The mighty Past is eloquent with a thousand voices, and they blend into a choral harmony of promise and prophecy for the n.o.bler future of humanity.
At the foot of the Scala Santa, on either side, are statues of Christ and Judas, and of Christ and Pilate, very interesting groups by Jacometti, and there is also a kneeling statue of Pio Nono.
The statue of Judas is considered one of the most notable of the late modern Italian sculpture.
The Rome of to-day is in strange contrast even to the city that Page and Hawthorne knew, in the comparatively recent past; and the Rome of the ancients is traced only in the churches and the ruins. It is a _mot_ that one hears every language spoken in Rome, except the Italian! So largely has the Seven-hilled City become the pleasure ground of foreign residents. The contrast between the ordinary breakfast-table talk in Rome and in--Boston, for instance, or Washington, is amusing. In the Puritan capital it usually includes the topic of weather predictions and the news in the morning paper, with whatever other of local or personal matters of interest. In Washington, where the very actors and the events that make the nation"s history are fairly before one"s eyes, the breakfast-table conversation is apt to turn on matters that have not yet got into the papers,--the evening session of the previous night, perhaps, when too long prolonged under the vast dome to admit of its having been noted in the morning press. But in Rome the breakfast-table talk is apt to be of the new excavations just taken from the bed of the Tiber; the question as to whether the head of St. Paul could have touched (at the tragic scene of his execution) at three places so far apart as the tri-fontanes; or a discussion of the marvellous freshness of the mosaics in the interior of the Palace of the Caesars; or, again, of the last night"s b.a.l.l.s or dinners, and matters most frankly _mondaine_, and of contemporary life.
The American Emba.s.sy, whose location depends on the individual choice of the Amba.s.sador of the time, is now in the old Palazzo del Drago on the corner of the Via Venti Settembre and the Via delle Quattro Fontane. The street floor, like all the old palaces, is not used for living purposes.
The portiere, the guards, the corridors, and approaches to the staircases monopolize this s.p.a.ce. The piano n.o.bile is the residence of the beautiful and lovely Principessa d"Antuni, the youthful widow of the Principe who was himself a grandson of Marie Christine, the Queen of Spain. The young Princess who was married to him at the age of seventeen, ten years ago, is left with three little children, of whom the only daughter bears the name of her great-grandmother, the Spanish Queen. Perfectly at home in all the romance languages, an accomplished musician, a thinker, a scholar, a student, a lovely figure in life, a beautiful and sympathetic friend is the Princess d"Antuni. She is "of a simplicity," as they say in Italy, investing the dignity of her rank with indescribable grace and sweetness. The two long flights of stairs that lead up to the secundo piano in the Palazzo del Drago--the floor occupied by the American Emba.s.sy--have at least a hundred steps to each staircase, yet so broad and easy of ascent as hardly to fatigue one.
These flights are carpeted in glowing red, while along the wall are niches in each of which stands an old statue, making the ascent of the guest seem a cla.s.sic progress.
The Palazzo del Drago has an elevator, but elevator service in Rome is a thing apart, something considered quite too good for human nature"s daily food, and the slight power is far too little to permit any number of people to be accommodated, so on any ceremonial occasion the elevator is closed and the guests walk up the two long flights. The total lack of any mastery of mechanical conditions in Italy is very curious.
