UC-NRLF 
 
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THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND 
 
 MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID 
 
J^' 
 
 A- 
 
 ^' 
 

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 -A,, 
 
 SOUTH BY EAST. 
 
INTERIOR OF PALATINE CHAPEL. 
 
 [P. 190. 
 
South by East: 
 
 ^oit§ of Srauil in ^tftitli^nt ^urir^^. 
 
 BY 
 
 G. F. R O D W E L L, 
 
 SCIENCE MASTER IN MARLBOROUGH COLLEGE. 
 
 W,it\) i^timerous Illu2trati0n0. 
 
 ILontron : 
 
 MARCUS WARD & CO., 67 & 68, CHANDOS STREET, STRAND, 
 
 And royal ULSTER WORKS, BELFAST. 
 1S77. 
 
Marcus Ward and Co., 
 
 ROYAL ULSTER WORKS, 
 
 BELFAST. 
 
i^0 the P^morit 
 
 OF 
 
 FRANCESCO NARDI 
 
 I DEDICATE 
 
 i^his l00h. 
 
D(^ 
 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 N the following pages I have made no attempt to 
 preserve a special continuity in the treatment of the 
 subjects discussed, or to give a formal description of any 
 of the places mentioned. Such descriptions will be found in 
 guide-books, and in that excellent class of books which has arisen 
 during the last few years, of which Hare's Days in Home may 
 be taken as a good example. Here I have jotted down ideas 
 and impressions, which presented themselves from time to 
 time while visiting certain well-known places. These chapters 
 are literally what they profess to be, "Notes of Travel," often 
 desultory, but, I trust, seldom inaccurate. Portions of several 
 chapters have appeared from time to time in our school paper. 
 The Marlhurian, and the major part of the " Summum Bonum " 
 is from The Cliftonian of 1870. Nearly the whole of the chapter 
 on Athens was printed in the Dublin University Magazine for 
 July, 1875, and the account of the Tuscan Memorial to Galileo in 
 Nature, for August, 1873. I must express my thanks to Prof. 
 Ehousopoulos for permission to copy the engraving of the heads 
 of Homeric Heroes, from his ErXEIPIAION TH2 EAAHNIKH2 
 APXAIOAOriAS. 
 
 G. F. EODWELL. 
 
 Marlborough, May IJfth, 1877. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAP. 
 
 I. — General Impressions of Northern Italy 
 II. — Milan ..... 
 III. — Verona, Padua, Venice 
 IV. — Bologna, Elorence, Pisa 
 
 V. — Eome . . . . , 
 
 VI. — The Monastery op Monte Cassino . 
 
 VII.— Naples .... 
 VIII. — Messina, Taormina, Catania . 
 IX. — Syracuse . . . . . 
 
 X. — Palermo and Girgenti 
 XL — Athens . . . . . 
 
 XII. ^ — Cairo . . . '. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 9 
 
 20 
 
 . 31 
 
 47 
 
 . 70 
 
 106 
 
 . 137 
 161 
 
 . 170 
 187 
 
 . 216 
 251 
 
'i^t 0f Jllu^traticn^. 
 
 Interior of the Cappella Palatina, Palermo — Erected in 1132 
 (p. 190) . . . . 
 
 Milan Cathedral ...... 
 
 S. Anastasia, Verona .... 
 
 House of the Capulets . 
 
 Cathedral of S. Mark, Venice 
 
 Florence ...... 
 
 Michael Angelo ..... 
 
 Pisa ....... 
 
 Lake Trasimenus in Roman Times . 
 Cathedral of Pisa, and the Leaning Tower 
 Baptistery of Pisa . . . . . 
 
 The Appian "Way ..... 
 
 The Capitol ..... 
 
 The Forum, Restored ..... 
 
 Arch of Titus ..... 
 
 Table of Shew-Bread, &c., on Arch of Titus 
 
 The Coliseum ..... 
 
 Columbarium ...... 
 
 Hadrian's Tomb, Restored .... 
 
 Castle of S. Angelo ..... 
 
 Piazza and Basilica of S. Peter 
 
 Apollo Belvedere. Vatican .... 
 
 Head of Apollo Belvedere .... 
 
 Laocoon Group. Vatican .... 
 
 Zeus of Otricoli ..... 
 
 Sleeping Ariadne. Vatican .... 
 
 Barberini Juno. Vatican .... 
 
 Frontispiece. 
 
 20 
 32 
 33 
 36 
 50 
 52 
 56 
 61 
 63 
 64 
 70 
 72 
 72 
 73 
 74 
 74 
 76 
 77 
 78 
 80 
 83 
 84 
 85 
 86 
 87 
 88 
 
List of Ilhtstratioits. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Melpomene. Vatican .... ... 89 
 
 Head of Eros. Vatican . . . . , . .90 
 
 Bust of Cronos. Vatican . . . . . .105 
 
 The Well, Monte Cassino . . . . . . .110 
 
 Entrance to the Church, Monte Cassino . . . . .111 
 
 Monte Cassino . . . . . . , . ll.> 
 
 Study of Monks' Heads . . . . . . .126 
 
 VieAv of the Monastery from the Garden . . , . .128 
 
 I^aples ......... 137 
 
 The Catacombs of I^aples . . . . . . .141 
 
 Demeter Enthroned. Painting from Pompeii. N'aples . . . 142 
 
 Persephone Enthroned. Painting from Pompeii. IS"aples . . .143 
 
 Farnese Bull. JSTaples . . . . . . .144 
 
 Farnese Hercules. !N'aples . . . . . .145 
 
 Head of Juno. ]S"aples . . . , . . .146 
 
 Pallas Athene. Naples . . . . . . .147 
 
 Eesting Hermes. iN'aples . . . . . .148 
 
 Terra Cotta Bowl, Bronze Lamps and Stands, found at Pompeii . .149 
 
 A Temple at Pompeii . . . . . , .150 
 
 House of Pansa, Pompeii . . . . . . ,150 
 
 The Solfatara ........ 153 
 
 Baise ......... 157 
 
 Cameo of Athenion. N'aples Museum . . . , . 1 60 
 
 Entrance to the Harbour of Messina . . . . . .161 
 
 The Castle of Scilla . . . . . . .162 
 
 Messina ......... 162 
 
 The Cathedral of Messina . . . . . .164 
 
 Taormina ......... 165 
 
 Euined Theatre at Taormina . . . . . .166 
 
 Calabrian Coast, as seen from Messina . . . . .166 
 
 Catania . . . . . . . . .168 
 
 Greek Theatre at Syracuse . . . . . . .172 
 
 Syracuse and its Environs . . . . . .174 
 
 Archimedes . . . . . . . . .176 
 
 Tomb of Archimedes . . . . . . .177 
 
 Charnel-house of the Monastery of the Cappuccini, Syracuse . . .182 
 
 Papyrus ......... 184 
 
 The Island of Capri . . . . . . . .187 
 
8 
 
 List of Illustrations. 
 
 The Harbour of Palermo, and Monte Pellegrino 
 
 King Eoger of Sicily receiving his Crown from the Hands of Christ 
 
 Interior of the Cathedral of Monreale 
 
 Campanile of the Church of La Martorana 
 
 Cloisters of the Monastery of Monreale 
 
 Bronze Eam of Syracuse ..... 
 
 Porta Nuova, Palermo ..... 
 
 Grotto of S. Eosalia ...... 
 
 Temple of Concordia, Girgenti .... 
 
 Interior of the Temple of Concordia .... 
 
 Ancient Distaff still used in some parts of Sicily 
 
 The Heroes of Homer ...... 
 
 Salamis ....... 
 
 The Academic Grove, Eestored ..... 
 
 Temple of Zeus Olympius ..... 
 
 Dionusos and Lion. From the Monument of Lysicrates 
 
 Theseus. Prom the Pediment of the Parthenon 
 
 The Acropolis, Athens ...... 
 
 The Acropolis, Eestored ..... 
 
 Parthenon and Erechtheum ..... 
 
 Erechtheum, Eestored ..... 
 
 Caryatide of the Erechtheum ..... 
 
 Arch of Hadrian ...... 
 
 Greek Vases ........ 
 
 The Dodwell Vase preserved in Munich. An Example of early Greek 
 Vase-painting ...... 
 
 Eondanini Medusa. Munich ..... 
 
 Pompey's Pillar, Alexandria ..... 
 
 Palm Trees ....... 
 
 Street in Cairo ...... 
 
 Eastern Asses ....... 
 
 Water-Carriers of the East ..... 
 
 Mosque of the Sultan Hassan ..... 
 
 Pyramids of Ghizeh ...... 
 
 The Sphynx . . • . 
 
 Tombs of the Mamelukes ..... 
 
 Obelisk at Heliopolis ...... 
 
 Sakieh ....... 
 
 PAGE 
 
 188 
 
 190 
 
 190 
 
 191 
 
 192 
 
 195 
 
 196 
 
 198 
 
 204 
 
 205 
 
 215 
 
 216 
 
 228 
 
 229 
 
 231 
 
 232 
 
 232 
 
 233 
 
 234 
 
 235 
 
 236 
 
 236 
 
 238 
 
 246 
 
 247 
 250 
 252 
 254 
 255 
 256 
 257 
 261 
 262 
 263 
 267 
 268 
 270 
 
 \ 
 
 ^.^ 
 
 'ni 
 
SOUTH BY EAST. 
 
 C H A P T E K I. 
 
 GENERAL IMPRESSIONS OF NORTHERN ITALY. 
 
 The Journey — Turin — Cheapness of Labour — Resources of the Country —   
 Paper Money — Character and Individuality of Italian Towns — Alessan- 
 dria — Genoa — Beauty of its Position — A Desecrated Shrine. 
 
 T is to be hoped that the Continental railway 
 
 companies will soon adopt the system of Pullman 
 
 sleeping cars, which all American railways possess, 
 
 and which we use in our own country for long 
 
 journeys to the North of England and Scotland. For 
 
 j|,|. such a journey as that between Paris and Turin they are 
 
 IP really essential, if it is to be accomplished with any degree 
 
 p of comfort. The coupes are very poor substitutes for 
 
 V the roomy, well-furnished Pullman, which is so carefully 
 
 fitted with springs that the shaking is reduced to a minimum, 
 
 if and is, moreover, provided with every comfort and con- 
 
 y venience that the space will admit. The mail train between 
 
 Paris and Turin consists of a few first-class carriages, and the 
 
 delays are as infrequent as possible. Yet the journey occupies 
 
 twenty-two hours, and the tedium of it is indescribable ; you leave 
 
 Paris at eight o'clock in the evening, and if you are fortunate 
 
10 Impressions of Northern Italy. 
 
 enough to get some broken sleep, you awake perhaps at four or 
 five o'clock next morning shivering with cold, and you look out 
 upon a dull, grey landscape, sufficiently monotonous in every 
 direction. In travelling through central France you pass over 
 scores of miles of flat, fertile country, which even in spring does 
 not look bare, and which in summer presents a mass of variegated 
 colours. Towards the afternoon the country becomes more rugged, 
 and for some distance before the Mont Cenis tunnel is reached the 
 train traverses a very picturesque mountainous district. A slight 
 delay takes place near the entrance to the tunnel, carriages are 
 changed, and in less than half-an-hour we shall be in Italy. The 
 tunnel is 8^; miles long, and we traverse it in a little more than 
 twenty minutes ; it is perfectly ventilated, no discomfort is experi- 
 enced in passing through it, and the carriages are well lighted, and 
 run with surprising smoothness. It was snowing slightly on the 
 French side of Mont Cenis, but as we emerge on the Italian side, 
 a really warm and dazzling sun makes us open the windows and 
 pull down the blinds, and the thick snow-clouds and leaden sky 
 of the other side of the tunnel are replaced by a blue and cloudless 
 heaven. The efiect is almost magical, and reminds us of the feast of 
 Albertus Magnus, on which occasion he is said to have taken his 
 guests into a garden in which there were several feet of snow and 
 all the surroundings of a severe winter day, but so soon as they 
 were seated at the table Albertus muttered an incantation, where- 
 upon the snow suddenly disappeared, a bright sun shone from out 
 a cloudless sky, and midsummer suddenly replaced midwinter. 
 
 As we emerge into Italy the beautiful and fertile plain of Lom- 
 bardy stretches out before us to the south and west, while to the north 
 we see the semicircular range of the Alps. Wherever we may be 
 in Northern Italy, even for miles to the south of Turin, we see this 
 great belt of mountains sometimes bounding the distant horizon, 
 sometimes comparatively near. Towards evening we reach Turin, 
 a prim little town, which between 1859 and 1SG5 was the capital 
 
Cheapness of Labour. 11 
 
 of Italy, and the residence of the king. It contains a large number 
 of parallel streets, and a few fine piazzas, which are clean and new- 
 looking, although   the town is of considerable antiquity. Like 
 Jerusalem, Turin has endured many sieges ; so early as 218 
 B.C. it was destroyed by Hannibal, and it has undergone many 
 subsequent changes. It scarcely retains a vestige of its older 
 buildings, and with a site and name two thousand years old looks 
 like a city of yesterday. It contains but little to interest the 
 traveller — a fairly good museum, a renaissance cathedral of 1498, 
 and a university with about 2000 students. 
 
 You have no sooner entered Italy than you are struck with the 
 cheapness of labour. At the last station on the French side of 
 Mont Cenis you may notice that the railings are of the usual flimsy 
 laths which are used in many parts of France for this purpose, and 
 which, as far as strength or security are concerned, are simply use- 
 less. On the other hand, at the first station on the Italian side of 
 Mont Cenis, the railings are formed of square stone pillars, placed 
 at short intervals with intervening beams of wood. As the lath 
 railings are too flimsy and paltry, so are these unnecessarily massive 
 and elaborate, and probably each pillar has taken as long to fashion 
 as would make twenty yards of the lath railing. We find many 
 other examples of the cheapness of labour : men are often seen 
 ploughing with a primitive wooden plough which has scarcely been 
 altered since the time of the early Eomans, and which is drawn by 
 six or eight (on one occasion we saw as many as twelve) oxen. 
 Two or three men manage one plough : one guides it, and occa- 
 sionally uses a long ox-goad tipped with steel ; the others walk by 
 the heads of the foremost oxen. Compare this with a steam-plough, 
 or with an ordinary iron plough drawn by a pair of good English 
 cart-horses ; the work would be done twice as well and twice as 
 expeditiously. At the same time, we have to remember that if 
 labour be cheap in Italy the necessaries of life are also cheap, and 
 the land is so prodigiously fertile that it repays any care expended 
 
12 Impressions of Northern Italy 
 
 upon it an hundredfold. If the soil of Italy could be placed under 
 high Norfolk farming, the yield would considerably increase the 
 wealth of the landed proprietors, and, through them, of the whole 
 country. 
 
 That the resources of the country require to be extended there 
 can be no doubt. Few countries possess less capital. The chief 
 currency is paper money, of which you get about twenty-seven 
 one-lire notes for a sovereign. Each of these notes goes at least as 
 far as a shilling in this country ; a porter makes you a low bow on 
 receiving a bank note for 2^d., and the custodian of a' church 
 thanks you profoundly for a note which is worth nearly 5d. It is 
 to be hoped that the finances of United Italy will soon be in a 
 more satisfactory condition ; the people are somewhat heavily taxed, 
 and taxation must increase to pay for the new ironclads, hundred- 
 ton guns, and army equipments, unless the agricultural and com- 
 mercial resources of the country can be developed. Then a silver 
 currency will begin to make its appearance, and the detestable 
 local bank notes, which are useless outside the town in which they 
 are issued, will disappear. 
 
 Northern Italy is in many respects different from the southern 
 parts of the peninsula, and we cannot wonder at this when we 
 remember that till lately the country was broken up into a number 
 of small States and Duchies — Lombardy, Venetia, Parma, Modena, 
 Ferrara, and so on, each with its separate government. It is 
 curious to notice how little the Northern Italians know of the 
 south of their kingdom : you meet Italians in Milan and Venice 
 who have not been in Rome for five-and-twenty years, while they 
 have visited England, France, and Germany several times during 
 the same period, and Switzerland many times. There could be no 
 united national feeling so long as Italy was divided into a number 
 of petty states ; and there can be no doubt that the country will 
 now evolve and maintain an individuality which it has never 
 before possessed. 
 
Characteristics of Italian Towns. 13 
 
 The larger cities of Northern Italy possess but little character 
 compared with the smaller towns. Milan, Florence, and Turin 
 in many respects resemble Paris, and you scarcely feel that you are 
 among a new people. Some of the churches and palaces in these 
 cities are indeed remnants of the past ; but there is little else of 
 antiquity, and the towns seem to have lost all character and 
 individuality. Some travellers rave about Venice in such an 
 unconscionable way that one goes there expecting to see one of the 
 prodigies of the earth ; but the expectation is not always realised. 
 The beauty of the city is very dependent on external causes — a 
 bright clear air and delicately-tinted clouds. As we entered Venice 
 on a dull, leaden day, the approach from the mainland reminded 
 us forcibly of the Norfolk marshes : it rained pitilessly ; the Grand' 
 Canal looked like a deserted pond ; there was the usual squabble 
 among, guides and porters and hotel-touters, and until we found 
 ourselves alone in a gondola, with our luggage lying about us, we 
 might have imagined that we had just arrived at Hull or Bristol. 
 Again, in Florence you find neat, modern-looking houses, omnibuses 
 in the Piazza della Signoria, cabs and cabmen of the usual kind, 
 unclean beggars, and abusive guides. Commend us rather to such 
 delightful old towns as Verona, Pisa, Padua, Bologna ; these possess 
 a thousand times the individuality of such cities as Turin and 
 Milan. In them you really feel yourself in Italy. In them you 
 find quaint old buildings and battlements, herb-markets of the 
 fourteenth century, beautiful public fountains, and tombs, gardens 
 of cypress trees five hundred years old ; palaces which once belonged 
 to Ghibellines and Guelphs, Capulets and Montagues ; churches in 
 which the same faith has found a home for a thousand years ; old 
 grey campaniles that have rung in fifty generations of men, and 
 have rung once more at their departing. 
 
 From Turin we go to Genoa by way of Alessandria, a town of 
 some sixty thousand inhabitants, founded in 1167, and named 
 after Pope Alexander III. On one occasion we had a forced 
 
14 Impressiojis of Northern Italy. 
 
 detention of several hours in Alessandria, and found it to be a 
 singularly uninteresting town ; in fact, we can remember but two 
 facts connected with it — the one that a cattle fair was taking place 
 in the market-place, where we saw numbers of the beautiful cream- 
 coloured oxen of the Maremma, splendid placid beasts with large 
 dark liquid eyes and black muzzles ; the other that we were a good 
 deal surprised to find a large church used as a hay-barn. 
 
 The city of Genoa owes much to its j)osition ; seen from the 
 sea, or from above the town, it fully justifies its name of La 
 Superga ; but when you descend to the harbour, through narrow 
 winding streets, the illusion disappears, and you are reminded of 
 any other busy seaside port — Marseilles, or the neighbourhood of 
 the London docks. Although Genoa in the Middle Ages was one 
 of the most important seaports in the world, having great oriental 
 possessions and an enormous commerce, it never attained the 
 position which was reached by its great rival, Venice. It was often 
 disturbed by internal dissensions, and was perpetually at war with 
 the Pisans and Venetians. The city never seems to have developed 
 so important a constitution as Venice ; we rarely hear either of its 
 Government or its Doges, while the Venetian Councils and the 
 constitutions of the Doges are often quoted in the history of 
 Europe. Many of the old Genoese palaces remain, and attest the 
 wealth of their former occupants ; some of them contain a few good 
 pictures, and one of them has been converted into a flourishing 
 university apparently much devoted to law, for we saw therein 
 a professor of natural philosophy lecturing to some half-dozen 
 students, whilst the professor of law had a crowded class-room. 
 Few of the churches of Genoa are of interest ; perhaps S. Lorenzo, 
 the Cathedral, is the most interesting. It dates from the twelfth 
 century, but has been so frequently altered that it combines three 
 distinct kinds of architecture — Romanesque, Lombardo-Gothic, and 
 Renaissance. We can scarcely be surprised, therefore, to find it a 
 somewhat unsightly and inelegant building. It has a great relic 
 
Genoa — A Desecrated Shrine. 15 
 
 in the sacristy — the vessel which was used by our Lord and His 
 disciples when they partook of the Paschal Lamb. It was captured 
 at Csesarea by the Genoese during one of the crusades. 
 
 One remembers Genoa best on account of the beauty of its 
 situation. Placed at the summit of the curve formed by the Italian 
 coast trending to the north-west, and the French coast trending to 
 the north-east, it forms the culminating point of the gulf which 
 bears its name, and a sort of half-way house on the lovely Kiviera. 
 Its climate is very mild, for while it is protected by hills to the 
 north, it is open to the sea and the sun on the south. So admirably 
 suited for a maritime city is it, that it has been used as a harbour 
 from very remote times, certainly long before the Christian era. 
 Now, in common with Venice and Pisa and other Italian cities, it 
 shows signs of commercial decay, but it still possesses a considerable 
 trade, and its population is equal to that of Newcastle. 
 
 The decayed splendour of the city is not nearly so conspicuous 
 as it is in Venice, yet we have rarely seen anything so utterly 
 desolate and God-forsaken as a desecrated shrine which we once 
 saw in one of the streets facing the harbour — a street busy with 
 life and full of the voices of men. Here we saw a large broken 
 window, raised somewhat above the level of the street, but in a 
 line with the rest of the windows, and approached by three or four 
 well-worn steps. It proved to belong to one of the small wayside 
 shrines common in Italy, and had no doubt been much resorted 
 to by sailors before starting on a voyage. The shrine consisted of 
 an altar surmounted by a figure of the Virgin and Child, rudely 
 carved in wood or made of plaster of Paris, and clumsily painted 
 with many colours. Above the altar were hung numerous votive 
 offerings, which had been presented to the shrine in the hope of 
 securing a prosperous voyage, or which had been vowed in a time of 
 peril at sea. We could but think of the sailor in the Naufragium 
 of Erasmus, who promised mountains of gold to our Lady of Wal- 
 singham if he was saved from drowning ; and of the Zealander (at 
 
16 Impressiojts of Northern Italy. 
 
 whose expense Erasmus has made so merry) who, as the ship was 
 sinking, bellowed out loudly so that S. Christopher might hear 
 him, promising him a great statue to be placed in his church in 
 Paris if he should ever set foot on dry land again, and then added 
 in a whisper to his companion, " Si semel contigero terram, non 
 daturus sum illi candelam sehaceam." But somehow the Genoese 
 shrine had fallen into disrepute ; the vowed gifts hung upon the 
 sacred walls had failed to appease the potent god of the sea, and the 
 mariner had complained of his faith and changed gods, and had 
 therefore deserted them. It was now a desecrated shrine ; no sailor 
 about to trust himself to the waves knelt upon the steps to pray for a 
 prosperous voyage, no sailor's wife to supplicate her husband's safe 
 return. The place was desolate and deserted, no one even bowed 
 the knee in passing it ; the glass of the window was broken ; great 
 lumps of plaster had fallen from the ceiling, a black wine-bottle 
 stood on the altar, everything was mouldering and going to rack and 
 ruin. And then we thought that surely a desecrated shrine is one 
 of the saddest and most pitiful sights in all the world. 
 
 We wonder what the worshippers in the first Church of San 
 Clemente in Rome would say if they saw above their old church 
 the present San Clemente, and the buildings of the Irish Domini- 
 cans I And what would the still earlier worshippers of Mithras say 
 if they could see their temple with two San Ciementes above it, 
 dark and desolate, flooded with water, with the altar at which they 
 had been wont to worship standing in the midst of the waters far 
 from the light of day 1 Or what would the Sicilian worshippers of 
 Athena of twenty-three centuries ago say if they could see their 
 temple in Syracuse converted into a Roman Catholic cathedral ? 
 What would they say if they could see (as we once saw) IMonsignor 
 the Bishop surrounded by half-a-hundred canons, priests, deacons, 
 sub-deacons, deacons of the throne, chanters, sub-chanters, acolytes, 
 thurifers, bearers of crosier, mitre, biretta, and pastoral staff, singing 
 mass on some fine sunny January morning on the occasion of a 
 
Pagan Temples and Chris Han Churches. 17 
 
 festaf "Desecration, forsooth," they would exclaim with one voice, 
 "it is much more: insult has been added to injury; our temples 
 have not only been destroyed, but other temples have been built 
 with and upon their ruins, and other worships have been celebrated 
 within our fanes." Verily they too would lament the changed gods."^'' 
 
 * In speaking of a heathen temple in Catania which had been converted into 
 a church, Brydone {Sicily and Malta, 1776) is led to make some curious remarks 
 concerning the resemblance of the Roman Catholic rites to those of the heathens. 
 He dissents somewhat from the opinions expressed above, and has certainly pushed 
 his point too far ; but the subject is suggestive. He says of the temple : — " It has now 
 been purged and purified from all the infection contracted from the heathen rites, and 
 is become a Christian Church, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, who has long been 
 constituted imiversal legatee and executrix to all the ancient goddesses, celestial, 
 terrestrial, and infernal. And, indeed, little more than the names are changed, the 
 things continuing pretty much the same as ever. The Catholics themselves do not 
 attend to it ; but it is not a little curious to consider how small is the deviation in 
 almost every article of their present rites from those of the ancients. I have some- 
 where seen an observation, which seems to be a just one — that during the long 
 reign of heathenism, superstition had altogether exhausted her talent for invention ; 
 so that when a superstitious spirit seized Christians, they were under a necessity 
 of borrowing from their predecessors, and imitating some part of their idolatry. In ' 
 some places the very same images still remain ; they have only re-christened them, 
 and what was Venus or Proserpine is now Mary Magdalene or the Virgin. The 
 same ceremonies are daily performed before these images, in the same language, 
 and nearly in the same manner. The saints are perpetually coming down in 
 person, and working miracles, as the heathen gods did of old. The walls of the 
 temples are covered with the vows of pilgrims, as they were formerly. The holy 
 water, which was held in such detestation by the first Christians, is again revered 
 and sprinkled about with the same devotion as in the time of paganism. The 
 same incense is burnt by the priests, arrayed in the same manner, with the same 
 grimaces and genuflexions before the same images, and in the same temples too. 
 In short, so nearly do the rites coincide, that were the pagan high priest to come 
 back and resume his functions, he woidd only have to learn a few new names ; to 
 get the Mass, the Paters, and the Aves by heart, which would be much easier to 
 him, as they are in a language he understands, but which his modern successors 
 are often ignorant of. Some things, to be sure, would puzzle him ; and he would 
 swear that all the mysteries of Eleusis were nothing to the amazing mystery of 
 Transubstantiation, the only one that ever attempted to set both our understanding 
 and our senses at defiance, and baffles equally all the faculties both of the soul and 
 bodv." 
 
18 Impressions of Northern Italy. 
 
 We have not far to turn if we would discover other desecrated 
 shrines — the Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis, the temples of 
 Baalbec, the Parthenon, the ruined abbeys of England, the thousand 
 and one temples in Mexico, India, Burmah. But these we view in 
 a different light from the deserted shrine of the harbour of Genoa ; 
 for we almost forget the desecration in the beauty of the ruins, 
 and in the fact that the faith in whose service they were erected, 
 and in some cases the very race of men who erected them, have 
 passed away. Time the destroyer, less ruthless than man the arch- 
 destroyer, so often gives a charm of its own to the ruins of ancient 
 temples, that our sorrow for their loss is almost turned into joy for 
 their present beauty. The various clothings of nature ; the dark- 
 green ivy, the pale-grey or yellow lichen, the hues of weathered 
 stone, the perfection and harmony of the buildings themselves, and, 
 above all, the ever-changing tones of light — all these things divert 
 our thouorhts from the ruin as it was, to the ruin as it is. There 
 is a picture by Turner which should claim our attention in this 
 regard : — The ruins of a Greek temple stand upon a bold promontory 
 overlooking the sea ; its desolation is complete , wolves howl among 
 the ruins, great birds of night perch upon the broken columns, 
 dark vegetation covers the floor ; below is seen an angry sea ; above, 
 the moon breaking through skimming clouds, and fitfully illumi- 
 nating both sea and temple. The whole scene is very weird, and 
 infinitely saddening. One would like to look at it with the music 
 of the church-scene in Faust, or the tomb-scene in Ernani, sounding 
 in one's ears. But let us complete the ruined temple, range the 
 columns in order, cover them with a star-spangled roof, put frieze 
 and pediment in its place, and a great statue of gold and ivory in 
 the midst, and then imagine a crowd of gaily-dressed worshippers 
 streaming towards the beloved fane. And this is the place in 
 which wolves howl, and owls wing their noiseless flight I Truly 
 the world is growing old. 
 
 One thought forces itself upon us as we gaze at such desecrated 
 
Reflections. 
 
 19 
 
 shrines. Will S. Peter's ever make way for the temple of an 
 unknown faith, and will its carved alabaster and verde antique be 
 built into the palace of the conqueror ? Or, again, when the New 
 Zealander stands upon the ruins of London Bridge, will S. Paul's 
 be open to the sky and desolate — a deserted temple as woe-begone 
 and lone as the Virgin's shrine in Genoa ? 
 
CHAPTER 11. 
 
 MILAN. 
 
 The Cathedral — The Relics — S. Carlo Borromeo — Holy Thursday Ceremonies — 
 S. Ambrogio — The Bibliotheca Ambrosiana — Milan as a Musical Centre — Career of 
 a Promising Singer — The First Night of a New Opera at La 
 Scala. 
 
 ILAN, the capital of Lombardy, is a fine modern 
 city, nearly as large as Sheffield, It has undergone 
 the same process of Haussmajinization that Paris 
 lately underwent, and is now full of fine broad 
 streets, lofty houses, and palatial public buildings. 
 Since the Austrian evacuation it has passed through 
 many changes. Very little remains of the old city except 
 a few churches. Of course the central point of attrac- 
 tion is the Cathedral, called by the Milanese the eighth 
 wonder of the world. It is the third largest cathedral 
 in Europe, and has been so often described that we 
 shall say but little about it, save that it is the most 
 wonderful and imposing and elaborate mass of white 
 marble that the mind can conceive. The rich- 
 ness of the exterior passes description ; there are nearly a 
 hundred separate spires (or spirettes, if we may use such 
 a word), and 4500 white marble statues, the size of life. Within, 
 it is supported by fifty-two columns, fifteen feet in diameter, 
 the beauty of which is somewhat marred by the replacement 
 of the capitals by niches containing statues. Moreover, the 
 vaulted roof is painted in imitation of open work, a terrible 
 
<! 
 
 W 
 H 
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 o 
 
S. Carlo Borromeo. 21 
 
 barbarism in such a building. The high altar and its surroundings 
 are worthy of the building, and two fine bronze pulpits are affixed 
 to columns near the altar. The Cathedral contains many relics, 
 among others the ring and staff of S. Carlo Borromeo, the great 
 Archbishop of Milan, whose character is described so lovingly by 
 Manzoni, in / Promessi Sposi. A descendant of S. Carlo (Cardinal 
 Edward Borromeo) is now Archpriest of S. Peter's in Kome. 
 
 First among all the relics in the Cathedral is the body of S. 
 Carlo, which rests in the Cappella S. Carlo Borromeo, in front of 
 the choir. It is preserved in a coffer of rock-crystal, which is 
 placed in a tomb of chiselled silver, decorated with gold and 
 precious stones. If ever a man deserved to be canonised, that 
 man, as all who have read his life must allow, was S. Carlo 
 Borromeo. But it is an unseemly and barbarous thing to show 
 his poor shrivelled corpse, decked out with gold and jewels, to 
 chance visitors, for five lire each ; and to have them stand curious, 
 open-eyed, and open-mouthed, where the faithful kneel with closed 
 eyes and in prayer. And what would S. Carlo himself, the least 
 selfish and ostentatious of men, have said, when he walked bare- 
 footed through the streets of Milan, with his plain wooden crucifix, 
 to visit the poor, plague-stricken, and djdng, if he had known that 
 their descendants would have dressed him out in cloth of gold, 
 and exhibited him for broad silver pieces ? And what must the 
 devotee who kneels praying in front of that silver tomb think 
 when he repeats " et expecto resurrectione mortuorum . . . " ? 
 Come ! let us leave the subterranean chapel of the dead, and go 
 upstairs into the scarcely less dim choir. It is Holy Thursday, 
 and the great relics are to be exposed, the vessels and candlesticks 
 of silver, the jewelled effigies of former Archbishops, the bones of 
 the Saints ; and the successor of S. Carlo — Luigi Nazari, by the 
 Divine Mercy, and the grace of the Holy Apostolical See, Arch- 
 bishop — is to attend at an early service, and to wash the feet of 
 twelve poor men, after the fashion of His Holiness the Pope, on 
 
22 • Milan. 
 
 the same day. It is raining hard, the morning is very dim, and, as 
 a consequence, the Cathedral is almost in darkness ; so much so 
 indeed that candles are necessary in the organ loft, and in front of 
 the Archbishop's throne. There are but few persons present, 
 perhaps not a hundred in the whole of the vast edifice. A 
 subterranean passage connects the Cathedral with the Archbishop's 
 palace, and near this we patiently wait for the procession. At length, 
 between eight and nine o'clock, the front of the procession begins 
 to surge up from underground, headed by the magnificent jewelled 
 crucifix of great antiquity, preserved with the rest of the 
 Cathedral treasure. Then come chanters and sub-chanters, 
 acolytes and thurifers, and the twelve old men, dressed like 
 bakers in white frocks fastened round the waist, and with flat 
 white caps upon their heads. They are for the most part fine 
 men, with long grey beards, and plenty of self-confidence. Then 
 a pause ; then priests, deacons, and officers of the Archbishop's 
 household ; and then, bearing himself like an Emperor, came the 
 Archbishop himself. No King, First Consul, Viceroy, Emperor, or 
 Sultan could possess a more magnificent mien and carriage, or be 
 more becomingly dressed. Imagine a fine man, who understands the 
 nature of a processional pace, and who moves with a steady, even^ 
 and dignified gait ; imagine him clothed in fine linen, and in a 
 flowing robe of purple silk, carried by a train-bearer ; above the 
 robe a cape of ermine, upon which rests a crucifix of gold ; at the 
 back the robe looped up by a gold tassel, so as to reach the collar, 
 and divide the ermine into two parts, and beneath the cape, simple 
 sleeves of white linen — imagine all this, and you will have some 
 idea of the Archbishop. We could not help thinking that this 
 simple but rich dress of white linen, purple silk, and ermine, just 
 relieved with two simple ornaments of gold, was infinitely more 
 becoming than the gorgeous dress in which an Archbishop 
 celebrates High Mass ; jewelled mitre, cope of cloth of gold, lace 
 sleeves, embroidered silk gloves, and so on. A crowd of Mon- 
 
The Church of S. Ambrogio. 23 
 
 signori followed the Archbishop, who was conducted to a faldstool 
 (somewhat like that at which the Pope is kneeling in Eaifaelle's 
 "Miracle of Bolsena") in front of the altar; after kneeling for a 
 few moments he left the choir, and was conducted to a side chapel, 
 where the priests formed a square about him, and the service 
 began. The service was very long, and we could not stay to the 
 end, but no doubt it was conducted in the same manner as the 
 corresponding office in Eome, which has been often described. 
 The old men sat alone in the choir ; the silver vessels were 
 exposed on an illuminated altar. A most striking effect was 
 produced by going into the darker portions of the Cathedral and 
 looking at the circumscribed highly illuminated space immediately 
 surrounding the Archbishop. The effects of light and shade Were 
 wonderful ; the Chiaro-oscuro would have delighted Rembrandt, 
 and the masters of his school. The singing was rather good ; the 
 organ loft, almost in darkness, was illuminated by a few large 
 candles for the singers ; a priest stood at one extremity to watch 
 the ceremonies below, and give notice to the organist when to 
 commence. The faces of the singers — now in dark shadow, now 
 in bright light, now in a demi-tint, at one time animated, at 
 another at rest — formed a wonderful picture. 
 
 The oldest church in Milan is S. Ambrogio, which was founded 
 by S. Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, in the fourth century, on the 
 ruins of a temple dedicated to Bacchus. The front of the church 
 dates from the ninth century, and is enclosed by arcades, under 
 which are preserved a number of old monuments and tombstones. 
 It was here that S. Ambrose closed the gates of the church against 
 the Emperor Theodosius after the massacre of Christians in 
 Thessalonica, and compelled him to undergo a public penance — a 
 very daring act for a Churchman in the fourth century. Three 
 Saints are buried in the church, SS. Ambrose, Protasius, and 
 Gervasius. The Mosaics in the Tribune are very fine, and are 
 earlier than those of S. Mark's, in Venice. Of the remaining 
 
24 Milan. 
 
 seventy-eight churches of Milan but few deserve any notice : — S. 
 Lorenzo, for its antiquity ; S. Alessandro, for its costly decora- 
 tions ; and S. Maria della Grazia, in the convent of which latter 
 church is still to be seen that great glory of Milan, the Cenacolo 
 — Leonardo da Vinci's "Last Supper." This wonderful picture, 
 which is familiar to every one in the form of an engraving or 
 oil-copy, is unfortunately in a very bad state of preservation, but 
 several old copies of it still exist, and give one a good idea of 
 what the original must have been. 
 
 Milan possesses some good pictures in the Brera, or Palace of 
 Arts and Sciences. Among others, RafFaelle's "Marriage of the 
 Virgin," Francia's "Annunciation," and Mantegna's " Saints." In 
 the same building there is a collection of 170,000 volumes and 
 1000 MSS. One of the finest collections of MSS. in Italy exists 
 in the Bibliotheca Ambrosiana, founded by Cardinal Frederic 
 Borromeo in 1609. Here there are 15,000 MSS., many of them 
 being holographs of celebrated Italians : Petrarch, Tasso, Galileo, 
 Leonardo da Vinci, S. Carlo Borromeo, and others. Among them 
 is a large folio volume completely filled with notes and drawings 
 by Leonardo, who was at once eminent as a painter, sculptor, 
 engineer, musician, mathematician, and man of science, and who 
 was at least a century in advance of his time. 
 
 Milan possesses the finest hospital — the Ospedale Maggiore — 
 we have ever seen in any city. It contains 6000 beds, and is 
 consequently nearly ten times larger than the largest London 
 Hospital. Architecturally it is a magnificent and very ornate 
 building of red terra-cotta, and it contains no less than nine 
 courts, the first of which is surrounded by arcades. 
 
 Milan is the musical centre of Italy, and a singer is scarcely 
 recognised at any of the Italian Operas of Europe who has not 
 first satisfied the critical Milanese. The Milan School of Singing 
 is resorted to by almost all those who intend to make music 
 a profession ; there are at least four celebrated masters who 
 
Career of a Proinising Singer, 25 
 
 can command almost any price for their lessons, and who have 
 pupils from all parts of the world. Again, singers have been 
 known to pay the director of La Scala large sums of money for 
 permission to appear on his stage. The fortune of a singer who 
 has appeared at La Seala and has pleased the Milanese is made, at 
 least in Rome, London, Paris, and St. Petersburgh. The English 
 and French impresarii are always glad to announce a new singer 
 as "from the Teatro della Scala." 
 
 The career of a promising singer is frequently of this nature. 
 He enters the Conservatorio of some small but musical town, such 
 as Bologna or Parma, where the fees are very low. He makes 
 considerable progress, and after a few years of really arduous 
 study under very competent masters, he appears at the Apollo 
 Theatre at Rome. Fairly successful here, he passes on to the San 
 Carlo in Naples, then perhaps to the Pergola in Florence, and thefi, if 
 he has had the good fortune to have succeeded, he appears at La Scala. 
 This is the turning-point of his professional existence ; if he finds 
 favour with the Milanese, he may be a happy man for the rest of 
 his life ; there is London, Paris, Vienna, and St. Petersburgh before 
 him, and an enterprising impresario soon hears of him, and 
 engages him for a season of forty nights, for a sum upon which he 
 can live in luxury for the rest of the year, and the very interest of 
 which would more than have sufficed for his expenditure while a 
 student in the Bologna Conservatorio. There is a bright prospect 
 in the future ; a long vista ended by a pretty villa near his native 
 city, or in the environs of Paris, if he prefers to follow the 
 example of many of his eminent countrymen — Rossini among the 
 rest ; or if the singer be a lady, there are the chances of marrying 
 a nobleman, after the manner of Patti and Lucca, or at least of 
 marrying a rich husband. Also the pleasure of being described as 
 prima donna assoluta, and of having showers of flowers, and 
 adulation and applause, rained down upon her head. Often 
 she will receive more substantial results, expressed by such 
 
26 Milan. 
 
 paragraphs as the following : — " Tlie Emperor of Eussia, at the 
 conclusion of the Opera, presented to Mdlle. Soprano a bracelet set 
 with diamonds and pearls. The gifted singer will start in a few 
 days for London, w^here we understand she has been engaged by- 
 Mr. Gye for the season, for a sum of 100,000 francs." But there 
 is another side to the question : suppose that our singer fails to 
 please the Milanese critics — suppose that she is heartily hissed at 
 the end of her first song, and that the audience laugh audibly at 
 her acting (and the habitues of La Scala never hesitate to go to 
 such extremes), then she is doomed — doomed for the rest of her 
 life to wander over the face of the earth from one theatre to 
 another, a seconda donna or less : Bertha in II Barhiere, a 
 " damigella della Kegina " in II Flauto Magico, Eudige in 
 Guglielmo Tell. 
 
 Although, as we have stated, Milan is the musical centre of 
 Italy, and a singer has to get her diploma at La Scala, it is 
 notorious that you ordinarily hear worse singing at the Italian 
 Opera in Milan than you hear either in Paris or London. The 
 reason is obvious. The Milanese do not offer their singers so large 
 a salary as the English or French managers, consequently the 
 successful singer, having used La Scala as a ladder leading to 
 fortune, climbs to the uppermost rung, lands herself safely at the 
 top of the musical and histrionic tree, and kicks over the ladder. 
 II Direttore, il Impresario, il Segretario, and all the other officials, 
 may go down on their knees and beg the new prima donna to 
 stay, the signorina points to her draft of agreement with the 
 English impresario, and reminds the officials that she has a living 
 to make and has worked hard for it. Thus the regular staff of La 
 Scala is far less efficient than that of Covent Garden or the 
 Italiens. We suppose the salaries offered by the Milan Director 
 would be less than one-quarter the salary offered in England, 
 France, or Russia. In the Gazetta Musicale of Milan, we noticed 
 an offer of IGOO lire (nearly £64) a-year for a competent and able 
 
First Night of a New Opera. '^7 
 
 musician to direct the services in the Metropolitan Basilica of San 
 Marco in Venice. In this same journal a long list of names was 
 given of different singers oj)en for engagements after such and 
 such a date, in this fashion : — Jacobo Campanella, baritone, buffo 
 singer, has sung at the Pergola, and Carlo Felice ; after June 
 2nd, address, &c. 
 
 We surely must not blame the Italians because their operatic 
 performances are inferior to our own, when we tempt away their 
 best singers by the offer of large salaries. The principal musicians 
 in this country are Italians. Not to mention the great influx 
 (even down to the chorus) which takes place at the commence- 
 ment of the Italian Opera season, we have many located amongst 
 us, for instance Costa, who undertakes the management of the 
 principal musical performances in this country — Her Majesty's 
 Opera, the Sacred Harmonic Society, various Provincial Festivals, 
 &c. We can afford in this country to give a great star more than 
 a hundred pounds for one night's performance, in Russia they do 
 more than this, and in America even more. 
 
 AVe were fortunate in being present in La Scala on the first 
 night of a new opera, Viola Pisani ; founded on Lord Lytton's 
 Zanoni, and composed by the Maestro Perelli. The latter is a 
 young and poor musician, who has shown considerable talent, and 
 has received the patronage of a rich merchant in Milan, wdio, 
 anxious for the success of his protege, and confident of his talent, 
 agreed with the Director of La Scala to make good any loss, 
 should loss occur ; and the lio-htino; alone of the laro-est theatre in 
 Europe costs a heap of money, to say nothing of principal singers, 
 second singers, chorus, conductor, orchestra, prompter, scene-painter, 
 music-copyist, and so on down to the sub-assistant scene-shifter. 
 Let us look at the libretto before we listen to the opera. The adapter 
 of the novel to the opera still speaks of " Sir E. Bulwer," forgetting 
 that he was created a Baron in 1866 ; he calls his opera a 
 " dramma lirico-romantico," and gives a very brief sketch of the 
 
28 • Milan. 
 
 plot, from which one is led to infer that the whole opera has been 
 adapted from about half-a-page of the novel. Among the singers 
 there is not a single name we recognise : — " Clarenzo Glyndon 
 giovane ingiese" is taken by Signor CamjDanini Italo ; we had 
 lately in England, at Her Majesty's Opera, a Signor Italo 
 Campanini. This inversion is curious, but operatic names are often 
 inverted, or invented altogether : Miss Charlotte Scales shows 
 talent for singing, is sent to Italy for a year, and returns — the 
 butterfly escaped from the larva condition, as Mdlle. Carlotta 
 Scalessi ; nay more, Mr. Thomas Firkin, a sturdy basso of great 
 promise, who does not go to Italy at all, appears at a concert at 
 Hackney Wick as Signor Ferdinando Acquapendente. But to 
 return to La Scala ; after the list of actors, a full page of small 
 print is given of the various persons concerned in the production 
 of the opera, beginning with Maestro Concertatore e Direttore per 
 le Opere, and ending with the barber and bootmaker. Between 
 these extremes we find the names of the principal musicians. One 
 thing is very noticeable ; the Director appears in every instance 
 to have secured the services of the very best authorities on each 
 particular subject ; no doubt the very bootmaker has taken out a 
 patent. The Master of Declamation in the Eoyal Conservatorio is 
 engaged, so also is the Professor of Perspective in the Poyal 
 Accademia. The Collahoratori are mentioned, and the costumier, 
 and the florist, and the gasman ; and these no doubt are each at 
 the head of a staff" of men, for as many as four hundred people are 
 sometimes concerned in the representation of a great opera, 
 including of course nearly a hundred musicians. 
 
 But we are tired of looking at the book ; the big theatre (said 
 to be capable of holding 4000 persons) is nearly full ; the 
 musicians have done tuning their instruments, the conductor and 
 prompter are in their places ; the time has arrived, and the 
 orchestra commences the overture. Meanwhile we are thinking 
 of the happiness, mingled with intense anxiety, of the young 
 
First Night of a New Opera. 29 
 
 Maestro Perelli, sitting perhaps somewhere hidden in a box, with 
 the generous old merchant, who thinks of the full house, and 
 the opera, and his money-bags perhaps about to be lightened. 
 Can any delight, says somebody — perhaps Holmes — be so intense 
 as that of a violinist playing his own compositions on a perfect 
 instrument ? We would also say, can any excitement — a first 
 game at roulette, a first charge in battle, a first novel, a first sight 
 of the Pyramids — be so altogether glorious as this which the old 
 merchant afi'orded to the young maestro ? A great performance, 
 in a great theatre, in a great city, in the presence of the artistic, 
 literary, and fashionable cream of a highly cultivated community ; 
 an operatic apotheosis. This little heap of manuscript, wrought 
 out in the dead of night, practised in the morning, altered at mid- 
 day, examined, refined, developed, thought about, always — this 
 little roll of paper has, like a magic scroll, evoked the appearance 
 of orchestra, chorus, the descending series from the director to the 
 bootmaker, and the vast audience. Could more be done for 
 S. Cecilia herself? Surely, Master Perelli, this must be the 
 proudest and most anxious moment of your life ! The overture 
 is received coldly ; no applause ; audience rather restless ; people 
 entering the house late. A good deal of introductory recitative ; 
 several airs are sung ; the house is without emotion. Clarenzo, 
 near the end of the first act, sings a long air ; the people hiss ; the 
 Master Perelli shudders ; the merchant claps his hand on his 
 pocket and thinks of the Maremma Eailway (at 63^). Act 2 has 
 commenced ; the singers know their parts well, and do their best ; 
 they bear admirably with the audience ; a song is loudly hissed 
 while the singer is in the middle of a phrase, he does not blench ; 
 perhaps he is used to these solemn sacrifices. The Milanese seem 
 happy enough ; they seem to enjoy the discomfiture of the singers 
 much as the Spaniards laugh at an awkward bull-fighter who is 
 only a little gored. The merchant is biting his lip. The Master 
 Perelli is praying to his patron saint, and vowing a little censer of 
 
30 Milan, 
 
 silver if the next act passes without a hiss. And what of il 
 Maestro Concertatore e Direttore? He is sipping some black 
 coffee, he does not care, perhaps he thinks Perelli a young 
 upstart, and thinks of the glorious days when Rossini wrote and 
 Tamburini sano-. And what of il Maestro Direttore ed istruttore 
 del Cori f He is an old hand at these matters, and has that song 
 from the Sonnamhula " All is lost now" running in his ears. The 
 ship has struck ; it is now only a matter of time. The third and 
 fourth acts are loudly hissed, other signs of disapprobation are 
 rudely shown ; no one has been ajjplauded, no scene has been 
 applauded, the curtain falls for the last time, amid hisses ; no one 
 is called before the curtain. The Master Perelli is in tears, ay, 
 crying like a child ; and the kind-hearted old merchant pats him 
 on the shoulder and tells him to be comforted, and we hope one 
 of his argosies will return from the East laden with unwonted 
 treasures, to recoup him for his generosity in the cause of art. 
 And we are fain to remind the Master Perelli that at least one of 
 the most popular operas of the day was hissed off the stage the 
 first night. 
 
 After the opera came a really splendid ballet (Le due Gemelle) 
 which lasted more than an hour, and was finer than any ballet we 
 ever saw, either in Paris or London. The Milanese applauded 
 this ; a week before they had hissed Lohengrin. They appear to 
 like lively, bright, catching themes, which can be listened to for 
 awhile, and taken up again at any time, rather than severe 
 philosophical compositions, which requii-e the undivided attention, 
 and which, compared to the others, are as "Paradise Lost" or the 
 " Purgatorio" to a collection of vers de Societe. The Milanese like 
 to use their Opera House as a kind of salon, and to discuss the 
 affairs of the day, and exchange the courtesies of life at other 
 times than between the acts. No wonder, therefore, that they 
 prefer the elegant, light, infinitely harmonious themes of Bellini, to 
 the more formal, severe, and philosophical compositions of Wagner. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 VERONA, PADUA, VENICE. 
 
 Verona — The Scaligers — S. Zenone — Padua — Its University — Giotto's Chapel — A 
 Procession in Padua — Venice — The Piazza of S. Mark — The Basilica of S. Mark — 
 High Mass on Easter Sunday — Church Music in Italy — Music at 
 S. Mark's — Churches of Venice — Murano. 
 
 KOM Milan we went to Verona, one of the most 
 
 charming old towns of Northern Italy. Every one 
 
 who goes to Italy ought to visit Verona, if only for 
 
 the sake of Romeo and Juliet ; but there are other 
 
 reasons why it should be seen. When places lie 
 
 out of the direct highways of commerce, changes come to 
 
 them but slowly, and they preserve their integrity much 
 
 longer than cities which are the residence of the Court of 
 
 the country, or centres of art and commerce. AVe certainly 
 
 felt that we were really in Italy, much more thoroughly 
 
 in Verona than in either Turin or Milan. 
 
 The most prominent structure in Verona is the Amphi- 
 theatre, erected under Diocletian, in 284 a.d., and capable 
 of containing 27,000 spectators. It is in a good state of preservation, 
 and stands in the very centre of the town. Not far from this is 
 the Herb Market, the buildings surrounding which have not been 
 altered for centuries ; or, if altered, have been simply restored in 
 their original style. This was once the site of the Forum of the 
 Republic. 
 
32 l^erona, Padua, Venice. 
 
 For many years Verona was governed by the Scaligers, whose 
 wonderful tombs now form a conspicuous object near the centre of 
 the town. They were erected in the thirteenth century, and the 
 most considerable of them consists of a fine sarcophagus, covered 
 by a canopy, and surmounted by an equestrian statue of Can 
 Signorio Scaliger, Verona ceased to be a separate Eepublic in 
 1405, when it was conquered by the Venetians, and held by them 
 till it was captured by the French General, Massena, in 1796. 
 Afterwards it was occupied by the Austrians, and finally became 
 a part of United Italy in 1866. It is the second city in Venetia. 
 
 Verona has many churches, but none of them are of much 
 interest or imjDortance, with the exception of S. Zenone, a 
 Romanesque basilica of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, with 
 a campanile of the eleventh century, and cloisters with slender and 
 delicate columns, which are asserted to have been restored as early 
 as 1123. S. Zenone was a Bishop of Verona and a patron saint of 
 fishermen ; he is represented in the choir of the church by a 
 crudely painted marble statue, holding an Episcopal stafi", and also 
 a fishing-rod with a silver fish on the end of it. S. Anastasia is 
 also a fine edifice. 
 
 We entered by chance a church in Verona dedicated to our 
 own S. Thomas of Canterbury, and there witnessed a rather curious 
 performance. The church was empty, but a vesper service was 
 going on, and a few priests stood in front of the high altar, one of 
 whom was most lustily chanting some verses alternately with the 
 choir. The latter, and the only instrument — a harmonium — 
 were placed behind the altar, and were quite out of sight. This 
 arrangement produced a most slovenly service, musically considered, 
 for the harmonium-player sometimes did not begin in time, and 
 som^etimes began too soon. The priest, who evidently enjoyed the 
 sound of his own voice, frequently indulged in ad libitum passages. 
 He would lenojthen out the last word of a verse with various 
 embellishments ; or he would execute an elaborate passagio 
 
■a 
 
Curious Performmice. 
 
 33 
 
 chromatico, and introduce as much Jioriture as he conveniently 
 could on the spur of the moment. Meanwhile, the harmonium- 
 player, who did not know the priest's treatment of this or that 
 particular passage, sometimes interrupted by commencing the next 
 verse, together with the choir, before the priest could bring his 
 
 HOUSE OF THE CAPULETS. 
 
 improvisation to an end. The effect of this was disastrous, nay 
 more — ludicrous. Two courses only were left open to the priest 
 — he could either stop abruptly, or he could rush headlong down 
 the scale, and prepare for the next verse. 
 
 Near the Herb Market is the lofty, bare, and cold-looking 
 
34 Verona, Padua, Venice. 
 
 house of Juliet's parents ; the armorial hat of the Capulets is still 
 to be seen over one of the doors. The tomb of Juliet is shown in a 
 garden belonging to a Franciscan Monastery. It is a great trough 
 of red marble, and was probably originally a water trough. There 
 is no authority for calling it the tomb of Juliet, but as everything 
 connected, even remotely and by name only, with the history of 
 that unfortunate young lady is interesting, everybody goes to see it. 
 
 Another sight should not be missed in Verona, the Giardini 
 Giusti, on the left bank of the Adige ; for not only will the visitor 
 obtain from it a good view of the town, and of the Alps and 
 Apennines, but he will also see some cypress trees more than a 
 hundred feet high, which are said to be five hundred years old. 
 
 On the way from Verona to Venice one cannot avoid stopping 
 at Padua, a quaint old town of Venetia, best known perhaps by its 
 University, which was founded in 1238. When Harvey studied 
 at Padua in the sixteenth century, the University possessed 
 18,000 students, and it still has a considerable reputation as a 
 legal university. The only church of any importance is the 
 Basilica of S. Anthony. The Arena Chapel, a small mortuary 
 chapel erected in 1303, contains Giotto's celebrated frescoes,. painted 
 in 1304. It is difiicult to believe that some of the better preserved 
 of these frescoes are more than 550 years old. The west wall is 
 occupied by a single painting representing the Last Judgment, in 
 which it is supposed that some of the figures were suggested by 
 Dante, who visited Giotto in 1304. Some of these frescoes are 
 being reproduced by the Arundel Society, and it is to be hoped 
 that good copies will be taken of all of them before it is too late. 
 
