«HtA 
 
 PLAIN- 
 TOWNS 
 
 ITALY 
 
 EGERTON'R' WILLIAMS JR. 
 

 CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 FROM 
 E> J. B< 
 
Cornell University Library 
 DG 674.W72 
 
 Plain-towns of Italy; thf cities of old V 
 
 3 1924 019 178 684 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of tiiis book is in 
 tine Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924019178684 
 
^p ©aerton E. ^tlllams, ^v. 
 
 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY: THE CITIES 
 OF OLD VENETIA. Fully Illustrated. 
 
 HILL TOWNS OF ITALY. Fully Illus- 
 trated. 
 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 Boston and New York 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
rnixE. PIAZZA vr 
 

 ITTORIO EMAXUELE. 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 %f)t Cities of mt} Wmetia 
 
 BY 
 
 EGERTON R. WILLIAMS, Jr. 
 
 Author of " Hill-Tovms of Italy," " Ridolfo," etc. 
 
 ILLUSTRATED FROM 
 PHOTOGRAPHS 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 
 
 1911 
 
COPYRIGHT, I9II, BY EGERTON R. WILLIAMS, JR. 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 Published October jqil 
 
 /\]o^^S'/ 
 
To 
 
 the truest, most faithful, and most reliable of friends 
 
 Ernest Botd Millard 
 
 whose lifelong constancy and sterling character have pre- 
 served in the oft clouded heavens a circle of brightness that 
 has never narrowed, this work is dedicated as a slight mark 
 of the affectionate gratitude and esteem for which I can find 
 no adequate expression. 
 
Oh! land, to mem'ry and to freedom dear. 
 Land of the melting lyre and conqu'ring spear. 
 Land of the vine-clad hill, the fragrant grove. 
 Of arts and arms, of genius and of love, 
 Hear, fairest Italy ! Though now no more 
 Thy glitt'ring eagles awe th' Atlantic shore. 
 Nor at thy feet the gorgeous Orient flings 
 The blood -bought treasures of her tawny kings; 
 Though vanished all that formed thine old renown. 
 The laurel garland, and the jewelled crown, 
 Th' avenging poniard, the victorious sword. 
 Which reared thine empire, or thy rights restored; 
 Yet still the constant Muses haunt thy shore. 
 And love to linger where they dwelt of yore. 
 
 Macauiat. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 The issuance of this volume, designed as a companion 
 book to the Hill-Towns of Italy, marks the second 
 step in the execution of a project which was conceived 
 at. the time of the latter's production; and which was 
 confirmed in my mind by the kind reception accorded 
 the Hill-Towns by the public. Eight years, it is true, 
 have since passed; but it was not until four years ago, 
 on laying aside all other business and coming to Italy 
 to dwell, that I was able at last to devote myself to 
 the preparation of this work, — a work exceedingly 
 more laborious than the former, and requiring far more 
 time for its due completion, both from the nature of 
 the ground it covers and from the wider scope which 
 I have endeavored to give it, but, like the former, a 
 work of love. 
 
 From the hill-towns of central Italy I turned by 
 contrast to the great northern plain, seeking, as I had 
 done with the mountain-regions, that section of it 
 which is most filled with interest of every kind. Such 
 is the province of Venetia. It is a daring thing, I know, 
 to oflfer at this day a book dealing with cities so oft 
 written about as Padua and Verona, each of which, 
 also, requires and has received a full volume for its 
 entire elucidation. They are, however, but a small 
 though necessary part of this work; which endeavors 
 to be an exposition of the whole region of old Venetia, 
 setting forth all its towns and countryside worth visit- 
 ing, in the realms of history, art, and natural beauty, 
 including the varied peoples and their ways, with re- 
 ferences to a good part of the authorities who have at 
 
X PREFACE 
 
 any time written upon those subjects; taking the reader 
 with me as a companion in my wanderings, from day 
 to day. 
 
 Most of the towns covered — especially in the dis- 
 tricts of the Polesine, the Trevisan Marches, and Fri- 
 uli, more than half of the total number — have been 
 very little and but casually written about in our 
 language, some of them not at all; while in the case of 
 the larger cities, their political and artistic history and 
 associations had to be collated from a large number 
 of different sources. Thus the field which I have aimed 
 at has not hitherto been occupied : the gathering within 
 one cover of all that information and description 
 which may enable the fireside reader to see the whole 
 of the lovely Veneto through my eyes, and which may 
 at the same time act as a helpful guide to the hurried 
 traveler. "Whether I have succeeded in this aim, it 
 remains for the reader to decide. 
 
 Venetia should be visited and read about, for the 
 same reasons that make it the most beautiful and 
 fascinating section of that wondrous plain, for which 
 the nations of man have struggled and bled since the 
 dawn of civilization. The story of the Veneto surpasses 
 in interest and significance even that of Lombardy or 
 Emilia, and cannot be too closely grasped by him who 
 would know the gradations of human progress. Its 
 towns are deathless monuments on the advancing 
 path of human culture, liberty, and the science of free 
 government. 
 
 Under the Romans, mighty Padua was the third 
 city of the Empire, — following only upon Rome and 
 Cadiz; Verona and Brescia were also centres of the 
 first magnitude, and Cividale and Aquileia were the 
 guardians of the frontier; for from Padua to the latter 
 marched the great highway to the Orient, and from 
 
PREFACE xi 
 
 Verona and her neighbor led the teeming arteries of 
 commerce across the Alps. Under the Goths, Odoacer, 
 Theodoric, and their successors held royal sway upon 
 the Adige, where Alboin subsequently ruled his Lom- 
 bards, and fell by the assassins' steel. In fact, with 
 the fall of Rome the fount and centre of Italian power 
 shifted to the northern plain, to its industrious cities, 
 who conserved within their walls all that remained 
 of Roman knowledge, law, and customs, commingling 
 not with the barbarians, preserving the freedom and 
 handicrafts of their citizens, asserting through the 
 dark ages the individualities and the rights of Roman 
 municipalities, uniting in the glorious Lombard 
 League to shake from their land the oppressive rule of 
 the foreign emperors, — until they burst from the 
 long shadow as the leaders and propagators, with 
 Florence, of the rising Renaissance. 
 
 Nothing is more inspiring than the annals of Padua, 
 Verona, Brescia, and Vicenza in those four hundred 
 years succeeding the end of barbaric rule, from the 
 loosening of the Prankish grip to the middle of the thir- 
 teenth century, when as indomitable little republics, 
 fighting oflF the pretensions of Pope and Emperor, 
 advancing steadily the causes of human knowledge, 
 civilization, and free government, while London and 
 Paris lay still in the mire of savagery, they embellished 
 their paved piazzas with those marvelous series of 
 churches and civic buildings, constructed with an art 
 drawn from their own untutored minds and expressing 
 their own vivid individualities, which still demon- 
 strate to our wondering eyes how lightly upon them 
 lay that shadow of the Middle Age ! Then was founded 
 that great university which drew its scholars by the 
 thousands from every country on the globe, which for 
 centuries placed Padua far in the van of human 
 
xii PREFACE 
 
 thought and progress, and disseminated her culture 
 through the barbaric nations of the north. Followed 
 at a distance by the institutions of Verona and Vicenza, 
 it led the way from mental obscurity into the bright 
 fields of Humanism. 
 
 In the succeeding era of the despots, the Veneto 
 maintained its leading position. In the Polesine it 
 produced that resplendent race of tyrants, the oldest 
 and most cultured of all, who from their conquest of 
 that district descended upon Ferrara, Modena, and 
 Reggio, placing the proud name of Este amongst the 
 antecedents of all royal lines. From the Trevisan 
 Marches appeared that most famous and powerful of 
 early despots, Ezzelino da Romano, who reduced the 
 whole province beneath his bloody yoke, and has left 
 in many a town his still visible and fearful imprint. 
 The subsequent Delia Carrara of Padua, and Delia 
 Scala of Verona, stood foremost among the tyrants 
 of the dawning Renaissance, illustrious for their con- 
 quests as for their patronage of science, literature, 
 and the arts, and they began the remodeling of their 
 subject cities on the alluring lines of to-day. After 
 them came the mightier power which caused their fall, 
 the great Republic that stretched her resistless arms 
 slowly over the whole eastern plain, endowing it for 
 all time with the lustre of her name. Venice brought 
 to the long battling cities peace, order, prosperity, 
 and a benevolent, paternal rule that caused them to 
 leap forward in the onrush of the Renaissance, and 
 develop those magnificent schools of painting, sculpt- 
 ure, and architecture which made Venetia the jewel- 
 casket of Italy. 
 
 Thus was inaugurated that wonder-working era 
 which crowned the Veneto's historical importance 
 with a beauty that is possessed by no other province. 
 
PREFACE ' xiii 
 
 that spread through every town and hamlet, and was 
 bound into all the circumstances of their lives. Venice 
 became the adored ideal of her emulative subjects. 
 Vicenza's grand school of architecture, led by the im- 
 mortal Palladio, Scamozzi, and Calderari, united with 
 the great Sammicheli of Verona, and with Sansovino, 
 Coducci, and the other builders of the Sea Queen, in 
 remoulding the Veneto cities into a lustrous semblance 
 of their suzerain. In his home town Palladio erected 
 that marvelous Basilica which was the chef d'oeuvre 
 of the Renaissance. Over the field of sculpture pre- 
 sided the royal genius of Donatello, from the crown 
 of his glittering masterpieces at S. Antonio of Padua; 
 and his brilliant followers, Rizzo, Leopardi, and the 
 Lombardi, joined with Riccio, Sansovino, and the 
 latter's disciples, in the splendid adornment of the 
 Veneto's churches and piazzas. 
 
 In the field of painting the province rose still more 
 supreme. Cultured Padua had led the way at the 
 beginning of the trecento by calling to her Giotto him- 
 self, who left his imperishable masterpieces upon the 
 walls of her Church of the Arena; and Verona had 
 followed by producing that astonishing pair of artists, 
 Altichieri and d'Avanzo, whose works in Padua prove 
 them to have been Giotto's greatest successors of the 
 century. The quattrocento saw initiated in that same 
 city the momentous school of Squarcione, from whose 
 portals emerged the leading genius of the new age, 
 Andrea Mantegna; and the contemporary school of 
 Verona soared by the early cinquecento into such a 
 brilliancy, glowing with the gorgeous canvases of 
 Liberale, dai Libri, Caroto, the Morone, Cavaz- 
 zola, and a dozen other renowned masters, that no 
 one who has failed to study them can know the full 
 achievements of Itahan art. At Vicenza labored the 
 
xiv • PREFACE 
 
 refulgent Montagna and Buonconsiglio; at Castel- 
 franco, the superb Giorgione and his pupils; at Bas- 
 sano, the famous family of the Da Ponte. Brescia's 
 school reached its apogee in the lustrous works of 
 Moretto and Romanino. To the woods of Friuli the 
 eyes of the world were drawn by the exploits of Por- 
 denone, Pellegrino da S. Daniele, Giovanni da Udine, 
 and others. To the masterpieces of all these schools 
 and artists of the first rank, scattered sparkling 
 throughout the towns and villages of the plain, were 
 added those of the mighty Venetian masters, — from 
 the Bellini to Palma Vecchio, from Tiziano to Tiepolo. 
 Such is the feast of loveliness which the province 
 offers to the traveler, and which it has been my 
 pleasant duty to set forth in these pages. Accuracy 
 I have striven to maintain, without diffuseness or un- 
 necessary detail, repeating only so much of the history 
 and distinctive traits of each school and master, giving 
 only so much description of the leading works, as may 
 enable the reader to grasp their true significance and 
 beauty. "He who would comprehend the Italians 
 of the Renaissance," said Symonds, "must study their 
 art. . . . Not only is painting the art in which Italians, 
 among all the nations of the world, stand unapproach- 
 ably alone, but it is also the one that best enables us 
 to gauge their genius at the time when they impressed 
 their culture on the rest of Europe. In the history of 
 the Italian intellect, painting takes the same rank as 
 that of sculpture in Greece." — It may be that I 
 should apologize for intruding the lists of the principal 
 works in the great galleries of Padua, Vicenza, Ve- 
 rona, and Brescia; but the stay-at-home reader can 
 easily skip those paragraphs, and to the others they 
 will afford an enlightening conception of the delights 
 offered by those respective cities. 
 
PREFACE XV 
 
 Fascinating, however, as are the countless artistic 
 masterpieces and the picturesque architectural dress 
 of these towns of the Veneto, interesting as are their 
 historical and literary relics and associations, there is 
 still more to interest the stranger, in the natural 
 scenery of their settings and countrysides, and the 
 marked diversity of their appearance, customs, and 
 inhabitants. Let no one associate them, because they 
 are plain-towns, with the ideas of sameness or mono- 
 tony. The plain of the Veneto is so narrowed between 
 the Alps and the sea that the serrated mountain-ridges 
 ever loom vast and grim before the eyes, fancifully 
 backgrounding the towered city, or the rich cham- 
 paign, dotted with glistening Venetian villas and om- 
 nipresent campanili; while to the west of Padua the 
 landscape is further beautified by the far-seen chains 
 of the Euganean and Berici Hills. Every district has its 
 distinctive natural characteristics and charm, — from 
 the Veronese with its battlemented medieval strong- 
 holds, the Polesine with its numerous little walled 
 cities at the feet of the Euganei, and the Trevisan 
 Marches with their mighty rivers and high-perched 
 castles, to strange Friuli with its dark blanket of for- 
 est. The towns themselves display marked divers- 
 ities, in their picturesque piazzas dominated by grand 
 old churches and palaces, their looming medieval 
 towers, their neighboring mountain-summits, and the 
 generally present castle of the bygone signori, glower- 
 ing down from its adjacent eminence. 
 
 Among all those cities that owned the sovereignty of 
 Venice, two only are left without these pages : Bergamo 
 and Crema were for a time Venetian, it is true, but are 
 omitted because they were much more identified with 
 Lombardy, of which province they form integral parts, 
 being but a few miles distant from, and long governed 
 
xvi PREFACE 
 
 by, its capital, Milan, whose shadow has lain upon 
 them all the centuries. They would properly, there- 
 fore, take their places, and I hope will at some future 
 date, in a volume dealing with that region of the 
 Sforzas and the Visconti; which would also include 
 captivating Cremona, and the glorious Mantua of 
 the princely Gonzaghi. 
 
 The untraveled reader may wonder, though the 
 voyageur will not, why I have taken pains to mention 
 the names and qualities of many of the inns that enter- 
 tained me upon these sojourns. But it is unquestion- 
 able that there is no one piece of information so valu- 
 able to the success and comfort of a traveler, and so 
 eagerly sought for from his confreres, as judgment 
 founded upon personal experience of the hotels in a 
 district or city to which he may at any future date 
 pay a visit. At the risk, therefore, of criticism from the 
 few who are inclined to seek for base motives, but in 
 order to be of assistance to those who will yet travel 
 through Venetia, I have given the names and good 
 points of the hostelries that afforded me comfort and 
 fair service, without any knowledge of the errand 
 upon which I was bound. Even in the smallest places, 
 nearly everywhere through the Veneto, good treat- 
 ment can be obtained for the traveler who is willing 
 to put up with simplicity and eat in the Italian mode; 
 it is only a question of knowing which albergo to 
 repair to, — as it is of knowing which hotel among the 
 many in the larger cities. 
 
 If my descriptions of the design of the larger towns 
 be supplemented by the purchase of the cheap local 
 maps, or by references to the fine plans contained in 
 Baedeker's Northern Italy, the reader will follow 
 my movements and observations with greater clear- 
 ness, and the visitor upon the spot will have the pleas- 
 
PREFACE xvii 
 
 ure of hunting out for himself every object worth 
 seeing, without the objectionable aid of native guides. 
 The Baedeker's possession is advisable, of course, for 
 more reasons than this; since the present volume is not 
 adaptable to usurp all its functions as a guidebook, 
 but rather to supplement its very condensed and lim- 
 ited information, — not only in the way of omissions, 
 but particularly in the various realms that it has no 
 space to enter. 
 
 My thanks are due to the excellent Commendatore 
 Alinari, for the kind permission which enables me 
 properly to illustrate this book. Some of the districts, 
 however, — the Polesine, Trevisan Marches, and 
 most of Friuli, — have been photographed still less 
 than they have been described; and there it was neces- 
 sary to take some views of my own, as best I could 
 with the poor film furnished in Italy. My thanks are 
 due also to a number of local savants and connoisseurs, 
 besides those herein mentioned, who drew for my 
 assistance upon their accumulated stores of art-know- 
 ledge and archaeology. 
 
 Above all, I acknowledge with a full heart my deep 
 indebtedness to the wife whose enthusiasm first in- 
 spired, then supported me in the heavy task, during 
 these three years of continuous study, travel, and la- 
 bor; without whose inestimable aid in the researching 
 and annotation of hundreds of volumes, the word 
 "Finis" would probably never have been written. 
 
 E. R. W. 
 
 Venice, July 1, 1911. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 I. THE BRENTA AND THE PALACE OF STRA . . 3 
 
 n. PADUA THE LEARNED 28 
 
 HI. PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 62 
 
 IV. VICENZA THE PALATIAL 97 
 
 V. BASSANO, CITTADELLA, AND CASTELFRANCO . 138 
 VI. TREVISO AND THE VILLA GIACOMELLI . . 177 
 
 VII. FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 224 
 
 VIII. UDINE AND CIVIDALE 271 
 
 EX. VERONA LA DEGNA 322 
 
 X. VERONA LA MARMORINA 351 
 
 XL BRESCIA THE BRAVE 418 
 
 XII. BRESCIA LA FERREA 454 
 
 XIII. MONTAGNANA, ESTE, AND MONSELICE . . 497 
 
 XIV. ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA . . .540 
 INDEX 589 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Udine. Piazza Vittokio Emantiele .... Frontispiece 
 
 Map 3 
 
 Stba. The Royal Villa 8 
 
 Stba. The Grand Hall, Royal Villa 24 
 
 Padua. Basilica of San Antonio, with the Statue of 
 
 Gattamelata. (Donatello) 40 
 
 Padua. Bas Relief, St. Anthony becalling to Life 
 
 A Youth to prove the Innocence of his Father. 
 
 (G. Campagna) 56 
 
 Padua. Altar with Bronzes. (Donatello) ... 72 
 VicENZA. Palazzo della Ragione. (Palladio) ... 98 
 VicENZA. Madonna and Saints, in the Church of San 
 
 Stefano. (Palm a Vecchio) 104 
 
 VicENZA. Garden of Palazzo Quirini 112 
 
 VicENZA. Baptism of Christ, in the Church of S. Corona. 
 
 (Giovanni Beluni) 120 
 
 VicENZA. Palazzo da Schio, formerly known as the Casa 
 
 AuREA OR Ca d' Oro (The Golden House) . . . 128 
 Vicenza. Villa Rotonda by Palladio and Scamozzi . 136 
 
 VicENZA. Public Museum 136 
 
 Vaeese. General View op the Monte Sacro . . . 138 
 
xxii ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Vaeesb. Church op Santa Maria del Monte and the 
 
 Last Chapel 142 
 
 Bassano. The River Brenta with the Wooden Bridge 146 
 Bassano. Piazza Vittorio Emanuele and Church of 
 
 St. John Baptist 146 
 
 Bassano. The City Wall 150 
 
 *Bassano. The Western River Bank 154 
 
 Marostica. View of Ancient Walls and Castle . . 158 
 Cittadella. The Bassano Gate and View of the Walls 162 
 Castelfranco. Remains op the Old Castle of the 
 
 Twelfth Century 166 
 
 Castelfranco. Madonna and Child with Saints. 
 
 (Giorgione) 170 
 
 CoNEGLiANo. Gateway to Old Town. — Castle Hill in 
 
 Background 194 
 
 Treviso. Piazza dei Signori 194 
 
 Treviso. Annunciation. (Tiziano) 208 
 
 *Maser. Villa Giacomelli. Central Pavilion . . 214 
 Maser. Villa Giacomelli. Entrance, with Fountain 
 
 AND Little Temple 214 
 
 Maser. Villa Giacomelli. Detail of Wall. (Paolo 
 
 Veronese) 220 
 
 TJdine. Palazzo Comunale. Town Hall — Fifteenth 
 
 AND Sixteenth Centuries 234 
 
 CrviDALE. San Peltrudis. Early Lombard Sculptures 274 
 Verona. Old Castle Bridge 326 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS xxiii 
 
 Verona. Chtjhch of Santa Maria in Organo (St. Mary's 
 
 OF THE Organ) 326 
 
 Verona. The River Adige from the Ponte Navi . . 340 
 
 Verona. Church of St. Anastasia 350 
 
 Verona. The Virgin and Child Enthroned. (GmoLAMO 
 
 DAI LlBRl) 366 
 
 Verona. Altar Triptych in Church of San Zeno 
 
 Maggiore. (Andrea Mantegna) 380 
 
 Verona. Tomb of Romeo and Juliet 394 
 
 Verona. View in the Giusti Gardens 406 
 
 SoAVE. The Castle and Wall, looking Northward . 414 
 Brescia. Palazzo Municipale. (Fromentone da Brescia) 440 
 Brescia. The Cross of St. Helena. (In the Museum of 
 
 Christian Art) 490 
 
 Battaglla. a Farm on the Canal 540 
 
 Battaglia. The Castle of St. Helena .... 548 
 Near Battaglia. The Castle of Cattajo with Moat and 
 
 Bridge 558 
 
 Arqua. a Peasant's House 568 
 
 Arqua. Parish Church and Petrarch's Tomb . . . 568 
 Arqua. The House of Petrarch 582 
 
 The reproductions marked with an asterisk (*) are from photographs 
 by the author. All others are by Fratelli Alinari, Florence, and are used 
 by their courteous permission. 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE BRENTA AND THE PALACE OF STRA 
 
 Once did she hold the gorgeous East in fee. 
 And was the safeguard of the West; the worth 
 Of Venice did not fall below her birth, — 
 Venice, the eldest child of Liberty. — 
 And what if she has seen those glories fade. 
 Those titles vanish, and that strength decay; 
 Yet shall some tribute of respect be paid 
 When her long life has reached its final day. 
 
 — Wordsworth. 
 
 The steamer was pushing her prow swiftly through 
 the still, wide waters of the Lagoon, as we sat upon her 
 after-deck looking backward at the receding domes 
 and towers of Venice. Over the blue, mirroring ex- 
 panse they rose, more dimly now, arched gloriously by 
 the still bluer dome of the Italian sky. For months 
 we had been living amongst them, living over again 
 their wonderful bygone centuries of strife and tri- 
 umph: from the ruins of Torcello we had watched in 
 fancy the Queen of the Sea once again build herself 
 from out that primitive confederation of lagoon-girt 
 isles, whose capital shifted from one beach to another, 
 until it came at last from Malamocco to rest upon that 
 Rivo Alto which centres the Venice of to-day; with 
 Pietro Orseolo the Great we had sailed in her first 
 grand fleet of warships, to impose the rule of the Re- 
 public upon the shores of the Adriatic; with Domenico 
 Michiel we had crested the Mediterranean to relieve 
 
4 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the Christian Kingdom of Jerusalem from assailing 
 heathen, conquer the beautiful isles of the Levant, and 
 carry home saintly bodies from violated sepulchres; 
 with Enrico Dandolo we had accompanied the Cru- 
 saders to Zara and the capture of Constantinople, 
 and seen the sway of Venice extend from that wealthy 
 capital over a hundred fair cities of the Orient; with 
 Michele Steno we had watched the Mistress of the 
 Sea turn at last from her own domain and begin the 
 Subjugation of the Italian mainland; we had wondered 
 as Padua fell into her power, despoiled of the princely 
 Delia Carrara, and Vicenza and Verona, from the 
 kingdom of the ruined Scaligers, then Brescia and 
 Bergamo, from the falling Visconti, and Rovigo and 
 Adria from the enfeebled Estensi, — until that beau- 
 tiful rich territory thenceforth known as the Veneto, 
 bore the winged lion of St. Mark from the Adda on the 
 west and the Po on the south, to Aquileia and Udine 
 in the far northeast. 
 
 We had seen in these memories the Turk come to 
 Constantinople, and despoil Venice one by one of her 
 possessions over the sea; but only more firmly had she 
 held to that fair kingdom of North Italy, attaching 
 the people to her by gifts of public freedom and bene- 
 volence, and the adornment of their towns, until not 
 even all the great powers of Europe, leagued against 
 her by the Pact of Cambrai, could sever those cities 
 from their willing allegiance. Unto the end brought by 
 the French Revolution three centuries later, they re- 
 mained to Venice, the last but richest product of all 
 her conquests, when all the others had departed. 
 
 Then it was, while the League of Cambrai assailed, 
 while the Turk was despoiling Venice over-sea, and 
 the Veneto alone remained true to her, that in the 
 decline of her physical power there had blossomed 
 
THE BRENTA 5 
 
 forth like a wondrous orchid her aesthetic culture of 
 the Renaissance. We had seen the Bellini bringing 
 to perfection their marvelous canvases, and the still 
 greater school developing with Giorgione, Titian, and 
 Jacopo Palma the elder, in a marble city now re- 
 splendent with bright frescoes on every house fagade, 
 with beautified interiors luxuriant in her own fine 
 sculpture and glassware, and the cloths and precious 
 ornaments of the East. 
 
 Then it was, too, that with that sudden keen appre- 
 ciation of the beautiful, and great increase of luxury, 
 we had seen the whole external life of Venice alter, 
 and her nobles turn from their commercial strife 
 of centuries to the ownership of landed estates. The 
 city had lost her commercial primacy with the dis- 
 covery of the new route to India around the Ckpe; 
 trading became neither lucrative nor fashionable; 
 and we had watched the famous old houses one by one 
 turn sadly to the Veneto, and invest their remaining 
 wealth in lands and country villas. We had seen the 
 territory of Padua, the whole eastern Veneto to the 
 foothills of the Alps, become filled with the nobles' 
 wide-spreading estates, and dotted from end to end 
 with their Renaissance chateaux, in which they passed 
 the summers and autumns in villeggiatura. 
 
 Thus had a new fashionable existence arisen; and 
 the inevitable rivalry for the possession of the fairest 
 villas increased amongst the patricians, until many 
 families actually beggared themselves in building and 
 entertaining beyond their means. It was a curious 
 corner of history and architecture, about which many 
 people know little or nothing, — this strange trans- 
 ference of the Venetian nobles to the mainland in the 
 sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It had hap- 
 pened to strike my interest exceptionally, in descend- 
 
6 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ing the eras of Venetian history, — and it was the 
 reason why we were now en voyage to the mouth of the 
 river Brenta. 
 
 Four days before our departure we had been wan- 
 dering through the mazes of the extensive Museo 
 Civico, in its beautiful modern-romanesque palace 
 near the head of the Grand Canal; and in a little room 
 on the top floor, not always visited, we had come upon 
 an extraordinary, perfect model of a giant villa of the 
 Renaissance. It was the actual building-model of 
 the great chateau erected in those days of rivalry by 
 the Pisani family, on the banks of the Brenta, — the 
 so-called Palace of Stra. As we gazed upon its pro- 
 totype in miniature, I could well understand how it 
 came to eclipse all other patrician villas, — to such 
 an extent that no attempt was ever made to surpass it. 
 Looking at its vast extent of halls, courts, corridors, 
 and suites, imperial in space and number, our minds 
 actually failed to comprehend how a single private 
 family could have accomplished it. Nothing better 
 exemplifies the hugeness of those bygone fortunes of 
 Venetian nobles; but, gazing at it, we longed to see 
 the structure itself. 
 
 The Brenta became naturally the first seat of the 
 patricians' country-houses, since it is the stream 
 nearest to Venice; upon and along it ran always the 
 highway to Padua and the west, before the Austrians 
 constructed the modern railway-bridge. It flows a 
 little to the north of Padua, and thence easterly into 
 the Lagoon at Fusina, some four miles south of the 
 present railroad. It was inevitable that in former days 
 the first and chief line of noble villas should arise 
 along this watery highway; and there the Pisani 
 erected their palace. Communication along the an- 
 cient route is still maintained, by a small steamer from 
 
THE BRENTA 7 
 
 the Piazzetta to Fusina, and an electric tramway 
 thence upon the old highroad to Padua. I had never 
 thought of pursuing this route before; but it would 
 be a new and pleasant way of reaching Padua. 
 
 In going to the latter city I was but starting upon 
 the execution of a plan I had had in mind for years, 
 and for which the visit to Stra was an appropriate 
 opening. For years I had thought of some day 
 traveling through the length and breadth of the great 
 northern plain of Italy, — that richest section of the 
 inhabited world, for which nations have fought since 
 time immemorial, — and inspecting carefully one by 
 one its many illustrious cities, which heretofore I had 
 seen but hurriedly. During our stay in Venice, and 
 our living over again her centuries of glory, this de- 
 sire had crystallized into the first aim of visiting that 
 hinterland, fairest and chief portion of the Lombard 
 Plain, which the Republic had so forcefully made her 
 own, and beautified with her wealth and genius. So 
 the spring had passed, the summer had come with its 
 flooding golden light, and I was on my way at last to 
 the Veneto. What more fitting, I thought, than that 
 I should first observe the scenes of the Sea Queen's 
 primal conquests on the mainland, follow her historic 
 highway of so many generations, and view the landed 
 estates and villas to which her patricians first re- 
 moved. Then would come Padua, appropriately, the 
 first prominent city to fall to her victorious arms. 
 
 It was a beautiful July day. We were happy with 
 anticipations and the lovely scenes about us, while 
 the steamer moved evenly, silently, through the still 
 water. Gazing at those white domes and campanili, 
 ever receding, sinking, our thoughts had been coursing 
 again over the marvelous centuries that had produced 
 them, and held them safe, inviolate, from all assault 
 
8 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 or rapine. Here and there out of the wide blue mirror 
 rose other walls and towers, upon islets small and large, 
 — medieval monasteries, churches, and public insti- 
 tutions. How many times, I thought, had this same 
 path across the Lagoon been followed by Venetians, 
 and by all the illustrious travelers who sought their 
 city's charms, for a thousand years before railroads 
 were dreamed of! What a procession it must have 
 been in those old days, of craft of every size and 
 style and beauty, passing each other where now the 
 steamer cruised in solitude! 
 
 The low-lying mainland, at first hardly distinguish- 
 able over the blue but for the trees that dotted it, had 
 now come close at hand, revealing the narrow mouth 
 of the little Brenta, but no sign of human habitations 
 save one or two buildings on the bank. Fusina was 
 hidden behind the woods on the right. The steamer 
 came alongside a quay; we debarked through a very 
 modern shed, and found the electric train of two hand- 
 some new coaches waiting on the other side. I blessed 
 my fortune that the old, rickety, smoky steam-tram, 
 of whose discomforts I had heard, had gone the way of 
 the past. In another minute we were rolling rapidly 
 up the valley of the Brenta, with the stream on our 
 left, and a flat, wooded countryside to right. 
 
 What a difference this from the old-fashioned 
 method of ascending the river, which the Venetians 
 followed for twelve hundred years, before electricity 
 or rails were thought of! Evelyn spoke of it in his 
 trip of 1645: "We changed our barge and were then 
 drawne by horses thro' the river Brenta, a strait 
 chanell as even as a line for 20 miles, the country on 
 both sides deliciously adorned with country villas and 
 gentlemen's retirements." ^ And Lady Morgan wrote 
 
 ' John Evelyn, Diary and Letters. 
 
w 
 
 3^% t'^ 
 
THE BRENTA 9 
 
 of her trip of 1819: "It is a delightful thing to roll 
 along the banks of the Brenta — on a fine, bright, 
 sunny, holiday morning! — The canal lying through 
 a laughing, lovely, fertile champagne; — the elegant 
 marble villas to the left, with their Palladian f agades, 
 their green verandas, and parterres of orange trees, 
 inducing the belief that they are still lorded by the 
 Foscarini and the Bembi of the great and free days of 
 Republican Venice!" ^ While Byron rhapsodized of 
 the journey by eventide : — 
 
 Gently flows 
 The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil 
 The odoriferous purple of a new-born rose. 
 Which streams upon her stream, and glassed within it glows. 
 
 Two companions were going with me as far as Padua, 
 destined to accompany me also while there; but when 
 I should go on to Vicenza and Bassano, it must be 
 alone. It was a pleasure to all three of us to drink in 
 with our eyes the soft greenery of the grass and trees, 
 after being so long immured amongst the stones of 
 Venice. On leaving the coast behind, wide cultivated 
 fields appeared, white stuccoed farmhouses glowing 
 brilliantly in the hot sun, churches, little villages, and 
 distant campanili ever rising above the level of the 
 distance, — that distinctive mark of Veneto scenery. 
 The highway accompanied us, — together with the 
 river, — a white, dusty, hard, macadamized road, 
 smooth as asphalt, laden with mules and peasants, 
 and carts drawn by creamy oxen or diminutive don- 
 keys. It was almost as thickly settled as an English 
 village-street, and the tram made a stop every five 
 minutes at some larger aggregation of buildings. 
 
 Soon we came to a stretch along the river, where 
 the first villas of the Venetian patricians burst upon 
 
 1 Lady Morgan, Italy, vol. ii. 
 
10 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 our view. Alas, they were mostly, as we soon found, 
 in a condition of sad decay. Nearly all of them had 
 been plastered outside with stucco; and this, neg- 
 lected and unpainted for ages, crumbling and faUing 
 off in places, joined with the close-shuttered and 
 boarded windows, and the overgrown gardens, to 
 give them an aspect desolate and melancholy. Along 
 the river banks they extended, on both sides, mile 
 after mile, uniform in their large size. Renaissance 
 lines, rococo decorations, and abandoned, ruinous ap- 
 pearance. Even when they were of stone, or enlivened 
 by modern plebeian tenants, the decay, the weedy, 
 tangled grounds, everything about them, emphasized 
 the sad contrast with what must once have been.^ 
 
 This, then, was all that was left of that extraordin- 
 ary, artificial, highly cultured and peculiar social ex- 
 istence, which was the first of its sort in Europe, which 
 set the mark that the French and English nobility later 
 sought to attain; that first return to the soil by a whole 
 polished upper class, after the dangers of country-life 
 in the Dark Ages had been removed. Here were the 
 boarded up, mouldering salons and ball-rooms where 
 they had played, and practiced the art of conversa- 
 tion, and danced into the small hours; here were the 
 densely overgrown gai-dens once so carefully ornate, 
 with statues still upreared but dilapidated and forlorn, 
 where they had walked and whispered gallantries in 
 
 ' Some of these were constructed by Palladio, and by other famous 
 architects and artists. On the very brink of the " bello ed allegrissimo 
 fiume," — as Cardinal Bembo designated the Brenta, in a letter from his 
 Paduan villa — still rises Palladio's Palazzo Foscari, which Giacomo 
 Zanella thus describes in his Vita di Andrea Palladio: "On the ground - 
 floor are the rooms for the servizio della casa ; by two magnificent stair- 
 cases at the sides one ascends to the Ionic loggia; the great hall is made 
 in the shape of a cross; in the corners are commodious chambers, and 
 overhead, smaller bedrooms." 
 
THE BRENTA 11 
 
 the cool of the afternoon; here were the ruined casinos, 
 pavilions, and summer-houses, where they had loved 
 to contrast rusticity with silks and laces. 
 
 It was not difficult to construct it all in the mind 
 again, that so-long-past life that thought not of the 
 morrow; repeopling these decadent edifices with the 
 gay creatures who once made them shine, refilling 
 these mouldering mews with the horses and painted, 
 swung carriages, that once occupied this same road 
 at sunset with a procession of brilliant coloring. These 
 villas were beautiful then; as Mrs. Piozzi — Doctor 
 Johnson's Mrs. Thrale — indicates to us in the 
 bright commentary on her travels, by her enthusiastic 
 remark upon " the sublimity of their architecture — 
 the magnificence of their orangeries, the happy con- 
 struction of the cool arcades, and general air of festiv- 
 ity which breathes upon the banks of this truly wizard 
 stream, planted with dancing, not weeping willows." ^ 
 
 But through the tall trees of a park upon our right 
 there now suddenly flashed upon our eyes the vision 
 of a distant, white, Renaissance fagade, seen down a 
 long green vista; then we turned a corner, ran swiftly 
 along a high park-wall, and passed before a building 
 of proportions so imposing and monumental, that we 
 knew it could be nothing else than the Palace of the 
 Pisani. Our conviction was confirmed a minute later 
 by the stoppage of the tram, and the calling out of the 
 station of Stra. We debarked in a village-street, be- 
 fore a solitary inn, with naught but scattered dwell- 
 ings in sight. 
 
 • Mrs. Piozzi, Glimpses of Italian Society in the 18th Century. In 
 Shakespeare's day Lady Arundel, wife of the noted art-collecting earl, 
 and Sir Henry Wotton, who was thrice ambassador to Venice, 1604-25, 
 both had splendid villas upon the river; and their example was followed 
 by innumerable Enghshmen of high rank during the two succeeding cen- 
 turies. — Vide L. Pearsall Smith, Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton. 
 
12 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Leaving our luggage at the locanda, we walked back 
 the half-mile to the palace, along the highway, with 
 the Brenta close upon our right. Along the farther 
 side of the stream stretched more Renaissance villas 
 of goodly size, all boarded up, shuttered and decaying, 
 with the invariable baroque statues looking sadly out 
 from the tangles of shrubbery. But on our left soon 
 rose the high stone wall of the park of the Pisani, 
 and through an ornamental gateway at its corner 
 we looked down a beautiful, far, green vista to the 
 shining white fagade of which we had first caught 
 a glimpse. Grand as the building was, larger and 
 handsomer than any villa we had seen, it was but 
 the stables, or mews, of the establishment; so we 
 were informed by the people of the adjacent farm- 
 house, — and were directed to follow the park-wall 
 to the palace entrance. 
 
 Another five minutes' walk brought us to the villa, 
 whose mighty fagade looked directly upon the high- 
 way and the river. Its magnificent proportions and 
 harmonious lines, radiantly white in the rays of the 
 summer sun, dazzled and overwhelmed us as we stood 
 gazing upward. The noble delineations were genu- 
 inely Palladian; a grand central pavilion, three stories 
 in height, was thrust forward from the mass, holding 
 Corinthian half-columns running the height of the 
 two upper stories, and supporting a pediment with a 
 beautiful stuccoed frieze of wreaths and putti; the 
 long wings, of two stories, ended in smaller pavilions 
 of simpler design, with a quiet rusticated basement, 
 and on the upper floor, Ionic pilasters in couples be- 
 tween the heavily corniced windows; while on the 
 gables of the pavilions and along the balustrades 
 topping the wings, rose against the sky-line many 
 statues and decorative urns; the whole exhibiting a 
 
THE BRENTA 13 
 
 harmony of lines, an accurate proportion of openings 
 to solid, and an absence of over-ornamentation, that 
 were charming and impressive beyond words. 
 
 Large dark clouds had been hastily gathering in the 
 sky for one of those heavy thunder-storms so frequent 
 here in the summer, and we entered the simple main 
 doorway of the palace as the first large drops began to 
 fall. Though the portal was open there was no person 
 in sight. The central hall ran through to the back of 
 the villa, forming in the middle a double colonnade 
 between open courts at the sides. We walked through 
 it to the rear doorway, where again the sight of the 
 gleaming Scurie greeted us, rising majestically behind 
 a long stretch of lawn and flower-gardens, framed by 
 the woods on each hand. The black sky now vomited 
 thunderbolts and a rush of hail, that was soon driving 
 into the courts pellets as large as fair-sized cherries. 
 It is just such tropical storms that the peasants dread 
 more than anything else that can happen, annihilating 
 in a few minutes, as they often do, the labors of a year. 
 
 We shuddered irresistibly, then, realizing the ter- 
 rible destruction that was happening about us, wiping 
 out the means, the happiness, of scores, perhaps hun- 
 dreds of families. For the poor Lombard peasant who 
 owns or rents his farm — unsupported by a landlord 
 — lives nowadays upon such a close margin between 
 the usurer and ruin, that a single hailstorm like this 
 one not only destroys his crops of the season, but 
 eflFects his entire downfall. Only those can survive 
 who live upon the mezzeria, or sharing-system, with 
 a good landlord to tide them over the year, at his own 
 expense. Such are the countless, unknown tragedies 
 of the plain. 
 
 The keeper of the palace, which is now a national 
 monument, appeared when the storm was over, fifteen 
 
14 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 minutes later, explaining that he had been occu- 
 pied in closing the windows; and he proceeded to 
 conduct us over the piano nobile. We went first to the 
 great central salon, or ball-room, directly over the 
 colonnade between the courts. Its dimensions and 
 beauty were truly amazing: it is two stories in height, 
 with imitation-stucco decorations in the way of pi- 
 lasters, cornices, and mouldings, all cleverly painted 
 with realistic shadows, and with a balcony around the 
 upper story, having a splendid, open-work, bronze 
 railing. Its chief attraction, however, is the huge 
 ceiling-painting by Tiepolo. As from a glorious azure 
 heaven, of whitest clouds and infinite depth, angels 
 and beings of the upper world flock to chant the 
 glorification of the Pisani. While not a great work, 
 and lacking in only too many points as a first-class 
 fresco, it fulfills the one supreme function of a ceiling- 
 picture, — it is decorative; and its bright, joyous 
 colors, its sense of space and freedom, illumine the 
 whole hall with their gayety. 
 
 Thence we were conducted on an interminable 
 round of the chambers of the piano nobile, which have 
 the rare distinction of still containing much of their 
 old furniture. We saw a billiard-room filled with in- 
 different paintings, and rooms and suites decorated 
 in all sorts of usual and unusual styles of the decad- 
 ent Renaissance; we saw the royal bed once occupied 
 by the Emperor Maximilian of Austria, when he 
 stayed here for a time, the suite and bedroom used 
 by Victor Emmanuel II in the strenuous days of the 
 Risorgimento, — and, finally, the gilded, lavishly deco- 
 rated chamber and couch of the great Napoleon, when 
 he was accomplishing the downfall of the ancient 
 Republic of Venice. 
 
 Quite as one would expect, this chamber and couch 
 
THE BRENTA 15 
 
 of the soldier of fortune, gi-devant bourgeois, were very 
 much more elaborate and ornate than any of the 
 others; they had been made over and redecorated in 
 the manner of the First Empire, — beautifully, it must 
 be said, — even to the embroidering of the imperial 
 crown and letter "N." I could not help but think, as 
 I gazed upon that pillow pressed by the conqueror, 
 of the vast upheaval just then coming to the whole 
 civilized world from the one head that had there 
 reclined. 
 
 We did not have time to visit the now empty mews, 
 once filled with scores of blooded horses and silken 
 carriages, nor to walk along the inviting shady avenues 
 of the park; but were obliged to hurry to catch our 
 train for Padua. Again we coursed along the high- 
 road, through the densely populated and. cultivated 
 countryside, past village after village; and, as Hazlitt 
 said of the same road in 1826, "the whole way was 
 cultivated beauty and smiling vegetation. Not a rood 
 of land lay neglected, nor did there seem the smallest 
 interruption to the bounty of nature or the industry 
 of man. For miles before you, behind you, and on 
 each side, the trailing vines hung over waving corn- 
 fields (wheat). Every foot and acre of this immense 
 plain is wrought up to a pitch of neatness and pro- 
 ductiveness equal to that of a gentleman's kitchen- 
 garden. The whole is literally, and without any kind 
 of exaggeration, one continued and delightful gar- 
 den." 1 
 
 Mendelssohn, on his first visit here four years later, 
 wrote home with delight: "Venetian villas were occa- 
 sionally visible from the road; our way led past houses, 
 trees and gardens like a park. The whole country had 
 a festive air, as if a prince were expected to make his 
 
 1 William Hazlitt, Notes of a Journey through France and Italy. 
 
16 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 grand entry, and the vine-branches with their rich 
 purple grapes, hanging in festoons from the trees, 
 made the most lovely of all festive wreaths." ^ 
 
 But my thoughts turned now to the wonderful old 
 city that we were approaching. I had already visited 
 Padua on several occasions, during fifteen years past, 
 but each time casually and not fully, seeing sufficient 
 really only to whet the desire for a completer under- 
 standing of her treasures of art and history. Padua is 
 truly one of the greatest towns of Italy, and always has 
 been, — in historic accomplishments, in size and power, 
 in Renaissance culture, in science, literature, and art. 
 
 Her importance began in very early ages. The 
 founder is said by the inhabitants, who thoroughly 
 believe the statement of Virgil, to have been Antenor, 
 the brother of Priam of Troy, at the head of a band 
 of Trojan survivors. (How those confreres of Hector 
 did duty as founders of Italian towns!) In reality 
 the town was first Etruscan, then Celtic; and after the 
 Celts' subjugation, about 200 B.C., became very power- 
 ful under Roman rule, being the second largest city in 
 the whole Peninsula. The Latin writer Strabo relates 
 that she was able to send forth an army of two hundred 
 thousand, — of course much exaggerated, but signi- 
 ficant of her former size. Livy, who was born and 
 died in Padua, says that her confines once extended 
 to the sea. With the decline of Roman power, as was 
 inevitable with all the cities situated upon the plain, 
 she suffered attack and rapine from one savage in- 
 vader after another, being burned to the ground by 
 Attila, by the Lombards in 601, and by the Huns 
 about 900; until very little was left of her former 
 amplitude, and naught of her magnificence. Well did 
 Dante cry: 
 
 * Mendelssohn's Letters from Italy and Switzerland. 
 
THE BRENTA 17 
 
 Where 't is the lot of tyranny to mourn. 
 
 There Heaven's stern justice lays chastising hand 
 
 On Attila, who was the Scourge of Earth.' 
 
 In the succeeding Middle Ages Padua gradually 
 raised her head again, struggled with the other towns 
 against the emperors, and instituted a free, republi- 
 can form of government, building for its use the huge 
 and celebrated civic structure called the Palazzo della 
 Ragione. In 1222 she joined the march of learning by 
 founding her great university, which after seven cen- 
 turies of proud distinction still stands among the 
 foremost of the world. 
 
 Then came the day of that extraordinary and never- 
 to-be-forgotten tyrant, Ezzelino da Romano, the first 
 of his kind, — who has left his bloody traces, not only 
 in Padua, but over the whole of the Veneto. Unique 
 amongst three centuries of bloodthirsty Italian des- 
 pots, for the extent to which his cruelty exceeded all 
 others', his career of over thirty years' unbridled con- 
 quest and excesses is the best proof of how such ty- 
 rants ruled by fear alone. Originally but a small 
 noble of the Trevisan marches, he became by his fight- 
 ing ability captain of the imperial forces in Lombardy, 
 recognized as such by Frederick II, and honored by 
 him with his daughter's hand. With such armed 
 power behind Ezzelino, gathered from the GhibellLne 
 towns, he proceeded, nominally in the name of the 
 Emperor but really for his own aggrandizement, to 
 subdue and lay waste one city after another that would 
 not voluntarily submit, until his sway extended from 
 the Po and the Adda to high Pieve di Cadore in the 
 Alps. 
 
 Every step in this path of conquest was marked by 
 bloody cruelties that to us to-day seem beyond hu- 
 
 ' Dante's Inferno, canto xn; Gary's translation. 
 
18 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 man deeds. Padua was one of the first cities to fall 
 under his assault, and one of the greatest sufferers 
 from his bloodthirstiness. The inhabitants had un- 
 wisely pulled down, in their anger, the old dwelling 
 of his family, — some remains of which still exist in 
 the Via S. Lucia; and this he revenged by a sack and 
 massacre extending for many days. After that he 
 impressed into his army the major portion of the able- 
 bodied men, constructed a formidable fortress for 
 his own residence, and built eight large prisons, 
 which he kept crammed to overflowing by all persons 
 of any sex or age for whom he could conceive the 
 slightest animosity. Although these imprisoned thou- 
 sands were constantly depleted by appalling tortures 
 and executions, new unfortunates were as swiftly 
 hurried into their places. Later on, for a revolt against 
 him by the Paduans in his absence, Ezzelino seized, 
 tortured, and executed the whole body of their com- 
 patriots in his army, some eleven thousand in number. 
 Such was the monster whom Symonds has well 
 described as "a small, wiry man, with terror in his 
 face and enthusiasm for evil in his heart, who lived 
 a foe to luxury, cold to the pathos of children, dead 
 to the enchantments of women. His one passion was 
 the greed of power, heightened by the lust for blood." ' 
 Dante placed him in the lowest circle of Hell beside 
 Attila: — 
 
 These are the souls of tyrants who were given 
 To blood and rapine. Here they wail aloud 
 Their merciless, wrongs. — That brow. 
 Whereon the hair so jetty clustering hangs, 
 Is Ezzelino! ^ 
 
 And Ariosto spoke of him in the Orlando Furioso, 
 canto XXXIII, as — 
 
 ' J. A. Symonds, Age of the Despots. 
 
 2 Dante's Infernt, canto xu; Gary's translation. 
 
THE BRENTA 19 
 
 Fierce Ezzelino, that most inhuman lord. 
 Who shall be deemed by man a child of Hell, 
 And work such evil, thinning with the sword 
 Who in Ansonia's wasted cities dwell." 
 
 Ezzelino was defeated at last, in 1259, by a combina- 
 tion of the many enemies whom he had raised all over 
 Italy; he was made a prisoner, though wounded, but 
 tore off his bandages until he bled to death. His 
 memory has never ceased, among the peasantry of the 
 Veneto, to be the subject of devilish myths, and the 
 mention of his name is sufficient to quell an obstrep- 
 erous child. 
 
 Ezzelino's fall signaled the time of Padua's great- 
 est power and prosperity since Roman days. Relieved 
 and joyous, free and self-governing, she plunged into 
 the building and adornment of those other splendid 
 structures that distinguish her to-day, — the Church 
 of S. Antonio, the Baptistery, the Churches of the 
 Arena and the Eremetani. In 1318 the Paduan Guelfic 
 captain, Jacopo della Carrara, was elected by his com- 
 patriots as "Capitano del Popolo"; he assumed ab- 
 solute power, and founded the subsequent dynasty 
 of despots of that name. For a while they lost their 
 city to the Delia Scala of Verona, but soon recovered 
 it. They were a distinctly manly and generous race, 
 maintaining their authority by an upbuilding of the 
 city, and the happiness which they conferred. There 
 are few finer figures of those times than that unfortun- 
 ate Francesco della Carrara, who was despoiled of 
 his power by Gian Galeazzo Visconti of Milan in 1388, 
 and his son Francesco Novello, who experienced a 
 series of romantic adventures in his attempts to regain 
 the throne. These finally succeeded in 1390, when on 
 the dark night of June 19 he swam the river, entered 
 the town alone, without forces, and was welcomed 
 
20 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 with such joy by the citizens that they rose in arms 
 and expelled the Visconti garrison. 
 
 In 1405, after Gian Galeazzo's death, however, the 
 Venetians, having successfully played off for some 
 time the Carrara and the Visconti against each other, 
 now seized Padua by treachery, and took Francesco 
 and his sons in an iron cage to Venice, where they were 
 strangled. Harsh as was this treatment of the des- 
 pots, that of the people of Padua was such that she 
 soon became one of the Republic's most loyal sub- 
 jects; caressed, adorned, and prosperous under the 
 sway of the doges, above all with assured peace, she 
 carried the white Lion of St. Mark with pride unto 
 the end. During the terrible war of the League of 
 Cambrai, 1508-16, when the united great nations 
 overwhelmed the Republic, and her towns departed 
 from their allegiance, Padua remained true, and re- 
 pelled with success the attack of the Emperor Maxi- 
 milian's army, though it was a hundred thousand 
 strong.^ 
 
 But the most important events in the history of 
 Padua lay outside of her politics, in the fields of sci- 
 ence, religion, and art. Her great university has ever 
 played the most prominent part in her life, drawing, 
 as it has, for centuries, such multitudes of the first 
 minds of Europe to its lecture-halls. Padua "ranks 
 with Florence in the ardor with which she threw 
 herself into the humanistic movement and devoted 
 herself to the revival of the classical ideals, and recon- 
 struction of the antique civilization. Her university, 
 receiving students from both sides of the Alps, formed 
 
 ' To those wishing a fuller account of Fadu|in annals, and to those mak- 
 ing a long stay in the city, I recommend The Story of Padua by Cesare 
 Foligno, in the Medieval Towns Series, which has been issued since this 
 volume went to press; in it the town's history is accurately and elaborately 
 narrated, and her manifold points of interest are intimately described. 
 
THE BRENTA 21 
 
 at the beginning of the fifteenth century the centre 
 of intellectual culture; nobles, poets, and philosophers 
 spurring each other on in the work of research and 
 exploration."^ 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Thomas Hoby, Fynes Mory- 
 son, and many other prominent intellectual English- 
 men of the Elizabethan Age, here perfected their edu- 
 cation; and in the succeeding century it became a 
 common thing for Oxford men to repair to Padua after 
 their graduation. Thus was the Renaissance of learn- 
 ing transplanted to Britain. Among the later pilgrims 
 came Oliver Goldsmith, in 1755, earning his way on 
 foot by playing the flute, and procuring by his labors 
 at the University that degree of M.B. on which was 
 founded his claim to the title of Doctor. 
 
 Here it was that Petrarch came towards the end of 
 his life, and made a home in the neighboring town 
 of Arqua for his various collections, where his friendly 
 protector, Jacopo II della Carrara, often journeyed to 
 visit him; here it was that Torquato Tasso, long 
 after, when "not yet turned seventeen, passed a pub- 
 lic examination in canon and civil law, philosophy, 
 and theology, with universal eulogy, and astonish- 
 ment of that learned university";^ and in the fol- 
 lowing year published his heroic poem "Rinaldo," 
 the beginning of his fame; ,while Dante, in the course 
 of his wanderings, found at Padua for some years 
 a congenial residence, obtaining honors and susten- 
 ance by lecturing in the University. The artist 
 whom the latter met at Padua in 1306, with whom 
 he formed an intimate friendship, and whom he often 
 used to watch while at work, introduces us to the 
 remarkable and early importance of the city as a 
 
 ' M. Crutwell, Andrea Mantegna. 
 
 ^ Mrs. Trollope, Homes and Haunts of the Italian Poets, ii, 113. 
 
22 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 centre of art: for it was Giotto himself. Dante's own 
 comment shows the latter's position then : — 
 
 O powers of man! how vain your glory, nipt 
 E'en in its height of verdure, if an age 
 Less bright succeed not. Cimabue thought 
 To lord it over painting's field; and now 
 The cry is Giotto's, and his name eclipsed.^ 
 
 Padua was one of the first towns of Italy to enter 
 with zeal into the new birth of Art; she called Niccolo 
 and Giovanni Pisano to her as soon as they became 
 famous, and Giotto as soon as he had made his genius 
 known to the world; oflFering to the latter works of a 
 size such as he was never elsewhere called upon to 
 execute. He covered the huge walls of the Palazzo 
 della Ragione with frescoes, — alas, now utterly de- 
 stroyed; he painted, according to Vasari, "una bellis- 
 simacapella" in the Church of S. Antonio, of which 
 there remain now but questionable ruined fragments; 
 and, last but chief, he lined the nave of the little 
 church of Madonna dell' Arena with that marvelous 
 series of frescoes depicting the lives of Christ and the 
 Virgin, which have ever since remained the most im- 
 portant product of pictorial art. 
 
 Following the time of Giotto, Padua called to her 
 that great pair of Veronese painters, Altichieri da 
 Zevio and Jacopo d'Avanzo, who surpassed not only 
 all others of the fourteenth century, but sometimes 
 even Giotto himself in lifelikeness and realism; that 
 curious pair who so steadfastly labored together, about 
 whom so little is known, and of whose extensive works 
 so little is left us. 
 
 But Padua, pushing on with zeal, began now to 
 produce painters of her own: first, Giusto Padovano, 
 who about 1378 filled her quaint little Romanesque 
 
 ' Dante's Purgaiorio, canto xi; Gary's translation. 
 
THE BRENTA 23 
 
 baptistery, with that extraordinary series of New 
 Testament pictures which still remain to make us 
 wonder; then, in the early fifteenth century, the 
 teacher Squarcione, who from a tailor made himself 
 by long travel and study the founder of Padua's real 
 school of art, training many scores of students by the 
 process of copying from the antique sculpture of his 
 collections. 
 
 This process made the Paduan school almost the 
 earliest to grasp the secret of rendering "tactile 
 values,"^ enabling them to depict objects with real- 
 istic solidity; it also gave them disagreeable manner- 
 isms of stiffness and lack of beauty; but beyond, and 
 forgetting all else, it produced for us that magnificent 
 artist who was able, while seizing the truth of tactile 
 value, to keep and develop his own sense of grace and 
 color, who became Padua's greatest representative, 
 and the foremost of his time in all north Italy — An- 
 drea Mantegna. 
 
 This profound genius, born at Vicenza in 1431, 
 entered at the age of ten into the circle of Paduan 
 students; at seventeen he began producing finished 
 pictures; and, most fortunately, while yet a very 
 young man, he made the acquaintance and friend- 
 ship of that pioneer of Venetian beauty, Jacopo Bel- 
 lini, whom Padua had called to her as she had so 
 many others. Their intimacy is shown by the fact 
 that Mantegna married Jacopo's daughter, in 1453. 
 There can be no doubt, therefore, as to who saved 
 Andrea from the stiffness and harshness general to the 
 Paduan school, and aided and inspired him to the 
 grace and glow of color which he later manifested. 
 He may also have taken some of his opulent hues 
 from the German painters, who, says Lord Lindsay, 
 
 ' This is Mr. Berenson's happy phrase. 
 
24 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 "abounded at Padua about the middle of the fifteenth 
 century; and it is to them, and their predecessors, if 
 I mistake not, that Italy owes the first introduction 
 of that rich coloring, exhibited as early as 1371 by 
 Lorenzo Veneziano."^ 
 
 About this same time, also, in 1444, Padua had 
 summoned to her the Florentine sculptor Donatello, 
 fresh from his triumphs by the Amo; he came with a 
 circle of assistants, and proceeded, not only to orna- 
 ment S. Antonio with a wonderful series of bronze 
 statues, crucifixes, and bas-reliefs, but to model and 
 cast the first lifesize equestrian statue made in bronze 
 since ancient times. This was the likeness of Venice's 
 condottiere-general, Gattamelata, which excited so 
 much astonishment and marveling over the whole of 
 Europe. There can be no doubt also that with such 
 significant works going on about him, the young Man- 
 tegna drew from them further inspiration and know- 
 ledge. All fitted him for his coming triumph, when, 
 employed with other assistants by Squarcione, some- 
 time between 1453 and 1459, to decorate for the 
 Ovetari family their chapel in the Church of the 
 Eremetani, his six frescoes on the lives of Saints 
 James and Christopher raised him at one bound to 
 the supremacy of his day. Like the Brancacci chapel 
 at Florence, which after 1428 became the resort of 
 artists anxious to study the attainment of realism by 
 Masaccio, so after 1458 did this chapel of the Ere- 
 metani become the teacher of succeeding generations. 
 It was with a deep longing to behold once more 
 these exceptional relics of the Renaissance, that I 
 looked eagerly forward as the electric train brought 
 us closer to Padua's medieval walls. We had left 
 the Brenta, turning southwestward, and were ap- 
 
 ' Lord Lindsay, Christian Art. 
 
STRA. THE GRAND HALL, ROYAL VILLA. 
 
THE BRENTA 25 
 
 preaching the city at its northeastern corner. The 
 rich plain in which Padua Hes, now spread around us 
 in its luxuriance of gardens, shrubbery,' and massive 
 trees, is backed immediately on the west by the 
 Euganean Hills, — that outpost of the Alps which 
 stretches so far to the south as to rise like a group of 
 solitary islands from the sea. On the east lies the 
 Lagoon, on the north the Brenta, on the south, at a 
 further distance, the Po. Through this plain flows 
 the Bacchiglione, from the Alps, along the northern 
 side of the Euganean Hills, then southeastward into 
 the Lagoon ; and this is the stream which of old was 
 the life of Padua, filtering through it and around it 
 in a network of spreading canals, that mark the suc- 
 cessive extensions of the city's moats. 
 
 A glance at the map of the town reveals this fact 
 quite clearly. In the centre one sees a small quadri- 
 lateral, marked out by the two arms into which the 
 Bacchiglione was first divided by the spade, to flow 
 around the walls of the then little town and join again 
 on the eastern side.^ And in the middle of this, the 
 oldest portion of the city, one sees, as he would expect, 
 the gathered buildings of the Duomo, the Baptistery, 
 and the Palazzo del Capitanio, with their piazzas; 
 while close at hand rise also the Municipio and Pal- 
 azzo della Ragione, upon the ancient piazzas of the 
 fruit and vegetable markets {dei Frutti and delle Erbe) . 
 A very old highway runs through the centre from 
 south to north, from the first-mentioned structures to 
 
 1 In early times Padua was thus watered by the Bacchiglione alone; but 
 after the warring Vicentines had once or twice diverted the course of that 
 stream down its secondary channel, via Este and the Po, leaving the Pad- 
 uans high and dry, and therefore forced to come to terms, the latter in 1314 
 dug the still existing canal which brings the water of the Brenta, from 
 Stra, into the fosses of the city. It was this which gave the direct water- 
 communication with Venice. 
 
26 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the northern Roman gate of the Ponte Molino; whence 
 it continues through the medieval gateway of the 
 Barriera Mazzini, ending eventually at the modern 
 railway station. It is of various names in its different 
 sections, the northern half having been formerly 
 called Via Maggiore, and lately renamed after Dante. 
 
 Around this oldest, central section one notes the 
 successive extensions of the city's walls, as the place 
 grew in size, marked by further deviations of the 
 Bacchiglione for moat-purposes; there being thus 
 added to the original town two sections on the south 
 side, one on the east, and one on the north and west, 
 outlining in all a space many times as large as the 
 primordial. Within this large area, delimited still by 
 the heavy wall and flowing fosse of the Middle Ages, 
 the modern city is shrunk to but a quarter of its Re- 
 naissance extent; and yet it has a population of nearly 
 ninety thousand. 
 
 So much I had observed upon former visits; and I 
 saw now that the electric tramway was leading us into 
 town by a directly northern entrance. The scattered 
 houses of the suburb toward the railway station were 
 already about us; we ran swiftly through the homely 
 dwellings and factories, turned to the left, south- 
 ward, crossed an arm of the Bacchiglione which once 
 served as the northern moat, and in an instant were 
 coming to a stop amongst what seemed like a chaos 
 of Roman ruins. And so they were; for we had stopped 
 in a new street beside the crumbhng ancient walls 
 of the Roman amphitheatre, in the northern corner of 
 the eastern section of the city, — that Arena which 
 found its unending fame centuries after its original 
 uses had terminated, by furnishing the site and ma- 
 terial for the church to the Madonna which Giotto 
 made immortal. 
 
THE BRENTA 27 
 
 The high old circling walls of pinkish stone hid 
 from our present view the church within; we could 
 see only that other treasure of Padua, the Church of 
 the Eremetani, lying adjacent on the south, with its 
 cloisters now occupied by lolling soldiery. A single 
 carriage was in waiting for chance passengers. Secur- 
 ing this, and piling our heavy luggage into it, we 
 drove at once to the old tavern of curious name which 
 has comforted so many travelers, — the Fanti Stella 
 d'Oro. Two blocks to the south, a block to the west, 
 — across the first eastern moat, which is now a 
 picturesque canal between medieval houses, through 
 what was once the Porta Altinate of the Romans, — 
 and we found ourselves in the Piazza Garibaldi, on 
 which the albergo looks down. 
 
CHAPTER n 
 
 PADUA THE LEARNED 
 
 Antenor, from the midst of Grecian hosts 
 Escaped, was able safe to penetrate 
 The Dlyriau bay, and see the interior realms 
 Of the Tibumi, and to pass beyond — 
 Founded the walls of Padua, and built 
 The Trojan seat, and to the people gave 
 A name, and there aflSxed the arms of Troy. 
 Now, laid at rest, he sleeps in placid peace. 
 
 — Cbouch's Virgil. 
 
 It was now the middle of the afternoon. Rather ex- 
 hausted by the heat of the trip, we at once sought 
 a siesta in the comfortable chambers secured at low 
 figures, after ascertaining that that arrangement for 
 meals would prevail which is now customary in most 
 northern Italian towns: viz., morning cafe complet at 
 lire 1.25, and table a la carte for the other meals. This 
 method is not only more satisfactory to most foreign- 
 ers, who are very tired of long table d'hote meals and 
 usually fond of a certain few dishes, but it is also much 
 more inexpensive for a party. 
 
 By five o'clock we had sallied out for our first walk 
 of revisit about the charming old city. Our starting- 
 point, the Piazza Garibaldi, is one of two widenings 
 of that other main thoroughfare of the central section 
 which curves around from its north gate and along 
 its eastern side, just within the old eastern moat; Via 
 Garibaldi they call it, also Via Otto Febbraio and Via 
 Roma. It has become by accident the centre of mod- 
 ern life and shopping. In its middle part the old 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 29 
 
 arcades that lined it have been done away with, and 
 hundreds of modern shops installed, whose gay win- 
 dows shine with finery. Modern well-dressed crowds 
 are ever pushing along its sidewalks, or occupying 
 them with cafe-tables, and in the evenings it is 
 proudly a-glitter with electric lights and signs. 
 
 I, however, wished to have the sensation of entering 
 the city as of old, through its northern gates, as one 
 usually enters from the railway station; so we followed 
 Via Garibaldi northwest to Via Dante, and went out 
 the latter to the station; then turned around. Ap- 
 proaching the town thus customarily, the old sights 
 greeted me one by one with the joy of recognition. 
 
 The chestnuts on the broad highway were larger 
 than ever, hiding the ugliness of the new, adjacent 
 suburb. There in the centre of the road was the 
 ornamental pillar with its reminiscence of Venetian 
 loyalty, — the inscription that tells one: "Here was 
 the rampart where our compatriots defeated Maxi- 
 mihan, and revenged the iniquity of the League of 
 Cambrai, and the invasion of the foreigner, Sept. 29, 
 1509." Then the ramparts loomed up before us on 
 the right, those marking the city's greatest exten- 
 sion: huge brick walls, massive and undecayed, with 
 a round bastion at the corner, and the moat before 
 them still flowing. 
 
 We passed through this wall by the lofty, glower- 
 ing, medieval, brick gate known as the Barriera Maz- 
 zini, and immediately behind it saw to the left the 
 familiar mass of the Church of the Carmini; while to 
 the right rose the first suggestion of Ezzelino da 
 Romano, the still intact tower of one of his twelve 
 fortress-prisons, brick above, upon a foundation of 
 enormous Roman stones. I could hardly repress a 
 shudder as I thought once more of the countless tor- 
 
30 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 luring deaths that must have occurred within that 
 masonry. Opposite, in pleasant contrast, stood before 
 the church a wreathed statue of the genial Petrarch. 
 It reminded me also of our own poet, Chaucer, who 
 is said to have met Petrarch in this city, when he 
 "learnt from him the story of Griselda, reproduced 
 in the Clerk's Tale."i 
 
 A few more southerly steps, and we were on the 
 Ponte Molino, before the northern gate of the Roman 
 city, over that arm of the Bacchiglione which was the 
 fosse of the Roman wall. It is a stream here quite 
 broad and swiftly flowing, lined with large trees and 
 overhanging, decaying houses; a little restaurant to 
 the right extends over the water with a covered 
 veranda, whose set tables and flasks suggest happy 
 carousings of summer evenings. The foundations of 
 the five arches which thus conducted the ancient Via 
 Aurelia into the city, still show their Roman work- 
 manship. But that which most draws the eye is the 
 huge masonry of the gate, with its great stone blocks 
 of the republican era, fitted evenly together, and its 
 medieval additions frowning and crumbling over- 
 head. Here it was, as an inscription reminds us, 
 that Francesco Novello swam the stream by night, 
 entered the town, and roused the people to that 
 memorable expulsion of the Milanese; and it was 
 from this tower of the gateway that Galileo, it is 
 said, when lecturing at the University, used by night 
 to sweep the heavens with his glass. 
 
 We kept straight down the Via Dante, which now 
 exhibited that characteristic of the plain-towns which 
 is so specially evident in Padua, — the colonnades 
 along the house-fronts. Here they are often on both 
 sides of the way, — as they used to be, everywhere, 
 
 1 W. W. Skeat's Chaucer. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 31 
 
 in the Middle Ages, — confining the street proper to 
 a dark strip hardly ten feet in width. 
 
 They have a unique interest, all their own in Padua, 
 • these heavy arcades extending for miles, that give 
 to the traveler such grateful shade from the burning 
 summer sun and shelter from the storms of winter. 
 They are so clearly the constructions of every age: 
 brick pillars, stone pillars, stuccoed pillars, columns 
 of the same diversity, columns with rudely cut, prim- 
 itive capitals of the tweKth and thirteenth centuries, 
 with Gothic capitals of the fourteenth and early fif- 
 teenth, with Renaissance capitals in gradual develop- 
 ment to the rococoism of the seventeenth; all bear 
 the marks of the period of their making, and remind 
 one incessantly of the many generations of change and 
 strife that have flowed beneath them. 
 
 Pursuing our dim way along them down the Via 
 Dante, past barred windows, quaint little shops and 
 dirty little cafes, we noticed on the right a handsome 
 Gothic palazzo of the Venetian style, having exquisite 
 pointed windows in dainty terra-cotta mouldings, 
 including a central one of six lights with a genuine 
 Gothic marble balcony. A little farther on, the cen- 
 tral Piazza dei Signori suddenly opened, called nowa- 
 days the Unita d'ltalia, and we found ourselves under 
 the old Venetian Lion on its column, before the rem- 
 nant of the vast bygone palace of the Renaissance 
 despots, once famed throughout Italy as the Reggia 
 Carrarese. 
 
 This remnant is the so-called Palazzo del Capitanio, 
 which faces the piazza on the west: a medium-sized 
 building, distinguished by a monumental Renaissance 
 stone gateway of two stories in the centre, through 
 which leads a street to the rear. This archway, with 
 its handsome flanking columns, is considered one of 
 
32 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the finest works of the architect Falconetto, exe- 
 cuted in 1523; the upper part of the surmounting 
 tower, however, dates from the fourteenth century, 
 and from it looks forth the enormous clock that is 
 said to be the earliest striking one in Europe. It was 
 constructed in 1344-64 by a certain Giacomo Dondi, 
 whose descendants are still accordingly endowed with 
 the patronymic of "Dondi dell' Orologio." Under 
 the clock-face is the broad inscription, — "Senatus 
 Venetus Andrea Gritti Principe," which makes that 
 famous long-gone doge seem but of yesterday; and 
 over that stands the white marble relief of the Lion 
 of St. Mark. 
 
 How much it has meant, that most celebrated 
 insigne, — and what extraordinary pride and care 
 did the subject towns display in showing it. The first 
 acts that Venice did after conquering a place, were 
 to place the relief of the Lion on the fagade of the 
 palace of government, the statue of the Lion on a 
 white marble column in the central piazza, and the 
 banner of the Lion on a red Venetian mast. Most of 
 those statues in the Veneto were destroyed by the 
 Austrians during their supremacy; this one of Padua 
 is a modern substitute, and the column is a relic of the 
 Roman Forum, dug up in 1764. 
 
 For this Palazzo del Capitanio the great Palladio 
 constructed an outside staircase. We walked through 
 the archway, along the deep brick mass of the build- 
 ing, for some distance to the rear, and there finally 
 discovered what I had never noticed before, — a small 
 rear courtyard, illumined like a treasure-house by the 
 resplendent white mass and beautiful lines of the 
 stairway. It rises in two covered flights, straight- 
 away, to a right-angled landing at the top, undecorated 
 save for the heavy balustrade and the unfluted Ionic 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 33 
 
 columns. There is no frieze, no sculpture; it is grand 
 and beautiful simply from its perfect proportions and 
 noble, harmonious lines. 
 
 Close beside this to the right rises the detached Li- 
 brary of the University, an uninteresting brick build- 
 ing, on the exterior, but containing an immense hall 
 with frescoes by Campagnola, the pupil of Titian, who 
 was one of the best of the late sixteenth-century paint- 
 ers of the Paduan school. This Sala dei Giganti, like 
 the original building itself, was formerly a part of the 
 mighty Reggia; when it was frescoed under Jacopo II 
 della Carrara, by D'Avanzi and Guariento, with sub- 
 jects suggested by the despot's dear friend, Petrarch. 
 These were subsequently covered over by Campag- 
 nola's work, — all but two interesting portraits : one 
 of Petrarch himself, the other of his Paduan disciple, 
 Lombardo della Seta. Nearby remains the chapel of 
 the great palace, also now occupied by the University, 
 and once frescoed by Guariento. 
 
 The Reggia was mainly erected by Ubertino della 
 Carrara (about 1345), and contained a score or two of 
 different, connected structures, with over four hun- 
 dred rooms, surmounted by an imposing array of 
 battlemented towers. Its principal, eastern front ex- 
 tended from the Piazza del Duomo on the south, to the 
 Vicolo S. Niccol6, some distance north of the Piazza; 
 its westward extent was nearly as long, to the Via 
 deir Accademia, behind the Library. Besides the oflfices 
 of government, stables, servants' quarters, etc., its 
 princely apartments were famed for that magnificence 
 of decoration and furnishing which has been so well 
 described for us by the Paduan annalist, Bernardino 
 Scardeoni. The numerous noble courts, arcades, and 
 flowered gardens complemented its brilliancy. It was 
 connected with the western ramparts, and Ezzelino's 
 
34 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 castle on the southwest, by a covered passage raised 
 on further arcades. Yet of all that grandeur there sur- 
 vive to-day only these renovated buildings of the 
 Library, the Palazzo del Capitanio — which was 
 occupied by the Venetian Podestas — and the struct- 
 ure adjoining the latter on the south, used now for the 
 Monte di Pieta. 
 
 It being now after six o'clock the Library was 
 closed for the day; so we returned to the piazza, to 
 examine the charming Renaissance loggia that adorns 
 it upon the south. This Loggia del Consiglio, as it is 
 called, is in reality the first thing to catch one's eye 
 on entering the piazza, so superior to all else is it in 
 grace and finish. It has the dainty simplicity of the 
 early Renaissance, having been constructed about 
 1493, and consists of a deep arcade or loggia, sur- 
 mounted by a single upper story with double and 
 triple windows; the arcade is approached by a wide 
 flight of steps, and embellished with a pretty balus- 
 trade and six monolithic marble columns with Co- 
 rinthian capitals. The building is otherwise entirely 
 of white stone, and delightfully effective, so much so 
 that we did not for several minutes notice the statue 
 which it holds in the loggia — Vittorio Emanuele II 
 in his full regalia as the Conqueror. 
 
 We continued to follow the Via Dante, passing 
 immediately on the right another fine Renaissance 
 fagade of simple lines, handsome in spite of the hid- 
 eous red boarding of its upper windows, and having 
 a large ornamental entrance, — the Monte di Pieta; 
 beyond it opened soon the Piazza del Duomo, with 
 the Cathedral looming on the west, and the Bishop's 
 Palace on the south. The latter, originally erected 
 about 1300, was rebuilt in 1474, and contains in its 
 grand salon an excellent example of a Renaissance 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 35 
 
 hall, adorned with a frieze of fifty portraits of the 
 bygone primates; it holds also a portrait by Guariento 
 of the poet Petrarch, who was, thanks to Jacopo II, a 
 canon of the Cathedral, and dwelt for some time in the 
 House of the Canons. Neither edifice was of strik- 
 ing appearance, the Duomo having but the unfinished 
 brick fagade which is so common. More interesting 
 were the Romanesque lines of the Uttle ancient brick 
 Baptistery, at the church's northeast corner, dating 
 from the middle of the thirteenth century; it is drum- 
 like in structure, with a flat dome, and no ornamenta- 
 tion save two rows of Byzantine mouldings, — yet it 
 has its own quaint effectiveness. Adjacent on the 
 north side of the piazza we saw a handsome detached 
 Renaissance archway, of the Doric order, — the so- 
 called Area Vallaresso, which was erected by G. B. 
 deUa Scala in 1632. 
 
 We entered the Duomo. The flap of the leathern 
 curtain admitted us to that strange region into which 
 a mighty church transforms itself at eventide and 
 vespers: a vast chiaroscuro into which great pillars 
 mount, through which filter dim rays of red and pur- 
 ple and gold from lofty windows, and where the glitter 
 of starlike candles scintillates softly from gilded altar- 
 piece and jeweled monstrance. Here and there in the 
 dusk a darker shadow reveals that higher phenome- 
 non, — a kneeling spirit in silent comniunion with 
 the Almighty. Seen thus the simplest building takes 
 on a form and significance of moving emphasis, recall- 
 ing to the observer from the shadowy past those myr- 
 iads of bygone figures, that have travailed and passed 
 away. 
 
 The original edifice on this spot was a work, it is 
 said, of the seventh century; which was reconstructed 
 in 1124, in 1400, and finally, in 1524-75. The present 
 
36 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 structure, aside from its size and fine proportions, is of 
 little interest; but it preserves in its sacristy a number 
 of precious old reliquaries, miniatures, vessels, etc., 
 besides a group of pictures of some worth, by Pado- 
 vanino, Schiavone, Campagnola, and Bassano. 
 
 On account of the dusk it was now out of the ques- 
 tion to inspect the interior of the Baptistery; so we 
 returned to the Piazza Unita d' Italia, and traversed 
 the block on its east to those other ancient squares, 
 the Piazzas dei Frutti and delle Erbe, which lie re- 
 spectively on the north and south sides of the vast 
 Palazzo della Ragione. 
 
 ' Nothing stranger than this mighty structure greets 
 the eyes of the traveler in all North Italy; no amount 
 of revisiting can accustom him to its size. Its medie- 
 valism is so apparent, in the Gothic parapet and the 
 Romanesque columns and frieze of the prodigious 
 logge, that the mind is at once led back to the dark- 
 ness of that twelfth century which gave it birth, and 
 one marvels that it could have left us such a produc- 
 tion. Apparently four stories in height, the whole of 
 the upper three consists of one immense hall, with 
 a curving wooden roof, tinned upon the outside, 
 which arches from one wall to the other. The logge, 
 added in 1306, are two-storied arcades that extend 
 along the entire hundred and fifty yards of each side; 
 the lower consists of ponderous masonry arches, now 
 occupied by shops; the upper, of a colonnade of light 
 marble columns, connected by a marble balustrade. 
 
 Next to this on the east we noticed, in passing, the 
 Palazzo del Municipio, a richly ornamented but 
 irregular building of the cinquecento, connected with 
 the Salone — as the Paduans call the Palazzo della 
 Ragione — by a heavy archway over the intervening 
 street. Walking around to the eastern front of this 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 37 
 
 structure, we found ourselves on the Via Otto Feb- 
 braio, and directly before the large building of the 
 University on its farther side. This occupies a full 
 square block, is faced with an interesting late-Re- 
 naissance fagade in stone, and contains a magnificent 
 cortile by Jacopo Sansovino, — which was now shut 
 to us by the lateness of the hour. We turned up the 
 thoroughfare toward the hotel, past the Post Office 
 on our right, and I pointed out to my companions 
 what is really one of Padua's chief curiosities — the 
 Caffe Pedrocchi, directly opposite, which occupies a 
 large stuccoed building between three streets, faced 
 with three handsome Doric porticoes, approached by 
 flights of steps and ornamented with sculptured lions. 
 This was the site of the spacious ancient Forum, bril- 
 liantly laid out under the Julian Emperors; of which 
 significant remains were discovered during the caffe's 
 construction. 
 
 We came back to it later, after dinner, through the 
 crowded way glittering with a thousand lights, and 
 found it also thronged and aglow, like a scene on the 
 boulevards of Paris. Every evening while in Padua we 
 sat on one of its porticoes, consuming coffee and ices, 
 watching the well-dressed crowds at their nightly 
 amusements. 
 
 On the morning after our first walk, which had 
 covered the approach to town and the central sec- 
 tion, we sallied forth early for some interior observa- 
 tion, determined to commence with that which was 
 earliest and of greatest importance, — the frescoes of 
 Giotto. So we repaired again to the ruined Arena on 
 the northeast, — located just outside the ancient city, 
 as was the Romans' invariable custom, — and to the 
 medieval structures which had been built from its 
 material. 
 
38 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 So throughly did the medievals use up the stones of 
 the amphitheatre that we found now within its walls 
 of enceinture naught but lawns and flower-beds, care- 
 fully tended by the municipality, with several recent 
 excavations, showing at the bottom various finds of 
 broken columns and entablatures. The ruins when 
 more extensive had been granted by the Emperor 
 Henry III, in 1090, to the Delesmanini family — from 
 whom they were purchased about 1300 by one Enrico 
 Scrovegno; he erected from them in 1303 a chapel to 
 the Madonna, in order to redeem, it is said, a repu- 
 tation made by his father for miserliness and usury, 
 — so bad that Dante placed him in the seventh circle 
 of his Inferno. Enrico also enlarged and beautified the 
 palace of the Delesmanini, occupying the ground 
 between the chapel and the entrance, so that it was 
 long famed as one of the grandest mansions in North 
 Italy; of it, however, not a trace now remains except 
 the pillars of the gateway. In 1306 Enrico induced 
 Giotto, still a young man and recently risen to fame 
 by his paintings in Florence and at the Vatican, to 
 come to Padua and decorate the chapel. There it 
 stood now before us in the centre of the inclosure, a 
 building so small and plain that one could hardly 
 realize its significance in the history of art. 
 
 A keeper let us in through the iron railing round- 
 about, and a step through the little doorway brought 
 us into an aisleless, round-arched nave, without col- 
 umns or chapels, having simply a slightly raised 
 tribune, a plain high-altar, and four plastered walls 
 from which the still bright colors of the deathless com- 
 positions glowed down upon us. They were lighted 
 by a triple Gothic window high in the entrance-wall, 
 six lancet windows on the right side, and two in the 
 apse. Between the two last-mentioned lay the tomb 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 39 
 
 of Enrico Scrovegno, a late trecentist work, repre- 
 senting him in the then accepted fashion, lying in 
 armor upon the cover; and the walls of the choir were 
 covered with frescoes by some followers of Giotto, 
 of no importance. 
 
 Giotto's frescoes are confined to the nave, which 
 they illuminate in four great rows of separate tab- 
 leaux, thirty-nine in all, beginning at the top to the 
 right of the choir-arch and continuing clear around 
 and back across the arch, gradually descendiag, until 
 they end with the huge representation of the Last 
 Judgment on the entrance wall. Before this master- 
 piece of human genius words are futile; sensations 
 vainly struggle, as they rush across the consciousness, 
 to disentangle themselves and stand forth; one can 
 only sit for a long time and gaze, gaze with the whole 
 sold at one scene after another, sinking ever deeper into 
 the atmosphere of that wonderful Biblical land, feel- 
 ing ever more keenly impressed upon one the infinite 
 pathos of Jesus' life and the infinite beauty of his 
 character. 
 
 In that these scenes do depict the history of the 
 lives of Christ and his Mother, commencing with the 
 Rejection of Joachim's offering because he was child- 
 less, and ending with the Ascension, lies a fact that 
 should have special attention as a light upon their 
 power. Books have been wi'itten upon Giotto's break- 
 ing away from the old traditions and opening a new 
 era of lifelikeness and individualism, upon his being 
 the first to grasp the secret of tactile values, upon his 
 inception of the dramatic and of true story-telling, 
 upon his adoption of coloring in broad masses and 
 lighter tones, upon his discovery of the proper laws 
 of composition, of the handling of masses, of darkness 
 and light, of natural, dignified action; and all these 
 
40 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 wondrous inceptions are seen here displayed. But 
 there is more than that. 
 
 The true highest end and aim of representation 
 should be, is bound to be, the setting-forth of some- 
 thing spiritual, the striking of a psychic chord which 
 shall vibrate in the soul of the observer. This is the 
 truth which Wilham W. Story seized upon, and devel- 
 oped in his remarkable sculptures. This is the truth, 
 often unrecognized, which has always confined good 
 art to the depicting of the human form, as the only 
 medium by which the spiritual can be expressed. In 
 proportion as the human beings represented display the 
 higher attributes, and by their expression and action 
 set forth a spiritual idea or the exaltation of a godlike 
 quality, in that same proportion does the spectator 
 thrill in response. When therefore a painter goes be- 
 yond the use of ordinary mortals, to the depicting of 
 Him who alone has been perfectly divine in life and 
 character, whose every action and very aspect must 
 have radiated spirituality and uplifted all that beheld 
 him, the painter uses the one, perfect, highest medium 
 for his accomplishments; so that if the work be well 
 done, it must speak to the soul of the spectator as 
 could nothing else inanimate. 
 
 Of course it was not in pursuance of this truth, now 
 so patent to us, that the medieval artists devoted 
 themselves exclusively to Biblical subjects, or that 
 Giotto covered these walls with illustrations of the 
 lives of Jesus and the Virgin; but because, until the 
 time of the full Renaissance, it was entirely by the 
 Church and the Monastery, and upon the churches 
 and the monasteries, that they were given their work. 
 The vast majority of the people were then unable to 
 read; and so, as in this Chapel, the Church spread the 
 divine story before them in pictures which they could 
 

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 ITH THE STATUE OF OATTAMELATA. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 41 
 
 not fail to understand, and profit by. Nevertheless it 
 was inevitable that Art, when ascending and expand- 
 ing, should do so by the exposition of the spiritual in 
 man; and should begin to decline when it transferred 
 its representations, as it did in the sixteenth century, 
 to the mythology of the heathen, without soul. 
 Raphael's myth of Cupid and Psyche in the Corsini 
 Palace at Rome, just about marks the turning-point. 
 
 Giotto, whether or not he ever formulated this 
 truth to himself in words, at any rate must have 
 known and appreciated the superior power of expres- 
 sion in the divine story, for he was always portraying 
 it, and spiritual ideas, even when given entire latitude 
 as to subject. Thus, with his intuitive genius, he de- 
 veloped an ideal form of the Christ, which in my opin- 
 ion has never since been surpassed and very seldom 
 equaled. That was the great task: to depict a human 
 shape from which should radiate all the highest beau- 
 ties of the soul, which should be beautiful in appear- 
 ance while yet full of manly strength and sorrowed by 
 trials, which should be radiant though sad, powerful 
 though meek, majestic though lowly, divine though 
 human. 
 
 How many, many painters have tried it in succeed- 
 ing generations, and are still trying it! And when has 
 one ever succeeded in properly combining all those 
 opposing qualities, and presenting to us an image that 
 to our souls cried, "This is Christ"? Nearly always 
 the failure comes in the inability to combine with the 
 necessary fairness and gentleness that manliness and 
 power which are also necessary. Generally the result 
 is effeminate. I know of no Christ but Giotto's to 
 which my heart can go out without one reservation. 
 
 With such reflections in mind, what a profoimd 
 sense comes upon one, as he examines these frescoes. 
 
42 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 not only of the marvel of their making when they 
 were done, and their leadership through all the centu- 
 ries, but of their still existing superiority in the expo- 
 sition of the Divine, — in their power to thrill the 
 soul of the observer. It is true that of the thirty-nine 
 pictures the first twelve are devoted to the life of the 
 Virgin before Jesus' birth, — following the accounts of 
 the Apocryphal gospels known as the "Protevan- 
 gelion" and "Gospel of St. Mary"; but one must 
 remember that this is appropriate, in a chapel dedi- 
 cated to the Virgin, and that Giotto must have aimed 
 to set forth one continuous epic, from the inception 
 of her life to the culminating Crucifixion.^ 
 
 Though the figures are about life-size, no one would 
 imagine it, in looking at them high upon the walls. 
 No more of them are put into any one picture than is 
 necessary for the idea, with careful composition and 
 balancing, and comfortable free spaces; and the back- 
 ground, whether of land or architecture, is but little 
 developed, so that the eye is not attracted from the 
 characters. The dramatic action is easy, natural, dig- 
 nified, and yet of wonderful expressiveness; there is 
 always grace, both in the ensemble and in the separate 
 figures; the colors are laid on in Giotto's broad masses 
 and light tones, so effective in wall-decoration; the 
 faces are all keenly individualized; the solids and forms 
 represented have the tangible realism and solidity 
 that no one before Giotto attained. Yet above all 
 these marvels of execution and expression is the mar- 
 velous figure of the Saviour; whether raising Lazarus, 
 entering Jerusalem upon the ass, washing the feet of 
 the Apostles, or suffering crucifixion. He is always 
 
 • For a fuller discussion of these frescoes, see Ruskin's monograph on the 
 chapel; or Andrea Moschetti's La Cappdla degli Scrovegne e gli Affreschi di 
 Giotto in Essa dipinti, Alinari, Florence, 1904. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 43 
 
 the perfect man, the Son of God. Manliness and 
 power shine from Him, while yet He is meek and 
 lowly; all the qualities that we would seek, all the 
 experiences that He had suffered, radiate from that 
 beautiful countenance which seems more than human. 
 
 The composition and dramatic action in the Rais- 
 ing of Lazarus are of the strongest in the series; there, 
 too, is one of the finest figures of Christ, in the very 
 act of summoning back the spirit to the decaying 
 body. The Maries kneel before Him in fear and adora- 
 tion, while the spectators cry aloud in their amaze- 
 ment. In the betraying kiss of Judas, the counten- 
 ance of Jesus while suffering the kiss turns a look 
 upon the traitor of infinite, sad reproach, that once 
 seen can never be forgotten. The entry into Jeru- 
 salem has a realism, in the people climbing the palm 
 trees to break off branches, and doffing their cloaks 
 and skirts to spread before the ass's feet, that makes 
 one comprehend the eventful doings of that day as 
 never before. 
 
 When we see the great tragedy ended by the Depo- 
 sition in the Tomb, surrounded by weeping apostles 
 and friends, then there comes, in the Resurrection, 
 one of the fine touches of Giotto, significant of his 
 infinite care, — in that the form of the risen Christ, 
 though of the same physical likeness as before, is no 
 longer the same. It has become unearthly; and its 
 spirituality is clearly marked. This is so also in the 
 Ascension. 
 
 In the life of the Virgin there are two especially 
 marked pictures: first, the meeting at the Golden 
 Gate between Joachim and Anna, after their separa- 
 tion, in which there is most moving pathos in the 
 manner in which the elderly couple cling to each other, 
 and Anna fondly holds Joachim's head while kissing 
 
44 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 him, — significant of the true, pure love of the long 
 and happily married; secondly, the Salutation of 
 Elizabeth to the Virgin, upon the latter's visit, which 
 is full not only of pathos but of profound physiognom- 
 ical meaning. 
 
 These frescoes did more than open the eyes of the 
 world to the possibilities of painting; the forms in 
 which Giotto cast many of the compositions became 
 types for those subjects, which succeeding artists 
 proceeded to follow for centuries. In looking at the 
 two last-mentioned pictures one has to remember 
 that for generations thereafter the two meetings be- 
 came reproduced countlessly in the very same fashion, 
 even to the identical manner in which Elizabeth 
 seizes the Virgin, looking into her face. In the Vir- 
 gin's presentation at the Temple we see for the first 
 time that flight of steps, with the waiting high priest 
 at the head of them, up which the girlish figure kept 
 climbing for so many succeeding ages. Here is the 
 prototype of the Worship of the Magi, with the fore- 
 most kissing the Divine Child's foot, the other two 
 standing in the rear with their costly offerings in 
 hand, and the camels of the caravan behind; of the 
 Flight into Egypt, with Mary and the Child upon a 
 donkey, and Joseph walking; of the realistic Crucifix- 
 ion, with the brutal soldiers parting the garments on 
 one side, and the Virgin fainting between her friends 
 on the other. Giotto adheres to the sacred narrative 
 in that she is standing, — "stabat mater," — but the 
 fainting idea became so seized upon and developed, 
 that eventually she was depicted as prone upon the 
 ground. Paolo Veronese was fond of this method. 
 
 In that same fresco is seen one of Giotto's ideas 
 which, most unfortunately, was not long followed : the 
 representation of the superhuman, intangible forms 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 45 
 
 of the angels, flying roundabout and consoling the 
 Sufferer, by showing them always at two-thirds length, 
 — as if just appearing phantom-like from the air. The 
 dire results of neglecting this precept are well shown 
 in the angels and flying saints of Tintoretto long 
 after, which are portrayed in full with such fidelity 
 that one always feels that their heavy bodies are 
 about to fall ponderously on the persons beneath. 
 Likewise with Giotto's Last Supper, here represented 
 properly with the apostles all around the table: he 
 would not deviate from truth as did the later artists, 
 in placing the diners upon one side only. 
 
 About the walls of the nave, under the lowest series 
 of tableaux, Giotto also depicted in separate panels, 
 in grisaille, fourteen single figures illustrative of the 
 Virtues and Vices; monumental works of their kind, 
 which here usually pass unnoticed, but anywhere else 
 would stand preeminent. Like the frescoes above, in 
 which — to quote F. Mason Perkins — " Giotto may 
 truly be said not only to have perfected the icono- 
 graphy of Byzantium and the Middle Ages, but to 
 have permanently fixed the laws of religious compo- 
 sition," so also in these figures, "he succeeded in. 
 formulating a series of allegorical representations 
 which, on account of their powerful significance of 
 imagery, were handed down by his successors as gen- 
 erally accepted types of those abstract qualities which 
 they symbolized." ^ 
 
 I did not upon this visit neglect to examine more 
 carefully than theretofore the great fresco of the Last 
 Judgment on the entrance wall, which Mr. Perkins 
 styles "at once the grandest and the most monumental 
 of all Giotto's works." High in the centre sits the 
 same beautiful figure of the Saviour, in a vesica-piscis, 
 
 » F. M. Perkins, Giotto. 
 
46 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 with the twelve apostles throned to right and left and 
 a host of angels -filling the sky above, while He looks 
 downward with welcoming hand to the elected souls, 
 with the saints and martyrs at their head; on the right 
 below is Satan, as a horned, partly human form, swal- 
 lowing sinners and devoting them to horrible punish- 
 ments; and directly over the doorway is the interest- 
 ing group of Enrico Scrovegno receiving from three 
 charming saints the model of the chapel. 
 
 We went for a while into the little sacristy to the 
 left of the choir, to look at the statue of Enrico Scro- 
 vegno, standing in a niche with prayerful hands: a 
 fine example of the great Giovanni Pisano, — to whom 
 is also attributed the quaint Madonna upon the altar. 
 In the sacristy also was kept the grand crucifix painted 
 by Giotto on wood, which formerly hung in the trib- 
 une. Then we returned to the chapel door, and lin- 
 gered a last moment before departing, "gazing on 
 these silent but eloquent walls, to re-people them with 
 the group, once, as we know, five hundred years ago, 
 assembled within them : Giotto intent upon his work, 
 his wife Cinta admiring his progress, and Dante, with 
 abstracted eye, — conversing with his friend." ^ 
 
 Hours had passed us by, and it was lunch-time; 
 but in the afternoon, after a siesta, we returned to the 
 same location, for a visit to the adjacent Church of 
 the Eremetani, — built likewise from the stones of the 
 Arena. Its plain fagade is of no interest; but imme- 
 diately upon entering I was struck, as formerly, with 
 the strangeness of the interior. It has, like the Ma- 
 donna deir Arena, that curious characteristic of the 
 later thirteenth century, when it was built, — an un- 
 adorned nave without aisles or columns, having vast 
 bare wall-spaces, intended to be brightened with fres- 
 
 ' Lord Lindsay, Christian Art. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 47 
 
 coes, and once so covered, but now coldly and mono- 
 tonously whitewashed. This bareness is emphasized 
 by its extraordinary length; and its arched wooden 
 roof is of Oriental style, painted fantastically blue and 
 white. 
 
 The origin of that peculiar roof was this: there 
 lived at that epoch in Padua a certain Augustinian 
 monk, one Fra Giovanni, who had visited India as a 
 missionary, and brought back with him the design of 
 the covering of an Indian hall. This design was first 
 applied by the Paduans to the roofing of their enorm- 
 ous hall in the Salone, and then, as it solved the 
 problem admirably, to this huge nave of the Ere- 
 metani, which would not appear fantastic but for the 
 ridiculous coloring. Thereafter it was copied far and 
 wide through northern Italy, in the greatest churches 
 and civic buildings. 
 
 Affixed high upon the walls to right and left of the 
 entrance, we saw two fine Gothic tombs of the Delia 
 Carrara (Ubertino and Jacopo minore), removed 
 hither from the destroyed Church of S. Agostino, 
 Jacopo's being distinguished for its Latin inscription, 
 composed by his grateful friend, Petrarch. Both were 
 sculptured by Andriolo de' Santi, the noted architect 
 of the Church of S. Antonio. On the entrance wall 
 itself were two rather pretty altars of painted terra- 
 cotta, products of the school of Donatello's pupil, 
 Bellano. There was naught else to enliven the nave 
 but two or three simple altars on each side, against 
 the long blank spaces. The choir, with its adjacent 
 chapels, was almost equally uninteresting, having only 
 some damaged frescoes by the Byzantine-mannered 
 Guariento, — although they are, perhaps, the best of 
 his known works. 
 
 This cold nave, however, was once the scene of 
 
48 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tremendous human passions; for here it was that on 
 the day before Christmas, 1585, occurred the penulti- 
 mate act in the wondrous, terrible drama of Vittoria 
 Accoramboni, — that drama so perfectly character- 
 istic of the unbridled lusts and horrors of the decaying 
 Renaissance, which has left behind it no worse relic 
 and no stronger epitome; that tragedy over which so 
 many authors of many tongues have lingered, and 
 which John Webster immortalized in his stage-epic of 
 The White Devil. 
 
 To sum up what is so well known, Vittoria Acco- 
 ramboni, — so famed for her beauty that from a poor 
 girl of unknown family she had become the wife of 
 Francesco Peretti, nephew of the Cardinal Montalto, 
 subsequently Pope Sixtus V, — not satisfied with 
 such a rise, schemed with her brother for her husband's 
 assassination, in order to marry the brutal Duke of 
 Bracciano, chief of the Orsini; and, after escaping 
 decapitation in prison for the murder, and three times 
 wedding the duke, following different papal decrees 
 annulling the marriage, fled with him from the court 
 of Sixtus to far-oflf Padua. Here they had no sooner 
 established themselves and their retinue, in various 
 rented palaces in the city and on the Lago di Garda, 
 than Bracciano died, — of poison, it is supposed, at 
 the hands of his enemies; leaving Vittoria well pro- 
 vided for by his will, yet subject to the power of his 
 nephew and executor. Prince Ludovico Orsini. The 
 latter, who had bitterly hated her from the first, and 
 opposed her marriage, immediately did all that he 
 could to thwart and despoil her; and soon ended by 
 invading at night her palace near the Arena, with 
 forty armed, masked bravos. This was the Palazzo 
 Cavalli which still stands opposite the church, de- 
 voted nowadays to a school of army engineering. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 49 
 
 They found Vittoria at her prie-dieu, costumed for 
 bed, and slew her with many daggers; including in the 
 slaughter her young and innocent brother Flaminio, 
 as he sang to his lute, unconscious of danger. Next 
 day the two corpses were laid out together in an open 
 coffin in this Church of the Eremetani; and all day 
 long the people of Padua crowded by with rising ire. 
 In the dimness of the nave I could almost see again 
 that strange, weird scene: the fair body of Vittoria 
 upon the black velvet pall, its white exposed breast 
 gaping redly with tl^e wounds, — still so gloriously 
 lovely in her crown of golden hair, that the gazing 
 bourgeois forgot, as they looked, her past of crime, 
 and with ever-increasing anger raised their hands, and 
 swore revenge upon the murderer. 
 
 The finale quickly followed: Prince Ludovico had 
 intrenched himself with his followers in his palace 
 hardby; the people of Padua called out their soldiers, 
 armed at large, and besieged the murderer with mus- 
 ket, firebrand, and cannon; his men fell dying, his 
 dwelling tottered, and he surrendered. Such was 
 Padua's Christmas Day of 1585. Two days later. 
 Prince Ludovico Orsini met his doom of strangulation 
 in the dungeons of Venice; seventeen of his surviving 
 bravos were hanged, decapitated, and quartered, eight 
 condemned to the galleys, and six to long terms in 
 prison. Well could Webster cry of those princes 
 of the Renaissance : — 
 
 These wretched eminent things 
 Leave no more fame behind 'em than should one 
 Fall in a frost and leave his print in snow. 
 
 What a contrast to pass from that scene to the 
 little chapel adjoining the right transept of the church, 
 dedicated to Saints James and Christopher, — and 
 find true fame immortal blazoned there by the paint- 
 
50 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 er's quiet brush. Here it was, about 1453, that Squar- 
 cione was commissioned by the Ovetari family to 
 depict the lives of those saints; that he delegated the 
 work to his pupils Niccolo Pizzolo, Bono da Farrara, 
 Ansuino da Forli, and Andrea Mantegna; and that 
 from the resulting compositions the renown of Man- 
 tegna soared starlike to the sky, never to sink. Un- 
 fortunately a number of the frescoes have now become 
 so much damaged and erased as to spoil both their 
 details and their appearance as a whole; but enough 
 still remains, including several whole pictures of 
 Andrea's, to make us understand how he, theretofore 
 an unknown youth, came before their completion to 
 be sought by the Marchese Gonzaga to ornament his 
 court at Mantua, — and became at a bound the 
 object of the flocking world's praises. 
 
 The illustrations from the life of St. Christopher 
 are on the right wall, those of St. James on the left; 
 Mantegna's works are the two lowest on the right, 
 and the four lowest on the left, — large panels with 
 life-size figures, which show by their marked differ- 
 ences in execution and expression the great step for- 
 ward made by the youth while engaged in their com- 
 position. In the earlier ones, the second series of St. 
 James, we notice more attention given to the archi- 
 tecture and landscape than to the figures, which are 
 immobile, rather stiff, and without expression; but 
 in the four later (including what we can decipher of 
 the defaced Death and Burial of St. Christopher) 
 the human forms rise to a positive grandeur in their 
 graceful dignity, individuality, and power. Above all 
 is their marvelous solidity, which has a finished real- 
 ism that delights the rested eye. 
 
 The middle series on the left — St. James baptizing 
 a convert in the street, and appearing before Herod — 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 51 
 
 have in spite of their statuesqueness a beauty all their 
 own, in the splendid perspective, the realism of the 
 buildings and the countryside, the pleasing, balanced 
 composition, and the most extraordinary use (for that 
 period) of actual light and shade. In the very real 
 soldier who stands alone, turning his head away from- 
 Herod as though in grief and disapproval, one sees 
 the countenance of Mantegna himself, as he was then, 
 a youth of twenty-five; and what better than that 
 lined, worn face could tell one of his young years of 
 unceasing application and study. 
 
 Likewise, as the legend has it, the broad counten- 
 ance of Squarcione is visible, in the Execution of St. 
 Christopher, upon the burly soldier with spear in 
 hand, who is looking over his shoulder at the rather 
 amusing bulk of the condemned giant-saint, which 
 they are. vainly trying to fill with arrows. The latter 
 are not merely stopped miraculously in the air, but 
 one of them has flown back into the eye of the watch- 
 ing and blaspheming king. This can barely now be 
 discerned. The execution of St. James has more pa- 
 thos, as he lies on the ground, with the uplifted mallet 
 about to descend and dash out his brains; and the 
 head of the saint projects from the wall in a manner 
 that is genuinely startling. To left of this he is on his 
 way to execution, and has stopped in a crowded city 
 street to heal a suppliant unfortunate; in this scene 
 there is a remarkable disposition of grouping and 
 thronged movement, with the same fine realism as 
 to buildings and perspective, and a very easy, pow- 
 erful, dramatic action. Through all the pictures runs 
 Mantegna's great characteristic, which so many paint- 
 ers strive after to-day, — the depicting of the clothed 
 human form so that the observer is clearly conscious of 
 the body beneath, in all its solidity and articulations. 
 
52 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 The other frescoes in the chapel are of importance 
 only to show one the tendencies of Squarcione's 
 school, and emphasize how far Mantegna rose above 
 them. Besides the upper panels of the lives of Saints 
 James and Christopher, — the former executed by 
 Ansuino and Bono da Ferrara, — they consist of repre- 
 sentations of the four evangelists on the ceiling, and 
 some excellent work by Pizzolo on the wall and vault- 
 ing of the apse behind the altar; including a large 
 Assumption of the Virgin in which she is drawn with 
 much tactile value and dignity. Good critics also 
 attribute to Pizzolo the two first scenes concerning 
 St. James. 
 
 On finishing the examination of this chapel, we 
 had done with the sights of the northeastern quarter; 
 and when we resumed our walk upon the following 
 morning, I took my companions back to the central 
 section, to visit the interiors which we had there 
 omitted. We started south down Via Garibaldi, 
 but, just before reaching the nearby Piazza Cavour, 
 stepped up the narrow Via S. Andrea to the right for 
 a short distance, to see a mutilated, ancient, sculp- 
 tured figure of a cat, — unmistakably a cat, of heroic 
 size, — seated upon a column cut from the same kind 
 of gray stone, old enough apparently to date from 
 Roman days. This was the famed'"Gatta di S. An- 
 drea," — originally intended to be a lion, the device 
 of the surrounding ward, — which was raised in 1212 
 to celebrate the citizens' victory, with Ezzelino, over 
 Aldobrandino d' Este. 
 
 Returning to Via Garibaldi, we went on to the 
 University, whose doors were now open, and a stream 
 of students passing in and out. As we entered through 
 the large deep archway to the central court, flanked by 
 four Doric half-columns supporting a heavy entabla- 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 53 
 
 ture, I thought of how many, many generations that 
 stream of eager, aspiring youth had been so passing, — 
 even since before the days of Dante, — and reflected 
 upon the airs of antiquity assumed by some modern 
 universities that can boast of a century's existence. 
 Even the curious, loving nickname, bestowed on this 
 one of Padua by the students and people, — II Bo, — 
 dates from a famous tavern, with the sign of the ox, 
 that existed on this spot more than four hundred years 
 ago. Up to 1493 the various component schools were 
 scattered about the city ; but in that year the Venetian 
 Government, as one of the first, wise moves in its new 
 possession, collected them all into the large building 
 theretofore occupied by the "Osteria del Bo." The 
 edifice subsequently underwent many reconstructions, 
 receiving the present dignified fagade in the latter part 
 of the sixteenth century. The number of students is 
 now about fourteen hundred, comparing well with the 
 largest institutions of other countries to-day, but a 
 shrinkage indeed from the eighteen thousand reported 
 to us from the Early Renaissance. 
 
 The strikingly beautiful central court that we 
 entered dates from the cinquecento, by the hands of 
 the great Sansovino; two stories of rhythmical white 
 colonnades with rounded arches, the lower of the 
 Doric order, the upper of Ionic, flashed down upon 
 us from all four sides their charming lines with reliev- 
 ing shadows; the pedestals of the Ionic columns were 
 sculptured with reliefs, and between them stretched 
 a handsome balustrade; the Doric frieze of the first 
 story was ornamented, in the spaces between the 
 customary triglyphs, by circles, globes, musical instru- 
 ments and bucrania, — sure mark of the commenced 
 Decadence, as was also the line of lions' heads above 
 the upper columns, with conventional designs inter- 
 
54 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 laced between. The cornice was small, and made of 
 acanthus consoles at intervals. Round about the 
 four walls hung countless armorial bearings of by- 
 gone prominent graduates, and over the balustrade 
 hung groups of present undergraduates, in earnest 
 discussion. 
 
 We mounted the staircase to the upper story, and 
 visited the great hall of the University, on the court's 
 eastern side: a magnificent chamber, with a large 
 rostrum, many curving rows of fine seats, and a richly 
 painted ceiling; the four walls being closely studded 
 with the wooden, gilded coats of arms and crests of 
 former generations, hundreds upon hundreds, glis- 
 tening with gold-leaf and animated by countless 
 strange heraldic figures. The portiere pointed out to 
 us a number of crests of celebrated personages of the 
 Renaissance. Here Galileo taught mathematics, from 
 1598 to 1608. Women sometimes in those days at- 
 tended here also, — as we had noticed, in ascending 
 the staircase, by the statue of the famed Elena 
 Lucrezia Piscopia, who on account of her remarkable 
 erudition received here a doctor's degree about the 
 middle of the seventeenth century, — one of the 
 earliest to be bestowed upon the gentler sex. 
 
 The portiere then accompanied us to the top-floor 
 front, where we saw one of Padua's most interesting 
 relics: the first anatomical arena ever constructed in 
 Europe, — in 1482, — whose lines have been followed 
 by all succeeding ones: six tiers of oval wooden 
 benches with railings, rising steeply one above the 
 other to the ceiling, with the operating-table in the 
 confined central space, placed on a trap-door by 
 which it could be raised from a basement below with 
 the body already in position. The whole construction 
 was of wood, now cracked and worn by time, but 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 55 
 
 still, after four centuries and more of use, in surpris- 
 ingly good condition. As I thought of the brilliant 
 light that had spread from this room into the modern 
 knowledge of the human body, — while we slowly 
 descended the stairs and left the famous precincts, — 
 Shelley's lines passed through my mind : — 
 
 In thine halls the lamp of learning, 
 Padua, no more is burning; — 
 Once remotest nations came 
 To adorn that sacred flame. — 
 Now new fires from antique light 
 Spring beneath the wide World's might. 
 
