Dreams, Waking Thoughts, and Incidents Part 13

"Advancing in a cold shudder to its edge, part of which was newly crumbled in, I discovered the form of the young man suspended by one foot to a branch of juniper that grew ten feet down: thus dreadfully did he hang over the gulph from the branch bent with his weight. His features were distorted, his eye-b.a.l.l.s glared with agony, and his screams became so shrill and terrible, that I lost all power of a.s.sistance. Fixed, I stood with my eyes riveted upon the criminal, who incessantly cried out, 'O G.o.d! O Father! save me, if there be yet mercy! save me, or I sink into the abyss!'

"I am convinced he saw me not; for not once did he implore my help.

My heart was dead within me. I called out upon the Lord. His voice grew faint, and as I gazed intent upon him, he fell into utter darkness. I sank to the earth in a trance, during which a sound like the rush of pennons a.s.saulted my ear: methought the evil spirit was bearing off his soul; I lifted up my eyes, but nothing stirred; the stillness that prevailed was awful.

"The moon looked stained with streaks of blood; her orb hanging low over the waves afforded a sickly light, by which I perceived some one coming down that white cliff you see before you; and soon I heard the voice of the young woman calling aloud on her guilty lover. She stopped. She repeated again and again her exclamation; but there was no reply. Alarmed and frantic she hurried along the path, and now I saw her on the promontory, and now by yonder pine, devouring with her glances every crevice in the rock. At length perceiving me, she flew to where I stood, by the fatal precipice, and having noticed the fragments fresh crumbled in, pored importunately on my countenance.

I continued pointing to the chasm; she trembled not; her tears could not flow; but she divined the meaning. 'He is lost!' said she; 'the earth has swallowed him! but, as I have shared with him the highest joy, so will I partake his torments. I will follow; dare not to hinder me.' I shrank back.

"Like the phantoms I have seen in dreams, she glanced beside me; and, clasping her hands above her head, lifted a steadfast look on the hemisphere, and viewed the moon with an anxiousness that told me she was bidding it farewell for ever. Observing a silken handkerchief on the ground, with which she had but an hour ago bound her lover's temples, she s.n.a.t.c.hed it up, and imprinting it with burning kisses, thrust it into her bosom. Once more, expanding her arms in the last act of despair and miserable pa.s.sion, she threw herself, with a furious leap, into the gulph.

"To its margin I crawled on my knees, and, shuddering, looked down into the gloom. There I remained in the most dreadful darkness; for now the moon was sunk, the sky obscured with storms, and a tempestuous blast ranging the ocean. Showers poured thick upon me, and the lightning, in clear and frequent flashes, gave me terrifying glimpses of yonder accursed chasm.

"Stranger, dost thou believe in the great Being? in our Redeemer? in the tenets of our faith?" I answered with reverence, but said I was no Catholic. "Then," continued the aged woman, "I will not declare before a heretic what were the sacred visions of that night of vengeance!" She paused; I was silent.

After a short interval, with deep and frequent sighs, she resumed her narrative. "Daylight began to dawn as if with difficulty, and it was late before its radiance had tinged the watery and tempestuous clouds. I was still kneeling by the gulph in prayer when the cliffs began to brighten, and the beams of the morning sun to strike against me. Then did I rejoice. Then no longer did I think myself of all human beings the most abject and miserable. How different did I feel myself from those, fresh plunged into the abodes of torment, and driven for ever from the morning!

"Three days elapsed in total solitude: on the fourth, some grave and ancient persons arrived from Naples, who questioned me, repeatedly, about the wretched lovers, and to whom I related their fate with every dreadful particular. Soon after I learned that all discourse concerning them was expressly stopped, and that no prayers were offered up for their souls."

With these words, as well as I recollect, the old woman ended her singular narration. My blood thrilled as I walked by the gulph to call my guide, who stood aloof under the cliffs. He seemed to think, from the paleness of my countenance, that I had heard some gloomy prediction, and shook his head when I turned round to bid my old hostess adieu! It was a melancholy evening, and I could not refrain from tears, as, winding through the defiles of the rocks, the sad scenes which had pa.s.sed amongst them recurred to my memory.