 We were surprised between seven and eight o'clock one 
 morning in Padua to notice a long procession of priests and 
 attendants walking through the streets. A large wooden crucifix 
 was carried at the head of the procession ; then came a number of 
 men in short surplices carrying large candles, then a priest dressed 
 in full canonicals carrying the Viaticum under a canopy supported 
 
A Religious Procession. 35 
 
 by four men, tlien more men in surplices carrying candles, then a 
 number of men in their ordinary dress carrying candles, and lastly, 
 school children and the usual accretion of idle bystanders. They were 
 lustily singing a low wailing chant. The bystanders knelt on the 
 pavement as the priests passed. The procession soon halted at a 
 very dark and mean blacksmith's shop, and the priest with one or 
 two attendants entered. He was carrying the Viaticum to dying 
 persons. When he entered a house the whole procession knelt, and 
 remained kneeling in the open road (for they walked in the middle 
 of the street), until he returned. The effect of all the lighted 
 candles in bright, hot sunshine was curious. Although there was 
 scarcely a breath of wind, the mere fact of movement in the open 
 air made the candles gutter extravagantly, until they began to 
 assume all sorts of monstrous forms. Men walked by the side of 
 the large candles (which were three or four feet long, and four or 
 five inches in diameter), carrying large paper cones to collect the 
 dripping wax, by the sale of which they no doubt hoped to realise 
 a few centesimi. Some of the candle-bearers purposely carried 
 their candles at an angle of about forty degrees, by which means 
 the guttering was of course considerably increased. One of the 
 collectors of wax had certainly a pound of wax in his paper cone. 
 
 Such processions through the main streets of a town can only 
 take place in quiet out-of-the-way towns like Padua ; in a town 
 with any life or traffic they would be impossible. In Florence, for 
 example, the matter is managed in a far less formal manner. A 
 man goes in front loudly ringing a bell, probably to warn people to 
 clear the road, then follow two or three men in the habit of monks, 
 then the priest with the Viaticum, over which a kind of gilt 
 umbrella is carried. The priests are always at the service of the 
 poor ; a soul in distress is sure to find solace at their hands ; they 
 are always ready to lighten the journey of one who is about to die, 
 and their services are in constant requisition in every Itahan town. 
 Whatever a man may have been during life, if he has nedected 
 
36 Verona, Padua, Venice. 
 
 confession and the offices of the Church, and been otherwise a 
 notorious evil-liver, he seeks for priestly advice and consolation at 
 the last, "when the keepers of the house tremble, and the strong 
 men bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, 
 and those that look out of the windows are darkened;" and that 
 consolation is never denied. 
 
 From Padua to Venice the distance is short ; the marshes 
 begin near Mestre, and you cross over to the city by means of a 
 long, low railway, built on piles. A smooth-gliding and noiseless 
 gondola takes you to your hotel, and your bedroom looks out upon 
 a narrow street of water. There is always a peculiar charm about 
 placid waters ; the aspect of Nature becomes changed in their 
 midst, the lights are far more changeful, and the reflections far 
 more multiform than we are accustomed to on dry land. It takes 
 a day or two to get used to Venice, but then if you have only 
 bright sunny days and moonlight nights you obtain a thousand 
 effects of novelty and beauty. Among these must surely be 
 reckoned the sight of a sunset over the lagoon from the Campanile, 
 and a view of the Doge's Palace, by moonlight, from the lagoon. 
 
 The centre of life in Venice is the Piazza of S. Mark, which is 
 not altogether unlike the Palais Royal in Paris. It is surrounded 
 on three sides by lofty houses, the lower parts of which are shops or 
 cafes, while on ' its east side stands the Cathedral of S, Mark, in 
 front of which the three lofty masts which once bore the banners 
 of Candia, Cyprus, and the Morea still stand. 
 
 The Basilica of S. Mark's is altogether oriental in its magnifi- 
 cence. It is in the form of a Greek cross, and upon the extremity 
 of each arm rises a dome, while a larger central dome crowns the 
 whole. The domes are covered internally with mosaics, some of 
 which date from the tenth century ; the floor is of marble mosaic, 
 and the whole interior is rich with gilding, bronzes, and variegated 
 marbles. On the outside of the building, and over the principal 
 entrance, are the celebrated bronze horses, which were formerlv 
 
o 
 
 > 
 
 
 O 
 
 Hi 
 
 P 
 
 w 
 
High Mass in S. Mark's. 37 
 
 believed to be the work of a Greek master, but are now believed 
 to be Eoman, and probably of the time of Nero. It is probable 
 that Constantine caused them to be conveyed to Constantinople, 
 whence they were brought to Venice by the Doge Dandolo, in 1204. 
 They were carried to Paris by Napoleon, in 1797, and were restored 
 to Venice in 1815 by the Emperor Francis. There are some 
 comparatively recent mosaics over the doorways on the outside of 
 the building. The Treasury of S. Mark is very rich in relics, 
 among other things a silver column containing some of the true 
 cross, a portion of the skull of S. John, and a crystal vase 
 containing the blood of our Lord. 
 
 We were anxious to see whether the services in the Cathedral 
 corresponded to the splendour of the building, and as we were in 
 Venice on Easter Sunday, we determined to go to the High Mass 
 at 11 A.M. There had apparently been services from a very 
 early hour, and the Basilica was tolerably full of people, who 
 stood in different parts of the building (for there are but few 
 seats in Italian cathedrals) ; a few had penetrated into the 
 choir, and had found seats between the screen and a railing 
 enclosing the high altar and the stalls of the priests. While 
 waiting for the Patriarch we had leisure to remark the high altar, 
 a magnificent work of wrought bronze covering; the relics of S. 
 Mark ; the Pala d'oro behind the altar, a broad surface of jewelled 
 and enamelled gold ; the throne of the Patriarch ; seats and stalls 
 for the Monsignori and other priests ; and an altar for the Patriarch 
 opposite his throne, on which were placed four mitres of cloth of 
 gold, three of which were jewelled ; a gold ewer and basin, gold 
 salvers and anointing vessels ; several books bound in old silver 
 bindings, white shoes and stockings, and other things, all for the 
 exclusive service of His Eminence. 
 
 A slight commotion in the body of the church proved that the 
 procession was making its way to the choir, and a moving mass 
 of red could be seen in the distance ; a few minutes after, the cross- 
 
38 Verona, Padua, Venice. 
 
 bearer entered the choir; then chanters and other officials, then 
 four laquais de place, body- servants of the Patriarch, then 
 Monsiguori ; finally, Joseph Louis, Cardinal of Treviso, Primate of 
 Dalmatia, and Metropolitan, himself. He was clothed from head 
 to foot in crimson silk, and had a long train carried by a train- 
 bearer. The service immediately commenced. And here we were 
 struck by what we invariably noticed in Italian churches, viz., 
 that the service had apparently no reference to the people ; the 
 priests had met together to perform ceremonies and worship, but 
 no part of the service was directed to outsiders ; ninety-nine people 
 out of a hundred could certainly not hear what was going on in 
 the choir, and eighty per cent, of the people (at a guess) could 
 not see. The priest appears to worship for, not with the 
 people ; in Florence we saw a large body of priests (in Santa 
 Maria Novella ?) celebrating vespers in their stalls behind the high 
 altar, and therefore out of sight of the people in the church, who 
 indeed did not number a dozen. Often and often one may enter 
 a church in Italy and find several priests lustily chanting a service 
 by themselves, and to themselves. In the Cathedral of Pisa we 
 saw a large body of ecclesiastics, who celebrated High Mass among 
 themselves, and formed several processions to various side altars, 
 apparently for their own edification ; the people in the Cathedral 
 did not appear to take much interest in the matter. But to return 
 to the Easter-day service : not only did the priests appear to be 
 performing the service for their own behoof, but half the service 
 appeared to consist of adoration of the Patriarch, or something very 
 akin to it. He was approached on bended knees ; when they took 
 ofi" his gloves they reverently kissed them, placed them on a gold 
 salver, then upon his altar; whenever they bowed to the high 
 altar they turned and bowed to the Cardinal also ; they frequently 
 knelt before him and poured water over his hands from the golden 
 ewer into the gold basin, both of which were replaced upon the 
 Cardinal's altar, together with the fine linen towel with which he 
 
High Mass in S. Mark's. 39 
 
 had wiped his hands. Various attendants having brought the 
 white shoes and stockings from the altar, a kneeling Monsignor — 
 without his mitre — drew on the holy hosen, fastened them, and 
 then put on the sacred shoon. The Cardinal's mitres were often 
 changed, his red robes were covered with great vestments heavy 
 with cloth of gold. At intervals he read, in a nearly inaudible 
 voice, from a book held before him ; occasionally he placed his 
 hands together and said Pa-a-ax Voheescoom. Meanwhile several 
 of the Monsignori — there were nine present — notably those in the 
 more backward stalls, entered into conversation in fairly loud sotto 
 voce; the musicians and singers in the gallery behaved as 
 indecorously as men in their position (just above the Cardinal) 
 well could ; the visitors talked and craned their necks ; the natives 
 in the body of the church talked, spat loudly on the mosaic pave- 
 ment, and women tried to hush their screaming babies. The four 
 laquais de place sat behind the Cardinal's altar within the 
 railings ; they had no books, they made no attempt to follow the 
 service, but looked about them in a vacant sort of manner, 
 simply star-gazing. These are the things as we saw them, 
 and as such are stated merely as facts ; not to be viewed in 
 any spirit of ridicule or severe criticism, for the time has 
 happily passed when a man may deride the faith and worship 
 of another. We question whether we have any right to speak 
 jocularly of the many-armed idol of the Chinese, or of an African 
 fetish, though it be fashioned ever so crudely out of wood and 
 stone. AVe speak here of a Church which was once our own. 
 
 When the preliminaries were finished, the Cardinal approached 
 the high altar and knelt before it, while one of the Monsignori 
 removed his mitre, and another his small red skull-cap, not 
 otherwise removed. Then he celebrated the office of the Mass, 
 while the people in the church, being warned by the ringing of a 
 bell, knelt. After this the service was practically at an end, some 
 of the priests left the church, others, to the number of about eight. 
 
40 Verona, Padua, Vejuce. 
 
 followed the Cardinal into a capacious circular pulpit, where he sat 
 down in a great gilt chair, and read aloud (apparently to himself, 
 for his voice was very feeble, and he never looked up), from a large 
 book, for at least an hour. The Monsignori about him looked 
 edified, and some of the people crowded round the pulpit, but he 
 was quite inaudible at a short distance. And this was the 
 termination of the service. 
 
 So much for the ceremonial part of the service ; let us now 
 enquire whether the music was equal to the place and to the 
 occasion. 
 
 Let us be pardoned here if we make a slight digression in 
 regard to Church music in Italy, before we arrive at the special 
 case of the Easter-day music at S. Mark's. And firstly, let us 
 very briefly trace the history of Church music. We know 
 practically nothing of the music of the ancients. The forms of 
 their instruments are indeed preserved. One of the best Egyptian 
 frescoes in the British Museum, which dates from the fifteenth 
 century B.C., represents a musical entertainment in which flutes 
 and other instruments are used ; on a monument in Rome which 
 was brought from Egypt by Augustus, an instrument resembling a 
 Neapolitan guitar is to be found ; and Hermes Trismegistus is said 
 to have invented the lyre. The Greeks attributed the invention of 
 several of their musical instruments to the Egyptians. Although 
 we know that the ancients possessed a musical system, we know 
 nothing of that system, save from the vague accounts given by 
 Vitruvius, ApoUodorus, and a few other writers. Here and there 
 we can obtain scraps of information relating to the instruments, 
 such as the account of the addition of the seventh string to the 
 lyre, the high price of a good flute in the time of Pericles, and so 
 on, but no more. Of the ancient arts, poetry and sculpture alone 
 remain to us ; music and painting have been almost lost. We say 
 almost, because certain musical instruments were found in Pompeii, 
 and the very numerous wall decorations show us that the ancients 
 
Modern Music. 41 
 
 were by no means deficient in the art of painting. When we 
 remember how wonderfully the Greeks excelled in the two former 
 of these, it is reasonable to imagine that their music and painting 
 were equally great. Dr. Burney has remarked that religion only 
 can impart permanence to any system of music : he conceives, 
 moreover, that the hymns sung in the temples in the time of 
 Plutarch were then relatively of the same antiquity as some of the 
 oldest hymns of the Roman Catholic Church are now. 
 
 With the disappearance of the old gods came the disappearance 
 of the wonderful temples erected to their honour, the sculptures 
 which visualised them, the paintings which adorned their shrines, 
 the magnificent poetry in which they were addressed, the music 
 which formed a part of the ceremonies of worship. 
 
 It is to Italy that we must look for the birth of our modern 
 music. There the Church once did its best to give permanence to 
 the musical system, and fostered musical talent to the same extent 
 that it fostered painting. For a number of years all music was 
 sacred : the finest musician and the finest painter were alike 
 secured for the service of the Church, as they should still be, and 
 to some extent, and in some countries, still are. A plain chant of 
 the Catholic Church is said to have been composed in the fourth 
 century by S. Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan. Two centuries later, 
 Gregory the Great composed some of the chants which still bear his 
 name, and introduced Gregorian music into the services of the 
 Church. The music of Italy of course became the music of the 
 Roman Catholic world. So early as 1310 a book of sacred songs 
 (now preserved in Florence) was in existence. The most notable 
 event in the early history of music was the designation of the 
 sounds of the octave by points or marks distributed upon lines 
 and spaces, a scheme suggested and introduced in 1022 by Guido 
 of Arezzo, a Benedictine monk. He also introduced the names 
 Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, Sol, La, and took them, it is said, from a hymn 
 sung on S. John's day which commences : — 
 
42 Verona, Padua, Veiiice. 
 
 Ut queant laxis resonare fibris, 
 Mix'A. gestorum /amuli tuorum, 
 SolwQ polluti ^abii reatum. 
 /S'ancte Johannes. 
 
 The Si was afterwards added by Le Marie, and was taken from 
 the initials of the words of the last line. 
 
 The progress of the art in Italy cannot be traced here ; we 
 may allude, however, to several notable facts in its history, simply 
 to show that it owes its earlier and much of its later develop- 
 ment to Italian genius. In the year 1330 a treatise appeared 
 on counterpoint, in which are certain laws strictly observed even 
 in the present day. We remember also to have heard of a later 
 treatise, De falso Contrapuncto, which profoundly influences 
 music ; but we must confess to having forgotten the name of the 
 author — certainly an Italian. Then near the end of the fifteenth 
 century the " Terminorum Musicse Diffinitorium" of John Tinctor, 
 the first precise treatise on music, was published, followed a few 
 years later by the treatise of Gafi'orio. In the sixteenth century 
 appeared Palsestrina, who united melody and counterpoint, and 
 who established a school of music which was very generally 
 followed. He was the author of no less than eighty masses. 
 A few years ago a mass of Palaestrina's was employed for the 
 Easter Sunday service in S. Eoch, at which church the finest 
 musical services in Paris are to be heard. The anxiety of the 
 public to hear the mass was excessive, and the crowding and 
 pushing in the church altogether unseemly in a place of worship, 
 but the music was not liked, and the revival has not been 
 re-attempted. We need scarcely allude to more recent Italian 
 composers : Pergolesi, Paisiello, Cherubini, Pacini, and many others. 
 
 Although the Germans have excelled in several forms of 
 composition, and many seek for the " music of the future " far to 
 the north of Milan, no one denies that the Germans received their 
 music fiirst from Italy, and that the greatest composers of all 
 
Mtisic in S. Mark's. 43 
 
 countries have received their first ideas of music more or less 
 directly from that source. 
 
 It being admitted then that Italy is the parent of modern 
 music, and that the art owes its chief development to the fostering 
 care of the Church, we should surely expect to hear fine Church 
 music there in the present day. Nothing can be more disappoint- 
 ing. The Church music of Italy is generally quite unworthy 
 of the edifice in which it is performed, the service which it 
 professes to interpret, and the people who desu-e to use it as an 
 auxiliary to the Church ceremonies and their own acts of worship. 
 This is the more remarkable when we notice that no expense is 
 spared in the decoration of the edifice and the vestments of the 
 priests. A church may be encrusted with verde antico ; it may 
 contain fine paintings, marble statues, vessels of rock crystal, a 
 painted roof, an altar of chiselled gold; the vestments of its 
 priests may be heavy with precious metals and embroideries ; it 
 may possess priceless chalices, cinque-cento crosiers, and pastoral 
 staves covered with Limoges enamel ; but the Mass you hear on a 
 high day may be badly sung to the strains of a small organ 
 altogether out of tune. 
 
 Let us take as an example the Easter Sunday service in 
 the Church of S. Mark, of the ceremonies attending on which 
 service we have spoken above. The musical arrangements 
 are of this nature : on each side of the chancel, right and left of 
 the high altar and about fifteen feet above it, there is a gallery 
 containing an organ, in front of which musicians playing violins 
 and violoncellos, and the singers, sit. At the approach of my 
 Lord Cardinal, the conductor (in the left hand gallery) rapped 
 loudly with his baton, and the organ and musicians forthwith 
 began rather irregularly. There seemed throughout to be no 
 communication between the manager of the ceremonies in front of 
 the high altar, and the conductor of the music above ; on one 
 occasion, when the organ began to play in the middle of some 
 
44 Verona, Padua, Venice. 
 
 solemn office, a priest was obliged to look up and loudly say 
 "hssssh." Between the conductor and the organist in the right 
 hand gallery there appeared to be absolutely no communication, 
 and the only way of stopping the organ when necessary was to 
 rap loudly two or three times with the baton. The conductor (who 
 during any intervals of leisure laughed and talked with the singers 
 around him) had a very peculiar mode of directing his choir ; he 
 never varied his system of three strokes, twice he rapped loudly 
 on a projecting ledge apparently placed for that purpose, then he 
 elevated his baton, thrust it forward with a waving motion, and then 
 followed two more raps and another wave. This lasted through- 
 out the entire service. What music there was, w^as utterly spoilt 
 by this continuous and loud rapping : perhaps the conductor 
 thought it would make the music more spirituelle, but it did not 
 appear to have that effect. "^^ The singing was not good. The 
 singers and musicians made no attempt to preserve the most 
 ordinary decorum when they had nothing to do. During intervals 
 in the Mass, when, for example, His Eminence was washing his 
 hands or putting on vestments, the organist played popular 
 operatic pieces — not the prayer from Masaniello, or the march 
 from Le Prophete, but light pieces, which, for aught we know, 
 may have been serenades. When the service was about half 
 over, the musicians and singers hurried away, and left the 
 organist alone, who, having lost his mainstay, the conductor, 
 appeared to play whenever he pleased ; at least the service often 
 
 * This unpleasant addition to a musical performance is more or less common 
 throughout Italy, but it would seem to be specially indulged in at Venice. Goethe, 
 writing from Venice in 1786, says : — "The performance would have been a source 
 of great enjoyment if the accursed maestro di capella had not beaten time with a 
 roU of music against the grating, as conspicuously as if he had to deal with school- 
 boys whom he was instructing. As the girls had repeated the piece often enough, 
 his noise was quite unnecessary, and destroyed all impression, as much as he would, 
 who, in order to make a beautiful statue intelligible to us, should stick scarlet 
 patches on the joints. The foreign sound destroys all harmony." 
 
The Campanile of Venice. 45 
 
 went on without having any regard to the music, and the 
 organist returned the compliment by playing without any reference 
 to the ceremonies around him, except of course at certain 
 well-marked parts of the service. Altogether the whole affair was 
 so carelessly managed, that one could but regret that any music 
 had been introduced at all. 
 
 We hope the time will come when the Italians will endeavour 
 to make their Church music something like what it once was. We 
 wonder whether the Patriarch of Venice has ever seen Gide's 
 picture, "The Practice of the Choir," or Rubio's picture of 
 "Palsestrina repeating the Mass of Pope Marcellus." We 
 recommend them to the notice of His Eminence, and we would 
 also ask him to remember that Adrian Willaert was Mcestro di 
 Capella of his metropolitan Church of San Marco ; that he founded 
 the Venetian School of Music, and numbered among his followers 
 Rore, Zarlino, and Costanza Porta. 
 
 Nearly opposite to the Basilica of S. Mark rises the great 
 Campanile of Venice, a tower 304 feet high, which is ascended by 
 means of a winding inclined plane. The view from the summit 
 well repays the tedium of the ascent. The Palace of the Doges, of 
 fourteenth century Venetian- Gothic, is a building adorned with 
 many columns and rich mouldings outside, while within, its 
 numerous chambers are full of the finest examples of the Venetian 
 School of Painters. The Palace is connected with the State 
 prisons on the east side by the famous Bridge of Sighs. Venice 
 contains a capital gallery of pictures, in which, among others, is 
 without doubt one of the finest pictures in the world : Titian's 
 "Assumption." The churches are very numerous, and some of 
 them, such as the Gesuiti, are rich beyond description — altar 
 pieces by Titian and Tintoretto, spiral columns of verde antique, 
 walls inlaid with variegated marbles, and fine monuments of gilt 
 bronze. 
 
 A pleasant afternoon may be spent in Venice, if the day be fine, 
 
46 
 
 Vero7ta^ Padua^ Venice. 
 
 by taking a gondola from one end to the other of the Grand Canal, 
 and distinguishing the various palaces on its banks. Another 
 afternoon may be devoted to Salviati's glass-works on the Island 
 of Murano, where one not only sees the manufacture of his 
 beautiful imitations of old Venetian glass, but also a museum 
 containing some rare specimens of the antique glass. As we 
 returned from Murano we saw a curious hearse-shaped gondola 
 gliding towards an island full of cypress trees. It was a funeral 
 barge on its way to the Cemetery Island, for no burials are allowed 
 to take place within the city. Still nearer to the city we heard 
 most piercing shrieks and wails long continued, painfully rending 
 the still air about us ; our gondolier said that we were passing 
 the madhouse of Venice. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 BOLOGNA, FLORENCE, PISA. 
 
 Bologna — Tlie University — The Leaning Towers — Florence — Art Collections — 
 The Baptistery — The Duomo — Santa Croce — The Monastery of S. Mark — 
 Savonarola — Galileo's Tower — The Memorial to Galileo — Pisa — The 
 Cathedral — Galileo's Lamp — The Baptistery — The Leaning Tower — 
 
 The Campo Santo- 
 
 -The Dream of Brother Angelo. 
 
 '^^/f HE railroad from Venice to Bologna passes through 
 Ferrara, which was long governed by the cele- 
 brated House of Este, one of the most ancient 
 and noble families in Europe. There are some 
 f^^ good pictures in the town, and the Castle is a most 
 picturesque mediaeval building. As we approach 
 Bologna, the low marshy ground, which prevails more 
 or less between Venice and Ferrara, gives way to a 
 fertile tract of country, in the midst of which Bologna 
 stands. Few cities of the earth have had such 
 enduring vitality as Bologna. It was founded by 
 the Etruscans, and during the Punic War we find 
 it espousing the cause of Hannibal. It was con- 
 stituted a free town by Charlemagne, and has always been 
 celebrated as a learned and literary city. Its University, 
 which still flourishes, is one of the oldest in the world, 
 and was founded in 1119, according to some authors at a much 
 earlier date. The University has always been celebrated for the 
 study of jurisprudence and of anatomy. It now possesses one of 
 
48 Bologna^ Florence^ Pisa. 
 
 tlie finest anatomical museums in the world, and it is said that 
 the anatomy of the human frame was first taught here in the 
 fourteenth century. In the University we were shown the portrait 
 of a lady who for many years lectured with great eclat on anatomy. 
 She is said to have been in every respect a most cultivated and 
 accomplished woman, and to have possessed great personal 
 attractions. Bologna has also numbered among its professors a 
 lady (Tambroni) who lectured on Greek, and another (Laura Bassi) 
 who was Professor of Mathematics and the Physical Sciences. 
 Here are facts for those who advocate the rights of woman ! 
 The University once possessed 10,000 students, but at that 
 time universities were far less common than they are now. It 
 now possesses about 400 students and sixty professors. The 
 buildings are very complete, and comprise a fine Library and a 
 Museum of Antiquities. Associated with the University there is a 
 Hospital, Collection of Natural History, Botanical Garden, and 
 Observatory, and it is one of the most complete educational 
 establishments in Italy. 
 
 In art Bologna was as prominent as in literature and science. 
 It has given its name to the Bolognese School, and has produced 
 Francia and the Caraccis, who in their turn were followed by 
 Guercino, Guido Eeni, and Domenichino. The town possesses 
 some magnificent specimens of the works of these artists in 
 its Academy of Fine Arts. The gem of the whole collection, 
 however, is Raffaelle's " S. Cecilia." 
 
 Bologna, like many other of the Italian cities, was for some 
 centuries governed by the heads of various powerful families ; 
 in 1512, it was annexed to the States of the Church by Julius II. 
 From that time, until (in 1859) it united itself with the Kingdom 
 of Italy, it has undergone several changes of government, and has 
 been 'the scene of various revolutions. 
 
 In Bologna the traveller feels himself in old Italy. The town 
 is full of quaint old buildings, palaces, churches, and towers, and 
 
The Leaning Towers. 49 
 
 the streets are lined on either side by long rows of arcades, under 
 which the citizens find protection from the scorching summer sun. 
 The very numerous churches contain a number of good pictures. 
 There are said to be 130 churches in the city ; in an English city 
 of the same population the number would certainly not exceed 40. 
 
 Near the centre of the town stand the two Leaning Towers — 
 Asinelli and Garisenda. The latter was erected in 1110, and 
 although only 138 feet high is 8 feet out of the perpendicular; 
 while the former is 272 feet high, and is only 3 J feet out of 
 the perpendicular. The view from the top is good, but the ascent 
 is made by a series of very rickety wooden staircases, and we never 
 felt less secure in a lofty building. One of these days, if a number 
 of people go up at once, it is to be feared that an accident will 
 take place. The obliquity of the towers is due, in both instances, 
 to the settling of the foundations, and in the case of Garisenda 
 this took place so rapidly that the tower was never completed. 
 
 Between Bologna and Florence the railway crosses the 
 Apennines, and although the ascent is long, and slow, the scenery 
 is a great relief after the monotonous level of the district between 
 Venice and Bologna. Florence rests in a valley enclosed by the 
 Apennines, and the beauty of its position has rendered it one of 
 the most attractive towns in Italy. Between 1864 and 1870 it 
 was the capital of the United Kingdom of Italy. It is a very 
 modern-looking city compared with Padua or Bologna, and during 
 the years that it was the capital it underwent a good deal of 
 renovation. Florence dates from the first century B.C. It 
 attained its greatest prosperity and splendour under the de 
 Medicis, and it has always been the great focus of the arts and 
 sciences, of literature and languages, indeed of every form of 
 intellectual activity in Italy. The mere mention of the names of 
 some of the men who worked their life's work in Florence will 
 prove this : Dante Alighieri, first and foremost, Boccaccio, 
 Machiavelli, Galileo, Orcagna, and Brunelleschi, Ghiberti and 
 
 6 
 
50 
 
 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 Michael Angelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Fra Angelico, and Savonarola. 
 In fact, if the Renaissance was the gift of Italy to Europe, we may 
 say that it was first the gift of Florence to Italy. Painters, poets, . 
 statesmen, men of science, churchmen, men of letters, sculptors, 
 musicians, men possessing to the highest extent those faculties 
 which most ennoble the human race, and most conduce to an 
 advanced and exalted civilisation — such men congregated at the 
 Court of the Medicis. 
 
 Florence is full of works of art, many of which have been 
 rendered familiar to us for many years by means of engravings 
 or photographs. The two great galleries, the Uffizi and the Pitti, 
 are not only filled with fine pictures, but they contain some 
 
 remarkable masterpieces of an- 
 cient and modern sculpture, and 
 a rare collection of precious gems 
 — vases of onyx, rock crystal, 
 and lapis lazuli, vessels of 
 chiselled and jewelled gold, in- 
 cised stones, and bassi-relievi in 
 gold and jasper. Many of these 
 were collected by the Medicis. 
 One of the most celebrated of 
 the saloons in the Uffizi contains 
 the famous group of Niobe and 
 her children, found in Rome in 
 1583, and acquired by Cardinal 
 Ferdinand de Medici. The 
 figures are believed to be antique 
 copies of works by Praxiteles or 
 Scopas. 
 
 The Baptistery is a somewhat 
 plain octagonal structure, dating perhaps from the thirteenth century. 
 Its magnificent bronze doors are justly celebrated all over the world. 
 
 NIOBE. 
 
O 
 
 w 
 
 o 
 
 fa 
 
Churches of Florence. 51 
 
 The first door, which is the oldest of the three, occupied Andrea Pisauo 
 twenty -two years. The others are by Ghiberti, and were finished 
 about a century later. They are among the finest specimens of 
 bronze work that have ever been produced. In the interior of the 
 Baptistery there are some old mosaics, and the tomb of Pope 
 John XXIII., with a recumbent statue by Donatello, The 
 Baptistery possesses an altar and cross of polished silver, which 
 together weigh 466 pounds. The Cathedral of Florence is some- 
 what disappointing inside, owing perhaps to its darkness ; the 
 proportions are very good, however, and Brunelleschi's dome is a 
 model of architectural skill and beauty. The fagade of the 
 cathedral is still unfinished. From the summit of the dome a 
 beautiful view of the surrounding country may be obtained. The 
 Campanile, commenced by Giotto in 1334 and recently restored, is 
 a square tower containing four stories, and reaching to a height of 
 293 feet. The lower part is richly decorated with statues and 
 bas-reliefs, and alternate bands of variegated marbles are frequently 
 introduced into the structure. 
 
 Conspicuous among the churches of Florence is the Santa 
 Croce, which is its Westminster Abbey, and contains the tombs 
 of many of the most eminent Florentines, or monuments 
 erected to their memory. Michael Angelo is buried here, and 
 there are monuments to the memory of Dante, Galileo, Leo 
 Baptista Alberti, Alfieri, Machiavelli, and many others. The 
 church also contains some remarkable frescoes by Giotto, recently 
 discovered under the whitewash. The Church of S, Lorenzo, 
 facing the Piazza of S. Lorenzo, and near the centre of the town, 
 is one of the most ancient churches in Italy, having been 
 consecrated by S. Ambrose in 393. It was burned down, however, 
 in 1423, and was subsequently erected from the designs of three 
 of the most eminent Italian architects — Brunelleschi, Michael 
 Angelo, and Donatello. The Sacristy contains the world-renowned 
 monuments of the Medici, which are considered the chef dJ ceuvres 
 
52 
 
 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 of Michael Angelo. They were erected by the order of Giulio de 
 Medici (Pope Clement VIII.) in 1523. 
 
 MIOriAKL ANOELO. 
 
 Memorials of Michael Angelo meet one at every turn in 
 Florence. His city is justly proud of him. Mrs. OHphant speaks 
 of him as "the greatest Florentine master, he who stands alone 
 among the crowd, exceeding all, as his gigantic statues tower over 
 all other works, alone at once in greatness and in individuality."'"" 
 
 The four marble figures — Day and Night, Evening and Da.wn — 
 
 * u 
 
 The Makers of Florence," 1876. 
 
Monastery of S. Marco. . 53 
 
 are among the finest of modern sculptures, and may be compared 
 without disadvantage with some of the finest sculptures of antiquities. 
 Near to this Sacristy is the Chapel of the Princes, in which six of 
 the Medici are interred. It is a most gorgeous structure, encrusted 
 with marbles and mosaics ; the princes are buried in vast granite 
 sarcophagi, above some of which there are bronze statues. The 
 chapel is said to have cost the Medici family more than £800,000. 
 In the Church of S. Maria Novella there are also several fine private 
 chapels, which belong to the Strozzi, Gaddi, and other noble 
 families. 
 
 To our mind one of the most interesting places in all Florence 
 is the Monastery of S. Marco, in which lived Fra Bartolommeo, Fra 
 Angelico, Fra Girolamo Savonarola, and Sant Antonino. The cell 
 occupied by Savonarola is still shown, together with a few of his 
 books, and a picture representing his execution. The Florentines 
 burned their great Reformer one day, and the next almost worshipped 
 him. The custodian of S. Mark's heaped all sorts of epithets upon the 
 perpretators of the crime, when we asked him his opinion on the 
 subject. Villari, in his admirable Life of Savonarola, has given 
 us a very just estimate of his influence. " He was," he writes, 
 " the first to raise up and display before the world the standard of 
 that epoch which many call the Kenaissance. He was the first in 
 the fifteenth century to make men feel that a new life had 
 penetrated to and had awakened the human race. Hence he may 
 justly be called the prophet of a new civilisation. But whoever 
 would make him the head of a sect, of a system, would be greatly 
 mistaken, and would prove that he neither knew Savonarola nor 
 his time; The Renaissance was not yet modern civilisation, but 
 was only a presentiment of it ; it had a general character, but it 
 was undefined and undetermined. The men of that time foresaw 
 a new and more vast synthesis of the human race, and felt that 
 they were approaching nearer to God. The blood beat in their 
 pulses with feverish strength ; ideas followed each other with 
 
54 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 delirious rapidity ; tliey were subject to a power greater than 
 themselves, which launched them into an unknown ocean, to 
 discover a land unknown but divine. . . . Two Italians first 
 led the way to the epoch of the Renaissance. Columbus opened 
 the paths of the ocean. Savonarola began to open those of the 
 spirit. While one was ascending the pulpit, the other was 
 spreading his sails to the wind, and dashing his bold prow through 
 the waters of an unknown sea. Both believed themselves to have 
 been sent by God to spread Christianity over the earth ; both had 
 strange visions, which aroused each to his appointed work ; both 
 laid their hands upon a new world, unconscious of its immensity. 
 One was rewarded with chains, the other with a consuming fire." 
 
 Many of the cells in the Monastery of S. Mark contain paintings 
 by the loving hand of Fra Angelico ; sometimes we find frescoes of 
 Fra Bartolommeo, and in the small refectory there is a "Last Supper," 
 by Ghirlandaio. The first-named of these great painters is well 
 called II Beato Angelico ; his subjects were always taken from the 
 life of the Master he loved so well, and no painter has ever exceeded 
 him in a spirit of devoted piety and profound sympathy with all 
 subjects connected with the Christian faith. 
 
 A few miles out of Florence, at Arcetri, stands the Tower of 
 Galileo, which he used as an observatory, and from the summit of 
 which he made so many great discoveries. The new Florentine 
 Observatory is fittingly placed near to the watch-tower of the inventor 
 of the telescoj^e. On the way back to Florence, we passed the villa in 
 which Galileo spent the last years of his life, and in which Milton 
 visited him. Here we saw a bust of the great philosopher, with the 
 following inscription beneath it : — 
 
 2vv Qeio 
 
 Aedes qiias viator in tueris licet exiguas Divinus Galilseus Coeli maximus 
 spectator et Natiiralis Philosophise Eestitutor, sen potius Parens pseudoso- 
 phorum malis artibiis coactus incoluit ab anno 1631, Kal. Novembis ad 
 annum 1642, VI. idus Januarii. Huic Natura Concessit Loci Genium 
 Sanctum Venerare et titulum ab lo. Bapt. Clementi Nellio. 
 
Galileos Children. 55 
 
 Galileo spent the greater part of his domestic life at Arcetri. 
 It was by no means a happy home. Of his three natural children, 
 his son Vincenzio was a constant thorn in his side. He was a lazy 
 fellow, who was always writing to his father for money, and who, 
 Italian-like, preferred to idle away his life in singing and lute-playing, 
 to adopting any profession, or attempting to get his own livelihood. 
 We cannot find one good quality in Vincenzio Galileo ; he was 
 mean, selfish, inconsiderate and unnatural in his behaviour towards 
 his father. One example of this is sufiicient. He had quartered 
 himself on his father, together with his wife and children, when the 
 plague broke out in the neighbourhood ; whereupon Vincenzio 
 deserted the old man, and went to a more healthy locality, leaving 
 him to take his chance with the other inhabitants of the 
 district. Galileo's daughters Polissena and Virginia were placed in 
 the Convent of S. Matthew, at Arcetri, in 1614, when the eldest 
 was only thirteen years old ; henceforth they became Sister Maria 
 Celeste and Sister Arcangela. Of the latter we hear but little, but 
 Sister Maria Celeste constantly corresponded with her father, and 
 the greater number of her letters have been preserved, and are now 
 in the Palatine Library at Florence. These letters contain some 
 interesting details of convent life of the period, but of necessity 
 they do not bear upon many of the doings of the outside world ; 
 their general tenor is the same throughout ; they are full of her 
 love for Heaven and for her " dear lord and father," as she was 
 wont to call Galileo, and they almost invariably pass to an opposite 
 extreme of matters exceedingly of the earth, earthy — the baking of 
 cakes, the mending of linen, the getting up of his collars, and so on. 
 She tells her father all the minute details of her work, as — " I have 
 been extremely busy at the dinner-napkins. They are nearly 
 finished ; but now I come to putting on the fringe, I find that of 
 the sort I send as a pattern a piece is wanting for two dinner- 
 napkins : that will be four hraccia.^' The last paragraph of this 
 desultory letter begins, " These few cakes I send are some I made a 
 
56 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 few days ago, intending to give them to you when you come to bid 
 us adieu ;" and ends, "I thank Him for everything, and pray that 
 He will give you the highest and best felicity ;" and a postscript 
 immediately follows this — " You can send us any collars that want 
 getting up." 
 
 Galileo's villa was very near the convent, and a constant inter- 
 change of courtesy seems to have taken place ; Galileo sent money 
 and presents of meat and wine, while Sister Maria Celeste sent him 
 plums, and baked pears, and candied fruits, and cakes, and mended his 
 linen, and kept his wardrobe in order. Her love for him amounted 
 almost to worship, at least to veneration. When at length, worn 
 out by watching in the convent infirmary, by ill health, and by the 
 many privations inseparable from a convent life, she felt her end 
 approaching, Galileo was in confinement at Siena, and she feared 
 she should see him no more ; but he was allowed to retire to his 
 own house, and arrived at Arcetri in time to see his daughter 
 before her death. Writing of this time (1634), Galileo says: " Here 
 I lived on very quietly, frequently paying visits to the neighbouring 
 convent, where I had two daughters who were nuns, and whom I 
 loved dearly ; but the eldest in particular, who was a woman of 
 exquisite mind, singular goodness, and most heartily attached 
 to me." 
 
 Galileo continued actively employed to within a few years of 
 his death, in January, 1642. During his latter years he was a 
 great sufferer. " I have been in my bed for five weeks," he writes 
 to Diodati, in 1637, "oppressed with weakness and other 
 infirmities, from which my age, seventy-four years, permits me 
 not to hope release. Added to this, 'proh dolor ! the sight of my 
 right eye, that eye whose labours (I dare say it) have had such 
 glorious results, is for ever lost. That of the left, which was and is 
 imperfect, is rendered null by a continual weeping." Thus the 
 poor old man complained, until finding that his blindness was 
 incurable, and that his many ills were increasing, he ceased 
 
Memorials of Galileo. 57 
 
 repining, and begged his friends to remember him in their prayers, 
 till his unhappy chequered life was closed by death. 
 
 The Florentines fully recognise the greatness of the philosopher 
 of Arcetri : they have built him a shrine worthy of a saint ; in the 
 inscription on his house they call him Divinus Galilceiis ; and in 
 the shrine itself they have preserved, after the manner of a 
 saintly relic, one of his forefingers which was detached from his 
 body when it was removed from the chapel of SS. Cosmo and 
 Damianus to Santa Croce. This relic is preserved in a small 
 reliquary urn, upon the base of which is the following inscription 
 written by Thomas Perelli : — 
 
 " Leipsana ne spernas digiti quo dextera coeli 
 Mensa vias nunquam visos mortalibus orbes 
 Monstravit, parvo fragilis molimine vitri 
 Ausa prior facinus cui non Titania quondam 
 Suffecit pubes congestis montibus altis 
 Ne quidquam superas conata ascendere in arces." 
 
 Again we have Via Galileo and Bihlioteca Galileina. The 
 Pisans point with pride to the Lampada Galileina in their 
 Cathedral, and honour his statue in their University ; and these 
 are the descendants of the men who paid Galileo tenpence a day 
 for his services in the University ; who made him abandon his 
 professorship because he proved that Aristotle was not infallible ; 
 and who said derisively to his followers — " Ye men of Galilee, why 
 stand ye gazing up into heaven ?" or, as Ponsard has it — 
 
 " Ecoutez ce que dit 1 Apotre : Dans les deux 
 Pourquoi Galileens, promenez-vous vos yeux ? 
 C'est ainsi que d'avance il lancait Tanath^me 
 Contre toi, Galilee, et centre ton systeme." 
 
 The Tuscan Memorial to Galileo is in Florence, in the Museo di 
 Fisica e di Storia Naturale. It is entirely the work of Tuscans, 
 and is said to have been constructed at a cost of 1,000,000 lire 
 (nearly £40,000). It consists simply of a vestibule, from which 
 
58 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 opens a small rectangular hall, witli a semicircular tribune, in 
 which is placed the statue of Galileo by Prof. Costoli. The 
 interior of the hall is entirely lined with white marble, and with 
 frescoes in admirable taste. The frescoes in the vestibule represent 
 Leonardo da Vinci in the presence of Ludovic Sforza, Duke of 
 Milan, to whom he is making known some of his great inventions. 
 Apropos of this, there exists in the Ambrosian Library, in Milan, a 
 large folio full of MSS., notes, and drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, 
 which the courteous director of the library is always willing to 
 place in the hands of interested strangers, and which well repays the 
 most careful examination. Some of the sketches of hydraulic 
 apparatus appeared to us to be worthy of minuter study than they 
 seem to have received. Opposite the fresco described above is one 
 representing Volta explaining his invention of the pile to the members 
 of the French Institute, in the presence of the first Consul 
 Napoleon, and I^agrange. In the vestibule are also placed marble 
 medallions of Leo Baptista Alberti and Baptista della Porta. A 
 fresco in the hall, by Bezzuoli, represents Galileo lecturing in Pisa 
 on the laws of falling bodies. This is a really striking and well- 
 conceived painting : Galileo in his professional toga stands by the 
 long inclined plane, showing his results to his colleague, Mazzoni. 
 In the foreground is a professor in a monastic habit, kneeling near 
 the inclined plane, and counting the time of descent of the falling 
 body by the beats of his pulse. Young students are pressing 
 round Galileo, in order, if possible, to aid him in his experiments ; 
 while on another side the Aristotelian professors are looking on 
 with derision, and searching in vain the writings of the Peripatetic 
 for explanations of the new facts. In the background appear the 
 Cathedral and the Leaning Tower. The whole conception is noble 
 and spirit-stirring, and one longs for a similar treatment of other 
 great discoveries in science — such as Davy discovering potassium, 
 Faraday obtaining the first magneto-electric spark, and magnetising 
 a ray of light. The opposite painting represents a meeting of the 
 
The Galileo Memorial in Florence. 59 
 
 Accademia del Cimento : the patron of the Society, the Grand 
 Duke Ferdinand II., is eagerly watching an experiment which is 
 being made by Eedi, Viviani, and Borelli, on the apparent (to them 
 real) reflection of cold by a parabolic mirror. One of the rough 
 spirit thermometers recently invented by the Academy is placed 
 at the focus of the mirror, and a block of ice is used as the source 
 of cold. 
 
 The three frescoes in the Tribune immediately around the 
 statue of Galileo represent three notable events of his life : in the 
 first he is seen intently watching the swinging of a lamp in the 
 Cathedral of Pisa ; in the second we see him in the act of presenting 
 his telescope to the Venetian Senate ; and in the third he is 
 represented as an old man, in his house at Arcetri, dictating the 
 geometrical demonstration of the laws of falling bodies to his 
 disciples Torricelli and Viviani. On the arch above the stgitue, the 
 astronomical discoveries of Galileo — the Italians claim for him the 
 Milky Way, the Nebula of Orion, the Phases of Venus, the 
 Mountains of the Moon, the Satellites of Jupiter, the Solar Spots, 
 and the Ring of Saturn — are pourtrayed very efiectively on 
 a blue ground. Bas-reliefs in marble on the pillars of the arch 
 represent his terrestrial discoveries — these are said to be the 
 Pendulum, the Hydrostatic Balance, the Thermometer, the 
 Proportion Compass, the Keeper of Magnets, the Telescope, and 
 the Microscope. Beneath the frescoes and around the statue are 
 niches, containing some of Galileo's instruments, his telescope, an 
 objective made by the astronomer himself, a proportion compass, 
 and a magnet, with a keeper which he constructed for it. 
 Immediately surrounding the statue we notice the busts of his 
 most celebrated followers, Castelli, Cavalieri, Torricelli, and 
 Viviani. In the hall there are six cases containing old apparatus, 
 chiefly that of the Academy of Cimento. The various thermometers 
 figured in the " Saggi di Naturali esperienzi" of the Academy are 
 here to be seen ; the vessels they used for showing the incompres- 
 
60 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 sibility of water ; hygrometers ; together with astronomical and 
 geodesical instruments. Here, also, is the large burning-glass 
 constructed by Bregaus of Dresden, employed by Averani and 
 Targioni in their experiments on the combustion of the diamond, 
 and afterwards used by Sir Humphry Davy. The various 
 inventions and discoveries of the Academy are shown in bas-relief 
 on the pillars of white marble. 
 
 The memorial is altogether worthy of the man, and of the fine 
 taste of the Florentines. It is, perhaps, the only sanctuaire 
 scientiJiquG which exists, but we may hope that the example 
 will be followed in this and other countries. The Milanese 
 have recently bought the collection of apparatus and the MSS. 
 of Volta (for a sum, we believe, of 100,000 lire) ; a suitable 
 museum for them will, no doubt, soon be fitted up. It is much to 
 be wished that Faraday's apparatus could be collected together in 
 one place, as a memorial to the man. 
 
 We have spoken above of the discoveries attributed to Galileo 
 by his countrymen. We are inclined to think that some of his 
 claims have been pressed too far ; but on such a subject an almost 
 endless controversy might be carried on, for we may remember that 
 even the invention of the telescope has been claimed for others of his 
 own countrymen (Antonio de Dominis and Baptista Porta), as well 
 as the Dutch ; and the invention of the thermometer has been attri- 
 buted to Cornelius Drebbel, Sanctorio of Padua, and others. But if 
 we put all this aside, Galileo still stands out pre-eminently as one of 
 the fathers of experimental philosophy : he did not create it, but he 
 introduced a taste for it, and enlarged it, and he possessed in an 
 eminent degree the true spirit of philosophical inquiry, the ardent 
 love of research, the " Provando et Riprovando" which the 
 Academy of Cimento adopted as its motto. 
 
 The journey from Florence to Rome carries one through some 
 interesting country. On either side of the railway, one sees at 
 intervals picturesque old Etruscan towns perched upon hills. The first 
 
From Florence to Rome. 
 
 61 
 
 important town is Arezzo, beyond which the railway passes through 
 the fertile valley of the Chiana. Till the middle of the eighteenth 
 century this valley consisted of an unhealthy marsh, perfectly useless 
 for purposes of agriculture. Its drainage was commenced by Torricelli 
 and Viviani, mathematicians of the seventeenth century, and pupils 
 of Galileo. But the work was not completed until the last century. 
 There can be no doubt that if the same system were applied to 
 thousands of acres of malarious land between Pisa and Rome, it 
 might be converted into productive soil, and small towns would 
 speedily, spring up in the midst of districts which are now all but 
 
 LAKE TRASIMENUS IX ROMAN TI.MES. 
 
 uninhabited. A little to the north of Lake Trasimenus stands 
 Cortona, which, like Arezzo and Perugia, was one of the twelve 
 confederate cities of Etruria. After leaving Cortona, the railway 
 skirts for some distance the shores of the lake, and then, turning a 
 
62 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 little to the west, follows its course to Rome by way of Cliiusi and 
 Orvieto, a short cross Hue which has only recently been opened. A 
 good view of Lake Trasimenus is obtained from the railway. Its 
 greatest breadth is about eight miles, and its circumference thirty. 
 The shores are prettily clothed with olive groves, and in some 
 directions are bounded by precipitous hills. It contains three 
 very picturesque islands, upon one of which there is a Monastery. 
 It reminds one a little of one of the Lakes of Killarney, but of 
 course of Killarney seen under very different aspects of light and 
 shade and weather than those which usually prevail on the humid 
 coast of Kerry. It was on the north-east shore of this lake 
 that Hannibal defeated Flaminius (b.c. 217), with the slaughter of 
 15,000 men; and the battle was thereafter known as the "Battle 
 of Lake Trasimenus.'* 
 
 A residence of many weeks is necessary in order to know 
 Florence thoroughly, and then the environs are so beautiful that 
 another week or two may be advantageously spent in exploriug 
 them. A short journey by rail takes us to Siena, Pisa, Lucca, or 
 Leoliorn, and the beautiful coast road between Pisa and Genoa can 
 easily be reached in a few hours. 
 
 In Pisa the four great gems of the town are set close together 
 in one corner — the Cathedral, the Canipo Santo, the Baptistery, 
 and the Leaning Tower — and it is really difficult to describe the 
 peculiar delight with which one makes acquaintance for the first time 
 with these old friends of our childhood. Pictures of the Leaning 
 Tower seem to be amonof our earliest recollections — whether as 
 nursery prints, or as pictures in our first reading-books. All the 
 rare beauties of the town are concentrated in one spot, and 
 it is well for them that they are in such good company, for each 
 one is so beautiful in itself that it does not suffer from being placed 
 in juxtaposition with its equally beautiful neighbours. The 
 Cathedral dates from the early part of the twelfth century ; it is of 
 white marble, and the fa9ade is adorned with four different tiers of 
 
Galileo s Lamp. 03 
 
 columns placed one above the other. Many of the columns in the 
 interior were taken from ancient Greek and Roman temples. 
 Within, the Cathedral contains a few good paintings and some 
 magnificent carvings. On one occasion when we were there High 
 Mass was being celebrated, and we were surprised to see to how 
 great an extent the officiating priests exceeded the worshippers. 
 The priests appeared to monopolise the service altogether ; it 
 apparently had no reference to the outside worshippers. The music 
 was very bad, and there were frequent processions round the aisles. 
 We were shown the Lampada di Galileo, a ponderous and ornate 
 lamp of bronze, which hangs from the ceiling, and is said to be the 
 work of Benvenuto Cellini. It is called Galileo's Lamp because it 
 is known that he discovered the isochronism of the pendulum by 
 watching the swinging of a lamp in this very cathedral. He 
 observed that the lamp was swinging backwards and forwards in a 
 given time, and that whether the space through which it swung 
 were large or small, (say) an arc of two inches or an arc of two feet, 
 it always executed its swing in equal times. After this discovery, 
 the pendulum was at once employed as a measurer and regulator of 
 time. W^e are very much inclined to believe that the lamp shown 
 as Galileo's Lamp is not really the one which led to the observation, 
 but that most likely one of the smaller lamps in the side aisles 
 was set swinging, and kept up its motion long enough for Galileo to 
 make the observation. 
 
 The Baptistery is of nearly the same date as the Cathedral ; it is 
 a beautiful circular buildino; with reliefs, and a number of columns 
 both inside and out. It contains a large stone pulpit, carved 
 by Nicola Pisano in 1260. The spherical surface of the 
 interior and the perfect form of the dome lead to a curious echo 
 within the building ; if a sound be produced, it is reverberated 
 backwards and forwards for fifteen seconds. The Campanile or 
 Leaning Tower was finished in 1350 ; it is entirely built of white 
 marble, and is eight stories high. The view from the summit, 151 
 
64 
 
 Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 feet above the pavement, is very good. The Tower is no less than 
 twelve feet out of the perpendicular, and it has often been wondered 
 
 whether this 
 is the result 
 of accident 
 or design. 
 There can be 
 little doubt, 
 we think, 
 that the ob- 
 liquity has 
 been pro- 
 duced by the 
 settling of 
 the founda- 
 tions, as in 
 the case of 
 the Leaning 
 
 Towers of 
 Bologna. 
 The upper 
 layer of the 
 Pisa Campa- 
 nile is not in- 
 clined to the 
 
 same extent as the lower stories, as if an attempt had been 
 made to compensate for the defective verticality of the rest of the 
 structure ; moreover, the largest bell, which weighs six tons, is hung 
 on the side of the tower remote from the overhamjino; side. 
 
 The Campo Santo of Pisa is certainly the most remarkable 
 and beautiful cemetery in Italy. It is enclosed by a long quad- 
 rangle of arcades, the sides of which, opening on the burial-ground, 
 are filled with open pointed windows containing delicate tracery. 
 
 BAPTISTERY OF I'ISA. 
 
The Canipo Santo. 65 
 
 Below, there are a number of carved tombs and monuments of all 
 ages — Etruscan, Eoman, Mediaeval, Modern. The ground in 
 which the dead rest was brought from the Holy Land. The 
 walls are covered with frescoes by some of the older masters. 
 Among these are the " Triumph of Death," attributed by some to 
 Orcagna ; " Hell," " The Last Judgment," the chief events narrated 
 in Genesis, perhaps by Buffalmacco, and various other scenes from 
 Old Testament History, by Benozzo Gozzoli. 
 
 The Campo Santo of Pisa is a place in which one loves to dream 
 day-dreams. Shut out from the noisy world, surrounded by the 
 dead of all ages ; weird, beautiful, solemn, and antique, the 
 environment is such that one feels altogether separated from the 
 busy life of men. The thoughts revert to the time, nearly 700 
 years ago, when Archbishop Ubaldo began the work ; one thinks 
 of the many generations of princes, poets, painters, philosophers, 
 and priests who have wandered beneath its arches, and slept 
 within its holy earth ; and one remembers its long placid existence, 
 through all the times of revolution and war, and the intestine feuds 
 of its rulers, for God's acre is always sacred. Our day-dreaming 
 ultimately took the form of the following little story, which we 
 have called— 
 
 THE DEEAM OF BEOTHER ANGELO. 
 
 During the Papacy of Nicholas V. there lived in the Convent 
 of S. Antonio, at Pisa, a monk called Brother Angelo, who was 
 renowned for his piety. He had entered the convent as a young 
 man, and had spent the best part of his life in it, ministering to 
 the wants of the afflicted and the poor, and performing the number- 
 less duties which belonged to every member of the Brotherhood. 
 When the day's work was done, he loved to wander in the Campo 
 Santo, which was close to the convent ; he would walk round the 
 cloisters again and again, admiring their beauty, sometimes looking 
 lower, and contrasting the old Eoman tombs and tablets with the 
 
6fi Bologna, Florence, Pisa. 
 
 monuments of more recent date ; lie would watch the cypress trees 
 in the green quadrangle, and bethink him that the loved ones over 
 whom they waved their branches rested in earth which was doubly 
 holy, for they rendered it holy, and it had been brought from the 
 summit of the mount, sacred in all ages to corqe as the scene of 
 the Divine Tragedy. Here, too, he would rest. He had selected 
 for his last home a corner of the sacred field opposite Orcagna's 
 great fresco representing the Dream of Life, the Triumph of Death, 
 and the Last Judgment. At this he would never weary of looking. 
 He would sit by the hour together, till daylight had darkened into 
 night, with his eyes fixed upon it in a kind of dreamy contemplation. 
 Now he would scrutinise the courtiers in the oranore grove, and the 
 dread w^inged figure of Death swooping down upon them with his 
 broad scythe, and then turn his gaze upon the group of halt and 
 maimed begging to be gathered in the same garner ; his eyes would 
 wander slowly over the whole picture until he could have reproduced 
 every detail of it from memory — the hunters stopped by the three 
 open coftins ; the dogs; the hermit milking a doe; the great-eared 
 rabbit in the background ; the chapel overshadowed by palm 
 trees, the monks peacefully following their occupations, and above 
 them all, the Condemned in the grasp of demons, and the Blessed 
 borne to their rest on angels' wings. 
 