 Traversing the passage along the left side of the 
 Municipio opposite, we came at once to the Piazza 
 delle Erbe and the south side of the mighty Salone, 
 where a wide outside staircase ascends to its hall. 
 Mounting this, we rang a bell by a hanging cord, and 
 were admitted by a woman keeper for a small fee, — 
 stepping from the first-floor loggia immediately into 
 the vast inclosure. As my eye swept over its ninety- 
 one yards of length, thirty yards of width, and thirty- 
 two yards of height, to the gigantic wooden span over- 
 head, I wondered again how the medievals could ever 
 have done it. In such a space the two colossal, black- 
 stone, Egyptian statues of Neith by the doorway 
 looked nothing unusual, and the giant wooden model 
 of Donatello's horse for the Gattamelata statue, at the 
 west end, seemed no more than life-size. The acreage 
 of floor was increased to the eye by the lack of all 
 furniture; naught encumbered it except the statues 
 mentioned, and a curious dark-stone pedestal in the 
 northeast corner, — the Lapis Vituperii, upon which 
 for centuries defaulting debtors were stood in the 
 piazzas, to be cleared from insolvency by the fire of 
 their creditor's tongues. 
 
56 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 All around the immense walls, in three hundred and 
 nineteen separate compartments, run fully as curious 
 quattrocento frescoes, by one Zuan Miretto and another, 
 representing the signs of the Zodiac and other astro- 
 nomical bodies, of allegorical meaning. It was these 
 walls, or this roof, that Giotto once tinted with his 
 magic brush, — a labor marvelous for size as well as 
 beauty, if he covered all the space; but a fire in 1420 
 destroyed the work, leaving us with no conception of 
 what would have been one of the world's chief treas- 
 ures. The hall had just then been rebuilt, when Giotto 
 worked upon it; originally three chambers, they had 
 been converted into one in 1306, with the aid of the 
 wide roof whose design Fra Giovanni brought back 
 from India. There above us it still sprang from wall 
 to wall, a mighty, open- wood work construction, in the 
 same lines as that of the Eremetani, mounting from 
 each side to the peak in a succession of half-arches, 
 one upon another. 
 
 How dusty, bare, silent, and deserted was this 
 strange place which has held such priceless artistic 
 treasure, "where the very shadows seem asleep as 
 they glide over the wide, unpeopled floor, [and] it is 
 not easy to remember that this was once the theatre 
 of eager intrigues, ere the busy stir of the old burg 
 was utterly extinguished." ^ 
 
 We went down to examine Donatello's wooden 
 horse, — a huge, lifelike figure with a modern head, 
 teeming with muscular energy, which was praised by 
 poets to the skies when it came from the master's 
 hand, the first man-made charger since ancient days. 
 Behind it to the right, on the end wall, we noticed a 
 little monument to Livy, containing the bones of his 
 freedman Titus Halys, which were when first found 
 
 ' J. A. Symonds, Fine Arts, chap, ii, p. 60. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 57 
 
 mistaken for the historian's. Other Roman relics and 
 inscriptions line the walls of the loggia without, on 
 the north side, where we looked down upon the 
 flocked toadstool-covers of the market-stands in 
 Piazza dei Frutti, and the morning pandemonium of 
 the bartering populace rose to our ears. 
 
 Descending, we made our way through the crowd 
 westward to Via Dante and the Duomo. The piazza 
 before the latter was vacant and silent as ever, and 
 the sun poured into it somnolently; three soldiers 
 were in fact asleep together before the triumphal arch 
 of the Carrara. I found the sacristan within the 
 Duomo, and brought him out to let us into the an- 
 cient, round Baptistery, which is always kept locked. 
 
 Exclamations of astonishment burst from my com- 
 panions' lips as we stood in that strange cubic nave, 
 of the twelfth century, gazing at its quadrangular 
 walls and flat dome : the whole structure, every square 
 inch of its surface above the wainscoting, — on walls, 
 dome, entranceway, presbytery, chapels, even to the 
 soflSts of all the arches opening into the chapels, — 
 was covered with vivid, dramatic frescoes that irra- 
 diated the dusk with countless colors ! ' Never have I 
 seen another building so completely painted; a huge 
 flower-garden, it has properly been called. But if now 
 so exuberant in hues, what must it have been when 
 Giusto Padovano first did this work, in 1378, more 
 than five centuries ago. 
 
 He was not a first-class artist; his drawing was 
 faulty, his compositions ill-arranged, his work lacking 
 in grace, lifelikeness and natural expression; but what 
 a world of energy, dramatic exposition, and true, 
 deep feeling, was poured into these representations of 
 the sacred story, — and still shines from their earnest 
 figures, straight to the heart of the observer. No- 
 
58 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 where have I seen a more perfect setting-fortli of that 
 profound religious emotion which the Renaissance at 
 first excited in the trecento Italians. The work, it is 
 true, was considerably retouched by Luca Brida in the 
 eighteenth century, — to which are due its present 
 bright colors; but he was singularly careful not to 
 injure the lines of the master. 
 
 The cycle is commenced on the southern wall by 
 the portrayal of the life of John the Baptist, and con- 
 tinued on the northern and western walls and the 
 chancel arch of the eastern, by those of the Virgin 
 and the Saviour; the small chamber of the chancel is 
 lined on all sides with some forty scenes of the Apo- 
 calypse, — "the most complete and comprehensive 
 illustration of the Apocalypse ever attempted in 
 painting,"^ — and its cupola contains the customary 
 Descent of the Holy Ghost; while the lower parts of 
 the dome of the nave are adorned with the history 
 of the Book of Genesis, as far as the placing of Joseph 
 in the well, and its centre holds a remarkable, serried 
 Gloria. In the last, "Our Saviour stands in the 
 centre, within a circle of light, and below Him, in a 
 vesica piscis, the Virgin, erect, with her hands raised 
 in prayer, as at St. Mark's and in the Duomo of 
 Murano. To their right and left sit, in different atti- 
 tudes, and with their distinctive emblems, the saints 
 of God, male and female, five rows deep, in a vast 
 circle; the effect is singularly brilliant, and reminds 
 one of Dante's comparison of the church in heaven to 
 a snow-white rose.''^ This, says the same distin- 
 guished author, "is the first instance, I believe, of the 
 style of composition subsequently adopted by Cor- 
 reggio and later painters, but originally, as in the 
 present instance, imitated from the mosaics." 
 
 ' Lord Lindsay, Christian Art. 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 59 
 
 Besides this, perhaps the first painted Gloria, of most 
 interest to us were the fervid, energetic tableaux of the 
 sacred lives, so rich in significant incident and earnest 
 feeling as to impress one in spite of all their faults. 
 Through them all shone forth the preponderating in- 
 fluence and example of Giotto; nearly everywhere a 
 repetition of his ideas of composition, expression, and 
 color; below Altichieri also in their setting-forth, yet 
 bearing the distinctive marks of the emotion behind 
 the hand that drew them. Here were already again 
 the Child- Virgin on her way lip the temple steps to 
 the waiting high priest, the Last Supper with the 
 sleeping St. John upon Jesus' breast, and a Betray- 
 ing Kiss of Judas practically identical with that of 
 the Arena; there were other scenes, however, which 
 Giotto had not represented, and in which Giusto 
 shows himself capable of original composition. 
 
 From this building we went on to the only remaining 
 sight of interest in the central section, the large castle 
 of Ezzelino in its southwest corner, whose grim battle- 
 mented tower still glowers down over the whole city 
 as when that devil kept it filled with tortured suf- 
 ferers. This keep, however, is about all that one can 
 see of it, for the original castle has been rebuilt and 
 inclosed with later and more extensive structures, 
 which are occupied as barracks and an astronomical 
 observatory; the walls of Ezzelino being visible on the 
 south and west sides only, where they back darkly 
 upon two arms of the first city moat. There were 
 originally two towers, of great height and strength, 
 which the people called the Zilie, after their architect; 
 one of them was demolished in the sixteenth century, 
 and the other reduced to its present size in 1769, when 
 adapted to observatory uses. The extensive and ter- 
 rible mass of dungeons which Zilio constructed under- 
 
60 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ground, he himself was one of the first doomed pris- 
 oners to enter. They must still exist, in large part, 
 though sealed from modern eyes. 
 
 We wandered thence for a while through the narrow 
 winding ways of the southeastern portion of the 
 central section, — the most ancient part of Padua; 
 true medieval ways of dirt and shadows, too con- 
 fined for arcades, leaned over by high, gaunt, stone 
 dwellings or walls of crumbling stucco, with an occa- 
 sional larger palace of Renaissance days in more pre- 
 tentious lines. This quarter continues across the arm 
 of the Bacchiglione forming the first eastern city moat, 
 into the southerly part of the town's eastern addition; 
 and into this part I took my companions after lunch, 
 by way of the Via S. Francesco, which runs south- 
 eastward from the University. 
 
 Hard behind the buildings of the University, the 
 ancient moat, now a picturesque narrow stream of 
 muddy water, creeps between decaying backs of 
 medieval houses and frequent leafy gardens; and 
 immediately beyond this, we came upon the very 
 dwelling which Dante occupied when living in Padua, 
 six centuries ago: an excellently preserved, stuccoed 
 palace of Gothic lines, the "windows with tracery in 
 their pointed arches which clearly had been renewed 
 in ironwork. This modem touch, and the fresh-looking 
 grayish paint over all, made it difficult for the mind to 
 grasp that in those very walls had worked and slept 
 the author of the Divine Comedy. 
 
 Opposite, on the south side of the street, in a recess 
 at a house corner, stands a relic still older: an ancient 
 stone sarcophagus, surmounted by pillars supporting 
 a brick trecento canopy, — which is thoroughly be- 
 lieved by most Paduans to contain the remains of 
 their Trojan founder, Antenor. I tested the truth of 
 
PADUA THE LEARNED 61 
 
 this by inquiring of a number of passing citizens; their 
 responses were as positive as unanimous. As a mat- 
 ter of fact, however, the sarcophagus was unearthed 
 in 1274, while digging a cellar, and in it "was found a 
 skeleton of mighty size, still grasping a sword, with 
 a crude Latin inscription from which the excited 
 populace insisted that this was the tomb of Antenor. 
 Modern criticism looks upon it as the burial-place of 
 some Hungarian invader of the ninth century." ^ 
 
 A few paces beyond this diverges to the right, 
 southward, the Via del Santo; and we slowly followed 
 it to that great block of buildings, which in the minds 
 of the Italians distinguishes Padua far beyond the 
 rest of her possessions, and which is certainly for us 
 next in interest to the frescoes of Giotto : the enormous 
 church and cloisters of St. Anthony of Padua, with 
 their attendant courts and chapels. Stretching over 
 acres upon acres of ground, they form one of the most 
 celebrated groups of edifices in all Italy, and a saintly 
 shrine second only to that of St. Francis of Assisi. 
 
 ' C. Hare, Dante the Wayfarer. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 PADUA AND S. ANTONJO 
 
 " And whither journeying ? " — " To the holy shrine 
 Of Sant' Antonio in the city of Padua." 
 
 — Samuel Rogcbs, Italy. 
 
 It is difficult for a foreigner to realize how large a part 
 St. Anthony occupies in the Italian Catholic mind, 
 until he has lived for some time in the country, and 
 visited this city where the saint labored and died. 
 St. Anthony was a follower of St. Francis; but far 
 greater than that which repairs to Assisi is the steady 
 concourse of pilgrims who throng to Padua year after 
 year, to lay their hands in prayer against the sar- 
 cophagus containing the sacred relics; and extensively 
 as the Church of St. Francis has been adorned by the 
 great artists of the past, far more so has been this 
 church of his follower, until the devotion of six centu- 
 ries has gathered here one of earth's grandest collec- 
 tions of artistic treasures. The impulse of Cathol- 
 icism to beautify its holy places has found here a most 
 remarkable exposition. 
 
 He was a Portuguese — St. Anthony — whose 
 thoughts turned to self-sacrifice and religious zeal 
 from his very childhood; first betaking himself as a 
 missionary to the fanatical Moors, then obliged by 
 illness to return to Europe, a happy wind drove his 
 vessel to the northern shores of Italy, where he was 
 attracted to Assisi by the fame of St. Francis's 
 preaching, and at once embraced the latter's cause 
 with unequaled ardor. Far and wide then he traveled 
 for years, in the Franciscan habit, preaching with a 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 63 
 
 fervor that converted whole multitudes, and whole 
 cities in a body, until the fame of his sanctity became 
 second to that of St. Francis only. Miraculous powers 
 were attached to him by the people; and eventually 
 his life and holy deeds became one of the most beauti- 
 ful legends of the Church. Countless are the miracles 
 attributed to him, and thoroughly believed in by the 
 devout; one often portrayed is that of his preaching 
 to the fishes of the sea, who rose to the surface to listen 
 to him, when the inhabitants of Rimini would not; 
 many others are of dead persons restored to life, — 
 a young girl that had been drowned, a child that had 
 been scalded, a noble lady stabbed by her husband, 
 a youth slain by the brother of his inamorata, etc. 
 Well known is the story of the heretic Boradilla, who 
 required a miracle to remove his doubts; and St. 
 Anthony, with the Host in hand, at once by a word of 
 command forced the mule which Boradilla was driving 
 to kneel before the sacred object. 
 
 The latter years of the Saint's life were spent in 
 Padua, where he greatly comforted the inhabitants in 
 their horrible existence under Ezzelino, and fearlessly 
 confronted that tyrant himself with the memorable 
 words: "O most cruel tyrant, and mad dog! the ter- 
 rible sentence of God hangs over thee. When wilt 
 thou cease to spill the blood of innocent men.''" 
 Whereupon "they saw the monster, whom all feared, 
 fall upon his knees, with a cord about his neck, before 
 ■the man of God, confessing his sins and imploring 
 pardon." ^ Even after his death the Saint continued 
 to appear and sustain the Paduans under Ezzelino's 
 continued cruelties. He died at the early age of thirty- 
 six, in 1231, exhausted by his life of hardship and sac- 
 rifice; and the very next year was canonized, and the 
 1 Perkins, Tuscan Sculptors. 
 
64 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 vast church to contain his shrine commenced by the 
 devoted people, — who have ever since called him by 
 no other name than "II Santo." He was exceedingly 
 fond of children, was often supported in his trials by 
 visions of the infant Christ, and is not only therefore 
 identified with child-life and love, but usually repre- 
 sented as carrying the little Jesus in his arms. 
 
 The first sight of the mighty temple erected over 
 his remains is always an amazing one. My companions 
 were duly surprised, as we came upon it behind its 
 wide, stone-paved piazza at the south end of the Via 
 del Santo, — so gigantic was the mass of buildings, 
 so lofty the gabled peak of the church, crowned by its 
 extraordinary throng of Oriental pointed domes and 
 minarets, whose blue spires soared from every part 
 into the bluer sky, and made the whole edifice seem 
 a creation of dreamland. S. Marco of Venice was 
 clearly responsible for the design, as it has fathered 
 so many Byzantine-domed structures over the terri- 
 tories of Venetia. 
 
 The church faces westward, with the extensive 
 piazza before it and upon the north, along the south- 
 ern side of which run the adjacent lower buildings 
 containing the chapel of S. Giorgio, the Scuola del 
 Santo, and the part of the monastery made over into 
 the city's museum of fine arts. First to attract our 
 attention, however, after the soaring domes and min- 
 arets, was the fine bronze equestrian statue rising 
 upon a very high stone pedestal, opposite the north- 
 western angle of the fagade, — a wonderful war-horse 
 of heroic size, mounted by a stern-visaged knight 
 whose presence commanded the whole inclosure. It 
 was the Gattamelata of Donatello. What a marvel- 
 ous work — so perfectly life-like, so vigorous and 
 powerful, so dominating! the first bronze horseman 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 65 
 
 since the days of Rome, yet after four centuries of 
 existence still unsurpassed. 
 
 We turned from it to consider the fagade, which is 
 one of the most unusual of North Italy, partly in that 
 it is constructed, like the rest of the edifice, of a 
 strange brick of yellowish hue, — "a most vile ma- 
 terial wherewith to attempt the construction of a 
 noble church. Stone is used very sparingly in the 
 voussoirs of the arches, etc." ^ The great Niccolo 
 Pisano was the architect, however, and has not failed 
 to give us a Gothic fagade of imposing lines. Its most 
 striking feature is a charming colonnade, of pointed 
 arches upon slim marble shafts, with light marble 
 balustrades between the shafts and above it, — which 
 crosses just below the gable; below this are four huge, 
 recessed Gothic arches, the two outer wider than the 
 inner ones, and between the two inner a lower, 
 rounded, recessed doorway, topped by a rounded 
 niche containing an ancient statue of the Saint. In 
 the outer arches are two small, rectangular side door- 
 ways, each with two deep lancet windows overhead; 
 while each of the inner arches contains a single lancet 
 opening, still narrower and longer. Above the colon- 
 nade, the gable holds a simple rose-window, with a 
 double Gothic one on each side, of trefoil lights, and 
 — with that variation which ever in Italy accom- 
 panies the Gothic — a Romanesque cornice of little 
 round arches along the sloping eaves. From the peak 
 soars a three-storied minaret with an acute spire, 
 backed by one of the looming domes, tinned, and 
 painted azure. From the intersection of the nave with 
 the wide transept rises a large colonnaded drum, upon 
 which towers highest of all a tinned spire, bearing a 
 winged angel to the clouds. The whole construction 
 
 ' Street, Brick and Marble in the Middle Ages, chap, vii, pp. 117-18. 
 
66 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 is most strange, in its medley of the Romanesque, the 
 Gothic, and the Byzantine. 
 
 Approaching more closely the main portal, we ob- 
 served in its lunette the famous fresco placed there 
 by Mantegna at the age of twenty-one, — the brown- 
 frocked figures of Saints Anthony and Bernardino, 
 chief lieutenants of the Franciscan order, holding be- 
 tween them the golden monogram of Christ, glistening 
 like a sunburst; a work unfortunately now retouched 
 and much ruined, but still exhibiting what a power 
 of modeling and disposition the master had at that 
 age acquired. Below it are handsome, modern bronze 
 doors, containing in high-relief four beautiful Gothic 
 niches with the four leaders of the Franciscan order, 
 — the two already mentioned and Saints Bonaven- 
 tura and Louis of Toulouse. 
 
 We entered the nave — and stood overpowered by 
 the vast space of incense-scented gloom, whose mighty 
 stone pillars towered to dim domes far above; it was 
 pierced in the distant choir by shafts of light from 
 lofty windows, that fell upon a wondrous, gleaming 
 high-altar, adorned with lovely bronze figures which 
 stood upon its top about a majestic crucifix. It was 
 the famous altar of Donatello. The lofty roof is sub- 
 divided into two bays and two domes alternately, 
 and the piers to support the latter are so heavy as 
 almost to conceal the lower aisles and give the effect 
 of a nave only; it is the chief fault of the construction. 
 The upper wall-spaces that once were covered by fres- 
 coes of the early masters, which must have beauti- 
 fully illumined the edifice with their flood of color and 
 gold-leaf, now stand whitewashed and cold, — a result 
 of the fire of 1748; but waves of beauty still pour 
 from the pictures and sculptured monuments upon 
 the piers, and the massed treasures of the choir. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 67 
 
 There is a grandeur about all the rear part of the 
 structure : two great domes, one over the intersection 
 of the transept, and the other over the high-altar, 
 shower down their mystic light; tall, graceful, pointed 
 arches circle round the apse, opening into the ambu- 
 latory behind; and before the choir rises an exquisite 
 rood-screen, of pavonassa columns with sculptured 
 bases and Corinthian capitals, upholding round arches 
 with richly decorated edges and soffits, upon whose 
 entablature stand a crowd of saintly figures. Behind 
 these we saw still higher the bronze saints and twink- 
 ling candles of the high-altar; and the long marble 
 floor stretching up to them was dotted with dark 
 living figures, moving ceaselessly to and fro in the 
 religious silence. 
 
 Concentrating our attention upon details, it was 
 first struck by a most engaging painting upon the first 
 pier to the right, facing the entrance, — a Virgin and 
 Child, with four Franciscan saints, by the compara- 
 tively unknown early cinquecentist, Antonio Boselli 
 of Bergamo; a work of delightful grace and coloring, 
 of that calm, sweet, joyous expression that moves the 
 heart of the observer. On the opposite first pillar we 
 saw another Madonna, of the fourteenth century and 
 more primitive, — the so-called "Madonna of the 
 BUnd," which is supposed by the Paduans to have 
 miraculous healing power. The second piers are faced 
 by ornate, sculptured tombs of the Late Renaissance, 
 — that on the right being of the famous Cardinal 
 Bembo, poet and connoisseur, friend of the great, 
 patron of artists and literati^ whose "Paduan retreat 
 became the rendezvous of all the ablest men in Italy, 
 the centre of a fluctuating society of highest culture";^ 
 
 * J. A. Symonds, Renaissance in Italy. — Cattaneo modeled this bust 
 at Rome, in 1552, under the oversight of Sansovino and Tiziano. 
 
68 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and that on the left, of Alessandro Contarini, by 
 Sammicheli, adorned with several of those hideous 
 negro forms characteristic of the Venetian baroque. 
 
 But one chapel opens from the aisles, that of the 
 Sacrament, midway on the right, where we noticed 
 two fine bronze gates, and the tombs of Gattamelata 
 and his son, against the walls, in red, white and black 
 marbles. Then we came to the right transept, which 
 is occupied by the Chapel of S. Felice, as the left tran- 
 sept is by the "Cappella del Santo," — two of the 
 chief wonders of the place. We stood in the dusky 
 nave, delighted, turning our eyes from the beauties of 
 one chapel to the other, — from the exquisite marble 
 screens which face them, to the rich bronzes, sculp- 
 tures, paintings, hanging-lamps and silver candelabra 
 glittering within; while between them towered the 
 precious rood-screen with its saintly figures, backed 
 by the great altar and bronzes of Donatello. Few 
 other churches in Christendom can give just such a 
 fairy scene of artistic splendor. 
 
 The two chapel-screens alone are magnificent and 
 unique; that to the right, of Gothic lines and highly 
 colored marbles, built in 1372-76, — that on the left, 
 of the Renaissance, glistening in white and azure 
 marbles, and harmonious carvings; both are arcaded 
 below, and adorned in the upper divisions by statues 
 in regularly placed niches, by richly hued panels and 
 dainty designs, by string-courses and pilasters with 
 diversified reliefs; dainty relief- work also decorates 
 the quoins and soflSts of the arches; while in the 
 pointed arches of the one hang fine old Oriental brass 
 lamps, dimly burning, and through the rounded 
 arches of the other gleam the beauties of its sanctuary 
 under the massed candle-lights of its altar, — splen- 
 did silver candelabra shaped into putti and flowers, 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 69 
 
 bronze angel-statuettes, and, around the walls in 
 recesses, a succession of large marble high-reliefs 
 representing miracles of St. Anthony, — life-size 
 figures that seem to move and breathe in the golden 
 light. 1 
 
 This last was the "holy of holies"; for the Saint's 
 body lay under its altar-top, ever attended by burning 
 tapers, ever prayed over by the Franciscan brethren, 
 ever worshiped by the endless stream of the devout, 
 who knelt in rows of little chairs facing the sanctuary, 
 and filed one by one around the altar to the rear of 
 the sarcophagus, to kiss and weep against its marble 
 block, and beg assistance in their troubles. "The 
 nave was filled with decrepit women and feeble child- 
 ren, kneeling by baskets of vegetables and other pro- 
 visions, which, by good St. Anthony's interposition, 
 they hoped to sell advantageously in the course of the 
 day. Beyond these, nearer the choir, knelt a row of 
 rueful penitents, smiting their breasts and lifting their 
 eyes to heaven." ^ 
 
 In the Chapel of S. Felice we saw only a high cin- 
 quecento altar, approached by steps with handsome 
 railings, and surmounted by five saintly statuettes;' 
 but round upon the walls were those wonderful fres- 
 coes, which follow Giotto's in interest as well as time, 
 — the celebrated work of Altichieri and Jacopo 
 d' Avanzo. How many times I have returned to study 
 
 ^ The brilliant Riccio was the designer of this Cappella del Santo, about 
 1500, and directed its commencement; the work was continued by Gio- 
 vanni Minello and Sansovino, until 1531, and thereafter finished by Fal- 
 conetto. 
 
 ' Beckford, Itali/, vol. i. 
 
 ' This chapel was constructed for the Marchese di Soragna in 1372 by 
 Andriolo, then head architect of the church; the five statues, also by his 
 hand, represent the Marchese and his wife, and Saints Peter, Paul, and 
 James. — Bartolomea degli Scrovegni, who is believed to have been 
 poisoned by her husband, Masilio dalla Carrara, lies behind the altar. 
 
70 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 those pictures, rejoicing in their realism, power, and 
 individuality. The genius, as is recognized to-day, 
 was that of Altichieri, the founder of the school of 
 Verona, who developed under the study of Giotto, 
 and was the first great painter of North Italy to suc- 
 ceed the master. This work was commenced by him, 
 with d' Avanzo's assistance, in 1376. On the left wall, 
 the lunettes of the rear wall, the spaces of the right 
 wall beside the window, and the lunettes of the outer 
 wall above the arches, is depicted, in eleven, large and 
 small, graphic scenes, the legendary life of St. James, 
 to whom the chapel was originally dedicated, — vivid, 
 dramatic pictures, filled with striking figures of ex- 
 traordinary lifelikeness, in both garb and action, and 
 of high individual character, telling the story with 
 conciseness and power. But, chief of all, from the 
 whole space of the rear wall beneath the moulding, 
 stand forth the hundred variegated figures of the 
 tremendous Crucifixion. Sadly faded as they are from 
 their pristine glory of brilliant coloring, damaged and 
 obscured, close inspection still reveals their strength 
 of composition, drawing, and significance, combined 
 in a realism never surpassed. 
 
 Giotto's leadership and influence, of course, are 
 everywhere visible : the backgrounds, perspective, and 
 often the architecture show the same limitations ; the 
 tactile values, action, and expression are as fine as 
 anything of the master himself, and the realism in 
 places is beyond him. The scene will ever linger in my 
 memory that shines from the third lunette: a stretch 
 of sandy seashore at dusk, before the castle of Queen 
 Lupa, which rises in the rear, of decent proportions 
 and sombre picturesqueness, with the Queen and her 
 sister looking down from a balcony; on the beach the 
 forms of Hermogenes and Philetes, just laying the 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 71 
 
 body of St. James upon a long stone, which is shaping 
 itself at the touch into a sarcophagus; finally, the 
 waiting boat with its prow upon the strand, and a 
 mysterious-looking angel holding the rudder. So 
 mystic is the little scene, so dark and heavy in atmo- 
 sphere and shadows, so weird in movement and expres- 
 sion, so natural in drawing and perspective, that one 
 finds a shudder stealing down his back. It is a finely 
 spaced, effectively arranged, dramatic composition; 
 and the others are not far behind it. 
 
 But the Crucifixion is the chef-d'oeuvre, — an enorm- 
 ous work, thirty feet or more in length, and perhaps 
 fifteen feet high. In the already accepted fashion, 
 the saints and friends of Christ are massed upon one 
 side, the soldiers and enemies upon the other; the 
 former weep, the latter scoff and cast dice for the gar- 
 ments; and on the outskirts are many people engaged 
 indifferently in their everyday occupations, with 
 streets, buildings, gossip, barter, and the various 
 domestic animals. These, however, are but the back- 
 ground for the supreme tragedy, whose brutality is 
 as well conveyed by the soldiers' callousness as is its 
 poignant grief by the emotions of the saints. Remark- 
 able figures are they, every one of that throng, — 
 natural, yet highly individualized, garbed appropri- 
 ately for the epoch, intensely alive, and marked with 
 keen expressions. It is a work that would rank among 
 the highest in any age of development, — yet how 
 marvelous when we realize that it was done in that 
 far-away, primitive trecento, by its crude methods, 
 one of the first truly realistic crucifixions, if not the 
 very first. 
 
 "Altichieri combines many faults of those later 
 Tuscan painters: exaggerated love of costume and 
 finery, delight in detail, preoccupation with local 
 
72 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 color. . . . The accessories absorb him. . . . The spec- 
 tator is in danger of forgetting the Figure upon the 
 Cross. . . . Good qualities consist in clearness of 
 narration, eflfective massing, and fine distances. The 
 composition and facial types, fresh and memorable; 
 the architecture handled with loving precision and 
 perspective, though the nai've and unmathematical is 
 seldom wanting. The portrait-heads are individual- 
 ized to the utmost limits permitted by form in that 
 day, while to this gift of direct observation is added 
 a power of rendering the thing seen, surpassed by 
 Giotto alone."^ 
 
 We crossed the nave to the Cappella del Santo, and 
 examined next its exquisitely carved pilasters,^ and 
 the series of high-reliefs around its walls. There are 
 nine scenes, commencing with the Ordination of St. 
 Anthony on the left wall; the others represent certain 
 of the miracles, four of them being resuscitations of 
 dead persons. They were executed between 1500 and 
 1530, by Sansovino, Tullio Lombardo, and several 
 other artists of the Venetian school. Especially inter- 
 esting we found the last scene, by Antonio Lombardo, 
 in which the Saint is causing a little child to bear wit- 
 ness in favor of its mother, and all the forms are very 
 Greek in treatment, from that artist's study of the 
 antique; while most beautiful of all to us was Giro- 
 lamo Campagna's Resuscitation of a Youth, in which 
 the figures are of an ideal beauty, grace, and tense 
 significance. As we examined those on the back wall 
 the steady stream of devotees kept passing by the 
 holy tomb, mostly women of the lower class, who laid 
 
 1 Berenson, Norih Italian Painters. 
 
 * One of these beautiful pilasters, by Girolamo Pironi of Vicenza, is 
 especially remarkable for the delicate grace of its grapevines, with birds, 
 snakes, etc., among the leaves, wrought with elaborate accuracy. 
 
PADUA. ALTAR WITH BKUXZES. (DUXATELLO.) 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO " 73 
 
 their heads and lips against the marble altar-back, 
 pressed to it rosaries and other objects for a blessing, 
 and repeated their prayers aloud ecstatically; some- 
 times they wept and moaned, in an emotion that 
 regarded none surrounding. I wished that I might 
 have such comforting faith in the powers of the in- 
 animate. 
 
 After looking also at the richly sculptured silver 
 candelabra, and the white and gold decoration of the 
 ceiling that completed the effect, we entered by a 
 small doorway an adjacent chapel on the east, filled 
 with contrasting gloom, in which still forms knelt 
 murmuring before an altar, and through which softly 
 percolated the picturesque hues of old frescoes and 
 the colored marbles of medieval tombs. This was the 
 Cappella della Madonna Mora, the only remaining 
 portion of the earlier Church of S. Maria Mater 
 Domini, which stood upon this ground in St. An- 
 thony's day. In 1852 the chapel was carefully re- 
 stored; but there still stands upon its altar the statue 
 of the " Madonna Mora " (a black-faced image) which 
 the Saint was wont to adore. Off from it on the north 
 opens a smaller chapel, a recess whose walls are cov- 
 ered with ruined, retouched frescoes of Giusto Pada- 
 vano, now of little worth. In the adjacent left aisle of 
 the church, which here is prolonged as an ambulatory 
 around the choir, we noticed the peculiar baroque 
 monument of Caterino Cornaro, father of the Caterina 
 whom Venice adopted as the Republic's daughter, 
 and gave as a bride to the King of Cyprus; then we 
 made the circuit of the ambulatory, peering through 
 the locked wickets of its seven successive chapels, at 
 the modern frescoes and sculptures adorning them. 
 
 The central one of these, — the Cappella del Te- 
 soro, or Sanctuary, constructed by Perodi about 1690, 
 
74 • PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 — lying directly behind the high-altar, is lavishly 
 decorated with marbles and gold-leaf, and contains 
 some remarkable relics (shown by the monks for 
 three and one half lire) — such as fine gold-work of 
 the dnquecento, and the chin, tongue, hair, and other 
 pleasant fragments of St. Anthony. The other six 
 chapels have been allotted to and decorated by the 
 different chief nationaUties; that at the north end 
 best pleased us by some really fine modern paintings 
 of New Testament scenes, extraordinary in that the 
 artist had achieved, for once, the Early Renaissance 
 simplicity and strength of composition and color. 
 After all, I thought, we could paint to-day as well as 
 four centuries ago, if our artists would thus return 
 to the great precepts and the uplifting themes; but 
 my mind wandered sadly to the recent Venetian art 
 exhibition of late canvases from all over Europe, in 
 whose thousands there were few indeed that were 
 not petty, in subject, in composition, in dignity, and 
 heart-appeal. We puny moderns paint things without 
 true feeling, or elevation, and try to make up for the 
 lack of heart-interest by tricks of atmosphere and 
 manner. I fear that our art will never be great again, 
 until we return to the methods that glorified it in the 
 past, with minds reattuned to simplicity and truth. 
 
 From the southern end of the ambulatory we 
 mounted at last, by a few steps through a side door, 
 into the elevated choir. Several assistant sacristans 
 were constantly engaged in exhibiting its beauties to 
 the unceasing throng of visitors, — chiefly pilgrims 
 to the shrine. Our attention was first drawn to the 
 two sides of the marble screen, separating the choir 
 from the aisles, which were designed by Donatello; 
 they were of solid construction, some ten feet or more 
 in height, adorned with pilasters, panels, and patterns 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 75 
 
 of white and colored marbles; and each carried six 
 bronze plates of reliefs, from the Old Testament, 
 about two feet square — ten of them by Bellano 
 (1488), the Paduan sculptor who learned from Dona- 
 tello, and two by his pupil Andrea Riccio (1507) — 
 like paintings in their wealth of background, detail, 
 and crowds of small figures in dramatic action. 
 Riccio's, as Mr. Perkins said, "at once place him on 
 a higher level than his master." The whole constitute 
 an effect of remarkable splendor and beauty; while 
 each plate is a study, in itself, of the possibilities of 
 bronze in vivid portrayal. 
 
 Fascinating as were these to us, they were forgotten 
 when we turned to the altar. This was reconstructed 
 in 1895 after Donatello's original design, and adorned 
 upon both sides with his exquisite bronze reliefs. The 
 main body is raised upon five steps of precious mar- 
 bles, and faced completely with bronze placques, — a 
 central square, representing the half-figure of Christ 
 with two little angels lowering it to the tomb, and ten 
 oblong panels, containing the master's celebrated 
 little angel-musicians, with two more of them on the 
 ends. They are utterly charming, these rounded baby- 
 figures, blowing with puffed cheeks upon their various 
 instruments. At the rear of this base rises the ante- 
 pendium, of glistening Carrara cut into lovely pilas- 
 ters, panels, and a wreathed cornice, and faced with 
 three larger bronzes : a square Pieta in the centre, and 
 two wide plates, representing miracles of St. Anthony, 
 at the sides. The two last, with their two companion 
 pieces on the altar's back, are the finest work of all, 
 truly wonderful in their perspective, handling of 
 masses, and expressiveness. Fitly topping all this are 
 the seven life-size bronze statues rising above, and the 
 crucifix rising again above them, bearing a form of 
 
76 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Christ that seems unsurpassed, for its union of realism 
 with grace. A quaint Madonna stands just below His 
 feet, holding her Babe, with Saints Francis and An- 
 thony at her sides. All but the two sainted bishops 
 on the ends are from the master's own hands. 
 
 Here, then, are gathered upon one altar a score and 
 a half of the world's greatest masterpieces of sculp- 
 ture. We understood their perfection when we stopped 
 to remember that Donatello came to Padua at the 
 very height of his powers. "The third period of 
 Donatello's artistic development, comprising the 
 years (1444-54) spent at Padua, is the time of matur- 
 ity in technical skill and in range of thought. Dona- 
 tello is now fifty -eight years old; for about forty years 
 he has been constantly studying nature, the antique, 
 and his trade. One might reasonably expect, then, to 
 find in this, the only important commission outside of 
 his own city, a tour deforce. And such it is : for it com- 
 prises reliefs which are his masterpieces in relief, sep- 
 arate statues of great character and beauty, and much 
 ornamental detail exquisitely designed and wrought. 
 ... In artists like Donatello, however, the energy of 
 imagination is so great that it extends itself over a 
 broader field, and the intelligence is so penetrating 
 that it sees in each object its own significant features. 
 Therefore we have sculpture ranging in technique 
 from the equestrian statue of Gattamelata to the 
 delicate bas-relief of the young St. John, and in sub- 
 ject, from the joy of singing children to the agonized 
 repentance of a Magdalen." ' 
 
 There is one more masterpiece in this choir, that of 
 Riccio, — a magnificent bronze candelabrum nearly 
 twelve feet high, formed into a great variety of lovely 
 designs and figures from Christian and heathen lore, 
 
 ' Freeman, Italian Sculptors, chap. v. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 77 
 
 upon a half-dozen graduated divisions.^ Also inter- 
 esting is the full-length, contemporary portrait of St. 
 Anthony, which is said to be his most accurate like- 
 ness, — placed near the left-hand entrance. After 
 examining this, we had just enough of the day left to 
 pay a visit to the buildings adjoining the church on 
 the south, which are entered by doors in the right 
 aisle. We saw the large Chiostro del Capitolo, with 
 its handsome Gothic arcades and medieval tombs; the 
 small Chiostro del Noviziato, the rooms above which 
 are still occupied by the friars; the sacristy, with its 
 tarsia-work from Squarcione's designs and its marble 
 ornamentation by Bellano; and other rooms and pass- 
 ages occupied by Gothic tombs. Here was formerly 
 the " bellissima cappella " of S. Jacopo, — spoken of by 
 Vasari as having been so splendidly frescoed by Giotto, 
 — which is probably identical with the later chapter- 
 house; the frescoes, alas, have long disappeared, 
 although the brethren exhibit some alleged fragments 
 of them in a row of ruined saints in the "Cappella del 
 Capitolo." Still more fragmentary we found the re- 
 mains of the cloister in which St. Anthony used to 
 walk, belonging to the former Church of S. Maria, — 
 a small, broken colonnade behind the apse, adorned 
 with Gothic bits of terra-cotta. 
 
 On the next day we visited the buildings which 
 extend from the southwest angle of the church along 
 the south side of its piazza, — little brick structures 
 of Gothic lines and Romanesque cornices, with long 
 homely brick pilasters dividing their fagades, in Lom- 
 
 1 It was "by this magnificept Paschal candlestick," said Perkins, in his 
 Italian Sculptors, that Andrea Briosco, called Riccio from his curling hair, 
 obtained his great reputation. "This noble work of art is divided by rich 
 cornices — and is crowned by a rich vase. . . . Every portion is wrought out 
 with the utmost care, not a detail neglected, nor is any part of its surface 
 unadorned." 
 
78 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 bard fashion. The first is but the screen of an ancient 
 graveyard, whose monuments are visible through its 
 pointed gateway; the second is the flat-gabled "Cap- 
 pella S. Giorgio," which Altichieri and d' Avanzo have 
 made immortal. One of the church's sacristans 
 brought a huge key that opened the door of the 
 simple, round-arched entrance, locked us within, and 
 went away again, saying that he would return in a 
 half-hour. We hardly noticed it, so affected were we 
 by the sight of that extraordinary nave: the whole four 
 walls are frescoed from top to bottom in one vast mass 
 of brightly colored dramatic scenes, whose hundreds of 
 life-size figures, clad in costumes and armor of old, stand 
 forth with vivid power, — moving, struggling, tortur- 
 ing, pressing in brilliant throngs, before backgrounds 
 of fanciful architecture. There are twenty-two large 
 tableaux, some much injured, some almost entirely de- 
 faced; but the majority have a remarkable brightness, 
 with joyous colorings that brought to our realization 
 the pristine brilliancy of such pictures of the trecento. 
 The stories that they portray are of strong and 
 tragic interest : the legends of St. Lucia and St. Cate- 
 rina on the right wall, that of St. George on the left; 
 the Crucifixion and Coronation of the Virgin are 
 on the altar-wall, and by the entrance, the Annuncia- 
 tion, Adorations of the Shepherds and the Magi, the 
 Circumcision, and the Flight into Egypt. Especially 
 stamped upon my mind is the scene of St. Lucia being 
 taken to execution, where she has refused to move, and 
 the oxen harnessed to drag her have fallen to their 
 knees; upon her pure uplifted face is an expression of 
 sublime confidence in the divine goodness that one 
 cannot easily forget.^ The execution of St. Catherine 
 
 ' "She stands as unmoved and still as if communing with God in the 
 midst of a desert, — her whole figure and attitude, her utter, effortless. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 79 
 
 also is of unusual expressiveness and power, — the 
 same profound feelings being manifest in her sweet 
 countenance, while the wheel that was to rack her 
 flies asunder. The scenes as to St. George are filled 
 with very forceful knightly figures, clad in glistening 
 chain-armor. Through all the pictures the realism is 
 unbroken, of wonderfully accurate drawing and solid- 
 ity for the period, with dignified movement, and ex- 
 ceeding power of disposition and expression. Every 
 time that I have seen these frescoes I have been more 
 impressed by their superiority in such respects to any 
 that followed them for a hundred years; while for 
 pure, deep feeling they have seldom been surpassed 
 in any epoch. In them, said Layard, "the spirit of 
 Christian chivalry finds, for the first and almost for 
 the last time, its voice in the painting of Italy." In 
 the power, too, that is here displayed, of handling 
 crowds, of balancing masses, and managing so as to 
 bring out strongly and pointedly the chief idea of 
 every tableau, Altichieri stands preeminent. These 
 works of his should certainly be more appreciated and 
 studied by the world at large than they have been 
 hitherto.^ 
 
 From the chapel we finally stepped next door, to 
 the so-called "Scuola del Santo," a building erected 
 by the Brotherhood of St. Anthony in 1499-1505, 
 according to the customary model of those fraternity- 
 
 unresistant immobility, forming the most marked contrast with the 
 frenzied efforts of the oxen, and the rabid rage of her persecutors." — Lord 
 Lindsay. 
 
 ' " Every variety of character " — wrote Lord Lindsay in his Christian 
 Art — "is discriminated with a degree of truth that startles one ; — feeling, 
 simplicity, and good taste, prevail throughout; — there are crowds of 
 figures, but no confusion; the coloring is soft and pleasing, the backgrounds 
 are more usually of the most gorgeous and exquisite architecture. The 
 author comes very near Masaccio in his peculiar merits, while in Christian 
 feeling, invention, and even in composition, he surpasses him." 
 
80 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 schools, with a large meeting-hall upon the upper 
 floor. Around, the four walls of this hall, above the 
 wainscoting, extend seventeen large frescoes, painted 
 in different centuries, from the fifteenth to the eight- 
 eenth, representing — of course — events of the Saint's 
 life. They were not clearly discernible to us by the 
 dim light from the grimy windows, nor was the parrot- 
 like chatter more enlightening, of the crone who fol- 
 lowed us about, and responded to questions simply 
 by repeating her monologue. The best of the pictures 
 are the three done by Dom. Campagnola, and the 
 three by Titian ;i though all are badly injured and 
 some ruined completely. Titian's have also been so 
 spoiled by restorations as to be no representations 
 of his power; they portray certain of the Saint's 
 miracles, — the causing of the infant to give evidence 
 for its accused mother (number 1), the resuscitation 
 of the wife slain by her husband (number 11), and 
 the healing of the boy who cut off his foot in remorse 
 for having struck his mother (number 12). 
 
 On leaving the hall, as our eyes were somewhat 
 tired of painting, we walked around to the famous old 
 botanical garden of Padua, founded in 1545, which 
 lies close by on the south. The narrow street leading 
 from the piazza in that direction took us across two 
 small arms of the Bacchiglione, the second of which 
 runs just before the garden and is prettily shadowed 
 by its leaning trees and bushes. Through a locked 
 iron gate we could see graveled paths winding off 
 through the cool shade of the wood, lined by many 
 varieties of shrubs, — an inviting contrast to the 
 
 ' These, and the rest of Titian's frescoes executed in Padua, were 
 painted by him at an early age, about 1511, when he resided here for a 
 while on account of the financial depression and other troubles in Venice, 
 caused by the war of the League of Cambrai. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 81 
 
 heat and glare of the sun. We pulled a wire that 
 rang a bell, and were shortly admitted by an intel- 
 ligent caretaker, who conducted us over the grounds. 
 Surprise and pleasure filled us at the size and beauty 
 of the giant trees that surrounded us on all sides, 
 shutting off in a moment that medieval Italy in which 
 we had been living, with its shadeless plain, and bare 
 streets and piazzas, transporting us apparently to 
 some quiet English dell; a charming transition, 
 which made me suddenly realize that all Lombardy 
 could be like this, covered with great trees and lawns 
 and copses, would men permit it. It has the neces- 
 sary deep soil, the temperate climate, the rainfall; 
 and must have been so covered in bygone ages. All 
 the monarchs of the North were here, — elms, oaks, 
 and beeches, as grand as any of English pride. We 
 saw the hickory that is one hundred and fifty years 
 old and one hundred and twenty feet tall, the aged, 
 hollow plane tree (dating from 1680) that is the an- 
 cestor of all the planes in western Europe, and, finally, 
 inclosed in a many-sided house of its own, the cele- 
 brated palm {Chamosrops humilis) planted about 
 1580, that was so admired by Goethe on his visit of 
 1786. The front side of its dwelling was now open (it 
 is closed only in winter-time) and we could clearly 
 see the dozen different trunks, within the close foliage, 
 that raise it sixty feet or so from the ground, into an 
 imposing yet graceful mass. 
 
 This stands in the eastern portion of the grounds, 
 which is laid out as a wide extent of flower-beds and 
 squares of shrubs, with a long greenhouse running 
 along the outer side, and other palms and exotic 
 plants scattered about. Here are countless varieties 
 of growth usually unknown to the Temperate Zone, 
 and many others brought from the Orient. "It is 
 
82 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 pleasant and instructive," said Goethe, "to walk 
 through a vegetation that is new to us. With ordin- 
 ary plants, as well as with other objects that have 
 been long familiar to us, we at last do not think at 
 all; and what is looking without thinking?"^ 
 
 That afternoon we completed the sights of the Pi- 
 azza of S. Antonio by paying our visit to the Museo 
 Civico, which is next to the Scuola del Santo, and like 
 it occupies a portion of the old monastery buildings. 
 A handsome aspect has, however, been given it by 
 a modern marble fagade of Renaissance lines, and a 
 truly beautiful modern staircase, all of white stone, 
 on the left of the entrance hall. The end of this hall 
 opens into an old arcaded cortile of the friars, pictur- 
 esquely occupied now, in corridors and centre, by 
 an assemblage of ancient sarcophagi, monuments, 
 and bits of sculpture, including the fragments of a 
 Roman temple excavated from the ancient forum, on 
 the site of the Caffe Pedrocchi. The upper front hall, 
 into which the stairway debouches, has been richly 
 built over, and filled with many casts of the most 
 renowned antique sculptures; through a glass door it 
 is continued as a book-lined gallery of the library, 
 but before this door another one to the left opens into 
 the first hall of the paintings. 
 
 All of Padua's great pictures, as has been seen, lie 
 without this collection, which is neither extensive nor 
 distinguished; yet it contains a number of works that 
 always afford one pleasure. In the first salon, which 
 consists of three rooms thrown into one and still 
 partially divided, there hang a good Palma Vecchio, 
 a Madonna with two saints, of his usual warm rich 
 coloring and tone, with a beautifully graduated land- 
 scape; a landscape by Giorgione, that well exhibits 
 
 ' Goethe, Autobiography: Letters from Switzerland and Travels in Italy. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 83 
 
 his powers of perspective and atmosphere; an unfin- 
 ished Titian^ with half-figures of Christ, three apostles 
 and three other persons, of strong realism and individ- 
 uality; and a delightful example of that fine cinque- 
 centist, Boccaccio Boccaccino, of Cremona, who has 
 not yet come fully into his own, — a Madonna with 
 two female saints, much faded in its delicate tints, 
 but still showing his characteristic tone of golden 
 shades, his soft flesh-work, and peculiar grace. All 
 three figures are painted from the same model, which 
 he used so constantly. In the centre of the room is a 
 superb, unusual, Japanese vase of large size, brilliantly 
 decorated with warriors in full suits of their curious 
 ancient armor, on wide fields of snow, — of a com- 
 position and perspective almost Occidental. 
 
 The second room, running to the right from near 
 the end, showed us greater treasures : foremost among 
 them, three Giovanni Bellini Madonnas, one of which 
 (415) is especially well preserved, with rich broad 
 hues of green and orange and crimson, and the far 
 blue peaks of the Alps in the rear, as seen across the 
 Lagoon; one of his brother's characteristic processions 
 of people in sixteenth-century garb, and animals, 
 before a town of that epoch, with many churches and 
 towers looking over its heavy walls, — labeled the 
 "Visit of the Magi"; one of Francia's calm, sweet- 
 faced Madonnas, surrounded with angels, exquisitely 
 moulded and finished; one of Antonello da Messina's 
 realistic portraits, of a man of forty much in need of 
 a shave; another Madonna by Boccaccino, with that 
 lovely limpid eye which he developed; a splendid 
 Holy Family by Garofalo, in an extraordinary back- 
 ground of land and sea and distant blue mountains, 
 of very fine modeling, subdued coloring, and skillful 
 use of light, — though his lack of genius emerges in 
 
84 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the want of expression; lastly, an important example 
 of Pordenone, — a Madonna with two saints, wanting 
 in emotion, but of that soft, rich tone and coloring, 
 which mark him so distinctively. Later in the year, 
 when I was searching over various Friulan towns for 
 works of Pordenone, I wished that I could find others 
 of this excellence. 
 
 The third hall opened at the extreme end of the 
 first, extending far to the right,' lighted only from its 
 lofty ceiling, and glowing with the countless hues of a 
 hundred large canvases, that led up to one great mas- 
 terpiece on the end wall : it was in a massive gold frame 
 of exceptional richness, — the chef-d'oeuvre of the gal- 
 lery, the Madonna and Saints of Romanino. We 
 approached at once to examine it. It is rare to find 
 Romanino's work far from Brescia, and this is an 
 excellent specimen. The Madonna sits enthroned, of 
 life-size, holding her Child, with four saints standing 
 at the sides, a girlish child-angel seated on. the step 
 of the throne, playing a tambourine, and two others 
 holding a crown over the Madonna's head. It is a 
 splendid display of deep, harmonious coloring, based 
 upon the lovely rose-shade of the Virgin's gown, and 
 glittering with much gold. Very graceful, too, are the 
 figures and composition, in that master's usual full 
 curves; but, like so many of his works, it lacks feeling 
 and expression. It is pietistic on the surface only, — 
 repose without joy of soul. In the same room are two 
 more of his paintings, smaller, — another Madonna 
 and Saints, of similar qualities, and a Last Supper 
 poorly composed. We noticed two Tintorettos — one 
 a portrait, the other a realistic scene of the Magdalen 
 washing Jesus' feet, very fine in atmosphere, natural 
 disposition, and expression. There were also two ex- 
 pressive portraits of Venetian patricians by Titian; 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 85 
 
 an overcrowded, undignified Paolo Veronese; an ex- 
 cellent Tiepolo, at that master's best, representing 
 S. Patrizio preaching to the people in his bishop's 
 robes; and, best of all, a very beautiful Previtali, a 
 signed panel of Madonna, Child, and a donor, radiat- 
 ing indescribable charm from its golden light-eflFect, 
 luminous atmosphere, and softness of countenance. 
 
 Also belonging to the Museo Civico, and well worth 
 exarnination by any one who has the time, are various 
 lesser collections: majolica-ware, porcelain, cameos, 
 bronzes, ivory-carvings, wood-carvings, laces, coins 
 and medals, tapestries, miniatures, autographs, text- 
 iles, old costumes and furniture, etc.; besides the 
 prehistoric and Roman antiquities, the geological col- 
 lection, the modern paintings and sculptures, and 
 the precious documents amongst the archives. The 
 library, too, contains many valuable works. 
 
 In the eastern part of the huge southern section of 
 the city, there are, besides the Orto Botanico already 
 described, two prominent objects of unusual interest; 
 and one of them is very unusual. This is the vast 
 piazza known for recent ages by the name of "Prato 
 della Valle," now misnamed Piazza Vittorio Emanuele 
 II, distant a couple of blocks to the west of the Botani- 
 cal Garden. Its popular name during the Middle Ages 
 and the Renaissance, and still occasionally heard, was 
 the Zairo, — a corruption of the Latin theatro; for here 
 the Romans had an immense theatre, in which, ac- 
 cording to Strabo and Tacitus, they celebrated once 
 every thirty years the games commemorating Ante- 
 nor's founding of the city. The medieval bishops and 
 nobles used the building as a quarry, so that its stones 
 and marbles are scattered through the walls of Padua. 
 The later name, Prato della Valle, records the marshy 
 nature of the ground. 
 
86 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 We first went down there on a lovely summer 
 morning, when there was not a cloud in the sky, and 
 the sun was already beginning to render the baked 
 streets uncomfortable. It was consequently a marked 
 relief to emerge upon that great open space of mov- 
 ing airs, and feast our eyes upon the luxuriant foliage 
 of its wooded central oval, which preserves the out- 
 line of the ancient theatre. Hundreds of huge plane 
 trees were there, solidly massed, with graveled walks 
 percolating their shade, surrounded by a stone-banked 
 canal of flowing water that coolly reflected the leafy 
 boughs bending far overhead. Across the water led 
 four ornamental bridges from the four sides of the 
 oval, — to one of which we hurried, through the in- 
 tense glare and heat of the down-beating sun. 
 
 This much was ordinary; but on the balustrades of 
 the bridges, and the parapets of the canal all around 
 the extended circle, rises a procession of heroic statues 
 of every age, so numerous and so varied that at the 
 first sight one can only stare in bewilderment. Surely 
 so many statues were never elsewhere gathered in one 
 place. It is like a city of people of stone. They stand 
 in every sort of costume of the bygone centuries, in 
 every kind of posture, from every rank of human 
 greatness, — poets, generals, philosophers, kings, 
 statesmen, princes, professors, literati, — all the men 
 of note who have at any time attended Padua's Uni- 
 versity, to teach or to learn. Not Padua alone has 
 erected them, but cities and courts all over Europe, 
 to perpetuate the memory of their illustrious sons. 
 The four bridges are distinguished by the company 
 of popes and doges, in all the grandeur of their crowns 
 and ceremonial robes; but the dignity of these, and 
 too many others, unfortunately, is marred by their 
 baroque style of scuflpture, — the wind-tossed, cum- 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 87 
 
 brous, convoluted garments, convulsive attitudes, 
 and wild gestures that make us shrink away.^ It is 
 only, however, when one stands here, looking at the 
 far-extended throng of immortals, that he fully real- 
 izes what a part in history has been played by the 
 University of Padua. 
 
 Walking in the refreshing shade of the mighty plane 
 trees, our eyes turned from the statuary to the far 
 lines of buildings fronting the piazza. Nearly all were 
 simple three-storied dwellings, some on the north and 
 east being ensconced in the green of little gardens; but 
 in the centre of the west side our gaze was caught by 
 a larger, ornamental structure of red brick, faced 
 by two imposing Gothic arcades, the upper twice the 
 height of the lower. It was the so-called Loggia Muni- 
 cipale, or Amulea, an excellent example of the possi- 
 bilities of brick in graceful dignity and power; It is 
 little used except on that annual occasion when this 
 whole immense space becomes alive and teeming, — 
 the yearly fair of the Festival of St.' Anthony, June 
 13-16; then does the deserted piazza blossom far and 
 wide with the crowded umbrellas, tents and canvas 
 roofs of traders and entertainers from all over Italy; 
 while these groves resound with music and the laugh- 
 ter of thousands, these avenues reecho with the hoof- 
 beats and cheers of horse-races, and from those Gothic 
 loggie orators speak, and authorities bestow the prizes. 
 It is one of the last, great, characteristic Italian fairs 
 remaining to us from the Middle Ages; and is spe- 
 cially interesting because its inauguration, in 1275, 
 was made to celebrate the city's release from the 
 
 • It was this "'vulgar, flaunting statuary" that roused the wrath of 
 Mr. William Hazlitt; " the most clumsy, affected, paltry, sprawling figures 
 cut in stone, that ever disgraced the chisel!" (Hazlitt's Journey through 
 France and Italy in 1826.) And yet they are but ordinary, everyday 
 baroque-work. 
 
88 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 terrible clutches of Ezzelino. All over Italy, too, that 
 festival of St. Anthony, protector of children, is cele- 
 brated with churchly pomp. We had been in Venice 
 when last it occurred, and well remembered the holy 
 week of services, fasting, and entertainments, in all 
 the parishes of the city. Many important events oc- 
 curred on this broad area during the Middle Ages, 
 when it had become a desolate swamp, outside the 
 city walls. It was the scene of many a desperate battle 
 between the Paduans and besieging foes. Here Pietro 
 della Vigna made his memorable speech to the citizens, 
 on behalf of the Emperor Frederick II. It was never 
 fully drained again until the eighteenth century, when 
 the Venetian Government dug the present elliptical 
 canal, with its trees and statues. 
 
 Our stroll was finally turned to the southeast, 
 where we observed the piazza to be dominated by 
 a massive pile of religious buildings, the foremost of 
 which was a huge church topped by various Byzantine 
 domes, with a tall, unfinished, rough-brick fagade, 
 above a flight of wide-spreading steps. They were the 
 convent and church of S. Giustina, the renowned 
 female saint of Padua, who was the daughter of the 
 barbarian King Vitalicino (or Vitaliano) and was 
 martyred by the Emperor Maximian. According to 
 the legend, Venetia's conversion to Christianity was 
 commenced by St. Mark, and upon the latter's call to 
 Rome by St. Peter, was continued by St. Prosdocimo, 
 St. Mark's disciple, who became the first Bishop of 
 Padua. By healing hundreds of sufferers afflicted with 
 the plague, he won the attention and belief of the 
 barbarian monarch, Vitalicino, then holding sway at 
 Padua, who was forthwith baptized, together with his 
 daughter and all his court. Giustina devoted her life 
 to the cause, and died rather than yield herself to 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 89 
 
 Maximian. She and Prosdocimo therefore became the 
 city's patron saints; which glory they shared until 
 St. Anthony was added to them, in 1232. 
 
 We crossed to the church, which was first built in 
 453, when its wealth of treasures and embellishments 
 drew the praises of several of the early chroniclers. 
 That edifice, however, was finally demolished by the 
 great earthquake of 1117. This, the third church, was 
 commenced in 1502 from the plans of the brilliant 
 architect, Fra Girolamo of Brescia, and carried grad- 
 ually to completion through the genius of Andrea 
 Briosco (or Riccio), Alessandro Leopardi of Venice, 
 and Andrea Morone of Bergamo. The result is an 
 undying monument to their abilities. Two relics still 
 survive from the earliest edifice, — the pair of medi- 
 eval lions, or griffins, flanking the main portal. 
 
 The extensive convent, with its several fine cloisters, 
 has now been handed over to the soldiery, whom we 
 saw lolling about the doorways on the right. It was 
 there that the Emperor Frederick II stayed, with his 
 brilliant retinue of knights and noblemen, when visit- 
 ing Ezzelino in January, 1239; and the latter provided 
 him with shows and entertainments of such magnifi- 
 cence, that he felt obliged to declare he had never any- 
 where seen their equal. Mounting the church steps, 
 and running successfully the gauntlet of the many beg- 
 gars waiting to waylay pilgrims, we entered at once 
 the nave, which is of splendid Renaissance lines and 
 impressive proportions. A sense of exceeding spacious- 
 ness and beauty enveloped us, purely from the size and 
 harmony of the parts; for all has been whitewashed, 
 save the brown capitals of the pilasters, the cornice, 
 and the yellowish ribs of the lofty, arched roof. The 
 choir contributes sensibly to the effect, with its wide 
 semicircle of rich oak stalls, radiating, as a sculptured 
 
90 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 whole, a thousand exquisite curved lines and surfaces; 
 and the five domes far overhead lend their majesty. 
 All of these imposing features, in spite of the absence 
 of rich marbles and sculpture, as Sir Henry Wotton 
 felt impelled to remark, "do yet ravish the beholder 
 (and he knows not how) by a secret harmony in the 
 proportions."! It is one of the finest examples of 
 the pure classical revival, adapted to ecclesiastical uses. 
 The nave, three hundred and sixty -four feet long by 
 ninety-eight feet wide, is flanked by lofty aisles and 
 rows of chapels; and the spacious transept reaches a 
 breadth of two hundred and fifty feet. 
 
 In the right aisle we found a fine canvas by Luca 
 Giordano over the fourth altar, — the Death of St. 
 Scholastica, of deep expressiveness and true genius, — 
 and a less worthy Palma Giovane over the fifth, repre- 
 senting St. Benedict and his disciples. At the end of 
 the right transept an open passage led us to two dark, 
 curious little chapels, occupied by a number of pray- 
 ing devotees : the first containing a well, at the bottom 
 of which lie the bones of many early Paduan martyrs, 
 a grating into the former prison of S. Daniele, and, 
 adjacent below, the catacomb holding the original 
 graves of S. Giustina and S. Prosdocimo. It seems 
 that in the year 1050 the then bishop, Bemando, was 
 granted a vision during his sleep, in which he saw the 
 bodies of St. Julian and many other martyrs, buried 
 here underground; whereupon he proceeded to exca- 
 vate, discovering not only the remains revealed during 
 his slumber, but also the corpses of St. Maximus and 
 St. Felicita. Such was the origin of the well. As for 
 Saints Giustina and Prosdocimo, the former now lies 
 beneath the high-altar of the church, and the latter, 
 under the side-altar devoted to his worship. 
 
 1 L. P. Smith, Sir Henry Woiton ; Life and Letters. 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 91 
 
 The second chapel, of S. Luca, was adorned with 
 a recumbent statue of the latter saint before the altar, 
 some frescoes by Campagnola, and over the altar a 
 painted, gold-framed head of the Madonna, alleged 
 to have been brought from Constantinople in the 
 eighth century, and to be very holy. It was this last 
 object that the devout were worshiping, including a 
 country parish priest who told me in an awed whisper 
 of the miracles which it had peformed. I responded 
 that it looked to me exceedingly like a very modern 
 painting, which could not be at best over a hundred 
 years old; whereat the good man was deeply horrified, 
 and assured me fervently that the legend was true. 
 
 We returned to the nave, at whose upper end, in a 
 chapel to the right of the choir, is a beautiful marble 
 Pieta, of several life-size figures, — r a seventeenth-cen- 
 tury work, by Parodi, remarkably executed and of 
 much feeling. Then we inspected the striking choir- 
 stalls. They are divided by double arms, the lower 
 of which are all carved alike, but the upper all dif- 
 ferently; from the latter rise slim, oak, Corinthian 
 columns to the rich entablature, upon which stand 
 charming putti between the head-pieces; while on 
 each back are two scenes cut in relief, the lower 
 from the Old Testament and the upper from the New, 
 different with every stall. These reliefs were executed 
 from designs by Campagnola about 1556, and are not 
 individually of much excellence; but the whole effect 
 is extraordinarily pleasing. It is greatly added to by 
 the huge canvas of Paolo Veronese on the end wall, 
 with its beautiful gilded frame, whose double columns 
 on each side and heavy entablature are in form and 
 size somewhat like a Corinthian temple; the picture, 
 representing the martyrdom of S. Giustina, though 
 riotous in rich colors, has the faults of Veronese's 
 
92 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 later works in being too crowded, diflfuse and unrest- 
 ful, — in a word, unsatisfactory, almost unmeaning, 
 upon closer inspection. 
 
 By a door to right of the choir, through a long pass- 
 age, we visited the remaining fragment of the original, 
 early church, — its choir, which has stalls with panels 
 of tarsia-work that are quaint but not unusual; then 
 we returned to the left transept, and inspected the 
 church's most interesting relic. This is an iron case 
 against the north wall, barred with strips of iron 
 across its open top, but permitting one to see within 
 two coffins, one inside the other, mouldering in deep 
 decay: the very coffers in which the body of St. Luke 
 (according to the legend) was carried from Constan- 
 tinople to Venice in 1177. There is said to be some 
 possibility of truth in the story; at any rate, it brought 
 vividly home to me, as never before, a sense of the 
 actual corporeal existence of those figures usually so 
 mystical, — our Saviour and his apostles. Under the 
 tomb in the centre of this transept, also, which is 
 handsomely adorned with serpentine and alabaster, 
 are alleged to lie some of the portions of St. Luke's 
 earthly frame. 
 
 Another interesting place in this same quarter of 
 the city is the garden of the Palazzo Giustinian, which 
 we found not far from S. Antonio, on the north side of 
 the Via Cesarotti running eastward from the Piazza 
 del Santo. The palazzo itself is a later construction, on 
 the site of the Early-Renaissance palace of Alvise Cor- 
 naro; but in the garden to the rear still remain the 
 delightful casino, loggia, and arcades built for Cor- 
 naro by Falconetto, about 1524. The latter was then 
 over sixty years of age, at the height of his powers. 
 Bart. Ridolfi collaborated in executing the rich stucco 
 decorations, and Dom. Campagnola in painting the 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 93 
 
 Raphaelesque frescoes. Their combined work produced 
 a charming example of the fanciful, high-Renaissance, 
 palatial architecture and decoration, on mythological 
 lines, in the manner of Giulio Romano that glorified 
 the superb Reggia of the Gonzaghi; almost the only 
 example of that work still remaining to Padua, and, 
 considering all things, in fair condition. The two- 
 storied arcades, prettily draped with vines, connect 
 the rear loggia with the casino, and the latter with the 
 palace, running along their eastern sides. The loggia 
 consists of open arcades surmounted by a single large 
 hall, used for banquets; a purely classical, stone struc- 
 ture, adorned with statues in external niches, and 
 stucco-framed frescoes in the archways. In the casino 
 many small rooms, elegantly decorated on their ceil- 
 ings with stucchi and arabesques, surround the octa- 
 gonal music-room of the ground floor and the open 
 loggia of the upper; the latter, as well as the portal, 
 being further adorned with marble divinities posed in 
 niches. 
 
 There was another prominent building of Padua 
 which we had not yet visited, — the so-called Scuola 
 del Carmine, adjacent to the church of that name 
 which we had passed on our walk to and from the sta- 
 tion. I remember that we went to it on the afternoon 
 of this same day; and after briefly looking over the 
 well-proportioned church, with its excellent specimen 
 of Varotari (Padovanino) on the last altar to the right, 
 we were passing through the passage on the east side 
 leading to the annexed cloister, when we encount- 
 ered the parroco himself. He was a tall, spare, broad- 
 shouldered man of about forty, neatly dressed, with 
 classic, intellectual features and handsome eyes, — 
 one of that fine type of Italian gentlemen, courteous 
 and learned, who cheerfully resign all ambitions for 
 
94 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 a life of well-doing and brotherly love. He was in- 
 stantly interested in our quest and in rendering us 
 what service he could: took us into the cloister, 
 where a number of small boys were playing, pointed 
 out the beauties of its old columns and arches, told us 
 of the school which had taken the place of the bygone 
 monks, and finally conducted us to the former oratorio, 
 — a large chamber next the street, — where he ex- 
 plained with eloquent criticism the frescoes covering 
 its walls. Then with rare though tfulness and dignity 
 he left us alone to consider the paintings, impressed 
 deeply by his powerful but delightful personality. 
 
 "You see," I said to my companions, "there are 
 still Italians like Doctor Antonio." Yet this was no 
 very exceptional parroco; hundreds such, perhaps 
 thousands, live their modest, unselfish lives, all over 
 Italy; I have met a score of them myself, first and last. 
 
 The frescoes that still shone brightly from the four 
 walls of the low-roofed chapel, were divided into a dozen 
 large scenes, with figures near life-size, impressively 
 scattered before charming landscapes and architect- 
 ure, — of striking differences in style and treatment, 
 yet all of light tone and coloring, and collectively of 
 most engaging effect. They portray scenes from the 
 life of the Virgin and her parents, and were executed 
 by Titian and several Paduan cinquecentists. The 
 poorest, ascribed to the lesser artist, Dario Campag- 
 nola, are fortunately on the window wall ; on the long 
 space of the left wall are- four by Girolamo da Santa 
 Croce, better than most of his other preserved works, 
 of a composition and movement that are dignified, 
 graceful, and pleasing, though lacking in individual 
 grace of feature, and expression; their realism, too, 
 is injured by the too general introduction of six- 
 teenth-century costumes alongside the Biblical per- 
 
PADUA AND S. ANTONIO 95 
 
 sonages. In the Sposalizio young long-hosed gallants 
 of the cinquecento even stand on the platform beside 
 the bridegroom. By some critics these four tableaux 
 are accredited to Giulio Campagnola, the father of 
 Titian's pupil, Domenico. The three pictures of the 
 Nativity, the Circumcision, and the Magi, on the 
 entrance-wall, by Dom. Campagnola, have figures 
 more natural and better modeled, of excellent spacing 
 and disposition, though also wanting the divine spark 
 of genius. The group of St. Joseph, the Virgin, and 
 the Divine Child just born, is especially attractive. 
 
 But when we turned to the altar-wall, true genius 
 struck us with its power, never better emphasized than 
 by these surroundings : it was a Titian, sadly injured, 
 but glowing still in all its harmonies of line and color, 
 — the meeting of Saints Joachim and Anna at the 
 Golden Gate. What a contrast to the others were 
 these forms of solidity and actuality, with their pro- 
 found expression of true love relieved from fears. 
 Beside them, on the altar, was a contrast still greater 
 as to beauty, — a little canvas of the Madonna and 
 Child by Palma Vecchio, of his exquisite pureness of 
 line and richness of shade. It was the same lovely, 
 noble countenance that looks forth from his Santa 
 Barbara at Venice, and is possessed by so many of his 
 illustrious women. 
 
 The remainder of our stay in Padua was devoted to 
 the objects of minor interest, concerning which I shall 
 be brief. Two of them are found in the central section : 
 the Scuola S. Rocco, abutting on the little Piazza of 
 S. Lucia, and the Church of S. Pietro, a little west 
 of the University Library. The latter contains pictures 
 by Varotari and Palma Giovane, and a colored terra- 
 cotta relief by Bellano; the main hall of the former is 
 pleasantly frescoed by Titian's disciples, — Gualtiero, 
 
96 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Dom. Campagnola, and Stefano dall' Arziere. In the 
 southern section, S. Michele, just beyond Ezzelino's 
 castle, contains some interesting, early, anonymous 
 frescoes; and in S. Maria in Vanzo, close at hand on 
 the east, may be seen some of Dom. Campagnola's 
 best work, besides a good Entombment by Jacopo 
 Bassano, and a splendid, though injured, Madonna 
 with Saints by Bart. Montagna of Vicenza. In the 
 eastern section, a good walk takes one first to S. 
 Francesco, a short way beyond Dante's house; where 
 he finds a delightful series of frescoes by Titian's pupil, 
 Girolamo del Santo, a high-altar piece by Paolo Vero- 
 onese (representing the Ascension), examples of Palma 
 Giovane and Dom. Campagnola, and the fragments 
 of the splendid bronze tomb of Pietro Roccabonella, 
 which was begun by Bellano and finished by Riccio. 
 Continuing from this eastward, past the great building 
 of the Ospitale Civile, one reaches the little Church of 
 S. Massimo, in the street of the same name, with its 
 three fine specimens of the art of G. B. Tiepolo; and 
 some distance beyond that, at the eastern limits of the 
 city, he arrives at the imposing Renaissance gate of 
 the Porta Portello, which was designed in 1518 by 
 Guglielmo Gigli of Bergamo, in the form of a Roman 
 triumphal arch, very richly decorated, — an inter- 
 mediate between the styles of the Lombardi and Pal- 
 ladio. Two other city gates, both constructed by 
 Falconetto, are worthy of inspection by him who 
 makes a long stay, — the Porta S. Giovanni and the 
 Porta Savonarola; they are excellent examples of 
 the most classical period of the Revival. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 VICENZA THE PALATIAL 
 
 Beneath is spread like a green sea 
 The waveless plain of Lombardy, 
 Bounded by the vaporous air. 
 Islanded by cities fair. 
 
 The old words of Shelley repeated themselves softly 
 in my mind as I looked from the window of the express 
 which was rushing northwestward to Vicenza. So 
 perfectly flat was the ground that even this slight 
 elevation commanded quite a view, — always the 
 same: innumerable fields of wheat and Indian corn, 
 occasional orchards, with garlands of vines swinging 
 from tree to tree in Umbrian fashion, then corn again, 
 always corn, lifting its tall stalks in countless parallel 
 rows that waved gently in the early morning breeze. 
 Between the fields ran lines of trees as fences, often 
 also across the fields in rows, a rod or so apart, — 
 elm, ash, beech, horse-chestnut, and especially the deli- 
 cate mulberry, for the silk- worm cultivation; while 
 willows in general shaded the banks of the many ir- 
 rigating-ditches, and tall poplars marked the frequent 
 roads, breaking the cold winds that sweep the plain 
 in winter and early spring. 
 
 Richness was the distinguishing characteristic of 
 this wonderful alluvial country, and denseness of pop- 
 ulation, — the two concomitant qualities that have 
 made the nations fight for it since time immemorial. 
 The ploughed or upturned earth was always black 
 and loamy, looking of primeval wealth; the crops had 
 
98 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 a growth, the vegetation a luxuriance, such as one 
 seldom sees anywhere else, — the only discordant 
 element being the stunted majority of the trees, stout 
 knobby trunks crowned with sprouts of this year's 
 shooting, that showed the practice prevalent here as 
 elsewhere in Italy of stripping off the boughs for fuel. 
 The peasants in fact have nothing else to burn. But 
 the obtruding feature of the landscape was the con- 
 stant presence of habitations; everywhere over the 
 meadows rose the white walls of houses, shining from 
 surrounding foliage, sometimes single but as often in 
 village groups; — always the presence of man, be- 
 trayed if in no other way by the never-absent cam- 
 panili of his churches. When I think of Lombardy, 
 that image rises in my mind, — of slender towers 
 soaring far above a great sea of vegetation, capped 
 with spires or pointed cupolas, upon belfries of round 
 arches and white stone shafts; near at hand, in the 
 middle distance, far-away and haze-shrouded, each 
 marks an invisible town, with scores or hundreds of 
 teeming, crowded old dwellings, dominated by their 
 parish churches with swelling Byzantine domes, that 
 often are seen afar beside the campanili; and if one 
 stops to listen, in the leaf-rustling silence there steals 
 upon the ear the music of their bells, at early morn, 
 at sun-stilled noon, at balmy, roseate eventide, surg- 
 ing from every direction over the tree-tops, blending 
 into a chime whose mellow tones seem laden with all 
 the sorrows of the tragic past. 
 
 Often the train ran through, or by, these little 
 plain-towns, affording quick glimpses of dirty, cobble- 
 paved streets, shadowed by tall, crumbling, dirty 
 buildings, with old stucco walls stained or crudely 
 colored, dark archways, littered courtyards, sunlit 
 piazzas occupied by ancient well-covers and women 
 
VICEXZA. rALAZZ( 
 
A RAGIOXE. (PALLADIO.) 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 99 
 
 filling jars, dilapidated rococo church fagades, narrow 
 ways blocked by clumsy wagons harnessed to sleepy 
 oxen, and everywhere children, rolling in the dirt, 
 playing, crying, running beside the track. When 
 passed at a little distance they were more pleasing 
 to the eye, — the solidly massed white walls seen 
 through intervening verdure, with their uniform red- 
 tiled roofs, little surrounding gardens, and picturesque 
 towers soaring against the blue. All these small un- 
 walled towns are as much a development of the three 
 last centuries as are the solitary farmhouses that now 
 dot the landscape, — an evolution of more peaceful 
 days. Often we passed close to one of the latter, but 
 its wall-inclosed front yard littered with straw and 
 manure-piles, its filthy stables and pig-pens under the 
 same roof (sometimes under the very floor) of the 
 living-rooms, its whole appearance and air of decay 
 and neglect, showed little advancement over the ignor- 
 ance of the Middle Ages. Of course there were excep- 
 tions, — dwellings clean and well-kept; and now and 
 then my eyes were also gladdened by the sight of a 
 charming villa, set amidst lawns and shady grounds. 
 The roads were very frequent, invariably of splendid 
 form and firmness, and their travelers were invariably 
 the slow-moving teams of white or creamy oxen. The 
 streams were fully as frequent, of a number and size 
 always astonishing to the traveler upon his first visit 
 to Lombardy, bearing swiftly to the sea the endless 
 melted snows of the Alps, and often adorned with old 
 mills and huge revolving wheels. About the only re- 
 minders or relics of the distant past were the occa- 
 sional, battlemented, dark walls and towers of a castle 
 of the dark ages, looming over the tree-tops as grimly 
 as in days of lance and foray, though often now but 
 a ruined and empty shell. 
 
100 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Such were the regular features of the plain; but 
 to-day, as the express rushed on without a stop, my 
 gaze roamed on beyond them to the south, to an 
 appearance not always present, that crowned the 
 landscape with its majesty. This was the lofty out- 
 line of the Euganean Hills, upon which the poet 
 penned those lines about the plain. There they 
 swelled in the blue, hazy distance, in all their beauty of 
 curving lines and smiling, village-dotted flanks, add- 
 ing to the scene that touch of grandeur without which 
 its flatness might become monotonous. It is a curious 
 position that they occupy, so far isolated from the 
 mother Alps; but they are not alone in this. For, as 
 we left them gradually to rear, washed upon the west 
 by a sea of verdure that stretched to the horizon, from 
 this same sea ahead I saw another hill-chain rising, 
 the brother of the Euganean in general shape and out- 
 line. It was the Monti Berici, the first outwork of the 
 Alps thrown southward upon the plain, as the Colli 
 Euganei are the second. So much nearer to the moun- 
 tains are the Berici that a narrow valley only inter- 
 venes on their northwest; and it is exactly at the east- 
 ern end of this defile that is located the city of Vicenza. 
 From the rich slopes of the wooded hills, dotted white 
 with a thousand villas, my thoughts turned to the 
 ancient town which we were so rapidly approaching, 
 looking backward from its strategical situation in 
 command of this important pass, to the part in history 
 that it has played. 
 
 Vicenza, it is true, has never been large enough to 
 act a leading part, and has been aflBliated in turn with 
 the fortunes of her stronger neighbors, Padua, Verona, 
 Milan, and Venice; but she wSs important enough to 
 be one of the first prizes for which those powers hun- 
 gered and fought, and has consequently endured more 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 101 
 
 vicissitudes than if she had been independent. When 
 she had struggled from early medieval darkness into 
 a self-sustaining municipality, which fought bravely 
 as a member of the two Lombard Leagues against 
 the two Imperial Fredericks, — like Padua and all the 
 cities of this region, she fell into the diabolical 
 clutches of Ezzelino, and encountered the greatest 
 disaster of her history in being assaulted by the Im- 
 perial troops in 1236, and almost utterly destroyed by 
 sack and fire. When she re-arose with courage from 
 her ashes, there immediately ensued one of the strang- 
 est occurrences of all times, — the career of Fra Gio- 
 vanni of Vicenza. 
 
 This extraordinary man was a Dominican monk, 
 who "undertook the noble task of pacifying Lom- 
 bardy. Every town in the north of Italy was at that 
 time torn by the factions of the Guelphs and Ghibel- 
 lines; private feuds crossed and intermingled with 
 political discords ; and the savage tyranny of Ezzelino 
 had shaken the fabric of society to its foundations. 
 It seemed utterly impossible to bring this people for 
 a moment to agreement. Yet what popes and princes 
 had failed to achieve, the voice of a single friar accom- 
 plished." ^ Fra Giovanni commenced his wonderful 
 preaching at Bologna in 1233, where his eloquent de- 
 pictions of the horrors of warfare, and the beauties 
 of reconciliation and forgiveness, so moved every 
 class of the populace that enmities were laid aside 
 and order installed. Then he moved to Padua, where 
 he was received with great enthusiasm, and soon 
 accomplished similar results. "Treviso, Feltre, Bel- 
 luno, Conegliano, and Romano, the very nests of the 
 grim brood of Ezzelino, yielded to the charm. Verona, 
 where the Scalas were about to reign, Vicenza, Man- 
 ' Symonds, Age of the Despots, Appendix iv. 
 
102 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tua, and Brescia, all placed themselves at the disposi- 
 tion of the monk, and prayed him to reform their 
 constitution."^ 
 
 Finally Fra Giovanni played his great stroke, and 
 "bade the burghers of all the towns where he had 
 preached to meet him on the plain of Pasquara, in the 
 country of Verona. . . . More than four hundred thou- 
 sand persons . . . appeared on the scene. This multi- 
 tude included the populations of Verona, Mantua, 
 Brescia, Padua, and Vicenza, marshaled under their 
 several standards," besides contingents from many 
 other places, and a large aggregation of princes and 
 ruling nobles. So forcibly did the friar address them, 
 with such powers of hypnotic influence, that he in- 
 duced all present to swear to a friendly confedera- 
 tion, — another league of the Lombard cities, which 
 should establish peace upon a firm foundation. What 
 stranger incident in history than this ! Sad it is, then, 
 to see with what human frailty Fra Giovanni undid 
 his glorious work. Giddy with success, he made the 
 people of Vicenza and Verona appoint him their sov- 
 ereign lord, with "the titles of Duke and Count. The 
 people, believing him to be a saint, readily acceded 
 to his wishes." But once in possession of absolute 
 power, the friar's whole nature seemed to undergo a 
 change; the frenzy of persecuting fancied heretics 
 seized him, and his blood-guiltiness became like that 
 of Ezzelino. At last, when he had burned at the stake 
 sixty prominent Veronese in a body, the populace rose 
 against him in arms, beat down his guards, and in- 
 carcerated him in a dungeon. He came forth from it, 
 eventually, to find himself without a follower in the 
 land, and sank into an obscure grave. 
 
 Ezzelino kept his heavy hand upon Vicenza until 
 
 1 Symonds, Age of the Despots, Appendix iv. 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 103 
 
 his death in 1259; but even then she could not secure 
 freedom, for the ambitious leaders of Padua proceeded 
 to subjugate her, and asserted their rule until 1311, 
 when she became the object of the cupidity of the 
 Delia Scala, newly risen despots of Verona. War for 
 Vicenza's possession then ensued, in which the Pad- 
 uans were led by that brilliant soldier Jacopo da 
 Carrara, whom seven years later they elected to be 
 their lord; but the celebrated Can Grande, greatest 
 of the Delia Scala, was at the head of the Veronese 
 forces, and dictated Vicenza's cession in 1319 at the 
 gates of Padua herself. So was the example of Ezze- 
 lino followed, here and all over North Italy, and his 
 death succeeded by the upgrowth of a swarm of 
 tyrants, to whom the fierce local struggles between 
 Guelfs and Ghibellines gave their opportunity. As 
 time went on, the lesser potentates sank one by one 
 under the assaults of the more powerful, and their 
 territories were absorbed in the larger states. Thus 
 the Scaligers, after erecting under Can Grande a king- 
 dom of huge proportions, fell victims in rapid decay to 
 the power of the Milanese Visconti, who seized Vicenza 
 in 1387. She became a part of the wide territories 
 accumulated by that greatest and vilest of medieval 
 despots, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, the Viper, whose 
 unexpected death in 1404 alone probably saved all 
 Italy from union under his yoke. His vast posses- 
 sions, from the Alps to the states of Rome, gathered 
 by such an infinitude of baseness and treachery, 
 crumbled to pieces at a stroke, — divided, not only 
 between his sons, but amongst the neighboring de- 
 spoiled and covetous powers. Vicenza was claimed 
 and marched upon by the Carrara, which proved to be 
 the latters' undoing; for while their army stood before 
 the Vicentine walls, Gian Galeazzo's widow called the 
 
104 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Venetian Republic to her aid. It was a fatal call. Up 
 to this time Venice had chiefly confined her mighty 
 energies to the sea; now she turned them definitely 
 upon the mainland; with irresistible power she swept 
 the Carrara out of Padua, and not only seized that 
 city for her own, but also Vicenza, Bassano, and 
 Verona, as "the price for her support of the Visconti," 
 — who had no option but to submit. These cities, and 
 their outlying territories, were the second enlargement 
 of the Veneto, which had commenced with the Trevi- 
 san Marches taken some time before from Padua. 
 
 Vicenza, flattered, embellished, and given a measure 
 of self-government by her new conqueror, found now 
 that peace and comfort which she had hitherto vainly 
 sought, and became firmly devoted to the Venetian 
 sway. She vigorously supported the Mistress of the 
 Sea in her succeeding wars of the quattrocento, endur- 
 ing on one occasion, for her sake, a siege that reduced 
 the inhabitants to eating rats and grass, and almost 
 decimated them, until, after months of heroic suffer- 
 ing, the enemy were dislodged by a succoring Vene- 
 tian army. Venice always stood by her subject cities; 
 but when the League of Cambrai in 1508 united 
 against her all the great powers of Europe, seeing 
 resistance vain, she politically offered to Vicenza and 
 the other towns complete freedom of action, that 
 they might surrender without destruction. Vicenza 
 accordingly yielded to the Imperialists; but soon 
 after, ashamed of such conduct, re-tendered her al- 
 legiance to the Republic. This manly though imprud- 
 ent course brought upon the city its second great 
 disaster; for the Prince of Anhalt proceeded to march 
 upon her, in 1510, dispersed the insufficient Venetian 
 forces of Commandant Baglioni, and seized the place 
 with fury and rapine. "The people of Vicenza also 
 
yiCEXZA. MAUC.IXXA AND SAINTS, IX THE CHURCH OF SAN 
 STEFANO. (FALMA VECCMID.l 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 105 
 
 fled before the invaders; but about six thousand, who 
 had thought to conceal themselves in a disused quarry 
 near the town, were tracked to their hiding-place, and 
 all of them suffocated by the orders of a French cap- 
 tain of adventure, named d'Herisson." ^ 
 
 Even this terrible event did not destroy the people's 
 Venetian patriotism, and at the dissolution of the 
 League of Cambrai, along with all their sister towns, 
 they returned voluntarily and gladly to their old 
 allegiance; — wonderful testimony to the beneficence 
 of the Republic's rule. At the final extinction of the 
 Republic by Bonaparte, Vicenza shared the fate and 
 vicissitudes of her neighbors, which ended in the 
 hateful Austrian domination. In the glorious Risorgi- 
 mento she furnished more than her share of the heroes, 
 and again played a noble and courageous part, espe- 
 cially in the war of 1848-49. 
 
 The Austrian general Nugent was marching west- 
 ward his corps in May, 1848, to unite with Marshal 
 Radetsky's army, shut up in the Quadrilateral; but 
 when he came to Vicenza, the little city, guarded only 
 by a few thousand volunteers and Swiss Papal troops, 
 to the Marshal's astonishment put up a formidable 
 defense. Across the valley, across the flanks of the 
 enfolding hills, everywhere the heavy Austrian at- 
 tacks were intrepidly rolled back for hour after hour, 
 the women assisting at the barricades, the showers of 
 shells falling in the streets being greeted only by 
 shouts of "Viva V Italia!" So roughly were the Aus- 
 trians handled that they gave it up, and started across 
 the Berici Range in the night, toward Verona. Yet 
 a few days later Radetsky tried to take his revenge, 
 by sending back 24,000 men and 54 guns to punish 
 the insolent town. 
 
 1 Brown, Venice: An Historical Sketch of the Republic. 
 
106 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 The Vicentines were now reinforced from Venice, 
 and from Padua by the troops of General Dorando, 
 who took command; and all night long on the 23d of 
 May, while the lightning vied in flashing with the 
 guns, the attacks of the enemy on Monti Berici were 
 met and driven back. "Fiery missiles fell into the 
 town, the cannon roared on the walls and from the 
 barricades; at last, on the next morning, after pro- 
 digious feats of valor, in which the Swiss troops took 
 their full share, the enemy retired, after having 
 thrown the dead and wounded into the flames. . . . 
 Thus Vicenza for the second time had to congratulate 
 itself on its escape." ^ Sad it is, then, to know, after 
 such heroism, that Radetsky himself returned on the 
 8th of June, mounted the hills to the south, and, ad- 
 vancing on their crests, succeeded in commanding the 
 city with his guns, and so forcing its surrender. "Thus 
 fell Vicenza; its defense is the more remarkable as the 
 city was without regular fortifications, and held out 
 simply from the courage of its brave defenders." ^ 
 
 Vicenza also attained an honored place in the art 
 of the Renaissance, developing her own distinctive 
 schools of painting and architecture. But in the 
 former her importance was due to three men only: 
 not Mantegna, in spite of his being born here, for he 
 labored elsewhere, — but the late quattrocentist Gio- 
 vanni Speranza, and the early cinquecentists Bar- 
 tolommeo Montagna and Giovanni Buonconsiglio, — 
 the great part of whose works are still confined to their 
 native town, beautifying its churches and palaces. 
 Buonconsiglio's tendencies were clearly Venetian, in 
 
 • Emilio Dandolo, The Italian Volunteers, or Lombard Rifle Brigade. 
 
 ^ Ibid. — It was here that Massimo d' Azelio, wh ile taking his part 
 bravely in the defense, received the musket-ball in his leg. As he wrote to 
 his daughter from Ferrara on June 17, — "Dopo aver fatto tutti gli forzi 
 possibili, si e capitolato, avendo avuto onorevoli condizioni." 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 107 
 
 coloring and composition, and he attained consider- 
 able beauty in his pietistic pictures; but Montagna's 
 was a stronger and more individual spirit, develop- 
 ing marked characteristics, with peculiar, powerful 
 figures, striking expressiveness, and much study of 
 realism, — with at the same time much repose, and 
 exceeding loveliness in tone and line. So distinctive 
 are his works, in their breadth of conception gained 
 by his years of travel, that for the art-lover they alone 
 are worth a journey to Vicenza. Giovanni Bellini, 
 Cima da Conegliano, and particularly Palma Vecchio, 
 turned aside from their Venetian works to paint some 
 splendid canvases for the churches of Vicenza, that 
 are also well worth the visit in themselves. 
 
 But it is in the department of architecture that 
 Vicenza shone preeminent; for she produced Tommaso 
 Fromentone, Vincenzo Scamozzi, Calderari, and, chief 
 of all, the great Andrea Palladio.^ The latter was 
 born and educated here, and spent his best years in 
 adorning the city that he loved, until the imprint of 
 his genius shone from her every street, and she be- 
 came the palatial Vicenza that we see to-day. Not 
 only did Palladio rebuild his own town into a vision 
 of beauty, — it was his masterful mind that gave a 
 new impulse in the middle cinquecento to the already 
 decaying architecture of the Renaissance, reverted it 
 to the first principles of strength and harmony of 
 lines, without depending on adornment for effect, 
 and re-discovered that extensive use of outer columns 
 which was more true to the Roman styles, and has 
 been to the modem world the chief legacy of the 
 classic. In a word, it is to Palladio that we owe the 
 final, predominant form of Renaissance architecture. 
 
 ' Vicenza is further distinguished as the home of Italy's greatest recent 
 novelist, Fogazzaro, who died there but a few months ago. 
 
108 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 But every Englishman, and every American, owes 
 him a special debt: it was from Palladio's style, set 
 forth in his palaces and churches at Venice and Vi- 
 cenza, that Inigo Jones and the English artists, at- 
 tracted at last from their long resistance, drew the 
 forms of the English Renaissance, — which, lightened 
 and slightly modified in America by the use of wooden 
 materials, became her one native style, the Colonial. 
 
 The revolution which Palladio accomplished, he 
 did by discarding all that had immediately preceded 
 him, and going straight back to the study and applica- 
 tion of antique forms and lines, as seen in the build- 
 ings still remaining from Roman times. Symonds 
 says of him: "The greatest builder of this period was 
 Andrea Palladio of Vicenza, who combined a more 
 complete, analytical knowledge of antiquity with a 
 firmer adherence to rule and precedent, than even 
 the most imitative of his forerunners. . . . One great 
 public building of Palladio — the Palazzo della 
 Ragione at Vicenza — may be cited as perhaps the 
 culminating point of pure Renaissance architecture."* 
 And Goethe: "I say of Palladio, he was a man really 
 and intrinsically great, whose greatness was out- 
 wardly manifested. . . . What an imposing effect 
 have his edifices. . . . There is indeed something 
 divine about his designs, which may be exactly com- 
 pared to the creations of the great poet, who out of 
 truth and falsehood elaborates something between 
 them both, and charms us with its borrowed exist- 
 ence." " 
 
 The building mentioned by Symonds — the old 
 Broletto, or town-hall, of Vicenza — was externally 
 rebuilt by Palladio in a form at once so magnificent 
 and so joyously beautiful that it is not only his mas- 
 
 ' Symonds, Fine Arts. ' Goethe, Autobiography ; Letters from Italy. 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 109 
 
 terpiece, and the culminating point of Renaissance 
 architecture, but one of the very few greatest Italian 
 structures of all time and all places. I knew this before 
 going there. I had learnt that one had no right to 
 think he knew Italy, who had not observed and 
 studied this chef d'ceuvre of her artistic perihelion. It 
 therefore was the loadstone that drew me to Vicenza, 
 with an impatience momentarily greater as my train 
 approached the foot of the Monti Berici. 
 
 We crossed a small stream; it was the Bacchiglione, 
 
 — still the Bacchiglione, — which waters Vicenza long 
 before it reaches Padua. The Vicentines, when at 
 their frequent wars with the Paduans, as hereinbefore 
 stated, used to dam it up south of their city; which 
 converted the land east of Monti Berici into a swamp, 
 but deprived Padua of drinking-water and power. 
 Dante speaks of this, — 
 
 Ma tosto fia che Padova al palude 
 Ganger^ I'aqua che Vicenza bagna 
 Per esser al dover le genti crudi. 
 
 Immediately after, we crossed another small stream, 
 
 — likewise flowing southward, — the Retrone, which 
 here unites with the Bacchiglione, after the former 
 has circled the city upon the south and the latter upon 
 the north. Then we stopped in a covered station, 
 surprisingly large for a place of 45,000; from which I 
 emerged to find the town itself well to the north, and 
 a wide stretch of grassy level fields intervening, cov- 
 ered near the walls with a handsome grove of giant 
 plane trees. I gave my bag to &facchino and started 
 on foot over the avenue across the fields, which 
 proved to lead straight north to the city's southwest- 
 ern gate; but before I reached the gate I had a charm- 
 ing sight, — a promenade diverging southeasterly 
 
110 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 from the avenue, through the plane wood, with 
 arboreal monarchs on each side arching its far, shady 
 vista. Here, as I subsequently learned, repair the 
 youth and fashion of Vicenza on summer evenings, to 
 stroll amid the scents of greenery with the lamps of 
 fireflies lighting the shadows. 
 
 The Porta Castello opened before me, an old arch- 
 way between medieval buildings, dominated by the 
 tall picturesque tower which the Scaligers built during 
 their possession, to keep watch and ward over the 
 city and country. Through the gate I entered a little 
 piazza of the same name, extending transversely, and 
 saw Vicenza's main thoroughfare, the Corso Principe 
 Umberto, leading straight before me to the northeast 
 for a long way, — narrow but dignified, shadowed by 
 impressive Palladian palaces. It in fact crosses the 
 city, to the bridge on the northeast over the Bacchi- 
 glione. But what immediately caught my eye with 
 interest was a tall, two-storied, unfinished structure 
 at the south end of the piazza, only two windows in 
 width, but of exceeding grace and power combined; 
 it was the celebrated Palazzo del Conte Porto al Cas- 
 tello, once called by the people the Ca' del Diavolo, 
 and which, so many authorities allege, would if finished 
 have been Palladio's most handsome private palace. 
 It was not completed, as Zanella puts it, because 
 "I'animodeinostrinobili era maggiore delle rendite."^ 
 
 By this noble fragment the visitor is introduced at 
 his first step to Palladio's principal method of con- 
 struction, — the running of pilasters or half-columns 
 the height of the upper stories, surmounted by a heavy 
 frieze and cornice. Here they are Corinthian half- 
 columns, standing upon very massive pedestals which 
 occupy the whole of the spaces between the simple 
 ^ Giacomo Zanella, VUa di Andrea Palladio. 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 111 
 
 basement windows; while the single upper story is 
 loftier than two of usual size, and its windows between 
 the columns are adorned with pediments and heavy 
 balconies. There is no other ornamentation, except 
 the relieved garlands of the frieze; yet it is handsomer 
 than any mass of decoration could be. 
 
 On the left side of the piazza stands a statue of Gari- 
 baldi (they all look about alike, these statues of the 
 Liberator), and next it on the northeast, at the be- 
 ginning of the Corso, a palace of Vincenzo Scamozzi's, 
 — the Palazzo Bonin. It is a good example of his 
 powers: an open Doric colonnade on the first story, 
 without arches, Ionic half -columns on the second story, 
 separating windows like those of the Ca' del Diavolo, 
 and surmounted by a continuous heavy cornice, — and 
 a short third story, of Corinthian pilasters between 
 simple squared windows. Like Palladio, Scamozzi 
 used columns, and heavily pedimented windows, for 
 most of his effects of grace or power. ^ — But next 
 to this building, on the left, was my destination, the 
 principal inn existing to-day in Vicenza, located in 
 an old palace behind an attractive, well-flowered gar- 
 den. The former "Hotel de la Ville," once so praised 
 by travelers, has disappeared; but I found this Al- 
 bergo Roma excellent for a small place. Its stately 
 old rooms and halls made me feel like a visitor to 
 some noble house; which impression was enhanced 
 when we sat down to dine that evening in the open, 
 scented air of the garden, with screening bushes shut- 
 ting out the everyday world. 
 
 In the afternoon, however, when the sun had sunk 
 a little toward the western hills, I started out for my 
 
 ' How well he succeeded will be remembered by all travelers, when they 
 call to mind his magnificent Proeuratie Niwve, on the south side of the 
 Piazza of St. Mark. 
 
112 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tour of first impressions ; and never have I had a more 
 delightful walk, more full of enjoyable surprises and 
 fresh bursts of beauty or picturesqueness. "In a word, 
 this sweet Towne has more well-built Palaces than 
 any of its dimensions in all Italy, besides a number 
 begun and not yet finished (but of stately design)." ^ 
 These "contribute in the whole to give Vicenza an 
 appearance of splendour and beauty not common 
 even in Italy. "^ I had no sooner stepped from the 
 garden into the street than the first of the long series 
 confronted me upon the opposite side, — the Palazzo 
 Loschi, built in the eighteenth century, nevertheless 
 of Palladian style. The heavy half-columns along the 
 upper stories, the stern basement, and rich entabla- 
 ture, lent an air of grandeur and impressiveness to 
 the narrow way; and here was prominent a later char- 
 acteristic of this style, the row of projecting human 
 heads, carved from stone, with fearful grimaces and 
 distortions, ornamenting the keystones of the win- 
 dow arches. These were positively so grotesque and 
 varied that I stood spellbound for a moment under 
 their evil glances, as if they carried hypnotic influ- 
 ence. Strange indeed are the eccentric channels into 
 which decadent art will run.^ 
 
 Away before me to the northeast stretched the 
 Corso, resplendent with other palaces at intervals as 
 far as the eye could reach, — an endless array of shops 
 and inviting caffes in the ground floors, the narrow 
 sidewalks and pavement thronged with a crowd fresh 
 from their midday siesta. As I strolled along I found 
 
 ' Evelyn, Diary and Letters. 
 
 ' Eustace, Classical Tour through Italy. 
 
 ' In this palace was preserved till recently one of Italy's most valuable 
 artistic relics, — which America can now pride herself upon possessing, 
 for it hangs in Mrs. Gardner's gallery at Boston. This is Giorgione's 
 famous Christ bearing the Cross. 
 

 
 VICENZA. GA 
 

 F PALAZZO QCIRINL 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 113 
 
 that by no means were all the fine buildings in Palla- 
 dio's manner; there were Gothic palaces, with charm- 
 ing pointed windows, and many of the Earlier Renais- 
 sance forms, of the quattrocento and first half of the 
 cinquecento. Most pleasant of all, I found that the 
 entrance-hallways, including those in simple unadorned 
 fagades, almost invariably opened directly into gar- 
 dened courts; so that the eye was gladdened by a 
 succession of engaging vistas, through hallways and 
 ornamental wickets, of green masses of shrubbery 
 and gorgeous flower-beds. This is a characteristic of 
 Vicenza that never fails to impress the most careless 
 traveler, and ever after calls up, with the mention of 
 her name, visions of groves and blossoms framed by 
 old cortili.^ 
 
 Beyond the second street on the left (still narrower, 
 and darker, were these little side ways) loomed up the 
 large and picturesque Palazzo Thiene, and beyond the 
 third street the double Palazzo Braschi, — all three 
 splendid Gothic edifices of the quattrocento, built of 
 brick once plastered but now more or less bare again, 
 with balconies and pointed windows of stone or 
 marble framework, exquisite in design and delicate 
 enrichment. 
 
 Most of these Gothic arches were trefoil, with plain 
 heavy cusps, foliage capitals, spiral mouldings at the 
 angles of the jambs, and dainty balustrades or bal- 
 conies; many were also slightly ogive, with delicate 
 labels, capped by ornamental balls or vases. Still 
 farther on, rose on the opposite or south side the con- 
 
 1 Some of the noble mansions, nearer the outskirts of the city, are 
 backed by gardens of wide extent and noted loveliness, which are well 
 worth seeing when admission can be procured. Particularly pleasing are 
 those of the Marchese Salvi, and of the Palazzo Quirini, with their ordered 
 profusion of groves, walks, lawns, and shrubberies, embellished everywhere 
 by marble sculptures and fountains. 
 
114 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 trasting Palazzo Porto, with one of Scamozzi's monu- 
 mental fagades, as powerful and grandiose in its ponder- 
 ous columns as the Gothic structures were light and 
 fanciful; and through its wide central hall was visible 
 a beautiful courtyard, ennobled by fine Doric col- 
 umns and entablature. Then, beyond the Via Zanella 
 leading to the left, I came on that side to the fairest 
 Gothic building of them all, thte famous Palazzo da 
 Schio, looking as if the pride of the Grand Canal of 
 Venice had been bodily transported to soar magni- 
 ficently above this narrow way. From its second and 
 third stories, besides many single lovely windows, 
 shone two delightful colonnades of four ogive arches, 
 cusped and labeled, with slender marble shafts crowned 
 by exuberant capitals, and connected at their bases by 
 balustrades; on each side of them opened single 
 windows of similar style, adorned with balconies pro- 
 jecting widely on elaborately carved consoles, — at 
 whose upper corners sat the quaintest imaginable 
 little marble figures of jfutti and lions, holding armorial 
 shields. 
 
 Close beyond this again on the left, I passed the dwell- 
 ing of Palladio, having a simple early f agade with broad 
 spaces intended to be frescoed, and once so adorned, 
 as the lingering fragments gave evidence. Finally the 
 Corso debouched into the northern end of a spacious 
 piazza, named after Vittorio Emanuele II; and front- 
 ing it on the corner to the right, I saw the grand pal- 
 ace built by Palladio in 1566 for the noble family of 
 Chieregati, now devoted to the municipal collections 
 of art, antiquities, and natural history. It is cer- 
 tainly one of his most imposing creations: on the 
 ground floor is an extensive Doric colonnade, without 
 arches, with simple Doric frieze; and the Ionic colon- 
 nade above this is broken in the centre by a project- 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 115 
 
 ing pavilion adorned with half-columns, over the pedi- 
 ments of whose windows recline sculptured figures 
 nearly life-size; the whole effect being monumental 
 rather than graceful, — which is increased by the row 
 of statues upon the eaves. At the northeast angle of 
 the piazza I saw another of Palladio's buildings, the 
 celebrated Teatro Olympico which he constructed on 
 ancient lines; naught was visible on the oytside, how- 
 ever, but a mass of irregular, unfaced structures sur- 
 rounding a wide, cluttered entrance-court; and a sign 
 informed me that the ingress now was upon the back 
 street. 1 
 
 Putting off this visit until later, I returned along 
 the Corso as I had come, passing through the arcades 
 which line its central part, and not turning until I had 
 almost reached the hotel. There I veered to the south 
 by the short Via Loschi, beside the palace of that 
 name, and came quickly to a little piazza overshad- 
 owed on the east by a huge church, whose fagade was 
 remarkably like that of S. Antonio at Padua. It was 
 the Duomo. Its front is crossed by the same five, 
 large, recessed Gothic arches, the central one contain- 
 ing a simple squared doorway and the next two hold- 
 ing lancet windows, — while in the centre of the flat 
 gable opens a broad rose-window. It is not very hand- 
 some. I advanced into the widening of the piazza on 
 the south side of the church, where stands a recent 
 
 ' From that street behind the theatre the Ponte degli Angeli spans the 
 Bacehiglione, connecting with the eastern quarter of the city; whose six 
 thoroughfares radiate fan-like from the Piazza Venti Settembre at the 
 bridge's end. Here, not far distant, may be visited the Church of S. Pietro 
 Apostolo, with its statues of Adam and Eve by Albanese, and its beauti- 
 ful relief of Charity over the portal, executed in marble by Canova. — 
 From the southern end of Piazza Vittorio Emanuele the Viale of the same 
 name leads southward, — a shady embankment dividing the two rivers, 
 which affords a pleasant promenade; and the walk may be continued to 
 the marble arch of Palladio at the foot of Monti Berici. 
 
116 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 monument to Victor Emanuel, overlooked on the west 
 by the long, very attractive fagade of the Episcopal 
 Palace. This pleased me exceedingly by its noble 
 simplicity:' the basement heavily rusticated, with un- 
 framed oblong windows, the upper story adorned only 
 with Doric half-columns, between balconied windows 
 which were framed by Ionic pilasters upholding pedi- 
 ments. Yet it was constructed as late as 1819. The 
 building itself, however, is fully four centuries old; as 
 is proved by the charming court-fagade, or arcade 
 (to the right within), which was erected by Fromen- 
 tone in 1494. It is a little masterpiece, worthy of the 
 fame of him who designed the glorious Municipio of 
 Brescia; and by the Vicen tines is often proudly called, 
 after its author, the Loggia di Fromentone. 
 
 I entered the Duomo, to find myself in a long, low, 
 Gothic-arched nave, with no aisles, but chapels open- 
 ing directly from each side; and saw at the end a 
 highly elevated choir of Renaissance lines, with a 
 dome just before it. Little light came through the 
 narrow windows to relieve the dusk, which was al- 
 ready somewhat peopled with persons at their after- 
 noon devotions. Making the round of the chapels, I 
 discovered but three interesting works of art, — a 
 canvas of Madonna and Saints by Montagna, fourth 
 on the left, a Death of the Virgin by Lorenzo Ve- 
 neziano, fifth on the right, and the elaborate monu- 
 ment of Bishop Girolamo Schio, executed by Palla- 
 dio's disciples, Girolamo Pironi and Maestro Giovanni. 
 The Montagna was unfortunately greatly faded, but 
 I could see that the colors must once have been rich 
 and harmonious; the saintly figures were still grace- 
 ful and pleasing, though a little disappointing in their 
 want of feeling and expression. 
 
 There was still time enough before dinner to visit 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 117 
 
 Vicenza's great monument, Palladio's capo di lavoro; 
 and I turned my steps eastward with a heart beating 
 somewhat faster than usual, full at the same time of 
 the keenest anticipations, and fear lest I should en- 
 counter disappointment. The exterior of the Duomo's 
 apse surprised me into a moment's stop, — a splendid 
 construction all in red marble, with white basement 
 and angle-strips, and large lancet windows; there are 
 few, if any, in the plain-towns to surpass it. A narrow 
 way. Via Garibaldi, runs from it eastward, parallel 
 with Corso Umberto, between very old houses, little 
 shops whose contents bulge upon the pavement, and 
 stalls for the sale of every sort of produce. Following 
 this, and threading my way through the crowd that 
 trafficked and gossiped, in a couple of blocks it ended 
 suddenly before a mighty building of dazzling white 
 arches that shone gloriously in the blaze of the sinking 
 sun. It could be no other than the Basilica Palladiana. 
 Lowering my eyes, I turned to the left, past a statue 
 of Palladio, into the wide Piazza dei Signori stretching 
 far to the east, — crossed to its northern side, and 
 then faced about toward the Basilica. 
 
 Never shall I forget the utter amazement that held 
 me motionless, the bewildering sensation of not be- 
 lieving my eyes, and the final rush of overwhelming 
 feelings, — as the magnificent glowing spectacle tow- 
 ered before me in the golden halo of sunset, like an 
 enchantment or a dream of fairyland. The whole vast 
 structure was of marble,* glittering in the level sun- 
 rays like some unreal edifice from hands that were 
 more than mortal, — like the wondrous palace that 
 sprang from earth at the touch of Aladdin's lamp, or 
 
 ' Marble, at least, to all intents and appearances; though as a fact it is 
 a calcareous carbonate of extraordinary hardness, called, after the place of 
 its quarrying, the pietradi Piovene. 
 
118 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 that which the gods raised for Cadmus while he slept. 
 The long rows of superb arches, one above the other, 
 resting fairylike on beautiful columns free of walls, 
 seemed to mount into the air without sustenance or 
 weight, bearing against the blue the forms of heroes 
 turned to stone by the Medusa's head. It was a lace- 
 work of marble held aloft by unseen power, through 
 whose pattern ran curves of ethereal grace, inter- 
 threaded with countless pillars of elegance and maj- 
 esty. No words could portray this sublime creation 
 from the brain of man, no photograph reveal its daz- 
 zling beauty in the sunset glow. Yet here it slept 
 in this little town, like the palace of the Sleeping 
 Beauty, unknown and unnoticed by the hordes of 
 travelers who pass within a mile of it on the speeding 
 cars, year after year. 
 