The grand ball given at the American Emba.s.sy just before Ash Wednesday in the winter of 1907 was a very pretty affair. Up the rose-red carpeted stairs the guests walked, the statues looking silently on, but apparently there was no Galatea to step down from her niche and join the happy throng. In the antechamber each guest was asked to write his name in the large autograph books kept for that purpose, and then, pa.s.sing on, was received by the Amba.s.sador and Amba.s.sadress in the first of the splendid series of salons thrown open for the occasion. At this time it was Mr. and Mrs. Henry White who represented the United States, and won the hearts of all Rome as well, and a.s.sisted by their charming daughter, Miss Muriel White, they made this ball an affair to leave its lovely pictures in memory. The scenic setting of an old Roman palace captivates the stranger. It may not impress him as especially comfortable, but it is certainly picturesque, and who would not prefer--at least for the "one night only" of the traditional _prima donna_ announcements--the pictorially picturesque and magnificent to the merely comfortable? The lofty ceilings, painted by artists who have long since vanished from mortal sight, make it impossible to attain the temperature that the American regards as essential to his terrestrial well-being, and as the only sources of heat were the open fireplaces the guests hovered around these and their radii of comfortable warmth were limited. In one salon there was one especially beautiful effect of a great jar of white lilacs placed before a vast mirror at sufficient distance to give the mirror reflection an individuality as a thing apart, and the effect was that of a very garden of paradise. The music was fascinating, the decorations all in good taste, and the occasion was most brilliant,--_tres charmante_ indeed. The American amba.s.sadress was ablaze with her famous diamonds, her corsage being literally covered with them, and her coiffure adorned with a coronet, but the temperature soon forced the amba.s.sadress to partially eclipse her splendor with the little ermine shoulder cape that is an indispensable article for evening dress in Rome. The temperature does not admit the possibility of _decollete_ gowns without some protection, when these resplendent glittering robes that seem woven of the stars are worn. Among the more distinguished guests, aside from the _corps diplomatique_ and the t.i.tled n.o.bility of Rome and visiting foreigners, were M. Carolus Duran, the celebrated portrait artist of Paris, and among other interesting people were Miss Elise Emmons of Leamington, England, a grand-niece of Charlotte Cushman.
M. Carolus Duran was very magnificent, his breast covered with jewelled orders and decorations from the various societies, academies, and governments that have honored him. He is a short man and has grown quite stout, but he carries himself with inimitable grace and dignity, and in his luminous eyes one still surprises that far-away look which Sargent so wonderfully caught in his portrait of the great French artist, painted in his earlier life.
The number of s.p.a.cious salons with their easy-chairs and sofas enabled all guests who desired to ensconce themselves luxuriously to do so, and watch the glittering scene. The supper room and the salon for dancing were not more alluring than the salons wherein one could study this brilliant throng of diplomates, t.i.tled n.o.bility, distinguished artists, social celebrities, and those who were, in various ways, each _persona grata_ in Rome. Among those at this particular festivity were the American novelist, Frank Hamilton Spearman, with Mrs. Spearman. In late American fiction Mr. Spearman has made for himself a distinctive place as the novelist whose artistic eye has discerned the romance in the new phases of life created by the extensive systems of mountain railroading, and the great irrigation schemes of the far West, which have not only opened up new territory, but have called into evidence new combinations of the qualities most potent in human life,--love, sacrifice, heroism, devotion to duty, and tragedy and comedy as well. In his novels, "The Daughter of a Magnate" and "Whispering Smith," in such vivid and delightful short stories as "The Ghost at Point of Rocks," which appeared in _Scribner"s Magazine_ for August of 1907, Mr. Spearman has dramatized the pathos, the wit, the vast and marvellous spirit of enterprise, the desolation of isolated regions, the all-pervading potency and one may almost say intimacy of modern life made possible by the Arabian Nights" dream of wireless telegraphy, "soaring" cars, long-distance telephoning, and lightning express train service in cars that climb the mountains beyond the clouds, or dash through tunnels with ten thousand feet of mountains above them. Mr. Spearman is the novelist _par excellence_ of this intense _vie modernite_.
On Washington"s Birthday, again, the stately salons of the American Emba.s.sy in the old Palazzo del Drago were well filled from four to six with an a.s.semblage which expressed its patriotism and devotion to Washington by appearing in its most faultless raiment and in an apparent appreciation of the refreshment tables, from which cake and ices, tea and various other delicacies, were served.
The informal weekly receptions at the Emba.s.sy are always delightful, and the dinners and ceremonial entertainments are given with that faultless grace which characterizes the American amba.s.sadress.