 In such contemplation sat the Brother Angelo one evening as 
 the sun went down over the old city. The bells of the Leaning- 
 Tower were softly ringing in the night, and the dying sounds of 
 the Vesper Psalm — " Tu es spes mea, portio mea in terra viventium" 
 — exhaled from the Cathedral, were carried by the evening breezes 
 into the cemetery ; otherwise all was silent within the cloisters. 
 The monk was alone with his own thoughts. And he thousfht 
 how the bells would still be rinfrintx when ten generations of his 
 successors should have passed away ; how the same vesper service 
 would be chanted in the Cathedral by other voices in the centuries 
 to come : and how infinitely more evanescent was man than every- 
 
The Dream of Brother Angelo. 67 
 
 thino- else around him. He wondered, too, whether the world and 
 the race of men would be changed in the far-off future times ; when 
 the place of Nicholas of Sarzana would be filled perchance by a 
 Nicholas X. or a Leo XXV., Servus Servorum Dei. Thus the monk 
 sat thinkino" till the sun went down, and the vespers were ended, 
 and the bells had ushered in the night. Darkness and silence 
 rested upon the city ; the cemetery was very still, no bird of night 
 winged its dusky flight among the cypresses, only a faintly- 
 moanincr wind waved their branches to and fro with a dull muffled 
 sound. Yes, there was something else astir — surely the fresco had 
 started into life ! The courtiers made merry in the orange grove ; 
 soft music and sweet voices mingled with the gentle rustling of the 
 leaves; the oranges shone "like golden lamps in a green night ;" 
 the hermit milked the doe ; the big-eared rabbit hopped away from 
 the doo-s. the horses whisked their tails and stretched out their 
 necks ; the cripples cried La buona mancia, Frate, la huona 
 mancia ! the angels waved their wings ; but the figure of Death 
 stayed his scythe, and the demons ceased their torture, and no 
 flames issued from the abode of the Condemned. The living groups 
 then descended and dispersed themselves about the cloisters ; the 
 horses clattered on the pavement, the dogs barked ; the courtiers 
 were joined by a great throng of Popes and Cardinals, Princes and 
 Poets, Painters and Musicians, and courtly dames, who laughed and 
 talked, and told of Florence two centuries before. But as the monk 
 looked and listened, he heard all at once a dull beating sound, and 
 the air darkened — Death was on the wing, and the mowing had 
 commenced. The gay multitude, lately so full of vitality, were in a 
 moment levelled with the ground ; the last stroke of the scythe was 
 made, it would be the monk's turn next ; Death was flying towards 
 him, the scythe whistled through the air, its cold edge touched his 
 neck, and — he awoke, shivering to find himself in darkness, in the 
 dead of night. "I know," said he, "that I have been warned;" 
 Death requires me now, and has spared me a little while, that 
 
68 Bologna, Floyence, Pisa. 
 
 I may go hence and die among my brethren." So saying, the 
 Brother Anofelo returned to the Convent, and his brethren looked 
 upon him wonderingly, for his visage was changed, for lo ! he was 
 about to die. And he said " My brethren, farewell, I am going to 
 leave you ; bear me to the chapel and be with me while I pass the 
 dark river ; for already I see dimly the bright Land beyond," and 
 he sank into their arms, and became henceforth as one already 
 dead. 
 
 Then the monks carried him to the chapel and placed him upon 
 a low catafalque, with his head a little raised and turned towards 
 the high altar, upon which stood an uncovered monstrance. Lighted 
 candles were placed around the catafalque and upon the altar, 
 otherwise the chapel was in darkness, and the shadows retreated 
 into the surrounding gloom. The monks were in their places, the 
 Abbot and the priests stood on the steps of the altar ; and when all 
 was ready they began to chant a Miserere. At length the solemn 
 service of extreme unction was concluded, and the monks gathered 
 around their brother to sing a last hymn. At his head stood the 
 Abbot, at his feet a priest holding a monstrance upon which his 
 dying gaze might most fitly rest ; on either side there were monks 
 wavino- censers ; over his head one held a crucifix ; the others 
 knelt. Then the hymn began. But from the first the Monk 
 Anselo had been as one who is dead : his head had fallen back, his 
 eyes were closed, he was motionless even to his heart, and the last 
 hymn was drawing to a close : — 
 
 Christe, cum sit hinc exire, 
 Da per matreni me venire 
 Ad palmam victoripe — 
 
 sang the monks to an old, simple, solemn measure ; then the dying 
 man opened his eyes, and raised himself a Uttle, while a soft 
 indescribable glow seemed to surround his head, as he joined them 
 
The Dream of Brother Angelo. 
 
 69 
 
 in the hymn in a clear and wondrously sweet voice, so that his 
 brethren thouQ-ht it was the voice of an ano;el wlio had come to 
 meet his departing soul : — 
 
 Quando corpus morietur 
 Fac ut animse donetur 
 Paradisi Gloria. 
 
 and then the sweet voice was heard no more, and the monk fell 
 back into the arms of the Abbot, while his pure and most spotless 
 soul was borne on the wings of the ascending hymn to heaven. 
 "Amen," sano; the monks. 
 
 They buried him next day in his chosen ground, over against 
 the great picture. Where were now the waving orange trees, and 
 the prancing horses, and the cripples who cried for alms so lately \ 
 Figures on the walls only ; stony, motionless, dead, as we see them 
 now. But as the tearful Abbot said, ..." qui credit in Me 
 etiam si mortuus fuerit, vivet," . . , the figure of Death 
 seemed to fade out of the fresco, and the wings of the angels to 
 shine with an unearthly sheen. 
 
Kim^f^wxirvK:t»'trwf<>f',w?tf,r::Mr^r'%w\w^r'^rw^r\wnmm'Jtv»mM«m^ 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 ROME. 
 
 General Character of the City — Ancient Rome — The Surroundings of the Capitol — The 
 Coliseum — The Columbarik — The Castle of S. Angelo — S. Peter's — Other Churches 
 in Rome — Art Collections in Rome — The Study of Art — Rome as a Religious 
 Centre — The Roman Catholic Hierarchy — The Vatican Palace and its Inmates — 
 
 Complex Politics of the Church — The Attitude of the Church 
 
 in reference to Modern Progress. 
 
 city in the world has had so prolonged and 
 so famous a history as Eome. No city has more 
 profoundly influenced the destinies of the human 
 race. In no city can so much be found to interest 
 a cultivated mind. It is difiicult to know where 
 to begin, the old and the new in all things are so 
 strangely blended together. Structures which 
 were erected two thousand years ago stand next to houses 
 of yesterday. Here is a wall which was built five hun- 
 dred years before the Christian era, brought to light in 
 making the foundations for a new villa. Here is a Christian 
 Church which was built more than twenty years before 
 the birth of Christ ; and another which covers in its 
 lowest basement a temple in which Mithras once was 
 worshipped. Here S. Peter was imprisoned, there Jordano Bruno 
 was burnt. Here Christians fought with wild beasts ; there, in 
 the most magnificent and lavishly decorated fane in the world, 
 
< 
 
Ancient Rome. 71 
 
 silver trumpets sound and cannon blare at the supremest moment 
 of the Christian ceremonial. 
 
 As one enters Eome for the first time, the more prominent 
 facts of its history crowd themselves upon the mind, and produce 
 only a blurred and confused series of ideas, which require time for 
 their disentanglement. A city which can boast a long line of 
 C£esars, followed by a long line of Popes ; once a centre of 
 Paganism, long since the centre of a great faith. A city taken 
 and re-taken, built and re-built, by Etruscans and Eomans, Gauls 
 and Saracens, Goths and Vandals, Guelphs and Ghibbelines, 
 Neapolitans and Germans, French and Italians. And in turn 
 sending out soldiers to conquer Samnite and Carthaginian, Greek 
 and Macedonian, Parthian and Arabian, Gaul and German, 
 Neapolitan and Sicilian. Again, there is the whole modern 
 aspect of the Eternal City from the point of view of religion, 
 literature, art, and human progress. 
 
 It is perhaps preferable first to see what we can of the ancient 
 remains of the city, and thus endeavour to realise it in the 
 time of the Csesars. The old wall, which is very massive, and 
 nearly fifty feet high, entirely surrounds the city, and is twelve 
 miles long. It is pierced by twelve gates, of which the Great 
 Porta del Popolo leads to the north and east of Italy, while the 
 Porta S. Paolo is an opening on the south-west, leading to Ostia, 
 and the Porta S. Sebastiano is the gate of the Appian Way 
 leading to Albano and Southern Italy. Outside the walls the 
 country is in some directions very bare and desolate. You 
 pass through long stretches of malaria-stricken district ; or you 
 suddenly find yourself at the edge of a tract of low marshy 
 ground, recently flooded by the Tiber, and quite impassable, even 
 on horseback — a continuation of the Pontine marshes. 
 
 The Capitoline Hill was the central point of ancient Rome. 
 It is rendered conspicuous by the buildings upon it, rather than 
 by its own height, for it stands only 160 feet above the sea. A 
 
72 
 
 Rome. 
 
 beautiful view of 
 Rome may be ob- 
 tained from the sum- 
 mit of the Campanile 
 which now surmounts 
 the Capitol, and cer- 
 tainly one of the best, 
 if not the best, view 
 of the Forum and 
 Coliseum. The Piazza 
 of the Capitol has in 
 its midst a magnifi- 
 cent bronze statue ol 
 Marcus Aurelius, 
 which once stood in the Forum. It is flanked on either side by 
 palaces, the one the Capitoline Museum, the other the Palace of 
 
 THE CAPITOL. 
 
 THE 1-UKLlM, UtblOKLU. 
 
The Arch of Titus. 
 
 73 
 
 the Conservatori ; the former contains by far the most interesting 
 collection, and possesses some of the finest extant sculptures : among 
 others, the Dying Gaul, the Satyr of Praxiteles, and the Faun 
 of rosso antico, from Hadrian's villa. Many of the statues in 
 the Capitoline Museum are from the villas of Sallust, Antoninus 
 Pius, and Hadrian; others have been found from time to time 
 during the excavations of Rome. The Tarpeian Rock is near 
 the Capitol, and is now a most insignificant elevation ; if this 
 is indeed the Tarpeian Rock over which criminals were thrown, the 
 level of the ground beneath must have been considerably raised. 
 To the south-west of the Capitol are the remains of the great 
 Forum Romanum, which was once the centre of civil and political 
 
 ARCH OF TITUS. 
 
74 
 
 Rome. 
 
 life. On either side and at the end are the remains of temples or 
 other buildings — such as the Temple of Saturn, the Colonnade of 
 the Twelve Gods, the Temple of Vespasian, the Temple of 
 Concordia, and the Arch of Septimus Severus. Following the Via 
 Savia, the old pavement of which remains in good condition, we 
 
 ^ pass beneath the 
 Arch of Titus, taking 
 
 TABLE OF SHEW-BHEAD, ETC., ON ARCH OF TITUS. 
 
 of the captive Jews, 
 in which the Table of 
 Shew-bread and the 
 1 Seven-branched Can- 
 dlestick are repre- 
 sented. A little further we see on our right hand the well-preserved 
 Arch of Constantine, the sculptures on which were taken from a 
 triumphal arch which stood at the entrance to Trajan's Forum. On 
 our left hand is the Coliseum. 
 
 The Coliseum is undoubtedly one of the most imposing 
 structures in the world, but we are often led to imagine that it is 
 
 THE COLISETTM. 
 
The Coliseum. 
 
 & 
 
 quite the most imposing. This it assuredly is not. After looking 
 at the smaller but more perfect arenas of Aries and Verona, we 
 confess that we were somewhat disappointed at the first sight of 
 the Coliseum, although we saw it under very favourable circum- 
 stances — a clear moonlight night, on the first night of our first visit 
 to Kome. If we compare the impression which it produces upon 
 us with that of the Parthenon, the Pyramids, and Heidelberg 
 Castle, we are not quite sure whether we should put the Coliseum 
 last, or last but one. But it is necessary to remember that we do 
 not see much more than one-third of the building. The guide- 
 
 book statistics — to the eff"ect that it could contain 87,000 
 spectators ; that 5000 animals were killed in it during an hundred 
 days, and so on — really convey no idea at all to the mind. In its 
 present ruinous condition one cannot realise it as an arena nearly 
 so well as in the case of either of the amphitheatres before 
 mentioned, each of which contained nearly one-third as many 
 spectators as the Coliseum. The Amphitheatre of Aries is so 
 comparatively perfect that bull-fights are still held in it, and it 
 accommodates all the sight-seers of the town. The Coliseum^ on 
 the other hand, is quite ruined as to its interior, and requires to be 
 propped up by enormous buttresses as to its exterior. It is 
 dreadfully disfigured by the large holes which were cut in every 
 part of it during the Middle Ages, in order to extract the iron 
 clamps which formerly held together the blocks of travertine of 
 which the exterior is constructed. Let us, however, give the 
 Coliseum its due : the appearance of it from a neighbouring 
 elevation is very grand, and the fa§ade, which is more than two 
 hundred feet high, is really magnificent. Extensive excavations 
 have lately been made within the Coliseum, and they have brought 
 to light some of the arrangements for flooding the arena with 
 water ; indeed the works had to be stopped on account of the 
 quantity of water which accumulated, and the water had to be 
 pumped out day and night. An interesting ceremony took place 
 
76   Rome. 
 
 in the Coliseum a few years ago. The relics of S. Clemente, who 
 suffered martyrdom in the Coliseum, were carried in procession by 
 a large body of ecclesiastics from his church (hard by in the Via 
 S. Giovanni in Laterano), through the Coliseum, in token of the 
 triumph of the once despised faith, and of its permanence com- 
 pared with even such gigantic structures as the Coliseum itself. 
 
 The Palatine Hill is covered with ruins of the Palaces of 
 the Csesars, which are of comparatively little interest, but the 
 views of Eome which can be obtained from different sides of the 
 hill are interesting. Following the Appian Way from the south- 
 west corner of the Palatine, we soon come to a small street which 
 leads to the Baths of Caracalla. This must once have been a very 
 sumptuous building ; it had space for sixteen hundred bathers, and 
 was adorned with frescoes, mosaics, and statues. In the immediate 
 neighbourhood are the tombs of the Scipios, and in an adjacent 
 garden three well-preserved Coliimharia. These are deep square 
 subterranean vaults, the sides of which are perforated with pigeon- 
 holes (hcDce the name Columbarium), in which small cinerary 
 urns, often of clay, sometimes of marble, were placed. These 
 vaults were sometimes possessed by two or three separate families, 
 who deposited the ashes of their dead in different parts of the 
 structure, inscribing the name of the deceased on a tablet above 
 the pigeon-hole. Ordinary burial and cremation were for a long 
 period practised at the same time in Rome. In this quarter of the 
 city remains of ancient Eome meet one at every turn, and they are 
 described in detail in scores of books ; the remains of the ancient 
 walls, the house of Tiberius Claudius Nero, the porticoes of 
 Septimius Severus, the portico of Octavius, the Temples of Vesta 
 and of Fortuna Virilis, and the Cloaca Maxima, are a few of the 
 principal. Of the great Temple of Jupiter Stator, the foundation 
 of which was ascribed to Romulus, very scanty remains exist, 
 insufficient indeed to enable the antiquary to assert that they really 
 belonged to the old temple. 
 
CJOLUMBAKIUM. 
 
Castle of S. Angelo, 
 
 17 
 
 The most conspicuous monuments of mediaeval and modem 
 Rome are the churches, which are met with at every turn. Of 
 course S. Peter's claims the first notice among these, and it 
 generally receives an early visit from strangers. It stands on the 
 right bank of the Tiber, on the site of the very ancient Etruscan 
 city of Vaticum. On crossing the Ponte S. Angelo, we find 
 ourselves face to face with the Castello, formerly the tomb of 
 
 r" 
 
 
 IlliflliliP^ 
 
 I!,. 
 
 j>irv-t'J^..^.'ii''- ill" J 
 
 HADRIAN S TOMB, RESTORED 
 
 Hadrian. Here there is but little to detain us. It is a huge 
 cylindrical structure of travertine, which was once faced with 
 marble, and probably surmounted by a low cone of masonry, on 
 the apex of which was a statue of Hadrian. The empty niches for 
 the reception of the cinerary urns may still be seen in the centre of 
 the building. Many other emperors were deposited here. The 
 Goths converted the building from a tomb into a fortress, and it 
 has been used by many of the Popes in that capacity. A long 
 covered passage connects it with the Vatican Palace, and in times 
 of tumult Popes have sometimes taken refuge within its walls. The 
 castle was besieo;ed in 1527, in the time of Clement VII. There is 
 
78 Ro7ne. 
 
 little to be seen in it now. The view from the summit is very 
 fine ; and on the way thereto various dungeons are pointed out, 
 in one of which Beatrice Cenci was immured ; a torture chamber is 
 also shown, and various apartments used by the Popes. In one of 
 these there is a large wooden coffer, standing five feet high, which 
 a certain Pope left full of ducats. On emerging from the castle, 
 and walking in an easterly direction for a short distance, we come 
 to the Piazza of S. Peter's, surrounded by colonnades. The 
 columns are four deep, and on the roof of the colonnades there are 
 126 statues. The Egyptian monument in the centre was brought 
 to Rome by Caligula. It was erected in its present position by 
 Sixtus V. in 1586. A curious incident, which is often alluded to 
 in scientific works, occurred during the elevation of this enormous 
 mass of stone. It had not been foreseen that the strain on the 
 ropes would stretch them, and that allowance must be made for 
 this in the arrangement of the raising gear. Thus it happened 
 that, when the workmen had got to the end of their tether, it was 
 found that the column was not yet quite in a vertical position. A 
 sailor in the crowd, however, who knew that ropes shorten when 
 they are moistened, called out, "Moisten the ropes," and the 
 contraction thus produced enabled the 800 workmen to hoist the 
 obelisk into its proper position. The sailor, who lived on the 
 Riviera, near S. Remo, was rewarded by being allowed to provide 
 the palm-branches for the Palm Sunday services in S. Peter's, a 
 monopoly still enjoyed by his descendants. On each side of the 
 obelisk there is a fine fountain, and at the corners of the steps leading 
 to S. Peter's there are colossal statues. On the rioht the colonnade 
 leads to the Vatican Palace. The earliest Basilica of S. Peter is 
 said to have been erected by the Emperor Constantine. It was a 
 magnificently-decorated edifice containing a quantity of treasure, 
 and inlaid with mosaics. Many Emperors and Popes were crowned 
 in it, amonoj others CharlemaQ:ne, who received his crown from 
 Leo III. in 800. The old cathedral had fallen into a state of 
 
o 
 
 o 
 
 H 
 
S. Peter s. 79 
 
 decay by the middle of the fifteenth century, and had likewise been 
 damaged by fire. Pope Nicholas V. commenced the new building 
 in 1450, and it was continued by Julius 11. , Leo X., Alexander 
 Vn., and Urban VIII., under the charge of the most skilled 
 architects of the time, notably Michael Angelo, Fontana, and 
 Bernini. The church was finally consecrated in 1626, on the 
 thirteen-hundredth anniversary of the consecration of the original 
 edifice by Sylvester. It has from first to last cost nearly 
 £12,000,000 sterling. Cardinal Wiseman, in his essay on the 
 " Points of Contact between Science and Art," has given an 
 interesting account of the method which was adopted to strengthen 
 the dome. As early as the year 1681, it was noticed that large 
 cracks were beginning to show themselves in the dome, and these 
 increased to such an extent that it was feared that the whole 
 structure would fall in. The weight was calculated, and it was 
 found that the dome alone with its lantern weighed more than 
 55,000 tons. An ultimate calculation showed that the excess of 
 pressure against support amounted to 1674 tons ; and this had to 
 be compensated for at once, otherwise the complete ruin of the 
 edifice might be looked for. Large iron girders were braced round 
 the drum of the dome, and no further movement has been 
 apparent. 
 
 On entering S. Peter's we are at once struck by its great 
 magnitude ; people who are wandering about near the high altar look 
 quite small; and the canopy which covers the altar is nearly 100 
 feet high, but itself looks small until you are near to it. S. Peter's 
 has nearly twice the area of the Cathedral of Milan and S. Paul's 
 in London ; more than twice that of S. Sophia at Constantinople, 
 and nearly three times the area of the Cathedral of Cologne. 
 S. Peter's contains no less than forty-six altars, and nearly four 
 hundred statues. The interior is very rich ; rare marbles encrust 
 the walls and pillars ; marble medallions portray eminent Popes 
 and Saints ; there are statues in bronze and marble, and a good 
 
80 Rome. 
 
 deal of mosaic work. The dove with the olive branch perpetually 
 appears on all the pilasters. The tomb of S. Peter is beneath the 
 high altar, and before it eighty-nine lamps are kept perpetually 
 burning. At the extreme end of the Cathedral there is a great 
 bronze chair containing within it the wooden chair of S. Peter. In 
 the side chapels there are many pictures, statues, bas-reliefs, and 
 rich shrines. Of all the statues we admire most that of Alexander 
 VIII., a beautiful bronze work by Arrigo di S. Martino. The 
 Pontiff is seated, and is in the act of giving the blessing ; his 
 attitude is very striking, and his aspect calm and dignified. 
 During a visit to Rome the visitor is constantly tempted to wander 
 into S. Peter's ; there is sure to be something that he has not seen 
 before. Yet it must be confessed that in point of beauty the great 
 basilica will not bear comparison with such beautiful edifices as the 
 Church of S. Ouen at Rouen, or Strasburg Cathedral. Of course 
 as far as sumptuous internal decoration is concerned, S. Peter's 
 exceeds any existing cathedral of even half the size, but we cannot 
 admire the building either within or without from an architectural 
 point of view alone. 
 
 Out of the 360 churches which Rome possesses, not more than 
 six or seven are of any great interest to the ordinary traveller. 
 After S. Peter's, the Patriarchal Archbasilica of S. John Lateran 
 should be visited. This was for many years the principal church in 
 Rome, and calls itself by the proud title, " Omnium urbis et orbis 
 ecclesiarum mater et caput." It has a fine gilt stucco ceiUng, a 
 beautiful and very graceful shrine, containing the heads of S. Peter 
 and S. Paul, a number of marble statues, and a beautifully-decorated 
 chapel. The great Church of S. Maria Maggiore contains two of 
 the most sumptuous chapels in Rome — the Sixtine and the 
 Borghese. All that architecture, painting, and sculpture can do 
 has been done ; all kinds of decorative work have been lavishly 
 introduced, gilt bronze, Florentine mosaics, amethyst and lapis 
 lazuli, choice paintings, cofi'ers of gold repouss^ work containing 
 
.11 
 
 W 
 
 &4 
 
 o 
 
 03 
 
 pa 
 Q 
 
 <: 
 
 M 
 
The Churches of Rome, 81 
 
 the rarest of relics ; such things appear in many churches in Rome, 
 in the Gesu for example, and in the magnificent Basilica of S. Paul's 
 without the walls. The Church of 8. Clemente is of special interest 
 from its great antiquity. The upper church dates from 1108, while 
 beneath it has been discovered the original church, of which S. 
 Jerome speaks in 392. In this latter a number of frescoes were 
 discovered a few years ago ; some of these, although of early date, 
 are in a very good state of preservation. The Abbot, Father 
 Mullooly, has published a capital account of the lower church, 
 which was excavated under his auspices. Beneath the lower 
 church, we descend to a Temple of Mithras, which is now nearly 
 filled with water. The inner sanctuary containing the altar is, 
 however, visible. Those who are fond of church architecture will 
 find but little to interest them in the churches of Rome. There is 
 but one building that even approximates to Gothic — S. Maria sopra 
 Minerva — and, as a rule, the churches are unsightly without, and 
 often full of tawdry decorations within. The round arch and the 
 square pilaster often appear ; also gilt stucco ceilings, pictures, and 
 marble statues. The high altars are often of richly carved and 
 inlaid marble ; sometimes of bronze, and sometimes of chased silver. 
 Most of the churches possess relics : thorns from the crown of 
 thorns ; boards from the holy manger ; the bones of Saints ; the 
 imprint of the Apostles' knees or feet ; sometimes the complete 
 skeleton of a Saint reposing beneath the high altar, the poor skull 
 covered with gleaming jewels, the skeleton covered with richly- 
 embroidered mantles, and the long fingers thrust into white kid 
 gloves. 
 
 Rome is, we need not say, one of the great homes of art. The 
 education of a painter or sculptor is not considered complete until 
 he has spent some time in Rome. The city contains quite a 
 community of painters and sculptors. Among the studios most 
 worthy of a visit we may mention that of Mr. W. W. Story, many 
 of whose works are well known in this country : — his recent 
 
82 Rome. 
 
 production, "Electra at the Tomb of Agamemnon" seems to 
 us to be one of the most beautiful creations of modern times. Mr, 
 Benzoni's " Julia and Diomed fleeing from Pompeii" is also a fine 
 work. There are innumerable private collections which are thrown 
 open on certain days — such as the Doria, Farnese, Barberini, and 
 Borghese collections — and, above all, there are the incomparable 
 collections of the Capitol Museum and of the Vatican. 
 
 The works of art which these museums contain are quite over- 
 powering. Unless you are an artist born and bred ; unless you are 
 specially interested in art and specially educated in art, it is simply 
 useless to wander about through long galleries containing the finest 
 sculpture and painting in the world. The study of art is 
 notoriously neglected in this country, and when we go abroad we 
 too often find that we are quite unable to appreciate the beauties 
 of a statue or a painting, or to discover its defects. Under any 
 circumstances, what is the possible use of wandering through the 
 Capitol Museum, when the first room contains such profoundly 
 grand works as "The Dying Gaul," "The Satyr" of Praxiteles, 
 "The Antinous " from Hadrian's villa, "The Amazon," and "The 
 Demeter," Here surely you have artistic food enough to satiate 
 the most rabid lover of art. It is mere waste of time after this to 
 go into the Room of the Philosophers, or the Stanza del Fauno,"'^ 
 Again, in the magnificent collection of the Vatican, you see in 
 succession " The Apollo Belvedere, " The Laocoon," " The Mercury," 
 " The Perseus," and " The Pugilists," and then you had better go 
 away to the Egyptian Room, or to the Sixtine Chapel, or to 
 something absolutely diflferent. It is mere folly to continue to see 
 statuary after this. The notion of wandering from one room to 
 another, and saying, " I like this," and " I don't care for that," is 
 quite absurd, 
 
 * " I have seen," says Goethe, writing from Rome in 1786, "the frescoes of 
 Domenichino in Andrea della Valle, and also the Farnese Gallery of Caraccio's, 
 Too much, forsooth, for months — what, then, for a single day!" 
 
The Vatican Gallery. 
 
 83 
 
 Instead, therefore, of attempting a detailed account of any one 
 gallery, or any one work of art, we have preferred to insert some 
 woodcuts of notable statues. 
 
 The Apollo Belvedere was found in the ruins of the ancient 
 
 APOLLO BELVEDERE. TATICAX, 
 
 Antium at the close of the fifteenth century. In 1792 a 
 bronze statuette, which must have been copied from the same 
 original, was found near Janina. It is a work of incomparable 
 merit. " The attitude of the god," says Llibke {History of 
 
84 
 
 Rome. 
 
 Scvlpture), "is full of pathos, and is conceived at a dramatic 
 moment. Ardently excited, and filled with Divine anger, 
 with which is mingled a touch of triumphant scorn, the 
 intellectual head is turned sidewards, while the figure, with 
 elastic step, is hastening forwards. The eye seems to shoot 
 forth lightning, there is an expression of contempt in the 
 
 HEAD OF APOLLO BELVEDERE. 
 
 corners of the mouth, and the distended nostrils seem to breathe 
 forth Divine anger. It is a bold attitude, thus transfixed in marble, 
 full of life-like and excited action, indicating, it is true, a distinct 
 aiming at theatrical efi"ect — which is increased by the faulty restora- 
 tion of the hands — and therefore only calculated to be viewed from 
 one aspect." 
 
The Vatican Gallery 
 
 85 
 
 The celebrated group representing the punishment of Laocoon, 
 a priest of Apollo, for an offence committed against the god, is 
 mentioned by Pliny as the work of the Rhodian sculptors, Agesander, 
 Athenodorus, and Polydorus. It was found in the ruins of the 
 Palace of Titus in 1506. " The sculptor," says Liibke, " conceived 
 the incident at the decisive point, and with astonishing art formed 
 
 LAOOOON QSOTTP. VATICAN. 
 
 one united and closely connected group from three successive 
 moments of action. The sudden violence of the evil is depicted with 
 a life which verges on the extreme limits of plastic art, and even 
 encroaches upon the picturesque. . . . There is something light- 
 ning-like in the composition, for although it embraces three separate 
 moments, it combines them so completely that they appear as one." 
 
86 
 
 Rome. 
 
 The marble head of Zeus discovered at Otricoli is probably a 
 Koman copy of a work executed during the epoch of Alexander the 
 Great. It indicates a departure from the most perfect Greek 
 type, and is not without faults of style, but it still remains 
 a powerful work. Ltibke says, "The main point of the charac- 
 
 ZEUS OF OTEIOOLI. VATICAN. 
 
 terisation lies unmistakably in the abundant hair falling on 
 both sides in thick masses, and in the bold, elevated brows, 
 beneath which the eyes seem to gaze over the vast universe. 
 The compact brow and prominent nose complete the expression 
 of wisdom and power, while the full, slightly-parted lips imply 
 mild benevolence, and the luxuriant beard, and firm, well- 
 
The Vaticmi Gallery. 
 
 87 
 
 formed cheeks, betray sensual vigour and imperishable manly 
 beauty." 
 
 The Sleeping Ariadne of the Vatican, although belonging to 
 rather a late period, is a beautiful example of elegant grace. 
 The attitude of repose is represented in a masterly manner, and 
 the details of drapery have been most carefully worked and per- 
 fected. The Barberini Juno is also a finely-draped figure, but it 
 lacks the extreme delicacy of the Ariadne. 
 
 Among the many statues of the Muses in the Vatican collection, 
 
 SLEEPING ARIADNE. VATICAN. 
 
 we may mention the Melpomene and the Euterpe as well-conceived 
 and carefully treated studies. 
 
 The head of Eros, which was found at Centocelle, is remarkable 
 for its boyish grace, together with a peculiar dreaminess of expression 
 which has been conveyed by the subtlest touches of the artist's hands. 
 
88 
 
 Rome. 
 
 The head of Cronus has a certain massive sternness well be- 
 fittinof the character of the god. 
 
 The Dying Gaul is believed to be a work of the school of 
 Persamos, It is treated with wonderful realism, and is one of 
 
 the finest sculptures extant. 
 It represents a Gaul who, 
 having been conquered in 
 battle, has killed himself 
 with his own sword to avoid 
 slavery. 
 
 Let us ask the ordinary 
 well-educated person, who is 
 not a specialist, or particu- 
 larly devoted to sculpture, or 
 painting, or music, if he really 
 remembers, and can really 
 talk of, and knows anything 
 about, any twenty statues, 
 pictures, musical composi- 
 tions, buildings, ruins, views, 
 or books, in the whole world. 
 And if not, is not the folly of 
 rushing from one town to 
 anotlier, to walk throuoh 
 miles of galleries, sufficiently 
 obvious ? We will beirin 
 these lists with works about 
 ^ which we imagine there can 
 be but little dispute, and will 
 ask the reader to complete each list up to twenty, and then to 
 see how much he really knows about each one of his favourite 
 works. Sculpture : — The Dying Gaul, the Faun of Praxiteles, 
 the Antinous, the Venus of Milo, the Apollo Belvedere, the Venus 
 
 BARBEUIXI JUNO. YATICAX. 
 
The Study of Art. 
 
 89 
 
 of the Capitol, the Sleeping Ariadne, the Farnese Bull, the 
 
 Hercules, the Laocoon, the Zeus of Otricoli, the Young Augustus, 
 
 and the Perseus, will form a good beginning. Bronzes: — Our 
 
 own magnificent head in the British Museum, from the Castellani 
 
 Collection, the head of Bacchus 
 
 in the King's Palace at Naples, 
 
 the Eeposing Mercury and the 
 
 Drunken Faun in the Naples 
 
 Museum, and the Ram of 
 
 Syracuse. Pictures: — The 
 
 *' Assumption " of Titian, the 
 
 " Immaculate Conception " of 
 
 Murillo, the " Transfiguration," 
 
 the San Sisto Madonna, the 
 
 Communion of S. Jerome, the 
 
 Tribute Money. Ruins : — The 
 
 Parthenon, the Theseum, the 
 
 Pyramids, Heidelberg Castle, 
 
 the Coliseum, the Temples at 
 
 Paestum, Glastonbury Abbey. 
 
 Existing Buildings : — Notre 
 
 Dame of Paris, the Cathedrals 
 
 of Milan, Cologne, Strasburg, 
 
 and Ely, the Church of S. Ouen 
 
 at Rouen, the Donaustaufi" Wal- 
 
 halla, S. Mark's, Venice, the 
 
 Great Group at Pisa ; and so 
 
 on for musical compositions, 
 
 and scenery, and books, and 
 
 all else that tends to the cultivation of an elegant taste, and 
 
 the refinement of human life. 
 
 We say then, if your time is your own, and if you have an 
 elegant and cultivated taste, and a highly sympathetic and 
 
 MELPOMENE. VATICAN. 
 
90 
 
 Rome. 
 
 appreciative temperament, you may, by spending some years in 
 Eome, acquire a very satisfactory amount of real knowledge 
 concerning history and literature, archaeology and art. Then, if 
 you will, you may visit that long list of collections, beginning with 
 " Albani Villa," and ending with " Vatican Collections," together 
 with the thousand and one sights in the way of Churches, 
 Catacombs, remains of Temples, Golden Houses, and Fora. 
 But, and if, your visits to Rome consist of a week or two, once 
 
 a-year, it is better to 
 thoroughly examine and 
 try to understand a few 
 of the best sculptures, 
 pictures, and buildings, 
 and thus to carry away 
 a little real and perma- 
 nent knowledge, in place 
 of a dim and- hazy recol- 
 lection of many things 
 imperfectly seen, and 
 often altogether mis- 
 understood. 
 
 It is true that poetry 
 is cultivated in our English educational system, but music, 
 painting, and sculpture are altogether ignored as general sub- 
 jects of study. Ought it not to be possible to acquire in 
 our schools, side by side with history, grammar, and arithmetic, 
 ideas concerning one or other, or all of these ? In Germany, 
 France, and Italy, it appears to be possible, and if we had so 
 much as a good series of art primers, the experiment could 
 surely be tried in this country. We can generally say why we 
 like or dislike a man, or a horse, or a book ; but can any one man 
 out of ten — might we not say one out of a hundred ? — say precisely 
 why he likes this or that picture, or song, or piece of sculpture ? 
 
 HEAD OF EROS. VATICAN. 
 
The Study of Art. 91 
 
 We think there is no place in the world in which one feels so 
 utterly at sea, as in a gallery of painting or sculpture. We confess 
 that the other day we saw a picture in a large English gallery 
 which impressed us more than anything in the whole collection, 
 and if we were asked the simple and natural question, " Why ? " 
 we could not give one single reason. Can anything be more 
 ridiculous ? A very few elementary ideas about art would at least 
 enable one to know what to look for in a picture, and if these ideas 
 were cultivated one might in time get to crudely analyse the 
 impression made upon one's mind by a picture. Compare for the 
 moment the pleasure to be derived from the sight of a picture — in 
 this instance simple enough in itself, a portrait of Don Balthazar 
 Carlos with a bloodhound beside him ; — if one sees in it simply a 
 piece of canvas with a representation of a boy painted on it, or if 
 one sees it with the eye of a man who describes it thus : — " The 
 little man is booted, gloved, hatted, wearing a dark green suit stiff 
 with gold, and is holding by the muzzle with his right hand a short 
 gun of which the butt rests on the ground. A bloodhound watches 
 half asleep beside him, with its heavy face laid along the ground ; 
 two small greyhounds sit, all eagerness, behind. It is the very 
 magic of reality, and that without ostentation or sign of toil. The 
 strokes and spots of colour, when one is close to them, look all 
 confusion ; but fall back, and there is the living frame of the boy 
 standing sturdy and alive in his suit of green and gold ; in the 
 gold an incredible subtlety and soberness and variety ; in 
 the expression of the dogs an intense truth of character, rendered 
 with two or three weighty and perfectly calculated touches of the 
 brush ; and then a wild landscape full of romance, full of silver 
 light and azure shadow, and ending in a range of dark sierras 
 that you can scarcely distinguish from the clouds above them." 
 And this is no description written by an artist for artists, but 
 an extract from last week's newspaper written for the general 
 public. If we were to read one of Mr. Euskin's rhapsodical 
 
92 Rome. 
 
 descriptions of a great picture, we should feel our ignorance 
 yet more. 
 
 We should be glad even to know the aim and object of the 
 painter : is it to present us with a faithful representation of that which 
 he paints ; is it to idealise ; is it to convey subtle and obscure 
 impressions ; is it to evoke a certain mode and tone of thought in 
 the observer ? Will anybody walk through this gallery with us, 
 and point out the special beauties of each of the greatest pictures ? 
 Here is a Dutch kitchen with red pots and pans strewn about it, 
 a large cabbage and some carrots on a table, a woman in a white 
 cap plucking a lean yellow fowl, a child sprawling on the floor — 
 it is a great work of art, and cost £4000 only three weeks ago. 
 Then very near is the figure of a gentleman dressed in black velvet 
 with his hand on the hilt of a sword ; a very straight and 
 formal S. Sebastian tied to a tree and pierced full of arrows, but 
 exhibiting no traces of pain ; then a group of men in a thousand 
 possible and impossible caps, dressed in long robes of vermilion, 
 indigo, and pea green ; a monk with a skull ; a dead warrior ; 
 sheep feeding in a pasture ; a banquet scene ; a market-place in 
 winter ; the interior of Milan Cathedral ; the portrait of a Cardinal ; 
 a landscape ; a storm at sea ; a sunset ; the ecstasy of a Saint. 
 We wander among all these in a dream, the images become 
 superposed — the Cardinal is in the kitchen, and the monk is at 
 the helm of the foundering vessel ; we cannot comprehend what 
 we see because we do not know what to look for, what to admire, 
 in a word, because we have never been taught the very first 
 rudiments of art. 
 
 Again, let it be a gallery of sculpture : it is as difficult for a man 
 who is ignorant of art to discern the fine points of a statue, as 
 for a man ignorant of horseflesh to choose a perfectly sound 
 horse. Why do people rave about the Faun of Praxiteles ? Why 
 is that magnificent statue of Mercury condemned as the most 
 debased art ? What do people see in that much mutilated arm to 
 
The Study of Art. 93 
 
 admire ? We cannot tell, because we have never known what we 
 ought to look for in a statue. 
 
 With music it is perhaps different, it is too subtle a matter 
 to analyse the varying moods produced by varying themes ; 
 we should not care to know why we listen to " Le chemin du 
 Paradis," and " Poor Mary Ann," and " Quis est homo," with 
 streaming eyes ; or why our hearts beat quickly, and we become 
 animated with a lively motion (as our neighbours over the water 
 would say), and inclined to sing, or shout, or dance, when we listen 
 to "II segreto per esser felice," or the "Largo al factotum." To know 
 this would perhaps be the blunting of some of our finer emotions ; we 
 should be on the verge of elliptical brain currents, reflex action of 
 the sensory nerves, and all that sort of thing. But we do protest 
 against our growing up to be men and then finding that we have 
 no notion why we like one picture or statue better than another, 
 and that we possess no words even to talk intelligibly about such 
 things. 
 
 Leaving now Rome as a centre of art, we have to consider an 
 altogether different aspect of the Eternal City. 
 
 Apart from all other points of interest, Rome has been for 
 many centuries the great religious focus of a large portion of 
 Christendom. 
 
 We suppose there has never been a system, either religious or 
 ethical, which has maintained such intense and uniform vitality as 
 the Roman Catholic Church. When Mr. Gladstone's government 
 was defeated a few years ago by the " Noes" of the Roman 
 Catholic Irish Members, one of the French journals drew attention 
 to the fact, as a proof of the still-existing power of the Church. 
 We may talk of the " decline of Papal power," " the waning 
 energy of the Roman Catholic Church," and so on; but the 
 Church which has any hand in the defeat of a powerful government 
 in a distant land is scarcely in its dotage. The Annuario Pontijicio 
 yearly gives a list of the Popes, commencing with " 1. — Peter, 
 
94 Rome. 
 
 Saint and Apostle ; native place, Bethsaida ; Date of Election, a.d. 
 42 ;" and ending with " 257. — Pius IX., Giovanni, Maria, Mastai, 
 Ferretti : — Sinigallia — 1846." A succession so vast, so continuous, 
 so prolonged, that no one kingdom or empire of the earth can 
 show any series of rulers to be for a moment compared with it. 
 When people shake their heads and tell us that Pius IX. is the 
 last Pope, we wonder if they remember the number of his 
 predecessors, and if they know aught of the inner life of this great 
 and wonderful Church. The man is not yet born who will see the 
 last Pope. A Church which has outlived fifty generations of men, 
 has seen the fall of fifty mighty empires, and has witnessed 
 chancres in the tone and mode of thought and of life more varied 
 and more profound than can ever occur in the world again, is not 
 likely to succumb to a loss of temporal power. Its power and 
 influence over the minds of men will outlive many kingdoms 
 which do not yet exist. The vitality of the Church, we repeat, is 
 marvellous ; its power throbs through the veins of the remotest 
 and least cultivated communities : a mandate issues from Home, 
 " Apiid S. Petrum sub Annulo Piscatoris die . . . Pontif. 
 Nostri Anno ... ," and forthwith men travel from the 
 remotest Siberia, from Mexico, from the very ends of the earth, to 
 attend the (Ecumenical Council. The mandate of Pio Nono, 
 Pontifex Maximus, Servus Servorum Dei, ad Perpetuam Rei 
 Memoriam, as it thunders from the Vatican, spreads like a wave 
 of sound, enlarging as it spreads ; its echo is heard on the very 
 confines of space. Telegraphs transmit it to the brink of the 
 higher civilisation ; couriers gallop with it day and night over 
 prairies, through burning deserts, over frozen steppes ; it is carried 
 over wide rivers and untracked mountains ; it is found in the 
 midst of pathless forests. The whole Roman Catholic world 
 responds to it. 
 
 At the end of every year there is published in Rome a 
 clergy -list of the superior clergy — including Bishops and ]\Ion- 
 
The Roman Catholic Hierarchy. 95 
 
 sigiiori — entitled La Gerarchia Cattolica, e la Famiglia, 
 Fontificia. A glance at its pages may help us to understand by 
 what means two hundred millions of the human race are directed 
 and governed in matters ecclesiastical. At the conclusion of the 
 year 1875 the Catholic Hierarchy consisted of — 
 
 The Sacred Colle2;e of Cardinals 57 
 
 Patriarchs of both Eites 12 
 
 Archbishops and Bishops of the Latin Church . . . 734 
 
 „ „ of the Eastern Church . . 50 
 „ „ with the Titles of Sees in partibus 
 
 Infidelium .... 274 
 
 Patriarchal Archbishops and Bishops without title . . 28 
 
 Abbots without a Diocese* 11 
 
 1166 
 
 The present Pope has created 23 new Metropolitan Sees, and 
 129 Bishoprics. 
 
 There have been 257 Popes, of whom the first 56 were 
 canonised; 21 were afterwards canonised, the last being S. Pius 
 v., who died in 1572. Thus more than one-fourth of the entire 
 body are Saints of the Church. The complete titles of the Pope 
 are " Bishop of Eome, Vicar of Jesus Christ, Successor to the Chief 
 of the Apostles, Pontifex Maximus of the Universal Church, 
 Patriarch of the West, Primate of Italy, Archbishop and 
 Metropolitan of the Roman Province, Sovereign of the Temporal 
 Dominions of the Holy Roman Church;" besides additional titles 
 as the holder of certain offices, such as " Prefect of the Sacred 
 Roman and Universal Inquisition," " Protector of the Arch- 
 confraternity of the Via Crucis," &c. His Holiness is now 85 
 years old, and has been Pope longer than any one of his 
 predecessors, viz., for thirty-one years. 
 
 * That is to say, Abbots, Uke the Abbot of Monte Cassino, who themselves 
 exercise episcopal jurisdiction, and hence belong to no Diocese, but are directly 
 subject to the Holy See. 
 
96 Rome. 
 
 The College of Cardinals may consist as a maximum of seventy 
 members. There are, however, thirteen vacant hats. Of the fifty- 
 seven existing Cardinals, eight were appointed by Gregory XVI. 
 The oldest Cardinal (Filippo de Angelis) is eighty-four years old, 
 the youngest (Lucien Bonaparte) is forty-eight. No less than 
 twenty-five of the Cardinals — an approach to half of the entire 
 number — are seventy years old or upwards. There are six Car- 
 dinal Bishops, forty-two Cardinal Priests, and nine Cardinal Deacons. 
 Among the latter are Cardinal Antonelli, Secretary of State, and 
 Cardinal Borromeo, descended from S. Carlo of Milan, the Arch- 
 priest of the Patriarchal Basilica of S. Peter. First among the 
 Cardinals, and in many respects as important a man as the Pope 
 himself, is Constantine Patrizi, Bishop of Ostia and Velletri, Dean 
 of the Sacred College, Archpriest of the Patriarchal Archbasilica of 
 the Lateran, Vicar-General, Grand Prior Commander in Eome of 
 the Sacred Military Order of Jerusalem, Prefect of the Sacred 
 Congregation of Kites, Secretary of the Holy Eoman and Universal 
 Inquisition — together with a page of other titles of lesser impor- 
 tance in small print.'"" 
 
 During the Pontificate of Pius IX. no less than one hundred 
 and nine Cardinals have died. 
 
 After the list of Cardinals, we find more than a hundred pages 
 given to a list of the Patriarchs, Archbishops, and Bishops in 
 Residential Sees : thus — 
 
 "Dublino, Diiblinen. — Arciv. Irlanda, -f- Emo e Emo Sig. Card. Paolo 
 Culleu, alumno, del Pont. Collegio Urbano della Propaganda, n. in Dublino 
 27 Ap. 1803, ell. all' Arciv. di Armagh 8 gen. 1850, trasl. nel mag. 
 1852." 
 
 * This was written last year, towards the latter end of which both Cardinal 
 Antonelli and Cardinal Patrizi died. A few changes have been produced by this 
 means, but for the purposes of this notice they are quite immaterial. Only last 
 week several new Cardinals were elected, and in to-day's Times (March 19th), 
 there is the last Papal Allocution — a document well worthy of perusal. 
 
The Roman Catholic Hierarchy. 97 
 
 This is followed by more than fifty pages of names of Arch- 
 bishops and Bishops inpartibus hifidelium, among which we notice 
 the sees of Halicarnassus, Apamea, Bethlehem, Bethsaida, Corinth, 
 Hebron, Olympia, Sidon, Sion, and Troy. A short list of Abbots 
 and Prelates without dioceses follows ; then a list of the Latin 
 names of all the Sees arranged alphabetically, as — 
 
 Soutwarcen . Soutwarcum . Southwark. 
 
 Cliftonien . Cliftonia . Clifton. 
 
 Kildarien . Cellaquercus . Kildare. 
 
 After this we have the Apostolic Delegates of the Propagation 
 of the Faith, Vicars- Apostolic (stationed in every part of the known 
 world, Central Thibet, Tonquin, Yunnan, &c). Prefects- Apostolic, 
 and Principals of Eeligious Orders. 
 
 The second and smaller part of the book treats of " La Famiglia 
 della Santita di Nostro Signore Papa Pio IX., Gloriosamente 
 Eegnante." This commences with Cardinals and Prelates Palatine, 
 Confidential Chamberlains, a secretary of despatches, an under- 
 secretary of state, a sotto-datario (that is, an ofiicer of the Chan- 
 cery who affixes the " datum Romse " to the Pope's Bulls) ; and a 
 Chaplain of the Sacred Apostolic Palaces. Then follows a long 
 list of the Pope's Domestic Prelates, including, apparently, a large 
 proportion of the Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops, and Monsignori 
 in the Hierarchy ; the College of Apostolic Protonotaries, the 
 Auditors of the Sacra Rota Romana, the Court of the Segnatura, 
 which includes in its numbers most of our Euorlish Monsionori ; 
 Pontifical Masters of the Ceremonies. Then the Officers of the 
 Noble Guard, Chamberlains of Honour in purple robes. Chamber- 
 lains of Honour without the City, Officers of the Swiss Guard, 
 Officers of the Palatine Guard of Honour, Private Chaplains, the 
 Confessor of the Pontifical Family, the private steward, the 
 Carriers of the Pontifical Chair, and so on down to the avant 
 couriers. 
 
 In the Appendix an account is given of the Sacred Congrega- 
 
98 Rome. 
 
 tions : and first of the Sacred Roman and Universal Inquisition, of 
 which the Pope himself is Prefect, and the Vicar-General Cardinal 
 Patrizi, Secretary ; a long list of Counsel, a compiler, a reporter, 
 and a notary. Secondly, the congregations of the Consistory ; the 
 Bishops and Monks ; the Council ; ecclesiastical privileges ; the 
 Propagation of the Faith ; the Index ; Sacred Eites ; Ceremonials ; 
 the discipline of the Monks ; Indulgences and Sacred Relics ; the 
 examination of Bishops ; Extraordinary Ecclesiastical affairs ; — 
 next in order, the officers of the Apostolic Penitentaries, Courts of 
 the Apostolic Chancery, of the Apostolic Dataries, of the 
 Apostolic chamber ; the secretary and sub-secretaries of state, of 
 despatches, of memorials, and of the auditor's office ; the Apostolic 
 Nuncios and Delegates, the Ambassadors ; the Vicariat of Rome ; 
 and, finally, the Apostolic Colleges. 
 
 Large as is the number of dignitaries in the Roman Catholic 
 Church, it would appear that the number of offices is still larger ; 
 all the principal dignitaries seem to take a part in the direct 
 government of the Church as a body, as well as individually, in 
 their own dioceses. The offices are for the most part of considerable 
 antiquity, and it is curious to find the Congregation of the 
 Inquisition still in existence. Some of the offices exist now only 
 in name, and were created when the authority of Rome was more 
 widespread than it now is ; that is, when cases were sent to Rome 
 to be judged in the Ecclesiastical Courts, and when Popes governed 
 Emperors, and Emperors governed Barons, and Barons governed 
 serfs. 
 
 At the present time the Vatican contains more than five 
 hundred persons, including the Pontifical Guard, the various 
 officers of the Pope's household, a,nd the ecclesiastics more directly 
 concerned with the external administration of the affiiirs of the 
 Roman Catholic Church. There is a private printing press within 
 the palace, and a stafi" of men connected with the propagation of 
 the Papal decrees. Many of the congregations meet in the Vatican. 
 
The Inmates of the Vatican. 99 
 
 The Pope has remained in the Vatican, a self-constituted prisoner, 
 since the occupation of Rome by Victor Emmanuel in 1870. 
 Between the Pope and the King there is no love lost, and many 
 bitter speeches relating to the Italian Government have found their 
 way into the Papal allocutions. The Pope refuses to accept the 
 three-and-a-half millions of lire (about £130,000 in Italian paper 
 money) which the Italian Government offered as a compensation for 
 the loss of tlie Temporalities of the Holy See. The advisers of the Pope 
 maintain that it is impossible to receive payment without yielding 
 a certain amount of allegiance, and that hence it is better to decline 
 the offer altoo^ether. The collection of Peter's Pence amounts to 
 nearly double this amount, and from time to time the Pope 
 receives more direct presents. Thus, only a few weeks ago the 
 Duchess di Galliera forwarded £40,000 to the Vatican, with a 
 request that masses might be said for the soul of the recently 
 deceased Duke. The expenses of the Vatican are considerable ; 
 all the internal mechanism of the ecclesiastical government, the 
 stipends of numbers of archbishops, bishops, monsignori, and 
 canons, the repairs of S. Peter's, and so on. 
 
 The Pope, in spite of his great age, is still an active old 
 man. He walks daily in the galleries or gardens of the Vatican, 
 and at an early hour he meets some fifteen or twenty of his more 
 special advisers, who discuss the affairs of the Church and of the 
 world. Formal councils and committees, and frequently receptions, 
 follow. Probably no court in the world possesses more minute 
 information concerning the affairs of other countries and other 
 courts. The Papal ambassadors, nuncios, delegates, and other 
 members of the Hierarchy, are found in every part of the world, 
 and are in constant communication with the Vatican. The curious 
 chapter in the " Wandering Jew " about M. Rodin and the des- 
 patches, and the globe covered with little red crosses, does not 
 much exaggerate the case. " From this room," said a general of 
 the Jesuits to the Duke de Brissac, " I govern not only Paris, but 
 
100 Rome. 
 
 China ; not only China, but the whole world, and all without any- 
 one knowing how it is done." We must remember the very 
 exceptional facilities which the members of the Church possess for 
 obtaining information. ■^''' In the chambers of the Vatican the 
 minutest change in the tone, and temper, and attitude of at least 
 all Eoman Catholic courts and countries is well known as soon as 
 it occurs, and every species of subtle diplomacy is bred within the 
 earner e secrete of the apostolic palace. The Pope, as we have 
 said, still regards himself as a prisoner, and it is a positive fact that 
 in certain parts of Belgium — and, we have been assured, also in 
 Ireland — straws, purporting to have come from the Pope's dungeon 
 (for prison, used in a very wide and general sense, may easily 
 become dungeon, used in a very literal and restricted sense, a 
 thousand miles from the scene of action), are sold as charms 
 to the more gullible and least well-informed among the faithful. 
 Thus His Holiness, who lives in a palace of a thousand rooms, full 
 
 * An able writer in the Times (Feb. 3rd, 1877) makes the following very just 
 remarks : — " The Eoman Catholic Church is, at the least, the most powerful 
 Corporation existing in Europe, or even in the world, and is second in 
 authority and influence to few among the Civil States of Europe themselves. It 
 is not merely a Corporation, but an admirably organised Corporation, capable of 
 acting with a rare union and persistency, and possessing a variety of agencies 
 unequalled by any similar political organisation. It has of late committed itself 
 to a dogma which is in such astounding contradiction to the facts of history and 
 the conscience of mankind, that it is incredible the Church should fail, sooner or 
 later, to undergo either some violent convulsion, or to encounter some tremendous 
 collision with the world at large. But for the present its members accommodate 
 themselves to the extraordinary demands made upon their faith ; they are docile, 
 and even enthusiastic. At the same time there exist in most Continental countries, 
 social and religious dreams which menace the existing order of civil life. The 
 minds of the artisan class are seething with plans for the reconstruction of society, 
 and in countries where these illusions are not so freely exposed to the light of day 
 aB they are in England, they are magnified by a feverish imagination. An 
 organisation resisting these principles and holding this position, is capable of 
 becoming at any moment an extremely potent influence in political and social 
 life." 
 
The Vatican Council. 101 
 
 of the choicest works of art in the world, surrounded by a highly- 
 cultivated body of men devoted to his service, is, for the base 
 purposes of petty priestcraft in distant countries, represented as a 
 literal prisoner, languishing in a dungeon on a bed of straw. 
 
