nova. In the midst of the universal degeneracy of Venetian morals, Emo proved himself a citizen. It was he who, after the dispersion of his fleet by a tempest at Eleos, and the loss of two vessels, a disaster in which Emo, having fallen into the sea, narrowly escaped drowning, came to the senate and said, "Allow my property to be employed in repairing the losses the republic has just experienced." This great man might probably have prevented the ignominy of the last moments of his country; courage and honour, extinct in the councils of the republic, still survived in the arsenal; and, as if the element which first afforded refuge to the founders of Venice, was ever to animate, excite, and reinvigorate their descendants, the last of the Venetians was a sailor. CHAPTER XXI. Theatres.-Saint Benedict.- La Fenice.-S. Peruc chioi;—Buratti.—Carnival. The theatres of Venice are neither destitute of charms nor splendour. I saw represented, in 1828, at the old St. Benedict theatre, a national and very lively comedy of the advocate Sografi, le Donne avvocate. A young man paid his addresses to three Italian girls, and promised to marry them: in order to support their claims, they went before the judge; the Venetian gained the cause, and espoused her lover, after having pleaded with eloquence and in the Venetian dialect. The piece was played with spirit and to nature. La Fenice is one of the first theatres of Italy and the largest; it holds about three thousand persons. By means of a Canova, always disinterested when there was question of patriotic monuments, put no price ou his work. The senate decreed him an annuity of one hundred ducats; besides which he received a gold medal of the value of one hundred sequins, presenting the mausoleum of Emo, and on the reverse an inscription very honourable to the artist. The payment of the pension having experienced some interruption in 1797, at the fall of the republic, Bonaparte, who was by chance informed of it, wrote to Canova expressing his interest for him and assuring him of his protection. After the cession of Venice to Austria, the pension was restored to him when at Vienna, but under the strange condition of chosing that city for his residence: he nevertheless obtained a dis, ensation from it, having offered to direct gratuitously, while at Rome, | drawbridge thrown over an adjoining court, the scene can be considerably lengthened, and on certain occasions a jet d'eau shoots up, raising its crest to the ceiling. I have not been present at this kind of prodigy, which must be more fantastic than effective. La Fenice, burat down in 1836, is already tastefully rebuilt. Of the four grand operas which are represented here during the theatrical season (from the 26th of December to the 20th of March), two are generally new and composed by the best masters. Operas are occasionally performed in the spring and in autumn, and our most celebrated dancers have appeared upon this stage. It was at La Fenice that S. Locatelli made the first essays of his astro-lamp, and there this theatrical luminary arose for the first time. The experiment tried since at our Grand Opéra obtained some credit for the inventor, but it is probable that this mode of lighting will never be practised there. The new system throws a brighter light upon the scenery and the decorations, but leaves the audience in comparative darkness: the worthy S. Locatelli, accustomed to the negligence, the freedom, the absence of vanity in Italian women, did not doubt in his own mind that the ladies of Paris would resign themselves to the obscurity into which he plunged their beauty and their attire. It is impossible to speak of the music of Venice without recalling to mind the Venetian airs of Perucchini, so lively, natural, and graceful, which accompany so well the poetry of Pietro Buratti, a popular Anacreon, author of more than seventy thousand verses, a poet admirable for fire and originality. These little pieces are truly chefs-d'œuvre.' his favorite abode, some of the imperial pupils. * Buratti, deceased Oct. 20, 1832, aged somewhat less than sixty years, had also translated Juvenal into the Venetian dialect. This smart passage from one of his letters, cited by his biographer S. Paravis, frankly explains the style that he had chosen : "Alleno delia così detta bella società per quelle noie mortali che non ne vanno mai scompagnate, to viveva con tali uomini che non davan luogo a versi che fra i bicchleri, e li volevan conditi di sali corrispondenti all' ottuso loro palato. Bisognava dunque di necessità rinforzar la dose per essere inteso e gustato. Ecco il vero motivo del genere prescelto a quello che più si confaceva alla tempra della mia anima, capacissima per intervalli delle più dolcl emozioni. Che s' ella mi domanda la spiegazione di questo fenomeno, lo non saprei da The carnival of Venice, though still the longest in Italy (the amusements Commence the day after Christmas, and the masked balls on twelfth-day), is barely the shadow of what it was formerly: this kind of institution misses the ancient rigorous government of Venice, which it seemed to mitigate. At the present day this brilliant carnival is only composed of the people, the higher class scarcely joining in it, and there are not six hundred masqueraders wandering in gondolas, or in the square of St. Mark and the Piaz Letta. CHAPTER XXII. Courtesans. and had their indemnity and endowment. The senate, in order to divert