The American consulate is always a charming centre in Rome, and in the present residence of Consul-General and Mrs. De Castro, who have domiciled themselves on a lofty floor of a palace in the Via Venti Settembre, commanding beautiful views that make a picture of every window, the consulate is one of the favorite social centres for Americans and other nationalities as well, who enjoy the charming welcome of Mrs. De Castro.
Professor and Mrs. Jesse Benedict Carter, in their lovely home in the Via Gregoriana, add another to the pleasant American centres in the Eternal City, Professor Carter having succeeded Professor Norton as the princ.i.p.al of the American Cla.s.sical School.
Mrs. Elihu Vedder, a.s.sisted by her accomplished daughter, Miss Anita Vedder, has a pretty fashion of receiving weekly in Mr. Vedder"s studio in the Via Flaminia, and these Sat.u.r.day receptions at the Vedders" are a feature of social life in Rome which are greatly sought. The distinguished artist reserves these afternoons for leisurely conversation, and pictures and sketches are enjoyed the more that they may be enjoyed in the presence of their creator. Miss Vedder has called to life again the almost lost art of tapestry, and her productions of wonderful beauty are considered as among the most desirable in modern decorative art. Among these tapestries are "The Lover"s Song," "Salome Dancing before Herod," "The Annunciation," "The Legend of the Unicorn,"
"The Lovers" Picnic," and "The Lovers." The tapestries were painted in Rome and in the Vedder villa, _Torre Quattro Venti_ on Capri, where the artist and his wife and daughter pa.s.s their summers. The established English Church has two chapels in Rome, one the Holy Trinity, of which Rev. Dr. Baldwin is the rector, and the other English chapel in Via del Babuino has for its chaplain Rev. Dr. Nutcombe Oxenham, whose ministry is one of the most helpful factors in Rome. Dr. and Mrs. Oxenham occupy a charming apartment in the Piazza del Popolo, the most picturesque piazza in Rome, with the terraced Pincion hillside crowned by the Villa di Medici on one side, and the "twin churches" on another; and the beautiful salon of Mrs. Oxenham, with its wealth of books and cla.s.sic engravings and gems of pictures, is one of the homelike interiors in Rome. Mr. and Mrs. Oxenham receive on Wednesdays, and an hour with them and their guests is always a privileged one.
The work of this church, largely through the active co-operation of Mrs.
Oxenham, extends into wide charities which are without discrimination as to sect or race,--the only consideration being the human need to be met in the name of Him whose care and love are for each and all.
Among the delightful hostesses of Rome is the American wife of Cavaliere Cortesi, an Italian man of letters, and in their apartment, in one of the notable palaces in the Corso, some of the most brilliant musicals and receptions are given, the "All"Ill.u.s.trissima Signora" being a.s.sisted in the informal serving of tea by the two little fairy daughters, Annunziata and Elizabetta, whose childish loveliness lingers with the _habitues_ of this pleasant home.
In the Palazzo Senni, in the old part of Rome, looking out on Castel San Angelo and the Ponte d"Angelo, across to the dome of St. Peter"s, the Listers had their home; and though Mrs. Lister, one of the most distinguished English ladies of Rome, has gone on into the fairer world beyond, her daughter, Miss Roma Lister, sustains the charming hospitalities for which her mother was famous. Her salons on the piano n.o.bile of the palace are rich in souvenirs and rare objects of art. Mrs.
Lister, who was of a noted English house, was evidently a favorite with Queen Victoria and the royal family; and her marriage gifts included two drawings by the Queen, both autographed, and a crayon portrait of the Empress Frederick with autographic inscription to Mrs. Lister. Another personal gift was a portrait of Cardinal Newman, with his autograph. A bust of Lady Paget of Florence, the widow of Sir Augustus Paget, formerly the English Amba.s.sador to Italy, is another of the interesting treasures which include, indeed, gifts and offerings from a large number of those eminent in state, in art, in literature, or in the church. The gracious hospitality of Miss Lister is dispensed to groups of cosmopolitan guests, and her dinners and other entertainments are among the most brilliant in Rome.