 The extraordinary complexity of the politics of the Roman 
 Catholic Church may be well judged of by the letters which were 
 written from Rome during the sitting of the Ecumenical Council. 
 They were published in the AUgemeine Zeitung, and are said to 
 have been written by the secretary of Cardinal Hohenlohe, and to 
 represent the views of those prelates who were opposed to the 
 Dogma of Papal Infallibility. The letters were published in this 
 country in 1870, under the title of "Letters from Rome on the 
 Council," by Quirinus. If they are to be relied upon, they form a 
 most remarkable record of the workings of the inner machinery of 
 the Vatican. It is shown that various attempts were made to force 
 the acceptance of this unpalatable dogma upon the minority, that 
 discussions were stopped, and the mouths of the dissentients shut 
 in many ways. The author endeavours to prove that the retro- 
 spective force of the dogma is prodigious. The seal of infallibility 
 has been set upon some of the most autocratic and tyrannous 
 decrees that have ever been promulgated. Thus, according to the 
 Decretal Novit of Innocent III., the Pope may reverse any judicial 
 sentence, and summon any sovereign before him to answer for what 
 he believes to be a grave sin, and he may even by his sole power 
 depose the king. According to the same authority, the Pope may 
 remit all sins of all men. The Pope, by Divine right, can give over 
 whole nations to slavery for a sin committed by their sovereign ; 
 he may make slaves of foreign nations if they are not Catholic. 
 Leo X., in the Bull Pastor Eternus (1517), declares it to be con- 
 sonant with the Gospel to burn to death as heretics those who 
 appeal from a sentence of the Pope to a General Council ; and in 
 the Bull Supernce Dispositionis he rules that all clerics may con- 
 sider themselves not bound in conscience by civil law. Once 
 
102 Rome. 
 
 again, the Bull Sahhatliina of John XXII., confirmed by Alexander 
 v., Clement VII., Pius V., Gregory XIII., and Paul V., affirms 
 that they who die wearing the Carmelite scapular will be delivered 
 from Purgatory on the Saturday next after their death by the 
 Virgin, and will then be carried straight to heaven. On the other 
 hand, good and learned Catholics will tell you that the Pope is only 
 infallible under certain strictly defined and limited conditions, and 
 in matters of faith, not in matters of discipline ; that some of the 
 above outrageous Bulls were forged ; some applied to one special 
 kingdom under special circumstances ; that some are not recognised ; 
 and that the question of Infallibility does not afi'ect them. On the 
 one hand we have Dr. Littledale [Contemporary Review, January, 
 1877), waiting about " The Inner Life of the Vatican Council," from 
 the opposition point of view of Roman Catholics, and from his own 
 point of view as a Protestant ; w^hile Cardinal Manning [The Nine- 
 teenth Century, March and April, 1877) gives us "The True Story of 
 the Vatican Council," from the extreme Ultramontane point of view. 
 The ultimate result is that the reader comes to the conclusion that he 
 knows nothing about the matter, and if he takes the trouble to 
 read •' Vaticanism," and one quarter of the replies thereto, his mind 
 gets into such a state of confusion in regard to the whole matter 
 that he ceases to attempt to unravel it. 
 
 Of one thinjT there can be no doubt — viz., that a great 
 deal is said about Roman Catholicism which emanates from 
 the most sheer ignorance, or from the grossest illiberality. 
 How it is that people can assimilate with the idea of Christian 
 charity the monstrously offensive remarks which they make 
 in regard to a very noble religion, which was once our own, 
 w^e cannot pretend to understand. When ignorant people, 
 who see Italian peasants kneeling in front of the figure of the 
 Virgin, and pouring out the prayers of their souls, talk about 
 " abominable idolatry," " terrible superstition," and so on, they 
 show the narrowness of their own culture, and the illiberality of 
 
Misconceptions. 103 
 
 their own minds. We have no doubt they would say that it 
 would be preferable not to pray at all than to pray in that fashion, 
 forgetting that the outward and visible image is only to remind 
 these poor people of the existence of the Divinity to whom they 
 pray.'"" You often find, indeed, far more true piety in your Italian 
 peasants, than in the peasantry of more northern countries pro- 
 fessing other faiths. As the world grows older, and wiser, 
 and more liberal, it ceases to place eternal salvation upon one 
 minute, and particular, and strictly defined, mode of worshipping 
 God, and recognises the fact that, so long as the weightier matters 
 of the law are truly accepted and followed, the tithes of mint, 
 anise, and cummin, are of very little import. 
 
 No one can deny for a moment the great abuses which have 
 existed in the Roman Catholic Church. When we look back to the 
 Middle Ages and think of certain bulls, decretals, briefs, allocutions, 
 and apostolic letters ; of denunciations of heresies, limitations of the 
 modes of faith, torture, imprisonment, starvation, burning, in the name 
 of Christ ; of pious men and good citizens, in every sense servants of 
 God, tied to the stake, and in the midst of fearful agonies exhorted 
 to repent by archbishops and bishops professing to be followers of 
 Him who showed charity to all men ; when we see countries 
 devastated, the poor reduced to starvation, virtuous kings deposed, 
 Christian burial refused, death multiplied by exterminating w^ars 
 in the name of Christ ; when we see the privacies of home life dis- 
 closed, son encouraged to denounce his father, daughter to plot 
 against her mother, all home ties, and all social relationships, 
 
 * " Now, pray, don't you think," says Brydone, referring to this same subject a 
 
 century ago, " that this personal kind of worship is much better adapted to the 
 
 capacities of the vulgar than the more pure and sublime modes of it, which would 
 
 only distract and confound their simple understandings, unaccustomed to specula- 
 
 lation, and that certainly require something gross and material, some object of 
 
 sense to fix their attention % This even seems to have been the opinion of some 
 
 of the sacred writers, who often represent God under some material form." 
 p 
 
104 Rome. 
 
 all that makes the fireside sacred, perverted under a false 
 guise ; and finally, when we see the exorbitant pride, arrogance, and 
 love of power of some 'of the successors of the Fisherman of Galilee, 
 the rise and progress of the vast system of ecclesiastical laws which 
 are afterwards permitted to override and abrogate the civil laws of 
 States ; when we see all this, we are led to ask ourselves whether it 
 can be true that this is really the religion whose Founder advocated 
 love, charity, mercy, justice, and peace. Or whether we have wit- 
 nessed a religious system which has been employed by crafty men 
 to obtain immense governing power over the minds of men, who 
 have attempted to gratify this innate love of power, and to acquire 
 great temporal happiness, by acting upon a special quality of the 
 human mind which all races alike possess — the fear of the gods. 
 That any one man or community of men should, at the point of 
 the sword, and by the exercise of every tyrannous and vile practice 
 which the heart of man can conceive, endeavour to force his fellow- 
 men to worship God in one particular manner and after one 
 particular form, does seem to us to be one of the most extra- 
 ordinary anomalies in the whole range of human existence ; and 
 from this standpoint we are inclined to agree with the King of 
 Brobdingnag, when he concluded from Gulliver's account of the 
 doings of his people that they were " the most pernicious race of 
 little odious vermin that nature ever sufi'ered to crawl upon the 
 surface of the earth." All sects, down to the very smallest, in all 
 lands, put in practice propagandism, and are all vindictive and 
 cruel in thought, if not in deed, when that one question of difier- 
 ence in belief comes before them. There seems to be a tendency 
 in many human natures and communities to force their own belief 
 upon others — a sort of fanatical mania comparable with spiritual- 
 istic madness or the extreme dominance of any abnormal idea 
 contrary to the light of nature. This form of mania has been a 
 characteristic of certain orders of minds from the earliest times. 
 It is much to be regretted that the present sovereign Pontiff, 
 
The Church and Modern Progress. 
 
 105 
 
 who began his career as a Liberal, did not continue a Liberal. If 
 he had met modern progress half-way, instead of utterly renouncing 
 and opposing it, there can be no doubt that the foundation would 
 have been laid for a closer brotherhood amons; the members of the 
 Christian community, and that his own faith would have been at 
 this moment in a stronger position than it is now. To renounce 
 the progress of Biblical criticism, the discoveries of science, the 
 different tone, colour, and temper which facts assume in this 
 nineteenth century of grace, and to plunge back into the obscurity 
 of the dark ages, was surely the most unwise method of forwarding 
 human progress and augmenting human faith. 
 
 - Wv. ^ ''W<\N;^\\ ^^^ \ ^ x'^'^ 
 
 J^rST OF CRONUS. VATICAN, 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE MONASTERY OF MONTE CASSINO. 
 
 San Germanno — Ascent of Monte Cassino — Entrance to the Monastery — The Central 
 Court— The Well— The Refectory— The Church of Monte Cassino— The Sacristy— 
 The MSS. and Charters — Life of S. Benedict — History of the Monastery — Present 
 Condition of the Monastery — A Walk in the Garden — The Summum Bonum. 
 
 liEVENTY miles to the north of Naples, and 
 nearly ninety-three from Rome, the 
 train stops at the small town of San 
 Germanno. It stands on the site of 
 the old city of Casinum, and was itself 
 much more important than now in the 
 Middle Ages, for we read that Courts 
 were held there by Popes and Emperors, 
 treaties signed, and important alliances 
 made. It now possesses but little of interest : the scanty remains 
 of an amphitheatre, mentioned by Pliny as having been erected 
 by a rich Roman lady at her sole expense ; and a square building 
 surmounted by a dome, probably an ancient tomb and now a 
 church, are the only sights worth seeing in the town. But above, 
 on Monte Cassino, a conical mountain of limestone, stands a vast 
 white building, which is perceived long before the train enters San 
 Germanno. It is the world-famous Monastery of Monte Cassino, 
 from whence went S. Augustine to Christianise the Island of 
 
Ascent of the Mountain. 107 
 
 Britain, and witliin whose walls sleeps one who most profoundly 
 influenced the whole civilised world, by his words, and thoughts, 
 and deeds, the founder of the first Monastery and of Monte 
 Cassino, the great S. Benedict. 
 
 The mountain on which the Monastery stands is about 
 seventeen hundred feet above the sea, and is ascended by a broad, 
 winding road, three and a-half miles long, paved throughout with 
 rough stones. It takes a good hour and a-half to walk to the 
 summit, but the road can be traversed by mules and horses. 
 At intervals wayside chapels and oratories appear ; one, the Chapel 
 of S. Mauro, which marks the place where S. Benedict and S. Mauro 
 took leave of each other ; another, the oratory of S. Scholastica, the 
 sister of S. Benedict. Then we come to crosses standing here and 
 there by the roadside, and as we get higher and higher, these 
 increase in number. One of them surmounts a rock upon which 
 is engraved : — 
 
 Padre Nostro 
 Che sei nei Cieli 
 Affratella a noi I'lnghilterra 
 Nella Unita della Fede. 
 
 It was at this point of the road that Father Tosti converted an 
 illustrious Englishman to Eoman Catholicism, and he expressed a 
 wish in the above inscription that all the children of Albion might 
 be similarly converted, after the example of the Benedictine monk 
 who became the first Archbishop of Canterbury. 
 
 A cross a little higher on the road stands over a stone which 
 bears the imprints of the knees of S. Benedict. It is said that 
 when, in the year 529, he ascended Monte Cassino for the 
 first time, he found the inhabitants of the mountain wor- 
 shipping pagan gods. When he came in sight of a Temple of 
 Venus which crowned one of the lesser heights, he fell upon his 
 knees and prayed that the false gods might be exterminated, and 
 when he rose he found the imprints of his knees in the rock ; soon 
 
108 The Monastery of Mojtte Cassino. 
 
 afterwards, adds the chronicler, the profane habitations of the 
 priestesses of Venus became the cells of the monks, who consecrated 
 them by prayer and labour. The last chapel on the road is 
 dedicated to S. Agatha, and was first erected in 1373 by the 
 Abbot Faenza, with a hope of obtaining the intercession of the 
 ^ Saint with heaven, for the aversion of the frequent shocks 
 of earthquake, which had sometimes proved disastrous to the 
 Abbey. 
 
 We met in ascending the mountain but few persons. 
 Sometimes two or three men would be seen who were conveying 
 necessary stores to the Monastery ; sometimes groups of boys, 
 or young men, belonging to the College of Monte Cassino, 
 in long black garments and broad black hats, were to be seen 
 at various turns of the road. These seemed to us the politest 
 little men in the world. Instead of staring at the stranger who 
 had thus invaded their solitude, they took off their big hats with 
 a grace and courtliness worthy of any period or occasion. The 
 College is attached to the Monastery, and the Professors are 
 Benedictines. The boys belong to many of the best families 
 between Eome and Naples, and often begin and finish their 
 education in the Monastery. They looked very healthy and 
 seemed very happy, but we wished that some benefactor of the 
 College had levelled for them a cricket field somewhere, and 
 made it an ordinance that football should be played thrice weekly 
 in winter. We saw a few gjonnastic appliances within the 
 Monastery, otherwise the sole exercise seemed to be to walk or 
 run someway down the mountain, and then to return again. 
 Summer and winter they rise at five, and work many hours of the 
 day. The holidays, however, amount to nearly three months. It 
 is said that the discipline which is maintained in the CoUege is so 
 strict, that many young feUows who have been educated there 
 depart from the ways in which they have been taught to walk as 
 soon as they pass out from the great gate for the last time. Others 
 
Entrance to the Monastery. 109 
 
 return again and again to their old school, and spend some of the 
 great fete days of the Church within its walls. 
 
 A portion of the Monastery is now undergoing repair, and the 
 slowness of the work and difficulty of transporting materials were 
 very apparent, and helped us to realise that the work of construc- 
 tion of the whole vast building must have been a labour almost 
 comparable with that of building the great pyramid. For example, 
 we saw a block of stone about a yard square and a foot thick, 
 being dragged up the mountain with the greatest labour by six 
 oxen with the assistance of seven men. Four of the men goaded 
 the oxen, the other three helped the stone to ascend by inserting 
 large levers behind the wheelless truck on which it was placed. 
 In spite of all this expenditure of force, the oxen frequently 
 stopped panting for breath, and at the rate of progression which 
 prevailed so long as we watched the group, the cortege must have 
 started many hours before. 
 
 At present we have only reached the portal of the Monastery. 
 We enter it by an ascending passage formed of large blocks of 
 travertine, noticing to the right the old entrance, now walled up. 
 Near this entrance four miracles were performed by S. Benedict : the 
 first, the resuscitation of the son of a peasant ; on another occasion S. 
 Benedict slipped and fell, and left an impress of his elbow upon the 
 stone ; again, in order to rebuke the avarice of his cellarer, he threw 
 a bottle of oil to the ground, but it was not broken ; and again, near 
 this same spot were found one morning two hundred sacks of flour, 
 without any clue to discover who had brought them. These 
 miracles are recorded in the following lines : — 
 
 " Mortuns hie puer est, Benedieti voee revixit. 
 Taeta silex eubiti subsedit pondere sacri. 
 Pleno oleo pMala signantur saxa eadenti. 
 Bis eentum modii farinas mane videntur." 
 
 Beyond the door at the end of the ascending entrance we find 
 level ground, in the form of a large court, called the Cortile 
 
110 
 
 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 Centrale, and side courts; those on the right leading to the 
 libraries and archives, while those on the left belong to the College. 
 
 A series of arcades, called the Loggia 
 del Paradiso, run round the central 
 court, and they are surmounted by a 
 stone balustrade, from which, in one 
 direction — west — a lovely view over the 
 plains of the Garigliano may be obtained. 
 In the centre of the great court there 
 is a cistern ; the opening is surmounted 
 by two marble pillars supporting an 
 architrave, to which the pulley for the 
 water bucket is attached. 
 
 From the central court a broad marble 
 staircase, flanked by colossal statues of 
 S. Benedict and S. Scholastica, ascends 
 to the raised platform upon which 
 The stairs occupy the whole length of 
 the court, and lead to a square cloister containing the statues 
 of benefactors, and standing immediately in front of the 
 church. These were constructed in the sixteenth century. 
 Many of the columns supporting the cloisters are said to have 
 been taken from the Temple of Apollo, which formerly occupied the 
 site of the church. Among the statues we find those of Abondance, 
 the mother of S. Benedict ; Urban V., who restored the abbey after 
 the earthquake of 1349, and who accorded to the Abbot the 
 privilege of taking precedence of all the other Abbots; Charlemagne, 
 who made the Fathers of the Monastery, Chaplains of the Holy 
 Empire ; and Robert Guiscard, whose gifts, according to Peter the 
 Deacon, were too numerous to count. 
 
 We come now to the church itself, but this we shall have 
 so many opportunities of visiting, during our stay, that we 
 need not specially describe it here — and the more so because 
 
 THE WELL, MONTE CASSINO. 
 
 the church stands. 
 
Evening Service. 
 
 Ill 
 
 we have not yet housed ourselves for the night, or indeed 
 got beyond the porter's lodge. Arrived there, we send in 
 
 ENTRANCE TO THE CHURCH, MONTE CASSINO. 
 
 our letter from Eome to the Abbot, and presently a monk, the 
 politest of Frenchmen, comes forward and welcomes us very 
 cordially to the Monastery. Then having sent the luggage to our 
 room, he offers coffee or wine, and takes us into the library, where 
 we examine the treasures which it contains till sunset, rushing out 
 for a moment to see the red-litten sky over the western mountains. 
 A little later, the monks have their evening service in a small chapel 
 beneath the church, always used in winter. The huge central 
 reading-desk, which, together with the vellum-leaved missal upon 
 it, had been used for similar services for centuries, by many 
 generations of men, was alone illuminated ; the rest of the chapel 
 was almost in darkness. As the monks from time to time came 
 out of the darkness and gathered around the reading-desk, some 
 fine effects of chiaroscuro were produced.. After the service, we 
 went at once to the refectory, in which, at half-past twelve and 
 
112 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 balf-past seven, the monks meet. Tables were ranged around the 
 walls. Silence was observed during dinner, and one of the monks 
 read from a low pulpit. The Abbot — Monsignor d'Orgemont, 
 Nicholas III. in the long line of Abbots — sat at a small table in the 
 centre of the cross tables, that is, at one end of the room, and mid- 
 way between the walls. Sitting here with these solemn, silent, 
 and black -robed brethren, one felt carried back five hundred years, 
 and no doubt that yery scene has scarcely altered in any material 
 detail during that period. The next day we dined in the large 
 refectory, a fine well-proportioned room, with the Professors and 
 the boys. Here there were central tables as well as tables ranged 
 round the wall. The reading from the pulpit during the meal did 
 not take place, but silence was observed. 
 
 The interior of the Monastery consists of long arched corridors, 
 opening out of which are the rooms occupied by the Fathers. These 
 are simple uncarpeted chambers very plainly furnished, and usually 
 commanding a lovely view ; in fact, all the front windows of the 
 Monastery look out upon one of the most beautiful views that can 
 be well imagined. In the extreme distance, to the west, a little 
 strip of sea may be seen — the Gulf of Gaeta, — while to the east 
 stretches the valley of San Germanno, bounded by the mountains 
 of the Abruzzi. The north-east view includes wild rugged 
 mountains, together with the most lofty and conspicuous height 
 in the neighbourhood — Monte Cairo — which rises close to the 
 Monastery to a height of 5000 feet. To the west and south 
 stretches the valley of the Garigliano, separated from the sea by 
 the mountains of Gaeta. This fertile plain was the Campania 
 Felix of the Eomans, and there once existed in it the cities of 
 Fregella, Interamna, Casinum, and Aquinum. Small villages now 
 occupy the sites of the older towns. Near Eoccasecca we see the 
 ruins of the castle in which S. Thomas Aquinas, the great glory 
 of the Church, and its greatest theologian, was born. He was 
 partly educated at Monte Cassino. In the middle of the plain 
 
View from the Monastery. 
 
 113 
 
 there are remains of the Convent of Piumarole, founded by S. 
 Scholastica in a.d. 542, shortly after her brother had founded Monte 
 Cassino. It is said that once a year S, Scholastica ascended from 
 her Convent to the base of Monte Cassino, to meet S. Benedict, 
 who descended from his Monastery. The brother and sister are 
 buried together beneath the high altar of the Church of Monte 
 Cassino. 
 
 The ancients speak of the neighbourhood of Casinum as being 
 often subject to fog. This is still very noticeable, although the 
 
 MONTE OASSINO. 
 
 plain is not considered to be especially unhealthy, and the air of the 
 mountain is very pure. Looking out of our window just before 
 sunrise, we noticed long streaks of mist hanging over the plain, and 
 marking out the course of the rivers ; but the neis^hbourinor moun- 
 tains on a level with us were perfectly free from cloud, and were 
 seen sharply defined through a perfectly clear atmosphere. The 
 sunrise was very lovely. It was curious to be standing in a warm 
 bright blaze of light, and to see the town of San Germanno beneath. 
 
114 The Monastery of Mojite Cassino. 
 
 buried in comparative obscurity. It seemed a long time before 
 the sunlight reached the plain, and began to dissipate the mists. 
 The huge shadows of the mountains receded slowly, and the first 
 rays of the sun did but little to clear the air. All this time Monte 
 Cairo and the complete amphitheatre of mountains around were 
 flooded with bright light, and stood out clearly above the nether 
 gloom. 
 
 Soon after sunrise came one of the courteous Fathers to see how 
 we had slept. He had been up since five o'clock, and had already 
 done a good deal of work. After a while he returned to the 
 library to continue his labours of copying old MSS., having first 
 told us that there would be service in the church at eleven o'clock. 
 "We devoted some of the intermediate time to the church, which is 
 one of the great glories of the Monastery. Murray says of it, "the 
 interior far surpasses in elegance and in costliness of decoration 
 every other in Italy, not excepting S. Peter's itself;" and indeed, 
 without going quite so far as this, we know of no Italian church 
 with which we can compare it for richness of decoration, except 
 San Martino in Naples, and perhaps one of the side chapels in the 
 Gesu in Kome, and in S. Maria Maggiore — but these latter are of a 
 somewhat difl'erent character. Rather than attempt a description 
 from notes or from memory, which would probably be wanting in 
 some particulars, let us give in brief abstract the account by 
 M. Paul Guillaume, in his Description Historique et Artistique du 
 Mont Cassin. The church was originally erected on the site of a 
 Temple of Apollo in 529, by S. Benedict, but it was destroyed 
 sixty years later by the Lombards. A hundred and thirty years 
 afterwards, Petronace of Brescia constructed another church upon 
 its ruins, which was destroyed by the Saracens in 884. Twenty 
 years later, the Abbot, John I., rebuilt it, and it was enlarged and 
 embellished by the celebrated Abbot Desiderius in 1066, and 
 consecrated by Pope Alexander II. in 1071. This beautiful 
 building remained for nearly three hundred years, but it was 
 
The Church. 115 
 
 overthrown by an earthquake in 1349. It was at once recon- 
 structed, but in 1648 the building showed such evident signs of 
 decay that it was thought to be better to rebuild it. It was built 
 from the designs of Cosmo Fansaga, a Spaniard, the most 
 celebrated architect of his time, and it was consecrated after nearly 
 a century of work had been expended upon it, in 1727. This is 
 the church that we now see : its various vicissitudes are recorded in 
 a Latin inscription, which commences : — 
 
 Casinensem Ecclesiam. 
 Quam falsi numinis fano araque subversa 
 S. Benedictus anno DXXIX. 
 Vero Deo dicaverat." 
 
 The bronze doors of the church were made in 1066, by order 
 of the Abbot Desiderius. They record all the possessions of the 
 Monastery in the eleventh century, in the case of the left-hand 
 door, in letters of silver. Here are also two side doors. The 
 church possesses the title of cathedral, and the monks are Canons 
 of the Cathedral Church. 
 
 On entering, we notice that there are three naves, with 
 four chapels on each side. Over the high altar a lofty painted 
 dome rises, and the choir is prolonged some distance 
 behind the altar. On each side of the church there are arches 
 separating the naves, supported by square pilasters, flanked by 
 columns from the church erected by the Abbot Desiderius. The 
 square pilasters are encrusted with rich marbles, forming various 
 designs ; among others appear the crosses of the ten religious and 
 military orders which follow the rules of S. Benedict. The roof 
 and the upper part of the walls of the church were painted by Luca 
 Giordano (1632-1705). The subjects are taken from the life of S. 
 Benedict. Of smaller compositions, there are twenty of the most 
 celebrated Popes belonging to the Benedictines, and twenty 
 symbolic virtues, among which we notice Discretion, Patience, 
 Hospitality, Constancy, and Zeal. Each chapel is a gem in a 
 
116 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 setting of its own ; all that rich Florentine mosaic, marble statues, 
 gilt bronze, lapis lazuli, silver, and paintings, both in oil and 
 frescoes, can do to render a place of worship worthy of its Deity 
 has been done. The high altar of the church is of marble of the 
 kinds called nero antico and bianco antico, and of polished 
 amethyst quartz ; it is said to have been designed by Michael 
 Angelo. Beneath rest the remains of S. Benedict and S. 
 Scholastica. There are two conspicuous monuments to the right 
 and left of the high altar; one to the memory of Peter de 
 Medici, who was drowned while coming to the assistance of the 
 Monastery in 1503, the other to that of Guido Fieramosca, Prince of 
 Mignano. In the choir there are 82 stalls of carved wood, which 
 are certainly the finest examples of wood-carving we have ever 
 seen. Of these M. Paul Guillaume says, "C'est un monde de 
 statues, de portraits, de figures, d'animaux, de fruits, de fleurs ; le 
 tout travaille, fouille avec un fini, une patience dont on retrouve 
 ,difficilement un autre exemple. . . . Sur les bras de chaque 
 stalle, on voit un petit gdnie dans un position tout differente de 
 son voisin. D' autres figurines, ayant divers emblemes sym- 
 boliques soutiennent les premieres. I.es dossiers des stalles 
 superieures sont orn^s de capricieux dessins en relief, ou toute 
 la nature est representee, et qui entourent constamment quelqu 
 illustre personnage de I'Ordre Benedictin, figure, en demi-buste, 
 dans une petite niche." The choir further possesses one of the 
 finest organs in Italy, and no less than fifty -seven choral books on 
 vellum, of the fifteenth century, many of them adorned with fine 
 illuminations. Beneath the choir is a subterranean chapel, a 
 mortuary chapel, and a small chapel which the monks use in winter 
 when the upper church is very cold. The sacristy contains mosaics, 
 sculptures, bas-reliefs, and paintings, some of which are of great beauty. 
 The reliquary contains among other things the metal weight showing 
 the exact weight of bread allowed to each monk daily. It weighs 
 1053 grammes (about 2 J lbs.) ; and upon it is inscribed in Roman 
 
The Collection of Manuscripts. 117 
 
 characters, Ponc^ws lihre, panis Beati Benedicti. It is the only- 
 real relic remaining of S. Benedict. Other relics are thorns from 
 the crown of thorns, a portion of the veil of the Virgin Mary, and 
 a piece of the true cross. The latter is enclosed in an equal-armed 
 cross of gold and enamel of the tenth century, and bears a Greek 
 inscription in uncial letters. The abbot's pastoral staff, which he 
 carries only on state occasions, is a magnificent sixteenth century 
 work, attributed to Benvenuto Cellini. It is of gilt copper, and is 
 of very graceful form, and beautifully chiselled. 
 
 Soon after the service we had a mid-day meal of soup, meat, 
 and apples. Then we strolled very leisurely over some parts of the 
 Monastery of lesser interest, such as the capitular chamber and 
 the gallery of inscriptions. The picture gallery was unfortunately 
 closed for repairs; and the tower of S. Benedict, in which he is 
 believed to have lived, was also being repaired. 
 
 Monte Cassino possesses a very rich collection of MSS. of great 
 literary and historic value. Classified according to age, we find : 
 fifth century, one ; sixth, one ; seventh, two ; eighth. Jive ; ninth, 
 forty-one ; tenth, thirty-seven ; eleventh, two hundred and ten ; 
 twelfth, eight y- three ; thirteenth, one hundred and forty-six ; four- 
 teenth, one hundred and twenty ; and fifteenth century, eighty-four. 
 Of those anterior to the sixteenth century, there are 39 MSS. of the 
 Holy Scriptures, 43 on dogmatic theology, 30 on canon law, 18 on 
 astronomy and mathematics, 22 letters of the Fathers. Thirty-five 
 MSS. prior to the sixteenth century have illuminated figures and 
 other ornaments. We were much struck by one gigantic choral 
 book of vellum, which was freely illuminated throughout ; but 
 when we came to the service for Christmas day, all the rest was 
 outdone, the pages being painted a magnificent rich crimson, and 
 the letters of gold. We have read somewhere that in the library 
 of El Escorial there is a Gospel of S. Matthew the leaves of which 
 are of purple vellum, while the letters are cut out of sheet gold, and 
 gummed to the vellum — the weight of gold is said to exceed 
 
118 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 seventeen pounds. The Monte Cassino MSS. are almost all in 
 Latin or Italian, only three are Oriental, six Greek, two Proven9al, 
 and thirty-eight Spanish, while eleven hundred and ten are Latin, 
 and two hundred and fifty Italian. The earlier MSS. are the 
 works of S. Ambrose and S. Augustine, Homilies, and Epistles, 
 Lives of Saints ; also Hippocrates and Galen. In the eleventh 
 century MSS. we notice Confessions of S. Augustine ; Boethius' 
 Arithmetic; Bede's History of England; Acts and Canons of the 
 Councils ; and Laws of the Lombards. In the twelfth century : 
 John the Presbyter concerning Ancient and Modern Music ; 
 Constantinus on Surgery ; the Decretal of Gratian ; a Lexicon ; 
 and the Acts of the Council of Ephesus. In the thirteenth century: 
 Chronicles of Casinum ; S. Thomas Aquinas ; Abelard ; Tracts on 
 Medicine and Surgery ; and Homer's Iliad. 
 
 In addition to the MSS., Monte Cassino possesses 90,000 
 charters, usually legal instruments relating to the Monastery. The 
 most ancient of these dates from the eighth century, and is a 
 diploma of Grimoald II., Prince of Benevento, granting certain 
 privileges to the Abbess of S. Marie de Cinglis. A well-preserved 
 chartulary is that of the Abbot Desiderius, afterwards Pope Victor 
 III, ; the signature is given in curious Lombard characters, in which 
 each letter is remarkably prolonged : — 
 
 Ego Desiderius Di. gra. abbs. SS. 
 
 The history of an institution which has endured for twelve 
 centuries must of necessity be of considerable value, not alone in 
 reference to the history of the country in which it exists, but also 
 as afi'ecting the human race. Several good histories of Monte 
 Cassino exist. A book often quoted is the Historia AhbaticB 
 Cassinensis, of Father Erasmus Gattula, published in Venice in 
 1733, in four folio volumes. But the great historian of the 
 Monastery is Father Luigi Tosti, now an inmate of Monte Cassino. 
 His Stona della Badia di Monte Cassino was first published in 
 
S. Benedict. 119 
 
 Naples in 1843. The following facts we have taken from the 
 above-mentioned work of M. Paul Guillaume, who for two years 
 resided in the Monastery, and who freely used the works of 
 Gattula and Tosti in the compilation of his smaller history. 
 
 S. Benedict was born in Nursia in 480, of a noble family both 
 on his father's and mother's side. Even while young he perceived 
 the extreme corruption of Rome, and this induced him to retire to 
 Subiaco, where he lived in a cave for three years, and where his life 
 was so saintly that many illustrious persons visited him, and some 
 remained to live near him. But Florent, the priest of the place, 
 became jealous, and tried to poison the holy man ; whereupon S. 
 Benedict, together with two companions, S. Mauro and S. Placidus, 
 left Subiaco and were led by three ravens which they fed. The birds 
 flew to Monte Cassino, where, in memory of their guidance, they still 
 keep a most pert and comical raven. In the eleventh century S. 
 Peter Damian mentions that the monks of Monte Cassino preserved 
 the race of ravens which had guided S. Benedict. The mountain 
 was then — a.d. 529 — crowned by a cyclopean wall, remains of which 
 may still be seen in the garden of the Monastery ; and in the 
 midst of it rose a temple sacred to Apollo. Even at this time, two 
 centuries after the conversion of Constantine, there existed, not 
 many miles from Rome, the most rank pagan idolatries. On 
 the heights of Monte Cassino, Janus, Venus, and Apollo had 
 temples, sacred groves, and troops of faithful worshippers. S. 
 Benedict began his work at once ; he preached the true God to the 
 inhabitants of the mountain, and converted them. The statue of 
 Apollo was thrown down, and a cross put in its place ; while the 
 temple became a Christian Church. S. Benedict then began to 
 frame rules of life for his numerous disciples, and he drew up 
 a code which was soon put in practice in many parts of Europe. 
 Among other things he enjoined his followers to occupy themselves 
 with manual labour, with song, and with letters. During the rest 
 of his life S. Benedict gave an example of all the virtues to his 
 
 R 
 
120 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 followers, and is said to have performed many miracles. He was the 
 founder of the first and greatest of the Eeligious Orders, and must ever 
 be regarded as a great benefactor of the human race. He died in 
 543, having lived to see his Monastery in a state of prosperity, his 
 discijDles a numerous body of men, and himself beloved. In the 
 year of his death the Order of Benedictines took root in France, 
 and six years previously it had been introduced into Sicily by S. 
 Placidus. 
 
 During the lifetime of S. Benedict, the Monastery had been en- 
 dowed with various possessions. A good deal of land surrounding 
 the mountain had been given to it, and in the hands of 
 succeeding abbots these temporal domains increased in number 
 and value. Thus the cupidity of the surrounding nobles was 
 aroused, and we are not surprised to find that, in those lawless 
 times, the Monastery was pillaged and destroyed. This happened 
 for the first time in 589, when Noton, first Duke of Benevento, 
 attacked it at the head of a lawless band of Lombards, and 
 destroyed it. The greater number of the monks fled to Eome, 
 where they were allotted a habitation near S. John Lateran by 
 Pelagius II., and where they founded the celebrated Monastery of 
 the Lateran. A few monks only remained at the tomb of S. 
 Benedict. One hundred and thirty years later, Petronax, a 
 rich and pious citizen of Brescia, rebuilt the Monastery, and 
 the restored church was consecrated in 748. Its reputation 
 soon rose again, and various illustrious personages assumed the 
 Benedictine habit, among others Carloman, the uncle of Charle- 
 magne, and Ratchis, King of the Lombards. During the succeed- 
 ing hundred and fifty years the Monastery flourished wonderfully ; 
 the buildings were increased and embellished, the monks became 
 far more numerous, letters and arts flourished, and a school of 
 learning arose there, to which the Bishop of Naples sent 
 his clerics to be instructed in the sacred and profane sciences, 
 and in music. At this time, also, a number of monks began to 
 
Forhmes of the Monastery. 121 
 
 transcribe the works of antiquity, and it is due to their care that 
 many precious treatises have been preserved to us. 
 
 But the Monastery was not destined to meet with continuous 
 successes. In 844, Siconolfo, the first Prince of Salerno, attacked 
 it, and carried off all the riches which had been accumulated by 
 the beneficence of Pepin le Bref, Charlemagne, and Louis le 
 Debonnaire. Some years later, devastating hordes of Saracens 
 utterly destroyed it, for the second time since its founda- 
 tion. The monks fled to Teano, carrying with them a few 
 rare manuscripts and imperial diplomas. Early in the tenth 
 century the Abbot Leo began to reconstruct the Monastery, and he 
 was much assisted by Landolfo, Prince of Capua, and the Abbot 
 Aligerno. Under the latter, it flourished considerably, and 
 soon possessed a large number of monks from various parts of 
 Europe. But the eleventh century was the golden age of the 
 Monastery, under the abbots John III., Atenolfo, and Theobald. 
 In the time of the latter (1022-35) the arts and letters flourished 
 wonderfully at Monte Cassino ; a great deal of translation was 
 done, and a considerable amount of original literary work. In 
 1022, Odilon, Abbot of Cluny, visited the Monastery, and gave the 
 abbot the title of Ahbas Ahhatum, which was confirmed by Pope 
 Pascal II. in 1116. Cardinal Frederic de Lorraine, afterwards 
 Stephen IX., showered upon it all sorts of benefits — enriching 
 the church with precious ornaments, and the library with 
 richly-illuminated missals and antiphonaries. But the Abbot 
 Desiderius, afterwards Pope Victor III., surpassed all his predeces- 
 sors in generosity and magnificence. He belonged to the family of 
 the Princes of Benevento, and in his youth had been a very warlike 
 man. Later in life he became disgusted with the world, and put 
 on the Benedictine habit. He was elected Abbot of Monte Cassino 
 in 1058. For thirty years he devoted himself to the interests of 
 the Monastery, and proved himself a great patron of the arts 
 and letters. He entirely restored every part of it, and the 
 
122 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 new church was consecrated by Alexander II. in 1071. Desiderius 
 collected works of art, both ancient and modern, from all sources, 
 and brought together at Monte Cassino a number of sculptors, 
 painters, and workers in mosaic. His monks were learned in all 
 sciences, sacred and profane. Among them may be mentioned 
 Alfano, who afterwards became Archbishop of Salerno ; Pandolfo, 
 the father of the Princes of Capua, who composed a treatise, De 
 Calculatione, and another, De Luna ; Amatus, the historian of the 
 Normans ; Leo of Ostia, the author of the famous Chronica 
 Casinensis Minor ; and Constantinus Africanus, the founder of the 
 medical school of Salerno. Desiderius founded a special school of 
 copyists, whose works became so famous that scrittura Cassinese 
 became a term for beautiful writing. Among other ancient works 
 which were transcribed we may mention — Cicero, De Natura 
 Deorum ; Homer, Terence, Ovid, Fasti ; Seneca, Virgil, and 
 Theocritus. The Cardinal Odorisio, who succeeded Desiderius as 
 abbot, continued the good works which his predecessor had 
 inaugurated. 
 
 It is impossible to expect uniform progression in anything, and 
 the golden age of Monte Cassino in the tenth century was followed 
 by a period of decadence in the eleventh. The abbots were great 
 feudal lords, and were obliged to take part in the numerous wars 
 which at that time occurred in Southern Italy ; " et ils y perdirent," 
 says M. Guillaume, " a la fois, repos, richesse, et amour des arts et 
 des lettres." 
 
 In 1120 the inhabitants of San Germanno broke into open 
 rebellion. Twenty years later, Roger, King of Sicily, made an 
 attack upon the Monastery, and the soldiers of his successor 
 drove out the monks, and established themselves in their 
 place. Frederic II. converted the Monastery into a fortress, 
 and made Gordano di Calabris their captain, a man "poco 
 amante dei monaci." In 126G, Charles d'Anjou took it under 
 his protection, and repaired its fortunes. The removal of the 
 
Fortunes of the Monastery. 123 
 
 Popes to Avignon, and tlie numerous wars which desolated the 
 kingdom of Naples, were the source of many ills to the 
 Monastery. In 1322, Pope John XXII., wishing to increase the 
 dignity of the abbots, who already exercised episcopal jurisdiction 
 over a large diocese, elevated them to the rank of bishops. The 
 new abbots were often sent from a distance, and sometimes they 
 were not Italians ; the monks became discontented, and thus in- 
 ternal feuds arose. Then in 1346, Louis of Hungary marched into 
 the kingdom of Naples, and laid siege to the Monastery. Finally, 
 in 1349 a terrible earthquake reduced the beautiful buildings of 
 the Abbot Desiderius to a heap of ruins. In the following year 
 Boccaccio visited Monte Cassino, and found the library in the 
 most dire state of confusion ; — a few monks continued to live 
 among the ruins. At length, in 1362, Guillaume Grimoard, 
 a Benedictine, and Abbot of S. Victor in Marseilles, came to 
 visit the tomb of his patron Saint, and was touched with com- 
 passion at the sight of the monks weeping among the ruins of their 
 Monastery. Afterwards, when Grimoard became Pope Urban V., 
 he commenced its restoration, and in his hands and those of Andre 
 de Faenza, and a noble Roman, Pietro de Tartaris, the work made 
 good progress, and a noble pile of buildings arose. 
 
 During the second half of the fifteenth century the Monastery had 
 the misfortune to be governed by abbot-commanders (ahbati 
 commendatari), who cared more for its revenues than for the 
 interests of the monks, and who gave its best offices to favourites, 
 and often resided at a distance. The last abbot-commander was 
 John de Medici, who was given this important office when he was 
 eleven years old ; he became a cardinal at fourteen, and later we 
 know him under the name of Pope Leo X. 
 
 It is unfortunate that Monte Cassino could not keep to its 
 peaceful and religious duties without constantly mixing itself up 
 with any wars which took place in its vicinity. As the Monastery 
 owned a good deal of land, it was perhaps impossible to remain 
 
124 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 non-belligerent. But the constant petty wars in the kingdom 
 of Naples caused it to become a fortress or a barrack time after 
 time. It was repeatedly fortified ; it was taken and re-taken, 
 and bloody massacres took place within its walls (1502). At 
 length, a thousand years after its foundation, peace seemed to be 
 restored ; the abbot-commanders were replaced by regular abbots, as 
 the surrounding country became less and less subject to wars. When 
 we look back at the numberless vicissitudes through which the 
 Monastery passed during the first thousand years of its existence, 
 we are led to wonder by what means the numerous diplomas, 
 charters, and other MSS. which it possesses, could have been 
 preserved. No doubt they were often hidden, and brought to light 
 again in less troublous times. 
 
 Early in the sixteenth century (1510), the Abbot Squarcialupi 
 of Florence (Ignatius I.) began a complete restoration in a 
 style worthy of its ancient fame. This work was continued by 
 his successors in the seventeenth and eis^hteenth centuries. The 
 present church was commenced in 1637, and many successive 
 abbots lavished treasure upon its decorations. 
 
 In 1796, Ferdinand, King of Naples, established himself and 
 his court in Monte Cassino, while the French General Mathieu 
 took up his residence in the abbatial palace in San Germanno at 
 the base of the mountain. Ferdinand soon fled to Capua. In 
 1799, the French imposed a heavy war tax on the monks, 
 and as thay were unable to pay it in full, the treasure of S. 
 Benedict was seized : beautiful chalices, ciboria, and reliquiaries 
 were melted down, together with two busts of S. Benedict and S. 
 Sebastian in silver. A little later, the French Republicans com- 
 pletely sacked the Monastery. The monks fled into the mountains, 
 with the exception of Giambettista, Federici, and Enrico Gattola. 
 When the soldiers entered the building, these men besought tbem 
 to spare the historic treasures of fourteen centuries, but in vain. 
 At the entrance to the rooms containing the archives, young Gat- 
 
Fortunes of the Monastery. 125 
 
 tola knelt, and entreated the soldiers at least to spare them ; to 
 which request the only answer he received was the stroke of a sabre, 
 which stretched him senseless, and bathed him in blood. The 
 insensate villains wilfully destroyed books and manuscripts which 
 could never be replaced, and fed with the precious archives 
 the fire wherewith they cooked their food. Surely the author of 
 " Daniel Deronda " must have been thinking of some such scene as 
 this when she penned the very vigorous passage placed at the head 
 of chapter xxi. — 
 
 " It is a common sentence that knowledge is power ; but who hath duly 
 considered or set forth the power of ignorance ? Knowledge slowly builds 
 up what ignorance in an hour pulls down. Knowledge, through patient 
 and frugal centuries, enlarges discovery, and makes record of it ; Ignorance, 
 wanting its day's dinner, lights a fire with the record, and gives a flavour 
 to its one roast, with the burnt souls of many generations. Knowledge, 
 instructing the sense, refining and multiplying needs, transforms itself into 
 skill, and makes life various with a new six days' work ; comes Ignorance, 
 drunk on the seventh, with a firkin of oil and a match, and an easy ' Let 
 there not be,' — and the many-coloured creation is shrivelled up in black- 
 
 ness." 
 
 Early in the present century Joseph Buonaparte converted the 
 Monastery into a museum of objects of art ; the abbot was called 
 Direttore delta Stabilimento, and the monks, deprived of their 
 Benedictine habit, became the guardians of the treasures. But 
 when Ferdinand I. reascended the throne of Naples, it was 
 restored to its rightful use, and was allowed a grant of nearly 
 £2400 annually. In 1821 it was once again applied to 
 military purposes, and occupied by the Neapolitan soldiers who 
 went to oppose the Austrians ; the Monastery did not, however, 
 sufier harm. When Victor Emmanuel became King of United 
 Italy, one of the first Liberal measures was the suppression of 
 Eeligious Houses. Throughout Sicily and Italy we constantly meet 
 with such institutions converted to secular uses — sometimes into 
 barracks, sometimes into schools, and sometimes they are left tenant- 
 
126 
 
 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 less. It was feared that Monte Cassino would meet the same fate, 
 but owing to the exertions of Mr. Gladstone, whose Government 
 was then in power, the Italian Government consented to allow 
 Monte Cassino to continue to exist as a monastery and an educa- 
 tional establishment. We heartily thank Mr. Gladstone for this 
 one Conservative action of his later years, and we echo the Floreat 
 perpetuo which he has written over against the time-honoured 
 name of the Monastery. 
 
 Monte Cassino is now permitted to exist as a great national 
 monument, and as an important educational establishment, in 
 which a number of the sons of the principal families around 
 Eome and Naples are educated. The Fathers are regarded 
 by the Government as the guardians of the national monument, 
 but they continue to live in community and with the strict observance 
 of the rules of S. Benedict. They for the most part belong to good 
 families, and are men of considerable learning. 
 
 In 1855 there were twenty brethren, nine laymen, and seven- 
 teen noviciates ; the present number is, we believe, somewhat 
 larger. The main division is into Fathers, called Dom or Pere, 
 
 and Brothers, called 
 Fra or Frere. The 
 costume for all is 
 black ; a soutane, 
 girdle, and scapular, 
 and a broad hat 
 turned up on three 
 sides, together with 
 a large flowing 
 mantle on certain 
 occasions. The abbot 
 is exempt from all 
 episcopal jurisdic- 
 
 tion, and is subject 
 
Inmates of the Monastery. 127 
 
 solely to the Pope. He is elected by a general Chapter composed 
 of ail the abbots of the congregation, and sometimes by the Pope 
 direct. He holds office for three years, but he may be re-elected. 
 Formerly he was the first baron in the kingdom, and was entitled 
 to drive a coach and six. He still governs the whole community 
 and diocese of Monte Cassino, which contains about 100,000 
 persons, and is one of the largest dioceses in Italy. At the time 
 of its greatest splendour the Monastery possessed, according to M. 
 Hoeften (Commentaris sulla Vita di S. Benedetto), two principali- 
 ties, 20 countships, 440 towns, boroughs, and villages, 250 castles, 
 336 manors, 23 seaports, and 1662 churches. Its revenues for- 
 merly exceeded £20,000 a-year. No wonder the abbot was so 
 great a personage. He is still addressed — " Illustrissimo e 
 Reverendissimo Monsio'nor Dom N. N. Abate Ordinario di Monte 
 Cassino." He has almost all the powers of a bishop — administers 
 the sacrament of confirmation, officiates pontifically with the mitre 
 and pastoral staff, wears a pectoral cross and ring, and gives the 
 solemn triple benediction after the office which he celebrates. 
 Charlemagne created the abbots of Monte Cassino, Chancellors of 
 the Holy Empire, while Urban V. granted them the privilege of 
 occupying in all councils the first place among all the other 
 abbots. After the abbot comes the Prior, who is charged with the 
 interior discipline of the Monastery ; then the Father Vicar, who 
 administers the affairs of the diocese ; the Master of Novices, the 
 Grand Cellarer, who has charge of the revenues of the Monastery ; 
 the Father A^xhevist, who has charge of the archives ; the Father 
 Librarian, the Strangers Father (" il Padre Foresterario "), who 
 receives strangers, and exercises the hospitality of the Monastery ; 
 the Father Vicar of the Sacristy, and so on. The monks have 
 four services in the choir daily — 8 a.m.. Primes; 11 a.m.. Tierce 
 and Grand Mass ; 2 p.m., Vespres and Complines ; 7 p.m., Laudes. 
 In the morning the Fathers give all their free time to the instruction 
 of the boys in the seminary, or to copying MSS. in the archives ; 
 
128 
 
 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 in the afternoon they walk for an hour or two in the environs of 
 the Monastery. During the very hot weather everybody takes a 
 siesta after dinner. 
 
 Our last evening with these kindly, pleasant companions has 
 come. The sun is going down, and already as we look from our 
 window the valley is in deep shadow, and the evening mists are 
 beginning to rise. Father Anselmo comes to tell us that his 
 labours for the day are over, and that he proposes a walk 
 in the garden. And so we wander out to the edge of the 
 
 VIEW OF THE MONASTERY FROM THE GARDEN. 
 
 small plateau on which the Monastery stands, and look right 
 and left into the valley beneath. The cyclopean wall is at our 
 feet, and a few huge detached blocks of stone are lying in the gar- 
 den. Lettinoj the mind wander from the time when this, the first 
 structure of the mountain, was built, we try to realise some of the 
 subsequent events in the life of Monte Cassino. It is capped by a 
 many-columned temple, surrounded by groves sacred to the gods, 
 and the people are prostrate around a statue ; now the statue is 
 replaced by a cross, and on the site of the temple stands the Church 
 
Father Anselmo. 129 
 
 of Christ. Again the scene changes — the Valley of the Garigliano 
 is full of soldiers, and they are scaling the mountain — a gun booms 
 from the roof of the Monastery, and mail-clad soldiers pour from 
 the great gateway. Once more grave Fathers wander in the long 
 corridors, and the sound of the Vesper Hymn comes from the 
 chapel. And then we thought of the many generations of men 
 which had lived and died on this spot, of the work that had been 
 done here, the treatises written, the manuscripts transcribed, the 
 missals illuminated, the youth instructed, the poor comforted. 
 Father Anselmo talked of many things as we paced up and down — 
 of his life, and duties, and religion ; of S. Thomas Aquinas and S. 
 Augustine, both connected more or less directly with Monte 
 Cassino. The one he compared, as to his mode of reasoning, with 
 Aristotle, the other with Plato. Of S. Thomas he said — as we 
 have always heard in every Roman Catholic country without one 
 dissentient voice — that he stands out as the first theologian of the 
 Church in all time. Hearing that physical science was our 
 favourite subject, the father asked for a definition of fire, and 
 made us repeat the scientific definition until he had learnt it by 
 heart. Then he said he had often thought that an admirable 
 symbol of the Trinity was to be found in the science of acoustics, 
 in the case of a stretched string and its principal vibrating divi- 
 sions. The string vibrating as a whole gives the fundamental 
 note ; when it divides itself into two vibrating segments it gives 
 the octave, and when into three vibrating segments, the tierce, 
 the three simplest relationships of any three sounds ; and the string 
 may simultaneously vibrate after these three modes. Thus we 
 discoursed till the sun went down. The next morning we had 
 time, before descending the mountain, to take a parting glimpse at 
 some now familiar scenes — to see the sun rise over the valley, and 
 to wander on the terrace, and get a last look at the church, in 
 which there was always some newly-discovered beauty to be found. 
 The time for parting has come : — Farewell, dignified and learned 
 
130 The Monastery of Monte Cassino. 
 
 Abbot ; farewell, genial and kindly Prior ; farewell, Father Cellarius, 
 to whom we have been more specially indebted for the direct acts 
 of hospitality ; farewell, Father Tosti ; and farewell you. Father 
 Anselmo, whose urbanity, and consideration, and thousand kindly 
 offices will not soon fade from our minds. You who so gently over- 
 looked our ignorance, so patiently listened to our lame discourse, you 
 who helped us so kindly when we halted in our knowledge ; who at 
 dawn of day came to see how we had slept, and at close of even to wish 
 us God-speed and the grace of heaven. Farewell — but not a long fare- 
 well. We must descend to the nether world. Every step downwards 
 seems to take us further from old-world life. We are leaving 
 behind us the cinquecento, and fast entering the century of hard, 
 bullying, practical facts, and mad toil and moil, and struggle for 
 existence. Presently the train carries us off to Naples, and we get 
 a last glimpse of the Monastery standing out calm and clear above 
 us, incoronate with the lingering splendour of the day. 
 
 There are monasteries and monasteries. No doubt the Italian 
 Government did wisely in determining upon a reform in this 
 direction ; but a wholesale suppression was rather a severe measure 
 to begin with. In many cases the system had been grossly abused, 
 and to enter a monastery became an excuse for leading an idle, 
 profitless, and sometimes sensual life. We may no more compare 
 such grand institutions as Monte Cassino with a monastery 
 of fat, dirty, idle Cappuccini, than we may compare Milan 
 Cathedral with a joss-house. The remarks on the subject made 
 in a subsequent chapter do not apply to Monte Cassino. The 
 attractions offered by such a monastery are manifold : — a calm and 
 dignified repose in the midst of learned brethren of one mind and 
 fraternity ; a systematic and orderly life raised far above the petty 
 cares and turmoils of the world ; the example and rules of 
 a great Saint of the church, their founder ; the possibility of doing 
 good work in the world ; — these things, and many more, commend 
 themselves to certain orders of mind. If to be God-fearing and self- 
 
The Monks of Monte Cassino. 
 
 131 
 
 denying ; to be honest, and brave, and sober-minded ; to be diligent 
 and humble, and true ; to live in the beauty of holiness, at peace with 
 all men, and in the exercise of works of charity ; if to attain the 
 "calm content of which Seneca says so much, with all else that he 
 considers needful for the attainment of a happy life, and to put in 
 practice S. Paul's precepts and rules of Christian life : — if these 
 things conduce most to individual happiness, and to the sum total 
 of earthly felicity, then we say that the monks of Monte Cassino 
 must be the happiest of men. 
 
132 
 
 The Stimmum Bonum. 
 
 THE SUMMUM BONUM. 
 
 A Conversation in the Garden of Monte Cassino. * 
 
 ^ old Casinum's height there stands a Fane 
 Founded long centuries ago, by one 
 Whose saintly life and store of earnest works 
 Were fitly crowned by his last legacy, 
 His great example, and a sect of men, 
 ^BJ Who passed from age to age his much-loved fame. 
 
 His piety and rules of discipline ; 
 
 And made the stately minster he had reared 
 
 Eenowned and noble to all future time. 
 
 There wandered once adown the garden's slope. 
 
 At close of day, two men whose fervid talk 
 
 Betokened some grave subject of discourse : 
 
 A Father of S. Benedict, who passed 
 
 His holy life on Mount Casinum's height, 
 
 And a philosopher who loved to trace 
 
 In pagan modes of thought his rule of life. 
 
 Thus one had more of faith ; of reason one. 
 
 This one had read, and studied, and worked out 
 
 The subtleties of old philosophies. 
 
 And shed on them the essence of his mind. 
 
 The other, blessed with faith, his reason made 
 
 At one with that of a most holy saint ; 
 
 And thus in perfect calm of faith he lived. 
 
 They talked of life, and death, and man's career ; 
 
 They asked each other how to best attain 
 
 The summum honum of our earthly strife. 
 How runs the course of pure philosophy ? 
 
 How should we walk therein — how strive, how grasp 
 
 The summum honum of our reasoning life ? 
 Look you ! the course of pure philosophy 
 
 Is as a devious path, all rough with mounds, 
 
 Which have been raised by mortals in fond hope 
 
The Summum Bonum. 133 
 
 Of seeing further, and with clearer ken, 
 Than they who stand upon the nether ground, 
 Into the ghostly caverns of the past — 
 Into the mist of ages yet to come. 
 
 Some mounds there be which signify the place 
 Where the ripe thought of ages has amassed 
 Its varied treasures : monuments are these 
 To wisest, greatest, truest of earth's sons ; 
 And travellers by the path delight to rest 
 Upon their rugged tops, all hoar with age, 
 And thence survey their journey's distant road. 
 But there are others which are monstrous foul : 
 Oft they contain within their festering mass 
 Dead forms of antique systems, which the world 
 Has buried from her most offended sight. 
 Because they were such hideous, loathsome things. 
 Albeit some ascend these fearful tombs. 
 And when they reach the summit they are worn 
 With plodding through the heavy, reeking soil ; 
 And as the light of day fades quickly out, 
 They lie them down hard by the mouldering dead, 
 To rest awhile their over-wearied limbs ; 
 And lo ! 'tis here their travail has its end. 
 
 As we commence our journey by this path, 
 Full soon we see a most neglected mound, 
 
 Which long has ceased to be the halting-place 
 
 Of any traveller to the distant land ; 
 And in dull faded letters there we read — 
 
 " Gorgias," " Polus," " Prodicus," wise men 
 
 Who once received the homage of mankind, 
 
 Sophist ! quick arose thy lofty mound, 
 
 Founded in sandy soil, the storms of Heaven 
 
 Rave it quite through from base to highest crown. 
 
