Part 4

The next day we made an excursion into the country on horseback to see the Convent of the Camaldoli. Unfortunately the late hours of Devonshire House are transferred to the Chiaia, so we did not begin our expedition till six o’clock; when just as we arrived at the Convent the last fiery rays sank behind the promontory of Circe. What a view lay stretched at our feet! Objects that would rouse torpor itself, and call forth the energy of the poet, philosopher, painter, historian. The Campania Felix backed by the bold ridge of Apennines, with the Lake of Patria, Linternum, etc., the distant islands of Ponza and Ventotene, the nearer ones of Ischia and Procida, Baia, Misenum, Capri, and Cape Minerva. I cannot enumerate all the grand and pleasing objects. We exhausted the patience of two planets; the sun first shunned us, and then palefaced Cynthia left us, before we got home.

I never in my life experienced the degree of happiness enjoyed: it was the gratification of mind and sense. The weather was delicious, truly Italian, the night serene, with just enough air to waft the fragrance of the orange flower, then in blossom. Through the leaves of the trees we caught glimpses of the trembling moonbeams on the glassy surface of the bay; all objects conspired to soothe my mind and the sensations I felt were those of ecstatic rapture. I was so happy that when I reached my bedroom, I dismissed my maid, and sat up the whole night looking from my window upon the sea.

This frolick was unusually absurd, as I was to go early with ye D. of Devonshire, etc. to dine at Belvedere[33] with the King. I was ready at seven, but ill and faint, and obliged to eat _diavoloni_ to keep alive. We arrived too late: the King waited _an hour_. The King was very pleasant and conversable; he shewed us the whole manufactory, the mechanical part I did not much comprehend. He was so gallant to me that they joked and said I should be sent to Calabria, the common way the Queen takes to remove her rivals, tho’ she allows him to _people_ his own colony of manufacturers. Before we quitted him he insisted on our promising to dine at Carditello, and the Sunday after at St. Leucio to see the wedding. From the Belvedere we went to the English garden, which is very beautiful from being in many respects unlike one. There is one of the prettiest thoughts for an ornament I ever saw; a large building representing ancient baths, supposed to have been dug out from a stratum of tufa which covered them. It is done with the best taste and judgment possible, and is as complete a thing as can be. I returned home at night more dead than alive from fatigue.

[Sidenote: 1793 VESUVIUS]

The next day after, we went to the mountain. I invited poor Italinski. I would not go higher than the Cross, that is, I would go no further than my mule could carry me; the others went to the running lava. We all wrote our names at the Hermitage, a retreat inhabited by a man clothed in a holy garb,[34] but whom report says is not sanctified in his deeds; many rendezvous are kept in his neat, trim cell, and but for his paying he would be expelled from his nominal solitude.

Saturday was the last morning I passed in Naples. I quitted those scenes of tranquil pleasure and harmless gratification with unfeigned regret. But ah me! what can please or cheer one who has no hope of happiness in life. Solitude and amusement from external objects is all I hope for: home is the abyss of misery! I am but as a zero in society, attached to none, belonging to none I esteem. We passed the evening at Caserta with the Hamiltons; their house was not large enough to hold us all, and I lodged in Hackhert’s[35] house. _Mullady_ sang _Nina_, Paisiello’s music; her vile discordant screaming took off the whole effect of his simple melody.

