearned eyes the manuscript of Petrarch, containing portraits of himself and Laura, was more interesting. Petrarch is hideous--but I was pleased with the head of Laura, which in spite of the antique dryness and stiffness of the painting, has a soft and delicate expression not unlike one of Carlo Dolce's Madonnas. Here we saw Galileo's forefinger, pointing up to the skies from a white marble pedestal; and exciting more derision than respect.

At the Pietra Dura, notwithstanding the beauty and durability of some of the objects manufactured, the result seemed to me scarce worth the incredible time, patience, and labour required in the work. Par exemple, six months' hard labour spent upon a butterfly in the lid of a snuff-box seems a most disproportionate waste of time. Thirty workmen are employed here at the Grand Duke's expense; for this manufacture, like that of the Gobelins at Paris, is exclusively carried on for the sovereign.

Nov. 20.--I am struck in this place with grand beginnings and mean endings. I have not yet seen a finished church, even the Duomo has no facade.

Yesterday we visited the Palazzo Mozzi to see Benvenuto's picture, "The Night after the Battle of Jena." Then several churches--the Santa Croce, which is hallowed ground: the Annonciata, celebrated for the frescos of Andrea del Sarto; and the Carmine, which pleased me by the light elegance of its architecture, and its fine alto-relievos in white marble. In this church is the chapel of the Madonna del Carmele, painted by Masuccio, and the most ancient frescos extant: they are curious rather than beautiful, and going to decay.

To-day we visited the school of the Fine Arts: it contains a very fine and ample collection of casts after the antique; and some of the works of modern artists and students are exhibited. Were I to judge from the specimens I have seen here and elsewhere, I should say that a cold, glaring, hard tea-tray style prevails in painting, and a still worse taste, if possible, in sculpture. No soul, no grandeur, no simplicity; a meagre insipidity in the conception, a nicety of finish in the detail; affectation instead of grace, distortion instead of power, and prettiness instead of beauty. Yet the artists who execute these works, and those who buy them, have free access to the marvels of the gallery, and the treasures of the Pitti Palace. Are they sans eyes, sans souls, sans taste, sans every thing, but money and self-conceit?

Nov. 22.--Our mornings, however otherwise occupied, are generally concluded by an hour in the gallery or at the Pitti Palace; the evenings are spent in the Mercato Nuovo, in the workshops of artists, or at the Cascina.