modern houses. I touched his little slippers, which are preserved, together with his two walking sticks, in a tiny cabinet where he used to write, and where I wondered how he found space to stretch his legs. The slippers are very small and of a peculiar, rather Eastern, shape, and very little worn. Altogether, I could not realise the lapse of time between his date and ours. The little sketches round the walls of the room, which is furnished with yellow satin chairs and sofa, are very admirable and free. The Titian hung here is a very splendid bit of colour. This was a very impressive visit. The bronze bust of M. A. by Giovanni da Bologna is magnificent; it gives immense character, and must be the image of the man.”
On October 21st I bade good-bye to Bellucci. His system forbade praise for the pupil, which was rather depressing, but he relaxed sufficiently to tell my father at parting that I would do things (Farà delle cose) and that I was untiring (istancabile), taking study seriously, not like the others (le altre). With this I had to be content. He had drilled me in drawing more severely than I could have been drilled in England. For that purpose he had kept me a good deal to painting in monochrome, so as to have my attention absorbed by the drawing and modelling and chiaroscuro of an object without the distraction of colour. He also said to me I could now walk alone (può camminare da sè), and with this valedictory good-bye we parted. Being free, I spent the remaining time at Florence in visits to the churches and galleries with my father and sister, seeing works I had not had time to study up till then.
“October 22nd.– We first went to see the Ghirlandajos at Santa Trinità, which I had not yet seen. They are fading, as, indeed, most of the grand old frescoes are doing, but the heads are full of character, and the grand old costumes are still plainly visible. From thence we went to the small cloister called dello Scalzo, where are the exquisite monochromes of Andrea del Sarto. Would that this cloister had been roofed in long ago, for the weather has made sad havoc of these precious things. Being in monochrome and much washed out, they have a faded look indeed; but how the drawing tells! What a master of anatomy was he, and yet how unexaggerated, how true: he was content to limit himself to Nature; knew where to draw the line, had, in fact, the reticence which Michael Angelo couldn’t recognise; could stop at the limit of truth and good taste through which the great sculptor burst with coarse violence. There are some backs of legs in those frescoes which are simply perfect. These works illustrate the events in the life of John the Baptist. Here, again, how marvellous and admirable are all the hands, not only in drawing, but in action, how touching the heads, how grand and thoroughly artistic the draperies and the poses of the figures. A splendid lesson in the management of drapery is, especially, the fresco to the right of the entrance, the ‘Vision of Zacharias.’ There are four figures, two immediately in the foreground and at either extremity of the composition; the two others, seen between them, further off. The nearest ones are in draperies of the grandest and largest folds, with such masses of light and dark, of the most satisfying breadth; and the two more distant ones have folds of a slightly more complex nature, if such a word can be used with regard to such a thoroughly broadly treated work. This gives such contrast and relief between the near and distant figures, and the absence of the aid of colour makes the science of art all the more simply perceived. Most beautiful is the fresco representing the birth of St. John, though the lower part is quite lost. What consummate drapery arrangements! The nude figure vue de dos in the fresco of St. John baptising his disciples is a masterly bit of drawing. Though the paint has fallen off many parts of these frescoes, one can trace the drawing by the incision which was made on the wet plaster to mark all the outlines preparatory to beginning the painting.”
These are but a few of my art student’s impressions of this fondly-remembered Florentine epoch, which are recorded at great length in the Diary for my own study. And now away to Rome!
CHAPTER VI
ROME
THAT was a memorable journey to Rome by Perugia. I have travelled more than once by that line, and the more direct one as well, since then, and I feel as though I could never have enough of either, though to be on the road again, as we now can be by motor, would be still greater bliss. But the original journey took place so long ago that it has positively an old-world glamour about it, and a certain roughness in the flavour, so difficult to enjoy in these times of Pulman cars and Palace Hotels, which make all places taste so much alike. The old towns on the foothills of the Apennines drew me to the left, and the great sunlit plains to the right, of the carriage in an embarras de choix as we sped along. Cortona, Arezzo, Castiglione – Fiorentin – each little old city putting out its predecessor, as it seemed to me, as more perfect in its picturesque effect than the one last seen. It was the story of the Rhine castles and villages over again. The Lake of Trasimene appeared on our right towards sundown, a sheet of still water so tender in its tints and so lonely; no town on its malaria-stricken banks; a boat or two, water-fowl among the rushes and, as we proceeded, the great, magnified globe of the sun sinking behind the rim of the lake. We were going deep into the Umbrian Hills, deep into old Italy; the deeper the better. We neared Perugia, where we passed the night, before dark, and saw the old brown city tinged faintly with the after-glow, afar off on its hill. A massive castle stood there in those days which I have not regretted since, as it symbolised the old time of foreign tyranny. It is gone now, but how mediæval it looked, frowning on the world that darkening evening. Hills stood behind the city in deep blue masses against a sky singularly red, where a great planet was shining. There was a Perugino picture come to life for us! Even the little spindly trees tracing their slender branches on the red sky were in the true naïf Perugino spirit! How pleased we were! We rumbled in the four-horse station ’bus under two echoing gateways piercing the massive outer and inner city walls and along the silent streets, lit with rare oil lamps. Not a gas jet, aha! But we were to feel still more deeply mediæval, whether we liked it or not, for on reaching the Hotel de la Poste we found it was full, and had to wander off to seek what hostel could take us in through very dark, ancient streets. I will let the Diary speak:
“The facchino of the hotel conducted us to a place little better than a cabaret, belonging, no doubt, to a chum. I wouldn’t have minded putting up there, but Mamma knew better, and, rewarding the woman of the cabaret with two francs, much against her protestations, we went off up the steep street again and made for the ‘Corona,’ a shade better, close to the market place. My bedroom was as though it had once been a dungeon, so massive were the walls and deep the vaulting of the low ceiling. We went to bed almost immediately after our dinner, which was enlivened by the conversation of men who were eating at a neighbouring table, all, except a priest, with their hats on. One was very loquacious, shouting politics. He held forth about ‘Il Mastai,’ as he called His Holiness Pope Pius the Ninth, and flourished renegade Padre Giacinto in the priest’s face, the courteous and laconic priest’s eyebrows remaining at high-water mark all the time. The shouter went on to say that English was ‘una lingua povera e meschina’ (‘Poor and mean’!)”
The next morning before leaving we saw all that time allowed us of Perugia, the bronze statue of Pope Julius III. impressing me deeply. Indeed, there is no statue more eloquent than this one. Alas! the Italians have removed it from its right place, and when I revisited the city in 1900 I found the tram terminus in place of the Pope.
“October 27th.– After the morning’s doings in sunshine the day became sad, and from Foligno, where we had a long wait, the story is but of rain and dusk and night. We became more and more apathetic and bored, though we were roused up at the frontier station, where I saw the Papal gendarmes and gave the alarm. Mamma went on her knees in the carriage and cried, ‘Viva Il Papa Rè!’ We all joined in, drinking his health in some very flat ‘red grignolino’ we had with us. I became more and more excited as we neared the centre of the earth, the capital of Christendom, the highest city in the world. In the rainy darkness we ran into the Roman station, which might have been that of Brighton for aught we could see. I strained my eyes right and left for Papal uniforms, and was rewarded by Zouaves and others, and lots of French (of the Legion) into the bargain.
Then a long wait, in the ’bus of the