On Sunday morning we went to the Belvedere to see the ceremony of the St. Leucio marriages;[36] as I went with the Duchess I was, of course, too late. They were over. The King as soon as he heard of our arrival came and met us upon the _perron_, and conducted us upstairs, where we found the Queen: her coming was an unexpected condescension on her part. The sight of the manufacturers enjoying the Festival was very pretty and gratifying. A thousand people were enjoying themselves among their families in their gala clothes, dining under the prettiest rustic arcades ornamented in the best possible taste: this number all fed, even existing, by the bounty of the King, and each pouring out the sincerest benediction upon him for his bounty. I wished this picture of happiness of his own creation might excite the disposition to extend the blessings of ease and security by encouraging industry in Calabria and other parts of his dominions, where the wretched peasant is ferocious from ignorance and sloth. He conversed with them with familiarity, and enquired into their family details, all of which he seemed perfectly acquainted with; scandal says their establishment answers the double purpose of seraglio and nursery. The Queen was, as she always is, very conversable and clever, but appears to have a most impetuous temper. We dined at 12, a very good dinner, all off his own farm; the wines were from his vineyard. The evening was not tedious, tho’ long; she brought all her children to us and shewed off their talents. At night the Court was illuminated, and the happy colonists danced tarantulas. We stayed till the Queen withdrew about 10 o’clock. She was very flattering in her compliments to me, and shook my hand with cordiality; her reason for liking me that I had been at Vienna and knew many of her old friends.

[Sidenote: A ROYAL FARM]

The next day we dined at Carditello with the King; it is a small hunting palace in the centre of his farm. The dinner was served upon a table of Merlin’s construction. No servants attend, but by pulling a bell your plate is pulled down and a clean one sent up; so with the dishes, and all you ask for. In short, it is exactly like a trap-door at a theatre. He showed us all his cows, hogs, and pigs, and his breed of stallions. He occasionally favours ladies with a sight of a strange operation to be performed upon them before women; but this we escaped. His carriages conveyed us to Capua, where we found our own. The Devonshires went on to Rome. Some arrangements required my return to Naples; Lady Plymouth drove me in her phaeton home.

The evening previous to my quitting Naples, 22nd May, I walked in the Villa Reale after supper with Ly. Plymouth, Ld. Berwick,[37] and Italinski. The latter was much dejected at my approaching absence, and I really was affected by his sorrow, as he is not a man to say lightly things he does not feel. He said when I went he should imitate Mark Antony, who after his defeat retired to Alexandria and wrote _Timoleon_ [_sic_] over his door, thereby declaring he was become a misanthrope. I was sorry at leaving Ly. P., because, tho’ I am not very prudent, I think she is less so, and I might have kept her out of the scrape she is on the brink of falling into, for Ld. Berwick remains the whole summer. Lord Palmerston, comically enough, calls them ‘Cymon and Iphigenia,’ for till their attachment began Ld. B. was never heard to speak: love roused him.

On the 23rd the Websters left Naples for Capua, ‘the antidote to all pleasure at present from its filth and dulness,’ and continuing their journey crossed the River Garigliano.

The gayest scenes until Mola di Gaeta, the verdure, the festoons of vines hanging between the trees, with the glow of a crimson sun sinking into the Mediterranean. Upon my arrival at Mola I dined, and in the evening was tempted by the beauty of the moon to row upon the sea within the bay for a short time. Early in the morning, by seven, I was again in the boat, and examined the extensive remains of Cicero’s Formian Villa. The bath is the principal object; it is beautiful. It is in a covered recess _dans le fond d’un beau salon_, with columns on each side: adjoining to it there are many rooms, high and narrow, and very like those at Pompeia. The fishponds are large.

I did not go to Gaeta, distant about three miles: I regretted the impracticability of the disposition of him who invariably checks all I wish to do. There are still preserved unburied the bones of the Connétable de Bourbon, his adherents not venturing to inter in consecrated ground one who had perished in a sacrilegious act. He was killed in 1527, in the assault of Rome. Benvenuto Cellini in his entertaining Life of Himself assumes the honour of marking him with his _scoppietto_ and killing him, but this _glory_ rests upon his own assertion. There are few characters in history more deserving of compassion and indulgence than this high-spirited and unfortunate Constable. The caresses and revenge of Louisa de Savoie offended and urged him to be a traitor; the one he rejected (?), the other he resisted. Thus he became her victim beyond her wishes, for by deserting his country and adding infamy to his name, he deprived her of her hopes of making him yield to her desires.

At the extremity of Mola, in a vineyard, they show a circular tower, which is called the tomb of Cicero. Beyond it are many sepulchral monuments on each side of the road, which is made on the Appian Way. The ancients always placed their tombs on the highway, whence the common inscription ‘Siste viator.’

