Volume I Part 29 (1/2)
April 4th, 1830 {p309}
To the Sistine Chapel for the cereot into the body of the chapel, not without difficulty; butM de la Ferronays in his box, and he let us in (Morier and et there, for twice the Papal halberdiers thrust me back, and I find since it is lucky they did not do worse; for upon some occasion one of them knocked a cardinal's eye out, and when he found who he was, begged his pardon, and said he had taken hi the frescoes, but they are covered with dirt, the 'Last Judgures on the ceiling and walls are very grand even to norance The music (all vocal) beautiful, the service harmoniously chanted, and the responsive bursts of the chorus sublime The cardinals appeared a wretched set of old twaddlers, all but about three in extreood preacher, Gregorio, Capellari [afterwards Pope Gregory XVI] On seeing then is elected by and frooverned These old creatures, on the deue as in the high and palmy days of the Papal power Roh the Pontifical authority is so shorn of its beams; but the fact is that the overn the country,[15] and he is condemned to a life of privation and seclusion An able or influential cardinal is seldom elected The parties in the Conclave usually end by a coht or influence, and there are not now any Sixtus the Fifths to ement hazardous Austria, Spain, and France have all vetos, and Portugal clairadation Roed to submit The most influential of the cardinals is Albani[16] At the last election the Papal croas offered to Cardinal Caprara, but Albani stipulated that he should make him Secretary of State; Caprara refused to promise, and Albani procured the election of the present Pope (who did not desire or expect the elevation), becaoverns the country He is rich and stingy The great Powers still watch the proceedings of the Conclave with jealousy; and though it is difficult to conceive how the Pope can assist any one of them to the detriment of another, an Ambassador will put his veto upon any cardinal whom he thinks unfavourable to his nation; this produces all sorts of trickery, for when the Conclave want to elect a man who is obnoxious to Austria, for example, they choose another whom they think is equally so (but whom they do not really wish to elect), that the veto may be expended upon him, for each Government has one veto only The last veto absolutely put was on Cardinal ----, as elected on the death of Pius VII He had behaved very rudely to the Ee in the north of Italy after the downfall of Napoleon, thinking it was a good moment to bully the abdicated Emperor's wife She complained to her father, who pro and ambitious man, and the veto killed him with vexation and disappointment
[15] This, from what I have heard since, was not true of the last Pope, Leo XII, as an odious, tyrannical bigot, but a ood man of business, and his own Minister He was detested here, and there are many stories of his violent exertions of authority He was a sort of bastard Sixtus V, but at an i him of old, with steps unequal'
He used, however, to interfere with the private transactions of society, and banish and ih rank, for immorality
[16] Albani holds the Austrian veto, and is supported by her authority But I have heard that since Clement XI, as an Albani, there has always been a powerful Albani faction in the Conclave This cardinal is enormously rich and the head of his house The Duke of Modena is his nephew, and it is generally thought will be his heir
Went and walked about St Peter's, and was surprised to find how very little longer it is than St Paul's To the Farnese Palace, built by Paul III out of the ruins of the Coliseus to the King of Naples, and is consequently going to decay It got into his hands by theof Naples with the last heiress of the house of Farnese The Neapolitan property here consists of the Farnese and Farnesina Palaces, the Orti Farnesiani, and the Villa Madama, all in a wretched state; and the Orti, in which there are probably great remains, they will not allow to be excavated Many of the fine things are gone to Naples, but a few remain, inally from the Villa of Adrian These two, principally the one through the other, have been the greattreasures of art were drawn The frescoes in this palace are beautiful--a gallery by Annibal and Agostino Caracci, with a few pictures by Domenichino, Guido, and Lanfranco Annibal Caracci's are as fine as any I have seen; also a little cabinet picture painted entirely by Annibal, which is exquisite
[Page Head: A DEAD CARDINAL]
As ere going to this palace we drove by the Cancellaria (which was likewise built out of the Coliseulia) was lying in state there So seen all the living cardinals, we thought we e with the dead one, and went up