The Eternal City is not as hospitable to various phases of modern thought as is Florence, in which Theosophy, Christian Science, and psychic investigation flourish with rapidly increasing ardor; but Rome has a Theosophical Society, among whose leaders is the Baroness Rosenkrans, the mother of the distinguished young Danish novelist, and the aunt of Miss Roma Lister. The society has its rooms in the very heart of old Rome, and holds weekly meetings, often with an English lecturer as the speaker of the hour. A Theosophical library, in both English and Italian, is easily accessible, and the meetings are conducted in either language as it chances at the time. The accession of Annie Besant to the presidency of the Theosophical Society, succeeding Colonel Olcott, whose death occurred early in 1907, was most satisfactory to the Roman members. Mrs. Besant is one of the most remarkable women of the day. She is in no sense allied with any fads or freaks; she is essentially a woman of scholarship and poise, of genuine grasp of significant thought and of brilliant eloquence.
Theosophy, rightly interpreted, is in no sense antagonistic, but, rather, supplemental to Christianity. It offers the intellectual explanation--the details, so to speak--of the great spiritual truths of the Bible.
Rome seems fairly on its way to become an English-speaking city, so numerous are the Americans and English who throng to Rome in the winter.
There are now at least a dozen large new hotels on the scale of the best modern hotels in New York and Paris, beside the mult.i.tude of the older ones which are comfortable and retain all their popularity; yet this increase in accommodation does not equal the increase in demand. In February the tide of travel sets in toward Rome, and from that date until after Easter every nook and niche are filled to overflowing. The demand for apartments in Rome is greater than the supply, although the city is being constantly extended and new buildings are rapidly being erected. It would seem as if, with the present increasingly large number of Americans and English, it might be an admirable financial enterprise for capitalists to come and build comfortable modern apartment hotels.
There seems to be no adequate reason why, in this age, people should be compelled to live in these gloomy, dreary, cold, old stone palaces, without elevator service and with no adequate heating, lighting, and running-water facilities. There would seem to be no conceivable reason why these conveniences should not be at hand in Rome as well as in New York. As for the climate, with warm houses to live in, it would be charmingly comfortable, for the deadly cold is not in the temperature out of doors, but only in the interiors. One is warm in the sunshine in the streets, when he is fairly frozen in the house. Mentioning this, however, with wonder that some enterprising American did not begin such building operations, a friend who has lived for sixteen years in Rome replied that the Italians would never permit it; that no foreigner is allowed to come in here and initiate business operations. And the Italians continue building after the old and clumsy fashion of five hundred years ago.
Italy has a curiously pervasive and general suspicion of any latter-day comfort. The new apartment houses of from four to seven stories are largely without any elevator; if there is one it usually only ascends about halfway, and it is so clumsy and slow in its methods, so poorly supported by power, that half the time it does not run at all. The streets of Rome are paved with rough stones; the sidewalks are very narrow; the lighting is inadequate. Bathrooms are rare and insufficient in number, and all interior lighting and heating arrangements lack much that is desirable according to American ideas of comfort.
Still the Eternal City is so impressive in and of itself that sunshine or storm, comfort or the reverse, can hardly affect one"s intensity of joy and wonder and mysterious, una.n.a.lyzable rapture in it. The twentieth-century Rome is a very different affair from the Rome on which Hawthorne entered one dark, cold, stormy winter night more than half a century ago. In the best modern hotels one may be as comfortable as he likes, with all the fascinations of life added besides. No wonder that Rome is one of the great winter centres, with some of the most interesting people in the world always to be found under the spell of its enchantment.
