Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843/Part 3/Letter 19
LETTER XIX.
Ruins of Rome.—The Holy Week.—Music and Illuminations.
“What are the pleasures that I enjoy at Rome?” you ask. They are so many, that my mind is brimful of a sort of glowing satisfaction, mingled with tearful associations. Besides all that Rome itself affords of delightful to the eye and imagination, I revisit it as the bourne of a pious pilgrimage. The treasures of my youth lie buried here.
The sky is bright—the air impregnated with the soft odours of spring—we take our books and wile away the morning among the ruins of the Baths of Caracalla, or the Coliseum. From the shattered walls of the former, the view over the city and the Campagna is very beautiful. The Palatine is near at hand, and majestic ruins guide the eye to where the golden palace spreads its vast extent. These ruins, chiefly piles of brick—remnants of massive walls or lofty archways—may not be beautiful in themselves; but overgrown with parasites and flowering shrubs, they are grouped in so picturesque a manner among broken ground and dark gigantic trees—the many towers of the city gathering near— the distant hills on the clear horizon, with clouds just resting in scattered clusters on the tops, and the sky above, deeply blue—that the whole scene is delightful to feel, as well as look at.
There is one view from the Coliseum that I am never tired of contemplating. Ascending to the second range of arches, and looking from the verge towards the tomb of Cestius—in the foreground is the Temple of Venus, the Palatine Mount, and the ruins of the Forum—the country, varied by woods and hills and ruins, is spread beyond—the tomb of Cestius, gleaming at a distance, is a resting-place for the eye—and various trees seem placed expressly to give the scene the air of a landscape sitting for its picture—all grace and smiles and radiance.
The Forum used to be, long, long ago, before I ever saw it, a broken space of ground, with an avenue through the Campo Vacino leading to the Coliseum, with triumphal arches and tall columns half-buried in the soil. Now the excavations are considerable. I have heard painters lament that the picturesque beauty has been spoilt; but as its appearance, such as time and neglect had left it, is changed, it is as well to complete the task of excavation. Much has been done since I was here last, and workmen are in constant employ. I wish you could see the chief among them. Imagine an Indian file of fifty old men in the last stage of decrepitude, grey-headed, bent-shouldered, and feeble-legged, each rolling a small wheelbarrow, creeping along so slow, and yet that extreme slowness appearing an exertion for them.
From the Forum we ascended the hill of the Capitol, and, with some trouble, got the custode, and mounted the tower of the Campidoglio. We looked round, and fancied how, from this height, the patricians and consuls of Old Rome watched the advance of marauding parties that wound out from the ravines of the hills, or whose spears and helmets glittered above the brow of the Janicular hill; and the cry of the Sabines, or fiercer and more terrible, of the Gauls, made the populace gather in the Forum below, and give their names to be inscribed as soldiers for instant fight. The Tiber glitters in the distance, and Soracte rising from out the plain,
“Heaves like a long-swept wave, about to break,
And on the curl hangs pausing.”[1]
I never look at the ridge of Sant’ Oreste, (as it is now called,) but these lines, which so admirably paint it, come into my mind.
I scarcely know what view of Rome to prefer. That from the ruined Baths of Caracalla, or from the verge of the Coliseum, or the panorama of the Capitol, or from the porch of the Lateran, which commands a different landscape.—~You see nothing of the city, for your back is turned on it; you are on a height, the Campagna at your feet, spanned by a number of ruined aqueducts, whose grandeur and extent impress the mind, more than any other object, with a sense of Roman greatness. From the Lateran down to the Coliseum, nearly a mile, and in the adjoining space, was the most magnificent quarter of the old city. Now it is occupied by Poderi, divided by high walls, with here and there a ruin—a toppling wall or broken arch. When Pope Gregory VII. called in Robert Guiscard to drive Henry III. from his capital, the Saracens of Sicily, under the command of the Norman, sacked Rome, and this portion of the city was burned and levelled with the soil. So utter was the desolation, that the survivors found it more convenient to build nearly a new town at a distance, than to attempt to restore their homes among the smoking ruins of palaces, temples, and baths, which lay a black heap, till they crumbled away—and trees and flowers sprung up, and the peasantry came with the plough, and sowed seed and reaped corn.
We spent half a day rambling over the Palatine—the Contadino, our guide, told us that every July and August, the mal’ aria reigned, and his sunken cheeks spoke of his having been a victim. He asked us if we had the mal’ aria in England.—“Che bel paese,” he said with a sigh on hearing our negative.