the young men also from politics, and to maintain its power, took on itself the care of supplying the houses of the courtesans with the most beautiful women, whom it recruited in Epirus and the islands of the Archipelago. At Venice," says Montesquieu, "the laws force the nobles to be moderate. So accustomed are they to parsimony, that none but the courtesans can make them part with their money. Advantage is taken of this medium for the support of industry; the most contemptible women expend without danger, whilst their tributaries lead a life of the greatest obscurity." The most cunning Venetian courtesans would, I believe, have had some trouble of Venice, who are much more niggardly to extract any thing from the new masters than the ancient Venetian nobles. Per The celebrated beauties, noticed by Montaigne and Rousseau, philosophers of the same school, which it is not surprising to find there, are one of the by-haps the suppression of these creatures gone peculiarities of Venice. The French police had already extinguished the two lights that formerly shone at the windows of these courtesans, who were entirely suppressed by Austria in 1815, at the very moment of the restitution of the four famous bronze horses, and when they remounted their original place so that the Venetians said, in a murmuring tone, that the emperor, who gave them back their horses, might as well have left them their vacche: an Italian jest, difficult to translate. Morals have gained nothing by this rigour; the courtesan is replaced by the needy man's daughter, or by the Citizen's wife inclined to indulge her passions: and corruption, instead of flowing in a separate channel, infects the bosom of families. The ancient courtesans of Venice formed an institution which really served the cause of liberty, either by detecting sometimes important secrets, or ruining men whose fortunes might have rendered them dangerous. Therefore, the senate, who towards the end of the last century had endeavoured to disperse them, was obliged to recall them by a decree; they described them in this document under the name of nostre benemerite meretrici: they were inviolate and sacred, has been less a measure of morals than of finance, another kind of reduction al together in the spirit of the economical government of Austria. CHAPTER XXIII. Environs.-Islands.--Isle of Murano.-Saint Michael. I I visited, in September 1828, the church of St. Michael in Murano, where expected to find the body of Fra Paolo, which was to have been transferred there. It had been discovered in the month of July, in the demolition of an altar of the ancient church of the Servites. At the death of Fra Paolo, the senate, owing to the threats of Urban VIII., had not dared to erect the monument which had been decreed, on account of his immense popularity, to this extraordinary man, theologian, historian, mathematician, and anatomist, and the marble was withdrawn from the studio of the sculptor. Grosley, in 1764, was struck with the nudity of this tomb, without epitaph or any kind of inscription; we see by this called Cà Rampana, from the neighbouring palace of the illustrious family of that name, from whence proceeds the injurious denomination of carampana. See post, book VII, chap. ii. how it came to be forgotten. The existing monument was erected at the expense of the city, by no means a rare occurrence. The sort of resurrection of Fra Paolo may be likened to the exhumation of other celebrated dead of whom we have previously spoken: in default of men, our age produces at least some illustrious remains. The inscription on the sepulchre of the monk Eusebius, by Aldus Manutius, encrusted on a slab of marble ornamented by pretty sculptures, is curious and characteristic.3 Such is the merit of the arabesques and ornaments which decorate the front, the doors, the choir of Saint Michael in Murano and the grand chapel, that the Venice Drawing Academy has net judged them less fit than the antique to form the taste of its pupils, and has consequently taken a great number of models. A simple stone, upon the pavement, indicates the spot where reposes Morelli, the late learned librarian of Saint Mark. The epitaph, composed by his pupil, his friend and worthy successor, the abbé Bettio, simply recapitulates the labours, the services, the renown, the dignities of this great bibliographer, and that readiness to oblige, the duty and first quality of men placed at the head of great literary treasures. The Emiliana chapel adjoining the church, is a small temple of the commencement of the sixteenth century, abounding with taste and elegance. The church of Saint Peter and Paul offers some remarkable paintings: St. Blase seated, surrounded by saints, by Palma; a fine Annunciation, by Pordenone; St. Jerome in the Desert, by Paolo Veronese; a Descent from the Cross, of a character at once grand, expressive, and original, by Giuseppe Salviati; the Virgin upon her throne, with the infant Jesus and saints, a curious work of the Vivarini; the Virgin, The body of Fra Paolo is now at Saint Michael in Murano; upon the slab of white marble bordered with bardiglio (sky-coloured marble of Carrara), is this inscription, by S. Emmanuel Cigogna: Ossa Theol. Reip. venetæ buc translata A. MDCCCXXVIII. | | two angels, and the doge Barbarigo kneeling, a large celebrated painting by Giovanni Bellini ; St. Agatha in prison, visited by St. Peter, a correct and sublime composition, by