Traversing a wild thicket, we soon regained the sh.o.r.e, where I rambled a few minutes whilst the peasant went for the boatmen. The last streaks of light were quivering on the waters when I stepped into the bark, and wrapping myself up in an awning, slept till we reached Puzzoli, some of whose inhabitants came forth with torches to light us home.

I was vexed to be roused from my visions, and had much rather have sunk in some deep cave of the Cimmerians than returned to Naples.

LETTER XXIV

NAPLES, November 9th.

We made our excursion to Pompeii, pa.s.sing through Portici, and over the last lava of Mount Vesuvius. I experienced a strange mixture of sensations, on surveying at once the mischiefs of the late eruption, in the ruin of villages, farms, and vineyards; and all around them the most luxuriant and delightful scenery of nature. It was impossible to resist the impressions of melancholy from viewing the former, or not to admit that gaiety of spirits which was inspired by the sight of the latter. I say nothing of the Museum at Portici, which we saw in our way, on account of the ample description of its contents already given to the public, and because it should be described no otherwise than by an exact catalogue, or by an exhibition of engravings. An hour and half brought us from this celebrated repository to Pompeii. Nothing can be conceived more delightful than the climate and situation of this city. It stands upon a gently-rising hill, which commands the bay of Naples, with the islands of Caprea and Ischia, the rich coasts of Sorento, the tower of Castel a Mare; and on the other side, Mount Vesuvius, with the lovely country intervening. It is judged to be about an Italian mile long, and three and a half in circuit. We entered the city at the little gate which lies towards Stabiae. The first object upon entering is a colonnade round a square court, which seems to have formed a place of arms. Behind the colonnade is a series of little rooms, destined for the soldiers' barracks. The columns are of stone, plaistered with stucco and coloured. On several of them we found names scratched in Greek and Latin; probably those of the soldiers who had been quartered there. Helmets and armour for various parts of the body were discovered amongst the skeletons of some soldiers, whose hard fate had compelled them to wait on duty, at the perilous moment of the city's approaching destruction. Dolphins and tridents, sculptured in relief on most of these relics of armour, seem to show that they had been fabricated for naval service. Some of the sculptures on the arms, probably belonging to officers, exhibit a greater variety of ornaments. The taking of Troy, wrought on one of the helmets, is beautifully executed; and much may be said in commendation of the work of several others.

We were next led to the remains of a temple and altar near these barracks. From thence to some rooms floored (as indeed were almost all that have been cleared from the rubbish) with tesselated mosaic pavements of various patterns, and most of them of very excellent execution. Many of these have been taken up, and now form the floors of the rooms in the Museum at Portici, whose best ornaments of every kind are furnished from the discoveries at Pompeii. From the rooms just mentioned we descended into a subterraneous chamber, communicating with a bathing apartment. It appears to have served as a kind of office to the latter. It was probably here that the clothes used in bathing were washed. A fireplace, a capacious cauldron of bronze, and earthen vessels, proper for that purpose, found here, have given rise to the conjecture. Contiguous to this room is a small circular one with a fireplace, which was the stove to the bath. I should not forget to tell you that the skeleton of the poor laundress (for so the antiquaries will have it), who was very diligently was.h.i.+ng the bathing clothes at the time of the eruption, was found lying in an att.i.tude of most resigned death, not far from the was.h.i.+ng cauldron in the office just mentioned.

We were now conducted to the temple, or rather chapel, of Isis. The chief remains are a covered cloister; the great altar on which was probably exhibited the statue of the G.o.ddess; a little edifice to protect the sacred well; the pediment of the chapel, with a symbolical vase in relief; ornaments in stucco, on the front of the main building, consisting of the lotus, the sistrum, representations of G.o.ds, Harpocrates, Anubis, and other objects of Egyptian wors.h.i.+p.

The figures on one side of this temple are Perseus with the Gorgon's head; on the other side, Mars and Venus, with Cupids bearing the arms of Mars. We next observe three altars of different sizes. On one of them is said to have been found the bones of a victim unconsumed, the last sacrifice having probably been stopped by the dreadful calamity which had occasioned it. From a niche in the temple was taken a statue of marble: a woman pressing her lips with her forefinger.