Often, as at Venice, we leave our home without any definite object, and wander about the deserted part of Rome—that which once was the centre of its magnificence. Thus we viewed the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, built by Michael Angelo, with materials, columns and marbles, remnants of the Baths of Diocletian; it is one of the most striking and majestic of the Roman churches. Thus we found ourselves at the foot of the Capitol, and an inscription led us to visit the Mamertine prisons, a spot held sacred since St. Peter and other Christian martyrs were confined there. It is indubitably the oldest relic of the ancient republic, and the monument of its cruel and arrogant disdain for human life and suffering, impresses one painfully. How much of that has there ever been all over the world—and now! I used to pride myself on English humanity; but the boast is quenched in shame, since I read, last winter, the accounts of the cruelties practised in the Affghan war. We were injured, and, therefore, we revenge; such also was the tenet of old Rome.
The galleries of the Capitol often entice us. Here are some of the finest statues in the world. The Amazon, in whom a severe and martial expression is allied to feminine grace, and a something womanly softens the countenance in spite of sternness. The Venus of the Capitol is the only Queen of Beauty that can at all compete with the Goddess of the Tribune. The Cupid and Psyche is less tender and innocent than the Florentine group, but there is a passionate love in the caress that makes the marble appear tremulous with emotion.
Holy Week is over. The ceremonies of the Church strike me as less majestic than when I was last here; perhaps this is to be attributed to the chief part being filled by another actor. Pius VII. was a venerable and dignified old man. Pope Gregory, shutting his eyes as he is carried round St. Peter’s, because the motion of the chair makes him sea-sick, by no means excites respect. If I ever revisit Rome during the Holy Week, I shall not seek for tickets for the ceremonies; it will be quite enough to enter the Cathedral for half-an-hour while they were going on.
But a thousand times over I would go to listen to the Miserere in the Sistine Chapel; that spot made sacred by the most sublime works of Michael Angelo. I do not allude to the Last Judgment—which I do not admire—but to the paintings on the roof, which have that simple grandeur that Michael Angelo alone could confer on a single figure, making it complete in itself—enthroned in majesty—reigning over the souls of men.
The music, not only of the Miserere, but of the Lamentations, is solemn, pathetic, religious—the soul is rapt—carried away into another state of being. Strange that grief, and laments, and the humble petition of repentance, should fill us with delight—a delight that awakens these very emotions in the heart—and calls tears into the eyes, and yet which is dearer than any pleasure. It is one of the mysteries of our nature, that the feelings which most torture and subdue, yet, if idealized—elevated by the imagination—married harmoniously to sound or colour—turn those pains to happiness; inspiring adoration; and a tremulous but ardent aspiration for immortality. Such seems the sentient link between our heavenly and terrestrial nature; and thus, in Paradise, as Dante tells, —glory beatifies the sight, and seraphic harmony wraps the saints in bliss.
Another sight of this week, is the washing of the feet of the pilgrims. The ladies of Rome belong to a sisterhood who perform this service on Good Friday for the female pilgrims. The hospital of the Pelegrini was crowded; we could hardly make our way. In my life I never saw so much female beauty as among the sisterhood—their faces so perfect in contour; so lovely in expression; so noble, and so soft, that the recollection will haunt my memory for ever.
I went to mass at the Church of the Jesuits—as usual glittering with ornaments, precious stones, wax-lights, and all manner of finery. The music was in the same style—well suited for the Opera-house; it would there have enchanted; but it wanted that solemn, religious descant, which awed the spirit in the Sistine Chapel.
The illumination of St. Peter’s terminated the sights of the week—that and the fire-works of the Castel Sant’ Angelo.—There is more of creation in the first of these sights than in any other in the world. It is but a dim, and scant, and human imitation of the third verse of the first chapter of Genesis; but it is an imitation of the most sublime act of divine power; and though bearing but a very weak resemblance to what we imagine of the moment when, on a word, light disclosed the glories of creation, yet, there is darkness, and radiance sudden and dazzling bursts forth, and—it is very fine.
It is curious to see all these solemnities—many of them doubtless of Pagan origin—dear to the people, and therefore preserved and christianised by the Popes—and to reflect, that such, for many, many centuries, was the chief link fostered by religion between man and the Divinity. We have obliterated all this among ourselves. No doubt the impulse of piety in the heart is a truer and purer oblation; but Catholics reason that these are aids and supports to enable weak humanity—a creature half matter, half soul—to sustain itself in its pious ecstacies. Besides, God created in us not only the sense of, but also in some degree the power of creating the beautiful; and is it not well to dedicate to divine worship the glorious gifts which were bestowed for the purpose of raising the soul from earth and linking it to Heaven?
- ↑ Childe Harold, Canto IV.