After a great deal of knocking ere admitted to a private view half an hour before the public was let in He had been embalmed, and lay on a bed under a canopy on an inclined plane, full dressed in cardinal's robes, new shoes on, his face and hands uncovered, the forers black, but on one of the before the bed, and thecurtains drawn He was 87 years old, but did not look so much, and had a healthier appearance in death than half the old walking
Took a look at Pasquin, who had nothing but advertisements pasted upon hi been an end to the witty dialogues of the days of Sixtus V, so quaintly told by Leti; they are so little 'birds of a feather'
(for Pasquin is a ment, Marphorius a colossal statue of the ocean) that, residing as they did at different parts of the town, it is difficult to understand how they ever came to converse with each other at all I remember one of the best of his stories Sixtus V made his sister a princess, and she had been a washerwoman The next day Pasquin appeared with a dirty shi+rt on Marphorius asks him 'why he wears such foul linen;' and he answers 'that his washerwoet it washed'
To the Farnesina: Raphael's frescoes, the faelo painted on the wall, as it is said as a hint to Raphael that he was too minute There it is just as he left it Here Raphael painted the Transfiguration, and here the Fornarina was shut up with hiht that to shut up his mistress with him was not the way to keep hiood one which produced these frescoes and the Transfiguration
[Page Head: POMPEY'S STATUE]
I very nearly forgot to mention the Palazzo Spada, where ent to see the famous statue of Pompey, which was found on the spot where the Senate House fors can be certain) the identical statue at the foot of which Caesar fell
his face within his robe Ev'n at the base of Poreat Caesar fell
People doubt this statue, because it is not like his busts There is certainly no resemblance to the bust I have seen, which represents Poreat double chin It is iination to look at this statue without interest, for it calls up a host of recollections and associations, standing before you unchanged from the hour when Caesar folded his robe round him and 'consented to death' at its base Those who cannot feel this had better not come to Rome Cardinal Spada was Secretary of State when this statue was found, and Julius III (Giocchi del Monti, 1550) made him a present of it
The Temple of Bacchus is one of the most remarkable objects in Rome; it is not in the least altered, merely turned into a Christian church, and so and the pavement are just the same as when it was devoted to the worshi+p of the jolly God The mosaics are beautiful, and perfectThe paves cut out upon it, all ancient Roman Not a column has been removed or mutilated The fact is, Rome possesses several complete specimens of places of heathen worshi+p; this temple, the Pantheon, and San Stefano Rotondo are perfect in the inside, the Pantheon within and without, Vesta and Fortuna Virilis perfect on the outside
[Page Head: A CAPUCHIN CHARNEL-HOUSE]
In the Rospigliosi Palace is the famous Aurora of Guido It is in excellent preservation, and three artists were copying it in oils One copy was just finished, and adin to like frescoes better than oils; there is such a life and brilliancy about the of Ro but the Pope's apart view of Rooes there the last day of the Holy Week, and stays there all the su can be more ets up very early, lives entirely alone and with the greatest si ambition is, which will sacrifice the substantial pleasures of life for thehome we stopped by accident at the Capuchins, and looked in to see Guido's St Michael, hich I was disappointed till I looked at it from a distance We then went to their catacombs, the most curious place I ever saw
There are a series of chapels in the cloisters, or rather compartments of one chapel, entirely fitted up with hued symmetrically and with all sorts of devices They are laid out in niches, and each niche is occupied by the skeleton of a friar in the robes of his order; a label is attached to it with the name of the skeleton and the date of his death Beneath are mounds of earth, each tenanted by a dead friar with similar labels When a friar dies, the oldest buried friar, or rather his skeleton, is taken up and promoted to a niche, and the newly defunct takes possession of his grave; and so they go on in succession I was so struck by this strange sight that, when I ca description of it:--
_THE CATACOMBS IN THE CAPUCHIN CONVENT_
In yonder chapel's ht peep, In strange and awful cemetery laid, The ancient Fathers of the convent sleep
No storied marble with monastic pride Records the actions of their tranquil life, Or tells how, fighting for their faith, they died Unconquer'd ious strife