 It was hard to realize that within that marble 
 splendor stood an aged, brick, Gothic edifice of medi- 
 eval times; yet so it was, and a closer inspection could 
 just discern in the shadows of the deep arcades some 
 of the pointed arches of the original Broletto. The 
 latter was not a handsome building, and it was by 
 order of the Signoria that Palladio in 1549 began the 
 construction of this classic covering, — therefore one 
 of his earliest works, although not completed until 
 nearly seventy years later. ^ The lower of the two 
 
 • The work of erection was supervised by Palladio himself for thirty 
 years, up to his death in 1580; but it was not fully completed until 1614. 
 He was aided, from time to time, by many of his pupils and followers. 
 Praise, for instance, is especially due to the very talented Girolamo Pironi 
 (author of the exquisite pilaster fronting the Cappella del Santo at Padua) 
 for the many sculptures which embellish the free spaces of the lower 
 arcade. Palladio's, however, was the guiding mind ; and to him was given 
 all praise by the commission to examine the artistic and historical monu- 
 ments of Venetia, which was appointed by the Archduke Ferdinand Maxi- 
 milian, Governor-General, in 1859. "This building" — they reported — 
 "is without doubt the. capolavoro of Palladio, and that in which he best 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 119 
 
 arcades is of course Doric, and the upper Ionic; tte 
 arches in each case spring from coupled, detached 
 columns, one behind the other, and are separated by 
 piers adorned with long half-columns reaching from 
 base to cornice. There is no other ornamentation, 
 beyond the balustrades of the second story and the 
 roof, and the statues surmounting the latter; the 
 beauty of this wonderful edifice comes purely from 
 its harmony of parts and lines, — the greatest exem- 
 plar that I know of the truth that true loveliness lies 
 not in adornment. Over the arcades soars from 
 within a tall third story of contrasting heavy wall- 
 spaces, topped by a huge, curving, tinned roof like 
 that of the Salone at Padua; and these, I realized 
 now, were of the primal building. 
 
 My eyes wandered from the lofty arch of the roof 
 to the still loftier tower that dominates the whole 
 construction at its northeast angle, soaring into the 
 clouds like the Mangia of Siena; square in shape, of 
 unstuccoed brick, endowed with a slim elegance and 
 lightness, it projects almost its whole width into the 
 piazza at the eastern end of the fagade, and, far aloft, 
 above a graceful belfry with double arches of white 
 marble on each side, alters to an octagonal cylinder of 
 three divisions, capped by a Byzantine-looking dome 
 and columned lantern. This last is two hundred and 
 sixty-five feet above the pavement. I walked to its 
 foot, and observed there a large marble tablet in a 
 classic frame of pilasters and entablature, bearing 
 many names in rows: they were the Vicentines who 
 had given their lives for their country in the Risorgi- 
 mento; — and to my mind, as I looked, returned the 
 
 demonstrated his knowledge of the application of the rules of ancient 
 Roman architecture. The design is noble, simple, grandiose, harmonious." 
 See Monumenti Ariistici e Storici delle Provinde Venete. 
 
120 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 picture of that terrible struggle of 1848 upon Monte 
 Berici, when its slopes ran red with their valiant blood. 
 Some twenty feet above this was a handsome Renais- 
 sance archway relieved in marble, containing the 
 sculptured figures of the Madonna, Child, and two 
 Saints, — an engaging group, graceful and well exe- 
 cuted. As far again above this stood the old Venetian 
 Lion, of whitest marble and proudest mien, reminding 
 me in an instant of what I had for the moment for- 
 gotten, — that to the beneficence of the Republic's 
 rule were due this great Basilica, and most of the 
 splendors of the city. 
 
 Beyond the tower, still fronting on the piazza, 
 extends the addition to the Basilica, also built by 
 Palladio, which is devoted to the courts, and called 
 therefore the Tribunale, — an edifice of entirely dif- 
 ferent style, having five stories of heavy stone walls 
 pierced by regular and simple windows; while oppo- 
 site this, equidistant at the eastern end of the piazza, 
 rise the two Venetian columns, nobly proportioned, 
 of shining marble, topped by the memorable figures 
 of the Lion and the Saint. They looked so new to me 
 as to suggest reproduction; but even at that it is ever 
 touching, — this undying allegiance to the Mistress 
 of the Sea, long after her sun of glory has sunk be- 
 neath the horizon. 
 
 I now faced about westward, and found new beau- 
 ties irradiated by the sunset glow on the piazza's 
 northern flank: chief of these, and very exceptional, 
 the long fagade of the Monte di Pieta in the centre, 
 glittering like a kaleidoscope from the vivid colors of 
 new frescoes laid over all its wall-spaces from top to 
 bottom. These were recently finished reproductions 
 of the original paintings, that had utterly faded out 
 in the rains and sun of several centuries. The build- 
 
VILEXZA. DAFTIS.M OF CHRIST, IN THE CHL'RCH UF S. CUEONA. 
 {(UOVANXI BELLIM.) 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 121 
 
 ing itself was plain, but the mass of gorgeous tableaux, 
 designs, and crowning frieze made it radiant as a 
 tropical flower; and closer inspection of the Biblical 
 scenes depicted, revealed a pleasing excellence of com- 
 position and action, at once decorative and dramatic. 
 
 To the west of this palace, across a narrow side 
 street, the three-storied Palazzo del Capitanio glis- 
 tened in its heavy arches and wealth of ornament. 
 Cubical in shape, its fagade separated into three di- 
 visions by ponderous Corinthian half -columns of brick 
 reaching from pavement to cornice, its three arches of 
 the ground floor opening into a deep, shadowy loggia, 
 — it is a strange building, almost purely a monument, 
 erected by Palladio in 1571. The large windows over 
 the arcade are adorned with massive balconies, and 
 every foot of wall-space is covered with terra-cotta 
 worked into figures and designs. This last character- 
 istic is still more prominent on the side towards the 
 street, which is adorned with half a dozen statues and 
 decorated from top to bottom with still more cotta 
 reliefs, of every sort, — human figures, masks, mus- 
 ical instruments, scrolls, etc. The structure has there- 
 fore a special interest, in being almost the only repre- 
 sentative in Padua of the Renaissance method of 
 terra-cotta decoration, which rose to such noble heights 
 in the hands of the artists of Cremona and Milan. It 
 evidently arrived here too late. — Of the statues on 
 the street side, two, representing Peace and Victory, 
 commemorate the Venetian victory of Lepanto over 
 the Turks. Above the loggia stretches a single broad 
 hall, used for meetings of the Signoria and other city 
 bodies, which was adorned with ceiling-paintings by 
 Fasolo, now removed to the Pinacoteca. 
 
 Another edifice that now attracted my attention 
 rose from the very centre of the painted Monte di 
 
122 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Pieta, as different from the colored walls on each side as 
 day is from night; this was another white marble fa- 
 gade, of most exquisite, dainty, Renaissance lines, which 
 caught on the rebound and flashed to my eyes, as I 
 stood there watching, the last, roseate, sunset gleams 
 from the Basilica. It consisted only of two delicate 
 arcades, of three arches each, crowned by a baroque 
 pediment adorned with a charming relief and five 
 statues. Four Corinthian half-columns embellished 
 each story, at the sides and between the arches; and 
 in all the spandrils of the latter were reclining sculp- 
 tured figures, women below and lovely putti above. 
 One could hardly realize that this very classic edifice was 
 a church, — the Church of S. Vincenzo, — for nothing 
 more removed from religious ideals could be imagined; 
 yet so it went in those extraordinary cinquecento days, 
 when the whole populace was breathing the very air of 
 antiquity, when priests and cardinals were connois- 
 seurs in Greek mythology, and the very duomos were 
 penetrated by goddesses disguised as saints. 
 
 Through the middle of the Basilica runs a public 
 passage from north to south, occupied, as well as the 
 arcades, by the stalls of vendors of provisions; the 
 upper floor was designed as the customary great hall, 
 for the meetings of the large Communal Council, and 
 the ground floor to serve as a covered market, — 
 showing how little they then thought of the sights 
 and smells which disgust us to-day.^ As I strolled 
 through the passage at this evening hour, however, 
 the stalls were all closed and boarded and their keep- 
 ers gone. On the south side I found myself elevated a 
 full story above the ground, which there is open as a 
 small piazza in the shadows of tall old houses, and, to 
 
 ' The hall can still be seen, on application to the proper authority, but 
 aside from its size has little of interest to repay the trouble. 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 123 
 
 judge by the odor emanating from its deserted booths, 
 is used as a fish market. A wide stairway descends from 
 the arcade to this Piazza delle Erbe, and at its eastern 
 side a bridge leaps from the palace to a picturesque, 
 medieval brick tower, grim with heavily barred win- 
 dows and battlements, evidently still occupied as a 
 prison; the bridge itself is beautified by a lovely, triple. 
 Renaissance window, that seems curiously out of 
 place in such surroundings. 
 
 Map in hand, I strolled down the piazza and took 
 the first turning westward, somewhat beyond, to find 
 myself in a very narrow, dark way sloping gently up- 
 hill, labeled the Contrada Proti. (It is a peculiarity 
 of Vicenza that most of her streets are called Contrada, 
 instead of Via.) Quickly here upon the left appeared 
 the object of which I was in search, — the very re- 
 markable, so-called Casa Pigafetti. Its marble fagade 
 rose before me, narrow and three-storied, — one of 
 the strangest and most elaborate that I had ever 
 encountered: a round-arched doorway, and a little, 
 square, strongly barred window on each side of it, 
 pierced the basement wall, which was faced to half its 
 height with arabesque reliefs, amongst them being the 
 motto, "II n'y est rose sans espine"; slender spiral col- 
 umns with foliage caps stood at the jambs of the door- 
 way, other spiral columns at the comers of the build- 
 ing, running its whole height, and others again at the 
 angles of the three Gothic windows of the second 
 story; three balconies upheld the window-ledges of 
 the third story, trefoil in shape, the left-hand one upon 
 consoles composed of griffins; and this third story was 
 most ornate of all, — its Gothic windows being decor- 
 ated at the angles with columns of vases placed one 
 upon another, the topmost richly flowering, — its 
 panels cut with elaborate designs, and griffins in high- 
 
124 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 relief bearing escutcheons, — while its cornice, in weird 
 contrast, was in curious, broken, Renaissance lines. 
 This puzzling medley of unconventional and wanton 
 ideas was erected about 1480 for 'Antonio Pigafetti, 
 the sea-captain, but by what designer no one knows. 
 I speculated vainly about it as I walked back to the 
 hotel in the falling dusk, delighted with my memorable 
 ramble, — eager, with that appetite which none but 
 a traveler knows, for the dinner spread upon tempt- 
 ing white tables, under colored lantern lights, in the 
 greenery of the garden. 
 
 Next morning I was out betimes, on my way to 
 Vicenza's two churches which are renowned for their 
 paintings. Both are in the section north of Corso 
 Umberto, toward its eastern end; and I came first to 
 S. Stefano, by turning a short way up the Contrada 
 Zanella, which it fronts upon the east. The building 
 itself is unimportant, its fagade being of an ordinary, 
 modem. Renaissance design; but from its altar in the 
 left transept shines one of the most glorious canvases 
 of Palma Vecchio, — his celebrated St. George, with 
 the Madonna and Santa Lucia. The Madonna sits 
 high in the middle, holding the sacred Child erect 
 upon her left knee, with a lovely little girl-angel play- 
 ing a guitar at her feet and dreamily singing; in the 
 rear is an attractive landscape of hills and groves, 
 domed by a sky of Italian blueness, with cumulus 
 white clouds; but chief of all is the grand figure of 
 St. George upon the left, clad cap-a-pie in glistening 
 Milanese armor, and holding a staff flying his stand- 
 ard. His noble, heroic countenance, with flowing 
 hair, his steadfast gaze, his whole attitude and ex- 
 pression, radiate manliness and spirituality combined, 
 — a superb accomplishment. 
 
 In pleasing contrast to his martial sternness are the 
 
jyiCENZA THE PALATIAL 125 
 
 the Virgin's face, the soft curves 
 Lucia's figure><the lustrous fairness of the Babe, 
 and the deep resplendence of golden tone and richest 
 colors. By such surroundings the knightly form is set 
 forth and emphasized, wjth the sunlight glittering 
 softly from his burnishedr^-corselet, greaves, and 
 brassarts; never have I seen elsewhere so powerful, so 
 realistic, and yet so ideal a St. George, — not even in 
 Carpaccio's of the Schiavoni, nor Mantegna's of the 
 Accademia. In nearly every respect that one can 
 think of, this is a perfect pietistic painting; if there 
 be a noticeable want, it is only in the blankness of the 
 Madonna's face, which, with downcast eyes, is rather 
 vacant of expression; but who can dwell upon this, 
 before the inspired grandeur of the Knight's. 
 
 I looked also for an instant at a poor specimen of 
 Tintoretto, representing St. Paul, in the first chapel 
 on the left; then went on to the Church of S. Corona, 
 which lies a block farther to the east, just oflE the 
 Corso, — a Dominican edifice, built in the last years 
 of the thirteenth century, with a Gothic red-brick 
 fagade looking not a tenth of that age.^ But its com- 
 monplace dusky interior revealed to me treasure after 
 treasure: two quaint frescoes by Speranza, — a 
 Madonna on the entrance wall, and a group of angels 
 beside the second altar to thelett; another quattrocentist 
 Madonna and Saints, fourth to the left, by unknown 
 hands, accompanied by "a number of Fogolino's 
 puffy angels" ^ (1530); an Adoration of the Magi by 
 Paolo Veronese, third to the right, having a graceful 
 Madonna and Child, and still showing its original gor- 
 
 ' In this church Falladio was originally buried; but his body was later 
 removed to the general cemetery, where it lies under a monument sculp- 
 tured by the talented De Fabris. 
 
 2 Crowe and Cavalcasalle. 
 
126 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 geous coloring, — but an excellent example of Paolo's 
 method of taking richly gowned Venetian patricians, 
 posing them in attitudes, and labeling the result a 
 scriptural event; a very good Leandro Bassano, repre- 
 senting S. Antonio giving alms, third to the left, with 
 his usual, dark, luminous atmosphere, and fine tactile 
 values and execution; the splendid, gilt, Gothic tombs 
 of the Thiene family, in the chapel to the right of the 
 choir; and a superb example of Montagna, in a beauti- 
 ful Renaissance frame, on the second altar to the left. 
 This last was a group of five saints, the Magdalen in 
 the centre, of an Umbrian, golden softness and repose, 
 their flesh malleable yet strongly moulded, full of 
 grace in composition and attitude. Here I saw Mon- 
 tagna's powers, — his rich tone, harmonious coloring, 
 symmetry of forms, clear-cut execution, and above all, 
 restfulness. Such a feeling of dreamy, sweet peace 
 came over me as I gazed, that I would have liked to 
 live on with those happy saints in their angelic region. 
 Last and chief of all, however, came the famous 
 Baptism of Christ by Giovanni Bellini, on the fifth 
 altar to the left, — one of that great master's few large 
 canvases, and one of his few most perfect works. 
 Books have been written upon this masterpiece, but 
 its wondrous charm cannot be conveyed. The Saviour 
 stands in the centre, with gentle, radiant countenance 
 and hands folded upon his breast, nude but for a loin- 
 cloth, his feet upon the pebbles of the brook; the Bap- 
 tist stands upon the bank to the right, considerably 
 higher, leaning with outstretched arm to pour the cup 
 of water upon the sacred head; three angels of heav- 
 enly loveliness watch from the left bank, one kneel- 
 ing and two standing; in the rear is a remarkable land- 
 scape, both fair and picturesque, — a vale bounded by 
 swelling mountains on whose flanks perch towered 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 127 
 
 castles; and at the apex of the azure dome of sky 
 appears the half-figure of the Almighty, surrounded 
 by winged putti-he&ds, with His hands spread out in 
 blessing, and the Dove of the Holy Ghost speeding 
 earthward. Over all is a tone of infinite richness and 
 warmth, shimmering with hidden golden light, into 
 which blend softly the brown and blue tints of the 
 lofty hills; the upper sky is gilded by the sun already 
 set, with floating, fleecy cloudlets; but lower down it 
 is of fathomless blue. Beautiful as are these access- 
 ories, and the forms and faces of the heavenly watch- 
 ers, so excellent is the composition that the eye is ever 
 led back and focussed on the Christ. There at last 
 are a countenance and flgure, executed since Giotto's 
 time, that rise very near to our lofty ideals of the 
 Perfect Man: a wonderful combination of manly 
 strength and exquisite grace, powerful yet delicate, 
 with a lustre more than mortal radiating from within; 
 a face of celestial beauty that yet is virile, stamped 
 indefinably with his sorrows, thoughtfulness, and love. 
 What a profound emotion shines forth from his eyes, 
 from the tense dark figure of St. John, from the 
 trembling suspense of the angelic witnesses, from 
 the awful majesty of the Father! Surely this is one 
 of the very grandest works, not of Italy alone, but of 
 all the world. 
 
 Leaving the church, I proceeded to the end of the 
 Corso and the building of the Teatro Olympico of 
 Palladio, then circled round to the street in rear of it, 
 and found a door where I could obtain entrance. The 
 female portiere led me through several disused corri- 
 dors and rooms, until we emerged suddenly upon the 
 end of the stage. Vicenza's famous relic of the classic 
 revival lay before me, — a genuine reproduction in 
 stucco of a theatre of the ancients. Behind a slightly 
 
128 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 sunken, semicircular pit for the chorus, rose the seats 
 in thirteen tiers, topped by an ornamental screen of 
 Corinthian columns supporting a balustraded entabla- 
 ture, with statues in niches between the columns, and 
 surmounting the balustrade. The stage, with no foot- 
 lights, was backed at a short distance by a most 
 sumptuous classical fagade, three stories in height, 
 which bent forward at right angles at the ends; in its 
 centre a high arch afforded a deceptive vista of an an- 
 cient city street, lined by palaces, leading straightaway 
 to a distant city gate; and smaller squared doorways at 
 the sides gave similar vistas running obliquely. 
 
 Between and above these openings the entire 
 fagade was extravagantly embellished with a succes- 
 sion of niches in classic frames, holding statues, with 
 Corinthian columns and half-columns, topped by 
 other statues, and tableaux of reliefs on the third 
 story; — the whole being about as rich as possible an 
 assemblage of ancient architectural forms, with count- 
 less stuccoed figures inRoman garb. Even the dimin- 
 utive palace fronts on the deceptive sloping streets 
 were overloaded with cracked and crumbling statuary. 
 But it is wonderfully preserved for stucco-work, and 
 one of the best resuscitations of the past to be found 
 anywhere. It was entirely Palladio's idea, started by 
 him in 1579, though not inaugurated untU after his 
 death, when Sophocles' (Edipus Tyrannus was pro- 
 duced first, in 1584.' Ever since then there have been 
 
 ' This is the oldest of the classic Renaissance theatres, because that 
 built by Alfonso I of Ferrara for Ariosto has long disappeared. Scamozzi 
 soon followed this with his charming court-theatre for Vespasiano Gon- 
 zaga at Sabbioneta (1588-90), and G. B. Alleotti, another pupil of Palladio, 
 constructed the celebrated Teatro Famese at Parma in 1618-28; both still 
 exist, although in ruinous condition. Palladio's work, therefore, was the 
 prototype of these; and he followed closely the precepts of Vitruvius, as 
 may be seen, with a few private divergences. The ninety-five statues are 
 supposed to be portraits of the local academicians of his day, who fum- 
 
VICENZA. FALAZ7A) DA SCHIO, FORJIERLY KXOWN AS THE CASA 
 AUREA OR CA D' ORO (THE G-OLDEN HOUSE). 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 129 
 
 and still are, productions of the Greek dramas at 
 intervals, as well as other plays; and it affords Vicenza 
 a convenient assembly-hall for large gatherings. 
 
 The remainder of that morning, and the afternoon 
 also, I spent in the Museo Civico, across the Piazza 
 Vittorio Emanuele, Scattered about the ground floor 
 and in the court of the palace, I found fragments of a 
 Roman theatre and other antiquities; the upper floor, 
 reached by a stairway to the left in the court, is nearly 
 all devoted to the collection of paintings. Here I en- 
 tered first the fine large hall occupying the central 
 pavilion, which must have been a splendid salon when 
 inhabited by the Chieregati family, for it was typical 
 of Late-Renaissance grandeur and formality. Room 
 number one opened from this to the left rear, — a small 
 chamber toward the Corso, — and the series continued 
 through other chambers along the same side, proceed- 
 ing west. In the first four of them were the best of the 
 large assortment of pictures. 
 
 Room I revealed to me a pleasing Domenichino, — 
 the Baptist as a boy, preaching, half-seated against 
 a rock, with a lamb by his side; also a group of the 
 Four Ages by Van Dyck, — the woman very lovely, 
 with white soft flesh and speaking eyes and lips, and 
 roses in her hands, — the sleeping babe very pretty. 
 Room II exhibited an excellent Holy Family with St. 
 Catherine, by Campagnola, graceful and rich in tone, 
 in an exquisite evening landscape, — and five, sep- 
 arate, interesting Madonnas. One of these was. by 
 
 ished the funds. A century ago the building was falling to pieces, but was 
 repaired in 1816 through the generosity of Conte Orazio Porto; during 
 which reparations the present new roof was superimposed, and painted in 
 1828 by Pjcutti. — The adjoining structure, with its now disused halls and 
 chambers, was added to the theatre in 1582 by Scamozzi's designs; and 
 from its name, the Odeon, seems to have served the Academy for its pur- 
 poses of dramatic culture, and for entertainments. 
 
130 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Giovanni Bellini, in his usual method, but injured; 
 another, by Titian, also injured, but still of exceeding 
 beauty in form and color; a third, by Mocetto, Bel- 
 lini's pupil, with the Child held erect on the left knee 
 before a green tapestry, — an example of what exquis- 
 ite paintings often came in that period from artists 
 of minor rank; a fourth was labeled Timoteo Viti and 
 signed "Joannes Belinus," — doubtless a forgery; for, 
 though of attractive moulding and lighting, it was not 
 at all in Bellini's style, but more like Raphael's master, 
 in the flesh work; while the fifth (number 207) was by 
 an unknown artist, — a superb creation of the Venetian 
 school, of striking beauty in the face and hands. In 
 Room III was another mystery, a portrait of a young 
 man with flowing golden hair (255) bearing the unmis- 
 takable marks of the manner of Leonardo da Vinci, 
 and probably by Luini or Solario or another of his 
 pupils. Here also I found to my delight a very early 
 and lovely work of Cima, — the Madonna with Saints 
 James and Jerome, of his usual golden tone and grace- 
 ful repose. Room iv contained the Montagnas, and 
 other chief works of the Vicentine school: most 
 beautiful of all was that master's group of the Ma- 
 donna with Saints John and Jerome, splendidly com- 
 posed, modeled, and colored, of fine atmosphere and 
 perspective. Among other masters were Jacopo Bas- 
 sano's Madonna with Saints Catherine and Mary 
 Magdalen, and Girolamo del Toso's Madonna with 
 Saints Catherine and ApoUonia; both engaging ta- 
 bleaux; — but the Montagnas, with their peculiar 
 grace and pietistic feeling, their glow of tone and rich 
 coloring, alone repaid me for my journey. 
 
 The remaining rooms in the rear contained inferior 
 paintings, portraits, Murano glassware, engravings, 
 drawings, architectural plans of Palladio, Scamozzi, 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 131 
 
 and Calderari, and the collections of coins and natural 
 history. Returning to the entrance-hall, whose spa- 
 cious walls were lined with the better quality of pic- 
 tures, I found an unusually grand specimen of Jacopo 
 Bassano, — a majestic tableau of the Rettori of Vi- 
 cenza kneeling to the Madonna, with Saints Mark and 
 Vincenzo by her side; a large, powerful work, in his 
 customary dark tone, of striking modeling, and light 
 and atmospheric effects. Here also was an anonymous 
 but extremely beautiful Madonna with two Saints 
 (number 5) of splendid fleshwork, coloring, and grace, 
 with a lovely background on the right, of rounded hills 
 crested by towered and battlemented towns. 
 
 Another day I spent in wandering about the still 
 unvisited parts of the ancient city, particularly those 
 north of the Corso Umberto, looking for interesting 
 palaces and churches. Commencing where I had the 
 other day, at Santo Stefano, I found immediately 
 opposite, in the same Contrada Zanella, another of 
 Palladio's unfinished but monumental palaces, — the 
 Thiene, constructed for Vicenza's long preeminent, 
 noble family of that name.^ It has an extraordinary 
 fagade: the basement of bricks laid to resemble blocks 
 of rusticated rough stone, the great windows of the 
 piano nohile adorned at their angles with Ionic col- 
 umns encased in cubic stone blocks at intervals (a 
 hideous decadence) and the whole structure giving 
 a ponderous Egyptian-like effect, — the beginnings of 
 the Rococo. The back of this palace is lighter and 
 more graceful, because of earlier construction, its win- 
 dows being relieved with simple cotta mouldings and 
 the wall-spaces colored with modern frescoes. 
 
 ' This edifice, now occupied by the Banca Populare, represents but one 
 quarter of the original plans drawn by Palladio, — which, if carried out, 
 would have given us one of the few most princely residences of the whole 
 peninsula. 
 
132 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 The Corso Porti, which this back looks upon, has a 
 number of other fine buildings, — it is a street of 
 palaces. Opposite the Thiene stands the Porto Bar- 
 barano, also by Palladio, an example of his best work, 
 imposing with its heavy string-courses and rows of 
 Ionic and Corinthian half -columns; and further to the 
 north, on the left, rise in perfect contrast a whole 
 group of buoyant Gothic structures, beautiful both 
 in the ensemble and individually. Colonnaded win- 
 dows of four ogive, trefoil arches, grace their second 
 stories, also single windows with charming, Gothic, 
 marble balconies; and through sculptured entrance- 
 arches one looks into colonnaded Gothic courts with 
 delightful staircases. Then comes another Palladian 
 palace, the second of the two CoUeoni standing side by 
 side, of which the first is Gothic; and so it continues 
 through the quarter, — airy and massive styles in 
 close juxtaposition, one setting ofif the other. 
 
 In the northern part of the Contrada S. Lorenzo, 
 farther to the west, I found the Gothic church of that 
 name, dating from 1185, — a spacious dusky edifice of 
 good proportions, adorned with the tombs of Mon- 
 tagna and Scamozzi; it fronts on a little piazza decor- 
 ated with a monument to the poet Giacomo Zanella, 
 who was a Vicentine. Near the Corso in this same 
 street stands one of Palladio's finest efforts, the great 
 Palazzo Valmarana. I ended my tour at the extreme 
 northwestern part of the town, where the smaller 
 Church of S. Rocco gave me what I had been seeking, 
 a good example of Buonconsiglio; — for the one or two 
 of his canvases in the Museo were not impressive. 
 This, however, was an exquisite pietistic canvas, a 
 Madonna with four saints, of blissful repose and truly 
 wonderful coloring.^ 
 
 • A conception of the true height of Buonconsiglio's undoubted genius 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 133 
 
 On my last day at Vicenza I combined a ramble* 
 over the southern section with my visit to Monti 
 Berici. After some wandering I struck the Basilica 
 Palladiana, and turned directly southward by the 
 street from the Piazza Erbe; it quickly crossed the nar- 
 row Retrone, affording me an excellent view of the 
 bridge next on the east, the graceful, white Ponte S. 
 Michele, which was constructed on classic lines, with 
 a single wide span, by Palladio. My way, the Corso 
 SS. Apostoli, continued southward between three- 
 storied, stuccoed dwellings, past the large Teatro 
 Garibaldi with its huge classic portico, until I came 
 to the enceinture-street, formerly just inside the city 
 wall, called Porta S. Giuseppe; in this, just to the left, 
 still stands one of the city gates (for the walls are de- 
 molished) — the Porta del Luzzo, its arch of great 
 stones being intact from Roman days, with brick 
 additions of the Middle Ages. Further to the left, 
 inside, I discovered one of the most curious little 
 houses that it has ever been my lot to see : of general 
 Renaissance lines, its basement was built of irregular 
 stones and broken bricks, with windows framed by 
 stucco set to represent rusticated stone blocks; the 
 windows of the upper story were framed by half- 
 columns of brick chipped all over their rounding sur- 
 faces; beside these were two niches holding statues, 
 and over them ran a stone Doric frieze surmounted 
 by other statues; — altogether a potpourri of fascinat- 
 ing horror. 
 
 Beyond the gate I followed to the right for a short 
 way the old city moat, still flowing with water, and 
 struck a road which took me southward to the foot of 
 
 can best be obtained, strange to say, at the little town of Montagnana 
 (q. v.), for which he painted three or four canvases of extraordinary size 
 and beauty. 
 
134 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Monti Berici; this it climbed gently between rows of 
 majestic trees until it reached the beginning of the 
 brick arcade, constructed in the quattrocento to cover 
 the pious pilgrims ascending on their knees, and give 
 them holy stations at which to stop and pray. From 
 all over northern Italy they came for generations, — 
 merely because some one in 1428 had alleged that the 
 Virgin had appeared to him on the summit; and the 
 Church of Madonna del Monte had therefore been 
 erected over the spot, with supposed miraculous pow- 
 ers of healing. Italy has many such pilgrimage arcades, 
 but this is surely, one of the longest. Away up the 
 fertile green slope I could see it climbing, climbing, 
 until it turned to the right at three hundred and fifty 
 yards distance, and continued as far again: an un- 
 broken arched corridor with much-worn steps, open 
 only on the left between the pillars, with landings 
 every few rods adorned by crucifixes and fair frescoes 
 of the life of the Saviour. The peasants no longer 
 ascend on their knees, but some of them do pray at all 
 the stations, — doubtless sent up for penances by their 
 confessors. 
 
 As I slowly mounted, my thoughts reverted again to 
 those bloody days of 1848, when this same religious 
 passage was the scene of terrible struggles, the Ital- 
 ians using it as one of their chief defenses, and fighting 
 with the bayonet on each landing in turn, until the 
 steps were choked with the dead and dying. — Then 
 my eyes were arrested by another road ascending the 
 hill some way to the east, and by a glittering white 
 object at its foot, which on closer observation and in- 
 quiry proved to be a beautiful ornamental arch of Re- 
 naissance days, — the Arco delle Scalette of Palladio, 
 crowned with statues and a Venetian Lion. — At last 
 I reached the summit, after running the fire of a num- 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 135 
 
 ber of holy-relic sellers near the top, and saw the 
 church rising before me on broad, high steps, in the 
 shape of a Greek cross, — as it was reconstructed in 
 1688. 
 
 Far below on the north lay the thousands of roofs 
 of Vicenza in their warm red tiles, surmounted by 
 towers here and there, packed closely in the luxuriant 
 vale, with the foothills of the Alps soaring behind, on 
 the west and northwest, higher and ever higher, till 
 they became distant dark peaks against the sky. Far 
 away to the east spread the plain of Venetia, an im- 
 mense, verdurous, green ocean, sparkling with the 
 white dots of farmhouses and villages, its haze-shrouded 
 horizon describing a great quarter-circle, from Bassano 
 to Padua; and to the south extended the top ridge of 
 the Berici, along which Radetskyhad finally advanced, 
 dark with woods upon the summit and upper flanks, 
 froba whose umbrageous depths peeped glistening 
 villa-towers and grim, castellated keeps. 
 
 Within the church I found one of those overdecked, 
 overgilded, Late-Renaissance interiors, with fine col- 
 umns hidden by gaudy cloths with gilt fringe, and 
 altars adorned by tinseled, crowned Madonnas; but 
 one altar, to the right of the choir, held a genuine 
 treasure, a masterpiece of Montagna, representing the 
 Pietd. The body of the Christ was of most realistic 
 moulding, and very clearly dead, though not at all 
 spiritual in aspect; the Madonna's attitude and grief 
 were moving, as were St. Joseph's, who, wringing his 
 hands at the left in agony, apparently feels that he 
 cannot approach closer to that holy intimacy of Mother 
 and Son. 
 
 In a room back of the choir on the floor below I saw 
 another good painting, the celebrated Banquet of 
 Paolo Veronese which was cut to pieces by the Aus- 
 
136 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 trian troopers in 1848; it has been admirably pieced 
 together, and shows a typical, huge, Veronese dining- 
 scene, with all its accessories of colonnades, stairways, 
 marbles, richest vestments, fine plate, Venetian patri- 
 cians, climbing urchins, and varied animals. Near this 
 room was a charming little Gothic cloister, with a 
 handsome Renaissance well-top. Behind the church 
 on the east were two monuments to those who died 
 fighting on this spot in 1848, one of them a statue 
 dedicated by Vicenza to "The Genius of the Insur- 
 rection." 
 
 On descending the arcade, at the turning-point half- 
 way down I bore to the east along a lower ridge, whose 
 gradual slope to the southeast conducted me past some 
 fine villas, to the famous residence known as the "Ro- 
 tonda,'* built by Palladio for the Marchese Capra. It 
 is one of the master's most pure and most successful 
 creations: a central square structure of two stories, 
 containing a circular domed hall, and adorned on each 
 of the four sides with a massive, Ionic, six-columned 
 portico, approached by lofty steps and crowned with 
 statues.^ Here, upon Radetsky's final assault in 1848, 
 over three thousand trained Austrian troops were held 
 at bay for hours by three hundred young students of 
 the University. What a spirit blazed in those brave 
 hearts, — the spirit that makes miracles possible; 
 naught else could have accomplished the wonder of 
 free, united Italy. 
 
 I found two interesting excursions that can be easily 
 
 ' This imposing design has often been reproduced in English villas, at 
 Chiswick, Tunbridge Wells, and elsewhere, and particularly at the royal 
 French estate of Marly. — The Villa Valmarana, near the Rotonda, con- 
 tains several frescoes by G. B. Tiepolo, in his usual decorative manner. 
 
 A fine example of Montagna may also be found in the environs, — 
 a beautiful canvas of the Madonna between Saints John and Anthony, at 
 the Church of S. Giovanni Ilarione. 
 
VICENZA. VILLA R(.lT(INDA BY I'ALLADKJ AND SCAMOZZI. 
 
 VICENZA. ITBLIC MUSEUM. 
 
VICENZA THE PALATIAL 137 
 
 taken from Vicenza within a day's time. The first, 
 and more important, is by the little railway to the 
 Val d' Asti, which passes the towns of Thiene and 
 Schio, situated where the foothills slope into the plain 
 some fifteen miles to the north, — the birthplaces of 
 the two great Vicentine families known by their names. 
 Thiene has one of the castles that belonged to Barto- 
 lomeo CoUeoni, decorated with a number of fine paint- 
 ings: a series of frescoes by Paolo Veronese, another 
 by Battista Zellote of Verona, and one of Gaudenzio 
 Ferrari's characteristic, beautiful angels making mel- 
 ody. From here it is a splendid drive along the foot- 
 hills eastward to Bassano, through the fascinating, 
 picturesque old town of Marostica, with its Rocca 
 and its Renaissance villas.^ Schio, a city of thirteen 
 thousand people, is of less account, although its large 
 Duomo and cemetery are worth seeing if one is there, 
 also several of its grand houses. The second trip is 
 by the tramway up the Valdagno to the northwest, 
 passing Montecchie, with its huge ruined castles of 
 that family (the Montagues of Shakespeare's Verona) 
 and the handsome Villa Cordellina, decorated with 
 frescoes by G. B. Tiepolo. From the town of Valdagno 
 it is a pretty mountain-drive to the celebrated Baths 
 of Recoaro, with their numerous large hotels. 
 1 See next chapter, at the close of " Bassano." 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 BASSANO, CITTADELLA, AND CASTELFRANCO 
 
 The hamlets rested on the Tyrol's brow. 
 The Asolan and Euganean hills. 
 The Rhsetian and the Julian, — sadness fills 
 Them all, for Eccelin vouchsafes to stay 
 Among, and care about them; day by day 
 Choosing this pinnacle, the other spot, 
 A castle building to defend a cot. 
 
 Robert Browning's SordeUo. 
 
 I DEPAETED from Viccnza, not by the main line of rail- 
 road by which I had come, but over the branch line 
 extending northeasterly through Cittadella and Castel- 
 franco to Treviso, parallel with the bases of the Alps 
 and about ten miles distant therefrom. This fair 
 region, one of the richest of Venetia, is a long gradual 
 slope from the mountains to the sea-level, percolated 
 by countless swift streams that are fed by the melted 
 snows, and thickly covered by habitations and vil- 
 lages. Besides its exceptional fertility ■- — due to the 
 abundant watering and good drainage, and its eleva- 
 tion of one to four hundred feet above the marshiness 
 of the lower lands — it has always been an important 
 field for travellers to or from the north, traversed and 
 fought over by invading armies since the dawn of 
 Italy. For into its smiling meadows debouch two 
 great routes from the Tyrol and German lands: one 
 near the middle of its Alpine barrier, — the Val Su- 
 gana, which is the defile of the Brenta, — the other 
 at its eastern end, the Valley of the Piave, descending 
 from the Cadore country with its three well-trodden 
 
•n , 
 
 
BASSANO 139 
 
 passes. Just where the Brenta emei^es from its gap, 
 sits the little but important city that has always 
 guarded for Italy the Sugana Pass, — Bassano; which 
 therefore has ever been an object of fierce contentions, . 
 and subjected to as many external vicissitudes as a 
 city of the first rank. 
 
 Bassano, a place of but fifteen thousand inhabitants 
 to-day and never much larger, was an object of tender 
 solicitude to the rulers of Imperial Rome, and of rapa- 
 cious desire to all the medieval tyrants of northeastern 
 Italy, from the bloody Ezzelino downward. In general 
 it shared the successive fortunes of its neighbor, 
 Vicenza. After suffering much from the cruelties of 
 Ezzelino, — who was Bassano's hereditary lord, and 
 had constructed over the town one of his heavy for- 
 tresses, where he and his brother Alberico often re- 
 sided, — the city followed Vicenza into the clutches 
 of the Delia Carrara, and, after their defeat by Can 
 Grande, into the possession of the Scaligers; with the 
 fall of the latter it became the prey of the Visconti, 
 was one of the many towns included in the duchy 
 with which the Emperor Wenceslaus in 1395 invested 
 Gian Galeazzo, and was left by the latter to his son 
 Filippo Maria. With Vicenza, finally, when Filippo's 
 mother made that ominous call for aid, Bassano and 
 all this region found happier days in the iron grasp 
 of Venice. As the Republic neared its end, nearly 
 four centuries later, under the victorious advance of 
 Napoleon against the Austrians, Bassano was the 
 scene of that battle which proved the doom of her 
 suzerain. Wormser, with his second great Austrian 
 army, defeated and driven up the Adige, had re- 
 turned into Italy by the Val Sugana, followed all the 
 way by the untiring French; just as he had finally 
 regained the open country at Bassano, Napoleon over- 
 
140 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 took and forced 4iim to give battle; and the citizens, 
 watching the terrible conflict from their walls, saw the 
 French power emerge supreme over the shattered and 
 dispersed Austrians. The fall of the ancient Republic 
 became then only a matter of months. 
 
 The little city also took her peculiar and secure posi- 
 tion in the history of art, by giving birth in the heyday 
 of the Renaissance to the several generations of the 
 family of Da Ponte. The first of these famous painters 
 — usually called after their town instead of by their 
 family name — was Francesco, the elder, who labored 
 at the close of the quattrocento, and in the earlier, more 
 confined, pietistic manner, with a grace and pictur- 
 esqueness all his own. His son Jacopo was the greatest 
 of them all, bringing to full development their charac- 
 teristic dark tone and hazy, shadowy, luminous atmo- 
 sphere. He was followed by his three sons, Leandro, 
 Francesco the younger, and Girolamo, of whom the 
 first-named best sustained the tradition, some of his 
 numerous works being truly of wonderful merit. But 
 so distinctive is the method of them all, that they are 
 the one family of artists whose pictures can be de- 
 tected at a glance by the veriest tyro. Many and 
 scattered as are their works, and capable of being well 
 studied at Venice, still their native city is the one place 
 where they can be fully understood and appreciated; 
 for there are far more of them here than in any other 
 town, and they have been gathered side by side in one 
 large hall of the Museo. 
 
 The train that conveyed me from Vicenza was made 
 up of a half-dozen very old and worn-out little coaches, 
 of four to five compartments each, upholstered with 
 very soiled and frayed cloth on very hard seats; and 
 they swayed and rocked like a ship in a gale, to the 
 jerks of a puffy little engine fit for the scrap-heap, at 
 
BASSANO 141 
 
 degrees of inclination suflBcient to alarm an unhabitu- 
 ated foreigner. As we rolled slowly through the end- 
 less fields of corn and by the everpresent habitations, 
 always overlooked by distant campanili, the Alps 
 accompanied us on the north, their noble line of snow- 
 clad peaks soaring above the nearer summits black 
 with forests. At the station of Cittadella I had to 
 change to another branch line, running from Padua to 
 Bassano; the little town itself, famous for its perfect 
 medieval walls, was hidden at some distance by the 
 abundant trees. 
 
 The second train was very like the first in composi- 
 tion and action; and it was slowly indeed that we 
 climbed the northward slope to the mountains. I still 
 sat upon the left, and as my eyes roamed over the dis- 
 tant villages to the west, my thoughts once more re- 
 verted to the monstrous Ezzelino; for it was here, in 
 this happy-looking country between Vicenza and Bas- 
 sano, at a place called Priola, that he perpetrated the 
 most celebrated of all his infamies, and perhaps the 
 most inhuman outrage of any that this world has suf- 
 fered. The villagers, well knowing what to expect in 
 any event, had offered what resistance they could to 
 the tyrant's troops; and when their castle fell, Ezze- 
 lino took every man, woman, and child alive in the 
 place, regardless of age or condition (some accounts 
 say two thousand in number), destroyed their eyes, 
 cut off their noses and legs, and cast them into the 
 fields to die of weakness and want. No wonder the 
 Pope declared a crusade against him as an infidel and 
 a scourge to mankind. 
 
 The approaching Alps had steadily loomed higher 
 and higher, until the greater peaks disappeared be- 
 hind the foothills, now close at hand, and the level 
 slope changed into long rounded swells. Bassano came 
 
142 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 in sight to the left, behind her medieval walls, and we 
 stopped at a station some way to the south of them. I 
 stepped into one of the two little rickety albergo omni- 
 buses in waiting, and was jolted heavily over the cob- 
 blestones, through a picturesque old city gate with 
 high Gothic arch, down a narrow street that led north- 
 ward to the centre of the town. There I found three 
 piazzas, running east and west, connected by short 
 passages; the middle one much larger than the others, 
 and fronted by the principal church and caffes. The 
 inn proved to be just off the western piazza, — an old, 
 irregular building behind a little court, with a littered 
 stableyard on one side; the ground floor occupied by the 
 kitchen and dining-rooms, the bedrooms hidden about 
 dark winding passages above. The house was full of 
 guests from neighboring towns, who made the cor- 
 ridors reecho with their continuous shouting, — the 
 peasants' customary tone of conversation; and I 
 learned that a bicycle-meet was to occur here on the 
 morrow, the participants riding in battalions from 
 their respective villages. After a dinner in company 
 with various gentlemen who ate with their hats on 
 (according to the peasant's manner), consumed 
 alarming quantities of meat and macaroni with the 
 sole aid of their knives, and roared continuously at 
 each other with deafening bellows, I solaced my 
 nerves with' some caffe nero at a sidewalk table in 
 the main piazza; and then found a cinematograph 
 exhibition, which gave a performance of five numbers 
 for the modest sum of thirty centesimi, in the first 
 class. 
 
 Moving pictures are now the one great amusement 
 of the Italians. There is hardly a town so small as 
 not to possess at least one such show; and the prices 
 are usually twenty centesimi for the second class, 
 
BASSANO 143 
 
 thirty or forty for the first.' Here the national love 
 of tragedy is prominently manifested; the popular 
 piece must have plenty of blood-letting, and above 
 all a harrowing ^nis, that leaves most of the charac- 
 ters upon the groimd. Especially successful this even- 
 ing was the story of Parasina; when it ended with the 
 death of herself and Ugo upon the block, a united sigh 
 of satisfaction arose from the excited populace. The 
 concluding number, as always, was supposed to be 
 very funny — " comicissima," — and consisted of the 
 usual chase of one person by many others, at whose 
 clearly intentional tumbles the audience roared with 
 delight. 
 
 I had an unsuccessful night, disturbed until 4 or 5 
 A.M. by a tremendous carousal in the eating-rooms 
 below, constantly increased by new arrivals, — shouts 
 and songs alternating with speeches, that invariably 
 wound up with the modern Italian imitation of the 
 Anglo-Saxon cheer, — a languid "Eep! — Eep! — 
 Urrah!" — that sounded as if it pained the deliver- 
 ers; and it was therefore rather late in the morning 
 when I again returned to the main piazza, to find that 
 it had been decorated during the night by a dozen red 
 masts bearing bright streamers and festoons ; while all 
 around the walls were pasted placards, announcing in 
 large letters the various prizes that were to be con- 
 ferred, — upon the best-decorated bicycle, the most 
 fanciful characterization, the most comical rider, and 
 so forth. It is curious to notice how in rural Italy the 
 modern fads, customs, and fashions follow faithfully 
 
 ' In the cities there is often also a third class, costing ten centesimi; at 
 which rate children and private soldiers are neariy everywhere admitted, 
 — the latter proving the mainstay of the business in garrison-towns. As 
 a teacher for them of general information, it is invaluable; and one sees 
 them, night after night, drinking in with open mouths the wonders of this 
 world. 
 
144 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 those of the northern nations from five to ten years 
 behind; and so the bicycle frenzy is now at the height 
 which it attained with us a decade ago. 
 
 There is nothing monumental about this old market- 
 place, nor suggestive of the town's historic past, ex- 
 cept the lofty, medieval, brick tower rising above the 
 house-tops at the northeast corner, and the town 
 clock-tower, on the north side, which has an open 
 loggia in its first floor, supported on Romanesque col- 
 umns, and a Gothic balustrade across its top, where 
 the town bell swings in the open. The buildings, 
 arcaded upon the east, west, and north sides, have 
 very plain, stuccoed, modern-looking f agades. All traces 
 of the frescoes that once adorned them have dis- 
 appeared. The south side is dominated by the huge 
 Church of S. Giovanni Battista, with a Late-Renais- 
 sance fagade, its central pediment upheld by four 
 great Corinthian half-columns, — too baroque in the 
 whole effect to be imposing. Nothing exhibited the 
 decrepitude of age, except the Gothic belfry-arches 
 and battlements of the brick tower, — only remnant 
 of the former palace of the Venetian podestas, — and 
 a lonely crumbling statue of some mitred saint, on a 
 rococo column at the western end. 
 
 I entered the church, which proved to be of curious 
 shape, its spacious nave running parallel with the 
 fagade, the recess of its choir opening in the middle of 
 the farther side; but on an altar to left of the choir 
 stood a very beautiful painting by Girolamo da Ponte, 
 representing St. Filomena, — a dainty white figure 
 full of exquisite softness, grace, and expressive loveli- 
 ness, elegantly modeled and posed, with two other 
 saints at her sides, and a Madonna and Child of unus- 
 ual beauty overhead. It was a revelation to me of the 
 full powers of that artist. To the right of the choir 
 
BASSANO 145 
 
 was an excellent canvas of his father, Jacopo, — S. 
 Antonio di Padova between two angels, with a cherub 
 below and others above; opposite it on the entrance 
 wall was his St. Paul preaching in the Roman Forum; 
 both were finely conceived and drawn, in his usual, 
 soft, dark tone and atmosphere. In the sacristy I 
 found an extraordinary thing: a lifesize terra-cotta 
 group behind glass, representing St. John baptizing 
 Jesus, attended by David and another prophet and 
 five angels, — clearly a Tuscan work of the beginning 
 of the cinquecento, and alleged by the parroco to be a 
 labor of the rare Giovanni Minelli de' Bardi. The 
 once rich coloring still lingers on the well-composed, 
 expressive figures, which, — with the exception of the 
 fine Christ and one or two of the angels — are not 
 graceful, though dignified and full of feeling. 
 
 When I came out, the piazza was more closely 
 thronged than before, and companies of cyclists were 
 already arriving by the long, straight way from the 
 southern gate, topped by its open loggia, — exciting 
 cheers of enthusiasm by their patchwork costumes, 
 flags, and loads of flowers, more or less covered by the 
 dust of the roads. What especially struck me was 
 the number of accompanying children, likewise fanci- 
 fully arrayed in upholstery and tassels, manfully 
 working their little legs on diminutive machines, and 
 clearly exhausted, — some of them not over four or 
 five years of age. Not having further time to lose, I 
 made my way with difficulty back to the lower piazza, 
 from whose foot a narrow descending street led me 
 westward to the river Brenta, and the picturesque old 
 wooden bridge across its rapid waters. 
 
 Here was all the interest for which I had looked in 
 vain in the city's centre; it was a delightful picture, — 
 the mountains soaring close on the north with vast 
 
146 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 precipitous flanks, green or darkly wooded, the wide 
 stream emerging from its gorge and bounding, splash- 
 ing along over beds of shining pebbles, and the line of 
 diversified crumbling houses on the farther bank, lean- 
 ing over the ripples with moss-grown walls, decayed 
 wooden balconies, broken red-tiled roofs, and little 
 courts shady with foliage; while over their roofs rose 
 the spires of poplars and cypresses from adjacent 
 gardens. It was quite a suburb of Bassano, on the 
 farther shore. That side was level ground, stretching 
 for some distance to the Alpine wall on the west, lux- 
 uriantly dotted with groves of trees, shining villas, 
 and clusters of dark cypresses; while to the south it 
 merged into the boundless plain, covered by an opales- 
 cent haze of heat.^ 
 
 Not the least of the picture was the curious bridge 
 that strode over the bluish-gray water on piers of oaken 
 beams, wooden also in its parapets, and the gabled 
 roof with its numerous supporting pillars. The former 
 stone bridge was destroyed by the French on that 
 memorable occasion of 1796. Across the worn plank- 
 ing was coming a steady procession of peasantry, afoot, 
 on mule-back, and in little two-wheeled vehicles, — 
 packed like sardines, six in a box, seated upon the 
 floor with legs dangling over; all doubtless eager to 
 behold the wonders of the bicycle-meet. Advancing 
 upon the bridge I gazed delightedly, amidst the hub- 
 bub, at the brightly colored groups of women washing 
 
 • So charming is this landscape that it quite carried away the imagina- 
 tion of Mr. William Beckford, when he descended through the Sugana 
 Pass. " It was now I beheld,' ' he wrote, " groves of olives, and vines cluster- 
 ing the summits of the tallest elms; pomegranates in every garden, and 
 vases of citron and orange before almost every door. — I felt sensations of 
 joy and novelty run through my veins, on beholding this smiling land of 
 groves and verdure." — W. Rockford, Italy, with Sketches of Spain and 
 Portugal. 
 
BASSAXO. THE KIVER liREXTA WITH THE W( lODEX BKinGE. 
 
 BASSANO. PIAZZA VITTOIIK) EMAXT'ELE 
 
BASSANO 147 
 
 on the bank below, at the foaming rapids, the strips 
 of gleaming sand, and the mill-wheels turning lazily; 
 then I caught the scene's completing note, — two 
 grim, dark, medieval towers soaring against the sky, 
 upon the top of the rising ground to the northeast, 
 casting over the landscape the spell of the dread past 
 of battle-axe and dungeon. For they rose from the 
 old fortress of Ezzelino, that has echoed with such 
 countless cries of suflfering and sorrow. 
 
 I decided to make my way to the castle, and on re- 
 turning to the little piazza at the bridge's end came 
 immediately .upon another interesting relic, — a tall, 
 aged, stuccoed house standing upon the elevated north- 
 ern side of the area, part- way up the hill; clearly a 
 medieval structure, that once was covered with rich 
 frescoes. From this location came the surname of 
 Bassano's family of painters, — for it was the resid- 
 ence of the "Da Ponte." There they all lived, from 
 generation to generation, four hundred years ago, that 
 here seemed but as yesterday. An old dame, who had 
 paused by my side, assured me that there were no per- 
 sonal relics of the family remaining within; so I pressed 
 on up the slope, until I finally reached, by a round- 
 about course, another open space far above the stream 
 and not far from the precincts of the fortress. 
 
 Here the view over the flat country to the west was 
 more extensive and lovelier; it presented the aspect of 
 a luxuriant park, massed with rich copses, glistening 
 with villas ensconced in dales and perched on verdant 
 knolls, with rows of poplars lining hidden roads and 
 cypresses gathering their dark points around ancient 
 monasteries. In one spot they outlined the square of 
 a large camposanto, the burial-ground of Bassano, 
 whose white stones gleamed through the shadowy 
 groves. But the closely hemming mountains were the 
 
148 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 majesty of the scene, soaring behind from steep foot- 
 hills to massive peaks; and far to the southwest ap- 
 peared the Monti Berici, across the intervening vale 
 that held the towers of Vicenza. 
 
 Turning my back at last upon this enchanting land- 
 scape, I proceeded toward the castle of Ezzelino, and 
 came quickly to the fortress-wall, fronting the street. 
 It was of typical medieval construction, and well pre- 
 served, as was also the high-arched gateway. Within, 
 however, to my surprise, I found nothing older than 
 some plastered dwellings and a large stuccoed church, 
 which was the Duomo; but no better use could have 
 been made of the stones which the despot used for 
 cruelties. Only the outer shell remains from his con- 
 structions, and the taller of the two towers, whose 
 grimness is modified by the bushes spreading over its 
 broken summit; the other, plastered and adorned with 
 a belfry, serves as the campanile of the church. 
 
 I was glad to step out of the intense heat of the sun 
 into the latter's cool interior. It consisted of a nave 
 without aisles, and a choir-recess at the end. To the 
 right and upon the end wall were three mediocre 
 paintings, alleged by the sacristan to be products of 
 Leandro da Ponte; one of them was amusing, a battle 
 of St. George and the Dragon, in which the beast was a 
 fiend of partly human shape, spitting fire, clawing the 
 poor saint, and painfully hooking him with a barbed 
 tail like a boat-hook. On an altar near this, to the 
 right of the choir, was a kneeling marble figure of St. 
 Catherine, with a head by Guarinai; and its face was 
 of most emotional, gentle, pathetic beauty. On the 
 left wall was a copy of Leandro Bassano's Circum- 
 cision. 
 
 Leaving this rather unsatisfactory cathedral, I 
 stopped just outside the fortress-gate to admire a 
 
BASSANO 149 
 
 painted Renaissance mansion on the east, known as 
 the house of Lazzaro Buonamici; I could see that the 
 critics were right in considering it a splendid specimen 
 of the arabesque style of decoration, for the wall- 
 spaces were covered with curious patterns, of grace 
 and vivid coloring. I took the street leading straight 
 away southward from the castle, parallel with the 
 river, and soon stopped again, before a high battle- 
 mented wall constructed of that strange medley of 
 cobblestones and broken bricks which characterizes 
 medieval masonry. Set in this wall, in utter contrast, 
 was a handsome, marble. Renaissance gateway; set 
 upon it, some way from the gate, was a bust of King 
 Humbert, covered with faded wreaths; and set within 
 it was the courtyard of a ruinous old palace, adorned 
 with a picturesque, roofed, outside staircase. 
 
 It was, as I learned, the so-called Palazzo Pretorio. 
 I looked for a while at the arched gateway, with its 
 unusual decoration of diamond reliefs all over the 
 frame; then my interest was diverted to a house- 
 front across the way just beyond, holding fragments of 
 a large fresco which still clearly showed a fine group of 
 lifesize saints and warriors. The composition was 
 probably a Massacre of the Innocents, and its pink 
 and crimson prevailing hues were still bold enough to 
 reveal its original wealth of gorgeous coloring. It 
 lifted for an instant, like a lightning flash, the veil 
 from those cinquecento days when Bassano, with all 
 her sister-cities, was embellished from end to end with 
 such vivid paintings, and her every street blazed like a 
 hothouse of tropic orchids, — radiant in hue as towns 
 of man never have been since. 
 
 The street ended in the upper of the central piazzas, 
 close by the old, Gothic, brick tower which I had 
 noticed before, and which is said to be the solitary 
 
150 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 remnant of the palace of the Venetian podestas. On 
 the south a brick church fully as ancient turned its 
 side to the piazza, decorated with a Romanesque brick 
 cornice around its eaves; and adjacent to this I found 
 a large Romanesque cloister, with a curious round 
 tower from some bygone building in its corner. From 
 the eastern end of this piazza another street runs 
 southward, and in this, shortly to the right, stands the 
 city's Museo Civico with its various collections. 
 
 It was after lunch when I repaired to the Museum, 
 forcing my way with difficulty through the crowds, 
 which, denser than ever, were watching the judging of 
 the different bicycle contests in the market-place. 
 Upon entering, I was shown at once to the first floor of 
 the large building, into a central rotunda from which 
 branched at right angles three fair-sized halls. That to 
 the left was filled with plaster casts from the sculp- 
 tures of Canova, and two or three of his original mo- 
 dels (Canova was born near Bassano, at the little 
 village of Possagno,^ and lies buried there in a church 
 which he built) ; that to the right held the municipal 
 collection of general paintings; and that to the rear 
 contained the remarkable aggregation of the works of 
 the Da Ponte. I lost no time in investigating the 
 latter, which proved to be excellently arranged in 
 chronological order. 
 
 First there were two or three canvases by Francesco 
 the elder, rather stiff in their figures but quaint and 
 
 ' Possaguo is worth a visit by those having the time, if only for the sake 
 of the pleasing drive. It lies about ten miles northeast of Bassano, at the 
 foot of the imposing precipices of Monte Gruppa; and the good highway 
 thither leads via the village of Romano, immortalized as the birthplace of 
 Ezzelino and his tribe. The residence of Canova may be seen at Possagno. 
 The church which he built is a small imitation of the Pantheon at Rome ; it 
 contains his tomb, an altar-piece painted by him, one of his sculptures (a 
 splendid bronze relief of the Entombment), and a fine canvas by Porde- 
 none, called his Madonna della Misericordia. 
 
BASSANO 151 
 
 pleasing, — especially the large Madonna with Saints 
 Peter and Paul, before an engaging landscape of blue 
 lake and bluer mountains. Then came the works of 
 Jacopo; perhaps the finest of these was the Baptism of 
 Lucille by S. Valentino, — an effective composition, 
 strongly lighted; but there was the usual anachronism 
 of Venetian sixteenth-century dress, and even the 
 kneeling devout Lucille was garbed in a shimmering 
 white satin gown with a rope of pearls. It was wonder- 
 fully moulded as to the figures, with much realism of 
 action and atmosphere; many consider it Jacopo's 
 masterpiece. Others of his pictures here, however, were 
 nearly as good, — the Nativity, the Circumcision, and 
 S. Martino, especially, — all excellently composed 
 and vigorously drawn, with powerful light-effects. 
 The S. Martino lingers with me as a most knightly 
 form, on horseback, in full armor but for the head, 
 giving his. cloak to a beggar whose wretchedness and 
 rags form a striking contrast; the horse is splendidly 
 modelled, the knight's face full of beneficent feeling. 
 Finally came the works of the third generation; fore- 
 most of which was Leandro's large canvas represent- 
 ing the Podestd of Bassano, Lorenzo Capello, with his 
 two small sons and their tutor, making obeisance to 
 the Madonna and Saints Clement and Bassiano 
 (dated 1597) — a-magnificent group of graceful figures, 
 finely spaced and disposed, of excellent tactile value, 
 in the sun-filtered, heavy atmosphere of a hazy sum- 
 mer afternoon; the shades of coloring, too, were lovely, 
 concentrating in the central rich carmine of the cloak 
 of the podestd. 
 
 To fill up the final wall-spaces of this hall there were 
 a number of modern paintings, including five beautiful 
 landscapes, of splendid air- and golden light-effects, 
 and three of Roberto Roberti's (1837) charming Ve- 
 
152 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 netian scenes. The third hall, to right of the rotunda, 
 contained a surprising quantity of works of many 
 other schools and epochs, and several that were quite 
 pleasing. Among these was a Madonna with the 
 Child and infant St. Catherine, ascribed to Giovanni 
 Bellini, — but, although of considerable worth, the 
 features were too poor for that master; also a Ma- 
 donna with the child John the Baptist and another 
 saint, by Bonifazio Pitati, very rich in tone, grace and 
 modeling; a Christ with Mary Magdalen, in a wonder- 
 ful evening landscape fringed by golden sky, athwart 
 which rise the black spires of cypresses, — by an 
 unknown author, exquisite in moulding and expres- 
 sion; and one of Bonifazio's Last Suppers, well com- 
 posed and realistically drawn. There was further a 
 very Giottesque Crucifixion, in tempera on wood, one 
 of the few remaining panels of Guariento, of Padua. 
 The whole gallery is but one more instance of the in- 
 exhaustible wealth in artistic treasures of the count- 
 less little cities of Italy. 
 
 In the outskirts of Bassano I found a delightful 
 example of the statuesque villas of the Late-Renais- 
 sance, the Ca' Rezzonico, constructed in the eight- 
 eenth century for the great Venetian family of that 
 name, who for generations held their villeggiatura 
 here, in much pomp. It is of course a stuccoed build- 
 ing, according to the style of that epoch, but of at- 
 tractive lines and proportions, with square towers at 
 the corners; it has a noble stone portal of baroque 
 design, surmounted by a head of Jupiter, and ap- 
 proached by wide-spreading steps. To right and left 
 of these steps run heavy stone parapets adorned with 
 vases, busts, and classic statues, while other sculp- 
 tures, shrubs, and flower-beds ornament the front 
 lawn to its massive balustrade upon the road. From 
 
BASSANO 153 
 
 the centre of each side of the villa, high walls, screening 
 the grounds in the rear with customary privacy, 
 stretch at right angles to columned pavilions, and are 
 pierced halfway by classic archways, through which 
 one sees mythological divinities posed in gleaming 
 marble against the green of luxuriant foliage. 
 
 The interior is still more splendid: a spacious, 
 beautiful atrium greets the entering visitor's eye, two 
 stories in height and balustraded around the upper 
 gallery; all is light in hue, of glistening carved marble 
 or delicately moulded stucco, with a surprising absence 
 of decadent effects; the grand marble stairway rises at 
 one side, approached through an imposing portico, 
 and over this, and the various arched doorways, are 
 posed harmonious groups of sculptured figures.^ So 
 perfectly has it all preserved the atmosphere of that 
 courtly, splendor-loving period, that, as one gazes, 
 he half-unconsciously expects to see entering a silk- 
 clad noble in periwig and rapier. 
 
 Within the city I discovered but one more item of 
 special interest, the Church of Madonna delle Grazie, 
 which is remarkable for its corner altar, — canopied, 
 sculptured symmetrically in both stone and wood, and 
 holding a strange ancient Madonna in an exquisite 
 Renaissance frame. Without the city, but easily 
 reached by carriage over the fine roads in sixty to 
 ninety minutes, there remained of interest the little 
 towns of Marostica and Asolo, both situated amongst 
 the first foothills of the Alps, — the former about five 
 miles to the west, the latter about ten miles to the east. 
 But as they are not plain-towns, I will sum them up 
 
 * Amongst the artistic treasures here is preserved a bas-relief by 
 Canova, representing the Death of Socrates. — The Villa Parolini I 
 found to be another mansion of the environs worth visiting, for the sake 
 of its enchanting park; and the Church of SS. Trinity, at least until 
 recently, contained an excellent Crucifixion by Jacopo da Ponte. 
 
154 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by saying that Marostica contains quaint arcaded 
 streets, a piazza with Venetian columns, mouldering 
 Renaissance palaces, medieval town-walls with pict- 
 uresque gateways and crumbling towers, a striking 
 old ruined fortress, called the Rocca, and a number 
 of fine villas with very pleasing grounds; while Asolo 
 is famed as the place to which the widowed Queen 
 Caterina Cornaro retired, after handing over Cyprus 
 to the Republic, and where she lived long in much 
 well-doing, the centre of a highly cultured circle, — 
 including Cardinal Pietro Bembo, who there com- 
 posed his "Asolanum";^ it contains the villa which 
 the ex-queen and her court occupied, as well as several 
 others, and holds in its church a beautiful early work 
 of Lorenzo Lotto, — a Madonna with two saints, of 
 his usual superb coloring. Browning loved Asolo, — 
 and dwelt there long; it inspired his "Pippa Passes," 
 and "Asolando."^ 
 
 A fascinating trip by rail from Bassano is up the 
 new road through the tremendous defile of the Val 
 Sugana, to the lovely Lake of Caldonazzo and the 
 charming old city of Trento; whence it is but a step 
 northward to Bozen and the Tyrol,^ or a step south- 
 
 ' This celebrated work of that great connoisseur, who has been well 
 called "the dictator of letters of his period," and whom Cellini depicted 
 so cleverly in his Autobiography, was written before he had become an 
 intimate of the glorious Gonzaga court of Isabella d' Este at Mantua; 
 and its contents, as Mrs. Oliphant has put it, were "about the fantastic 
 little court of Queen Catherine Cornaro at Asolo, a small Decameron, full 
 of the unreal prettiness, the masques, the posturing, and versifications of 
 the time." He lies buried in S. Antonio at Padua (q. v.), where he also 
 dwelt many years. 
 
 ^ To foreigners distressed by the midsummer heat of Venetia, there is 
 no course so enjoyable and so inexpensive as to journey direct to Bozen by 
 this new road (7 hours, 18 lire in the second class). There the hot yreeka 
 may be passed delightfully at the 4000 feet elevation of Klobenstein, on the 
 adjacent Ritten, reached easily by funicolare, — where these words are 
 being penned; or one may seek any other of the scores of cool Tyrolese vil- 
 lages on the neighboring heights. 
 
CITTADELLA 155 
 
 ward to Verona. This same new line has been con- 
 ducted from Bassano straight across the plain to 
 Venice, passing Castelfranco midway; forming thus 
 the shortest route between Venice and the north. On 
 leaving Bassano for Cittadella, however, I had to 
 descend by the same branch road that had brought 
 me up. We rattled and swayed down the imper- 
 ceptible slope, leaving the Alps ever farther and 
 smaller behind us, and were at Cittadella Station in a 
 surprisingly short time; — so powerful is the aid of 
 gravity to a distressed and aged Italian locomotive. 
 
 It was, as usual in the Italian summer-time, a won- 
 drous clear day, with floods of golden light from a 
 cloudless sky; and nature seemed very lovely in spite 
 of the heat, as I walked toward the town between 
 umbrageous trees and fertile fields glowing with flow- 
 ers. To the right of the road soon appeared a little 
 stream of sleeping water, sunk between sloping banks, 
 dotted with water-plants and shaded by overhanging 
 boughs; then through the dense foliage I discerned the 
 farther bank mounting to a height of some twenty to 
 thirty feet above the level, and carrying upon its 
 summit an ancient, massive city wall, curving far to 
 left and right, crowned by decaying battlements which 
 reflected themselves peacefully in the silent fosse. In 
 their interstices, and upon the tops of the huge square 
 towers at intervals, shrubs and bushes flourished, and 
 part-way up the crumbling face of the brick curtain 
 crept the tendrils and leaves of ivy. 
 
 It was the wall of Cittadella, famous to-day for its 
 exceptional preservation. Seven centuries ago it was 
 built, long before Ezzelino and his brother tyrants; the 
 Paduans did it, to erect this little town into a fortress 
 against the Trevisans, who on their side had made it 
 necessary by fortifying Castelfranco. What greater 
 
156 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 contrast with those turbulent, fratricidal days could 
 there be, than this serene and lovely spot, bathed in a 
 silence emphasized by the hum of noonday insects. I 
 rested awhile upon the grassy bank, under the curving 
 branches that dipped the still water; and it was diffi- 
 cult indeed to realize that over that very wall before 
 me men had fought and bled — had poured down 
 stone and iron and boiling oil upon their brothers 
 climbing from below — had piled up the slain until 
 they choked and crimsoned this peaceful stream. And 
 all for what cause? Only because they, children of the 
 same race and the same speech, chanced to live some 
 in one town and some in another. 
 
 These fortifications did not avail to save Cittadella 
 from incurring the successive despotisms of her neigh- 
 bors. With them she passed from Delia Carrara to 
 Delia Scala, to Visconti, to the Serene Republic; but 
 so little has she been that she has earned no part nor 
 mention in that troublous history; — and the same 
 obscurity operated to preserve her walls, bringing 
 them strangely to the front to-day as an admirable 
 specimen of a medieval fortress. 
 
 Resuming my walk, I came shortly beyond to the 
 southern and principal gateway of the town, the Porta 
 Padovana, jutting considerably forward from the wall 
 beside a guard-tower of extra size, and approached by 
 a brick bridge of later construction. On its decaying 
 stuccoed fagade, between the long narrow apertures 
 where once emerged the supporting beams of the 
 drawbridge, still stood the marble Venetian lion; over 
 this was a modern clock-face, and above that again 
 the ancient alarm-bell, hanging under a Renaissance 
 canopy with four columns. To the right of the gate a 
 modern plastered house had found a foothold between 
 the moat and the wall, and upon the bridge lounged a 
 
CITTADELLA 157 
 
 dozen idlers in very modern dress; but to the left the 
 long battlements extended as of old, presenting a 
 charming picture through the ash trees, cypresses, and 
 drooping willows that lined the stream. 
 
 The tunnel-like entrance arch admitted me to three, 
 separate, square ante-ports, one behind another, 
 hemmed by lofty crenellated walls, and connected by 
 similar dark archways; certainly, I thought, it would 
 not be an easy matter to take such a gate by assault. 
 When I emerged again into the sunshine, the main 
 street, Borgo Vicenza, extended straightaway before 
 me to the north, of most unusual width, lined by three- 
 storied, modern-looking buildings. The plan of the 
 Uttle city I found to be very simple, and pleasing: four 
 gates in all pierce the circular enceinture, at each of 
 the cardinal points of the compass, named after the 
 neighboring city on each side; two thoroughfares con- 
 nect these entrances, crossing the town in straight 
 lines and intersecting at its centre; and at this centre 
 lies the piazza, or market-place, with the parish 
 church. Looking up the Borgo Vicenza, I could see 
 the Porta Bassano at its other end, and that at such a 
 comparatively short distance that no one would think 
 there could be ten thousand inhabitants in the place. 
 The broad street was arcaded on each side, affording 
 me a grateful relief from the down-beating sun as I 
 passed one little shop after another, and nearly as 
 many dark caffes; the last were all crowded to over- 
 flowing, — for it was a festa. 
 
 I stepped into one of these narrow drinking-places 
 — the villager's sole club and recreation — - and found 
 that it opened behind into a pleasant arbor shaded by 
 luxuriant vines, where a dozen peasants were gossiping 
 and singing over bottles of wine on plain board tables. 
 I took a glass of beer, which proved to be quite fair, 
 
158 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and listened for a minute to the conversation; they 
 were discussing socialism and its theories, — if not 
 with a broad grasp, at least with strong feeling and 
 partisanship. Nothing is more significant of the future 
 than the constantly increasing spread of those doc- 
 trines amongst the lower classes; the Mayor of Rome 
 to-day is a socialist; and his party seems to be steadily 
 advancing from municipal to governmental control. 
 
 The central piazza proved to be of considerable size, 
 with the Municipio overlooking it on the west from a 
 columned Palladian fagade, — a comparatively mod- 
 ern structure, — and the church rising on the north 
 side. The latter was a large brick edifice, faced by six 
 huge half-columns, also of brick, but possessing white, 
 Corinthian, plaster caps; the Corinthian cornices of 
 the pediment were likewise of stucco, and the base- 
 ment of white limestone. Next it I observed a dwell- 
 ing bearing remains of a large, early, figured fresco, 
 with traces still lingering of its once florid coloring. 
 Here crossed the east and west thoroughfare, its vistas 
 framed by similar modest dwellings and ending in the 
 lofty arches of the other two city gates, — Porta 
 Treviso and Porta Vicenza. 
 
 Shortly to eastward on this Via Venti Settembre 
 stood the Prefettura, its fagade showing fragments of 
 extensive painting, and adorned with a red marble 
 Renaissance doorway, over which was the old Vene- 
 tian lion, of the usual polished white marble. Evid- 
 ently there had been little outward change here since 
 the days of the Republic's podestas. TheTrevisan gate 
 at the east end bore also, over its heavy archway, the 
 remains of a large mural painting. The Porta Bassano 
 at the north was the most heavily fortified entrance of 
 the four; here there were four separate fortified ports, 
 a number which I have very seldom seen elsewhere, 
 
,--,-, i- 
 
CITTADELLA 159 
 
 that I remember, — two inside the wall, one within its 
 thickness, and one outside. All over them, and upon 
 the wall proper, which here was as lofty in places as 
 seventy-five feet above the moat, were battlements of 
 unusual length, — those upon the foremost ante-port 
 being Ghibelline, or forked. The fosse, here also, had 
 lost all its warlike aspect under the peaceful shade of 
 cypresses and drooping willows; and its rounding inner 
 bank, mounting high to the brickwork, was prettily 
 covered with shrubs and shade-trees. 
 
 Returning to the church, I found the morning con- 
 gregation just streaming out, and entered past them 
 into the spacious nave. There were no aisles; and upon 
 the side altars, to my surprise, stood a number of inter- 
 esting canvases. The first on the left held a work of 
 Leandro Bassano, an azure Madonna in clouds, above 
 S. Francesco and other saints, including a bishop of 
 marvelously embroidered robe; — a strongly painted 
 picture, of fine tone and grace and modeling. Next it 
 was a remarkable Crucifixion from the same hand, 
 representing the Father as bending from heaven to 
 embrace the dying Son upon the Cross, with the Ma- 
 donna and various other saints grouped below, and — 
 curiously enough — Christ again represented as the 
 Child in his mother's arms; this was also a strong work, 
 clearly and vigorously drawn and moulded, in an 
 exquisite deep rich tone, with hazy atmosphere, and 
 softest coloring in broad masses. There were, further, 
 a good Pieta of the school of Mantegna, clearly show- 
 ing that master's style, and in the sacristy, a most 
 realistic Supper in Emmseus by Francesco Bassano the 
 yoimger. So once more was it demonstrated that in 
 wonderful Italy no village is too small to have its 
 masterpieces. 
 
 As I wended my way back to the station, I passed. 
 
160 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 outside the southern gateway, on the left, a building 
 that was an enlightening example of the way in which 
 these small towns are still erecting fine edifices; it was 
 a newly finished mansion of three or four stories, of 
 remarkably pure and beautiful Renaissance lines, — a 
 delight to the eye. Twenty minutes later I had caught 
 my train, and was speeding (?) to Castelfranco. We 
 went a little north of east, through the same ever fer- 
 tile landscape, varied only by the lofty ridge of the Alps 
 keeping us company on the left; and in half an hour or 
 less I had descended at my destination. This was not, 
 I will own, without considerable misgivings; for the 
 sun was already well toward the horizon, and the 
 necessity stared me in the face of spending the night in 
 this out-of-the-way place. But I plucked up my cour- 
 age with the reflection, that in Italy a bed is always 
 comfortable, and followed a porter with my bag on his 
 shoulder to the first-named hostelry in the guidebook. 
 Ten minutes northward walking brought us into the 
 town, and five more to its central piazza. Then there 
 loomed suddenly before me a castle of such size as I 
 had never seen before, — its vast, battlemented, brick 
 wall sweeping on northward from tower unto tower 
 for full half a mile, apparently, topped in the centre by 
 a keep of huge proportions, while to the westward ran 
 another side of equal length; both walls rose upon an 
 artificial bank thirty to forty feet in height, at whose 
 foot flowed the ancient sluggish moat; and over their 
 battlements within soared other towers, and domes, 
 and roofs of buildings. It was a startling sight to 
 burst upon one's view so unexpectedly, impressive in 
 its grandeur, its sense of might, and intimacy with 
 medieval days. At each corner of the fortress — the 
 southeastern one where I stood, and those which I 
 could discern at the ends of the two sides — were 
 
CASTELFRANCO 161 
 
 square piles of enormous massiveness ; but those in the 
 middle of the lines were by far the loftiest, and evid- 
 ently guarded of old the entrances; that on the south- 
 ern wall had had a belfry added to its summit, and 
 beside it there loomed above the battlements the high 
 white apse and dome of a large church. 
 
 Thus I saw that this was not an individual castle, 
 but a town-fortress, containing streets and varied 
 buildings; — it was the original Castelfranco, which 
 the Trevisans erected as their fortified outpost against 
 the raiding Paduans in 1199, and also to act as a re- 
 straint upon the freebooting proclivities of the Cam- 
 posampiero family, who occupied a stronghold not far 
 away (now demolished). "The colony of Trevisans 
 who first settled here lived entirely outside the castle, 
 and pledged themselves to maintain 200 horse for the 
 defense of the frontier. In return for this service they 
 were exempt from certain taxes, and therefore called 
 their dwelling 'Free Castle.'" ^ They earned their ex- 
 emption, for there was an almost constant state of 
 warfare, brigandage, and harassing tactics against 
 Treviso's enemies on this side, until the territory was 
 acquired by Venice in 1329, — the first step of the 
 Republic upon the mainland. Under her sway Castel- 
 franco was seldom disturbed; the chief exception being 
 the advance of the Emperor Maximilian during the 
 War of Cambrai, when the fortress was saved from 
 destruction only by an obsequious surrender. 
 
 Prior to that, however, — during the later quattro- 
 cento, — the castle was occupied, with the consent 
 of the Venetian Government, by the powerful condot- 
 tiere Tuzio Costanzo, who had gained this recom- 
 pense by his services for the Republic, and kept it 
 while he lived. Now it remained but the centre of the 
 
 1 Horatio F. Brown, In and Around Venice. 
 
162 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 modern, enlarged town of twelve thousand inhabitants, 
 and the long open areas on its north and east sides 
 formed the people's market-place and piazza. Lines of 
 dwellings that looked fully as aged as the fortress 
 frowned at it across the sunlit spaces, rising upon 
 continuous arcades with decrepit, ancient pillars, shad- 
 owing diminutive shops that seemed to have slept for 
 centuries. In the northeast corner was the only life, 
 and there it was over-abundant; for the whole popu- 
 lation were evidently gathered there en masse, watch- 
 ing a small boy draw lottery numbers from a cage, in 
 alternations of breathless interest and surging howls. 
 
 Through this excited crowd my guide led the way 
 with considerable difficulty, and immediately ushered 
 me into a carriage entrance penetrating the buildings 
 upon the piazza's northern flank. On the right of this 
 passage, in the rear, was a worn, dirty, stone staircase, 
 and.on the left a typical Italian kitchen, with its large 
 brick hearth for the open fire, and rows of highly 
 burnished copper utensils decorating the smoky walls. 
 
 "Ecco!" cried the facchino, proudly waving his 
 hand, and setting down my bag, "un grande albergo!" 
 To judge by his tone the native fondly conceived 
 it an hotel of the premier order. — "Where is it?" I 
 asked, gazing blankly around, while my heart sank 
 with a leaden dismay. 
 
 "Here," he responded, again indicating the kitchen, 
 "and above," ^ pointing upward; "and this is where 
 one eats," — with a flourish of his hand around the 
 dirty passage and toward the stableyard behind. I 
 began to wish that I had never heard of Castelfranco. 
 Not a living soul was to be seen. I got rid of my 
 enthusiastic companion with half a lira, and after some 
 search unearthed from a closet a little wizened old 
 woman, who moved by jerks, with a terrible volubil- 
 
o 
 
 S5 
 
CASTELFRANCO 163 
 
 ity of which I could hardly catch a word, and whose 
 blazing little eyes held the light of a lunatic. I finally 
 understood that no room could be had at present, be- 
 cause all were occupied by the town gentry in viewing 
 the lottery-drawing; nothing whatever could be done 
 until that epoch-making event should be terminated. 
 After sitting around the kitchen for half an hour, how- 
 ever, the yelling outside subsided, the people gradu- 
 ally dispersed, and a landlady appeared to conduct 
 me to a chamber. It was a huge old room on the 
 first-floor front, with a lofty arched ceiling, sparsely 
 furnished with an iron bed and washstand, a decayed 
 wooden dresser, table, and single chair, — which were 
 lost in the shadows. The little old woman, who ap- 
 peared to have been permanently assigned to me, tot- 
 tered in and out from the adjacent hall, bringing towels 
 and water, and chattering without cessation, demand- 
 ing what I wanted to eat, where I came from, how 
 long I should stay, when I should retire and rise, and 
 a hundred other things, — until I shut and locked the 
 door upon her in despair. Then she would not allow 
 me to rest, — continually returning to bang upon the 
 door and scream more questions, and finally station- 
 ing herself to babble through the keyhole. The queer- 
 est part of all this was, that it was not the acting of a 
 complete lunatic, but simply the endeavors of a peas- 
 ant, who seldom sees a person of the upper class, to 
 render herself exceedingly helpful and agreeable; I 
 have often had encounters of this nature in remote 
 places, though never another so extreme. 
 ' To get away from her noise I withdrew to the fur- 
 ther window, thrusting my head out, leaning over the 
 sill, and found myself opposite the northeast corner of 
 the castle, with a splendid view down its north and ■ 
 east sides. The sun had set, and the upward-stealing 
 
164 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 shadows were emphasizing the massiveness of the 
 great walls and towers, rising from the still darker 
 masses of trees and shrubbery along the moat's high, 
 sloping, inner bank. The thought came, of the vast 
 labor that it must have taken to pile up such a bank 
 of earth, — thirty to forty feet in height, and a sixth 
 of a mile long on each side of the quadrangle, — seven 
 hundred years ago, when they had no implements but 
 picks and spades, no powder to blast with, nor steam 
 engines to drill or shovel. The chief tower, in the 
 centre of the east side, bore a large clock-face of later 
 days; and upon its summit an octagonal open lantern 
 lifted its columns and pointed cupola against the deep 
 blueness of the sky, with its stripes of fleecy gold. 
 
 Behind that very keep, within those walls, had met 
 in long-gone days the solemn conclave of Lombardy's 
 strongest Ghibelline rulers, — the noble chieftains of 
 the Visconti, the Gonzaghi, the Estensi, and the Delia 
 Carrara, to cement their solemn federation against the 
 pretensions of John of Bohemia. It was on August 6, 
 1332. The Emperor had temporarily gone to Avignon, 
 to confer with Pope John XXII, leaving his son Charles 
 at Parma to act as general viceroy in his absence; and 
 the opportunity was seized by some of the leading 
 plain-towns to league themselves for mutual support, 
 — for "the Ghibelline nobles were afraid lest he might 
 engage in a conspiracy with the Pope to crush their 
 power. "^ It was almost the only occasion through all 
 the centuries that those four antagonistic, warring 
 families met together in peace and harmony. In my 
 fancy I could see that pomp of arms and blazonry, the 
 courtyards ringing with the tread of knights and flash- 
 ing with their shields and pennons; — each prince striv- 
 ing to impress the others, and, while he greeted them 
 
 ' Oscar Browning, Ouelphs and Ghibellines, chap. xii. 
 
CASTELFRANCO 165 
 
 with honeyed words and ermine robes, wearing under 
 the latter a shirt of mail, and watching every move- 
 ment for a dagger thrust, every wine-cup for a treach- 
 erous poison. 
 
 It was a hundred and fifty years after this that 
 Tuzio Costanza acquired the fortress. In 1495, when 
 the Venetians had leagued with the other powers to 
 drive Charles VIII out of Italy, and the League had 
 appointed Francesco Gonzaga its commander-in-chief, 
 Tuzio headed his own company under the latter, and 
 won such fame by his exploits against the French that 
 the Duke of Orleans bestowed upon him the famous 
 appellation of "the best lance in Italy." Tuzio's son 
 Matteo became a condottiere also, and fought with his 
 company for Venice, as his father had done; he was 
 in the way of attaining renown, when he was slain at 
 Ravenna in 1504, — and the broken-hearted father 
 brought home the body to his castle. Matteo was 
 buried in the old church of the fortress, under a tomb 
 that became celebrated for its beauty; and Giorgione, 
 his friend, immortalized his knightly form in color. 
 
 Immediately before my window, upon the sward of 
 the fosse's outer bank opposite the corner tower, stood 
 a memorial that led my thought to these softer, pleas- 
 anter channels. It was a gleaming marble statue, upon 
 a high, well-shaped pedestal, of a comely youth clad 
 in charming cinquecento costume of rich, embroidered 
 doublet and long-hose, with a graceful cloak falling 
 from his shoulders, and a jaunty velvet cap upon his 
 curls; and in his left hand he held a painter's palette, 
 in his right a brush. ^ It was Giorgione himself — the 
 great Giorgione; "born halfway between the moun- 
 tains and the sea, that young George of Castelfranco 
 
 • This charming work was executed in 1878, by the Venetian sculptor, 
 Benvenuti. 
 
166 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 — Stout George they called him, George of Georges, 
 so goodly a boy he was. Have you ever thought what 
 a world his eyes opened on — what a world of mighty 
 life — of loveliest life, when he went down, yet so 
 young, to the marble city, and became himself as a 
 fiery heart to it?"^ 
 
 I know naught in our language besides this splendid 
 simile of Ruskin's that so well conveys the immediate, 
 powerful effect which the genius of this marvelous 
 youth had upon the Venice and the art of the Renais- 
 sance. It was in 1477 that he first saw the light in this 
 little town, a child by his father's side of the locally 
 prominent Barbarelli family, while his mother was a 
 peasant from Vedalago; and from the tenderest age 
 his whole impressionable and passionate soul devoted 
 itself to absorbing the beauty of all existing things, 
 
 — throbbed with it, and radiated it with tongue and 
 brush to all about him. His physical personality also 
 reflected this love of the beautiful; when he had gone 
 to labor at Giovanni Bellini's studio, and grown to 
 first manhood, his commanding figure, noble head, 
 and graceful, dignified deportment, quickly drew from 
 the Venetians that sobriquet by which he is still known. 
 Like the proverbial fiashing meteor, as has been well 
 said, his star soared above his master's and all others', 
 glowed unsurpassably brilliant in the meridian, and as 
 quickly perished of its own internal fires. Who that 
 knows Giorgio Barbarelli through his works, does not 
 love him, — and who that is acquainted with the sad- 
 ness of his early fate, does not compassionate it.''^ 
 
 "In his works two characteristics prevail, senti- 
 
 ' Tuthill, Precious Thoughts from Rushin. 
 
 ' He died in 1512 at Venice, at the age of 33, his heart broken — so it 
 is said — by the faithless conduct of his inamorata, Cecilia, in secretly 
 transferring her affections to Giorgio's pupil, Pietro Luzzo. The remains 
 lie near those of his friend Matteo Costanzo, in the Castclfranco cemetery. 
 
CASTELFRANCO 167 
 
 ment and color, both tinged with his peculiar temper- 
 ament; the sentiment is noble but melancholy, and 
 the color decided, intense, and glowing. He was the 
 first Venetian who cast aside the antiquated con- 
 straint of the Bellini school, treated art with freedom, 
 and handled his colors in a bold, decided manner. 
 The works of Giorgione are amongst the most rare 
 and beautiful examples of the Venetian school."^ 
 Alas, that they are so very rare; to come upon one 
 is like finding a coruscating ruby in a bed of sand. 
 Who does not cherish with keen delight the memory 
 of that wonderful Concert in the Pitti, with its at- 
 mosphere of languorous dreamy eventide through 
 which the musicians' strains are stealing! 
 
 Kugler's famous summary is the best: "His paint- 
 ings generally have a luminous power and subdued in- 
 ternal glow, the sternness of which forms a singular 
 contrast to the repose which prevails without; and his 
 portraits represent an elevated race of beings capable 
 of the noblest and grandest efforts." 
 
 It was the very rareness of these supreme works 
 which had brought me to Castelfranco; not that this 
 his native town, as one would naturally suppose, con- 
 tains any number of them; but because here exists one 
 canvas that, in the opinion of many critics, is the great- 
 est and most glorious of them all. It hangs in the 
 parish church of S. Liberate; — not a portrait, like 
 the majority of his works, but a large pietistic tableau, 
 of the Madonna enthroned with Saints Liberale and 
 Francesco by her side. 
 
 At this point in my meditations a renewed and 
 .louder shrieking through the keyhole by my crazed 
 attendant recalled me with the information that it 
 was time to go down and dine. I descended with fore- 
 
 1 Shedd, Famous Painters and Paintings. 
 
168 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 boding, and was placed at a small table in the dusty 
 carriageway, in the company of a number of hatted 
 gentlemen, who, as usual, bellowed at each other and 
 drank wine until they grew perilously red in the face. 
 However, the soup and macaroni were excellent, and 
 I "made out" surprisingly well. When it was time to 
 retire, my faithful attendant led me to my chamber 
 with a lighted candle, and continued her running, 
 chattering performance of the afternoon, until I put 
 her out and told her to return no more. When she 
 had finally disappeared, I recollected that I had no 
 drinking-water, and looked for a bell; there was none. 
 I shouted, and banged the table in the great shadowy 
 hall, but no one came. I descended the staircase, — 
 and found the doors at its bottom tightly locked. 
 The situation faced me that I was alone in this queer 
 old building, and bolted in. 
 
 It was one of the strangest predicaments that my 
 travels have ever given me. In those huge gaunt halls, 
 so full of shadows and silence, it had a sinister, alarm- 
 ing aspect; I knew nothing whatever about this place, 
 and all the old tales of travelers robbed in out-of-the- 
 way inns began to course through my head. Every 
 act of the old woman and the other queer inmates 
 assumed a new significance, as I paced up and down 
 through the darkness; because I could obtain no water, 
 I immediately acquired a thirst of extraordinary in- 
 tensity; I noticed for the first time that the candle 
 was old and low, and would soon leave me in an appal- 
 ling gloom ; finally the thought of a possible fire came 
 to me, starting perhaps in some other part of the 
 building, when I should be trapped like a mouse, — 
 for the windows were twenty feet from the stones 
 below. Wrought by all these ideas to desperation — 
 I laugh now whenever I think of it — I took up a 
 
CASTELFRANCO 169 
 
 heavy chair, again descended the stairs, and battered 
 furiously upon the panels of the doors, making a din 
 that would have roused the seven sleepers. For a long 
 time there was no response; I redoubled my efforts, 
 — and at last heard feet approaching, a key turn in 
 the lock, and saw a sleepy, round, night-capped face 
 thrust in before me, with an expression of comical 
 bewilderment that I shall never forget. 
 
 "By the Madonna! what was happening? Was the 
 house falling down? - — Had the spirits gone after the 
 signore? — What was the signore doing with that 
 chair?" — Considerably discomfited and abashed, 
 but still angry, I made my complaints as to the ab- 
 sence of bell, water, and candle; the woman brought 
 me the two latter articles, reclosed the door, and I 
 heard the key again turn in the lock. I was obliged to 
 return to the upper hall; and then, at a sudden remem- 
 brance of all her* words, the horrors commenced to 
 travel down my back in rapid waves. — "Had the 
 spirits gone after the signore!" — Great Heavens! 
 Then there were supernatural beings in these dismal 
 chambers, that were accustomed now and then to 
 "go after" unfortunate visitors! — This was worse 
 than before; — locked alone in an ancient palace, 
 haunted by spectres, that visited their wrath upon 
 intruders ! 
 
 Of course I do not believe in ghosts, — who does? — 
 but I am not ashamed to confess that I shivered as 
 I looked horror-stricken around the shadowy corners, 
 dreading each second to behold some fearful appari- 
 tion. I wished now with all my soul that I had never 
 heard of Castelfranco. Each dark piece of furniture 
 assumed, as my eye fell upon it in the dusk, some 
 shapeless, moving form; each step that I cautiously 
 made, echoed into some semblance of unearthly noise. 
 
170 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 I stole to my chamber door, feeling that all about me 
 were unseen malevolent beings, reaching toward me 
 with their ghostly hands. Then an actual sound that 
 was no echo shrilled from the dark end of the hall, — 
 a frightful squeak, or gibber, of fiendlike accents, — 
 that lifted my hair straight upon end and completed 
 my discomfiture. I bounded into the room, slammed 
 and bolted the door, and threw off my clothes faster 
 than I had ever done in my life, not daring to look 
 around; — crawling into bed in a minute, under the 
 shelter of the sheets, as good Mr. Pickwick did when 
 he had read the autobiography of the madman. 
 
 When I awoke in the morning, with the sunshine 
 pouring brightly in, how ludicrous seemed the inci- 
 dents of the night — how I laughed as I recalled them. 
 And that final uncanny sound, — why, it was naught 
 but the squeak of a mouse in the wall; the ghosts were 
 mice, and nothing more. — But, I* took care not to 
 spend another night in such a prison. 
 
 After an early breakfast I entered the fortress upon 
 its northern side, where a later brick bridge crosses the 
 moat, and the lofty wall is broken down for some dis- 
 tance. To the west from the bridge, the fosse has at 
 this place more than its usual garniture of grassy 
 slopes with shrubs and flowers, for hence extends upon 
 the outer bank a fine row of giant plane trees, and 
 beneath them, a pleasant shady promenade beside the 
 silent water. On the evening previous I had walked" 
 here for a while, and encountered, in the darkness 
 pierced only by twinkling caffe-lights across the piazza, 
 quite a number of coupled lovers, strolling in signifi- 
 cant silence and contiguity. This morning the scene 
 was very different, for it was clearly another festa: the 
 two lines of buildings fronting the piazza were bril- 
 liant with the waving red, white, and green of the 
 
J 
 
 CASTELFRAXCO. MADUNXA AXD CHILD WITH SAINTS. (GIOIUilOXE.) 
 
CASTELFRANCO 171 
 
 national colors; crowds moved about aimlessly, the 
 men stiff and awkward in their holiday clothes; and 
 now came the town band with a flourish of trumpets, 
 pompously marching to the national air, cheered by 
 the populace and followed by a long string of men and 
 boys. But the dignity of the procession was sadly 
 injured by the musicians having no uniforms, and being 
 all in shirt-sleeves, with an extraordinary variety of 
 soiled and threadbare waistcoats. I could not help 
 laughing at their ludicrous appearance, and the per- 
 fect solemnity with which their orderless tail mean- 
 dered after them. Up and down the long piazzas they 
 marched, all that morning, ceaselessly tooting the 
 same air, whose tired strains followed me into every 
 street. 
 
 The fortress I found to be quartered just like Citta- 
 della, by two main thoroughfares crossing at right 
 angles in the centre. The one which I now entered ran 
 from the northern gateway (utterly destroyed) to the 
 church at the south end; and few traces of age were 
 visible in the freshly painted stucco buildings that 
 confined it closely without arcades. Still narrower 
 side ways, like alleys, diverged occasionally between 
 brick walls more clearly aged and dilapidated. On the 
 left I passed the town theatre, which — as usual with 
 every Italian borough, however small — was large 
 and carefully ornate, with great columns supporting 
 a classic portico. Shortly beyond was the intersection 
 of the east and west avenue, presenting quite a differ- 
 ent aspect because of the huge, towered gateways 
 overlooking it at the ends; upon this also, just to the 
 left, stood the Municipio, — a simple but well-designed 
 Renaissance structure, arcaded on the ground story. 
 
 I continued to S. Liberale, whose lofty fagade look- 
 ing down the street was likewise of modern Renais- 
 
172 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 sance design; it was exceptionally light in color, being 
 of painted stucco, and imitated a Doric temple, with 
 four enormous half-columns supporting a cornice and 
 pediment of that order. Statues crowned the flat gable, 
 and adorned the side parapets of the entrance court; 
 while behind on the right soared the old, dark, central 
 tower of the southern wall, with battlements topping 
 its added belfry. That was the original, early campa- 
 nile, but this was not the original church, for which 
 Giorgione painted his altar-piece, — in which he was 
 buried, and to which TuzioCostanzo brought the body 
 of his warrior-son ; that structure had been razed, and 
 this late, pretentious edifice reared in its place, while 
 the tombs of the two friends were removed to the local 
 cemetery. 
 
 I found the single doorway open, and lifting the 
 heavy leathern curtain, passed within. A beautiful, 
 spacious nave of Renaissance design greeted me, with 
 a lofty, arched roof, an elevated choir, backed by a 
 rounded apse, and similar apses at the ends of the 
 short transept; the lower aisles were divided off by 
 heavy piers, and arches springing from Ionic half- 
 columns at their sides, over which ran a handsome 
 block cornice; while above the intersection of nave 
 and transept rose a majestic dome. All was in glisten- 
 ing white, except the accentuating brown trimmings 
 on the capitals, mouldings, and entablature. No paint- 
 ings of merit were in the church proper, but I found 
 them in the sacristy, to the left of the choir; its walls 
 were covered with pictures, forming the only public 
 collection in Castelfranco. 
 
 Among them were several by Paolo Veronese, fres- 
 coes brought hither from the nearby Villa Soragna: 
 two female figures representing Justice and Temper- 
 ance, over the doors, — both graceful, well-modeled. 
 
CASTELFRANCO 173 
 
 and beautifully clothed, and a ceiling-piece represent- 
 ing Fame blowing her trumpet, with old Father Time, 
 wearing an hour-glass for a hat. Besides these was 
 a canvas, in the rear passage, a lovely Marriage of St. 
 Catherine in that master's best style, faded indeed as 
 to colors, but exceedingly well-composed, dignified, and 
 expressive. Here was also a Circumcision by Palma 
 Giovane (signed, 1610), with individually charming 
 figures of soft, well-moulded fiesh-work, and of a fine, 
 rich tone; but — as so often with him — the figures 
 were too numerous, crowded, and unrestful. 
 
 The said rear passage led me to the space behind 
 the high altar, which is kept carefully locked and the 
 key intrusted to one certain man only, who had to be 
 sent for to open the door. There was good reason for 
 such care, for there, alone upon the apse-wall, glis- 
 tened that treasure of treasures beyond all price, — 
 Giorgione's pala. The Madonna appears seated upon 
 a marble throne, which is taller than the heads of the 
 two standing saints, — its lower base of red marble, with 
 a medallion of the Costanzi arms in its centre, its 
 pedestal of glittering Carrara, draped in the middle 
 with a falling damask rug of exceeding beauty. The 
 throne itself is of simplest possible design, relieved 
 only by a striped, grass-colored carpet under the Ma- 
 donna's foot, and a cloth of red-and-gold, flowering 
 pattern at her back. The long-lashed eyes of her pure, 
 exquisite face are downward cast, her left hand rest- 
 ing upon the rectangular marble arm of the seat, her 
 right hand and knee holding the sacred Infant, who 
 looks towards S. Liberale. Nothing could be more 
 simple also than the Madonna's garb, — the loose, 
 open-necked bodice of velvet-green, the full-draped, 
 unadorned robe of softest rose, and the white linen 
 kerchief upon her head. 
 
174 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Back of the throne there runs across the stage at 
 man's height a dark-carmine screen, which sets forth 
 well the two forms before it of monk and warrior, and 
 reveals behind it a distant landscape of indescribable 
 charm, — verdurous groves and castellated hill, 
 spreading vale and dim blue mountains crowned by 
 towered cities, all swathed in heavy, shimmering air. 
 But that to which the eye turns from the beauteous 
 Madonna, is the knightly, youthful form of S. Libe- 
 rale : clad cap-a-pie in glittering mail he stands, even 
 to helmet, gusset, and genouilliere, — a short-sword at 
 his side, in one hand a staff whose pennon droops 
 above his head; a manly, noble, martial figure, with the 
 sunlight glistening upon the polished facets of the 
 armor, — yet gracious in his bearing, and gentle in the 
 boyish face that looks with quiet eyes from the un- 
 visored casque. These were the face and form, tradi- 
 tion tells us, of.Matteo Costanzo; and the armor is 
 that very mail which lies carved upon Matteo's mar- 
 ble figure on his tomb. Once besides this his friend 
 Giorgio portrayed him, in that identical S. Liberale 
 which was bequeathed by Samuel Rogers to the Brit- 
 ish National Museum, and which was the study-piece 
 for this. 
 
 Over the whole picture, arranged with such happy 
 symmetry and balance, disposed with such repose and 
 gracefulness, radiates that magical glow of gold and 
 crimson intermixed that seems to pour forth from some 
 hidden fiery interior, — that lifts the simple scene and 
 quiet figures into a glimpse of heavenly glory, aild 
 makes us long for such beatitude. Well indeed may 
 the greatest of critics pronounce, that "foremost 
 among the productions acknowledged by successive 
 genera,tions as true Giorgiones, we should place the 
 altarpiece — in the Church of Castelfranco."^ 
 
 ' Crowe and Cavalcaselle. 
 
CASTELFRANCO 175 
 
 When I left the church, it was to stroll thoughtfully 
 down to the fortress's eastern gate, with the lofty 
 clock-tower above it; and there, as I traversed its 
 tunnel-like entrance, upon the outer keystone of the 
 central arch my wandering eyes lighted upon a little 
 painting of surprising beauty, that to me as certainly 
 bore the marks of Giorgione as did the masterpiece I 
 had left. The shadows that would hide it from most 
 passers-by have preserved its lovely coloring with 
 exceptional vigor. It is a simple fresco of the Madonna 
 and Child, exquisite in the lines and moulding of the 
 forms, as well as the grace of the attitudes; and the 
 fair-haired child is truly one of the few loveliest that 
 I have ever seen. I made inquiries as to its authorship, 
 but nothing is known with certainty. 
 
 The piazza without this gate is used for cattle fairs 
 on Fridays, — when it must be a curious sight to see 
 it packed with those hundreds of white and pearly 
 oxen, in row after row, to the confining arcades. At 
 its southeast corner I found a house with fairly well- 
 preserved, Late-Renaissance frescoes on its fagade, 
 amusing in design ; in one of them was Hercules, slay- 
 ing the lion, — in another, strangling in his arms a 
 rather laughable, kicking Antaeus. Three other dwell- 
 ings of the town, which a guide is necessary to point 
 out, are of some interest: one of them the ancient 
 ruinous residence of the Costanzi, in the Vicolo del 
 Paradise (what should we think of an Anglo-Saxon 
 street labeled the Heavenly Way?), distinguished now 
 by nothing particular except the family escutcheon 
 in the gable toward the court; another being the 
 house in which Giorgione was born, — although of 
 questioned authenticity. The third is the house where 
 the master customarily stayed when revisiting the 
 city; it is located near the church, upon the same 
 
176 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 piazza, — as I afterwards found; — a plain stuccoed 
 building, much altered from the pristine plan, but still 
 showing traces of its illustrious occupant in the re- 
 mains of his frescoes upon the ceiling of the former 
 hall. These represent every sort of instrument, mus- 
 ical and otherwise, amidst an extraordinary assem- 
 blage of human heads and skulls, masks, helmets, 
 shields, gorgons, books, easels, hour-glasses, etc., all 
 of which seem to have been sketched in a spirit of 
 amusement, yet with a clear fertility of sprightly 
 fancy, and an undeniable power of execution and 
 decorativeness; — qualities which confirm our belief 
 in the correctness of their attribution to Barbarelli, 
 whose spirit was ever gay in those days when he 
 lingered here amidst a few chosen disciples.^ 
 
 ' Amongst those pupils for a time was Pordenone, who had followed 
 Giorgione from the studio of Bellini, eager to acquire the mastery of these 
 wondrous new developments, which — he could well see — would raise 
 painting to its meridian. This it was which made him the great master 
 that he became. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 TREVISO AND THE VILLA GIACOMELLI 
 
 Fair Italy! 
 Thou art the garden of the world, the home 
 Of all Art yields, and Nature can decree. 
 Even in thy deserts, what is like to thee? 
 Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste 
 More rich than other climes' fertility; 
 Thy wreck a glory, and thy ruin graced 
 With an immaculate charm which cannot be defaced. 
 
 — Lord Byron. 
 
 Twenty miles north of Venice, halfway between the 
 Alps and the lagoons, sits the ancient city known to 
 the Romans as Tarvisium, and to the modern Italians 
 as Treviso, which formerly guarded the great highway 
 from the Serene Republic to the north, as Padua 
 guarded that to the west. When Titian made one of 
 his frequent journeys to the Dolomites, to the high 
 Cadore country and picturesque Pieve where he was 
 born, he would follow this highway of all the centuries, 
 — from the shore of the Lagoon, or Mestre, by horse- 
 back to Treviso, where he lay overnight; then across 
 the wide bed of the Piave to Conegliano at the foot of 
 the hills, and Serravalle at the head of its ascending 
 vale; whence the pass of the Col Vicentin led the tide 
 of travel by a short cut over the mountains, to Belluno 
 and the upper valley of the Piave. From Belluno the 
 artist had another long day's ride up that magnificent 
 defile to the place of his nativity and boyhood, perched 
 upon its castled hill far above the joining waters of 
 the Piave and the Boite, — where the signory and the 
 population were wont to receive their illustrious fellow- 
 
178 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 citizen with joyous Sclat. From Pieve the countless 
 travelers for German lands pressed on by either of the 
 three excellent passes leading to the valley of the Drau 
 and the Tyrol. 
 
 That which conduced to Treviso's ancient import- 
 ance, even more than this route, was her location upon 
 the greatest of all lines of communication, — that over 
 the Julian Alps to the northeast : the land route from 
 Italy to Dalmatia, Hungary, and the Orient, — the 
 way by which those swarms of barbaric invaders 
 poured into the plain of Lombardy. For the various 
 passes united at Udine, and led westward by one high- 
 way, to join the northern road at Conegliano. Treviso 
 was early made a Roman Municipium, and, legend 
 has it, by Julius Caesar himself. It suffered greatly 
 from the barbarian invasions and sank into obscurity; 
 to rise again in the twelfth century as the dominant 
 town of all this section of the plain, in which there was 
 no other large place as far as the confines of Udine. 
 For a glorious time the little republic flourished, 
 maintained its independence, and fought with Padua 
 on the south; but it was in this beautiful, rich terri- 
 tory, well watered by swift streams, — known as the 
 Trevisan Marches, — that Ezzelino attained his first 
 successes as a conqueror; he seized Treviso at the be- 
 ginning of his career, and his brother Alberic long 
 governed her with tyrannous power. ^ After Ezzelino's 
 death in 1259, the little city fell before the Carrara, 
 was later captured by Can Grande della Scala, — who 
 
 ' Here it was that Alberico, angered by the seizure of his daughter 
 Adelisa and her husband Rinaldo d'Este, who were taken as hostages by 
 Frederick II, shut himself up in 1239, imprisoning all the city officials 
 and defying the Emperor's power. In consequence whereof the luckless 
 Trevisans had to endure a long and frightful siege from the Faduans and 
 other imperialists, which ended in Alberico's extinction, and their annexa- 
 tion for a time to the Faduan domains. 
 
TREVISO 179 
 
 died here, at the height of his fame, in 1329, — and 
 finally was taken by the intervening Venetians, in 
 1339, when Treviso and her immediate territory — 
 including Castelfranco, Conegliano, and other smaller 
 places — formed the first mainland possessions of the 
 Republic, upon the peninsula.^ 
 
 In 1356, Treviso was already so attached to her 
 sovereign as to endure without flinching a long and 
 terrible siege from Lewis the Hungarian; in 1380, she 
 faced another from Francesco Carrara; and she con- 
 tinued to bear manfully the attacks dealt against the 
 Mistress of the Sea throughout all the wars of those cen- 
 turies, standing by her unto the coming of Napoleon. 
 From 1813 onwards Treviso suflffered with her sister- 
 towns the odious domination of the Austrian; but in 
 the revolution of 1848 she played an heroic part, endur- 
 ing a siege and bombardment without proper means of 
 defense, until forced to yield by overwhelming power. 
 After the final victory of 1866, her plebiscite for union 
 with the Kingdom of Italy was noteworthy for the fact 
 that out of 6990 votes cast not one was against the 
 proposition. 
 
 The city is located at the confluence of the small 
 rivers Sile and Botteniga; Dante lingered in his wan- 
 derings at their place of junction, struck by the beauty 
 of the swift, tree-shaded streams, which he mentioned 
 in the Paradiso (ix, 43) — the latter under the appella- 
 tion of Cagnan. In the history of art, Treviso has been 
 of little importance, developing no school of merit like 
 her sister-towns, no single artist of high rank; nor did 
 she turn herself in Renaissance days to much cultiva- 
 
 > This was a part of the despoliation of the weak Mastino II della Scala, 
 Can Grande's successor, which was worked in concert by the Venetians, 
 the Visconti, and the Delia Carrara; and which ultimately reduced the 
 huge Scala kingdom to naught but the adjacent cities of Verona and 
 Vicenza. 
 
180 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tion of painting or architecture. Her most interesting 
 buildings come down to us from the earlier times of 
 Romanesque and Gothic designs; and her indulgence 
 in the brush was mainly confined to the coloring of 
 facades, — in which respect she "furnishes the most 
 modern specimens of house decoration, giving proof 
 of a deep study of the great Mantegnesque examples." ^ 
 
 At the end of the trecento the little known but highly 
 interesting Tommaso da Modena came here to fill 
 the churches and monasteries with his frescoes; but 
 the Trevisans poorly followed his excellent example 
 and influence, developing only second- and third-rate 
 artists like Dario, Pietro Pennachi, and the letter's 
 son Girolamo. This Girolamo da Treviso was the best 
 of the lot, — having benefited by the influence of 
 Squarcione and his Paduan school, — and did more 
 than any of the others to beautify his town.^ But 
 Treviso could give birth to great artists if she could 
 not teach them; to the studios of Venice she sent that 
 illustrious trio, Rocco Marconi, Lorenzo Lotto, and 
 Paris Bordone, — of whom, however, but very few 
 specimens remain in their native place. 
 
 The plan of Treviso shows an oblong quadrangle, 
 whose east and west diameter is nearly twice the 
 length of the north and south; and is delimited still 
 by its huge Renaissance brick walls and moat. The 
 Botteniga strikes it at the centre of the northern side, 
 dividing forthwith into a half-dozen branches, two 
 of which follow the moat to right and left and supply 
 its water, the others of which flow through the city, 
 marking out as they do so the limits of the original 
 
 ' Crowe and Cavalcaselle. 
 
 * Pennachi was an unimportant pupil of Carpaccio. Girolamo, of more 
 talent, became finally one of the chief engineers of the English King, Henry 
 VIII, for whom he built various structures and fortresses, and was slain 
 ' while prosecuting for him the siege of Boulogne. 
 
TREVISO 181 
 
 smaller town, and turning many mill-wheels with their 
 swift impetus. 
 