Benedetto Caliari, the brother, the assistant and the friend of Paolo Veronese; the Martyrdom of St. Stephen, by Leandro Bassano; an Assumption, by Marco Basaiti, a brilliant artist, of Greek origin, of the commencement of the sixteenth century; the Virgin, some saints, and the senator Lorenzo Pasqualigo, by the elder Palma; and the Baptism of Jesus Christ, by Tintoretto. The ceiling of the church of the Angels, by Penuachi, enjoys some reputation: in the centre is the Crowning of the Virgin; around, thirty-four compartments present figures of apostles, prophets, and angels; the colouring of this ceiling is much better than the design. The church of Saint Donatus, called the Duomo of Murano, is of a GrecoArabian architecture of the twelfth century: the pavement of the temple is inlaid with elegant mosaic-work of the same epoch, and ten columns of Greek marble support the nave. The paintings are interesting: a demilune representing the Virgin with the infant Jesus, and some figures, is a good performance by Lazaro Sebastiani, of the year 1484 ; the ancon of carved wood painted, of 1310, representing Bishop St. Donatus, with the two small figures of the podestà Memmo and his wife, is curious for the costumes. A mosaic of the Virgin appears to be nearly as ancient as the temple. The Descent of the Holy Ghost in the Cenaculum, by Marco Vecellio, is fine. The island of Murano still contains the manufactures of looking-glass, crystal, and pearls, for which Venetian industry was formerly renowned; but the two first cannot, at the present day, compete * See ante, book v. chap. xxi. 3 Lector, parumper siste. rem miram leges. Edens, bibens nil prorsus et usque suos monens with the fabrics of France and England. The Venetians learnt the art of glassmaking from the Greeks, who were very jealous of their secret, which they had preserved from antique tradition. The sand of Tyre, which gave the transparency to the glass of the ancients, might also have been employed by the Venetians when they made the conquest of the same shores. The manufactories of large varnished pearls, to the number of three, bave closely preserved the secret of this cheap and showy fabrication, which allows to the moderately rich the splendour and luxury of the wealthy. But this frivolous industry, like that of works of fashion, cannot prove a sure resource for a state, since it does not provide for real and durable wants. The exportations of these articles are trifling, and Uncertain; nor has the trade been suffielent to prevent the ruin of Venetian Commerce. CHAPTER XXIV. Isle of Torcello.-Saint Fosca.-Lido. The charming isle of Torcello is still remarkable for its monuments. The Duomo bears the impress of the East and of the middle ages: the front, the roof, and the pavement are inlaid with precious mosaics representing symbols, and circumstances of sacred history; marbie columns support the nave; the holy water vase appears to have been a heathen altar, and a marble pulpit rises behind the choir, in the midst of semi-circular steps. The magnificence of this temple, The neighbouring small temple of Saint Fosca, a work of the ninth century, whose materials were taken from the ruins of Roman edifices, is one of those primitive monuments of barbarous times, imitated, renovated, and restored with elegance, like certain literary masterpieces of the epochs of civilisation. At Saint Fosca is interred the skilful painter Cappuccino, who, having escaped from his convent, found an asylum at Venice against the pursuits of his order. The tomb has for inscription these words: Bernardus Strozzius, pictorum splendor, Liguria decus, a flattering eulogium in the vicinity of the great Venetian masters. A writer of a lively imagination has given a poetical description of the Lido, it would be hazardous to risk another description after his, that all the world has read. It is, however, to be regretted that it contains nothing on the castle of Saint Andrew, a masterpiece of military architecture, by San Micheli, monument of a victory, which, in its desolation, breathes still the strength and ancient warlike magnificence of Venice.3 It was upon the firm and solitary bank of the Lido, that Byron took his daily ride. Had he died at Venice, it was his wish to have reposed there near a certain stone, the limit of some field, not far from the little fort, so as to escape, by a wild caprice, his native land, too heavy for his bones, and the abhorred funeral obsequies of his relatives. CHAPTER XXV. founded in the year 1008, by bishop The isle of Saint Lazaro.-Armenian Convent.— Orso Orseolo, bears testimony to the ancient wealth of Venice and the splendour of its monuments even before the achievement of its superb old basilic. The churches of Saint Geminian and of Saint Job the Almoner, by Sansovino and Scarpagnino, Bere, sccording to the opinion of Cicognara, only mitations of the small temple of Saint Fosca. The al and curious work published in 1825 by Mr. Robert, superintendent of the Saint-Geneviève library, under the title of Fables inédites des xile, Let XIV necles, et Fables de La Fontaine, rapchets de celles de tous les auteurs qui avaient, iui, traité les mêmes sujets, wilbout diminishthe glory of La Fontaine, indicates the obscure des of the Fables choisies, mises en vers, as he has self entitled bis immortal collection. The pretty piece of Broeys is only a feeble imitation of the an popular farce of Patelin, by Pierre Blanchet. Mechitar.