 Not far from this we see a massive mound 
 
 Upreared by Socrates, augmented much 
 
 By Megaric and Cyrenaic crew ; 
 
 A very mountain bears the mighty name 
 
134 The Summum Bonum. 
 
 Of Aristotle ; twice a thousand years, 
 He meted love of wisdom to mankind. 
 
 Here is a mount beloved of deadly snakes 
 And scorpions, and the ever-croaking frog ; 
 All horrent reptiles crawl upon its sides 
 And hide their hideous forms within its breast. 
 Hard by the summit is a darksome cave, 
 Whilom a wizard grim at his weird work 
 Had sat therein, and ofttimes shrieked aloud 
 His cursed spells into the midnight air. 
 Then slacked the birds of night their droning wings, 
 And listed drowsily, and drooped their heads, 
 And wondered if a prey were near at hand. 
 Here he invoked Azael and great Sammael : 
 He asked the stars in his profanity 
 For clearer ken of hidden mysteries ; 
 And passing quickly to a grosser work, 
 More suited to his own most gruesome soul, 
 Besought the smoking entrails of a beast 
 To unfold the glories of the seventh sphere. 
 What wisdom this ! A Mediaeval lore 
 Eooted in Eastern soil, which grew apace. 
 And flourished greatly in a Western land. 
 It is not here. Oh ! no, we find not here 
 The summum bonum of our reasoning life. 
 
 Cartesius' mound is very broad and flat ; 
 No name is seen upon it, but below 
 A broken slab repeats the vanished theme, 
 Cogito ergo sum. Let us pass on. 
 On Leibnitz hill we still are fain to find 
 The famous fish-ponds : far more lasting they 
 Than the crude argument which they evoked. 
 The mound of Berkeley is of solid rock, 
 Of substance most material ; he said, 
 It lacked a real existence, a perception, 
 Subjective phenomenon, an idea. 
 But it remains conspicuous from afar, 
 
The Sumjnum Bonum. 135 
 
 While liis poor frame, so quick, so sensible, 
 Has crumbled out of objectivity. 
 
 We may not stay to name them one by one. 
 We must go on more quickly, lest our halt 
 Keep us for ever from the wished-for goal. 
 Full many mounds we see of varied forms, 
 Some covered with a beauteous bosky cloak 
 From which peep ruins of forgotten shrines; 
 While asphodel and cypress cover some. 
 And others groves of myrtle and of bay. 
 Some are morasses, eager to entrap 
 The traveller's foot, and rife with fell disease. 
 Such one is seen in an accursed mound 
 Full of decay, too loathsome to approach, 
 The home of vultures and of fearful ghouls, 
 And of uncleanly beasts of varied kind ; 
 And lo ! the names in fiery blazon writ 
 Of Diderot, Holbach, and La Mettrie. 
 
 ISTot far removed from this a hill is seen 
 In aspect new and in proportion vast ; 
 To it there flock of every race and creed 
 Innumerable followers, and they help 
 To make it yet more vast, for they would fain 
 Climb up to heaven by its slanting sides : 
 And on it is the name of Auguste Comte. 
 
 But oh ! what graceful peak uprears its head 
 Sublime above the plain, until it cleaves 
 The snowy canopy of clouds above ? 
 It is thick clothed with amaranthine flowers. 
 And on its utmost top it bears a fane 
 Sacred to Immortality ; within 
 There dwells the calm, the most ineffable. 
 The sovereign spirit of the greatest Greek. 
 Here let us rest, here throw our burden down, 
 Of Moleschott, Eenan, Biichner, and their school ; 
 Tlien start afresh well strengthened for the toil. 
 All Platonized in essence, and in soul. 
 
136 
 
 The SmmuMm Bomtm. 
 
 Here ends the course of pure philosophy ; 
 Strive we no further, we have now attained 
 The summum honum of our reasoning life. 
 
 Then spake the son of Benedict, and said — • 
 " That same immortal goal we humbly seek 
 In faith, in love of Christ, in charity, 
 In active labour with our hands and minds. 
 In meditations, communings of soul ; 
 In showing forth to all men the great love 
 And mercy of their God, and how He died 
 To purge and whiten their most scarlet souls." 
 
 The monk went upwards to his cloistered height, 
 The sage returned to the great world below, 
 Thus parting company, but not for aye. 
 
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CHAPTER VII. 
 
 NAPLES. 
 
 Populousness of the City — Life and Death — Character of the Neapolitans — Condition of 
 the City as regards Art— Musical Taste — Sights of the City — The Cathedral — San 
 Martino — The Catacombs — The Museum Collections — Library of Papyri — Pompeii 
 — Vesuvius — Puzzuoli — The Solfataras — Lacus Avernus — The Grotto of the Sibyl — 
 The Grotto del Cani — The Amphitheatre of Puzzuoli — Baise — Salerno — The Temples 
 at Pisestum, 
 
 E always think that Naples must be the most 
 populous city, for its size, in the world. That 
 it should thus appear is no doubt due to the 
 fact that the inhabitants spend most of their 
 time in the open air. Morning, noon, and night, 
 the great central Via di Roma is thronged with 
 people, who walk in the middle of the street, 
 fill up the spaces between the carriages, squeeze 
 themselves into the narrower streets, and who appear 
 to be constantly in slow motion from the upper to the 
 lower part of the town. Then the Molo is always 
 crowded with sailors, the suburbs with the poor popu- 
 lation, and in the afternoon every one who can afford 
 a horse, and a vehicle of any sort, drives along 
 Our first impressions of Naples associate death 
 
 the Chiaja. 
 
138 Naples. 
 
 with it as well as life. In the thickest part of a crowded street a 
 great oblong gilt coach slowly winds its way ; at its four corners 
 sit priests holding lighted candles, and it contains a coffin within. 
 Or sometimes a great gilt coffer, with a movable lid like an old- 
 fashioned tea-caddy, is carried along high above the crowd on the 
 shoulders of the bearers. Or, if the coffin be a small one, it is 
 sometimes carried in its bald, uncovered form on the head of a 
 bearer, while the mourners follow. One evening we passed a shop 
 which was brilliantly illuminated ; facing the street on a sloping 
 bier lay a dead daughter of the house dressed as a bride. Tall 
 candles were burning around the coffin, and the relatives sat 
 around. Three hours later we passed the same house : the candles 
 were still burning, and some of the mourners still watched, others 
 had fallen asleep from sheer weariness. One old woman stood 
 immovably fixed, gazing at the dead. The family watches all 
 night, and twenty-four hours after death the corpse is removed, 
 under the charge of a Confraternita, to which all those who 
 can afford it, belong. The members of these Societies have 
 the sole charge of burying the dead. At the end of less 
 than two years the coffins are opened, the bones are collected and 
 cleaned, and then stowed away in niches belonging to the 
 special Confraternita of which the deceased was a member. The 
 members of these different Brotherhoods have distinctive dresses: red, 
 black, and white are the most usual ; the garments envelope the 
 whole person, and a hood with openings for the two eyes completely 
 covers the head and face. Each person carries a book in one hand 
 and a lighted candle in the other, and there is something very 
 ghostly and horrible in the whole affair. The terrors of death are 
 often brought before the living. In a church in Girgenti there is 
 a flaming picture of souls in Purgatory on the front of the 
 high altar ; and we remember to have seen in Salerno a side 
 chapel in one of the churches specially dedicated to souls in 
 Purgatory. The altar was covered with small wood carvings 
 
Character of the ISfeapolitans. 139 
 
 representing a pink body emerging from a mass of very red flames : 
 one of these little images was placed in each of the candlesticks, 
 and a large wooden image in the same condition was placed on one 
 side of the altar. The rich Neapolitans do not pay much respect 
 to the dead, and sometimes desert their houses as soon as the 
 breath is out of the body of their nearest relative, leaving the 
 whole matter in the hands of the Confraternita. 
 
 At the time of any rapid mortality, these Societies are 
 sorely tried. Naples has been frequently visited by cholera, and 
 sometimes by the plague. Pictures in the Museum represent the 
 city in an indescribable state of horror, during the visitation of 
 plague. It has also suffered much from earthquakes, and from 
 sieges by Greeks, Romans, Goths, Saracens, Normans, and Spaniards, 
 yet it has always remained populous, and now contains more 
 than half-a-million of inhabitants. 
 
 The Neapolitans are a gay, lazy set of people, too indolent to 
 be of much use in the world. While Florence has produced some 
 of the most illustrious poets, painters, sculptors, architects, 
 musicians, men of letters, and men of science which the world has 
 ever seen, Naples has scarcely produced one great man in the whole 
 range of its long existence. This of course may be partly attributed 
 to the frequent changes of rulers, the bad forms of government to 
 which it has been subject, and the want of patrons of learning, like 
 the de Medicis, to foster a taste for arts and letters, and to stimulate 
 genius. As far as music and painting are concerned, art is not 
 well represented in Naples. The pictures in the Museum cannot 
 for a moment compare with the galleries of Florence and Rome. 
 As to music, the singing in the churches is very bad ; we heard an 
 execrable performance of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Mercadante, 
 and even at the great San Carlo itself — one of the finest opera 
 houses in the world — the performance was not nearly so good as 
 that which one hears in London, Paris, Milan, or Rome. La 
 Forza del Destino had been played for many nights. It lasted four 
 
140 Naples. 
 
 hours, and was followed by a ballet which lasted raore thau an 
 hour, and concluded with a great transformation scene like that of 
 a pantomime. The ballet was very elaborate, but the dancing was 
 not nearly as good as that which one sees in Paris. Throughout 
 Italy, one might almost say throughout Europe — for we have 
 heard one or other of them, from Belgium to Cairo, taking in 
 Athens by the way — Offenbach and Lecocq seem to be the most 
 popular composers. A French company, at any theatre in any city, 
 which gives "La Fille de Madame Angot," or "La Grande 
 Duchesse," is sure to get a crowded house week after week, while 
 the great opera houses and the native theatres often languish. Yet 
 Naples once had a name as a great musical centre. Scarlatti, 
 Porpora, Pergolesi, Sacchini, and Jomelli were Neapolitans, so also 
 were Cimarosa and Paesiello ; and the Neapolitan School of Music 
 claims Rossini (born at Pesaro), Bellini (born at Catania), and 
 Mercadante. 
 
 Within Naples itself there is but little to be seen. There is a 
 great palace at Capodimonte, high above the town, containing a 
 few pretty pictures, and some passable porcelain ; and another 
 near the water's edge, containing some fine saloons, a hanging 
 garden from whence a lovely view over the bay may be 
 obtained, and, above all, a bronze head of Bacchus from Hercul- 
 aneum, which is certainly one of the finest bronzes we have ever 
 seen. Then in the midst of the city, and high above it, stands the 
 Castel Sant' Elmo, which must be ascended for the sake of the 
 view. In a Monastery adjoining the Castle is the famous Church 
 of San Martino, which for richness of decoration can alone compare 
 worthily with the Church of Monte Cassino. It is profusely 
 adorned with a great variety of coloured marbles, and with 
 mosaics, bronzes, and paintings. We never remember to have 
 seen so many relics in any one place (except perhaps in Cologne) ; 
 there is some of the hair of the Virgin, and whole coffers full of 
 bones of the Saints. The churches of Naples are usually some- 
 
u 
 
THE CATACOMBS OF NAPLES. 
 
The Catacombs. 141 
 
 what unsightly buildings, and frequently gaudily decorated in bad 
 taste inside. There is something to be said for the Cathedral, 
 however, although it was nearly destroyed by an earthquake, and 
 has had frequent additions since. The fagade is decidedly good, 
 and it would be seen to much better advantage if it were not 
 hemmed in by houses. There are some fine tombs of kings, and 
 some of the side chapels are in fairly good taste. The ceremonial 
 is magnificent on great occasions, when the Cardinal Archbishop 
 (Riario Sforza) is present. The Canons wear large capes and sashes 
 of crimson silk lined with white fur, and it is somewhat difficult to 
 distinguish them from the Cardinal himself. There is a large choir 
 of boys of all ages, dressed in long black garments covered above 
 with lace. Beneath the high altar there is a chapel which contains 
 the shrine of S. Januarius, the patron Saint of Naples. The 
 principal relic of the Saint which is shown is one of his fingers. 
 The phial containing his blood is (unlike most of the relics in 
 Italy) never shown to visitors. The greatest Church Festivals in 
 Naples occur at the time of the liquefaction of the blood of S. 
 Januarius, which takes place three times a-year, in May, September, 
 and December, and immense throngs of people witness the miracle. 
 Naples is full of priests ; between the station and the hotel we 
 certainly passed a score. The services in the churches are frequently 
 attended, even on week days, by a large number of people. The 
 people in some respects seem to be blindly superstitious, in others 
 sincerely pious, and in others utterly profane. The Neapolitan 
 temperament is very difiicult to analyse. 
 
 The Catacombs of Naples are of great interest even after those 
 of Rome; they are said to extend for several miles underground; 
 and they consist of broad arched passages hollowed out of the 
 rock, containing on either side niches which once contained the 
 bodies of the dead. They were without doubt excavated by the 
 early Christians ; many Christian emblems are painted upon the 
 walls, sometimes in a very rude manner. In some places the 
 
142 
 
 Naples. 
 
 original fresco has been covered with a coating of plaster, and a 
 second fresco has been painted over the first, occasionally even a 
 third. A work on the Catacombs of Naples by Herr Schultz is 
 about to be published in Jena, and it will no doubt throw great 
 light upon the history of these very early Christian tombs. 
 
 The great sight of Naples is the Museum, now called the Museo 
 Nazionale, formerly the Museo Borhonico. It has existed since 
 
 DEMETEU ENTHRONED. PAINTIiJG FROM POMPEII. NAPLES. 
 
The Museum. 
 
 143 
 
 1790, and has acquired some superlative treasures from Pompeii, 
 Herculaneum, Capua, Puzzuoli, Minturnse, Stabise, and Cumse. All 
 the older separate collections belonging to the State were gathered 
 together in this Museum : those from Portici and Capodimonte, and 
 the Farnese and Borgia collections. In many respects the Museum 
 is unrivalled ; for instance in ancient bronzes, wall paintings, and 
 implements of domestic life. The collections of sculpture and of 
 
 PEKSEPHONE ENTHRONED. PAINTING FKOM POMPEII. NAPLES. 
 
 vases are also very fine. The wall paintings from Pompeii and 
 Herculaneum are the only specimens of ancient painting on a large 
 scale which exist ; the small paintings on vases, generally of one 
 
144 
 
 Naples. 
 
 colour, are the only other examples in the world. They prove to us 
 that the art of painting was well understood by the ancients. Some 
 of the pastoral pieces possess a grace and delicacy which we could 
 scarcely have looked for at the period. The interiors of all the 
 principal houses in Pompeii were painted, often with great skill and 
 taste. MahafFy {Rambles and Studies in Greece," 1876) justly 
 says of the Pompeii wall-paintings : — " Though they are only 
 the wall decorations of a second-rate mongrel Greek town, 
 there are both grace and power in many of the figures. The 
 colouring is bright and life-like, and the faces full of expression." 
 
 FARNESE BULL. NAPLES. 
 
The Museum. 
 
 145 
 
 A few good mosaics were also found in the city, and are 
 preserved in the Museum. In the Gallery of Inscriptions there 
 exist two of the finest pieces of sculpture in the world ; the 
 Farnese Hercules from the Baths of Caracalla in Kome, and the 
 Farnese Bull. This latter is an incomparable work, by the 
 
 •PARNESE HERCULES. NAPLES. 
 
146 
 
 Naples. 
 
 Rhodian sculptors Taiiriscus and Apollonius. It is believed to 
 have been bewn out of a sino-le block of marble, but when found 
 in 1534 it was very much mutilated. It was restored by 
 Michael Angelo in a very effective manner. The gracefulness 
 of the attitudes, the boldness and vigour of the design, and the 
 animation transfused throughout the whole conception, are beyond 
 criticism and praise. The group represents Dirce bound to the 
 horns of a wild bull by the sons of Antiope. Llibke says of it : — 
 " Besides the dramatic life, the distinct and at the same time 
 thrilling arrangement, and the rapid action expressed in the scene, 
 
 HEAD OF JUNO. NAPLES. 
 
The Museum. 
 
 147 
 
 there is a special fascination in the splendidly-formed figures 
 which have all something heroic in them, and the treatment of 
 which, though betraying accurate knowledge, is less detailed than 
 in those of the Laocoon." The Farnese Hercules, which was also 
 found in the Baths of Caracalla, is probably a copy of an original 
 by Lysippos. "The design," says Llibke, "is extremely grand, 
 and the figure has something of the ideal form of a demi-god, not 
 merely from its colossal size, but still more from the powerful 
 structure of the limbs. The exceeding smallness of the head also, 
 combined with the exaggerated breadth of shoulder, chest, and 
 thighs, may be justified as characteristic of the Hercules type." 
 The beautiful head of Juno in 
 the Museum is probably a copy 
 of a work by Polycletos of 
 Sicyon, who was a younger con- 
 temporary of Phidias, and the 
 greatest sculptor of the Pelopon- 
 nesus. The Pallas Athene found 
 at Herculaneum rejDresents the 
 goddess in a warlike attitude, 
 with a helmet and armour. The 
 action is vigorous, but the work 
 is not one of any great merit. 
 
 The bronzes, for the most part 
 from Herculaneum, are fine 
 examples of ancient art. We 
 have already alluded to the Head 
 of Bacchus in the Palazzo Eeale. 
 The "Eeposing Mercury" in the Museum is perhaps the finest com- 
 plete ancient bronze extant. This statue was found at Herculaneum. 
 Llibke says of it : — " It presents a fresh picture of elastic youth, 
 resigning itself to a moment's easy repose, after preceding efi'ort ; 
 one of the numerous ideas which the Palaestra afi"orded to Greek 
 
 PALLAS ATHENE. NAPLES. 
 
148 
 
 Naples. 
 
 sculptors." The Drunken Faun, the Sleeping Satyr, the Apollo, and 
 the Runners, in the same room, are also works of high art. In 
 an adjoining room there are many examples of Greek armour from 
 Psestum, and of the helmets and body-armour of Gladiators from 
 Pompeii and Herculaneum, 
 
 When scrolls of papyrus were first discovered in Herculaneum, 
 it was hoped that if they could be unrolled and deciphered, valuable 
 additions might be made to our collections of ancient classics. 
 Accordingly great care was taken to unfold the carbonised remains 
 of any papyri that were found, to paste them on rolls of linen, 
 and then to decipher and transcribe them. But the hope has not 
 been justified by the result ; no work of any interest has been 
 discovered, and the principal papyri which have been deciphered 
 
 BESTING HERMES. NAPLES. 
 
The Museum. 
 
 149 
 
 are found to be Greek treatises on the Epicurean Philosophy, 
 written by a contemporary of Cicero. At present scarcely a single 
 papyrus has been found at Pompeii, but it is thought that in a town 
 of its size there must have existed a Public Library ; it is therefore 
 confidently hoped that in the buried portion of the town, a number 
 of these manuscripts may yet be found. 
 
 TERRA COTTA BOWL, BRONZE LAMPS AND STANDS, FOTTND AT POMPEII. 
 
 The Egyptian collection of the Museum is small and poor ; and 
 the picture gallery contains but few good works. The library has 
 200,000 volumes, and some rare Greek MSS. The collection of 
 coins is very complete, and the mode of exhibiting them to the 
 public might well be followed in the British Museum, and in some of 
 the Continental collections. The collection of vases contains many 
 
150 
 
 Naples. 
 
 examples of the highest art. In some adjoining rooms a number 
 of domestic utensils and implements from Pompeii are preserved. 
 They are mainly of bronze, and include beds, chairs, cauldrons, 
 baths, tables, kettles, candelabra, surgical instruments, cooking 
 utensils in great variety, musical instruments, tripods, pitchers, 
 weapons, and many other things which at every turn remind us 
 that the domestic appliances of a Pompeian eighteen centuries ago 
 did not differ much from those of the modern Neapolitan. This 
 collection in the Museum should be seen and carefully studied, both 
 before and after Pompeii itself is visited. 
 
 A TEMPLE AT POMPEII. 
 
 Pompeii can be reached in an hour from Naples by train, or if 
 the day be fine, and the visitor is inclined to start early, it is a 
 pleasant drive along the edge of the Bay of Naples. The history 
 of the destruction of the town by ashes from Vesuvius, is too 
 well known to need even passing notice. Those who have not read 
 

 O 
 
 < 
 A, 
 
 o 
 
 CO 
 
 o 
 
Pompeii and Herculaneum. 151 
 
 any of the graver histories of the event have been fascinated by 
 the Last Days of Pompeii, written when the author was staying 
 there, during a very active period in the history of the excava- 
 tions. The town seemed to be doomed to destruction ; the awakened 
 energy of Vesuvius began to show itself in a.d. 63, when a fearful 
 earthquake laid the whole place in ruins. However, nothing 
 daunted, the inhabitants re-erected the city, and had scarcely 
 finished it when the final catastrophe of a.d. 79 destroyed it for 
 ever. A dense shower of ashes fell, and covered the town to a 
 depth of three feet, and shortly afterwards showers of red-hot vol- 
 canic dust and pumice stone added an additional eight feet ; these 
 showers continued until the stratum of volcanic matter was twenty 
 feet deep. The excavations were first commenced in 1748, and 
 have been continued, not without intermission, until the present 
 time. More than half the town still remains buried beneath the 
 ashes. The process of excavation proceeds very slowly ; the exca- 
 vated ashes are carried away in small baskets on the shoulders of 
 boys. It is performed at the expense of the Government, and any 
 treasure-trove which may be found is at once removed to the 
 Museum in Naples. The bare walls of the town are standing, the 
 roofs, which were mainly of wood, do not remain. All is open to 
 the sky. Almost as good an idea of Pompeii is obtained by 
 studying the model in the Naples Museum, and then carefully 
 examining the various things found in the city, as by visiting 
 the city itself. It is true that one sees the walls of the houses, 
 the counters of the shops, the oil jars, and amphorae for wine, the 
 ruined Forum and temples, theatres and amphitheatre, the street- 
 fountains and the stepping-stones, the baths and the gardens, bake- 
 houses and taverns, ovens and corn-mills ; but the main interest, 
 when once the general character of house, theatre, temple, and 
 Forum are ascertained, is concentrated in the various relics of 
 domestic life found in the city. They recall the life of the inhabi- 
 tants as much, or even more, than the walls of the houses. From 
 
152 Naples. 
 
 first to last we are reminded of the fact that, although we boast 
 much of nineteenth century civilisation, we have in some respects 
 made no progress at all. Herculaneum is believed to have been a 
 much finer and more wealthy city than Pompeii. Although the 
 excavations have been carried on to a far more limited extent than 
 in the case of Pompeii, very rich treasures in the form of bronze 
 and marble statues have been found. The city is no less than 119 
 feet below the level of Eesina and Portici ; it was overwhelmed by 
 lava, and subsequent eruptions contributed quantities of ashes and 
 lava to further raise the level. A portion of the great Theatre of 
 Herculaneum has been excavated, and it is estimated that it held 
 at least ten thousand spectators. 
 
 Of course we visited the dire cause of all these calamities — 
 Vesuvius. We ascended from Portici, and our path at first lay 
 through a somewhat narrow gully full of large stones. We soon 
 came upon the lava, and by following rough pathways we reached 
 the foot of the cone. Here the real fatigue of the ascent com- 
 mences. The rest of the ascent has to be made under rather trying 
 conditions ; the slope of the cone is considerable, and the ashes of 
 which it is composed are so loose that the foot sinks into them, and 
 for every step forward there is a perceptible portion of a step of 
 retrogression, due to the movement of the ashes under the pressure 
 of the foot. When at length you reach the edge of the crater, you 
 sometimes get a fine view over the surrounding district, and the 
 course of the lava which was last emitted may be easily traced ; 
 sometimes you get no view at all, and a chilly rain descends ; 
 sometimes you are enveloped in sulphurous smoke, and have to 
 grope your way out of it. If the day is tolerably fine, you are glad 
 to sit down and rest near the edge of the crater. The guides cook 
 eggs in the hot ashes, and produce bottles of Lachryma ; they also 
 thrust a stick into a fissure, in which red-hot lava can be seen, and 
 bring it out blazing. The crater is lined with sulphur as far as the 
 smoke allows one to see into it. The smoke consists to a great 
 
Vesuvius. 
 
 153 
 
 extent of sulphurous acid gas. The descent is easily made ; you 
 run down the cone in five or six minutes, and are back at the 
 Observatory in a very short time. This building stands on a 
 spur of rock, in such a position that a lava stream must divide and 
 run on either side of it. In it Prof. Palmieri watches for any indi- 
 cations of unusual disturbance. Some of his instruments are con- 
 nected with rods which are sunk some distance in the rock, and 
 the least movement is registered automatically. The Neapolitans 
 say that Palmieri is perjDetually predicting an eruption of Vesuvius, 
 and that he is never right. It is as well, however, in such matters 
 to be on the safe side, and no doubt when the next eruption does 
 take place it will afford abundant evidence of its intention before- 
 hand. 
 
 The whole district around Naples is very volcanic in character. 
 At Puzzuoli there is a half-extinct volcano, from fissures in the 
 crater of which sulphurous and other vapours are perpetually 
 ascending. At one point steam and sulphurous acid pour out 
 of a kind of cavern with considerable force. When Vesuvius 
 
 THE SOLFATAKA. 
 
154 Naples. 
 
 is active this outburst ceases. The crater of the Solfatara (as this 
 half-extinct volcano is called) is surrounded on all sides by steep 
 banks of pumice stone. The vegetation is very scant. In some 
 places the soil is so hot that six inches below the surface you 
 cannot touch it. In one spot hot blue mud bubbles up, and 
 small sulphur crystals are often found incrusting the light white 
 pumice stone. The ground is quite hollow beneath you — -you 
 are literally "dancing on a volcano;" a large stone thrown down 
 upon the ground causes a hollow resound beneath. Who knows 
 but that the whole interior of the crater may not some day be 
 blown out, as the interior of the crater of Vesuvius, once covered 
 with meadows, was suddenly upheaved ? The last eruption was 
 in 1198. The scenery of the Solfatara is very weird ; it might be 
 the entrance to the infernal regions. Here you have the place 
 ready to hand for any number of legends, or dread stories of doom. 
 From such a place might Zeus have thundered beneath the earth 
 when he summoned Edipus to the shades below — 
 
 " Hither — by this way come — for this way leads 
 The Unseen Conductor of the Dead — -and she 
 "Whom Shadows call their Queen ! Light, sweet Light, 
 Rayless to me — mine once, and even now 
 I feel thee palpable, round this worn form 
 Clinging in last embrace — I go to shroud 
 The waning life in the Eternal Hades. 
 
 Then suddenly a bodiless voice is heard : 
 
 It called on him — it called ; and over all 
 
 Horror fell cold, and stirred the bristling hair ! 
 
 Again the voice — again — ' Ho ! Edipus, 
 
 Why linger we so long ? Come hither, come.' "* 
 
 Not far from the Solfatara rises Monte Nuovo to a height of 45G 
 feet. It was upheaved in 1538 after an earthquake, and is mainly 
 
 * Trans, by Lord Lytton (Athent^-, Bk. 5, Chap. iv.). 
 
Lake A vermis. 155 
 
 composed of trachyte and pumice stone. On the road to Baise, near 
 Monte Nuovo, a long narrow passage in tlie face of a rock leads to some 
 springs which have a temperature of 198°, and eggs are easily cooked 
 in the water. A quantity of hot vapour pours out from the roof 
 of the passage, and as you enter you feel almost stifled. These 
 hot springs were called Thei'moB Neroniance by the ancients. Close 
 at hand is Lacus Avernus, which the ancients regarded as the 
 entrance to Hades. The Cimmerii were believed to live in perpetual 
 obscurity in the caves under the surrounding rocks, and here also 
 Eneas descended with the Sibyl to the shades below. A cavern 
 near the lake is called the Grotto of the Sibyl. The floor descends 
 somewhat until you come to an opening in the side of the cavern 
 which is called " The Entrance to the Infernal Regions ;" here the 
 guide lights a torch, and you have to clamber upon his back while 
 he carries you through a narrow rock passage knee deep in water. 
 You presently come to a chamber full of warm water which is 
 called the "Sibyl's Bath;" certain frescoes are pointed out on the 
 wall. The whole place is very unpleasantly warm, and you are 
 half-stifled with the resinous smoke of the torch which is carried 
 just in front of you. It is altogether a very uncanny place, and 
 well deserves its name. Lake Avernus itself, though evidently 
 formed in the crater of an extinct volcano, does not possess 
 that desolate and weird aspect which one would have expected 
 from the ancient accounts of it. It is a circular basin 200 
 feet deep in the middle, and four or five hundred yards across. 
 The water looks black ; it was absolutely motionless when we 
 saw it. The precipitous sides of the crater are covered with 
 bushes and underwood, and the general aspect is far less solemn and 
 weird than the crater of the Solfatara. The Lago d'Agnano (now 
 drained) is another example of the crater of an extinct volcano. 
 It is rather larger than the Lake Avernus. Just beyond the edge 
 of the crater there are some hot sulphur baths, very similar to the 
 Solfataras of Puzzuoli. On one side of the crater is the celebrated 
 
156 Naples. 
 
 Grotto del Cani, a cavern from which issues no less than six 
 hundred pounds weight of carbonic acid gas in the course of 
 the twenty-four hours. The cavern slopes rather abruptly down- 
 wards. When you enter, a peculiar warm stratum of atmosphere is 
 at once perceived rising a little above the knees, and if you lap up 
 some of the warm invisible gas with the hollow of your hand, you 
 perceive a fresh taste like that of very fully aerated soda-water. 
 The dog — a fat white Pomeranian — which is immersed in the gas 
 for a few seconds, to show its stupefying effect, did not in the least 
 object to the operation, and trotted along to the mouth of the 
 cavern by the side of his master, in a very willing and docile 
 manner. A striking experiment was made at the end, illustrating 
 both the weight of carbonic acid, and its inability to support 
 combustion. We were requested to go outside the cavern, and to 
 stoop down so that our eyes were nearly on a level with the layer 
 of carbonic acid in the cavern ; the glaring torches were then 
 suddenly depressed below the layer, and were instantly extinguished, 
 while a dense layer of resinous smoke floated on the surface of the 
 carbonic acid. 
 
 The neighbourhood of Puzzuoli is of extreme interest. Not 
 only does it contain the before-mentioned Solfataras, but there are 
 the remains of a fine Koman amphitheatre, which is estimated to 
 have held 40,000 people. The form is a singularly elegant oval. 
 The building is in almost as ruinous a condition as the Coliseum, 
 but there is a well preserved sub-structure, two stories in depth, 
 containing receptacles for wild beasts and for gladiators, and there 
 are arrangements for flooding the arena with water on the occasion 
 of naval combats. In the town of Puzzuoli near the sea-shore 
 there exist the remains of a temple known as the Temple of 
 Serapis. A few columns only remain standing, but these are of 
 special interest to the geologist, because they bear unmistakable 
 signs of having undergone a change of level, more than once since 
 they were erected. At one period the sea-level was apparently 
 
Baice. 
 
 157 
 
 twenty feet above the present level, and this was probably caused 
 at the same time that Monte Nuovo was upheaved. The coast-line 
 now seems to be gradually sinking, 
 
 A pleasant drive from Puzzuoli, past Monte Nuovo and Lacus 
 Avernus, leads to Baise, once the most fashionable of Eoman 
 watering-places, full of villas, baths, temples, and all the adjuncts 
 of Eoman luxury in the time of Hadrian. The present village is 
 full of the ruins of its former greatness. The first of these is a 
 large domed building, probably a bath. There is a curious echo 
 here, often met with in circular domed buildings ; the voice seems 
 to run round the walls of the building; rather than to be reflected. 
 If you stand near the wall, a whisper directed against the 
 opposite wall is very distinctly heard, but if you move a little 
 away the sound is very much enfeebled. Before we left the ruin 
 an old woman came in with four young girls, who ofiered to 
 dance the Tarantella. If this were the true Tarantella, it is a 
 very stupid dance. It reminded us most of a very slow Irish jig, 
 
 BAI^. 
 
158 Naples. 
 
 with all the spirit taken out of it. We were told in Naples that 
 there are fourteen steps in this dance ; but there did not appear 
 to be more than four. The old woman played a large tambourine, 
 and occasionally yelled cacophonously ; the dancers made use of 
 large castanets. They were soberly clad, without the admixture of 
 bright colours one sometimes sees worn by the Neapolitan peasantry. 
 Near the present harbour of Baise there is a curious octagonal 
 building called the Temple of Venus, in a very ruinous condition. 
 At the somewhat primitive inn at Baise we had some oysters from 
 Lacus Lacrinus, which certainly does not keep up its ancient fame 
 in this respect. The oysters were the most miserable, thin, taste- 
 less little things possible. The Spigola, on the other hand, a fish 
 from the same lake, is extremely delicate and toothsome. We 
 drove a little further along the Baise road to Bacoli, to see the view 
 in either direction from the hill above the town. In one direction 
 the eye rests upon Ischia and Procida and Cape Misenum, while 
 in the other Nisita and Posilippo stand out into the sea, and 
 Vesuvius is seen beyond ; the Bay of Puzzuoli is just beneath one 
 to the south. Near Bacoli there are well-preserved remains of a 
 gigantic reservoir called the Piscina Mirabilis. 
 
 The coast to the south of Naples is as interesting as that 
 to the north. For some little distance beyond Pompeii, on the 
 Salerno line, the scenery is uninteresting, but presently the railway 
 passes through some lovely mountain valleys, and at length makes 
 a magnificent descent into Salerno. The railway passes through 
 tunnels just above the sea, and as it emerges upon a rock gallery 
 beautiful glimpses of the very lovely bay are seen. Salerno itself 
 is a bright, gay little town, with a cathedral, well worth a visit, 
 containing mosaics, sarcophagi, and antique columns. It is said 
 to enshrine the remains of S. Matthew, which were brought from 
 the East in 930. At five o'clock in the morning Ave started ofi" to 
 visit the ruined temples at Psestum ; as far as Battipaglia we went 
 by train, and drove the rest of the distance in a somewhat primi- 
 
PcBestum. 159 
 
 tive carriage drawn by three horses harnessed abreast. The road 
 has always been infested by brigands, and the whole district 
 is considered to be as bad as the worst parts of Sicily. We 
 were assured, however, that such stringent measures had lately 
 been taken by the Government that it was quite safe to travel 
 without an escort of carbineers. We escaped quite unmolested, 
 but less than a fortnight after our visit we read in the newspapers 
 that one of the brigand chiefs had just been shot near Salerno 
 during an engagement with the troops. The officer commanding 
 the detachment of troops stationed at Psestum told us that all 
 had been quiet there for some length of time. 
 
 The temples at Psestum are admirably preserved, when we 
 remember their great antiquity. The columns are all standing, 
 together with architraves and pediments, and the remains are 
 considered the finest existing exam23les of Greek temples, with the 
 exception of those at Athens. They are of very early Doric, and 
 slight peculiarities in the capitals and in the tapering contour of 
 the shafts has secured for them the name of " Psestum Doric." The 
 temples suffer considerably from the nature of the material of 
 which they are constructed, which is so coarse a travertine, that 
 as in the case of the temples at Girgenti, it was covered with 
 stucco. If these temples had been constructed of white marble, 
 and had been placed upon an eminence with a rich background of 
 dark green, they would surely have been in every respect among 
 the most beautiful buildings that have ever existed. The temples 
 stand on a plain a few miles from what used to be called the Sinus 
 Pcestanus, now the Gulf of Salerno. Their low position, and the 
 peculiar squat massive nature of both columns and buildings, 
 remind one not a little of certain Egyptian temples. The finest of 
 the three is the Temple of Neptune, which possesses 36 columns, 
 30 feet high and 7 J feet in diameter, while in the interior there are 
 tVv'O series of seven columns each supporting smaller columns 
 above, which in their turn supported the roof. The second temple 
 
160 
 
 Naples. 
 
 possesses 50 columns, 6 feet in diameter. It is considered to be 
 later, and of less elegant proportions than that of Neptune. The 
 Temple of Ceres is less well preserved than the others, and the 
 dimensions are smaller ; it is, however, in better condition than 
 ninety-nine out of a hundred remains of the period, . It is difficult 
 to understand why these temples have suffered so little either from 
 time or the hand of man ; there appears to . have been no earth- 
 quake to throw them down, sirocco to wear them away, or man 
 to quarry them for building materials, in all the three-and-twenty 
 centuries of their existence. 
 
 At the best of times Psestum is an unhealthy malarious place, 
 and was considered so even in the reign of Augustus. The region 
 is very desolate ; we passed large tracts of low, marshy, unculti- 
 vated ground, in which the only living things to be seen were 
 buffaloes. The population is very thinly scattered, and the whole 
 district fever-stricken. As we returned the rain came down in 
 torrents, and although we were pretty well protected, we caught 
 such a cold that it took us many days, combined with the warm 
 air of Cannes, to get rid of it. 
 
 CAMEO OF ATHKNION. NAPLES MUSEUM. 
 
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CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 MESSINA, TAORMINA, CATANIA. 
 
 Entrance to the Harbour of Messina — The City — The Cathedral — Taormina — The 
 
 Theatre — Aci Reale — Catania. 
 
 ^E leave Naples late in the afternoon of a 
 January day, and the departing daylight only 
 allows us to get a good view of the city and 
 of S. Elmo. Vesuvius and Monte Somma 
 continue visible for some length of time, and we 
 pass close to the island of Capri. On the following 
 morning we find ourselves among the Lipari Islands, 
 and the regular cone of Stromboli is specially con- 
 spicuous. Soon after we sight the Sicilian coast and 
 the prominent lighthouse at the entrance of the Straits 
 of Messina, which are here so narrow that the smallest 
 houses on both the Calabrian and Sicilian shores arc 
 plainly seen. Nearly opposite the extremity of 
 Sicily we see Scilla on the opposite coast ; then we 
 enter the harbour of Messina, protected from the sea by a projecting 
 sickle-shaped mass of land, from which the town took its Greek 
 name of Zankle [(dyKX-q, a sickle). The town is built at the water's 
 edge, and at the bottom of a low ridge of hills ; it presents a long 
 
162 
 
 Messina, Taormma, Catania. 
 
 array of well-built lofty stone houses facing the sea, and connected 
 with each other by stone arches wherever a block of houses has to 
 be interrupted to make way for a street. The extreme massiveness 
 
 THE CASTLE OF SCILLA. 
 
 of the houses, and their connection by means of arches, is necessary 
 in a town in which earthquakes are not uncommon. Although no 
 serious earthquake has occurred for many years, it is usual to ex- 
 perience a shock at least once a month, and the first thing that we 
 heard on landing was that a shock had been felt the previous day. 
 Otherwise the situation of Messina is admirable, and it is the most 
 flourishing commercial town in Sicily. Nothing can better illus- 
 trate the perfection of the position of the city than the fact 
 that it still continues to flourish after a lifetime of more than 
 twenty-two centuries, during which it has undergone numberless 
 
xfltSS?:: 
 
 ■i''^^^^^^^ 
 
 ■''''?''yiillll'll!iil!||[lllilT, 1 1 
 
 ii!|liiiW*!ii||| ' 
 
 CO 
 
Messma. 163 
 
 vicissitudes. As early as 396 B.C. the town was entirely destroyed 
 by Himilco, and it was repeatedly assaulted and reduced in 
 after times. During the last two centuries it has been 
 attacked by foes of another kind :— in 1740 the plague carried off 
 40,000 persons, and the great earthquake of 1783 reduced it to ruins. 
 It was rebuilt, however, and suffered no further signal disaster 
 until the bombardment of 1848, and finally, the outbreak of cholera 
 in 1854, which destroyed 16,000 persons. In spite of all this the 
 town has now more than a hundred thousand inhabitants, and it 
 carries on a large trade with various parts of the world. More than 
 5000 vessels enter its port yearly, and the harbour is at all times 
 gay with a great variety of craft. 
 
 Messina contains very little of interest, and on one or two 
 subsequent occasions, when we have been obliged to stay a few 
 hours while our vessel was coaling, or discharging merchandise, the 
 time has hung very heavily. The Cathedral, and the Fountain of 
 Montorsoli, are the only objects of much interest. We climbed a 
 hill at the back of the town, and obtained a lovely view of the 
 Calabrian coast, the straits, and the harbour. We also went to a 
 Convent of Cappuccini, a little to the north of the town, and saw the 
 same sort of sight that we have described in connection with the 
 Convent of Cappuccini in Syracuse. The principal amusement of 
 the Messinians seemed to be to stroll through the Strada Garibaldi, or 
 the Corso, returning by the long lines of quays, and taking by the 
 way the public market-house, in which we never failed to find all 
 sorts .of curious fish, from fresh anchovies to red and blue fishes like 
 those which the Arabian fisherman found in the pond between four 
 hills, after he had released the Genius. In the evening: there was 
 plenty to do, for the inhabitants of Messina are very musical people, 
 and provide themselves with a fairly good opera company during 
 the season. One of our favourite London stars made her debtit at 
 the Messina Opera House a few years ago. We heard a moderately 
 good performance of Mose in Egitto. 
 
164 Messina, Taormina, Catania. 
 
 In spite of the numerous earthquakes which have destroyed 
 Messina, a portion of the Cathedral dates from the fourteenth cen- 
 tury. It has suffered twice from fire, and was almost entirely over- 
 thrown in 1 783, but the fa9ade remains to testify to the beauty of the 
 original building. Within the Cathedral there are a few mosaics of 
 the fourteenth century, a monument to Archbishop Giudobaldo by 
 Gregorio da Siena, and a high altar which is said to have cost more 
 than £150,000. The latter is inlaid with rare polished marbles and 
 lapis lazuli, and would be suitable for such a church as S. Paolo 
 fuori le Mura, near Eome. It contains the letter which the Virgin 
 Mary is said to have written in the year 42, and to have sent to the 
 inhabitants of the city by the hands of S. Paul. 
 
 A very slow train took us from Messina to Taormina. Much 
 of the distance we passed in sight of the sea on one side, 
 while on the other there were groves of lemons or oranges. 
 Taormina, the old Tauromenium, is a large village perched 
 upon a hill-side nearly a thousand feet above the sea. It 
 has the great charm, among several others, of being a very 
 primitive place. We saw a woman grinding maize in a small 
 stone quern, exactly like those which we preserve in our museums 
 as relics of a remote civilisation. We were the only foreigner in 
 the place during the two days we were there. There are two 
 village inns, and we had been recommended to go to the Timeo. 
 Here we found a small house on the edge of a steep rock, inhabited 
 by three persons only — the landlord, his wife, and their son ; the 
 latter waits upon you, while his mother cooks for you, and the 
 padrone himself superintends everything, and, if you desire it, will 
 sit down to the piano and play to you all the evening. W^e were 
 quickly served with some capital fish and an omelette, and some 
 Monte Venere — a very fair wine. There was no butter to be had 
 in the village, but plenty of honey, also from Monte Venere. We 
 were apportioned three rooms en suite, one at least of them facing 
 the sea. At a little after seven o'clock the next morninsf we were 
 
2 A 
 
 THE CATHEDRAL OF MESSINA. 
 
Taormina. 
 
 165 
 
 awakened by a flood of liglit, and looking out of the window, we 
 saw such a sight of loveliness as surely no one can hope to see 
 often in a lifetime. The sun was rising over the sea beneath 
 some light banks of fleecy clouds, which shone with splendid rosy 
 hues ; a great path of light was reflected from the placid sea, in 
 which also the many-hued clouds were mirrored ; on the left was 
 the Calabrian coast, the hills of which were beginning to receive 
 the morning sun ; while directly below us was the hill-side, dotted 
 with houses. A little later we saw Etna from the roof of the 
 house, covered with snow, reflecting a splendid pink light. Every 
 moment the scene altered as the sun rose higher, or as the position 
 
 of the clouds varied. 
 
 The scene was altogether indescribable. 
 
 TAORMINA. 
 
 After breakfast we climbed to the Castle of Taormina, which 
 stands on a hill 1392 feet above the sea. This place, if rebuilt and 
 well fortified, would be as strong as Gibraltar or Ehrenbreitstein — 
 that is to say, practically impregnable. It was once the Acropolis 
 of Tauromenium, and was founded in the fourth century B.C., since 
 which time it has undergone many sieges, and has, at one time or 
 
166 
 
 Messina, Taormina, Catania. 
 
 other, been captured by Greeks, Syracusans, Romans, Saracens, 
 Normans, French, and Neapolitans. The castle is now a complete 
 ruin, but the visitor is well rewarded for his toilsome climb on a 
 hot January day by the splendid view from the summit, in which, 
 in one direction. Mount Etna and its lesser spurs are the most 
 conspicuous objects, and in the other the sea and the Calabrian. 
 coast. 
 
 But the great sight of Taormina is the Greco-Roman Theatre, 
 
 RUINED THEATKE AT TAOKMIXA. 
 
 which stands on a spur of rock 436 feet above the sea, and which 
 commands a view of the coast of Sicily, both southward towards 
 Syracuse, and northwards towards Messina, The Theatre of 
 Dionusos, on the slope of the Acropolis at Athens, and the Greek 
 Theatre at Syracuse, both command such fine views that one at 
 first imagines that they could not be surpassed, but the sight of 
 Taormina altogether exceeds these, and the view at the time of the 
 setting sun is one that we know not where to match. The Theatre 
 itself, which was restored by the Romans, is one of the finest 
 
From Taonnina to Catania. 167 
 
 remains of an ancient theatre. The stasje is said to be the best 
 preserved in existence next to that of Aspendus in Pamphylia. 
 
 We left Taormina with great regret, and, provided that one 
 could ensure the same absolute isolation and quiet which we 
 enjoyed, we should like to spend many days there. After the 
 noise and bustle of a city like Naples, and the worry and turmoil 
 of what is called sight-seeing, nothing can be more delightful than 
 a few days in this incomparably lovely place. We have seen from 
 time to time paintings of Taormina, some of them by good artists, 
 but we cannot say that they the least help one to realise the beauties 
 of the place ; and indeed no one can hope in a picture to give any 
 idea of the ever-changing shades of light which, from sunrise till 
 sunset, course over the place, and which bathe the whole scene in 
 a magic glow. 
 
 We were sorry to leave the Timeo, with its kindly, good- 
 natured people, who did their best to adapt their little hotel to the 
 requirements of nineteenth-century life, and succeeded too. In the 
 visitors' book we read a letter from an Englishman who had been 
 obliged to spend a Christmas Day there, and who said that 
 perhaps the best recommendation he could give the place was that 
 he had passed there a happy Christmas, although alone, and far 
 from his native land. 
 
 At the foot of Taormina lies Giardini, an unhealthy place, where 
 fevers prevail. Here we take the train for Catania, and soon enter 
 upon a lava-strewn tract of country, which looks very bleak 
 and desolate. The prickly-pear is the only plant that grows 
 between the crevices in the lava, but when the latter is dis- 
 integrated it produces a capital soil, especially for vines. The first 
 station of any importance to which we come is Giarre, near to 
 which are the remains of the famous chestnut-tree di cento 
 cavalli, under the shade of which a hundred horsemen could 
 repose. A little further on we come to Aci Keale, where the 
 small stream of the Acis empties itself into the sea. Here, too. 
 
168 Messina, Taormina, Catania. 
 
 was born the charming pastoral my thus of Acis and Galatea, and 
 the one-eyed PolyiDhemus. At Aci Castello we see the seven 
 Scogli de' Ciclopi, the rocks which Polyphemus in his rage hurled 
 after Ulysses, and a few minutes afterwards we stop at Catania. 
 
 Catania, like Messina, was founded several centuries before the 
 Christian era, and, like Messina, has undergone destruction many 
 times, either by the hand of nature or of man. But the district is so 
 fertile, and so rich in mineral wealth, that the town has always speedily 
 risen again from its ruins, and it has now nearly 70,000 inhabitants, 
 and a considerable trade in sulphur, wine, cotton, and grain. A 
 town which has been so often destroyed, of course contains but 
 little of interest from an archaeological point of view. There are 
 fragments of a Greek Theatre, and well-preserved remains of Koman 
 baths. The Cathedral possesses a silver coffer containing the 
 remains of S. Agata, who was put to death in 252 a.d. by the 
 Prsetor Quintianus. Near the outskirts of the town is the magni- 
 ficent Monastery of San Nicola, one of the largest institutions of 
 this nature in the world. Since 1866 it has suffered the fate of 
 nearly all the monasteries in Italy, and is now used for various 
 purposes, such as barracks and schools. It contains some fine 
 specimens of architecture, and in the chapel there is an organ by 
 Donato del Piano, which possesses five rows of keys, and is said to 
 be one of the finest in Europe. From the garden of the Monastery 
 (in which we gathered orange blossoms in the open air early in 
 January) a fine view of Etna is obtained, and one of the great 
 lava-streams stopped just beyond the garden wall. The ascent of 
 Etna is made from Catania, but the cone was thickly covered with 
 snow, and the guides refused to make the ascent, so that we could 
 only admire it from a distance. 
 
 When Brydone visited Catania in 1770 he found there a con- 
 siderable manufactory of amber crosses, beads, and figures of saints. 
 " We bought," says he, " several of these respectable figures, and 
 found them electrical in a high degree, powerfully attracting 
 
ir ^" T\'^iRiN 
 
 s 
 
 m 
 
 m 
 
 
Amber Saints. 
 
 169 
 
 feathers, straws, and other light bodies, somewhat emblematical, 
 you will say, of what they represent. Some pieces of this amber 
 contain flies, and other insects, curiously preserved in its substance, 
 and we were not a little entertained with the ingenuity of one of the 
 artists, who had left a large blue-bottle fly with its wings expanded 
 exactly over the head of a saint, to represent, he said, Lo Spirito 
 Santo descending upon him." 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SYRACUSE. 
 
 Syracuse — The Fort ot Euryalus — The Greek Theatre — Stone Quarries — Ear of 
 Dionysius — Latomia cli Cappuccini — Tomb of Archimedes — A despoiled Monastery 
 of the Cappuccini — A Charnel-house — The Anapus and the Foun- 
 tain of Cyane — The Papyrus Plant. 
 
 mm 
 
 W\^ T last the train from Messina, which travels scarcely 
 ji|!(j: as fast as an old stage-coach, creeps into Catania, 
 ■[(; : and late in the afternoon of a warm January day we 
 take our seat for Syracuse. Our companions are an 
 English lady going to Malta, and two or three 
 Sicilians. We pass through some miles of desolate lava- 
 strewn country covered with the prickly pear, then through 
 groves of oranges and lemons. Meanwhile the sun is 
 sinking fast, and lighting up the snow-capped peak of 
 Etna ; the balmy air of midday is becoming chilly, and we 
 feel unaccountably sleepy : presently the English lady 
 (who lives in Messina) awakens us with many apologies, 
 remarking that a foreigner is very apt to catch malarious 
 fever if he sleeps at sundown, and with great difficulty we remain 
 awake, chill and uncomfortable, until we reach Syracuse. The 
 station is very dark, a few miserable oil lamps only make the 
 gloom more oppressive, and the station yard is in complete dark- 
 
 4 
 
Antonio. l''! 
 
 ness. We call out in bad Italian for a cab, and are at once 
 answered in unmistakable English, " There ain't any cabs here, 
 sir ; here's an omnibus." At the same time a tall, dark man comes 
 forward, tells us he is a Manchester man, a guide, and the only 
 Englishman in all Syracuse, and begs to be allowed to show us the 
 city. Whereupon we tell him that we had proposed to take 
 Salvatore Politi, the custodian of the museum, for our guide, but 
 upon his assuring us that Salvatore knows scarcely a word of 
 English, we accept his services, and had no reason to regret having 
 done so. Antonio proved himself a kind of Figaro ; he was 
 at once guide, philosopher and friend, interpreter, major-domo, and 
 valet. He was at the hotel early in the morning and late at night, 
 recommended the best room and the best wine, kept beggars, 
 touters, boatmen, at a distance, made bargains, arranged the day's 
 proceedings, procured a capital open carriage, for which we paid 
 six lire (about 4s. lOd.) a day, and was altogether a factotum. 
 Add to this the fact that his charge was very small, and you per- 
 ceive he was a useful man, but it must be confessed that he 
 was too fond of the strong Syracusan wine, and was a far less 
 efficient guide in the evening than in the earlier part of the day. 
 It would be interesting to know more of the history of this man ; 
 he is a fine, broad-shouldered fellow, evidently well acquainted 
 with English life, and fond of sport. The only part of his 
 history that he would tell us was that he was once in a different 
 position in life, which we can quite credit. By this time the 
 lumbering omnibus has passed the two drawbridges and the gates 
 of the city, and we find ourselves in a dim-lighted narrow street, 
 and soon after stop at the Locanda Victoria, where the landlord, 
 who appeared also to keep a bookseller's shop, revived us with 
 some capital fish and a bottle of Muscato di Siracuso. 
 
 Early next morning came Antonio with the carriage, and we 
 
 drove at once to the Fort of Euryalus, the western extremity of 
 
 , Epipolse. Here we found a number of rock-hewn passages com- 
 
172 
 
 Syracuse. 
 
 raunicating with a great court, approaclied by flights of steps. 
 The rock is full of galleries provided with openings at intervals 
 through which the besieged could speedily retire into the inner- 
 most parts of the fortress. There are also galleries for mounted 
 men, positions for catapults, and a surrounding ditch. The whole 
 constitutes one of the most interesting Greek remains in existence. 
 Euryalus is the key of Epipolse. When Dionysius enclosed the city 
 with the walls, the outline of which is still to be seen, he was care- 
 ful to specially strengthen this north-west corner, and to erect upon 
 
 OEEEK THEATRE AT STRACTTSE. 
 
 it the stronghold, the ruins of which we see. It is probable that 
 Archimedes, at the request of Hiero the Second, made important 
 additions to the fort. The view from Euryalus was very fine : the 
 sky was perfectly cloudless ; Etna covered with snow, and, forty 
 miles away, looked only a few miles off in that clear air ; nearer at 
 hand, Hybla was visible in the one direction, the sea in the other, 
 and to the east the town. We then drove back to the Greek 
 Theatre a ma^jnificent structure, and the largest of its kind after 
 
The Greek Theatre, 173 
 
 those of Miletus and Megalopolis, and the Theatre of Dionusos on the 
 slope of the Acropolis. It is nearly semicircular, and consists of more 
 than fifty tiers of seats hewn in the solid rock ; the eleven lower 
 tiers were once cased in marble. It could accommodate no less 
 than twenty-four thousand persons. A few inscriptions are still 
 visible, among them the names of Hiero and his queen PhiUstis. . 
 The view from the theatre is magnificent ; the spectators sitting in 
 their places could command a full view of Ortygia and the harbour ; 
 a little more to the west their eyes would roam over the vale of the 
 Anapus and rest upon the great Temple of Zeus Olympius, and the 
 monuments of Gelon and Damarata. In this theatre ^Eschylus 
 recited some of his dramas, and here perhaps some of the comedies 
 of Epicharmus were first acted. Near at hand is the rock- 
 hewn street of tombs in which, as in Pompeii, the ruts left 
 by the chariot wheels can still be traced ; its rocky sides 
 are full of cavities long since robbed of their dead. Descending 
 from the street of tombs, we reach the Latomia del Paradiso, one 
 of the numerous quarries in which prisoners and slaves were con- 
 fined and compelled to work, and from which the stone for building 
 the walls was procured. In one of the quarried caves men were 
 engaged in extracting nitre from the soil. Scores of slaves had 
 lived and died in that cavern, and now, after the lapse of centuries, 
 the nitrogen which had entered into the composition of their blood, 
 and muscle, and brain, was converted into nitre. The soil is so 
 excessively nitrous that it is only necessary to boil it with water, and 
 strain off the clear liquid, which on cooling deposits a plentiful 
 crop of crystals. Near the nitre cavern is the so-called ear of 
 Dionysius, a curious curved cavern a hundred feet long, and seventy 
 or eighty high. It narrows to a thin curved roof, and this no 
 doubt has much to do with the peculiar acoustic properties of the 
 cavern. The least sound is augmented by reflection to an extra- 
 ordinary extent, the voice is painfully loud, a piece of paper flipped 
 by the finger produces a noise like the report of a pistol, and the dis- 
 
174 
 
 Syracuse. 
 
 charge of a pistol produces a succession of reverberations exceeding 
 that of any thunder-stcrm we ever witness in this country. Near the 
 upper tiers of seats of the Greek Theatre there is a passage which 
 
 £s1ACIJSEanditsENV1RQNI3 
 
 C<tStf2luri'tti\ 
 
 inicks wudtr 
 
 Scale. 
 1 
 
 ^ V"'! Mtt^ 
 
 leads to a small chamber placed at one extremity of the roof of the 
 ear of Dionysius ; here it is possible to hear every word uttered by 
 a person below, more than a hundred feet distant, even if he 
 speaks in a low voice. Whether there is any truth in the suppo- 
 
Latomia de Cappuccini, 175 
 
 sition that this cavern was used by Dionysiiis as a place of confine- 
 ment for State prisoners, and that every word they uttered was 
 heard by a person placed in the roof-chamber, we cannot pretend to 
 decide, but we certainly never saw a more complete arrangement 
 for eaves-dropping. 
 
