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 OUT OF HARNESS.
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 S1E WILLIAM A' BECKETT, 
 
 CUIKi' JUSTICE OF VICTORIA. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 J. J. GU1LLAUME, CHESTER SQUAKE. 
 
 1854.
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 A TOUEIST'S DIARY often proves a wearisome task, 
 not only to himself, but, if lie is lucky enough to get 
 any, to his readers also. For this reason I purposely 
 omitted keeping any record, whilst en route, of my 
 recent itinerations ; and I would recommend all who 
 can trust to observation and memory to follow my 
 example. A glance at many things is sufficient, 
 whilst all that is really deserving of recollection will 
 probably obtain it without constant recourse to the 
 pencil or pen. Moreover, there is a responsibility 
 and restraint in wandering about, ink-horn and note- 
 book in hand, from which I would fain be free. 
 Nature and Art have been created for sublimer ends 
 than merely to sit for their portraits, even if all had 
 the power to take them. I have not ; but I can feel 
 
 ".. 1117012
 
 2 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 what I see, and something of my impressions I have 
 endeavoured here to record. So much by way of 
 preface, and now for some account of my tour. 
 
 Disgusted with the so-called summer of England 
 during the months of June and July last, I left 
 London about the middle of August, determined to 
 enjoy myself, if the weather would permit me, in a 
 three months' ramble whithersoever my fancy might 
 take me, keeping always pretty briskly on the move. 
 I had but recently arrived from Australia on a limited 
 leave of absence ; and, as my native land had welcomed 
 my return with about six days' tears to one day's 
 smiles during the two months I had passed there, I 
 thought I would try whether I might not meet with 
 a more agreeable reception on the other side of the 
 Channel. I was not insensible to the feeling in 
 which the bard of Erin, in reference to that particu- 
 larly rainy " gem of the sea," affectionately ejaculates 
 
 " More dear in thy sorrows, thy gloom, and thy showers, 
 Than the rest of the world in their sunniest hours ; " 
 
 but, though proud enough, I trust, of my country, I 
 was not disposed just now to address the white cliffs
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 3 
 
 of Albion in a strain precisely similar to the above. 
 On the contrary, I made up my mind to say good-by 
 to the aforesaid cliffs as speedily as possible, with the 
 express intention of discovering whether other parts 
 of " the rest of the world " would afford me a gleam 
 of those " sunniest hours " at which the patriotic min- 
 strel turned up his nose in comparison with the "gloom 
 and the showers " of his own dear Emerald Isle. 
 
 I was accompanied by a wife and family, who had 
 never before been on the Continent human beings 
 who could help themselves, and me too (for I am 
 somewhat of a valetudinarian) without the aid of 
 courier, footman, or valet- de-place. Away, then, we 
 were all whisked to Folkestone by one of those 
 peculiar trains which occupy nearly as much time in 
 performing the last half mile of the journey, as has 
 been consumed in accomplishing the whole of the 
 former part. I may as well say here, that I hate 
 railway travelling, and am selfish enough to wish it 
 had never been invented. My reasons for this bar- 
 barous anti-utilitarian sentiment will sufficiently 
 appear in the course of these pages. 
 
 Folkestone to Boulogne, whence, per Diligence, 
 
 B2
 
 4 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 to Calais, and thence, per railway to Lille, brings us 
 on well in our route Bhinewards. Prom Lille we 
 are projected to Brussels, where we arrive in the 
 midst of preparations for an illumination in honour 
 of the marriage of the Duke of Brabant. The 
 ceremony had only just finished, and Brussels was 
 swarming with about three times the number of its 
 ordinary population, all parading the streets in 
 holiday costume, and with holiday faces. "Have 
 you not written to secure beds ? " said an old hand, as 
 we reached Brussels. " I am afraid, then, you will 
 get none ; good morning ! " Nonsense ! thought 1 ; 
 but it was no nonsense. Up and down here and 
 there for one dreary hour and a half were we trailed 
 through the town in the railway omnibus before 
 possibility of lodgment, at any place, under any 
 circumstances, appeared. As the ponderous machine 
 carried us about, stopping every minute at the doors 
 into which we were not to enter, I felt we were becom- 
 ing a sort of show, and a sense of humiliation began 
 to come over me at the idea of our forlorn position. 
 We were clearly the rejected ones of Brussels, and 
 were wandering about houseless and homeless in the
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 5 
 
 midst of its comforts and festivities. We could not 
 scream out to the gaping spectators that we had 
 money to pay for a lodging if we could get one; 
 that we would get out of the place if we could ; that 
 we wouldn't have come at all had we known, &c. &c. 
 Here we were here, only to be in everybody's way, 
 a laughing-stock to others, and a burden to ourselves. 
 At length, after being rejected at every other decent 
 hotel in the city, we were accommodated at one with 
 an attic which took the wind out of us to get up to, 
 and made us giddy to look down from. Double 
 prices added to the interest of our position, and deter- 
 mined us on a departure by first train the following 
 morning. Meantime, we endeavoured to find what 
 amusement we were capable of enjoying by a drive 
 through the streets at night, which, in honour of the 
 Duke's marriage, were brilliantly illuminated. All 
 the world was abroad, and as we were no longer 
 houseless wanderers, we had no objection to be 
 abroad too. We soon wearied of the monotonous 
 glare, and were glad to sink to repose, if that can be 
 called sinking which was accomplished by an ascent 
 of some two or three hundred steps. By the way, an
 
 6 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 illumination abroad is somewhat different from an 
 illumination at home. The staple of the Brussels 
 display was a species of Chinese lantern ; there were 
 very few coloured lamps, no gas, one or two trans- 
 parencies, and a great many rows of flaring oil wicks 
 in the window-sills and balconies, which emitted no 
 very agreeable odour to those above, and dropped in 
 rather damaging instalments on those below. 
 
 I should state here that we were to have been 
 joined at Brussels by some relations, who were to 
 accompany us to the Rhine. Of course they would 
 not find us at the hotel agreed upon for our meeting, 
 but as we had left them a letter to tell them of our 
 whereabout, we wondered to have heard nothing of 
 them. A hope arose within us that they might not 
 arrive at all, for a "lodging upon the cold ground" 
 appeared to us the only lodging they would obtain ; 
 and however appropriate this style of apartment may 
 be for love-crazed young maidens, it is not exactly 
 the thing for railway travellers. Luckily, our friends 
 were not exposed to the risk ; for, by a mistake into 
 which we had ourselves nearly fallen at Muscrou, 
 they were, in the process of changing trains at that
 
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 7 
 
 place, whisked back again to Lille, instead of being 
 forwarded on to Brussels. They discovered their 
 error almost instantaneously ; but the train was off. 
 We laughed at the thing afterwards, but it is really 
 no joke, when one is all hurry to get on, to be taken 
 aback in this way. The fault lies with the way in 
 which the authorities manage, or rather mismanage, 
 things at Muscrou. It is the frontier town of Belgium, 
 and you have, in consequence, to submit to an 
 inspection of luggage and passports; for which 
 purpose you are, on leaving the train from Lille, 
 shown in at one door, and out at the other, of a large 
 building, where the inspection takes place. On 
 issuing from this, nothing is seen of any train, nor of 
 any one to give you any information about it. At 
 length, nearly a quarter of a mile off, it is perceptible ; 
 and, being reached, you get in, of course, unless told 
 otherwise, to the train you have left. The result is 
 such as happened to our friends, who reached 
 Brussels after we had left, and necessitated our 
 stopping for them at Liege, whence we all together 
 proceeded by railway to Cologne. 
 
 It is ridiculous to talk of having seen the country
 
 8 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 and towns through which one passes in a railway 
 carriage. One can see nothing of either. As to the 
 towns, you do not in fact go through them, it is 
 literally ly them ; and yet this brief sJdrtation upon 
 the edge of a town, of which not a single inhabitant, 
 and scarcely a single house is visible, we call having 
 been at it. I have caught myself saying I have 
 been at Ghent at Aix-la-Chapelle, when my whole 
 acquaintance with them was obtained in the manner 
 I have just described. Now in the good old times 
 of the whip-cracking postilions, and street-thundering 
 diligences, you did actually achieve an, eye-conquest 
 of a town they professed to pass through. You gene- 
 rally went through the heart of it, through the 
 principal street, where the people came out to look at 
 you, and you had an opportunity of looking at the 
 people ; and if you stopped to breakfast or dinner, for 
 which an hour used to be allowed, you had an 
 opportunity not only of making a meal, but of taking 
 a leisurely glance at the town, perhaps of going over 
 the Cathedral and the Town Hall. You could say 
 then that you had been at such and such a place, 
 without feeling that you were imposing upon yourself
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 9 
 
 or your audience ; but on the strength of a railway 
 transit it is sheer delusion to suppose anything of 
 the sort. 
 
 As regards the country, there is more excuse for 
 our talking about that than the towns. The eye 
 does, here and there, contrive to get sight of an 
 'expanse which may be surveyed as a whole before 
 half of its parts have disappeared under the inspection. 
 Still there is a pea-shooting swiftness about our own 
 motion which forbids all calm or rational enjoyment 
 of the view. There is a sense of hurry, which is a 
 foe to all reflection, and to all imagination. Little 
 inspiration from nature would painter or poet be 
 able to draw if they were to behold her only from 
 the window of a railway carriage. Euskin in his 
 l< Seven Lamps of Architecture" observes that "where 
 rest is forbidden, so is beauty." He is right; 
 Repose is an essential condition of the beautiful, 
 however it may be dispensed with by the sublime. 
 And it is equally necessary to a perception, or rather 
 I should say to a reception, of the beautiful, that the 
 mind on which it is to act, should be in a state of 
 repose also. This it cannot be with the body in a
 
 10 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 rapid whirl, any more than it could reflect calmly in 
 a high wind, or amid the roar of cannon, even if 
 sensible of no inconvenience from the one, or danger 
 from the other. Why, it is impossible even to taste, 
 properly at least as a Kitchener or a Soyer would 
 have you taste if you eat in a noise. I am no 
 epicure, but I do nevertheless avow that I never 
 wholly relish the taste of any particularly toothsome 
 edible or drinkable without some degree of thought 
 and one can't think in a row. Little is it I know about 
 wine ; but if a friend will insist upon my opinion of 
 his new purchase of port or claret, he must hold his 
 tongue whilst I taste it, he must give me leave to 
 reflect before I answer him. 
 
 Now the object of all that I have been just 
 saying, is to account for the confession that I have 
 really nothing to tell of the country or places we 
 saw between Brussels and Cologne. I could see 
 that after we passed Liege, there were glimpses of 
 lovely scenery, which continued more or less all the 
 way; but as to drinking in to mentally tasting any 
 of its beauties, the iron horse which bore me along 
 took care I should not do that.
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 11 
 
 What is to be seen at Cologne may be learnt from 
 Murray's Handbook ; I did not see it, but hastened 
 on to Bonn, a prettier and cleaner town. Here we 
 stopped for a day, during which we made an excur- 
 sion to Godesberg, a ruined castle on a hill about five 
 miles from Bonn, and from which a very picturesque 
 and extensive view of the Rhine and the country 
 through which it flows, may be obtained. Next 
 morning we embarked on the Rhine, and proceeded 
 down it as far as Castel (opposite to Mayence) 
 sleeping on the way at Coblentz, and Bingen. I 
 am ashamed to say that I was not so impressed with 
 the beauty of the scenery, as I had expected. To be 
 candid, I think the Rhine is overrated. After some 
 twenty miles or so have been passed, a monotony 
 begins to be felt, which you only do not admit at the 
 moment, because you have taken your passage for 
 nearly the whole way down ; and, moreover, you don't 
 like to confess even to yourself, that you are 
 disappointed. You find, however, that your fellow 
 passengers as well as yourself, are in no hurry to 
 rush up stairs from dinner, and are in a great hurry 
 to rush down stairs to it. Murray points out some spots
 
 12 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 that I observed everybody to be reading about before 
 they reached them, but very few looking at when 
 they came in sight of them; and certainly no one 
 sacrificed even his cheese to his enthusiasm for the 
 beautiful, amid the company with whom I had the 
 honour to dine on board the good steamer, (by-the-bye 
 it was a very bad one), Prinz von Preussen. Perhaps 
 we were a little out of humour with the weather, for 
 just as we had seated ourselves to dine upon deck, 
 out of compliment to the charms we were so desirous 
 to enjoy, up came the wind and down came the rain, 
 and sent us all below, with better appetite than 
 temper. 
 
 At Bingen.we took a drive to Krusenach, where 
 people go to improve their health by keeping good 
 hours, and drinking nasty water. The baths are 
 said to have sufficient iron in them to impart fresh 
 tone to the nervous system ; and what with one o'clock 
 dinners, early rising, and pleasant society, it is highly 
 probable that valetudinarians of a certain class may 
 find a sojourn there both agreeable and beneficial. 
 
 On landing at Castel, our intention was to proceed 
 forthwith to Frankfort by railway ; but the steamer
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 13 
 
 was so much beyond its appointed time that we were 
 obliged to see the train go without us. I may 
 observe here that the steamers on the Rhine never do 
 keep their time, and no one, therefore, should make 
 any arrangement on the faith of their regularity. 
 We had to remain four hours at Castel, doing 
 nothing, but being most impotently indignant ; and, 
 as we vented our wrath viva voce in English, looking, 
 I have no doubt, supremely ridiculous. 
 