Within the area is a well, where the priest threw the ashes of the sacrifices. We saw in the Museum at Portici some lovely arabesque paintings, cut from the walls of the cloister. The foliage which ran round the whole sweep of the cloister itself is in the finest taste.

A tablet of basalt with Egyptian hieroglyphics was transported from thence to Portici, together with the following inscription, taken from the front gate of the chapel:

N. POPIDUS N. F. CELSINUS.

AEDEM ISIDIS TERRAE MOTU COLLAPSAM A FUNDAMENTO P. SUA RESt.i.tUIT HUNC DECURIONES OB LIBERALITATEM c.u.m ESSET ANNORUM s.e.x ORDINI SUO GRATIS ADLEGERUNT.

Behind one of the altars we saw a small room, in which, our guide informed us, a human skeleton had been discovered, with some fish bones on a plate near it, and a number of other culinary utensils.

We then pa.s.sed on to another apartment, almost contiguous, where nothing more remarkable had been found than an iron crow: an instrument with which perhaps the unfortunate wretch, whose skeleton I have mentioned above, had vainly endeavoured to extricate herself, this room being probably barricaded by the matter of the eruption.

This temple, rebuilt, as the inscription imports, by N. Popidius, had been thrown down by a terrible earthquake, that likewise destroyed a great part of the city (sixteen years before the famous eruption of Vesuvius described by Pliny, which happened in the first year of t.i.tus, A.D. 79) and buried at once both Herculaneum and Pompeii. As I lingered alone in these environs sacred to Isis, some time after my companions had quitted them, I fell into one of those reveries which my imagination is so fond of indulging; and transporting myself seventeen hundred years back, fancied I was sailing with the elder Pliny, on the first day's eruption, from Misenum, towards Retina and Herculaneum; and afterwards towards the villa of his friend Pomponia.n.u.s at Stabiae. The course of our galley seldom carried us out of sight of Pompeii, and as often as I could divert my attention from the tremendous spectacle of the eruption, its enormous pillar of smoke standing conically in the air, and tempests of liquid fire continually bursting out from the midst of it, then raining down the sides of the mountain, and flooding this beautiful coast with innumerable streams of red-hot lava, methought I turned my eyes upon this fair city, whose houses, villas, and gardens, with their long ranges of columned courts and porticos, were made visible through the universal cloud of ashes, by lightning from the mountain; and saw its distracted inhabitants, men, women, and children, running to and fro in despair. But in one spot, I mean the court and precincts of the temple, glared a continual light. It was the blaze of the altars; towards which I discerned a long-robed train of priests moving in solemn procession, to supplicate by prayer and sacrifice, at this destructive moment, the intervention of Isis, who had taught the first fathers of mankind the culture of the earth, and other arts of civil life. Methought I could distinguish in their hands all those paintings and images, sacred to this divinity, brought out on this portentous occasion, from the subterraneous apartments and mystic cells of the temple. There was every form of creeping thing and abominable beast, every Egyptian pollution which the true prophet had seen in vision, among the secret idolatries of the temple at Jerusalem. The priests arrived at the altars; I saw them gathered round, and purifying the three at once with the sacred meal; then, all moving slowly about them, each with his right hand towards the fire: it was the office of some to seize the firebrands of the altars, with which they sprinkled holy water on the numberless bystanders. Then began the prayers, the hymns, and l.u.s.trations of the sacrifice. The priests had laid the victims with their throats downward upon the altars; were ransacking the baskets of flour and salt for the knives of slaughter, and proceeding in haste to the accomplishment of their pious ceremonies;--when one of our company, who thought me lost, returned with impatience, and calling me off to some new object, put an end to my strange reverie. We were now summoned to pay some attention to the scene and corridor of a theatre, not far from the temple. Little more of its remains being yet cleared away, we hastened back to a small house and garden in the neighbourhood of Isis. Sir W. Hamilton (in his account of Pompeii communicated to the Society of Antiquaries), when speaking of this house, having taken occasion to give a general idea of the private mansions of the ancient citizens, I shall take the liberty of transcribing the whole pa.s.sage. "A covered cloister, supported by columns, goes round the house, as was customary in many of the houses at Pompeii. The rooms in general are very small, and in one, where an iron bedstead was found, the wall had been pared away to make room for this bedstead; so that it was not six feet square, and yet this room was most elegantly painted, and had a tesselated or mosaic floor. The weight of the matter erupted from Mount Vesuvius has universally damaged the upper parts of the houses; the lower parts are mostly found as fresh as at the moment they were buried. The plan of most of the houses at Pompeii is a square court, with a fountain in the middle, and small rooms round, communicating with that court. By the construction and distribution of the houses, it seems, the inhabitants of Pompeii were fond of privacy. They had few windows towards the street, except where, from the nature of the plan, they could not avoid it; but even in that case the windows were placed too high for anyone in the streets to overlook them. Their houses nearly resemble each other, both as to distribution of plan, and in the manner of finis.h.i.+ng the apartments. The rooms are in general small, from ten to twelve feet, and from fourteen to eighteen feet; few communications between room and room, almost all without windows, except the apartments situated to the gardens, which are thought to have been allotted to the women. Their cortiles, or courts, were often surrounded by porticos, even in very small houses; not but there were covered galleries before the doors of their apartments to afford shade and shelter. No timber was used in finis.h.i.+ng their apartments, except in doors and windows. The floors were generally laid in mosaic work. One general taste prevailed of painting the sides and ceilings of the rooms. Small figures and medallions of low relief were sometimes introduced. Their great variety consisted in the colours, and in the choice and delicacy of the ornaments, in which they displayed great harmony and taste.