 The Sile, coming from the west, enters the moat at 
 the southwest corner and courses broadly along it to 
 the southeastern angle, dividing, for half the distance, 
 into two arms that inclose a long, narrow island at the 
 centre of the southern side, — the right-hand arm 
 being the city fosse, the left-hand and broader arm 
 flowing between tree-shaded quays. Into this last 
 empty the different branches of the Botteniga, its 
 main branch joining towards the island's eastern end. 
 In the very centre of the town lies appropriately its 
 chief piazza — "Dei Signori, " — from which the prin- 
 cipal thoroughfare, under the names of Via Venti Set- 
 tembre and Via Vittorio Emanuele, runs windingly 
 down, across the island, to the main gate at the middle 
 of the southern wall. 
 
 Just without this gate — the Barriera Vittorio 
 Emanuele — stands the railroad station; and here I 
 debarked late in the afternoon, after an uneventful 
 three-quarter-hour's run from Castelfranco, hoping 
 that in this place of thirty-five thousand inhabitants I 
 should find a comfortable, modernized hotel. Across 
 the sunny piazza I saw the flowing moat, and behind it 
 the great, grim, brick walls of the cinquecento, masked 
 on the right hand by the foliage of a charming little 
 park extending eastward along the stream; through 
 its cool shade meandered gravelled paths, attended 
 by flower-beds, and upon its benches sat many loung- 
 ers, watching a dozen stately swans sporting in the 
 water under the shadows of the battlements. 
 
 I climbed into the 'bus of the hotel to which I had 
 been recommended at Vicenza, — endowed with that 
 common but pleasing name of Stella d' Oro (Golden 
 Star), — and rattled away over the cobbles, through 
 
182 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the Barrier, over a long piazza crossing the island, and 
 a bridge at its end across the main arm of the Sile. 
 Picturesque old houses backed upon the water's north- 
 ern bank, and a pleasant, shady quay adorned the 
 southern. Thence the Via Vittorio Emanuele took 
 us winding between ancient houses, freshened by mod- 
 ern paint and plaster, filled with trim little shops, until 
 at an eastward bend we crossed the first arm of the 
 Botteniga — a narrow, dark, dirty stream between 
 aged walls, that once formed here the moat of the 
 primal town; and immediately beyond it we drew up 
 before an imposing, handsome building occupying a 
 block of its own, having a garden on the side toward 
 the water. It was the hotel; and very much aston- 
 ished* and pleased was I to find such a one in a little 
 town of this size, seldom visited by foreigners. They 
 gave me an attractive, newly furnished room over the 
 garden, where I was nightly lulled to sleep by the 
 rhythmical murmur of the current; and the table, 
 — which, like the other towns, was entirely a la 
 carte — proved of equal excellence. Thus can one live 
 in provincial Italy on the fat of the land, at a price 
 of no more than eight to nine francs per day. 
 
 After dinner, under the trees in the garden, illum- 
 ined by colored lanterns, I strolled northeastward up 
 the Via Venti Settembre — how much Italians ever 
 make of that occupation of Rome! — to the Piazza dei 
 Signori. The dark battlemented form of the four- 
 teenth century Prefettura loomed up on its eastern 
 side, with caffe lights shining from its heavy arcades; 
 other caffes illumined the nearer side of the area, and 
 all of them had spread their crowd of little tables far 
 out upon the flagged pavement, occupying half the 
 open space. Seated at them, and moving through them 
 with visiting gossip, were throngs of well-dressed peo- 
 
TREVISO 183 
 
 pie, — the aristocracy of Treviso, taking their evening 
 outing. Other throngs less aristocratic strolled up and 
 down in the space between the phalanxes of tables, 
 and massed themselves strongly at the piazza's south- 
 ern end. Here there rose another arcaded building, of 
 Renaissance lines, with lofty arches, — the palace of 
 the governmental telegraph department, occupied also 
 by the city fire department, and the museum of paint- 
 ings. Before this I now discerned a band-stand erected, 
 filled with ornate regimental musicians, about to com- 
 mence the evening concert. I took a seat at a table, 
 and enjoyed my caj6 noir, watching the people and 
 listening to the music. 
 
 The band played at intervals selections — as usual 
 — from the German and Italian operas ; it is always 
 a wonder to me what excellent instrumentalists are 
 found, and developed, amongst the youths of every 
 Italian regiment. The people, well though not smartly 
 dressed, the women in styles less fashionable than in 
 the larger cities, sipped their coflfee and liqueurs and 
 innocuous syrups, clearly with more enjoyment in their 
 conversation than in the drinks, as is the national way. 
 I ascertained that these concerts occurred upon two 
 or three evenings a week, as in all garrison towns; but 
 these good gossiping Trevisans would be found here 
 every night. They sat in family parties about the tiny 
 tables, talking and laughing with incessant volubility, 
 sometimes . all at once; while those gentlemen who 
 evidently conceived themselves especially popular or 
 witty, moved from group to group with elaborate salu- 
 tations and smiling quips. Villari has so succinctly 
 expressed this phase of Italian life that I can do no 
 better than repeat his words : — 
 
 "The streets and cafes are places of rendezvous for 
 all classes. The idle section of the jeunesse dorSe pass 
 
184 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 more than half the day lounging about the main streets, 
 chattering and gossiping. Even men of business and 
 hard-working professional men prefer to meet in the 
 street or at some cafe to discuss their affairs and see 
 their friends, rather than in their own homes. Differ- 
 ent cafes are frequented by different classes. One is 
 the resort of the officers, another that of university 
 professors, another of students, another of lawyers. 
 The ordinary cafe is at best a somewhat dismal resort; 
 it is dusty, stuffy, and uncomfortable; the chairs are 
 apt to collapse, the sofas are dingy, and cleanliness is 
 not remarkable."^ To this should be added that in a 
 small place like Treviso the central piazza, rather than 
 the streets, is the general rendezvous; it is the drawing- 
 room of a large and very friendly household, whose 
 members are more at home in it than in the chambers 
 where they reside; to use the old metaphor, it is the 
 true heart of the city, where beats its pulse, and form 
 its feelings; and its life pours forth through all the 
 arteries, to flow back like the tide. 
 
 When I returned to this piazza next morning, the 
 dim mass of the Prefettura had resolved itself into a 
 structure of most interesting details: the piazza run- 
 ning from northwest to southeast, the palace occupies 
 three quarters of its northeastern flank, — a huge, 
 three-storied edifice of yellowish brick, with two great, 
 projecting wings inclosing a good section of the square. 
 It comes from Romanesque days, having been first 
 constructed in 1184, and much rebuilt in the past cen- 
 tury. The whole ground story of the right wing is a 
 large open loggia, half-filled by the tables of a caffe; 
 and along the first story of the main body and the 
 left wing, runs a round-arched brick arcade, upon 
 glistening, white stone pillars. 
 
 ' Luigi Villari, Italian Life in Town and Country. 
 
TREVISO 185 
 
 But its chief beauty lies in the long series of splen- 
 did triple Romanesque windows upon the second 
 story, carefully restored; the three arches of each 
 being adorned with terra-cotta labels over their brick 
 quoins, and supported by two pairs of coupled shafts 
 of polished marble, — all recessed within a large arch 
 outlined in terra-cotta placques. Other Romanesque 
 windows adorn the third story of the main body, — 
 dainty little double lights, each with a single pair of 
 coupled shafts, one behind the other; while over them 
 runs a Romanesque brick cornice, surmounted by 
 Ghibelline battlements, — which continue along the 
 right wing. Soaring over the whole, from the rear of 
 the central structure, is the majestic municipal tower, 
 its lofty stuccoed face unbroken save by the clock and 
 two tiny embrasures, its deep-arched belfry frowning 
 war-like from its crenellations. Altogether, this is one 
 of the few most interesting and characteristic public 
 buildings erected in North Italy during the era of the 
 municipal republics. 
 
 I looked at the marble tablets covering the pillars of 
 the right wing toward the inclosed space, and found 
 them to be the town's memorials to the heroes of the 
 Risorgimento. On the other side of this wing is a 
 superb outer stairway, with marble balustrade, rising 
 upon arches to a Gothic doorway in the second story; 
 and in the centre of the adjacent section of the piazza 
 stands a marble statue of Independence, as a female 
 in classic garb leaning upon a battleflag-standard and 
 holding a wreath of laurel. 
 
 I traversed a passage through the middle of the 
 palace, to another, smaller piazza in its rear, upon 
 which it looks with a broad arcade sustained by slim 
 columns rising from a parapet; under this arcade open 
 the doors of two small churches, side by side, — S. 
 
186 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Vito and S. Lucia, — dating from the fifteenth cen- 
 tury. The latter bore formerly the curious name of the 
 Madonna of the Prisons, — which used to be adjacent ; 
 in it condemned prisoners received the last rites of the 
 Church before being executed in the piazza without, 
 and their poor mutilated bodies were then interred in 
 the vaults. Neither of the edifices contains anything 
 remarkable, — beyond a fair canvas by Titian's 
 nephew, Marco Vecellio, over the high-altar of S. Vito. 
 
 Immediately next to them, however, under the 
 same palatial roof, are the rooms of the local Monte di 
 Pieta, in one of which hangs a very unusual painting, 
 generally ascribed to Giorgione; an attendant showed 
 it to me, in a sort of council chamber on the first floor. 
 It represents the dead form of our Lord, nude but for 
 a loincloth, sitting upon the lid of his sarcophagus 
 with one leg inside the latter and one outside, leaning 
 backward against some winged putti who are. pushing 
 and pulling to accomplish the interment; a ghastly 
 sounding subject, and the picture is even more brutal 
 than it sounds, — the Christ's figure being disagree- 
 ably muscular, in hardened bunches, the skin of deadly 
 leaden hue, the aspect of the face horrifying; and it is 
 so violently foreshortened that, interesting as it is to 
 artists, it must strike the average beholder unpleas- 
 antly. It is powerful and realistic, — that cannot be 
 denied, — and the moulding of the flesh is of most 
 exceptional solidity; also the putti, taken separately, 
 are very graceful, charming little forms, while the 
 toning and coloring are of that deep gorgeousness 
 peculiar to Barbarelli. 
 
 Yet it did not seem to me to be that master's work. 
 "If in all [his] canvases we have examined, the com- 
 mendable features are quiet movement, just propor- 
 tion and gentle shape, here we are bound to admire the 
 
TREVISO 187 
 
 colossal torso and herculean limbs of a giant, the mus- 
 cular strength and fleshy growth of angels aping juv- 
 enile athletes, and a tendency to depict strong action 
 or equally strong foreshortening. In the dashing fresco 
 which Pordenone finished at San Niccolo of Treviso 
 ... we observe the same neglect of drawing, the same 
 display of flesh and muscle, and similar contractions 
 of extremities."^ It is really, therefore, with small 
 room for doubt, one of Pordenone's works done soon 
 after his graduation from Giorgione's teaching; the 
 products of which period have ever since been mis- 
 taken for the master's. 
 
 From the northwest side of the Piazza dei Signori 
 the chief thoroughfare continues in that direction 
 under the name of Via Calmaggiore. Starting now up 
 this, my eyes rested first upon the old Renaissance 
 palace to the right, at the comer of street and piazza, 
 whose fagade is covered with rustica up to the fourth 
 story, all of the same heaviness, — a rather extraor- 
 dinary design. The effect is bad, and is accentuated 
 by the lack of any cornice. This is really the left wing 
 of the Prefettura; its side towards the piazza bears a 
 lower continuation of the arcades, on marble pillars, 
 and three upper rows of simple oblong windows di- 
 vided by graduated marble pilasters, — from Doric 
 on the first floor to Corinthian on the third. Adjacent 
 to this upon the street is a fagade more quaint and 
 interesting, — the Casa Alessandrini, likewise of cin- 
 quecento design; it rises upon an arcade of two wide 
 arches only, and terminates in a simple wooden roof, 
 but is adorned with two beautiful Renaissance bal- 
 conies; and all over the stucco of the three stories are 
 the remains of excellent frescoes executed by the 
 cinquecentist Pozzasaretto, — a number of the large 
 
 ' Crowe and Cavalcaselle, ii, 3. 
 
188 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 figures being clearly preserved, in that queer dark pink 
 or roseate tint, of flesh used upon house-fronts. 
 
 The way continued, narrow and shadowy between 
 heavy arcades on both sides, picturesque with its old 
 fagades of every style and epoch, alive under the colon- 
 nades with bright, varied little shops and throngs of 
 people. Crumbling Romanesque dwellings frowned 
 down, dwellings with details of Gothic days, dwellings 
 of the Renaissance age, — adorned with columns, or 
 handsome window frames only, or marble balconies, or 
 large fragmentary frescoes of pink and carmine hues. 
 Finally the apse jmd side of a great church loomed 
 upon my left, with a huge unfinished campanile of 
 massive stones, so ponderous as to confirm without 
 words the story that the Trevisans once started to 
 build a tower higher than that of any other city, and 
 had to relinquish the attempt as beyond their means. 
 These were the campanile and body of the Duomo. I 
 followed a diverging way between the two, passing on 
 the right, adjacent to the former, an aged, moulder- 
 ing house with curious, heavily barred windows and 
 an outside staircase, and next to this again, the an- 
 cient Baptistery, — a tumbledown brick structure with 
 Romanesque mouldings ; then I emerged upon the ex- 
 tensive piazza over which the Cathedral faces north- 
 westward. 
 
 This Piazza del Duomo is fully a hundred and fifty 
 yards long from southwest to northeast, and half as 
 broad. It is gloriously dominated and brightened by 
 the Duomo's mighty fagade, with its six huge Ionic 
 columns rising upon their lofty flight of steps, — a 
 most successful example of modern classicism, having 
 been added in the last century to the original edifice 
 of the twelfth and fifteenth.^ To right of it stretches 
 
 ' It is mostly a Renaissance structure, Ji^iving been entirely remodeled 
 
TREVISO 189 
 
 the long Vescovado, or Bishop's Palace, of Late- 
 Renaissance design, with an elaborate colunined en- 
 trance and arabesque frescoes. Its right wing, front- 
 ing the piazza on the southwest, is an older structure 
 of two stories only, having a whole architectural 
 scheme painted on its flat stuccoed wall, — pilasters, 
 rustica, cornice, ornamental panels, string-course, 
 niches containing vases, frames to the windows, and 
 even a frescoed balustrade across the top. I began to 
 think the very windows must be painted too. 
 
 Across the sunny open space, diagonally opposite 
 the Cathedral and behind a row of shade trees, rises 
 the Tribunale, or court-house, — a fine, large, modern 
 building. On the northeast side is one of Treviso's 
 most interesting house-fronts, dating from Renaissance 
 days, with various pretty details, including a four- 
 windowed loggia with openwork marble panels; and 
 above the loggia its whole wall is frescoed in once rich, 
 einquecento designs of fertile fancy, — among them 
 mermaids sporting in a sea, and at the very top a 
 curious checkerboard effect in red and white. 
 
 I mounted the high steps of the Duomo and entered, 
 finding myself in a broad, vaulted nave without tran- 
 septs, crowned by three successive domes, — the sec- 
 ond over the choir, and third over the retro-choir; at 
 the sides were single, lower aisles, flanked by very 
 shallow chapels. The spacious structure was of good 
 Renaissance lines, simple but well-proportioned, and 
 majestic in effect, — almost the only architectural 
 decoration being the rosettes upon the sofiits of the 
 arches. The stuccoed pillars were painted light-brown, 
 likewise all the trimmings, leaving in glistening white 
 
 on the earlier foundations by Pietro Lombardo, in 1485-1505; and the 
 majestic classic interior is one of the Lombardi's best titles to fame. The 
 red marble lions of the portico are relics of the medieval church. 
 
190 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the side walls and arches, the sections of the vaulting, 
 and illumined domes. A handsome tesselated pave- 
 ment of red and white marbles completed the scene. 
 
 But there were masterpieces here also; and I com- 
 menced the round, — noticing immediately upon the 
 first altar to the right a pleasing old canvas of Madonna 
 and Saints, of rich tone, good drawing, and pious atmo- 
 sphere, holding a delightful little girl-angel upon the 
 step of the throne, who with a plaintive air crushes 
 some flowers to her bared bosom. I was told that the 
 author was unknown. In the second chapel I saw Bor- 
 done's Adoration of the Shepherds, with excellently 
 modeled, expressive figures, in a weird landscape of 
 hills and ruined temple, and over all a heavy, shad- 
 owy air-eflfect, in that master's peculiar, rich, brown 
 tone. Here against the second pillar was also a relief 
 of the Lombardi, representing the Visitation, — a beau- 
 tiful thing, with an expression in Elizabeth's face very 
 deep and wonderful for stone. 
 
 But in the chapel to the right of the choir I came 
 upon the gem of the whole place, and of Treviso, — 
 Titian's Annunciation : the Madonna is kneeling upon 
 a checkered marble floor, toward the spectator, but 
 with her lovely, pensive face turned over the left 
 shoulder to greet the angel; the latter, apparently a 
 girl-child of twelve, has just alighted with outspread 
 wings, bearing the lily in her left hand and raising the 
 right hand in blessing; behind her stretches darkly 
 afar a tempestuous scene of rugged mountains and 
 rolling clouds, through which bursts from heaven a 
 stream of light, following the holy messenger. This 
 is very grand, and would be entirely so but for the 
 presence of one contrasting, even laughable figure: it 
 is a little, wizened old man, wrapped in a cloak and 
 hood, crouching and peering round the rear corner of 
 
TREVISO 191 
 
 the marble wall upon the left, — of course, the donor, 
 but a more ridiculous donor never obtruded himself 
 upon holy personages. 
 
 A painted terra-cotta bust of this wealthy Trevisan, 
 Broccardo Malchiostro, — who provided the money 
 for the building and adornment of the chapel, and 
 after whom it is therefore named, — stands at one 
 side; it is of about the same date, 1520, as the pict- 
 ure which he procured from Titian. At the same time 
 he induced Pordenone to aid in the decoration; who 
 thereupon, with the assistance of his chief pupil, 
 Pomponio Amalteo, placed a series of frescoes upon 
 the walls and cupola, — the Salutation and the 
 Adoration of the Magi, below, and a heavenly vision 
 of the Eternal Father surrounded by angels, overhead. 
 Though formerly, and doubtless justly, considered of 
 great worth, these have been so damaged during the 
 centuries that they now attract little notice. — 
 Near by, on the left wall of the antechapel, is a fres- 
 coed Madonna of 1487, — a specimen of the work of 
 Girolamo da Treviso. 
 
 Just off this chapel is the sacristy, in which I was 
 shown another canvas by Bordone and a picture of the 
 original, Gothic Duomo. In the handsome Cappella 
 del Sagramento, to the left of the choir, constructed 
 by Lorenzo and Battista Bregni, the altar consists of 
 an elegant tabernacle of marble, — acinquecento monu- 
 ment to Bishop Zanotti, covered with small bronze 
 figures of saints and putti, and adorned, in front, with 
 bronze plates bearing New Testament scenes in relief. 
 By some this masterpiece is said to be the work of the 
 Lombardi; by others, of the brothers Bregni.^ To the 
 
 ' According to Mr. Perkins (in his Italian Stmlptors) this was unques- 
 tionably done by Pietro Lombardi. "The ornamental marbleworls upon 
 the tomb," he says, "would be alone sufiBcient to establish the sculptor's 
 
192 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 right of it are two niches in the wall, containing angels 
 by Sansovino. 
 
 In the left aisle, third chapel, I found the church's 
 third treasure, a once delightfully colored group of 
 three saints and a donor, by Bissolo,^ graceful, quiet, 
 and softly, charmingly pietistic. In the second chapel 
 was still another Bordone, — S. Lorenzo with four 
 other saints, of fine, warm, dark tone and atmosphere, 
 and considerable attractiveness. The first chapel held 
 a very excellent modern work, of St. Francis raising 
 the dead. 
 
 Leaving the Duomo, I strolled away down the con- 
 tinuation of Via Calmaggiore, known as Via Canova; 
 and found what I was seeking a few paces on the right, 
 — the house of Giuseppe Olivi. This was the patriot 
 who, being podestd of Treviso when the rising of 1848 
 broke out, called all the people together here before 
 his dwelling, and addressing them amidst intense ex- 
 citement, proclaimed the end of the Austrian domin- 
 ion; a provisional government was immediately 
 formed, of which Olivi was elected president; and with 
 much wisdom he governed the town, defending it 
 bravely against the Austrian bombardment and attacks 
 until they succumbed to superior numbers. The house 
 was a dainty, but not remarkable. Renaissance struc- 
 ture, with a long balcony across the upper story and a 
 tablet to the patriot's menaory; as I gazed at the bal- 
 cony, the figures that stood upon it on that memorable 
 day seemed to live again, and the street to surge with 
 
 reputation. Its most remarkable feature is an exquisite sculptured 
 frieze, which seems to have been worked out with a needle rather than 
 with a chisel, — finely and delicately as it is wrought." 
 
 ' Francesco Bissolo was a native of Treviso, who studied his art under 
 Giovanni Bellini, but soon threw off all the constraints of the Bellini man- 
 ner, developing a strong individual style, of much beauty in the forms and 
 coloring. 
 
TREVISO 193 
 
 that wildly excited multitude, till I could begin to real- 
 ize the passions of the time. 
 
 Returning to the piazza, I looked back down Via 
 Calmaggiore at the picture which was made by its old 
 houses opposite the Baptistery, — dwellings from the 
 earliest medieval times, such as are still found in Tre- 
 viso by the dozen, with first floors projecting widely 
 over the walk on massive beams ; and from one of their 
 little casements leaned a figure belonging to the same 
 epoch,- — a maiden in quaint bodice of flaring red, with 
 a crimson cap upon her ebon hair. 
 
 There are two interesting walks to be taken from 
 this piazza, and as I gazed I debated them in mind, 
 ending by taking the Via Cornarotta which leads 
 northeast from the side of the frescoed house. It 
 proved a narrow, quaint way, with an out-of-the- 
 world, forgotten air, shadowed by old crumbling pal- 
 aces that looked deserted. Two of these were of at- 
 tractive Renaissance lines; another had a second story 
 projecting far over the street, countless years showing 
 in every beam. 
 
 In about two hundred yards I came to the Muni- 
 cipio, at the angle of a cross-street, — a good modern 
 building, but strangely located, in this quiet quarter. 
 Next it was the most curious old dwelling yet discov- 
 ered, with ground-floor windows of little, heavily barred 
 slits, like a prison; and opposite this were more houses 
 with the ancient projecting floors. Southward this 
 Via del Municipio would lead me directly to the Pre- 
 fettura; but I turned northward upon it, across the 
 long, spacious Piazza dei Fillipini (wherever got they 
 that name?) to the ramparts of the city, looming 
 mighty now before me.^ Below the great embankment 
 
 * These were constructed near the end of the quattrocento by the great 
 Veronese architect, Fra Giocondo; and earned their fame by resisting many 
 a fierce assault and bombarding siege. 
 
194 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ran a street, the Via delle Mura, outlining its massive 
 bulk indefinitely to west and east; by a path I mounted 
 to its broad top, planted now with rows of shade trees, 
 under which ran the graveled promenade that is the 
 principal walk of the modern citizens. The reason for 
 its popularity was evident at once; for over the brick 
 parapet I saw the stupendous Alps soaring near at 
 hand, like a gigantic, precipitous, and serrated wall — 
 rising here quickly to far elevations with few interpos- 
 ing foothills; over the shoulders of the foremost were 
 thrust glittering snow-peaks, and to the foot of the 
 rocky wall swept the fertile plain, beautiful with woods 
 and grain-fields and shining villas. 
 
 From out this plain came pouring the stream of the 
 Botteniga, filling the moat beneath my feet, but mostly 
 plunging underneath the wall, to reappear upon the 
 inner side divided into three or four branches. This 
 was just to the right of where I had mounted; and on 
 walking to the spot I saw between two of the radiating 
 arms a delightful rustic islet, piled with rough cement 
 blocks into a tiny hill, atop which sat a summer- 
 house overgrown with creepers. A lovely scene, of a 
 kind most unexpected. It was attached to a neighboring 
 shady garden by a rustic foot-bridge; and beyond it 
 the swift waters rushed on diversely between the backs 
 of buildings and other gardens, till lost to sight. 
 
 Adjacent to the stream without the wall was some- 
 thing still more unusual and surprising: a modern ^ity 
 suburb of the upper class, the first one I had yet 
 found, consisting] of a road lined with very recent, 
 ornate dwellings, separated amongst lawns and mead- 
 ows. The North ItaHans have at last discovered, 
 then, the joys of having one's own house, in rural 
 surroundings; but as I gazed, I saw, alas! that they 
 have not yet discovered the veranda, — that which 
 
. 1 1 *: • « . < > * "'1^7' 
 
 ml 
 
 CONEGLIAXO. GATEWAY TO OLD TOWX. — CASTLE HILL IN 
 BACKGROUXD. 
 
 ^£jfp-irttirt'i« 
 
 
 TREVIS(J. PIAZZA DEI PIGXORI. 
 
TREVISO 195 
 
 gives rural life most of its charm. These brand-new 
 villas were so extraordinary in design and ornamenta- 
 tion, so exemplary of the awfully misguided taste of 
 the modern Italians, that they were worth walking 
 miles to see; such a nameless patchwork of walls, 
 pavilions, recesses, chimneys, flat roofs, pent-roofs, 
 archways, mansards, — in no style nor method ever 
 known to man, with brick here and stone there, plain 
 stucco here and rough stucco there, glaring each in 
 half a dozen frightful, discordant colors, daubed from 
 eaves to basement with every sort of discordant orna- 
 ment (forgive the name!), — they were an abominable 
 concatenation that would shake the nerves. To cap 
 the climax, upon their surrounding lawns was not one 
 sheltering tree, nor the sign of one planted; they 
 stood forth naked in all their lurid pride. I turned 
 my head and hurried eastward along the rampart, 
 hoping that living next to Nature will yet bring them 
 her quiet harmony. 
 
 Some way beyond the river I went down the first 
 street to the south, and shortly, on a left-hand turn- 
 ing, came to the interesting little Church of S. Maria 
 Maddalena, of the sixteenth century. The edifice 
 itself is in no way remarkable, but within it are sev- 
 eral good paintings of Paolo Veronese. Four of them 
 are upon the side walls, large tableaux representing 
 the Resurrection of Lazarus, the Magdalen at Christ's 
 feet, the Sacrifice of Abraham, and the Expulsion from 
 the Garden of Eden; not being in Paolo's last, over- 
 crowded, over-ornamented style, I enjoyed much their 
 rich tone, strong modeling, and brilliant colors. Over 
 the high-altar is another, and over the altar to the 
 left of the choir, the best of them all, — one of those 
 smaller crucifixion scenes which that master painted 
 so tenderly, with the Madonna lying fainting at the 
 
196 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Cross's foot, supported by other female saints, and 
 over all the scene a sombrous, awesome, murky atmo- 
 sphere. There is another, almost identical with this 
 canvas, in the Church of S. Sebastiano at Venice. 
 Nearly as much as the paintings did I enjoy the con- 
 versation of the parroco, who showed me them, — a 
 thorough Italian gentleman, of erudition and most 
 engaging manners. 
 
 From the church I stepped back to the rampart, and 
 followed it again to the main northern gateway, near 
 its eastern end, — the Porta S. Toma, renamed lately 
 after Mazzini. This is one of the handsomest city 
 gates in North Italy; it is a great, ponderous, square 
 structure, rising athwart the wall, stuccoed except 
 upon its outer face, and capped by a flat dome with 
 a marble statue of St. Paul. In the middle of its long, 
 dark passage I found high upon the left wall a little 
 shrine of extraordinary beauty, — a marble high-relief 
 of the Madonna and Child adored by warriors and an- 
 gels, clearly a Renaissance work of the best period, 
 and of very exceptional grace and expressiveness. It 
 is unfortunate that such a gem should be so little 
 known, and its author also. Without the passage 
 there was a fine stone bridge crossing the wide moat, 
 from which a clear view was commanded of the gate's 
 splendid fagade; it reminded me of the ornamentation 
 upon the Renaissance court-fagade of the Palace of 
 the Doges, — the six Corinthian marble columns, 
 three on each side of the archway, rising from pedes- 
 tals, carved with St. Mark's Lion in relief, to rect- 
 angular projections of the entablature, — the elabo- 
 rately relieved panels between them, cut with shields 
 and piles of arms, and the great winged lion with his 
 gospel, glowering from atop the arch, above the en- 
 graved date of MDXViii. 
 
TREVISO 197 
 
 Over the bridge was passing each way a continual 
 procession of contadini, afoot or mule-back, or driving 
 two- wheeled carts; and as I watched, I thought of 
 how many, many generations that same march of 
 travel had been traversing this same gate, passing on 
 up that white road to Germany and Austria, Dalma- 
 tia, and Byzantium. I thought of Titian riding 
 through the archway on his steady old nag, a stately 
 picture in his flowing white beard and velvet gown and 
 cap, jogging on toward his native mountains and early 
 friends; and the dashing Pordenone spurring through 
 on his fiery steed, on a visit to dazzle his townspeople 
 with his honors and jeweled finery. 
 
 In this eastern quarter of Treviso beyond the Bot- 
 teniga, there is but one more object of general inter- 
 est, — the Church of S. Maria Maggiore, toward the 
 southeastern corner. I went directly down to it now 
 by the Borgo Mazzini, which soon opened into the 
 largest piazza of this city of large spaces, yclept del 
 Mercato; — and from its southern end, still down, by 
 Via Stangade, in which I passed on the left the notice- 
 able Casa Lezze Casellati, — more completely cov- 
 ered, with better preserved frescoes, than any other I 
 had seen. Unfortunately, they were not good frescoes; 
 yet the house as a whole was very striking, — its 
 fagade ruddy with the flames of Troy, from which 
 ^neas was just stalking forth with Anchises on his 
 back. 
 
 Shortly beyond I came to S. Maria Maggiore, a 
 huge church, with a curious, cream-colored, stucco 
 front, pierced by three round and two long, square- 
 headed windows, framed by brown cotta mouldings; 
 beside it stood another ponderous unfinished campanile, 
 — the medieval Italians were ever ambitious beyond 
 their powers. The spacious, dusky interior contained 
 
198 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 several objets d'art of interest : over the entrance door, 
 a painting by Palma Giovane, — the Descent from 
 the Cross ; upon the high-altar, a richly colored pietis- 
 tic canvas, attributed to Palma Vecchio; off the left 
 aisle, a semicircular chapel, filled with many decadent 
 frescoes by Jacopo Laura in 1590; and, principally, the 
 ornate Renaissance tomb of the condottiere Mercurio 
 Bua, — who, like most of them, fought for Venice. 
 This monument is a large marble slab against the left 
 wall, cut with three scenes in high-relief, and seven 
 charming niches holding maidens with pitchers and 
 rounded putti; — all by Bambaja, of the Milanese 
 school (1480-1548) . It is attractive in many respects, 
 though showing evidence of the first decadence. 
 
 Across the bare, sunny piazza before this church I 
 noticed a quaint house of the trecento, well preserved, 
 and typical of the Gothic secular style in its doors 
 and windows of pointed arches, and other picturesque 
 details. Before it led the Via Carlo Alberto northwest, 
 — one of the very few instances in which I have found 
 a street named after that noble, unfortunate initiator 
 of Italian unity; and this paucity I think very strange. 
 It took me to the city post-office, where I crossed the 
 main arm of the Botteniga — with a view of pictur- 
 esque old mills amidst the current — to the Piazza and 
 church of S. Leonardo, shortly east of the central 
 piazza. The building is insignificant; but on the right 
 wall of its nave I saw a pleasing old painting of the 
 Madonna and Child, accredited to Giovanni Bellini, 
 and certainly much in his style. 
 
 Just a block south of this piazza lies the great civic 
 hospital of Treviso, occupying an enormous quad- 
 rangle between four streets, — one of the largest and 
 best institutions of that kind in Italy, the land of 
 hospitals; it was founded in 1332, and has been re- 
 
TREVISO 199 
 
 peatedly enlarged, until it can, I believe, accommo- 
 date nearly a thousand patients. I looked through the 
 windows at the rows of clean little rooms, shining with 
 white walls and whiter linen, and thought what a mar- 
 velous godsend it must be to the poor of this locality. 
 The nursing sisters completed the scene, with their 
 immaculate caps and sweet, unselfish faces. 
 
 Shortly to the west of this piazza, upon a narrow 
 way, I found the strange decaying loggia, dating as far 
 back as 1195, which they call the Loggia dei Cavalieri, 
 because it originally served as an assembly-place for 
 the nobles. Square in shape, but one lofty story in 
 height, it has five round arches on each side, supported 
 on marble pillars; being extraordinarily well propor- 
 tioned and harmonious for a building of that so-called 
 dark age, and much like a Renaissance structure, — 
 so much so as to make one realize that the classic style 
 had never died out entirely. Within there are said to 
 be fragments of very early frescoes; but I could not 
 see them, for the building has become so tottering that 
 the authorities have boarded it up entirely. Adjacent 
 to it is the small Piazza delle Erbe, usually filled with 
 fruit and vegetable stalls, and littered with their 
 refuse; from which it is but a step northwestward to 
 the rear of the Prefettura. But I followed southwest 
 the Via Umberto, upon which the Loggia faces, until 
 it brought me to the Via Vittorio Emanuele just 
 above the hotel, — completing thus my first giro 
 through Treviso. 
 
 In the little southeast section of the original town, 
 a triangular space between Via Umberto and the main 
 branches of the Sile and Botteniga, there are several 
 objects of some interest, which I hunted up one after- 
 noon. Firstly, I found a small three-sided piazza in the 
 section's western angle, near the hotel, fronted by two 
 
200 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 large palaces and the Church of S. Andrea, the latter 
 standing upon the highest point in the city; within it 
 hang two attractive paintings, — a picture of St. 
 Andrew by Bevilacqua, over the high-altar, and one of 
 Giovanni Bellini's glorious golden Madonnas, with S. 
 Lucia and S. Crisostomo. 
 
 Opposite on the west stands the Renaissance palace 
 of Count degli Azzoni, huge and imposing, once beauti- 
 fied by frescoes now vanished, with a spacious orna- 
 mental cortile; on the south rises the residence of the 
 Conti d' Onigo, renowned for the vast and beautiful 
 garden that stretches clear to the Sile, resplendent 
 with statues, vases, grottoes, and kiosks, and stretching 
 over the water the boughs of its stately trees. There 
 seems an unusual darkness in the deep shade of that 
 grassy bank, and well may it be; for it was the scene, 
 in 1903, of the tragedy of self-destruction that cut oflf 
 the last scion of that famous family, — a sad end to 
 its centuries of grandeur. 
 
 Upon the Via Regina, — which divides this section, 
 leading from the Piazza dei Signori straight south- 
 easterly to the middle bridge over the Sile, — I found 
 an exceptionally interesting Renaissance dwelling, 
 well down on the east side, near the river, adorned 
 with four stories of charming windows and other pleas- 
 ant details, besides remnants of frescoing in graceful 
 designs; and on reaching the immense civic hospital 
 shortly to east of it, I discovered a way down its left 
 flank to the river, that was a vista lifted bodily from 
 the twelfth century. It could not have been touched 
 for hundreds of years. So narrow that I could almost 
 reach from wall to wall, rudely paved and filthy, it 
 was covered and darkened by the far protruding first 
 floors of a long row of ancient houses which thrust 
 out decaying beams from their crumbling walls. Walk- 
 
TREVISO 201 
 
 ing through this medieval, dusky passage, past little 
 iron-studded doors and slit, prison-like windows, I 
 almost expected to see a bravo step out before me 
 with cloak, gauntlet, and dagger. The contrast at its 
 end was all the greater, when I emerged suddenly upon 
 the broad] sunny quay and splashing blue water of the 
 Sile, which rushed over a weir into glistening white 
 foam. Away to the west stretched the green line of 
 luxuriant maple trees upon its farther bank, to where 
 the vista was arched by a roseate gilded bow from the 
 vanished sun; immediately on the left the main arm of 
 the Botteniga came roaring in, under the broad stone 
 arches of the quay; and the joined waters soon turned 
 at right angles to the south, sweeping on between rows 
 of foliage. Such was their confluence, where Dante 
 once lingered in admiration. 
 
 I strolled upon the bridged embankment over the 
 junction, and there, as Italy never fails in gentle feel- 
 ings, stood midway over the torrent a tasteful monu- 
 ment in marble: no statuesque form, but a simple 
 medallion on the face of a pyramid, graved with the 
 poet's laureled head in profile; and under that, the 
 words that he wrote in memory of this spot, in canto 
 IX of the immortal Paradiso: — 
 
 E dove Sile e Cagnan s'accompagna — 
 
 — Ah, that great, unfortunate wanderer from realm to 
 realm, with no home to lay his head, exiled from all he 
 loved so tenderly, — as I thought of him standing 
 melancholy on this spot, Rossetti's lines came to my 
 mind : — 
 
 — Arriving only to depart. 
 From court to court, from land to land, 
 Like flame within the naked hand 
 His body bore his burning heart, 
 That still on Florence strove to bring 
 God's fire for a burnt offering. 
 
202 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 I walked on farther, down the stream in the dreamy 
 sunset glow, till, traversing the ramparts and joining 
 its southern arm, it swept united eastward along the 
 base of the city wall. Here was a lovely spot, with 
 gardens upon one side trailing over the battlements, 
 and woods of thick trees upon the other, as far as the 
 huge round bastion at the town's southeastern corner; 
 peaceful now at eventide with strolling couples, where 
 "swords once flashed and arrows flew, and lifeblood 
 stained the water another hue." 
 
 One morning I went to the Duomo by a shorter, 
 directer route than that through the central piazza, 
 by little streets west of Via Calmaggiore and parallel 
 with it. I passed by the small church of S. Gregorio, 
 near the piazza, insignificant in design as well as size; 
 but on glancing over it found an excellent work of 
 Palma Giovane. In Italy no sod is too poor to hide a 
 violet. Shortly beyond I found a thing still more 
 pleasing, — a splendid Gothic palace, rising upon a 
 noble arcade of pointed arches, with exquisite Gothic 
 windows and other details. This was hidden in a byway 
 a block south of the retired Piazza Pola ; surround- 
 ing which, and all about the neighborhood, I found a 
 number of interesting old houses, of different styles. 
 The Gothic dwellings are the rarest in Treviso, but 
 here and there one is unexpectedly discovered, — 
 usually arcaded upon the ground story, of bricks with 
 handsome cotta plaques adorning the quoins, some- 
 times on primitive pillars, sometimes on columns of 
 shining marble. That fine Lombard cotta-work would 
 beautify the homeliest building. 
 
 From the west corner of the Piazza Pola one of the 
 oldest streets of the city runs southwestward, a pic- 
 turesque vista of ruinous two-story houses with wide- 
 projecting floors. Beyond this a very narrow, dark 
 
TREVISO 203 
 
 way brought me to the apse of the Cathedral, looming 
 overhead like a colossus; and I circled round it through 
 one of those curious hidden areas of Italian cities, 
 devoted to the lowest class of wineshops and houses. 
 Here in the very shadow of the Duomo were low dark 
 places filled with tuns and barrels, and bulging them 
 upon the area, with dirty tables, rush-seated chairs, 
 and emptied bottles, — noisy all the nights, deserted 
 at this hour but for one or two lazy, sleeping tatter- 
 demalions. 
 
 I came out upon the Piazza del Duomo, and took 
 the Via Canova northwest, past Olivi's house. It led 
 me to the Borgo Cavour, Treviso's broadest street, 
 running to the only western gateway, Porta Cavour, 
 which pierces the ramparts near the city's northwest 
 corner. Here were fresh, dignified, modern buildings, 
 a church, — S. Agnese, — and opposite the latter, on 
 the right, the extensive edifices of the Biblioteca and 
 Museo Comunale. The former is noted for its collec- 
 tion of valuable manuscripts. In the latter was for- 
 merly kept the city's collection of paintings, now re- 
 moved to the palace on the central piazza. After much 
 hammering, I routed out a spectacled old gentleman in 
 knee-breeches, who confessed himself to be a professor 
 of art, and the guardian of the place, but asserted that 
 there was nothing now to be seen here, and nobody 
 ever came to see it. I insisted, however, until he turned 
 me over to his good dame, with a sigh, and a bunch of 
 enormous rusty keys. 
 
 She conducted me back through the passage, to 
 several rooms packed and littered with ancient and 
 medieval bits of sculpture and architecture, which a 
 couple of wood-turners were now using as a workshop. 
 I poked about through the huge, heterogeneous, dis- 
 orderly mass, unearthing a number of things of con- 
 
204 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 siderable interest, including one or two medieval stone 
 Madonnas of quaint grace. Then my conductress took 
 me upstairs, and unlocked one forgotten cobwebbed 
 room after another, till a full score of theni stood open 
 in dust and decay to my astonished eyes. 
 
 Here were old paintings, etchings, engravings, sculp- 
 tures in marble, bronze, porcelain and terra-cotta. 
 Delft ware, Gubbio ware, faence, majolica, carvings 
 in ivory and wood, textile fabrics of every sort and 
 costumes of every age, laces, miniatures, gems, cameos, 
 manuscripts plain and illuminated, Murano glass, 
 German stained glass, spinets, harpsichords, lutes, 
 psalteries, medieval arms and armor, tapestries, em- 
 broideries, churchly vestments, candelabra, furniture 
 of many epochs, — in a word, every sort of human 
 instrument or manufacture, possessing artistic merit 
 or historical association, produced or used during the 
 past ten centuries. All these were scattered through 
 the rooms and corridors without order or arrangement, 
 piled in heaps, thrust in corners, spread behind glass 
 cases, hanging upon the walls, and all alike covered 
 with the dust and cobwebs of years. It was a gold- 
 mine of the countless artistic treasures and produc- 
 tions of the long-past generations. Here were all the 
 things that once beautified their castles and medieval 
 houses, — that sprang into joyous life in the glamour of 
 the Renaissance, — that they used and lived with in 
 those strange, varied ages. Digging here, it was easy to 
 reconstruct in mind a medieval household, or a palace 
 of the cinquecento, with these very articles that had 
 played such a part, — even to the gowns, the laces, 
 and silken coats of the human beings that had dwelt 
 amongst them. 
 
 There was an intimacy about these thousands of 
 orderless relics, cast thus on one side as if used but 
 
TREVISO 205 
 
 yesterday, — a lack of formality and tagged arrange- 
 ment, of removal to a distance in stiff rows and cate- 
 gories, — that took me into those bygone days, revivi- 
 fied for me their life and dwellings, and warmed my 
 heart towards those very human people of long-past 
 ages, in a way that no conventional museum nor expo- 
 sition had ever succeeded in doing. It seemed to me 
 like the garret of a great house, to which its inmates 
 had just been casting their worn-out finery; and that 
 I should find them all alive again on descending the 
 stairs, walking about in costumes and amongst furn- 
 ishings like these thrown aside. It was a unique ex- 
 perience, a unique opportunity, in this modern world 
 with its sad, eternal sameness ; which — alas — can 
 no longer be repeated at this spot. For the good dame 
 informed me that they were even now at work classi- 
 fying and arranging this heterogeneous mass, to shape 
 it into a fine museum with formal rooms and ordered 
 cases ; — another display to chill the heart and under- 
 standing. 
 
 Chief of all the treasures which this mine produced 
 for me were a score of extraordinary trecento frescoes, 
 that had been transferred bodily on strips of plaster 
 from an ancient church now turned into a barrack. 
 They hung upon the walls of the first long hall I en- 
 tered, illumining its dusty shade with their still bright 
 hues, in broad, soft masses ; and their lovely, rounded 
 forms, with charming eyes, smiled at me from glowing 
 medieval groups, — feminine saints performing mira- 
 cles, or going to their execution. But that which made 
 me stop to consider was their power of execution, the 
 moulding of those well-drawn figures, the way in 
 which they stood forth from the level real and tangible, 
 — a wonderful ability in a painter of the fourteenth 
 century. There were few indeed, closely following 
 
206 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Giotto, who could learn that power. And these strong 
 figures were naturally yet gracefully arranged, in 
 compositions of dramatic vigor, speaking their parts 
 with elevated sincerity and effect. Who could this 
 painter he? I had never seen his work before. The 
 woman also did not know. But when we descended, 
 the professor in knee-breeches answered me, with a 
 shout of amazement, — " Tommaso da Modena!" 
 
 Why, of course; who else could it have been? But 
 if Tommaso possessed such powers as these, it is a 
 pity they are not more widely known. I decided to re- 
 pair at once to inspect his other works, at the great 
 Dominican Church of S. Niccolo. 
 
 Before leaving the Museum buildings I looked out 
 of a rear window at the extensive stretch of woodland 
 behind them. Here, in the very northwest corner of 
 the city, was a wide area of groves and gardens, once 
 the private grounds of nobles, which the Signory were 
 now converting, with the aid of paths and shrubbery, 
 into an attractive public park. When finished, it will 
 be an addition to Treviso's beauties that should de- 
 light any visitor from the North, longing for the shade 
 and coolness of his native wealds. 
 
 S. Niccolo, really the principal sight of the city, 
 stands in its southwestern corner, approached by a 
 long, straight, wide thoroughfare of the same name, 
 that leads directly west from Via Vittorio Emanuele, 
 shortly below the hotel. This street widens, halfway, 
 into the Piazza Bressa; and upon this piazza's north- 
 ern side I found the town's most interesting house: 
 a Renaissance dwelling, covered upon its stuccoed 
 f agade with frescoes of extraordinary preservation, — 
 frescoes of huge, saintly figures, arrayed in the long- 
 hose and puffed sleeves of the middle cinquecento, — 
 powerful, well-moulded figures with thick necks, glow- 
 
TREVISO 207 
 
 ing with brilliant colors, — the figures of Pordenone. 
 This is the only fagade remaining to us of the several 
 which that artist painted here, — and one of the very, 
 very few remaining anywhere in Italy from the hand 
 of an old master of the first rank. 
 
 As far again beyond this, loomed up the giant struc- 
 ture of the Dominican church upon the left; it is a 
 Gothic edifice of the beginning of the trecento, — 
 erected under the direction of Pope Benedict XI, who 
 was an inmate of its monastery, — and has been for 
 its many treasures constituted a national monument. 
 Its face is to the west, its left side towards the street. 
 The red brick exterior, pierced by lancet windows, 
 presented to me no special merit; and I entered by the 
 great front doorway, as the sun was sinking in a sea of 
 gold. 
 
 Ah! what a mighty, dusk-laden interior was this, 
 soaring on colossal white pillars to indefinite heights, 
 traversed by slender light-rays from the lofty windows, 
 and crowned in the far distance by a glistening altar 
 under a curving apse, in the centre of which glowed a 
 great and radiant picture from a golden frame; through 
 the chiaroscuro, breathing the incense of centuries, 
 filtered softly, sweetly, the old hues of saintly frescoes 
 from every pillar and wall, smiling from quaint figures 
 in medieval garb. How strange was this effect, — to 
 behold on each large white column a form of heroic 
 size, faintly lustrous, livened by the dusk, martial in 
 mail and sword or holy in flowing vestments; while 
 many others gazed with them at the visitor from the 
 walls of the stuccoed aisles. 
 
 Recovering from the first weird sensation, I saw 
 that they were all, or nearly all, trecento work; the 
 executors had been Tommaso da Modena, chiefly, and 
 several fellow artists; those of Tommaso being clearly 
 
208 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 distinguished by their superiority of drawing and 
 moulding, having natural rounded faces with keen 
 eyes of strong expressiveness. Especially lovely was 
 his St. Agnes, immediately to the left, with the tiny 
 lamb nestling in her left hand, — also the St. Cather- 
 ine, on the fourth column to the right. Behind the 
 latter, on the wall of the right aisle, there glowered 
 suddenly before me a form so gigantic and monstrous 
 as to take my breath away, — a bare-legged Colossus, 
 forty feet in height, strange and terrible for a second 
 in the masking eventide. But it was only a fresco of 
 St. Christopher, painted by Antonio da Treviso in 
 1410, — perhaps the largest painted figure in exist- 
 ence. 
 
 The noble proportions of this vast edifice, one of 
 the few grandest Gothic interiors of Italy, struck me 
 with a keen delight, — so free and majestic are the 
 lines. Lofty, striped, pointed arches leap from one 
 mighty column to another, and rise triumphally before 
 and behind the choir, whose apse is luminous with 
 seven tall lancet windows; the arched roof is of the 
 wooden construction of the Eremetani of Padua, soar- 
 ing buoyantly far above the gleaming marble floor. 
 No chapel recesses break the sweeping lines of the con- 
 fining walls; but little altars stand against them, one 
 in each bay, under its two lofty windows. 
 
 Over the main doorway I saw another quaint early 
 fresco, of the Annunciation; the great church is a gen- 
 uine gallery of primitive artists, a class all by itself. 
 But I went on to the later paintings around the apse. 
 In the chapel to the right of the choir, over the altar, 
 is the famous large canvas of Sebastiano del Piombo, 
 representing the risen Christ surrounded by the twelve 
 apostles, all standing, and St. Thomas putting his 
 fingers to the wound in the Saviour's side; while under- 
 
TKP:VI,S<J. ANNUNCIATION. iTIZIANO.) 
 
TREVISO 209 
 
 neath appear the half-figures of six proud Trevisans, 
 priests and women. It is a splendid work, of noble 
 dignity and earnestness, exceedingly rich in tone and 
 coloring, — so grand, indeed, that many insist it to 
 be a production of Giovanni Bellini. Upon the walls 
 of this chapel are other frescoes by Tommaso da 
 Modena, similar in style and merit to those upon the 
 columns. 
 
 On entering the choir my heart was lifted in delight 
 by two superb products of the Renaissance. On its 
 left wall before the altar stands the celebrated tomb 
 of Count Agostino Onigo, — one of the finest accom- 
 plishments, if not the masterpiece, of Pietro and 
 TuUio Lombardi: two beautiful marble sarcophagi, 
 one above the other, both exquisitely enriched by 
 delicate reliefs, project from the wall within a large 
 marble oval, - — the lower supported by two heavy 
 corbels, the upper by fanciful lion's claws resting on 
 the former; the lower adorned at its centre and angles 
 with three lovely putti holding horns of plenty, and 
 between them, two wreaths of fruited branches con- 
 taining fine Roman heads in profile; the upper cut 
 with a spread eagle in centre, and round about it the 
 daintiest possible arabesques of convoluted foliage. 
 From one corbel to the other, another garland, pon- 
 derously rich, depends in a semicircle, enclosing a 
 porphyry medallion with marble wings; and on the 
 top of all stand three striking marble forms: the Count- 
 Senator in the middle, stem and powerful, with his 
 square, clean-shaven face and robe of honor, — two 
 charming little pages at the sides, in doublet, long- 
 hose and flowing curls, each holding a shield with the 
 Onigo lion rampant, each a perfect foil to the dignity 
 of the noble. But this is not all: for around the 
 marble oval is a huge frame of bright arabesques in 
 
210 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 color, and at its foot to right and left, two splendid 
 cinquecento warriors in glowing finery, so naturally 
 painted that they stand forth tangible, in their 
 haughty pride. By many this frescoing is called the 
 work of Bellini; but more likely it is that of Jacopo 
 de' Barbari. There are few monuments like this, — 
 so successful, on such a scale, in its charming combina- 
 tion of the two branches of art. 
 
 The other masterpiece here is that great picture 
 which glistens down the nave from the centre of the 
 apse- wall, high above and behind the altar; as I 
 stepped nearer, it opened upon me with a refulgent 
 glory almost divine, — the radiance of form and color 
 characteristic of those chefs d'oeuvre that glorified the 
 Renaissance, and made Italy the treasure-casket of 
 the world. Like the sunset which I had left without, 
 its gorgeous colors burst from the glowing tone; in 
 a celestial atmosphere the Madonna sat enthroned, 
 amidst saintly figures of monks and bishops, of bea- 
 tific serenity. Seldom have I seen a more perfect, 
 clean-cut execution than this, which caused the forms 
 to stand forth living beings, and beings of superhuman 
 beauty, with their spiritual faces and glossy robes. 
 Between them, on a velvet carpet over marble steps, 
 reclined a flowing-haired angel of celestial loveliness, 
 playing softly on a psaltery with rapt, upturned gaze; 
 but loveliest of all was the sweet Madonna, over 
 whose gentle head rose the high, ornate back of the 
 marble throne, and, still higher, the curving dome of 
 the covering pavilion, whose marble arches opened 
 upon a sky of cumulous white clouds. 
 
 Whose hand made this wondrous thing of beauty, 
 worthy of Titian or Palma.? It was a pair of hands, — 
 Fra Marco Pensabene, of Venice, the Dominican, who 
 commenced the work, and Girolamo Savoldo, of 
 
TREVISO 211 
 
 Brescia, who completed it ; the latter's paintings are 
 distinguished for their high beauty and finish, for this 
 same depth of tone and color, and refinement of draw- 
 ing, while no such other splendid relic of the former's 
 brush is known; so I conceive this to be chiefiy the 
 product of Savoldo's genius. Says the critic, Professor 
 Giovanni Milanese, — " Gli artisti sentono una mano 
 che seppe fondere insieme il magico colorire del Gior- 
 gione col divino disegnare di Raffaele." ^ 
 
 When I had turned at last from this delight, and 
 was glancing at the curious baroque monument of 
 Pope Benedict XI on the right wall, in which the Pope 
 is sculptured as seated between two cherubs, before a 
 wildly tossing curtain, — a gentle voice at my side an- 
 nounced the abbot of the monastery, the Reverend 
 Professor Ogniben, a man of charming culture and 
 deportment. He chatted a while engagingly about his 
 artistic treasures, and then led me to the sacristy and 
 the adjacent cloister. In the former he discovered to 
 me two canvases of Palma Giovane, and out of the 
 latter opened a square chamber of exceptional interest, 
 — the old oratory of the friars, dating from at least 
 1170. In the centre of the rear wall a large Byzantine 
 fresco of the Crucifixion confronted me, executed 
 about that date, but remarkably preserved. Two 
 saints stood beside the nude, contorted form of the 
 dying Saviour; four angels, likewise weeping, appeared 
 in the air above; and under quaint wooden canopies at 
 the sides were Saints Paul and Peter; — altogether a 
 work, for that period, of wonderfully good drawing 
 and sincere expression. 
 
 This room was called, after the fresco, the Cappella 
 del Crocefisso. All around the ancient walls other 
 
 • The artists perceive a hand that knew how to mingle the magic col- 
 oring of Giorgione with the divine designing o£ Raphael. 
 
212 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 painted figures looked down upon me, primitive also, 
 but so realistic and lifelike as to excite a still greater 
 surprise; they were all Dominican friars, seated each 
 within a little cell, before a table laden with books or 
 parchments, reading or writing, with their earnest 
 faces highly individualized, — faithful portraits, as 
 was evident, of brothers who had made their mark in 
 the world. Here were, as the inscriptions indicated. 
 Saints Pietro Martire and Thomas Aquinas, Popes 
 Innocent V and Benedict XI, and many that had 
 earned fame in other ways. But my surprise at such 
 realistic modeling and expression in works evidently of 
 the trecento, was dissipated when the good abbot re- 
 vealed the author, — "Tommaso da Modena." I 
 thanked him when I left, for opening my eyes to the 
 full merits of that little known artist; and he sent next 
 day to my hotel an illustrated booklet of seventy-five 
 pages devoted to the beauties of S. Niccolo. Before 
 departing, however, I made with the courteous father 
 another round of the church, in which he pointed out 
 to me several of its minor jewels: another canvas or 
 two of Palma Giovane, an attractive altar-top by 
 Girolamo Campagna, a picture by Francesco Bassano, 
 and other works of lesser interest, including one by 
 Marco Vecellio. 
 
 After this visit I had but one more to pay in Tre- 
 viso, — which took me, the next day, back to the cen- 
 tral piazza where I had begun. The handsome Renais- 
 sance structures at its southern angle are twain, 
 connected by a high arcade; the right-hand loggia, of 
 the fire and telegraph building, being supported on 
 Doric columns encased in rings; the left-hand loggia 
 consisting of rusticated arches, bearing an upper story 
 of three windows, with coupled Ionic half-columns 
 between them and at the angles. In this piano nobile 
 
TREVISO 213 
 
 were three large chambers, in which I found the city's 
 collection of paintings now established, — though not 
 yet entirely hung. Two of the rooms contained works 
 of the Renaissance period, mostly of small account; 
 the third, some good modern canvases, including sev- 
 eral of high merit. 
 
 In the first chamber I enjoyed two fine portraits by 
 Leandro Bassano, of a young man and his wife, and a 
 picture of a Dominican monk by Lorenzo Lotto, of 
 much naturalism and individuality. In the second room 
 were, amongst many others, a sublime Madonna by 
 Giovanni Bellini; a Holy Family with Saints Roch and 
 Sebastian, by Paolo Veronese, not well composed, but 
 having graceful figures superbly modeled; one of Tin- 
 toretto's lifelike portraits, of Bartolommeo, the father 
 of Bianca Capello; a splendid Adoration of the Magi 
 by an unknown hand, possessing an extensive hilly 
 landscape graduated softly from brown hues to blue, 
 and beautifully toned and colored; also two exquisite 
 works by Paris Bordone, — the first a Madonna on a 
 high pedestal, before a stretch of pretty country, with 
 a baby angel at her feet and two saints at the sides, — 
 the second (claimed by some to be a Palma Vecchio, 
 and very much in his style), being a most lovely Holy 
 Family, very rich in hues, graceful, and skillfully 
 lighted, with softest and most attractive fleshwork, — 
 a painting of the very first rank. This was, it is true, 
 a small collection for Italy; but what countless enco- 
 miums would it not bring forth, what offers of count- 
 less gold, if it could be bodily transported across the 
 sea. 
 
 There is another Lorenzo Lotto, perhaps finer than 
 any of the foregoing canvases, just outside of Treviso, 
 in the village church of S. Cristina, five miles distant; 
 it is a Madonna enthroned with saints, of his usual high 
 
214 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 sensuousness and gorgeous coloring, and to my mind 
 well worth the drive. But there is a far greater object 
 to be visited from this city, — the renowned Villa 
 Giacomelli, perhaps the most artistic of all those 
 numerous chateaux that were built about the country 
 by the patricians of Venice.' It stands just at the foot 
 of the Alps, some fifteen miles northwest of Treviso 
 and ten miles east of Bassano; easily to be visited, 
 therefore, by carriage from the latter place, but more 
 comfortably by rail from Treviso to Cornuda, three 
 miles distant. There, where the slopes of the foothills 
 commence, just without the little village of Maser, 
 this monument of the Renaissance was raised by the 
 prominent Venetian family of Barbaro, — Marcanto- 
 nio Barbaro, Procurator of St. Mark, and his brother 
 Daniele, the Patriarch of Aquileia, — and was made 
 immortal by the conjoint labor of three of the great- 
 est artists of the age. Palladio designed the palace, 
 Paolo Veronese painted it, Alessandro Vittoria en- 
 riched it with his sculptures. 
 
 What a vision is raised for us by the sound of those 
 three names together; where else is there such a resid- 
 ence, constructed in all three branches of art by the 
 leading masters of its period? The fame of Villa Bar- 
 baro soon resounded far and wide when it was finished, 
 raising it at once to a chief place in the galaxy of 
 Venetian country-houses, celebrated by visiting artists 
 and literati, and the scene subsequently of many a 
 fSte of the great world in the seventeenth and eight- 
 
 ' A third trip that should be taken from Treviso, by travelers endowed 
 with time, is by rail up the valley of the Piave to Feltre and Belluno; a 
 journey of delightful scenery, which reaches its maximum at Belluno, upon 
 its isolated lofty rock girdled by great mountain ranges. The city is 
 picturesque also in its winding medieval streets, shadowed by quaint old 
 houses and dignified palaces of the Renaissance; it has a fine Titian, a 
 Cathedral by Palladio, and charming walks on all sides. 
 
MASER. VILLA I ilAC'l l.MELLI. CENTRAL I'AVILKJX. 
 
 
 
 V. 
 
 
 
 
 Wt" te 
 
 
 JAj 
 
 k .^^ 
 
 
 
 B {^M 
 
 1 
 
 fl 
 
 
 |i'"j^H|| 
 
 y^ 
 
 
 
 k^ 
 
 !#' ^ 
 
 fe^^^ 
 
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 ^^HIk^^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 ^^^^^^Eii 
 
 MASER. VILLA GIAC(J.MELL[ EXTKANCE, WITH i-(JUXTAlN AND 
 LITTLE TEJU'LE. 
 
TREVISO 215 
 
 eenth centuries.^ In it died Lodovico Marin, the last 
 Doge of Venice, to the possession of whose family it 
 had passed; from the Marin it descended through 
 marriage to the Masena family, and from them by 
 similar process'to the Giacomelli, by whose name it is 
 to-day generally known. 
 
 One bright morning, therefore, I was rolling north- 
 westward across the plain toward the mountains, on 
 the line that climbs the valley of the Piave to Feltre 
 and Belluno; and I watched the Alpine wall come 
 steadily closer and higher, while the train slowly 
 abated its momentum on the ever increasing grade of 
 the unseen slope. Away on each side stretched the 
 smiling fields of corn and vine, the vineyards radiating 
 far rows of stunted trees, from which the garlands 
 swung glistening with bright leaf and tendril and new- 
 fledged grape : — 
 
 I must say 
 That Italy 's a pleasant place to me. 
 Who love to see the sunshine every day. 
 And vines (not nailed to walls) from tree to tree 
 Festooned, much like the back scene of a play.' 
 
 At the town of Montebello, where joins the branch 
 from Castelfranco and Padua, we met the first of the 
 foothills; behind it came a wild stretch of wooded 
 country, undulating in long swells, over which the 
 engine panted slowly to the second line of hills. At 
 their very feet I disembarked, in the scattered village 
 of Cornuda; and securing a little vehicle, started west- 
 ward on the old highway to Asolo and Bassano. 
 
 It was a delightful drive: the road was level, but on 
 
 1 It was here that Lord Burlington — who was enamored of Palladio's 
 works, and had made a journey into Italy in order to hunt down some of 
 his lost designs — claimed to have discovered a number of the great mas- 
 ter's plans and notes, which the English nobleman published in his eu- 
 logium of 1730. ' Lord Byron, Beppo. 
 
216 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 both sides of this restricted upland section of the plain 
 rose the hills' dark, wooded flanks, loftier on the north, 
 — dotted amidst their umbrageous wildness with 
 occasional white villages topped by campanili, with 
 towered gray castles, and glistening villas. The floor 
 of the vale was richly cultivated; but here too were 
 trees in exceptional abundance, in groves and orchards, 
 shading the gardens and lining the fields. It did not 
 seem like Italy, nor did the frequent farmhouses along 
 the road, except for the old, broken, stucco walls, and 
 front barnyards littered with refuse and manure. 
 Venice was like Florence in the peace that she gave her 
 territory, permitting living upon the soil at an age 
 when everywhere else it was impossible. For the same 
 reason her patricians could build country-places of 
 beauty, instead of fortified castles, from the cinque- 
 cento downward. 
 
 The fine, hard road wound along between hedges 
 and trees, fields of Indian corn and wheat, vineyards 
 and orchards; now and then we passed a group of peas- 
 ants traveling in their regular mode, — packed five 
 or six into a tiny two-wheeled cart without seat or 
 springs, their heavy boots dangling from front and 
 rear, as they sat on the bottom back to back, their 
 round red faces peering curiously from beneath large 
 caps, over the big market-baskets upon their laps. 
 After some three quarters of an hour we traversed the 
 straggling village street of Maser, and just beyond 
 it came to a beautiful, classic, stuccoed church at the 
 left of the road, with glittering white columns and 
 ornate pediment; it was the chapel of the Villa Gia- 
 comelli, constructed in 1580.* 
 
 ^ This wag also Palladio's work, and is ornamented by the plaster- 
 sculpture of Vittoria. The latter executed the adjacent ornamental foun- 
 tain, in the middle of the road, which is a faithful example of the taste of 
 the later cinquecento. 
 
VILLA GIACOMELLI 217 
 
 Near by were a large sculptured fountain, in the 
 very decorative style of the Late-Renaissance, and a 
 large closed gateway on the right, through whose bars I 
 saw a graveled avenue leading straightaway up a long 
 slope, between brick parapets crowned at intervals by 
 charming little statues of putti. At the upper end of 
 this pleasing vista, unshaded by any trees, stretched 
 the long, imposing fagade of the villa itself, glittering 
 marble-like over the green fields and across the fertile 
 valley. What an admirable, commanding situation 
 this was; and how the whiteness of its stuccoed columns 
 and arcades gleamed in the sun, against the wood of 
 tall pines rising darkly behind! 
 
 In the centre, looking directly down the avenue, 
 projected a graceful, two-storied pavilion, with four 
 Ionic half-columns supporting a pediment filled with 
 a sculptured tableau; from this centre ran somewhat 
 lower arcades to right and to left, — simple stuccoed 
 arches on stucco piers, with sloping red-tiled roofs, 
 and two stories of windows gazing from under them; 
 at the ends were pavilions, rising on similar arches 
 more widely spaced, which had no openings in their 
 upper floors, but instead, large painted sun-dials. 
 Before the front door lay a handsome circular flower- 
 bed, with four marble divinities standing around it; 
 other statues adorned the plot before the villa, and the 
 glitter was complemented by a series of tall white chim- 
 neys rising from the tiles. I walked on slowly up the 
 driveway, and, as I did so, thought of the countless il- 
 lustrious guests that had walked here in past days, — 
 warriors, statesmen, artists, poets, — the grieat men 
 of three successive centuries. 
 
 I bent my steps to a door in the right arcade, intro- 
 duced myself to the housekeeper, a very pleasant 
 person, learned that the proprietors were fortunately 
 
218 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 absent, and hence received a permission to look over 
 the piano nobile. One of the finest traits of the Italian 
 nobility is the gracious readiness with which they 
 suffer strangers to inspect their homes. A maid who 
 was detailed to guide me led the way up the main 
 staircase, from the beginning of the right arcade to 
 the rear hall of the central pavilion; this last was a 
 large square chamber, with gleaming white parietes 
 illumined by a flood of light from the back windows 
 and doorway, with a handsome dining-table in the 
 centre, and rich furniture and canvases about the 
 walls. But that which irradiated the apartment with 
 gorgeous hues was its lofty arched ceiling, brilliantly 
 painted from end to end, representing a heaven of white 
 rolling clouds, peopled with a beautiful, spectacular 
 assemblage of classic gods and goddesses. 
 
 It was the Olympus of ancient Greece; and upon the 
 wall over the entrance glowed a banquet scene, at 
 which the diners here below doubtless often looked 
 up, quaffing their wine in jovial imitation of the gods 
 and their cups of nectar. Above the windows shone 
 another such Olympic tableau; and along the upper 
 sides extended realistic balustrades, upon whose rail- 
 ings leaned silken cinquecento figures, returning the 
 gaze of those below, in the company of monkeys, dogs, 
 and parrots, — inevitable companions of the Renais- 
 sance nobility. The frescoing was completed by single 
 figures of Olympians on the four pendentives of the 
 vaulting. All these many graceful divinities, in their 
 more or less nude forms of splendid modeling and lus- 
 trous flesh, their brilliantly tinted, flowing draperies 
 and hair, their beautiful countenances and impressive 
 mien, — radiated the joys of life, the harmonies of 
 art, the pleasures of the table, the enchantments of 
 fair women, the bliss of paradise, on sumptuous waves 
 
VILLA GIACOMELLI 219 
 
 of color that must have inspired the mortal banqueters 
 with a like felicity. 
 
 Paolo Cagliari was in the very prime of his powers, 
 between fifty and sixty years of age, when with his 
 magic brush, rioting in those dreams of carnal happi- 
 ness and magnificence that most quickened it, he 
 lifted this chamber to the immortality which is here 
 depicted. With the constant increase of his fame and 
 wealth, love of splendor and ostentation had grown 
 upon him, step by step with his own joyous revelings, 
 till it spread itself resplendent in these gorgeous scenes 
 of feasting and mythology, and produced elsewhere 
 those strange gigantic canvases of banquets glittering 
 in princely pomp. Then he could no longer portray a 
 group of simple piety, — a picture that would speak 
 to the heart; and when he tried, the martyrdom that 
 was attempted emerged as a glistening show of silks 
 and jewels. So was produced that Death of S. Gius- 
 tina at Padua, and the great Marriage of Cana in the 
 Louvre. Strangest of all, but perfectly typical of the 
 epoch, Paolo at the same time asserted a piety pro- 
 found, and was constant in his churchly devotions. 
 Only a few years after painting this villa, in 1588, he 
 died in the very "odor of sanctity." 
 
 The full, complete beauty of this dining-hall was 
 not, however, revealed to me until I stepped to the open 
 doorway in the rear, — to be struck by a sight that 
 held me motionless : a little garden lay before me, level 
 with the fioor, holding in its centre a basin of water 
 with a tinkling fountain; and behind it, close at hand, 
 circling round upon all sides, rose a wall of stucco 
 shaped into one great mass of sculpture, glistening and 
 coruscating in the dazzling sunlight enough to blind 
 the unexpecting eyes. This, then, was Vittoria's addi- 
 tion to the palace, — a statued garden such as no other 
 
220 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 age would have produced. The wall sloped upward to 
 a flat central gable, under which an archway formed 
 the entrance to a grotto, guarded by two giant forms 
 leaning against the jambs, — Atlantes supporting the 
 entablature; while over the entablature, and all around 
 the curving walls, shone a score of other gleaming 
 figures, nude and beautiful, from the midst of gar- 
 lands, putti, niches, shields, and piles of ancient arms, 
 all executed in high-relief. One large garland of fruits 
 drooped across the arch-top, supported by two lovely, 
 winged, female divinities leaning upon its quarters, — 
 a very unique and charming design; above their heads 
 rose the peak of the long, flat gable, having a heavy, 
 block cornice, and at their sides, in the angles be- 
 tween the eaves and lower cornice, glowed the joyous 
 reds and blues of two oblong frescoes in rococo frames, 
 — Venus playing with Cupid, in cinquecento coiffure, 
 and little else. 
 
 Under the cornice on both sides were niches at inter- 
 vals, containing the statues, with panels of arms be- 
 tween them, and drooping garlands mounted astride 
 by the most charming cherubs. The whole construc- 
 tion was surmounted, on the front of its peak, by an- 
 other moulded Venus, whose form shone like living 
 alabaster against the black pines towering behind. 
 Such was the classical vision that poured its irides- 
 cent curves through the wide openings of the salon, 
 to complement the painted paradise overhead. 
 
 My guide now opened a door in the left wall, and 
 revealed four successive chambers on that side, all 
 looking upon the garden, luxuriously furnished as 
 bed- and living-rooms, and bearing evidences of late 
 occupation. Upon their ceilings disported the Greek 
 immortals of Veronese in decorative poses, though few 
 in number compared with the hall; in the first room 
 
MASEK, VILLA GIACl_)-MELLI IiP:TAIL OF WALL. (PAOLO VEIKJXESE.j 
 
VILLA GIACOMELLI 221 
 
 was also a lovely fresco of Madonna and Child; in 
 the last, a very handsome canopied bed of former 
 times, and upon the end wall, a painting of startling 
 deceptiveness. This was an open doorway, through 
 which a huntsman was just entering, accompanied by 
 a dog, — and his features were those of Paolo Cagliari 
 himself. He was a good-looking man, of fair beard 
 and good proportions, on whom the years sat very 
 easily, — resembling more a merry country squire than 
 one's idea of an artist. 
 
 On the other side of the hall I was shown four sim- 
 ilar rooms. The first again contained a Madonna on 
 the wall and Greek divinities on the ceiling; the third 
 was decorated in Pompeian style, with little panels 
 of pretty landscapes amongst the grotesques (not the 
 work of Cagliari) ; and in the fourth was another painted 
 open doorway on the end wall, this time admitting the 
 person of an attractive woman, — the wife of Vero- 
 nese. Thus he and she still look down the vista of the 
 rooms he glorified, through the open doorways all in 
 a line, till their glances find each other at the distant 
 ends. In this final chamber stood another gorgeous 
 bed, upon its ceiling gambolled graceful futti, and on 
 the walls were various paintings by Paolo's pupils; — 
 a bewitching ensemble, which, I fancy, would hold in 
 the country most of the year any art-lover having the 
 joy of its occupancy. 
 
 Last of all I was conducted to the main hall, which 
 occupies, the front part of the central pavilion, ad- 
 jacent to the dining-salon. It is in the form of a Greek 
 cross, with four chambers filling the corners between 
 the arms. In the centre is a four-sided divan topped 
 by a marble statue; overhead are charming arab- 
 esques covering the whole of the vaulted ceilings; and 
 round about the walls, eight frescoes by Veronese, 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 representing niches containing brightly tinted, alle- 
 gorical, female figures, — symbolizing the different 
 branches of music. But besides these, Paolo had 
 placed here two more of those curious, deceptive, 
 open doorways, apparently leading into the cham- 
 bers, — double doors in each case, with one of each 
 pair partly ajar, and two youthful figures just step- 
 ping through them, a girl and a boy, clad in the 
 pretty costumes of Paolo's age. Over all the wall- 
 spaces not so utilized, he had constructed with his 
 brush an elaborate architectual scheme in grisaille, 
 with pilasters, cornices, and little panels of designs 
 and figures; into which scheme the imitation niches 
 and doorways were carefully fitted. 
 
 Amongst these painted pilasters I also discerned a 
 number of grisaille medallions bearing heads; and my 
 guide informed me that they were likenesses of the 
 Barbaro family, and of the three great artists who had 
 labored here for them. She then opened the two front 
 rooms, always the guest-chambers of the villa, which 
 were beautiful with wood mosaic floors, ornate stucco 
 chimneys, and ceilings glowing with the opulent 
 colors of Veronese. One of these very decorative pic- 
 tures was the so-called "Matrimony," or antique 
 wedding-scene; the other, a scene of Bacchus in the 
 vintage, finely composed and modeled, radiant with 
 the spirit of Omar Khayyam, — the joy of 
 
 Beaded bubbles winking at the brim. 
 
 The scene from the windows here was fully as lovely: 
 the flowered circle with its shining marbles, the majes- 
 tic avenue lined by statues, the green, gardened slope 
 to the luxuriant valley, the dark hills against the blue 
 horizon with their forests of pines. No wonder the 
 Venetian patricians loved to linger here, with beauty 
 surrounding them both within and without. 
 
VILLA GIACOMELLI 223 
 
 The grandiose hall, the whole sumptuous villa, 
 are a brilliant exemplar of that old courtly life of 
 gay villeggiatura; also — I thought, as I wended my 
 way back to Treviso — of the utter artificiality of 
 the Renaissance society of the decadence, when the 
 elaborate social forms and ceremonies were as hollow 
 as the stucco imitations roundabout. Then did men 
 forget that underlying first principle upon which true 
 art must stand, upon which had been erected the fab- 
 ric of its glory when the Renaissance was young, — 
 that principle which Browning has so well expressed: 
 
 It is the glory and the good of Art, 
 
 That Art remains the one way possible 
 
 Of speaking truth, to mouths like mine at least.^ 
 
 ' Robert Browning, The Ring and the Book. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 PROM TKEVISO TO UDINE 
 
 We've sent our souls out from the rigid north. 
 On bare white feet which would not print nor bleed. 
 To climb the Alpine passes, and look forth 
 Where booming low the Lombard rivers lead 
 To gardens, vineyards, all a dream is worth. 
 
 — Mbs. Browning, Casa Guidi Windows. 
 
 Northward, along the great highway of the centuries, 
 laid deep and lasting by Roman arms, the highway 
 plodded over by such countless caravans of merchants, 
 on their way to and from the countries of the north 
 and east, the highway tramped by so many imperial 
 armies on their march to Thrace and Syria, by so 
 many barbaric hosts on their way to the mastery of 
 Rome, — Alaric with his Visigoths, Attila with his 
 Huns, Theodoric with his Ostrogoths, Alboin with his 
 Lombards; — what would all those myriads have 
 thought, in what deadly fear would those conquerors 
 have fallen prostrate, could they have beheld this giant 
 demon of steel and fire that whirled me over their 
 storied route! 
 
 Here was the mile-wide bed of the dashing Piave, 
 which used to hold their legions in check a month or 
 more, when its spring flood burst from the confining 
 mountains over the helpless plain, — now a huge desert 
 of cobbles and boulders shining brightly in the sun, 
 over which the train crawled carefully on shaky spans, 
 finding to-day naught of that hurtling deluge, but a 
 peaceful little stream meandering through the stones.^ 
 
 ' The great problem of the Veneto has ever been the confining to one 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 225 
 
 On its farther side the Alpine wall loomed closely 
 now, upon the left, sweeping from southwest to the 
 far northeast, faced by gentler, tree-clad hills, that 
 gleamed with villages and castles. On one of those 
 smiling heights edging the plain there stood, I knew, 
 the grand old. castle of S. Salvatore, rendered famous 
 by the brush of Pordenone; the highway bent west- 
 ward to it, through the adjacent village of Susegana, 
 which lay in a dell hidden from my sight. But stead- 
 ily, as we ran on, the train approached the base of the 
 hills, and in a few miles came against it, at the station 
 of Conegliano. I disembarked, deposited my luggage 
 at the parcel-room, and emerged into a stately, tree- 
 lined avenue leading straightaway west to the massed 
 buildings of the town, surmounted by a height with 
 a ruined castle. 
 
 There stands an ancient castle 
 On yonder mountain-height. 
 Where, fenced with door and portal. 
 Once tarried steed and knight.' 
 
 It was a beautiful vista: over the white walls and 
 red roofs rose ponderous old campanili; over them all 
 mounted the steep hillside, its vineyards unbroken but 
 for the battlemented wall climbing on the left from one 
 shattered tower to another; and adjacent to the grim 
 keep of the castle, surrounded by the sentinel spires 
 of tall cypresses, glistened a villa with a classic, col- 
 course of these numerous rivers across the plain; whose flooded onrush, 
 in the steep and comparatively short descent between the Alps and the 
 sea, not only carried into the latter the washed soil of the mountains, but 
 swept away the precious earth of the level, leaving behind only a desert of 
 broken rock. Modem engineering science has succeeded in binding them 
 with mighty dikes, whose summits have continually to be raised, as the 
 beds of the streams rise year by year. Even then, breaks and disastrous 
 washouts often occur, in times of unusual rain, spreading desolation over 
 large tracts of country. 
 ' Translated from Goethe by Aytoun and Martin. 
 
226 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 umned fagade. As I gazed, I thought of the stormy 
 ages that had rolled over this little, out-of-the-way, 
 but important city. 
 
 Conegliano, as I have said, was always the junction 
 of the two great highways to the north and east, and 
 therefore a link in the chain of communication that 
 no power would ignore. She was a fortress, perched 
 upon this battlemented hill, controlling the trafl5c of 
 the two routes at her will. In the ages of Rome's de- 
 cline she suffered the perils of her location, in siege 
 and sack and destruction by the passing invaders, 
 over and over, — another little section of those bar- 
 baric horrors that never were written in detail and 
 man will never know. In the succeeding Middle Ages, 
 she rested long under the hard yoke^ of the Trevisan 
 Republic, and was then successively taken by Ezzelino, 
 the Delia Carrara, and Delia Scala, — until, along 
 with Treviso and the rest of the Marches, she found 
 rest and safety in the bosom of the Serene Republic. 
 
 Venice then rebuilt the castle that overlooked the 
 town, and re-strengthened the protecting walls that 
 crept down from it to envelop the buildings at the foot 
 of the slope, installing a podestd that governed hence- 
 forth, from a seat more commanding than in any other 
 of her towns save Brescia. In the following century 
 the artist was born who did more to make Conegliano 
 known than all the incidents of her history. Gian 
 Battista Cima was a boy in those very streets before 
 me, under the shadow of the great fortress of the 
 podesta which made such a lasting impression upon his 
 
 ' That the yoke of Treviso over the Marshes was hard, we find by such 
 entries as this in the annals of Friuli: "In 1164 war is begun upon Treviso 
 by the league of the Coneglianesi with Ceneda and with Ottone, Bishop 
 of Belluno, protected by Valdarico, the Patriarch of Aquileia, who ex- 
 horted them to free themselves from obedience to the Trevisans." — F. di 
 Manzano's compilation of the Annali del Friuli. (Author's trans.) 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 227 
 
 mind; but the impression of the Alpine peaks was 
 stronger still, and when he had wandered to Venice 
 in search of artistic learning, drawn by the marble 
 city like steel to a magnet, those gentle pictures which 
 he soon began to produce under the influence of Gian 
 Bellini, full of golden tones and pietistic peace, carried 
 always in their backgrounds the line of his native hills. 
 
 Thence did the Venetians name him Cima, — the 
 Italian word for mountain-top, — Cima da Conegli- 
 ano. At the mention of that name, what lovely visions 
 rise before us, what inspired, holy figures, full of grace 
 and dignity, lost in ecstatic contemplations, standing 
 in idyllic landscapes, — whose distant towered castle 
 with flanking walls was the frowning memory of the 
 child. But he dearly loved his native place; — often, 
 as time went on, he returned to visit it, and took a 
 share in filling its streets with joyous colors on their 
 house-fronts. 
 
 "Amongst rude decorations of this kind at Cone- 
 gliano we notice a slender neatness and regularity in 
 delineations of the human shape, and a reddish tinge of 
 flesh, familiar to Cima: yet Cima's productions have 
 little else to remind us of local influences, and we are 
 at a loss to name an artist in Friuli to whom he owes 
 any marked feature of his style." ^ Besides these fres- 
 coes, now entirely vanished, he executed for the Duomo 
 one of his finest canvases, — a large Madonna and 
 Saints, the chief sight and treasure of his city to- 
 day. 
 
 The avenue extending from the station was not 
 long; and advancing down it I came soon to a wide 
 transverse thoroughfare along the base of the hill, 
 faced upon the east side with three- and four-storied 
 stuccoed buildings of modern appearance, containing 
 
 * Crowe and Cavalcaselle. 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 shops and caffes. Upon its west side stretched gardens 
 of shrubbery and flowers, some twenty-five yards in 
 width, backed by closely set, rear walls of dwellings, 
 of even height; and these curved gently with the 
 street line as it swept to north and south, circling 
 with the foot of the hill. Then the truth broke sud- 
 denly upon me : this was the line of the vanished city 
 wall, that once stood with its moat upon the ground 
 now covered by these gardens, — leaving the houses 
 that had risen just within the wall as the present 
 demarcation of the ancient burg. Directly before me, 
 looking down the road to the station, where once had 
 opened the main gateway of the fortress, now opened 
 a corresponding entrance through the line of old build- 
 ings, — a wide, deep, shadowy passage beneath them, 
 entered by a triple archway, and approached by a 
 cement-flagged promenade. 
 
 Through this modern gateway, and up and down 
 this main street that formerly had been but a road 
 outside the fortification, throngs of people were con- 
 tinually passing; it was a very busy scene, enlivened 
 further by bicycles and crowds of peasants' vehicles. 
 Over the roofs of the wall of houses, to the left, rose 
 one ancient touch, — a huge, heavy, Romanesque 
 campanile, with a belfry of three arches, capped by a 
 pointed Byzantine cupola, speaking of countless age 
 in every line and crumbling stone; it was — as I soon 
 learned — the campanile of the Cathedral. Far higher, 
 behind it, soared the green slope of the hill, to the 
 great, black donjon glowering down still as when the 
 podesta kept watch from it over the city and plain. 
 
 I approached and traversed the gateway, coming 
 out within upon the central piazza of the old town, a 
 fair-sized, stone-paved, empty space, burning fiercely 
 in the sun, — once pleasingly named after their great 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 229 
 
 man, Cima, now weighted with the appellation of 
 Venti Settembre. On its left rose a mass of old houses, 
 hiding the side of the Duomo; on its right, the little 
 Palazzo Municipale, with a loggia on the ground floor, 
 of Renaissance design and some attempt at grace; but 
 the chief edifice looked down from the elevated rear 
 side, — a monumental, ponderous structure of decad- 
 ent Renaissance style, with heavy, bare wall-spaces 
 and classic pediments, partly Greek in effect, partly 
 Egyptian. The wide main body of it had two lofty 
 divisions, — plain, stuccoed basement and piano 
 nobile; in its centre there projected well forward and 
 to the height of a third story a massive pavilion, hold- 
 ing on its first floor as the building's chief feature a 
 large loggia, whose two middle supports were detached 
 caryatids of mammoth size and ugliness. Before the 
 three square windows of its third story stood plaster 
 statues, copies of the antique; at the ends of the main 
 body were two slight pavilions, adorned on the first 
 floor by temple-like constructions, of four heavy pilas- 
 ters and pediment, with long windows between the 
 central pilasters, before which stood two other heroic 
 statues. Other pediments crowned the loggia and cen- 
 tral pavilion, and other heavy pilasters of uncouth 
 shape framed the first-floor windows; while the three 
 doorways of the basement were not framed at all. 
 Seldom have I seen anywhere a more extraordinary 
 and peculiar design, — so ponderous and clumsy, 
 with such a bad mixture of styles; yet in spite of all, 
 retaining a certain nameless dignity and power. 
 
 This curious structure was the town's opera-house; 
 and posters were affixed to the walls announcing 
 a grand presentation of Carmen for that evening. 
 Think of it, — a country place of only ten thousand 
 inhabitants, with a huge palace for the housing of 
 
230 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 their operatic seasons. — O wonderful Italy; — where 
 else could be found such a people! 
 
 Adjacent to the gateway on the south, a handsome 
 Renaissance dwelling looked across at the theatre, 
 having elegant windows, beautifully cut as to their 
 mouldings, and one unusual corner window with a 
 balcony very richly sculptured. From the piazza the 
 street swept curving to north and south, between tall 
 old stuccoed houses, — • those on the east side forming 
 the inclosing wall; deep, shadowy arcades ran below 
 on both sides, and here and there were lingering por- 
 tions of the bright frescoes that had once embellished 
 the city. To the right I found a number of Renaissance 
 palaces, once full of grandeur and noble families, now 
 put to common uses, with stables in their ornamental 
 cortili. 
 
 Immediately to the south, on the west side of the 
 way, rose the Duomo, undistinguishable as to its 
 fagade from the rest of the row of buildings, except 
 for the abundant frescoes of Old Testament scenes 
 between the openings of the upper story; below con- 
 tinued the arcade, upon large, plastered, Gothic 
 arches; above were a number of double Romanesque 
 windows; and the paintings were remarkably pre- 
 served, both in lines and colors, affording an excellent 
 idea of the appearance of the streets of four centuries 
 ago. There were tableaux of the Deluge, King David 
 with his harp, and other Judaical incidents, not very 
 well drawn but full of bright hues and picturesqueness. 
 
 The interior, which I entered directly from the 
 arcade, proved an utter contrast from the aged fagade, 
 — an arched nave of Renaissance lines, simple and 
 regular, aisles with side chapels, and a deep choir with 
 a chapel on each hand. On the last altar to the left I 
 found the pala of Cima, — a great glowing group of 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 231 
 
 the Madonna enthroned between St. John, St. An- 
 thony, and four others, including two women. The 
 splendid tone was much darkened by age, but the 
 duskiness perhaps enhanced the grace and solidity 
 of the quiet figures, — especially the two lovely girl- 
 angels sitting at the foot of the throne and making 
 melody. As was so often the case with Cima, no pro- 
 nounced feeling nor expression emanated from the 
 persons ; but there were dreamy atmosphere, soft, har- 
 monious coloring, and a pensive, happy restfulness. 
 "In the background . . . the models of architecture 
 and ornament are taken from the cupola chapels of 
 S. Marco; the Virgin's head is of a regular Bellinesque 
 type, and the angels . . . seem inspired from those 
 of Giovanni Bellini."^ 
 
 In the wall of the chapel to the left of the choir, the 
 priests had recently constructed a grotto of imitation 
 rock, placed within it a brand-new wax Madonna, and 
 hung the sides of it with many silver-gilt h'earts; then 
 the story was sent abroad that miracles had been 
 worked by the figure, and it found countless prompt 
 believers, as such yarns always do in Italy. Already 
 the Madonna had her throng of devotees, — of whom 
 I saw several kneeling before the grotto, — and had 
 received a lot of true testimonials and valuable gifts. 
 
 I emerged and walked about the streets for a while, 
 looking mainly at the fragments of frescoes on facades, 
 in which Conegliano abounds. The famous old house 
 of the Borgo della Madonna was especially interest- 
 ing, — a three-storied structure rising on the usual 
 arcade, having the spandrils of its arches painted with 
 bright pictures, and varied cinquecento tracery over 
 the upper stories. The identity of the artist was 
 shown by a shield of arms supported by an angel, with 
 
 ' Crowe and Cavalcaselle. 
 
232 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the word "Darius," — the same Dario who worked at 
 Treviso. There are, I was told, other paintings inside 
 the house; but it was closed and I could not enter. I 
 found a number of other old fagades almost as pleas- 
 ing, of varied age and excellence, some having mot- 
 toes with the pictures ; many were in a state of preserva- 
 tion beyond that of other towns, and the figures were 
 well modeled for such decorative work, though stiff 
 and gaudily colored. 
 
 Finally, returning to the central piazza, I started 
 up the narrow way beside the theatre, to climb to the 
 castle. After passing the two higher streets parallel 
 with the main one, it turned to the left, and mounted 
 beside the old wall of circumvallation, steadily and 
 steeply, till a chapel was reached near the top, — a 
 quaint little old chapel, called the Madonna of the 
 Snows; a pretty name, which indicates the severity of 
 the winters here. Now the path turned somewhat to 
 the right 'again, between high garden walls, which 
 prevented any sight of the classic villa that I had 
 observed from below, and brought me to the summit 
 at the very foot of the castle wall, in the shadow of 
 the great tower looming far into -the blue. 
 
 Alas, this tower proved to be all that was left of the 
 once powerful fortress. It had been the donjon-keep, 
 rising upon the east, or town side, of the quadrangular 
 fortification; but of all the rest naught remained ex- 
 cept the outline of the quadrilateral, marked by walls 
 of the old stones that were but shadows of the original, 
 — all around which soared lines of spear-like cypresses. 
 The entrance was by a gate in the middle of the north 
 side. Within, where formerly had stood around the 
 courtyard palatial stone buildings full of the splendor 
 of Venetian might, now lay amidst the shadowy 
 cypresses only a ruinous graveyard of falling head- 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 233 
 
 stones. Gone were the great halls, the hundreds of 
 chambers, the courts, the stables, the battlemented 
 walls, the guarding towers, — gone so long that the 
 very memory of their centuries of glory had faded 
 from the people's minds, and the cemetery which had 
 taken their place had fallen to a like decrepitude. 
 Even the custodian was an aged, tottering wreck of 
 a human being. 
 
 The keep, to whose foot he led me, had been pre- 
 served through the superior massiveness of its con- 
 struction. Attached to its base lingered also two or 
 three ancient chambers, in which the custode dwelt, 
 with his family. I climbed the tower, from one square 
 loft to another, by ladder-like stairs mounting from 
 successive rough-boarded floors to similar ceilings; 
 and stopped in one compartment to study some pa- 
 pers affixed to the wall. One of these was a complete 
 plan of the original fortress, intensely interesting, 
 showing every portion and use of the vast structure; 
 the others were photogravures of two of Cima's most 
 renowned pictures, in whose background were clear 
 views of the castle as it looked in his day, — a mighty, 
 dark mass of towers and curtains, crowning the sugar- 
 loaf hill. 
 
 At the summit a splendid panorama lay spread 
 around me, — the city at my feet, the hazy plain 
 stretching to indefinite distance, sparkling with white- 
 walled farms and villages; the rounded hills upon the 
 other side, glowing with cultivated meadows, copses 
 of woods, and charming villas, — divided by luxuriant 
 vales, and rising gradually to the mountain-peaks, 
 bare and serrated. From the red roofs below came the 
 rattle of drums, and a chorus of bugles playing a 
 lively air, to the march of some unseen company; 
 reminding me again of the bloody sword of Mars ever 
 
234 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 hovering over this lovely landscape. The Teutons 
 may come in their legions again, some day, down this 
 highway to the richest of all plains, as they have come 
 so many times during the centuries. 
 
 Descending, I made the circuit of the walls, by the 
 tall dark cypresses, discovering on the south side a 
 picturesque modern villa with most attractive garden, 
 and at the northwest corner a partly destroyed round 
 tower of extraordinary thickness, where once the pow- 
 der of the fortress was kept. Outside the walls upon 
 the north was an open space once used for the parade, 
 where the views of the surrounding vales and hills 
 were more uninterrupted than from the keep. To the 
 northwest I saw the mountain-wall open like a wedge, 
 admitting a valley that crept from the plain far into 
 its bosom; that was where I was going, to Ceneda and 
 Serravalle at the head of that fair valley. It was the 
 old route to Belluno and the north. 
 
 But first there was another trip to be made; and 
 returning as I had mounted, to the piazza of Conegli- 
 ano, I secured a rig for the modest sum of six francs, 
 with a sleepy boy for a driver, and set out southward 
 upon the great highway to Treviso. For once the horse 
 was a lively one, — I had bargained for that, — and 
 we rattled between the buildings of the modern sojith- 
 ern extension of the town, into a suburb of recent 
 upper-class villas, like that I had seen at Treviso, -^ 
 scattered over sunny lawns, with colors that could be 
 heard miles away. The road between them, stretching 
 straightaway to the southwest as far as the eye could 
 reach, was a beautiful vista between giant plane trees, 
 which spread their welcome shade overhead and gave 
 intermittent glimpses of the lovely hills upon the right. 
 What wonderful roads are these of Italy; this one had 
 a surface perfectly curved from the centre down to 
 

 o 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 235 
 
 the draining-ditches on the sides, from which it was 
 separated by round granite posts every few yards, — 
 a vast expense. It was macadamized as hard as stone, 
 doubtless upon the original Roman foundation deep 
 below, — twenty centuries old, and as strong as ever; 
 and no dust rose from it to disturb the traveler. Every 
 one or two hundred yards was a heap of broken stones, 
 — material for repair, always kept at hand. An ab- 
 solutely perfect highway, — yet no different from the 
 others which lead over every Italian township, except 
 in these two extraordinary rows of planes, closely 
 planted and of tall height, beautiful as a dream, all 
 descendants of that one old monarch in the garden of 
 Padua. 
 
 Like a dream, too, were the vistas that they afforded 
 of the accompanying hills. Backward rose the height 
 of the fortress, with its grim tower and columned villa 
 and circling spires of cypresses; next it soared a cul- 
 tivated mount, then one topped by a castle with com- 
 plete, gray, battlemented walls and keep, ensconced in 
 luxuriant foliage; and so they stretched on, hill after 
 hill, parallel with the road and far away toward the 
 mountains, smiling with bright fields, green vineyards, 
 and gray olive groves, picturesque with dark patches 
 of wood and towered castles, glistening with fair white 
 villas amongst the trees, — while ever in the back- 
 ground, in contrasting majesty, soared the precipitous 
 bare flanks of the Venetian Alps. 
 
 After four or five miles of this delightful scenery we 
 came to the little cross-roads village of Susegana, 
 scattered with modern houses at the foot of a hill 
 that stood somewhat forward and separated from the 
 chain. Up this last wound an avenue of shady horse- 
 chestnuts, and on its summit stood a castle grander 
 than any I had yet beheld. It was S. Salvatore, the 
 
236 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 famous seat of the great family of the Colalti, possess- 
 ors of this village and all the countryside far and wide; 
 — one of the few medieval chateaux that still remain, 
 intact and occupied, attached to the original name 
 and fortune: — 
 
 That old pile. 
 Which flanks the clitl with its gray battlements 
 Flung here and there, and, like an eagle's nest, 
 Hangs in the Trevisan.' 
 
 The Counts of Colalto, centuries ago, obtained this 
 royal residence at the cost of much blood and strug- 
 gle, and afterwards fought bravely in the wars of 
 Venice; from father to son it has steadily descended 
 all these generations, who have manifested such ex- 
 ceptional wisdom and prudence that the present 
 count still enjoys the estates of his first noble ances- 
 tor. Their name itself came from this height where 
 they first took residence: "Giovanni di Col-alto" was 
 simply "John of the high hill."^ 
 
 At the top of the shady avenue we reached a level 
 space just below the walls, surrounded by later, dwell- 
 ings of the family's retainers, land, at its end, a gate- 
 way in the fortification. Here an old servant made 
 his appearance, to whom I transmitted my desire; he 
 vanished for a while, reappeared, and stated that the 
 family were away and the majordomo had therefore 
 
 ' Rogers, Italy. 
 
 ' Of all the blue-blooded families of Europe, the Colalti are, beyond 
 ' question, one of the purest and most ancient, — tracing their line unbrok- 
 enly to the sixth century. They were, says Manzoni, "one of the most 
 noble and illustrious families that King Alboin (of the Lombards) brought 
 with him into Italy; and he left them in Friuli. They are of allied blood 
 with the princely house of Brandenburg. Charlemagne confirmed their 
 jurisdiction and fief, and his successors did the same. A great number of 
 them distinguished themselves, in war and in churchly dignities, and they 
 have also been distinguished by their illustrious connections with the 
 principal families of Italy." — Annali del Friuli. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 237 
 
 consented to my seeing the main courtyard and the 
 chapel. Once more I was in luck. The old man, court- 
 eous^ in manners, like most servants of high Italian 
 houses, led me over the ancient drawbridge, under the 
 portcullis, still ready to descend, and up a sloping 
 graveled way that wound between the base of the 
 castle and the edge of a precipice on the northwest 
 side; there had been no danger of attack here, and so 
 there was but a small parapet topping the abyss. 
 How many generations of gleaming knights and medi- 
 eval cavalcades had wound down this same approach, 
 with glistening steel and pennons, on destrier and 
 palfrey. 
 
 It curved to the west along the summit's western 
 edge, passed through another gateway, and entered a 
 long, wide, stately court, faced upon the east by a line 
 of palatial edifices, four and five stories in height; on 
 the right it first jutted out over the precipice into 
 a little garden, — commanding splendid views of the 
 vale below and the girdling chain of hills, where 
 doubtless the ladies were used to sit in the afternoons 
 of long ago, — and then was walled in by a quaint lit- 
 tle church of simple lines, with its right side upon the 
 court. At the opposite end of the flagged area rose 
 another palace, faced by a monumental flight of steps 
 adorned with statues, at whose head opened a large 
 archway closed by handsome iron gates; and through 
 the latter was visible a lovely rose-garden, backed by 
 a Renaissance wall surmounted charmingly by a row 
 of marble divinities. 
 
 I stopped to enjoy this attractive vista; then exam- 
 ined more attentively the buildings on the left. They 
 were of several different styles and epochs, not archi- 
 tecturally ornate, but fairly proportioned and impos- 
 ing; the oldest portion of all the present buildings had 
 
238 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 been at the north end of this line, — so they told me, 
 — dating from about 1200, but was only lately entirely 
 rebuilt, with the exception of a massive outside stair- 
 way of Romanesque days which still led to the main 
 doorway in the first floor. The other structures were 
 covered upon their extensive stretches of plaster by 
 modern frescoing, — designs in grisaille, which had 
 rather a tasteful effect. 
 
 The old servant opened the chapel for me, whose 
 interior of cracked and crumbling stucco clearly dated 
 also from the thirteenth century, and was covered 
 from end to end with bright-hued frescoes of different 
 ages. It was a joy to my eyes, — a typical private 
 chapel of medieval grandees. The little nave was 
 filled with the rude benches on which the retainers had 
 heard mass for hundreds of years, excepting the space 
 in the centre of the right side occupied by the great 
 family pew, surrounded by a heavy rectangular rail- 
 ing; the seats within the latter were nearly as rude as 
 those without, but of course my ladies had always 
 cushions carried by their maids. Opposite to this, 
 against the left wall, was a stone tomb of some Colalto 
 of the time of the Crusades; and another tomb was 
 against the end wall, behind the simple high-altar. 
 
 Under this flagged floor, if the legend of Samuel 
 Rogers were true, lay long hid from human ken a 
 sepulchre of horror, a subterranean vault containing 
 the pier in which, hundreds of years ago, the "White 
 Lady" who haunted the castle was walled alive. 
 Rogers has told the story well in his verses upon 
 " Coir Alto " : ^ she was a maid, gentle and fair, named 
 
 ' Rogers, Italy. Many critics, 1 know, consider it to have been a fab- 
 rication of the poet, — according to his wont. The incident of the mirror, 
 certainly, may have come from the similar legend of the Castello Estense 
 at Ferrara. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 239 
 
 Cristine, of a melancholy habit, dressed always in 
 spotless white like a nun, and was tiring- woman to 
 the countess of her day. The latter, seated one 
 evening before her mirror, submitting her hair to the 
 ministrations of the maid, bade a farewell to her noble 
 lord, who was leaving on a journey; then turning to 
 the glass, she caught, as she thought, a reflection 
 of — 
 
 A smile, a glance at parting, given and answered. 
 That turned her blood to gall. — That very night 
 The deed was done. — 
 
 They led her forth, the unhappy lost Cristine, 
 Helping her down in her distress — to die. 
 No blood was spilt. — Fresh as a flower just blown. 
 And warm with life, her youthful pulses playing. 
 She was walled up within the castle wall — 
 Under the chapel. — There nightly at that hour. 
 In her white veil and vesture white she stands 
 Shuddering — her eyes uplifted and her hands 
 Joined as in prayer; then like a blessed soul 
 Bursting the tomb, springs forward, and away 
 Flies o'er the woods and mountains. Issuing forth, 
 The hunter meets her in his hunting-track; 
 The shepherd on the heath, starting, exclaims — 
 'T is the White Lady! 
 
 I could not learn that the people of the castle, or 
 those of the countryside, believe in the legend, nor 
 that any of them have ever beheld the ghost. Rogers 
 added that in his day one old retainer, hunting, saw 
 it in the morning mists, and was so terrified that he 
 never went forth again; also that the very mirror 
 which occasioned all the mischief was still to be seen. 
 
 Along the right wall of the chapel, between the win- 
 dows, and on the entrance wall over the doorway, ran 
 a series of quaint figures and tableaux of the trecento, 
 more or less obliterated, with Giottesque saintly heads 
 and forms emerging from the ruin here and there, in 
 restful, haloed simplicity, — their broad, light hues 
 
240 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and gilding commingling in one general, sweet, golden 
 tone. But on the left wall — what a contrast ! Over 
 its free spaces rioted the huge figures, bold actions 
 and high colors of the Late-Renaissance, — bull-like 
 forms of reddish flesh, in long-hose and puflfed sleeves, 
 energetically enacting scenes from the New Testament, 
 — the familiar forms of Pordenone. Here were the 
 Magi, Annunciation, Journey to Egypt, Raising of 
 Lazarus, and Meeting with the Magdalen. On the 
 rear wall was the last Judgment; on the rear portion 
 of the right wall, St. Jerome, and the Salutation of 
 Elizabeth; and on the ceiling, the four Evangelists. 
 They were badly injured, and did not seem well com- 
 posed, nor of much expression or feeling; but they were 
 of course quite decorative, and finely modeled, with 
 individual figures of considerable grace. The form 
 of the Madonna was always sweet and attractive; and 
 the Flight into Egypt showed somewhat more merit 
 than the rest. But I was disappointed by their wretched 
 condition, which hindered any decent appreciation. 
 
 It was for these paintings I had come, but that 
 which proved of far more enjoyment was the visit 
 which I now paid to the castle proper; the majordomo 
 yielded to my persuasions, and opened the sacred 
 precincts. Penetrating the eastern buildings by a 
 passage in the ground floor, I found on their farther 
 side, above the ramparts, a long narrow garden of ex- 
 ceeding loveliness, — beds of flowers, and fine shrubs, 
 with geometrically winding paths; a stone circular 
 fountain adorned its centre, filled with goldfish, and 
 an enormous yew tree of great age shaded its northern 
 end. The plastered walls of the castle looked down 
 with hues as gay as the flowers, — frescoes of gods 
 and goddesses and cherubs, floating upon clouds, in 
 the high flesh-tints of Pordenone; queer designs, of 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 241 
 
 no discernible aims, and not especially attractive. 
 Most pleasing of all was the view, from the garden 
 parapet, of the grounds below; thick trees swept 
 around with the circling enceinture of the castle walls 
 at twenty to thirty yards' distance, hiding the outer 
 battlements and the rest of the hill, and forming a 
 pleasant screen for the privacy of the noble family; 
 and within them, ten yards or so below, lay another 
 beautiful garden, shining like a jewel-case, with hand- 
 some palms and orange and lemon trees. Over the 
 waving tops of the surrounding foliage was visible 
 the wide luxuriant plain, stretching into the hazy 
 distance. 
 
 From this idyllic scene, I stepped through a door- 
 way near the yew into the main hall of the castle, in 
 the renovated wing. A magnificent white stone stair- 
 way in three divisions led to the upper hall, which 
 opened grandly on the staircase well; the ascent was 
 commanded by a life-size portrait of a dignified elderly 
 gentleman, with a small white beard, and features of 
 much pride and benevolence. It was the present Count 
 Colalto, who, they told me, did not belie his counten- 
 ance, being a man of exemplary kindness, and well 
 beloved;^ he and his family were at present at their 
 palace in Vienna, where they spend most of their time, 
 — visiting the castle only during the summer months 
 and late autumn. He has other palaces at Gratz, 
 Paris, Venice, Rome, and the Riviera, which also ab- 
 sorb much of his leisure. Such is the life of a modern 
 nobleman of wealth. The upper hall was richly de- 
 corated, in contrast to the bare, polished, stone walls, 
 
 ' The Count exemplifies that hereditary virtue which has enabled his 
 long line to continue so well the family health, possessions, and dignities. 
 His benevolence is both deep and practical, being shown in model dairies, 
 factory buildings, etc., upon his difEerent estates, — one of which I saw at 
 the foot of the hill, on my departure. 
 
242 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 with old rugs, vases, tapestries, and paintings; among 
 the latter being a lovely, early quattrocento panel of 
 the Madonna adoring her Child, and two good can- 
 vases, dated 1494 and 1510, by little-known artists, 
 one of them including a Madonna of extraordinary 
 beauty. The furniture was worthy of inspection, being 
 fine, modern, Venetian imitations of carved medieval 
 chairs and settees; so that the whole salon was a per- 
 fect reproduction of a castle hall of the Middle Ages. 
 Near by I was shown a room that was a delightful 
 example of the trecento, — its walls completely cov- 
 ered with light, Giottesque frescoes, the beams of its 
 wooden ceiling painted with designs, the furniture all 
 careful imitations of that period. I was not admitted 
 to the other buildings of this row, where the family 
 and their guests dwell, but learned that the rooms 
 were decorated and furnished in various styles of the 
 past two centuries, and contained a number of valu- 
 able old masters. They took me to the edifice at the 
 end of the courtyard, which dates from the sixteenth 
 century, and is now little used. On its first floor front 
 was the Salle d'Armes, composed entirely of arms and 
 armor used by the Colalti and their followers in the 
 wars of the Renaissance period, — bearing the dents 
 of the blows of sword and musket-ball, and other ev- 
 idences of long use. Amongst every kind of medieval 
 implement, especially interesting were the battle- 
 axes and truncheons, which few men of to-day could 
 wield, the engraved corselets, the curious early com- 
 binations of spear and pistol (the latter set in the 
 shaft), the long narrow bronze cannons, the clumsy 
 arquebuses and other primitive guns, and the com- 
 plete equestrian suits of mail upon mounted knightly 
 figures. But what made them all of an interest far 
 beyond that of such collections in museums, was the 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 243 
 
 knowledge that they had stood the brunt of many a 
 battle, upon the shoulders and in the hands of the men 
 who had lived in this same castle, — the ancestors of 
 those here to-day. 
 
 On the ceiling of the well of the grand staircase lead- 
 ing to this hall I saw a large round fresco by Tiepolo, 
 in his usual airy manner, and in the disused chambers 
 at the side, other examples of his work, amidst profuse 
 decorations in the Pompeian style. From the last 
 room a door admitted me to the terrace above the 
 rear of the charming rose-garden, and to the company 
 of its rows of statues; thence there was another beauti- 
 ful view, of the tree-lined battlements below, the 
 ordered gardens adjacent to them on the slope with- 
 out, which seemed to girdle the whole enceinture with 
 their flowered walks, — and the lustrous vale and smil- 
 ing hills upon the south. What a perfect elysium was 
 this castle in the air, richer than a castle in Spain be- 
 cause endowed with the glorious dome and caressing 
 sun of Italy, — the embodied realization of one's fond- 
 est fancies, lovelier than any dream in its circling flow- 
 ered terraces and shady groves, suspended above this 
 enchanting landscape, thrilling with its countless 
 memories of centuries of history and ancestral associ- 
 ations! It will linger with me ever, as one of the 
 happiest remembrances of my life. 
 