 We got to Frankfort at about seven o'clock in the 
 evening, when our patience was again tried by finding 
 that all the hotels were full not a bed to be had 
 even for one and the burden of our song was " we 
 are seven." One maitre d'hotel offered to give us 
 up his own room if we could all sleep there together, 
 observing that he would put up one or two curtains 
 " pour conserver la morale." I am afraid gratitude 
 was not the feeling with which we listened to this 
 proposition of our conservative friend, but we declined 
 to accept it, and posted off with what haste we could 
 to secure places by the train to Darmstadt, where, 
 fortunately, we found no difficulty in being housed. 
 Next morning we started for Basle, a distance of
 
 14 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 one hundred and fifty-six miles, occupying nine hours 
 by rail, and no stopping at any of the stations for 
 refreshment. The railway stops short of Basle by 
 about six miles, so that it was near eight in the 
 evening before We got into the town. Here again 
 we were doomed to undergo the mortification of 
 going from house to house before we could gain 
 admission for the night. The Trois Couronnes, that 
 everybody goes to, had not room for everybody at 
 least not for us, and, as a great favour, we were 
 kindly allowed to enter the jaws of the Stork 
 (Cigogne). Perhaps the reader thinks that the 
 number of our party was the cause of our rejection ? 
 Not so ; single individuals and couples had been 
 turned away from the same hotels. We had simply 
 come at a time when a concurrence of causes had 
 made the hotels unusually full. This nightly struggle 
 for a bed, however, was becoming so disgusting that 
 I began seriously to think of giving up further 
 progress in my intended tour, and making direct 
 for the less romantic but more hospitable localities 
 of my own country for Greenwich if need be; 
 anywhere, in short, where I could get a bed.
 
 OUT OF HAENESS. 15 
 
 Albert Smith tells us that not much is to be seen 
 at Basle, and he is right. One thing I congratulated 
 myself on here; our railway career was, for the 
 present, at an end. Now, thought I, we shall really 
 have an opportunity of enjoying the country we pass 
 through. People may abuse it as they will, but I 
 confess I like nothing better, when one is not tied to 
 time, than the jog-trot progress of voiture travelling. 
 The pace is so leisurely that it offers all the advantages 
 of a pedestrian tour to those who can walk. Unfor- 
 tunately, I can't ; but my family could, and frequently 
 did. Seven is about the maximum of a voiturier's 
 passengers, but we had no difficulty in meeting with 
 a carriage capacious enough for our party, and our 
 luggage into the bargain. Our agreement was to be 
 taken from Basle to Lucerne for sixty francs, leaving 
 the former at ten A.M., and arriving at the latter next 
 day at three P.M. The feat was accomplished very 
 pleasantly by two horses and a German coachman, of 
 whose language we understood nothing, nor he of 
 ours. We found this a disadvantage in more 
 respects than one, and resolved in future to have 
 nothing to do with a German driver who could not
 
 16 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 speak French. Murray's ' ' Handbook for Switzerland " 
 (Route 4) will inform the reader all about the 
 localities we passed through between Basle and 
 Lucerne. Our sleeping place was Kreutzstrasse, 
 where the " Lion " received us with open arms, and 
 where we found good beds, good feeding, an obliging 
 hostess, and a tolerable piano tolerably well played by 
 a tolerably pretty daughter. The country is very 
 beautiful all the way to Lucerne, especially at the 
 highest point of the mountain pass called the Unter- 
 Hauerstein. Here I alighted ; and, mounting on the 
 back of one of my sons, was carried by him to the 
 summit, from whence, being deposited on the grass, 
 I enjoyed a delicious view of the landscape around. 
 
 I suppose the country in this part of the world has 
 been much changed since Arnold of Winkelried 
 guided that bundle of spears into 'his breast by which 
 he achieved his own deliverance from the troubles of 
 this life, and that of his countrymen from the op- 
 pression of the Austrians. Tor this reason, perhaps, 
 my vicinity to the lake of Sempach, near which he 
 fell, did not kindle up those peculiar emotions which 
 one is expected to feel when passing over ground
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 17 
 
 that lias drunk in the blood of martyrs or 
 heroes. I am afraid however, that, in these matters 
 I am deficient in the organ of veneration. If even- 
 spear had been preserved, and clearly identified, which 
 had entered the heart of the patriotic Arnold, I really 
 don't think I could have drawn up the blind of the 
 carriage window to have inspected one of them. 
 Sights of this description are to me such mere sights 
 that I take not the slightest interest in beholding 
 them. As curiosities as things revealing, in some 
 measure, the state of the nations or times to which 
 they belong, such as the relics of Pompeii, I have 
 no objection to take a peep at an old spear, or an 
 old anything else. But if it is merely because the 
 spear went through the heart of a distinguished man, 
 I confess myself indifferent to the inspection. Why 
 should I desire to see it ? I know what a spear is ; 
 that any other spear would have done similar execu- 
 tion ; that, if the story be true, Arnold must have been 
 killed by a spear ; and that my imagination of what 
 the spear must be like, will give me a very sufficient 
 idea of what it actually was. "Ah ! " somebody will 
 say, " you have no poetry in your soul/' To which
 
 18 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 I reply, that the question is not one of poetry, but of 
 taste, tell me, if you like, that I have no taste. 
 
 Here we are at Lucerne ; of course drive up to the 
 "Schwitzer Hof," and of course, for so it seemed to 
 be, there was no room for us. " We might have 
 beds at the Dependences, and our meals in the hotel, 
 if we liked." This we did not like, and made off to 
 the " Schwan " where we were satisfactorily housed. 
 Bad weather and the non-arrival of letters kept us two 
 days at Lucerne. Our intention was to have gone 
 up the Lake to Muellen, and thence over the 
 St. Gothard to Milan. On enquiring, however, the 
 price of fares by the diligence, we were informed that 
 we might book our places, if we pleased, to Milan, 
 but that the proprietors of the diligence could not 
 undertake to convey us beyond Bellinzona, that, in 
 short, there was a dispute between the Swiss and 
 Austrian authorities, which made the probability of 
 our entry into Italy from the former country very 
 doubtful. So we made up our mind to cut across to 
 Geneva, and try if a passage was practicable over the 
 Simplon. A word about the postal authorities here. 
 My brother having left a sick wife at Boulogne, had
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 19 
 
 arranged with her when and where to write to him, 
 the first place being Lucerne. " No letter/' however 
 was the answer to his enquiry on the appointed day. 
 The same answer is given him the next day; he 
 having written in the meantime to his wife, to say 
 he would be at Geneva on a certain day, and wait 
 there for a letter. Before starting, however, for 
 Geneva, I suggested that my brother should ask to 
 look at the letters himself. This request was very 
 grudgingly complied with; but the result of the inspec- 
 tion was that a letter was found to have arrived on 
 the very day it had been enquired for. The same 
 thing occurred on our arrival at Geneva, with the 
 exception that the post-office official would not 
 permit any other inspection than his own, until my 
 brother insisted when the result was a letter, as 
 before. To me the same thing occurred subsequently 
 at Rome, and, indeed, I found several travellers com- 
 plaining of similar occurrences in their own case. 
 
 At Lucerne we were occupied in gazing on the 
 lake from the windows of our hotel, took a drive in 
 the environs, bought a Swiss cottage in the day, and 
 were rather startled by a Swiss thunderstorm at 
 
 c 2
 
 20 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 night. The lion of the place is actually a lion not 
 a living one, but one carved out of the living rock 
 in commemoration of the fidelity of the Swiss 
 Guards who fell at the Tuileries in defence of 
 Louis XYL, in September, 1792. You are told all 
 about the matter by one of the survivors that is, if 
 you happen to find him alone, but generally there 
 are so many visitors that he is in the midst of his 
 story before you arrive. Alison, however, and others, 
 having given us some insight to the same story, we 
 do not so much regret having come in at the fag-end 
 of the old veteran's recital; and tender him the 
 usual franc without requesting him to " begin again." 
 Speaking of the locus in quo, our friend Murray says, 
 " There is a quiet solitude and shade about the spot 
 which is particularly pleasing and refreshing." With- 
 out hypercritically observing that we expect solitudes 
 to lie quiet, the locality of the lion is not for the 
 visitors a quiet solitude. On the contrary, there is 
 a hubbub, and a tramping, and a chattering going 
 on, that is destructive of all idea of solitude, or the 
 reflections therefrom arising. If one could buy out 
 the old Swiss Cicerone for half an hour, or get him
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 21 
 
 to buy out or keep off other people for that time, one 
 might enjoy the locale of the lion, and possibly feel a 
 little more respect for the lion himself; for amid 
 bustle and formality the beauties of Art, equally with 
 the beauties of Nature, lose much of the impression 
 they would otherwise produce. 
 
 Before I leave Lucerne, having spoken so irre- 
 verently of antique relics, I beg to make atonement 
 by informing the traveller who likes such things, that 
 he will find in the arsenal of the above city a very 
 select assortment, of which I refer him for a full and 
 complete catalogue to Murray's "Handbook for 
 Switzerland," Route 10, p. 37. 
 
 Prom Lucerne we hired a voiture to proceed to 
 Geneva, sleeping at Payerne, Berne, Eschalmoz, and 
 Lausanne. The scenery throughout is charming; 
 but the most striking feature in the journey is the 
 entrance into Friburg. You have to cross a suspension 
 bridge, which, when you first see it from a distance, 
 seems so much nearer the sky than the earth, that 
 you begin to doubt whether it could be intended for 
 the inhabitants of the latter. As you approach 
 nearer, however, you find that it is really a practi-
 
 22 OUT OF HAENESS. 
 
 cable bridge, and that you are carried safely by it 
 over one of the most picturesque chasms in Switzer- 
 land. The view from the terrace of the hotel is 
 most beautiful; of the kind, I doubt whether any- 
 thing can be found go beautiful. The approach to 
 Berne, too, is very striking; without having had a 
 glimpse of the city before, you, at a sudden turn 
 of the road, find yourself in full view of it, stand- 
 ing out bright and clear, like a newly-painted 
 panorama. 
 
 Did any one ever see the clock strike at Berne ? 
 I mean the clock, that goes through such a variety of 
 mechanical evolutions in the shape of cock-crowing, 
 bears marching, &c. &c. 
 
 We never did, though we made one or two 
 attempts. Either the clock had just struck, or it 
 was too early, or we had come to the wrong clock, or 
 it could be seen at any time, and so ended in being 
 seen at none. Of course we all went to the terrace 
 where the man was carried over the parapet on horse- 
 back, and, instead of being dashed to pieces in his 
 descent of one hundred and twenty feet, lived to be 
 seventy years of age. The record of the transaction
 
 .OUT OF HARNESS. 23 
 
 does not state his age at the time, but the feat was 
 evidently of too gymnastic a character to have been 
 perpetrated with impunity by limbs that had seen 
 their best days; and we may conclude, therefore, that 
 the hero of the tale would have had his existence 
 considerably curtailed if his unpremeditated and, as 
 they say in the bills, "much admired act of horse- 
 manship" had terminated fatally. "What I have 
 just written on the subject has occupied much more 
 time than was bestowed by any of us in contem- 
 plating the catastrophe. We were much more con- 
 cerned in the consumption of some very delicious 
 water-ices which we took in the open air, enjoying 
 meanwhile I was going to say, the scenery before 
 us, but truth compels me to admit that, during the 
 period of our aforesaid gustation, we had our backs 
 to the beautiful prospect which the terrace com- 
 mands. I am afraid we carry about with us a good 
 deal of the animal, in these excursions that we talk 
 so intellectually and sentimentally about. Don't let 
 it be supposed, however, that we did not appreciate 
 the prospect I have spoken of; but it was certainly 
 a secondary consideration to the ices. At a shop in
 
 24 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 Berne, we were shown some tables that had been at 
 the great Exhibition ; and as we had not been there 
 we concluded on purchasing a table that had, think- 
 ing that, besides being a very pretty article of Swiss 
 wood-work, it would be a very imposing thing to say 
 to our friends in Australia, "Do you see that table? 
 It was in the great Exhibition; we bought it at 
 Berne." Vanity in its way, this ! but not of a very 
 criminal kind, I hope ; the fact is, if there were no 
 one to look at what we bought, few purchases would 
 be made for their own sake, not even excepting the 
 original letter of Cardinal Pole, which was sold by 
 Mr. Sotheby the other day for 40J. 
 
 We had not time to see much of Lausanne, and 
 what we did see, the state of the weather did not 
 permit us to enjoy. Strong wind and drifting rain 
 damp considerably one's zeal for communion with thd 
 picturesque. We managed, however, to take a 
 promenade of sufficient extent to be convinced of 
 the truth of all we had heard about the beauties of 
 the place. After sleeping one night there, we tra- 
 velled along the margin of the lake, through Nion, 
 Coppet, &c., to Geneva. The weather was still
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 25 
 
 unpropitious, and continued so during the three days 
 passed at Geneva. Indeed, we came to the conclu- 
 sion that even the early part of September is too late 
 for a trip to Switzerland. We found many parties 
 getting out of it as quickly as they could on that 
 account, and giving up excursions which they had 
 intended to take. At Geneva we had a repetition of 
 the post-office scene which had occurred between my 
 brother and the authorities at Lucerne. The result 
 was that, being an affectionate husband, he would 
 run no further risk of trusting to postal intelligence 
 of his wife, and with his daughter quitted us to join 
 her. He left Geneva, however, under some appre- 
 hension of being stopped at the French frontier, in 
 consequence of not having had his passport vised by 
 the English ambassador at Berne; a proceeding 
 which, when there, we had been informed was per- 
 fectly unnecessary. So, as far as my brother was 
 concerned, it turned out to be ; notwithstanding the 
 long-faced predictions of certain travellers who had 
 taken the trouble to send to Berne to get the afore- 
 said vise, he was allowed to pass into France without 
 any notice of its omission. I found, indeed, a
 
 26 -OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 general impression among English tourists that there 
 was no leaving Switzerland without the Berne vise, 
 and rumours were rife of several parties having been 
 turned back at various points of exit for the want 
 of it. 
 
