Part 3 (1/2)
A little while ago Captain F. lent me D'Israeli's Essays on the Literary Character, which had once belonged to Lord Byron; and contained marginal notes in his hand-writing. One or two of them are so curiously characteristic that I copy them here.
The first note is on a pa.s.sage in which D'Israeli, in allusion to Lord Byron, traces his fondness for oriental scenery to his having read Rycaut at an early age. On this Lord Byron observes, that he read _every book_ relating to the east before he was ten years old, including De Tott and Cantemir as well as Rycaut: at that age, he says that he _detested_ all poetry, and adds, ”when I was in Turkey, I was oftener tempted to turn mussulman than poet: and have often regretted since that _I did not_.”
At page 99 D'Israeli says,
”The great poetical genius of our times has openly alienated himself from the land of his brothers” (over the word _brothers_ Lord Byron has written _Cains_.) ”He becomes immortal in the _language_ of a _people_ whom he would _contemn_, he accepts with ingrat.i.tude the fame he loves more than life, and he is only truly great on that _spot_ of _earth_, whose genius, when he is no more, will contemplate his shade in sorrow and in anger.”
Lord Byron has underlined several words in this pa.s.sage, and writes thus in the margin:
”What was rumoured of me in that language, if _true_, I was unfit for England; and if _false_, England was unfit for me. But 'there is a world elsewhere.' I have never for an instant regretted that country,--but often that I ever returned to it. It is not my fault that I am obliged to write in English. If I understood any present language, Italian, for instance, equally well, I would write in it:--but it will require ten years, at least, to form a style. No tongue so easy to acquire a little of, and so difficult to master thoroughly, as Italian.”
The next note is amusing; at page 342 is mentioned the anecdote of Petrarch, who when returning to his native town, was informed that the proprietor of the house in which he was born had _often_ wished to make alterations in it, but that the town's-people had risen to insist that the house consecrated by his birth should remain unchanged;--”a triumph,” adds D'Israeli, ”more affecting to Petrarch than even his coronation at Rome.”
Lord Byron has written in the margin--”It would have pained _me_ more that the proprietor should _often_ have wished to make alterations, than it would give me pleasure that the rest of Arezzo rose against his right (for _right_ he had:) the depreciation of the lowest of mankind is more painful, than the applause of the highest is pleasing.
The sting of the scorpion is more in _torture_ than the possession of any thing short of Venus would be in rapture.”
The public gardens are the work of the French, and occupy the extremity of one of the islands. They contain the only trees I have seen at Venice:--a few rows of dwarfish unhappy-looking shrubs, parched by the sea breezes, and are little frequented. We found here a solitary gentleman, who was sauntering up and down with his hands in his pockets, and a look at once stupid and disconsolate. Sometimes he paused, looked vacantly over the waters, whistled, yawned, and turned away to resume his solemn walk. On a trifling remark addressed to him by one of our party, he entered into conversation, with all the eagerness of a man, whose tongue had long been kept in most unnatural bondage. He congratulated himself on having met with some one who would speak English; adding contemptuously, that ”he understood none of the outlandish tongues the people spoke hereabouts:” he inquired what was to be seen here, for though he had been four days in Venice, he had spent every day precisely in the same manner; viz. walking up and down the public gardens. We told him Venice was famous for fine buildings and pictures; he knew nothing of _them_ things. And that it contained also, ”some fine statues and antiques”--he cared nothing about them neither--he should set off for Florence the next morning, and begged to know what was to be seen there? Mr. R----told him, with enthusiasm, ”the most splendid gallery of pictures and statues in the world!” He looked very blank and disappointed. ”Nothing else?” then he should certainly not waste his time at Florence, he should go direct to Rome; he had put down the name of that _town_ in his pocket-book, for he understood it was a very _convenient_ place: he should therefore stay there a week; thence he should go to Naples, a place he had also heard of, where he should stay another week: then he should go to Algiers, where he should stay _three weeks_, and thence to Tunis, where he expected to be very comfortable, and should probably make a long stay; thence he should return home, having seen every thing worth seeing. He scarcely seemed to know how or by what route he had got to Venice--but he a.s.sured us he had come ”fast enough;”--he remembered no place he had pa.s.sed through except Paris. At Paris he told us there was a female lodging in the same hotel with himself, who by his description appears to have been a single lady of rank and fas.h.i.+on, travelling with her own carriages and a suite of servants. He had never seen her; but learning through the domestics that she was travelling the same route, he sat down and wrote her a long letter, beginning ”Dear Madam,” and proposing they should join company, ”for the sake of good fellows.h.i.+p, and the _bit of chat_ they might have on their way.” Of course she took no notice of this strange billet, ”from which,” added he with ludicrous simplicity, ”I supposed she would rather travel alone.”