The Rome of to-day is a curious mixture of ruins and of modern buildings which are neither modern nor mediaeval in their structure, but many of which combine the most picturesque features of the latter with the latest beauty of French and American architectural art. The cla.s.sic buildings are now largely in unpleasant surroundings; as, for instance, the Pantheon, which is surrounded by a fish market, with unspeakable odors and other repulsive features. "But the portico, with its sixteen Corinthian columns, is forever majestic; the interior, a vast circular cell surmounted by a dome through which alone it is lighted, there being no windows in the walls, is ma.s.sive and grim, but the magical illumination, the eye constantly revealing the sky above, gives it wonderful beauty. Over the outer portals is the inscription of its erection by Agrippa twenty-seven years before Christ, so it has stood for nearly two thousand years. Colossal statues of Augustus and Agrippa fill niches. In diameter the interior of the Pantheon is one hundred and thirty-two feet, and it is the same in height, which insures the singularly harmonious proportions. The tribune of the High-Altar is cut in the thickness of the wall in the form of a semicircle, and is ornamented, like the door, with four pilasters and two columns of violet marble. The six chapels are also cut in the wall and ornamented by two columns and two pilasters. The columns and the pilasters support the beautiful cornice of white marble; the frieze is of porphyry, and goes round the whole temple. Above this order there is a species of attic with fourteen niches, and the great cornice from which rises the majestic dome. Eight other niches are between the chapels, and these are also with a pediment supported by two Corinthian columns. They are now converted into altars. In this temple are buried several artists, among whom are Raphael, Giovanni da Udine, Balda.s.sare Peruzzi, and Annibale Carracci. Raphael is buried beneath the base of the statue called la Madonna del Sa.s.so, sculptured by Lorenzetti. This church is, however, without paintings or sculptures of much interest. Victor Emmanuel was entombed here on the 20th of January, 1878, and King Umberto on the 9th of August, 1900." One of the imposing ceremonies of Rome is that always celebrated in the Pantheon on March 14, in memory of King Umberto Primo.
A grand catafalque, surmounted by the royal crown, and surrounded by tall candelabra with wax candles, is erected in the centre of the temple, draped with black velvet and gold lace, and lighted with electric lamps. The ma.s.s is for a chorus of voices only. All the civil and military authorities, the state dignitaries, and the _corps diplomatique_ to the court of Italy are present. The troops, in full dress uniform, file in the Piazza of the Collegio Romano, Via Pie di Marmo, and the Piazza della Minerva, enclosing thus a large square in the Piazza del Pantheon. The spectacle is one of the most imposing of all Roman ceremonies.
The King, and Queen Elena, and the Dowager Queen Margherita, accompanied by their respective civil and military households, a.s.sist at the requiem ma.s.s celebrated in the Pantheon, and at a commemoration service, on the same day, in the Royal Chapel of the Sudario, where also a.s.semble the ladies and gentlemen of the Order of the Annunziata.
On the same morning the feast of St. Gregory, Pope and Doctor of the church, is celebrated at his church on the Caelian Hill. He was born of a n.o.ble family, and was Prefect of Rome in 573. Pope Pelagius II made him regionary deacon of Rome, and sent him as legate to Constantinople in 578, where he remained till the death of Pelagius, when he was elected Pope (590). He introduced the Gregorian chant. His first great act was to send St. Augustine to convert the Saxons of England to the Christian faith. An inscription in the Church of San Gregorio Magno states that St. Augustine was educated in the abbey which was erected on the site of the present church by Gregory, and that many early archbishops of York and Canterbury were also educated there. It was on the steps of this church that Augustine and his forty monks took leave of Gregory, when setting out for England. He died in 604, after a pontificate of thirteen years and six months. He was buried in the portico of the Vatican Basilica, and his body lies under the altar dedicated to him in this same church. His church, on the Caelian Hill, was built on the site of the monastery founded by him. In the chapel of the triclinium, near the church, the table on which he served the poor is shown. Near the church also is seen his cell, where his marble chair and one of his arms are exhibited.