-Kover.-Moonlight at Venice. The little island of St. Lazaro, the most graceful of those that rise out of 2 M. Charles Nodier, Jean Sbogar. 3 The most remarkable monument of San MIchell's science, says M. Quatremère de Quincy, is the fortress of Lido. It had been reckoned impossible for him to give a firm foundation to such an enormous mass in a marshy soil, continually assalled by the waves of the sea and the ebb and flow. He effected his purpose, however, and with great success. In constructing it, he made use of the stone of Istria, so well adapted to resist the weather. The mass is so well fixed that it might be taken for a hewn rock. Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages des plus célébres architectes, l. 1. 164. for ever the isle of St. Lazaro for a retreat. In the sacristy is the tomb of Count Stephen Aconz Kover, a noble Hungarian, archbishop of Sinnia, and the third abbot-general, who resided sixty-seven years at the monastery and died in 1824, after having enlarged and perfected the Armenian institution, at this day a tribunal of language. This illustrious abbot, poet, and scholar, author of a good universal geography of which eleven volumes have appeared, the two others having perished in a fire at Constantinople, taught his dialect to the French orientalist Lourdet, who died in 1785, whilst on his return from Venice to Paris where Kover was also called, and where he would have professed but for the troubles of the revolution. the bosom of the lagoon, is inhabited by | the Armenian monks, an affable and la- | borious sect, who publish, in the Armenian tongue, good editions of the most useful and esteemed books, and devote themselves to the education of their youthful compatriots. With its convent, lyceum, and printing-office, this house might reclaim the most passionate enemy of monastic institutions. The abbot-general and archbishop, Placidus Sukias Somel, of Constantinople, is an accomplished prelate whose manners possess a kind of oriental dignity not destitute of grace or mildness. The library, to which has been added a cabinet of natural philosophy, counts about ten thousand volumes and four hundred oriental manuscripts, principally Armenian; like every thing else, it is in perfect order. Lord Byron, during the winter, went there for some hours every morning, in order to take Armenian lessons of Dom Pas-regarded the Armenian monks as herequale the librarian; Byron, dissatisfied, tired of the world, and satiated with most things of this life, sought to penetrate the difficulties of an Eastern idiom; he found no interest but in difficulties, and this impetuous poet studied a grave, cold, and historical literature of translations and polemics. It is through error that an esteemed historian and a celebrated traveller 3 have Des tics; they have always been good catho- The Armenian monks called Mechitarists take this name from their founder, The return to Venice at night, by the abbot Mechitar of Petro, born at Se-moonlight, is one of the finest scenes of baste in Armenia, who, in the year 1700, assembled at Constantinople several monks his compatriots, after which be established himself at Modon, whence he passed with his congregation to Venice after the loss of the Morea by the republic, which generously accorded to him Two first-rate editions of the Chronicle of Eusebius have been given after the Armenian manuscript in the library of the convent of the isle of Saint Lazaro; one at Milan, in 1818, a quarto volume, by S. Mai, and P. Zohrab an Armenian who treacherously separated himself from the other monks the edition printed the same year at the convent, two volumes folio, and published by P. J. B. Aucher, is infinitely preferable; the monks had sent one of their body as far as Constantinople, in order to compare afresh their Eusebius with the manuscript of which it was a copy. The Armenian monks have also conceived the project of giving a complete collection and critical editions of the writers of their nation from the fourth century, the most brilliant epoch and Augustan age of Armenian literature, to the fifteenth century. Since this time there appears to have been no original productions. These monks have already prepared for the press all that remains of the authors who Italy. The silence of the city and the oriental aspect of Saint Mark and the Ducal palace, have at this hour something enchanting and mysterious, and the pale splendour reflected on the sea and the marble palaces contrast with the black gondola gliding solitarily over the have written from the fourth century to the commencement of the eleventh. But such an undertaking still requires much time, labour, research, and outlay, which do not permit the hope that the publication will soon take place. Three volumes of a small portable collection of the selected works, executed with much care, appeared in 1826, 1827, and 1828, as if to give, remarked M. SaintMartin (Journal des Savants, July 1829), a foretaste of the grand collection. P. Clakciak has recently published a second edition of his Armenian and Italian Dictionary, which has been highly spoken of by orientalists. For want, said be, of something flinty to break his thoughts against, he tortured himself with Armenian. Byron laboured at the English part of an English-Armenian grammar published at the convent of Saint Lazara. Mem., vol. III. chap. vill and I, and vol. IV., chap. VI. 3 M. Daru, Lady Morgan. |