 I returned to Conegliano by the stately avenue of 
 planes, stopping for a few minutes at the parish church 
 of Susegana to see its altar-piece, which is a pietistic 
 tableau by Pordenone, in better preservation and 
 pleasingly effective; and by five o'clock I was again 
 rolling northward on a train, into that extensive valley 
 that penetrates like a wedge the Alpine wall, to the 
 foot of the Col Vicentin. The track followed the west- 
 ern side of the vale, along the slopes rising near at 
 
244 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 hand, until a height, jutting far into the plain like a 
 peninsula, rose before our path and sent us curving 
 round its headland. Looking up to its long summit, I 
 saw near the end three separate old castles perched 
 upon it, two of them in far advanced and picturesque 
 ruin, the third still strong with towers and battle- 
 ments and shining casements. At the foot of the de- 
 clivity, upon the level, here somewhat narrowed be- 
 tween the headland and the opposite wall, glistened 
 the red roofs of many houses, whose white fagades and 
 campanili flocked about us as we slowed to a stop. 
 A neighbor informed me that this was Ceneda, that 
 the surviving castle overhead was inhabited by its 
 bishop, and the larger of the ruined ones had been 
 that of the medieval seigneurs. ^ 
 
 There is always a reason for the existence, or loca- 
 tion, of an Italian town; and I saw at once how Ce- 
 neda had first come into being, — because of this neck 
 through which the highway of the North was forced, 
 commanded of old by the fortress on the height. Be- 
 yond it, when we resumed our course, the level ground 
 opened wide again, into a basin that was a glowing 
 treasure-house of richest fields and vineyards, and 
 prosperous dwellings lining shady roads. It was excep- 
 tionally luxuriant, even for Italy, being protected 
 from cold winds by the enfolding mountains, which 
 narrowed soon again as we proceeded to the end ; and it 
 
 ' The Conti di Ceneda are another very ancient and illustrious family, 
 of Lombard origin; being descended from a certain Count Giovanni, to 
 whom in 739 King Luitprand granted the fief of Ceneda, together, with 
 many others. His descendants devolved the actual government of the 
 little city upon its Bishop, as a feudatory, who held sway for centuries, 
 until replaced by the family of Camino. The Counts themselves continued 
 to occupy the castle on the hill until comparatively modern times, when 
 it was suffered to fall to pieces, and they removed to one of their other 
 residences; having evidently preserved a part of their possessions through 
 all vicissitudes. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 245 
 
 was thickly settled as one continuous, spreading vil- 
 lage. In fact, it is now all one incorporated city, three 
 or four miles in length; for the town of Ceneda was 
 in the year 1879 joined with that of Serravalle at the 
 apex of the valley, forming a total population of 
 twenty-two thousand souls, including all the country- 
 side between; and it has been renamed as one unit, 
 after the liberating King, — Vittorio. 
 
 I descended at the terminal station, to find myself 
 still a full mile and more below the ancient burg of 
 Serravalle. Wishing to stop at its heart, I disdained 
 the temptations of the modern first-class hotel opposite 
 the station, where I saw gayly dressed Italians loung- 
 ing in pleasant grounds, — a genuine summer-resort, 
 — and taking an omnibus, was ported up the long 
 straight highway to the head of the vale, where clus- 
 tered thickly the tall old houses of the original town, 
 within their medieval walls. We entered the walls by a 
 four-storied, battlemented, stone and stucco gateway, 
 which was also the municipal clock- and bell-tower, 
 and over whose battlements loomed imposingly the 
 vast mountain-sides ahead, black with forests. Within, 
 the highway became a narrow medieval street, dark- 
 ened by picturesque stuccoed dwellings rising upon 
 arcades, and finally debouched into the town's 
 piazza, just beyond the inn which I was seeking. 
 
 It was a typical country hostelry, of the third class, 
 entered by a dark driveway under the arcade, with 
 the eating-rooms on the left of the passage, and the 
 kitchen in the rear beside the stable-yard. The boni- 
 face, who proved a very agreeable man and most 
 anxious to please, led me to one of the two front 
 chambers on the first floor, which was meagrely furn- 
 ished with an iron bed and washstand, an old wooden 
 dresser, and single chair; but it had the chief desidera- 
 
246 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 turn, — clean linen, — and was certainly cheap at the 
 price, a franc and a quarter. I settled my belongings, 
 and walked out again to the street and the near-by 
 piazza. 
 
 The high old stuccoed houses changed their simple 
 dress as they approached this centre of the town, to 
 an ornateness that surprised me, — displaying fine 
 Renaissance windows and balconies, and Gothic de- 
 tails still more pleasing. On the left of the opening of 
 the square, I was arrested by a Gothic palace of mag- 
 nificent design: above a colonnade of pointed arches 
 rose a piano nobile of colonnaded Gothic windows 
 stretching clear across the fagade, upon marble shafts 
 with elaborate foliage-capitals; two lights larger than 
 the others occupied the centre, opening upon a lovely 
 Gothic marble balcony; in the third story were two 
 single windows, and one quadruple, of similar form; all 
 of them were slightly ogive, and decorated upon the 
 tip of the point with little vase-like reliefs; while at 
 the summit this delightful construction was crowned 
 by a well-proportioned cornice. Here the piazza ex- 
 panded easterly from the street, which kept straight 
 on along the left flank of a hill that loomed up in the 
 very apex of the vale; from the eastern end of the 
 square another street led up a defile, passing the hill 
 on that side; and over the height between them 
 extended a whole section of the ancient town. 
 
 Very soon the situation was made clear to me: here 
 was the oldest, original quarter of Serravalle, perched 
 upon this eminence that blocked the pass to the north; 
 — a better medieval position could hardly be con- 
 ceived. After the earliest days the town had crept 
 down into the valley, eventually forming its central 
 piazza out of what had doubtless been at first its 
 market-place outside the southern walls. The square 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 247 
 
 was surrounded by three- and four-storied, stucco 
 buildings of Renaissance times, with goodly stone bal- 
 conies and columned windows above the ground-floor 
 colonnades, — except at the eastern end, where it was 
 flanked by a dashing stream; over this a short stone 
 bridge led to another open space beside the large 
 Cathedral. The latter was of ugly, bare, plastered 
 walls, with its entrance door apparently in its apse, 
 westward turned, before which from the very bank of 
 the stream rose the heavy detached campanile, — 
 also plastered, and terminating in an octagonal lan- 
 tern and red-tiled spire. But that which gave to the 
 whole piazza a dignity and picturesqueness of excep- 
 tional strength, was the towering closely, upon its 
 three sides, of the mighty, precipitous mountain-walls, 
 which loomed far overhead, with rocky crags and 
 black, wooded summits, hemming in the shadowed 
 vale like a canyon. Strange indeed was this eflFect, 
 of Alpine grandeur and wildness glowering down upon 
 the very roofs of a town-square. 
 
 On the left hand, perched upon one precipitous crag, 
 sat the ruins of a gray stone building, said to have been 
 a castle of the Counts of Ceneda, by which they 
 guarded the precious northern road a*nd exacted heavy 
 toll from the passing travelers. Well underneath it, 
 extensive landslides had scarified the mountain's face, 
 and made the scene more awesome; and just at its 
 foot, in the piazza's northwestern angle, sat the pic- 
 turesque old Palazzo Municipale, a quaint relic of 
 the trecento. A deep, shadowy loggia occupied its 
 ground floor, behind three round arches on Gothic 
 marble columns; over the centre of the latter was the 
 ringhiera, with a Gothic marble balustrade, and on 
 each side of it a charming triple window of trefoil 
 arches; while beside the palace rose a curious old tow^r 
 
248 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 upon a pointed archway, capped by a Renaissance 
 belfry, and covered, on its falling plaster, with many 
 shields of bygone syndics or podestas. The remains of 
 the Venetian Lion still lingered over the ringhiera; 
 and upon the walls of the loggia shone the softened 
 colors of fragments of old frescoes, including a group 
 of Madonna and Saints that were still quite decorative. 
 
 Of the history of Serravalle and Ceneda, of which 
 this building formed a part, it is only necessary to say 
 that it followed that of Conegliano;' and of their art, 
 that they never produced any good painter, except 
 Jacopo da Valentina, who studied under the early 
 Vivarini of Venice, was a follower of Squarcione and 
 Crivelli, and became more known for his severe mould- 
 ing than for grace or coloring. Dario painted their 
 house-fronts; and Basaiti the Venetian, Francesco da 
 Milano, Carpaccio, and Amalteo, the pupil of Porde- 
 none, came to aid in adorning their churches. The 
 last-named is alleged by Crowe and Cavalcaselle to 
 have been the author of these frescoes of the town 
 loggia. But greatest of all the stranger artists who 
 decorated the twin cities was Titian; his daughter 
 married and resided here, and he was used to stop over 
 with her, on his trips to Pieve, for weeks and months 
 at a time. On some such occasions he painted the two 
 wonderful canvases which have beautified and made 
 famous the two cathedrals. 
 
 It was still light enough to see the interior of Serra- 
 valle's Duomo, — which I remember as a well-pro- 
 portioned, rather pleasing edifice with an elevated 
 choir; it contained some of Amalteo's highly colored, 
 
 • The possession of the Conti di Ceneda was interrupted by the ambitious 
 Trevisans about the beginning of the twelfth century. Against their pre- 
 tensions the Cenedese repeatedly rebelled, often with bloody battles and 
 reprisals, until Ezzeliuo laid his iron hand upon the Marches. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 249 
 
 highly energetic work, and formerly a canvas of Car- 
 paccio's, which I could not find; but dwarfing all else 
 was the great Titian on the choir-wall. It is dated 
 1547, and represents the Madonna between Saints 
 Peter and Andrew, — a grand tableau, dignified, 
 almost majestic, toned like a reverberating bronze bell 
 of deep, inspiring note, glowing with the master's 
 splendid, harmonious hues; — the kind of harmony 
 at which one gazes and gazes, till he is lost in its golden 
 atmosphere of celestial peace, thrilled with the lofty 
 impulses that radiate from the holy faces. 
 
 Emerging into the dusk of eventide, and returning 
 to the inn, I enjoyed an excellent dinner in which the 
 piece de resistance was a plate of those poor little birds 
 that the hunters shoot by the myriad, — beccaficchi, 
 
 — whose tiny bodies do not yield a mouthful apiece; 
 
 — and yet the people wonder why their crops are 
 being every year more destroyed by insects, and vainly 
 march forth statues of the Madonna to disperse the 
 pests. I was fed in solitary state at a separate table 
 in the rear; and found much diversion in the doings 
 of a crowd of peasants who seemed to be celebrating 
 the festa of some friend. Though they drank only 
 wine, they became quite intoxicated, and then loudly 
 displayed their histrionic abilities, till the place was 
 a perfect bedlam. But my sleep afterwards was easy, 
 on the always comfortable Italian bed; and early in 
 the morning I was again in the piazza, rejoicing in the 
 inspiration of the fresh mountain air. 
 
 This time I pushed on beyond, by the main street, 
 along the west base of the hill, until I finally passed 
 through an aged gateway in the northern city wall, 
 and found the valley opened out again, rich and lovely, 
 between the close-confining mountain flanks. On 
 through this charming dale ran the white highway, 
 
250 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 toward the peaks of the Col Vicentin looming grimly 
 ahead, — on to Belluno, and the majestic beauties of 
 the gorge of the Piave. I returned to town by the 
 diverging way around the hill's eastern base, passing 
 quarries high up on the terraces of the mountain, mills 
 along the plunging waters of the stream, and ter- 
 raced gardens of old palaces, suspended on the hill- 
 side in faded grandeur. 
 
 In the first portion of this pleasant walk, the out- 
 ward progress, I observed near the northern city wall 
 an old church of Gothic times, — S. Giovanni Bat- 
 tista, — whose dusky, worn interior glowed with a 
 number of excellent paintings. To chance upon some 
 unknown church, and discover a few artistic treasures 
 unpublished to the world, is sometimes a pleasure 
 greater than would be the finding of a gold nugget in 
 an abandoned mine. The good parroco, in a thread- 
 bare cassock with the sleeves rolled up, unshaven and 
 dirty, was vigorously polishing the silver of the altar 
 in the sacristy. A young man of thirty-five, doubtless 
 without influential connections, having obtained no 
 better charge than this out-of-the-way parish and its 
 ruinous edifice, with few communicants, and poverty 
 too severe to permit assistants, he had — as I learned — 
 with his own hands restored the building, and recalled 
 the allegiance of the people. He told me, simply, how 
 he had found a lot of old soiled canvases in the base- 
 ment, cleaned them with bread and wine, and hung 
 them upon the bare altars and choir- walls. There was 
 nothing exceptional about him, — but one must ad- 
 mire such loving souls that are not ashamed of hard 
 manual labor in the service of good ; and there are many, 
 many, such poor, devoted, slaving priests in Italy. 
 
 Among his unearthed paintings were four of sur- 
 prising merit: two groups of three saints on the first 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 251 
 
 and second altars to the right, by the Httle known 
 Francesco Frizimelaga (signed, dated 1607), of much 
 quiet grace, harmonious color, and gentle feeling; a 
 splendid example of Jacopo Valentina (signed, dated 
 1502), on the first altar to the left, — a panel of the 
 Madonna and four Saints, with an especially fine 
 figure of the Baptist, displaying Jacopo's rich, deep 
 tone and sincerely pietistic qualities, so attractive that 
 I stood wondering why his fame is not wider; and 
 behind the high-altar, a large Baptism of Christ by 
 Francesco da Milano, well disposed and tinted, of 
 much expression and power. 
 
 A traveler who happened to be spending some time 
 at Serravalle would do well also to look up the paint- 
 ings of Basaiti — who has left us so many pleasing 
 pictures — at the churches of S. Lorenzo and S. 
 Silvestro alia Costa; also the work of Valentina at 
 S. Giustina, and that of Jacobello del Fiore in the 
 Hospital of S. Lorenzo. 
 
 When I went to Ceneda, it was by the omnibus of 
 the inn, in the afternoon hours, down the long straight 
 highway as far as the railroad station, and thence on 
 foot the remaining mile or so, through streets lined 
 thickly with modern-looking dwellings and shops, 
 with the fields behind the latter open and cultivated. 
 The long space of the valley between the original 
 towns has thus been covered in recent times, in a curi- 
 ous combination of stretches of open country, village 
 streets, and scattered clusters of habitations, with 
 occasional handsome grounds about gaudy villas; the 
 largest of these clusters being naturally around 
 the station, opposite to whose ornate stone terraces 
 stretch various beautiful lawns with stately shade 
 trees. On arriving in old Ceneda, at the foot of its 
 castled promontory, successive directions from passers- 
 
252 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by brought me safely through its winding ways to the 
 main piazza; which lies at the southern base of the 
 headland, beneath the medieval mansion of its bishop. 
 
 The latter's cathedral fronts upon the piazza's 
 eastern end, — a great, plain, stuccoed structure; on 
 its north side is the little Municipio, with the proverb- 
 ial loggia; and before it extends the long, dirt-paved 
 area, between separate three-storied buildings, to the 
 wall and terraced gardens of the Marchesa Costantini, 
 at the western end. These, famed far and wide in a 
 land of beautiful gardens, raise over the wall mighty 
 elms and beeches that allow but a glimpse of the 
 handsome villa in their bosom, and stretch afar up 
 the slope of the mountain, here curved to the south, 
 in a luxuriance of copses, shady paths, and areas of 
 shrubs, flowers, and exotic plants, surpassing descrip- 
 tion. At the far summit stands a temple of classic 
 lines, looking down with its noble white portico o^er 
 the riotous verdure below. 
 
 I stepped first into the Duomo, which opened to me 
 a spacious nave of simple Renaissance lines, lower 
 aisles with shallow chapels, a transept adorned by a 
 pompous dome, and a large choir elevated above an 
 ancient crypt. Its Renaissance renovation makes it 
 look unlike an edifice which has played the great part 
 that it has in this people's history; — the bishop and 
 his canons having been foremost, through all the 
 centuries, in every public advancement, and equally so 
 in the development of art; as they were the medium 
 by which several foreign artists came to Ceneda, — 
 called to embellish the walls and altars of the Duomo. 
 Here then were the chief relics of those long-gone 
 visits, the main objets d'art of the twin cities, — their 
 collection of paintings. 
 
 Amongst the throng of them that shone from altar- 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 253 
 
 tops and wall-spaces were, firstly, a Coronation of the 
 Virgin by Jacobello del Fiore (about 1408), primitive 
 and quaintly graceful; secondly, two superb works of 
 Jacopo Valentina, — of whom his town may well be 
 proud. These were a Madonna with Saints Anthony 
 and Sebastian, second to the left (signed, 1510), dis- 
 playing a little donor at the bottom; and a Madonna 
 with Saints Biasio and John the Baptist, and donor, 
 fourth to the right, showing a rich marble throne, 
 with a clear blue sky behind it dotted by fleecy clouds, 
 and also two charming little putti-heads; both pictures 
 were highly finished and deeply toned, of attractive 
 coloring and atmosphere, with Madonna figures of 
 remarkable beauty. 
 
 Less in importance were the two Palma Gio vanes; 
 — a Baptism of Christ, first to the left, having a good 
 form of the Baptist, — not emaciated, for once, — 
 with a dazzling angel holding the Saviour's garment; 
 and a risen Christ, in the chapel to the left of the choir, 
 of Palma's characteristic vaulting type, to me rather 
 displeasing. In the sacristy were two small Tiepolos, 
 one of them a Crucifixion of considerable power of 
 expression. But far and away beyond all the others, 
 beyond any painting that I had seen since leaving 
 Venice, was the large and marvelous picture that 
 greeted me in the third chapel to the right, astounding 
 me by the unexpectedness of such a find, and the 
 grandeur of its beauty. I had received no warning that 
 a great masterpiece remained here; it is mentioned in 
 none of the guidebooks; and the coming thus suddenly 
 upon its dramatic loveliness was an experience not to 
 be forgotten. 
 
 It was one of those rare, great works that at the first 
 glance speak in trumpet-tones to the mind and heart, 
 a vivid, realistic, yet idyllic tableau, of exceptional 
 
254 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 force and feeling, radiating power and loveliness and 
 intense expressiveness combined; it glowed with a 
 profound internal radiance that made the scene celes- 
 tial, and a deep iridescence of gorgeous coloring, that 
 fell upon the soul like a burst of stately melody from 
 a pealing organ; it was mantled in shadowy atmo- 
 sphere, through which the piercing light touched 
 every salient form with glory, — and held speaking, 
 living figures, of perfect lifelikeness, and superhuman 
 beauty. 
 
 The idea of the picture was simple and timeworn, 
 its setting-forth most poetical and enchanting. It 
 exemplified perfectly the loftiness of genius, — which 
 conceives an everyday theme in terms of grandeur, 
 moulds it in a novel, fascinating shape, and strikes fire 
 from its spirited feeling to the heart of the observer. 
 This was, then, only a tableau of the Madonna en- 
 throned between Saints Roch and Sebastian, standing 
 at her sides; but to the right and rear of the canopy 
 that sheltered them, stretched a countryside of vivid 
 tragedy, wild and fearsome in the shrouding pall of 
 night, whose heavy, murky atmosphere wrapped every 
 object in indefinable awesomeness. Over this wild 
 scene lowered a turbulent, black sky with rolling 
 masses of storm-clouds, menacing and advancing, 
 appearing to hold in their turbid depths thunderbolts 
 straining at the leash; while all Nature ceased its 
 breath in that dread silence before the elements' 
 explosion. The coming peril was made manifest by a 
 touch of gentle light from the hidden moon, silvering 
 the inky clouds' lower edges above the distant hori- 
 zon, accentuating with its peaceful ray the terrible 
 wrathfulness of the storm; but the striking, purposed 
 contrast was in those gathered saiintly figures, serene 
 and lovely, whose faces, expressive of heavenly calm 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 255 
 
 and holy thought, were Ufted to the Eternal with no 
 fear of what earth could do. 
 
 Such grandeur of tone and chiaroscuro, such incom- 
 parable power and grace united, such a combination 
 of all the potentialities of the brush, — but one genius 
 that ever lived in this North Italy could have accom- 
 plished them; — it was Tiziano. This was Titian's 
 second masterpiece executed for the twin cities; and I 
 will say truthfully, having studied nearly all his works, 
 that to me it seems one of the two or three greatest 
 of them all. It may not make upon all others the same 
 profound impression, — it cannot; people are too 
 varied in tastes; — but from me that impression has 
 never departed, — has lingered as a steadfast, sub- 
 lime glory; and to any true lover of painting, its appeal 
 must be worth the whole journeying through the towns 
 of Venetia. 
 
 Previtali, that splendid artist of Bergamo who at- 
 tained the nearest of them all to pure, unalloyed 
 beauty, painted for this same cathedral about the 
 year 1500 an Annunciation, which Titian is reported 
 by Ridolfi to have much admired; but I could not find 
 it, and the sacristan asserted no knowledge of it. So 
 I finished my visit by gazing at the fine old Gothic 
 bishop's chair, attractively carved, with inset niches 
 containing wooden statuettes, — and at the model of 
 the proud new fagade now planned for the Duomo, 
 set against the first pillar to the left; then I crossed the 
 sunny piazza to the Palazzo Municipale. 
 
 This curious Renaissance structure is of two stories: 
 a ground-floor loggia behind five arches on square 
 brick pillars, slightly elevated and approached by 
 marble steps; and an upper, stuccoed division contain- 
 ing three double-arched stone windows, — the central 
 one being the customary ringhiera, with balcony, and 
 
256 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 a ruined Venetian Lion overhead. I entered the deep 
 loggia, noticing upon its walls damaged portions of 
 extensive frescoes in the manner of Pordenone. There 
 had been three large pictures. On the left wall re- 
 mained a group of life-size persons, with a cluster of 
 houses perched above them on a rock, crowded with 
 people in the windows and balconies, — realistic, 
 very substantial people, in gay cinquecento costumes; 
 on the rear wall was a cortege of heroic cavaliers and 
 foot-soldiers emerging from a city gate, passing a poor 
 woman seated by the roadside with a youth's head in 
 her lap, all backed by a wide landscape of a valley 
 hemmed by rolling mountains, in excellent perspective; 
 on the right wall was another city gate, framing a vista 
 of palatial buildings, — also a monarch seated upon 
 his throne, surrounded by courtiers. These were but 
 fragments of the original scenes, which doubtless por- 
 trayed incidents in the life of some saint; but they 
 were vividly realistic and tangible, of dignified action 
 and strong expression, and very impressive in their 
 throngs of brilliantly costumed figures. The work was 
 strong enough for Pordenone's own; but the artist 
 was his pupil, Pomponio Amalteo. It was a most un- 
 usual painting for a public place, a veritable curiosity, 
 — and a good example of what fine work Amalteo 
 could do. 
 
 I continued up the piazza to the gateway at its end 
 into the Costantini grounds, sent in my visiting-card 
 to the Marchesa, and was graciously permitted to 
 walk about under the guidance of the head gardener. 
 The villa, an elaborate modern structure, stood on the 
 level, surrounded closely by flower-beds, shrubberies, 
 gravel paths, and clumps of great trees, with the stables 
 and garage shortly to the right. Immediately behind 
 these buildings commenced the hillside, which mounted 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 257 
 
 steadily afar in one luxuriant thicket of horticulture, 
 
 — an indescribable, orderly tangle of glades of rare 
 and majestic trees, groups of plants of every species, 
 indigenous and exotic, and beds of shrubs and flowers 
 of a myriad lovely varieties, — with huge greenhouses 
 concealed in copses, brilliant with more tender beau- 
 ties; while everywhere ran winding paths, — affording 
 enchanting ghmpses, as they climbed, of the town and 
 distant plain and frowning mountains, — leading to 
 rustic seats and summer-houses, perched on shady 
 knolls. 
 
 Near the summit was a large kiosk, with an unin- 
 terrupted view over the tree-tops, where the family 
 and their guests were wont to take their tea of after- 
 noons; but this famous old Venetian family had lost its 
 last male representative on the recent death of the 
 Marchese, and must soon disappear. The classic 
 stone building at the top proved to be a mausoleum, 
 
 — church above and burial crypt below, — contain- 
 ing the remains of the Marchese and others of his 
 line. I gazed for a while at the grand panorama 
 spread below in the glow of sunset, — the far extended 
 white buildings and campanUi of Ceneda, the promon- 
 tory with its castles, hiding Serravalle from sight, the 
 endless plain softly green in the level, golden sun-rays, 
 the mighty wall of the Alps stretching indefinitely to 
 the northeast; — and I envied for a moment these 
 Venetian patricians who have such gardens of Eden 
 for their villeggiatura. 
 
 As I looked, the golden rays lifted themselves from 
 the ground to the rounded white clouds far aloft, and 
 began to color them with wondrous hues of pink and 
 rose and scarlet; then, from the shadows stealing over 
 the plain, arose the soft, sweet note of a vesper-bell, — 
 then another, of more mellow tone, and a third, still 
 
258 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 farther distant; till soon they were calling from every 
 campanile, far and near, — and the united clamor, 
 sweeping over the unbroken level, seemed a fusion of 
 all the heart-cries of the desolating centuries. 
 
 Now was the hour that wakens fond desire 
 In men at sea, and melts their thoughtful hearts 
 Who in the mom have bid sweet friends farewell; 
 And pilgrim newly on his road, with love 
 Thrills, if he hear the vesper-bell from far. 
 That seems to mourn for the expiring day.^ 
 
 There are two other delightful excursions to be 
 made from Serravalle, — in the mountains near at 
 hand, each readily covered within the light of a single 
 day : one, to the famous castle of Brandolin on Monte 
 Cisone, — a magnificent old stronghold, finely situ- 
 ated and decorated; the other, to the celebrated forest 
 on a wide tableland near the Col Vicentin, that be- 
 longed to the Venetian State, and was thence called 
 the Bosco del Consiglio. The Republic used it for 
 piles to sustain the marble city, and in the building 
 of her ships, for which it furnished for centuries excep- 
 tional masts and spars. It is a wild, untenanted, 
 mysterious tract of mountain country, of lofty, ghost- 
 like forest glades, and beautiful vistas of the peaks on 
 one hand, the far-stretching plain below on the other. 
 
 Early one morning I returned down the valley by 
 its branch railroad to the junction of Conegliano, and 
 took the main line eastward, leading to Udine and the 
 end of the plain. Now I entered the region called 
 Friuli, — the corner between the slopes of the Julian 
 Alps and the lagoons, — thinking, as the train sped on, 
 of all that I had read concerning its woods and wild- 
 ness, its aloofness and peculiar people, its countless 
 sorrows under the invader's heel, and its long, pathetic 
 
 • Gary's translation of Dante, Purgatorio, canto vin. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 259 
 
 retardation in civilization and art. As we left the Tre- 
 visan Marches behind, the Alps receded, and the plain 
 assumed a different aspect. An extraordinary num- 
 ber of large swift streams dash across it from the 
 mountains, bearing their silt to the bars and salt 
 marshes along the coast of the Adriatic, pushing the 
 latter farther seaward year by year, ever extending 
 the mainland, by the same alluvial process which has 
 made it all. Every few minutes we crossed another 
 river, — different branches of the historic Livenza, 
 flowing insignificant in the present summer drought, 
 through winding channels in their wide stony beds; 
 but in the melting spring-times and rainy autumns 
 they are roaring giants, that hurl along boulders and 
 trees from the Alpine slopes, stop the tide of travel, 
 and often devastate the fields. In some parts these 
 torrents have made beds two to four miles in width, 
 covered with the invariable rounded stones, that 
 glisten to a far distance in the beating sun.* 
 
 Where oleanders flushed the beds 
 Of silent torrents gravel spread; 
 And, crossing, oft we saw the glisten 
 Of ice, far up on a mountain head.^ 
 
 All Friuli was densely forested in ancient and medi- 
 eval times, — which contributed much to its people's 
 
 ^ ' Before these streams were confined within their modem dikes, they 
 were continually, during the countless centuries, changing their courses 
 from one decade to another; which, added to the annual floods, bore every- 
 where the best part of the soil into the sea, leaving the plain covered with 
 but a thin, poor deposit of earth, impregnated with sand and pebbles and 
 scattered over with boulders, fit only for the growth of forests and the 
 grazing of cattle. For the same cause the population was ever scanty and 
 poor, dwelling apart in the woods from the rest of humanity, and so devel- 
 oping that uncouth patois which is still in use. Venice much improved their 
 condition; and in modem times there has been a great gain in all directions, 
 particularly in the redemption and cultivation of the soil. 
 ^ Lord Tennyson. 
 
260 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 crudity and peculiar character, — and is still so cov- 
 ered with trees as to present the general appearance, 
 from a height, of one great wood; they line the roads 
 and fields, and stand in more frequent copses than in 
 Lombardy. A large extent of the cleared land is so 
 regularly covered with water as to be useless for crops; 
 these untilled meadows, the omnipresent streams and 
 woods, the absence of frequent habitations, and the 
 comparative sparseness of the towns, all joined to give 
 the country-side an aspect quite different from the rest 
 of Venetia. It was a somewhat desolate, mournful ap- 
 pearance, that slowly, inappreciably affected my spirits 
 while I stayed in Friuli, — imparted the sensation of 
 being far from the Italy I love, and made me long, 
 after a week or so, to get away. Ouida well expressed this 
 sentiment in her vagrant Pascarel: "All Friuli is sad 
 and unlovely; if it were not for the glimpses of the 
 Alps away there toward Venice, it would be hateful, 
 — that desolate, historic land that had every road of 
 it stamped bare by the iron heel of Barbarossa." 
 
 On this first day, however, I descended from the train 
 somewhat less than halfway to Udine, at the ancient 
 town of Pordenone, which produced the painter of 
 that name. It was the Portus Naonis of Roman days, 
 was despoiled by Alaric, destroyed by Attila, tramped 
 down again by Theodoric and Alboin, seized by the 
 Carlovingians, and, after the end of the latters' rule, 
 had begun to enjoy a little independence when it be- 
 came the prey of the Austrian and Italian despots.' 
 
 • The earliest Friulan chronicles report the city and its territory to 
 have been, during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, in the possession of 
 certain " Dukes of Austria and Styria," from whom it passed, in 1222, to the 
 powerful Friulan family of Castello, allied to that of Ceneda. From them 
 it was forcibly seized, in 1270, by the Patriarch of Aquileia, who during 
 those ages claimed the territorial as well as the ecclesiastical rights as far 
 west as the river Mincio, and in large part maintained them. Pordeijone 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 261 
 
 Its aloofness did not save the city from the common 
 fate of the eastern plain-towns : it was reached after, 
 and grasped in turn, by the Delia Carrara, the Delia 
 Scala, the Visconti, and the Venetians. Under the 
 Republic it at last flourished once more, awoke to the 
 Renaissance, when this had grown to maturity farther 
 south, and developed during the cinquecento its own 
 tardy school of painting, which colored its house 
 fronts and adorned its churches. From these local 
 artists — deprived by their remoteness of the teach- 
 ings of the great schools and masters, until Gian 
 Bellini's time — emerged one of the two geniuses to 
 whom Friuli gave birth, whose success was the more 
 remarkable and praiseworthy considering the primi- 
 tive conditions of his native art and the smallness of 
 his early advantages. 
 
 Giovanni Antonio Licinio (de' Sacchis or de' Cuti- 
 celli, according to different authorities upon the fam- 
 ily name) was born at Pordenone in 1483, passed there 
 his early years, and in his later period of renown and 
 wealth often returned there for considerable visits, 
 during which he decorated churches and palaces with 
 the fruits of his mature powers. While still living as a 
 youth under the parental roof he was wounded by his 
 brother in a quarrel, and in consequence went away, 
 abandoning his family name for the assumed one of 
 Regillo. The place to which he first went to study his 
 art is alleged by some authorities to have been the small 
 school of Castelfranco, but by Ridolfi and others — 
 
 continued to be a bone of contention between the Patriarchs and the Aus- 
 trian dukes (the De' Castello having transferred their claim to the Haps- 
 burgs) until the Delia Carrara stepped in, toward the end of the trecento. 
 Prom them it was seized by Can Grande della Scala; and from his weak 
 successor, Mastino II, it was taken by the Visconti, — so that for a few 
 years this district formed a part of the immense kingdom of Gian Galeazzo. 
 Upon his death it was occupied by Venice. 
 
262 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 which opinion is accepted by Lanzi — to have been the 
 neighboring city of Udine, where he acquainted him- 
 self with the extraordinary productions of that other, 
 preceding, great painter of Friuli, Pellegrino da San 
 Daniele. Subsequently ( or as Rinaldi states, in the 
 first place) he journeyed to Venice and became a 
 worker in the studio of Giovanni Bellini, in the com- 
 pany of Titian and Giorgione. But it was the last- 
 named artist who most excited the young Friulan's 
 admiration and waxing powers; whether or not he fol- 
 lowed Giorgione to Castelfranco, certain it is that he 
 adopted the latter's style, attained much of his pe- 
 culiar glowing tone and coloring, and followed his 
 manner to the end, while developing later some de- 
 cidedly variant characteristics. I had seen at Treviso, 
 in the debated Entombment, how entirely similar was 
 the work of the youthful painter to that of his adored 
 Barbarelli. 
 
 The Venetians, according to their habit, did not 
 call him Regillo, but "II Pordenone"; and the appel- 
 lation has clung, — which is perhaps fortunate, for 
 it serves to distinguish him from his cousin Bernar- 
 dino Licinio, who produced works of less ability in a 
 somewhat similar style. As Pordenone advanced in 
 his strength of original conception, bold execution, 
 and vigorous action and expression, until he became 
 after Barbarelli's death one of the chiefs of the Vene- 
 tian school, he traveled all over North Italy decorating 
 churches, palaces, and castles. His was an exceptional, 
 restless, forceful, ardent spirit, which shines reechoed 
 from his daring, powerful pictures, with their massive, 
 bold, energetic figures in brilliant costumes; his large 
 frescoes were therefore very striking productions; and 
 he executed them in all the different northern states 
 and courts, from Piacenza in the southwest to Udine 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 263 
 
 in the northeast. But, unfortunately, most of them 
 have perished, and those remaining are rarely in a 
 good condition. His frescoes in his native place enjoy 
 the distinction of being authentic beyond a question, 
 because they are described in a still existing autograph 
 of the master; and I eagerly hoped to find them in a 
 decent preservation. His smaller, pietistic canvases, 
 however, were so entirely different from the frescoes, 
 often, as to make one wonder if he had not a double 
 personality; they were as gentle, dignified, refined, and 
 serenely lovely as the larger works were bold and 
 vigorous. 
 
 The station lies to the south of the little city, now 
 of but five thousand inhabitants, with a long, straight, 
 modern thoroughfare leading north from it to the 
 central piazza. Leaving my luggage in deposit, I fol- 
 lowed this broad way between its late stuccoed build- 
 ings, seeing no signs of the medieval walls. The fairly 
 wide piazza was bounded by the same sort of modern 
 structures, and crossed by the main street running 
 east and west, which was a section of the great high- 
 way from Italy to the Orient. It was unusually wide, 
 paved with cobblestones, and lined on both sides by 
 continuous arcades of every age and style, upon which 
 rose four-storied buildings of stone and plaster. Most 
 of the old town lay to the north of this avenue, which 
 very likely was originally but a road along the outside 
 of the southern walls, — as at Conegliano. 
 
 In its western portion I found nothing of interest; 
 but its eastern contained an interesting variety of edi- 
 fices, from quaint Gothic arcades and fagades to pon- 
 derous palaces of the Late-Renaissance; and between 
 a forking of the way, facing down it toward the piaz- 
 za several hundred yards distant, rose the curious old 
 Gothic Palazzo Municipale. The appearance of this 
 
264 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 building was unique: the main body had three triply 
 recessed, large, pointed arches in the ground floor, 
 opening into the customary, deep, shadowy loggia, 
 and three corresponding openings in the upper floor, 
 of which the central was a simple doorway, and the 
 outer were triple Gothic windows, topped by brick 
 mouldings in the form of geometrical tracery within 
 a terra-cotta label. These windows were a curiosity 
 that would have wildly aroused the enthusiasm of the 
 late Mr. Street in his Gothic wanderings. Over them 
 ran a trecento cornice in the shape of connected, brick 
 trefoil arches resting upon corbels: and from each upper 
 corner rose a strange square turret, — an open belfry of 
 four trefoil arches (one to each side) sustained by mar- 
 ble columns, and surmounted by an acute brick spire. 
 The structure dates, it is said, from as early as 1291. 
 But the queerest feature was the narrow portico 
 which projected from the building's centre and rose 
 two full stories above the cornice, like a tower: its 
 first division, a Gothic archway upon marble columns 
 of unusual weight; its second, a rounded archway with 
 a balustrade, forming a ringhiera balcony entered by 
 the aforesaid doorway; its third and fourth divisions, 
 solid, square brick bodies, with marble columns at the 
 angles; and upon the face of the third story stood 
 a huge clock-face, upon the summit of the fourth was 
 a bell swinging in the open, with two bronze figures 
 beside it, to strike the hours with hammers, — so much 
 like the clock-tower of St. Mark's as to make one gaze 
 for a moment in astonishment. All of this delightful 
 old edifice was of unstuccoed, unpainted brick, except 
 the score of marble columns, and some marble blocks 
 at the angles of the portico's first division. In the 
 Italian civic buildings of Gothic times, I know nothing 
 resembling it. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 265 
 
 The upper story of the palazzo contains the city's 
 collection of paintings; but before visiting that, I 
 turned into the left branch of the forking street, where 
 the great, ponderous form of the Cathedral stood 
 looking across at the palazzo's side. Its fagade was 
 but partly finished, as far as the tops of the shafts of 
 the white stone columns, that rose to the height of a 
 single story, — appearing strange, indeed, without 
 any capitals, just as they stood when the masons 
 dropped their tools far back in Renaissance days. 
 Above them the wall was of bare plaster only; but 
 in their centre stood the completed main doorway, in 
 a Renaissance marble frame of exceeding loveliness. 
 The faces of its pilasters were cut with arabesque reliefs, 
 its rich entablature was surmounted by a finely moulded 
 arch, and within this arch, beside it, and upon it, 
 stood four very old statues, of the Saviour, a saint, 
 and two angels. Following the former loyalty of the 
 Municipio, in its careful resemblance to the Venetian 
 clock-tower, this edifice was dedicated to S. Marco. 
 Inside it I found a wide, flat-arched nave, without 
 aisles, with shallow chapels at the sides, a transept, 
 and a raised choir flanked by chapels; — all in quiet, 
 unadorned Renaissance lines, covered with shining 
 plaster. Though commenced in 1360, the building 
 was not completed and decorated until during the 
 quattrocento. 
 
 This was the simple, spacious church that Por- 
 denone worked for at several different periods, and 
 enriched with his genius. Immediately upon the 
 first altar to the right stood the best of those produc- 
 tions, a canvas of a beauty so refined and lustrous, that 
 I was transfixed with delight. It was one of his smaller 
 pietistic works, thoroughly gentle, blissful, dignified, 
 and strong, component of the qualities of Bellini and 
 
266 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Giorgione. It was a Holy Family of his more repose- 
 ful, early period (1515) — the graceful form of the Ma- 
 donna standing alone in the centre, St. Joseph hold- 
 ing the sacred child, and St. Christopher at the other 
 side; behind them a curious rocky landscape, with 
 a village and some ancient ruins; dark clouds overcast- 
 ing the sky above, through which fell a golden, crim- 
 son light upon the pleasing figures, wrapped in a glo- 
 rious warm tone and atmosphere. The quiet, refined 
 coloring had faded into still more delicate hues, ac- 
 cordant with the peaceful rapture of those beautiful 
 faces. 
 
 In the first little chapel of the right transept were 
 some small, damaged frescoes, representing scenes from 
 the New Testament, said to be by Pordenone's school, 
 — not first-class pictures, but of good spacing and 
 action, and high coloring; and the altar-piece was a 
 Holy Family by A. Matteo, containing a lovely Ma- 
 donna, of rich tone and happy tints. Adjacent upon 
 a pillar I observed one of Pordenone's frescoes, — 
 the two forms of Saints Roch and Erasmus, the former 
 in the artist's own lineaments; though sadly injured, 
 they were still full of strength and individuality. 
 In the second chapel of this transept, behind its altar, 
 appeared a very old fresco of the Madonna and two 
 saints, by an unknown hand, also much damaged, but 
 interesting for its remarkable power, and the beauty of 
 the Holy Virgin. 
 
 Behind the altar I found Pordenone's third work, 
 a large canvas of his later period of massive, strenu- 
 ous figures (1535). It represents the glorification of 
 St. Mark, with a number of other saints of heroic 
 size, including S. Alessandro in gleaming armor, and 
 three charming little angels playing instruments. 
 The coloring, once so gorgeous, has faded away, leav- 
 
PROM TREVISO TO UDINE 267 
 
 ing the huge forms without any very pleasing attri- 
 butes; but it illustrates the master's exceptional abil- 
 ity in forceful, clean, well-modeled drawing. As Va- 
 sari well said, "He stood preeminent above them all, 
 surpassing his predecessors in the conception of his 
 pieces, in design, in boldness, and the use of his colors 
 in his frescoes, in rapidity, in grandeur of relief, and 
 indeed in every other accomplishment of the art"; 
 and Lanzi, "Pordenone seemed to vie with Giorgione 
 in spirit, a spirit equally daring, resolute, and great, 
 surpassed by no other, perhaps, in the Venetian 
 school." 1 
 
 There was one more first-class painting in this 
 Duomo, a splendid example of Pogolino of Vicenza, 
 over the third altar on the left of the nave; it repre- 
 sented the Madonna with Saints Biagio and Apol- 
 lonia, in his restricted but restful quattrocento style, 
 remarkably well disposed and modeled, the tone and 
 color gone, but still of enticing grace, — especially 
 in the lovely Virgin. The picture has been for cen- 
 turies highly esteemed in Pordenone, whose people 
 call it the Madonna della Colonna. During the same 
 period the Cathedral had another, similar Pogolino 
 of much renown, which I could find no trace of, — an 
 Apotheosis of St. Francis, between Saints Daniel 
 and John the Baptist. In the small baptismal chapel 
 on the left I saw the original wooden sides of the ancient 
 foqt, preserved in glass cases, covered with uncom- 
 monly quaint little pictures from the life of the 
 Baptist, by an unknown master, — not Pordenone, 
 as alleged by the simple natives; the scenes of the 
 Birth and the Banquet of Herod were unusually 
 good. 
 
 On leaving the church I examined a fine old oak 
 
 * Lanzi, History of Painting, vol. Ii, p. 147. 
 
268 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 bench of five seats, placed against the entrance wall, 
 within a railing, and richly and beautifully carved; 
 it was the former seat of the city's podestd and as- 
 sessors, brought here for preservation from the Muni- 
 cipio, — a relic of the highest development of that wood 
 sculpture which in this land of forests was its first 
 chief art. 
 
 I recrossed to the municipal palace, climbed the 
 stairway behind the loggia to its upper floor, and in- 
 vestigated the pictures, which were hung around the 
 sides of the main salon in front. ^ Among the several 
 dozen were a few of striking excellence: a large canvas 
 (number 1) of Saints Roch, Sebastian, and Gothard, 
 with two exquisite cherubs at their feet, making mu- 
 sic under an open temple-roof, — of tender, golden 
 tone and light, but of unknown authorship; a specimen 
 of Alessandro Varotari, manifesting, for once, real 
 genius, — which I had always thought he wanted, — 
 showing the Madonna with the infant Christ, who is 
 receiving a lily ivom a female personifying Justice, 
 St. Mark standing at the right with his Lion (an un- 
 usual picture, exceptionally preserved and conspicuous, 
 yet of daintiest grace and coloring, and fine atmo- 
 spheric and light-effects); thirdly, a small, restored, 
 but lovely work of Leandro Bassano's, — a Madonna 
 with Saints Catherine and John the Baptist, replete 
 with excellence of composition and modeling, rich, soft 
 coloring and sombrous tone, having" a background, to 
 the left, of a Diaz-like landscape, and to the right, of 
 a bright green curtain, before which the attractive 
 Madonna worships her Son with downcast eyes; 
 
 ' This waa the chamber, I was told, in which Pordenone's municipal 
 council had met for six hundred years; that unique assembly of nobles and 
 bourgeois, which governed the city so well and steadily during all the 
 changes and agitations of the Middle Age. The room itself was redeco- 
 rated in the Renaissance. 
 
FROM TREVISO TO UDINE 269 
 
 finally, and chiefly, the extraordinary, long, narrow 
 fresco by Pordenone, which was removed from his 
 house when the latter was demolished in 1838, and 
 hung clear across the end of the chamber. 
 
 This is a strange paysage, of much variety, clearly 
 painted by the master for diversion in his light- 
 some hours: it shows a fertile valley, with a distant 
 village at the foot of two hills, on whose shoulders 
 rise aged castles (an exact likeness of Ceneda, even 
 to the Duomo tower), with the line of the serrated 
 Alps behind, and a grove at one side; before the 
 latter dance a number of peasants to the playing 
 of flutes, while others sit about or drink beer, in 
 genuine Flemish genre style. It is very curious and 
 interesting for the versatility and gay spirit it mani- 
 fests, — for nothing 'more opposite to the glorious 
 Holy Family of the Cathedral could easily be imag- 
 ined; and it shows Pordenone a good master of land- 
 scape, with strong powers of realistic atmosphere and 
 perspective. 
 
 After this there was nought else to be done but walk 
 around the streets of the old town on the north, look- 
 ing for remains of frescoed fagades, and hunting up 
 Pordenone's other paintings in the scattered churches. 
 Crowe and Cavalcaselle said in their day," We find 
 here house decoration as frequent as elsewhere, 
 Mantegnesque in spirit and above the style of Dario " ; 
 but now, at any rate, it was very little to be seen. In 
 the church "di Torre" was a delightful Pordenone 
 canvas, of the Madonna enthroned between four 
 saints and some pretty angels; and in those of "di 
 Villanova" and "di Roraigrande" were frescoes of 
 his upon the choir- vaultings, representing the Evangel- 
 ists with their symbols, and prophets and doctors of 
 the Church general. Altogether, that master's native 
 
270 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 city, though Kttle interesting in itself, and though 
 lacking an example of his great dramatic frescoes, 
 affords perhaps the best comprehension to be obtained 
 anywhere now of the deep versatility of his genius, 
 in its varying moods and different ages. "^ 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 UDINE AND CIVIDALE 
 
 The moon is up, and yet it is not night — 
 Sunset divides the sky with- her — a sea 
 Of glory streams along the Alpine heights 
 Of blue Friuli's mountains. 
 
 — Childe Harold. 
 
 Op all the storied lands of Europe this is the most pa- 
 thetic and the most laden with sorrowful memories. 
 The sunset that lies upon its peaks shines not so much 
 with glory as with the crimson blood of its countless 
 slain inhabitants; and its advancing shadows hold the 
 smoke of numberless burning habitations. Friuli has 
 been the most important and perilous frontier of all 
 the world's long ages. It became Rome's outpost as 
 early as 183 B.C., when, having subdued the Boii and 
 taken over the control of the half of the plain south of 
 the Po, she founded Aquileia at the foot of the eastern 
 Alps and the Adriatic, as a guard against further 
 incursions of the Celtic tribes. The ^milian and Cas- 
 sian highways were then extended to the north, and 
 Roman cities stretched gradually over the plain, to 
 Padua, Concordia, Opitergium (Oderzo), Utina, and 
 Portus Naonis. From their Forum Julii at the Alpine 
 base, this whole district in later days obtained its 
 name of Friuli. Henceforth it was a pejrpetual battle- 
 ground for the Latin people; hardly had it recovered 
 from the long wars of the Roman subjugation of the 
 Celts, when it became the scene of conflicts between 
 the candidates for the imperial throne. Proconsuls 
 marching their legions from the Orient found their 
 
272 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 advance contested at the end of the Alpine passes, 
 and the garrisoned cities of the plain defying their pro- 
 gress. When Constantinople became a capital, there 
 were as many devastating legions marching the other 
 way, from the day when Constantine rushed with only 
 twenty thousand veterans to snatch the crown from 
 Licinius. Ah, how many unremembered times did 
 those wretched Friulan towns suffer siege, assault, and 
 fiery destruction, at the hands of their fellow citizens, 
 in those two centuries of civil strife. 
 
 Yet it was only a preparation for the terrible ages 
 that followed. From the invasion of the Visigoths in 
 403 A.D., with.Alaric at their head, the vast onrush of 
 barbarians from the East turned Friuli into a blood- 
 deluged and smoking desert. Attila with his Huns in 
 452 first earned here his appellation of the "Scourge 
 of God"; the unlucky province, as in every case, re- 
 ceived the full brunt of the savages' first lust and 
 wrath, and scarcely one builded stone was left upon 
 another. After Udine, Aquileia herself was seized and 
 destroyed. The castle hill that rises in Udine's centre 
 from the perfect level, is said to have been thrown up 
 by Attila's order, that he might watch from its sum- 
 mit the burning of the sister-city, — an impossible 
 legend, strangely like that about the monster Nero, 
 yet showing by its very excess what an ineffaceable 
 impression of horror was made by the conqueror's 
 brutality. So fell magnificent Aquileia, with her my- 
 riad marble temples, baths, porticoes, and palaces, 
 one of the few grandest productions of Roman genius 
 and civilization. Padua, Vicenza, Verona, Bologna, 
 nearly all the great cities of the plain, sank with most 
 of the little ones into ashes, before this incarnate fiend. 
 But from the despoiled fugitives left of Aquileia's 
 population, who had fled for a safe retreat to the 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 273 
 
 marshy islands of the lagoons, rose that city of fairy- 
 land destined to be greater than them all, and to rule 
 them in after days with immortal splendor. 
 
 Following the Huns, in 489, ruined Friuli was de- 
 scended upon by Theodoric and his Ostrogoths. They 
 were confronted on the Isonzo, that flowed past the 
 remains of Aquileia, by Odoacer, the recently ap- 
 pointed ruler of Italy, king of the settled Visigothic 
 tribes, who were intrenched in a fortified camp; and 
 one of those momentous battles of the world took place, 
 of which this unfortunate district saw so many. The 
 Ostrogoths — in spite of inferior numbers, and of 
 being incumbered by their long trains of women and 
 children, oxen and belongings — swam the river, took 
 the fortresses by fierce assault, and scattered their ene- 
 mies far and wide. Theodoric seized what was left of 
 the poor Friulan towns, but did not burn them, — an 
 act he was above; he went on to defeat Odoacer at a 
 decisive battle near Verona, occupy all of North Italy, 
 and reign very justly till his death in 527. 
 
 Then came the armies of the great Justinian, to 
 reconquer Italy for the Byzantine throne, and make 
 Ravenna the seat of his viceroy's government. Then 
 Alboin and his Lombards, in 568, who grasped Friuli 
 and the greater part of the peninsula with a grip which 
 did not relax for two hundred years. Alboin divided 
 his new realm into thirty-six separate duchies, of 
 which Friuli was one; and this he bestowed upon his 
 nephew Gisulf, who immediately placed his capital at 
 Forum Julii, — thenceforth known as Cividale. 
 
 Gisulf, after a noble reign, perished in defending his 
 duchy against the invading Mongolian Avars, in the 
 early years of the succeeding century; once more the 
 miserable people suffered the consequence of their 
 frontier location. It was then that occurred the mem- 
 
274 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 orable tragedy of Romilda, the Lombard princess, 
 who opened the gates of Forum Julii to her barbarian 
 lover, saw her city ruined under her eyes, and reaped 
 that horrible, exceptional fate which Gibbon so viv- 
 idly narrates.^ A large number of luckless Friulans 
 were borne away captive, the men to be massacred 
 in Pannonia, the women and children doomed to the 
 worse fate of slavery. Finally came the Franks under 
 Charlemagne, who seized the oft-conquered towns and 
 constituted the province a county of his own realm, 
 toward the close of the eighth century. 
 
 Under the loose sway of the Prankish counts the 
 Church gradually assumed the chief power in Friuli. 
 Counts and Archbishops dwelt together in Cividale; 
 the latter having removed there from ruined Aquileia, 
 after their return from Grado, — a place in the adja- 
 cent lagoons, where they and many of their flock had 
 found asylum during the ravages of the Huns. The 
 Archbishop was Patriarch of Friuli, Istria, and Dal- 
 matia, and when he departed from Grado, had left 
 there in charge a local bishop, whose see was soon 
 rapidly increased by the arrival of more refugees. 
 After the coming of the Lombards with their Arian 
 faith, it was embraced by the Patriarch of Aquileia,^ 
 along with all his subject bishops, excepting Grado 
 alone; Elias, Bishop of Grado, thereupon seized the 
 opportunity to obtain from Pope Pelagius II in 579 a 
 law making him and his successors the Patriarchs of 
 the Lagoons and Istria. Such was the foundation of 
 the Metropolitan See of Venice; which grew in power 
 constantly with the growth of the island towns, and 
 provoked the envious hatred of Cividale. 
 
 ^ Gibbon, Decline and Fall, vol. iv. 
 
 ' This was the primate's customary title, and continued to be so after 
 the removal to Cividale, and to Udine. 
 
/i-.^/i^'-f-r-t'M-t '•' !• 
 
 civil 
 
 lAL?;. SAN I'ELTRUUIS. EARLY LU.MBAKD bCULi'TUKJib. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 275 
 
 For six hundred years the reverend Patriarchs of 
 Aquileia, not satisfied with their sway upon the main- 
 land, — which extended to the Mincio in the west, — 
 never ceased their efforts to recover the lost territory 
 of Istria and the Lagoons; and the history of Friuli 
 became in part a series of wars waged by one holy pre- 
 late against the other. Several times the hot attacks 
 upon Grado by the Friulans, led by their Patriarch, 
 succeeded in taking the city and expelling its churchly 
 ruler; but at last Venice took a hand in favor of the 
 latter, after one of these expulsions, effected with the 
 aid of the Emperor Frederick. She attacked Aqui- 
 leia with her war-fleet, and brought its Patriarch in 
 chains to the Doge's palace. Thereafter his success- 
 ors were obliged for many generations to send to the 
 Republic a yearly, ironical tribute of twelve pigs. 
 
 The result of these centuries of strange warfare be- 
 tween Friuli and the Lagoons was the end of the Pa- 
 triarchs' dominance over the Friulans, and their entire 
 subjection to Venice. In the first years of the fifteenth 
 century the Emperor Sigismund waged war against 
 the Serene Republic, and the Patriarch of Aquileia, 
 with his allied forces, once more siezed the opportun- 
 ity to attack Grado and the towns of the lagoon; but 
 Venice acted quickly, and before the Emperor could 
 send assistance, overran and conquered the whole 
 Friulan territory, and, despite all combinations and 
 excommunications, retained it as her permanent pro- 
 vince. Cividale was occupied in 1419, Udine in 1420, 
 and the latter — then grown to be the larger city, and 
 the seat of the Patriarchs — was made the capital of the 
 province; while the primates themselves were reduced 
 to simple archbishops, without any temporal power. ^ 
 
 1 This revolution left the Patriarch of Grado alone in his primacy; but 
 in 1445 the Venetians removed his seat to St. Mark's, — to produce long 
 after, from one of its holders, the good Pope that reigns to-day. 
 
276 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Friuli now had peace at last; prosperity developed 
 under the kind Venetian rule, and with it the retarded 
 arts of the Renaissance, The wood-carvers of the 
 forests laid aside the chisel and took up the brush, 
 laboriously teaching themselves, for two generations, 
 the principles of drawing. So were evolved without 
 outside teaching those two quaint painters of the lat- 
 ter part of the quattrocento, the best of their fellows, 
 — Domenico da Tolmezzo and Andrea Bellunello; 
 they turned out earnest, naive, sentimental pictures, 
 with little power of modeling, grace, or coloring, but 
 decidedly good considering their authors' lack of 
 advantages. Their figures and groups of holy person- 
 ages were drawn with a faithfulness, a sincerity, a 
 deep feeling, that lift the results above mere categories 
 of points successful or failed, into expositions of two 
 lovable, believing human souls. One forgets the brush 
 in thinking of the artist. To them, if to any painters 
 that have lived, are applicable Lytton's significant 
 words : — 
 
 For Art in Nature made by Man, 
 To Man the interpreter of God.' 
 
 At last, about 1500, the methods of Venetian paint- 
 ing penetrated the country, and graduates of the 
 school of Giovanni Bellini awoke the Friulans with 
 their graceful work. Of these the first to gain pro- 
 minence were Giovanni Martini, and that Martino 
 d' Udine, Friuli's primary genius, who was called "Pel- 
 legrino" (singular) by his master, on account of his 
 unusual ability, and "da S. Daniele" after the town 
 where he long resided and executed his masterpieces. 
 They were great rivals; but "the style of the former 
 was harsh and crude, though not destitute of grace,"* 
 and the latter far excelled him both in execution and 
 
 ' Lord Lytton, The Artist. * Lanzi, History of Painting. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 277 
 
 in beauty. Girolamo da Udine also developed a charm- 
 ing Bellinesque manner. 
 
 After these men came the disciples of Titian and 
 Giorgione, — including Friuli's second genius, Por- 
 denone, and that excellent decorator, Giovanni da 
 Udine, with whom all are familiar from his labors in 
 Rome; he studied under Raffaele as well as Barbarelli, 
 and brought into Friuli upon his return that use of 
 grotesques, named after Raphael, with which he 
 became chiefly identified. In the next generation, in- 
 cluding Pordenone's disciple, Amalteo, who was con- 
 siderably above his fellows, the art entered upon its 
 steady decline; and produced thenceforth no Friulan 
 worker of first-rate ability, — if we except Antonio 
 Carnio, in the seventeenth century, in whom was the 
 last flare-up of the dying fire. 
 
 Udine, the Roman Utina, which has taken the place 
 of Aquileia and Cividale as the capital of Friuli, lies less 
 than ten miles from the eastern Alpine wall, and some 
 twenty miles north of the lagoons, upon the Roggia 
 Canal, connecting the rivers Torre and Cormor, upon 
 either side. About five miles to its northwest rises the 
 chain of foothills, separated from the Alps, in which 
 nestles the town of S. Daniele. The reason for Udine's 
 existence in earliest times, and its survival of all dis- 
 asters, is that it has always been the junction of the 
 highways, once traversed by horse and now by train, 
 which enter the plain from Austria; — one of these 
 passes descending from the north by the valleys of the 
 Tagliamento and the Fella, the other crossing by way 
 of Gorz on the east. This was an important position, 
 strategically as well as commercially; and the history 
 of Udine, accordingly, has been in large part that of 
 Friuli. It succeeded Cividale as the virtual capital 
 of the province about 1248, when it was formally 
 
278 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 designated by the Patriarch of Aquileia as the resi- 
 dence of his successors. 
 
 When the Venetians seized the province in 1420, 
 Udine held out under siege beyond the other cities, 
 endeavoring to preserve the safety of her patriarchal 
 ruler; but when the latter fled by stealth to the 
 Count of Gorizia, Udine became an unwavering Vene- 
 tian subject. After Napoleon in 1797 had chased the 
 Austrians out of Italy, following them to the very 
 gates of the Julian Alps, it was at the little village of 
 Campo Formio, only four miles from the capital, that 
 the terms of peace were arranged and signed. Al- 
 though by them France received the Netherlands, and 
 Austria recognized the independence of the Cisalpine 
 and Ligurian Republics, Friuli and all the Venetian 
 territories east of the Adige passed under a foreign 
 yoke; and when, after sixty years of suffering and 
 struggling, Friuli was finally freed by the war of 1866, 
 Udine saw the Austrian boundary drawn hardly a 
 dozen miles beyond, leaving in their hated hands 
 Gorizia, Trieste, Istria, and Dalmatia, — all the east- 
 ern lands of Venice, vibrating still with her speech and 
 pride, and which Italians will never rest satisfied till 
 they have joined once more to the motherland. 
 
 The castle hill of Udine — which certainly has 
 every appearance of artificial construction — stood at 
 the northern side of the oval of the original, smaller 
 town, whose outline is still clearly visible upon the 
 plan, marked by the broad streets replacing the walls; 
 to-day all this is inclosed in the middle of the modern 
 city, — a quadrilateral many times the former size; so 
 that the castle now stands a little north of the city's 
 centre. The Roggia Canal penetrates the quadrangle 
 on its northern side, flows around the east side of the 
 original oval, — which it completely encircled as a 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 279 
 
 moat in the first place, — and emerges on the south by 
 the side of the railroad station. The lofty embankment 
 of the Renaissance walls is still standing upon the 
 southern, eastern, and eastern half of the northern 
 sides of the rectangle, and on its western side has been 
 replaced by a shady parkway. 
 
 Roundabout the old citadel, inevitably, are found 
 the centres of the city's life : along its western base lies 
 the lengthy, ancient market-place, still called the Mer- 
 cato Vecchio; at its southern angle lies the smaller 
 Piazza Vittorio Emanuele, fronted by the Municipio, 
 the town loggia, the clock- and bell-tower, and the or- 
 nate, arched entrance to the castle grounds; and on its 
 northeastern flank stretches the vast Piazza d'Armi, 
 five hundred yards long by three hundred wide. 
 To the south of this piazza and the hill, rise the 
 other chief public buildings, — the Duomo, Prefet- 
 tura. Archbishop's Palace, and Tribunale. From the 
 Piazza Vittorio Emanuele the principal thorough- 
 fare runs southeasterly, past the Cathedral, under the 
 names of Via Posta and Via Aquileia, to the main 
 gate called Porta Aquileia. This pierces the southern 
 city wall a little east of the station; and some dis- 
 tance west of it opens another gateway called Porta 
 Cussignacco, from which the other main street runs 
 windingly, under different names, through the, promi- 
 nent Piazzas Garibaldi and Veijti Settembre, north- 
 ward to the market-place. Between these two city 
 gates, outside the ramparts and yet north of the rail- 
 road tracks, a new residence quarter has lately arisen, 
 containing a number of avenues with glaring modern 
 houses, standing in extensive lawns and gardens, — 
 which stretch behind the buildings and do not hide 
 their ugliness. 
 
 When, therefore, I had arrived late in the afternoon 
 
280 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 from Pordenone, after a journey of no special interest, 
 beyond the crossing of the wide stony bed of the his- 
 torical TagliamentOji — this new section was my first 
 glimpse of Udine. I entered the omnibus of the Al- 
 bergo Italia, theretofore recommended to me as a fam- 
 ous old hostelry,' and was driven westward through 
 the aforesaid modern streets to Porta Cussignacco. 
 Here an official of the octroi duties appeared and went 
 through the usual performance, opening the door and 
 asking if we had anything dutiable, shutting it again 
 before we had fairly responded with the customary 
 negative. It is strange how the cities cling to that 
 antiquated method of raising revenue, — for taxing 
 food and drink is the unfairest of all systems, bearing 
 heavily upon the poor and hardly touching the rich; 
 but I had found of late a few towns that had abolished 
 it, like Vittorio and Conegliano; and at any rate it is 
 more civilly executed than years ago, when I some- 
 times had to suffer the entire ransacking of my lug- 
 gage. _ 
 
 Inside the gate the way became instantly medieval, 
 
 — narrow and dark, between aged, stuccoed dwellings, 
 
 — and so led us windingly to the broad Piazza Venti 
 Settembre, four or five hundred yards southwest of the 
 castle, and to the inn facing it upon its western end. 
 The usual driveway pierced the arcade of the buildings, 
 to the stable-yard behind; on the left of the passage 
 
 ' As an instance of the extraordinary rapidity with which these rivers 
 have raised their beds since they were confined by dikes, showing the tre- 
 mendous masses of stony detritus brought annually from the Alps, which 
 they used to scatter over the plain, it should be noted that the town of 
 Codroipo, on the Tagliamento's left bank, now lies at a level some thirty 
 feet below the torrent's present bed. One can therefore understand the 
 devastation caused when such a stream breaks loose. In flood-times there 
 is a watchman, night and day, to every hundred yards upon the dikes. 
 Casarsa, on the Tagliamento's right bank here, holds in its church some 
 fairly good frescoes of Pordenone, of his middle period (1525). 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 281 
 
 and yard were the dining-rooms and kitchen, while a 
 stairway on the right ascended to the upper hall, and 
 the dark tortuous corridors leading to the chambers 
 of the different floors. The heavy, cumbrous furniture 
 looked unaltered from a couple of centuries ago; but 
 everything was quite clean and comfortable, and its 
 very age produced that sensation of homelikeness 
 which is so pleasing in the old-fashioned country inns. 
 I was given a fine large bedroom looking upon the rear 
 garden; and found the cooking excellent. 
 
 When I went out the next morning, the deserted 
 shadowy piazza of the evening hour had altered to a 
 dazzling scene of active life; the sun poured down from 
 a cloudless sky upon a village of canvas roofs dotting 
 the inclosure, which joined with the flagged pavement 
 in radiating the flood of light. It was now the grain 
 market of the city, but the booths shone richly with 
 nearly every kind of produce; the old peasant women 
 who tended them chattered and laughed noisily, 
 children rolled and shrieked in every corner, and 
 crowds of men and house-wives trafficked and ges- 
 ticulated. The old house-fagades surrounding the 
 place complemented the scene, with their deep ar- 
 cades on piers and heavy pillars, their stained stucco 
 faces of the upper stories, and windows of every by- 
 gone shape and condition. In the centre was a hand- 
 some stone fountain of Renaissance days, with two 
 basins, and near the western end, a lofty marble 
 column surmounted by a quaint, crowned figure of 
 the Madonna. Just behind this rose the only building 
 of any pretensions, adjacent to the inn, — a marble- 
 faced, religious structure of rococo design, ugly in its 
 details of window-frame, niche, and gable, but effective 
 as a glowing whole, with its ornate, columned belfry, 
 and baroque statues lining the cornice,. 
 
282 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Moving througli the crowd, I saw a couple of men 
 in garb so strange that I did not for an instant dis- 
 cern their occupation; they wore long, black, single- 
 breasted coats reaching to their feet, with no braid 
 nor other ornamentation, and ported high hats and 
 long heavy batons, — presenting altogether a most 
 funereal appearance, and reminding me of nothing so 
 much as an undertaker combined with a poor Eng- 
 lish country beadle. But they were gendarmes, and 
 it was the regular police costume of the city. Aston- 
 ishingly different, this, from the gold lace, epaulettes, 
 cocked hats, fancy swords, and general bird-of -paradise 
 costume of the usual Italian gendarme; and it demon- 
 strates better than a chapter of description the similar 
 difference in the character of these North Italians 
 from that of their brethren farther south. They are 
 so much nearer to northern coldness, quiet, and sim- 
 plicity, which detest showiness, and the use of cold 
 steel in the time of peace. The same sort of police 
 uniform, modeled upon those of England and Hol- 
 land, prevails in some of the other North Italian 
 towns. 
 
 From the end of this piazza I followed a street north- 
 eastward that brought me shortly to the front of the 
 Cathedral, which is set off by open spaces on three 
 sides, and backs upon the Via della Posta; — a spacious 
 brick building of the thirteenth century, originally of 
 the transition style between Romanesque and Gothic, 
 but with its once noble fagade mutilated by baroque 
 portals. These were just in process of being removed, 
 in a wholesome restoration. I could see the original 
 main entrance, cleared of the mean additions, revealed 
 as a beautiful pointed archway, recessed with elaborate 
 mouldings, in which lingered the foot-rests and can- 
 opies of vanished statuettes; and in the tympanum 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 283 
 
 was one of those delightfully quaint, early reliefs, — 
 of the Crucifixion and the Lamb. 
 
 Above, there stretched across the fagade from shoul- 
 der to shoulder one of those interesting, Lombardesque, 
 arcaded cornices, of crossed round arches springing 
 from coupled, slender shafts, the intersections form- 
 ing pointed trefoils; at the ends of this arcade, and in 
 the gable, were three circular, brick, false windows, 
 recessed with many mouldings, which doubtless once 
 were filled with open tracery. There were two more 
 handsome Gothic portals, in the sides of the church, 
 which had never been demolished and still partly pre- 
 served their exquisite marble sculptures; and far 
 above the roof soared the ponderous old six-sided 
 cam'panile. 
 
 In the extensive, dusky interior I found the un- 
 usual design, for Venetia, of a nave with two aisles 
 on each side, — the outer, lower aisles being ar- 
 ranged as two series of open chapels; six enormous 
 pillars lined the nave, and shorter pillars divided the 
 inner from the outer aisles; there was no transept, but 
 an elevated 'presbytery extended from wall to wall, 
 arched by frescoed groinings and a double dome 
 painted with a cloudy paradise; the choir was further 
 elevated; and the only light penetrating the chiaroscuro 
 entered through the dome and the small clerestory 
 windows. On the wall over the main entrance pranced 
 a Late-Renaissance equestrian statue (1617) of General 
 Count Antonini of Udine;^ the other main sculptures 
 
 * This statue, with a similar one to Marc, di Manzano in the Duomo of 
 Cividale, was erected by the Venetian Government to the memory of 
 those two valiant Friulan captains, who fell fighting against the imperial- 
 ists. The remarkable manner in which this great church, with its broad 
 open presbytery and choir, elevated above the nave, is adapted to show- 
 ing off the magnificent ceremonies that have been traditional with the 
 patriarchate^ is also worthy of attention. 
 
284 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 were two remarkable benches of choir-stalls at the 
 ends of the presbytery, richly carved with designs and 
 reliefs of Biblical scenes and martyrdoms, also an an- 
 cient marble sarcophagus behind the high-altar, with 
 Early-Christian reliefs crudely depicting the Flagella- 
 tion and the Crucifixion, — a very interesting relic. 
 
 The church was a veritable gallery of Friulan paint- 
 ings, containing works of Bellunello, Domenico da 
 Tolmezzo, Girolamo da Udine, Giovanni Martini, 
 Pellegrino da S. Daniele, Amalteo, and Pordenone, 
 besides other masters of less importance; and chief of 
 them all were the two splendid specimens of those long 
 dead rivals, Martini and Pellegrino, standing appro- 
 priately side by side, on the first two altars to the left. 
 Martini's (done in 1501) represents St. Mark enthroned 
 between two bishops; and, though faded in tone and 
 color, leaving now only estimates as to its original 
 brilliancy, it is of excellent composition and drawing, 
 and a certain picturesque grace. Pellegrino's (done in 
 1502) has the advantage of much better preservation, 
 and is generally more effective and lovely, showing 
 the superiority of his genius . This really famous picture 
 represents St. Joseph holding in his arms the infant 
 Christ, with the young St. John leaning near by against 
 a railing and gazing tenderly at the Child, — and a 
 stately background of classic building, ruinous and 
 romantic; there is a curious, died-out, old-gold tone, 
 with a sense of gentle and seraphic feeling; and the 
 boyish form of the Baptist is thoroughly enchanting. 
 Lanzi says of the former, that it is "the richest speci- 
 men which appeared from his [Martini's] hands," and 
 of the latter, that it is "still worthy of admiration for 
 its architecture," and each of its figures "displays 
 the finest contours and the best forms." ' 
 
 1 Lanzi, History of Painting. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 285 
 
 Pordenone's works were in the sacristy, — three 
 small canvases, of which one, the burial of a saint, 
 was poor and of doubtful authenticity. The other two, 
 Christ raising Lazarus and a bishop healing a woman, 
 were full of exceptional feeling and good atmosphere, 
 and one contained a very grand figure of the Saviour. 
 From this room the old sacristan conducted me across 
 the street on the south side of the Duomo to a little 
 church called the Chiesa alia Purita, which he opened 
 with his keys and showed me lined about with large 
 paintings. 
 
 It was a single-storied chapel, with a flat ceiling 
 and another floor above it, simple in lines and fur- 
 nishings and of modern appearance; but it dated from 
 the seicento, and had been decorated with nine pic- 
 tures by the Tiepoli, father and son. Now the Tie- 
 poli were artists very little fitted to adorn a sacred 
 place or reproduce a religious scene, and I gazed at 
 this their attempt to swim in an alien element with 
 much curiosity. The work of Giovanni Battista, the 
 father, consisted of one of his large, circular ceiling 
 frescoes, intended to represent the Ascension of the 
 Virgin; and showed his customary white clouds, blue 
 spaces, and scattered flying figures, in his usual gay tone 
 and tints. There was actually no difference from his 
 regular reproductions of Olympus and Greek gods, if 
 I except possibly the uplifted, rapt face and pose of the 
 Virgin's figure, which were undeniably devotional. 
 Otherwise it was positively amusing. The work of 
 Tiepolo, junior, consisted of eight large pictures in 
 grisaille upon the walls, above the wainscoting, re- 
 presenting both Old and New Testament scenes : such 
 as Elias and the bears, — a strong and realistic tableau; 
 the entry into Jerusalem, — with an unbearded Christ; 
 Jacob dying amidst his twelve sons, — of excellent 
 
286 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 dramatic force; the Sons of Maccabeus, — finely 
 composed and acted, — and so on. These pictures, 
 though poor in modehng and grace, had much power 
 and dramatic value, and showed the son much superior 
 to the father in versatiHty and expression. 
 
 From the rear of the Duomo I now followed the 
 Via Posta northwestward, coming quickly to the 
 Piazza Vittorio Emanuele. Before my delighted eyes 
 opened one of the most pictureque city squares of all 
 Italy, — so varied, so faced with beautiful architect- 
 ure, so adorned with handsome arcades, columns, 
 and statuary, so imposingly dominated by the vast 
 castle towering upon its hilltop overhead, that I stood 
 still, enraptured. The place is an elongated rectangle 
 stretching northwest and southeast, with the citadel 
 rising above its northern corner; the continuation of 
 the Via Posta extends with its tramway tracks along 
 the southwestern flank, divided from the rest of the 
 open by a stone parapet, upon which the remaining, 
 larger space is terraced as a monumental promenade, 
 sloping gently with the hill's first inclination up to a 
 splendid portico on the right. 
 
 This portico is an exquisite Renaissance arcade, long 
 and deep, entirely of glistening marble, whose fair, 
 rounded arches rise upon slender Ionic columns; an 
 approaching flight of marble steps extends the whole 
 length; and in the centre it is lifted to two stories by 
 a square pavilion, faced by a huge archway, twice the 
 height of the colonnade, which is sustained by triple 
 clusters of Ionic shafts. Behind the pavilion rise a 
 graceful dome and lantern, upon whose left the muni- 
 cipal clock- and bell-tower soars into the blue. This 
 is another beautiful Renaissance monument, in two 
 divisions visible above the top parapet of the loggia: 
 the first of heavy, rusticated, stone blocks, faced by 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 287 
 
 the old reUef of the winged Venetian Lion, the second 
 containing the clock-face, with handsome large Ionic 
 columns at its angles, upholding a ponderous entab- 
 lature; while on its flat summit stand the customary 
 Venetian bell, and bronze figures wielding hammers. 
 What a reverence and admiration all these towns must 
 have had for their overlord, to reproduce so faithfully 
 and repeatedly the various features of her Piazza of 
 St. Mark. 
 
 Higher still than the bell and its beaters rises the 
 great castle upon its eminence, gazing proudly down 
 through a hundred windows upon the square at its feet, 
 commanding the whole city and the country far and 
 wide. But castle as it is still always called, the appel- 
 lation is a misnomer; for the original fortress,^ dating 
 from Roman days, was destroyed in the quattrocento, 
 and the height recrowned in 1517 by this Renaissance 
 palace, built by Giovanni Fontana. So that instead of 
 a ponderous fortress greeting my eyes, I saw a palatial, 
 six-storied, flat-roofed edifice, faced with plaster now 
 decaying, and endowed with a severe sameness by its 
 countless square-headed windows, which had no other 
 ornamentation than simple ledges and cornices. Its 
 only unusual feature was the lofty basement, rising to 
 half the total height and separated from the piano 
 nobile by a cornicione fully as heavy as the top one. 
 
 The church of the castle was visible on its right, de- 
 tached, marked for a church only by the huge cam- 
 panile, which rose in several long divisions to an ornate 
 Renaissance belfry, with a pointed dome topped by a 
 monstrous, flying, bronze angel, far above the palace- 
 roof. Around the palace were also visible the green 
 lawns of the hilltop, and bunches of trees on each side. 
 
 1 In that building dwelt the patriarchal rulers of Udine, from the thir- 
 teenth century. 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Within the huge building — once occupied by the stately 
 Venetian Government, and its political prisoners, 
 groaning in the underground dungeons left from an- 
 cient days — ^now remained, nothing whatever, as I was 
 told, except the city's collections of art and antiquity. 
 
 I lowered my eyes again to the piazza, and advanced 
 upon the terrace to examine the imposing lines of 
 sculpture that make it radiant. If the Anglo-Saxon 
 people in general once realized the incalculable bene- 
 fit rendered to a city by an abundance of heroic monu- 
 ments, which not only make it beautiful and beloved, 
 but awaken and sustain in the inhabitants sentiments 
 of civic patriotism and ambition, some of their wealthy 
 philanthropists would certainly divert their money to 
 such embellishments. Here was a whole city made im- 
 pressive by the inspiring monuments of its piazzas. 
 Before' the great central archway of the portico, 
 reared a fine equestrian statue of Victor Emmanuel, 
 in bronze, upon a lofty marble pedestal, which was 
 covered with faded wreaths deposited by patriots. 
 At the middle of the northern end rose a splendid marble 
 Goddess of Peace, throned high above an encircling 
 stairway, — a memento of the pact of Campo Formio. 
 Here, too, upon the front corners of the terrace, were 
 those happy reminders of the glorious Venetian Re- 
 public, her invariable twin columns, — bearing the 
 Lion of St. Mark and the Goddess of Justice. Colossal 
 figures of Hercules and Csecus guarded the main ap- 
 proach, and an oval marble fountain of three basins 
 cooled the dazzling air with its tinkling waters. 
 
 But the greatest, loveliest, and most memorable 
 factor of this whole scene I have purposely left un- 
 touched until the end, — the fairylike palace of rose- 
 and-white marbles facing it upon the left, more beauti- 
 ful than the loggia, the clock-tower, the sculptured 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 289 
 
 monuments, — more striking than all of them to- 
 gether. It was a structure of dreamland, an edifice 
 of seafoam thrown up by the waves and shining rose- 
 ate in a sunset glow; it was another of those marvel- 
 ous buildings which the Italians of Gothic times 
 created for their town halls and ducal palaces, to 
 make us wonder to-day at so much loveliness in solid 
 matter, — of that wonderful company which includes 
 the Palazzi Municipali of Perugia, Siena, Verona, 
 and Cremona, — of the unsurpassable type of the 
 Doge's palace at Venice. As the good old Udinese 
 copied their clock-tower from St. Mark's, so also, 
 when they built a new Municipio in 1457, they re- 
 produced on a smaller scale the sublime lines and 
 coloring of the Palazzo Ducale. 
 
 This exquisite specimen of Gothic work is more a 
 scintillating jewel than a majestic monument, — a 
 ruby whose gleaming rays illumine joyously the whole 
 piazza, and to enjoy a sight of which right willingly 
 I would send a friend all the way from Venice. It is 
 the contrast and complement of that other palatial 
 wonder, the Basilica of Vicenza. All around its first 
 story runs the splendid Gothic colonnade of the doges, 
 but more delicate and ethereal, on more slender, fluted 
 columns, with elaborate foliage caps; between them 
 extend the sections of a superb Gothic balustrade, its 
 railing of white marble, and its dainty balusters of 
 alternate serpentine and Carrara. Within is one great 
 loggia covering the whole ground floor, whose pave- 
 ment is elevated a half-dozen steps above the street, 
 — which are arranged semicircularly before the two 
 central arches. The approach at the southern end, 
 where the ground is lower, is by a handsome double 
 stairway, having the same dainty balustrade. 
 
 Over the red-and-white voussoirs of the pointed 
 
290 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 arches rise the sheer marble walls to the lofty cornice, 
 in alternate horizontal strata of rose color and white, 
 broken only by the few but carefully balanced win- 
 dows, three on each side. The central of these win- 
 dows on the front side consists of a colonnade of five 
 trefoil arches on marble shafts, and has one of the most 
 perfect Gothic ringhiera balconies existing, supported 
 on voluptuously modeled corbels, with a railing con- 
 taining panels of geometrical open tracery. The other 
 windows are of similar graceful construction, with 
 three trefoil arches instead of five. 
 
 Still another winsome feature is the marble Ma- 
 donna standing at the southeastern angle over the 
 corner column, under a luxurious Gothic canopy 
 covered with crockets, finials, and spire, holding her 
 Babe in one hand and a model of a fortress in the other, 
 — a very fine early work, which has always been 
 especially revered by the Udinese. 
 
 I entered the wide, darkened loggia by the front 
 steps, and found its roof upheld by rows of columns 
 similar to those of the fagade, supporting rounded 
 arches; here had been the meeting-place of the people 
 for hundreds of years, — and a number of groups were 
 at this moment conversing loudly in different bays, 
 with a continual going to and fro. On the rear wall to 
 the right I found the famous Madonna of Pordenone, 
 so dear to the inhabitants, — a frescoed figure of truly 
 wonderful loveliness, with something of a Raphael- 
 esque contour to her rounded cheeks, and a softness 
 of well-modeled flesh, a grace of posture, a sweetness 
 of expression, quite impossible to conceive without 
 beholding. The Virgin with her Child stands before 
 a curtain, which just permits a glimpse to the rear of 
 a distant hill-town on its rocky crag, backed by ser- 
 rated mountains. In a separate compartment just 
 
HDINE AND CIVIDALE 291 
 
 below, before a marble pillar in a different landscape, 
 three ravishing child-angels are making music with 
 song and psaltery. Restored it is, of course, but very 
 skillfully, in the original, softly bright, harmonious 
 colors, broadly massed. Its seraphic beauty lights up 
 the whole loggia, and no one who has seen it can deny 
 the power of graceful, pietistic repose to its author, 
 nor refuse him a debt of gratitude. Some critics — 
 wrongly, I think — claim that the painter was Gio- 
 vanni da Udine. Pordenone once executed another 
 Madonna for this piazza, upon the wall of the opposite 
 loggia; but I looked for it in vain, and only discovered 
 it eventually in the civic museum. 
 
 A conflagration in 1876 quite gutted the upper story 
 of the Municipio, so that the fine, heavy, oak-beamed 
 roof which I now saw was a very recent reproduction 
 of the original. A passage arching the narrow street 
 in the rear led me to a large lofty hall in the annex; 
 this was a still older building, that has always served 
 for municipal purposes, containing the offices of vari- 
 ous departments ; and its great hall has been for count- 
 less generations the principal assembly chamber of 
 the city. Around its walls hung many canvases, in 
 several rows, including a large number of unusual size. 
 None of them were very noteworthy, but the best of 
 the Renaissance works were a Gathering of the Manna 
 by Grassi, the Udinese, a Last Supper by Amalteo, 
 and Saints Agostino and Girolamo by Martini, — which 
 Lanzi calls remarkable for its power of coloring. 
 
 I found here a functionary willing to show me the 
 upper floor of the Municipio, above the loggia, and we 
 ascended to it by a marble staircase beside the pass- 
 age. There were four large chambers, with fine hard- 
 wood floors and furniture, and hideous arabesques 
 covering the lofty walls and ceilings, the results of the 
 
292 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 reconstruction; they contained plenty of those green 
 baize tables which Italian officialdom is so fond of, 
 and ponderous armchairs arranged formally for the 
 sittings of councils and committees. Upon the lower 
 parts of the walls were a few old canvases, of no 
 importance; of which the most noticeable was a 
 Pomponio Amalteo, representing Christ appearing to 
 some kneeling, pompous officials in very sumptuous 
 dress. 
 
 After this I left the piazza for the Mercato Vecchio, 
 which extends from its northwestern angle, in the same 
 direction, along the base of the hill, — rather a very 
 broad street than a piazza proper. It is lined with old, 
 four-storied, stuccoed buildings, rising upon continu- 
 ous colonnades, having shops and caffes in the ground 
 floors and faint traces of bygone frescoes on their 
 fagades. One block to the west of it I came to the 
 Mercato Nuovo, where the trade of produce now con- 
 gregates, under the customary canvas roofs and um- 
 brellas, — a smaller, square-shaped piazza, quite 
 crowded by the merchants and buying housewives. 
 In their midst rose another statue of the Virgin, an- 
 other splashing fountain, and at the farther end a 
 strange but elegant, old well-head, with four marble 
 columns, and a fifth upon their suriimit. Ah, those 
 countless, charming, picturesque old market-places of 
 Italy, thronged with her warm-hearted people and 
 filled with the products of their genius, — how the 
 heart goes out to them, of one who has lived among 
 them! 
 
 At the western end of this piazza stands the Church 
 of S. Giacomo, a handsome, Late-Renaissance edifice 
 entirely sheathed with marble and highly decorated 
 with sculpture; and upon an adjacent wall is an excel- 
 lent old fresco of the Madonna. The Via Canciani 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 293 
 
 leads thence southward to the Piazza Venti Settem- 
 bre; and I followed it back to my hotel. 
 
 Upon my next visit to the central piazza, I climbed 
 the hillside to the castle. The entrance to the grounds 
 was by a rusticated stone archway with Doric half- 
 columns, i in the northeastern angle behind the God- 
 dess of Peace; within which I found a driveway curv- 
 ing up the slope alongside a fascinating, arcaded 
 passage, consisting of a number of long flights of steps. 
 These were arched over by masonry, and lined upon the 
 left by a series of delightful Gothic arcades, consisting 
 of trefoil, ogive arches in stucco, supported by marble 
 columns with primitive foliage capitals. The steps 
 were worn by centuries of climbers; and my thoughts 
 reverted to all the myriads of visitors that had mounted 
 here before me in long past ages, — in silken doublet 
 and long-hose, velvet gown and feathered cap, and all 
 the varying gay costumes left us only in pictures. 
 Ah, what pictures must not those old arcades have 
 seen, — what whisperings of love, and hatred, and 
 ambition, what pomp of proud patricians, and misery 
 of poor prisoners going to their doom ! 
 
 I mounted between the east end of the castle and the 
 church, and on the farther, northern, side discovered 
 a wide, grass-grown parade covering the summit, with 
 the true fagade of the edifice looking down upon it; 
 a grand, double, circular stairway of two stories led 
 majestically to the principal portal, in the piano 
 nobile. The custode, who dwelt in a little building be- 
 side the church, sent his wife to conduct me over the 
 palace, and she admitted me through a small doorway 
 of the basement, into a large hall where doubtless the 
 
 '■ This finely proportioned structure, with its marked sense of power, 
 was probably designed by Palladio upon his visit here in 1556, during 
 which year it was erected. But there is nothing certain about it. 
 
294 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 guards once lounged. It was utterly denuded now, as 
 were all the halls and chambers of the immense struc- 
 ture. A number of the ground-floor rooms contained 
 the city's collection of old sculpture and bits of archi- 
 tecture, — looking deserted and forlorn amidst the 
 lofty, echoing, cold walls. 
 
 There was nothing remarkable here ; but adjacent lay 
 the entrance to the interesting old dungeons, hidden 
 amongst the ancient foundations on which the present 
 edifice was raised. I crept through those places 
 of terrible memories by flickering candlelight, which 
 revealed countless painful scratchings on the walls, of 
 phrases and fragments of verse, — groans of dying 
 unfortunates torn from them by their agony, of which 
 every one represented unspeakable sufferings unto 
 death. It was entirely dark at midday in those horrible 
 stone boxes, where mortals had confined each other 
 since the days of Rome, and where the Venetian Gov- 
 ernment immured its political opponents. One needs 
 occasionally to descend into some such oubliettes of 
 past times, to be properly grateful for living to-day. 
 
 We ascended to the great entrance hall of the pal- 
 ace, in the centre of the piano nobile, directly above 
 the guard hall and still more spacious; the principal 
 portal opened from it, upon the top landing of the 
 grand external staircase. I looked over its ponderous 
 coffered ceiling, — richly gilded, the panels adorned 
 with painted tableaux, — and its lofty walls covered 
 with decadent Renaissance frescoes, arranged in cu- 
 rious large scenes, more or less defaced, — imagining 
 the countless brilliant gatherings which they had 
 witnessed under the Venetian rule. How many and 
 many a stately assembly of Friukn patricians had 
 curtsied here in laced coat and periwig under the Gov- 
 ernor's eagle eye, — in what an outward splendor of 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 295 
 
 music and ceremony, with what an inner trembling 
 at the remembrance of the black dungeons yawning 
 beneath their tripping feet, and pulsating with the 
 . groans of dying wretches who had been their friends, 
 their relatives, their brothers. The rule of the terrible 
 Ten was omnipotent here as in Venice; and no man 
 knew when a touch upon the shoulder might take him 
 forever from human ken. 
 
 The adjacent suites of chambers, in the western 
 wing, were filled now with the city's collection of 
 paintings: several rooms, first, containing specimens 
 of the old Friulan masters, then others containing 
 modern works left by recent legacies. They had been 
 removed here but a few weeks ago from the Palazzo 
 Bartolini beyond the Mercato Vecchio, — which still 
 preserves the Municipal Library. It was not a large 
 nor an impressive collection; but, like even the small- 
 est museum of inexhaustible Italy, it had some works 
 of such merit and enticement as to make the whole an 
 agreeable memory. 
 
 The first room held pictures of the earliest periods, 
 both before and just after the institution of Venetian 
 methods; chief and most pleasing among them being 
 the two masterpieces of Girolamo da Udine, whose 
 warm, golden tone and graceful, well-modeled, Bel- 
 linesque figures were a striking contrast to the more 
 primitive, stiff panels, resembling tapestries. One of 
 the two represented S. Domenico, with six captivating 
 girl-angels making melody, outlined against a sky of 
 enchanting blueness, in a glowing harmony of colors; 
 the other was Girolamo's Coronation of the Virgin, 
 between the Magdalen and John the Baptist, — a 
 work of most powerful spacing, effective disposition, 
 and clear perspective, with figures of vigorous mould- 
 ing and quiet dignity. The Eternal Father is portrayed 
 
296 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 as seated upon a simple cloth-covered form before a 
 hanging velvet curtain, behind which to the far dis- 
 tance stretches the Plain of Friuli, to its castled foot- 
 hills and craggy Alps; the Madonna kneels at his right . 
 hand upon a lower step, with meek, downcast coun- 
 tenance and folded hands, while the Almighty places 
 a crown upon her coif; the two saints stand to right 
 and left, and a tiny, chubby, winged cherub, perched 
 upon the lowest step, is handling meditatively a lute. 
 The wide free spaces, the warm, dreamy tone, the 
 strong, simply-robed figures, the broad, rich masses 
 of color, all conjoin to make this an exceptional work, 
 and overshadow its lack of expression. 
 
 In the second room the principal object was Porde- 
 none's Madonna, which formerly adorned the public 
 loggia, — a lovely female form, gentle and winsome, 
 of his usual powerful moulding and vivid flesh-color. 
 In the third room I was struck by a piece of silk 
 embroidery surpassing anything in that line I had 
 ever seen, — an extraordinary curiosity and artistic 
 chef d'ceuvre combined; it was a veritable painting in 
 thread, showing a pair of lions couchant, of most vivid 
 lifelikeness and vigorous grace. Here was also an ex- 
 traordinary modern canvas, that seized the beholder 
 with its tragic expressiveness like a breathless vise : it 
 represented a lone man and woman upon a mountain- 
 top, clasping each other with agonized, terror-stricken 
 faces, surrounded by the advancing flood, beaten by 
 the thundering elements; — a profound accomplish- 
 ment, executed by F. Giuseppini, who died in 1862. 
 The remaining four or five rooms contained indiffer- 
 ent etchings, woodcuts, engravings, and ordinary 
 modern paintings. The view from the windows of all 
 of them was impressive, — over the red-tiled roofs 
 and campanili of the city below, across the adjacent, 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 297 
 
 barren-looking plain with its glistening river-beds, to 
 the rounded foothills and towering mountains. 
 
 On the following day I set out from the central 
 piazza for an examination of the quarter east of the 
 hill, following the Via Manin, which runs easterly from 
 the place's southeastern angle, along the southern 
 base of the height. It is a short street, and halfway 
 upon the left I passed a delightful Old Renaissance 
 palace covered with a reddish-brown stucco; its far- 
 projecting wooden roof shadowed a fine colonnaded 
 window of five arches, with marble shafts, and double 
 marble balconies of handsome design; while the plas- 
 ter held inset below it an ancient relief of the Madonna, 
 Child, and putti. The way debouched into a bay at 
 the southern angle of the vast Piazza d' Armi, which 
 I saw stretching a third of a mile before me to the 
 northwest, adorned in the centre with a large oval 
 grove of trees, and holding a second, triangular grove 
 in its far apex. It reminded me of Padua's Prato della 
 Valle, and shimmered with the same fierce sunniness. 
 
 I crossed it, however, to the curious Church of the 
 Beata Vergine delle Grazie on the eastern side, enjoy- 
 ing in passing the unusual beauty of the trees, — horse- 
 chestnuts, and planes of magnificent dimensions, one 
 of the latter being fully six feet in diameter. The 
 church rose at the top of an imposing flight of steps, 
 with a classical fagade of four mammoth Corinthian 
 stucco columns. Adjacent on the right were some 
 charming old cloisters, of Gothic arches sustained by 
 primitive columns, with bits of early frescoing in the 
 lunettes, and shapely palms of several species embel- 
 lishing the court. 
 
 The interior of the edifice proved to be one glitter- 
 ing mass of modern bright decoration, carried to the 
 extreme, — the ceiling covered with gay-hued fres- 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 coes, the walls with gilding, plaster statues, painted 
 wooden reliefs, and other frescoes, of appalling poor- 
 ness and number. It was another " miracle-working " 
 church, — which accounted for all these riches, that 
 the priests had reaped from the credulous pilgrims. 
 Two rooms, on the right and left immediately after 
 entering, were hung to the ceiling, upon their four 
 walls, with objects of every sort supposed to have 
 been given by thankful, cured suppliants, — crutches, 
 wooden limbs, wooden heads, frames containing 
 chromos, harrowing pictures of sick-beds, crude repre- 
 sentations of the miracles performed, — thousands of 
 them, and doubtless in great part true witnesses; 
 Lourdes shows us what implicit faith will do. A con- 
 tinuous stream of peasants was coming and going, 
 with awed faces, many of them purchasing mementoes 
 and trinkets for deposit from the vendors upon the 
 steps. And the object of all this worship and belief 
 was but an old canvas painted with a figure of the 
 Madonna, hidden behind an embroidered cloth over 
 the altar in the left chapel. 
 
 At the southern end of the Piazza d' Armi stands 
 the Tribunale, or court-house, and upon its south side, 
 facing westward over a little park running southeast- 
 erly from the end of the Via Manin, the huge palace 
 of the Archbishop.^ This was the building to which 
 I now bent my steps, to see the frescoes of Giovanni 
 Battista Tiepolo and Giovanni da Udine, decorating 
 its piano nobile. The Bishop was luckily away in the 
 mountains, and a sole caretaker left in charge, who 
 
 ' This small but pleasant Giardino Pubblico, with its groves of cypresses, 
 preserves in its knolls some fragments of the embankment of the earliest 
 eastern city-wall, with the latter's moat — the Roggia Canal — still flow- 
 ing softly by. The palace was a late cinquecento erection of the Archbishops 
 — no longer Patriarchs and rulers, owing to the Venetian dominion ; in it 
 at different times stayed Pope Pius VI, Napoleon I, and Victor Emmanuel. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 299 
 
 conducted me up the grand winding staircase of six 
 flights, with pardonable pride. Upon the ceiling of its 
 well was one of Tiepolo's characteristic circular fres- 
 coes, this time representing the Pall of the Angels, — 
 a work of real power, in which the falling, whirling 
 forms seemed to rush downward before the eyes. 
 
 The grand suite was upon the third-story front, as 
 often in Friuli, commencing with a large throne-room 
 opening from the stairway, which was adorned with 
 portraits of all the Bishops of Udine, and the Patriarchs 
 of Aquileia before them, back to the first tenant of the 
 office. The ceiling-painting was modern. But the ad- 
 joining so-called gallery, or reception-room, contained 
 six paintings by Tiepolo: a "tondo" upon the ceiling, 
 showing the Sacrifice of Isaac, and five scenes from 
 the same story upon the walls, of which two were in 
 brown monochrome. The largest and best picture 
 was Jacob appearing to Rachel and her sister, though 
 the figures of the Sacrifice were the better moulded, 
 and its angel, an alluring apparition. The tangibility 
 was in general rather poor, and the colors too light, but 
 the composition was good and the dramatic action 
 and expression surprisingly so. The second chamber, 
 or Sala Rossa, contained Tiepolo's remaining labors, — 
 a large Judgment of Solomon upon the centre of the 
 ceiling, beautifully colored, well grouped and posed, 
 but not individually graceful nor realistic, — and four 
 figures of prophets in the corners. 
 
 The third room, or state bedchamber, was charac- 
 teristically adorned by Giovanni da Udine, with five 
 of his customary little panels, in the centre and corners 
 of the ceiling, — which often make one feel that he 
 must have distrusted his power to draw large figures. 
 They represented scenes from the life of Christ, — the 
 giving of the keys to Peter (central), the multiplication 
 
300 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 of the loaves and fishes (best of the lot, with a noble 
 form of the Saviour), the meeting with the Centurion, 
 Jesus preaching from a boat in the lake, and Judas 
 receiving the betrayal money. They were second-class 
 work, showing clearly that little pains had been taken. 
 I was more interested in the fourth chamber, — a 
 fine large library, lined with handsome cases and count- 
 less old tomes, with a delicate oak balustrade around 
 the second story, surmounted by graceful wood-carved 
 putti, and a bright modern ceiling-painting. It was 
 an interesting example of the delightful old libraries 
 hidden in private palaces all over Italy : — 
 
 For Italy 's the whole earth's treasury, piled — 
 With coins of scholars' fancy, which, being rung 
 On workday counter, still sound silver-proof: 
 In short, with all the dreams of dreamers young.' 
 
 The most pleasing sight of all came last, in the 
 private chapel off the throne-room, whose pala con- 
 sisted of a delectable Madonna by Palma Giovane, in 
 partial chiaroscuro, her child standing upon a little 
 cloud upheld by a baby-angel; — a splendidly modeled 
 work, with rich, soft, flesh-portrayal, of exceeding grace 
 and quiet feeling. When I went down I noticed the 
 courtyard in the rear, — a large space surrounded by 
 a stately stone wall crowned with many marble 
 statues, and holding in its centre a lovely Old Renais- 
 sance well-top. The building itself was of no interest 
 externally, the huge f agade being of plainest, unadorned 
 stucco. I sat down for a while in the Public Garden be- 
 fore it, — a pretty, cooling spot, consisting of varied, 
 tree-clad knolls and dells, through which flowed the 
 shining strip of the Roggia Canal.^ On its western side 
 
 ' Mrs. Browning, Casa Guidi Windows. 
 
 ' Southward the garden merges into the broad Via Gorgni, which, 
 occupying the site of the earliest walls, and still accompanied by the moat 
 (the Roggia), bends round in a wide curve to the Piazza Garibaldi in the 
 southwest. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 301 
 
 rose amongst shady groves the irregular old brick mass 
 of the Prefettura. One block west of this again, on the 
 east side of the Via Posta, a little south of the Duomo, 
 I found, later on, a private palace even more interest- 
 ing to me than the Arcivescovado. 
 
 This was the Palazzo Tinghi, upon which Pordenone 
 once lavished his genius, both inside and out; the paint- 
 ings are unusually preserved, and, though unknown to 
 the guidebooks, constitute one of Udine's principal 
 sights. The fagade was entirely painted by that great 
 master, about 1527; and suflScient remains to show us, 
 for once, how dazzling the effect of such work must 
 have been. It extends over all the abundant wall- 
 spaces, — between the windows, over the arcade, as 
 courses between the stories, and as a frieze beneath 
 the eaves; the different backgrounds being tinted in 
 delightful soft monochromes of light brown, ochre, 
 reddish-brown, white, and golden brown, — upon which 
 appear happily contrasted life-size figures of Greek 
 gods and goddesses, mythological heroes, and antique 
 groupings, each in a single color harmonious with its 
 setting, — white forms on ochre, brown on white. In 
 the frieze, prettiest of all, a series of charming white 
 figures in ancient costume extends the whole width of 
 the house, engaged in making sacrifice upon altars, and 
 other pursuits, all exquisitely outlined against a back- 
 ground of golden brown. Between the third-floor win- 
 dows are four panels of similar scenes, whose white- 
 robed participants shine like cameo-cuts against 
 gleaming gems, — of lavender glow, of orange-brown, 
 of rose-red, and emerald-green. Judged by this lin- 
 gering effect, the whole classic composition must have 
 coruscated in its early years like a transplanted rain- 
 bow. 
 
 As for the inside paintings, I was informed that the 
 
302 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 chambers of the fiano nobile embellished by Porde- 
 none had been during the centuries entirely built over, 
 — all but one room, in the very centre, which was now 
 used by a certain dentist. Doctor Clanfero. He proved 
 to be a most pleasant man, and made me free of the 
 apartment. Here I had the pleasure of beholding a pri- 
 vate salon decorated by a great master, — a rare treat, 
 worth many of the best canvases. It was a little square 
 room, with the lower parts of the walls covered by 
 three elaborate landscapes and an Annunciation, prob- 
 ably from other hands; but the magnificent frieze was 
 indubitably by Pordenone, — a brilliant, superbly sus- 
 tained series of frolicking 'putti, intertwined with vines 
 and grotesques, the design of perfect grace and regu- 
 larity, the flowers and leaves exquisitely drawn, the 
 lovely, fresh cherubs delightful beyond words. Through 
 the twining verdure ran a multitude of unnatural 
 but vividly realistic beasts and birds, with long necks 
 and human lineaments, ugly and fascinating. By the 
 same master were the two sphinxes at the sides of the 
 landscape on the right wall, — which had an uncanny 
 likeness to the side look of his feminine saints, — and 
 the two similar weird beasts above them, with male 
 heads. Never had I seen anything quite equal, in its 
 like, to this grotesque but joyous and bewitching fan- 
 tasy. Remembering Pordenone's paysage at his birth- 
 place, these landscapes were possibly also his work, 
 with their pleasing aggregation of lakes and woods and 
 mountains, overlooked by enchanted castles, peopled 
 by uncouth rustics gamboling in the foreground. 
 
 I discovered an interesting short walk through the 
 southern portion of the city, starting down from 
 Piazza Venti Settembre to Piazza Garibaldi, — so 
 called after the bronze statue of the Liberator occupy- 
 ing its centre, with a drawn sword under his folded 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 303 
 
 arm. Before this was the house from which the "altis- 
 simo eroe" spoke to the Udinese, on March 1, 1867, 
 those " words of patriotism and glory " which the tablet 
 records; behind it was the large Renaissance building 
 of the Institute of Technology, having a central, higher 
 pavilion faced with eight two-storied half-columns 
 and pilasters. Round the corner to the southwest I 
 found a very prepossessing, modern Renaissance, 
 red-brick house, with handsome marble windows and 
 loggia, and a curious frieze of painted festoons. 
 
 The Via Gorgni ran thence to the east, -which I fol- 
 lowed to the church and extensive cloisters of S. 
 Spirito. The former was nothing; but the latter, now 
 secularized and occupied by tenants, were bounded 
 by tall double colonnades, — the lower of flat arches, 
 the upper of stucco pillars supporting a wooden, tiled 
 roof, — altogether very quaint and picturesque. A 
 block to the north of this, next the huge structure of 
 the Ospedale Civile (it is always a wonder, what great 
 and well-equipped hospitals these small Italian cities 
 have), I visited the church of the Franciscans, — of no 
 account externally, but endowed with a resplendent 
 high-altar piece by Pellegrino da S. Daniele. It was a 
 Madonna standing upon clouds, which wpre upheld 
 by various saints, — a very darkly toned work, with 
 finely moulded flesh of a rich reddish tinge. Over 
 another altar was a canvas by Amalteo. 
 
 Another and last walk took me into the northern 
 quarter, starting from the exceptionally wide Via 
 Zanoni, — a block west of the Mercato Nuovo, — 
 which represents a section of the original western city- 
 wall. Here also, the old moat still flows along its side, 
 — an arm of the Roggia, — laving the bases of the 
 dwellings in Venetian style; and to reach the street 
 each house has a little bridge thrown over the water. 
 
304 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 A number of housewives, as I gazed, were kneeling upon 
 the sidewalk washing the family linen before their 
 own doors; in other sections I had seen a similar use 
 of the canal waters at the backs of the dwellings. 
 Near by, on the street leading north from the Mer- 
 cato Nuovo, I found the little Church of S. Pietro 
 Martire, containing an elegant example of Tiepolo's 
 peculiar genius as a ceiling painter, — a large fresco 
 of the Madonna in glory, with Saints Francis and 
 Catherine and a number of lovely angels, all suspended 
 upon clouds above a templed city, in which S. An- 
 tonio is visible dispensing alms. This church has also 
 a living wonder, — the only Italian sacristan who 
 refuses tips, and yet shows his building courteously. 
 The painting by Carpaccio which used to be here I 
 could obtain no trace of. 
 
 This street curves round to the north end of the 
 Mercato Vecchio, at the northwest base of the castle 
 hill, looming steeply overhead, — near the so-called 
 Casa di Risparmio, and several other very old build- 
 ings with wide-projecting wooden eaves, showing re- 
 mains of extensive frescoing. On one of them linger 
 still three clear heroic figures, of gods or saints (about 
 the same to the polytheistic lower classes), possessed 
 of considerable tactile value and well proportioned, 
 with flesh of that usual, queer, reddish-brown tinge. At 
 the very end of the street, in the shadow of the castle, 
 I came to that Palazzo Bartolini which contained the 
 library, and, formerly, the art collection; upon looking 
 it over, the pleasant directors of the institution showed 
 me a magnificent canvas of Palma Giovane which had 
 not yet been transferred. 
 
 It was a very large work, perhaps twelve feet by 
 six, representing St. Mark with the standard of Udine 
 before the Virgin with her Child, an elderly saint in 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 305 
 
 priest's cassock, and a number of very winsome an- 
 gels, while to the right through a window was visible 
 in the distance the castle hill, with the loggia and 
 clock-tower at its foot; — a grand composition, of the 
 first rank, with perfectly modeled figures of high grace 
 and expressiveness, in a dark and hazy atmosphere 
 that lent enchantment, sparkled with golden lights 
 and romantic feeling, and softened the glow of the 
 sumptuous hues. — By the time this is read, it will 
 doubtless have been hung in the castle. 
 
 From this point the prominent Via Gemona runs 
 northward to the gate of the same name in the centre 
 of the northern city wall. Following it, I came soon 
 to a small piazza dominated on the left by the large 
 Palazzo Caiselli, inhabited for many generations by 
 one of Udine's chief families; its fagade was another 
 example of how strangely imposing the old Italian 
 palaces can be, though having but simple stuccoed 
 walls and unadorned windows. It comes, I believe, 
 from the careful balancing of the openings, their just 
 proportion to the solid, and the invariable heavy cor- 
 nice full of dignity. This one contains some works of 
 Tiepolo and a Tintoretto of repute; but the noble pro- 
 prietor was away in the mountains, and I could not 
 be admitted for lack of his permission. 
 
 A little beyond, on the east side, loomed up the 
 majestic palazzo- of the Banca d' Italia, a splendid 
 Renaissance structure, with long-and-short rustica- 
 work at the angles, rusticated half-columns along the 
 first story, and Corinthian half-columns above; though 
 of two divisions only, its enormous eaves projected 
 at a height equal to half a dozen of our modern 
 puny floors. The stately, columned entrance-hall, 
 with its impressive stairway, framed a vista of the 
 luxuriant garden in the rear, whose marble statues 
 
306 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 gleamed against masses of tangled verdure, percolated 
 by a silver stream of flowing water. 
 
 Finally, I reached, upon the same side, the interest- 
 ing, quaint, little house once inhabited and decorated 
 by Giovanni da Udine, and still cherished for his sake 
 by the faithful people, — as a tablet witnessed. Its 
 ground story consisted of the usual arcade, but on 
 the upper story the master had expended his fertile 
 fancy in exceptional lines : at the sides of the one real 
 window were painted false ones, — of circular shape, 
 representing medieval glass in small round panes, — 
 and six pretty painted panels with classic mouldings, 
 of which one contained a most engaging little relief 
 of the Madonna and Child. The view which Giovanni 
 enjoyed from this residence was surprisingly pleasant: 
 the long straight street stretched on to the distant 
 gateway, paralleled on the right by a splashing stream, 
 that washed the old house-fronts and turned a heavy 
 mill-wheel; and far above the arched gate loomed the 
 dark flanks of the wooded Alps near at hand.wafting 
 fresh breaths of the free, pine-scented breezes from 
 their alluring summits. 
 
 Amidst those very hills, sheltered in the noble val- 
 ley of the Tagliamento near its entrance upon the 
 plain, nestle the two picturesque old towns of Gemona 
 and Venzone; which contain various pictures of the 
 early Friulan masters, well worth visiting to any lover 
 of the art. S. Daniele also, in the foothills to the north- 
 west, holds in its Cathedral a fine altar-piece of Por- 
 denone, representing the Trinity, and in its Church 
 of S. Antonio, that magnificent series of frescoes which 
 have given Pellegrino his chief title to fame. I did not 
 upon this occasion visit either of these places, for they 
 are strictly hill-towns, and my researches were con- 
 fined to the Italian plain. Nor did I for the same rea- 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 307 
 
 son go to Grado or Aquileia, for those are practically 
 sea-towns, and part of Austrian territory. But no un- 
 confined traveler should omit the sight of their most 
 interesting relics, — their wonderful Romanesque ca- 
 thedrals of countless age, their remains of Roman 
 temples, baths, and palaces, their ancient mosaics, 
 sculptures, monuments, glassware, metal-ware, cotta- 
 ware, jewels, and artistic objects of every class, their 
 delightful medieval frescoes and carvings, and their 
 Renaissance paintings and chisel-work, including the 
 beautiful -pala by Pellegrino. 
 