[Sidenote: JOURNEY TO ROME]

Fondi and Terracina were the next places of interest on the road.

The Turks under Barbarossa made a descent on Fondi. The prize they coveted was the haughty beauty Julia di Gonzaga, wife of the Count of Fondi. She escaped their designs by hiding amongst the rocks; in revenge they pillaged and burnt the town, in 1534. From Fondi we soon reached Terracina, the ancient _Anxur_. The situation is remarkably gay and pleasing. The town is close upon the sea; just above it rises an abrupt rock on which are the ruins of a Gothic palace forming a very picturesque view. The islands appear very close. Ponza is the largest and most celebrated.

Stopped at Gensano to make Mrs. Hippisley[38] and her sister, Mde. Ciciaporcia, a visit. The road from Gensano to l’Aricia is most beautiful, through thick woods of chestnut trees, rich in foliage, and fine ilexes of an immense bulk. The freshness and luxuriance of the spring in Italy is far beyond anything we can have a notion of in England.

Just at the Villa Barberini we met Jenkins,[39] who came to meet me to beg I would dine with the Devonshires, etc., at his villa at Castel Gondolfo. The Villa Barberini stands upon the site of Domitian’s villa, the remains of which are very great. Porticoes extending above a mile, and substructions of three different rows serving as a terrace to those above. The Lago di Albano is excessively pretty: it is formed very evidently in the crater of a sunken volcano. Ly. Duncannon ill, and obliged to stay at Jenkins’. Got to Rome rather late. Very good lodgings at the English tailor’s in the Piazza di Spagna. Mr. Hippisley came as soon as I arrived, and we walked about the streets. I became impatient for daylight, and was so full of curiosity that I got no sleep the whole night. I could only think of the moonlight peeps I had enjoyed of the Coliseum, so stately, so awfully majestic.

On Sunday morning, 26th of May, I arose with alacrity, and under the ciceroneship of old Morrison began my course of _virtu_. The first place was the Colonna Palace.... _Raphael_, ‘Holy Trinity,’ for a church at Perugia, mentioned in his life. Its pendant, the _Gaspar Poussin_, is preferable to it in every respect. _P. Veronese_, ‘Venus and Cupid,’ in his very best manner.... _Salvator Rosa_, ‘St. John in the Wilderness.’ The idea is taken from Raffaelle’s at Florence: the face is very ugly and mean, the whole figure mean. Naked figures ought to elevate the subject and give an idea of sublimity beyond any drapery. This St. John looks like a man stripped of his clothes.

We dined with the Palmerstons. In the evening Morrison took us to the top of the Capitol that we might have an idea of the topography of the city and adjacent country. The view from thence is very grand.

[Sidenote: VILLA BORGHESE]

_May 28th._--Went to see some drawings in the possession of a Mr. Greaves, a person who accompanied Messrs. Berners and Tilson in their expedition into Greece, Asia Minor, and Egypt. The drawings are most accurately executed, and are assured to be faithful portraits. It was the opinion of those gentlemen after minute examination that the Pyramids are works of art, and not huge masses of rock polished and shaped into their present form. They met a young man of the name of Browne,[40] who flatters himself that he has discovered the long-sought for Temple of Jupiter Ammon, situated in an oasis in the dusts of Libya. He describes it as an oblong building like the cell of a temple, ornamented inside with bas-reliefs of ram’s horns and the other attributes of that Divinity. The remains inspire no idea either of richness or badness. Cambyses was the last who attempted to explore the sandy deserts in search of this splendid shrine; he and his army perished in the enterprise. Mr. Browne is now at Alexandria learning Arabic.

Mr. Hippisley dined with us and brought Count della Walsh, an earl made by James III., the Palmerstons, etc. The same dreadful derangement. I shall soon become mad myself if I much longer witness his paroxysms. All human miseries must have a termination; this consoles, tho’ at 22, it is a melancholy consolation. I am almost choked, suffocated by my sorrow, I have sobbed myself sick, I must to bed.