 In spite of the weather, we managed to take one or 
 two drives in the environs of Geneva, and to have a 
 peep, inter alia, at that popular scene, the junction of 
 the Arve with the Rhone. We were, however, 
 compelled to pass a considerable portion of our time 
 in looking out upon " the blue and arrowy Ehone " 
 from the windows of our hotel the I/Ecu de Geneve. 
 Here, one evening, I found myself seated, watching 
 the women who came, one after another, to wash 
 clothes in the river. Several were standing upon the 
 balustrade, with their baskets before them, the river 
 running deep and rapidly by their side, whilst they 
 stooped down to reach the water, dragging the various 
 articles of linen backwards and forwards in the stream, 
 till I thought some of them would lose their balance 
 from the energy of their movements, if not from the 
 insecurity of their position. In this way they 
 appeared to get through a great deal of work ; I can't
 
 OUT OF HAENESS. 27 
 
 tell how many baskets were carried away on the heads 
 of the fair (I have certainly seen fairer) blanchisseuses 
 in the course of an hour. It was nearly dark when a 
 solitary washer came with her load, and transporting 
 that and herself to the parapet, commenced her as 
 it appeared to me, very dangerous vocation. I was 
 curious to see how long she would remain at it, and 
 felt a kind of interest in her proceedings as if it was 
 doubtful whether they would terminate safely. As 
 night drew on, I could scarcely see her figure on the 
 parapet, from the height of my chamber ; but I was at 
 length relieved by the sight of her basket on her head, 
 and hearing her trip off singing, with her work 
 accomplished. Well, thought I, there at least is no 
 idler in God's world ! How many of us in this hotel, 
 where we are all taking our pleasure, are performing 
 our allotted parts as patiently and cheerfully, shall I 
 say as usefully, as that poor strong-armed, hard toiling, 
 but I trust, light and happy-hearted girl ? Excuse 
 this digression, reader, but I thought it better than a 
 description of Mont Blanc, which the clouds wouldn't 
 allow me to see, and which you may learn all about, 
 with much more edification, from Albert Smith.
 
 28 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 A table d'hote affords both exercise and amusement, 
 for the rapid succession of dishes keeps your knife 
 and fork in constant play, and you can look at or 
 listen to your neighbours, if you can't talk to them. 
 The spread at the L'Ecu de Geneve is highly creditable 
 to the manager of the gastronomic department. But 
 how stubbornly unsociable with each other are 
 English strangers over their meals. Nothing but a 
 growl is wanting to suggest the idea of a human 
 menagerie at feeding time. A dog over his bone is 
 not more exclusive than the traveller from that cele- 
 brated land, where " every Englishman's house is his 
 castle," seems over his plate. Of course there are 
 exceptions to this habitual reserve, and it very soon 
 disappears if any one has the courage to firmly and 
 respectfully attack it. We had a party sufficiently 
 large of ourselves to be independent of conversation 
 with others ; but there were many solitary travellers, 
 who were our co-guests at the dinner- table, that I 
 longed to take pity upon by having a word with, and 
 I always did when I could. It is not easy, since the 
 general use of moustaches and cigars, to distinguish 
 Englishmen from foreigners; and if taciturnity
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 29 
 
 prevails as well, there is no very apparent clue to the 
 discovery. We had been dining one day at the 
 table d'hote, when I heard somebody near us, as 
 dessert was being served, say, " They are evidently all 
 foreigners at this end/' " No/' said I aloud, " I am 
 riot for one, nor any of my family; " on whicli some 
 half-dozen gentlemen, and two ladies opposite, very 
 good-humouredly made the same announcement, and 
 the result was that we all got into a very pleasant 
 chat for the afternoon. 
 
 From Geneva we made arrangements to proceed 
 to Milan, in sufficient distances each day to reach 
 the latter city on the sixth from our departure. Our 
 first day's journey was along the north side of the 
 lake, as far as St. Gingoux a saint, by the way, I 
 never heard of before, unless the gentleman so fre- 
 quently invoked under the familiar appellation of 
 " Jingo" be the same. The second night we slept 
 at Martigny ; the third, at Tourtemagne ; the fourth, 
 on the Simplon ; the fifth, at Arona ; and the sixth 
 found us in the midst of the Lombardo-Venetian 
 capital. It was a delightful journey altogether : 
 easy travelling, fine weather, magnificent scenery,
 
 30 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 and beloved companions. The guide-books will tell 
 how many beautiful things we must have seen, but 
 not how much we enjoyed them. Indeed I don't 
 know that I can do this myself; suffice it to say, that 
 ever and anon, as we wound slowly through some of 
 Nature's most lovely panoramas my boys walking 
 up the hills, and my wife by my side I, stretched 
 at full length in our ample voiture, gazing dreamily 
 on the sweet prospect before me, and with the soft 
 breath of heaven blowing balmily and healthily over 
 my brow and cheek, forgot for the time all the 
 irksome brainwork and heartfelt anxieties of gone-by 
 years in distant climes ; and, giving myself up to the 
 calm pure bliss of the moment, had neither sigh for 
 the past nor care for the future, I was not able to 
 partake of all those physical delights which result in 
 such circumstances from the possession of a strong 
 pair of legs ; but in the mere pleasure of travelling 
 itself, with liberated mind and improving health, I 
 experienced a sense of tranquil happiness that obli- 
 terated all remembrance of pain or sorrow, and 
 drew from me, in my emotions of gratitude towards 
 Him who was its source, a prayer that I might go
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 31 
 
 back to that distant clime and that irksome brain- 
 work, of which I have spoken, a better if not a 
 haler man. 
 
 There is a waterfall near the inn at Tourtemagne, 
 which most travellers who have time, run to take a 
 peep at. Two poles thrust through an arm-chair 
 made a sufficiently safe vehicle for the conveyance 
 of my person thither. I trembled at one or two 
 crossing-places, where the solitary plank seemed 
 somewhat too fragile for its passing burden; and 
 began to fear, from the general steepness and slip- 
 periness of the ground, that some of us might be 
 introduced to a fall of not quite so interesting a kind 
 as that we were in search of. However, we arrived 
 there safely, approaching sufficiently near to get our 
 ears stunned by the noise, and our cheeks watered 
 by the spray. Altogether, my body was more stirred 
 than my mind; yet, thought I, if this diminutive 
 cataract sounds so formidable by Jonathan ! shall 
 we say ? what must Niagara be ? 
 
 From the moment that you enter the valley of the 
 Rhone until you reach the Italian side of the Simplon 
 the eye is attracted by a succession of cottages, huts,
 
 32 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 and sometimes villages, that dot the apparently 
 inaccessible slopes of the mountains on either side of 
 the road. By the aid of a telescope, what seemed a 
 stone is discovered to be a house, and a patch of 
 green, no larger than a pocket-handkerchief, turns 
 out to be a cultured field. Plots of ground which 
 appear untenable to human footing, and too insig- 
 nificant in size to be worth cultivation, even on the 
 level soil, are dug, planted, and fenced with a care 
 and labour that nothing, surely, but the sternest 
 necessities could have induced. The inhabitants of 
 these mountains must be wretchedly poor, or wretch- 
 edly ignorant; or they would never persist in 
 attempting to raise by themselves what a better 
 application of their labour would enable them to 
 purchase from others, and perhaps to obtain some- 
 thing more than that mere animal subsistence which 
 is the result of their present toil. 
 
 I shall not attempt to describe what has been 
 described so frequently already the passage of the 
 Simplon. Neither shall I say much about our visit 
 to Isola Madre and Isola Bella, on the Lago Maggiore. 
 I shall not soon forget either the sublime of the
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 33 
 
 mountains,, or the beautiful of the lake. Of Isola 
 Bella nothing can be said that is too eulogistic. The 
 palace it bears has been called a toy by some 
 fastidious gentlemen ! Stuff ! the idea of expecting 
 or desiring an edifice like Windsor Castle to rise out 
 of that fairy isle, and frown over those calm and 
 smiling waters. The palace, the gardens, the terraces, 
 are just what they should be, in such a clime, on such 
 a spot. When Pauline says to Claude Melnotte, 
 <{ Sweet Prince, tell me again of thy palace by the 
 lake of Como," he replies by describing it as 
 
 " Shut out by Alpine hills from the rude world, 
 Near a clear lake, margin'd by fruits of gold 
 And whispering myrtles ; " 
 
 a decided fib, as told by the deceiving Claude, but 
 unquestionably true if we transfer the description 
 from the sham palace at Como to the real one at 
 Isola Bella. By the way, it is fortunate for its 
 owner that it does not lie within the Austrian 
 dominions, for, by a recent proclamation of the 
 Emperor, among the estates of several noblemen 
 declared forfeited, are those of the Count Borromeo.
 
 34 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 The confiscation of Isola Bella would be a European 
 calamity; at all events, we doubt whether in 
 Austrian hands it would be as cheerfully open to the 
 inspection of English visitors, as it is now. 
 
 To the Borromeo family belongs also Isola Madre, 
 of which the chief attraction is its garden : we 
 visited it; but the traveller to whom time is an 
 object, will lose little by missing it, if he has already 
 seen Isola Bella. There is one little drawback to 
 the pleasure of inspecting these islands, viz., the 
 presence of the individual who acts as guide and 
 exhibitor. To enjoy them fully, one ought to be at 
 liberty to roam unwatched and unattended through 
 these lovely retreats, and to be able to stop here and 
 there, as the mood inclined, without the presence of 
 an impatient conductor, or the chattering of a loqua- 
 cious cicerone. Then the boatmen, notwithstanding 
 the fixed prices of their tariff, growl very considerably 
 at you, if your hion-mano does not considerably 
 add to their legal fare : and altogether, in one's 
 excursions to these isles of beauty, there is such a 
 mixture of the practical with the poetical, as deducts 
 materially from the influence of the latter. Towards
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 35 
 
 night, however, the view from the balcony of our inn 
 at Baveno, restored to our imagination a happier 
 tone, and sent us to rest, dreaming of the soft moon- 
 light we had left smiling over the lake, and listening 
 to the sweet songs which might be still heard echoing 
 from its shore. We sat for some time enjoying 
 at our window the moonlight and the harmony, and 
 must have been asleep before either had ceased. 
 What was this harmony after all ? Nothing more, 
 if you like to take it so, reader, than a few work- 
 people trying to forget the toil of their hands in the 
 exercise of their lungs. Even so ; and judging from 
 the spirit and good-will with which they sang, I 
 should say the attempt was successful. There were 
 about twenty young persons of both sexes grouped 
 together under some trees before the inn, all em- 
 ployed in preparing flax, and rapidly at work with 
 their fingers, which appeared to require neither light 
 nor attention to guide them. Every now and then a 
 voice would begin singing, then two or three more 
 took up the tune, and finally, all joined in chorus. 
 Occasionally a false note would be detected, when 
 they would stop and burst out laughing; or the
 
 36 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 offender might be heard receiving a jobation from 
 one who seemed to be either the Jullien or the 
 Hullah of the occasion. Then they would sing and 
 laugh, and laugh and sing again ; and so, I was told, 
 many an evening was passed by these poor but light- 
 hearted people, in the prosecution of their labours for 
 their daily bread. Well, thought I, these people 
 may be ignorant and superstitious, but what I see 
 here is better, at all events, than the toil of the 
 factory, or the recreation of the public-house. Italy 
 may have fallen low enough in some respects ; but in 
 others, there is at least one nation which I fear has 
 fallen far lower. 
 
 From Arona to Milan the country is flat but 
 fertile ; rice fields abound, but the cultivation of it is 
 a very unwholesome occupation, in consequence of 
 the marshy nature of the ground which is required 
 for its growth. The oxen in this part of the country 
 are magnificent the finest in the world for strength, 
 shape, and beauty. We found here, and throughout 
 Italy, as was the case also in Switzerland, the vines 
 blighted and discoloured by disease of some kind, 
 which not only impaired the flavour of the grape
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 37 
 
 itself, but rendered it unfit for making into wine. 
 Talking of wine, let me recommend Vino d'Asti 
 bianco to those who like a palatable draught on a hot 
 day; it is not unlike sparkling perry, and is decidedly 
 better than mediocre champagne ; water, however, is 
 preferable to both, if it is to be got pure. The only 
 real drawback which we experienced in the course of 
 our Italian tour to our gustatory enjoyments was the 
 want of milk for breakfast, and the consequent neces- 
 sity of turning that meal into a premature dinner. 
 
 We stayed at Milan five days, during which we of 
 course visited La Scala and the Duomo. More inte- 
 resting than either was our inspection of Leonardo 
 da Vinci's Last Supper a rapidly fading, but still 
 sufficiently impressive fresco to vindicate its title to 
 the wide- world celebrity it has obtained. The traces 
 that still remain of the Saviour's features conveyed to 
 us a very different feeling from that which we expe- 
 rienced in regarding through its crystal coffin the 
 actual countenance of the richly-shrined Carlo Bor- 
 romeo : the one showed us all that was earthly and 
 perishable in its most offensive relation to the 
 senses j the other, all that was divme and spiritual
 
 38 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 in their loftiest relation to the imagination. From 
 the dead body, mouldering in its cold but gilded 
 sepulchre, we turned with disgust; to the painted 
 figure on the damp wall we turned with admiration, 
 reverence, and hope; admiration for the art that 
 could prrtray the God-like in human form, reverence 
 for Him it sought to bring before us, and hope for 
 the future, of which He was at once the evangel and 
 the example. 
 