 Near the beautiful Greek Theatre is an ungraceful Eoman 
 amphitheatre, which is quite devoid of interest from any point of 
 view, and will bear no comparison with such structures as the 
 arenas of Verona and Aries. Close to the amphitheatre is a large 
 tabular mass of masonry nearly seven hundred feet long, which is 
 called the altar of Hiero II., and upon which it is believed the 
 hecatombs of oxen were annually offered in commemoration of the 
 expulsion of Thrasybulus. 
 
 Further to the east in the Achradina (where ax/oaSes are said still 
 to grow), we come to the Catacombs, an underground city of the dead 
 hewn out of a somewhat soft rock, and believed to contain at least 
 eight miles of passages. Near to this is the Church of San Giovanni 
 founded in 1182, and beneath it is the Crypt of Marcian, in which is 
 shown the altar from the steps of which S. Paul preached when he 
 landed at Syracuse. There can be no doubt of the extreme anti- 
 quity of the crypt. Close to this ancient church is the Latomia de 
 Cappuccini, the quarry in which it is believed the Athenian 
 prisoners were confined. It is shut in by vertical rocks covered 
 with vegetation, and below is full of lemon trees and pomegranates. 
 The sides of the rocks, wherever a chink can be found, are covered 
 with caper plants, while here and there is seen the fig and the 
 olive. There are a few graves of Enoiish and American sailors, the 
 inscription being rudely cut upon the adjacent rock. The place is 
 now a luxuriant garden, with nothing to remind us of what once 
 took place in it. Everything around is peaceful and smiling. 
 "Yet this is the scene of a great agony. This garden was once the 
 Gethsemane of a nation where seven thousand free men of the 
 proudest city of Greece were brought by an unexampled stroke of 
 
176 
 
 Syracuse. 
 
 fortune, to slavery, shame, and a miserable end. Here they 
 dwindled away, worn out by wounds, disease, thirst, hunger, heat 
 by day, and cold by night, heart sickness, and the insufferable 
 stench of the putrifying corpses. The pupils of Socrates, the 
 admirers of Euripides, the orators of the Pnyx, the athletes of the 
 Lyceum, lovers, and comrades, and philosophers, died here like dogs ; 
 and the dames of Syracuse stood doubtless on those parapets above, 
 and looked upon them like wild beasts. What the Gorgo of 
 Theocritus might have said to her friend Praxinoe on the occasion, 
 would be the subject of an idyll a la Browning ! How often, 
 pining in those great glaring pits, which were not then curtained 
 with ivy or canopied by olive trees, must the Athenians have 
 thought with vain remorse of their own Ehamnusian Nemesis, the 
 goddess who held scales adverse to the hopes of men, and bore the 
 legend — ' Be not lifted up ' ! How often must they have watched 
 the dawn walk forth fire-footed upon the edge of those bare crags, 
 or the stars slide from east to west across the narrow space of sky ! 
 How they must have envied the unfettered cloud sailing in liquid 
 ether, or traced the far flight of hawk and swallow, sighing, ' Oh 
 that I too had the wings of a bird ! ' The weary eyes turned up- 
 wards found no change or respite, save what the frost of night 
 
 brought to the fire of day, and the burning 
 sun to the pitiless cold constellations."''' 
 
 As we returned from the Latomia de 
 Cappuccini we were shown the tombs of 
 Archimedes and Timoleon ; on the former 
 we could trace no signs of the cylinder and 
 the sphere which Marcellus caused to be 
 engraved upon it, and by which in after years 
 Cicero discovered it near one of the gates of 
 
 AKCllIMEDES. 
 
 * " Sketches in Italy and Greece," by J. A. Symonds. Compare the conclusion 
 of the Seventh Book of Thucydides Avith this description. 
 
Modern Syracuse. 
 
 177 
 
 the city, overgrown with thorns, and forgotten. Indeed it 
 is believed that these tombs are far later monuments to 
 Eoman citizens. Near the entrance to the city stands a 
 single column which once belonged to a temple of Ceres ; 
 in the open space around it the peasants winnow their corn, and 
 celebrate harvest festivals. The bread of Sicily is worthy of the 
 Island of Ceres, for, although it is unfermented, it is perfectly 
 white, and is made in the form of the most tempting little loaves 
 one can imao-ine. 
 
 TOMB OF AKCHIMEDES. 
 
 Of the present city of Syracuse there is but little to be said, 
 A town of about twenty thousand inhabitants entirely confined to 
 the island, full of narrow dirty lanes, unlighted by gas, and offering 
 no attraction of any kind. We believe there is not an English- 
 man in the place (except Antonio), even our consul is an Italian. 
 The morality of the place is at a low ebb ; stabbing societies exist, 
 and a very few lire suffice to put a man out of the world. In 
 many respects Syracuse resembles the lowest part of the Quartier 
 St. Antoine in Paris. Of actual sights in the citv, there is the 
 
1^8 Syracuse. 
 
 Cathedral built on the site of an ancient temple, and between 
 some of its massive columns ; there is the Museum containing a 
 finely-draped but headless Venus : and there is the Fountain of 
 Arethusa, planted with papyrus. 
 
 Adjoining the Latomia de Cappuccini is the Monastery, from 
 which the stone-quarry takes its name. Till recently it was a 
 flourishing institution, full of fat Sicilian monks, but when Italy 
 came to be united into one kingdom, under one sovereign, it shared 
 the fate of the greater number of Italian monasteries : the monks 
 were expelled, and the building converted to secular uses. We saw 
 lately in Rome a large monastery which had been thus taken from 
 the clerics, and converted into science laboratories in connection 
 with a technical college, with Signor Cannizzaro, Senatore del 
 Regno, as Director. We have heard Roman Catholics of the 
 Papal party complain most bitterly of such appropriations, not 
 apparently so much because the monasteries contained, in their 
 opinion, a useful body of men, of service to the State, or 
 at least to the Church, but because they afforded places 
 of retirement and repose, in the decline of life, to a large 
 number of persons. Further, it is urged that monasteries tend 
 to prevent starvation among the lowest classes of the community, 
 in a country which possesses neither poor-rates nor work- 
 houses. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that they 
 harboured a number of people too lazy to work, and glad to live 
 by begging in the name of the monastery as a charitable institu- 
 tion. Mr. Sayce (in the Fortniglithj Review for October 1st, 
 1875) gives a curious account of a monastery at Gubbio, which 
 " had so fattened upon the decay and demoralisation of the 
 town that, out of a population of six thousand, between 
 two and three thousand were entirely supported by that 
 institution, whose weekly doles saved them from the trouble of 
 workino; for their bread. The oversown resources of the Monas- 
 tery were the monopoly of twenty monks, each of whom kept a 
 
Monastery of the Cappitccini. 179 
 
 family in the town. When the Monastery was dissolved, the 
 monks and their families, amounting in all to some two hundred 
 persons, were added to the standing army of beggars, and the 
 landed proprietors in the place find themselves compelled, by the 
 fear of an emcute, to support as best they can this idle and 
 degraded population." 
 
 The members of the primitive monasteries had four main 
 objects in view — solitude, labour, fasting, and prayer ; to these 
 were added a fifth — poverty. No one could recognise in many of 
 the monasteries of Italy, institutions which would have found 
 favour in the eyes of S. Benedict, S. Bernard, S. Dominic, or S. 
 Francis. Although we should be grieved to see the spoliation of 
 such grand and historic institutions as Monte Cassino and the 
 Convent of S. Calixtus, we can but regard the suppression of the 
 monasteries by the Italian Government as a most wise policy. 
 Monasticism in this nineteenth century, this busy work-a-day 
 world, is an anachronism. Essentially a mediaeval institution, it 
 has outlived its age : it is an ecclesiastical Struldbrug. 
 
 But we are on our way to the suppressed Monastery of the 
 Cappuccini, which is about half-a-mile outside Syracuse, near the 
 coast of Achradina, and from which a lovely view of the town and 
 harbour may be obtained. Antonio tells us that if we are inclined to 
 stay in Syracuse at any time for a month or two, he could get us 
 rooms in the Monastery, for, we really forget what, ridiculously 
 small sum of money a month ; and he promises splendid shooting 
 over Lysimeleia and the marshes around the Anapus — flocks of 
 woodcock and snipe, and a liost of other birds. On our way to 
 the Monastery we passed a benevolent-looking old man, who 
 saluted Antonio with a grace worthy of Louis Quatorze, He was 
 once a monk in the neighbouring Monastery, and it was his duty 
 to show the charnel-house to visitors. Now it once happened that 
 an English yacht put into Syracuse harbour, and the inmates of it, 
 including a doctor, visited the Monastery. In the charnel-house 
 
180 Syracuse. 
 
 the doctor noticed a very fine skull, so well proportioned and 
 anatomically perfect that he coveted it, and offered the monk ten 
 lire for it. The latter was unable to resist the offer, he reached 
 down the skull from its shelf, and it was presently on its way to 
 England. But the mercenary monk was discovered, and promptly 
 dismissed, and from that day to this, said Antonio, he has never 
 prospered. It was otherwise in a monastery in Rome, where we 
 have heard a man say he was shown a collection of bones of the 
 saints, and on asking for a morsel as a relic, was politely told, 
 " Take what you will, Signor ;" whereupon he carried ofi" a sanctified 
 tibia in his sleeve. 
 
 Having reached the Monastery, we are met at the gate by the 
 chief inhabitant, a coarse-looking boot-maker, whose wife had 
 charge of a small collection of native wines. In fact a part of the 
 Monastery was converted into a kind of inn, and one or two 
 persons lived in other portions of it. The boot-maker, Antonio in- 
 formed me, was the possessor of a capital voice, and accompanied 
 himself on the guitar in a really creditable way. We tried in vain 
 to get him to perform, but were, unfortunately, a little too im- 
 portunate, for when we showed a good deal of eagerness to hear 
 him, the man all at once turned shy, and declared we were a 
 maestro from Naples come to see the musical nakedness of the land. 
 The interior of the building was dreary in the extreme ; it contained 
 large, vaulted, whitewashed rooms and passages echoing to the tread, 
 but otherwise dull, desolate, and lifeless ; an empty refectory, in 
 which some two hundred monks could have dined ; and a chapel, the 
 most dark, and terrible, and God-forsaken we ever saw, better 
 fitted for the mysteries of Isis and Horus, than for the worship of 
 the Saviour and the Virgin mother. 
 
 The chapel stands in the very heart of the building ; it is ill- 
 lighted, tawdry, full of faded tinsel, cobwebs, dust, and ashes ; a 
 high-altar, surmounted by some barbarous specimen of modern art, 
 and flanked by a couple of dusty glass cases, each containing the 
 
The Charnel-house. 181 
 
 mummy of a deceased monk clad in his brown habit. But greater 
 horrors awaited us yet. A large wooden trap door in the floor 
 was opened, and we were requested to descend. On entering 
 the crypt we saw niches in the wall around us, and in every niche 
 the horrible, shrivelled remains of what had once been a man. 
 "What thou art I was once: what I am thou shalt be soon," was 
 written in a conspicuous place. Boxes were placed on the floor 
 and on shelves ; they each contained similar horrible relics of 
 humanity, dressed in the clothes they had worn. It was the cus- 
 tom of the monks to place a deceased brother in a small chamber 
 containino- lime for some weeks after his death, at the end of which 
 time he would be found a mummy, the dry, shrivelled skin clinging 
 horribly to the almost projecting bones. It was pitiful to see these 
 poor remains; "chapless and knocked about the mazzard." 
 Antonio pointed out a round hole in the breast of one of the 
 occupants of a niche, and remarked, "There is a rat's nest there." 
 There was a hideous little mummy dressed in a faded biretta, a 
 dingy alb, and a discoloured stole, upon which was placed a small 
 ticket setting forth that it was the Canon Stephano, who had died at 
 such-and-such a date. We shall not easily forget the ghastly aspect 
 which the skull presented ; a set of grinning teeth, deep eye-sockets, 
 the shrunken skin parted on each side of the nose ; it reminded 
 one a little of the figure of Death, in Albert Durer's " Knight and 
 Death." Surely Holbein must have visited such a place as this 
 while he was painting his " Dance of Death." There are several of 
 his subjects which are not unconnected with our Canon : — the 
 preacher over whose head Death holds a jawbone, to show 
 that he is the better preacher; the priest whom Death accom- 
 panies, as he carries the viaticum to a dying person ; the Canon 
 before whom Death holds up an hour-glass as he enters a 
 cathedral ; and the Mendicant Friar, who is just entering his 
 Monastery, with full money box and w^allet, and who is seized 
 by the cowl and dragged back by Death, while underneath is 
 
182 Syracuse. 
 
 written, " Sedentis in tenehris et in urnhra mortis, vinctos in 
 mendicitate." 
 
 The Canon Stephano is the culminating point of the charnel- 
 liouse horrors. Enough, enough ! " Call the carriage, Antonio," 
 " Ecco calzalaio, grazie, grazie ;" thank heaven we are once more 
 in the blessed light of day. Such places have not in them any- 
 thing that savours of immortality ; we are brought face to face 
 with corruption in its most ghastly forms, and the refrain of our 
 souls is, " Man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to 
 live, and is full of misery ;" but as we issue from the loathsomeness 
 of the charnel-house into the bright air above, and find ourselves in 
 the presence of teeming Nature, the old form ever-dying, the new 
 form ever-born, it is then that the refrain of our souls becomes, " I 
 am the resurrection and the life," and we feel that in a double sense 
 we have passed from darkness into light. 
 
 It is pleasant to turn from the horrors of the Cappuccini 
 charnel-house to the bright, sunny scenery around Syracuse. 
 Before eio-ht o'clock the next moruin^ Antonio came to the hotel 
 to conduct us to the Anapus and the Fountain of Cyane. There 
 was no breakfast to be had at a moment's notice, so we bought 
 some bread and oranges by the way, and hastened down to the 
 harbour, where we found a boat and three boatmen waiting for us. 
 Having rowed across the Great Harbour, we soon came opposite 
 the mouth of the Anapus, when the boat suddenly grounded on a 
 sand-bank, and the sailors got out and began to push it over 
 the bar. We then entered the river, a most insignificant stream 
 bounded by high banks covered with luxuriant vegetation, and 
 with the large reeds seen throughout Southern Italy. The boat 
 had to be pulled, and sometimes one or two men got out and 
 towed it. 
 
 The Anapus is now a mere streamlet, not so large as the Wilt- 
 shire Kennett in dry weather, and it could never have been much, 
 if indeed it were at all, larircr than it is now. It is curious. 
 
The Anapus. 183 
 
 therefore, to find it described by Theocritus as /xlyavpoov"' (Idyll 1, 
 1. 68), and more curious to find this translated " the hroad stream 
 of Anapus" by Banks, and agaiu, " hroad Anapus" by Chapman. 
 Edwards, in his Latin translation of Theocritus (1779), has trans- 
 lated it magnum Jlumen. 
 
 As the passage in which this occurs is without doubt one of the 
 greatest beauties of Theocritus, closely imitated by Virgil, Milton, 
 Pope, and Lord Lyttleton, we give it in full. Banks translates it 
 as follows : — 
 
 " Begin, dear Muses, the bucolic strain ! 
 For Thyrsis sings, your own iEtnean swain. 
 Where were ye, Nymphs, when Daphnis pined away, 
 Where through his Tempe Peneus loves to stray, 
 Or Pindus lifts himself ? Ye were not here. 
 Where broad Anapus flows, or Acis clear. 
 Or where tall JEtna looks out on the main." 
 
 Fawkes (of the Idylliums of Theocritus, 1767) gives the fol- 
 lowing translation : — 
 
 " Where were ye, Nymphs, when Daphnis pined with love ? 
 Did ye on Pindus' steepy top reside ? 
 Or where through Tempe Peneus rolls his tide ? 
 For where the waters of Anapus flowed. 
 Famed streams, ye play'd not, nor on Etna's brow, 
 Nor where chaste Acis laves Sicilian plains, 
 Begin, ye Muses, sweet bucolic strains." 
 
 About three-quarters of a mile from the mouth of the Anapus 
 the Cyane enters it, and we turned into this smaller stream, 
 both in order to see the papyrus, and to reach the clear source of 
 the river, called the Fountain of Cyane. Low, marshy ground lay 
 on both sides of the river, and not far from its junction with the 
 Anapus we saw two columns of the famous Olympieum, the 
 
 * Ov yap Srj Trorafjuo ye [xeyav poov. 
 
184 
 
 Syracuse. 
 
 Temple of Zeus Olympius, in which Gelon placed a statue of the 
 god covered with a mantle of gold. It was near to this spot, 
 according to ancient legend, that Pluto descended with Proserpine 
 into the lower regions. As we moved slowly up the narrow rivulet, 
 we soon came in sight of the papyrus growing in the water at the 
 edge of the bank, in a state of great luxuriance. It is a beautiful 
 tufted reed which grows to a height of from twelve to fifteen feet, 
 and the stem may attain a diameter of two inches. This is the 
 only place in Europe — almost in the world — where the Egyptian 
 
 papyrus (Cyperus Papyrus) grows, and it has probably been 
 found on the banks of the Cyane for more than two thousand 
 years. The only other place in which it has been seen of late 
 years is on the banks of a small river a few miles north of Jaffii. 
 It has quite died out of Egypt, probably because it was only 
 
The Papyrus. 185 
 
 allowed to be grown in certain parts of the country belonging to 
 the Government, in order that it might increase in value. "The 
 remarkable prophecy of Isaiah," writes Sir Gardner Wilkinson,'"' 
 "has come to pass which foretold that the papyrus should be no 
 more in Egypt : ' The paper reeds by the brooks, by the mouth of the 
 brooks . . . shall wither, be driven away, and be no more,' and this 
 Egyptian plant no longer grows in Egypt. Yet its name is des- 
 tined to survive ; the ' Bible,' or book, is so called from the hyhlus, 
 and its other name, pajDyriis, will be perpetuated in 'paper.'" 
 Papyrus paper is still prepared, in small quantities, at Syracuse, as 
 a specimen of an obsolete manufacture ; it is not nearly so smooth 
 or even as the best kinds of ancient papyrus, but it is prepared in 
 the same way. The rind is taken from the stem of the reed, and 
 the light pith within is sliced longitudinally, the thin strips thus 
 produced are placed side- by-side on a flat board, and a second layer 
 is placed upon them at right angles to the first, then they are 
 gummed and firmly pressed, and are afterwards dried. Pliny gives 
 a full account of the manufacture in ancient times, and mentions 
 that the tufts at the top of the long reeds were used to deck the 
 statues of the gods. Papyrus paper seems to have been more or 
 less in use till the time of Charlemagne, when it was superseded 
 by parchment. 
 
 As we pushed our boat along we frequently met with small 
 forests of the papyrus, the drooping heads of which hung over into 
 the boat and brushed us lightly as we passed ; at length we reached 
 the source of the rivulet, a circular basin some fifty or sixty feet 
 in diameter, full of exquisitely clear and blue water. The 
 name Cyane is no doubt connected with Kvavo?. This is 
 the very fount, say the myths, into which the nymph Cyane 
 was changed for daring to oppose the will of Pluto. Every spot 
 here is connected with some mythological story, and the name, as 
 
 * Ancient Egyptians, vol. ii. 
 
186 
 
 Syracuse. 
 
 in tliis case, has often endured from the earliest times of Sicilian 
 pastoral poetry. Keturning to Syracuse, we note the remains 
 of the ancient bridge near the junction of the Anapus and 
 the Cyane, also some magnificent Sicilian oxen browsing in the 
 marshes. The whole landscape is flooded with bright sunlight (it 
 is the 7th of January), and it is as warm as an English August 
 day ; wild flowers are blooming on all sides, and we begin to realise 
 more fully than we ever did before, why the earlier idyllic poets 
 were the children of this beautiful land. 
 
o 
 
 o 
 
>!^/;®"%'/^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PALERMO AND GIEGENTI. 
 
 Entrance to the Harbour of Palermo — Situation of the City — The Conca d'Oro — General 
 Character of the City — The Martorana — The Cappella Palatina — The Cathedral of 
 Monreale — The Cloisters — The Cathedral of Palermo — The Museum of Antiquities — 
 Th'e Catacombs — Monte Pellegrino and the Grotto of S. Rosalia — Journey to 
 Girgeuti — Present State of Brigandage in Sicily — Girgenti — Its Situation — The 
 Temples — The Rock of Athene — Sulphur Mines — The Cathedral of Girgenti — 
 A Curious Bajitismal Ceremony — The Acoustic Peculiarity of the 
 Cathedral — The Prison of Girgenti — Statistics of Crime — Brydone's 
 
 
 Visit to Girgenti in 1770. 
 
 ^[T^jT six o'clock Id tlie evening we leave Naples, 
 uj(| too late to see the bay to advantage at this time 
 y^ of the j-ear (January 3rd). Before startino-, we 
 
 have leisure to see the sun set behind the town, 
 while Capri and the Calabrian coast are shrouded 
 in a thin blue mist, and the smoke of Vesuvius is red- 
 dened by the last rays of the sun. As we steam out of the 
 harbour, the Castle of S. Elmo is dimly visible above the 
 town, and the line of the bay is marked out by a row of 
 gas lamps. Our boat is unpleasantly crowded, and although 
 the sea is very calm, the conviction that the Italians are 
 bad sailors is often forced upon us in a very dis- 
 agreeable manner. There were on board an entire opera 
 company going to Palermo to perform during the Carnival, 
 
188 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 and a number of soldiers whose immediate object was to put down 
 brigandage in Sicily. We had a very smooth passage, and a clear, 
 starlit night. At half -past six the next morning there was a pale 
 yellow glow in the east, and it was sufficiently light to read. A 
 thin haze floated on the water, through which the Island of Ustica 
 was visible on the one hand, and the Sicilian coast on the other. 
 The sun rose clear from the sea without any accompaniment of 
 clouds at a quarter past seven, and an hour later the mountains 
 which surround Palermo were clearly seen : — Monte Pellegrino with 
 its zio-zaof road leadina; to the Grotto of S. Rosalia on the rio;ht, and 
 Monte Catalfano on the left. 
 
 Palermo is situated at the edge of a plain, enclosed on the west, 
 south, and south-east sides by mountains, while to the north and 
 north-east it is open to the sea. The plain has thus somewhat the 
 form of a shell, and it is called the Conca d'Oro or golden shell, on 
 account of its great fertility. The city is surrounded by 
 orange and lemon groves, and even in midwinter roses and lilies 
 blossom in the open air. In fact the coldest weather is like an 
 English June, and the mornings and evenings even in January are 
 very mild. Owing to its proximity to the sea the landscape is 
 often overcast, and the perfectly cloudless sky which is so often 
 seen in the interior of southern lands is seldom observed here. 
 In consequence of the great masses of cloud which float in from the 
 north, the effects of light and shade are very striking : great 
 shadows frequently pass over the landscape and travel up the sides 
 of the mountains, and the sun may be shining brightly on one part 
 of the city while another is shaded by a densely-black cloud, and 
 the low hills in the vicinity may at the same time be capped by 
 clouds. We have never seen such a continuous change of lio-hts. 
 At this moment the hills to the south-east are in shadow, a briafht 
 spot of sunshine rests on Monreale and the lower part of Monte 
 Cuccio, a cloud rests on its summit ; Monte Pellegrino is in complete 
 shadow, the mountains just behind it in complete sunshine, while 
 
2e 
 
Church of La Marforana. 189 
 
 a thousand lights and shades pLay upon the sea. A few 
 minutes later and the whole scene is changed ; in fact, from 
 morning till night the lights and shadows, and half-lights and 
 half-shades, are not constant for one moment, yet in the valley 
 not a breath of wind is felt, and one wonders at the constant 
 movement of the clouds. 
 
 Palermo still justifies its Greek name, Panormus {ttciv, all; op/xos, 
 harbour) ; and formerly the name was still more appropriate, 
 because the small harbour, called La Sala, extended much 
 further into the city than it now does, and separated the 
 Acropolis from the outlying portions of the city. In fact, one 
 arm of the harbour is believed to have extended as far as the 
 present site of the King's Palace, now nearly a mile from the 
 water's edge. Even before the Greeks settled here, the harbour 
 was employed by the Phoenicians, and a town arose on the site of 
 the present city. 
 
 The modern Palermo is a town of about 200,000 inhabitants, 
 square as to its shape, and divided into four nearly equal 
 portions by two long streets, which intersect each other in the 
 centre of the town. It has had many masters, and at one time or 
 other of its existence has been governed by Phoenicians, Greeks, 
 .Romans, Arabians, Normans, French, Spaniards, and Italians. 
 
 In spite of its antiquity Palermo contains but few objects of 
 interest. It has several early Norman churches, and a few rem- 
 nants of Saracenic architecture. Among these is the church called 
 La Martorana, which was erected by the Admiral Georgios 
 Antiochenos early in the thirteenth century. It possesses three apses, 
 and a dome supported by four columns ; the interior is covered 
 with fine mosaics, which have Greek inscriptions. The church has 
 from time to time been disfigured by additions in very bad taste ; 
 it is now being judiciously restored by the Government. The 
 Campanile is worthy of notice. 
 
 The finest mosaics in Sicily are in the Cajppella Palatina, the 
 
190 
 
 Palermo and Gir genii. 
 
 King's Private Chapel in the Eoyal Palace, which was erected by 
 Roger IX. in 1132, and is in every respect a gem of Saracenic 
 
 architecture. The floor is of 
 marble, inlaid in designs with 
 coloured stones, as also are the 
 walls for the first ten or twelve 
 feet of their height, beyond 
 which they are entirely covered 
 with fine mosaics on a gold 
 ground. The ceiling is of the 
 indented nature so often seen 
 in Moorish buildings, and the 
 mosaics have inscriptions in 
 Greek, Latin, and sometimes 
 Cufic. In the centre of the 
 central apse Christ is repre- 
 sented as a majestic half-figure 
 in the act of blessing, while 
 the wall mosaics represent 
 THE HANDS OF CHRIST. sccncs from both the Old and 
 
 fAMosaicofthelSthCentvryintheChurchofLaMartorana.J-\T T' ■(- f 'VV. f^ fl, 
 
 dral of Monreale, which is situated on the side of a hiU 
 
 KING ROGER OF SICILY RECEIVING HIS CROWN FROM 
 
 of Monreale, wnicn is situatea on tne siae oi a 
 four miles from Palermo, is also famed for its mosaics, which 
 cover a space of more than 60,000 square feet, and are invaluable 
 records of the art of the twelfth century. When we remember 
 how very lengthy and laborious is the construction of even 
 a few square feet of mosaic, it is obvious that the amount of 
 labour expended upon the internal decoration of this cathedral 
 must have been prodigious. These imperishable pictures 
 represent scenes from the Old and New Testament, commencing 
 with the creation, and ending with the life of S. Paul. In the 
 great central apse is a singularly majestic head of Christ, with the 
 inscription — I. Xp. iravTOKpaTwp, and beneath it an enthroned Madonna. 
 
<! 
 O 
 
 o" 
 
 o 
 
 Q 
 
Cathedral of Monreale. 
 
 191 
 
 The floor of tlie Cathedral consists of inlaid marbles, and the walls, 
 as far as the commencement of the mosaics, are of white marble, 
 relieved at intervals by inlaid work. The ceiling, which is new, is 
 in good taste, and presents a bril- 
 liant mass of colour. Other con- 
 spicuous objects are the thrones of 
 the King and Archbishop on opposite 
 sides of the choir. They are of 
 fine marble inlaid work, and have 
 rich mosaics above them. Alto- 
 gether the Cathedral presents a most 
 brilliant mass of coloured decora- . 
 tion, without being offensively _: 
 gaudy, or in bad taste. We had 
 the good fortune to see it on the l| 
 day of a great festa, and the effect^^l. 
 was extremely striking. The whole 
 of the choir, which occupies about; 
 half the area of the Cathedral, was 
 filled with canons, priests, and ' 
 choristers. The Archbishop was on 
 his throne, on the steps of which 
 stood various assistants in the cere- 
 monies, in robes of purple. The 
 choristers on the side of the Arch- 
 bishop wore long purple cassocks 
 edged with red, and black birettas ; 
 while those on the other side wore 
 red cassocks and red birettas. The 
 effect of this many-coloured assemblage, combined with the magni- 
 ficent decoration of the choir, was gorgeous in the extreme when 
 seen from a little distance, especially when a long, slant beam of 
 sunlight would suddenly fall upon one part of the building, thereby 
 
 CAMPANILE OF THE CHUECH OF LA 
 MARTORANA. 
 
192 
 
 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 bringing out its brilliant colouring with an intense vividness. The 
 only thing that was quite incongruous in the service was the 
 singing, which was execrable in the extreme. The organ, a large 
 and new instrument, was one of those peculiar constructions called 
 Orchestrion, or some such name, which combines a number of 
 instruments with the organ; thus trumpets could be blown, and 
 
 CLOISTEKS OF THE MONASTEKY OF MONREALE. 
 
 drums beaten at will, and at first we were quite convinced that an 
 orchestra was stationed behind the organ. When the Archbishop's 
 procession entered, the organist played a very lively operatic air, 
 with accompaniments of cymbals and kettledrums ; during the rest 
 of the service he chiefly confined himself to the organ portion 
 of the instrument; the singing was altogether out of tune; 
 and, from a musical point of view, the service was most 
 slovenly. 
 
Cathedral of Palermo. 193 
 
 The Cathedral of Monreale is a very unpretending and, indeed, 
 unsightly building outside. It possesses a nave, two side aisles, 
 and three apses. The arches of the interior are Saracenic, and the 
 capitals of the columns and all the surface above them are covered 
 with mosaic. The bronze doors, which are in admirable preser- 
 vation, were erected in 1186, and within the Cathedral there are 
 some massive sarcophagi of porphyry of the same period, which are 
 the tombs of King William I. and his three sons. The Benedictine 
 Abbey of Monreale was founded in 1174 by William XL, and 
 the Cathedral was the abbey church. All that now remains of 
 the abbey is the garden, and, near at hand, some beautiful 
 cloisters, supported by 216 coliimns of white marble placed in 
 pairs. The capitals of these columns are all different, and the 
 shafts were formerly covered with mosaic ; the empty groovings 
 which one now notices were for the reception of mosaic work, 
 traces of which remain on many of the columns. The cloisters 
 date from the twelfth century. 
 
 The Cathedral of Palermo, dedicated to S. Rosalia, the patron 
 saint of the city, possesses a few external points of beauty ; some 
 of the windows for example, and the graceful Norman towers ; but 
 it has been so often restored and so often disfigured that there is 
 very little to be said about it. Towards the end of the last 
 century a Neapolitan architect made the whole building an eyesore, 
 by erecting a dome altogether out of keeping with the rest of the 
 structure. Within, the building is most unsightly; its plain, white- 
 washed walls and roof are a strange contrast to the gorgeousness 
 of Monreale, and an attempt to decorate the ceiling of the choir has 
 resulted in a most miserable failure. Red and blue streamers hang 
 down between the circular arches, and at the western extremity of 
 the building hangs a portrait of Victor Emmanuel under a kind of 
 canopy, before which are placed four candlesticks. The Cathedral 
 possesses four magnificent and massive sarcophagi of porphyry, 
 which would be more suitably placed in Monreale. They belong 
 
^94 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 to the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and contain the remains of 
 King Eoger, Henry VI., Frederick II., and of Constance, the 
 daughter of King Eoger, and wife of Henry VI. The sarcophao-i 
 were opened nearly a century ago, and the remains of the Emperor 
 Frederick were found to be but little decomposed in the course of 
 more than five hundred years. He was clad in magnificently 
 embroidered robes, covered with Arabic inscriptions, and the im- 
 perial crown and sword lay by his side. The crown and a part of 
 the robe are in the sacristy : the former is a kind of leather skull- 
 cap, covered with large uncut gems ; the latter is entirely covered 
 with embroidery of seed-pearls and gold thread. The only other 
 church of any interest in Palermo is a small ruined structure dedi- 
 cated to S. Giovanni degli Fremiti, which is of great antiquity, and 
 bears evidence of its Eastern origin. It is in the form of a tau 
 cross, and possesses three apses, covered by a large central dome 
 and four smaller domes, like S. Mark's in Venice. The bell of this 
 church was the first to ring the alarm at the time of the massacre 
 known as the Sicilian Vespers, in 12S2. 
 
 Of other buildings worthy of passing notice there is the Arch- 
 bishop's Palace, which possesses a beautiful tower of the twelfth 
 century, connected with the Cathedral by a flying arch high in the 
 air. The present Archbishop, Monsignor Michael Angelo Celesia, 
 was formerly Abbot of Monte Cassino, and belongs to a noble 
 Sicilian family. He refuses to acknowledge the present King of 
 Italy, and has consequently been turned out of his palace and 
 deprived of his revenues. He lives in the Archbishop's Seminary 
 close by, and receives his salary from the Pope. The Government 
 cannot take further stej s ; they have no power to appoint a new 
 Archbishop. The Sicilians generally are very disafi'ected towards the 
 Government, and would probably revolt if they got the chance. 
 
 Near the Archbishop's Palace there is a great hospital, erected 
 in 1330, and now used as a barrack. It contains several cinque- 
 cento frescoes, one of them the '• Triumph of Death," surely a most 
 
o 
 S 
 
 S 
 
 ►J 
 < 
 
 o 
 o 
 
Mtisettm of Antiqtnties, 195 
 
 inappropriate subject for a hospital — at least inappropriate to be 
 before the eyes of the patients. Palermo possesses a large and 
 flourishing university, and a library well supplied with works 
 relating to Sicilian history. 
 
 The Museum of Antiquities has lately undergone considerable 
 extension, and it now contains some good examples of early 
 Greek and Etruscan sculpture. Some of the former go back as 
 far as the seventh century before Christ, and are older than any 
 existing Greek sculptures, with the exception of the Lions at Mycenae. 
 The sculptures at Palermo are mainly from Selinus and Selinunto ; 
 they are, unfortunately, executed in very coarse sandstone, and in 
 many instances are much worn by the weather. The exposed 
 portions — face, hands, and feet — of the female figures are of white 
 marble, while the drapery, and the whole of the male figures, is of 
 the coarse sandstone used for the other portions of the temples. 
 Another of the great treasures of the Museum is the Bronze 
 Eam of Syracuse, an undoubted Greek work, of great per- 
 fection. The Museum contains a 
 few good pictures, some capital 
 terra-cottas and vases, a good 
 collection of Sicilian coins (con- 
 cerninsf which the Director of 
 the Museum, Signer Salinas, is 
 writing a long-expected mono- 
 graph), and a fine bronze group 
 
 from Pompeii. (^^^'^ »«■ "^^ iVMsewin, at Pu;emo.> 
 
 The sheltered Conca d'Oro is very warm even in the middle of 
 winter, and the greater number of our hot-house plants flower in 
 the open air. Camellias and orange blossoms, and many other 
 flowers, may be purchased for a mere trifle. Some of the 
 villas around Palermo have beautiful gardens, and within the city 
 there are several squares laid out as gardens. Perhaps the 
 prettiest of these is that called La Flora, a promenade, one side of 
 
 2 F 
 
 BRONZE RAM OF SYRACUSE. 
 
196 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 wliicli faces the sea. It is laid out with numerous walks, shaded 
 by orange trees, and contains statues, fountains, and small Greek 
 temples. We were a little surprised one afternoon when the band 
 was playing in the gardens to suddenly come upon an enclosure 
 planted with large cypress trees, and containing tombs. To com- 
 bine a pleasure garden with a cemetery seemed somewhat incon- 
 gruous ; but on closer inspection we found that the tombs were 
 dedicated to the memory of great Sicilians who had lived long 
 ago — Archimedes, Theocritus, Empedocles, and so on. 
 
 The environs of Palermo, in all directions save that of Monte 
 Pellegrino, are still very unsafe ; mounted soldiers patrol the 
 road between Palermo and Monreale, and it is considered alto- 
 gether a risk to go as far as Selinus, or even a little beyond 
 Monreale to San Martino. AVe visited a Saracenic chateau called 
 La Zisa, about a mile from the gate of the town. The view from 
 the flat roof is lovely in all directions ; and below, the Moorish 
 aspect of the building still reveals itself by the fountain and fish- 
 pond, and by the Arabic inscription. Near La Zisa is the Monas- 
 tery of Cappuccini (now converted into barracks), in the Catacombs 
 of which the rich people of Palermo deposit their dead. For 
 some months the dead are placed in dry earth, perhaps mixed 
 with lime ; at the end of that time they are taken up, and dressed 
 in the clothes which they wore during their lifetime, and are then 
 either put in a wooden coffer and deposited in the Catacombs, 
 or are placed in a standing position against the walls. The long 
 corridors of the Catacombs are thickly lined with these miserable relics 
 of mortality, which look down upon you from the upper walls, to 
 which they are fastened, in a horrible fashion. Each one bears in 
 his hand a placard, setting forth his name, age, and date of death. 
 Some hold in their hands a photograph of themselves, taken when 
 they were full of life and health. One word more about these 
 horrors, and we have done. On a certain occasion some men were 
 carrying a corpse to its assigned position in the vaults. They had 
 
PORTA NUOVA. PALERMO. 
 
The Grotto of S. Rosalia. IST' 
 
 descended the steps, cand were proceeding through one of the long 
 corridors, when they suddenly observed a skull move to the edge of 
 one of the shelves, and roll off on to the floor ; again it began to 
 move, and the men, thoroughly frightened, threw down the coffin, 
 and rushed upstairs as fast as their legs could carry them. Having 
 told their story of the animated skull, a number of people deter- 
 mined to see the phenomenon, and having arrested the motion of 
 the still moving skull, they found a rat inside it. 
 
 We made a pilgrimage to the Grotto of S. Rosalia, near the 
 summit of Monte Pellegrino. The zigzag road, built on arches, 
 is very tedious, and it is better to follow a goat path. After 
 a climb of more than an hour from the base of the mountain 
 we come in siMit of the Grotto, the front of which is now 
 hidden by a church, through which one passes to the abode of 
 the saint. It is said that S. Rosalia chose to live in this cavern 
 from motives of piety, and that she died there. Her remains were 
 not discovered till 1664, at which time the plague was raging at 
 Palermo. It was speedily banished by the presence of the sacred 
 relics, and from that time S. Rosalia has been the patron saint of 
 Palermo. The Cathedral is dedicated to her, and every year there 
 are festivals in her honour. Thousands of people make a pilgrim- 
 age to her cave, the town is illuminated, and there are horse races, 
 and several days of fete. In the Grotto there is an altar to 
 mark the spot where the remains were found, and beneath it 
 there is a beautiful recumbent statue of the saint in white marble, 
 somewhat too profusely gilt. A boy who was wandering about 
 near the church ran in, took a candle from the altar, and thrust it 
 almost into the face of the statue that we mis^ht the better 
 observe it. He appeared to be the only person in the 
 place. As we descended the mountain we fell in with a herd of 
 about two hundred goats, which had been browsing on its scanty 
 herbage during the day, and were now returning to Palermo. 
 
 We vrere anxious to see the ruined temples at Girgenti, and as 
 
198 
 
 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 the railway between that town and Palermo had just been opened, 
 we decided not to adopt the usual plan of going by sea, but to try 
 the new route. The distance between the two towns is less than 
 a hundred miles, but the journey occupies seven hours, and some- 
 times more. Nothing can be more tedious : the train stops at 
 
 GKOTTO OF S. ROSALIA. 
 
 every small station, and the officials gossip and waste time to their 
 heart's content. We have heard, however, that before the railway 
 was completed as much as three days were sometimes occupied by 
 the journey, or rather by attempts to effect the journey, at a time 
 
youniey to Girgeiiti. 199 
 
 Avhen the winter rains had rendered the rivers almost impassable. 
 The present line is only a single one, and it has been nearly com- 
 pleted for some time; prior to the 16th of last December (1876), 
 it was necessary to break the journey, and drive seven miles by 
 diligence, and the accommodation was often quite insufficient, so 
 that it happened that but few persons visited Girgenti by that 
 route. The completed railway has made a good deal of difference ; 
 althouoh the train started between five and six in the morninsj, 
 the station was crowded, and our one enfrine had to drag thirteen 
 heavy carriages. No wonder the progress was slow. 
 
 The line does not appear to be very well constructed, or perhaps 
 the sleepers have not yet settled into their places. The shaking 
 was excessive, and the unevenness of the rails at times very 
 apparent. Not many days previously the train had run off the 
 line near Acquaviva, and the passengers suffered a delay of several 
 hours. It is now proposed to run an express train between 
 Palermo and Girgenti, at the considerable rate (for Sicily) of nearly 
 thirty miles an hour ; but it is questionable whether the line, at 
 least in its present condition, can stand the wear and tear, and we 
 should be sorry to be among the passengers on the first occasion of 
 the increased velocity. 
 
 For the first twenty-five miles the line runs to the south-east, 
 turning due south after passing the river Torto, a little above the 
 village of Cerda. The scenery is not very attractive — the sea on 
 one side, and grey hills clothed with scanty vegetation on the 
 other, while in the plain there are olive trees or vineyards, and 
 sometimes corn, and occasional groves of oranges. Near the town 
 of Termini we notice on the shore several miles of long, narrow 
 nets for the tunny fishery, and many scores of people mending them. 
 About half-way between Palermo and Girgenti we come to Lercara, 
 a town of nearly ten thousand inhabitants, and the northern limit 
 of the sulphur mines. It was within a short distance of this station 
 that Mr. Rose, an English sulphur merchant, residing in Sicily, was 
 
200 Palermo and Girgenh. 
 
 captured by brigands a few months ago. His ransom was fixed at 
 £2400, and until it was jDaid the brigands carried him about from 
 place to place, hiding during the day in caves, and moving rapidly 
 to a new hiding-place during the night. As soon as Mr. Eose was 
 liberated, he took active steps to recover the amount of his ransom- 
 money from the Italian Government, and we believe the suit is still 
 pending. It seemed to be generally thought in Sicily that the 
 Government would refuse to pay the money, and in speaking of it 
 people said, "Would your Government pay back the money which 
 a robber had taken from you in England?" At all events, the 
 action of Mr. Rose, and the prompt and severe notice taken of the 
 occurrence by the leading European newspapers, has caused the 
 Italian Government to act with unusual vigilance. Troops are 
 being sent to Sicily ; there is a gunboat in the harbour of Naples 
 at the service of the coast cities, and one of the most active colonels 
 in the Italian army has been sent to the island to take the chief 
 command. Our train contained a number of soldiers whose 
 destination was Girgenti, and there were soldiers at every station 
 armed with pistols in addition to their usual weapons. The 
 people here say that there is not much fear now, and that Leone, 
 the chief of the brigands, has escaped from the island. In Girgenti 
 we were told that it was quite unnecessary to take an escort of 
 carbineers to the ruined temples, although not long ago some 
 brigands were captured in one of the temples. Still the panic has 
 not subsided, as the following extract from yesterday's Times 
 (Jan. 24th, 1877) clearly shows : — 
 
 " Brigandage in Sicily. — A memorial, bearing many signa- 
 tures, has been sent to Lord Derby by British subjects who are 
 engaged in or connected with trade and industrial enterprise in 
 Sicily, have invested capital in such enterprise, and employ numerous 
 persons, many of them British subjects, in the conduct of their 
 business in that island. They state that a system of brigandage 
 exists in that island which places their property in danger and 
 
Sicilian Brigandage. 201 
 
 uncertainty, and imperils the personal safety of those employed by 
 
 them. They accordingly ask Lord Derby to bring this matter 
 
 before the Italian Government with all the urgency possible, and to 
 
 press upon it the necessity for taking prompt steps for representing 
 
 the lawless system wdiich exists, and securing to those dwelling in 
 
 that island that security and protection for life, limb, and 
 
 property which every citizen, whether foreigner or native, is entitled 
 
 to expect from the Government under which he resides. It is a 
 
 matter of notoriety, confirmed, the memorialists believe, by official 
 
 reports made to the Italian Government, that there exists on the 
 
 part of a considerable portion of the population of Sicily, including, 
 
 it is said, some of the higher classes, a widespread sympathy with . 
 
 the brigands, and on the part of others a mysterious dread of their 
 
 vengeance, which prevents and paralyses any ordinary efforts to put 
 
 down the system. The means hitherto adopted of sending troops 
 
 to hunt the brigands in the mountains, unaccompani-ed by other 
 
 measures, is found not to be sufficient, as the recent capture of Mr. 
 
 Rose in the midst of a large number of persons, without any 
 
 resistance being offered by the bystanders, and the levy of a ransom 
 
 to the amount of 60,000f. (£2400) fully testifies, as well as the 
 
 more recent case reported in the newspapers of the capture of Signor 
 
 Tasca at the very gates of Palermo. Both of these events occurred 
 
 while the country was filled with troops. The memorialists suggest 
 
 that, in addition to a vigorous employment of military and police, 
 
 each province or locality should be held responsible for the peace 
 
 and security of the same, and that in the event of any act of 
 
 brigandage being committed therein, should be held responsible for 
 
 any damage occasioned thereby, or ransoms levied in respect of it. 
 
 In the first instance, the Government should pay at once to the 
 
 person injured the amount of any such damage and ransom, and 
 
 should assess double the amount thereof on the province or locality 
 
 within which the act of brigandage has been committed, and proceed 
 
 at once to levy the same on such locality, quarlering troops therein 
 2g 
 
202 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 upon the population, until such amount is paid. The troops to be 
 employed in the service should not be taken from Sicilian regiments, 
 but should be drawn from the mainland, and especially from the 
 northern parts of the Kingdom of Italy." 
 
 Beyond Lercara sulphur mines appear at intervals, and as 
 Girgenti is approached they become more numerous, and the 
 surroundino; rocks are more and more crvstalline in texture. 
 For some miles the rocks consist of great masses of highly 
 crystalline gypsum, which shine in the sun like mica. At 
 length the sea becomes visible between the hills, and we presently 
 stop at the base of the Acropolis of Girgenti. The train goes on to 
 the Porto Empedocleo, the harbour of Girgenti four miles distant. 
 A drive of twenty minutes along a steep winding road brings us to 
 the Porta del Ponte of Girgenti. The town now contains about 
 22,500 inhabitants. The old Greek city Akragas ("AKpayas) is said to 
 have contained 800,000, but this, no doubt, is a monstrous exaggera- 
 tion. If the whole of the ground within the limits of the ancient walls 
 (which are easily traced) were covered with houses, there would be 
 room for probably 300,000 persons, and there may have been 
 extensive suburbs stretching down to the sea-coast. The present 
 town stands on a rock 1160 feet above the sea, the site of the 
 Acropolis of the old town. Pindar calls Akragas " the most 
 beautiful city of mortals," and surely, whatever the buildings of the 
 city may have been, it would be difficult to find a more lovely 
 situation. The Acropolis and the hill beneath it slope gently 
 towards the sea, with a southern frontage. The view from the 
 present town embraces many miles of lovely sea, with a fertile plain 
 intervening, while on the north, and west, and north-east, there are 
 low grey mountains. The climate is delightful when the sirocco 
 does not blow, and the plain is luxuriant with flowers even in 
 midwinter. At this time (January 8th) the almond trees are 
 covered with blossom, and many wild flowers are blooming ; the 
 morning and evening air is as soft as that of an English June, 
 
The Temples at Girgenti. '^03 
 
 while the midday sun rivals that of our August. The town, with 
 its white houses standing out conspicuously, with the fertile plain 
 at its feet and the clear blue sea beyond, presents a charming 
 picture to the eye. As we descend towards tlie sea the old city 
 wall may be readily traced ; it is partly natural — that is to say, 
 formed by a low escarpment of rock, and where this breaks off or 
 sinks too low, it is continued by means of great blocks of stone. 
 Along the southern edge of the wall are the ruins of the old temples. 
 It must be confessed that the temples at Girgenti are very 
 disappointing, if one is already familiar with those at Psestum, 
 and with the Theseum and Parthenon. The rock of which the 
 temples at Girgenti are built is an extremely coarse brown sand- 
 stone full of shells. Such a material can never be worked with 
 anything like the sharpness of marble, and it weathers far more 
 easily. In certain directions the stone is very much worn by the 
 sirocco. It is true that this uncongenial material was once covered 
 with a stucco made of white marble dust, traces of which still 
 remain ; but this, at the best, must have been a very poor imitation 
 of real marble ; and when the dark brown sandstone began to show 
 itself as the stucco wore off, the effect must have been deplorable. 
 The Temple of Juno Lacinia stands at the south-east angle of the 
 city wall, 420 feet above the sea, and more than 600 feet below the 
 Acropolis. It was constructed in 500 B.C., and is regarded as a very 
 perfect example of the Doric style. Only sixteen out of its thirty- 
 four columns are still standing; time, and earthquakes, and the 
 sirocco have rendered it a complete ruin. If we follow the 
 southern wall of the old city in a westerly direction, we come to 
 the Temple of Concord, a well-preserved Doric structure, rather 
 later than the Temple of Juno. It owes its preservation to 
 a great extent to the fact that it was used as a church during 
 the Middle Ages ; its thirty-four columns are still standing. 
 The incongruous circular arches in the walls of the cella were 
 constructed in the Middle Ages. Proceeding still further to the 
 
204 
 
 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 west, we find, near the Porta Aurea of the old city, a great heap of 
 ruins which indicates the site and all that remains of the Temple of 
 Hercules ; and beyond this are the ruins of the Temple of Zeus 
 Olympius, which was commenced in 480 B.C., but never completed 
 The dimensions were on a grand scale ; the temple was 344 feet 
 long and 172 feet broad ; half columns of the Doric order, 52 feet 
 high and 10 feet diameter, projected from the walls. The temple 
 
 TEMPLE OF CONCORDIA, GIRGENTI. 
 
 is now an absolute ruin, not one column or even portion of a 
 column remains standing. The oldest ruin in Girgenti is believed 
 to consist of some steps and the bases of columns which once formed 
 a part of the Temple of Zeus Polieus, and which are now built 
 into the Church of S. Maria dei Greci, near the Cathedral. 
 
 From any point of view the temples of Girgenti are very insig- 
 nificant, no doubt on account of the mairuitude of the surrounding 
 
The Temples at Girgenti. 
 
 205 
 
 landscape. When we first looked out from an elevated point in the 
 town over the plain in which they stand, we did not distinguish 
 them for some length of time. Even the Temple of Juno had to be 
 pointed out. No doubt they are dwarfed by the surrounding hills 
 and the broad plain. The modern town towers above them, and the 
 wide sea is beyond them ; the colour of the stone does not allow it 
 to stand out conspicuously like white marble, even in bright sun- 
 shine ; again, the temples which are standing, are, as we have said. 
 
 INTERIOR UF THE TEMPLE OF CONCORDIA. 
 
 small, and badly preserved. The ruined heaps of the temples of 
 Zeus Olympius and of Hercules are invisible from the town. A 
 Greek temple must always owe much to its position ; the Parthenon 
 itself would have a very different effect if it stood at the base of 
 the Acropolis instead of on the summit. The fine modern Greek 
 temple (the finest copy of a Greek structure in the world), the 
 
206 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 Valhalla at Donaustauf, has its beauty enhanced tenfold by its 
 position on a hill rising abruptly from the Danube, and backed by 
 pine forests. 
 
 To the east of Girgenti, not far from the principal gate of the 
 modern city, the " Eock of Athene" rises to a height of more than 
 1200 feet above the sea. The view from its summit is magnificent 
 in every direction ; towards the north and east a succession of rocky 
 masses are visible, while the sea occupies the south of the landscape, 
 and the modern town stands on the heis^hts to the west. The 
 Acropolis of the old town included the Eock of Athene, which is 
 said to have once borne a temple of Athene on its summit. Whether 
 we look down from the town over the fertile plain of the Akragas 
 and the Hypsas to the sea, or whether we look up from the plain 
 towards the town with its surrounding mountains, the eye is 
 always satisfied, and always rests with pleasure upon each separate 
 part of the landscape, and upon the entire and complete view. 
 
 Modern Girgenti, although picturesque from a little distance, 
 is ill-built, and full of narrow streets and alleys. Many of 
 the streets have a continuous ascent by steps to the upper part 
 of the town, and the only possible traffic in them is carried on by 
 means of mules. The town is excessively dirty ; an open sewer 
 runs down many of the sloping streets. There is no good inn, and 
 it is almost impossible to get a cleanly and properly-cooked meal. 
 The inhabitants are, without exception, the slowest people we ever 
 came in contact with. If you order a cup of coff"ee you are kept 
 half-an-hour waiting for it, and at dinner they have no idea of 
 commencing to cook one dish until you have finished that which 
 went before. To be three-quarters of an hour late in keeping an 
 appointment, is with them to be punctual. They are, however, 
 a most polite and civil people, and very courteous to the stranger 
 in their land. As to occupation, they appear to have nothing 
 whatever to do, and they do it. They wander in the streets, talk, 
 smoke, sun themselves, and so on from morning till night. 
 
Sidphur Mines. 207 
 
 But we must make one exception at least in this matter of idleness. 
 Go outside the town to one of the sulphur mines, and the work will 
 remind you of Egyptian slavery in the time of the Pharaohs. We 
 saw mere boys, nearly naked, toiling up a steep incline of badly-cut 
 steps, with great lumps of sulphur ore on their shoulders. The 
 process of sulphur-mining as carried out in Sicily is most primitive ; 
 no machinery is employed, and the ore is brought to the surface l3y 
 manual labour alone. The sulphur is found associated with gypsum, 
 and sometimes with sulphate of strontia in beds of grey clay. As 
 much as 40 per cent, of sulphur is got out of the ore even by the 
 crude processes employed, and some ores are much richer than that 
 which we saw. The mine usually consists of a steep slanting 
 shaft sunk to a depth of about 100 yards into the side of a moun- 
 tain. The descent is effected by roughly-cut steps in the living 
 rock ; anything less secure we have rarely seen ; a false step would 
 probably precipitate a person to the bottom, unless he were 
 supporting himself by the walls of the shaft. No doubt the bare 
 feet of the miners prevent them from slipping. The sulphur ore, 
 when brought to the surface, is piled up over a large kind of oven 
 like a very shallow lime-kiln, a fire is then lighted underneath, 
 and the sulphur melts out of the rock, and flows away through an 
 orifice below. It is then run into cakes, sent to the Porto 
 Empedocleo, and shipped for its final destination. The Sicilian- 
 sulphur trade is said to be now in a rather bad condition ; far less 
 sulphur is sent to England than formerly, because we can obtain it 
 from iron pyrites at a cheaper rate. The sulphur mines of Sicily 
 are, however, very rich, and if worked with proper machinery they 
 would probably yield a considerable profit, even with the present 
 low price of sulphur. The w^orld consumes yearly several millions 
 of tons of sulphur, chiefly for the manufacture of gunpowder and 
 of sulphuric acid. 
 