The Villa Borghese is a most delicious spot just out of the city gates. The gardens are crowded with buildings. The saloon is about the size of that at Blenheim, fitted up recently in excellent taste, excepting that gold tissue curtains are put in the niches behind the statues. In this Hall is the famous bas-relief of the _Dancing Hours_. The Borghese vase is here; the form is beautiful, but the sculpture is but moderate. _The Gladiator_ is the finest statue in Rome: his exertion is well contrasted to the grace and composure of a pensive Muse, who is placed near him.... It would be impossible to enumerate half or even a tenth part of the different objects of my admiration.

The Devonshires are arrived, Ly. Bessborough ill, very ill. I met there Santa Croce;[41] she is a singular woman of her age, as she even possesses still some remains of beauty. She has contrived to attach to her, without any share of cleverness, many distinguished men, Florida Blanca, Bernis, Azara, etc. She was instrumental in assisting the Pope to become pontiff. She speaks abominable French, and to this day calls Bernis ‘Ma chère Cardinal.’

_The Vatican._--First court built by Bramante, reviver of architecture in Italy; the appearance too light. The museum is too extensive to detail, and one is so over-powered by the beauties of perfection that there is no leisure for accurate observation, especially the first six times of going. The _Laocoon_ is _terribly_ fine. Some have objected that he appears more occupied by his own sufferings than in those of his children, but the only expression is that of a man writhing in the last agonies of a painful death. It is one of the finest specimens of the Greek school whilst at its best, supposed about Alexander’s time. His pursuits in the East left Greece in peace, and the arts flourished. The _Apollo_ deserves its reputation. It was found at Hadrian’s villa at Antium. _The Nile_ with 16 boys, very fine. _Paris_, with a Phrygian bonnet on, reckoned very like _me_. There is in the gallery at Florence a bust of Livia which is reckoned to bear a most striking resemblance to _me_.[42]...

[Sidenote: CARDINAL BERNIS]

I dined with the Senator, upon the Capitol, in his palace. He is a Rezzonico, nephew to the late Pope. Papal nepotism is suspicious. He possesses a fine portrait of the late Pope,[43] done by Mengs; it will bear comparison with many of the old pictures. The gold-flowered curtain which forms the background is a _tour-de-force_ to show his skill in making a bad thing _not_ spoil a good one, but it offends the eye, and like most difficult things surprizes without pleasing. I went often to see old Bernis,[44] a veteran in the school of political intrigue and love. He is a phenomenon, for age has not impaired his faculties or misfortune subdued his liveliness. He lodges the Mesdames, aunts of the unfortunate Louis XVI. Madame Victoire[45] is so strikingly like him that it makes one start, and a paralytic affection, keeping her head perpetually moving, fills me with painful sensations. I declined going into any society, that my time might not be too much taken up, but I went occasionally to the Santa Croce’s. Prince Augustus, a pleasing young man, very like the Prince of Wales. Lady Augusta Murray had just ensnared him: she is reported to be with child.[46] The Royalists have got Nantes, it is said.

My evening walks were delicious, wandering over the scenes of classical events.

_Vatican._--Went to see the pictures. Loggia di Raphaello. History of Old and New Testament, executed by his scholars from his designs. ‘Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of salt, finely conceived: her whole figure is a dead white,’ which sufficiently tells the story. A _Dutch_ painter would have made her a _pillar of salt_.

The _Stanze_ were occupied after the assault of Rome by Bourbon’s soldiers, and they treated the walls as they would have treated those of the commonest barracks. On them may now be seen holes in which they placed hooks to suspend their kettles, and the trace of smoke is even visible. In the garden of the Vatican the Pope takes the only exercise he can with decency; he rides early in the morning on a little ambling mule. The extent of the building is prodigious; I have heard the number of rooms called 7000, if not more.