 The cathedral of Milan exacts, for its exterior, 
 an admiration which its interior does not com- 
 mand. This is cold, dark, and vast, and seems 
 as w%furnished, if the expression may be allowed, 
 as the majority of Italian churches are over- 
 adorned. There are many beautiful objects within 
 painting, sculpture, and stained glass of the best 
 but the tout ensemble is unsatisfactory. Service 
 was going on when we entered, but this did not 
 interfere with our movements about the church, 
 nor prevent the offers of sundry fee-taking officials 
 to escort us about it. Of course it was out of my 
 power to ascend to the summit, so I waited in the 
 nave whilst my* family set out on their journey to
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 39 
 
 the spire. Arrived thereat, they were struck by 
 finding my name, which I had chalked up twenty- 
 four years before, still undefaced; so that these 
 cards, exhibited for the inspection of everybody, do 
 stand some chance of handing down the nobodies 
 who leave them, to posterity. I amused myself in 
 the church by watching the congregation a very 
 small one and the people who came in and out, 
 for the purpose of performing some particular act 
 of devotion. Many remained after the service was 
 over, sitting on the benches, apparently engaged in 
 some mental meditation, but as undevoutly, as far 
 as posture was concerned, as if waiting for the 
 commencement of a play. 
 
 I have spoken of the corpse of Carlo Borromeo ; 
 it is deposited in a chapel beneath the floor of the 
 cathedral, and is a sight which is not exhibited to 
 those who visit the shrine of the saint without 
 an extra fee of five francs. The chapel arid its 
 treasures are pointed out to you by a gentleman 
 sufficiently polished in manner and clerical in apparel 
 to make one shrink from the idea of offering him 
 cash ; but our delicacy on this head turned out to
 
 40 OUT OP HARNESS, 
 
 have been misplaced, On our intimation that we 
 were desirous of inspecting the actual flesh and 
 blood I mean skin and bone of the sainted 
 cardinal, he (I mean the attendant, not the cardinal), 
 bowed graciously, and proceeded, in our presence, 
 with great gravity to prepare himself for the 
 exhibition, by lighting six or eight huge tapers, 
 putting a white robe over his shoulders, and uttering 
 sundry brief, but pious, ejaculations. He then put 
 some machinery in motion, which had the effect of 
 removing from the crystal coffin its outer covering, 
 and disclosing, dressed in his most gorgeous robes, 
 the body of the cardinal, the face, or rather what 
 remains of it, being distinctly visible. Our inspec- 
 tion concluded, we handed to the exhibitor the 
 customary fee, who received it with an air of bland 
 gratitude and dignified humility that made us feel, 
 for the moment, its acceptance, on his part, was 
 almost as much an act of piety as of profit. We 
 took our leave of him with due reverence, and had 
 some difficulty in persuading ourselves that we had 
 not been waited upon by some distinguished 
 dignitary of the Romish Church,
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 41 
 
 In Milan the English are more welcome to the 
 hotel- keepers than to the Austrian authorities. The 
 latter, however, give our countrymen little trouble if 
 they conform readily to their regulations. The 
 ordinary course on entering the city is to leave one's 
 passport, and receive in exchange for it a document 
 desiring the bearer to appear personally before the 
 authorities within twenty-four hours after his loca- 
 tion. Travellers are sometimes told that personal 
 attendance is not necessary, but we did not make 
 the experiment, and I heard of one gentleman who, 
 having inadvertently omitted it, was not only ordered 
 to quit Milan within forty-eight hours, but to proceed 
 forthwith out of the Austrian dominions. The 
 Milanese feel more than ever the humiliation of 
 subjection to Austria, and show that feeling in every 
 way which does not expose them to penal conse- 
 quences. The Italian nobility keep away from the 
 grand opera because it is supported by a government 
 they detest, and they would have to endure the 
 mortification of seeing the best seats gratuitously 
 given up to a soldiery by whom they have been first 
 forced to submission and are now kept in coercion ;
 
 42 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 but whatever the cause may be, the opera is very 
 different from what it was five-and-twenty years ago. 
 Then Rubini was in all his glory, enchanting the 
 Milanese, as he did afterwards the English, with his ex- 
 quisite vocalization in Bellini's II Pirata. The scenery 
 too was on a far more magnificent scale in the ballet 
 department. "II Trovatore " by Verdi and a ballet 
 called I/Araba were the pieces produced for the 
 opening of the season in the autumn of 1853. We 
 were disappointed with both, though we heard one 
 fine tenor (Bettini) and one or two pieces of music 
 worth hearing again. "We found Yerdi quite the 
 rage throughout Italy, and that one or other of his 
 operas was being performed simultaneously, and with 
 equal applause, at Rome, Florence, and Naples. 
 Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti seemed to have been 
 quite superseded, but I confess, notwithstanding, my 
 preference for any one of these three composers. A 
 " screaming farce " at the Adelphi is well enough, 
 but a screaming opera I detest, and that is just what 
 Verdi seems to delight in. Shouting is not singing, 
 and orchestral noise is not pleasant, though in accor- 
 dance with the most approved rules of instrumentation.
 
 OUT OF HAENESS. 43 
 
 In whatever else London may be defective, it beats 
 all other European capitals for female beauty. We 
 had thought the women tolerably ugly in Switzerland, 
 but in Milan we found them ^tolerably so. We sat 
 on Sunday, the most favourable day for observation, 
 for two hours in the public gardens, hearing the band 
 play, and watching attentively the various groups 
 promenading before and around us and I assert 
 without hesitation, that never were so many civilized 
 human beings collected together amid whom so little 
 was visible that could make one proud of belonging 
 to the race. Probably we did not see the most 
 aristocratic part of the community, but we were not 
 prepared to witness in so large a proportion of it, 
 such an amount of uncomeliness in person and 
 snobbishness in costume. It is the author of Eothen, 
 I think, who says that in passing through a district 
 of the Bedouins, he was so struck by the extreme 
 ugliness of the women that he could not help deeply 
 pitying the men who were their husbands. Some- 
 thing of the same feeling occurred to me, as I beheld 
 the oppressively plain faces, and ungainly shapes of 
 that portion of the sex out of which husbands are
 
 44 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 doomed to choose wives at Milan. Lady Wortley 
 Montague once wrote, that though she was a woman 
 herself, it was a consolation to her that she was not 
 obliged to wed one. The remark might have been 
 justified if it had been made after an inspection 
 of the female display upon which I have been 
 descanting. 
 
 At Milan we engaged a vetturino to take us 
 to Florence, which we reached in six days, sleep- 
 ing at Piacenza, Parma, Modena, Bologna, and 
 Covigliaio. The three first cities seemed dull and 
 dirty, and to possess no charms which could make a 
 sojourn in any of them desirable. The antiquarian 
 and the artist will of course find much in either to 
 interest them ; but it is manifest even to the cursory 
 eye of the passing traveller, that in these once famous 
 cities 
 
 " The light of other days is faded." 
 
 In some respects the same may be said of Bologna, 
 which is, however, still a magnificent town, full in 
 almost every street of palatial structures and noble 
 architecture. There is something peculiarly grand 
 and massive in the appearance of the buildings ; and
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 45 
 
 one can hardly conceive that art and literature could 
 be more worthily housed than they formerly were, 
 and to some extent still are, in the halls and galleries 
 of Bologna. 
 
 All who have read Rogers's "Italy," will re- 
 member the lines beginning 
 
 " If ever you should come to Modena," 
 
 a not very poetical prelude to a very affecting story 
 about one Ginevra, of which we have an English 
 counterpart in the song of " The Mistletoe Bough." 
 We did come to Modena, but left it too early in the 
 morning, and arrived at it too late in the afternoon to 
 pay the visit which the poet recommends. I saw, how- 
 ever, something which struck me as equally curious, 
 in a bookseller's shop, an Italian drama, under 
 the name of " Lord Byron," of which not the least 
 amusing portion was the list of the dramatis personse. 
 Among these, figured " Sir Murray Librajo, John, 
 Vecchio servo," &c. &c. ; among the other characters 
 are Byron's wife, and father-in-law, a lady that Byron 
 loves, and another lady in love with Byron. The 
 drama itself, though intended to be very serious,
 
 46 OUT OF HA11NESS. 
 
 could only make an Englishman smile. We are 
 very fond of borrowing from the French stage, but 
 the Italian seems to be indebted to us for subjects, 
 at least, if not for plays. With all our appreciation 
 of our great poets and actors, it has never occurred 
 to us to make any of them the hero of a play. 
 The Italians have taken a different view of the 
 matter; and, for anything I know, are perform- 
 ing there at this moment, as they were when I 
 left Turin, a drama entitled " Kean, or Perverted 
 Genius." 
 
 The country between Milan and Bologna is not 
 remarkable for beauty. Piacenza is entered by a 
 bridge of boats across the Po, the actual state of 
 which, at the time of our traversing it, was disgusting 
 to more senses than one. I do not remember ever 
 to have seen the much-abused Thames in so filthy a 
 condition. No slight source of amusement during 
 our journey were the peculiarities of our vetturino, 
 a somewhat corpulent but polite and loquacious Jehu. 
 If I had the talent of a Dickens, I would endeavour 
 to convey some idea of them. Here, however, are 
 one or two facts, which will speak for themselves.
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 47 
 
 On the morning of our leaving Bologna, and when 
 we were nearly a mile on our way, he pulled up his 
 horses suddenly, exclaiming with agonised vehemence, 
 "Oh, mon Dieu, Signor! Christo Corpo di Bacco! 
 j'ai oublie mon passeporte ! " We were not yet out 
 of the town, and his audible excitement bringing a 
 crowd about him, he offered one of them a trifle to 
 run to the inn and fetch the all important document. 
 Whilst waiting his return, my wife and one of my 
 sons took the opportunity of popping out to see if 
 they could buy some fruit. In the interim back 
 came the messenger with the wrong passport, a 
 mistake that I thought would have driven our friend 
 " Grumpy/' as we used to call him, mad. Fat as he 
 was, he sprang up nearly two feet into the air, and 
 then bounded off at a pace which he could evidently 
 not have kept up for more than half-a-minute. 
 Luckily, however, one of the servants of the inn 
 arrived with the right passport ; but now I began 
 to feel rather uncomfortable, for my wife had not 
 yet come back, and time was precious, as we 
 had a long distance to go before night. Our 
 excellent "Grumpy" was quite beside himself; and
 
 48 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 notwithstanding his respectful exclamations to me 
 of " Povera Signora ! Dio la Signora, oh, mon 
 Dieu, elle est perdue ! " I could hear several asides 
 of a character much more profane than either con- 
 solatory or complimentary. At length the signora 
 made her appearance, having certainly lost her way, 
 though fortunately, not herself. Poor Grumpy ! his 
 misfortunes for that day were not over. As we were 
 walking quietly up a steep hill near the close of 
 our day's journey only I and my wife being in the 
 carriage a peculiar jerk of the vehicle, and a 
 simultaneous cry from Grumpy, gave notice of some- 
 thing unusual. At the same moment my sons ran 
 up to the carriage door, and lifted myself and my 
 wife on to the road, where, on being deposited, I 
 perceived what had occurred. The reins had got 
 under the tail of one of the horses, which was 
 kicking up and lashing out fearfully, poor Grumpy 
 being all the time seated so near the animal, as to 
 present an almost unavoidable target for his heels. 
 Instead of letting the reins go, and jumping down at 
 once, he kept pulling them still tighter ; and when 
 the horse kicked all the more (which of course it
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 49 
 
 did), set up an absolutely piteous shriek, alternating 
 it with exclamations of " Christo ! Dio ! Povera 
 bestia ! " and throAving himself back, with his own 
 heels nearly over his head, to escape contact with 
 those of the poor Least he had so pathetically in- 
 voked. At length, dropping the reins, he contrived 
 to get down, but not without a slight blow on his 
 foot from the plunging quadruped. He really had 
 been in great danger, for his driving seat was so 
 close to the horses, that it was a marvel his brains 
 were not dashed out. When he had recovered him- 
 self, he protested that such a thing had never 
 occurred before ; that the animal had never kicked, 
 or been known to kick under any circumstances; 
 that there was not a quieter, milder, sweeter-tempered 
 horse in the country, &c. &c. The fact is, that 
 though these little Italian black horses are very 
 strong, and get through a great deal of work, they 
 are decidedly vicious if anything puts them out; and 
 although they don't shy, or jib, or run away, can 
 upon due occasion kick considerably. 
 