Their houses were some two, others three stories high."

We now pursued our way through what is with some probability thought to have been the princ.i.p.al street. Its narrowness, however, surprised me. It is scarcely eleven feet wide, clear of the footways raised on each side of it. The pavement is formed of a large sort of flattish-surfaced pebbles; not laid down with the greatest evenness or regularity. The sideways may be about a yard wide, each paved, irregularly enough, with small stones. There are guard stones at equal intervals, to defend the foot pa.s.sengers from carriages and horses. I cannot say I found anything either elegant or pleasant in the effect of this open street. But, as the houses in general present little more than a dead wall towards it, I do not imagine any views, beyond mere use and convenience, were consulted in the plan.

It led us, however, through the princ.i.p.al gate or entrance, to a sort of Villa Rustica, without the limits of the city, which amply recompensed our curiosity. The arcade surrounding a square garden, or courtyard, offers itself first to the observer's notice. Into this open a number of coved rooms, adorned with paintings of figures and arabesques. These rooms, though small, have a rich and elegant appearance, their ornaments being very well executed, and retaining still their original freshness. On the top of the arcade runs a walk or open terrace, leading to the larger apartments of the higher story. One of the rooms below has a capacious bow-window, where several panes of gla.s.s, somewhat shattered, were found, but in sufficient preservation to show that the ancients were not without knowledge of this species of manufacture. As Horace and most of the old Latin Poets dwell much on the praises of ancient conviviality, and appear to have valued themselves considerably on their connoisseurs.h.i.+p in wine, it was with great pleasure I descended into the s.p.a.cious cellars, sunk and vaulted beneath the arcade above- mentioned. Several earthen amphorae were standing in rows against the walls, but the Ma.s.sic and Falernian with which they were once stored, had probably long been totally absorbed by the earth and ashes, which were now the sole contents of these venerable jars. The ancients are thought to have used oil, instead of corks, and that the stoppers were of some matter that could make but little resistance, seems confirmed by the entrance of that, which now supplied the place with wine. The skeletons of several of the family who had possessed this villa were discovered in the cellar, together with bra.s.s and silver coins, and many such ornaments of dress as were of more durable materials. On re-ascending, we went to the hot and cold baths; thence to the back of the villa, separated by a pa.s.sage from the more elegant part of the house; we were shown some rooms which had been occupied by the farmer, and from whence several implements of agriculture had been carried, to enrich the collection at Portici.

On the whole, the plan and construction of this villa are extremely curious, and its situation very happily chosen. I could not, however, help feeling some regret, in not having had the good fortune to be present at the first discovery. It must have been highly interesting to see all its ancient relics (the greatest part of which are now removed) each in its proper place; or, at least, in the place they had possessed for so long a course of years. His Sicilian Majesty has ordered a correct draught of this villa to be taken, which, it is hoped, will one day be published, with a complete account of all the discoveries at Pompeii.