During the Lenten season of 1907 one of the privileges of Rome was to hear the sermons of Monsignor Vaughn, in the English Catholic Church of San Silvestre. Monsignor Vaughn is the private chaplain of the Pope. His discourses attracted increasing throngs of both Catholic and Protestant hearers. This celebrated prelate is a brother of the late English Cardinal. He is a man of great distinction of presence, of beautiful voice and fascination of manner. One discourse had for its theme the joys of the life that is to come. The spiritual body, he said, has many qualities not pertaining to the physical body. It is immured from all disease and accidents; it is subtle and can pa.s.s through any substance which is (apparently) solid to us, as, for instance, when Jesus appeared in the midst of his disciples, "the doors being shut." It is not a clog on the soul, continued Monsignor Vaughn; the spiritual body is the vehicle of the soul and can waft its way through the air; it can walk the air as the physical body walks the earth. It is not--as is the physical body--the prison of the soul, but the companion of the soul.
This is all a very enlightened presentation of spiritual truth, and it is little wonder that such preaching attracts large congregations. Holy Week in Rome bears little resemblance now to that of the past. The Pope is not visible in any of the ceremonials in any of the churches; and the impressiveness of former Catholic ceremonials is greatly lessened.
Indeed, with the pa.s.sing of the temporal power of the Pope, the picturesqueness of Rome largely vanished.
Not, a.s.suredly, from any lack of reverence for the colossal cathedral of St. Peter"s is that Basilica a resort for Sunday afternoons; it suggests a social reunion, where every one goes, listens as he will to the music of the Papal choir in the Chapel of the Sacrament, and strolls about the vast interior where the promenade of the mult.i.tude does not yet disturb in the least the vesper service in the chapel. Here one meets everybody; the general news of the day is exchanged; greeting and salutation and pleasant little conversational interludes mark the afternoon, while the sun sinks behind the splendid pile of the Palazzo Vaticano, and the golden light through the window of the tribune fades into dusk. Can one ever lose out of memory the indescribable charm of this leisurely sauntering, in social enjoyment, in the wonderful interior of St. Peter"s?
In the way of the regulation sight-seeing the visitor to Rome compa.s.ses most of his duty in this respect on his initial sojourn and goes the rounds that no one ever need dream of repeating. Once for all the visitor to Rome goes down into the Catacombs; makes his appallingly hard journey over Castel San Angelo, into its cells and dungeons, and to the colossal salon in which is Hadrian"s tomb; once for a lifetime he climbs St. Peter"s dome; drives out to old St. Agnes and descends into the crypt; visits the Church of the Capucines and beholds the ghastly spectacle of the monks" skulls; drives in the Appian Way; visits the Palace of the Caesars, the Baths of Caracalla--a ma.s.s of ruins; the Forum; the Temples of Vesta and Isis; the Coliseum, and the cla.s.sic old Pantheon. These form a kind of skeleton for the regulation sight-seeing of the Eternal City; things which, once done, are checked off with the feeling that the entire duty of the tourist has been fulfilled, and that, henceforth in Rome, there is laid up for him the crown of enjoyment, if not rejoicing; that he may go again and again to study the marvellous treasures of the Vatican galleries, the masterpieces of art in the Raphael stanze in the Vatican, the interesting pictures and sculpture in the many rich churches and galleries. The deadly chill of most of these galleries and churches in the winter is beyond words to describe. It is as if the gloom and chill and darkness of a thousand centuries were there concentrated.