 We arrived at Covigliaio, a pretty little village in 
 the mountains, rather late, and being very tired, and
 
 50 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 somewhat put out by the occurrences of the road, my 
 wife preferred going to bed to sitting down to dinner. 
 This was, however, no easy matter; for the piece of 
 furniture designated as a bed looked more like a 
 haystack in height, and without a ladder of almost 
 fire-engine altitude, was not to be reached. Having 
 taken due survey thereof, we discovered that it was 
 reducible at least six feet by removing two of the 
 huge mattrasses that had been employed to swell up 
 the astounding pile. The suggestion was easier 
 made than effected, and was at length only accom- 
 plished by calling to our aid the landlord, and the 
 whole strength of his establishment. For all that, we 
 had got into a very clean and comfortable inn, and 
 were much better "cared for" than at hotels of 
 larger pretensions. On leaving, the country continued 
 to grow more and more lovely, till at length its 
 culminating point of beauty was reached in those 
 portions of the road, which brought us within view of 
 Florence. How shall I speak of " La Bella Firenza ? " 
 I had visited it once before in the winter of 1829-30, 
 and even then it was beautiful, but now, in the 
 beginning of autumn, with scarce a leaf yet faded, and
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 51 
 
 its skies softer if less bright than those of summer, 
 it seemed an earthly Paradise. The environs on all 
 sides but especially on that of Eiesole, are en- 
 chanting, whilst, within the city itself, few spots offer 
 more delightful prospects or promenades, than are 
 to be enjoyed in the Boboli Gardens. I contrived, 
 by the aid of my sons' shoulders to get to the summit 
 of them ; and reclined there an hour by myself, whilst 
 they and my wife, made better acquaintance with the 
 beauties of the place than I was now enabled to do. 
 Whether my enjoyment was equal to theirs I know 
 not, but it was great, very great so much so, that 
 I no longer regretted to have found the Pitti palace 
 shut as with all its treasures of art, it could offer 
 nothing so beautiful within, as what was to be seen 
 without, the place of their deposit moreover I had 
 grown somewhat weary of looking at pictures, and 
 began to feel shall I confess it, that I did not 
 always derive from the inspection of even the most 
 celebrated, a pleasure commensurate with the toil, for 
 such it was to me, of obtaining a sight of them. 
 
 Don't let it be imagined that I undervalued what I 
 could not always enjoy but the highest productions 
 
 E2
 
 52 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 of art require for their true appreciation a more 
 matured judgment and taste than I pretend to possess. 
 Moreover, it is not the most striking which are the 
 most superior pictures or statues ; yet, where time is 
 wanting for making the comparison, the most striking 
 will, to the untutored eye, be the most attractive. I 
 was disappointed in the impression produced upon 
 me by the Venus de* Medicis when I first saw it, 
 but after a second and third sight of it, and viewing it 
 attentively, my admiration was gradually awakened, 
 and fixed. This was the case also with the Apollino, 
 and some of the principal pictures in the same room 
 (the Tribune), in which being left to myself whilst my 
 family roamed about the other apartments, I had an 
 opportunity of ruminating calmly and leisurely on 
 the treasures around me. 
 
 We went to two or three of the principal theatres 
 at Florence, and found good music and singing at all, 
 though none of the great European stars were among 
 the performers. Pleasant enough, too, we found a 
 drive in the Casino, the Hyde Park of Florence, and 
 where a sort of gathering a la Rotten Eow may be 
 seen in the fine evenings, but especially on the
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 53 
 
 Sunday. There is the same kind of lounging, gossip- 
 ing, and staring going on as may be witnessed 
 between Apsley House and the Serpentine any after- 
 noon between four and six, from April to July. 
 Bucks with fiery horses and fiery moustachios, patting 
 first one and then the other, as if both required a 
 little humouring to preserve their propriety; carriages 
 open and shut, with ladies old and young, all trying 
 to see and be seen; some reclining in voluptuous 
 elongation, as if heedless or disdainful of any homage 
 that might demand more fatiguing acknowledgment 
 than a glance of the eye, or a wave of the hand ; 
 others full of smiles and courtesy, chatting, talking, 
 and bowing at every opportunity, only too happy to 
 recognise and be recognised ; this, and a great deal 
 more, which is characteristic of the afternoon's 
 performances in the aristocratic locality just men- 
 tioned, may be witnessed on a smaller scale, and with 
 equal edification, in the Casino at Florence. 
 
 It is no news, perhaps, to say that alabaster 
 statuary and Pietro duro mosaic are to be had in 
 perfection in this delightful city. As to purchasing, 
 let me give two pieces of advice : buy the best of its
 
 54 .OUT OF HA.RNESS. 
 
 kind, and don't be your own carrier of what you 
 have bought. Perhaps you will have a friend at 
 hand skilled in such matters ; but if not, look well at 
 two or three shops, and inquire the prices at each, of 
 the same things ; you will be struck by the difference, 
 which arises from two causes; first, the habit many of 
 the vendors have of asking much more than they will 
 ultimately take ; and, second, from the greater or less 
 degree of finish, which is not always perceptible 
 without more care and investigation than unpractised 
 buyers ordinarily bestow. Bazzanti has one of the 
 best collections of alabasters, but you will perceive 
 even in his shop great differences in the execution of 
 the same figure, though offered at the same price. 
 The reason simply is that some of the hands he 
 employs are better than others ; and all you have to 
 do, when this is discovered, is to require any par- 
 ticular figure or group, which you may fancy, to 
 be executed by his best workman. If you succeed in 
 getting this, you will obtain such a piece of work as 
 you are not likely to meet with (and certainly not for 
 the same price) at any of the London shops. 
 
 Now as to being your own carrier, I was unlucky
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 55 
 
 enough to purchase a cabinet-sized copy of Eaphael's 
 Madonna del Sedula, and to carry it with me as part 
 of my baggage to Eome. On entering the Eoman 
 frontier, the case containing it was opened by the 
 Douaniers, who, on payment of a deposit to be 
 returned on reaching the Eternal city, and, after 
 affixing their official seal to prevent its being reopened, 
 allowed us to resume possession of it. On entering 
 Eome it was taken from us with an intimation that 
 the case and amount of deposit we had paid would 
 be returned on application next day at the Dogana. 
 
 Thither, next day, at the appointed hotir, we went, 
 but after waiting there an hour I was informed by my 
 wife that she had been desired to call again the next 
 day. A second visit was accordingly made, when 
 the same result took place, and a third day was 
 appointed for the restoration of the box and the 
 deposit. The third day we went, and having des- 
 patched my wife and one of my sons on their hitherto 
 fruitless mission, I remained nearly one hour in the 
 carriage outside before any tidings were brought to 
 me of their proceedings. At last they came, my son 
 holding something in both his hands which appeared
 
 56 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 like a mass of copper, and my wife, gentle creature 
 as she was, burning with rage and indignation, but 
 without the picture. For some reason or other, 
 which she did not understand Italian sufficiently well 
 to make out, the picture could not yet be had, but 
 they had returned the deposit, the insulting varlets, 
 in coppers ! and this was the ponderous mass of small 
 change four hundred and eighty baiocchi that I had 
 seen in my son's hands* Corpo di Bacco, wasn't 1 
 infuriated? Up to that moment I had in all our 
 travelling trials kept my temper, but I lost it then : 
 lame as I was, I managed, with my son's help, to 
 struggle through bales of goods and other obstructions, 
 to the desk where the chief official of the Dogana sat, 
 and telling my son to throw down the coppers before 
 the former, told him it was an insult to offer it in that 
 shape, and that, as to the picture, I would apply no 
 more for it, but should complain to the authorities, 
 and leave him to settle it with them. I have no doubt I 
 looked very ridiculous, and spoke very bad Italian, but 
 the official looked aghast and astounded, and said some- 
 thing that I was told afterwards was of an apologetic 
 character; but I was too impatient and indignant to
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 57 
 
 listen to any reply, and moved off, vowing I would 
 never enter the infernal yes, I am afraid I said 
 infernal place again. To get rid of my bile, I went 
 forthwith to the British Consul, who sympathised 
 with me in my annoyance, and undertook to save me 
 from any further trouble by procuring the box him- 
 self, and forwarding it to England with some other 
 goods I was about to entrust to his charge. Looking 
 back upon the transaction, I perceive that I was 
 absurdly outrageous, for experience might have taught 
 me that, even in my own country, official dilatoriness 
 is an evil by which the faith and patience of the most 
 patriotic are sometimes severely tried. But when, 
 out of a whole life, one happens to be able to spare 
 only six or seven days at such a place as Eome, to 
 find two or three hours of each day occupied in 
 running after a beggarly picture, there is really some 
 excuse for losing a little one's moral balance, and 
 wishing, for the moment, as I confess I did, the 
 authorities located within the ruins of the temple 
 of (I forget what, but it is the site of the Eoman 
 Dogana) at the d 1. 
 
 There are two routes from Florence to Eome ; one
 
 58 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 by way of Sienna; the other, through Perugia, 
 Terni, &c. The latter is taken by all who can afford 
 time to accomplish it, being incomparably the more 
 beautiful, though the longer and more expensive of 
 the two. One great attraction is the celebrated 
 cascade of Term, of which the reader may perhaps 
 remember a very striking description in " Childe 
 Harold." But the scenery all along is of the most 
 picturesque and enchanting kind. Perhaps nowhere 
 else in Italy will the artist or traveller find so much to 
 delight the eye or satisfy the imagination. Every 
 conceivable variety of beauty arising from the hap- 
 piest combination of Nature and Art, is to be met 
 with between Florence and Civita Castellana. It is 
 one exquisite panorama throughout. The eye has 
 constantly in view, either near or remote, some en- 
 chanting object. Now it is such as you look down 
 upon in emerging from the mountain-throned city of 
 Perugia a landscape of surpassing loveliness and 
 extent ; now, a white walled town glittering in the 
 rays of the morning sun, or reflecting its evening 
 hues from some distant eminence. Now a forest of 
 vine-trellised chestnut trees shuts out for awhile the
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 59 
 
 blue of the sky, and the green of the valleys ; now 
 we are passing a peasant's cottage now a decayed 
 palace now a magnificent monastery; something 
 here and there, perhaps, that suggests melancholy 
 reflections : but taken on the whole, offering a 
 succession of scenes, than which anything more 
 delightful to contemplate can hardly be imagined. 
 
 Among other celebrated localities on the way, is 
 the Lake of Thrasimene, where Hannibal thrashed 
 Flamininus, now called the Lake of Perugia. We 
 slept on its borders, at the village of Passignano, and 
 whilst dinner was preparing, my sons hired a boat for 
 a row on its classic waters. They returned thoroughly 
 disgusted ; the boat being dirty and fishy, and the 
 fisherman to whom it belonged, importunate and 
 extortionate. 
 
 Terni, however, is the ne plus ultra of attraction. 
 The cascade is about six miles from the town, a 
 miserable place enough, and where every house seems 
 going fast to decay. As we drew near the spot 
 where travellers alight to visit the falls, we found 
 ourselves escorted by a party of females mounted on 
 donkeys, which we were given to understand would
 
 60 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 be at our service for the usual "consideration." No 
 sooner had we alighted, than the fair riders of their 
 respective jackasses alighted too, and encircling us, 
 bridle in hand, pressed upon us the employment of 
 their submissive beasts in a chorus of clamorous im- 
 portunity, to which we at once yielded, in preference 
 to losing our time and temper by any preliminary 
 parley. Donkeys for four having been accepted, 
 negociations were opened for the conveyance of one 
 by chair ; and the terms having been arranged, I 
 found myself almost immediately hoisted by two poles 
 upon the shoulders of four villagers, with two others 
 as reliefs, and following rapidly in the track of the 
 long-eared quadrupeds to the place of our destination. 
 Our way lay through the gardens and grounds of the 
 Villa de la Graziana, the residence for about twelve 
 months of the Queen of George IV., when Princess 
 of Wales. A more romantic spot can scarcely be 
 conceived. The path to the falls winds through 
 orange-groves, orchards, and shrubberies, becoming 
 gradually higher and wilder, till at length you cross 
 a rocky scrub, and at a sudden turn of the path 
 have the waterfall full in view. To see it to greatest
 
 OUT OJ? HARNESS. 61 
 
 advantage, you are conducted to a sort of hut or 
 covered seat, which is exactly opposite the fall, and 
 from whence you can behold it from top to bottom 
 in its full proportions, the summit being as clearly 
 discernible as the base. It rises about two hundred 
 feet above, and descends one hundred and forty 
 below the spot from which it is beheld, and which is 
 so situated, that you can almost feel the spray as it 
 rebounds from the dash of the cataract into the 
 waters of the Yelino. 
 
 I have before alluded to the presence of guides 
 and ciceroni as no slight drawback to the pleasure 
 of sight-seeing abroad, particularly where natural 
 scenery is the object of attraction. At Terni we had 
 a similar infliction to endure from the Boswellian 
 omciousness of our attendants, who would not leave 
 us alone for a moment, but followed us about 
 wherever we turned, with a pertinacity and adhe- 
 siveness that suggested strongly the idea of policemen 
 or bloodhounds. The annoyance, too, is the less en- 
 durable, from the conviction that you will be expected 
 to pay for it. Thus on getting into our carriage to 
 return, a swarm of harpies held out their hands
 
 62 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 towards us, vociferating for " qualche cosa," for 
 doing what we would willingly have paid them to 
 have left undone. One had shown us this thing, 
 another that; a third had opened a door which a 
 fourth had shut ; a fifth had picked us an olive ; a 
 sixth a flower: the donkey conductress who had 
 nearly upset my wife by clutching her round the waist 
 all the tune she was riding, wanted something for 
 " taking care " as she called it, " of the Signora." 
 The porters of my chair grumbled at receiving double 
 what I had promised them; and finally, a sturdy 
 beggar who happened to be one out of a dozen that 
 I had really no baiocchi left to give anything to, 
 roared out some frightful imprecation on his more 
 fortunate brethren, which set them imprecating and 
 screaming in return, till the noise frightening our 
 horses, the postilion cracking his whip, dashed 
 through the surrounding crowd, and carried us away 
 from a scene for which, with all our previous experi- 
 ence of similar adventures, I must say we were 
 hardly prepared. 
 