 As for the latter artist, a journey to S. Daniele is 
 not necessary to become thoroughly acquainted with 
 his genius and personality; that can be accomplished 
 through his works in Udine, combined with those in 
 the most important of all the neighboring ItaUan 
 places, — Cividale. To Cividale then I went, when I 
 had finished my walks in the city; but not for Pelle- 
 grino alone, — far from it. Cividale has many other 
 important interests; its historical buildings and re- 
 mains date from all four periods : from the days of the 
 Roman Forum Julii, the fortified gateway of the Alps; 
 from those of the powerful Lombard capital, under 
 Gisulf and his successors; from those of the patri- 
 archate, under the later dukes and counts, and under 
 the sovereign sway of the archbishops; and from those 
 of the Venetian dominion, with its edifices and artistic 
 treasures of the Renaissance. Cividale especially con- 
 tains many rare relics of the Lombard and Frankish 
 period, probably beyond those of any other place, 
 and, above all, the extraordinary Lombard Chapel of 
 S. Peltrudis, which is one of the greatest memorials 
 of that race.^ 
 
 1 Gisulf placed his seat of power at Cividale in 568, and ruled there very 
 ably until 611, when he was slain, together with most of his chieftains, in 
 
308 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 The little city, nowadays possessed of but ten thou- 
 sand inhabitants, has a peculiarly interesting situation 
 at the very foot of the wall of the Julian Alps, — the 
 most oriental city of Italy, at the very beginning (or 
 end) of its vast northern plain. It lies almost directly 
 east of Udine, about ten miles distant, at the mouth 
 of the defile of the Natison River. 
 
 I started out early one morning by taking the tram 
 from the central piazza of Udine down the long main 
 street to the Porta Aquileia, — stopping off shortly 
 before reaching the battlemented, towered gate to 
 examine the Church of S. Pietro which was passed; 
 for it contained the final specimen of Pellegrino in the 
 city. Then I took a local train of aged little cars at the 
 station, and rattled unevenly over the plain, across 
 the glistening stony beds of the Torre and the Matina, 
 to the foot of the advancing mountains. Cividale 
 Station proved to be a half-mile from the centre of the 
 town, and a kind priest showed me the way to the 
 latter through the winding narrow streets. The central 
 piazza was adorned with a fountain surmounted by a 
 statue of a female armed with a Roman cuirass, and 
 was surrounded by arcaded houses and market-stalls. 
 
 heroically resisting the attack of the fierce Avars upon the city. In 737, 
 under the reign of Duke Pemmone, Calisto the Patriarch effected a coup- 
 de-main: being no longer able, like his predecessors, to reside in Aquileia 
 on account of the harassing attacks of the Byzantines, he had shortly 
 before removed to the Castle of Cormons, which proved altogether too 
 small for his state; taking advantage of a temporary absence of the Duke 
 from Cividale, he suddenly descended upon the city, forcibly ejected the 
 Bishop Amatore from the vescovado, and made himself at home. Nor did 
 the Duke dare to interfere on his return, — when Calisto had already com- 
 menced the erection of the grand church and the Baptistery of S. Gio- 
 vanni, in commemoration of his exploit. Thus strangely was installed the 
 Patriarchate at Cividale; which took up the reins of temporal government 
 when they dropped from the hands of the later Prankish Counts, and 
 continued to hold sway there until the removal to Udine in the latter part 
 of the thirteenth century. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 309 
 
 One of the houses was of fair Gothic design, with 
 pointed stone arches and painted panels above them. 
 The place appeared to have died long, long ago; 
 hardly a living being was in sight, and those that were, 
 were aged women drawing water. The piazza lay a 
 number of blocks west of the river, which ran to the 
 south; immediately on the east I came to another 
 open space, fronted by the Municipio on the right and 
 the Duomo and Arcivescovado on the left. 
 
 The Palazzo Municipale was a little building of 
 red-and-white marble, with the usual ground-floor 
 loggia, built of Gothic arches and adorned with 
 plaques to the memory of Garibaldi and Victor Em- 
 manuel; and it had a curious outside stairway to the 
 upper floor. Beyond it stretched a row of very old 
 dwellings of a picturesque reddish-brown color. The 
 Cathedral '■ was a huge edifice of stuccoed walls, recon- 
 structed in the quattrocento, with a stone f agade, of mixed 
 styles, completed by Pietro Lombardo about 1502; — 
 the lower part, with its three arched doorways, being 
 Gothic in type, while the upper contained a central. 
 Renaissance window of three lights, and a rococo 
 gable. Beside it on the right rose a short and very 
 heavy campanile, of stone and composite, having a 
 clock-face and the usual open belfry. The Bishop's 
 Palace was adjacent on the church's left rear, fronting 
 the northern end of the piazza with a large fagade of 
 Late-Renaissance design; it rose upon a stout arcade, 
 bearing imbedded in its upper plaster the remains of a 
 relief of the Venetian Lion, and a very old and curious 
 stone Madonna. 
 
 ' The earlier church was the one commenced by Calixtus in 737; be- 
 hind it he built his huge and famous palace, now vanished, which contained 
 eighty rooms and spacious halls, magnificently decorated with mosaics 
 and marbles. 
 
310 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 This place was more dead than the other. The 
 Duomo was locked up, the sacristan gone to Udine; 
 and I had a long task finding a living person with one 
 of its keys. When I finally entered, I found the in- 
 terior very spacious and handsome, — three mighty 
 stone columns on each side, with Romanesque cap- 
 itals, dividing the lofty, round-arched nave from the 
 slightly lower aisles with their Gothic vaulting, the 
 pavements being of gray-and-white marbles, the walls 
 of stucco with gray stone trimmings. In the first bay 
 of the right aisle stood one of the most interesting 
 Lombard relics, the ancient Baptistery of Calixtus (or 
 Calisto), — the very font which he had constructed 
 for his new church, upon his arrival in 737. 
 
 It was a small, octagonal, marble construction, of 
 eight slight columns rising upon heavy vertical slabs, 
 upholding solid arches cut from other slabs, with a 
 flat roof, and no cornice, — all materials from some 
 Roman temple, thus refitted together by the Lom- 
 bards to make a covered font for immersion. The 
 Corinthian capitals of the columns were unusually 
 rich, having very prominent drooping leaves. The 
 top slabs, of the arches, were cut with various long 
 Latin inscriptions and figures; the bottom ones were 
 engraved with divers designs, two being of Roman 
 workmanship and four others of Lombard. These last 
 four pieces, "executed in relief by lowering the surface 
 of the stone — within which the details are indicated 
 by furrows dug out,"^ have long excited interest 
 among antiquarians for their exceptional grace of 
 drawing and excellence of execution, — considering 
 that period, when reliefs were generally so rude; the 
 two front slabs have been removed for preservation to 
 the city museum, and a later font installed within, of 
 
 ' Perkins, Italian Sculptors. 
 
UDINE AND CIVTOALE 311 
 
 Renaissance form. The Lombard reliefs still remain- 
 ing on the structure consist of the emblems of the 
 Evangelists, and fanciful figures, — somewhat crude 
 compared with modern work, but extraordinary for 
 the eighth century. 
 
 Over the central portal of the church stood the gilded 
 equestrian statue to Marc, di Manzano, companion 
 to that of Udine's Cathedral, which Venice erected in 
 the early seicento; below it was the Renaissance tomb 
 of Nicolo Donato (1497), surmounted by statues of 
 the Virgin and two saints. The aisles did not have the 
 customary chapels, but altars affixed directly to the 
 walls. Over the first altar to the left hung a fine 
 Late-Renaissance canvas, by Pietro Meri, of 1671, 
 — S. Giacomo, with Saints Stephen and Lorenzo at his 
 sides; much like the Bassano work in its dark flesh 
 and dusky atmosphere, and full of charming grace. 
 The next altar held a specimen of Sebastiano Seccante, 
 chief fellow-artist of Amalteo (1537) — another group 
 of three saints (Joseph, Roch, and Sebastian) before a 
 ruined Doric temple; a work of warm tone, mystical 
 atmosphere, and grace of composition though not of 
 figure. St. Joseph supports af ascinating Child, stretch- 
 ing out his little fingers in blessing. Adjacent was a 
 remarkable crucifix of the ninth century, found long 
 afterward underground, made of painted wood, with 
 a striking countenance, most lifelike and agonized; 
 it shows that the Lombard sculptors could be realistic, 
 on occasion. 
 
 Over the third and fourth altars, respectively, were 
 splendid examples of the two Palmas, nephew and 
 uncle: the one an entrancing group of St, Elizabeth 
 with four female companions, under the Cross in 
 glory surrounded by putti; the other a strong vision 
 of the risen Saviour before the Magdalen, with the 
 
S12 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 sepulchre and its guarding angels to the right, and to 
 the rear an extensive landscape of lake and town and 
 mountain, glowing under a sunset sky, — not a can- 
 vas of individual grace, but of superb tone, atmo- 
 sphere, and coloring. There was a second Palma Gio- 
 vane in the chapel to the left of the choir, — a dark 
 and tragic stoning of St. Stephen, illumined by the 
 dazzling figure of the martyr, — also one of his un- 
 successful Last Suppers; and near them, a brilliant 
 Renaissance marble altar of 1558, attractively adorned 
 with sculpture, though having some modern additions, 
 of vases and a cupola. 
 
 The -pala of the high-altar is a famous silver ante- 
 pendium of 1204; in its centre are the larger relieved 
 forms, of the Madonna and several angels, — very fine 
 for that early period, — ■ and roundabout them, three 
 rows of little saints, standing. Above it rises a silver 
 crucifix of the same epoch. Near by, on the choir's 
 left side, I saw the seventeenth-century throne of the 
 Patriarchs, curiously plain, made of thin pieces of 
 wood painted red. How many and many a cardinal 
 had sat proudly in that chair, and had his red stock- 
 ings removed with awful ceremony. The choir was 
 much elevated, above the ancient crypt, remodeled 
 in the eighteenth century; and upon the right of the 
 handsome, ascending, marble steps, stood the older 
 patriarchal seat, of the eighth century, constructed of 
 heavy, plain, marble slabs. Think of it, — a chair 
 occupied by the same line of rulers for over eleven 
 hundred years; it had been the simple throne of all 
 those majestic warrior-prelates who swayed Friuli 
 for so long, and fought with Grado and the Lagoons. 
 It was wonderful to realize that every one of them had 
 occupied this very seat, in all his grandiose medieval 
 state, beginning with the fabulous St. Calixtus himself. 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 313 
 
 An Amalteo and a fourth Palma Giovane adorned 
 the chapel to the right of the choir, — representing 
 the Annunciation, and a group of three saints. By it 
 opened the door to the coretto, or Httle choir, used in 
 the winter-time because of its superior warmth; it had 
 a pala by G. B. Tiepolo, showing S. Antonio Abbate 
 kneeling to the Virgin, — a curious picture, as his 
 pietistic efforts usually were. Behind this room were 
 the large sacristy and the Consiglio dei Canonici, or 
 Cathedral Council. The second and third altar-pieces 
 of the right aisle were school pieces of Palma Giovane, 
 rather pleasing in their effects. 
 
 Leaving the Duomo, I was led down a narrow way 
 behind it to an ancient archway, which was probably 
 a gate of the Roman walls; a little carpenter popped 
 out of a workroom above it, and accompanied me 
 without to the northern flank of the huge convent of 
 the Ursulines, which stretches over a good part of that 
 northernmost section of the city. Its outer wall is now 
 the city boundary, and it backs upon the west bank of 
 the river. On this spot originally stood a little Roman 
 temple, which Peltrudis, the pious daughter of one of 
 the Lombard dukes, in the eighth or ninth century 
 converted into a chapel, and established a convent in 
 the buildings adjacent. At her death she was buried 
 in the chapel, and subsequently canonized; and the 
 edifice bears her name to this day. 
 
 Now the result of this good lady's actions was that 
 the Lombard sculptures of the best period, with which 
 she embellished this chapel in its transformation from 
 a temple, were carefully preserved intact and in- 
 violate during a thousand years thereafter, in the 
 unbroken sanctuary of the Ursulines; while nearly all 
 other artistic objects of the same epoch became de- 
 stroyed, in the unending warfare of Friuli. At the 
 
314 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 end of that millennium, when artists were lamenting 
 that there were so few examples left of good Lombard 
 sculpture, the town of Cividale suddenly awoke to the 
 fact that it carried hidden in its breast the one undis- 
 turbed religious building of Lombard days, with a 
 wealth of their artistic work to be found nowhere else; 
 so the signory condemned the edifice for public uses, 
 detached it from the nunnery, and put the little car- 
 penter in charge. 
 
 He led tne over the fields outside the northern wall, 
 to the river-bank, opened a wicket on its very edge, 
 and took me southward again, between the top of the 
 bank and another wall, until we reached the chapel. 
 The broad muddy waters of the Natison were rushing 
 far below, deep-set between their high, clay shores, 
 and along the farther side stretched the eastern sec- 
 tion of the city, — the quarter of S. Martino; promi- 
 nent among its scattered buildings was a huge, grim 
 prison of modern look, and upon one of the first range 
 of foothills towering close behind, black and menacing 
 with their endless forests, soared the keep and battle- 
 ments of a great gray castle. Very picturesque was its 
 appearance, unchanged with its hemming woods from 
 the far-off days when Lombard workmen built it stone 
 on stone; and my guide informed me that it was still 
 occupied by the descendants of its first baron. 
 
 We entered first an anteroom filled with Roman tab- 
 lets and architectural fragments, and then what" was 
 once the portico of the temple, but is now the chapel's 
 tribune, — for the heathen edifice looked toward the 
 river, and the Christian one looks away from it. The 
 four handsome marble columns that once adorned 
 the portico, now upheld the rood-beam, and some old 
 marble slabs, fixed between them, partly screened the 
 tribune from the nave. This little nave had neither 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 315 
 
 aisles nor side chapels, but a simple wagon-arched roof; 
 and over its plastered walls rioted the fragmentary 
 lines of mostly vanished frescoes, — haloed golden 
 heads, faint outlines of saintly forms, glimpses of feet 
 or arms, and narrowed eyes just looking through the 
 stains of centuries. 
 
 The Byzantine saints upon the right wall are said 
 to have been placed there in Peltrudis's time; those 
 two wooden-looking figures high upon the left wall 
 were added about the year 1000; and the rest were 
 trecento products of the school of Giotto, on both walls 
 and the vaulting and the three divisions of the trib- 
 une. The curious, richly carved, Gothic, wooden stalls 
 running round the nave, under a continuous, dainty, 
 curving cornice of the same material, as high as the 
 rood-beam, were also trecento work; and very pleasing 
 were the countless varied arabesques cut and painted 
 all over their backs and arms. The two extra-large 
 seats on the entrance wall were for the abbess and her 
 coadjutor; the two front rows of smaller seats, with 
 low, uncomfortable backs, were for the novices; and 
 I wondered to think how many, many generations of 
 nuns and novices had sat in these same stalls, singing 
 in the gloom, hidden far away here from the turbulent 
 advancing world. 
 
 But the great interest of this edifice lay in the upper 
 part of its entrance wall, above the doorway and the 
 cornice, where I saw the marvelous Lombard sculpt- 
 ures which have so rightly astonished modern criti- 
 cism. So amazing was this sudden revelation to me of 
 what those long-gone medievals could do, that I could 
 hardly believe I was beholding a work performed pre- 
 vious to the trecento. It was all in plaster, of a pecuHar 
 whiteness and ductility, executed with such profound 
 skill that one would deem it the product of an over- 
 
316 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ripe art, instead of a dark age of new beginnings. Im- 
 mediately over the doorway extended a relieved cor- 
 nice of very daintiest design, and a large ornamental 
 arch just clear of the wall, consisting of the most 
 exquisite openwork one could imagine. Of its four 
 parallel parts or strata, the second and chief was an 
 enchanting tracery of grapevine, whose leafy tendrils, 
 in a series of convolutions, carried bunches of most 
 seductive contour; — a thing not only perfectly 
 unique, but uniquely beautiful, which I have seen 
 nothing quite like in all my wanderings. The first and 
 third strata were peculiar, slender mouldings, and the 
 fourth, or outer one, a succession of quaint forms re- 
 sembling antique lyres. 
 
 Over this archway was a strange, effective string 
 course, or cornice across the wall, consisting of linked, 
 star like forms of delicate narcissi; upon it in the centre, 
 a deep, narrow niche, framed by two sturdy columns 
 with foliage caps and an openwork arch of flowering 
 design; within this niche sat a stiff, wooden, bishop's 
 image of the fourteenth century, of no account, — but 
 on each side stood three wonderful tall figures in three- 
 quarter relief, of Peltrudis and five sister saints. 
 
 These statues of heroic size, with their little feet 
 upon one cornice and their shapely heads beneath 
 another of the same delicacy, were almost perfectly 
 preserved after their existence of a thousand years, 
 and exhibited a style of mien and garb, a method of 
 dainty execution, not only utterly amazing considering 
 their period, but absolutely different from those of any 
 other age, — with an inexpressible kind of gracefulness 
 and dignity that stands quite alone. What a thorough 
 delight it was to find such an artistic treasure of an 
 epoch considered savage, — to behold a method of 
 sculpture emerging from long-past darkness which is 
 
UDINE AND CIVIDALE 317 
 
 entirely foreign to those we know, displaying forms 
 and graces strange to our own ideals, yet brilliantly 
 attractive. These unique figures were not of Roman 
 workmanship; nor Byzantine, nor of the customary 
 medieval styles; neither do they resemble any Re- 
 naissance productions, nor the uncouth modelings left 
 us elsewhere by the Lombards. They stand in a classi- 
 fication all their own.' 
 
 The figures are exceptionally short-waisted, with 
 long legs and disproportionately short arms; but those 
 that are belted wear gowns falling from just below the 
 bust in Empire fashion, in long straight folds, to 
 broad and richly embroidered hems, — bestowing the 
 inevitable slender gracefulness of that mode; their 
 hands, with drooping sleeves long from the elbow, 
 hold crosses and chaplets pressed against their breasts; 
 their necks are wreathed with jeweled necklaces, and 
 their locks adorned with royal crowns. These four 
 are princesses. The other two, beside the central 
 niche, are nuns swathed closely in robes of elegant 
 drapery, with simple coifs across their heads, and hands 
 outstretched in exhortation. 
 
 In spite of the stiffness of the attitudes and the poor 
 proportions of these forms, which betray the By- 
 zantine influence of their period, they are unutterably 
 captivating, with a haunting charm which defies analy- 
 sis; it must come partly from the exquisite drapery of 
 the robes, partly from the fair, rounded hmbs outlined 
 beneath in wondrous moulding, partly from the gentle, 
 maiden-like inturning of the knees (a stroke of true 
 genius), and, above all, from the serene loveliness of the 
 
 ' "Nor do we know," says Mr. Perkins, "of any other so perfect ex- 
 ample of that transition period in Italian architecture, when the Roman 
 and Byzantine elements seemed to hesitate, before blending into the 
 Romanesque." {Italian Sculptors.) 
 
318 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 virgin faces. How under heaven could a man of those 
 rough times, in a country of barbarians Hke the Longo- 
 bards, have learned to model such beautiful, stately 
 heads, such pure, maidenly countenances of rapt 
 expression, and such forms of alluring contour, dis- 
 played beneath finely fitted and elegant robes! It is 
 a miracle. But what is still more interesting is the 
 originality of the style, which has a medieval direct- 
 ness and simplicity in its lines, as well as a touch of 
 Byzantine obliqueness and angularity, yet produces 
 a vivid realism, and a weird, striking grace that re- 
 minds me of nothing so much as the art of the Japan- 
 ese. 
 
 The sarcophagus in which S. Peltrudis was buried 
 I saw still lying in a corner of the choir, with no notice- 
 able ornamentation; it had been opened by the muni- 
 cipality seven years previous, and some dust and frag- 
 ments of bone beheld by the oflBcials, who closed them 
 up again. — I departed with my guide, left him at his 
 Roman gateway, and walked to the bridge that car- 
 ries the main street over the river a little east of the 
 Cathedral. It is a handsome bridge, of stone arches 
 and piers and Renaissance workmanship, called the 
 Ponte del Diavolo, — for no reason that I could find, 
 except perhaps from the queer Italian fondness for 
 naming such structures after his Satanic Majesty; and 
 an imposing vista was given by it, of the rushing waters 
 far below in their yellow banks, and the mountains 
 towering black and grim above its distant bend. 
 
 Just beyond it, on the left side of the way, rose 
 the small churches of S. Martino and S. Maria dell' 
 Ospedale (or de' Battuti). They were not remarkable 
 externally, but contained several important objects. 
 S. Martino held the famous altar of Duke Pemmone, 
 which he presented on restoring the edifice, about 
 
IIDINE AND CIVIDALE 319 
 
 735, — covered with very crude reliefs, formerly 
 colored, of the Epiphany, the Visitation, and Christ 
 seated between angels, — quite the opposite of the 
 fine art of S. Peltrudis. The three Magi are said to be 
 portraits of Duke Rachis and Pemmone's two other 
 sons. In S. Maria I found Cividale's superb master- 
 piece of Pellegrino, over its high-altar, — a canvas of 
 surpassing loveliness, divided into three compart- 
 ments: in the centre was the Madonna with four 
 female saints, and a child-angel at her feet between 
 Saints Donato and John the Baptist, the former hold- 
 ing a model of the city in his hands; while St. Sebas- 
 tian stood in the right division, St. Michael in the 
 left. It was a work of exquisitely soft tone and shad- 
 ing, and deep, rich flesh-tints, of symmetrical group- 
 ing and dazzling beauty, both in the individual figures 
 and in the tout ensemble; the figures were splendidly 
 modeled, the coloring was a gorgeous scheme, and the 
 features of the Madonna and her companions, quite 
 enchanting. The only failure was in its lack of decided 
 expression and feeling. Near by on the altar wall were 
 hung two other little pieces by the same hand, — 
 some winsome cherubs, that were probably fragments 
 of a larger work. The local Church of S. Maria in 
 Valle also contains a specimen of Pellegrino, inviting, 
 but not as grand a picture as the former, which Lanzi 
 says is "enumerated among the rarest paintings of 
 Friuli." 
 
 Returning to the Piazza of the Duomo, I visited after 
 lunch the Museo Civico on its western side. It was a 
 good-sized building of two floors, given up entirely 
 to the various collections; and a truly wonderful ag- 
 gregation they were, not merely for a place of Civi- 
 dale's size, but for any city; for here lay the greatest 
 collection of Lombard relics existing to-day, with the 
 
320 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 possible exception of the jeweled articles of Monza 
 Cathedral. The two large halls of the ground floor 
 were spread with architectural fragments, tablets, 
 and sculptures of the Roman Forum Julii, and the 
 larger, stone objects of the Lombard period, including 
 rude monuments, weapons, and the remarkable sarco- 
 phagus of the first duke, Gisulf. 
 
 The learned custodian, Signor Mattia Banino, dis- 
 played the results of many years of study in indicating 
 to me the countless points of interest. Upstairs, the 
 various rooms held in glass cases the smaller Lombard 
 relics, of every branch of their civilization, and above 
 all the precious articles that belonged to the Cath- 
 edral treasury. Among these amazing proofs of Lom- 
 bard artistic skill were the ivory pax, or plate, con- 
 taining a relief of the Crucifixion, adorned with lapis- 
 lazuli and many other gems, which Count Ursus of 
 Ceneda was wont to kiss after mass in the customary 
 sign of peace; a gospel with exquisite backs of carved 
 wood; an ivory casket covered with reliefs of religious 
 scenes and figures, of extraordinary merit; and many 
 other delightful objects in ivory, wood, and silver, em- 
 bellished with Byzantine-looking carvings or studded 
 heavily with precious stones left from Roman days. 
 
 There were fascinating works also of the later, me- 
 dieval periods, including the very prayer-book used 
 by St. Elizabeth of Thuringia, bound in elegant 
 ivory backs and containing duecento miniatures, — 
 the psalter that once belonged to Queen Gertrude of 
 Hungary, and crucifixes, paxes, coffers, goblets, plates, 
 of every kind of material and rich ornamentation. 
 They opened to my eyes visions of royal luxury in the 
 "Dark Ages," fairly overwhelming in artistic wealth, 
 with princesses making everyday use of articles so 
 precious that a queen of to-day would lock them up in 
 
UDINE AND CIVTOALE 321 
 
 her vaults. Here also were many of the various little 
 articles, household and decorative, used in Imperial 
 Roman days; coins of every epoch from the republican 
 down, including one with a contemporary view of the 
 newly finished Coliseum; glassware of Roman make 
 and Venetian; medieval ivory sculptures by the score; 
 and a lot of those glistening tomes executed in early 
 monasteries, with page-settings and miniatures as 
 brilliant as flashing jewels. Such were but a few of 
 the contents of this treasure-house of olden times, 
 that after so many centuries makes us its revelation 
 of the artistic genius of the barbarian invaders, and of 
 the darkest age of history. ^ 
 
 On the day following, I was once more aboard train, 
 swiftly leaving sad Friuli behind me, retracing my 
 steps without a stop to Treviso. There I took the 
 branch-line to Vicenza, where connection was made 
 with the main line to the west. And the close of a 
 long day's journeying found me entering with the 
 sinking sun a great city whose marble quays and streets 
 blazed ruby-tinted in the after-glow, raising in my 
 heart a paean of joy as I gazed at their beauty and 
 grandeur, — the city of Italy that stands below only 
 Rome and Florence and Venezia, — Verona la Degna. 
 
 1 A final item of interest in regard to Cividale is that it was the birth- 
 place of that wonderful actress, Adelaide Ristoii ; and the house in which 
 that event occurred can still be pointed out. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 VERONA LA DEGNA 
 
 • 
 
 Am I in Italy? Is this the Mincio? 
 
 Are those the distant turrets of Verona? 
 
 And shall I sup where Juliet at the masque 
 
 Saw her loved Montague, and now sleeps by him? 
 
 — ROGEBS. 
 
 So felt I, as I stood once again in this greatest of 
 the plain-towns, grandest of them all in her glorious 
 past leadership in warfare, literature, and art, superbest 
 in her situation, loveliest still in her miles of marble 
 palaces and churches, her statued life, her school of 
 paintingsurpassing all the others, her whole exposition 
 of the finest accomplishments of man. Looking upon 
 the broad Adige dashing mightily between her quays 
 and castled hills, I reflected once more upon the tre- 
 mendous history which it had made and witnessed. 
 That which Ruskin said of the inspiring city echoed 
 from my heart: "Though truly Rouen, Geneva, 
 and Pisa have been the centres of teaching to me, 
 Verona has given the coloring to all they taught. She 
 has virtually represented the fate and the beauty of 
 Italy to me; and whatever concerning Italy I have 
 felt, or been able with any charm or force to say, has 
 been dwelt with more deeply, and said more earnestly, 
 for her sake." ^ 
 
 The greatness of Verona was the inevitable result 
 of her situation, — as the place made inevitable the 
 growth of a powerful city. Two thirds of the way from 
 the Piedmontese highlands to the sea, where the plain of 
 
 ' Ruskin, PrwterUa, vol. n. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 323 
 
 Italy is broadest, the wide stream of the Adige bursts 
 forth from its majestic valley, which like a plough- 
 share the river has furrowed straight through the 
 beetling Alps from far-off Bozen, Innsbruck, and the 
 lands of the Teutons. Wonderfully direct is that moun- 
 tain-road, almost as if drawn to a line, and of remark- 
 ably gentle grade also, rising but little above the level 
 of the plain through the heart of the towering peaks. 
 Here then, as Ruskin says, is "the great gate out 
 of Germany into Italy, through which not only Gothic 
 armies came, but after the Italian nation is formed, the 
 current of northern life enters still into its heart 
 through the mountain artery, as constantly and 
 strongly as the cold waves of the Adige itself." This 
 is the pass to which Bassano was a side door, through 
 the Valsugana as far as Trent; and it was vastly more 
 important than that other pass via the Piave and Ca- 
 dore, — which was handy for Venice alone. 
 
 Southward of the huge lake of Garda the Rhaetian 
 Alps have thrown an outwork of foothills upon the 
 plain, and a little further to the east, that formidable 
 projecting bastion which terminates in the Monti Be- 
 rici; between these promontories is the wedge-shaped 
 bay into which the Adige debouches. Dashing from its 
 valley the stream rushes along the bay's eastern side, 
 laves the western bases of the last few rounded hills, 
 and empties its waters upon the plain. Here, upon 
 those final small elevations, grew the ancient city 
 of Verona, extending down their slopes to the watery 
 highway, crossing it to the farther side, and spreading 
 westward along the level peninsula between the last 
 two bends of the river. For the Adige comes down in 
 windiftgs like a letter S, whose head is toward the 
 northwest, whose centre line extends northeasterly; 
 the hills rise from the east side of its lower half; and 
 
324 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the growing city crept southwesterly over the lower 
 inclosure till it stretched far and wide beyond. 
 
 The wall of the Roman town cut across this penin- 
 sula at about half its length; the wall of the Visconti 
 exactly embraced it; and the final great fortifications 
 of the Venetians, celebrated as the most powerful of 
 Renaissance times, and in fact quite impregnable, 
 swept in a huge semicircle from the centre of the 
 letter's top line to the end of the bottom, encompass- 
 ing a large section to the west. The eastern fortifica- 
 tions retained their original location, in an irregular 
 line along the summits of the hills a third to a half- 
 mile from the river's lower bend, adorned with strong 
 fortresses at the highest points, and enfolding at their 
 southern end a wide corner of the plain. This ancient 
 quarter of the city, called by the people Veronetta, — 
 or little Verona, — is very narrow in its northern part, 
 being closely confined between the Adige and the steep 
 height of S. Pietro, which was the town's birthplace 
 and has ever been its citadel; but toward the south the 
 eminences gradually recede as the stream curves away 
 southwest, allowing the quarter to widen out in the 
 shape of a triangle. 
 
 Since the days of the Goths and Lombards, when 
 Theodoric and Alboin successively inhabited the com- 
 manding castle of S. Pietro, the public buildings and 
 centres of life have been entirely on the western bank, 
 and Veronetta has steadily dwindled in importance; 
 until to-day it remains but a mostly forgotten corner 
 of the majestic city, visited only for the splendid 
 old churches that dot its silent streets. The one ex- 
 ception to this decadence is the long, busy thorough- 
 fare of the Venti Settembre, leading straight through 
 its southern portion, from the Ponte delle Navi to the 
 principal city gate at the southeastern angle, called 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 325 
 
 Porta Vescovo, — shortly without which lies the 
 main railway station; but the traffic with which the 
 railroad causes this avenue to be crowded, never stops 
 at its shops nor diverges into its side ways, — it flows 
 unrestingly across the river to the modern centres 
 of trade, religion, and amusement. 
 
 It was the trade that flowed from earliest days up 
 and down the long Adige Valley, — taking Italian 
 products to the German countries, and bringing their 
 products back, — that erected Verona, sitting astride 
 and guarding the route, into a city of such size and 
 power. Just so since the beginnings of time have 
 trade-routes made and unmade the great cities of the 
 world. We know not how early men dwelt on this 
 spot, but they certainly did so in the fourth century 
 B.C., for many remains of that period have been dug 
 up around the city. By the commencement of the 
 third century B.C. Verona was already ruled by Rome, 
 — in consequence, it is believed of voluntary submis- 
 sion; in B.C. 89 she obtained the privileges of a Latin 
 colony, and about 42 became a Roman Municipium. 
 Her importance continually increased; for she stood 
 at the confluence of several great Roman highways, 
 leading from all directions, and uniting for the north. 
 
 In the Imperial days her troubles began, for faction 
 first, and foe afterwards, aimed always to seize this 
 key to the Alps. At Verona met the legions of Ves- 
 pasian in 69 A.D., weary from their long march from 
 Syria, with the troops of the Emperor Vitellius; and 
 from the series of resulting battles the former assumed 
 the sceptre of the world. Decius and his legions, later 
 on, slew the Emperor Philip without Verona's walls. 
 The Emperor Gallienus extended and strengthened 
 those walls, including within them for the first time 
 the huge amphitheatre; and Claudius II in 268 saved 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the city from an irruption of the northern barbarians, 
 who were pouring down the valley. 
 
 More momentous than these events, however, was 
 the battle at Verona in 312 between the hosts of Con- 
 stantine and Maxentius, when the former marched 
 from his kingdom of Gaul to hurl the latter from his 
 Roman throne. Constantine was victorious, — and 
 again, later, at Rome; he united under his own sway the 
 countries of the West and East, and made Christianity 
 at last the religion of the State; — which position, ex- 
 cept for short relapses, such as that of Julian, was 
 thenceforth maintained. 
 
 With the coming of Alaric in 402, Verona entered 
 upon the critical portion of her history, since she be- 
 came one of the chief objects of the barbarian in- 
 vaders, and a capital of their kingdoms. As Ruskin 
 has well said, "There are no tragedies like the tra- 
 gedies of Verona under the Gothic and Lombard 
 Kings."^ Alaric was retreating from Italy after the 
 disastrous battle of PoUentia, when the fairness of 
 Verona tempted him to turn aside and seize her; but 
 the great Stilicho was on hand with his pursuing le- 
 gions, and under the very walls of the city inflicted a 
 terrific beating upon the Goths which permitted but 
 a portion of their host to ascend the valley. Under 
 AttUa, fifty years later, Verona was not so fortunate : 
 the magnificent Roman city, with her countless marble 
 palaces, baths, temples, theatres, which we can only 
 imagine now from the size of the relics, was left sacked 
 and burning by the Huns when they marched away. 
 Much, however, was not destroyed, and the ruins were 
 soon rebuilt in a baser style. 
 
 Then came Odoacer, King of the Visigoths remain- 
 ing in Italy, who displaced the last Emperor of the 
 
 1 Ruskin, Verona, and other Lectures. 
 
VEROXA (JLD CASTLE BRIlJIJE. 
 
 VEROXA, CHI'RCH OF SAXTA MARIA IN ORGAJiO (ST. MARY'S 
 OF THE ORGAN.) 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 327 
 
 West, Romulus Augustulus, and ruled Italy under the 
 title of Patrician granted by Constantinople. He not 
 only occupied Verona, but was the first ruler to make 
 it his seat of power. Who could help being enthralled 
 by those gracious, gardened hills, palace- and castle- 
 crowned, with the bright ribbon of the Adige winding 
 at their feet. The beautiful city, glowing with her 
 white and roseate marbles, with Ravenna now took 
 Rome's place as capital of Italy; and held it through 
 generations of changing dynasties. Odoacer was ele- 
 vated in 476; and only thirteen years later that other 
 branch of his race, the Ostrogoths, descended from 
 the Julian Alps with the great Theodoric at their head. 
 I have already mentioned how they defeated Odoacer 
 on gaining the Friulan plain, and scattered the Visi- 
 goths before them.^ The latter were reorganized at 
 Verona, and when Theodoric had slowly approached, 
 made before its walls their final stand. 
 
 So did the city once more witness a battle deciding 
 the fate of empire. Theodoric was triumphant, and 
 Odoacer with his remaining soldiers fled to Ravenna, 
 where he was killed some years later by the conquer- 
 or's own hand. The latter took his defeated adver- 
 sary's place in the palaces of Verona, lifting the town 
 into a prosperity and world-importance that have 
 made his name predominant in her history. Who 
 thinks of Verona, thinks of the great warrior and law- 
 giver throned upon her castled heights, rebuilding her 
 stately streets, reconstructing the political fabric and 
 the justice of ancient Rome. 
 
 Theodoric loved Verona, and admired beyond all 
 others her beautiful location. He rebuilt the old for- 
 tress-citadel upon the hill of S. Pietro into a magni- 
 ficent structure that was both a palace and a castle; 
 
 ' See beginning of last chapter. 
 
328 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and there he reigned, looking down over the wide city 
 at his feet. With the stones of the Roman ruins, and 
 particularly those from the Arena, he constructed 
 many other palaces and fortresses, baths and public 
 buildings, — restored the aqueduct, and strengthened 
 the outer walls. After the death of Odoacer, he dwelt 
 much at Ravenna also, but Verona was the residence 
 that he most enjoyed. There in his Gothic palace he 
 often received in state the envoys of the northern 
 nations, who took back to their tribes those stories of 
 his power that gave rise to the German legends of 
 the mighty "Dietrich von Bern." 
 
 Theodoric is said to have disliked and somewhat 
 repressed the Catholic religion, — which therefore 
 added to those legends the tale of his demoniacal 
 chase; this (among many other places) was represented 
 in the reliefs carved on the fagade of the Veronese 
 Church of S. Zeno, five centuries later. Christian- 
 ity had settled very early in Verona, so much so that 
 her first bishop, S. Euprepio, is said to have been 
 appointed by St. Peter himself; her whole first score 
 of bishops were saints, and the eighth of them, St. 
 Zeno, became through his unusual learning and devo- 
 tion the city's most prominent spiritual intercessor. 
 Three diflferent churches were named after him; and 
 the one just spoken of is the largest in the town, as 
 well as the most interesting. During the reign of Dio- 
 cletian, about 300, the renowned martyrdom occurred 
 here of Saints Fermo and Rustico: the former was a 
 noble who refused to recant his faith though ofiPered 
 pardon, the latter a poor, devoted friend who shared 
 his belief; they were executed in the Arena with hor- 
 rible tortures, before the whole delighted populace. 
 The story has it that the fire on which they were 
 placed was extinguished by a heaven-sent fall of rain. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 329 
 
 so that they had to be decapitated; and ever since 
 then, through all the ages, their names have been 
 prayed to in times of drought, — often with curious 
 success. 
 
 During the Byzantine repossession of Italy under 
 Justinian, his forces for a while seized and occupied 
 Verona. The Ostrogoths expelled them, — by an- 
 other great battle before the city, •^- but the Goths 
 had become so weakened that their last king, Teias, 
 was soon defeated and slain by Narses, in the year 560, 
 and their power came to an end. Narses retired to hold 
 sway at Rome as the viceroy of the Emperor; but 
 eight years later, as he was dying, the mighty Lom- 
 bards crossed the Alps under the leadership of their 
 king, Alboin, and seized upon the plain which after- 
 wards assumed their name, with no Italian army to 
 oppose them. Pavia became their capital and metro- 
 polis; but Alboin lingered also in the palaces of Verona, 
 and came there to that tragic end which has immor- 
 talized the name of Rosamund. 
 
 To sum up the oft-told tale, she was the daughter of 
 Cunamund, King of the Gepidse, the third of the 
 Gothic nations, who had kept to their homes in the 
 Balkan Plain; Alboin had conquered them before he 
 started for Italy, slain Cunamund, and made his skull 
 into a cup that always "adorned" his table. The fair 
 Rosamund, as beautiful as she was guileful and licen- 
 tious, became Alboin's queen. One evening at Verona, 
 when he was exceptionally drunk at the daily banquet, 
 he filled the skull-cup with ruddy wine and forced his 
 wife to quaff from the ghastly relic of her father. Ah, 
 shades of Sophocles and Euripides, — not even you 
 could have imagined a more creepy drama. 
 
 The queen, teeming with vengeance, stepped down 
 from her dignity to the joint love of Helmichis the 
 
330 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 armor-bearer and Peredeus the warrior; together they 
 slew Alboin, — when his wife had sent away all serv- 
 ants, lulled him to sleep, and "urged the reluctant 
 conspirators to the instant execution of the deed."* 
 Her dream of reigning in his stead was quickly dis- 
 pelled by the wrathful chiefs. She fled with her two 
 lovers and young daughter to the Byzantine exarch 
 who ruled at Ravenna, captivated him also, and at his 
 jealous suggestion poisoned Helmichis, while Peredeus 
 had his eyes put out. Her own due fate was not want- 
 ing; for when Helmichis had drunk half the enven- 
 omed cup and felt its instant effect, with a dagger to 
 Rosamund's bosom he made her take the rest of it; 
 shrieking and writhing, she quickly followed him into 
 the final arms of death. 
 
 Lombard dukes and kings succeeded Alboin inter- 
 mittently at Verona. The third sovereign, Antharis, 
 made the romantic wooing of Theodolinda, daughter 
 of the Bavarian King Garibaldo, which has been so 
 often since reproduced in varied form; under the guise 
 of his own emissary to the Bavarian Court he loved 
 and won her. She it was who turned the Lombards 
 from their Arian religion to the Roman Catholic. 
 About two centuries later, already decadent, they 
 yielded Verona to the attacks of Pepin, King of 
 France; and Desiderius, their last king, in 774 was 
 forced to surrender his capital and his whole country 
 to Pepin's invincible son, Charlemagne. The Lombard 
 had given Charlemagne his daughter, Desideria, in 
 marriage, to avert the storm, but the Frenchman soon 
 repudiated her and sent her home; in the resulting 
 warfare her brother Adelchi fortified and held Verona, 
 but it was taken in siege by a large French army, and 
 soon constituted the capital of a French county. 
 
 ' Gibbon, vol. iv, chap. XLV. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 331 
 
 Nothing better shows the fascination of ancient 
 Verona than the effect she produced upon the tri- 
 umphant Carlovingians. Pepin spent there all the time 
 that he could spare; Charlemagne himself relaxed and 
 rested on the lovely banks of the Adige. The populace 
 cherished for centuries memories of Pepin's power and 
 benevolence, and till recently pointed out a stone seat 
 in the ruins of the older castle of S. Pietro, from which 
 they said he had administered his unbiased justice. 
 A reminder of the residence of Charlemagne exists in 
 the quaint statues of Roland and Oliver adorning the 
 sides of the main portal of the Cathedral. The Prank- 
 ish Counts following the latter ruled at Verona, for 
 some eighty years, until in 886 the last of them was 
 overthrown by that strange, ambitious character, 
 Duke Berengarius of Friuli, who, though foiled in his 
 aims to sway all Italy, made himself a kingdom out of 
 the Lombard Plain, and reigned over it at Verona 
 until 923. His death was another tragedy : he was mur- 
 dered by a favorite noble, Flambert, whom he had 
 already forgiven one plot of assassination and heaped 
 high with favors, and who struck the fatal blow as the 
 King embraced him. 
 
 Berengarius's kingdom crumbled with his death, 
 but Verona and her territory were successively the 
 prey of Rudolph, Duke of Burgundy, and Hugh, Duke 
 of Provence; three of his own line followed the latter, 
 and then the Germans at last stepped into their fated 
 hegemony of North Italy, with the invasion, in 962, 
 of the Emperor Otho I. Verona was the first city met 
 and taken by him; and she not only settled into a long 
 German subjection, under the immediate rule of ap- 
 pointed marquises, but developed a strong Imperial 
 feeling, becoming the leading and most faithful Ghi- 
 belline city in the peninsula. This condition lasted 
 
332 PLAIN-TOWNS OP ITALY 
 
 until the middle of the twelfth century, when the 
 cruelties and rapine of the Emperor Frederick I, or 
 Barbarossa, caused Verona to join with the other 
 plain- towns, in 1164, to form a convention for their 
 joint defense. This was the so-called Lombard League, 
 which fought the Emperor so long and bitterly that 
 he had eventually to retreat from Italy; it was re- 
 newed against his grandson Prederick II, in 1226, and 
 resulted again in such triumphant success that no 
 German emperor followed him into the peninsula for 
 a space of sixty years. 
 
 These successes not only insured the power of the 
 communes over the country, they also overcame the 
 conquerors, by bringing forth the race of local despots. 
 While the two struggles continued, each town was 
 rent by the fighting factions of Guelph and Ghibel- 
 line, — for there was always a party who sympathized 
 with the emperors. In Verona the Guelphs were 
 favored by the Cappelletti family of nobles, and the 
 Ghibellines were led by the Montecchi, — the same ad- 
 versaries that Shakespeare has presented to us under 
 the names of Capulets and Montagues, Juliet belong- 
 ing to the one and Romeo to the other. 
 
 The leaders of the Guelphs were the great family of 
 San Bonafacio, who succeeded at one time in expelling 
 the Montecchi and their allies, and then called in the 
 Marchese d' Este, Azzo VI, to rule the city as podesta. 
 The Estensi had not yet seized upon Ferrara, and 
 swayed their primitive territory in the Euganean Hills. 
 Azzo held forth in Verona for a while, till the Montec- 
 chi and other exiles, with the aid of his own uncle, re- 
 gained the city by a surprise. Azzo escaped, procured 
 reinforcements, retook the city, fought the Ghibel- 
 lines from street to street and house to house, for 
 several weeks, and finally exterminated what was left 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 333 
 
 of them in their last remaining stronghold. This was 
 one of the most ferocious and desperate civic struggles 
 of the Middle Ages. 
 
 Soon afterwards came the League's war with Fred- 
 erick II, which extended desultorily over twenty-five 
 years. Seven years after its commencement, in 1233, 
 Era Giovanni the peacemaker held that astounding 
 meeting of all the plain-towns, to make a union of 
 peace, which gathered on the plain of Pasquara, three 
 miles from Verona's walls. ^ The pact which the vast 
 multitude swore to did not long endure. The friar 
 became ruler of Verona, but after his already men- 
 tioned feat of burning sixty citizens in a body, was 
 cast down and imprisoned. The city's third despot 
 quickly succeeded, — the worst and strongest of them 
 all. 
 
 Ezzelino da Romano was unwisely named by the 
 Veronese to be their captain, at the desire of Freder- 
 ick II, when the latter occupied the city in 1236; and 
 he made himself absolute master for over a score of 
 years. In 1238 his marriage to the Emperor's natural 
 daughter Selvaggia was celebrated with much pomp 
 at the local Church of St. Zeno. Ezzelino's cruelties 
 were much the same at Verona as elsewhere; and when 
 he died in 1259, it was only to leave the city to a 
 follower who founded a whole dynasty of masterful 
 tyrants. This was Mastino della Scala, the first of his 
 line, who was chosen podestd by the voice of the people 
 as soon as Ezzelino was dead. 
 
 The Della Scala were a local family of merchants, 
 of no known ancestry, who had come into prominence 
 under Ezzelino by having three of their male members 
 suffer death, and Mastino mount to favor and power 
 in order to save his own skin. They were not extremely 
 
 1 See chapter on Vicenza. 
 
334 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 wealthy, like the Medici, but climbed far more quickly 
 to absolute sway through their abilities as warriors 
 and rulers. The first five of them, with the exception 
 of Alboino, were remarkable conquerors and states- 
 men, adored by the people; they made Verona once 
 more the capital of a great state, the first power and 
 city of northern Italy, and bestowed upon her a pro- 
 sperity, a beauty, and a height of culture which she 
 had not seen since the days of Theodoric. Their re- 
 maining six rulers were ever more decadent tyrants, 
 who lost all that their predecessors had gained, reduced 
 the people to misery, and exterminated themselves by 
 a process of fratricide such as the horrified world had 
 never beheld before. Their descent was as rapid and 
 catastrophic as their ascent had been proud and glori- 
 ous, and their whole course was run in the short period 
 of one hundred and twenty-eight years. 
 
 Mastino the founder was but podestd and capitano, 
 — an honest, kindly, forceful man, who did not at- 
 tempt any show of absolute power. He quieted the 
 troubled city, exiled the agitators, and began the Scala 
 kingdom by the conquest of Mantua, Pavia, Piacenza, 
 and the upper valley of the Adige. In 1277 he was 
 unsuspectingly murdered by unknown parties while 
 walking one evening near his palace through a covered 
 passage called the "Volto Barbaro." Leaving no son, 
 he was succeeded in authority by his brother Alberto, 
 who reigned as absolute despot until 1301. Alberto 
 not only strengthened his hold upon the conquests of 
 Mastino, but extended his sway to Reggio, Parma, 
 Vicenza, Riva, Castel d' Arco, Este, Feltre, and Bel- 
 luno. He ruled wisely, consulted the welfare and hap- 
 piness of his peoples, and began that series of princely 
 buildings which constitute the beauty of the Verona 
 of to-day. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 3S5 
 
 Alberto left three sons, who ruled in turn: Barto- 
 lommeo, first, for a few years until his death; Alboino, 
 also for but a few years, until 1311; and Can Grande, 
 the greatest Scala of them all. The latter two in fact 
 reigned together until Alboino's idea.th, Can Grande 
 being always the captain and real master. He was a 
 prince whose preeminence in his period it is impossible 
 to overestimate. After Alboino's decease he made 
 himself sole ruler of the greater part of North Italy, — 
 the head of a state whose size and power dwarfed to 
 insignificance the territories of all his neighbors. At 
 war he was a consummate genius, the foremost of 
 his time, extending the Scala possessions by rapid 
 campaigns to Padua, Treviso, Monselice, Brescia, 
 Modena, Lucca, Bassano, and Cividale, until his king- 
 dom stretched from the far eastern end of the Friulan 
 Plain and the Alpen fastnesses of Cadore, to Milan 
 and Bergamo upon the west, and the stream of the 
 Arno beyond the Apennines. 
 
 This was the largest state that medieval North 
 Italy ever saw, — with the exception of the brief con- 
 quests of Gian Galeazzo Visconti fourscore years 
 later; it included a dozen of the fairest and richest 
 cities of the peninsula, and yielded to its sovereign 
 the vast private income of seven hundred thousand 
 florins in gold, which was surpassed by no European 
 potentate save the King of France. Can Grande be- 
 came the dazzling cynosure of all Western eyes, the 
 leader of Italy; and his capital, Verona, the centre to 
 which flowed this unceasing stream of gold, of power, 
 and adulation, became the glittering hub of attraction 
 to the world of literature, art, magnificence, and 
 courtly life. 
 
 For Can Grande was more than a conqueror; he 
 was a dilettante, a lover of all the graces and accom- 
 
336 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 plishments, drawing around him the greatest minds 
 and artists of his age. In the Renaissance and the 
 revolution of manners, that were now in full swing, he 
 played a leading part. The Scala love of building was 
 inherited by him, and he urged on with reckless ex- 
 penditure a host of architects, masons, and sculptors, 
 gathered from every side. Giotto came to Verona, at 
 his solicitation, and started her school of painting with 
 a series of works now vanished. He drew to his Court, 
 encouraged, and patronized those foremost in learning 
 and literature, of every branch and land; and enter- 
 tained handsomely the chief exiles of all other states. 
 His violence and small vices were overbalanced by 
 many splendid traits, — generosity, integrity, kindli- 
 ness, consideration, courtesy, justice, all in a large de- 
 gree, — with a loftiness and grandeur of soul far above 
 his day. 
 
 His tremendous thirst for glory was remarkably 
 commingled with, and tempered by, a love of his city 
 and country, and desires for the welfare of the people. 
 High as he had climbed, his ambitious spirit yearned 
 higher still. He had become the dominant leader of 
 all the Ghibellines, and they, adoring his magnanim- 
 ity, looked to him as the long-awaited savior of Italy; 
 in their hopes, as in his own, he was to reconquer the 
 whole peninsula for the Imperial cause, and rule the 
 united kingdom as the Emperor's vicar. This position 
 for North Italy had already been conferred upon him 
 by Henry VII. 
 
 These ambitions and hopes are set forth in the 
 writings of Dante, — the most illustrious of all 
 the exiles and literati whom Can Grande entertained 
 at Verona. Dante lingered long with him, and with 
 his brothers before him, at their palaces in the city 
 and castles roundabout, forming one of that renowned 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 337 
 
 courtly circle, highly honored by his royal hosts, and 
 himself highly esteeming the conqueror, — to whom 
 he dedicated his Paradiso. What he looked to Can 
 Grande to accomplish is shown in the oft-quoted pas- 
 sage of the Inferno, canto i, where the latter is clearly 
 indicated by the "greyhound" (veltro) who was to 
 come and destroy the papal wolf, and reunite Italy 
 under the Imperial sway. Dante afterwards fell out 
 with Can Grande, and left his Court for good. Nor did 
 the latter live to fulfill any of the greater hopes enter- 
 tained; for, like his brothers and all succeeding Sca- 
 ligers, who seemed to have but weak constitutions, he 
 died before he was forty, suddenly, at Treviso, in 
 1329. And his empire fell to pieces as quickly as it had 
 been made. 
 
 It was in the reign of Alboino, just preceding Can 
 Grande, that Shakespeare placed his tragedy of Romeo 
 and Juliet; although, as a matter of fact, the Montecchi 
 and Capelletti had ended their high positions and 
 enmity long before. The whole story of the lovers is 
 doubtless equally unreal, having its source in one of 
 the tales of the einquecento romancer, Luigi di Porto; 
 though there are not wanting people who claim that 
 such persons really existed, and were buried together 
 in the sarcophagus which was long pointed out in the 
 old Capuchin cemetery. 
 
 Can Grande left no sons, and the inheritance of his 
 great state fell into the incapable hands of Mastino 
 II, the elder son of Alboino. This prince had the con- 
 queror's ambition without his ability or depth of 
 soul. Instead of consolidating the loosely hung terri- 
 tories, like a man of sense, he quickly alarmed the 
 neighboring powers, already envious, by his prepara- 
 tions for further conquests. Venice, Florence, Milan, 
 Ferrara, and Mantua promptly leagued themselves 
 
338 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 together to avert this danger, attacked the tyrant 
 unitedly, and despoiled him of everything except 
 Verona and Vicenza. It was he who commenced the 
 unparalleled system of fratricide of his house, by 
 killing Bishop Bartolommeo della Scala with his 
 own hand. In him began the degeneration of the stock; 
 which was grafted into the Visconti by the marriage 
 of his daughter Caterina to Barnabo of that family, 
 — a fact of interest, because from her Milan's 
 world-renowned opera-house received its name, "La 
 Scala." 
 
 Upon Mastino's death in 1351, the throne of Ve- 
 rona again fell to three brothers, his legitimate sons, 
 who were as weak and criminal as the former trio had 
 been strong and noble. Can Grande II, the eldest, 
 ruled till 1359 ; Cansignorio, the second, followed him 
 for sixteen years; and Paolo Alboino, the youngest, 
 shared the power for a while in name only. There were 
 also a number of illegitimate brothers, including Freg- 
 nano, who had some character and ability. He was 
 loved by the people, and headed them in a revolt 
 against the tyranny of Can Grande II, when the 
 latter had driven them to desperation with his im- 
 positions. It was perhaps unfortunate that Fregnano 
 did not succeed; but Can Grande slew him on the 
 Ponte delle Navi, and dispersed the mob. 
 
 The result was the despot's erection of that fortress 
 on the bank of the Adige now called the Castel Vecchio, 
 or Castle of the Scaligers, with its strange, picturesque, 
 Gothic bridge crowned by forked battlements; and 
 there he shut himself up from the danger of rebellion, 
 holding the bridge to receive aid from his brother-in- 
 law, the Marquis of Brandenburg, up the valley, in 
 case of another rising. Death soon caught him, 
 however, by an insidious, treacherous hand more base 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 339 
 
 than himself, more dangerous than the people, — a 
 hand which should have been extended to defend him, 
 which penetrated all bars, and proved itself the vilest 
 of all murderers. It was Cansignorio. 
 
 This inhuman monster killed his brother with his 
 own dagger, and, mounting the throne, deprived the 
 latter's three sons of their inheritance. With that 
 inconsistency so characteristic of medieval Italians, 
 however, once firmly seated, he devoted himself to 
 the embelUshment of the city and the welfare of the 
 people. Such a queer compound is little to be under- 
 stood to-day, — but he certainly did much for Verona; 
 among other things, the public gardens near the 
 Scaliger palaces were opened, the Ponte delle Navi 
 was rebuilt in a grander form, painting was encour- 
 aged by abundant frescoing in his own and other 
 noble houses, and marble monuments and statues were 
 scattered richly through the town. His chief good 
 work was the aqueduct bringing potable water to the 
 city, which still spouts forth from the handsome foun- 
 tain that he placed in the central piazza. He built 
 himself a Gothic tomb far surpassing those of his pre- 
 decessors, so large and sumptuous that it is evident 
 he intended it to secure him a posthumous fame. 
 
 Throughout his day Cansignorio was very pious and 
 devout; — what a commentary upon the failure of a 
 faith which teaches that salvation is earned by pro- 
 fessions alone. He had no sons except two of illegit- 
 imate birth, Bartolommeo II and Antonio; and to 
 insure their inheritance of the throne, he crowned his 
 devotions and good deeds by another deliberate fratri- 
 cide, — the murder of poor Paolo Alboino, long con- 
 fined in prison walls. Then he died contented, in 1375, 
 and his sons took his seat together. 
 
 Bartolommeo, the elder, was by far the better of 
 
340 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the two, and for six years administered the two cities 
 with considerable justice. But the course of degenera- 
 tion was not yet run out. Bartolommeo had fallen in 
 love with a fair daughter of the Nogarola family, who 
 had another suitor in a son of the Malaspina; Antonio 
 slew his brother, sleeping on his bed, with the aid of 
 hired bravos, and deposited the corpse at night-time 
 in the street before the Nogarola mansion. Next day, 
 with its discovery, Antonio accused Malaspina of the 
 bloody deed, and arrested him, together with the 
 Nogarola girl and her father, declaring the latter to 
 have been its instigators. All three were put to hor- 
 rible tortures in the hopes of forcing a feigned con- 
 fession; they disappointed the fratricide by asserting 
 their innocence until death ended their sufferings. 
 That turned the accusations of the people upon the 
 true murderer. He endeavored to dissipate them by 
 a wonderful f^te. 
 
 Antonio's betrothed bride, the celebrated Samari- 
 tana, beautiful but heartless daughter of the despot 
 of Ravenna, arrived shortly after this with a jeweled 
 cavalcade, and the lord of Verona seized the opportun- 
 ity to make a festivity such as even those pageant- 
 loving ages seldom saw. There were processions of 
 thousands of silk-clad, begemmed nobles, with at- 
 tendants, pages, musicians, heralds, in every sort of 
 extravagant costume, and banners, flags, canopies, 
 with showers of gold, silver and sweetmeats, through 
 which Samaritana rode a white horse like a glistening 
 fairy. The ancient Arena witnessed the strangest 
 scenes of its bloody history; the same glittering court- 
 iers and maidens acted for the gathered populace 
 jousts and plays, including the siege of a "castle 
 of love" erected in the centre, which was defended 
 by girls raining sweets and flowers, and captured by 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 341 
 
 swains. These entertainments lasted for twenty-seven 
 consecutive days; and their expense was so vast, to- 
 gether with the foUies which Samaritana began soon 
 to commit, that Antonio found his exchequer denuded 
 when Milan and Padua stood suddenly hostile before 
 him. 
 
 Stripped and friendless by his own deeds, he could 
 put up no effectual defense against the Carrarese 
 troops led by the great English condottiere. Sir John 
 Hawkwood; and on the night of November 18, 1387, 
 the last of the Scaligers stole secretly and alone from 
 the palaces and the city where his ancestors had so 
 brilliantly reigned. The Visconti immediately oc- 
 cupied Verona, while the Carrara seized Vicenza. The 
 Visconti chief at this time was the renowned Gian 
 Galeazzo, who was engaged in building up his wide- 
 spread state. He extended Verona's outer wall across 
 the peninsula, rebuilt the fortresses upon the hilltops, 
 and continued the construction of palatial edifices. 
 Verona was to be the second brightest gem in the Vis- 
 conti crown; but his death in 1402 dissipated all those 
 dreams. Francesco Carrara at once took the city, un- 
 resisting, and installed in the princely chair Guglielmo, 
 the bastard son of Can Grande II. The latter died so 
 instantly, within twenty-four hours, that it cannot be 
 called a restoration; and the cause is often laid at the 
 door of him who profited by it, — Carrara. He was 
 proclaimed lord of Verona; — and Caterina, Duchess 
 Dowager of Milan, called the Venetians to the aid of 
 her infant sons. 
 
 We know what followed: the Republic extinguished 
 the house of Carrara and seized its territories, while 
 Verona suffered willingly the subjection of St. Mark. 
 Henceforth there was peace in the city, though some- 
 times trouble roundabout, during the wars of Venice, 
 
342 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 when condottieri generals had to be paid, to keep 
 them outside the walls. During the war of the League 
 of Cambrai, Verona, released like the rest of the Vene- 
 tian towns from their allegiance, inclined once more 
 to the Imperial cause which she had so long repre- 
 sented in the peninsula; she shut her gates against 
 the distressed Venetian army retreating from its de- 
 feat at Ghiaradadda, solemnly re-tendered her sub- 
 jection to the Emperor, Maximilian I, and received 
 him in her midst in 1509, with much Sclat. At the end 
 of the war, in 1517, she was restored to Venice; and 
 in the meantime had suffered so extremely from Ger- 
 man rapacity, extortion, and bloodthirstiness, that her 
 people were forever cured of their Ghibelline prefer- 
 ences. Such rejoicings were never again seen as when 
 they returned to the benevolent rule of St. Mark. 
 The saint's marble Lions were brought out from their 
 hiding-places, and reerected with songs of joy. 
 
 Then it was that the Republic constructed those 
 formidable fortifications around the city which be- 
 came the wonder of their time; nothing like them is 
 even yet to be seen in Europe. Verona, now of only 
 eighty thousand inhabitants, was then doubtless the 
 habitat of at least one hundred and fifty thousand, 
 as evidenced by her wide extent. Venice was determ- 
 ined never to lose the marble city again, and she did 
 not, until she fell herself. The renowned Veronese 
 architect, Michele Sammicheli, foremost of his age in 
 that profession, built those miles of gigan tic stone walls, 
 with their tremendous bastions, sallyports, scarps and 
 counterscarps, with mountainous embankments, and 
 a moat like a deep broad river; and in them he con- 
 structed five new and ornamental gates, whose beauti- 
 ful Renaissance archways still span the tides of travel. 
 
 No trouble now for nearly three centuries marred 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 343 
 
 the city's steady prosperity, beyond another visitation 
 in 1630 of that most terrible of all enemies, the plague, 
 which had already fiercely attacked her on half a dozen 
 or more occasions. This time it reduced her popula- 
 tion to the pitiful figure of only twenty thousand; 
 but in a few years, with Italy's unending prolificness, 
 the streets were again re-peopled. Toward the end 
 of the Republic, Verona for a time afiForded an asylum 
 to the French Pretender, afterwards Louis XVIII, who 
 was duly sent away in consequence of representations 
 from the Directory; but when Bonaparte arrived upon 
 the plain with his army, he used the fact of that asylum 
 as a pretext for occupying the city. On the night of 
 April 17, 1797, occurred that bloody, desperate up- 
 rising against the French which is known as the 
 "Veronese Vespers"; it was a frightful massacre, 
 which continued for three whole days, with resistance 
 to the troops advancing to the garrison's aid; but the 
 result was only a firmer hold and worse exactions by 
 Napoleon. 
 
 From the Peace of Luneville, in 1800, the city was 
 curiously divided between the French and Austrians, 
 until 1805, — the right bank of the Adige being French 
 territory and the left Austrian; then it was entirely 
 French till 1814, and after the latter date, entirely 
 Austrian until 1866. During the last-named period, 
 Verona became the chief stronghold of the foreign 
 yoke, the foremost member of the celebrated Quadri- 
 lateral. In the final war of 1866, the second disas- 
 trous battle of Custozza was fought close without the 
 city, the people listening to the thunder of the cannon 
 with anxious hearts; and with its close came a long, 
 harrowing line of Italian prisoners and wounded, who 
 were confined in the great Arena as a prison. But the 
 long awaited freedom soon arrived; the Austrians 
 
344 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 retreated, and in November of that same year Victor 
 Emmanuel made his triumphal entry into the city 
 amidst the tears of the welcoming populace. 
 
 Verona's history in art and letters has been as dis- 
 tinctive and proud as her political position. Among 
 her early, native-born, great writers were Catullus, 
 iEmilius Macer, Pomponius Secundus, and the elder 
 Pliny; her private palaces have always been celebrated 
 for their libraries, and her University has been pro- 
 minent ever since its foundation by the sons of Charle- 
 magne. In recent times she has produced Aleardi the 
 patriotic poet, Pompei, Pindemonte, and Scipione 
 Maffei the historian. 
 
 But especially original and glorious was Verona's 
 school of painting, which developed on its own separ- 
 ate lines of distinguished beauty, until in the cinque- 
 cento it gradually merged itself with the school of 
 Venice. So uniquely lovely and striking are its accom- 
 plishments, — for the most part to be seen only at 
 Verona herself, — that he who has not beheld them 
 can form no proper idea of the full powers of Italian 
 art. Can Grande originated Veronese painting by 
 bringing Giotto to the city; and Giotto left behind 
 there a pupil who became the true founder of its school. 
 This was Altichieri, whose chief remaining works, 
 however, are at Padua. He and D' Avanzo str,uck off 
 a little from Giotto's line, and left the diverging path 
 for their successors. Martini of Verona worked in their 
 time, and Pisanello (1380-1451), the great medalist, 
 followed them; the latter labored mostly at his won- 
 derful medallions, but executed in his city some fres- 
 coes also, of the very first rank for their periqd . Others 
 were painted by him in the Doges' Palace. He was the 
 first artist to be renowned for his careful reproduc- 
 tions of animal life. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 345 
 
 Pisanello left behind him, amongst other pupils, 
 three that became prominent quattrocento artists, — 
 Stefano da Zevio, and Francesco and Girolamo 
 Benaglio. In the next generation, at the end of the 
 quattrocento, uprose the greatest Veronese of them all: 
 Liberale, Girolamo dai Libri, Francesco Morone, and 
 Paolo Morando or Cavazzola. This was the quartette 
 that immortalized the school. Working well into the 
 cinquecento, at the very height of the Renaissance, 
 filled with religious feeling and an extraordinary love 
 of grace and coloring, they turned out those scores of 
 canvases that blaze from the churches and palaces 
 of Verona, with a gorgeous beauty quite astounding 
 to the stranger. 
 
 Most of these men had been bred as miniaturists, 
 which work was greatly practiced here, and so had 
 developed that painstaking minuteness which gives 
 to their work a perfection of finish, a careful loveliness 
 of every slightest detail, seen nowhere else, and makes 
 it more enjoyable than can be expressed. They de- 
 voted themselves to pietistic tableaux, in which they 
 expressed profound religious happiness, and which 
 they set forth with a nicety of drawing and grouping, 
 a celestial grace, and a glory of coloring quite Oriental 
 in its rich harmonies. The works of Girolamo dai Libri 
 were especially unparalleled for their wondrous love- 
 liness, — those of Morone for their power and depth 
 also; they all developed a depth of pious sentiment 
 considerably beyond that of other schools. 
 
 Liberale, the most advanced and far-seeing of his 
 associates, left for the second generation of the cinque- 
 centists some pupils of genius that formed another 
 remarkable quartette, — Caroto, Bonsignori, Torbido, 
 and Domenico del Riccio, called Brusasorci. Of these 
 Caroto was the greatest, having a most unique and 
 
346 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 efifective gracefulness, and much force; Torbido devel- 
 oped a style very much like Giorgione's; Bonsignori 
 was a renowned portrait painter; and Brusasorci ad- 
 vanced beyond them all into the free field of the later 
 Renaissance, discarding all precedents, working with an 
 originality and power of genius worthy of the deepest 
 study. Liberale's other pupils, Falconetto, and Paolo 
 and Niccolo Giolfino, as well as Farinata and Antonio 
 Badile, who were influenced by him, were able artists 
 of the same period without the fire of genius, but who 
 nevertheless produced some occasional striking pieces. 
 Badile was the uncle and teacher of the great man who 
 ended the long list, — who became a thorough Vene- 
 tian, and yet, by reason of being named after his native 
 city, has represented it more to the general world than 
 all his predecessors: this was Paolo Veronese (sur- 
 named Cagliari), — and with him the glorious school of 
 Verona passed away. 
 
 On the last leg of my journey from Vicenza to 
 Verona, I passed through scenery that had close con- 
 nections with this history. The route for the first half 
 of the way lay southwesterly, along the narrow vale 
 between the Monti Berici and the Alpen foothills, 
 whose rounded slopes glistened with far-oflp villages 
 and ancient castles peeping from the woods. A more 
 beautiful valley could hardly be conceived. About a 
 third of the distance through it, perched high upon the 
 shoulder of a near eminence on the right, the ruined 
 towers of the medieval stronghold of the Montecchi 
 were seen, with the clustering white walls of the village 
 bearing their name, — Montecchio. This was one of 
 the largest and richest castles of North Italy in those 
 days when Romeo made love to Juliet; and to it as an 
 impregnable fortress the family and their retainers 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 347 
 
 would retire, whenever worsted in their struggles in 
 Verona. To-day it is but an empty shell, though still 
 picturesque and formidable from afar. 
 
 At Montebello, two thirds of the way through, a 
 later country-place was passed, — the splendid villa 
 of the Conti Arrighi; and when we emerged upon the 
 wide plain again, and turning westward, stopped at 
 the town of San Bonifacio, only three miles to the 
 south of us lay the village where Napoleon in 1796 
 gained his momentous victory of Arcole; and only two 
 miles to the north, frowning in plain view from its hill- 
 top, sat the important Scala castle of Soave, to which 
 the Court so often retreated, and where Dante enjoyed 
 himself in its illustrious company. Then we passed the 
 little town of Caldiero, lying where the valley of the 
 Illasi debouches upon the plain; and looking up its 
 long straight defile, I fancied I could discern at least 
 one of those two other famous castles of the Scaligers 
 that guarded it of old, — Illasi and Tregnano. All 
 around Verona thus they sat, those strongholds of 
 the tyrants, on both sides of the Adige, dominating 
 the vales of the mountains, and glowering over the 
 plain. 
 
 Soon we rumbled into the huge covered station of 
 Verona, and, separating myself as soon as possible 
 from the flowing crowd, I took a vettura for the city. 
 It was the sunset hour. Up a wide, tree-shaded avenue 
 to the imposing stone arch of the Porta Vescovo, and 
 along the Via Venti Settembre, we coursed, through 
 its endless throng of wagons, carriages, and tram cars, 
 between its modem-looking, plastered fagades, — 
 until at length I found myself once more rolling over 
 the grand arches of the historic Ponte delle Navi. 
 Once again I beheld the muddy, whirling waters of the 
 Adige, the great stone quays, crowned with stately 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 boulevards, and the lovely hillsides, curving round from 
 north to southeast, gray with forests of olive groves, 
 and topped with bastioned citadels glistening in the 
 level sun. But loveliest of all was the rounded height 
 of S. Pietro, blocking the end of the river vista, rising 
 steeply with gleaming buildings, tier on tier from the 
 very quay, graced still above these by a row of tall 
 black cypresses like sentinels on guard, and crowned 
 upon its summit with an imposing edifice that glowed 
 golden in the western blaze. It was the latest castle of 
 S. Pietro, constructed by the Austrians upon the 
 foundations of Theodoric and the Romans, — a long 
 three-storied edifice, with square, towering pavilions 
 at the corners. 
 
 I thought of Theodoric also, and all the stirring, 
 eventful history of these shores, as I lowered my eyes 
 to the rushing waters : — 
 
 Green Adige, 't was thus in rapid course 
 And powerful, that thou didst murmur 'neath 
 The Roman bridges sparkling from thy stream 
 Thine ever-running song unto the sun. 
 When Odoacer, giving way before 
 The onrush of Theodoric, fell back; 
 And 'midst the bloody rack about them passed 
 Into this fair Verona, blonde and straight 
 Barbarian women in their chariots, singing 
 Songs unto Odin; while the Italian folk 
 Gathered about their Bishop and put forth 
 To meet the Goths the supplicating Cross.^ 
 
 And this same stream whose waters had made a 
 city great, — how had they not scourged and devas- 
 tated it through all the centuries! I thought of the 
 many times repeated floods, furious and resistless, 
 which it had poured from its mountain-gorge through 
 the level streets, and far and wide over the plain, 
 throwi];ig down, undermining, drowning, carrying 
 
 ' M. W. Arms's translation of Carducci. 
 
VERONA LA DEGNA 349 
 
 away, its multitudinous prey of human beings and 
 their works, receding at last only to leave behind its 
 final sting of pestilence. In 589, when Duke Antharis 
 wedded Theodolinda, the whole city and countryside 
 were buried fathoms deep in such an avalanche of 
 waters, with such a terrible destruction of lives, build- 
 ings, animals, and crops, that its horror remained with 
 the people for long ages after. Then it was that oc- 
 curred the strange reputed miracle of S. Zeno, — 
 when the roaring flood refused to strike those sacred 
 walls, banked itself up, and rushed divided on. Again 
 and again the Adige repeated its pitiless assaults, — 
 one of them, as late as 1757, leaving the city almost a 
 depopulated ruin. But to-day modern engineering 
 has hemmed the dangerous torrent into those mighty 
 stone embankments that I saw before me, and the 
 great muraglioni or dikes leading across the plain; 
 so that its powers of destruction are forever ended. 
 
 As we came off the bridge, I saw facing it the tall 
 Gothic apse of the huge brick Church of S. Fermo, 
 one of Verona's finest edifices, perpetuating the mem- 
 ory of her sainted martyr. We turned at a right angle 
 into the long straight thoroughfare leading north- 
 ward to the grand Piazza delle Erbe, at the very centre 
 of the town. Roundabout it at close distances lie all 
 the chief hotels; and for several hours, well into the 
 evening, I searched through them for the best accom- 
 modations, at reasonable rates, for a prolonged stay. 
 With some I was acquainted from former visits, into 
 the others I made close investigation; but it seemed 
 that every one of them was either too fancy in its 
 prices, too antiquated in its means, too dirty, or too 
 poor in table. At last, just when I was about giving 
 it up, I found exactly what I was hunting for: a thor- 
 oughly Italian caravansary, but newly furnished, 
 
350 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 immaculately clean, not too la,rge for good service and 
 homelikeness, quiet, centrally located, with excellent 
 cooking, a genial host, and very reasonable rates. It 
 was entitled the "Aquila Nera," and was situated in a 
 retired spot on the Via Quattro Spade, a little west of 
 the Piazza Erbe, with its rooms overlooking a silent 
 courtyard; and there I passed, with my companions 
 who joined me, as enjoyable a sojourn as Italy has 
 ever given me. 
 
 Verona is too vast, her sights too manifold, to be 
 more than enumerated within the limits of a single 
 chapter, and enumerated without a word of descrip- 
 tion. Those who wish a detailed catalogue or guide 
 will find it in the pages of Baedeker or Murray, or bet- 
 ter still, within the covers of that pleasant little vol- 
 ume, Verona, by Alethea Wiel, of the series of Medieval 
 Towns, — in which also the history has been well re- 
 lated. I have neither space nor desire to follow use- 
 lessly in their footsteps; but shall transcribe my own 
 rambles, from day to day, endeavoring through them 
 to give an idea of the general plan and appearance of 
 the historic city, of her principal avenues, piazzas, 
 buildings, and monuments, of her life and people, and 
 of the chief masterpieces of painting, showing the 
 characteristics and unique powers of her wonderful 
 school. 
 
VERONA. CHURCH OF ST. ANASTASIA. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 VEKONA LA MARMORINA 
 
 Still westward hold thy way, till Alps look down 
 On old Verona's walled and classic town. 
 Fair is the prospect; palace, tower, and spire, 
 And blossomed grove, the eye might well admire. 
 
 — NicHoiAs Mitchell. 
 
 "In Verona the gutters are of marble. The ledge you 
 lean upon, the flight of steps going up outside a house, 
 the posts which block a street against the wheels, the 
 fountain in the market-place, are all of white or red 
 marble. Pillars of white or red marble hold up the 
 overhanging roofs of shops, and the shopkeepers paste 
 their advertisements over marble. Every street has 
 its marble doorway, window, or balcony, shaped after 
 a |fine Renaissance pattern or carved with beautiful 
 ornament. . . . And there are monsters enough in red 
 and white marble, crouching at the doors of churches, 
 leaning over from the lintels, and carved in slabs let 
 into the walls of houses. . . . And the two colors of 
 Veronese marbles, red and white, are repeated in 
 bricks, in pavements, in castles, churches, palaces, and 
 bridges; till at sunset the whole city seems to flush 
 with ruddy light." * 
 
 How true I felt this, as I walked once more the en- 
 deared and fascinating streets, glowing with their 
 wealth of rich material and design, teeming with their 
 memories of past glories and tragedies. I was making 
 my way, on the morning after my arrival, to the near 
 Piazza Erbe, the centre of the city and its life. 
 
 1 Arthur Symons, Citiea of Italy. 
 
352 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 The great Arena, standing farther to the southwest, 
 at about the middle of the Visconti wall inclosing the 
 peninsula, is surrounded by another large piazza, an 
 immense one, named recently after Vittorio Eman- 
 uele, but still generally known by its old appellation 
 of Piazza Bra. That is second in importance, — lighted 
 at night by the blazing windows of caffes, thronged 
 with tables and moving people resounding with the 
 music of the garrison's band; and from its northeastern 
 angle runs a narrow street called Via Nuova, directly 
 to the southern end of Piazza Erbe. This street is the 
 town's principal promenade and shopping-centre, its 
 asphalt pavement being denied to vehicles, and given 
 up entirely to the endless crowds of pedestrians; 
 through it I was now proceeding, threading the lively 
 groups, looking into the bright little shops that 
 make the slender way strangely like to the Venetian 
 Merceria. 
 
 Then I stood at the southern end of Piazza Erbe, 
 gazing up its long and wonderfully picturesque vista, 
 framed by fine, old, four-storied buildings with their 
 traces of nearly vanished frescoes, crowded with its 
 hundreds of large, white umbrellas over market- 
 stalls, adorned with its ancient monuments that bear 
 such memories of the pulsating past; and I felt those 
 memories surge up within me like a storm. Few 
 piazzas in all Italy can compare with this one. Of it 
 the enraptured Dickens said, "It is so fanciful, quaint, 
 and picturesque a place, formed by such an extraor- 
 dinary and rich variety of fantastic buildings, that 
 there could be nothing better at the core of even this 
 romantic town!."' Its shape is peculiar, — the length 
 from north to south being perhaps four times the 
 breadth, and the western side curving gently in a broad 
 
 ' Pictures from Italy. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 353 
 
 arc. In the middle of that side I saw the delightful, 
 Gothic Casa dei Mercanti rising on its heavy arcade, 
 dating as far back as 1301, designed by Alberto della 
 Scala for the merchants' guilds, but latterly used for 
 the commercial courts. It was really more Romanesque 
 than Gothic, being of the transition period: its brick 
 arches were rounded, with alternate red and white 
 voussoirs, supported by heavy marble columns; and 
 the upper windows had charming double lights, sepa- 
 rated by coupled, slender shafts, — while battlements 
 crowned the roof. The rest of the buildings on that 
 side were private houses, once occupied by noble fam- 
 ilies; and the last few fagades still glowed with linger- 
 ing portions of paintings, by Liberali and Girolamo 
 dai Libri, well enough preserved to show how very 
 lovely they must once have been. 
 
 Opposite, in the centre of the right side, rose the 
 simple stuccoed fagade of the old Palazzo della Ra- 
 gione, or city hall, surmounted to a tremendous height 
 by the imposing municipal clock- and bell-tower, 
 called the Torre Lamberti, which was constructed in 
 1172, — according to the local story, by the family of 
 that name. It was of brick, square in shape till near 
 the top, where it ended in an octagonal belfry; huge 
 clock-faces adorned it more than halfway up; then 
 came a beautiful, triple, Gothic window on each side, 
 with marble shafts and red-and- white brick arches; 
 and each side of the belfry bore a similar, double win- 
 dow, long and narrow, leaving the great bells swinging 
 visibly in the open air. 
 
 At the end of the same side I saw the Casa dei 
 Mazzanti, where Alberto della Scala was living when 
 he founded the Mercanti, its lofty wall-spaces covered 
 with enormous painted figures of gods and goddesses, 
 nude forms of reddish brown, — Venus and Cupids, 
 
354 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and Titans struggling, — and at the very angle a 
 hideous Assumption of the Virgin. The end of the 
 vista was blocked by a striking Renaissance f agade of 
 marble, the Palazzo Maffei, looking down over the 
 piazza with its row of marble statues crowning the 
 cornice; and immediately on its left soared the bell- 
 tower built by Cansignorio when he adorned the piazza. 
 I lowered my eyes to the pavement of the square, — 
 practically hidden by the crowd of canvas toadstools, 
 and the congested throngs of people that pushed and 
 trafficked among the booths, — and noticed again 
 with pleasure the fine old monuments that raised their 
 heads in dignity. They stretched along the centre line 
 at regular intervals, lending history to the scene. The 
 first, at the south end, was the ancient Gothic market- 
 cross, of red marble; farther on rose a canopy supported 
 by four naarble pillars, elevated upon three steps, 
 and terminating in a point and ball, — the so-called 
 Tribuna, of 1207, from which decrees and judgments 
 were given for centuries ; near the centre sat the round 
 fountain, built, according to tradition, by King Pepin, 
 or Alboin, but first put to its present use by Cansig- 
 norio, — its splashing porphyry basin being fed from 
 the mouths of masks about the central pillar, and 
 the pillar surmounted by a strange, amusing figure of 
 "Verona," antique in body, badly medieval in head, 
 holding a tin scroll in the hands, and topped by a tin 
 crown; while at the northern end appeared the lovely 
 Venetian column, of gleaming marble, which was 
 reerected with such joy at the close of the War of 
 Cambrai; its winged Lion was displaced in 1797, — 
 when "Bonaparte addressed a manifesto to the Doge, 
 which . . . was followed by a decree ordering the French 
 Minister to leave Venice, . . . and the Lion of St. Mark 
 to be pulled down in all the continental territories of 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 355 
 
 Venice"; ^ — the first reprisal for the rebellion against 
 the French occupation. But it was put up once more 
 in 1888. 
 
 The busy populace filled the square and overflowed 
 into the picturesque arcades in the first stories of the 
 surrounding buildings, underneath which were shops 
 and caffes. As I elbowed through the crowd, past 
 the monuments, deafened by the pandemonium on 
 every side, the variegated contents of the stalls fell 
 under my eyes; ever^ kind of produce peculiar to 
 Italian life was exposed and freely handled, — all 
 varieties of grains, vegetables, fruits and fowls, pitiful 
 little slain birds by the hundred, live singing-birds 
 in cages, mushrooms and other fungi, flowers, plants, 
 boots and clothing, owls and eagles attached to poles 
 by strings, combs, brushes, and other articles of toilet 
 and the household, live turtles crawling over the 
 stocks of goods, — in a word, every conceivable kind 
 of ornamental or usable thing, and all mixed together 
 in a confusion beyond words. I thought of how many 
 ages this morning traffic had so continued, — from the 
 far-off days when this place had been the Forum of the 
 Roman city, when it had been used by the ancients as 
 a circus also, and resounded with the rumble of racing 
 chariots. 
 
 I gazed at the western walls, still keeping the oval 
 shape of the circus, to observe more closely those 
 extraordinary outside frescoes that had been executed 
 by Verona's two greatest artists. Girolamo's consisted 
 of a Madonna with two saints, and a group of saints 
 or apostles above them, — well spaced, composed, 
 and colored, the Child still very lovely, the Madonna 
 but formerly so; they were altogether much superior 
 to any exterior painting I had found in the plain. 
 
 ' Bourrienne, Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte. 
 
356 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Liberale's work was not so pleasing: a Coronation 
 of the Virgin in antique style, and below it a group of 
 Adam and Eve, — two heroic naked figures, with the 
 woman-headed serpent between them. Roundabout 
 were still also visible several series of Cupids and 
 wreaths and rich arabesques, with a separate figure of 
 an ancient warrior. 
 
 Turning back a little now, I entered the passage just 
 to the left of the Palazzo Ragione, topped by two slen- 
 der balustraded arches, the second holding suspended 
 by a rope one of those jawbones of whales, or ante- 
 diluvian mammals, which exercise such a curious fasci- 
 nation upon the Italian imagination; this second arch- 
 way opened into the famous Piazza dei Signori, one 
 of the few most interesting little squares of Italy. 
 Here the Scala princes had reigned and built, and from 
 them it had received its name and beauty. As I en- 
 tered at its southwestern angle, on my right immedi- 
 ately was the handsome side of the Palazzo Ragione, 
 and beyond it, across an archway, the Palazzo della 
 Tribunale; the Prefettura confronted me upon the 
 east, the Palazzo dei Giuriconsulti rose upon the west, 
 and upon the north side, glistening like a colossal gem, 
 shone the wonderful marbled fagade of the peerless 
 Palazzo del Consiglio. All of these were products of the 
 Scala genius for building. Upon the last three sides, 
 adjacent to the said palaces, opened other passages 
 of similar width; but one and all were covered by brick 
 or marble arches like that through which I had just 
 entered, and two were surmounted by marble statues; 
 so that the place was inclosed in a complete ring of 
 palatial splendor, — quiet and deserted compared 
 with the noisy Piazza Erbe, but seeming to radiate 
 still the dignity and magnificence of the court of the 
 Scaligers. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 357 
 
 The construction of the Palazzo Ragione on this 
 side was Hke the Gothic of its tower, — two upper 
 stories of alternate courses of red bricks and white 
 marble, with some splendid triple windows, above a 
 ground story of marble arches; at its eastern end was 
 a curious Late-Renaissance surfacing of dark-painted 
 stucco, two stories in height and five windows wide, 
 with all its openings beautifully decorated by terra- 
 cotta mouldings, and by relieved medallions containing 
 portrait-heads of the Scala princes. An archway led me 
 into its majestic courtyard, around three sides of which 
 ran a lofty arcade, of stone quoins upon heavy stone 
 pillars; and at its west side rose a grand marble stair- 
 way of the quattrocento, sustained on Gothic arches, 
 having a lovely balustrade; its once extended upper 
 landing had become perilous, and been mostly re- 
 moved. This space was formerly the Mercato Vecchio. 
 It commanded an impressive view of the great muni- 
 cipal tower at its northwest corner. 
 
 Returning to the Piazza dei Signori, I advanced to 
 the neighboring Palazzo Tribunale; it had a heavy, 
 red-brick tower at its nearest angle, which contained 
 little strongly barred windows, and was topped by 
 grim forked battlements; — a veritable donjon, as 
 it had proved to be in long-past days for many an 
 enemy of the Scaligers, confined in it by the latter 
 without charge or warning. According to local story 
 the whole of these prisoners were once murdered 
 together, — their number running from fifty to four 
 hundred, according to the authority. 
 
 A tablet in the palace wall stated that Cansignorio 
 had inhabited it from 1359 to 1375, and that it was in 
 the sixteenth century remodeled for the Venetian 
 Podestas. Its general design was of rich Renaissance 
 work, with an entrance arch of fine proportions and 
 
358 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Corinthian grace, and an extraordinary long balcony 
 on the second floor supported by very deep marble con- 
 soles. In its large courtyard, one side bore still some 
 Renaissance frescoes representing a whole architect- 
 ural scheme in great detail, with an angel blowing a 
 trumpet in the centre; while the passage out from its 
 south side was covered with a most unique marble arch- 
 way of the decadent period, seemingly constituted of 
 many kinds of implements of war, — the supporting 
 columns being cannons resting upon drums for bases, 
 and having capitals of mortars loaded with round shot. 
 The west side of the court was a quaint, three-storied, 
 brick loggia, restored as of old, upon the original an- 
 cient columns and supporting Gothic arches. 
 
 Coming out, I stopped to look at the statue of Dante, 
 facing the palace from the centre of the piazza, exe- 
 cuted by Ugo Zannoni in 1865, after the accepted type; 
 then I inspected the plain Palazzo Prefettura on the 
 east, which was originally the private palace of Mas- 
 tino I, built by him in 1272, and inhabited by him and 
 his successors. This was the residence in which Giotto 
 painted at Can Grande's order, and Altichieri a little 
 later, — in which Bartolommeo I received Dante upon 
 the poet's first arrival, and where Dante spent many 
 subsequent days and months. It has been remodeled 
 by successive rulers, till Mastino would not recog- 
 nize it to-day. The original fine stone arches have 
 been built-in and plastered over, dismally ; but I could 
 clearly see their outlines on the upper stories, as well 
 as the blocks of old reliefs that have been defaced. 
 
 Another handsome entrance-arch, by Sammicheli, 
 admitted me to its picturesque court, open to the 
 north, framed on the south and west sides by imposing 
 stone colonnades, sustaining brick, or brick and white 
 stone, arches; the alternate heavy pillars and columns. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 359 
 
 with rough-leaved capitals, had their bases two feet 
 underground, showing that the level has risen that 
 much since their setting, six hundred years ago. The 
 upper division of the court's western fagade was re- 
 cently restored, with a close imitation of the medieval, 
 red-and-white, arched windows, with their handsome 
 marble railings. All this red-and-white work is a 
 prominent characteristic of old Verona architecture, 
 particularly the Gothic, being apparently — as has 
 been said — a repetition of her marble hues; it is de- 
 lightfully effective, whether in brick alone, or brick 
 with marble or limestone, and becomes endeared to 
 one's heart by its happy repetitions. 
 
 From this palace I crossed to that of the Giuricon- 
 sulti opposite on the west, — a queer, ponderous, rococo 
 structure, built in 1278, and, like the others, remodeled 
 in the cinquecento; it has very ugly windows in its 
 stuccoed fagade, — made unusual by a two-storied, 
 stone entrance-arch, as high as those guarding the 
 passages; over this is a weird construction in the centre 
 of the top story, consisting of four Doric pilasters ris- 
 ing from a balustrade to a plain pediment surmounted 
 by dwarf obelisks. Atop the arch crowning the pas- 
 sage on its right, I observed a statue of the historian, 
 Scipione Maffei; and just behind this, in the north- 
 west corner, opened a dark, narrow courtyard be- 
 tween old houses, whose centre was brightened by a 
 most lovely Renaissance well -top. From the rear side 
 of the court, a low arched way led obscurely under 
 the dwellings to the Piazza Erbe, — the "Vol to Bar- 
 baro,"^ where Mastino I was killed in 1277. No more 
 fitting spot for an assassination could be devised. 
 
 I returned at last to the gem of all the Scala build- 
 
 ' So called, not from the barbaric deed mentioned, but from the former 
 palace of the Barbaro family, which was adjacent. 
 
360 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ings, the pride of Verona, which I had purposely left 
 until the end; and I speak truly when I say that words 
 can give little conception of the glorious beauty of the 
 Palazzo del Consiglio. What the Basilica Palladiana 
 is to the plain-towns in magnificence and majesty, 
 this unparalleled structure is in delicate, dainty loveli- 
 ness. Built at the very height of the Renaissance, by 
 command of the Republic in 1497, every development 
 and artifice of the science of classical architecture was 
 utilized for its success, — precious marbles, moulded 
 terra-cotta, painted stucco, and sculpture, being deftly 
 interwoven into a scheme of color that makes it a glow- 
 ing mosaic, a softly chromatic lacework, whose unob- 
 trusive tints happily accentuate the fairylike design. 
 Its genius is that of Fra Giocondo, Verona's great 
 architect, who deserves far more general fame than 
 he has received; besides erecting several noted build- 
 ings in Verona, and in other North Italian cities, he 
 assisted in the construction of St. Peter's, and labored 
 brilliantly for eight years in France under the orders 
 of Louis XII. 1 
 
 Designed for a town hall, this palace has the inevit- 
 able loggia in the ground floor, faced by a colonnade of 
 unsurpassable delicacy and grace; above several steps 
 rises a dainty balustrade, from which spring seven 
 slender marble columns with Corinthian capitals, to 
 uphold lightly moulded arches ; in the upper division 
 are four delightful double windows, framed by pilas- 
 ters wrought with gilded arabesques, and topped by 
 lunettes containing gilt, relieved designs ; under them 
 runs a painted string-course of wreaths and flowers, 
 from which, at the angles and between the windows, 
 larger stuccoed pilasters, arabesqued and prettily 
 
 ' He was also a remarkable engineer, — as is evidenced by his famous 
 walls of Treviso, already described. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 361 
 
 painted in gold, rise to sustain the gilded cornice; 
 between the windows and pilasters are frescoed pan- 
 els, and medallions of elegant form; while five marble 
 statues surmount the eaves. 
 
 The loggia is entirely faced with gray marble, and 
 studded with white plaster medallions holding heads 
 of illustrious Veronese; beside the doorway in its rear 
 wall are two life-size bronze figures by Girolamo Cam- 
 pagna, representing the Annunciation, and round- 
 about, the busts of other natives. The fine oaken ceil- 
 ing, heavily beamed and paneled, is exceptionally rich. 
 I found the caretaker of the palace in the adjacent 
 Prefettura, and visited the princely rooms above the 
 loggia. They consist of a splendid central salon, now 
 used by the Provincial Council, and two smaller cham- 
 bers at the sides, — all recently redecorated in the 
 original style. Especially beautiful are the doorways of 
 exquisite Renaissance design, in stone or gilded wood, 
 framed by pilasters with their faces carved in at- 
 tractive arabesques; also the magnificent quattrocento 
 ceiling of the salon, elaborately paneled, sculptured, 
 and gilded. The council chamber also contains four 
 large striking canvases by Paolo Veronese, of much 
 merit and beauty, — two being scenes from Verona's 
 history, and two, allegorical tableaux concerning the 
 city, personified as a woman; the strongest is that of 
 the Roman Emperor receiving Verona's crown, of ex- 
 ceeding grace and skillful light-effects. Here also 
 are some damask curtains, ballot boxes, and velvet 
 chairs from the adjacent Scala palace, all of the cinque- 
 cento or earlier. 
 
 In the afternoon I returned to this piazza, and de- 
 scended the narrow street leaving it at the southeast 
 corner, to the near-by Church of S. Maria Antica, — 
 and the celebrated tombs of the Scaligers. This little 
 
362 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 old Gothic edifice, dating from the eleventh century, 
 is where the princes were wont to worship, and in 
 its small open yard they sleep, appropriately near 
 the palaces where they reigned. The church's north- 
 ern (or left) side is toward the street, removed a dozen 
 yards, leaving room for the small cemetery between 
 it and the sidewalk. The inclosing iron grille, rising 
 from a red-marble parapet to a height of ten feet, 
 and crowned with quaint Gothic statues, bends round 
 to the wall of the edifice near its western end, leaving 
 a clear approach to its single doorway there located. 
 
 As I approached the spot, I saw first the superb 
 Gothic monuments of Mastino II and Cansignorio 
 rising behind the railing at the outer angles of the in- 
 closure, and soaring far into the air with their pointed 
 canopies capped by statues; then, the low church wall, 
 of red-and-white courses, pierced only by the entrance 
 and three tiny arched windows; and lastly, the tomb 
 of the great Can Grande, rising from the lintel of the 
 doorway, to a pyramidal point far above the eaves. 
 Topping this and the other monuments were eques- 
 trian figures, in marble, like all of the work, mailed 
 cap-a-pie, both horses and men, and bearing huge 
 winged helmets against the blue. No scene more 
 picturesque, or significant of medieval days, could be 
 found in all Italy. So exquisitely charming were those 
 open masses of trefoil arches, pointed pediments, 
 statuettes, and crocketed spires, all soaring gracefully 
 heavenward, — it was like stumbling upon a garden 
 of frozen white flowers, with the many fairies flitting 
 amongst them turned to stone. 
 
 Can Grande's tomb is severe and strong, befitting 
 the conqueror; the sarcophagus is carved in bas-relief 
 with scenes from his life, and bears two statuettes, but 
 the Gothic arches of the sheltering canopy are un- 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 363 
 
 adorned, and the pyramidal spire rising from its roof 
 has but a few crockets at the angles. Mastino's mon- 
 ument, at the northwest angle of the yard, is a rich 
 three-storied structure, — its first two divisions rising 
 by corner columns only; the second contains the elab- 
 orately carved sarcophagus, with the decedent's re- 
 clining figure, and its surrounding arches, with their 
 pediments, are heavily decorated. His equestrian fig- 
 ure has its vizor drawn; and the popular story goes 
 that it was so executed because, after Mastino's mur- 
 der of his kinsman. Bishop Bartolommeo, he never 
 wished his face to be seen again. 
 
 This monument, executed by one Perino da Milano, 
 otherwise unknown, is the best of them all; — ^ Can- 
 signorio's, though still larger, and more elaborate, 
 being over-decorated and more poorly sculptured. 
 Still, it is a wonderful sight, with its forest of flowering 
 pinnacles and scores of pleasing statuettes. Save that 
 it is hexagonal in shape, instead of square, its vertical 
 divisions are like those of Mastino ; but roundabout the 
 second division rise six separate small canopies holding 
 bronze statues of saintly heroes, and round the spire 
 cluster six others, still smaller, containing bronze 
 females representing virtues, with half a dozen marble 
 "virtues" seated in shell-like niches in the bases of 
 the elongated gables. The six columns surrounding 
 the sarcophagus are spirally twisted; four angels stand 
 at the corners of the recumbent knight; and on the 
 sides are relieved scenes, — which include a portrayal of 
 Cansignorio being welcomed to Heaven by the Saviour 
 and His Mother! Over every part is an exuberance of 
 decoration unsurpassed for amount and detail, though 
 betraying the initial decadence of the style. Its artist 
 was Bonino, of the celebrated Campione family. ^ 
 ' "This magnificent structure," says Perkins, in his Italian Sculptors, 
 
364 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Such is the tomb which that villainous fratricide 
 raised during his life, surrounding his dead form with 
 all the excellencies which it wanted when alive, trust- 
 ing, with them and the beguiling beauties of sculp- 
 ture, to earn an undeserved happy immortality. All 
 over the monument his emblems are repeated; and the 
 Scala ladder (which is the name's Italian meaning) is 
 cunningly wrought throughout the inclosing grille. 
 I entered the little yard, paying a small fee to the cus- 
 todian who guards the gate, and inspected the minor 
 tombs scattered about, fastened to the church wall 
 and lying upon the ground. Most of them are simple, 
 heavy sarcophagi, — that of Mastino I being distin- 
 guished by a cross carved on its side; Alberto's, his 
 faithful brother, is cut with various devices, and a 
 relief of the deceased kneeling to the Madonna; and 
 that of the bastard Giovanni della Scala projects 
 from the wall with some most attractive early carving, 
 of the Madonna and saints in elaborate niches. I en- 
 tered the church also, to find a genuinely Romanesque 
 interior, with low narrow aisles, — separated from the 
 nave by crude heavy columns, — and round arches 
 supporting a flat roof. It was very dark and still, with 
 a pervading feeling of vast age. 
 
 I turned down the narrow street leading to the right 
 beside the churchyard, passing on the left a remark- 
 able ancient house dating from the eleventh century, 
 tumbledown and picturesque, with a battlemented 
 wall screening a courtyard now desecrated by a filthy 
 stable.^ At the end of the short block, and to the right, 
 
 "is the embodiment of the profusely splendid, wayward, lawless life of 
 these princes. We find in it the same strange admixture of paganism and 
 Christianity, license and childlike faith, architecturally expressed by Ro- 
 man and Gothic elements, extravagance of style and simplicity of line." 
 
 ' The local story, that this was a palace of Romeo's family, is an inven- 
 tion for the bcguilement of tourists. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 365 
 
 upon the south of the Palazzo Tribunale, the pretty 
 little park of the Piazza dell' Independenza opened 
 before me, shaded by a giant oak and handsome palms 
 and fir trees, having a bronze equestrian statue of 
 Garibaldi in its centre, — noticeable because, for once 
 at least, the horse's feet were correctly placed. This 
 was the private garden attached to Cansignorio's pala- 
 tial residence, which he devoted to the uses of the 
 people. Under the trees were many benches, occupied 
 by loungers and nursemaids. It is a favorite gathering- 
 spot, as I afterwards found, for the populace on sum- 
 mer evenings. On its west side rises the long, stuccoed, 
 rococo Palazzo della Posta. Close by on the east lies 
 the river, with the Ponte Umberto, halfway between 
 the other principal bridges of delle Navi and di Pietra. 
 Returning to the corner of the churchyard, I walked 
 a block eastward, — past a fine old Gothic palace on 
 the left, — then a block northward, emerging into the 
 small piazza of S. Anastasia, fronted on the right by 
 that glorious church; it is one of the most perfect 
 Gothic edifices in the plain, — a work of the thirteenth 
 and fourteenth centuries. The great plain brick f agade, 
 whose marble facing has been finished along the base 
 only, and around the portal, seemed vast and impos- 
 ing upon its high flight of steps. Before it sits a marble 
 figure of Paolo Veronese, palette in hand, upon a lofty 
 pedestal; and on the north rises the side of the little 
 brick Church of S. Pietro Martire, — with its two 
 Gothic doorways, and pointed windows, — which was 
 founded by the Brandenburg soldiers in the guard of 
 Can Grande. Between the rear of it and S. Anastasia 
 I saw a short brick wall, with an arched gateway sur- 
 mounted by a Gothic tomb; it was the beautiful tomb 
 of Guglielmo da Castelbarco, which Ruskin pronounced 
 "the most perfect Gothic monument in the world." 
 
366 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Like those of the Scala, it consists of a carved 
 sarcophagus with a reclining figure, topped by a can- 
 opy of trefoil arches supporting a quadrilateral pyra- 
 mid; but the sculptured decorations are dignified 
 and charming, and the proportions very symmetrical. 
 Through the barred gate I saw a little abandoned yard 
 attached to S. Pietro, containing three ether Gothic 
 tombs of once prominent persons, — also well pro- 
 portioned and designed, though not so ornate. Still 
 another Gothic monument was the splendid portal of 
 S. Anastasia which I now approached; it was tall and 
 deeply recessed, beautifully arched and moulded, 
 and contained two doorways, in whose lunettes, and 
 in the pediment, were fourteenth-century frescoes. 
 But the interior was so surpassingly grand as to drive 
 away all thoughts of aught else. 
 
 The noble, aspiring nave, long and very lofty, soared 
 upon glistening white columns and pointed arches to a 
 groined vaulting, whose cells, as well as the soffits of 
 the arches, were covered with that remarkable and 
 lovely frescoing in designs, of the early quattrocento, 
 which is unique in Late-Gothic work. The lofty aisles, 
 likewise handsomely groined and painted, bore their 
 side altars affixed directly to the walls; the dim light 
 percolated from lancet windows; and behind thegleam- 
 ing high-altar under the distant triumphal arch, the 
 short choir ended in a graceful apse. The church was 
 filled with exceptional works of art. By the first two 
 columns crouched two curious marble figures of hunch- 
 backs, bearing holy-water basins on their shoulders, 
 of which the left one was by Paolo Veronese's father. 
 The right transept contained some remarkable paint- 
 ings: a St. Paul by Cavazzola, of striking power and 
 coloring, a Madonna and Saints by Girolamo dai Libri 
 — one of the most beautiful and perfect pietistic works 
 
VERUXA. YlK(.;iN AXJJ <_ IlILD EXTHRUXED. (GIKDLA.Aln DAI LIUKI. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 367 
 
 I have ever seen; and, in the second chapel to the right 
 of the choir, a superb example of Altichieri, that is 
 about the only one now remaining to Verona. This is 
 a fresco representing a number of mailed knights 
 kneeling before the Madonna, strong in composition, 
 action, and lifelikeness, dignified, and impressive, — 
 a brilliant exposition of his wonderful powers. As for 
 the Girolamo, — I have kept a photograph of its 
 fascinating beauty, with every detail like a cameo, set 
 up in my room wherever I have gone, from that day 
 to this. 
 
 In the next chapel were three rare examples of Mar- 
 tini, D' Avanzo, and Stefano da Zevio, and high upon 
 the transept wall over the chapel arch, one of the two 
 remaining frescoes by the latter's master, Pisanello, 
 representing St. George mounting his charger after 
 the death of the dragon. Though greatly injured by 
 the damp, which has removed the saint's figure and the 
 whole left side of the picture, enough lingers still — 
 in the spectators and various skillfully executed ani- 
 mals — to prove his worthiness of his fame. There is 
 almost no coloring left, but a fine modeling, and a 
 striking perspective of the fantastical castles perched 
 on a hilltop to the rear. In this same chapel the sac- 
 ristan showed a figure of Christ alleged to be by Man- 
 tegna(?), which was being entombed by two cherubs, 
 executed by his pupils; and around the window were 
 seventeen extraordinary terra-cotta reliefs of the life 
 of Christ, vigorous, dramatic tableaux, from the Flor- 
 entine quattrocento school. 
 
 The left transept afforded me two more interesting 
 works: a group of frescoes in the first chapel, by the 
 quattrocentist Francesco Benaglio, — consisting of three 
 scenes from the life of Christ, which showed well how 
 inferior he was to Altichieri, so long before, — and an 
 
368 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 engaging panel by Liberale, high on the west wall, of 
 Saints Magdalen, Clara, and Catherine, the Magdalen 
 posed above the others, clothed only in her golden hair, 
 and attended by two angels. This was a very graceful 
 group, of finely-modeled figures, having little coloring, 
 as usual with him, but displaying his strong powers of 
 realistic flesh-work and vivid feeling. 
 
 In the right aisle I observed a strange, painted, terra- 
 cotta group of the Entombment, — a fifteenth-century 
 work of unusual dramatic force, the figures life-size 
 and natural; also, as a frame to the fourth altar, an 
 interesting reproduction on a smaller scale of the 
 famous Arco de' Gavi of the Romans, — a marble 
 triumphal arch which until modern times stood near 
 the Castel Vecchio, a,nd was the city's chief object of 
 beauty. In the left aisle, finally, were four fairly good 
 pictures, two specimens each of the work of the cinque- 
 centists, Niccolo Giolfino and Michele da . Verona, — 
 the former's style being very free and advanced, the 
 latter's curiously antique; here also was a resplendent 
 Renaissance altar-frame of astonishing decorativeness, 
 including nine statues and a dozen marble columns. — 
 Seldom is there a church to be found anywhere with 
 such a wealth of artistic treasures of the first class. 
 Later, I obtained from the quay a view of its back, 
 showing clearly its splendid proportions, graceful apse, 
 and tall, imposing, Gothic campanile. 
 
 My next walk, on the following morning, took me 
 farther northeast to the extreme end of the peninsula, 
 occupied by the group of the Cathedral buildings. 
 The Via Duomo from the Piazza of S. Anastasia led 
 me directly northward a few blocks to the piazza of 
 the Duomo, upon which the latter fronts westward. 
 This great edifice was first erected about 800, over a 
 temple to Minerva, but now stands a Gothic structure 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 369 
 
 of the trecento, with a twelfth-century, Romanesque 
 choir and fagade, of the Lombard style; — its chief 
 material being red and white marbles in courses upon 
 the sides. The picturesque front, of yellowish-brown 
 marble below and whitened brick at the top, appealing 
 through its Lombard mixture of heaviness and light 
 details, was very pleasing to me, with the exception of 
 the two large pointed windows of later date. The roof 
 has a double pitch or gable, — the second and loftier 
 one being over the centre only, — with Lombard, 
 arcaded cornices along each, and five pinnacles rising 
 from the corners and apex. The main attraction is the 
 two-storied porch, round-arched in both divisions but 
 thoroughly Gothic, and of graceful lightness in the 
 slender supporting columns that rise from the backs of 
 antique crouching lions. Its entrance is exquisitely 
 and deeply recessed; at the sides of it stand the small 
 relieved figures of Roland and Oliver, already men- 
 tioned, very quaint in style and execution. 
 
 The interior is not so noble and imposing as S. 
 Anastasia, being much lower, and widely open through 
 the extreme spacing of the four clustered Gothic pillars 
 on each side, with their flat arches; nor is it adorned 
 with frescoes upon the vaulting, — whose groining- 
 cells are unhappily blue with gilt stars. The wide 
 aisles have no chapels, and the curious altar-frames 
 reach to their vaultings, nearly as high as that of the 
 nave. These frames are painted architectural schemes, 
 by Falconetto, representing grand marble arches 
 adorned with exuberant sculptures and statues, — 
 an absurd effect, which is heightened by the supposed 
 statues being colored brightly, as if they were live 
 personages posing there aloft. At the end of the nave 
 I saw Sammicheli's splendid choir-screen, — a semi- 
 circular roodloft of yellowish-cream marble, open 
 
370 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 above, with fine Ionic columns carrying a simple 
 entablature. Far above this again, over the triumphal 
 arch, a vividly tinted fresco of the Annunciation 
 looked down from its group of fancy angels; and be- 
 hind, from the vaulting of the apse, glowed Torbido's 
 large fresco of the Assumption of the Virgin, which 
 was designed by Giulio Romano. 
 
 There were a few very enjoyable works of art here, 
 among the large number: on the second altar to the 
 right, Liberale's charming panel of the Magi, — re- 
 plete with bright colors and happy fancies, reminding 
 me strongly of the great Florentine, Gozzoli, — and 
 three canvases by Giolfino, — a Pieta, and two groups 
 of saints, of considerable fairness and gentleness; at 
 the end of the right aisle, the beautiful Gothic tomb of 
 St. Agatha, from 1353, showing in marble a nun's form 
 of tender loveliness lying upon a bier, with four angels 
 at the corners, covered by an exquisitely designed 
 and sculptured Gothic canopy, — the whole supported 
 by other columns, and adorned from base to lofty sum- 
 mit with a marvelous wealth of carving; the beautiful 
 Renaissance framework of the shallow chapel contain- 
 ing the tomb ; the fine old bronze reliquaries and mon- 
 strances upon its altar; the frescoes of Torbido in the 
 choir, from the life of the Virgin; and last, but chiefly, 
 in a stately frame by Sansovino over the first altar to 
 left, Titian's enchanting picture of the Assumption. 
 This celebrated work, though much darkened and dis- 
 colored, is a superlative composition of lifelike dra- 
 matic figures, of intense expression, — the large forms 
 of the apostles grouped about the empty sarcophagus, 
 in wonder, having just perceived the Madonna borne 
 above them on a cloud, kneeling with folded hands, 
 gazing sweetly back at them. In the same aisle, upon 
 the organ and under its loft, I found some very cap- 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 371 
 
 tivating work by Brusasorci, including a number of 
 angels of bewitching beauty. Ah, in Verona, one is 
 continually dazzled by the enticing loveliness of her 
 painted feminine forms, and the unspeakably joyous 
 glory of their coloring. 
 