One of the regulation places for the devout sight-seer, who feels responsible to his conscience for improving his privileges, is the Museo n.a.z.ionale, or the Tiberine Museum, a large proportion of whose treasures have been excavated in making the new embankments of the Tiber. It is located on the site of the Baths of Diocletian, the great ruins of which surround it in the most uncanny way. Built around a large court, the salons of the museum are entered from the inner cloisters. In the centre of the court is a fountain, and around it are antique fragments of statues, columns, and statuettes found in many places. The famous Ludovisi collection of antique statuary is now permanently placed in this museum,--a collection that includes the "Ludovisi Mars;"
"Hercules," with a cornucopia; the "Hermes of Theseus," the "Discobolus Hermes;" the "Venus of Gnidus" as copied by Praxiteles; the "Dying Medusa;" the "Ludovisi Juno," which Winckelmann declares to be the finest head of Juno extant, a Greek work of the fourth century; a "Cupid and Psyche;" the two "Muses of Astronomy" and of "Epic Poetry," "Urania and Calliope;" "an Antoninus;" the largest sarcophagus known; a "Tragic Mask" (colossal) in rosso antico; a bust of "Marcus Aurelius" in bronze, and many other priceless works.
The splendor of scenic setting for art in the magnificent salons of the Casino Borghese has never been surpa.s.sed. They are, perhaps, the most impressive of any Roman interior, with lofty, splendidly decorated ceilings and walls, where recess and niche hold priceless sculptures.
The splendor of these salons, indeed, quite exceeds description. In the princ.i.p.al one is a group on one wall--a colossal relief--representing Marcus Curtius plunging into the gulf in the Forum. There are busts of the twelve Caesars; there are busts of all the Roman Emperors, with alabaster draperies, placed on pedestals of red granite. There are Bernini"s "Apollo and Daphne;" Canova"s celebrated statue of Princess Pauline Borghese (the sister of Napoleon I); Bernini"s "David" and "aeneas and Anchises;" Thorwaldsen"s "Faun;" "Diana," "Isis," "Juno," and many other celebrated cla.s.sic statues. All the great paintings which were formerly in the Palazzo Borghese--over six hundred in all--are now in this casino. The great work in this collection is Raphael"s "Entombment of Christ," painted in his twenty-fourth year. t.i.tian"s "Divine and Human Love;" Raphael"s portrait of "Caesar Borgia;"
Correggio"s "Danae;" Domenichino"s "c.u.maean Sibyl" and "Diana;" Peruzzi"s "Venus Leaving the Bath;" Van Dyck"s "Crucifixion;" t.i.tian"s "Venus and Cupid;" and "Annunciation," by Paul Veronese; Vasari"s "Lucrezia Borgia;" Botticelli"s "Holy Family and Angels;" Van Dyck"s "Entombment;"
Carlo Dolce"s "Mater Dolorosa," and Sa.s.soferrato"s "Three Ages of Man"
are among the great masterpieces in this museum.
The Villa Borghese (by which is meant the park) is some three miles in extent, and was laid out some two hundred years ago by Cardinal Borghese. As recently as 1902 it was purchased by the government for three million francs, and its official name is now "Villa Comunale Umberto Primo." These grounds contain fountains, antique statues, tablets, small temples and many inscriptions, with statues of aesculapius and Apollo, and an Egyptian gateway. They are open all day to every one freely and are one of the great attractions of Rome.
The great palaces of Rome are of later date than those of Florence.
There are some eighty princ.i.p.al ones, of which the Palazzos Veneziano, Farnese, Doria, Barberini, Colonna, and the Rospigliosi (containing Guido"s famous "Aurora") are the most important. The Farnesina Palace contains some of the most interesting pictures in Rome, and the traditions of the residence of Agostino Chigi, during the pontificate of Leo X, are still found in Rome,--traditions of the lavish magnificence of the entertainments given here to the Pope and the Cardinals.
The Monte Pincio is the famous drive of Roman society, and the promenade around the brow of the hill offers one of the most enchanting views of the world. Near the Trinita di Monti stands the historic Villa Medici, the French Academy of which the great Carolus Duran is now the director.
The view across the valley in which lies the Piazza di Spagna, the river to St. Peter"s, from the Villa Medici, is one of the finest in Rome.
The architecture of the garden facade is attributed to Michael Angelo.