Truly, ”Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time.” After this specimen, sketched from life, who will say there are such things as caricatures?
We visited to-day the Giant's Staircase and the Bridge of Sighs, and took a last farewell of St. Mark--we were surprised to see the church hung with black--the festoons of flowers all removed--ma.s.ses going forward at several altars, and crowds of people looking particularly solemn and devout. It is the ”Giorno dei morte,” the day by the Roman Catholics consecrated to the dead. I observed many persons, both men and women, who wept while they prayed, with every appearance of the most profound grief. Leaving St. Mark, I crossed the square. On the three lofty standards in front of the church formerly floated the ensigns of the three states subjects to Venice,--the Morea, Cyprus, and Candia: the bare poles remain, but the ensigns of empire are gone.
One of the standards was extended on the ground, and being of immense length, I hesitated for a moment whether I should make a circuit, but at last stepped over it. I looked back with remorse, for it was like trampling over the fallen.
We then returned to our inn to prepare for our departure. How I regret to leave Venice! not the less because I cannot help it.
_Rovigo, Nov. 3._ We left Venice in a hurry yesterday, slept at Padua, and travelled this morning through a most lovely country, among the Enganean hills to Rovigo, where we are very uncomfortably lodged at the Albergo di San Marco.
I have not yet recovered my regret at leaving Venice so unexpectedly; though as a residence, I could scarce endure it; the sleepy ca.n.a.ls, the gliding gondolas in their ”dusk livery of woe”--the absence of all verdure, all variety--of all _nature_, in short; the silence, disturbed only by the incessant chiming of bells--and, worse than all, the spectacle of a great city ”expiring,” as Lord Byron says, ”before our eyes,” would give me the horrors: but as a visitor, my curiosity was not half gratified, and I should have liked to have stayed a few days longer--perhaps after all, I have reason to rejoice that instead of bringing away from Venice a disagreeable impression of satiety, disgust and melancholy, I have quitted it with feelings of admiration, of deep regret, and undiminished interest.
Farewell, then, Venice! I could not have believed it possible that it would have brought tears to my eyes to leave a place merely for its own sake, and unendeared by the presence of any one I loved.
As Rovigo affords no other amus.e.m.e.nt I shall scribble a little longer.
Nothing can be more arbitrary than the Austrian government at Venice.
As a summary method of preventing robberies during the winter months, when many of the gondoliers and fishermen are out of employ, the police have orders to arrest, without ceremony, every person who has no permanent trade or profession, and keep them in confinement and to hard labour till the return of spring.
The commerce of Venice has so much and so rapidly declined, that Mr.
H---- told us when first he was appointed to the consuls.h.i.+p, a hundred and fifty English vessels cleared the port, and this year only five.
It should seem that Austria, from a cruel and selfish policy, is sacrificing Venice to the prosperity of Trieste: but why do I call that a cruel policy, which on recollection I might rather term poetical and retributive justice?
The grandeur of Venice arose first from its trade in salt. I remember reading in history, that when the king of Hungary opened certain productive salt mines in his dominions, the Venetians sent him a peremptory order to shut them up; and such was the power of the Republic at that time, that he was forced to obey this insolent command, to the great injury and impoverishment of his states. The tables are now turned; the oppressor has become the oppressed.
The princ.i.p.al revenue derived from Venice is from the tax on houses, there being no _land tax_. So rapid was the decay of the place, that in two years seventy houses and palaces were pulled down; the government forbade this by a special law, and now taxes are paid for many houses whose proprietors are too poor to live in them.
There is no _society_, properly so called, at Venice; three old women of rank receive company now and then, and it is any thing rather than select.