 The Sicilians are centuries behind the age, not only in mining 
 operations, but in many other respects. In central Sicily the 
 
203 Palermo and' Glrgenti, 
 
 agricultural operations are of the very simplest description ; 
 they still make use of the one-handed plough, which is at 
 least twenty centuries old, and they sow their corn broadcast — a 
 practice of still greater antiquity. The fertile earth makes up for 
 all deficiencies of labour, and returns abundant crops of corn, 
 sumach, oranges, lemons, olives, grapes, and chestnuts, for the least 
 possible expenditure of labour. The live stock of the farmer is 
 miserable ; goats indeed seem to flourish, but the horses and oxen 
 are the most miserable, lean, half-starved creatures that one can 
 imagine. A good deal of the internal traffic of the island is carried 
 on by means of mules, and a really good mule is the most useful 
 animal which you can possess in Sicily. 
 
 On the first evening of our arrival in Girgenti we made our 
 way to the Cathedral, which stands in the highest part of the town. 
 A curious sight presented itself on entering. The building was 
 almost in darkness ; it was faintly and very partially lighted by 
 some candles which were placed u23on a table in the aisle. Around 
 this table was a small group of persons, together with a priest and a 
 sacristan. It was the baptism of a new-born babe. A large flat 
 pewter dish stood upon the table, containing some water, and 
 a pewter ladle. The ceremony was a long one ; the priest read 
 from a book, then poured water from the ladle over the face of the 
 infant ; and this was repeated several times. During the ceremony 
 three men made the most hideous noises in the world with primi- 
 tive instruments of music — Italian bagpipes, such as one sees in the 
 hands of the pifferari, a triangle, and a tambourine. These men 
 sat in the nave, and continued without ceasing their dreadful din. 
 Presently about a dozen new-comers presented themselves with 
 other instruments of music — two violoncellos, a violin, and a drum 
 among other things. Forthwith each man began to play on his own 
 instrument as if it were the only one in the world, and entirely 
 without reference to the others. We thouo^ht of Prince Asfib — it 
 was music that he would have liked — 
 
A Baptismal Ceremony. 209 
 
 " Of Agib, who could readily at sight, 
 Strum a march upon the loud Theodolite. 
 He would diligently play 
 On the Zoetrope all day, 
 And blow the gay Pantechnicon all night. 
 
 " They played him a sonata — let me see I 
 Medulla oblongata — key of G. 
 
 Then they began to sing 
 
 That extremely lovely thing, 
 Scherzando ! ma non troppo,pppJ'* 
 
 Then under shadow of the darkness, and in a moment of cessation of 
 the music, some boys ran away with the drum, and they were promptly 
 chased from one pillar to another, through the centre and the side 
 aisles. The drum having been rescued, the infernal din began 
 again. All this time the priest droned from his book, and the 
 sacristan manipulated the candles, and tried to keep order among 
 the noisy executants. Thus was the poor little Girgentine babe 
 received into the Church of Christ, cum omne strepitu tuharum 
 et aliormn miisicoriim instrumentorum. Not long afterwards, when 
 the ceremony was over and nearly every one had gone away, we 
 heard a furious altercation at the Cathedral door, and found that it 
 was impossible to get out, for it was surrounded by a number 
 of people, who did not appear to be very remote from ruffians. The 
 sacristan was trying to shut the door in their faces, while they 
 seemed to be demanding a recompense. They were the vagabond 
 minstrels who had last come in to mar the baptismal service, and 
 " to render night hideous, and we fools of nature." They were now 
 adding insult to injury by demanding payment for their services. 
 We are glad to add that the sacristan escaped with his life. 
 
 On the followinof mornino; we returned to the Cathedral to see 
 the famous sarcophagus representing the story of Hippolytus. It 
 is a very fine work, although it is supposed to be only a Roman 
 
 *• Bab Ballads, by W. S. Gilbert. 
 2 H 
 
210 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 copy of a great Greek original. In the room in which the archives 
 are preserved we saw a rather fine vase which was found in a tomb 
 near Girgenti. On enquiring for the letter which used to be 
 preserved here, and which is seriously believed to have been 
 written by the devil in 1676, we were told that it had been 
 sent to Rome. We were further assured that it is written in no 
 known language, and that no one could read it. 
 
 We were anxious to examine the acoustic peculiarity of the 
 Cathedral, which has given rise to a good story, to be found in most 
 treatises on the science of sound. It is said that one of the 
 confessionals in the Cathedral was so placed that the voice 
 of the penitent, having been reflected to a certain distant part 
 near the high altar, was brought to a focus. This was 
 discovered by accident, and it was found that, by placing the 
 ear at the focus, the words of the penitent could be distinctly 
 heard. For a while the discoverer amused himself and his more 
 intimate friends by listening at this place to the revelations which 
 were intended for the priest's ear alone, and he thus became 
 acquainted with some of the profoundest secrets in all Girgenti. 
 But on one unfortunate occasion his wife occupied the confessional, 
 and he, like another Pentheus, was properly punished for having 
 pried into the mysteries of things.''" Now it is indeed true that if 
 
 * We probably owe this story to Brydone (Sicily and Malta, 1776). We have 
 certainly seen him quoted as the authority in a French work on Acoustics. He 
 says, *' If one person stands at the west gate, and another places himself on the 
 cornice at the most distant part of the church, exactly behind the great altar, they 
 can hold a conversation in very low whispers. For many years this singularity 
 was little known ; and several of the confessing chairs being placed near the great 
 altar, the wags who were in the secret used to take their station at the door of 
 the Cathedral, and by this means heard distinctly every word that passed betwixt 
 the confessor and his penitent, of which you may believe they did not fail to make 
 their own use when occasion offered. The most secret intrigues were discovered, 
 and every woman in Agrigentum changed either her gallant or her confessor. Yet 
 still it was the same. At last, however, the cause was found out ; the chairs were 
 removed, and other precautions were taken to prevent the discoveries of these sacred 
 mysteries; and a mutual amnesty passed amongst all the offended parties." 
 
The Prison of Girgenti. 211 
 
 you stand near the great west door of the Cathedral a whisper may 
 be heard at a certain point in front of the curvature of the apse, 
 and about twenty feet above the high altar. This we tested and 
 found to be an ordinary case of reflected sound ; but it is only at 
 this point that the sound is heard, and to it neither the too curious 
 man nor his friends could have easily penetrated. Moreover, we all 
 know that confessions are literally whispered into the priest's ear, 
 and unless the people of Girgenti have a speciality for loud confes- 
 sions, after the manner of the Pharisees, it is quite impossible that 
 the sounds could be audible to any one but the priest. 
 
 One word more about the Cathedral. We noticed that the 
 portrait of a man in uniform was suspended immediately over the 
 Bishop's throne, and under the episcopal canopy. On asking the 
 meaning of this, we were told that it was a portrait of the King, 
 and we were the more surprised at this when we remembered that 
 Monsignor Turano, the Bishop, will not acknowledge the King, in 
 consequence of which he is deprived of all his revenues ; his sulphur 
 mines, which made the See of Girgenti one of the richest in all 
 Italy, have been confiscated, and he has been turned out of his 
 Palace. But the portrait of the King is surely a symbol only ; it 
 is no more like Victor Emmanuel than it is like Eoejer I. or 
 Ptobert Guiscard, and if the King should ever visit Girgenti it must 
 certainly be taken down. Perhaps it is the portrait of the late 
 King. When the ecclesiastical authorities of Girgenti say Le Roi 
 est mort, Vive le Roi, they give their own special interpretation to 
 the phrase. 
 
 What else of Girgenti ? One thing more. We went over its 
 prison, which is a converted monastery, and is fairly comfortable 
 and clean for a Sicilian gaol. It is very spacious, yet we 
 sometimes saw five or six men crowded into one small 
 cell. Many of the crimes were very serious. In the small 
 Province of Girgenti there are many murders in a year. Perhaps 
 under such circumstances the Government is rio-ht in abolishing 
 
212 • Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 capital punishment — in course of time the inhabitants would be 
 decimated by this means, and the island would be underpopulated. 
 These hot-blooded people have recourse to the knife and the pistol 
 on the least provocation, but their blood cools as rapidly as it boils.'"" 
 
 * Since writing the above, the late Sindaco of Girgenti, with whom we visited 
 the prison, has been so good as to send us the statement of the Procuratore del 
 Re, made on the 5th of January, 1877, &ulla Amministrazione della Giustizia, 
 during the year 1876. It applies to the Province of Girgenti alone, which is one 
 of the seven Provinces into which Sicily is divided. This Province contains a popula- 
 tion of about 250,000. During the year (1875-1876) there was only one daring 
 murder in the city of Girgenti, with 22,500 inhabitants ; but there were 9 homicides, 
 and 19 highway robberies in the district immediately outside the town. In the other 
 Communes of the Province there has been an increase of crime : thus the number 
 of criminals in 1872 was 1712, increasing in 1873 to 1904, and in 1875 to 2163; 
 a decrease of 178 took place in 1875, but last year the number rose to 2019. 
 Unfortunately the augmentation is due to the more frequent occurrence of grave 
 offences : — the assassinations increased from 24 to 35 ; the highway robberies with 
 homicides from 4 to 8; the omicidi volontari* from 34 to 45; the robberies with- 
 out homicide from 81 to 116; the woundings with other assaults against the 
 person from 583 to 635 ; thefts from 281 to 326 ; and finally violent resistances 
 to the public authority from 42 to 55. The Procuratore admits that there are 
 many undetected crimes, and that many daring criminals have escaped owing to the 
 cowardice or connivance of the juries. The peasantry wiU often feed and shelter 
 the Avorst criminals, and will refuse to help the authorities. Sometimes men will 
 be seen who are apparently pursuing the quiet avocations of husbandry, and who, 
 on being questioned, deny all knowledge of the brigands for whom the troops are 
 in search, but who, as soon as the interlocutors disappear, will throw aside the 
 spade, and take up the gun, ready to cry " Abhuccdi sangii della j\[adon7ia" to any 
 passer-by who is Avorth the robbing. When they can find no better prey, they 
 often rob the small farmer returning from market, Avith the price of his corn in his 
 pocket. The large landowners dare not reside on their estates, and are obliged to 
 place them in the hands of agents, Avho often rob them of half their produce. No 
 wonder the Procurcdore laments the state of the Province, and calls upon all 
 the respectable inhabitants to aid the Government in the right administration of 
 
 * We have no English law tenn which exactly expresses omicidio voloniario. It signifies 
 wilful inurdcr, of such a nature that the crime has not been provoked by any cause, or if 
 provoked, twenty- four hours are required to have elapsed between the provocation and the 
 murder. Thus a man who kills another in a brawl is not guilty of omicidio volontario ; nor one 
 who, having been aggrieved, returns to his house for a weapon, and kills his enemy before 
 twenty- four hours have elapsed. 
 
Brydones Visit to Girgenti, 213 
 
 Addendum. — Since writing the above we have met with 
 Brydone's Tour through Sicily and Malta, a volume of travels 
 published in 1776 in the form of a series of letters. The author 
 visited Sicily in the summer of 1770, and it is curious to compare 
 his impressions with those which are afforded to the traveller a 
 century later. The book is full of acute observations and quaint 
 remarks. It is frequently inaccurate, for in those days there 
 existed neither "Murray" nor "Baedeker;" and the author has 
 sometimes missed an important sight. He sails from Malta to 
 Girgenti in a sparonaro, accompanied by two friends ; as he 
 approaches the Sicilian coast, he is struck by the magnificent 
 appearance of Girgenti, and says that it is " little inferior to 
 that of Genoa," but on closer inspection the city did not appear 
 by any means so splendid. Our traveller was anxious to 
 see whether the Girgentines still preserved the character for 
 splendour, luxury, and hospitality to which the ancient writers 
 make such frequent allusion. Plato says of the inhabitants of the 
 city, " they build as if they were never to die, and eat as if they 
 had not an hour to live." ^lian and Fazzello abuse the city for 
 its drunkenness, and praise it for its hospitality. Diodorus says 
 that the vessels of the Agrigentines were made of silver, and their 
 chairs of ivory ; he also mentions one of its citizens who, on 
 returning victorious from the Olympic games, entered the city 
 
 justice. Let us remember that this report was published a few weeks ago, in the 
 capital of the Province (Girgenti), and in the midst of the scenes which it describes. 
 The Procuratore puts in the first rank of offences, murders, assaults, and woundings, 
 and in the second, outrages on the public safety, and violence and resistance to the 
 public authorities. If we compare the above startling statistics with the crimes 
 committed during the same period in the County of "Wilts (of nearly the 
 same size and population as the Province of Girgenti), we iind remarkable 
 differences. We have to record one attempt to murder, two cases of manslaughter, 
 one case of cutting and wounding, eleven cases committed against property with 
 violence (mainly burglaries and highway robberies), and 4G9 common assaults. It 
 must be remembered that a "common assault" in Girgenti usually means a wound 
 Avith a knife. 
 
214 Palermo and Girgenti. 
 
 attended by three hiundred chariots, each drawn by four white 
 horses. 
 
 Brydone gives an amusing account of a dinner, to which he was 
 invited by the nobles of Girgenti, to meet the Bishop. He rose from 
 table convinced that the ancient inhabitants of Akragas could not 
 have understood the laws of hospitality or the luxuries of good eating 
 better than their descendants. There were thirty at table, and for 
 these were served an hundred dishes of meat, including the morene, 
 a peculiar species of eel, and a dish made of the enlarged livers of 
 fowls. Of the latter Brydone says, "It is indeed a most incom- 
 parable dish, but the means of procuring it is so cruel, that I will 
 not even trust it with you. Perhaps, without any bad intention, 
 you might mention it to some of your friends, they to others, till 
 at last it might come into the hands of those that would be glad 
 to try the experiment ; and the whole race of poultry might ever 
 have reason to curse me : let it suffice to say that it occasions a 
 painful and lingering death to the poor animal." After drinking a 
 good deal of Sicilian wine, Brydone quaintly observes, "The company 
 was remarkably merry, and did by no means belie their ancient 
 character, for most of them were more than half seas over, long before 
 we rose from table." Although " they were beginning to reel 
 exceedingly," they requested the English visitors to make a bowl 
 of punch, a liquid they had often heard of, but never seen. When 
 it was duly concocted, the Sicilians preferred the punch to any 
 wine on the table, and the bowl was often replenished. "They 
 called it Pontio, and spoke loudly in its praise, declaring that 
 Pontio (alluding to Pontius Pilate) was a much better fellow than 
 they had ever taken him for." Presently, however, a reverend 
 Canon became excessively ill, and exclaimed with a rueful counten- 
 ance, "I always knew that Pontius was a great traitor;" where- 
 upon one of the guests shouted out, " Aspettatevi Signor Canonico. 
 Niente al pregiudizio di Signor Pontio, vi prego. Kecordate, che 
 Pontio v'ha fatto un Canonico ; et Pontio ha fatto sua ExceUenza 
 
Brydone's Visit to Girgenti. 
 
 215 
 
 "uno Vescovo. Non scordatevi mai di vostri amici." After this 
 fashion did the reverend Canons of Girgenti talk in the presence of 
 their Bishop in 1770. The Bishop, a man both of genius and 
 erudition, appears to have entered into every joke, and enjoyed it. 
 From Girgenti, Brydone went overland to Palermo. He 
 describes the tedium of the journey, the perpetual fear of brigands, 
 and the beauty of the approach to Palermo. A long chapter is 
 given to the feast of S. Rosalia, during which the whole city was 
 illuminated, and the inhabitants enjoyed a five-days' holiday. 
 
 ANCIBNT DiaXAFF STILL UahiK IN iiOilJi PAKTS OF alCILV. 
 
THE HEROES OF HOMEK. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 ATHENS. 
 
 The Voyage from Marseilles to Athens — A Capful of Wind in the Medi- 
 terranean — Athens Forty Years Ago — Statistics of Progress — Athens of to-day 
 — The City and its Surroundings as seen from the Acropolis — Five Zones 
 of Vision — The Acropolis — The Parthenon and the Erechtheum — The Modern 
 Agora — Greek Brigands — Educational Progress in Greece — The 
 University of Athens — Addendum. 
 
 ''ARSEILLES and the Chateau D'lf have almost 
 
 faded from our sight, and we have a long journey 
 
 before we again touch land. On the afternoon of 
 
 December 28th we passed through the Straits of 
 
 Bonifacio, being about twenty-four hours out of 
 
 Marseilles Harbour, and on board the French 
 
 steamer " Labourdonnais," bound for Athens. We had 
 
 fondly expected to see numberless ships of various 
 
 capacity, flag, and rig ; to pass in sight of interesting 
 
 and historic shores ; to meet Massaniello-like fishermen 
 
 with red caps and striped jerseys in picturesque feluccas; 
 
 to get glimpses of great fish, and curious sea-birds, 
 
 and wonderful sunsets, not to speak of the marvellous 
 
 and unrivalled blue of the Mediterranean, of which 
 
The Voyage. 217 
 
 some travellers speak in such terms that we might imagine 
 
 all other seas to be of some other colour. We were doomed 
 
 to be disappointed on this day at least. Our diary recorded 
 
 nothing very wonderful : — " Saw one guU, afterwards a ship." 
 
 The most verbose writer could only have said : — " Awoke, got 
 
 up, dressed, read, breakfasted ; went on deck, saw a gull, talked 
 
 to fellow-passengers, read, saw a ship, dined, read : sea calm, 
 
 a little rolling. This life is becoming monotonous; went to 
 
 bed." And he might have added, " Slept till morning," had not 
 
 an event happened which we must now relate, begging our readers 
 
 to prepare their minds for startling nautical details, by calling to 
 
 remembrance such accounts as Sir Stamford Eaffles' story, or the 
 
 chapter " Portentosum Mare " in Lhomme qui rit, or the 
 
 Naufragium of Erasmus ; or the picture in the Graphic of a 
 
 few months ago illustrating an incident in Quatre-vingt-treize, in 
 
 which a loose gun rushes about the vessel during a gale like a mad 
 
 creature, killing the sailors, and finally staving in the ship's side. 
 
 Let us then begin in the orthodox manner. About 3 a.m. on the 
 
 morning of the 29th, we were aroused from sleep by But we 
 
 must first be truthful, and this compels us to adopt the fashion of 
 
 the most barbarous class of modern sensational novels, published 
 
 in monthly parts, which end their last chapter in each part at the 
 
 commencement of a climax ; in fact, they very often climb with 
 
 you to the last rung of the ladder, and keep you waiting there 
 
 till the next month's number comes out, thus : — " Sir Anthony 
 
 grasped the pistol ; it was loaded to the muzzle with swan shot. 
 
 One second more and " . . . To be concluded in our next — 
 
 or "In that supreme moment the man was sublime. . . . The 
 
 water had risen to his neck. Could he escape?" — or "No," she 
 
 replied firmly, "we have burned the will, this is for us, and she 
 
 displayed a dagger of curious workmanship, covered with Venetian 
 
 arabesques, and Byzantine damaskening." We do not, however, 
 
 intend to keep our readers waiting for a month, after this fashion, 
 2i 
 
218 Athens. 
 
 but, returning to our original proposition, we must first (let us add* 
 and last) be truthful ; we may as well say that, although we have 
 spoken of a diary, we spoke of it only in the abstract, and seriously 
 deprecate the practice of keeping one. If kept at all, it should be 
 as meagre as possible ; and it is only warranted, we think, in the 
 case of the most treacherous and unreasonable memory, or when 
 the writer is making a long and very varied tour. For this 
 keeping of a diary during one's travels tends to create an artificial 
 memory external to the individual. Suppose we could separate 
 that portion of the brain which contains the mechanism of memory 
 from the rest of the organism, should we like to run the risk of 
 carrying it in our pockets, and of becoming like the Struldbrugs 
 whenever we left it in the pocket of a changed coat, or mislaid it ? 
 Yet this is what we do with our diaries. We replace good service- 
 able memory by a little book which is lost as easily as a purse. 
 Moreover, this habit of making a book take the place of our 
 faculties of memory on slight occasions, tends to weaken those 
 faculties, just as wearing our arm in a sling weakens the muscles 
 of the arm. The memory does not strive to retain a fact recorded 
 in a diary, because it is easier to remember that the fact is in the 
 diary, than to remember the fact by itself. We can imagine a 
 man trusting so much to the record of events and facts in his 
 diary, that on referring to the real memory he would find it gone 
 — a self-induced aphasia — and all conversation, save of immediate 
 surroundings, would be conducted through the medium of the 
 written record. For the above reasons we kept no diary, and 
 have preserved on the tablets of our memory that considerable 
 entry : " Saw one gull, afterwards a ship." But this, as Swift 
 says so often in Tlie, Tale of a Tub, is a digression, and yet he 
 must needs give us in the same work a very dry " digression about 
 digressions," a practice which in this instance we do not intend to 
 follow, therefore let us resume. 
 
 About 3 a.m. on the morning of the 29th, we were aroused 
 
The Voyage. 219 
 
 from sleep by being bodily shifted in our berth through a space of 
 about three inches, first in one direction, then in another. (The 
 berths were at right angles to the length of the vessel.) Then 
 also began the overthrow of chairs in the saloon, the rolling of 
 chairs on deck, and a thousand-and-one noises. It was quite 
 impossible to sleep, and too dark to read. The vessel was rolling 
 through a very large arc (a fellow-traveller said 45°), and every- 
 thing on board that had the least play, were it but the eighth of 
 an inch, assumed the alternating motion of the vessel. When 
 morning came it was very difficult to dress ; it was impossible to 
 sit without holding on with one hand, and dexterously moving the 
 body so as to keep its centre of gravity in the right place, twice 
 with every complete roll of the vessel. Walking on deck was 
 impossible ; the most you could do in the way of progression was 
 to watch your opportunity when the deck was approaching 
 horizontality, and then to rush to the nearest support and cling to 
 it until the deck passed through its second phase of horizontality, 
 and then to make another rush. In fact, the whole day was spent 
 in the preservation of one's balance. It was impossible either to 
 read or talk with comfort, — worse than all, to dine. Of course 
 everything placed upon the table rolled off at once ; but the 
 steward was equal, and apparently used, to the occasion. A frame 
 with a number of cross-cords was fitted over the table, and the 
 cords were tightened so that the table presented the appearance of 
 a gigantic ^Eolian harp. Tumblers fitted in between two cords, 
 plates between others, dishes between others ; but even thus a 
 good deal of manipulation was necessary to reduce the discomfort 
 to a minimum. For if, in an unguarded moment, one left either 
 knife or fork to itself for the fraction of a minute, it slid away, and 
 perhaps darted into the waistcoat of a man opposite ; potatoes rolled 
 with considerable velocity to the other side of the table, then fell to 
 the floor, and even when you converted their rolling friction into 
 sliding friction by dividing them and thus giving them a broader 
 
220 Athens. 
 
 basis, they quietly slipped away and were seen no more. The eating of 
 soup could only be attempted during the short phase of horizontality, 
 and during the movement of the deck some few degrees on each 
 side of this position. The observation of our claret, at a level 
 altogether different from that of the top of the tumbler, led us to 
 realise a condition in which the first law of hydrostatics would 
 require correction and emendation. It was curious to see the 
 guests struggling each in his own way against the powers of 
 Nature. Roll, roll, roll, and then would come a SeKaKVfiia, and one 
 man would lose his soup, another his knife and fork, a third his 
 balance, a fourth his temper, a fifth his seat, a sixth his equani- 
 mity, a seventh courage, an eighth heart, a ninth faith in the 
 Mediterranean as a pacific sea. The tenth was dexterous ; albeit a 
 man of extreme ponderosity; he fought with the powers of Nature, 
 he was fain to cling with one hand to an iron pillar in the centre 
 of the saloon, and one was minded of the fact that his centre of 
 gravity was somewhat lower than that of most of us, and was 
 more easily kept within the base line. But it was curious to watch 
 that " cruel force gravity," as Mr. Mill calls it, trying with all its 
 might to secure so good a prize and to drag the great mass lower 
 and lower. And it was interesting to calculate the vis viva of this 
 mass supposing that it had fallen (a) to the floor, {/3) to the bottom 
 of the ve>ssel ; then a calculation of foot-pounds, of total energy, 
 and of the heat produced by the ultimate stopping of the mass, by 
 collision with the greater mass of the vessel. We have seen in a 
 pantomime a feast spread out upon a table, and as soon as the 
 guests were seated, the viands were raised high into the air by 
 invisible strings ; we have seen also a bun dance on a table, but 
 we had never before witnessed such constant commotion. The old 
 nursery rhyme which ends " And the dish ran away with the 
 spoon" best describes the situation. The oranges were the most 
 troublesome things of all, they were perpetually disporting them- 
 selves on the table and on the floor, and even if they were placed 
 
Arrival. 221 
 
 iDclividually and apparently securely between the afore-mentioned 
 ropes, they managed to bob under them, or jump over them, and 
 so to escape. 
 
 And what was the cause of all this ? The wind was not very 
 high, and would probably be called less than half a gale, but the waves 
 were large and often ran crosswise. The centre of disturbance was 
 probably distant, and there no doubt the wind was very high. 
 It all died out in about 20 hours, and next day (Dec. 31st), we 
 were passing Cape Matapan at 8 a.m., in a delightfully warm 
 atmosphere, the sea calm, not a breath of wind stirring, the sun 
 shining brightly, and the oldest passenger amongst us was sitting 
 on deck without either hat or great-coat. 
 
 A few hours later we passed between Cape Malea and Cerigo, 
 and at 10 p.m. we anchored in the Piraeus. Here a good deal of 
 unnecessary delay occurred. It was the last night of the year, and 
 as we were assured that we could not land till morning, we were 
 going to have a game of whist, and driuk the health of absent 
 friends in a bowl of punch. Presently some Greek officials and a 
 doctor came on board, and after much discussion, and an inspection 
 of the ship's papers, we were told that we must land at once. Only 
 one other passenger landed, the rest were going on to Constanti- 
 nople, and the " Labourdonnais" soon after steamed out of the 
 harbour. As soon as we landed, we found that the last train to 
 Athens had gone some hours before, and we had a drive of an 
 hour in a somewhat chill air. After leaving the Piraeus, we 
 traversed a broad, very muddy road, lined on both sides by vineyards 
 and olive groves ; at length some houses began to appear, then the 
 beautiful Temple of Theseus was seen on the right, and the dim 
 Acropolis beyond. We soon found ourselves passing through narrow 
 dimly-lighted streets, then we emerged into the broad street of 
 Hermes (oSos 'E/D/io{5), and presently stopped at the hospitable doors of 
 the Hotel d'Angleterre. 
 
 So much has been written about modern Athens since the 
 
222 Athens. 
 
 termination of the War of Independence, that, at first sight, it 
 mio-ht be assumed that there is nothingr more to be said on the 
 subject. But we are dealing with a city which has quadrupled its 
 population in less than forty years ; while the energy, culture, and 
 general progression of its people have been more than quadrupled 
 during the same period. 
 
 The city is now passing through its period of renaissance. 
 liCss than a century ago Gibbon asserted that it would then be 
 difficult to find in all Greece a copy of the works of Plato or 
 Demosthenes, or a person capable of reading them. It is far other- 
 wise now. Your modern Greek of culture worships the very 
 footsteps of the ancients. " This," said an Athenian lately, as we 
 were walking over the hill Ardettus, " is virgin rock, untouched 
 since the creation ; here may have walked Plato, and Socrates, 
 Zeno, and Aristotle." 
 
 The history of ancient Greek literature is largely studied in the 
 University of Athens ; Homer, and Sophocles, and Thucydides are 
 the subjects of long courses of lectures ; the works of the poets and 
 philosophers of former ages are eagerly read. The Athenians love 
 their city and everything that belongs to it ; they dwell with pride 
 upon the great deeds of former days ; they cherish the former 
 remains of ancient art which they possess, and a law of the land 
 forbids the exportation of antiquities. 
 
 Dr. Wordsworth, writing in 1832, says : "The town of Athens 
 is now lying in ruins. The streets are almost deserted ; nearly all 
 the houses are without roofs ; the churches are reduced to bare 
 walls and heaps of stones and tnortar. . . . The least ruined 
 objects are some of the ruins." A year later he writes : " Here 
 there are no books, no lamps, no windows, no carriages, no news- 
 papers, no post-office. The letters which arrived here a few days 
 ago from Napoli, after having been publicly cried in the streets, if 
 they were not claimed by the parties to whom they were addressed, 
 were committed to the flames." In place of all this we have now 
 
Signs of Progress. 223 
 
 a trim little city, possessing most of the advantages of a modern 
 continental town, and containing some 50,000 inhabitants. The 
 streets are hghted by gas, and are tolerably clean for an eastern 
 city ; the shops and hotels are good ; there are capital cabs, and 
 electric bells are not unknown. There is a university, an academy, 
 an observatory, a theatre, a royal palace, far too big for the city, a 
 new cathedral, several hospitals, capital schools, and a post-office, 
 which issues a set of stamps bearing the head of Mercury, and 
 beloved by collectors. There are several publishers, and an original 
 literature is beginning to make its appearance ; three or four papers 
 are issued daily, some in Greek, others in French. A railway has 
 at last appeared, telegraphic communication with Central Europe 
 and with India {vid Zante, Candia, and JEgypt) has been established ; 
 a standing army exists, and brigands are not only caught but im- 
 prisoned into the bargain. Progress is apparent in every direction. 
 So long as the Turks ruled and oppressed the land, reform and 
 revivification were impossible ; the vitality of the nation was crushed 
 out of it. Now the oppression has ceased, and the Greeks are once 
 more a free people; they have recovered rapidly both from the 
 effects of their recent state of bondage and from a destructive war, 
 and have shown an earnest desire for regeneration. Much remains 
 to be done ; but the progress made during the last forty years has 
 been surprisingly great.'" 
 
 * At the conclusion of an interesting paper " On the Statistics of the Kingdom 
 of Greece," M. Demetrius Bikelas makes the following remarks in regard to the 
 progress of the country : — " From the foregoing statements it results that in thirty- 
 five years of self-government the population of the Hellenic kingdom has been 
 doubled, while her revenues have increased nearly five-fold ; that her towns and 
 villages have been rebuilt and new ones founded; that her fields have been 
 cultivated to a considerable extent, and her seas covered with shipping; that 
 public education has attained a notable development, and that, in short, her people 
 have not remained idle. With a revenue of from £500,000 to £1,000,000 a-year, 
 her Government has managed, besides keeping up an army and navy, with a civil 
 list and all the outlay of administration, to establish schools, to open ports, and 
 erect lighthouses, to make some roads, and, generally speaking, to deserve a place 
 
224 Athens. 
 
 Perhaps some of our readers will protest tliat tliey really care 
 nothing about modern Athens, and are solely interested in its 
 antiquities, which must be always the same, and have been often 
 described ; yet in truth, in this respect also, the city is undergoing 
 change, and change in the right direction. So late as 1852, the 
 
 among the civilised governments of Christendom, in spite of all its shortcomings. 
 That its shortcomings are not few has been pointed out in many instances in the 
 preceding pages. But, under the circumstances which saw this small State begin 
 its political existence, the question is whether more could be fairly expected from 
 a first generation of freemen." This was written in 1868, and we must remember 
 that the same progression has continued from that time to the present. M. Bikelas 
 remarks that the friends of Greece expected at the time of her emancipation that 
 she would quickly take the same position in the world as certain other states of 
 equal magnitude, and would follow the example of JS'orth America ; but he clearly 
 shows that this could not be the case for many reasons. " The Greeks, emerging 
 from ages of serfdom, had none of the benefits of civilisation ; they had no political, 
 or social, or intellectual education to boast of ; they had no laws, no aristocracy to 
 lead them in the work of their regeneration ; and after they had achieved, by dint of 
 desperate efforts, the work of independence, they had to go through a series of revolu- 
 tions before settling down into an organised body politic ; while the belief that 
 their national unity is not yet complete has tended, and may for long tend, to 
 disturb the work of their internal development." 
 
 The following details show the extent of the progress made in various directions 
 by the Greeks. At the end of the ten years' War of Independence, only nine 
 towns had *' partly escaped the total devastation of the rest." Since that time no 
 less than ten new towns have been founded, and twenty-three old towns have been 
 rebuilt at a cost of about 1\ millions sterling. . . . The army consisted in 
 1868 of about 14,000 men, and the national guard of Athens of 7000. ... In 
 the seven years from 1858 to 1864 the trade of Greece increased to the extent of 
 40 per cent, on imports, and 10 per cent on exports. . . . The number of Greek 
 exhibitors in the International Exhibition of 1851 was 36 ; in 1855 (Paris) it had 
 risen to 131; and in 1862 (London) to 295. ... In 1834 the mercantile 
 navy of Greece, including the Ionian Islands, numbered 2745 vessels; in 1858 it 
 had increased to 3920; and in 1866, to 5156. . . . As to public works, no 
 less than thirty lighthouses have been built, the Straits of Euboia have been 
 widened, and 236 miles of roads have been opened. . . . Postage stamps were 
 introduced in 1861, at which time there were 92 post-offices in Greece. ... In 
 1867 there were 693 miles of telegraph worked by the Government at a yearly 
 loss of about £5000. Since this time many miles of wire have been added to 
 those already existing. 
 
Modern Athens. 225 
 
 Acropolis was partially covered with Turkish bastions, which have 
 since been removed ; the ruins of the Odeum of Herodes Atticus 
 were exposed in 1857, while the magnificent Theatre of Dionusos 
 was only laid bare in 1862. More recently an ancient cemetery 
 was discovered at a considerable depth near the commencement of 
 the Sacred Way ; it is still in progress of excavation. Let this fact 
 of the ever-changing nature of the city, both old and new, be our 
 apology for discussing an apparently trite subject. 
 
 It may fairly be asked at the outset whether it is worth making 
 so long a journey for a short time % To this we would unhesitat- 
 ingly reply, " Yes." Of course it would be preferable to spend six 
 months in the country, and to make walking tours to the principal 
 places of interest ; but, being at Athens, and having a clear week 
 at one's disposal, it is possible to see everything of any interest in 
 the town, and some few things outside of it. 
 
 Athenians who are most ardent in the praise of their city, tell 
 you that three days are sufficient to enable you to see the antiquities 
 thoroughly. Everything is so small in Greece ; the whole country 
 is smaller than Portugal ; Attica about half the size of Norfolk ; 
 Athens smaller than Ipswich. A visit of a week allows one to 
 make a daily visit to the Acropolis, to which, as can well be 
 imagined, the traveller is irresistibly drawn ; indeed he never likes 
 to have it out of his sight. There is a charm, a fascination about 
 the wonderful collection of ruins on its summit which is indescrib- 
 able. And yet, we may ask, what is it that gives this citadel of 
 ancient Athens such a power over the mind and imagination ? The 
 simple rock, 150 feet high, with a surface of 1000 feet by 500, is 
 not in itself specially remarkable. Saint Chamas has a fine position 
 for a citadel, so have Corinth and a dozen other places. We think 
 also of Stirling Castle and of Ehrenbreitstein, and of several elevated 
 positions near the Rhine. Yet, could we see the Acropolis as the 
 Athenian of old saw it, we might exhaust even his fruitful and 
 magnificent language in the attempt to find new phrases of admira- 
 
 2 K 
 
.226 Athens. 
 
 tion. Here was placed his parent city ; here the statues and 
 temples of his guardian goddess ; it was the fortress and treasury 
 of the city ; the home of its finest works of art ; the scene of its 
 most solemn ceremonies. We love the place because it was beloved 
 by that great succession of poets, orators, and philosoj^hers, whose 
 works have had the profoundest efiect upon humanity, and have 
 penetrated into every land ; because around it was spread a city 
 which for a thousand years was the source and home of all that 
 most delights, dignifies, ennobles, and refines the mind of man — 
 pure philosophy, soul-stirring oratory, divine poetry, heroic drama, 
 the most perfect culture in its most perfect form ; because upon it 
 we see, albeit in a ruined form, the grandest examples of an 
 architecture created and perfected by the most pure artists of all 
 time — an architecture which has served for twenty centuries as a 
 model for every civilised people, and of which we find copies in 
 every city in the world. 
 
 Thinking of these things, the traveller forgets the length and 
 discomfort of the journey ; he girds up his loins ; stuffs " Words- 
 worth," and "Smith," and "Herodotus," into his portmanteau, 
 hurries through France, and steams out of Marseilles Harbour, 
 some mild afternoon in December. Then a thousand miles of sea 
 and buffetings by rude waves, and delicious sunnings on deck, and 
 much pondering over Smith's " History," and useless regrets 
 concerning forgotten knowledge. And as often as he looks at the 
 book he is carried back in spirit to the time so long — so far too 
 long — ago, when that same "History" was a source of trouble and 
 vexation to him, till he sees himself a schoolboy once again, 
 puzzling over the details of the seventh year of the Peloponnesian 
 War, and ever and anon wandering away to the pictures of the 
 restored Acropolis, and the Temple of the Winds, and the Vale of 
 Tempe, and thinking how easy it would be to learn Greek history 
 there. How often have we not, under such circumstances, regarded 
 these too ideal scenes — vales and mountains, and sacred groves 
 
Viezu from the Acropolis. 227 
 
 beloved of the gods — as a kind of fairy-land to wliich we should 
 like to be suddenly transported by some magic horse or enchanted 
 carpet, from the dull, hot, class-room, within ten minutes of a 
 commencing lesson ! But the artist has not indicated in his fairy 
 views the parching heat, the dead herbage, the dried-up water- 
 courses, the uneven zigzag roads, the infinite inconveniences of 
 traversing them, or the thousand-and-one things which mar the 
 beauty of such scenes ; moreover, he had often deftly introduced 
 luxuriant semi-tropical plants where, afterwards, we could only find 
 bare, barren rock. Let us not blame him ; he gave us happy 
 anticipations. How lean and dull the real would be in this life 
 without the ideal. The lives of most of us are made up of much 
 dreaming and a little waking ; it is pleasant to believe our apples 
 sweet, even should they afterwards turn to ashes in our mouth ; but 
 we are surely dreaming now. 
 
 The first thingr that the traveller does on arriving^ in Athens is 
 to ascend the Acropolis, and scan the view which is presented to 
 him in every direction. Aristides compared the Acropolis to the 
 innermost zone of a shield, surrounded by four other zones ; the 
 second Athens, the third Attica, the fourth Greece, the outermost 
 the whole world. Thus Greece was the centre of the world, Attica 
 the centre of Greece, Athens the centre of Attica, the Acropolis the 
 centre of Athens. Let us also divide our field of view seen from 
 the AcrojDolis into five zones of vision, and commence with the 
 outermost. 
 
 We are in the centre of a plain, surrounded on three sides by 
 mountains. Turning to the west, we see Mount JEgaleos and the 
 island of Salamis beyond ; to the north-west the ridge of Parnes ; 
 to the east Pentelicus ; and to the south-east Hymettus ; while on 
 the south and south-west is seen the J^o-ean Sea, with all sorts of 
 wonderful lights and shades playing over its unrufiled surface. We 
 see also on the coast the three bays — Phalerum, Munycbia, and the 
 Piraeus — the last of which is still the harbour of Athens. Within 
 
228 
 
 AtJieiis. 
 
 the second zone we have the plain of Attica, extending between the 
 mountains and the city. It is gently undulating, not unlike some 
 of the Wiltshire downs ; a few narrow and very uneven roads cross 
 it in various directions and connect the outlying villages with the 
 metropolis. The plain is for the most part bare and treeless, but 
 on the west and north-west there is a winding grove of olive-trees, 
 some of which are said to be of great antiquity. Their peculiar 
 
 SALAMl.S. 
 
 silvery foliage affords infinite relief to the eye, after the sight of 
 barren mountains and barren plains. The site of Plato's Academy 
 is within this grove. Between the olives there are vineyards, and 
 the Cephissus, which even in December is a mere streamlet smaller 
 than the Kennet in Wiltshire, flows through the grove. Small 
 villages are seen here and there in the plain — Patissia, Colonus, 
 and Kara. 
 
 The third zone brino-s us to the immediate neio;hbourhood of 
 Athens. Here we sec, on the south-west, the Museum Hill, once 
 covered with houses, and still containing the remains of a monu- 
 
View from the Acropolis. 
 
 229 
 
 ment erected to the memory of the family of Autiochiis IV, The 
 Poet Musseus is said to have been buried here. Then a low hill, 
 the site of the Pnyx — the place where the public assemblies were 
 held, and from the raised hema of which Demosthenes addressed 
 the people, A little nearer the Acropolis, and on its western side, 
 is the Areopagus or Hill of Mars, upon which the Athenian judges 
 sat to pardon or condemn, and from whence S. Paul addressed the 
 
 THE ACADEMIC GKUVE, Ul.STUHED. 
 
 too superstitious men of Athens. Beyond the Areopagus rises the 
 Hill of the Nymphs, on the summit of which is the Observatory. 
 
 A word as to the latter. We are glad to know that 
 good astronomical work is now being done in the city, and 
 quite appreciate the generosity of Baron Sina (a wealthy 
 Greek of Vienna), who built the observatory; but we must 
 protest against its present position. However good it may 
 be for purposes of astronomy, it is undeniably an eye-sore from 
 an aesthetic point of view. The building is utterly out of harmony 
 with the graceful and beautiful ruins around it, and does no little 
 to mar the general effect. The mind is perpetually recalled from 
 
230 Athens. 
 
 its visions of the past by the sight of this formal building dedicated 
 to science, and, no doubt, destined to make all sorts of lovely 
 visions "yield their place to cold material laws." Shall we ever 
 see tall factory chimneys blackening the pure Pentelic marble ; a 
 waterworks company in possession of Ardettus ; telegraph wires 
 affixed to the Temple of the Olympian Jove ? Heaven forbid 
 it in our time ! Here at least let us be conservative. 
 
 To the north of the Acropolis is Mount Lycabettus, sometimes 
 called Mount S. George, the most conspicuous hill near Athens. 
 It is 900 feet higher than the Acropolis, and the view from its 
 summit is magnificent in every direction. As we continue our 
 course southwards we see the King's Garden, the Greek and 
 Protestant cemeteries, the hill Ardettus, and the remains of the 
 Stadium — a racecourse shaped like the letter U, 700 feet long 
 and 110 across, constructed B.C. 330. 
 
 The fourth zone brings us within the span once inclosed by the 
 walls of Athens. In it we see, a little to the north of the 
 Areopagus, the graceful Doric temple called the Theseum, the best 
 preserved ruin in Athens ; indeed, at a short distance, it appears 
 quite uninjured : yet it dates from B.C. 470. More to the north is 
 seen the greater part of Modern Athens, the new cathedral, the old 
 Byzantine churches, the long Street of the AVinds, terminated near 
 the Acropolis by the Temple of the Winds, and prolonged north- 
 wards until it reaches the villao^e of Patissia. The Street of the 
 Winds is intersected a few hundred yards from its commencement 
 by the second principal street of Athens — the Street of Hermes — 
 the west end of which is terminated by the railway station, and 
 the east end by the king's palace. 
 
 To the right, not far from the base of Lycabettus, we notice 
 the University, and the beautiful new Academy of Pentelic marble, 
 now in course of erection, the gift of Baron Sina. Looking from the 
 south-east corner of the Acropolis, we observe the sixteen remaining 
 columns of the Temple of the 01ym23ian Jupiter, the largest temple 
 
The Temple of Zens Olympiits. 
 
 231 
 
 ever dedicated to his fame. The columns, which are nearly seventy 
 feet high, are Corinthian, and of Pentelic marble ; near it flows the 
 Ilissus, a streamlet which is dry in summer, and which we crossed 
 at a chance place by stepping on projecting stones, without wetting 
 our boots, hard by the fountain of Callirrhoe, which is now a 
 stagnant pool, overgrown with water-weeds. Nearer the Acropolis 
 we see, still looking in a south-easterly direction, the graceful little 
 monument of Lysicrates, constructed in B.C. 335, and said by some 
 to be the first example of the use of the Corinthian column : still 
 
 TEMPLE OF ZEUS OLYMPIUS. 
 
 nearer, on the very slope of the Acropolis, is the Theatre of 
 Dionusos, brought to light a few years ago. It is in good 
 preservation ; the stage remains, and several rows of marble chairs 
 in the lower part of the theatre, each bearing the name of the owner ; 
 a chair in the centre, a little raised above the others, was for the 
 High Priest of Dionusos. At the south-east corner of the Acropolis^ 
 and also on its slope, we see the remains of the more modern 
 Theatre of Herodes Atticus (b.c. 140). Unlike the Theatre of 
 Dionusos, it was covered, and is said to have had a roof of cedar. 
 
232 
 
 Athens. 
 
 The mass of small arches above the sta2;e, and the dark colour of 
 
 o^' 
 
 the stone, do not lend any charm to the ruin. We are now at the 
 
 DIONUSOS AND LION. FROM THE MONUMENT OF LYSICRATES. 
 
 entrance to the Acropolis, and may narrow our gaze to the fifth and 
 innermost of our imagined zones, which we, indeed, have in reality 
 in the walls of the Acropolis, within which is that wonderful 
 collection of ruins, the chief of which are known as the Propylsea, 
 the Parthenon, and the Erechtheum. 
 
 THESE0S. FROM THE PEDIMENT OF THE PARTHENON 
 
 Around us now we have desolation and ruin. The ground is 
 thickly strewn with blocks of broken marble. Tempus edax, homo 
 edacior. Had it not been for the Venetian and Turkish bombard- 
 
The Acropolis. 
 
 233 
 
 ments, and the fatal thouglitlessness of storing gunpowder within 
 the whilom shrines of deities, these beautiful temples would be 
 standing intact. Time would, indeed, have partially obliterated the 
 finer lines of the more exposed sculptures, and would have given to 
 the marble that brownish tinge which we notice in the Theseum 
 and elsewhere. But no more. We should not see broken 
 columns in every direction ; the marks of cannon-balls upon 
 architrave and frieze ; the broken pediments, and the overturned 
 altars ; neither should we have had to mourn so many lost sculptures 
 of Pheidias, and Praxiteles, and Mvron. 
 
 THE ACROPOLIS, ATHENS. 
 
 As we stand within the entrance to the Acropolis, we see before 
 us a broad flight of steps leading up to the Propyleea — the gates of 
 the Citadel, constructed by Mnesicles, and finished in 432 B.C. 
 The building contained both Doric and Ionic columns, and its fine 
 gateways were closed by gates of bronze. The great central gate- 
 way and the smaller side openings still remain, together with a few 
 of the supporting columns. On the right there is a quadrangular 
 chamber which was once used as a picture-gallery, while on the 
 
 left stands the elegant little Ionic temple of the Wingless Victory, 
 2l 
 
234 
 
 Athens. 
 
 On emerging from the Propylsea we see the interior of the 
 Acropolis, with the remains of the Parthenon on the right and the 
 ruins of the Erechtheum on the left. The rock becomes steeper as 
 we approach the Parthenon, and at its highest point there is a 
 raised oblong platform upon which the structure of the Parthenon 
 rests. The base of the great Doric columns is nearly on a level 
 with the top of the Propylsea, and this elevation causes the 
 Parthenon to be a most conspicuous object, not only from the 
 
 THE ACROPOLIS, RESTORED. 
 
 entrance to the Acropolis, but from every part of the surrounding 
 plain. Many of the gigantic columns are still standing, particularly 
 at the ends of the temple. One realises, even in the present condi- 
 tion of the Parthenon, the remark of Colonel Leake, that "simplicity 
 and majesty of mass and outline forms the first and most remark- 
 able object of admiration in a Greek temple." The Erechtheum is 
 in an extremely mutilated condition ; here and there may be seen 
 elegant ornamental carvings and capitals of Ionic columns. An 
 
The Acropolis. 
 
 235 
 
 attempt has been made to partially restore the Hall of the 
 Caryatides, but the figures are very much broken. Looking at the 
 Acropolis in its present form, let us try to imagine what it once was 
 — to restore the great array of columns, the great frieze of the 
 Panathenaic procession, and the star-spangled roof ; to hang up the 
 shields under the metopes, and cover the walls with delicate 
 paintings of ivy-leaves, and vines, and fighting warriors ; to look 
 into the treasury, and see the most valued possessions of the city, 
 and to place the gold and ivory statue of Athena in the centre 
 of all. 
 
 PARTHENON AND ERECHTHEUM. 
 
 We must think of the Acropolis as it was in the days 
 of Pericles, when the whole of the summit of the rock was covered 
 with temples and statues, altars and votive ofierings ; when the 
 Propylsea formed a magnificent entrance to the great collection of 
 buildings within ; when it was a splendid aggregation of marble 
 columns of dazzling whiteness, enriched with gilding and colour. 
 On passing through its central gate we should have seen a roadway 
 edged with statues and altars ; on the left the great bronze statue 
 of Athena Promachus, 70 feet hio^h, the work of Pheidias. On 
 
236 
 
 Athens. 
 
 entering tlie Parthenon, the gold and ivory statue of Athena, also 
 the work of Pheidias, would have attracted our gaze, placed in a 
 
 ERECHTHEUM, RESTORED. 
 
 chamber of white marble delicately tinted with colours, and 
 adorned within and without by magnificent sculp- 
 tures and paintings. 
 
 In the Erechtheum we should have seen the most 
 sacred image of the goddess, the olive-wood figure 
 of Athena Polias, said to have fallen from heaven. 
 Here too would be the olive-tree planted by Athena, 
 the mark of the trident of Poseidon, the golden 
 lamp of Callimachus, which perpetually burned 
 before the statue of the goddess, and the silver 
 throne from which Xerxes witnessed the battle of 
 Salamis. And if it were the year of the great 
 Panathenaic procession, it would have been a 
 wonderful sight to have seen the horsemen and 
 charioteers, the elastic-limbed boys from the Palaestra 
 in the glory of early manhood, and the dancing 
 daughters of Athens, in all the grace of their 
 flowing garments and with golden grasshoppers 
 
 CARYATIDE OF THE 
 ERECHTHEUM. 
 
The Theseum. 237 
 
 in their hair, winding up the hill, bearing the crocus-coloured 
 peplos to place upon the statue of Athena Polias. 
 
 It is for the sake of such dreams as this, which may be 
 augmented at pleasure by the aid of the works of Aristophanes 
 and Pausanias, Wordsworth and Leake, Penrose and Dyer, that 
 the traveller is tempted to spend so much of his time on the 
 Acropolis. The view from the summit, the perfection of the 
 ruined temples, the attempt to imagine their past condition — all 
 form irresistible attractions. 
 
 After the ruins of the Acropolis, the Theseum is the most 
 interesting remain in Athens ; and is, perhaps, the most perfect 
 example of an early Greek temple which exists. It is 30 years 
 older than the Parthenon, and, like it, is of the purest Doric 
 architecture. The roof is Supported by thirty-six columns, and the 
 entire building is 122 feet long by 52 broad. The columns are 
 nearly all perfect, all remain in their places, and the temple might 
 be regarded as the work of a much later ao;e, were it not for the 
 tinge of brown, which reminds us that it has stood for centuries. 
 The sculptures upon it portray the exploits of Theseus and the 
 labours of Hercules. Like all Greek temples, it was once painted ; 
 traces of red, blue, and green drapery have been found, also of a 
 painted foliage and gilt stars. This temple, like the Parthenon, was 
 converted into a Christian church in 667, and was dedicated to S. 
 George of Cappadocia. It was afterwards used as an hospital, now 
 as a museum. It is fortunate that gunpowder has never been 
 stored in it, and that no Turkish or Venetian shell found its way 
 through the roof. The remaining monuments of Ancient Athens 
 are of comparatively little interest. The Temple of the Winds, 
 otherwise called the Horologium of Andronicus Cyrrhestes, was 
 erected B.C. 100, long after the best period of Greek art. The figures 
 of the winds sculptured upon its upper portion wUl bear no com- 
 parison with the beautiful reliefs of the Parthenon. The Arch of 
 Hadrian is very incongruous on account of its surroundings. 
 
238 
 
 Athens. 
 
 Ancient Athens was chiefly situated on the west and south- 
 west sides of the Acropolis ; the modern city extends to the north 
 and north-east. The busiest portion of the town is to the north of 
 the Acropolis, near the crossing of the two principal streets and the 
 Tower of the Winds. Here we find the modern Agora, and near it 
 remains of the old Agora, in the form of some massive masonry. 
 The Agora is a collection of sheds as close as the rows of ginger- 
 bread booths in a fair ; the commodities appear to consist princi- 
 
 AUCH OF HAUKIAN. 
 
 pally of fruits and of various kinds of meat — joints of mutton, lean 
 yellow fowls, kids, pigeons, and woodcocks. Then there are stalls 
 full of oranges from Poros, pears from Trieste, dates, dried figs, and 
 green vegetables. This market is a curious contrast to the Ilalles of 
 a French town of the same size ; the floor is uneven, and of unpaved 
 earth, and an attempt is made to keep out rain and sun by thin 
 boards, which slope from a central beam. Near the Agora, in a 
 
The Agora. 239 
 
 very narrow lane, is the clotli-market, full of goat-skin cloaks and 
 rough cloth woven by the natives, and red Albanian shoes. In the 
 vicinity the chief life and activity of the city is to be seen. Here 
 are people dressed in at least ten different kinds of costume. 
 Peasants from the neighbouring villages bring their flesh and fowl 
 to market, and return with household necessaries ; others bring 
 fruit and fish from the Piraeus, wild fowl from the marshes, firewood 
 from Hymettus. We saw one old man, in semi- Albanian costume, 
 who was driving about a dozen lean turkeys with a long cane ; 
 several hours later we met him again apparently with an 
 undiminished flock. He was still patiently driving it about, and 
 doing his best to kill two birds with one stone ; for, while he was 
 quite willing to stop if the turkeys found anything to eat by the 
 way, he was still more willing to stop if he found any one to eat 
 them. Round about the Agora there are restaurants, or ^evoSoxfta, 
 and cafes, where the inhabitants sip masticha, smoke cigarettes, and 
 read the 'E^^^^epk or "Eo-Trepos.* 
 
 * The 'E(f>r][jL€pi\ gave a short abstract of this article when it first appeared in 
 the Duhlin University Magazine in 1875. We append the two concluding 
 paragraphs in order to show how little Greek has altered since early times. 
 The pronunciation appears to have altered much more than the spelling, if indeed 
 we really know how ancient Greek was pronounced. It is curious to hear such 
 words as (Saa-tXev; pronounced vasilefs. 
 
 KaTcure/DW Treptypac^wv ti/v dyopavAeyei: "'H ayopa €ivc cnvdOpota-fia fJiiKpiov 
 ^vXlv(x)v TrapaTTip^ jxariiiv cos ^K^lva twv ttwAoi'vtwv ev rats Travy]yfivp€(riv ev EvpwTrr; 
 8ia(f)opa avTtKet/xeva. 'A7ravTW/xev iv avrrj KaXa TTopTOKoiWia tov IIopov, (XTrtSta 
 T>}s Tepyecrrr^s, <f>OLViKas, ^i)po. avKa, crrac^iSa, Kal Trepairepco npeara ufiviou /cai 
 TTpoSdrcDv, dypav, Trepicrrepas Kal ydXXovi. To eSa(^o5 o/xws elve /SopSopoiSes Kat 
 cAeetvov, Trotei 8e irepUpyov dvriOeo-LV Trpos rots yaAAtKoLs dyopas (halles). UXrjcriov 
 T^s dyopas virdpyet peydXi] kivijctl's, IStS 8e /3Ae7re6 rts TOvXd)(i(rTOV SeKa el8wv 
 ev8v[xa<rta<s. Tlept Tqv dyopdv elve TroXXd ^€vo8o)(eLa Kal Ka(jieveia, ottov ot KaTOiKol 
 TTivovcrt p.a(TTixo-v, Kairvi^ova-i crtydpa Kal avayi,V(j}(rKov(Tt Wjv '^(\>y]p.ipi8a Kal tov 
 "Eo"7repov." 
 