 Through a door to the left of the choir I passed to 
 the adjacent early Church of S. Maria Matriculata, 
 studded with old Roman columns like a crypt, and 
 beyond it, to the tenth-century Baptistery, S. Giovanni 
 inFonte, — a thoroughly Byzantine structure, with a 
 restored roof, dimly lighted by tiny arched windows 
 in the right and end walls, which were bare and white. 
 Diverse columns and pillars of ancient Roman edi- 
 fices, with rounded arches, separated the nave from 
 the low narrow aisles. An air of vast antiquity per- 
 meated this dusky place, assisted by the fragments of 
 Byzantine frescoes here and there, — saintly figures 
 drawn like mosaic; there were also a Madonna and 
 several saints of the tenth century, and various tab- 
 leaux of the quaint trecento. The custode exhibited a 
 Pieta which he said was by Mantegna, — a badly in- 
 jured panel, still betraying masterly anatomy and 
 expressivensss; also a Baptism of Christ by Farinato, 
 on a huge scale. Most interesting was the old baptis- 
 mal font in the centre, dating from at least 1200, — 
 a high octagonal basin of yellow marble, its sides cut 
 with remarkable New Testament scenes, having in its 
 middle the red marble tub in which the priest was 
 wont to keep himself dry while immersing the converts. 
 The reliefs were very wonderful for work of that dark 
 age, especially the journey into Egypt; — so lifelike, 
 dignified, and well composed were they, with little 
 appearance of Byzantine moulds. 
 
 Adjacent to this edifice I visited the little twelfth 
 century church of S. Elena, included, like the others, 
 
372 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 in the cathedral close; in it, according to the legend, 
 Dante in 1320 gave his Latin lecture of "De Aqua 
 et Terra." It is a bare, barnlike place, wooden-roofed, 
 with some finely carved choir-stalls, and containing 
 two good pictures, — a Deposition by Falconetto, and 
 a lovely Madonna and Saints in a glowing sunset 
 scene, alleged to be the work of Brusasorci. 
 
 Returning to S. Maria, we found on its farther, 
 western side a pleasing old cloister of about 1200, with 
 colonnades of coupled slim red shafts; and underneath 
 it, exposed in places by opened pits, a splendid Roman 
 mosaic pavement, in graceful designs of vases, birds, 
 animals, an olive tree, a dove eating grapes, etc., ex- 
 ecuted with great naturalness, in harmonious hues 
 of black and white and red. The intelligent caretaker 
 of this portion of the buildings assured me that the 
 pavement, which had been but recently discovered, 
 was proved to extend to the dimensions of one 
 hundred and fifty by four hundred feet, and had un- 
 questionably been the flooring of a Roman bath. 
 West again of the cloister extends the Palazzo dei 
 Canonici, — from which I just then saw the Archbishop 
 emerge in full ceremonial robes, and pass by me into 
 the Duomo. The palace contains a celebrated library 
 of ancient manuscripts, the Biblioteca Capitolare, 
 including codexes of unsurpassable value, from the 
 fifth to the ninth centuries. In it Petrarch brought to 
 light the letters of Cicero. 
 
 The Bishop's residence lies at the east end of the 
 Cathedral, and I now left the church by the south 
 door to walk around to it. From this side the exterior 
 view of the huge red-and-white edifice was most 
 imposing, — with the buttresses topped by pinnacles, 
 the wide projecting transept, and the chapel apses 
 embellished by effective pilaster-strips. The side porch 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 373 
 
 was like the main one, on a somewhat smaller scale, 
 with delightful old carvings of weird beasts and 
 Lombard capitals. On reaching the rear of the build- 
 ing, its lofty apse presented a handsome sight; and 
 still more pleasing, across the way, was a sudden 
 vista revealed to me through a barred gate, of the 
 richly verdurous garden of the Palazzo Zamboni, — 
 flowers of every shade, masses of varied foliage, marble 
 statues gleaming against them, tinkling fountains, 
 and peaceful paths wandering in the shade. 
 
 Just beyond, on the north side of the street, I came 
 to the Vescovado, behind a courtyard screened by a 
 high wall. Upon entering, this wall proved to be an 
 arcade toward the court, supported by a variegated 
 lot of very old columns, each different from the others, 
 — one of them being cut all over with little Gothic 
 arches; the story above them, showing traces of having 
 once been entirely frescoed in arabesques, was pierced 
 with Gothic windows. On the west projected the apse 
 of the Duomo; on the east was a Renaissance arcade 
 of two divisions; on the north, the ancient stuccoed 
 fagade of the palace, bearing marble Gothic windows 
 and a medieval tower, with several old statues at its 
 foot. I rang at the main doorway, under a portico, and 
 an aged servitor showed me over the piano nobile. In 
 its private chapel were exhibited three delicious little 
 panels by Liberale, — the Magi, and the Birth and 
 Death of the Virgin — exquisitely composed and 
 colored, realistic, yet with an idyllic atmosphere, 
 and executed with the perfect finish of miniatures. 
 
 To the right of the central tower we entered a 
 very fine old Gothic chamber, with a beautifully 
 carved wooden ceiling, Gothic stone doorways, and 
 vertical wall-beams also attractively carved, — a rare 
 treasure to find in Italy now. Here was a curious 
 
374 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 specimen of Caroto, — the Resurrection of Lazarus, — 
 with rather unpleasing figures but a brilliant tone 
 and landscape. Then I was taken to the great hall on 
 the second-floor front, containing an altar and a big 
 fireplace, adorned with indifferent landscapes frescoed 
 in large scale around the walls, and, above the latter, 
 in an unbroken circuit at the cornice, the full-length 
 portrait figures of all the Bishops of Verona, from 
 St. Peter to Pisamus in 1668, executed by Brusasorci. 
 They were portrayed as standing upon a gallery, two 
 between each pair of pillars, — were powerfully drawn, 
 and of most extraordinary individuality, although 
 mostly produced from the imagination. From the 
 northern rooms I looked directly upon the rushing 
 river, across a pretty little terraced garden. 
 
 This was just the spot where the stream bends from 
 its northeastern course around to a southeasterly one; 
 and on walking a hundred paces to the southeast, 
 through the irregular Piazza Brolo with its old stuccoed 
 houses, I came to the ancient Ponte di Pietra,i crossing 
 to the foot of the castle hill. Its foundations and two of 
 its arches are still Roman. Traversing the picturesque, 
 medieval, towered gateway that arches its end, I stood 
 upon it for a while watching the enchanting scene 
 around me, — the glistening hill with its palace and 
 beetling cypresses, the massive stone quays along the 
 east side, the decrepit old buildings here backing upon 
 the west bank, the floating wooden mills anchored in 
 the rushing water, with heavily turning wheels, con- 
 nected by narrow foot-bridges with the shore, — and 
 the lovely green heights billowing away on the north- 
 east, crowned with stone fortresses. 
 
 ' So named by the medievals in distinction from their one other bridge, 
 the Ponte delle Navi, which, as its name signifies, was then a wooden con- 
 struction upon floats. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 375 
 
 Turning southward from the bridge, to return to 
 my hotel and lunch, by the street that curves around 
 westerly to the vicinity of S. Anastasia, I noticed on 
 its right side an excellent example of one of the medie- 
 val Veronese customs: an aged building containing a 
 shop for dry groceries, — which in Italy are always 
 sold separately from the fresh produce, — adorned 
 under its cornice with a painted frieze composed of 
 several varieties of those wares. Such was its sign. 
 But this frescoing dated from the sixteenth century, 
 showing that the same business had been carried on 
 there for four hundred years, probably by the same 
 family, — a thing not uncommon here. Think of a 
 business house founded at the time of the discovery 
 of the new world, — and only a retail shop of the small- 
 est class, at that. Near where this Via Ponte Pietra 
 strikes the Via Duomo, I passed another interesting 
 edifice, — a beautiful old palace with an adjacent 
 statued garden seen through a wicket, as lovely as a 
 dream of the most courtly days of long ago. 
 
 That afternoon I visited the extreme part of Veron- 
 etta north of the castle hill, and including the latter; 
 starting out over the modern iron bridge named after 
 Garibaldi, which crosses just west of the Piazza del 
 Duomo. From the bridge opened a charming prospect 
 up the river, southwest, closed by the huge brick mass 
 of the castle of the Scaligers at its farther bend, topped 
 with formidable towers and battlements, — and by 
 its extraordinary crenelated bridge, which certainly 
 must be unlike any other in the world. It is heavy, 
 dark, and menacing, borne on ponderous piers, flanked 
 and crowned with towers, and slopes steeply from the 
 castle to the northern shore. This side of it the cur- 
 rent was filled with half a dozen more floating mills, 
 whose great revolving wheels showed its tremendous 
 
376 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 force. To the eastward was another line of old dwell- 
 ings, backing upon the water with mouldering walls 
 and bits of garden, curving from the hill of S. Pietro 
 up the left bank, to a vast brick church in a sun-baked 
 piazza, which faced westward with its right flank 
 upon the stream. It was my first objective point, the 
 Church of S. Giorgio in Braida, which contains many 
 fine paintings, — amongst them, Girolamo's master- 
 piece, and Verona's. 
 
 The Venetian city wall curves round the edifice, 
 striking the river between it and the Ponte Garibaldi; 
 so I quickly found myself walking through a little 
 park along the moat, which was stone-banked to a 
 depth of thirty feet. Then I crossed it by a bridge to 
 a white-stone city gate of good Renaissance lines, set 
 in the shadow of a huge round corner bastion, and, 
 penetrating the long dark archway, emerged upon the 
 Piazza of S. Giorgio. Its plain rococo fagade of light 
 stone was uninteresting; but on being admitted through 
 its side door by an old woman, the sacristan's wife, 
 I stood amidst a glittering display of paintings sur- 
 passing nearly every church I had ever seen. The 
 absence of aisles and transepts permitted the decora- 
 tions of the side altars, set in shallow recesses, as well 
 as those of the twin gilded organ-lofts and the choir, to 
 pour their wealth of brilliant colors upon the observer 
 like a princely gallery of art; a fine soft light illuminated 
 the canvases from the white-washed dome, and a 
 further beauty shone from the handsome Renaissance 
 marble railing inclosing the elevated choir, with its 
 eight surmounting bronze statues of saints. 
 
 Dominating this galaxy with its rich clear tone, 
 glowed the great masterpiece of Girolamo dai Libri 
 from the fourth altar on the left. I remember still the 
 sensations with which I gazed upon it, entranced. To 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 377 
 
 describe it, — there was naught but a Madonna simply 
 throned before an alluring landscape of fields, woods, 
 and hills dotted with castles, under the fruited lemon 
 tree which was the master's emblem, — with Saints 
 Zeno and Lorenzo Giustiniani standing at her sides, and 
 three angels of incredible beauty singing at her feet ; but 
 what words could give an idea of its unutterable charm, 
 its serene loveliness of figure, atmosphere and expres- 
 sion, its sense of a millennial tranquillity surpassing 
 earthly joys, whose note is struck by the melody of 
 those enchanting singers. Deeply golden is the tone, 
 the inner glow; the figures stand forth with a fidelity 
 to nature as striking as their haunting grace; their faces 
 of celestial loveliness, calm but beautiful, fill the be- 
 holder with delight, and the sumptuous, gleaming col- 
 ors of their embroidered robes fuse into one scintillating 
 harmony. Truly this was the zenith of Verona's art, — 
 the representative of its highest ideas and excellencies. 
 
 The other most prominent specimens of the school 
 here were a realistic, well-modeled Martyrdom of 
 St. Lawrence by Stefano da Zevio, exhibiting his ad- 
 vanced powers; two pleasing, brightly hued specimens 
 of Caroto, — an Annunciation and a St. Ursula with 
 her virgins, both showing his peculiar grace; and a 
 Martyrdom of St. George in Paolo Veronese's later 
 manner, — perhaps the best work of his yet remaining 
 in his native town. But I was also pleased by superb 
 examples of the two great masters of Brescia, — an- 
 other Martyrdom of St. George, by Romanino, and a 
 Madonna in clouds above five female saints, by Mo- 
 retto; the former was in four separate panels, of much 
 realism and expressiveness, the latter in Moretto's 
 characteristic, unmistakable tone, of silvery gray, — 
 displaying surpassing beauty in the rounded figures, 
 and their dignified, restful disposition. 
 
378 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 From S. Giorgio I followed the street southeast, 
 parallel with the bend of the river, to the smaller 
 Church of S. Stefano. This was another red-and- white 
 edifice, with a simple portal in its plain facade of the 
 eleventh century, topped by a rose-window and ap- 
 proached by steps. The original church here was the 
 oldest in Verona, its first cathedral, destroyed by 
 Theodoric in the sixth century; the present one was 
 built upon its remains, — turning the ancient choir 
 into a crypt by constructing a new choir above it. After 
 some trouble in finding the sacristan at his dwelling 
 near by, I was admitted to the nave, which appeared 
 short and narrow, separated by stucco pillars and arches 
 from the low, restricted aisles, and covered by a mod- 
 ern wooden ceiling; the presbytery was exceptionally 
 elevated, and approached by narrow stairs in the aisles, 
 between which extended a red marble railing. Under 
 this railing steps descended to the dark crypt; and over 
 it was visible the high-altar, with a bright modern 
 fresco above it. There were but two chapels to the 
 right, and one to the left; — altogether a most un- 
 usual, strange edifice, with an air of exceeding anti- 
 quity. 
 
 In the second chapel to the right was a picture by 
 Brusasorci, of good tactile value, — S. Stefano aiding 
 Christ to carry the Cross, with eight saints below; in 
 the first chapel were two tombs at the sides, holding 
 the remains of two bishops and forty early martyrs. 
 Climbing to the presbytery, which was lengthened 
 like a transept, I saw another work of Brusasorci in 
 its central dome, — the Saviour and four Evangelists, 
 with the instruments of the Passion curiously scattered 
 over the adjacent vaulting, — and at its right end, 
 a Caroto of beautiful bluish tinting, representing the 
 Madonna with Saints Peter and Andrew, before a 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 379 
 
 wide landscape. Here was another queer construction, 
 a highly raised ambulatory around the small choir, 
 reached by steps at each side of the high-altar; in its 
 walls were embedded ancient columns, and at its rear 
 stood the first episcopal seat of Verona, dating from 
 the sixth century, simply made of heavy marble slabs. 
 To the left in the presbytery was a fresco by Stefano 
 da Zevio, a Coronation of the Virgin, with a host of 
 pretty angels roundabout, and an Annunciation below. 
 
 Descending the twelve steps to the crypt, past an 
 antique statue of St. Peter, from the third century, it 
 appeared to extend the full width of the presbytery 
 above, — which was supported by a row of ancient 
 columns down the middle. Here was the original choir, 
 under the later one, and the original ambulatory, 
 likewise elevated and approached by steps at each 
 end. It seemed strange to stand in the very edifice 
 ruined by Theodoric foiuleen centuries ago. 
 
 S. Stefano has also an unusually picturesque tower, 
 of Romanesque design, rising upon the dome, and 
 visible only from above. I climbed the hill of S. 
 Pietro, from the east end of the Ponte di Pietra, and 
 soon commanded a clear view of this curious old 
 tower; it is of brick, very broad, and octagonal in 
 shape, consisting of two stories of open arcades, each 
 containing eight double arches. 
 
 The steep, narrow way, a veritable staircase, 
 mounted between decaying old houses, bore to the 
 right between walled fields, and finally brought me, 
 out of breath, to an esplanade before the castle. Here 
 the panorama was superb; just below me stretched 
 the line of cypresses, below them again a medieval 
 cloister, and then the ruins of the excavated Roman 
 theatre, which stood against the base of the hill a little 
 south of the bridge; the rows of broken white seats. 
 
380 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the flagged pit, the shattered stage, lay beneath 
 me hke a plan. Beyond them flowed the shining river 
 with its bright quays; and the sea of tiled roofs, with 
 towers of every age, extended far away between the 
 silvery windings to the sunburnt open plain. Toward 
 the north this crept into the enfolding mountains, with 
 their black flanks and dentated outlines. 
 
 In the castle itself there was nothing to see; this 
 modern barrack, rising behind its inclosed, empty 
 court, has hidden from sight the ruins of Theodoric 
 and Gian Galeazzo. Soldiers lounged in the windows, 
 and sentries guarded the open gates. I thought of 
 what a different view the Ostrogoth must have be- 
 held when he reigned on this summit, — the imperial 
 marble city, still largely existing, in its splendor of 
 baths, temples, and palaces; of which to-day there 
 remained beneath my eye only those broken frag- 
 ments of the theatre below, and the distant mutilated 
 arches of the Arena. 
 
 From the northern end of Piazza Erbe runs one of 
 the main thoroughfares of the city, a little south of 
 west, under the successive names of Corso Porta 
 Borsari and Corso Cavour, directly to the Castel 
 Vecchio of the Scaligers; whence it continues as a 
 modern wide avenue to the far-off Porta Palio. The 
 Hotel Aquila Nera is located midway between Corso 
 Borsari and Via Nuova; and just an equal distance to 
 the north beyond the former rises the large Church of 
 S. Eufemia, the remaining object of interest in the 
 eastern half of the peninsula. It is a brick structure of 
 the thirteenth century, of general Gothic type, crowded 
 closely between houses, with only a small open space 
 before the fagade. It has a curious brick front, with 
 two long windows at the sides of a simple Gothic door- 
 way, and an old tomb fastened under each window, — 
 
YEKOXA. ALTAR TKIFTVCH IX CHIKCH UF SAX ZEMJ MAGCilURE. 
 lAXDItEA MANTEGXA.) 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 381 
 
 the right one of the fourteenth century, the left of 
 shapely Renaissance design, by Sammicheli. Another 
 tomb by Sammicheli is attached to the south wall near 
 the side portal, — to whose marble reliefs my eyes 
 were first drawn, on arriving early one morning, pre- 
 pared for a long walk to the western quarters. 
 
 I entered the nave at once, finding a long, wide, aisle- 
 less space, with altars aflfixed to its bare walls and a 
 flat vaulting overhead, having no transept, and but a 
 small choir, with flanking chapels. The right chapel 
 was formerly distinguished by some grand frescoes of 
 Caroto, — which have now been practically destroyed 
 by the damp and by retouching, — also his master- 
 piece of the three Archangels, upon canvas, which has 
 now been removed to the city museum. Over the side 
 altars there remained a Brusasorci, — of the Madonna 
 in clouds with saints below, very light in tone, coloring, 
 and weight, — and a fine example of Moretto of Bres- 
 cia, similar in subject, but with far more grace and ex- 
 pression, in his strange green tone. There is a super- 
 stitious custom in some parts of Italy of retaining half- 
 witted men as assistant sacristans; and the one in this 
 church was the most daft I had yet encountered. He 
 wandered about mumbling to himself, and could be 
 made to understand nothing. 
 
 Close by in this street I noticed a house with fine 
 Gothic windows and a beautiful Gothic balcony of 
 openwork marble; and on returning to Corso Borsari, 
 I observed the adjacent Uttlp Church of S. Giovanni 
 in Foro, which — as its name implies — was first 
 built in the ancient days when the near-by Piazza Erbe 
 was still the Forum, and whose present fagade bears 
 some pleasing Gothic details. Then I marched west- 
 ward, with the tracks of the tramway, soon reaching 
 a stone screen that blocked the street from wall to wall, 
 
382 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 rising to a height of three stories, with two large arches 
 in the ground story for the passage of vehicles. It was 
 the Porta Borsari of the Romans, — the outer shell 
 of one of their city gates. 
 
 This very interesting relic of the building of Gallie- 
 nus still preserved much of the original adornment 
 upon its face, and was especially significant to me, 
 because this decoration was the forerunner of the Re- 
 naissance style : here were the half -columns, the pilas- 
 ters, the pediments, and classic window-frames, — the 
 whole key-note of the Renaissance method. One 
 might testify that it was a relic of the sixteenth cent- 
 ury, — aside from the age of the stones. Beside the 
 two large arches in their Corinthian settings, was a 
 smaller archway for pedestrians, and over them were 
 two divisions of half a dozen little windows each, 
 round-headed, and set in double frames, — some of 
 which are demolished. But it is a standing proof of 
 the directness with which the Italian Renaissance 
 style was reproduced from the later Roman. 
 
 The Corso Cavour, which I now followed, was wider 
 and more imposing, and so lined with fine palaces as 
 to rank first in the city. Immediately to the right rose 
 the Renaissance, rococo Palazzo Ponzoni; to the left, 
 the house of the painter Niccolo Giolfino, showing 
 traces of the frescoes with which he had once covered 
 it; next it were the little Piazza and Church of SS. 
 Apostoli, having a medieval tower made of all sorts of 
 material, and three ancient Roman tombs affixed to 
 its wall. Beyond, still on the left side, rose the splen- 
 did Palazzo Bevilacqua of Sammicheli, with a lofty, 
 rusticated, stone fagade of exceeding beauty, and a 
 handsome court possessing a good open stairway. 
 Opposite this structure stood an old Gothic archway, 
 capped by a statue of St. Lawrence with his gridiron, 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 383 
 
 — the entrance to the restricted yard and side portal 
 of the Church of S. Lorenzo; this is one of Verona's 
 most interesting edifices, said to have been first built 
 in the fifth century upon a ruined temple of Venus. 
 
 The present church of the eleventh century is thor- 
 oughly Romanesque, and delightfully picturesque. 
 Its fagade, turned westward upon another little court 
 entered from the quay, is like a medieval stronghold 
 in appearance, with round towers at the angles, pierced 
 only by loophole apertures, and but a narrow wall- 
 space between them, cut with a single doorway and 
 tiny windows; the material is fully as odd-looking, 
 being unplastered red brick and yellowish tufa, in 
 alternate rough courses. 
 
 When I entered, by a later side portico of Renais- 
 sance design, it was to stand amazed at the strange- 
 ness of the interior: here was a genuine, early Roman 
 basilica, with two-storied arcades all around a narrow 
 nave, like S. Agnese fuori le Mura at Rome; they were 
 heavily constructed, of the same red-and-white mate- 
 rials, with piers of grouped columns and single col- 
 umns, alternately; a light, marble, classic cornice sur- 
 mounted the lower arches, and the vaulting was 
 whitewashed. Naught else was plastered, not even 
 the rough walls of the apsidal choir, pierced by little 
 unframed windows far aloft. Through other such tiny 
 openings in the upper gallery walls, shafts of yellow 
 light from glass of that hue percolated the dusk with 
 a weird, antique effect. "These bare walls had all been 
 plastered and frescoed long ago, however, as was 
 evident by the small irregular fragments of such 
 work in Byzantine style, lingering here and there in 
 corners. One Renaissance canvas occupied the apse 
 wall, — a rich, glowing Madonna and Saints by 
 Brusasorci. 
 
384 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Continuing my way down the Corso Cavour, after 
 passing some more fine palaces, including Sammicheli's 
 majestic Palazzo Canossa, — I reached the Castel 
 Vecchio, and the piazza on its east side stretching from 
 street to river. This space contains a bronze statue of 
 Cavour, — who deserves more such memorials, — 
 and commands a clear view of the stronghold with its 
 battlemented bridge. Heavy square towers stand at 
 the four angles of the castle, no higher than its walls; 
 a moat, now dry, surrounds it, and the keep raises its 
 fierce, lofty head above the springing of the bridge in 
 the rear wall. A very peaceful look is given the eastern 
 part by the insertion of modern windows and the 
 growth of trees and vines in the grassy fosse; but I 
 found the central and western portions still perforated 
 by the old slanting apertures for the fire of arquebuses 
 and carronades; and across the main drawbridge, 
 through the guard-tower of the entrance, I saw sol- 
 diers filling the spacious courtyard as of yore. 
 
 For the place is now a barrack, with no ingress 
 allowed. A separate lane through its western part, for 
 the convenience of the public, led me between high 
 walls, under several archways, to the entrance of the 
 bridge and its guarding keep. Contadini with asses 
 laden with panniers were passing in and out. Climb- 
 ing the side parapet of the bridge, I looked between 
 two of its eight-foot battlements at the frowning 
 river-wall of the castle, and the tawny Adige dashing 
 below. 
 
 To-day thou still, O tireless fugitive. 
 
 Dost murmuring pass upon thy way, beneath 
 
 The Scaligers' old battlemented bridge.' 
 
 In those very walls, I reflected, the cowardly Can 
 Grande II huddled himself from the people's gaze, 
 
 ' M. W. Anus's translation of Carducci. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 385 
 
 and met the death which he sought to avoid, at the 
 hand of his murderous brother. But turning away, 
 I followed the quay along the right bank, which here 
 curved to the northward with the stream; and after 
 walking more than a third of a mile, swerved west- 
 ward to the large Piazza of S. Zeno. Here in the ex- 
 treme northwestern corner of the city stands its great- 
 est church, between the fortifications and the river, 
 facing the walls over a vast, dirt-paved, sunny piazza, 
 and turning its apse upon the hurtling waters. This 
 quarter, perhaps populous in the prime of Venetian 
 days, is now mostly bare and deserted, — a congeries 
 of silent, walled lanes between wide stretches of shady 
 gardens, with a few scattered dwellings. 
 
 Looking over the empty square vibrating with 
 heated air, loomed the impressive fagade of the his- 
 toric church, simple and dignified, constructed of 
 yellowish-white stone, — one of the finest accomplish- 
 ments of Lombard art. The nave with its gable is 
 much loftier than the slanting roofs of the aisles; along 
 the eaves runs an arcaded cornice; a handsome rose- 
 window tops the canopied portal, and pilaster-strips 
 in Lombard fashion are attached vertically at short 
 intervals. There is no other window, the only other 
 decoration being a Romanesque arcade of little blind 
 arches, like very small double windows blocked up, 
 crossing the fagade near the top of the portal. The 
 canopy of the latter is a simple round-arched gable, 
 supported by slender columns rising from red-marble, 
 antique lions, with stone panels at the sides contain- 
 ing many Lombard reliefs, and other painted reliefs 
 in the tympanum. The building was begun about 
 900 and completed in 1178, when the peace was signed 
 between the League and Frederick Barbarossa; its 
 design indicates the culmination of that architect- 
 
386 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ural period which Ruskin calls "the introduction of 
 Christianity into barbaric minds." ^ 
 
 Adding to the dignity given the edifice by its iso- 
 lated situation, are the two large towers isolated at 
 the sides, of equal age but diverse appearance; — the 
 campanile being to the right, in red-and-white courses 
 like the sides of the church, tall, square, and without 
 windows to its two-storied belfry, which is surmounted 
 by a spire with corner pinnacles; the other being a 
 square, red-brick, battlemented tower, patched, 
 blocked up and reopened like a crazy-quilt, — all that 
 remains of the medieval monastery, where the Em- 
 perors were wont to stay. Advancing to the church's 
 portal, I studied the curious Lombard reliefs beside it, 
 thoroughly characteristic in their archaic figures of 
 huntsmen, animals, and other evidences of Lombard 
 out-door life, including the celebrated "Chase of 
 Theodoric." The legend is represented by the King 
 as a horseman chasing a stag, which he vainly and 
 wildly follows to the very gates of Hell. 
 
 But when the bronze doors of the entrance were 
 before me, I forgot everything else in incredulous won- 
 der at their decoration. I was looking upon bronze 
 reliefs of the ninth century, in forty-eight divided 
 squares, — the only artistic work of such a nature 
 remaining to us from that dark age, and to me the 
 most interesting object in all Verona. The panels, 
 about a foot in diameter, contain miniature figures 
 of much crudity, enacting scenes from the Old and New 
 Testaments, without backgrounds or any regularity of 
 composition, much as a child would draw; but what 
 
 ' Ruskin, Verona, and other Lectures. — According to Mr. Perkins 
 {Italian Sculptors) the church was founded in the sixth century, and com- 
 pleted by Emperor Otho I in the tenth; but I cannot see where he obtained 
 bis authority. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 387 
 
 pen could describe their extraordinary dramatic action, 
 their vigor, and intensity of feeling! They are fasci- 
 nating beyond compare, — these uncouth forms, with 
 the strange pointed hats of the Lombards, coming 
 down to us from that far-off silent time of artistic 
 ignorance; here were tense dramatic composition and 
 motion, significance of pose and expression, five centu- 
 ries before Giotto. 
 
 After a long inspection, I passed through the inner 
 doors, down several steps into the nave, which 
 stretched majestically before me with rhythmically 
 curving arches, like a pealing anthem, and soaring far 
 aloft to a handsome wooden roof similar to Padua's 
 Eremetani; bare stone and brick were everywhere, in 
 red-and- white courses; it had a beauty above that of 
 riches. It is one of the noblest edifices I know, — one 
 of the few grandest churches of all Italy. The compa- 
 ratively small, but lofty, round arches, resting upon 
 alternate piers and columns, divide off the much lower 
 aisles, which have neither altars nor chapels; a great 
 length marks its stern, sublime grandeur; the distant 
 choir rises high upon the visible arches of the crypt 
 behind the central descending steps, — its front balus- 
 trade crowned with marble statues; and over the high- 
 altar in the rear towers a Gothic triumphal arch, fram- 
 ing the groined and vertical divisions of the graceful 
 apse, glistening at the top with frescoes. Here it was 
 that Ezzelino in 1238 led the daughter of the Emperor 
 to the altar. Oh, for a magic glass to call up again 
 that spectacle, — the glittering nobles in their silken 
 long-hose and jewels, the long-trained ladies, the men- 
 at-arms in gleaming casques and corselets, — holding 
 back the motley, gay crowd of bourgeois, — the Em- 
 peror on his throne, and the Archbishop in all his 
 glory! 
 
388 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 By the first column to the left I noticed the ancient 
 porphyry vase, nearly ten feet in diameter, which 
 according to the legend was brought to S. Zeno from 
 Rome by a demon; and on the choir parapet, its quaint 
 Byzantine statues of Christ and the apostles, of the 
 thirteenth century. On the right wall of the choir 
 hangs Verona's most cherished painting, in an ex- 
 quisitely carved Renaissance frame, — the celebrated 
 panel of Madonna and Saints by Mantegna (1459) 
 which wrought such a revolution in the Verona school, 
 and set the type for its pietistic work. Though ported 
 to Paris by Napoleon, and carried back (minus the 
 three predelle, which are now but copied), it is still 
 marvelously beautiful. 
 
 It is divided by Corinthian columns into three verti- 
 cal compartments; the throned Madonna sits in the 
 central division, surrounded by captivating, melodi- 
 ous putti, with suspended wreaths of luscious fruits 
 overhead; four bright-robed saints stand in each of 
 the side compartments, and between the rear pillars 
 of the covering portico is visible a turquoise-blue sky 
 striped with whitest clouds. The glorious, well-pre- 
 served coloring is a scheme of richest blues and orange 
 and lavender, the grace of the forms supernal, the 
 atmosphere and expression of a celestial, calm felicity. 
 Compared with Mantegna's still earlier works, the 
 influence of Bellini is dominantly manifest. 
 
 In the crypt I beheld five rows of antique marble 
 columns, of every shape and sort of capital, including 
 horrid mouthing beasts and deformed humans in large 
 numbers, and at the back, the bronze sarcophagus of 
 S. Zeno upon a marble pedestal. The cloisters, off the 
 north aisle, are lovely, composed of arcades with 
 coupled little red-marble columns, of the thirteenth and 
 fourteenth centuries, with crude-leaved capitals; and 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 389 
 
 various early tombs lie in the corridors, — the latter 
 being the entire contents of the "museum" which the 
 guidebooks speak of. Two sides of the rectangle have 
 Romanesque arches and two have Gothic arches. 
 Here the Emperors were used to walk with the abbots 
 when staying at the monastery, many centuries ago. 
 In Dante's day the abbot was Giuseppe, bastard son 
 of Alberto della Scala, for which appointment Alberto 
 is rebuked in the Purgatorio, canto xix. 
 
 I stepped over to the near-by gate and bastion of 
 S. Zeno, in the city wall, and enjoyed outside a splen- 
 did view of the fertile plain and looming mountains, 
 the tremendpus fortifications with their deep moat 
 and mighty embankments, the stone bastion with its 
 angles and sallyports, and the handsome Renaissance 
 fagade of the gate, erected by Sammicheli, in yellow 
 brick with stone trimmings. Then I followed the out- 
 side road along the walls for a third of a mile south- 
 ward, to the bastion and gate of S. Bernardino, close 
 inside which I came to the renowned church of that 
 name. Rising behind a courtyard with extensive ar- 
 cades was its simple brick fagade, fronting southward, 
 having a Renaissance marble doorway, two lancet 
 Gothic windows beside it, and a rose-window over- 
 head. The monastery of the Franciscans — by whom 
 the edifice was built in the quattrocento and to whom 
 it still appertained — lay upon the west side; it had 
 now been secularized, — except one cloister, reached 
 through the church, where dwelt the few friars left. 
 I saw three of them passing about, — reverend, white- 
 haired figures, of much dignity and pathos, — tend- 
 ing the building with a touching care. 
 
 The interior proved to be a nave with one aisle on 
 the right, separated by four arches, with no transept, 
 and only an end recess for the high-altar; four altars 
 
390 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 were affixed to the bare, white, left wall, and five chapels 
 opened from the aisle. The roof was flat and of painted 
 wood. The first chapel I found covered upon the walls 
 and arched ceiling with indifferent frescoes by Giolfino, 
 and bearing over its altar an excellent copy of the 
 great canvas of Madonna and Saints by Cavazzola, 
 which formerly stood there. The original, like so many 
 of the best pictures of the churches, had been removed 
 to the city museum. In the second chapel was a good 
 specimen of Bonsignori, a Madonna with two saints 
 and two baby-angels, of golden tone and rich coloring, 
 though little or no expression. Morone's frescoes in 
 the fourth chapel were practically destroyed; but the 
 fifth glowed like a huge jewel, with solid walls of bright 
 paintings by Caroto, Giolfino, and Francesco Morone, 
 and other copies of Cavazzola. At the end here was 
 the Cappella Pellegrini of Sammicheli's design, a beau- 
 tiful domed rotonda faced with marble. In the little 
 choir, to the left, hung a very lovely example of Be- 
 naglio, a triple panel in close imitation of Mantegna's 
 at S. Zeno, of exceeding grace, high finish, and glow- 
 ing tone, but lacking the latter's tender simplicity. 
 The cloister contained more frescoes of Giolfino, of 
 little importance. 
 
 But in the old library of the monastery, entered by 
 a separate doorway in the front street, the municipal 
 custodian showed me a work of much importance, — 
 the truly marvelous frescoes of Francesco Morone 
 executed in 1503. They extend all around the square 
 wooden-roofed chamber, above the wainscoting and 
 beneath an exquisitely painted frieze of convoluted 
 wreaths; and consist of two rows of medallions and 
 portraits of the most prominent Franciscans, with a 
 large scene of life-size figures covering the end wall. 
 This last is a most striking and beautiful composi- 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 391 
 
 tion, very freely spaced in a pleasing landscape, — 
 the throned Virgin in the centre, surrounded by angels, 
 a kneeling bourgeois couple at her feet. Saints Francis 
 and Claire standing by her, and the five protomartyrs 
 advancing on one side, the four doctors on the other. 
 The genuflexing couple are Leonello Sacramoso and" 
 his wife, to whom we are indebted for this delight. The 
 tone is a ravishing light blue, which runs throughout 
 the robes and lake and distant mountains in a joyous 
 scheme; the figures are superbly modeled, exceedingly 
 graceful, and of marked individuality, — which ap- 
 plies also to all the portraits, — and the heads are 
 distinctly powerful and realistic as to the men, ten- 
 derly lovely as to the Madonna. 
 
 My next walks were through the southwestern quar- 
 ter, between Corso Cavour and the lower river, com- 
 mencing with the Church of S. Maria della Scala on 
 my own street, — just south of Via Nuova, — which was 
 founded by Can Grande. It is stuccoed white, without 
 and within, the exterior being noticeable only for a 
 good Renaissance stone doorVay, the interior for its 
 spacious form, without aisles or transept, and its broad 
 ceiling, plastered and painted in designs. Over the side- 
 altars stand a Brusasorci, — St. Ursula and her virgins; 
 a Giolfino, the descent of the Holy Ghost; and a charm- 
 ing example of Francesco Morone, — a group of three 
 saints, with donors, and an Annunciation. Most in- 
 teresting was the little chapel to the right of the choir, 
 containing sixteen frescoed panels from the life of 
 S. Filippo Benissi, in the style of Altichieri, portraying 
 every sort of dramatic incident, strongly rendered, 
 with dignity, and well-drawn figures. Documents 
 recently discovered seem to establish that this was the 
 work of Badile, Paolo Veronese's master; but it must 
 have been done long before his time. 
 
392 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Shortly southwestward now, I came at last to the 
 Arena, whose mighty dark stone oval fills the eastern 
 part of the wide Piazza Bra. Its outer wall has been 
 entirely demolished, except for one fragment on the 
 northeast, four arches wide and three stories high, 
 enough to give an idea of its former external appear- 
 ance. The fagade was built of huge roughened granite 
 blocks, with pilasters on the piers between the arches, 
 and corniced string-courses, — simple, but powerful 
 and effective. The second wall — which everywhere 
 else is now the outer one, and but two stories high — 
 is constructed of the same heavy stones, with inter- 
 mediate floors of arched composite. — In the wall 
 of a dwelling at the piazza's southeastern corner, I 
 saw imbedded fragments of the earlier Roman city 
 wall, that had excluded the amphitheatre — having 
 doubtless, in fact, been built before it; and near by 
 on the south side were two well-preserved Renaissance 
 frescoes on the house fagades, of considerable charm. 
 
 Entering the Arena by one of its northern archways 
 (it formerly had forty-seven on the exterior, marked 
 by Roman numbers on the keystones), I stood in the 
 long central oval, surrounded by the endless swelling 
 tiers of seats, still kept smooth and unbroken, which, 
 vast as they now were, reached to only two thirds 
 of their former height. At intervals steps ascended, 
 smaller than the large blocks forming the seats, and 
 every few yards, above the five-foot parapet, and along 
 the higher tiers, were openings for ingress and egress. 
 At the northern and southern ends, the oval was par- 
 tially broken by the archways giving entrance to 
 the centre, topped by balustraded terraces, for the 
 seating of princes. Thoughts of the cruel Roman games 
 that had drenched this same arena so many times in 
 blood, crowded upon me, with visions of the madly 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 393 
 
 shouting populace; — thoughts of the martyrdoms here 
 of Saints Fermo and Rustico, and the hundred and 
 odd dissenting "Paterani" from Sirmione, burned alive 
 by Mastino I, in 1276; thoughts of the happier tour- 
 naments of Renaissance days, the jousts of Antonio 
 della Scala, with his besieged "Castle of Love," and 
 the bull-fights introduced toward the end of the 
 eighteenth century. 
 
 Several emperors and many princes enjoyed those 
 bull-fights, including Napoleon the Great, in 1802 
 and 1807. Here sat the famous Congress of Sover- 
 eigns of 1822, when the ruling princes from all over 
 Europe witnessed a memorable night-illumination of 
 the amphitheatre. Here the great Ristori made her 
 first appearance, — and many another histrionic or 
 operatic genius. Finally I thought of those terrible 
 days of the Risorgimento, when these walls reechoed 
 the groans and sighs of wounded Italian prisoners; and 
 of the joyful day of 1866, when Victor Emmanuel 
 received here the acclaiming homage of the Veronese. 
 Since then the structure has continued to be occa- 
 sionally used on festive occasions, with a number of 
 remarkably beautiful effects. 
 
 The mighty circle, breathing beauty, seems 
 The work of genii in immortal dreams. 
 So firm the mass, it looks as built to vie 
 With Alps' eternal ramparts towering nigh. — 
 Glistening and pure, the summer sunbeams fall. 
 Softening each sculptured arch and rugged wall. 
 We tread the Arena; blood no longer flows. 
 But in the sand the pale-eyed violet blows.' 
 
 As I gazed over the extensive Piazza Bra on emerg- 
 ing, it was a fair sight: the great ruin of the Arena on 
 the east, the imposing Palazzo Municipale on the 
 south, — in classic style, with its central portico of 
 
 1 Nicholas Mitchell. 
 
S94 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 eight huge Corinthian columns, — and the "Gran 
 Guardia Vecchia," or old city guard-house, to west, of 
 powerful, Late-Renaissance lines, its basement rusti- 
 cated and arcaded upon heavy piers, its lofty piano no- 
 bile adorned with coupled Doric half-columns between 
 the corniced windows; while on the north stretched the 
 long row of bright caffes, with their extruding tables, 
 and in the centre rose a statue of Victor Emmanuel II, 
 before grassy plots filled with trees and flower-beds. 
 From the guard-house southward extended a section 
 of the tall city wall of the Visconti, made of brick and 
 cobblestones in true medieval style, paralleled by the 
 wide Via Pallone to the river; on its north side was 
 the so-called Portoni, — a former city gate, composed 
 of two large arches of stone, fifty feet high, surmounted 
 by battlements, with a flanking, battlemented tower 
 of brick. Through the gateway I saw the broad Corso 
 Vittorio Emanuele extending straightaway southwest 
 to the Porto Nuova, between large modern buildings, 
 including several prominent palaces of noble fami- 
 lies. 
 
 The broad low structure of the Porto Nuova was 
 visible in the distance. We occasionally went out there 
 by tram car, admired its handsome Renaissance 
 design by Sammicheli, and took a delightful walk 
 outside the walls, northward, to the Porta S. Zeno, 
 where we found a tram to convey us home again. 
 The road led under trees along the huge embankment 
 without the moat, and past the colossal bastions of 
 light stone, with their advanced walls and ports, — 
 of which I often thought, that in their miles of great 
 blocks enough fine stone had been used to rebuild 
 the whole city, discard its brick entirely, and leave 
 a palatial wonder. But no; — the medievals would 
 economize in their dwellings, and lavish countless 
 
\-ERONA. TdMB 01 
 
:iMEO AND JULIET 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 395 
 
 riches on their fortifications. These gigantic mounds 
 of earth, too, within and without the fosse, which 
 stretched Brobdingnagian around the whole vast cir- 
 cuit, and must have required the labor of an innumer- 
 able host, for many years, — imagine embankments 
 fifty feet high and a hundred and fifty wide, made 
 without the aid of steam; — on them had been 
 expended enough work to build another large city. 
 The inner bank, and the enormous moat, are also 
 faced with mighty granite blocks, mile after mile. 
 Truly, these incredible walls of earth and stone are 
 one of the marvels of the world. The view all the way 
 was uncommonly lovely, with the sun upon our backs, 
 displaying the wide wooded plain with its sparkling 
 white farmhouses and villages, the towering moun- 
 tains to west and north, with their dark precipitous 
 flanks, the glittering snow-peaks in the rear, and the 
 penetrating gorge of the Adige. — Outside the Porta 
 Nuova, also, lies the subsidiary railroad station of 
 that name, recently finished, and coming into much 
 use. 
 
 Just to the right of the Portoni stands the Teatro 
 Filarmonico, with a handsome Renaissance fagade, 
 and a large portico of Ionic columns upon its south 
 side; before this portico extends a court, inclosed by 
 Renaissance arcades of dainty, fluted, Doric columns, 
 and containing architectural fragments, altars, tab- 
 lets, sculptures, inscriptions, and other relics of Roman 
 days, — all forming the Museo Lapidario, founded by 
 Scipione Maffei. On stepping through the Portoni, one 
 sees the old moat of the Visconti wall, still flowing 
 darkly between the back walls of houses. One day 
 I followed the wall southward to the river, along Via 
 Pallone, striking the stream at the lowest city bridge, 
 Ponte Aleardi; and here to the right, just without 
 
396 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the Visconti moat, in the former, abandoned grounds 
 and cemetery of the Capuchin monastery, next the 
 Adige, I found the reputed tomb of Romeo and 
 Juliet, guarded by a municipal custodian. 
 
 In a fragment of the old monastery cloisters, charm- 
 ingly arcaded upon two sides with slim marble shafts 
 and brick arches, rising from parapets, lies an uncov- 
 ered sarcophagus of red marble, filled to overflowing 
 with the visiting-cards of faithful believers, — believers 
 in spite of all evidence. The custode says gravely that 
 the lovers were buried together in this coffin, in the 
 Capuchin cemetery close at hand. Yet there are sacri- 
 legious persons who state that the sarcophagus was 
 not long ago a washing-trough; further, that neither 
 Romeo nor Juliet ever existed in the flesh, and con- 
 sequently they never were buried. Let one believe as 
 he listeth; — at any rate, this tomb is a pretty spot, 
 framed by its little garden on each side, with shady 
 trees, roses, aloes, climbing vines, and other shrubs 
 and flowers; and the custode claims to prove his story 
 by pointing out the remains of the monument which 
 formerly covered the sarcophagus, — some columns, 
 and broken bits of entablature, scattered about the 
 grass. 
 
 Lovers! Ye have not loved in vain: the hearts 
 
 Of millions throb around ye. This lone tomb 
 
 One greater than Mantua's prophet eye foresaw 
 
 In her own child or Rome's, hath hallowed ; 
 
 And the last sod or stone a pilgrim knee 
 
 Shall pi^ss (Love swears it, and swears it true) is here.' 
 
 There now remained to visit on the western bank 
 only the great Church of S. Fermo, at the end of the 
 Ponte delle Navi. On my way to it one afternoon, I 
 stopped to examine with interest the so-called Arco 
 Leoni, — the remains of a Roman city gate, built into 
 
 ' Walter Savage Landor. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 397 
 
 the side wall of a house on the east side of the Via 
 Leoni, leading from Piazza Erbe to the bridge; they 
 consisted of some half-visible columns and entabla- 
 ture, of rich sculpturing, — which probably covered 
 what was then, as now, the chief entrance to the an- 
 cient city. The southern Roman wall, therefore, ran 
 from the Adige here, — just north of the Ponte delle 
 Navi, excluding the latter, — westward to meet the 
 western wall at a right angle near the Arena. 
 
 But on that same street, close to Piazza Erbe, I had 
 first passed a building associated with what has just 
 been related, — the house of the Capelletti; for they 
 were real people, whatever the doubt may be con- 
 cerning their poet-created daughter; and legend has 
 always given this dwelling as their abode. It is a nar- 
 row, five-storied structure of brick, on the east side of 
 the confined way, pierced by a large archway in the 
 ground story and by four rounded windows in each 
 of the others, — its only balcony hanging on heavy 
 corbels at the fourth floor. "Heavens!" I thought 
 involuntarily, "what a climb poor Romeo had!" — 
 The height of it was as disenchanting as were the dirty 
 vans and refuse of the stable-yard seen through the 
 archway. One must shut his eyes to modern meta- 
 morphoses : — 
 
 But chief we seem to hear at evening hour 
 The sigh of Juliet in her starlit bower, 
 Follow her form slow gliding through the gloom. 
 And drop a tear upon her mouldered tomb.' 
 
 The face of S. Fermo is toward the west, its north 
 side upon the street which is the westward continua- 
 tion of Ponte delle Navi; so that its fine proportions 
 are clearly visible. From the bridge, or the street, 
 one sees a noble apse, a wide transept, a tall campanile 
 
 I Nicholas Mitchell. 
 
398 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 rising from their angle to a spire with corner pinnacles, 
 and, on turning the transept, a beautiful old Gothic 
 porch covering the side entrance, — a canopy of 
 pointed arches, above a recessed pointed doorway, 
 approached by fourteen steps. The choir and transept 
 are both of plain red brick, except for curious unordered 
 patches of light stone; the nave's side is also of brick, 
 but with a deep marble basement, and double Gothic 
 windows with marble muUions; its wide brick Gothic 
 frieze continues around the apse. The fagade, looking 
 upon an open bay from the street, has a round-arched, 
 deeply recessed portal approached by spreading steps, 
 and four lancet windows overhead, — being marbled 
 to the top of the entrance, and of brick and marble in 
 alternate courses above that. Altogether it is a very 
 lovely and picturesque example of Lombard Gothic, 
 charming by its very oddities; it was constructed early 
 in the trecento, — during "the period of vital Chris- 
 tianity, and of the development of the laws of chivalry 
 and forms of imagination, which are founded on Chris- 
 tianity," ^ — and which are nowhere better shown. 
 
 On entering, by the customary side portal, I found 
 myself in a long broad nave, without aisles or columns, 
 with a larch-wood roof like the Eremetani; at the end 
 were three chapels, with the high-altar in the centre, 
 faced by a semicircular screen of creamy marble ex- 
 tending into the nave; and over the side wall-spaces 
 not covered by altars or monuments, over the end wall 
 above the three chapels, was a world of old frescoing, in 
 every hue and state of decay, glowing like a vast cloud- 
 land of antique saints and angels. A lovely Annuncia- 
 tion on the left wall, showing the Virgin's bedchamber 
 within a quaint Gothic dwelling, is the only other relic 
 of Pisanello's painting in Verona; the rest of them — 
 
 ' Ruskin, Verona, and Other Lectures. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA S99 
 
 Madonnas, Crucifixions, groups of saints, martyrdoms 
 — are by Martini, Stefano da Zevio, and other early 
 Veronese masters, — in delightful soft old tints, ex- 
 hibiting dignity and deep feeling. The first chapel to 
 the left, some way down, holds Caroto's beautiful 
 pala of the Madonna and St. Anne in glory, with saints 
 below, — forms wondrously moulded, of exceeding 
 grace and softness, with a striking maternal joy and 
 pride in the fair face of the Virgin. Next this opens 
 a little room containing Riccio's brilliant, luxurious, 
 marble monument to Girolamo della Torre, with 
 bronze plates of reliefs, and supporting sphinxes, 
 that are but copies of the originals taken to Paris, 
 but possessing still the original charming frieze 
 around the marble base, and its exquisitely sculptured 
 columns. 
 
 There are further a canvas of Liberale, two of Tor- 
 bido, examples of Farinato and Brusasorci, a fine, 
 Gothic, trecento pulpit, and a small chapel in the right 
 transept containing tombs of titled descendants of 
 Dante. But the greatest interest of all lies in the ex- 
 tensive crypt, — the remains of a very early church 
 over which the later one was erected. It is reached 
 by a stairway, through the sacristy; and its various 
 kinds of early columns and bits of frescoing, endowed 
 with intense significance for the antiquarian, date as far 
 back in some instances as the latter part of the eighth 
 century. 
 
 Across the bridge from S. Fermo, and just to the 
 right on the broad tree-lined quay, facing the river, 
 stands the Palazzo Pompei containing the city's art 
 collections. Its two-storied stone fagade is of most 
 attractive Renaissance lines, — a rusticated base- 
 ment, and piano nobile of Doric half -columns support- 
 ing a Doric frieze and cornice, with windows capped 
 
400 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by masks. But leaving its contents to the last, I 
 passed it by one morning on my way to visit the rest 
 of the eastern quarter, — to inspect again the fine 
 old churches scattered through its silent streets. First 
 in modern interest, however, is the great cemetery 
 to the south, just without the fortifications, reached 
 from the eastern end of Ponte Aleardi by a splendid 
 avenue of tall trees. 
 
 Entirely surrounding it in the Italian style is a vast 
 square structure, with a classic portico on its western 
 front; high colonnades run around its inner sides, 
 adorned with countless tombs, in and against the walls. 
 These are decorated with many modern sculptures, 
 in the recent style addicted to realism and minute 
 details, — such as the family weeping over their dead. 
 The huge, rectangular grass plot in the centre is one 
 mass of graves, headstones, flat stones, and monu- 
 ments, with shrubs and flowers, but no trees; and the 
 graves are kept always fresh with flowers as none but 
 Italians do. One time we were present on the annual 
 "Day of the Dead," when the whole city seemed to 
 have turned its steps that way, clad in sad clothes and 
 burdened with wreaths and blossoms; it was a wonder- 
 ful sight to see this mourning, unanimous multitude, 
 depositing their tributes of undying affection, and 
 praying over their departed. 
 
 The first church to which I went was S. Paolo di 
 Campo Marzo, to the right on Via Venti Settembre, 
 but a few rods from the bridge. It has a simple, stuc- 
 coed. Renaissance fagade, with a stone tower, and a 
 simple nave without aisles or columns; over a side altar 
 is one of Girolamo dai Libri's delightful pictures of 
 the Madonna and Saints, beautiful beyond expression; 
 in a chapel off the right transept, a similar canvas by 
 Paolo Veronese, of considerable grace, — also some 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 401 
 
 injured frescoes by him, and a panel by Bonsignori; 
 in the sacristy, a handsome Caroto, — the Madonna 
 with Saints Peter and Paul, of which the Madonna 
 possesses a grand, imperial form, of exceeding beauty, 
 superbly drawn and moulded. There are, further, some 
 of the works of Farinato. 
 
 Next I wandered to Veronetta's chief church, SS. 
 Nazzaro e Celso, farther to the east at the foot of the 
 heights, on the long street diverging from Via Venti 
 Settembre near the gate, and running fairly straight 
 to Ponte di Pietra. The first S. Nazzaro was a grotto 
 in the face of the hill, where the earliest Christians 
 worshiped in troublous times; I found it behind a 
 machine factory on the right of the present edifice, — 
 several connected chambers hewn in the clifif, with 
 lingering fragments of quaint frescoes of that remote 
 period, probably the fifth century. The holy place 
 has been desecrated, and the paintings almost en- 
 tirely destroyed by the machinists who ply their trade 
 there in an adjunct to the main factory. I am sur- 
 prised that the city, usually so alert, has not long 
 ago adopted preservative measures. 
 
 The present church was first built in the eleventh 
 century, and then restored in the sixteenth, when its 
 five aisles were made into three. Before it extends a 
 wide inclosed court, having a curious decadent Renais- 
 sance gateway, upheld by four Doric columns ap- 
 parently tied with stone mourning-cloths, and having 
 a frieze of papal tiaras. The brick, gabled fagade, with 
 lean-to aisles, has a Gothic marble doorway, two long 
 windows, and a very pretty, sculptured rose-window. 
 The interior is usually closed, and I remember I had a 
 long hunt through the neighborhood to find an assistant 
 sacristan with a key to the side door. Once entered, I 
 saw a rather low, groined nave, separated by stucco 
 
402 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 pillars and round arches from still lower aisles; the 
 latter with pointed vaultings, and side altars directly 
 against their walls; the choir deeply recessed behind 
 a Gothic triumphal arch, with no flanking chapels. 
 Over the side altars were paintings by Farinato and 
 Brusasorci, and a true example of Badile, a charming 
 Madonna and Saints, of rich tone and good execution. 
 The chief interest lay in the Capella S. Biagio, off 
 the left transept, — one of Verona's foremost artistic 
 shrines. It was heavily frescoed by Falconetto, Cavaz- 
 zola, and Montagna; the latter 's work being especially 
 strong and dramatic, ' Cavazzola's especially lovely. 
 The pala was a glorious Bonsignori, with exquisite 
 predelle by Girolamo dai Libri, — perfect gems of 
 painting; and upon the left wall hung an entrancing 
 Madonna and Saints by Moretto. 
 
 The walls of the choir held large scenes from the 
 lives of Saints Nazzaro and Celso, by Farinato, of 
 much dramatic interest; the sacristy contained two 
 excellent canvases of Montagna, and a curious trip- 
 tych of Benaglio; with two more Montagnas — strong, 
 clear works — on its outer wall. 
 
 My next object was of a very different nature, — a 
 pleasant change from churches. About halfway up 
 the street already mentioned stands the large Palazzo 
 Giusti, with a long, Renaissance, stuccoed fagade, and 
 in the rear lie its celebrated gardens, extending well up 
 the hillside. A central archway admitted me to the 
 courtyard, backed by an iron grille; and through an 
 opened gate in the latter the portiere made me free of 
 the grounds. A magnificent sight now rose before me, 
 — the stateliest avenue that could be imagined, lined 
 
 ' These frescoes, together with the canvases in the sacristy, give one 
 really a better conception of the full powers of Bart. Montagna than his 
 works in his native city, Vicenza. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 403 
 
 by two rows of tall black cypresses, leading straight- 
 away across the level and grandly up the steep slope, 
 to a balustraded stone terrace perched far aloft, and 
 to another line of cypresses extended at right angles 
 along the height, backed by a graceful wood. It had 
 much of the impressive loveliness of the Villa d' Este. 
 To right and left upon the restricted level stretched 
 inviting swards, glowing flower-beds, banks of shrub- 
 bery, fountains, and water-basins; climbing vines had 
 verdurously beautified the walls of palace and enceint- 
 ure; an artist was painting a picturesque building on 
 the left, quite overgrown with creepers. 
 
 I ascended the avenue, and wandered up the wooded 
 hillside by winding, shady paths, which led me at last 
 to the open terrace; thence extended an enchanting 
 prospect, — the lofty cypresses and seductive gardens, 
 the ivy-clad palace, the far-sweeping ocean of tiled 
 roofs with soaring towers, the distant, haze-covered 
 plain, and the imposing mountains looming to the, 
 north. 
 
 Verona, thy tall gardens stand erect. 
 Beckoning me upward. Let me rest awhile 
 Where the birds whistle hidden in the boughs.* 
 
 And rest I did, lulled to a dreamy state by the whis- 
 perings of the leaves, gazing visionary over the storied 
 scene before me. 
 
 It was still another day, therefore, when I advanced 
 to finish Veronetta's sights, crossing the Adige by the 
 modem iron Ponte Umberto, opposite the Giusti gar- 
 dens. This course brought me first to the Church of 
 S. Tommaso Cantuariense, or St. Thomas of Canter- 
 bury, just beyond the bridge, situated upon what was 
 formerly an island in the river; but the eastern arm 
 
 ' Walter Savage Landor. 
 
404 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 has been filled up, forming now the wide street known 
 as "Interrato dell' Acqua Morta," which bends from 
 quay to quay in a long curve. The church has a fine, 
 regular, Gothic fagade of brick, with a recessed door- 
 way, and one rose- and two long windows of geomet- 
 rical tracery. The street on its left side is illuminated 
 by three house fronts with well-preserved frescoes, one 
 or two of them in Caroto's bright style, and one a fair 
 copy of Leonardo's Last Supper. 
 
 Entering, I found a strange, lofty, white-stuccoed 
 interior, adorned with four varied altars on each side, 
 having no transept, and three chapels in the end wall, 
 with the high-altar in the middle one. Here lay the 
 great Sammicheli, under his bust in the right wall; 
 near it were two splendid paintings, a Liberale and a 
 Girolamo dai Libri, and in the little sacristy I saw the 
 beautiful, moving picture by Garofalo, — a Madonna 
 with the infants Jesus and John, — which has been 
 made so familiar to all the world by countless repro- 
 ductions. Behind the high-altar hung a shapely 
 Caroto, and over the left altars stood two of those 
 numberless lovely pictures of Madonna and Child by 
 unknown masters of the Veronese school. 
 
 I then proceeded to my last great church, S. Maria 
 in Organo, which stands a little north of Palazzo 
 Giusti, backing upon its street from the west, and 
 entered from the said Acqua Morta. Close by is the 
 Via Seminaria, with the Episcopal College, a large 
 seminary, a huge monastery made into a barrack, a 
 fine palace or two, and some dainty, alluring. Renais- 
 sance balconies. S. Maria, founded as far back as the 
 seventh century, but now a structure of the twelfth, 
 though not a large church, is one of Verona's principal 
 treasure-houses. Behind the usual Veronese courtyard 
 it raises a droll, unfinished, low fagade, marble-faced 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 405 
 
 to the height of the Renaissance portal and ground- 
 windows, — which are separated by Corinthian half- 
 columns, — and of unadorned red brick and white 
 stone in the flat gable. 
 
 The interior is still more curious: a short, low, 
 round-arched nave, very dark, with wide-open aisles 
 separated by four slight columns on each side; a tran- 
 sept elevated by six steps, with a chapel at each end 
 and one on each side of the choir; the vaultings all 
 painted with designs and arabesques; the walls above 
 the low side arches covered with Old Testament scenes 
 by Francesco Morone. This remarkable wealth of 
 diversified color, in designs, frescoed pictures, and 
 glowing canvases everywhere the eye turns, makes 
 a spectacle of Oriental splendor. Morone's pala in the 
 third altar recess to the left is better preserved, more 
 finished, and more beautiful than his frescoes, — being 
 an utterly fascinating group of Madonna and Saints, 
 of unsurpassable richness. Savoldo's gorgeous pala 
 next it is almost equally entrancing; making a pair of 
 canvases that can never be forgotten. The walnut 
 choir-seats before the high-altar are exceptionally 
 adorned, having painted landscapes on their backs by 
 Cavazzola and Brusasorci; the latter has three power- 
 ful frescoes in and above the chapel to the left of the 
 choir; and the chapel to the right contains three real- 
 istic tableaux by Giolfino. 
 
 At the end of the right transept a stranger enters, — 
 the brilliant Guercino of Bologna, with two canvases 
 amongst the most striking in Verona, — two jewels 
 of a wondrous, glittering finish, superbly modeled and 
 true to life, yet lovely beyond all words; one represents 
 S. Francesca Romana with an angel, — the other, the 
 same figures, with the addition of the saint's brother 
 and several companions and guards. A third Guer- 
 
406 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 cino, once also here but now in Rome, has been 
 replaced by a copy. Near these, aloft, are three 
 frescoed figures, of the Archangels with Tobias, by 
 Cavazzola. 
 
 The finest of all the treasures, however, lie in the 
 retro-choir and the adjacent sacristy, — gems of art 
 to which I have many a time returned in joy. Amidst 
 the splendid, carved choir-stalls stands a marvelous 
 candelabrum of ebony and walnut, sculptured with 
 richest details by the genius of Fra Giovanni da Ver- 
 ona, who was a member here of the monastic brother- 
 hood of Monte Oliveto, to whom the church formerly 
 belonged; and the sacristy has been turned by him 
 into a veritable temple of wood-carving and tarsia. 
 All around it stretches a high oaken pailfeling of inde- 
 scribably delicate sculpturing, — columns, cornice, 
 arches, frieze, and entablature, all radiant with an 
 endless variety of minutest designs and arabesques; 
 and between the columns are the paneled backs of 
 seats, more remarkable still, with tarsia of incred- 
 ible deceptiveness and fertile fancy, — not merely 
 the usual objects of everyday life, but scenes with 
 the perspective and atmosphere of painting, show- 
 ing streets, palaces, castles, towns, and landscapes. 
 Though not advancing to the depiction of human 
 life, attained by the Bergamasque masters alone, in 
 their own class these stand at the head. One inter- 
 esting scene depicts in its background the ruinous 
 Castle of Theodoric; as it looked about 1500. 
 
 Over the paneling, next the ceiling, extends a series 
 of frescoed portraits of the monks of Oliveto, by 
 Morone, of speaking lifelikeness and strongest indi- 
 viduality; including Fra Giovanni himself, with his 
 hair whitened by his task of many years. Most of the 
 others are popes, kings, princes, doges, and great men 
 

 A'Elt(.)XA. VIEW IX THE GIUSTI GARDENS. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 407 
 
 of the world; and the sacristan indicates two of them 
 who were ex-monarchs of Britain in the eighth cen- 
 tury. On the ceihng is, further, a half-figure of the 
 Saviour, surrounded by a circle of putti-heads; and in 
 one corner hangs a very lovely Madonna and Saints, 
 by Girolamo dai Libri, — or, as Mr. Berenson thinks, 
 by Mocetto of Venice.^ 
 
 From S. Maria I repaired to the little, ancient 
 Church of S. Giovanni in Valle, shortly to the north 
 upon the slope of the hill, — a quaint edifice dating 
 from the fifth century, and practically unchanged from 
 Romanesque days. Its small fagade is distinguished 
 by naught but a fresco of Stefano da Zevio over the 
 doorway, bright and pleasing; its narrow wooden- 
 roofed nave — with alternate pillars of white stone 
 and columns of Verona marble, having diverse, queer, 
 old capitals — ends in a choir raised above seven 
 central steps, with side steps descending to the crypt. 
 The walls above the low side arches, once covered 
 with frescoes, are now white and bare, with a few 
 tiny Romanesque windows; but a graceful picture 
 by Bertolini, and a fresco of Stefano da Zevio, dec- 
 orate the right aisle. In the small crypt, upheld by 
 six ancient marble columns and two strange, taper- 
 ing pillars, I found two early Christian sarcophagi, 
 covered with reliefs of extraordinary realism and dig- 
 nity; and in the sacristy, several fairly good Renais- 
 sance paintings. In the yard on the right was visible 
 a fragment of the long-demolished cloisters, — a colon- 
 nade, with charming little coupled columns, of great 
 antiquity. 
 
 * It is certainly much in the style of the beautiful canvas of Mocetto 
 in the Vicenza gallery, and would raise still higher the fame of that re- 
 tiring pupil of Bellini. On the other hand, how account for the peculiar 
 lemon tree, Girolamo's emblem ? 
 
408 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 From here I proceeded to the ruined Roman theatre, 
 near the Ponte di Pietra, stopping a moment on the 
 way to inspect the Gothic, brick fagade of the little 
 Church of S. Chiara, with its marble portal and pretty 
 windows, and its quaint^ medieval relief of a giant Ma- 
 donna protecting devotees with her cloak. SS. Siro e 
 Libera, another very early church, built high upon one 
 side of the theatre, had been closed and was to be taken 
 down. This clearing-away, and much other recent ex- 
 cavation, had laid bare most of the Roman remains, 
 as I had observed them from the hilltop; it was still 
 more interesting to walk about the pavement of the 
 pit, through the unroofed antechambers, over the frag- 
 ments of the marbled stage, and, climbing the lofty 
 seats, left here and there in broken patches, to call up 
 visions of the magnificent spectacles that once had 
 been enacted there below. Even marine spectacles 
 had had their place, on seas of real water, pumped 
 from the adjacent river. How far they were ahead of 
 our little modern shows ! 
 
 At last, one day, I bent my steps to the city museum, 
 and began a slow investigation of its countless trea- 
 sures. It has a marvelous collection of paintings, 
 especially for so small a city, — nineteen rooms filled 
 to overflowing, — which must certainly be ranked 
 next to the municipal galleries of Florence, Venice, 
 and Milan; and above all, here alone can one obtain a 
 comprehensive idea of the glorious art of Verona. The 
 entrance hall opens directly upon a square court, 
 packed with pieces of ancient sculpture and architect- 
 ure; in the many rooms extending to the rear of it, I 
 inspected the collections of Roman and Etruscan 
 
 ' By this I mean, executed with exceptional quaintess ; for of course 
 it was customary in the trecento thus to depict the Madonna, personify- 
 ing the Church. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 409 
 
 coins, vases, bronzes, and reliefs, of prehistoric tombs 
 and antiquities, of fossils and natural history speci- 
 mens, of medieval statuary, and other sculptures. 
 On the staircase, to the left of the entrance hall, began 
 the overflowing paintings; — seven framed frescoes of 
 Giolfino, representing the arts and sciences, and three 
 works of Paolo Veronese, greeting me as I climbed to 
 the upper floor. I emerged at its northern end, with 
 the first half-dozen rooms of the series stretching be- 
 fore me southward along the fagade; and these con- 
 tained the chief of the treasures. The stairway and 
 landing being numbered i, and the office to its right 
 — with some unimportant pictures — numbered ii, 
 therefore with the large room iii, directly before me, 
 the collection proper began. 
 
 Space forbids more than the slightest summary. 
 This room in contained the earlier Veronese works, 
 of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, in which the 
 gallery is not very rich, — Pisanello and his pupils, 
 and some unknown masters; all quaint, pietistic works, 
 with slim, graceful figures, in the already partly de- 
 veloped, rich, Veronese coloring. Room iv was chiefly 
 Liberale's, — a delightful aggregation of pictures, with 
 figures possessing his peculiar, fine, light skin, and 
 fleecy, golden hair, of his nameless, peculiar charm, 
 that gives such spiritual beauty to the rough-hewn 
 faces. Room v was mainly Girolamo's, and therefore 
 more aglow with unadulterated, serene beauty than 
 any other; — exquisite groups of heavenly forms, 
 gathered around the Madonna, under his emblem of 
 the lemon tree. But here also stood Caroto's famous 
 group of the three Archangels with Tobias, — nearly 
 life-size figures, of a startling, unearthly loveliness and 
 power, unlike any others ever painted. Room vi, at 
 the end, belonged to Morone and Cavazzola, contain- 
 
410 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ing the latter's wonderful set of masterpieces depicting 
 the Passion, in whose unutterably dazzling brilliancy 
 of hue the Verona coloring found its meridian. 
 
 Of the rear chambers, room ix contained Torbido's 
 bewitching Tobias and the Angel, a splendid Baptism 
 of Christ by Paolo Veronese, and some other fine mis- 
 cellaneous pieces; room xiv, a gracious, life-size fresco 
 by Fr, Morone; room xvii, some specimens of other 
 schools, including an excellent, characteristic Perugino, 
 a resplendent La Francia, and a captivating panel of 
 the Magi, in an enchanting landscape (number 95) 
 by Eusebio di S. Giorgio, Perugino's gifted disciple. 
 Room XIX, finally, was a superb collection from other 
 schools, numerous and valuable; among them I espe- 
 cially enjoyed a very curious but characteristic Carlo 
 Crivelli, two golden, serene Cimas, Mantegna's Holy 
 Family with an Angel, — of remarkable modeling and 
 lif elikeness, — Palma Vecchio's glorious Magi, Boni- 
 fazio's striking Last Supper, Moretto's extraordinary 
 Head of Christ, Lanzani's beautiful Madonna with 
 infants, Mansueti's Madonna and St. Jerome, in an 
 inspiring landscape, and two of Gian Bellini's lovely, 
 dreamy Madonnas. There were also three rooms filled 
 with modern paintings, whose pettiness would give a 
 shock to any soul, after visiting the lofty spheres of. 
 the grandeur and genius of old. 
 
 I have already spoken of the castles lying about 
 Verona, which belonged mostly to the Scaligers in 
 their day. The principal ones still standing, in more or 
 less ruinous condition, are nine in number, — five 
 upon the west of the Adige, four upon the east; and 
 no visit to Verona is complete without some knowledge 
 of them. Those to the east are reached by carriage 
 or steam tramway from the Porta Vescovo, along the 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 411 
 
 base of the hills, parallel with the railway. In two 
 miles one arrives at the village of San Michele, birth- 
 place of the great architect; not very far from which 
 is the picturesque castle of Montorio, perched upon a 
 height with three great towers, commanding a beau- 
 tiful view of the village-dotted landscape, and the 
 battlemented city wall of Verona crowning the west- 
 ern ridges. It is closed to the public; but on one 
 occasion two ladies of our party succeeded in penetrat- 
 ing, only to find an empty shell. Originally erected 
 in Roman times, it was still intact when used by the 
 Scaligers. 
 
 But the chief Scala castle, and perhaps the most in- 
 teresting of North Italy, is at Soave, — already 
 mentioned as seen from the passing train. There the 
 gay Court often betook itself for rest; there the princes 
 hunted and hawked, and Dante passed lazy summer 
 days with Can Grande. The tram above mentioned 
 carried me one day to Soave village, which I found sur- 
 rounded by a picturesque wall and moat, with a pon- 
 derous, well-preserved, battlemented gateway, whose 
 open arch framed a charming vista of the main street, 
 with its stuccoed, sun-beaten buildings. At its north- 
 ern end I came to the large, classic fagade of the par- 
 ish-church, whose spacious basilica-interior proved to 
 contain a magnificent canvas of Dom. Morone, in 
 the choir, — a Madonna and Saints of resplendent 
 coloring. Opposite, and at the street's adjacent fork- 
 ing, rose two fine old Gothic palaces, with battle- 
 ments, remains of frescoes, and an arcaded loggia 
 with a delightful, Gothic, marble stairway. Here, in 
 a pharmacy I obtained the requisite permesso ; and 
 climbed the steep hillside on the east, to the towered 
 castle. 
 
 It is the only one of them all which has been re- 
 
412 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 stored, — and that accurately, in its medieval style. 
 Its lofty, well-conditioned walls once formed a link 
 in those of the town, which still creep up the slope 
 on each hand; and its main entrance was on the outer, 
 eastern side, over the town moat by a drawbridge, — 
 through a guard-tower, outer court, and inner, port- 
 cuUised gateway. So I entered, as did the Scaligers, 
 
 — to avoid passing through the town, — and stood 
 in the large, rectangular, main courtyard, with the 
 battlements on three sides and the inner court on the 
 left. Traversing a final wall, I reached that inner 
 courtyard, on the southern and highest point of the 
 hilltop, — a semicircular inclosure, that formerly 
 held all the residential buildings of the princes. Of 
 those there now remained but a two-storied stone 
 structure in the west corner, and the great keep in the 
 middle of the curving southern wall, — this of brick, 
 though the fortifications were mostly of stone. In 
 the ground-fioor of the building I saw the long guard- 
 room, with the guards' rude beds, tables, stands of 
 arms, etc., all restored as in the days of Can Grande; 
 up the picturesque outer stairway, overhung by a very 
 lovely iron lantern, I found five interesting rooms, also 
 accurately remodeled in decorations and furnishings, 
 
 — two drawing-rooms, a bedchamber, a dining-room 
 and a cabinet. 
 
 Here were tables, chairs, drawers, etc., all quaintly 
 carved in trecento fashion, lamps and stands of decorat- 
 ive wrought iron, a huge canopied bed, and a dining- 
 table carefully set with crudely figured majolica ware, 
 half -opaque blue glassware in medieval goblets and de- 
 canters, large earthen pitchers for wine, and curiously 
 shaped forks and spoons, — just then coming into 
 princely use; also arms and armor, and walls frescoed 
 in trecento manner, including one original figure of that 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 413 
 
 period; — in a word, every furnishing and disposition 
 to give a picture of that far-off life as exact as if one 
 were living it here and now. Very crude, we should 
 call it, — the picturesqueness soon vanishing before 
 an acquaintance with its discomforts and lack of re- 
 finements. Yet to Can Grande and his contemporaries 
 it seemed an age of wondrous luxury; and so it was, 
 compared with the life of their grandfathers, but one 
 century previous. 
 
 "In those times, says a writer about the year 1300, 
 speaking of the age of Frederick II (1200-1250), the 
 manners of the Italians were rude. A man and his 
 wife ate off the same plate. There were no wooden- 
 handled knives, nor more than one or two drinking- 
 cups in a house. Candles of wax or tallow were un- 
 known; a servant held a torch during supper. The 
 clothes of men were of leatheif, unlined; scarcely any 
 gold or silver was seen on their dress. ... A small 
 stock of corn seemed riches. . ' . The pride of man 
 was to be well provided with arms and horses; that 
 of the nobility, to have lofty towers, of which all 
 the cities of Italy were full. But now, frugality has 
 been changed for sumptuousness; everything exquis- 
 ite is sought after in dress, — gold, silver, pearls, 
 silks, and rich furs. Foreign wines and rich meats are 
 required." ^ Such was the alteration in one hundred 
 years, — to the days of Dante and Giotto, shown in 
 this castle. 
 
 Remains of the earlier periods were visible in lance- 
 heads, truncheons, other implements, and coins, found 
 on the premises; and more stirring still, were Roman 
 coins, lost by the Roman occupants sixteen centuries 
 ago, and now brought again to the hght. An upper 
 door let me out upon the adjacent battlements in the 
 
 ' Hallam, Middle Ages, vol. ii, part i, chap. ix. 
 
414 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 rear, whose promenade looked down the steep hill- 
 side, rich with vine and olive, guarded by the descend- 
 ing city wall with its crumbling towers, to the town 
 far below, shining cheerfully in the green fields, — 
 the wooded, dark foothills and Alps to the north, and 
 the limitless plain upon the south. I climbed the 
 mighty, hollow keep to its lofty summit, whence the 
 view was still more extensive; at its bottom yet re- 
 mained the horrible pit, where they once tossed the 
 bodies of the condemned. 
 
 In the centre of the inner courtyard, lingered the 
 ancient, worn well-head, upon which Dante must 
 often have leaned or sat, while pacing the green be- 
 tween the palatial buildings, now gone. 
 
 At Can La Grande's court, no doubt. 
 Due reverence did his steps attend; 
 The ushers og his path would bend 
 At ingoing as at going out.' 
 
 The buildings for the lodging of the servants, men- 
 at-arms, and horses, doubtless encircled the outer 
 courtyard; but they have all disappeared. I crossed it 
 again, and departed by another gate on the north side, 
 under an ancient fresco of the Madonna. 
 
 Thence, by carriage to Caldiero and up the lUasi 
 Valley, I journeyed to the village and castle of that 
 name, enjoying a view of the latter upon its hilltop 
 for an hour before my arrival. The Scaligers obtained 
 it from Pope Nicholas V, and upon their destruc- 
 tion it passed to the Conti Pompei of Verona, whose 
 last representative died in 1885, leaving his city pal- 
 ace to the Signoria for the museum. Upon one occa- 
 sion, when tearing down an old wall of the castle, 
 he found the chained skeleton of an ancestress, the 
 
 ' Rossetti, Dante at Verona. 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 415 
 
 Countess Ginevra, who had been punished for infidel- 
 ity by her husband long ago, in a manner similar to 
 the "White Lady" of Colalto. At the piazza of Illasi 
 I saw a fine, classic Municipio, and near it the hand- 
 some villa and gardens of the Marchese Carlotti. 
 The castle, though nearly as picturesque from below, 
 in its great tower, massive stone body and ruinous 
 walls, is not as interesting as Soave, — being neither 
 as old, nor kept in the medieval state. It consists of 
 a projecting keep, on the north side, and an adjacent 
 square building of three to four stories, both battle- 
 mented, and surrounded by the broken remains of the 
 enceinture. 
 
 All around it on the hillsides lies the beautiful 
 Pompei estate, dense with olive groves and vineyards, 
 white-spotted with excellent tenants' dwellings; and 
 the prospect over them of the rich valley with its 
 many villages is enchanting. The ascent from the 
 town is a full two miles; and let no one who makes it 
 omit first to obtain in the piazza a permit to visit the 
 castle, or he will not be admitted. After a small siesta 
 at a horrible country inn, where one basin-full of 
 water per chamber was supposed to be suflicient for 
 the day, I returned to Verona at eventide by the steam 
 tramway, making connection at Caldiero. 
 
 In the same valley of Illasi, farther north, lie the re- 
 mains of Tregnano castle, — consisting of a huge keep 
 and a crumbling outer wall with small towers. Of the 
 castles on the west bank Sirmione, situated on the 
 peninsula of that name at the southern shore of Lake 
 Garda, is the most interesting after Soave. It is a 
 beautiful spot, occupied by large Roman villas in an- 
 cient times. The great fortress is a glowering, fanciful 
 mass of tall irregular towers and forked battlements, 
 with two entrances, and several courts and inner walls. 
 
416 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 all surrounded by mighty, towered, outer walls. Of all 
 the castles of this region, it is the most famed in son^ 
 and story. 
 
 The Scala castles of Villafranca, Nogarole, and Va- 
 leggio lie near together southwest of Verona upon the 
 plain. I went by train to the first-named, erected in 
 1202 |by] the Veronese republic as a fortress against 
 the Mantuans; from it Mastino II and Can Grande II 
 constructed the vast wall known as the "Serraglio" 
 for miles across the level, with moats and towers for 
 sentinels, to protect their territory from Mantuan as- 
 saults. I found the castle to be a large ruined quadri- 
 lateral at the south of Villafranca village, its walls 
 of brick and cobblestones, three to five feet thick, 
 surrounded by a slimy moat, with square towers at 
 the corners, and a formidable keep and two guard- 
 towers beside the entrance in the northern side. 
 Nothing remains of the other buildings save a small 
 structure over the ingress, still inhabited; gardens 
 flourish everywhere within, and the peasants have 
 made a road through the middle. This was the fortress 
 which Ezzelino besieged in 1233, in which the people 
 of Mantua with their families took refuge in 1404 from 
 the cruelties of Galeazzo Gonzaga, and from which 
 they repulsed his fierce attacks. Though often so at- 
 tacked during the centuries, it never fell. In the vil- 
 lage, in 1859, was signed the peace between France 
 and Austria, ceding Lombardy to Italy. 
 
 Five miles to the west sits Valeggio, another Scala 
 fortress, guarding the Mincio; halfway to it rises a 
 monumental column marking the battlefield of Cus- 
 tozza, where the Italians were twice so bitterly de- 
 feated; — but close at hand also, seen from Villa- 
 franca's keep, rise the towers marking the fields of 
 the great victories of S. Martino and Solferino. This 
 
VERONA LA MARMORINA 417 
 
 is sacred ground, watered with the blood of the mar- 
 tyrs for Freedom, decorated with imposing memorials, 
 and sought by hosts of free Italians year after year, 
 in a solemn, patriotic pilgrimage. 
 
 Italia! by the passion of thy pain 
 
 That bent and rent thy chain; 
 
 ItaUa! by the breaking of the bands, 
 
 The shaking of the lands; 
 
 Beloved, O men's mother, O men's queen, — 
 
 Arise, appear, be seen! ^ 
 
 ' Swinburne, A Song of Italy. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 BRESCIA THE BRAVE 
 
 Brescia la forte, Brescia la ferrea, 
 
 Brescia lionessa d' Italia. — Dants. 
 
 O noblest Brescia, scarred from foot to head, 
 
 And breast-deep in the dead. 
 
 Praise him' from all the glories of thy graves. 
 
 That yellow Mella laves 
 
 With gentle and golden water, whose fair flood 
 
 Ran wider with thy blood. 
 
 — SWINBUHNE. 
 
 Brescia the brave, the iron-hearted, — Brescia the 
 lioness of Italy ! Even as far back as Dante's time she 
 was so known, — foremost in every danger, leader in 
 every struggle against oppression. And to what a glori- 
 ous climax came that lofty spirit, that heart of steel, in 
 the heaving, storm-tossed time of the Risorgimento, 
 — when never a day passed without some fresh hero, 
 some new martyr, issuing from her impassioned people 
 to battle for liberty, — when against all odds, all pos- 
 sibilities, she struggled desperately on, till the streets 
 lay piled "breast deep in the dead" ! A century before 
 that, Baretti had mistaken her fieriness for bragga- 
 docio; and his words reveal in her the same defiant 
 valor: "The people of Brescia made it formerly a 
 point of honor to be great bullies; and I remember 
 the time myself when it was dangerous to have any 
 dealings with them, as they were much inclined to 
 quarrel merely for a whim, and would presently chal- 
 lenge one to fight with pistol or blunderbuss." ' 
 ' Garibaldi. ^ Baretti, Manners and Customs of Italy. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 419 
 
 Evelyn in his day remarked their intrepid mettle, 
 reflected in their large manufacture of firearms, which 
 has ever been and still is a prominent industry. 
 
 Brescia is also celebrated for her extensive Roman 
 remains, which are third in size of all Italy, and reveal 
 her importance among the ancients. She must then 
 have been a happy, prosperous city, for history has 
 small record of her affliction with wars, courts, or 
 great events. Catullus spoke of her as "Brixia, • 
 Veronse mater amata mese,"^ and Virgil represented 
 her river Mella, now a smooth, yellow stream of no 
 large size, as — 
 
 — tonsis in vallibus ilium [florem] 
 Pastores et curva legunt prope flumina Mellse.' 
 
 Probably the lack of a commanding or critical site 
 was responsible for Brescia's early peace. She sits just 
 as far to the west of the southern end of Lake Garda as 
 Verona does to the east, and likewise at the end of a 
 mountain valley (the Val Trompia of the Mella), with 
 her citadel upon the last hill, and her houses spreading 
 from its slope far out upon the plain; but the valley 
 leads only to some mountain hamlets, and Brescia 
 commands no pass, navigable river, nor other trade- 
 route.^ Thus she had no strategic value; yet to-day she 
 
 ' " Brescia, beloved mother of my Verona." 
 
 « Georgics, iv, 277, 278. 
 
 " It must be noted, however, that Brescia was the customary stopping- 
 place, one day's journey from Milan, upon the great Roman road from the 
 latter place to Friuli and the Orient; and as such, she not only handled a 
 large amount of commerce (including that bound northward via Verona), 
 but impressed her charms upon many an emperor, who showed his re- 
 membrance in material ways. Csesar endowed the city with Roman citi- 
 zenship; and Augustus richly embellished it with public buildings and 
 monuments; hence its imperial name of Colonia Augusta Civica di Brescia. 
 Further royal attentions made it a city "ripristinata, donata di augustali 
 munificenze." — F. Odorici, Storie di Brescia, dai primi tempi all' e/d 
 nostra ; — to whose ten learned volumes the reader is referred for the 
 town's fullest and most accurate annals. 
 
420 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 possesses a population nearly as large as Verona's, — 
 seventy thousand, — and is one of the chief industrial 
 centres of Italy. 
 
 With Verona, Brescia successively shared the dis- 
 asters and occupations of the various barbarian na- 
 tions; and became an occasional dwelling-place for 
 Desiderius, the last Lombard King, who left the mark 
 of his residence in buildings still standing. With the 
 loosening of the grip of the Frankish Counts, the city's 
 fast developing martial spirit set up an independent 
 republic, about 1073, and proceeded to assert an 
 active part in Lombard affairs. One of the first heroes 
 she sent forth was the great free-thinking monk, 
 Arnold of Brescia, who first preached against the riches 
 and corruption of the clergy, advocated the freedom 
 of the soil and the holiness of poverty, roused the 
 Romans during their revolution of 1143 to such mad- 
 ness that they sacked the monasteries, and was finally 
 burnt at the stake in 1155 by Pope Hadrian IV. He 
 has become to all liberal Italians the initiator and 
 representative of free speech and advanced ideas; and 
 when his monument in Rome was recently unveiled 
 a violent anticlerical rioting took place. 
 
 The Brescian Republic was as Guelph as Verona 
 was Ghibelline, and, beginning with Frederick I, 
 struggled unceasingly against the Imperial preten- 
 sions; it was a prominent member of both Lombard 
 leagues, suffered a losing siege from the first Frederick, 
 and endured a victorious siege from the second Fred- 
 erick in 1337, which he was forced to raise after sixty- 
 eight days of fruitless attacks. Twenty-one years 
 later, however, it fell into the terrible power of Ezze- 
 lino, as a result of the internecine strife between Guelph 
 and Ghibelline, which, up to the coming of the next 
 Emperor, Henry VII, in 1310, rent every Lombard 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 421 
 
 city till it succumbed to the grasp of some tyrant. The 
 monster of them all chained his Brescian enemies to a 
 rock in the open plain, and let them perish of hunger. 
 
 But only one year later the Brescians obtained their 
 revenge by deserting at a critical moment from his 
 army; and Ezzelino was struck down by a Brescian 
 soldier in the Guelphic host. The republic was rein- 
 stated, endured some threescore years longer, and fell 
 forever in 1332 before the martial genius of Can 
 Grande della Scala. When the proud city emerged 
 from the weaker grip of Mastino II, about 1335, it was 
 only to feel the viler yoke of the perfidious Visconti, 
 who had united with the Carrara in despoiling the de- 
 generate Scaliger. Thus early did Brescia become an 
 important part of Visconti territory, — joined to the 
 fortunes of the race of the Viper;' and in order to 
 understand her subsequent history, it will be necessary 
 to summarize here that race's record. 
 
 The family of Della Torre had paved the way for 
 Milanese tyranny by asserting absolute power over 
 that city, as the result of prolonged struggles; so 
 that when Otho Visconti, Archbishop of Milan, in 
 1277 suddenly seized and imprisoned the Delia Torre, 
 his sole authority was recognized without trouble. 
 Later he associated with him in the government his 
 nephew Matteo, obtained from the Emperor the ap- 
 pointment of them both as Imperial Vicars, and 
 secured the people's acceptance of Matteo as his heir. 
 Both of these were very strong men, and Matteo be- 
 came "the model of a prudent Italian despot. . . . 
 He ruled his states by force of character, craft, and 
 insight, more than by violence or cruelty." ^ His 
 
 1 The Visconti standard and emblem represented an infant in the mouth 
 of a snake. 
 
 2 Symonds, Age of the Despots. 
 
422 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 successors followed his example. From 1302 to 1310 
 he was temporarily ousted by the Delia Torre and 
 the Guelphs; but with the advent of Henry VII in the 
 latter year, his welcome by the Delia Torre, and his 
 attempt to extort money from the Milanese, the peo- 
 ple rose, expelled Emperor and Delia Torre together, 
 and recalled the Visconti. The Guelphic cities every- 
 where rose, and Brescia had to endure in consequence 
 another distressing Imperial siege, which this time 
 overcame her. 
 
 Matteo's son Galeazzo succeeded him as despot in 
 1322, and Galeazzo's son Azzo followed, who subjug- 
 ated ten neighboring cities, including Brescia, and 
 left a large kingdom at his death in 1339, to Lucchino, 
 another son of Matteo. Lucchino secured possession 
 of Parma and Pisa also; and was soon succeeded by his 
 brother Giovanni. "The Visconti now took the place 
 of the Delia Scala as by far the most powerful of all the 
 houses of the Lombard Plain. Giovanni held the lord- 
 ship of sixteen flourishing Italian towns," ^ including 
 Brescia, Bergamo, Crema, and Cremona. He was 
 Archbishop of Milan as well as temporal ruler, — 
 "the friend of Petrarch, and one of the most notable 
 characters of the fourteenth century." ^ Upon his 
 death the huge domains were for a time divided be- 
 tween the three sons of his brother Stefano: Barnabo 
 received the four cities last mentioned, Matteo the 
 southern towns, and Galeazzo the western, while 
 Genoa and Milan were to be ruled jointly. But the 
 territories were soon reunited by the master political 
 craftsman of the trecento, the ablest of all the Visconti, 
 the greatest of all Italian despots, — Gian Galeazzo. 
 
 Matteo was assassinated by his brothers ; Galeazzo 
 
 • Oscar Browning, Guelfs and Ghibellines. 
 ^ Symonds, Age of the Despots. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 423 
 
 died; Gian Galeazzo, as his only son, succeeded him 
 in 1378 in possession of the western towns, and, by 
 long deceiving his uncle Barnabo with a mask of timid- 
 ity, finally induced him, in 1385, to come out of Milan 
 with his sons, and greet his nephew as the latter passed 
 by with an escort of horsemen. It was a fatal error; 
 for Gian Galeazzo with a word to his soldiers seized 
 Barnabo and the sons, entered Milan, imprisoned 
 them, and declared himself sole ruler of the Visconti 
 domains. Then began those endless, far-reaching, 
 secret schemings to make himself the master of all 
 Italy, by any means discoverable, — treachery, mur- 
 der, bribery, the sowing of dissension and suspicion, 
 the deception of friends and foes, the hiring of con- 
 dottieri to make wars, etc., — means which resulted 
 in the steady addition to his state of one city after 
 another, until it extended from the Alps to the Um- 
 brian Plain, from Friuli to Piedmont and Liguria. 
 
 While the rest of Italy trembled before the giant 
 hand closing irresistibly upon them, suddenly, how- 
 ever, in 1402, the plague carried oflF this archetype 
 of Machiavelli's ideal prince.^ His dominions by his 
 will were equally divided between the two legitimate 
 infant sons, for whom the widowed Duchess Caterina 
 was appointed guardian; Giovanni Maria was to have 
 Milan, and half the subject cities, including Brescia 
 and Bergamo, — Filippo Maria, the other half, with 
 Pavia for his capital. But — the formidable captains 
 of adventure whom Gian Galeazzo had trained and 
 held in leash, at the head of the forces which he had 
 helped them gather, instantly disregarded this will, 
 and acted for themselves ; while in those cities which 
 they did not seize, the old local tyrants bobbed up 
 again. / 
 
 ' Machiavelli, De Principatibris. 
 
424 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Pandolfo Malatesta, the condotiiere, with his troops 
 grasped Brescia in the turmoil. Francesco della Car- 
 rara took Verona. The Duchess now made her error 
 of calling the Venetians to her aid, — who expelled the 
 Carrara from Verona, Vicenza, and Padua, but kept 
 the spoil for their own. Catherine was soon poisoned; 
 Gian Maria was murdered at Milan, where he had 
 been indulging in the most inhuman atrocities ever 
 known; and Filippo Maria, likewise a cruel degener- 
 ate but more crafty and ambitious, proceeded step by 
 step to recover his father's dominions, by his father's 
 methods. He was a vile, hideous, cowardly creature, 
 who hid himself from all men in secret chambers, and 
 even constructed canals with high walls by which to 
 pass unperceived froni palace to palace; but he had 
 inherited his father's power of using abler men. He 
 discovered Carmagnola, making him captain of his 
 armies; and the latter between 1412 and 1422 success- 
 ively dislodged the swarm of lesser tyrants, including 
 Malatesta from Brescia; and so recovered most of the 
 Visconti territories. Then Filippo renewed his father's 
 designs upon Italy, and attacked the more southerly 
 states, with Francesco Sforza the elder as his general, 
 — who, it is said, started life as a woodchopper. 
 When Sforza was killed, his great son of the same 
 name succeeded him. Carmagnola had been so bril- 
 liantly successful that the mean spirit of Filippo was 
 jealous, and disgraced him. 
 
 It was his fatal error. Carmagnola fled to Venice, 
 induced the Republic to yield to the entreaties of 
 Florence to form a league against Milan, and in 1426 
 led a powerful Venetian army to victory over the 
 Duke. Brescia was the first fruit of the campaign, 
 and, with her surrounding lands, became from that 
 time a happy and prosperous Venetian subject. Car- 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 425 
 
 magnola drove the Milanese back on every side; 
 Sforza revolted against the Duke and took for a 
 while the other side, bought over by the Floren- 
 tines. Carmagnola had such great successes that he 
 became too independent and indolent for the Vene- 
 tian Council of Ten; who finally suspected him of 
 treasonable correspondence with Filippo, executed 
 him, and placed Gattamelata in charge of their forces. 
 The condottiere, Niccolo Piccinino, of Perugia, led 
 the Milanese in the ensuing campaign, with much 
 ability. 
 
 Now occurred the memorable siege of Brescia in 
 1439-40, by Filippo Visconti's army. The city had 
 already grown so fond of the Republican rule that she 
 "held out against unheard-of sufferings," — while 
 Gattamelata strove to relieve her. The re-provision- 
 ing of the city was finally accomplished by an unparal- 
 lelled feat, which has gone reverberating through the 
 annals of warfare: "Six ships and twenty-five lighter 
 boats were built at Venice, taken up the Adige to Mori, 
 just below Ala, and there placed upon rollers and 
 greased boards; more than two thousand oxen were 
 employed to haul them uphill, into the waters of the 
 little lake of S. Andrea. From S. Andrea they were 
 hauled in like fashion over a depression in Monte 
 Baldo, and gradually lowered down the western slope 
 till they reached the lake [of Garda] at Torbole."^ 
 Brescia was thus re-stored, to the amazement of Pic- 
 cinino; who was also soon defeated by Sforza, advanc- 
 ing from the south, and escaped with his own life only 
 "by being carried in a sack on the shoulders of one of 
 his men." 
 
 In 1442 Sforza was reattached to Duke Filippo by 
 succeeding in the marriage which he demanded with 
 * Brown, Venice: A Historical Sketch of the Republic. 
 
426 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the letter's only child, Bianca. Soon after Filippo ^ 
 died, in 1447, without having succeeded, in spite of all 
 his desperate attempts, in recovering either Brescia or 
 Bergamo; which thenceforth remained loyal and pro- 
 sperous Venetian cities, undisturbed in their allegiance, 
 except during the War of the League of Cambrai, 
 1508-16. 
 
 At the beginning of that terrible period of warfare, 
 after the first disastrous defeat of the Venetians, 
 Brescia at once surrendered to the French; but the 
 people were so maltreated, that they revolted on Feb- 
 ruary 3, 1512. Thereupon the renowned Gaston de 
 Foix — the "Thunderbolt of Italy," a nephew of 
 Louis XII — took the city by assault, only sixteen 
 days later, and gave it over to sack and massacre. 
 This was one of the most terrible events of the Re- 
 naissance age. For days the French troops hunted 
 down the citizens, pillaged, and destroyed, until the 
 city was a complete wreck, burned in large part, and 
 most of the Brescians who had not fled beforehand 
 were slain. Chevalier Bayard, the Knight "sans peur 
 et sans reproche," who was wounded in the assault, 
 stated in his diary that over twenty-two thousand 
 persons, of every age and sex, filled the streets with 
 their corpses. Brescia, till then one of the richest 
 cities of North Italy, was completely ruined, and 
 never entirely recovered from the destruction. The 
 survivors now remembered that twenty-six years pre- 
 viously this calamity had been prophesied to them, 
 for their sinfulness, by a wandering monk, — the 
 martyr, Girolamo Savonarola! 
 
 ' Filippo Maria, the last of the Visconti, was shortly succeeded in the 
 dukedom of Milan by Francesco Sforza, his son-in-law, who reigned till 
 1466. Five princes of the disastrous Sforza line rapidly followed him; his 
 grandson Francesco II, the last duke, coming to his end in 1526, when 
 Milan and its territories became a part of the Spanish dominions. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 427 
 
 After the Peace of 1516, which ended the war of 
 Cambrai, Brescia was returned to Venice, and thence- 
 forth remained steady in her allegiance until the end 
 of the Republic.' With Verona she afterward endured 
 the Austrian tyranny, but less patiently, and more 
 resentfully, her spirit of freedom rising more fiery 
 with every year of slavery, until she became the burn- 
 ing soul and centre of the revolution in Lombardy. 
 From Brescia there emanated an ever increasing 
 stream of conspiracies, plots, organizations, and heroic 
 leaders, against the foreign dominion; the grand old 
 castle upon her height was extended, strengthened, 
 and filled with Austrian battalions, to watch the 
 seething city at their feet. 
 
 These ebullitions at last burst forth in the rising of 
 1848, when Brescia's spirit had permeated and roused 
 the whole of Lombardy; like a whirlwind the Bres- 
 cians sprang to arms, assumed their preconceived 
 organization, and appointed as their leader Count 
 Martinengo, — the noble, devoted head of an historic 
 family, descended from that Tebaldo Martinengo to 
 whom the Emperor Otho I for his bravery gave fifteen 
 castles and the Order of the Red Eagle. When this 
 first attempt was ended by the defeat of the Piedmont- 
 ese and their Italian auxiliaries, under Charles Albert, 
 
 ' An interesting incident of the Venetian period was the grandiose 
 reception and entertainment, lasting twelve days, given by Giorgio Cor- 
 naro, the Podest^, to his sister, the ex-Queen of Cyprus, on one of her three 
 excursions from the solitude of Asolo (g.v.). "A guard of forty youths met 
 her outside the town. . . . Triumphs and allegorical pageants followed. 
 . . . The Queen entered the city in a chariot of state drawn by four 
 white horses, homed like unicorns. Jousts by torchlight were given, 
 and the jousters marched in procession, with helmets on their heads 
 from whose crests burnt flames. It was Caterina's last royal ceremony. 
 . . . But Venice showed herself jealous of this play at mimic royalty, and 
 Giorgio was soon after recalled." — Horatio Brown, Stttdiea in the His- 
 tory of Venice. 
 
428 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 at Novara, on March 23, 1849, — Brescia alone of the 
 Lombard cities refused to yield, having again risen 
 against the garrison, under Count Martinengo and 
 the young hero Tito Speri, captured the Austrian gov- 
 ernor, and blockaded his five hundred troops in the 
 citadel. It was a magnificent foolhardiness, which in 
 its very failure raised countless patriots from the blood 
 of the slain. ^ 
 
 Austrian batteries were massed about the city, and 
 day after day, from them and from the castle, was 
 poured a terrible storm of shot and shell that spared 
 neither child nor woman, fired the houses in a score of 
 places, and turned the streets into a blazing shambles. 
 Despite everything, the citizens would not yield, pre- 
 ferring death to that foreign domination. The pity of 
 it all was, that General Haynau, the Austrian leader, 
 knew of the result at Novara, but would not reveal it 
 to the Brescians; he did not want them to have a valid 
 reason for yielding; he was determined to exterminate 
 them through their very courage. Finally the advanc- 
 ing enemy, whose progress was bitterly contested from 
 building to building, and street to street, hemmed 
 the remaining Brescians into the central piazza, with 
 "scenes of such atrocious cruelty as baffle descrip- 
 tion. . . . The misfortunes of Brescia can only be 
 equaled by its heroic bravery; and the name of this 
 city has become sacred to all true Italians."^ 
 
 The decimated remnant at last surrendered. Tito 
 Speri and the other surviving leaders were ultimately 
 allowed to go free; but several years later, for a 
 
 ' "The Brescians are up!" cried George Meredith, in his romance, 
 Vittoria. "Brescia is always the eagle that looks over Lombardy!" And 
 the gifted author, who spoke of the Biaorgimento as the first and greatest 
 enthusiasm of his youth, described later with a thrilling power the flight of 
 the surviving patriots from the captured city. 
 
 * The Italian Volunteers; Appendix, note D. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 429 
 
 discovered conspiracy, Speri was confined, with many 
 others, in the castle, which was one huge prison-house 
 of patriots; then he was conveyed to the fortress of 
 Mantua, and garroted. He was but twenty-eight 
 years of age. The insurrection of 1849, however, be- 
 came famous as "The Ten Days of Brescia"; and 
 Haynau was known henceforth as "The Hyena of 
 Brescia, — execrated throughout the civiKzed world."^ 
 The city, nevertheless, was not dismayed; her intrepid 
 spirit soon soared fiercely once more. Ten years of 
 ceaseless plotting followed, — often discovered, as in 
 the said cabal of 1851-52, which sent so many illus- 
 trious citizens to the scaffold; and after the Peace of 
 Villafranca, which freed Brescia, but left eastern 
 Venetia still in Austrian hands, the Brescians con- 
 tinued to agitate, plot, and organize, until the Italian 
 Government was obliged, for form's sake, to arrest a 
 large number of them in 1862, who were preparing a 
 raid upon Austrian territory, under Garibaldi. 
 
 Brescia's school of art was as distinct in personality 
 as was her people's character; and though her artists 
 were never numerous, they were strong, unique, and 
 interesting. The Paduan school made the founda- 
 tion, as elsewhere in Lombardy, — through Vincenzo 
 Foppa, the pupil of Mantegna, and Ferramola and 
 others of Foppa's disciples. Vincenzo Civerchio of 
 Crema painted in Brescia about that time, and left 
 the impress of his genius. Foppa it was who started 
 the first school of Milan, also, in the latter half of the 
 quattrocento. Ferramola, "a cold and disagreeable 
 colorist,"^ survived the destruction of 1512, and left 
 widespread works; a fellow-laborer of his, about 1500, 
 was one Paolo Zoppo, a native Brescian also, said 
 
 * Orsi, Modern Italy. 
 
 ^ Layard, Handbook of Painting. 
 
430 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 to have been a pupil of Perugino and Giovanni 
 Bellini. 
 
 But now came the early cinquecentists, Brescia's 
 greatest masters. Girolamo Romanino (1485-1566), 
 who was the son of an obscure painter, and is said to 
 have been early influenced by Civerchio's grace and 
 power, completed his art education at Venice and 
 Padua, where "from studying the works of Giorgione 
 he acquired that brilliant golden coloring for which 
 his works are celebrated."^ I had already seen good 
 examples of them at Padua and Verona; but nearly all 
 of them remain at Brescia, where he lived long and 
 had many pupils. His only rival, and the greatest 
 of all Brescians, was Alessandro Bonvicini, called 
 II Moretto (1498-1555), the most of whose pictures 
 are also in his native town, — though I had observed 
 at Verona several specimens of his characteristic 
 "silvery tone." 
 
 I Moretto passed his whole life in Brescia; studying 
 under Ferramola first, then imitating Titian and the 
 Venetians, he eventually "formed a style of his own, 
 which . . . is distinguished ... by a cool, tender, 
 and harmonious scale of color which has a peculiar 
 charm, and is entirely his own. . . . He almost 
 rivaled Titian in the stateliness and dignity of his 
 figures. . . . Moretto was of a gentle, pious nature, 
 and his works are almost exclusively of a quiet, relig- 
 ious character.""^ It is related that he was wont to 
 fast and pray long when composing a painting of a 
 Madonna or other holy personage, and in such a way 
 painted two or three canvases by inspiration, which 
 attained miraculous powers. 
 
 Geronimo Savoldo (1508-48) was the third great 
 Brescian master, — who, however, seldom stayed 
 
 ' Layard, Handbook of Painting. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 431 
 
 there, having moved to Venice, where "he is known to 
 have become one of the most formidable of Titian's 
 rivals; not, indeed, in works of a large scale, but in 
 smaller pieces conducted with an exquisite degree of 
 care."^ To me his works are invariably most delight- 
 ful. 
 
 The next generation, in the middle and latter part 
 of the cinquecento, consisted chiefly of Moretto's pupils; 
 foremost among them was Giovanni Battista Moroni, 
 the renowned portrait painter, who was unsurpassed 
 in that line. Perhaps ahead of them all, however, 
 except Moroni, was Romanino's son-in-law and dis- 
 ciple, Lattanzio Gambara, who painted imposing 
 scriptural scenes, and "various histories and fables 
 truly beautiful."^ After these men came the decad- 
 ence. 
 
 My journey from Verona to Brescia was accom- 
 plished without incident, beyond the usual over- 
 crowding of the train always found upon the main 
 lines. The passengers were mostly commercial Ital- 
 ians, who travel nowadays very much more than for- 
 merly; they pile luggage and wraps in the empty seats 
 of a compartment, and often use every possible means, 
 including glowering, snarling, and refusal to move, to 
 deter others from entering, — being still, as a class, 
 remarkably medieval in all ideas regarding their own 
 comfort. The usual majority of traveling Italiaiis, 
 however, are very courteous. The train soon entered 
 the swelling, rounded, low hills thrown forward by 
 the Alps to the south of Lake Garda, and stopped 
 awhile at Peschiera, at the lake's southeastern cor- 
 ner, — beside its effluent, the historic river Mincio. 
 The Mincio flows directly southward, wide and deep, 
 
 I Lanzi, History of Painting. 
 
432 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 past Valeggio and Mantua to the Po, and has always 
 been of much strategic importance. Peschiera, a little 
 place of eighteen hundred people, "buried in its al- 
 most subterranean fastnesses like a mole," ^ has also 
 been important in a strategic way only, having been 
 a fortress for centuries, and a corner of the celebrated 
 Austrian "Quadrilateral." A number of its huge bas- 
 tions and moats were passed close at hand, — the 
 same which were so bravely carried by the Pied- 
 montese on May 30, 1848. 
 
 Then we proceeded along the lake's southern shore, 
 with beautiful views over its wide, blue expanse to the 
 imposing Alps between which it gradually narrowed, 
 — giving a far vista of wondrous grandeur. Charming 
 white towns and hamlets dotted the receding, lux- 
 uriant shores, and glistened from the dark Alpine 
 flanks. Here extended the slim peninsula of Sirmione;* 
 and afar on the northwestern bank, stretched at the 
 foot of those glowering peaks, lay the lovely pro- 
 tected coast-strip known as the Riviera, fragrant and 
 enchanting with its orange and lemon groves, and its 
 verdure of eternal summer. To it well apply Goethe's 
 enthusiastic lines : — 
 
 Dost know the land of lemon flowers. 
 Of dusky, gold-flecked orange bowers? 
 The breath of the azure sky scarce heaves 
 The myrtle and high laurel leaves.' 
 
 * Hazlitt, Journey through France and Italy in 18S6. 
 
 ' Poets from the classic days to Tennyson have extolled the loveliness of 
 this spot, and its enchanting Benacus. We remember Thomas Moore's 
 translation of Catullus: — 
 
 Sweet Sirmio! Thou the very eye 
 Of all peninsulas and isles 
 That in our lakes of silver lie. 
 Or sleep enwreathed by Neptune's smiles. 
 ' R. H. Schauffler's translation. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 433 
 
 We stopped another minute at Desenzano, at the 
 southwest angle, a pleasant, modern-looking town of 
 some five thousand inhabitants, whence the steamers 
 ply to the other ports. Then starting a last time, and 
 leaving the gracious lake behind, we crossed the plain 
 northwesterly to the next spur of the Alps, rolled 
 along its olive-covered, southern flanks for half a 
 dozen miles, and reached Brescia at its farther ex- 
 tremity. 
 
 The station proved to be close without the southern 
 wall, near the "Porta Stazione" at its western end. 
 I climbed into the 'bus of the principal albergo, and 
 was jolted through this gateway and up the wide, 
 modern-looking Corso Vittorio Emanuele, north- 
 eastward toward the city's centre. But when about 
 halfway to the centre, we turned to the right, into the 
 important thoroughfare which, under the names of 
 Corsos Palestra, Zanardelli, and Magenta, crosses the 
 city from west to east; and proceeding in the latter 
 direction, we soon stopped in the wide, brilliant Zanar- 
 delli, before the albergo on its southern side. 
 
 The old courtyard of the hotel had been modernized 
 into a glass-covered hall, with the restaurant on one 
 side, as usual, and the stairs upon the other. Here for 
 the first time in the plain-towns I was displeased; the 
 prices appeared out of all proportion to the poor ac- 
 commodation, the service was far from pleasant to 
 me, and the pompous landlord particularly dis- 
 agreeable. But I reflected that it was only for a week 
 or two, and endured my troubles philosophically. As 
 far back as Hazlitt's time, the bad inns of Brescia were 
 a cause of complaint.^ 
 
 The castle hill of Brescia, which, like Verona's, gave 
 origin to the town, rises at the northeastern corner of 
 
 1 Hazlitt, Journey through France and Italy in 18S6 (,soprd). 
 
434 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the quadrilateral, — whose sides turn generally to- 
 ward the four points of the compass; it is a detached 
 height, thrown forward some way from the southwest- 
 ern angle of the mountain-chain; the hills retreat to 
 the east and north, leaving a small section of the plain 
 
 — the once beautiful vale of the Mella — extending 
 behind the citadel for several miles. There a modern 
 quarter has recently grown up, with the erection of 
 dozens of factories, constituting Brescia's industrial 
 life; so that their ugly windows, chimneys, and smoke- 
 palls are conveniently separated and hidden by the 
 lofty hill. 
 