 Our last day's journey from Civita Castellana to 
 Rome offered nothing attractive in the scenery, and
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 63 
 
 we were glad when it was terminated. We arrived 
 in the Eternal city about three in the afternoon, and 
 remained in it for about eight days, a period in which, 
 if you believe Signor Piali's book upon the subject, you 
 may see all that is worth seeing in Rome. We did 
 not make the most of our time ; but no one, perhaps, 
 need be told, that eight months would hardly suffice 
 for making acquaintance with the in-door treasures 
 of modern and ancient art which attract travellers to 
 the capital of the papal dominions. We lost a great 
 deal of time in purchasing pictures, mosaics, &c., and 
 in making arrangements for their transport to England, 
 and we often found ourselves inspecting the contents 
 of the shops, and perusing the bills of the theatres, 
 when we might have been doing something much 
 more to the purpose that is the professed purpose of 
 our visit. The consequence was that we left many 
 things unvisited, which we might have seen, had we 
 made the best use of our time. Still I contrived to 
 see all the principal buildings and galleries ; of their 
 contents, I shall not have the effrontery to say much, 
 when I had opportunity of seeing so little. I have 
 already remarked that to appreciate the highest pro-
 
 64 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 ductions of art, in sculpture and painting, something 
 like educated taste is required. That which is guided 
 only by the feeling and the eye, as mine was, would 
 fail of realizing the delight experienced on beholding 
 the master-pieces of the world, by those who have 
 studied the principles and know something of the rules 
 of Art. I am ignorant of both, and shall therefore 
 frankly confess that I felt not the slightest emotion of 
 pleasure in looking at Michael Angelo's Last Judg- 
 ment in the Sistine Chapel. I stood opposite it for 
 some ten minutes, and miserable wretch that I am 
 saw nothing that I should care to see a second 
 time. Doubtless it is a wonderful and artistic 
 performance, but as to the idea itself, I cannot 
 give into the notion that drowning sinners catching 
 at floating saints in flat bottomed boats, is an 
 appropriate, or even a decent, exhibition of the Last 
 Judgment. 
 
 No one who has visited Italy can have failed to 
 notice the numerous copies which are to be seen in all 
 the principal cities, of the portrait of Beatrice Cenci. 
 The original is in the Palazzo Barberini, and fully 
 justifies its celebrity and popularity. Few copies
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 65 
 
 exactly hit the true expression of this most delicate 
 and refined of Guido's performances. There is a 
 peculiar look of sorrow, contrition and resignation 
 about the countenance of Beatrice that seems to 
 baffle more than half its copyists. Certainly not one 
 in ten of those I saw exposed for sale in Rome, were 
 successful in this respect ; and I have since observed 
 one or two in picture shops in London which are 
 still more inferior. In engravings and cameos the 
 expression is altogether lost. I was fortunate enough 
 to get a copy by Sig. Mazzuolini, in which the original 
 is most faithfully and happily delineated. To appre- 
 ciate the picture properly, one should read, before 
 viewing it, Shelley's tragedy of the Cenci his 
 portraiture of Beatrice is as exquisite as that by 
 Guido it is difficult, indeed, to say whose work 
 is the more beautiful of the two, the poet's or 
 the painter's. Shelley, however, had the inspiration 
 of the latter to assist him; he could hardly have 
 found in any history of Beatrice's sufferings and 
 character, so exquisite and touching a clue to either 
 as was afforded him by a sight of the pale and 
 melancholy face, that looks with such beseeching
 
 66 OUT OF HAKXESS. 
 
 sadness and subdued melancholy, from the canvas of 
 Guido. 
 
 Whatever they may not be doing at Rome in the 
 way of modern improvement, they are at least taking 
 good care of their antiquities. The Colosseum has 
 been propped in so many directions, and so substan- 
 tially, that, in some parts, it is hard to distinguish the 
 addition from the original. We of course visited it, 
 and if the reader has been wondering how a lame 
 invalid could manage the staircase I may as well 
 say, once for all, that I was carried on the back of 
 one of my sons not only up the steps of the 
 Colosseum, but up the steps of all other notable 
 localities, both of Rome and elsewhere, where my 
 curiosity would, but my legs would not, convey me. 
 People stared, but not rudely; and if they did, what 
 cared I? Time was when I should have stood 
 aghast at the notion of going pickaback up the stair- 
 case of the Vatican I am not such a fool now, 
 though I am afraid I did try a little the moral 
 courage, as well as the physical strength, of my sons 
 in these ^decidedly practical illustrations of contempt 
 for appearances. When I began this record, I did
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 67 
 
 not mean to make any quotations, but, upon this 
 subject of pickaback peregrination if any one should 
 laugh, may I request him to weigh well this con- 
 fession of J. P. Richter ; there is a deeper truth in 
 it than the words at first sight seem to convey. " On 
 the whole," says the worthy Jean Paul, " I hold the 
 constant regard we pay in all our actions to the 
 judgments of others, as the poisons of our peace, our 
 reason and our virtue. At this slave-chain I have 
 long filed, and I scarcely ever hope to break it entirely 
 asunder. I wish to accustom myself to the censure 
 of others and appear a fool that I may learn to endure 
 fools." 
 
 Among other extramural excursions from Rome, 
 we made one to St. Paul's Church, and the English 
 burying-ground. The former is one of the most 
 magnificent and costly churches in Italy, and when 
 finished, will be one of the most unique. The latter 
 was a more interesting sight to me, containing, as it 
 does, the remains of at least two of the most illus- 
 trious men of their day Sir Humphry Davy and 
 Percy Bysshe Shelley. It was with difficulty I found 
 the grave of the latter, and when I did, it was with 
 
 F 2
 
 68 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 a feeling of shame and mortification. The inscrip- 
 tion on the flat stone (it has no other) I could 
 hardly decipher for the dirt and moss, and I could 
 not have made it out at all, but for my previous 
 knowledge of its letters. Surely the many English 
 residing at Rome, might at least contrive to keep the 
 gravestone of their countryman clear of obstructions 
 nay, one would have thought the erection of a 
 monument over it, in these days of laudation to the 
 living and statues to the dead, not altogether out of 
 place, even though might be thereby preserved the 
 memory of one whose " cor cordium " did not always 
 beat after the orthodox fashion of the pious and 
 charitable hearts by which it was surrounded. 
 
 There are one or two churches at Rome of which 
 I admire the interior more than that of St. Peter's. 
 And beautiful as is the statue of the Apollo Bel- 
 videre, it is in the neighbourhood of others, before 
 which I have stood gazing as long and admiringly. 
 The reclining figure of Ariadne, at the end of one of 
 the galleries, is an exquisite specimen of ancient art, 
 Then, again, there are no unworthy rivals of the former 
 figure at the Museum in the Campidoglio. But
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 69 
 
 indeed, where there is so much to detain the most 
 uninformed eye, it is difficult to say where lies the 
 chief attraction. "What struck me forcibly in visiting 
 these depositories of ancient sculpture, was not 
 merely the perfection of the artist's skill, but the 
 magnificent lavishness with which the art itself 
 would seem to have been encouraged, judging from 
 the number of works many belonging to the same 
 period that have been preserved, in addition to the 
 far greater quantity that must have been destroyed 
 or lost. 
 
 Among other incomplete relics (there are hundreds 
 without a scratch or flaw) is a colossal torso in the 
 Vatican, which those, who understand such matters, 
 view with a sort of idolatry. But here again I was 
 sadly at fault. I could see nothing in it to admire 
 at least to be admired by me : a huge mass of 
 athletic muscle, however skilfully or naturally deli- 
 neated in a block of marble, is a spectacle that may 
 awaken the enthusiasm of the anatomist or the 
 artist; but the uninitiated will feel little of such 
 rapture ; and I confess that, excellent as was the 
 imitation, I beheld it with indifference, and had it
 
 70 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 been a reality, should certainly have turned from it 
 with disgust. 
 
 In Painting, too (I do not particularly allude to 
 what I saw at Rome), there is a class of subjects 
 which, whatever may be the merit of the artist, I 
 cannot help regarding with indifference. They 
 belong principally to the theological and mytho- 
 logical school. Martyrdoms, Crucifixions, and Holy 
 Families abound in the Italian galleries in perplexing 
 variety ; but there were not more than one or 
 two in regard to which the involuntary ejaculation 
 escaped me " This is beautiful ! " As to the 
 Jupiters and Ledas, Ganymedes, Hebes, Fauns, and 
 Nymphs, et id genus omne, I felt that the things 
 they were intended to represent were so unnatural 
 and ridiculously fabulous, that I had not the 
 slightest sympathy with the subjects. The horrible 
 and the unreal are alike my aversion, and neither 
 the sublime nor the ideal stands in need of such 
 auxiliaries. Between imagination and truth there 
 should never be divorce; from the actual to the 
 possible is their appointed range, and surely in 
 such a range there is scope enough for higher
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 71 
 
 and lovelier flights than were ever attained be- 
 yond it. 
 
 The legitimate object of Art is to elevate the 
 mind or purify the feelings ; mere emotions, without 
 one or other of these accompanying results, are of no 
 moral value, and may be produced in the most 
 common-place spectator by the most common-place 
 artist. Now, who is the better for communing with 
 Paul Veronese's " Jupiter and Europa," or Domeni- 
 chino's " Martyrdom of St. Agnes ? " Fancy the God 
 of heaven, mythological though he be, turned into 
 a bull for the sake of eloping with a mortal damsel, 
 whose charms have attracted him to earth ! Where 
 is the dignity or beauty, to say nothing of the 
 absurdity of the idea, to excuse its introduction into 
 a picture ? At most, the skill of the artist can 
 succeed in depicting what? human desire in the 
 countenance of a beast, a disgusting triumph of 
 art, one would have thought, if achieved; and if 
 this be not achieved, the picture resolves itself into a 
 still more disgusting conceit a pretty woman carried 
 away by an enamoured bull. "The Martyrdom of 
 St. Agnes" is an immense picture, of which the
 
 72 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 principal figure is St. Agnes herself seated quietly 
 in a chair, whilst a bare-armed executioner as quietly 
 plunges a knife into her throat, from which the 
 blood gushes forth in torrents, with a life-like reality. 
 Women of not very delicate nerves have been turned 
 sick by looking at this picture; and I confess I 
 beheld it with unmitigated disgust. What moral 
 effect can possibly be produced by it ? Yet the two 
 pictures I have just mentioned are considered master- 
 pieces of art ; and to say one word in disparagement 
 of them will, I know, be held in such an ignoramus 
 as myself, unpardonable heresy, or unpardonable 
 impudence. So be it. But the time probably is 
 coming, when the right of private judgment will be 
 exercised in regard to these matters, in spite of those 
 damnatory clauses in the creed of orthodox art, which 
 are as intolerant and bigoted in their way, as are 
 certain other clauses belonging to certain other 
 creeds of a more serious character. 
 
 From Rome we made arrangements to proceed to 
 Naples, which we reached on the third day from that 
 of our departure. A vetturino took us as far as 
 Capua, whence we continued the rest of our journey
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 78 
 
 by railway. Our sleeping-places on the road were 
 Cisterna and Molo di Gaeta ; at the latter, in the 
 hotel supposed to be built on the identical spot of 
 Cicero's villa. A charming view of the shore and sea 
 of the Mediterranean is to be had from its windows ; 
 but unless the villa of the orator was more comfortably 
 appointed than we found the hotel which bears his 
 name, it must have afforded sorry accommodation 
 to the " distinguished circles " which he is said to 
 have gathered there in his intervals of leisure. The 
 country between Rome and Naples is more interest- 
 ing from its historical associations and monumental 
 vestiges of the classic past, than from the beauty of 
 its scenery. It has, for the most part, a wild, 
 desolate appearance ; and if the realities of brigand- 
 age had not existed there, the imagination would 
 have readily suggested them. The high road is 
 tolerably secure ; but I would not advise the traveller 
 to wander far off it alone, in the neighbourhood of 
 Terracina or Fondi, or even Albano ; at the lake 
 called after the latter place, I read that an English 
 gentleman was stopped the other day (I write this in 
 April 1854) by a brigand, who, after presenting his
 
 74 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 carbine, lowered it with a bow, on receiving the 
 contents of a well-filled purse. 
 
 Such events, however, seldom occur in these days ; 
 but amid so much poverty and wretchedness as exist 
 among the inhabitants of the localities I am speaking 
 of, there are many, probably, who would rather be 
 bandits if they dared, than as almost all of them 
 are beggars. It is in the latter character that they 
 prove most annoying to the traveller ; for miles and 
 miles his steps are literally dogged by them, till his 
 patience and purse are both exhausted the latter 
 long before the former. The continued sing-song of 
 entreaty which they keep up men, women, and 
 children, in precisely the same tone and the same 
 words is like the constant buzzing of a mosquito, 
 and nearly as irritating. It fairly drives all the 
 legitimate associations of the scene out of one's 
 head. How can one, in the midst of such pests, 
 think about Marius in the marshes of Minturnae, 
 unless to wish oneself in the marshes too, to escape 
 from the greater horrors of the highway ? 
 
 It is a pity that there is not some way of paying a 
 round sum by way of composition for this roadside
 
 OUT OP HAENESS. 75 
 
 almsgiving. Such an impost in favour of mendicity, 
 I am certain most travellers would gladly tolerate, if 
 it would spare them the annoyance of personal soli- 
 citation. It would be as well, too, if the licensed 
 corruption, as well as the licensed beggary, could be 
 put upon a more satisfactory footing than it is, at 
 present, in certain parts of the Papal and Neapolitan 
 dominions. Everybody who has travelled therein, is 
 aware that he may be spared the inspection of his 
 luggage, by an adequate gratuity. The officials look 
 to it as a part of their legitimate perquisites in fact, 
 without it, they either could not or would not live 
 on their salaries and as there is a great deal of 
 trouble saved by this convenient form of bribery, and 
 there is no chance of the delinquents being reported 
 to any House of Commons, the practice is in very 
 general use and fair repute also with travellers, 
 particularly with that portion of them who belong 
 to that glorious and independent nation, where a 
 certain Bribery and Reform, and other Auxiliary 
 Bills were passed some of them not very long ago, 
 with such astounding eclat. 
 