 'O K. Rodwel yvwpL^iL Kal to, TroAtn/cd [xa<; Trpdy/xara* oixiXeu irepl twi' KOinidTtav 
 Ktti Aeyet, on eKctvos ^a tjto croJTrjp Trj<s 'EAAdSos, oVrts ^a KanopOov va l8pv(Ty 
 VTTOvpyeiov jSwo-ifiov ctti fiaKpov Kal vd ivwcry to, Koyu/xara TouAdxtcrroi' eis Si'o. 
 
240 Athens. 
 
 Near the Agora there is a prison, which, when we saw it, was 
 full of brigands. They were walking about an inner court in twos 
 and threes, in their usual goat-skin cloaks ; and although they wore 
 heavy iron chains extending from the waist to the ankles, they 
 appeared fairly comfortable, and were chatting and smoking as if 
 nothing particular had happened. 
 
 A good deal of misapprehension exists in this country in regard 
 to Greek brigands. The country is far safer now than it used to 
 be, and if the Turkish Government would co-operate with the 
 Government of King George, brigandage could be altogether 
 suppressed. At present if a robbery is committed and the brigands 
 are pursued, they have only to cross the frontier to be in comparative 
 security. The Greeks are always on the look-out for brigands, and 
 are doing their best to suppress them ; two members of the brother- 
 hood were recently captured at Nauplia, whither they had gone in 
 order to escape by sea. Since the murders on the Marathon road, no 
 less than 300 brigands have been captured, and seventeen were said 
 to be awaiting execution at the commencement of this year (1875). 
 It was, moreover, proposed that the bodies should be hung in chains, 
 as a warning to others, in various conspicuous parts of the country. 
 Whether this will be done is perhaps doubtful. It is still deemed 
 necessary to have an escort of soldiers for the long drive to 
 Marathon, but for shorter distances it is unnecessary. For instance, 
 the road to Eleusis is quite secure ; and on one occasion we rode 
 out into the country alone, for several miles, in the direction of 
 Sunium, returning by the coast near Munychia and Phalerum, and 
 so back to Athens by the Pirseus road. Although we met several 
 men armed with fowling-pieces, and very similar to the imprisoned 
 brigands in general appearance, not one of them seemed inclined to 
 give up his occupation of woodcock-shooting even for the five 
 minutes which, with a loaded gun levelled at our head, might have 
 sufficed to relieve us of watch and purse. It is probable that 
 almost any journey might be undertaken with safety if it were 
 
The Government. '^41 
 
 kept secret. AVben it is known that a traveller, supposed to be 
 worth robbing, is to make a certain expedition on a certain day, 
 the chances are greatly increased that the brigands will swoop down 
 from the mountains, put to rout the escort, which consists of some 
 five or six soldiers, and rob the traveller. It should be stated that 
 the Government authorities are always most willing to supply an 
 escort to visitors, and to offer them every facility in the prosecution 
 of their travels. 
 
 In ancient times, we remember that the small Greek states 
 were perpetually fighting against each other, and the same thing 
 now prevails in a somewhat different form. In this little kingdom 
 there are no less than four political parties, and changes of govern- 
 ment are of very frequent occurrence. If there could be a fusion 
 of parties — if the four parties could coalesce into two, the welfare 
 of Greece would be largely promoted. " Unity makes strength" is 
 a wise maxim. The four State parties are apt to fight out their 
 grievances among themselves, and to leave the State to take care of 
 itself. The man who can form a stable coalition ministry will do a 
 great service to the State.'"" 
 
 * Apropos of the Government of Greece, we recently met with the following 
 remarks in the letter of a Greek who is well acquainted with the state of his 
 country : — "It must not be forgotten that political education is the last growth of 
 civilisation, and that we cannot reasonably expect Greek society (emerging, as it 
 does, from the barbarism of Turkish oppression, and isolated from the rest of 
 Europe by the sea that surrounds it on three sides, and by Turkey on the north) 
 to all at once assume the virtues of political life, which we fail to discover in other 
 countries that have not had to fight against the same disadvantages. 
 
 " Greece is now getting its political education. What is the best system for 
 such an education? Protection (as we may call absolatisiti) or Liberalism'? I 
 trust that with the liberties we possess we shall eventually arrive as a nation at 
 the goal which our well-wishers have in view \ but meanwhile we stumble over 
 many difficulties in gaining our political experience ; and we deplore our failings, 
 and strangers laugh at them. At any rate, are we not likely to arrive at the goal 
 earlier and safer than if we were under an absolute Government? 
 
 "Moreover, could the present state of government have well been otherwise? 
 
 The Greek nation attained its independence by itself, by its own desperate efforts. 
 2 M 
 
242 Athens. 
 
 Whatever the faults of government may have been, it is unde- 
 niable that great progress has been made since the War of 
 Independence. In no respect is this more apparent, perhaps, than 
 in the matter of education. We have been assured that the system 
 of State education in Greece is more complete and comprehensive 
 than that of any other country. In Athens there is a flourishing 
 university, in which 1200 students are provided with a high-class 
 education, and there is a great central school for girls, which, with 
 its branches in the neighbourhood of Athens, provides education 
 for no less than 1500 pupils. 
 
 We all know how eagerly the schools of Athens were resorted 
 to by students from all parts of the world during the time of her 
 great philosophers ; and when Greece became a Roman province, 
 the conquerors respected the ancient fame of the city, and in* 
 matters of learning became the disciples of their captives. Thus 
 the force of arms gave way to the force of intellect and of spirit. 
 Not only did the flower of Roman intellect, Horace and Cicero, and 
 many whose names are familiar to us, study at Athens, but people 
 from every part of the world met in the city for one common 
 object — viz., to study the learning that he loved best. He had 
 plenty of choice ; there were four schools of philosophy, as in the 
 
 Once that independence attained, was it possible, was it practicable, to deprive the 
 people of their share in the immediate government of the country % They were not 
 tit to exercise such duties and rights, it is true. But they will learn. A genera- 
 tion or two must first pass. What has been done is a safe guarantee of what will 
 be achieved hereafter. 
 
 '' Fancy, fifty years hence, Greece with rail and carriage roads to every corner 
 of its beautiful and famed lands ; with cultivated fields throughout, and well-built 
 towns close to one another, and good hotels everywhere, and two or three lines 
 joining the country with the rest of Europe, east and west (in a northerly direction, 
 of course), and travellers thronging to it from every land, and the native population 
 on a level Avith the rest of civilised Europe not only in intellectual culture, but 
 also in material well-being. Fancy all that, and then you will understand the 
 impatience of Greeks to hasten the work and shorten the period of those fifty years 
 to come. All this will come." 
 
TJie University of Athens. 243 
 
 better days of iVthenian learning. "The student," says Gibbon, 
 " according to the temper of his mind, might doubt with the 
 * Sceptics, or decide with the Stoics — sublimely contemplate with 
 Plato, or severely argue with Aristotle." Round about Athens 
 were the groves in which both mind and body could find refresh- 
 ment and gain energy ; the Garden of the Epicureans, the Portico 
 of the Stoics, the Academy of Plato, and the Lycseum of Aristotle. 
 A city thus somewhat remote from the busy world of commerce 
 was well suited to be the great academy of the world. 
 
 But all this came to an end in the sixth century, when Justinian 
 closed the schools of Athens. Paganism was about to die, and 
 Christianity to blot out the remembrance of the old philosophers 
 and of the old gods. The pagan temples became Christian churches ; 
 the Parthenon, dedicated to the virgin goddess Athena, was now 
 dedicated to the Virgin Mother ; the Theseum became the church 
 of S. George of Cappadocia. Thus the schools of learning which 
 had endured for a thousand years ceased to exist, and we hear of 
 them no more. 
 
 But schools of Attic learning sprang up in every land. Tlie 
 philosophy of Aristotle was the philosophy of the Middle Ages ; 
 Homer was read in all countries ; once again intellect set force at 
 defiance. But Athens had lost its renown as a focus of culture, 
 and we have no record of any attempt to re-establish schools of 
 learning until the year 1837, when the present University was 
 founded. That it is a worthy attempt to restore the credit of 
 Athens as a centre of learning no one can deny, when it is 
 remembered that many of the students, after completing their 
 university career, travel into Asia Minor, and Turkey, and Egypt, 
 and disseminate the learning wliich they had acquired at home. 
 In fact, the University of Athens has become the University of the 
 East. The city is the centre of Oriental culture. While Greece 
 was in bondage, other centres of learning flourished and extended 
 culture. Athens cannot acain become the intellectual focus of the 
 
244 Athens. 
 
 world ; humanity and letters have moved westward ; the march of 
 civilisation is from the East to the West ; but let us never fail to 
 remember that the sun of all learninof rose in the East. 
 
 The University of Athens is like all continental universities ; no 
 one lives in college ; it is a place where lectures are given, examina- 
 tions held, and degrees conferred. The building consists of a finely- 
 decorated hall, in which speeches are delivered and the meetings of 
 the Academical body are held ; a well -arranged library of 200,000 
 volumes ; a cabinet of coins, and a number of lecture-rooms for 
 different professors. The course of studies is divided into four 
 faculties — theology, law, medicine, and philosophy. The lectures 
 commence at 8 a.m., and in the different departments are given 
 throughout the day till 6 p.m. Theology and law are, apparently, 
 less studied than medicine and philosophy. There are six professors 
 of theology and one sub-professor ; nine professors of law and five 
 sub-professors ; sixteen professors of medicine and eight sub-pro- 
 fessors ; and twenty professors of philosophy with four sub-professors. 
 
 The faculty of philosophy is a very comprehensive one ; under 
 the term is included almost everything except that which we 
 usually call philosophy, viz., logic and metaphysics. There are 
 lectures on Homer, Sophocles, Thucydides, and Pindar ; on ancient 
 Greek literature, and on the history of philosophy ; on Cicero, 
 Horace, Tibullus, and Juvenal ; on Eoman literature ; on the 
 history of the middle ages ; on analytical geometry, natural 
 philosophy, kinematics, chemistry, archteology, anthropology, 
 ethnology, zoology, vegetable physiology, and geology. This is a 
 very large section, and no wonder the number of professors should 
 be more than one-third of the whole body. 
 
 The professors are a cultivated body of men, many of whom 
 have travelled in Western Europe, while some have studied in 
 France, others in Germany ; they are all well acquainted with the 
 literature of their special subject, whether French, German, or 
 English ; but French seems to be the favourite language, and a 
 
Collections of Antiquities. 245 
 
 foreign work is usually made known to them through a French 
 translation. The wants of the University have caused the appear- 
 ance of an original Greek literature. The students require text- 
 books, and the professors must supply them with books in their own 
 language. This original literature will, no doubt, largely increase.^'" 
 
 There are several fine private collections of antiquities in 
 Athens. One of them will be remembered by all who have visited 
 the city. In it we saw several bowls of coloured glass of great 
 antiquity, rare specimens of coloured glass bottles, an armlet 
 of gilt bronze, several strigils of bronze, and a great quantity 
 of vases and terra-cotta fio-ures. The same collector has a cabinet 
 of well-selected Greek coins. Antiquities are constantly turning 
 up. Lately a number of very ancient terra-cotta figures have been 
 found at Tanagra, some of which have been sold at from £30 to 
 £50 a-piece. 
 
 Dr. Schliemann's collection of Trojan antiquities, about which 
 there has been so much controversy of late, is now (1875) housed 
 in Athens. Although it is perhaps questionable whether the 
 enthusiastic doctor is ris^ht in imaffinino: that he has found the 
 treasure of King Priamos, there can, we think, be no doubt that 
 the gold and silver vessels belong to a period of remote antiquity. 
 
 But we must take a last look at the many familiar objects 
 around us ; so utterly new a week ago, now, from constant com- 
 
 * In 1837 the University possessed 52 students; in 1845 tlie number had 
 risen to 195; in 1855, to 590; in 1866, to 1182. Between 1837 and 1866 the 
 number of students who had passed through the University amounted to 4631 ; of 
 these 2969 were born in the kingdom, while 1662 had come from other countries, 
 chiefly from Turkey. 
 
 In 1830 there were 110 schools in Greece; in 1855, 497; in 1860, 752; in 
 1866, 1307, including the Ionian Islands. 
 
 In all, in public and private schools and gymnasia, including the University, 
 there were in 1866 no less than 75,873 persons under instruction, or (taking the 
 population as 1,500,000) at the rate of 1 in 20. (From the Report of M. Drosos, 
 Minister of Public Instruction, 1866.) 
 
246 
 
 Athens. 
 
 panionsliip, apparently so old. The boat for Marseilles leaves the 
 harbour very early in the morning, and there will not be another 
 for a fortnight. So on the morrow we find ourselves steaming 
 down the iEgean sea, ever and anon catching a glimpse of 
 Lycabettus and the Hill of Musseus, and between them the scene of 
 the greatest literary and artistic triumphs the world has ever seen. 
 
 GREEK VASES. 
 
 a A large vase five feet high, somewhat exaggerated in style, and adorned with an excess 
 of ornament ; h, c, vases of the finest period of art, having black figures on a red ground ; d, an 
 early vase, having a black ground, and red ornamentatiou. 
 
 Addendum. — Since the above was written, few events have 
 happened in Athens of any importance. Several new public 
 buildings which were then in progress have been finished ; a 
 
Dr. Schlietnann. 247 
 
 museum lias been built on the Acropolis, and some progress has 
 been made in excavations. Athens promises soon to have one of 
 the finest museums of Greek antiquities in the world. Dr. Schlie- 
 mann is still making discoveries at Mycenae, and he has promised 
 to place whatever he finds there in a museum at Athens. His 
 success has already been most wonderful. He believes that he has 
 discovered the tombs of Atreus and Agamemnon, of Cassandra 
 and Eurymedon. In the various tombs already opened he has 
 found a gold diadem, gold cups, and a quantity of gold button- 
 
 THE DODWELL VASE PRESERVED I>f MUNICH. AN EXAMPLE OF EARLY GREEK VASE-PAINTING. 
 
 like ornaments ; also a quantity of pottery, and many bronze 
 implements. In a recently opened tomb he found four gold 
 vases and some engraved signet rings, and in another tomb the 
 bones of a man and a woman covered with ornaments of pure gold. 
 Archaeology owes very much to Dr. Schliemann, who is the most 
 indefatigable excavator of modern times. He is doing that for 
 Greece which Belzoni did in regard to Egyptian antiquities."^' 
 
 * Dr. Schliemann announced his discovery to the King of the Hellenes in 
 the following words : — 
 
 "To his Majesty King George — With unbounded joy I announce to your 
 
248 Athens. 
 
 In literature the Greeks have not been idle during the last two 
 or three years. Among other things, we may mention that three 
 plays of Shakspere (Othello, King Lear, and Romeo and Juliet) 
 have been translated into Greek by M. Demetrius Bikelas, and others 
 will speedily follow. AVe give below short extracts, together with 
 the Englisli, to show how M. Bikelas has accomplished his task. 
 
 lOYAIETA 
 
 ^KKOfxiq 8ev'^'q[Ji€p(j)cre' 6a <f)vyrj<s oltto Twpa', 
 "Htov cj)(i)vr] dr]8ovLov, KopvSaXos 8ev tjtov 
 TTov aov e(f)6f3i.cre tolvtI fxl to /ceAa Srj/ia tow 
 's €K€Lvr^v Trepa rrjV pu>8iav tolko'vu) Kade vvKTa. 
 "Q, ! TTLO'Tevcrefi, dy air')] [jlov, -t^Tov avTO a-q8ovL. 
 
 PI2MAI02 
 KopvSaAos eXaXyjce Kal Tr)v dvyrjv KrjpvTTei. 
 8\v dvar]86vL. Kurra^e rot (f^dovepa ^apaKia, 
 TTOV €(Trj[jLa8evcr€ tv (^ws 's rats aKpais rwv (rvvv€<f>(a]/. 
 'ISe, T^s vvKTas €(rf3vcrav ol Av;(vo^ ei'a? eVas, 
 Kat T(apa eAac^poTraTci Tracri^apry ry p-epa 
 els TtDv (Sovviov rats Kopvcfjals Trais Tra^vocr/ceTracr/xsvats. 
 TrpeTret va (f^vyw va crco^w" av fiitvo) ^'aTTo^avw. 
 
 Juliet. Wilt thou be gone ? it is not yet near day, 
 It was the nightingale, and not the lark, 
 That pierced the fearful hollow of thine ear ; 
 Nightly she sings on yon pomegranate tree : 
 Believe me, love, it was the nightingale. 
 
 Majesty that I have discovered the monuments which tradition, as related by 
 Pausanias, points out as the tombs of Agamemnon, Cassandra, Eurymedon, and 
 their companions, who were all killed whilst feasting at a banquet by Clytemnestra 
 and her lover ^gisthus. These tombs are surrounded by a double parallel circle of 
 tablets, which were undoubtedly erected in honour of these great personages. In 
 these tombs I have found an immense archaeological treasure of various articles of 
 pure gold. This treasure is alone sufficient to fill a large museum, which will be 
 the most splendid in the world, and which, in all succeeding ages, will attract to 
 Greece thousands of strangers from every land. As I am labouring from a pure 
 and simple love for science, I waive all claim to tlus treasure, which I offer with 
 intense enthusiasm in its entirety to Greece. Sire, may these treasures, with God's 
 blessing, become the corner-stone of immense national wealth. 
 
 "Dr. Hknry Schliemann. 
 
Modern Greek Literahtre. 249 
 
 Borneo. It was the lark, the herald of the morn, 
 
 No nightingale : look, love, what envious streaks 
 Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east : 
 Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day 
 Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops. 
 I must be gone and live, or stay and die. 
 
 Act III., Sc. 5. 
 
 Again, take the fool's speech in King Lear (Act L, Scene 4), which 
 commences — 
 
 Have more than thou showest, 
 Speak less than thou knowest. 
 Lend less than thou owest, 
 Eide more than thou goest. 
 
 This is rendered by M. Bikelas as follows : — 
 
 'E)(e TrAetOTepa aTr' ocra '^oSeviLS, 
 
 Aeye 'Atywrepa irapocra yvw/ot^ets, 
 
 fSaxTTa TzXeLOTepa dTrocra Savet^€6S, 
 
 fj.r) TTCpnvaTTJS orav ijfnropTJ'S va Ka/3aAiK€U7ys, 
 
 aKove TToAAa, kl oXiya va TricrTevy?. 
 
 Prof Papparougopoulos has completed his Hellenic History ; 
 Prof Rhousopoulos has written a work on Greek Archaeology, 
 the frontispiece of which represents seven fine studies of 
 Homeric Heads (placed at the head of this chapter) — Menelaos, 
 Paris, Diomedes, Ulysses, Nestor, Achilles, Agamemnon. Prof 
 Oikonomos continues his OiKovofxiKr] EiriOewpya-Ls ; and Prof Stroum- 
 pos often contributes scientific papers to Les Mondes. Thus 
 the Athenian professors are by no means idle, and the Uni- 
 versity will soon be far more independent as regards text-books 
 than it has hitherto been. 
 
 In a letter received within the last few weeks from a Greek, 
 
 who, having lived for many years in London, has returned to 
 
 Athens for the rest of his life, we note the following remarks : — 
 
 " I may tell you one thing : that I have found much progress in 
 
 everything. The town gets larger and prettier ; the pavements are 
 2n 
 
250 
 
 A thefts. 
 
 covered in most streets with beautiful slabs ; a great many houses 
 have been erected, some of them really splendid mansions. I am 
 told that 300 houses, or thereabouts, were built last year. The 
 Municipality is trying to increase the supply of water by clearing 
 out and utilising the magnificent subterranean aqueducts of the 
 Eoman period. Many public edifices have been finished, or nearly 
 so — the Polytechnic School, the Academy, &c. They are going to 
 build new law courts. In short, Athens is becoming a very 
 pretty little capital. I am told that the population is now between 
 65,000 and 70,000, while the Piraeus has 20,000. . . . As to 
 the Government, the progress is not there equally marked. Our 
 politicians are not generally admired by the people at large. But 
 there is some latent improvement that way. There is a public 
 opinion being gradually formed. It has as yet no real organs. 
 But as people get more educated and prosperous by degrees, they 
 will end by imposing their opinion on the governing class." 
 
 KOjMDAMINI medusa. MUNICH. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CAIRO. 
 
 Alexandria — Cairo — The Hotel — Climate — Novelty of an Eastern City — The Bazaars — 
 New Cairo — The Mosques — The Citadel — The Pyramids and the Sphynx — Memphis 
 — Eastern Burying-grounds — Other Sights of Cairo — Detention at Alex- 
 andria — The abrupt Termination of an Argument. 
 
 EAVING Naples on one of the last days of the 
 year (1875), we arrived in the harbour of Alex- 
 andria, after a dull and rather boisterous voyage, 
 which occupied about five days' time. The usual 
 crowd of boats surrounded the steamer as soon 
 as our anchor was cast, and the dragoman of one 
 of the hotels came on board, took charge of our 
 luggage, and conducted us on shore. On landing, 
 he advised us to give a rather formidable-looking 
 Government official a few piastres (four of which go 
 to the franc), in order to get our luggage passed 
 without being opened. Alexandria was particularly 
 miserable-looking, it had been raining hard, and the 
 streets were one mass of mud. At the best of times 
 there is but little to detain the traveller here ; there 
 are no remains of the ancient city, and it now reminds one 
 more of a second-rate French seaport than of anything else. 
 
252 
 
 Cairo. 
 
 We were glad to take the train the next day for Cairo, and 
 to leave behind us a town which is more European than Eastern, 
 and which is inhabited by the most mixed population under 
 the sun. We arrived at Cairo towards evening, and having 
 procured a cab and got clear of the station, we expected to find 
 ourselves at last in an Eastern town. Imagine then our astonish- 
 ment at being driven through a long boulevard lighted by gas, and 
 
 flanked on either side by tall white 
 houses with shops below. Ten 
 minutes later, the Frankish city 
 dissolved as if by magic ; we had 
 entered a dark, narrow unpaved 
 street, and we suddenly came upon 
 a little cortege consisting of a boy 
 carrying a large paper lantern and 
 leading a donkey, upon which sat 
 a great balloon-like mass of black 
 silk, while a second boy walked 
 behind and urged on the donkey. 
 It was a lady of Cairo, closely veiled, 
 and enveloped from head to foot 
 in a great silk mantle. We knew 
 now that we were in an Eastern 
 poMPEY's piLLAi;, ALEXANDRIA. clty. Prcseutly wc stopped in the 
 middle of the street called the Mooskee, at the top of a long 
 narrow lane, and the dragoman told us that this was the Hotel du 
 Nil. The entrance did not look very prepossessing, but when we 
 had reached the end of the lane, we found a very comfortable hotel 
 kept by a German, in which, although we were supplied with the 
 chiefest of European luxuries, we ran no risk of forgetting that 
 we were in an Eastern land. 
 
 The hotel is built round a small quadrangle, which is planted 
 with palms and other tropical plants. Most of the bedrooms are 
 
First Acquaintance with the City. 253 
 
 on the ground floor, and open into a verandah which runs round 
 the quadrangle ; the dining-room is at one corner of the quadrangle, 
 while a kiosk in the centre serves as a drawing-room. The hotel 
 w^as very full of people — English, Americans, Germans, and French; 
 several families who were on their way to Upper Egypt, and several 
 artists, both English and German, helped to make up our party. 
 The hotel life was very pleasant, and the place became liome at 
 once. An artist with whom we had travelled to Alexandria spent 
 several whole days, apparently very happily, in painting a palm- 
 tree opposite his bedroom window, and some of the ladies passed a 
 great deal of time in the hotel. We all met twice a-day at table 
 d'hote, for breakfast at half-past twelve, and again at half-past 
 six for dinner. After breakfast it was usual to sit in the garden 
 till three o'clock, that is, during the greatest heat of the day, for 
 although it was early January, the sun was as hot as on our 
 hottest August day. Some people preferred a siesta. A few Arabs 
 came into the garden every day after breakfast, either to amuse us, 
 or to sell their wares. The objects ofiered for sale were of the most 
 varied kind : — magnificently-embroidered table-cloths and silks, 
 amber mouthpieces for pipes, coins, bronze figures of Osiris, 
 scarabsei, photographs, pottery from Siout, were the most common ; 
 sometimes an Arab would bring a melancholy -looking Egyptian 
 vulture, or a jackal bound hand and foot, which he had caught in 
 the desert, or more probably prowling about one of the cemeteries 
 at night. As to our after-breakfast amusements, we sometimes had 
 conjurors, and sometimes serpent-charmers. A little Arab boy 
 would squat down in our midst, and presently would shake out of a 
 bag two large Egyptian cobras, a smaller snake, and a large kind 
 of lizard. The cobras raised themselves on their tails, and swayed 
 backwards and forwards, following every motion of the boy 
 with their glittering eyes ; then they would open their mouths 
 and hiss, and occasionally dart at the legs of a person passing near, 
 for which they were promptly struck down to the ground. The 
 
254 
 
 Cairo. 
 
 Egyptian cobra, like its Indian cousin, is one of the most deadly- 
 snakes that exists, and the Arab boy was questioned as to the 
 capabilities of his specimens, whereupon he seized one of them and 
 forced its mouth open to show that the fangs had been removed, 
 
 PALM TREES. 
 
 and more than this, he fearlessly pressed that part of the jaw from 
 which they had been extracted, and caused some of the yellow 
 gum-like venom to exude. When there was nothing else to do 
 
The Climate. 
 
 255 
 
 during the siesta hour, we read our guide-books, or Lane's Modern 
 Egyptians, and talked. The time passed pleasantly enough. 
 
 Apart from all the sights of Cairo, the pleasure of living is 
 enormously enhanced by the lovely climate. It rains on an 
 average only six days in the year, and day after day in early 
 January the sky is cloudless from morning till night, and the sun 
 is deliciously warm. Then the effect of contrast is exquisite. Not 
 many days before, the traveller experienced a succession of English 
 
 STREET IN CAIRO. 
 
 fogs, then perhaps snow and sharp frosts in central France, rain in 
 Italy, and half-a-gale in the Mediterranean ; now he finds himself 
 enjoying the most perfect summer weather, and, as regards vegeta- 
 tion, in the midst of a perpetual spring. Yet to be just, we must 
 confess that the evenings are sometimes chilly, and the night 
 air damp and unhealthy, although we noticed in the Mooskee that 
 the Nubian servants sleep all night outside their master's shops in the 
 open air on a kind of wicker bed. Again, on a certain morning on 
 our way to Sakkarah, at a somewhat early hour, a chilly, very 
 
256 
 
 Cairo. 
 
 dense fog, worthy of Glasgow in November, hung over the Nile, 
 but we emerged from it into a blazinor sun. 
 
 A traveller who visits Cairo for the first time does not care to 
 see any of the greater sights of the town for the first few days. 
 The whole environment is so novel, that it takes some time to get a 
 general idea of the life of this teeming city. We have often stood in 
 the Mooskee, or in one of the bazaars, and thought that we had never 
 seen anything in the grandest stage scene (in which everything is 
 of course exaggerated to heighten the efi'ect) which approached 
 
 EASTERN ASSES. 
 
 this, both for novelty and variety. Some years ago we remember 
 to have seen a pantomime called Aladdm, at Covent Garden, 
 and our glimpses of bazaar -life reminded us of that more than 
 of anything else. Turbaned men, with splendid flowing garments 
 of green, and purple, and maroon silk, poorer people with simple 
 blue cotton clothing and fezzes, portly eunuchs riding on white 
 asses, water-carriers and melon-sellers, donkey-boys urging their 
 steeds througjh the crowd, guards of the Khedive on high- 
 mettled Arab horses, and, if the street be wide enough, some 
 
The Bazaars. 
 
 257 
 
 of tlie ladies of His Higliness's harem in a close carriage, preceded 
 by a running footman with flowing white robes and a many- 
 coloured sash, and followed by outriders in black European clothes 
 and fezzes. The streets are full of life, and of ever-changing life. 
 A day in Cairo is scarcely complete without a ride or walk in the 
 bazaars. Some of these are so narrow that two camels cannot pass 
 abreast. The shops are mere large cupboards, in front of which 
 the owner sits on a carpet smoking a long chibouque. In these 
 cupboards, however, you find the productions of all lands, and 
 oriental manufactures in superabundance. If you want to purchase 
 anything, you find the operation more difiicult even than in Venice ; 
 
 -^ — • 
 
 WATER-CARRIEKS OF THE EAST. 
 
 the seller invariably begins by asking far more than his commodity 
 is worth, or than he expects to get ; the buyer promptly oflfers one- 
 half, or one-quarter, if he thinks that he has been much imposed 
 upon ; then the seller slightly lessens his demand, and the buyer 
 probably walks ofi". A moment later he is overtaken, and a fresh 
 reduction in price is made, and finally, by a little elasticity on both 
 sides, the bargain is struck. Certain bazaars have certain special 
 market-days, when trade is unusually brisk ; on such a day you see 
 men running about with their commodities among the closely- 
 packed moving throng. In the Turkish bazaar we saw a second- 
 
 o 
 
258 Cairo. 
 
 hand scimitar hawked about in this fashion. Among the more 
 interesting bazaars are the copper bazaar (beloved by artists on 
 account of its picturesque surroundings), the silk bazaar, the 
 perfume bazaar, and the carpet bazaar. 
 
 The present Ruler of Egypt has done much to transform Cairo 
 into the semblance of an European city. No doubt the health of 
 the inhabitants has been improved by some of the changes which 
 have been made, but it is equally certain that the picturesqueness 
 of this beautiful city has been partially destroyed. Ten minutes' 
 walk from the most truly Eastern portion of the city in and around 
 the Mooskee 'brings you to the Eshekieh, a kind of large square 
 laid out as a garden, after the manner of European towns. Around 
 this a number of new buildings have been raised by European 
 architects, in European style. Large white lofty houses resting on 
 arcades, as in Paris, the lower portion shops and the upper let out 
 in flats, an opera-house, a French theatre, and the new Hotel 
 d'Orient, are conspicuous in New Cairo. The three last-mentioned 
 buildings are the property of the Khedive, and are kept up at a 
 yearly loss of many thousand pounds. A fairly good French 
 company performs at the theatre during several months of the 
 year, while a decidedly good and exorbitantly-paid Italian com- 
 pany present some of the most popular operas at the other house 
 during the same period. Here we saw Faust given before a very 
 thin audience, and a few nights later, Aida, which is always 
 popular in Cairo, and the representation of which was well 
 attended. Aida was written by Verdi for the Khedive for the 
 opening of this new opera-house, and it is represented with a 
 completeness worthy of Paris or London. The story is completely 
 Egyptian from beginning to end, and themes from Egpytian airs 
 are often introduced in the course of the opera. The Khedive is 
 certainly a most enlightened potentate for an Oriental ; he is a 
 liberal patron of the arts and sciences ; he constructs bridges and 
 railways, erects sugar refineries, and does all he can to develope the 
 
oppressive System. 259 
 
 resources of his country on the one hand, while in matters of taste 
 and refinement, he keeps up his French theatre and Italian opera, 
 and invites artists of eminence to take up their abode in Cairo and 
 paint pictures for him. But unfortunately the revenue of the 
 country is altogether inadequate to such sweeping changes, and 
 the fellahs sufi'er an oppression which is quite unknown in any 
 European country, except perhaps Turkey. Money is still extorted 
 after a barbarous fashion, and the country is taxed to the utter- 
 most. Whether the schemes proposed by Mr. Cave and Signor 
 Scialoja, and more recently by Mr. Goschen, will improve the 
 financial condition of the country, remains to be proved, but we 
 can scarcely look with much satisfaction on the Khedive's reforms 
 so long as the means to carry them out are wrung from the 
 oppressed inhabitants of the land by the present harsh and 
 unjustifiable system. We have heard of old grey-headed men 
 who have been bastinadoed because they did not furnish a sum 
 of money arbitrarily extorted from them by the Sheik of the 
 village to make up his government assessment; and of children 
 driven to their work with whips, staggering and fainting under 
 their burdens. A man who knows Egypt well, and who spends a 
 large portion of every year there, assured us that the poorer people 
 can no longer afibrd dates, and* that they replace them by a kind 
 of small cucumber steeped in vinegar. Not many years ago the 
 salt was taxed — always the most iniquitous of taxes, because salt is 
 an absolute necessity, not a luxury of life. The very donkey-boys 
 are taxed. 
 
 The mosques and minarets of Cairo are very numerous, and 
 some of them are of great antiquity. A few years ago it was 
 dangerous for a stranger to go into any of them even when 
 accompanied by a soldier, but since the Cairenes have had greater 
 intercourse with Europeans they have learned to treat them in a 
 more civilised fashion. Still it is necessary to be accompanied by 
 a soldier, and to have a written order from the central ofiice of 
 
260 Cairo. 
 
 police in Cairo, before venturing into some of their mosques. This 
 is notably the case with the Mosque of Touloun, and the Mosque of 
 El Azhah — the University of Cairo. First we had to obtain a 
 written order in Arabic from our consulate ; this we were told to take 
 to the police office, a curious, very un-official looking building, full 
 of small rooms, in which people stood about and talked, or sat on 
 divans. After a good deal of delay, two papers were given us 
 stamped with an official seal, and a soldier was directed to accom- 
 pany us. We went first to the mosque of the Sultan Touloun, 
 which was built in 879, soon after the foundation of the city. It 
 is in a very ruinous state, and has been given up by the Khedive 
 to the beggars and outcasts of Cairo. A more horrible place we 
 never saw. It is a kind of Cour des Miracles. Within the 
 strongly-barred gate of the mosque a violent scuffle was going 
 on, and the guard inside refused to admit us until quiet was 
 partially restored. When we entered, the first thing that we saw 
 was a man stretched on the ground, and one of the guards ad- 
 ministering the bastinado to him. A little further on, an alfresco 
 butcher was cutting up an animal which had evidently just been 
 killed. In the large quadrangle swarms of miserable human beings 
 in filthy rags were herding together, lepers and cripples and 
 outcasts of every description. We were glad to get out of the 
 place, and did not care to penetrate far into it. It appeared to be 
 in a very ruinous and dilapidated condition, although retaining 
 some evidences of its former mao^nificeuce. Before obtaininof 
 admission to the Mosque of El Azhah, we had to take our docu- 
 ments to the Sheik of the Mosque — the Chancellor of the Univer- 
 sity of Cairo — for signature, and here arose another delay. Orientals 
 have no idea of hurrying themselves. El Azhah is a most interesting 
 place, and like most of the larger mosques, it is a small town within 
 a town. Inside the gate sat three grave-looking men having their 
 heads shaved, and people on either side were engaged in a variety 
 of occupations. Ihen we entered a large enclosure, in which were 
 
The Mosques. 
 
 261 
 
 little groups of students squatting on the floor around the professor, 
 who expounded Mohammedan law, physic, or divinity. Cairo is 
 the most celebrated of Arabic universities. The number of 
 professors appeared to be considerable, although the learners 
 surrounding any one of them rarely exceeded a dozen. Another 
 mosque into which we went was filled with worshippers. It was a 
 
 MOSQUE OF THE SULTAN HASSAX. 
 
 magnificent new building, richly carpeted and hung with a multi- 
 tude of lamps, while the roof was supported by numerous arches. 
 We particularly remember this mosque, because it was unprovided 
 with the usual matting slippers which visitors have to slip over 
 
2G2 
 
 Cairo. 
 
 their boots before they are allowed to enter a mosque, consequently 
 we had to take off our laced boots in the crowded street, and then 
 step into the building. Imagine the discomfort of unlacing one's 
 boots in Cheapside before entering a door standing flush with the 
 edge of the pavement ! Another mosque of beautiful proportions^ 
 but rapidly falling to decay, is that of the Sultan Hassan, erected in 
 1362, and containing some beautiful carved work. Perhaps the 
 most gorgeous mosque in Cairo, both as regards position, proportion, 
 and internal decoration, is the Mosque of Mehemet Ali, built upon 
 the Citadel of Cairo. It is conspicuous from a great distance, and is 
 indeed the most prominent object in the city. Its slender minarets 
 
 PYRAMIDS OF GHIZEH. 
 
 seem to pierce the sky. From one corner of it a fine view of Cairo 
 may be obtained, and the Nile may be traced for many miles. The 
 Pyramids can also be seen, and we rarely omitted a day without 
 climbing the Citadel to see the sun set behind them. The 
 sunsets are indescribably beautiful ; a rosy glow illuminates the 
 atmosphere just before sunset, and if watched in January from the 
 Citadel, the clear disc of the sun is seen to sink just between the 
 two Great Pyramids of Ghizch. 
 
 Of course we went to the Pyramids, and were pushed up and 
 
The Sphynx. 
 
 263 
 
 pulled down in the usual manner by the Arabs, and then pestered 
 for hackslieesli. Of the Great Pyramid we can only say that it takes 
 the mind some appreciable time to realise the vast size of it, and 
 the extravagant amount of human labour which must have been 
 requisite for its erection. It stands on the very edge of the desert, 
 and from its summit the narrow valley of the Nile is well seen. 
 Egypt then appears — what it really is — a very thin strip of fertile 
 land bordered by desert; to the west one sees nothing but a 
 
 THE SPHYNX. 
 
 dreary expanse of desert, to the south-west, desert edged by the 
 pyramids of Sakkarah, and to the east and south-east the narrow 
 strip of green fertile land which has been so justly celebrated 
 through all ages. The Sphynx is wonderful and inscrutable. Of 
 all the travellers, from Herodotus downwards, who have written 
 about it, we think Mr. Kinglake has best conveyed to the reader 
 some of the thoughts and impressions which pervade those who 
 gaze upon this wonderful creation of antiquity. Hence we 
 
2G4 Cairo. 
 
 make no apology for the following quotation {Eotlien, p. 248) : — 
 " And near the Pyramids, more wondrous and more awful than all 
 else in the land of Egypt, there sits the lonely Sphynx. Comely 
 the creature is, but the comeliness is not of this world ; the' once 
 worshi23ped beast is a deformity and a monster to this generation, 
 and yet you can see that those lips, so thick and heavy, were 
 fashioned according to some ancient mould of beauty — some mould 
 of beauty now forgotten — forgotten because that Greece drew forth 
 Cytherea from the flashing foam of the ^gean, and in her image 
 created new forms of beauty, and made it a law among men that 
 the short and proudly-wreathed lips should stand for the sign and 
 the main condition of loveliness, through all generations to come. 
 Yet still there lives on the race of those who were beautiful in the 
 fashion of the elder world, and Christian girls of Coptic blood will 
 look on you with the sad serious gaze, and kiss your charitable 
 hand with the big pouting lips of the very Sphynx. Laugh and 
 mock if you will at the worship of stone idols, but mark ye this, ye 
 breakers of images, that in one regard the stone idol bears awful 
 semblance of Deity — unchangefulness in the midst of change — the 
 same seeming will, and intent for ever and ever inexorable ! Upon 
 ancient dynasties of Ethiopian and Egyptian kings, upon Greek 
 and Roman, upon Arab and Ottoman conquerors, upon Napoleon 
 dreaming of an Eastern Empire, upon battle and pestilence, upon 
 the ceaseless misery of the Egyptian race, upon keen-eyed traveller, 
 — Herodotus yesterday, Warburton to-day — upon all and more 
 this unworldly Sphynx has watched, and watched like a Providence 
 with the same earnest eyes, and the same sad tranquil mien. And 
 we, we shall die, and Islam will wither away, and the Englishman 
 straining far over to hold his loved India, will plant a firm foot on 
 the banks of the Nile, and sit in the seats of the Faithful, and still 
 that sleepless rock will lie watching and watching the works of the 
 new busy race with those same sad earnest eyes, and the same 
 tranquil mien everlasting. You dare not mock at the Sphynx." 
 
The Pyramids. 265 
 
 On another occasion we went to see the pyramids of Sakkarah, 
 which, although of less size than those of Ghizeh, are believed 
 to be of greater antiquity. Of the magnificent city of Memphis 
 scarcely a trace remains : a few broken fragments of columns and 
 a recumbent statue of Rameses are almost all that we see above 
 ground. But here was found by Mariette Bey, in 1850, the 
 marvellous Apis Mausoleum, containing gigantic sarcophagi of 
 granite, in which the sacred bulls were placed after having been 
 embalmed. The whole neighbourhood of Memphis, on the desert 
 side, was a vast necropolis, and all the principal pyramids of Egypt 
 are within a few miles of the site of the ancient city, including 
 those of Ghizeh. Whether or no the great pyramid of Cheops 
 was designed, not only to preserve the relics of a king, but to hand 
 down to posterity measures of length and capacity, astronomical 
 data, &c., as Professor Piazzi Smyth would have us believe, may 
 be an open question; but there can, we think, be no doubt that 
 the pyramids are no more nor less than gigantic cairns to mark 
 the resting-place of the illustrious dead. There are no less than 
 seventy pyramids in Egypt, of all sizes, and in all stages of decay. 
 Some are so disintegrated that they have lost their pyramidal 
 form, and are now mere irregular heaps of rubbish. In the neigh- 
 bourhood of the pyramids (particularly at Sakkarah) fragments of 
 skulls and other bones, and small masses of mummy cloth stuck 
 together by bitumen, may be found in great abundance. "This 
 raised ground is a tomb," says an old Greek epitaph, attributed to 
 Isidorus of iEgea, "0 ploughman, stop your oxen, and draw out 
 the coulter of your plough ; for you are disturbing ashes, and upon 
 dust of this kind pour not out the seed of wheat, but tears." The 
 raised ground about Memphis is indeed a vast tomb, but there is no 
 ploughman to disturb the ashes, for the ground is barren, and 
 nothing can grow in the desert sand. The real disturbers of the 
 ashes have been travellers and explorers of the Belzoni 
 
 class, who have played the resurrectionist to a terrible extent. 
 2 p 
 
266 Cairo. 
 
 There is scarcely a local museum which has not at least one 
 mummy. 
 
 When the Khalif Almamoun penetrated into the King's 
 Chamber in the Great Pyramid, and having rifled the tomb in the 
 hope of finding treasures, scattered the ashes of the great king to 
 the winds, he set an example which has been followed unceasingly 
 from his time till the present. It was stated some years ago that 
 the remains of mummies were being shipped to Europe by the ton, 
 and there sold as a good manure for wheat and turnips. Here is an 
 opportunity for moralising after the manner of the " Imperial- Csesar- 
 dead-and-turned-to-clay" soliloquy ! The ashes of those mighty 
 sovereigns who ruled the world when it was young, torn from their 
 native land, are mixed with the soil of a Norfolk cornfield, and the 
 ploughman neither stays his oxen, nor draws out the coulter of his 
 plough. To what base uses may we not come. Perhaps in this 
 dish of mashed turnips there are atoms of nitrogen from the brain 
 of Sesertasen, and in this penny roll there may be phosphoric acid 
 from the bones of his chief baker. Yet if the man who makes 
 two blades of grass to grow where one grew before is to be regarded 
 as a great benefactor of his race, Osiris, having that precious jewel 
 the king's soul, will surely grant us the casket which contained it ; 
 and the king himself will rejoice that the ever-errant atoms of his 
 brain have helped to promote the civilisation of a new race, in 
 a land far distant from the land of his birth. 
 
 We have been assured by a man who knows Egypt well, that 
 mummies have been frequently used as fuel for locomotives, and 
 that this fact is founded on much more than Mark Twain's story of 
 the Egyptian engine-driver, who called out to an attendant fire- 
 man, " Hang these plebeians, they won't burn at all ; hand out a 
 king !" The same informant asserted that he knew \ki^t forty tons 
 of mummy cloth had been recently sold to a paper-maker. We 
 may take the stories for what they are worth (the story-teller was 
 a countryman of Mark Twain's) ; but it surely needs no great 
 
Mummies. 
 
 267 
 
 calculation to tell us that if all the inhabitants of even a small 
 country were embalmed for two or three thousand continuous years, 
 the remains would represent a good many thousands of tons of 
 matter. Since Mariette Bey has had charge of the Boulac Museum, 
 this wholesale spoliation has been suppressed ; and even during the 
 last year the Egyptian Eailway Companies have raised their fares 
 to an extent of fifteen per cent, on account of the increased cost of 
 
 TOMBS OF THE ilAMELUK.ES. 
 
 fuel. Meanwhile M. Mariette is constantly bringing to light the 
 most wonderful and beautiful remains of old Egyptian art — fine 
 sculptured figures, terra-cottas exquisitely moulded, engraved 
 stones, painted mummy-cases, jewels of gold, and mummies 
 dressed in the height of Ptahian fashion. There is no Isidorus in 
 this age to cry out, " Upon dust of this kind pour out tears." 
 
 2 P 2 
 
268 Cairo. 
 
 The cemeteries of Mahommeclans are very desolate places. 
 Imnoediately outside the walls of Cairo you meet with the principal 
 burying-place of the inhabitants. It is a complete desert, not a blade 
 of grass or of anything green is to be seen ; the dust is three or four 
 inches deep, and bare white walls divide oif the ground. The tombs 
 are often mere little mounds of dust, sometimes a shapeless and 
 unsightly mass of bricks and plaster raised over the grave ; while 
 in the case of great people an obiong mass of white marble covers 
 the grave, terminated by two small upright pillars, inscribed with 
 verses from the Koran ; on the top of one of these pillars a turban 
 or fez is often carved. The tombs of the Mamelukes are separate 
 buildings, on the edge of the desert. The funeral takes place the 
 same day as the death ; the body wrapped in many cloths is placed in 
 an oblong wooden tray, which is carried on the shoulders of people, 
 who rapidly push their way through the narrow bazaars, chanting 
 verses from the Koran, in a manner which conveys no idea of 
 music to European ears. On arriving at the place of burial, the 
 body is removed from the wooden tray and buried a little beneath 
 the surface of the ground ; fresh palm branches are sometimes laid 
 over the grave. It is said that the dogs of the town, and the 
 jackals of the desert, frequently disinter the bodies and eat them 
 during the night. We certainly saw two dogs, in broad daylight, 
 crouched beside a new grave, and probably waiting for the dark- 
 ness. Although the burying-ground of Cairo is of this desolate 
 description, the great feast of the Bairam is annually held among 
 its tombs, and swarms of people go there to join the festivities. 
 It is a kind of fair ; tents are pitched, swings and round-abouts set 
 to work, jugglers perform, ballad-singers troll out their lays, and 
 the universal story-teller finds a ready audience. 
 
 We visited also Heliopolis, where one great obelisk — the most 
 ancient in Egypt — marks the site of the priestly, learned city of 
 the ancient Egyptians, in which all their wisdom was diligently 
 studied. The city is much connected with sacred lore ; Moses 
 
Heliof)olis. 
 
 269 
 
 and Joseph and Jeremiah dwelt in it, as also did Eudoxus and 
 Plato. Not far from the obelisk, which bears the name of 
 Sesertasen I., a large sycamore tree of great antiquity is pointed 
 out as the tree under which the holy family rested during the 
 flight into Egypt. In the surrounding garden there is a sakieh for 
 
 raismo; water. 
 
 In Old Cairo we saw some very curious and ancient Coptic 
 churches, containing carved work in wood and ivory, and pictures 
 of a not very high style of art. Of the other sights of Cairo there 
 are the Dancing Dervishes, the Khedive's Palaces, and the Boulac 
 Museum. A ride to the petrified forest enabled us to realise more 
 
 OBELISK AT HELIOPOLIS. 
 
 completely than ever before the real nature of the desert ; mile 
 after mile of dreary sandy waste, devoid of any vegetation — the 
 most desolate landscape that one can possibly imagine. 
 
 When we arrived at Alexandria, we were surprised to find that 
 a violent gale had been raging in the Mediterranean, and we were 
 told at the Custom-House that it was quite useless to go on board 
 our boat, because it could not possibly leave the harbour. How- 
 ever, we determined to go, and after a good deal of splashing and 
 rough work in the boat we got on board, and were at once told 
 that the vessel could not leave the harbour that night. The next 
 
270 
 
 Cairo. 
 
 morning the same unwelcome news was repeated, and for nearly 
 five days we were kept prisoners in port. The Italian, Austrian, 
 and French vessels were moored alongside of each other, waiting 
 for the subsidence of the storm. Nothing could be more dreary 
 than this imprisonment a few hundred yards from the shore. 
 There was no help for it ; in Alexandria there was nothing to be 
 seen or done, and the boat mig^ht start at an hour's notice ; thus it 
 
 SAKIEH. 
 
 was useless to go on shore, and there was nothing to be done but 
 to wait patiently. When we were thoroughly tired of reading the 
 available books, and had written letters to every one at home, we 
 remembered a little incident which had lately happened in Cairo, 
 and amused ourselves by recording it, in a slightly modified form, 
 under the title of — The abrupt termination of an argument. 
 
The Abrupt Termination of an Argmnent. 271 
 
 THE ABEUPT TEEMINATION OF AN AEGUMENT. 
 
 HE author or authors of the Homeric Poems ; 
 the status of the Latin Patriarch of Constanti- 
 nople ; the difference between the thing moved 
 and the moving cause ; the number of angels 
 capable of standing on the point of a needle ; 
 the utility of definitions of Implied Notions ; 
 the character and attributes of the Principle of Evil ; the 
 doctrine of Transubstantiation ; the squaring of the circle ; the 
 position and function of the Eolic digamma ; the date of the 
 Eig-Veda Sanhita ; the founder of the pyramid of Sakkarah ; 
 the nature of the Soul ; the generation of the metals ; the original 
 of First Causes ; the respective merits of the assertions, '' Nihil est 
 in intellectu, quod non fuerit, in sensu ;" " Cogito ergo Sum;" 
 "Credo ut intelligam ;" the Infallibility of the Pope; the 
 boundaries of a dominion ; the possibility of perpetual motion ; 
 the nature of the heavens ; the habitability of the planets ; the 
 respective merits of intellectus and voluntas, as first principles ; 
 the most suitable form of Government for a particular people ; the 
 doctrine of Evolution ; Nominalism and Realism, universalia ante 
 res, or universalia in rebus, or universalia regarded as empty 
 conceptions without real existence ; the State Religion ; the 
 possibility of transmutation ; the existence of Spirits ; the nature 
 "of an Imperial taxation ; — these are a few of the subjects which 
 have from time to time furnished the matter for lengthy and 
 profound argument. 
 
 The mode of settling these arguments has varied almost as 
 much as the subjects of the arguments themselves ; a not unusual 
 method has been by the consumption of brain-tissue, time, paper, 
 ink, sheep-skins, and the manual labour of printers and book- 
 
272 Cairo. 
 
 binders. Another method has been by destructive and long- 
 continued wars involvinor the death of thousands of the human 
 race. In more individual cases it has been settled by poison, strang- 
 ling, roasting alive, banishment, incarceration in an oubliette, snick 
 and snee, bowde knives and tomahawks, the eiserne Jung frau, 
 the cauldron of boiling oil, a pistol-shot, the stroke of a dagger, the 
 blow of a fist. More pacific means have been found in the decisions 
 of kings, governors, rulers, khalifs, popes, cardinals, mitred abbots, 
 canons of the Church ; secret councils of ten ; ostracism ; auditors 
 of the Sacra Eota Komana, kadees, judges in the courts ecclesiasti- 
 cal, civil, criminal, and consular ; courts martial, star-chambers, 
 parliamentary committees, councils civil and ecclesiastical, imperial 
 and ecumenical. 
 
 We recently witnessed the termination of an argument by a 
 means which, in spite of its simplicity, was certainly as convincing 
 as any of the potent and elaborate processes mentioned above. In 
 fact it was more convincing than most of them, for a man 
 convinced against his will, will, as we all know, hold the same 
 opinion still, even if the convincer be my Lord High Chancellor 
 himself. 
 
 We were watching one evening at sundown for the appear- 
 ance of the mueddin to summon the Faithful to prayers. It was 
 in the clear air of Cairo, and the thousand minarets of that 
 picturesque city stood out sharply defined against the blue 
 
 cloudless sky. Presently my companion, Mr. A , pointed to a 
 
 mosque in our vicinity, remarking that he saw a man on the 
 minaret. " Surely, A— — •," I replied, " that is a bird, not a man.'* 
 ** Oh no," he replied, with the air of a confident man, perfectly 
 correct in his opinion, " I am sure it is a man ; that minaret is 
 really much further away than it looks ; this clear air is very 
 deceptive, and it is most difiicult to judge correctly of distances 
 and of the size of objects. In this case, however, there is not 
 much difficulty ; you can trace the outline of the mueddin's head, 
 
The Abrupt Termination of ait Argument. 273 
 
 and the folds of his robe, and in a moment we shall hear his call 
 
 to prayers. Besides," said A , " a bird would never remain so 
 
 long in one place, or be in that position." " As to the distance," I 
 replied, " the mosque is really very near to us ; besides, mueddins 
 do not dress in black, or usually stand in one position on the 
 minaret without moving or speaking. As to tracing the outhne of 
 his head, I can distinctly see the bird's beak, and it is slightly 
 fluttering its wings ; besides, whoever saw a mueddin or anybody 
 else, except a paralytic, with the whole line of his body inclined 
 forty degrees from the vertical?" "I don't care what you say," 
 
 said A , who between ourselves was fast beginning to Jose temper, 
 
 and to gain positiveness, " I am certain it is a man, the mosque is 
 many hundred yards away from us, and the mueddin remains in 
 one place simply because he is waiting for the precise moment of 
 summoning the people, which is some minutes after sundown, and 
 which is strictly defined by law. As to his looking black, it is 
 simply an effect of contrast due to the bright background of sky. 
 That which you declare to be the beak of the bird is the nose 
 of the mueddin, and what you call the fluttering of its wings 
 is the gentle movement of his robe by the evening breeze. 
 
 Finally," said A , with the air of one who puts the finishing 
 
 touch to a confutation, " as to the slope of the man's body being 
 unnatural, why, my dear fellow, that is the precise attitude which 
 the mueddin assumes when he leans on the parapet of the minaret 
 so that his voice may be more easily heard in the street below. In 
 fact, it is perfectly absurd to say that figure is like a bird ; anybody 
 with half-an-eye can see at once that it is a man, and it is mere 
 waste of time to stand arguing here, when "^^ "^'^ ■^'" ''' '"" 
 
 At this moment the hirdjieiu away. 
 
 Now A had been so confident in his opinion, so altogether 
 
 convinced that the bird of the minaret was a man, that I fully 
 expected that he would at least resort to a sophistry before 
 abandoning his position ; that, for instance, he would say that the 
 
274 Cairo. 
 
 thing we saw was the matter of a man having the form of a bird, 
 or the matter of a bird havino^ the form of a man ; or that he would 
 say all men are living creatures, the bird of the minaret is a living 
 creature, therefore the bird of the minaret is a man ; or, again, he 
 might say it was a man trying to fly. Or he might adopt the plan 
 of the ancient magister who loved to believe himself infallible, and 
 who on a certain occasion was construing Greek with a pupil ; 
 and as they construed they came to the word fBia^, and the master, 
 who knew it was a bird, but did not remember wJiat bird, promptly 
 said, " the nightingale." However, to make sure, he looked it out, 
 and found that it signified an owl. So at the next pause he said, 
 " Bms is not exactly a nightingale, it means a kind of nightingale 
 
 — in fact, an owl." As a final chance, then, A might say, 
 
 " Well, it is a kind of man — in fact, a bird." However, he was 
 wise enough to accept defeat, and surely a more conclusive termina- 
 tion to an argument can scarcely be conceived. 
 
 We wish that all bitter arguments could be settled as con- 
 clusively. 
 
 May we fairly call this discussion about the bird-man, man- 
 bird of the minaret an argumentum ad hominem ? 
 
BOOKS TO BE ISSUED SHORTLY. 
 
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