_Borghese Palace._--The best collection of Old Masters in Rome. ‘Virgin in the clouds’: the best _Tintoret_ in Rome. Leonardo da Vinci, known generally by his swarthy hue, sharp chins, high cheek bones, and drawn-up mouths. ‘Adoration of the Shepherds,’ _James Bassano_, good picture; he understood both perspective and colouring. Titian sent his son to study under him; his green drapery remarkably fine. There is always something homely and disgusting in his compositions. A ‘Last Supper’ by him offends from unpardonable anachronisms, as it generally consists of pickled herrings or Dutch cheese.... _Titian_, ‘Holy Family’: fine, sober light. Modern artists are too fond of contrasting their lights. The light of the sun being yellow, all objects illuminated by it ought to partake of its hue. A fine _Andrea del Sarto_, a very favourite painter of mine; his outline is so soft and his expression exquisite.... The _good_ pictures are so numerous that it would require pages to enumerate them all.

The _Doria Palace_, very fine mansion, and very full of fine pictures.

[Sidenote: ROMAN COLLECTIONS]

_4th June, 1793._--_Villa Ludovici_, on the Pincian Hill. The collection consists chiefly of marbles.... _Mars reposing_, I admired extremely, though it is not in the purest manner. The figure represents the action (if it is not an Irishism) so well of being perfectly _at rest_. A group called _Papyrius and his mother_. The expression of inquisitiveness in the mother is admirable; curiosity with a tender sort of maternal authority is happily united. The expression of Papyrius is deficient. _Pætus and Arria_, so called: a beautiful, expiring, languid figure: the action of the man turning his head is well conceived. A fine ceiling by Guercino.

_Farnesina._--The ceiling of the hall is painted by Raphael, but having suffered very much the ground or sky was painted by Carlo Marat in order to give greater effect to the figures, in which it is supposed that he has succeeded, but the contours of many of the figures have suffered in the attempt. It represents the story of Cupid and Psyche. Nothing can exceed the composition and variety of expression in most of the groups. This ceiling and that at the Farnese would warrant a decision that Raphael and A. Carracci are the first masters at Rome.

_Capitol._--In the court there are many fragments of statues. A statue of _Julius Cæsar_ in the military dress. A group of a lion devouring a horse; the flesh appears in the act of being drawn by the teeth of the lion from the ribs. The countenance of the horse is deficient; it does not express the anguish he should feel. A beautiful bronze statue of the _Boy picking out the thorn in his foot_; a simple action, very justly expressed. _The Wolf belonging to the Capitol_, which Cicero mentions among the ominous portents as being struck by lightning when the Republic was in danger. The traces are still visible of the lightning upon it. _Hecuba_, very fine, the exact portrait of a withered scold....

A fine collection of pictures. ‘The Sibyll,’ of _Guercino_, the composition is not simple, the drapery clumsy. ‘Fortune,’ by _Guido_, pretty subject, prettily treated, the colouring very feeble. ‘St. Sebastian,’ by the same, and with the same defect; the countenance placid and beautiful. An old witch, by _Salvator Rosa_, which might be mistaken for a portrait of Lady Knight.[47]

In all the collections much escapes me, as I am always accompanied by one whose impetuosity compels me to hasten from objects I would willingly contemplate, and whose violence of temper throws me into agitations that prevent me distinguishing the objects when they are before me. Much as I endure now, yet it is infinitely more bearable than formerly; experience and a better knowledge of the world makes me laugh at menaces that used to terrify me out of my senses. These threats have been again and again held out; they follow the slightest difference of opinion between us.

The present reigning grievance is the being from home, and my determined love for being abroad. The truth is I suspect some great derangement in his affairs, as his means are not proportioned to his expenses. Lady Palmerston, who abhors him and sees his conduct to me, is remarkable for speaking well, even to a fault, of everybody; she says that there are three people in the world who prove that the common saying of, ‘None are so bad but have some portion of good,’ is not true. The charming trio are Mrs. North, Duchess of Marlborough, and Sir G. Webster.

[Sidenote: TIVOLI]