 I must admit that I did not escape intact the
 
 76 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 temptation was sometimes too strong to be resisted 
 but I was wrong, and said so at the time ; and I did 
 once absolutely and obstinately decline, for the sake 
 of only five shillings, to be spared the delay and 
 trouble of an hour's search. And I had some amuse- 
 ment out of the proceeding, too ; for I was deter- 
 mined to take it coolly and philosophically, and thus 
 turn the tables upon my persecutors. The scene 
 occurred at Gaeta. " Signer," said the vetturino, 
 " they search again, here ; have you got a piastre ? " 
 "Yes," I replied; "but I don't mean to give it 
 again; let them search." The vetturino shrugged 
 his shoulders, as much as to express both his dissent 
 and disgust at my resolve; for, independently of the 
 delay it would occasion him, I suspect he was not 
 altogether uninterested in the division of the piastre. 
 However, seeing I had made up my mind, he reluct- 
 antly opened the door to admit the survey of the 
 attendant official, who, after an inspection of the 
 internal contents of the carriage, ordered all the 
 luggage on the outside to be unfastened and carried 
 up into the office of the Dogana. Thither, mounted 
 on my son's back, up several flights of stairs, I
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 77 
 
 followed my traps, and having seen them deposited, 
 remained to supervise their inspection. This was 
 performed by two subordinates, under the eye of a 
 third, who issued, on my entrance, from a dirty 
 corner where he had been smoking, and proceeded 
 to his work with an air and aspect that showed how 
 unused he was to anything of the sort, and that 
 seemed to say to me, " What a fool you are not to 
 cash up the fee ! " They detained me as long as 
 they possibly could, overhauling everything, even to 
 my washing-book which, by-the-bye, appeared most 
 particularly to interest them, for they turned its 
 leaves over with a care and anxiety that set us all 
 tittering, and induced me at last to say, that if they 
 wished to form a more intimate acquaintance with 
 its contents, I would make them a present of it. 
 Murray's Handbooks were eyed very intently also, 
 and a small paper-weight Mosaic I had bought at 
 Rome, was an object of attraction I thought they 
 would never have done regarding. I could not 
 exactly discover whether it was suspicion, curiosity, 
 or surprise, with which they were contemplating this 
 little specimen of art ; but it was evident they had
 
 78 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 got hold of either a puzzle or a novelty. The in- 
 spection was at length completed, and I had the 
 satisfaction of leaving the authorities as much mor- 
 tified and disappointed, as they had hoped to have 
 seen me. When our things were all repacked, the 
 porter who had carried them up and down stairs, 
 presented himself for a douceur. " What for ? " 
 said I ; "I did not employ you to carry the boxes 
 either up or down. Go to the Dogana." The poor 
 fellow stood aghast, and looked so piteous, that at 
 my wife's desire I relented, and gave him a couple of 
 carlini. 
 
 On arriving at the Railway terminus at Naples, 
 our trunks were again taken into the custody of the 
 Custom House authorities. These dignitaries were 
 stationed at the door of an apartment bare of furniture, 
 and not larger than a sentry box, in which they stood 
 watching, with the eagerness of caged beasts waiting 
 for their accustomed food, every arrival that promised 
 the chance of a fee. As we approached, one of them 
 stepped back, whilst the other exclaimed as we drew 
 out our keys, "No, no, Signer, piccolo moneta." 
 
 " How much ? " said I ; " what do you charge ?"
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 79 
 
 " Oh, we make no charge ; what you please." 
 " Well, here is a two-carlini piece ; will that do? " 
 " Not enough, Signor." 
 " Another two-carlini piece ; will that do ? " 
 " One more if you please, Signor ; ah that will be 
 sufficient ; (to the porter) take away the trunks." 
 
 During the time the above conversation was 
 passing, crowds of people were hurrying in and out, 
 and a herd of vagabonds denominated facchini 
 worrying us, and quarrelling among themselves, as to 
 the tender of their services to carry our luggage, and 
 call us a carriage. Having previously instructed one 
 of my sous to call a carriage, and already hired a porter 
 to carry our trunks, I obstinately declined any aid 
 from the bevy of harpies by whom we were now 
 surrounded, all screaming at the top of their voice, 
 glaring at us with importunate fierceness, and 
 clutching, whether we would or no, at the various 
 carryable articles which we had under our arms and 
 in our hands. Having made way through them, and 
 found the carriage my son had hired, we attempted to 
 get ourselves and our luggage into it ; but we soon 
 discovered that a second carriage would be necessary.
 
 80 OUT OP HAENESS. 
 
 I beckoned to one in sight which came up, whereupon 
 there was a rush of some dozen facchini towards it, 
 and then back again to us, each vociferating that here 
 was the coach he had called for us. Then there was 
 an indiscriminate seizure and transportation of luggage 
 from one carriage to another, amid a screaming, 
 hallooing, quarrelling, and confusion, that defy 
 description. It was in vain that I pointed to the 
 one man whose services alone I had engaged, and 
 whose services alone I desired it was in vain that I 
 used every physical and verbal remonstrance I was 
 capable of, against any further interference with our 
 persons or our things both speedily became beyond 
 our own control ; nor were suffered for a moment to 
 be within it, until we found ourselves deposited in the 
 respective carriages to which luggage and individuals 
 had been so indiscriminately and unceremoniously 
 consigned. Now reader, you will think, perhaps, 
 the scene was over, and that we were fairly off, 
 on our way to the hotel Corpo di Bacco ! 
 as these desperadoes say, the worst of it was yet to 
 come. No sooner had we given directions to our 
 drivers, than there arose a cry from the whole mob
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 81 
 
 of faccliini demanding qualcJte cosa for their insolent 
 interference. On my asking one of them, what he 
 had done, the whole responded with a shrill shout 
 which was equally savage and unintelligible . Pointing 
 to the only man I had employed, I exclaimed " I 
 have paid him, and will pay no more/' Then there 
 arose a positive yell of execration, in the midst of 
 which I ordered our driver to move on, but on his 
 attempting to do so, two or three laid hold of him, 
 others jumped upon the step of the carriage, and 
 another laid hold of the horse's head, causing him to 
 back and nearly upset the carriage. At this my 
 eldest son jumped down, and seizing one fellow by 
 the collar was about to strike him, when I begged 
 him to desist; a similar remonstrance became simul- 
 taneously necessary to my second son, who was 
 pushing another rascal away from the second carriage; 
 meanwhile I was calling aloud for the police, abusing 
 the driver for not going on, shouting alternately bad 
 Italian, and good, but not very temperate English ; 
 till at length, myself nearly exhausted with rage, and 
 my wife well nigh in hysterics, and amid a chorus of 
 vociferation such as an Italian mob can alone give
 
 82 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 out, we broke away from the desperadoes that clung 
 about our wheels and horses, and set off at full 
 gallop towards our hotel. We had proceeded at a 
 tremendous rate, for about half a mile, when 
 suddenly down went the horse of the carriage in 
 which were two of my sons, and at the same time 
 was seen, lying on the pavement, in a pool of what 
 looked like blood, a form that I feared, at first, 
 must be that of one of the occupiers of the carriage. 
 We were soon relieved by finding that it belonged to 
 a man who had been carrying a cask of red wine, and 
 who had been run over and knocked down in crossing 
 the road, causing the horse to fall upon him, and his 
 wine cask to break into pieces. The poor man was not 
 seriously hurt, but made a piteous moaning about 
 the loss of his wine, for which however four carlini 
 entirely consoled him. If he had been killed, however, 
 I doubt whether the emotion of the driver who had 
 run over him, would have equalled the lamentation of 
 the former, for his povera bestia, to which alone he 
 seemed to think it necessary to pay the slightest 
 attention. The animal was soon upon his legs again, 
 and without any further disasters we got to our
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 83 
 
 hotel, where, notwithstanding all our previous dis- 
 comforts, we sobered down into a sufficient state of 
 composure to enjoy a very capital dinner. 
 
 We arrived at Naples on a Saturday, and left it 
 the following Thursday. A residence there of four 
 months, from October 1829 until February 1830, 
 had made me pretty well acquainted with everything 
 worth seeing in the city and neighbourhood, so that, 
 as far as I was concerned, I did not regret the short 
 stay I was now enabled to make. The English, I 
 was told, are not very popular in Naples just at this 
 time, though to the hotel-keepers and shop-keepers 
 they are always welcome, if only for the sake of their 
 money. In the city we contented ourselves with a 
 visit to Virgil's tomb, the monastery of St. Elmo, 
 the Museum, and the theatre of San Carlo. Puzzeoli, 
 Baias, and Pompeii were the extent of our excursions 
 in the suburbs. Unfortunately, during our visit to 
 the latter, it rained nearly the whole day, so violently 
 at times that we could with difficulty find sufficient 
 shelter among the ruins to prevent our getting soaked 
 through. Years ago my first visit had been made 
 under equally unpropitious circumstances, the day 
 
 Q 2
 
 84 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 being wet and foggy throughout. Perhaps it was 
 all the more in keeping with the scene that Nature 
 should hang her pall over these skeleton memorials 
 of a destroyed city ; but desolation's self grows beau- 
 tiful beneath the blue of an Italian sky ; and, though 
 Pompeii was no more, the charm of its sunshine 
 would have been as sweet to me amid its ruins, as it 
 was to those who once tenanted its houses and 
 peopled its streets. I was doomed, however, to 
 depart without this gratification, and obliged to 
 abridge considerably my survey of its remains. 
 Hardly one-third of the city is yet exhumed, and it is 
 remarkable what slow progress is made by the govern- 
 ment in the excavation, or rather it is not remarkable 
 when it can only afford to devote a sum equal to 
 6000 per annum to carrying on the works. In our 
 own country, or in America, the entire city would 
 have been laid bare in a few years from its first 
 discovery. Some have objected to the displacement 
 of the objects discovered among the ruins, whether 
 works of art or otherwise, contending that some con- 
 trivance should have been effected by which they 
 might have been left in the exact position in which
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 85 
 
 they were found, or even, if possible, restored to that 
 to which they had originally belonged. Had such a 
 scheme been practicable it would have added certainly 
 to the interest and verisimilitude of the scene ; but a 
 measure requiring resources equal to the erection of 
 a Crystal Palace, though an object of Neapolitan 
 ambition, could hardly be possible to the capacities of 
 a Neapolitan revenue. 
 
 The Museum, where the Pompeian curiosities are 
 deposited, is, on their account, the most interesting, 
 perhaps, in the world. It would require a month's 
 daily inspection to form a complete acquaintance 
 with them. I shall not affect to say one word about 
 them after only an hour's walk through the various 
 rooms where they are classed and arranged. The 
 mosaics struck me as most wonderful and perfect 
 specimens of that kind of art. The remnant of the 
 female bust, found in one of the cellars of a large 
 house, is unsatisfactory as a view, though interesting 
 as a relic. It is exhibited in a glass case, and has a 
 decidedly geological appearance, suggesting anything 
 but the idea of a formation appertaining to the 
 human form divine. There is a more unmistakeable
 
 86 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 relic of the same kind in the shape of a man's head 
 (this is a nearly perfect petrifaction), but faces 
 that have become stones are not quite so agreeable a 
 sight as stones that have become faces ; the one is a 
 revolting reality, the other a pleasing illusion. 
 
 By the way, I was somewhat surprised on entering 
 the Museum, to see a notice to strangers that the 
 attendants are forbidden to receive any gratuity. 
 After one's experience in the tip line, from the chief 
 of a Dogana downwards, it was rather startling to 
 find any portion of his Neapolitan Majesty's domi- 
 nions where the practice is ignored. I am not sure 
 that the visitors to the Museum should be grateful 
 for the prohibition, for the duties of the gentry to 
 whom it applied seemed to me to be performed with 
 an inertness which rather too significantly indicated 
 the absence of the ordinary stimulus. Perhaps, in 
 our case, the officials were less on the alert, from 
 observing that we were attended by a commissionaire, 
 whose business it was to point out to us the most 
 remarkable objects; but, unfortunately, the gentle- 
 man we had hired in that capacity was too mute or 
 too stupid to be of the slightest service. He had
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 87 
 
 been thrust upon us by the innkeeper, as an invalu- 
 able appendage, at five francs per day ; but the only 
 result of his engagement with us was to add one to 
 our number at great inconvenience, particularly in 
 our drives, when his occupation of the coach-box, by 
 excluding one of our own party therefrom, incon- 
 venienced and discomforted all the remainder inside. 
 The fellow had nothing to say, except in answer to our 
 questions, and his information was so scanty that I 
 soon found my own recollections of the locality twenty 
 years ago preferable to making any enquiry of him. 
 I never paid away money with more disgust in my 
 life than when I gave this torpid impostor his 
 twenty francs for his four days' attendance. I always 
 avoided the employment of these gentry as much as 
 possible, and, as a general rule, declined their services. 
 Going one day into the Vatican, at Kome, a smirking, 
 smiling biped of the fraternity forced himself upon us 
 with an importunity which enabled him to carry his 
 point which, as the result proved, was to rob us for 
 doing nothing. When we got into the galleries, the 
 respective attendants, who were under no such restric- 
 tions as existed at the Museum in Naples, took upon
 
 88 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 themselves the task of pointing out all the different 
 objects, and gave our commissionaire a very distinct 
 intimation that his attentions were superfluous. That 
 functionary consequently contented himself with 
 standing at the door of each apartment as we entered, 
 and waiting there till we came out. For all that 
 does the reader believe it ? we were fools enough to 
 pay him. 
 