These gardens have a circuit of more than a mile, laid out in the formal rectangles and densely bordered walks of the Italian custom. All manner of old fragments of sculpture are scattered through them,--a torso, a broken bust, a ruined statue, an old and partly broken fountain,--and entablatures and reliefs are seen in the walls on every hand. No sound of the city ever penetrates into this dense foliage which secludes the gardens of the famous Villa Medici.
One of the features of Roman life is the fashionable drive on Monte Pincio in the late afternoons. An hour or two before sunset the terrace of the Piazza Trinita di Monti begins to be thronged with pedestrians, who lean over the marble bal.u.s.trade, gazing at the incomparable pictured panorama where the vast dome of St. Peter"s, the dense pines of the Villa Pamphilia-Doria on the Janiculum, and the dark cypress groves on Monte Mario loom up against the golden western sky.
Compared with the extensive parks of modern cities the Monte Pincio would prefigure itself as a drive for fairies alone. It comprises a few acres only, thickly decorated with trees and shrubbery, with a casino for the orchestra that plays every afternoon, and a circular carriage drive so limited in extent that the same carriage comes in view every few minutes.
The Eternal City has had so many birthdays that one would fancy them to have become negligible; but it was announced on April 21 of 1907 that the date was a special anniversary, and she took on aspects of festivity. The munic.i.p.al palaces and museums were hung with tapestries, flags were flying from the Capitol, the munic.i.p.al guards were all in full dress uniform and the munic.i.p.al orchestra played in the Piazza Colonna. The historic bell began ringing at eight in the morning in peals that were well calculated to call the Caesars from their tombs and which might, indeed, have been mistaken for the final trumpet calls of Gabriel. But the Romans take their pleasures rather sadly and sternly,--not like the light-hearted Florentines in song and laughter, or with the joyous abandon of the Neapolitans,--so there was no special manifestation on the part of the populace, and the day, cold, gloomy, and cheerless, did not inspire gayety.
When the Republic of Rome was established (on Feb. 9, 1849) a provisional government was appointed. In March of that year Mazzini proposed that the a.s.sembly should appoint a Committee of War, and it was decided to send troops to Piedmont. Later a triumvirate, consisting of Mazzini, Saffi, and Armellini, was formed, but disaster was near. In April the French troops landed at Civita Vecchia, and the Italians prepared to defend their country from the control of Louis Napoleon.
Mazzini is said to have been "the life and the soul" of this defence.
But the Republic was doomed, and when it had fallen the Pope returned, only under the protection of the French. But the French Empire, too, was doomed to fall; and when Garibaldi transferred his successes to Victor Emmanuel, the monarchy was consolidated by the union of Rome with Italy, and the present "Via Venti Settembre" in Rome--the street named to commemorate that 20th of September, 1870, on which the Italian troops entered the city and the Papal reign ended--perpetuates the story of those eventful days. "Victor Emmanuel, Cavour, and Garibaldi have been designated, along with Mazzini, as the founders of the modern Italy,"
said Dr. William Clarke, "but a broad line divides Mazzini from the others." Dr. Clarke sees between Cavour and Mazzini "the everlasting conflict between the idealist and the man of the world. The former," he continues, "stands by the intellect and the conscience; the latter by the limitations of actual fact and the practical difficulties of the case," and Dr. Clarke notes further:--
"It was pre-eminently Mazzini who gave to Italy the breath of a new life, who taught her people constancy in devotion to an ideal good. Prophets are rarely successful in their own day, and so it has been with the prophet of modern Italy. The making of Italy has not proceeded in the way he hoped it would; for the Italians, who are an eminently subtle and diplomatic people, have apparently thought it best to bend to the hard facts by which they have been surrounded. But if, as Emerson teaches, facts are fluid to thought, we may believe that the ideas of Mazzini will yet prevail in the nation of his birth, and that he may yet be regarded as the spiritual father of the future Italian commonwealth. For of him, if of any modern man, we may say that he
"Saw distant gates of Eden gleam, And did not dream it was a dream.""