Our next walk was to see the Columbarium, a very solemn looking edifice, where probably the families of higher rank only at Pompeii, deposited the urns of their deceased kindred. Several of these urns, with their ashes, and one among the rest of gla.s.s, inclosed in another of earth, were dug out of the sepulchral vaults. A quant.i.ty of marble statues, of but ordinary execution, and colossal masks of terra-cotta, const.i.tuted the chief ornaments of the Columbarium. It is situated without the gates, on the same side of the city as the villa just described. There is something characteristically sad in its aspect. It threw my mind into a melancholy, but not disagreeable tone. Under the mixed sentiments it inspired, I cast one lingering look back on the whole affecting scene of ruins, over which I had for several hours been rambling, and quitted it to return to Naples, not without great reluctance.

LETTER XXV

ROME, December 9th.

My last letter was despatched in such a hurry that I had not time to conclude it. This will be nearly as imperfect; but yet I cannot forbear writing, having the vanity to believe that you are pleased with hearing only that I am well.

Your friend H. walked with me this morning in the Loggios of Raffaelle, and we went afterwards to the Capitol. Nothing delighted me more in the whole treasury of sculptures, than a figure in alto relievo of Endymion, reclined on the mountain's brow: his head falls upon his breast with an ease and gracefulness, of which the Greeks alone had ever a true conception. Most of the chambers, if you recollect, are filled with the elegant remains of Adrian's collection. The villa of that cla.s.sic emperor at Tivoli, must have been the most charming of structures. Having travelled into various and remote parts of his empire, he a.s.sembled their most valuable ornaments on one spot. Some of his apartments were filled with the mysterious images and symbols of Egypt: others with Eastern tripods and strange Adriatic vases. Though enraptured with St. Peter's and the Vatican, with the gardens and groves of pine, that surround this interesting city, still I cannot help sighing after my native hills and copses, which look (I know not how it happens) more like the haunts of Pan than any I have seen in Italy. I eagerly antic.i.p.ate the placid hours we shall pa.s.s, perhaps next summer, on the wild range which belongs to our sylvan deities. In their deep fastnesses I will hide myself from the world, and never allow its glare to bicker through my foliage. You will follow me, I trust, into retirement, and equally forget the turmoils of mankind. What have we children of the good Sylva.n.u.s to do with the miseries or triumphs of the savages that prowl about London? Let us forget there exists such a city, and when reposing amongst ivy and blossoms of bloom, imagine ourselves in the ancient dominions of Saturn, and dream that we see him pa.s.s along with his rustic attendants.

LETTER XXVI

AUGSBURG, January 20th, 1781.

For these ten days past have I been traversing Lapland: winds whistling in my ears, and cones showering down upon my head from the wilds of pine through which our route conducted us. Often were we obliged to travel by moonlight, and I leave you to imagine the awful aspect of the Tyrol mountains buried in snow.

I scarcely ventured to utter an exclamation of surprise, though prompted by some of the most striking scenes in nature, lest I should interrupt the sacred silence that prevails, during winter, in these boundless solitudes. The streams are frozen, and mankind petrified, for aught I know to the contrary, since whole days have we journeyed on without perceiving the slightest hint of their existence.

I never before felt the pleasure of discovering a smoke rising from a cottage, or of hearing a heifer lowing in its stall; and could not have supposed there was so much satisfaction in perceiving two or three fur caps, with faces under them, peeping out of their concealments. I wish you had been with me, exploring this savage region: wrapped up in our bear-skins, we should have followed its secret avenues, and penetrated, perhaps, into some enchanted cave lined with sables, where, like the heroes of northern romances, we should have been waited upon by dwarfs, and sung drowsily to repose.

I think it no bad scheme to sleep away five or six years to come, since every hour affairs are growing more and more turbulent. Well, let them! provided we may enjoy, in security, the shades of our thickets.

ADDITIONAL LETTERS

[The following Letters, written in a second Excursion, which was interrupted by a dangerous illness, are added on account of their affinity to some of the preceding.]

LETTER I

COLOGNE, May 28th, 1782.