 How very noisy and dirty are the streets of Naples ! 
 how annoying the beggars ! how nasty the habits of 
 the people ! But what a gloriously beautiful vision 
 the city and its environs present, when seen from any 
 of the surrounding eminences. Nothing in the 
 world can equal the view from the monastery of San 
 Martino, or the succession of views that unwind 
 themselves as you descend the circuitous declivities 
 of the Strada di Pausilipo. I had not time to visit 
 the islands in the bay, but was told that many find 
 them even more delightful than the shores of the 
 mainland. There is- a story of an Englishman 
 having paid a visit to Capri to pass an hour or two, 
 and being so enchanted with it that he remained there 
 for thirty years. But the whole country is surpass-
 
 OUT OP HARNESS. 89 
 
 ingly lovely ; <( see Naples and die " is a compliment 
 to its charms, which I, who, like many others, have 
 seen it and live, can nevertheless testify is not 
 undeserved. One would hardly have imagined that 
 amid such fair and smiling scenes, deeds of the 
 blackest dye could be calmly resolved and coolly 
 perpetrated, even by such monsters as Caligula, Nero, 
 and Tiberius. Yet it was on the shore of Baise that 
 he, who fiddled when Rome was burning, ordered the 
 assassination of his mother; and upon its smiling 
 waters was the monster calmly gazing whilst the 
 tragedy, as he hoped, was being there consummated. 
 Agrippina, however, having managed to struggle 
 through the waves and reach, the shore alive, the 
 disappointed matricide was obliged to postpone his 
 gratification. The subject has been beautifully treated 
 in one of Casimir Delavjgue's poems, which, as it is 
 quoted at length in some other book of travels I 
 forget whose I shall not quote here. And now, 
 adieu to Naples ! beautiful to see, beautiful to remem- 
 ber ; memorable also for its ices, cheap, good, and 
 substantial, looking like half-pound pats of rich firm 
 butter, dwelling lingeringly and melting reluctantly in
 
 90 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 your mouth, as if they loved you as much as you 
 loved them. We had two objects in view in leaving 
 Naples by sea : to save time, and to avoid the 
 annoyances we had experienced by land from inn- 
 keepers, voituriers, douaniers, beggars, passports, 
 &c., &c. I have said but little about them here, for 
 they are trifles to record, and to many, perhaps, 
 trifles to encounter. They do, however, materially 
 detract from the pleasure of travelling in Italy ; and 
 drive many to the Mediterranean Sea before they 
 have become tired of its shores. We embarked on 
 board the Capri steamer on Thursday afternoon, and 
 were landed from her at Genoa on the morning of 
 the following Sunday. It was a tedious passage, for 
 nearly half of the time occupied by it was consumed 
 in lying at anchor opposite the respective towns of 
 Civita Vecchia and Leghorn. We reached each of 
 these places at six o'clock on the successive mornings 
 of Friday and Saturday, and did not leave them until 
 six in the afternoon ; so that we were stationary by 
 day, when we would have liked to be moving, and 
 moving by night, when we would have been glad 
 to be stationary. Of the Mediterranean, under such
 
 OUT OF HARNESS, 91 
 
 circumstances, we saw, of course but little; nor 
 could we land at Leghorn to take a run by railway to 
 Pisa, in consequence of our passports being only 
 vised for Genoa. Here we made the most of our one 
 day's sojourn, taking a drive in the environs, and 
 visiting some half dozen of the principal palaces. 
 Next morning we started at seven, by diligence, for 
 Busalla, where we got into a railway carriage that 
 brought us to Turin by four the same afternoon. 
 The railway has since been completed all the way 
 between the two cities. Those who visited them, as 
 I had, twenty-five years before, could not fail to be 
 struck by the marked improvement in both. Clean, 
 but busy streets, elegant buildings, a well dressed 
 and apparently prosperous community, are among the 
 external signs of an order of things which is beginning 
 to fix on Sardinia the eyes of all who are hopeful of 
 Italian regeneration. Turin is one of the finest 
 towns in Europe, and, though not so gay or bustling 
 as Paris, or so rich in art as Florence or Borne, is by 
 no means deficient in similar attractions, and, as a 
 residence, has all the comfort and convenience of an 
 English capital. It is a relief also to get into
 
 92 OUT OP HARNESS. 
 
 Sardinia to be free from the thraldom of the pass- 
 port system, which, though in force there, gives the 
 traveller little more trouble than he now meets with 
 in Trance or Switzerland. 
 
 "We took the Diligence from Turin to Chambery, a 
 journey of about thirty hours. We left the former 
 place at three P. M. and reached the latter the next 
 evening at nine. As we crossed it in the night we 
 saw little of Mont Cenis ; snow had recently fallen, 
 and was still unmelted near, though not on the road. 
 Unless it be for short distances, and in the coupe, 
 travelling by Diligence is very fatiguing. Not that 
 we had much to do with this kind of conveyance, for 
 with the exception of the journey just named, and 
 that from Chambery to Lyons, our travelling was all 
 by railway or hired carriage. The road between 
 these latter places is very beautiful in parts, and 
 good all along ; indeed throughout our tour great 
 improvement was manifest everywhere in the state 
 of the roads, as contrasted with their condition 
 twenty years ago. The old system of driving a la 
 postilion is discontinued, all the Diligences being 
 now supplied with a coachman and coach-box. The
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 93 
 
 traces, however, are much after the old fashion, 
 ropes being still more popular than leather among 
 the continental Jehus. It is surprising to see the 
 rate at which these huge vehicles are driven down 
 hill, and what a brisk telling pace is kept up by the fat 
 but sturdy cart-horse looking animals that drag them. 
 Down hill their pace is somewhat alarming, especially 
 to those who happen to notice the loose rein with 
 which the driver holds his horses, his sole dependence 
 for safety being in the apparatus which locks the hind 
 wheels, a machinery which they manage with such 
 readiness and dexterity that the most rapid descents 
 are generally made in perfect safety. After passing 
 a night at Lyons, we embarked on board the steamer 
 for Chalons, a ten hours' voyage on the Saone. It 
 rained so hard that we were obliged to keep below 
 the whole way, a most disagreeable necessity, as it 
 deprived us of some very beautiful river views, and 
 exposed us to much discomfort and inconvenience 
 from the crowded and incommodious state of the cabin. 
 It was one of the most miserable ten hours of 
 voluntary suffering I ever endured ; I defy any one to 
 be happy in a small steamer, with a large party, on a
 
 94) OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 wet day. We arrived, however, if in bad humour, 
 with a good appetite, at Chalons, whence we took rail 
 for Paris the next morning at six, and arrived in the 
 French metropolis the same afternoon at four. 
 
 All that is enjoyable at Paris lies pretty well on the 
 surface, and to any one who can use his legs and his 
 eyes, speaks sufficiently plainly. In its gayest season 
 it has more the appearance of a fair than a city. If 
 pleasure be there systematised into a business, business 
 itself seems to be carried on also with an air of 
 pleasure ; what may be the background of the picture 
 I know not, but the foreground attractions of Paris 
 are so immediate and striking, that the stranger, 
 however short his stay, cannot fail to be delighted 
 and amused. Certainly its externals are charming. 
 For scenery, costume, and decoration in stage effect 
 if I may be allowed the expression it surpasses 
 London and all other cities. The Place de la 
 Concorde, the Madeline, the Tuilleries, and the 
 Louvre, make themselves known and felt as visible 
 and noticeable objects. To what it has of the noble 
 and beautiful in architecture, breathing room is 
 given ; none of its Chefs d'csuvres are suffocated or
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 95 
 
 hedged in like St. Paul's. Then the Boulevards beat 
 Regent Street out and out for their size, convenience, 
 and gaiety. Each night gives them the effect of an 
 illumination; the brilliancy of the cafes and shops 
 all along, and indeed in those of most of the principal 
 streets, is most dazzling and picturesque. Each shop 
 is got up like a scene, in which is not unfrequently 
 visible a female form, even more attractive in face 
 and costume than the counter-charms (I don't mean 
 a pun) over which she so gracefully presides. But 
 seek to penetrate beyond this blaze of light, go 
 behind the scenes, and the illusion vanishes. Close 
 and untidy rooms, or perhaps, only a single room, 
 with few marks of care for cleanliness, or comfort, 
 reveal the inner home of the occupants of many of 
 those splendid Pavilions de Commerce. In truth their 
 true home is in the shop ; to be obliged to close that 
 on Sundays would be to them a punishment, rather 
 than a boon. There alone can they sit and enjoy 
 fresh air, and see, and be seen with that freedom 
 and advantage which every Parisian loves, It is not 
 therefore from mercenary motives that the shops 
 remain open on the Sabbath and in fact, I believe
 
 yo OUT OF HARNESS, 
 
 few purchases are made in them on that day. One 
 can imagine that a legislator of the Sir Andrew 
 Agnew class would not be very popular. The 
 public would neither understand him, nor tolerate 
 him. 
 
 But who does not know all about Paris ? It would 
 be impertinence to say one word more about it. We 
 left it after a fortnight's sojourn, and by the 15th of 
 November, just three months from the day we had 
 quitted it, were again in London. 
 
 In the foregoing narrative, I have abstained from 
 touching on any topics, that did not legitimately 
 belong to the object with which it was written viz., 
 to convey an idea of my own impressions and 
 feelings during my rapid tour, rather than to afford 
 information or instruction to intending travellers. 
 On this head the reader must consult Mr. Murray's 
 guide books, where he will find the concentrated 
 essence of all that the tourists have written on such 
 matters, arranged in such a form, as to be both a 
 literary companion and a roadside assistant. For 
 my part, whenever I take up a book of travels, 
 I feel mvself to a certain extent defrauded if I find
 
 OUT OP HA11NESS. 97 
 
 the author going into a long disquisition about the 
 history of the places he happens to visit. Because 
 he passes a day or two at Trent, is he justified in 
 telling me all about the Councils held there; or 
 treating me to a sentimental rigmarole about Petrarch 
 and Laura, because he has stopped to dine or sleep 
 at Avignon ? I have read all this before, or can read 
 it whenever I like, without buying his book. I want 
 to know what he has seen, heard, and felt, not what 
 other people have written. It is a mixture of imper- 
 tinence, and book-making that ought to be dis- 
 couraged. If the public think otherwise, I can only 
 apologise for the brevity of these pages, and will 
 promise next time a considerable amount of cribbing 
 from Gibbon, Hook, Eustace, Lady Morgan, Byron, 
 Moore, &c., &c., in short, from all those approved 
 authors, both ancient and modern, with whom it is 
 the pride and fashion of our dilettanti tourists to 
 display, in their publications, such profound and 
 extensive acquaintance. 
 
 To Murray also I must refer the reader for any 
 further information about hotel accommodation, travel- 
 ling expenses, and so forth. His handbooks will be
 
 98 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 found an almost unerring authority upon these points, 
 and every English tourist is deeply indebted to them 
 for the good effects which their publication has had 
 in keeping the whole body of European hotelkeepers 
 on the alert, to do their best for the traveller's comfort, 
 and their own repute. I have a warning to give, 
 however, which is not found in Murray don't include 
 in your bargain with a voiturier, your expences of 
 living on the road. It saves you money, certainly, 
 but your accommodation and fare are so different from 
 what they are when you, and not the voiturier, are 
 the paymaster, that few who have tried it once 
 would repeat the experiment. I speak particularly 
 of Italy ; such agreements indeed are seldom made in 
 Switzerland. At Cisterna, our first day's journey 
 from Rome, on the Naples road, our dinner was so 
 meagre, and the attention so reluctant, that I sent for 
 the innkeeper, and asked him to tell me candidly if 
 we were being treated in this way because he was 
 paid by the voiturier. He admitted that it was so, 
 excusing himself on the ground of the low price paid 
 him, of which he told us the amount, begging, however, 
 we would say nothing on the subject to the voiturier.
 
 OUT OF HARNESS. 99 
 
 We found that it was hardly one third of the sum 
 we had paid to the latter, and certainly was not 
 enough for justice to the traveller and profit to the 
 innkeeper. I must say, however, that we had at 
 Cisterna the disadvantage of a cardinal and the 
 passengers of a Diligence dining at the same time ; 
 but still the pickings of even a cardinal's repast 
 are not altogether pleasant, and upon this occasion, 
 did not appear to be very choice, for we had a 
 strong suspicion that one of the dishes was buffalo, 
 a suspicion that became confirmed, when the next 
 day we passed large herds of those animals in the 
 Pontine Marshes. To make sure of a decent meal 
 in future, we made a private arrangement with the 
 hotelkeeper, independently of the sum paid him by 
 the voiturier. 
 
 To those who may be contemplating a similar tour 
 to that which has been described in these pages, it 
 may not be uninteresting to know, without going 
 into detail, something of the expense. Our party 
 consisted of five adults, and from the period of our 
 leaving London, on the 18th of August, until our 
 return on the 15th of November, our expenses,
 
 ] 00 OUT OF HARNESS. 
 
 including every item sight-seeing, carriages, theatres, 
 guides, &c., &c., did not average more than 15s. per 
 head per diem. Had we made a longer stay at the 
 places where we stopped, the average would have 
 been materially less ; but when it is considered that 
 we were not more than one month out of the three 
 stationary, and that we travelled during the other 
 two, a distance altogether, on going and returning, 
 of nearly four thousand miles, it cannot be said that 
 travelling on the Continent is very costly. A similar 
 excursion could not have been made in England for 
 double the sum. 
 
 FTNJS. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 J. J. OUJLLAUME, PRINTER AND PUBLISH**, CHF.S