 Upon the latter the Romans built their fortress, and 
 at its southern foot, their templed city, whose extent 
 is still distinguishable by the regular network of right- 
 angled streets, occupying about a sixth of the area of 
 the present town. This Roman section is delimited on 
 the west by the medieval piazzas, del Duomo and del 
 Comune, — which now lie exactly in the city's centrci 
 
 — by the Corso Magenta on the south, the city wall 
 on the east, and the steep hillside on the north. At the 
 middle of the foot of this verdurous hillside stand the 
 imposing remains of the great Temple to Hercules 
 erected by the Emperor Vespasian; before which ex- 
 tended the ancient Forum, — still partly open, with 
 exiguous fragments of its classic buildings, under the 
 modern name of Piazza del Museo. For the reconsti- 
 tuted Temple has been fitly utilized as a museum of 
 antiquities. 
 
 I understood, then, the reason for the unusual width 
 of the Corso Zanardelli (formerly called Corso del 
 Teatro, on account of the location here of all the 
 theatres) when I emerged upon it next morning for my 
 preliminary walk: it occupies the site of the ancient 
 southern wall. An early-medieval extension of the 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 435 
 
 Roman town is also indicated upon the map, — its wall 
 running westward halfway along the Corso Palestra, 
 then northward along the Via della Pace and Via delle 
 Battaglie; thus including the central piazzas and the 
 early public buildings and churches. 
 
 The Corso was quite modern in appearance, — stuc- 
 coed modern buildings, tramway tracks, clanging cars, 
 a crowd of vehicles, and a greater crowd of pedestri- 
 ans; but on its northern side was a continuous deep 
 arcade, with an upper story containing two windows 
 over each wide arch, and over them again a series of 
 extraordinary large chimneys, perched upon the very 
 eaves; — while thirty feet back of these rose a man- 
 sard roof carrying a hanging garden with trellised 
 vines. Altogether a picturesque construction, — with 
 a great triumphal arch in its centre, and its deep ar- 
 cades filled with caffe-tables. 
 
 At its western end, where the Corso changes its name 
 to Palestra, the Via delle Spaderie — a quaint cogno- 
 men, this "Street of the Sword-Shops" — diverges 
 northward to Piazza Comune, three hundred yards 
 distant. That one of the principal streets should have 
 such a name fairly demonstrates the city's ancient 
 activity in that line. Evelyn said in 1645: "Here I 
 purchased . . . my fine carabine, which cost me nine 
 pistoles; this Citty being famous for these firearms. 
 . . . This Citty consists most in artists, every shop 
 abounding in gunns, swords, armores, etc."^ — But 
 first I sought the Piazza Nuova, — just off the Corso 
 Palestra to the right, a block farther west, — used for 
 the fruit and vegetable market. Here the scene was 
 
 ' Evelyn, Diary and Letters. — Here stood the workshop of the re- 
 nowned armorer, Maso of Brescia; who is supposed to have wrought the 
 very fine chain shirt in which Tito Melema sought to save his life. 
 (flomola.) 
 
436 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 more medieval: two- and three-storied, old stucco 
 houses surrounded the village of canvas-roofed booths, 
 glaring in the sun, thronged with chattering, gesticu- 
 lating people; the strange, large chimneys again sur- 
 mounted the eaves, and at the west end rose a pretty 
 marble fountain, bearing a shapely Cupid astride a 
 dolphin. Behind this loomed a heavy rococo palace, 
 of stucco with painful ornamentations, — one of the 
 former residences of the Martinengo family, now 
 occupied by the city health- and police-offices. I 
 noticed some of the gendarmes, with costumes and 
 batons much like those of Udine. 
 
 Returning to the narrow Via delle Spaderie, I fol- 
 lowed its crowded arcades to Piazza Comune (or 
 Vecchia), where the arcades became two-storied and 
 monumental, — along its eastern end. Westward 
 before me stretched the paved open square, to a pa- 
 latial structure of such superb and dazzling beauty 
 that I stood rooted in surprise: a great mass of white 
 and silvery gray marbles flashed brilliantly the radiant 
 lines of arches, columns, pilasters, balustrades and 
 carved cornices, assembled in the glorious harmony of 
 the stately Renaissance, with a bewildering wealth of 
 sculpture. Majestically imposing in the colossal arches 
 and pillars, yet joyous and graceful in the countless 
 rich details, that did not overload the purity of design, 
 it glistened in the morning sunlight like an epitome 
 of the great classic revival. It was Brescia's far-famed 
 Palazzo Municipale, — one of the grandest efforts of 
 the Renaissance. 
 
 The general design is quite the same as many another 
 Municipio of the plain-towns, — the three ground- 
 floor arches, opening into the public loggia, and the 
 single upper story, pierced by three ornate windows; 
 but what a difference in the magnitude of the scale, — 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 437 
 
 the arches, and the Corinthian half-columns facing 
 their piers, rising to a height of thirty feet and more ; 
 the upper division towering twice as high again, far 
 above the five-storied buildings near. And what a 
 difference in the wealth of material and ornament: the 
 exquisite carved arabesques on the faces of the upper 
 pilasters; the convoluted foliage with charming puiti, 
 enriching the lovely frieze; the delicate, gleaming 
 balustrades upon the cornices; the finely sculptured 
 heads looking forth from apertures in the arch-span- 
 drils; the sculptured Cupids gracing the eaves; — all 
 conveyed to me a sense of enchantment, with the 
 silvery glowing tone of a picture by Moretto. 
 
 "La Loggia" — as the people like to call it — 
 though commenced by the architect Fromontone in 
 1492, under the orders of that magnificent builder, 
 Gian Galeazzo Visconti, reflects mostly the genius of 
 Sansovino; Palladio, too, modelled those beautiful 
 window-frames, with the unusual carved cornices. 
 The original design intended a dome upon the sum- 
 mit, — which there is talk of now adding. The great 
 hall upon which the windows opened, splendidly 
 decorated by Palladio, was celebrated as one of the 
 stateliest in Italy; but was unhappily destroyed by a 
 fire in 1575. 
 
 In the adjacent northwest angle of the piazza 
 I observed a curious house which they had once com- 
 menced to ornament in consonance with the palace, 
 but had evidently stopped at the second story, leaving 
 the upper bare stuccoed wall at a queer variance with 
 the stone pilasters, ornate cornice, and handsome pedi- 
 mented doorway below. Elsewhere handsome build- 
 ings surrounded the piazza with a fit frame. On the 
 south stood the long, three-storied palace, marble- 
 faced and well-proportioned, of the Monte di Piet4, 
 
438 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 having pleasing Renaissance windows and two monu- 
 mental, arched entrances. The eastern was framed by 
 Corinthian pilasters, the western similarly inclosed, 
 — with a double arcaded passage below, running most 
 gracefully on central Corinthian columns through to 
 a rear street; over it was a delightful colonnaded win- 
 dow, of seven arches on dainty marble shafts, sculpt- 
 ured roundabout with shields and arabesques. It 
 would be difficult to find anywhere a more delicious 
 bit of the Renaissance. 
 
 On the east side of the piazza, the lofty arcade, car- 
 ried upon white granite pillars, was adorned overhead 
 with panels of shining black marble, a clock-face in 
 the centre, and the municipal bell swinging openly 
 upon the roof, with the usual bronze hammer-bearers 
 to strike the hours. Again the loving imitation of St. 
 Mark. At the northeast corner a heavy, medieval, 
 stone fortress tower rose above the roofs, grimly battle- 
 mented; and below it stood Brescia's monument to the 
 heroes of the "Ten Days," showing the city as a 
 marble female crowning her sons. 
 
 I entered the loggia of the Municipio, which was 
 adorned simply with the fine, monolithic, supporting 
 columns, of Corinthian type, and a very lovely portal 
 with four small columns at the sides, having delicate 
 details of carved arabesques and serpentine medal- 
 lions. Through an atrium I reached the grand stair- 
 case of white stone, whose lofty roof was decorated 
 with modern stucco reliefs and paintings; it had a 
 beautiful balustrade, and marble paneling at the sides. 
 But all this was modern; the original stairway — 
 which mounted at each side of the atrium, and of 
 which I saw a remaining landing, broken off just 
 above the doorway — having been destroyed in the 
 fire of 1575. The great upper hall then extended all 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 439 
 
 the way back, over the well where this later staircase 
 now mounted in the rear. An attendant at its top 
 took me into the remaining half of the hall, in front; 
 though entirely denuded of its marbles, and in a chaotic 
 state of commenced renovation, the shapely, grouped, 
 brick columns around the walls suggested visions of 
 its former glory. These conceptions were proved 
 correct a moment later, when, in looking over the 
 offices partitioned o£E in the rear, I was shown a little 
 painting, representing the hall's original design and 
 appearance, of truly wonderful beauty; two other 
 paintings represented the plan of the domed fagade, 
 and the new hall now in process of construction. One 
 office had an elegant, painted, wooden ceiling, of Re- 
 naissance design, — put up immediately after the 
 fire. 
 
 On emerging I inspected the sides and back of the 
 palace, finding the unusual fact that the rich design 
 of the fagade had been carried entirely around, so 
 that every aspect presented the same sumptuous and 
 dazzling decoration of varied marbles; and the sides, 
 from their much longer sweep, produced a deeper 
 feeling of power and immensity. Italy has few struct- 
 ures so perfectly carried out and entirely harmonized. 
 
 Having now seen Brescia's capo di lavoro, I strolled 
 through the archway of the clock-tower, eastward for 
 a block, between closely set old stuccoed buildings, 
 and southward then, immediately into the vast and 
 stately Piazza delDuomo. On to the south it extended, 
 for two hundred yards, with a breadth of fully seventy 
 yards, to a handsome modern palace at the farther 
 end; picturesque old buildings, painted in softened 
 tints of brown, pink, ochre, and green, lined the western 
 side; on the left rose first the renowned Broletto, with 
 its diversified, Romanesque fagade, of fascinating in- 
 
440 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 terest; then the stupendous form of the Duomo Nuovo, 
 with its ponderous, Late-Renaissance, stone front and 
 soaring dome; and finally, the quaint, round building 
 of the Duomo Vecchio, looking very aged and ugly 
 in its rough-stone walls, beside the white magnificence 
 of its successor. 
 
 The huge Broletto, or old town-hall, I perceived 
 extended a long way north from the piazza, along the 
 narrow street issuing from that angle, and quite a dis- 
 tance to the east, along the street between it and the 
 Duomo Nuovo, — occupying thus a large block by 
 itself. It is famous as one of Italy's finest Roman- 
 esque buildings, abounding in varied, engaging de- 
 tails of many different generations. It has all the 
 force, dignity, and charming native developments of the 
 civic structures erected in those ages when the cities 
 were proud and glorious republics, not yet subjected 
 to the debasements of tyranny. Therefore, though 
 not so finished and perfectly beautiful as Gian Ga- 
 leazzo's Municipio, it possesses, instead, a sense of 
 stern power and grandeur, lightened by diverse de- 
 tails of exquisite loveliness, — with a pathos arising 
 from their manifestation of the victories won by those 
 remote artisans, struggling by patriotic inspiration to 
 overcome the difficulties of artistic ignorance. For it 
 is a work of artisans, with each generation building 
 differently from its predecessors, — rather than the 
 product of an architect's design; and so it expresses the 
 aspiring soul, the fiery spirit, of those long-gone people, 
 written here clearly in brick and stone, — the im- 
 perishable record of their struggles and slow advances. 
 
 "In no way" — wrote the learned Symonds — "is 
 the characteristic diversity of the Italian communities 
 so noticeable as in their buildings. Each district, each 
 town, has a well-defined peculiarity, reflecting the 
 
imESf'IA. PALAZZO MT-XICIFALE, (FRO.MENTONE DA IIRESCIA.) 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 441 
 
 specific qualities of the inhabitants and the conditions 
 under which they grew in culture." ^ 
 
 The Broletto was mostly built between 1187 and 
 1227, was continued in the quattrocento, and badly in- 
 jured by horrible rococo changes in the seicento; but a 
 restoration of the parts so mutilated had been recently 
 commenced, in the original style. Broadly speaking, 
 there were five different structures: the first on the 
 corner next the Duomo, of white stone, with a fine, 
 round-arched portal, a long, corbelled balcony, and a 
 series of triple, Romanesque, marble windows on the 
 second story, that were really the most beautiful fea- 
 ture of the whole building; — the triple round arches 
 resting upon coupled red-marble shafts, and all in- 
 closed within a large arch, recessed with mouldings. 
 Two of these windows adorned the f agade, the others ex- 
 tended all along the side toward the Duomo; some had 
 been barbarously closed up in the seventeenth century, 
 but were now being restored. The second part of the 
 f agade, proceeding northward, was a high square tower 
 of browned stone, unbroken, except for three loop- 
 holes, to its battlemented belfry; the third was a long 
 extent of gray stone, in the two lower stories, and of 
 red brick in the topmost, with irregularly scattered, 
 lovely, red-and-white windows, including several of 
 three and four lights, with white marble shafts ; all 
 the upper windows had originally been of that charm- 
 ing design,^ and will be so replaced; the southernmost 
 of those remaining, placed just over the arched entrance 
 to the courtyard, was the ancient ringhiera, from 
 
 1 J. A. Symonds, Fine Arts, chap. ii. 
 
 2 These exquisite specimens of native duecento work, among the hand- 
 somest to be found anywhere, have the voussoirs of their arches alternately 
 red and white; while the graceful slender columns of white marble are 
 coupled one behind the other, in pairs. 
 
442 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 which proclamations and addresses were made to the 
 assembled people for centuries. 
 
 Next came a striking composition of the quattro- 
 cento, in brick with terra-cotta decoration, — the 
 fagade of the abandoned Church of S. Agostino, once 
 a part of the Broletto: it had an interesting Gothic 
 doorway, with curious, medieval, stone lions' heads 
 projecting roundabout from the wall, a charming 
 cotta rose-window, and above that a fine pointed 
 window; — but all three were blocked up and spoiled. 
 Finally came a very early structure, on the corner, 
 and extending along the northern side, composed of 
 heterogeneous medieval materials and very homely, — 
 except for the shapely cotta frieze and cornice. Adja- 
 cent to this northwestern corner a tiny park stretched 
 up the first slope of the castle hill, — which here loomed 
 far overhead ; the fresh green of the few massed trees 
 and the shrubbery, inclosed between high old dwell- 
 ings, delighted my tired eyes; and before them I 
 noticed a marble statue gleaming, — a young soldier 
 of fiery air, with musket and powder-horn, but common 
 garments, and a face so inspired with patriotic fervor 
 that the figure seemed to speak before my very gaze. 
 It was Tito Speri, — fitly remembered here, at the 
 foot of that fortress which he led his fellow citizens to 
 assault, and on the very spot where occurred the 
 bloodiest struggle of the conflict. 
 
 Turning back, I entered the courtyard of the Bro- 
 letto, — a wide space arcaded on the north and east 
 sides, presenting another fanciful mixture of styles; 
 the northern arcade was two-storied and of Renais- 
 sance design, the eastern, Gothic; the original western 
 one had been built up; and the windows above were 
 scattered in picturesque irregularity and diversity, — 
 including three more, on the south side, of those lovely. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 443 
 
 Romanesque ones with three and four arches. Four 
 pairs of their coupled, red-marble shafts were prettily 
 twisted in spiral coils. The old stone walls had been 
 patched, blocked up and reopened, till they looked 
 much like a checker board. People were continually 
 passing in large numbers, using the court as a conduit 
 from one street to another; they stood in groups, 
 shouting at each other with an echoing din; vehicles 
 passed also, the drivers using the arcades for stalls, 
 and leading their horses to drink at the central 
 fountain. 
 
 I crossed to the eastern arcade, supported on heavy 
 stone piers, and found it double, with "another row of 
 piers running down the centre. . . . The groining has 
 transverse and diagonal ribs, the former being very 
 remarkable, and, as not unfrequently seen in good 
 Italian work, slightly ogeed." ^ This peculiarity struck 
 me, however, as quite unusual, especially in a cloister. 
 There was a long stately stone stairway here, which I 
 ascended to the first floor, and there inspected a num- 
 ber of courtrooms and council-chambers, filled with 
 the customary green baize tables; several of the rooms 
 on the south side retained the original early ceilings, 
 with frescoes in crumbling Renaissance designs; and 
 there were two of the original big Romanesque win- 
 dows. But I have seldom seen dingier furniture than 
 that which disgraced these public apartments. 
 
 I next repaired to the Duomo Nuovo, whose white 
 rococo fagade, erected about 1600, is more imposing 
 than pleasing; it is in two divisions, with Corinthian 
 half -columns and pilasters for ornament; there are 
 three ugly squared doorways, and one upper window; 
 enormous as the dome is, — third largest in all Italy, 
 — it is concealed from the front by the lofty gable. 
 
 ' Street, Brick and Marble in the Middle Ages. 
 
444 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Like the Municipio, no expense has been spared in 
 carrying the same wealth of material and decoration 
 around the sides and rear. The adjacent old cathe- 
 dral, called from its shape "La Rotonda," dated orig- 
 inally from the seventh century; but in its present 
 form is of the tenth or eleventh, — as the medieval 
 walls of rough stone bear witness. 
 
 Its large central drum is pierced by a row of round- 
 arched windows near the top, is decorated with Lom- 
 bard pilaster-strips, and an arcaded cornice, and sur- 
 rounded by a one-story lean-to, in which opens the 
 main portal, of rococo design; a subsidiary entrance is 
 in the northwest side. This latter is of brick, round- 
 arched, with an old fresco of the Madonna and Saints 
 in its lunette, and opens upon a railed area eight feet 
 below, reached by steps from the street, — showing 
 how much the street level has risen since the build- 
 ing's erection. Eight feet in eight centuries, — slowly, 
 imperceptibly, by the mere bringing of country mud on 
 horses' hoofs and the deposit of waste; such was the 
 inevitable consequence of the old method of throwing 
 all garbage into the unpaved streets, — which buried 
 all the ancient cities so far beneath our levels. 
 
 It was now afternoon, and the cathedrals were both 
 closed for the siesta hour; but on another day I en- 
 tered the Duomo Nuovo, and stood surprised in its 
 vast, majestic interior, shaped like a Greek cross, 
 dwarfing all things with its far-off vaulting and stu- 
 pendous dome. The dimensions were not only magni- 
 ficent, but in perfect proportions, and all in light 
 hues. The enormous white piers separating nave from 
 aisles were adorned with Corinthian half-columns and 
 pilasters, rising to a rich frieze and cornice; the barrel- 
 vaulting of creamy stucco carried boldly decorated 
 ribs; around the great drum, in its flood of light, rose 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 445 
 
 other pilasters and cornices, terminating in the dome 
 that soared wonderfully to heaven. 
 
 By the first two piers stood modern monuments to 
 deceased bishops, with some of the excellent sculpture 
 of recent days; and over the second altar to the right 
 
 — affixed, like the others, directly to the side wall — 
 stood another and very striking modern work, a mag- 
 nificent Renaissance paZa-frame, of four huge gilded 
 columns upholding a gilded entablature, embellished 
 with two marble statues. It contained a painting by 
 Gregoletti, of Christ healing the sick. Next to this 
 came a genuine Renaissance work, of exceeding at- 
 tractiveness : an exquisitely carved marble sarcopha- 
 gus, crowned by three statuettes, and cut upon the 
 front side with three panels of reliefs, containing many 
 small figures of fine execution and dramatic action, 
 
 — scenes from the lives of the saints whose bodies 
 lay within; these were Saints Apollonius and Philas- 
 trus, — early Bishops of Brescia. 
 
 After one more look about the colossal edifice, re- 
 flecting how superior it was in luminosity and grace to 
 the Duomo of Florence, — which is of much the same 
 size and general plan, — I followed the guiding sac- 
 ristan down a passage to the right, descending a flight 
 of steps, into the presbytery of the Duomo Vecchio. 
 The circular nave of the tenth century lay still lower, 
 surrounded by eight heavy piers bearing rounded 
 arches, all of bare rough stone, likewise the wall above 
 them, in which the series of unframed windows ad- 
 mitted the light. Behind the piers circled an ambu- 
 latory, somewhat higher, — in which I was shown a 
 remaining section of the frescoes, coeval with the build- 
 ing, that once covered its vaulted roof; they were per- 
 fectly Byzantine, exactly like mosaic in design and 
 effect. Real, modern mosaic covered the floor of the 
 
446 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 nave; but the sacristan lifted a trap-door, displaying 
 a piece of the original pavement, one thousand years 
 old.i 
 
 Upon the west side of the ambulatory, adjacent to 
 the seldom used main entrance, I saw two fragments of 
 the old stairways, supported on heavy columns against 
 the wall, which once mounted to the tower there, 
 that was demolished in 1708. The ambulatory further 
 contained some interesting early tombs and reliefs; 
 chief among them, the magnificent red-marble tomb 
 of Bishop Berardo Maggi, dated 1308. On the cover 
 of the sarcophagus lies the Bishop in full robes, with 
 mitre and crozier, — the four Evangelists, in minia- 
 ture, sitting at his head and feet; also at the head and 
 feet, in separate niches, are the two martyred bishops, 
 Apollonius and Philastrus, and the two protecting 
 saints of Brescia, Faustinus and Jovita. Behind the 
 reclining form winds a most quaint procession of little 
 figures, — the priests who composed the decedent's 
 funeral cortege, carrying all the picturesque parapher- 
 nalia of the epoch. On the sides are St. George and 
 the dragon. Saints Peter and Paul, and an extraordi- 
 nary large tableau of the decedent being first received 
 into a monastery, showing the friars headed by their 
 abbot, the friends and relatives, and two of the monks 
 administering the oath to the novice. The artist was 
 probably Ugo da Campione, and it is one of his 
 finest works. 
 
 ' Among the innumerable grand pageants and historic ceremonies that 
 have been enacted on that pavement, — for every civic act of medieval 
 days was consecrated by the Church, — we may note the momentous 
 occasion of May 80, 1431, when, Brescia having been at last occupied by 
 Venice, and Filippo Visconti straining every resource to recover the city, 
 amid a gorgeous concourse of all her notabilities the already beloved 
 "standard of San Marco was solemnly consigned to Carmagnola; — and 
 he took the field in force." — Brown, Studies in the History of Venice. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 447 
 
 Faustinus and Jovita, of whom the Brescians think 
 so very highly, were brothers, natives of the city, 
 who were converted by that same St. Apollonius, and 
 devoted their property and lives to well-doing; but 
 being finally accused of the crime of Christianity, 
 which they admitted and refused to recant, they were 
 thrown to the IJons, — who of course declined to injure 
 them, — and were then beheaded. A curious tenth- 
 century relief of St. Apollonius adorned the wall near 
 the tomb. On the east side of the ambulatory were a 
 very lifelike and graceful trecento relief of the Ma- 
 donna, and two more interesting tombs: that of 
 Bishop Lambertino di Bologna, of 1349, having the 
 customary recumbent figure on the top, and the 
 Madonna with seven standing saints upon the front; 
 and another of 1479, in a niche having an elegant 
 marble Renaissance frame. 
 
 Here steps ascended from the rotonda to the am- 
 bulatory and from the latter to the presbytery, — 
 which was remarkably wide, and was added consider- 
 ably later, together with the long choir and apse. 
 Upon the apse wall hung Moretto's splendid As- 
 sumption of the Virgin, — whose noble, majestic 
 figure, seldom equalled in gracious dignity, hovers in 
 clouds amidst lovely child-angels, above the apostles 
 grouped in attitudes of amazement. The tone was 
 luxurious, golden above and silvery below, and the 
 whole effect superbly brilliant. At its sides hung two 
 Romaninos, of his poorer quality, suffering sadly by 
 the comparison; but below it was a sublime master- 
 piece of Palma Vecchio's, an Adoration of the Shep- 
 herds, of a grandeur of composition and figures, a 
 magnificence of tone, coloring, and luminous, golden 
 atmosphere, that exalt the observer instantly into a 
 celestial sphere. The Virgin with her Infant sits at 
 
448 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 the right, the Shepherds kneel at the left, and behind 
 them stretches a lustrous landscape, with flocks of sheep 
 and stately trees dotting the near velvety sward, 
 and mighty mountains looming blue in the distance. 
 It is indeed impossible to conceive anything more 
 beautiful than Palma's best works. 
 
 Here also was an alleged Giorgione, a Christ falling 
 under the Cross, which is certainly not the product of 
 that master, though indeed very rich in hue and glow. 
 And in a chapel to the right of the choir, having a 
 cinquecento marble railing, adorned with six charm- 
 ing putti, I saw five more Morettos, — a large canvas 
 of Elias sleeping in the Wilderness, with a child-angel 
 bringing food, and four small paintings of the Evan- 
 gelists. Here was another Romanino, — a group of 
 people at table, dispensing charity. In the chapel on 
 the left is hidden a supposed piece of the true Cross, 
 — which is exhibited once every ten years, when the 
 people become frantic with excitement; .their perfect 
 credulity is sometimes rather pitiful. 
 
 The crypt below the choir and presbytery follows 
 their shape, with twenty columns from ancient Ro- 
 man edifices, of every size and form, arranged in sev- 
 eral rows; their capitals are partially Roman, partially 
 work of the fourth and fifth centuries, — when this 
 Church of S. Filastro.was constructed. Over the altar, 
 where SS. Filastro and ApoUonio were formerly buried, 
 is an almost destroyed fresco of that same period, re- 
 presenting the Saviour and the two saints, in classic 
 embroidered robes of many colors. I could with 
 difficulty realize that I looked upon a painting exe- 
 cuted in the days of Constantino or Theodosius.i 
 
 ' This extraordinary relic of Imperial days, though undoubtedly re- 
 touched at a later epoch, shows that even before the coming of Byzantine 
 art Roman painting, already thoroughly decadent, had commenced to run 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 449 
 
 On the second morning of my stay I visited the 
 Piazza della Posta, in the rear of the Broletto, com- 
 manding a fair view of the overshadowing castle- 
 hill, with its long green slope extensively covered with 
 trees, and at the summit a large building of rough 
 stone, flanked by towers. This I knew was the main 
 structure of the ancient fortress, which the Austrians 
 had built over, and used as a prison for the patriots. 
 On the piazza's eastern side lay the central post-office, 
 also the building of the Queriniana Library, dating 
 from 1750, containing a number of rare old manu- 
 scripts (including Dante and Petrarch), medieval 
 tomes illustrated with miniatures, and other books of 
 the ninth and tenth centuries; but its best treasures 
 have been transported to the Museo Medievale. 
 
 Proceeding a couple of blocks eastward, I came to 
 the Piazza del Museo, long and narrow, occupying the 
 centre of the ancient forum; and looking down it from 
 the first slope of the hillside, as of old, stood the re- 
 constructed Temple of Hercules. Advancing near, I 
 saw that its remaining original materials consisted of 
 the high stone steps, their flanking parapets of un- 
 faced brick, the bases and lower portions of nine of 
 the ten great Corinthian columns, one entire column, 
 and the major part of the brick wall of the cellce, — 
 from which, as elsewhere, the marble had been taken. 
 The fragmentary columns had been recently finished, 
 the walls of the cellce completed, and a new roof super- 
 imposed; so that the exterior appearance, save for the 
 marble facing, was as gracefully impressive as eighteen 
 centuries ago.^ 
 
 into those stiff, angular, lifeless moulds, of conventional efiSgies, which 
 were all that could be produced by the mosaics of the succeeding centuries. 
 But there is here, in the richly embroidered garments, a fascinating hint of 
 the art's preceding powers. 
 1 When Vespasian in 69 arrived with his army from the East, marching 
 
450 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 How strange it was to walk up these same worn steps 
 that such numberless Roman sandals had ascended in 
 that long-ago. Here were the same three doorways 
 (with modern frames) , and behind them the same three 
 lofty cellcE, where the ancients prayed and sacrificed 
 to the gods. The central, larger chamber, on whose 
 rear platform had stood the statue of Hercules, even 
 retained a part of its original mosaic flooring, roped 
 off in the middle, adorned with fine figures of ani- 
 mal life. Around the walls of all three rooms were 
 placed Roman remains of sculpture and architecture, ^ 
 glass and earthenware, coins and bronzes, including 
 some fragments of the huge image of Hercules, bits 
 of the temple's beautiful entablature, and a few hand- 
 some pieces of Roman armor. 
 
 1 But the most celebrated object of this "Museo Ci- 
 vico Eta Romana" was its marvelous bronze figure of 
 a female charioteer, over life-size, called the "Statue 
 of Victory," — which occupied the centre of the left 
 chamber. Her form is superbly modeled in the best 
 Greek style, clad only in a thin clinging robe, whose 
 
 along the Subalpine Road, Brescia gave him a hearty welcome; and sent 
 her militia to aid his general. Ant. Primo, in the assault and capture of 
 Cremona, — the last stronghold of Vitellius. In remembrance thereof, 
 Vespasian, the following year, ordered the erection of this splendid temple 
 at the head of the Brescian forum, and its rich decoration also, at his own 
 expense. Hence the name by which it has ever been commonly known, — 
 the Temple of Vespasian. 
 
 ' This celebrated collection demonstrates in two ways the size and 
 magnificence of ancient Brescia: firstly, by its remains of so many distinct- 
 ive buildings of high class, — palaces, porticoes, temples, monuments, 
 etc., — discovered in all parts of the modern city, and extensively in the 
 surrounding fields; secondly, by its remarkable aggregation of tablets and 
 other inscriptions, worthy of the deepest study, whose words substantiate 
 not only the grandeur of the Roman town, but also its importance, — as 
 reflected in the numerous visits recorded of emperors and other exalted 
 personages, and their many decrees and acts for the municipality's benefit. 
 — As further evidence there is the interesting series of fragments of splen- 
 did mosaic pavements, clearly from public edifices of the highest rank. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 451 
 
 loose folds are girded naturally about the hips, — and 
 which is fastened together upon the shoulders, with 
 the right fastening slipped down upon the arm; the 
 hair is bound about the temples with a fillet, and 
 the back provided with wings, — which the Greeks 
 seem to have given to their goddess Nike; the left 
 foot is slightly raised upon a block, the lovely head 
 turned slightly to the left, and the arms extended in 
 the same direction, with fingers flexed as if grasping 
 the reins. For long after her discovery in 1826, this 
 attitude was thought explained by placing the left 
 upper hand on the top of a shield, whose bottom 
 rested upon the hip, and putting a crayon in the lower 
 right hand, as if she were writing upon the shield. 
 But recently it has been discovered (why not long 
 ago, I cannot imagine) that the glance from under her 
 lowered brows is directed keenly at some point a little 
 distant on her left, and of nearly the same height, also 
 that her hands are more naturally shaped to hold a 
 pair of reins than a shield and pencil. It is indubitable : 
 she was standing in a chariot, driving, with her eyes 
 upon the horses' heads, the reins passing first through 
 her upper hand and secondly through her right. If 
 the whole biga was of the same superlative excellence 
 as this inspiring charioteer, what a wonderful sight 
 it must have been ! She has all the dignity, grace, and 
 power of an Olympian goddess; and is rightly placed 
 among the half dozen greatest remaining statues of 
 antiquity. 
 
 Two other relics of the forum exist: one, a Corinth- 
 ian column with a fragment of its entablature, and its 
 base approached by steps, located in an excavation 
 on the east side of the piazza, about fifteen feet below 
 the level of the street, — showing that the forum's 
 pavement was that much lower than the present; 
 
452 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 this was clearly a portico, such as surrounded all the 
 imperial forums. The other relic consists of some lofty 
 columns embedded in a house wall, — somewhat to the 
 south of the modern piazza, in the right-hand street 
 leaving its bottom, — which have been identified as a 
 part of the Roman Curia. In the same neighborhood 
 I found another, unidentified bit of ancient architect- 
 ure, likewise built into a wall, and likewise caUing 
 to mind, by its hint of stately colonnades, porticoes, 
 and temples, how magnificent this spot must oncehave 
 been.i It was enough to make one sigh, to look around 
 at the present shabby, ugly buildings and dingy, nar- 
 row streets. 
 
 How had there come so vast a change? Not through 
 the abused barbarians, says the modern critic;'' — 
 although Alaric in 401 threw down the walls of that 
 superb ancient city, and ruined many buildings in his 
 sack, while Attila in 450 repeated the process. The 
 greatest destruction ensued gradually in the following 
 centuries, when through the changes in laws, customs 
 and habits of thought under the Lombard rule, the 
 impoverished and oppressed citizens abandoned their 
 old amusements, and allowed the theatres, temples 
 and public edifices to fall together into ruin. Then 
 began their steady spoliation for the building of habi- 
 tations, and the erection by the nobles of their palace- 
 
 ' All these various remains, says Dr. Giovanni Labus in his fine work on 
 the Vari Monumenti Antichi in Brescia, "record many great and majestic 
 edifices; amongst which were a theatre, also an amphitheatre, . . . and a 
 most imposing temple, indicated by a mighty column discovered in the 
 garden of Count Luzzago." A part of the foundations of the great theatre 
 has been found in the yard of the building directly east of the Temple of 
 Hercules, — lately used as a barrack, and therefore very diflBcult of access; 
 as was to be expected, the ancients had made use of' the hillside for that 
 purpose. The amphitheatre, by equal custom, lay out upon the plain, 
 beyond the southern walls. 
 
 * Dr. Giovanni Labus, idem. 
 
BRESCIA THE BRAVE 453 
 
 fortresses. The disastrous fires of 776 and 1097, and 
 the violent earthquakes of 1117 and 1212, completed 
 the destruction; for after each catastrophe, there was 
 no quarry so handy as the stones of the Roman ruins. 
 The wonder is, then, that the drum of a single column 
 yet remains on its original spot, to remind us of the 
 vanished magnificence and glory of Brescia Augusta. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 BRESCIA LA FEEBEA 
 
 Yet not in vain, although in vain, 
 O men of Brescia, on the day 
 Of loss past hope, I heard you say 
 Your welcome to the noble pain. — 
 
 Ah ! not for idle hatred, not 
 For honor, fame, nor self-applause. 
 But for the glory of the cause 
 You did what will not be forgot. 
 
 — Akthub Clough. 
 
 From ancient Brescia I advanced to medieval Brescia, 
 by leaving the old forum for the group of churches a 
 block farther east, — in one of which is located her 
 Museo Medievale. This is the desecrated edifice of 
 S. Giulia, a little to the left, upon the east side of 
 the next street, Via Gambara, and at the very foot 
 of the castle hill. The street which I was following. 
 Via Santa Giulia, runs east and west at the bottom 
 of the slope; and here, in this angle between the two 
 ways. King Desiderius erected the great convent of S. 
 Giulia, a large block of buildings now containing three 
 churches, — S. Salvatore, S. Giulia, and S. Maria del 
 Solario.^ The last faces upon Via S. Giulia a little 
 
 ' This was done by the King partly as a religious offering, partly for the 
 sake of his daughter Ansilperga, who wished to take the veil. Accordingly 
 she became the first Abbess of the convent, choosing Santa Giulia for its 
 patron, and surrounding herself with a following of noble maidens from the 
 highest Lombard aristocracy. To females of such birth the convent was 
 thereafter always restricted, causing it to be considered, until its closure, 
 one of the two or three most select in Europe. Its wealth was in accord- 
 ance, for Desiderius had most richly endowed it. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 455 
 
 beyond the corner; S. Salvatore lies behind S. Giulia, 
 at a lower level. The convent is abolished now, its 
 two oldest churches kept only as antiquities, and the 
 third given over to the uses of the museum. 
 
 S. Giulia was too recent to serve as an antique, 
 having been constructed in the fifteenth and sixteenth 
 centuries ; and accordingly I found its f agade to be of 
 Renaissance design, surprisingly handsome, all in 
 gleaming white stone. It had two lofty divisions, both 
 adorned with fine Corinthian pilasters, and sur- 
 mounted by a gable. Entering by a side passage, on 
 showing my governmental pass I was admitted by the 
 custode to the spacious interior. Here a unique sight 
 confronted me: a wide, high-arched nave without 
 aisles, columns, or transept, with a choir of the same 
 width and height, and an intervening presbytery 
 marked by two triumphal arches; the plastered walls 
 and ceiling of the choir being covered with huge glis- 
 tening frescoes, vividly colored; while the whole space 
 was filled from end to end with monuments, statuary, 
 showcases, weapons, armor, ivory carvings, architect- 
 ural fragments, bronzes, — a vast collection of objets 
 d'art of every size and kind, all products of the "Dark 
 Ages," and demonstrating how far from dark they 
 really were. 
 
 The choir, built first as a church in itself, about 1466, 
 carried three curious stucco arches on each side wall, 
 inclosing altars; the nave, built in 1599, carried a hand- 
 some stone frieze and cornice roundabout, sustained 
 by Corinthian pilasters ascending between its side 
 altar places. I first examined the vivid, retouched 
 frescoes of the choir, finding the side recesses also 
 completely painted with scenes, — on the back walls, 
 lateral spaces, soffits, and wall above, — all exceedingly 
 bright, dramatic, and picturesque; these were works 
 
456 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 of Ferramola, Zoppo, and the younger Foppa, — thus 
 varying from quattrocento simplicity to cinquecento 
 freedom. The abundant retouching had greatly ob- 
 scured the original mannerisms; but the pictures were 
 still interesting, and the tout ensemble presented a more 
 brilliant effect than any of like nature I had found. 
 
 The work on the right was Zoppo's, — and the 
 poorest, — consisting of scenes from the Passion ; 
 that in the first two recesses on the left was Ferra- 
 mola's, mostly ruined by the "restorer," but includ- 
 ing a Deposition finely composed and full of feeling; 
 that on the end wall was Foppa's, and much the best, 
 consisting of a huge Crucifixion, with eight small 
 tableaux at the sides, and below. The Crucifixion 
 was an excellent picture, not retouched, being strongly 
 spaced and disposed, and quietly colored, with well- 
 drawn figures of considerable grace and expression, 
 and an originally fine background and sky-effect. The 
 paintings on the upper side-walls, above the archways, 
 were better preserved, and generally better done, than 
 those below them; they were entirely from the New 
 Testament; but their authorship is uncertainly scat- 
 tered amongst the three artists and their pupils. 
 
 The third archway on the left contained something, 
 however, that was more beautiful and impressive than 
 all the brush work, — the magnificent marble mauso- 
 leum of Count Marcantonio Martinengo : a celebrated 
 cinquecento sculpture, among the richest in North 
 Italy. It was in the accepted form of a sarcophagus 
 raised upon columns, which rested upon an ornamental 
 base; but in this instance it backed against the wall, 
 leaving but three sides exposed, with pilasters corre- 
 lating to the four columns in front; and its height was 
 unusual, being fully ten feet. The exuberant and 
 fanciful decoration of the cinquecento covered every- 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 457 
 
 thing with richest reliefs, — columns, base, pilasters, 
 back panels, entablature, and sarcophagus; the frieze 
 was of bronze plates, with a great many little figures 
 in procession; five large square plates adorned the 
 sarcophagus, showing scenes from the Passion; three 
 round ones decorated the rear panels, and a number 
 of little round ones the bases of the columns; — but 
 seventeen altogether of these bronze pieces still re- 
 mained in France, whither they had been carried 
 in the wars. 
 
 Those returned to their places are the best work of 
 the monument, especially the scene of the Scourging, 
 — and the populace fleeing from a plague, upon the 
 frieze. Further lustre is added to the tomb by the 
 varied colors of the marbles, — white above, gray in 
 the entablature, white in the capitals and the plinths 
 of the columns and pilasters (these plinths are cut 
 with mermaids at the angles), and silvery gray again 
 in the shafts and bases. Charming arabesques are 
 relieved upon the white rear panels, and draped about 
 the columns and pilasters; and the circular bronze 
 plaques in the bases of the latter bear fascinating little 
 groups, of two to four figures each. At the end of an 
 hour's inspection, I kept finding new delightful de- 
 tails that had yet escaped me. Unfortunately, the 
 worker of this masterpiece is unknown. 
 
 A whole day could comfortably be spent in examin- 
 ing the treasures that crowd these wonderful halls. 
 Prominent among them I noticed a remarkable Dutch 
 seicento ivory sculpture, half life-size, placed in the 
 presbytery, — representing very realistically the Sacri- 
 fice of Abraham; foremost in the nave were some cases 
 of Lombard jeweled work, including the renowned 
 Cross of Galla Placidia, about four feet high, Greek in 
 shape, made of wood covered with silver and embossed 
 
458 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 with two hundred and twelve different antique gems 
 and cameos. These stones were mainly of large size, 
 of every ancient epoch and origin, and studded both 
 the sides very closely. At the centre of one side was 
 a wooden, gilded, archaic figure of the throned Christ, 
 and at the other, a Crucifix. The crudeness of the 
 Christ, and of the cuttings of some of the gems done 
 at that period, — the very mountings of the stones, 
 in clumsy bands of silver, all showed the artistic dark- 
 ness of the makers. 
 
 But most interesting of all, and, in fact, one of the 
 half-dozen most interesting relics of North Italy, was 
 the aureographic miniature at the bottom of one side, 
 showing with a startling lifelikeness, fairly photo- 
 graphic, a young mother with her two children. Here 
 I was looking upon persons dead fourteen centuries, 
 — historically famous persons, — Galla Placidia her- 
 self, with her young son Valentinian III, and her 
 daughter Honoria! It was indeed startling, to have 
 these royal personages suddenly emerge from the far- 
 off, classic age of Rome, — which has left us no other 
 such photographic likenesses, — and look one as nat- 
 urally in the face, garbed with simple costumes, as if 
 they were alive to-day. It seemed incredible that I 
 could really be beholding ancient Romans, — in a 
 picture of their own mystical era. Upon the dark 
 circle of the glass, the three busts appeared looking 
 out at me, — Placidia and her young son of seven 
 or eight years seated in front, Honoria standing in 
 the rear; they were clad, as I have said, ia the very 
 simplest of garments, which rather accentuated the 
 homeliness of their elongated features; the females 
 wore a sort of pompadour roll, brushed from their high 
 foreheads, and Placidia had also a pearl necklace about 
 her throat, and pearl pendants in her ears. In coloring 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 459 
 
 and faithfulness to nature, it was quite like a daguerreo- 
 type of sixty years ago.^ 
 
 Placidia was the daughter of Theodosius the Great, 
 reared with every advantage of education and accom- 
 plishment; and when at his death the Empire was 
 definitely divided between her brothers Arcadius and 
 Honorius, she accompanied the latter to his Roman 
 throne. Then came Alaric, with his three successive 
 sieges of the Capital, — upon whose surrender Placi- 
 dia became a Gothic captive, compelled to follow about 
 Italy in their train. The cowardly Honorius had taken 
 refuge in Ravenna. His sister, then about twenty 
 years of age, must have had greater charms than are 
 shown in this likeness of the woman of thirty-five, for 
 she soon fascinated Adolphus, the brother-in-law and 
 brilliant general of Alaric; and when Adolphus became 
 King of the Visigoths, at Alaric's death soon after- 
 ward, Placidia married him, despite the thunders of 
 the Emperor. 
 
 ' This wonderful aureograph was executed for Placidia, about 425, by 
 Bonnerio, a Greek artificer, probably domiciled at Ravenna, where she was 
 reigning. From her it passed into the possession of the cathedral treasury 
 there; where it still lay when King Desiderius, two centuries later, placed 
 a prelate favorite of his, one Michele, on the vacant archiepiscopal throne 
 by force of arms. Michele in return stripped the treasury of its choicest 
 valuables for a thank-offering to the King, including amongst them the 
 Cross of Placidia, and many of the other jewels now exposed in the Mu- 
 seum. Desiderius, doubtless stricken by superstitious fears, soon turned 
 over the valuables so earned to his daughter Ansilperga, as Abbess of S. 
 Giulia, — thinking thus to make his peace with an offended Heaven. The 
 Cross and jewels then remained in the treasury of the convent until the 
 dissolution of the latter, when they became the property of the munici- 
 pality of Brescia. — Bonnerio, says Sig. Odorici, "extended over the round 
 glass a gold leaf, and upon that, with most subtle skill, by the sti'okes and 
 points of a pen outlined these portraits. The gems represented he then 
 worked in silver; leaving us his own name in the gold, he removed the 
 superfluity of the leaf, and covered the work with a dark-blue tinting. 
 There resulted distinct gradations of the chiaroscuro, the variety of acces- 
 sories, the most delicate shades of the imperceptible mezzotints." — Storie 
 Bresciane (sopra). 
 
460 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Adolphus then became reconciled with Honorius, 
 and led his barbarian host, as Roman general-in-chief, 
 to bring back the rebellious Gauls to their allegiance. 
 His queen accompanied him, and at Narbonne, accord- 
 ing to Gothic custom, their delayed wedding-feast was 
 celebrated upon the first anniversary of their nup- 
 tials. Adolphus made his gift to the bride in the shape 
 of "fifty beautiful youths, in silken robes, [who] car- 
 ried a basin in each hand; and one of these basins was 
 filled with pieces of gold, the other with precious 
 stones of an inestimable value."^ This vast wealth of 
 gems was "an inconsiderable portion" of the endless 
 treasures seized by the barbarians in Italy, where 
 the gold and precious stones of the world had been 
 accumulating for four hundred years, drawn by the 
 conquerors from every country. An indescribable 
 sensation seized me as I realized that these very 
 gems before me, which had been Placidia's, must have 
 come to her in those same basins from Adolphus. 
 What stranger and more intimate contact with the 
 remote past could there be, than this lifting of its 
 veil for an instant's revelation. 
 
 But when the Goths had subjugated Gaul, and ad- 
 vanced into Spain for a similar purpose, Placidia's 
 troubles began: her first child died, Adolphus was 
 assassinated, and his widow — "dragged in chains by 
 his insulting assassin." ^ The latter was also murdered, 
 after seven days; Wallia became king, and consented 
 to a treaty with Honorius by which his sister was re- 
 turned to him. She arrived joyfully at Ravenna, only 
 to find that a new marriage for her had already been 
 arranged, — with the Roman general, Constantius. 
 Placidia, resisting, was forced to yield; but she soon 
 came to love her manly husband, and bore him the 
 * Gibbon, vol. iii, chap. xxxi. ' Gibbon, vol. m, chap, xxxiii. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 461 
 
 two children now before me. Again misfortune came, 
 with the death of Constantius, and a subsequent quar- 
 rel with Honorius; which obliged Placidia and her 
 children to seek a refuge in Constantinople, with her 
 nephew Theodosius the younger. 
 
 The death of Honorius followed, and Theodosius 
 by force of arms seated the child Valentinian III on 
 the Western throne, with his mother Placidia as regent. 
 Valentinian was then six years of age, so this por- 
 trait must have been executed within a year or two 
 afterward. He grew up a dissolute, weak youth, leav- 
 ing the reins of government to his mother, who held 
 them amidst ever increasing anxieties and dangers, 
 for twenty-five years. The Goths, the Vandals, and 
 the Huns pressed her territories more firmly upon 
 every side; and internal rebellions added to the con- 
 stant ferment. Spain and Africa were lost, the north- 
 ern provinces overrun. Amidst it all, Placidia's trou- 
 bles were aggravated by the conduct of her daughter. 
 This pure-eyed Honoria whom I looked upon, only 
 four or five years later, at sixteen years of age, yielded 
 to the illicit love of the chamberlain Eugenius; upon 
 its discovery the shame of the royal family became 
 published to all the world, and Honoria was imprisoned 
 for fourteen years in the Court of Constantinople. 
 At last in despair she made secret advances to Attila, 
 King of the Huns, who had once desired her; upon the 
 discovery of this offense she was returned in horror to 
 Italy, and "the ceremony of marriage was performed 
 with some obscure and nominal husband, before she 
 was immured in a perpetual prison."^ Attila again 
 demanded her as his bride; and she would eventually 
 have been given up to him, for the safety of Italy, 
 had he not suddenly expired in the arms of a new addi- 
 > Gibbon, vol. ni, chap. xxxv. 
 
462 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tion to his countless wives, — just as Honoria was 
 about to be taken from her prison. She therefore occu- 
 pied it until her death. 
 
 Placidia died in 450, worn out by all her sorrows 
 and anxieties, leaving Italy to the hands of the worth- 
 less Valentinian, who hurried the country to its doom. 
 Incapable of gratitude or forethought, he murdered 
 with his own hand, out of jealousy, the only man who 
 could have preserved his kingdom from the encroach- 
 ing barbarians, and who had acted as such preserver 
 for twenty years, — his general, Aetius. This deed he 
 followed with the violation of the wife of the promin- 
 ent Senator, Maximus. The latter took his revenge; 
 and only five 'years after Placidia's death her son fell 
 under the swords of assassins, leaving Rome to the ter- 
 rible sack of Genseric and the Vandals, three months 
 later. Such was the miserable fate of these innocent 
 children that I gazed upon. 
 
 I turned my eyes to the examination of the other 
 exhibits. There were handsome faience and majolica, 
 statuettes, bronzes, Venetian glass and enamel, medal- 
 lions and coins, niello work and Limoges enamel, 
 marble sculpture and reliefs, — every sort of artistic 
 workmanship, of the medieval and Early-Renaissance 
 eras; perhaps most pleasing of all to me were the 
 ivory carvings, of that delicacy and quaint grace in 
 (vhich the Late-Roman and Middle Ages excelled. 
 Amongst these was prominent the so-called "Lip- 
 sanoteca," a cross-shaped reliquary of the fourth 
 century, covered with remarkably lifelike figures, well 
 disposed in natural, easy, dramatic action; also, the 
 three extraordinary diptychs, — one of the fourth 
 century (the "Querinianum"), with figures of truly 
 wonderful modeling and beauty, and two of the sixth 
 century (the "Boethius" and "Lampadius"), of 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 463 
 
 which the former showed much decadence, and the 
 latter was almost crude. 
 
 From the choir, — near a cinquecento lecturn of 
 beautiful carving and tarsia, and a long case laden 
 with medieval choirbooks having exquisite minia- 
 tures, — I had looked through a barred opening next 
 the floor, into a much lower stone hall with rows of 
 ancient columns. On now descending a flight of stairs, 
 this hall proved to be the nave of S. Salvatore. The 
 eighth-century structure of King Desiderius had been 
 recently restored from a crumbling condition, leaving 
 the old Roman columns where they had been, five on 
 one side and seven on the other, diverse in size and 
 shape and capitals. After S. Michele of Pavia, this is 
 the oldest standing church of the Lombards in its 
 original state. In the end wall opened a low recess 
 that once contained the high-altar; and under this lay 
 a crypt containing more ancient columns, thirty-six 
 in number, smaller than those above, but quite ridicu- 
 lously variegated, and set astonishingly close together. 
 
 I observed some neglected, decaying frescoes here: 
 to the right in the antechamber, several by Romanino, 
 mostly destroyed; on the entrance wall of the nave and 
 in a denuded chapel to the left, a number by Foppa 
 and his pupils, — including some charming scattered 
 angels here and there, flying aimlessly, and a Cruci- 
 fixion of superior grace and quality. To the right 
 opened another little, dark, bare room, in which I stood 
 for a while gazing with an unavoidable feeling of sad- 
 ness at a slab in its flagged floor; for under that had 
 once been laid to rest, so long ago as to be almost 
 entirely forgotten, that unfortunate woman, Desid- 
 erata (also called Ermengarda), the sister of Ansil- 
 perga the first Abbess, and the daughter of Desiderius, 
 the last Lombard King, who consented to be a sacrifice 
 
464 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 to save her country, but was spurned and sent home 
 again by Charlemagne.^ The war then resulted which 
 ended in the destruction of her father's realm. How 
 near it was all brought by this physical contact; what 
 a dreary, desolated resting-place was this for the wife 
 of Charlemagne, — but yet how consonant with the 
 dissolution of her family and race! 
 
 The last of the three convent churches now drew 
 my attention, — S. Maria del Solario, whose fagade 
 of the twelfth century proved to be most extraordin- 
 ary: it was built of huge Roman blocks taken from 
 ancient edifices, as the fragmentary Latin inscriptions 
 showed; and the lofty bare wall was pierced only with 
 a left-hand doorway and two tiny barred windows on 
 the ground story, and two larger but simple windows 
 on the second story. The only ornamentation was a 
 Lombard frieze and string-course; and at the top rose 
 a Romanesque octagonal drum, having a colonnaded 
 window of six lights in its front side. The custodian 
 of the museum, who kept also the key to this church, 
 and had therefore accompanied me, now extended the 
 information that the prison-like openings of the ground 
 floor formerly gave light to the convent's treasure- 
 chamber, and that the church was upon the floor 
 above. 
 
 We entered and ascended the old worn stairs, while 
 I reflected how strange it felt to be climbing to a 
 church located like a bedchamber. Its interior was 
 still stranger : square in shape, of medium size, with its 
 plastered walls broken only by three round arches on 
 the east side, for altars, and by the two little windows 
 on the south side, and covered overhead with a wide 
 
 ' The reason for this famous divorce, though ascribed by several of the 
 old chroniclers to the physical condition of the unfortunate woman, has 
 ever been shrouded in a peculiar mystery. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 465 
 
 flat dome, — it yet gleamed and flashed with a thou- 
 sand bright tints radiating from every wall and arch- 
 way, which moved with countless vivid, life-size fig- 
 ures, arranged in groups and large scenes, from New 
 Testament history. The effect to a stranger entering 
 was startling. These frescoes, said the custode, were 
 the work of Bernardino Luini, the Milanese, and his 
 followers, between 1513 and 1518; and the graceful 
 figures, so remarkably preserved in the freshness of 
 their gay coloring, bore out the statement with their 
 Leonardesque faces. Yet the absence of any genius, 
 or even high ability, indicated that if Luini took the 
 contract, and made the designs, the brushwork must 
 have been entirely by his pupils. 
 
 The three altar-recesses contained two groups of 
 Madonna and Saints, and a group of monks; over 
 them was a large Crucifixion, of superior quality; on 
 the left wall, below, were four panels from the life of 
 S. Giulia, and above them, a huge Last Supper; the 
 right wall, from bottom to top, held a group of saints, 
 a Conversion of St. Paul, and Christ bearing the Cross. 
 All the pictures were principally distinguished for 
 their strong free spacing, and their graceful figures, 
 draped finely in garments of striking hue; being thus 
 very decorative, — though neither dramatic nor of 
 much feeling. My thoughts turned involuntarily upon 
 the twenty generations of sombre nuns that had wor- 
 shiped in this chamber, — until Napoleon suppressed 
 the convent in 1797; and upon the countenances of 
 lofty rank that had been hidden behind all those com- 
 mon veils. Seven queens had been among them, and 
 one hundred and nine princesses; while the rest had 
 been daughters of the highest nobility. Yet their life 
 was not hard, for they had to wait upon them numer- 
 ous humble serving women of the lay-sister class. 
 
466 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Another walk through this eastern quarter took me 
 first to the Church of S. Clemente, a little to the south 
 of Piazza del Museo, facing north upon a narrow lane 
 named after it. The fagade was one of those Late- 
 Renaissance, stucco creations, with stone trimmings; 
 the interior was a dark basilica without aisles or tran- 
 sept, but with a large chapel at the end, whence 
 Moretto's great canvas of Madonna and Saints glowed 
 down from the high-altar with a brilliancy that dis- 
 pelled the gloom; and from the side altars glistened, 
 in beautiful tones, four other Moretto masterpieces, 
 — which join in making the place a monument to his 
 genius. I know but few other churches so entirely 
 given over to the glory of a single artist of the first rank. 
 
 On the -first altar to the left stood the remarkable 
 picture of St. Ursula and her Virgins, of life-size, — 
 the lovely form of the saint in the centre, holding in 
 one hand the banner of the Church, a crown of gold 
 and jewels upon her head, her eyes directed sadly but 
 sweetly to the danger concealed upon the right; it is 
 a scene of brighter tone and stronger lighting than was 
 usual with Moretto. Over the second altar I saw the 
 Madonna with Saints Catherine of Siena and Cather- 
 ine of Alexandria, seated aloft upon a high stone altar 
 draped with a handsome rug, and Saints Jerome and 
 Paul standing below, — the scene darkly toned, the 
 colors faded, the lustre lingering only in the silken 
 sheen of the Madonna's light blue robe, and the chief 
 beauty resting in her charming, expressive face. Over 
 the third altar I observed Christ in glory with the 
 Cross, and Abraham and Melchizedek below, the priest 
 handing the warrior bread and wine; these forms were 
 also life-size and powerful; and in the dark gray tone, 
 without light or color, the strongly modeled figure 
 of the Christ looked very melancholy. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 467 
 
 Opposite on the right side, over the second altar, 
 glowed Moretto's famous composition of Saints 
 Cecilia, Agnes, Agatha, Lucia, and Barbara, — five 
 rounded female figures, taken from the same model, 
 of exquisite grace and pensiveness, very naturally 
 composed; again, however, the coloring was lost, and 
 the tone gray and cold, without effective background. 
 The greatest work of them all was the high-altar piece, 
 of the Madonna in glory above three standing male 
 saints, and two female saints seated at the lower cor- 
 ners, within an architectural hemicycle, — the Ma- 
 donna carrying her Child and surrounded by putti; 
 a most brightly hued, luminous, and blissful scene, 
 with effective light and shadow, grace of form and 
 arrangement, and an expression of deep feeling. 
 
 From this church I passed to another two blocks 
 farther east, S. Maria Calchera, containing important 
 examples of both of Brescia's great masters, — behind 
 a stucco fagade of rococo ugliness. The interior was 
 also rococo, overladen with offensive stucco ornament- 
 ation, — a nave of two domes without aisles or tran- 
 sept, having stucco pilasters rising between the side 
 altars, to a very rich cornice, with the only light com- 
 ing dimly from top windows on the right. Over the 
 first altar to the left stood Moretto's wonderful picture 
 of Christ at dinner with Simon, and Mary bathing his 
 feet, — of great naturalness in the persons, postures, 
 expressions, and accessories, in a dusky atmosphere 
 and dim light; though the colors again had faded, the 
 deep feeling in Mary's agonized, penitent face and 
 Christ's benevolent, Jewish features, together with the 
 realism of the garments, table, and in fact the whole 
 setting, made an appeal of profound emotion. 
 
 Second to the right was a Romanino of best quality, 
 St. ApoUonius blessing the Host, between four persons 
 
468 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 on each side, two kneeling, all richly clothed in green 
 and gold, and executed with pleasing flesh-work and 
 accessories; the saint, facing outward, was backed by 
 a low altar carrying a painting of the Pieta, which was 
 cleverly differentiated from the reality. In a little 
 chapel on the right I found another, small Moretto, — 
 the dead Christ on his tomb, at the foot of the Cross, 
 with Saints Dorothea and Jerome kneeling by it; 
 much damaged, but still full of grace and sentiment. 
 Behind the high-altar rose a Visitation, of life-size, 
 containing a number of spectators watching the per- 
 formance, including a charming Brescian girl in 
 cinquecento costume; this was one of the canvases 
 painted for Brescia by Calisto Piazza of Lodi, during 
 a visit of some duration. 
 
 The street running along the northern side of this 
 church, Via Trieste, is the main thoroughfare of the 
 eastern section, extending from Piazza del Duomo to 
 the sole eastern gate. Porta Venezia. As I followed 
 it eastward, it soon opened on the left into the vast 
 Mercato Nuovo, whose tree-lined, sunny quadrangle, 
 then deserted, is regularly crowded by the stalls of 
 produce and herds of animals. Another block to the 
 east opened the Mercato dei Grani, just within the 
 gate, in whose centre loomed Brescia's modern monu- 
 ment to her great son of long ago, — Arnold the Free- 
 thinker. Upon a handsome, two-storied pedestal of 
 stone, faced with four remarkable bronze tablets, 
 showing dramatic scenes from the friar's life in high- 
 relief, — rose his heroic bronze figure in the attitude 
 of preaching. To the left of it was a tiny park, upon 
 the embankment of the old city wall, from which were 
 visible the picturesque green hillsides stretching to 
 north and east from their adjacent angle, covered 
 richly with vineyards and lines of cypresses, dotted 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 469 
 
 with glistening villas in hues of pink, brown, white, 
 and yellow. Outside the gate, an avenue of splendid 
 horse-chestnut trees extended straightaway to the far 
 southeast, its hard white road lined on one side by a 
 steam tramway, — the highway to Verona, the famous, 
 ancient Via Subalpina. 
 
 Turning back along the Corso Magenta for a way, 
 and then southward along the Via Arsenale, which 
 runs from Piazza del Museo, I reached the Piazza 
 Moretto in the southeastern corner of the city, — 
 so called from the modern bronze monument to the 
 master in its centre. It is a striking work: at the foot 
 of a high white-granite pedestal sits the bronze female 
 figure of Fame, reading her book, and on the top stands 
 Moretto, in cinquecento long-hose, doublet, cloak, and 
 velvet cap, — a handsome figure, of heroic size, with 
 palette in one hand and brush in the other. It has a fit 
 location: for directly behind stands the large Palazzo 
 Martinengo, containing the city's picture-gallery of 
 the same name; the palace was devised for that pur- 
 pose by the Count's will in 1887, — a noble life ending 
 with a noble deed.^ On the piazza's south side rises 
 the Church of S. Afra, facing westward upon the street 
 with a front of ugly stucco. 
 
 S. Afra is renowned in Brescia for its curious con- 
 struction — a later church upon an early one — and 
 for its paintings of the Venetian school. A double 
 flight of steps ascends some eight feet to the portal, 
 
 ^ "Moretto," says Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco, in her Loirv- 
 bard Studies, "did a great deal of work for different members of the family, 
 and decorated several of their houses. The Palazzo Martinengo della 
 Fabbrica [also at Brescia] contains frescoes by him, showing eight fair 
 daughters of a Count Martinengo with their favorite dogs." These fres- 
 coes, covering the four sides of one large room, are beautiful beyond words; 
 their backgrounds filled with exquisite landscapes of flowered parterres 
 and castled hills, before which sit the lovely girls, on marble parapets 
 draped with Oriental rugs. 
 
470 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 under whose landing a barred window permits one 
 a sight of the dusky, columned, lower edifice, like a 
 cellar. It is over a thousand years old; the upper edi- 
 fice was built in 1580, and I found it, therefore, of fair 
 Renaissance lines, the nave bordered by Renaissance 
 pillars and arches, which divided off the aisles. But 
 the immediate impression came from the vast crowd 
 of frescoes that glistened from the sides of the pil- 
 lars, the sides and soffits of the arches, the wall spaces, 
 and the ceiling, — innumerable designs of arabesques, 
 intertwined with musical instruments, and pink putti 
 scrambling up and down the pillars, also interspersed 
 with figured scenes in panels; the colors, though much 
 faded, still showing a hundred gay tints, that fairly 
 showered down from every side. 
 
 Over the second altar to the left, affixed to the wall 
 of the aisle, glowed one of Paolo Veronese's rich com- 
 binations of color, — a Martyrdom of S. Afra: upon a 
 platform amidst an eager crowd of people, backed by 
 classic buildings, kneeled the saint in an incongruous 
 ball-dress of white satin, heavily embroidered, — a 
 lovely form, with uplifted, rapt expression on the vir- 
 ginal face, which strongly contrasted with the dark, 
 rough executioner who seized her. Behind the high- 
 altar hung a most extraordinary Tintoretto, of glisten- 
 ing blue tone and flooded light from an open sky, 
 in which Christ was ascending between Moses and 
 Elijah, borne upwards by fluttering putti, — while the 
 three apostles were visible below on the mountain- 
 top, amazed and fearful; the garments were bright- 
 hued, and between the two groups rolled the light-blue 
 clouds, shot with glittering sunrays. Who would have 
 dreamt that this could have been painted by the som- 
 bre master of darkness and shadow, who composed 
 the dusky canvases of the Scuola S. Rocco, who filled 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 471 
 
 all Venice with his gloomy, tragic pictures, — who 
 was the apostle of uncolored realism and the drama, 
 opposed to the beauty of gay hues. This very paint- 
 ing of his own hands gainsays his creed : in spite of its 
 flood of light and bright colors, it is dramatic, power- 
 ful, impressive; while its loveliness strikes a chord of 
 heavenly music. 
 
 Over the south doorway, finally, hung Titian's 
 splendid picture of the Woman taken in Adultery, — 
 in half -figures, as so often with his designs; that of the 
 Saviour being a great conception, full of beauty, mild- 
 ness, and stern majesty commingled, a celestial power 
 shining in his radiant face as He reproves the evil 
 elders crowding round; the woman herself is very fair 
 and penitent; there is a depth to the golden tone, the 
 sumptuous coloring, and the atmosphere, that fills 
 the scene with awe. — A sobbing startled me as I gazed, 
 — a miserable, tearful sobbing, from a rent heart. I 
 looked around, and in the shadows of the adjacent 
 altar recess beheld dimly two aged peasant women, 
 kneeling to a mummified corpse exposed behind a glass 
 front; to this alleged relic of some saint they were 
 mumbling beseeching prayers with outstretched 
 hands, while tears fell down the furrowed cheeks and 
 choked their utterance. Some deep disaster threat- 
 ened them, — the note of it was in their cries. The 
 solace of the Roman Church to such poor souls struck 
 me with a new force; ignorant beyond our conception, 
 correspondingly credulous, they would draw from the 
 supposed powers of that body a comfort that no spirit- 
 ual communion could give them, and go homeward 
 with a new peace and hope. 
 
 Westward from the Piazza Moretto the Via Moretto 
 extends across the city, parallel with Corso Zanar- 
 delli, on its south. Leaving my examination of the 
 
472 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 massed treasures of the Galleria Martinengo until I 
 should have seen all the scattered paintings of the 
 churches, I followed this street, so pleasantly named, 
 to the Church of S. Alessandro at the next corner. It 
 has a plain, stuccoed front, of Renaissance details in 
 pilasters and cornice, a basilica-interior, with arched, 
 ribbed ceiling painted yellow, and four altars recessed 
 in each wall, separated by Corinthian three-quarter 
 columns of roseate marble. It is remarkable for a fine 
 specimen of that rare old master, Civerchio, on the 
 second altar to the right, — a Pieta upon wood, some- 
 what faded, but still of warm tone and atmosphere, 
 with ungraceful figures possessing the artist's peculiar 
 charm and expressiveness. The Madonna holds her 
 dead Son, the Magdalen his feet, and roundabout 
 stand Saints Paul, Michael, and another, backed by 
 the Cross-laden hill of Calvary. Hare claims this to 
 be an Umbrian work. But the predelle are unmistak- 
 ably Civerchio's, showing scenes from the Passion and 
 the Resurrection which are of high finish and strongly 
 spaced, effective grouping, with wide landscapes of 
 excellent perspective, and delightful, warm coloring. 
 
 Adjacent, first on the right, I observed another 
 pleasing quattrocento work, a beautiful Annunciation 
 by Frate Michelangiolo da Piacenza, in an exquisite 
 Gothic frame; the minute and loving care of the min- 
 iaturist was visible in the fine texture, pattern, and 
 embroidery of the robes of cloth-of-gold. Five still 
 earlier pictures, by another hand, covered the predelle, 
 — very charming scenes, from the life of the Virgin, 
 of distinguished ability for the period. Fourth on the 
 same side was a strong pala by Gambara, of the man- 
 acled Christ crowned with thorns, with a bended head 
 of noble, harrowing expression; and under it was a 
 very graceful little marble Pieta, in relief, endowed 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 473 
 
 with much sentiment, by an unknown artist of the 
 same period. 
 
 Two blocks to the north of this and half a block to 
 the east, I found the Palazzo Tosio, — another noble 
 mansion devised some time ago to the city, with its 
 comprehensive collections of art, but now of compar- 
 atively little interest on account of the removal of its 
 Old Masters to the Galleria Martinengo. The marbles 
 of first rank were also transferred. I was shown over a 
 large suite of rooms on the piano nobile, handsomely 
 decorated in Late-Renaissance styles, containing mod- 
 ern paintings and sculptures; among those ornamented 
 in white-and-gold were a curious hall at the west end, 
 lighted only from a sky-light, adorned with white 
 Doric columns, having its walls entirely covered with 
 little landscapes, — some of them very good; and an 
 oval chamber near by, very tasteful and pretty, con- 
 taining two large, blue Sevres vases, edged with gold, 
 which were given by Napoleon III to Count Tosio; 
 these were unusually interesting, because painted on 
 their sides with excellent likenesses of the Emperor 
 and his lovely young bride, Eugenie. 
 
 Opposite this palace, at number 19, I had through 
 an open gateway a delicious vision of the long-gone 
 past: down a luxuriant green vista of shrubs and trees, 
 and over a high brick wall, I saw a beautiful old 
 Gothic colonnade, with one of its arches crowned by a 
 marble goddess; and there, above the shady greenery 
 of the garden, two persons were walking, — gray- 
 haired tutor and handsome youth, arguing some re- 
 condite point, looking as if they had stepped from a 
 page of Boccaccio. 
 
 In visiting the west side of the city I divided it into 
 two parts, — the first south of Corso Palestra, con- 
 taining three important churches close together, the 
 
474 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 second north of the Corso, containing palaces of in- 
 terest as well as churches. The latter walk I took first, 
 starting from the Corso up Via Dolzani, the continua- 
 tion of Corso Vittorio Emanuele. Here I came im- 
 mediately to Palazzo Masperi, another former resi- 
 dence of the Martinengo family, celebrated as the 
 most striking private palace in Brescia. It is a nar- 
 row, three-storied Renaissance structure, covered with 
 exuberant decoration like an edifice of fairyland, — 
 sculptured door-jambs and cornices, beautiful triple 
 windows, side windows with baroque cornices, a richly 
 carved balcony, an elaborate string-course, and above 
 all, a wonderful sculptured frieze, of arabesques with 
 gamboling amorini. 
 
 A little to the west, in the adjacent Via del Palazzo 
 Vecchio, I passed another famous old Brescian man- 
 sion, the Palazzo Calzavellio, — its vast stuccoed 
 fagade containing a splendid Renaissance doorway, 
 in a frame of fluted Corinthian pilasters, with a hand- 
 some double-window above it, heavy marble balconies, 
 and faint traces of extensive frescoes that once cov- 
 ered the wide spaces between the windows. Such a 
 construction was designed for the frescoes, — with a 
 broad painted frieze above them. Close by on the 
 opposite side was a fine example of the modernized 
 Renaissance palace, with rebuilt, imposing portal and 
 corniced windows; and at the angle of the next street- 
 crossing, loomed another huge, stuccoed palazzo, with 
 a Renaissance balcony of enormous dimensions. It is 
 an unceasing wonder, what a modern, small family 
 can do with these giant residences; in large part, as a 
 fact, they showed evidences of being deserted. 
 
 Northward up the Via della Pace from this corner, 
 past a gigantic, brick church-f agade with a great stone 
 portal, and another vast palace, of rococo design, I 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 475 
 
 reached, at the angle with the Corso Garibaldi, the 
 strange stone tower called the Torre della Pallata, 
 which is visible from all over the city. It is square in 
 shape, about fifty feet thicks built of heavy stone 
 blocks, with buttresses at the corners and giant bat- 
 tlements on the lofty summit, — as curious a relic of 
 medieval days as could be found anywhere. Some of 
 the blocks in the spreading base measure four feet by 
 two; the west side of it is decorated with a large 
 ornamental fountain of baroque style, sporting a 
 Triton blowing twin trumpets, some reclining divini- 
 ties, and a Goddess of Plenty seated at the top. 
 
 The broad thoroughfare of Corso Garibaldi evenly 
 bisects the western part of the city, running from 
 Piazza del Comune to the only western gate, in the 
 centre of the western wall, — Porta Milano; the Torre 
 della Pallata stands just halfway between those ex- 
 tremities. Proceeding westward now upon the Corso, 
 
 — which is quite modern in appearance and business, 
 
 — and passing a fine Palladian stone palace upon the 
 right, containing a grand, columned loggia of two sto- 
 ries, — I came eventually to a wide piazza before the 
 Porta Milano, having an old bastion of the city wall 
 upon the south. The present gate consisted of two 
 square low buildings with Doric porticoes, guarding 
 the street where it crossed, by a modern bridge, the 
 medieval fosse. In the piazza rose an equestrian 
 bronze statue of the Liberator, with a superb bronze 
 lion at bay on the front of the pedestal. 
 
 One block to the northeast, upon the Via S. Rocco, 
 which parallels Corso Garibaldi, I found the interest- 
 ing Church of S. Maria delle Grazie. In its plain 
 stuccoed fagade there was an earlier Gothic portal, 
 with almost indistinguishable, antique lions, and a 
 quattrocento relief of Madonna and Saints in the 
 
476 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 lunette. Entering by another doorway at the left, 
 I stood, to my surprise, in a delightful Early-Renais- 
 sance cloister, at the side of the church, consisting of 
 two little paved courts, divided and surrounded by 
 colonnades. A door in its left corridor opened into a 
 modern pilgrimage sanctuary; and the walls of all the 
 corridors were hung with the quaint gifts of success- 
 ful pilgrims, mostly rude pictures of scenes of sickness, 
 accident, and healing, harrowing in their eflFect. 
 
 The dark sanctuary, gleaming faintly with burning 
 lamps swung from chains, consisted of a three-sided 
 gallery inclosing a lower shrine, which contained the 
 altar with the saintly relics; alternate pillars and col- 
 umns, fluted and spiral, with inset colored marbles, 
 sustained the rounded arches of the gallery; under 
 the latter hung the lamps, diffusing a deep golden 
 glamour upon the successive frescoes of the outer wall. 
 These, though modern, were designed and softly tinted 
 in trecento style, with gilded figures outlined against 
 dusky backgrounds. The gilding and coloring, the 
 richly veined marble on every side, the incense-laden 
 dusk, the golden lamplight, all combined to produce 
 that exotic. Oriental effect, which appeals so strongly 
 to the sensuous nature of the Italians, and instantly 
 strikes the chords of their religious emotions. The 
 priests could devise no more successful means for 
 impressing the credulous devotees, and drawing the 
 silver from their pockets. 
 
 A side-doorway from the cloister admitted me to the 
 church, which was as dark and curious as the sanctuary; 
 the low-arched nave was flanked by columns, and still 
 lower aisles, having a flat dome above each bay of the 
 latter, and altars aflfixed directly to the walls; and over 
 every foot of surface rioted an awful scheme of stucco 
 reliefs, twisting over the vaulting, walls, arches, and 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 477 
 
 domes, — forced upon tlie attention by a barbaric gild- 
 ing. The vulgar effect was enhanced by the plaster 
 material of the arches and capitals, the common 
 black cloths draped around the columns and hang- 
 ing between them, edged with tinsel gilt fringe, and 
 the horrible scroll-like shields of arms attached to the 
 cloths, painted in gaudy gold and silver. Much as I 
 had seen of this vile sort of "decoration," this before 
 me was the worst yet found. I gladly turned away to 
 the pictures. 
 
 The best of them were a Foppa, of Madonna and 
 Saints, on the first altar to the left, — faded, dark 
 and colorless; and two Morettos, over the high altar 
 and in the chapel to the right of it. The first of the 
 latter, a Nativity, it was very difficult to observe; it 
 seemed to be different from the master's usual style, 
 with many figures in confused activity; the second 
 was most attractive, — a Madonna in glory, with 
 saints below, in a strange, rich, dark tone, from which 
 the three saints stood forth bathed in a silvery light, 
 splendidly portrayed, with a fine combination of vivid 
 realism, graceful dignity, and restful peace. 
 
 Continuing eastward along Via S. Rocco, I passed 
 on the left a palace with clear remains of cinquecento 
 frescoes, in many large panels, having figures of the 
 customary reddish-brown tint; — and finally reached, 
 just to the right in a side way, the renowned old 
 Church of S. Giovanni Evangelista. Its fagade of 
 rough brickwork held a simple Renaissance stone 
 portal; its dusky interior consisted of a nave and aisles, 
 — separated by piers faced with Corinthian half- 
 columns, upholding a plain cornice, with connecting 
 round arches, — and a large choir flanked by chapels. 
 The side chapels held some remarkable paintings: 
 a very beautiful Francia, — the Trinity adored by 
 
478 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 angels, first to the left, considered one of his few best 
 works; a Wedding of the Virgin by Romanino, fourth 
 on the left; and Moretto's animated Massacre of the 
 Innocents, third on the right, which is a harmony of 
 golden browns and light blues, in his "silvery" tone. 
 There was a second fine Moretto, in a magnificent 
 Renaissance frame behind the high-altar, — repre- 
 senting God the Father, the Madonna in clouds sur- 
 rounded by 'putti, and four saints below in a sunset 
 after-glow, — altogether of a dark tone and yet lumin- 
 ous beauty; and finally, there were the treasures of 
 the wonderful Cappella Corpus Domini, at the end 
 of the left aisle, — a precious shrine of Brescian art, 
 painted by Moretto and Romanino together. 
 
 Here was Civerchio's great Entombment, in a most 
 exquisitely carved and gilded Renaissance frame over 
 the altar, revealing at a glance the profound genius of 
 that master, — noble in conception, execution, action, 
 lifelikeness, and tender emotion. The Maries and the 
 Apostles are letting down the dead Saviour into the 
 sepulchre, slowly, gently, with heart-rending grief. — 
 On the right wall are five powerful Morettos : Elijah 
 in a dark and terrible wilderness, with an attending 
 angel of superhuman loveliness; the. Israelites collect- 
 ing manna; portrait figures of St. Mark and St. Luke; 
 and one of the grandest Last Suppers in existence, 
 superb in natural modeling, atmosphere, and tense 
 dramatic expression, — wanting only in the weakness 
 of the Christ. The sternness of these early works is 
 said to be due to Romanino's influence. Over them, 
 on the soffits of the side arch, Moretto also painted 
 six prophets. 
 
 The rest are Romanino's works: five correspond- 
 ing pictures on the opposite wall, six prophets above 
 them, and a beautiful Coronation of the Virgin in 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 479 
 
 the lunette over the altar, which is strongly com- 
 posed and drawn, with much majesty, grace, and indi- 
 vidual charm. This was my first revelation of his full 
 powers. His side paintings are less attractive: a Re- 
 surrection of Lazarus, Mary Magdalen before Christ, 
 Saints John and Matthew, and a family worshiping the 
 Sacrament. But altogether this little chapel contains 
 a glory of great brushwork, seldom equaled outside 
 of museums. 
 
 There remained one more large church in this quar- 
 ter, S. Maria del Carmine, a block and a half to the 
 north; but my visit to it did not require much time. 
 The only beauty in its rough brick fagade was a 
 curious marble portal, flanked with Renaissance col- 
 umns but recessed in Gothic fashion; the former 
 fresco in its lunette by Ferramola had disappeared. 
 Its lofty, spacious, bare interior — of nave and aisles 
 separated by stucco pillars, with Romanesque capi- 
 tals and round arches — contained no longer any 
 treasure of art. Foppa's ceiling-painting had also 
 lost all its value. Upon the walls and vaulting were 
 the ruined frescoes and the lingering remnants of 
 the arabesques, that once covered them from end to 
 end; and at the termination of the left aisle stood a 
 strange Calvary of painted plaster, in a cave dimly 
 lamplit, with life-size, mouthing figures. The apse wall 
 held a superb Renaissance frame, containing a badly 
 injured Annunciation, with a still lovely Madonna. 
 In all this ruin and echoing desolation 
 
 I felt like one who treads alone 
 
 Some banquet-hall deserted. 
 
 Whose lights are fled, whose garlands dead. 
 
 And all but he departed. 
 
 As I strolled back to the hotel, I noticed some wine- 
 presses being operated in the street that were of 
 
480 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 modern, mechanical make: a tub with a piston-cover 
 thrust downward by a screw, squeezing the juice out 
 of apertures at the bottom. Placed upon hand-carts, 
 they were being hauled from house to house, to press 
 each family's grapes at its own door; and the liquid 
 ran over the sides, along the gutters, staining them 
 red; — like Dickens's Paris of the Revolution. In 
 Verona (for it was now October) I had observed the 
 general use of the old-fashioned vats, likewise dragged 
 around upon carts, with ragged youths dancing bare- 
 foot upon the grapes. Chestnut roasters also now filled 
 the streets with their little charcoal ovens, radiating 
 appetizing odors; and venders of raw chestnuts and 
 walnuts spread their wares in piles, to dry, on strips 
 of canvas along the curb. 
 
 In the evening I usually repaired for my after-dinner 
 coffee to the caffes under the arcades across the way 
 from the hotel, which are frequented by the Brescian 
 ilite, and enlivened by the strains of a large orchestra. 
 Many of the company played cards regularly, with 
 those pasteboards so strange to Anglo-Saxon eyes, 
 upon which the suits are swords, sceptres, dies, etc., 
 and the royalties are creatures unrecognizable. So fond 
 are the people of music, that on coming out I never 
 failed to find a large crowd blocking the wide street, 
 listening in rapt silence to the orchestra within. Inter- 
 spersed between the caffes were the new features of 
 North Italian life, — American bars, in little rooms 
 where the beverages are taken standing, at cheaper 
 prices and without the necessity of tips; the drinks, 
 however, are as light as elsewhere, being coffee, na- 
 tive wines, beer, syrups, liqueurs, vermouth, bitters, 
 and various French and domestic appetizers and 
 apSritifs, of weird appearance and taste, but little 
 strength; only now and then is a glass of absinthe or 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 481 
 
 cognac sold, for the natives have no liking for strong 
 spirits. 
 
 Besides the several theatres roundabout, including 
 the opera-house, there were also half a dozen cine- 
 matograph shows, at which I passed an occasional 
 evening, and which were invariably crowded. Such 
 was the extent of the Brescians' dissipation. The 
 Corso Zanardelli, which they thought very cosmo- 
 politan in its arc-lights and few electric illumina- 
 tions, was already by eleven o'clock nearly deserted; 
 and before midnight the whole town was asleep. It 
 still exhibits all the old provincial peculiarities. The 
 shops, invariably little, are confined each to a sur- 
 prisingly narrow line; if one wishes to procure some 
 pins, he must, as elsewhere, hunt up the one place 
 where they are sold. Advertising is unheard of, or 
 any effort to increase trade. The little newspapers (?), 
 of two or four small sheets, contain very slight news 
 indeed of the outside world, and what there is, is gen- 
 erally copied from foreign journals and several days 
 old; their contents consist mainly of local happenings, 
 articles and letters written by ambitious local literati, 
 and poetic effusions. All speeches upon any occasion 
 whatsoever are carefully reported in full, and fulsome 
 obituary notices are a specialty. These last are also 
 posted all about the city, — together with notices and 
 addresses to the citizens, of every sort and subject. 
 One becomes accustomed to being startled by poster- 
 headings in large black letters, — "Citizens! Atten- 
 tion !" — or " Beware ! Fellow Citizens ! ' ' Every local 
 event, every election, every patriotic anniversary, is 
 preceded by a veritable war of placards between the 
 opposing parties. 
 
 When Ferrer was shot at Barcelona, the indignation 
 of the Socialistic masses broke out violently in North 
 
482 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Italy; the people filled the streets with noisy groups, 
 and fierce posters cried in mourning-black: "Lavora- 
 tori! — In segno di protesto contro 1' assassinio di 
 Francesco Ferrer! commesso dalla feroce reazione ges- 
 uitica spagnuola, poiche il lutto e di tutte le nazioni 
 civili, di tutti i popoli liberi che detestano le infamie 
 del dogma, Noi Vi Invitiamo — ad astenervi dal lavoro 
 nel pomeriggio di quest' oggi! [Signed] La Commis- 
 sione Esecutiva della Camera del Lavoro." ^ 
 
 And they did abstain from labor; the workmen 
 marched through the streets in a great procession, with 
 gloomy, defiant brows, shouting hoarsely for liberty: 
 "Down with the priests! Down with the Jesuits!" 
 — while the police accompanied them in nervous fear, 
 dreading every moment an attack upon the churches. 
 It was another demonstration of the ever increasing 
 Socialistic fervor of the Italian masses, — which will 
 end, who knows where? 
 
 Certainly this country is, in freedom of the person, 
 speech, and press, in the sacredness of property-rights, 
 in all that appertains to liberty, and popular rule, very 
 far advanced over Austria, — which is hated the more 
 for that very reason, — and in fact over all the Euro- 
 pean countries save France, the Lowlands, and Scan- 
 dinavia. Nowhere in the world, not even in England, 
 is there such general order, and absence of crimes upon 
 property and of premeditated violence, as in the Italy 
 of to-day. Burglary and highway robbery, for in- 
 stance, are now practically unknown. Nowhere in 
 the world is the person so perfectly safe, — if we omit 
 
 ' "Workmen! — In sign of protest against the assassination of Fran- 
 cesco Ferrer, committed by the ferocious Jesuitical reaction of the Span- 
 iards, since the grief is shared by all the civilized nations, by all free peo- 
 ples who detest the infamy of dogmatism. We invite You — to abstain from 
 work this afternoon! (Signed) The Executive Committee of the Chamber 
 of Labor." , 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 483 
 
 southern Italy, with its violence proceeding from pas- 
 sion. There is nothing more for the people to desire 
 unless it be a moderation of the too heavy taxes, or a 
 republican form of government; but the House of 
 Savoy has been too great a benefactor, — the King 
 is too noble, beloved, and thoroughly democratic in 
 his benevolence, to be placed on one side. 
 
 One morning I started out to visit the trio of south- 
 western churches, by taking a tramcar at the next 
 corner, which traversed the Corsos Palestra and Vit- 
 torio Emanuele to the station. The Brescian tram- 
 ways are quite like those of the other smaller cities, 
 — having little cars run by electric trolleys, and di- 
 vided by partitions into first- and second-class com- 
 partments; the fares are graduated according to the 
 class and distance, varying from two to five soldi,^ — 
 the most satisfactory of all methods; the cars do not 
 stop at every corner, but at certain equidistant points 
 marked by signboards, upon hail; and the passenger is 
 always furnished with a ticket upon paying, which he 
 is required to keep in sight, and which not only identi- 
 fies his payment but also the place at which he should 
 descend. Furthermore, the stubs of the tickets when 
 returned to the company's ofiice constitute an effect- 
 ual check upon the money received by the guards, 
 and render stealing impossible, — a safeguard which 
 American tramways have long vainly sought. 
 
 At Via S. Nazzaro, halfway to the gate, I descended 
 and walked a block to the west, reaching at the ad- 
 jacent corner the huge mass of SS. Nazzaro e Celso. 
 It is rather a modern church (1780), with a classic 
 stucco fagade, adorned by full-length, Corinthian 
 half -columns, a heavy cornice, and a gable surmounted 
 
 ' A soldo is practically equivalent to an American cent, or an English 
 halfpenny. 
 
484 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by half a dozen Berniniesque plaster statues. The 
 interior proved to be a spacious Renaissance basilica, 
 with an atrium separated from the nave by four mass- 
 ive Corinthian columns, shallow side chapels divided 
 by similar half-columns, and a slightly elevated choir 
 of the same width. From the apse wall a great canvas 
 by Titian radiated its refulgent glory over the whole 
 edifice, supplementing its pure, cold lines. 
 
 The atrium contained over the side entrances two 
 large works of Vincenzo Foppa, the scourging and 
 the beheading of Saints Nazzaro and Celso, of fairly 
 good anatomy and expression, but otherwise not at- 
 tractive; another Foppa, that once graced the organ 
 doors, lay in the sacristy, — an Annunciation, with 
 a Madonna of much sentiment. The Titian is a panel- 
 piece of five sections, in his wonderful warm tone and 
 golden light and flesh-work, of grand modeling and 
 lifelikeness, and exceeding grace; around the central 
 panel, of the Resurrection, are placed the separate 
 figures of St. George, Messer Averoldo the donor, and 
 St. Sebastian, — the latter form remarkable for its 
 solidity and writhing anguish (instead of the usual 
 absurd complacency) ; — and above them is a lovely 
 Annunciation with very noble forms. 
 
 Besides this work the church is renowned for four 
 superb and priceless Morettos: a silvery Coronation 
 of the Virgin, with four saints below, — a picture of 
 striking figures, gracefully composed before a delight- 
 ful landscape, but not so inspiring as tableaux of 
 deeper tone and color; a Christ in gloiy, surrounded 
 by 'putti, with two saints below, — more golden in 
 tone, but more crowded and disorderly; an Adoration 
 of the Child, whose chiaroscuro is so profound as to 
 leave visible only the shining Babe upon the ground, 
 with the dusky, kneeling forms of the Madonna, 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 485 
 
 Saints Nazzaro and Celso, St. Joseph, and several 
 others, while a flock of putti are dimly outlined behind, 
 — a charming scene, full of reverence, and happy, 
 stray glints of light upon faces and armor; lastly, in 
 the sacristy, a smaller Adoration upon wood, — of the 
 same darkness, with the last gleams of sunset visible 
 through a window, across distant mountains, — and 
 another Annunciation, of much sweetness, in separate 
 medallions at the sides. Adjacent hangs a Meeting of 
 Joachim and Elizabeth, in Moretto's style and color- 
 ing, and thought by many critics to be his product, 
 though it is not certain. 
 
 Almost opposite the fagade rises the large, preten- 
 tious Palazzo Fe, a very baroque, stucco building of 
 the same epoch. Returning to Corso Vittorio Eman- 
 uele, and proceeding northward, I came quickly to the 
 curious little Church of Madonna dei Miracoli. Its 
 rich front of the Early-Renaissance holds a most ex- 
 traordinary marble porch, — four advanced columns 
 upon a parapet, upholding a very broad entablature 
 topped by a curving gable, and all exquisitely carved 
 with a wealth of minute traceries astonishing to be- 
 hold; similarly carved are the faces of the four ad- 
 jacent pilasters on the fagade proper; seldom is there 
 to be found such a mass of beautiful, delicate detail. 
 
 As the interior was of no importance, I kept on 
 along the Corso, observing a fine Late-Renaissance 
 palace on the opposite side, impressive from the heavi- 
 ness of its columned window-frames and -cornices, sur- 
 mounted by large globes and busts; and turning to the 
 left, I reached in a few paces the great Church of S. 
 Francesco, which faces northward upon the Corso 
 Palestra. This fagade is of the Gothic period, built of 
 browned stone, having a simple portal, the remains of 
 an interesting, Gothic, terra-cotta frieze, and a beauti- 
 
486 PLAIN TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ful rose-window. The long, low, dark nave is flanked 
 by columns with Doric capitals and rounded arches, 
 and by aisles with chapels on the left side only. 
 
 There are four first-class paintings here, including 
 two of transcendent beauty: a Marriage of the Virgin 
 by the rare Francesco da Prato, first altar to the left, 
 — of fine golden tone and interior atmosphere, and a 
 Virgin with all the loveliness and bashful grace which 
 a bride should have; a detached fresco of the school of 
 Giotto, under glass, second on the right, — a Pietd, of 
 very deepest feeling, wonderful for its age; Moretto's 
 renowned group of Saints Margaret, Jerome, and Fran- 
 cis, standing in a portico with two putti hovering over- 
 head, — a scene of celestial peace and beauty; and 
 Romanino's sublime masterpiece of the Madonna and 
 Saints, blazing from its magnificent carved frame be- 
 hind the high-altar like a vision of heavenly glory. 
 The lovely, throned Madonna, exquisitely moulded 
 and poised, clad in a lustrous crimson robe, is holding 
 to her breast the Holy Child, while charming putti 
 flutter above; the Franciscan saints below are well- 
 balanced, nobly drawn, and gracefully expressive, in 
 the same gorgeous coloring; while the whole composi- 
 tion is backed by a sky of seductive blueness. A richer 
 glory of hues could not be found in all the Italian 
 schools. It is "the most celebrated and most Palm- 
 esque work of Romanino — grand in contrast of cowl 
 and frock — but still more grand in contrast of look 
 and expression." ^ 
 
 I had now wandered long enough through city 
 streets, and longed for a breath of the green nature 
 ever visible on the castle hill. The direct ascent leads 
 up from the little Piazza Tito Speri; the gradual one, 
 taken by the tramway, makes a three-quarter circle 
 
 ^ Crowe and Cavalcaselle. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 487 
 
 beginning at the northwest corner. But I first fol- 
 lowed a pleasant walk along the eastern flank, starting 
 from the converted Church of S. Giulia, and passing 
 immediately the very old, little edifice of S. Cristo, 
 perched to the left at the top of a long, walled incline. 
 I stopped to examine its curious fagade, constructed 
 half of white Roman blocks, upon some of which ro- 
 settes and other carvings could still be seen, and half 
 of stucco, and containing a Gothic rose-window, also a 
 Gothic frieze of terra-cotta plaques, glazed and col- 
 ored; the interesting early portal, framed by marble 
 pillars strangely cut with ancient reliefs of putti, 
 shields, vases, etc., had a lintel of a single, now broken, 
 stone, relieved with winged putti-heads, horns of plenty, 
 and a half -figure of Christ, — the Pagan and Christian 
 carvings thus being intermingled; while the lunette 
 held an early fresco of two prettily tinted angels. 
 
 The Via Gambara thence led me northward along 
 the slope, gradually rising, between green gardens 
 high upon the left and a charming little valley below 
 on the right, until I reached a small park at the north- 
 east shoulder of the hill, and at the angle of the city 
 wall. This wall ascended the valley, turned here, and 
 bore away westward along the top of the northern pre- 
 cipice of the hill, amalgamating finally with the castle 
 wall, frowning with towers. The paths of the little 
 park climbed upon the embankment at its angle, and 
 yielded pleasant views on every side; there were the 
 beautiful neighboring hill-slopes again, cypress- and 
 villa-crowned, the luxuriant plain, stretching south- 
 east into the haze of distance, and the northern valley, 
 once so fair, now belching smoke from a score of tall 
 chimneys, whose broad factories sparkled with hun- 
 dreds of windows. 
 
 But in them were the wealth and happiness of the 
 
488 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Brescia of to-day, — a more joyful sight to the native 
 than all the landscapes of Eden. Into such manufac- 
 turing has gone all the best and bluest blood of north- 
 ern Italy, the nobles turning their hands and old for- 
 tunes to a commerce no longer debasing, since it is the 
 sole means of regenerating their country; and in con- 
 sequence they are rebuilding the cities, and reaping for 
 themselves new fortunes of a surprising size. Hence 
 comes that unending stream of automobiles that cov- 
 ers the plain and assails the Alps in summer, to the 
 wonder of tourists, who know not that these modern 
 Lombards have made incomes of a hundred thousand 
 to five hundred thousand francs per year. 
 
 Luigi Villari has well expressed this change: "The 
 Lombard nobility is the most progressive section of 
 the Italian upper classes, and the richest. It is of 
 burgher origin, and . . . has taken the lead in the new 
 industrial and commercial movement. . . . Many of 
 the oldest names in the country are now connected 
 with silk factories, engineering works, and banks. 
 They are active, public-spirited, and exercise some 
 political influence." And again: "A new type of late 
 years has risen into prominence in Italian society, — 
 the man of business. The old Italian commercial 
 spirit has revived once more. — The typical uomo d' af- 
 fari is generally a Piedmontese or a Lombard. He is a 
 shrewd, intelligent person, educated perhaps in a Swiss 
 or a German commercial college, speaking several 
 languages, and ready on the spot whenever he sees a 
 market for his wares." ^ 
 
 Close by this corner stood the lonely church and 
 
 monastery buildings of S. Pietro, surrounded by trees. 
 
 The church had a peculiar f agade of stucco, painted in 
 
 imitation of an elaborate, stone, architectural design, 
 
 ' Luigi Villari, Italian Life in Town and Country. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 489 
 
 in which the real doorway and windows were given 
 fanciful deep frames. The monastery wall contained 
 a marble portal very prettily sculptured. I knocked 
 at this, and was admitted by a lay porter to two con- 
 nected Renaissance cloisters, the first containing a 
 charming marble well-top. Of all the Olivetans that 
 had walked and prayed here for centuries, but three 
 or four now remained. Turning into the church, I 
 found a handsome well-proportioned interior of gray 
 sandstone, erected by Sansovino, — with niches for 
 the side altars, divided by Corinthian pilasters inset 
 with imitation verde-antique medallions; while some 
 frescoes by Zoppo adorned the upper walls. 
 
 After this walk I visited the Galleria Martinengo. 
 Around its courtyard lie a number of ground-floor 
 rooms, not shown unless demanded, containing the 
 sculptures and casts from Palazzo Tosio; among them, 
 Thorvaldsen's two very lovely plaques of Night and 
 Day, Ferrari's powerful group after the Laocoon, Ba- 
 ruzzi's exquisite Silvia, seated upon the ground tying 
 her hair, Pampaloni's wonderful little praying girl, — 
 childish, upturned, sincere and trustful, that has been 
 so endlessly copied, — and some very pleasing plaster 
 compositions by recent Lombard sculptors. Mount- 
 ing the grand staircase, I came to the entrance hall of 
 the picture gallery, hung with the earlier Brescian 
 works; chief amongst them, Foppa's Last Supper, — 
 with the apostles, for once, properly seated around the 
 table, — and his lunette of Madonna and Child. 
 
 Then I entered the main room, upon the north side, 
 to be confronted at once by the masterpieces of the 
 school, — a room hung solidly with" great canvases, of 
 wondrous glow and coloring. Moretto's works here 
 are the grandest of his production, — including the 
 celebrated St, Nicholas presenting children to the 
 
490 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Madonna, the Madonna with two infants in glory and 
 four saints below, the Descent of the Holy Ghost, the 
 Adoration of the Child, the Christ at Emmaus, and 
 the St. Anthony enthroned; — all pictures of ideal 
 pietistic loveliness and expression. They are almost 
 entirely in his "silvery tone," illumined with soft and 
 richly gleaming hues; and the handsome figures, per- 
 fectly lifelike and gracefully posed, exhibit a full, 
 warm, rounded flesh-work which adds exceedingly to 
 the beauties of expression. 
 
 This appeared also a main characteristic of the Ro- 
 maninos present, which were otherwise much varied, 
 — according to his custom. Some were detached 
 frescoes, with figures too large for such a room, — 
 including a Christ at Emmaus with a very noble head. 
 Among his canvases were a Pietd, an Adoration of the 
 Child, — both very dark, — a Coronation of the Vir- 
 gin, of heroic size and very impressive, a weird Christ 
 bearing the Cross, clad in a white satin robe, and an 
 injured group of St. Paul with four other saints. 
 
 A few qther schools were represented, by several 
 striking works: a miniature procession on wood by 
 Mantegna, of extraordinary tinting, a wonderful 
 panel of the Madonna and two infants by Francia, 
 a damaged Madonna by the same, two of Moroni's 
 superb portraits, a lovely angel's head by Timoteo 
 Viti (?), a magnificent Adoration of the Child by 
 Lorenzo Lotto, gorgeously colored and finished, an 
 interesting Bearing of the Cross by the rare Marco 
 Palmesano da Forli, an Ecce Homo by Gian Bellini, 
 and finally, a marvelous little work of Raphael's, 
 representing the half-figure of Christ, showing at a 
 glance how far he surpassed all others in lifelike 
 moulding, golden fleshwork, and nameless grace. 
 
 In the adjacent third room there were a few more 
 
BRESCIA. THE CKuSS OF ST. HELENA. (L\ THE MUSEUM OF 
 CHRISTIAN ART.) 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 491 
 
 exceptional works, among a large number of average 
 merit: a Christ healing a blind man, by Barbieri, a 
 splendid triptych by Civerchio, — in which winged 
 putti were crowning S. Nicol6, with vivacious joy, — 
 and one of Savoldo's exquisitely beautiful composi- 
 tions, an Adoration, in the stable at night-time, with 
 a remarkable bluish moonlight effect seen through the 
 open window, silvering the distant streams and moun- 
 tains. The fourth room proved of little account; like- 
 wise the series of chambers on the other side, devoted 
 to engravings, drawings, etc. 
 
 That afternoon I climbed the castle hill, by the steep 
 footpath from Piazza Tito Speri at its southwest angle. 
 To the right, then to the left through a tunnel under 
 houses, and up a long flight of steps, — I reached the 
 first circling roadway of the park; straight ahead still, 
 over graveled paths, now ascending through the young 
 wood, now turning, twisting, mounting steps at inter- 
 vals, and winding again, — at last I emerged upon the 
 southwestern corner of the summit, which proved to 
 be surprisingly broad. There was room without the 
 great quadrilateral of the fortress for a wide shady 
 parkway and a stretch of turf; the old gray walls of 
 broken stone rose stout and high behind their moat, 
 looked over by varied buildings from the still higher 
 ground within. To the east appeared the citadel 
 proper, a ruined stone castle of shattered towers, 
 perched upon the loftiest point, inclosing the ga- 
 bled, barnlike structure which the AuStrians had 
 remodeled for their prison; on the left gleamed sev- 
 eral frightful new edifices of yellow stucco, hideous 
 in design, betraying by their "exposition style" that 
 Brescia had just been holding here some kind of 
 show. 
 
 The view outwardly from the corner was most ex- 
 
492 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tensive toward all but eastern points, being especially 
 fine of the city spread below and the busy northern 
 vale. After enjoying it, I entered the fortress by its 
 main portal in the middle of the southern wall; on 
 traversing whose deep dark archway, I stood in the 
 precincts so long hated, menacing, and inaccessible. 
 Pyramids of cannon-balls were reminders of those 
 days when thousands such were hurled upon the roofs 
 and streets below. Procuring an admission ticket at 
 the entrance, for the city's Museo del Risorgimento, 
 I was conducted past the new exhibition buildings, up 
 the farther height of the castle, — approaching the 
 latter on its western side. 
 
 On this small peak of the summit has stood the cita- 
 del of Brescia from the earliest known age; here the 
 Romans built their acropolis, and eventually adorned 
 it with a marble temple, whose massive columns and 
 gilded tiles flashed far and wide across the plain. ^ 
 The foundations of the later, medieval stronghold are 
 Roman. Even at this great height I found a moat 
 around it, necessarily dry, however, and crossed next 
 the southwest tower by a pair of the original draw- 
 bridges; the broader one, for carriages, was raised 
 against the wall; the slender one, for foot passengers, 
 was let down by the medieval balance-beam. In this 
 same grim, loop-holed round-tower, said my guide, 
 was first imprisoned Tito Speri. Inside the wall still 
 another ascent rose before me, between crumbling 
 stone buildings, to the supreme point where the tem- 
 ple had stood, one hundred and one metres above the 
 city streets, — now a bare spot with fragments of the 
 Roman foundations; the edifice was partly conserved 
 
 ' "The Brescians, also in this respect imitators of Rome, placed an altar 
 to the Genius of their Colony on the Campidoglio. Its base was discovered 
 in 1816." — Odorici, Storie Bresciane (aopra). 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 493 
 
 till modern times by reason of having been turned 
 into the early Church of S. Salvatore. 
 
 This was at the eastern side of the fortress; adjacent, 
 on the west of the open, rose the castle building proper, 
 with its rough gray walls; and the mighty round keep 
 of medieval days stood detached beside it. From its 
 lofty summit the white-coated foreigners used to watch 
 the plain, for signs of a rising against their tyranny. 
 Their gaze covered a wide tract of country; for in clear 
 weather the towers of Cremona and Piacenza are 
 visible to the south, — the latter fifty miles away, at 
 the foot of the Apennines. 
 
 Burning with glory, rosy in the sunset, 
 Lombardy's plain lay far and wide before them; 
 Swayed the Virgilian lake even as a bridal 
 Veil of maidens.' 
 
 The custodian opened the door of the main building, 
 in its southern front, and we mounted some dark 
 stairs to the two upper stories; both were completely 
 filled with interesting relics of the Risorgimento, of 
 every nature, recalling all the various aspects and trib- 
 ulations of that terrible epoch, and passing them in 
 review before the mind, with a new and vivid proxim- 
 ity that was wrought from the contact with such sur- 
 viving objects. Here were the placards which had been 
 posted from week to week in the streets of Brescia, 
 during the days of war and rebellion, — reporting the 
 latest successes or defeats of the patriotic cause, incit- 
 ing the people to courage and sacrifice, calling them to 
 arms, or assembly, or contribution of means; they were 
 a burning, harrowing, intimate record of human agita- 
 tions, surpassing in revivifying power any history ever 
 written. 
 
 ' Maud Holland's translation of Carducci. The Virgilian lake refers, of 
 course, to the reed-bound waters of Mantua. 
 
494 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Here was the table that Garibaldi then slept upon, 
 his saddle and carriage, his letters of blazing zeal to 
 Brescia and her leaders; here were the precious memen- 
 toes of Tito Speri, — his arms, writings, clothes, hand- 
 kerchief, — any commonplace thing that had been sanc- 
 tified by his touch; there were similar mementos of 
 other heroes, in large number, also relics of the periods 
 of plotting and organization, — in the shape of secret 
 communications, signs, manuals, agreements, etc., — 
 and relics of the war periods, in the form of guns, 
 swords, cannons, uniforms, and other equipments. Es- 
 pecially interesting were the wretched old muzzle-load- 
 ing muskets, — with which poor instruments the patri- 
 ots struggled against modern rifles, — and the pathetic 
 attempts at regimentals, with which they often took 
 the field. 
 
 Finally, in the low, top rooms of the gable, illumined 
 dimly from little barred windows set in the four-foot 
 stone walls, I observed with keen sympathy the nu- 
 merous steel manacles, — foot- and leg-irons, — still 
 attached to their heavy chains, fastened at short inter- 
 vals to the walls, with which the heroic prisoners had 
 been loaded like wild beasts. There they had been 
 chained, side by side, against the bare cold stones, 
 awaiting the dawn that should lead them forth to 
 death. So affecting was it all, so vividly did it recall 
 those frightful days, that I breathed with a real relief 
 when we emerged again into the sunshine, into the 
 realization that Freedom was here at last, safe and 
 undying. 
 
 It were not Freedom if thou wert not free, 
 
 Nor wert thou Italy, — 
 O mystic rose ingrained with blood, impearled 
 
 With tears of the whole world! ' 
 
 ' Swinburne, Song of Italy. 
 
BRESCIA LA FERREA 495 
 
 Another interesting walk to the city's outskirts is 
 that westward to the great Camposanto, which one 
 first sees at a distance, from the castle-hilltop. It 
 consists of the customary quadrangle, here quite ex- 
 tensive, lined on the four sides by rows of imposing 
 cypresses; the usual tombs of modern sculpture adorn 
 the inner arcades, some of them really beautiful; and 
 at the centre of the green rises the principal monu- 
 ment, — a lofty round tower upon a wide heavy base, 
 tipped with a pointed dome, to which one can ascend 
 by spiral stairs. 
 
 One other monument greeted me, with a farewell 
 to Brescia, upon the afternoon when I repaired to the 
 station to depart. It beautifies a pleasant grass-plot 
 without the Porta Stazione, adjacent to the road, — 
 standing thus to welcome the arriving traveler or 
 God-speed the departing. It is a striking composition, 
 unique and vigorous, with all the fire of the modeling 
 Italian genius, arresting by its very strangeness an eye 
 wearied of all the conventional designs: at the top of 
 half a dozen steps rises a plain marble screen, some 
 ten feet high and twenty feet broad; upon this stands 
 another section of similar size, embellished with a 
 prominent high-relief of impressive beauty, — a madly 
 dashing quadriga, driven by a majestic, helmeted 
 Goddess of Fame, holding a deceased hero with one 
 arm and a symbol of glory in the other hand. The 
 symbol, the reins, and a few other points are touched 
 with goldleaf, of glittering brilliance, which bestows 
 upon the whole a dazzling splendor befitting the theme; 
 and before the lower screen, upon a pedestal between 
 the steps, stands a noble bronze figure, of heroic size 
 and look, clad in the stately gown of a doctor of laws 
 or philosophy. Placed some fifty feet back from the 
 street, upon a gentle grassy knoll, encircled by flower- 
 
496 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 beds in front, and finely backed by a row of cypresses, 
 — against whose massed, dark foliage the marble 
 glistens and the horses plunge, — the whole superb 
 construction is an ideal encomium of the patriotic 
 statesman, Zanardelli. 
 
 He was another leader of those glorious days of 
 strife and unification ; his residence — whence he ad- 
 dressed the people, and emerged to guide them in their 
 crises — had been shown to me on Via S. Giulia. And 
 so the last thing I saw, as I went away, was still another 
 memorial of Brescia's heroic temper, — a final re- 
 minder of her lofty, intrepid spirit, that led the way to 
 freedom through blood and fire. 
 
 Beautiful Italy ! — golden amber 
 Warm with the kisses of lover and traitor! 
 Thou who hast drawn us on to remember. 
 Draw us to hope now; let us be greater 
 By this new future than that old story.' 
 
 ' Mrs. Browning, Italy and the World. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 MONTAGNANA, ESTE, AND MONSELICE 
 
 The land that holds the rest in tender thrall 
 
 For love's sake in them all. 
 That binds with words, and holds with eyes and hands. 
 
 All hearts in all men's lands. 
 
 — SWDSBUKNE. 
 
 Through the endless wheat-fields of the middle plain, 
 now yellow with stubble, now green with the sprout- 
 ing winter crop, now crossed by numberless files of 
 stripped mulberry trees stretching as far as the eye 
 could reach, I was rolling southeastward from Verona 
 to the historic district of the Polesine. Seaward now, 
 toward the fair Euganean Hills, — this time upon their 
 southern side, whence sprang that foremost of all 
 Italian princely races, more famous even than the 
 Visconti, — the House of Este. I was approaching the 
 immemorial cradle of that great family, the most an- 
 cient — aside from Savoy — of all ruling Italian dynas- 
 ties, the origin of whose power and nobility was so re- 
 mote as to be lost in the mists of time; that family 
 which counts among its descendants nearly every 
 European sovereign of to-day, from King George V 
 to the pettiest German grand duke. I was nearing the 
 primeval stronghold,, at the foot of the Colli Euga- 
 nei, from which they drew their name, and sallied 
 forth to their earliest conquests over the whole sur- 
 rounding region between the hills and the Po, — from 
 Legnago on the west to the Adriatic on the east. 
 
 This was the district of the Polesine, celebrated 
 from Roman days for the richness of its alluvial soil, 
 
498 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 washed down and watered by innumerable streams, 
 always thickly inhabited by a prosperous agricultural 
 people, with a dozen or more wealthy little cities of 
 five to fifteen thousand inhabitants. It was this fertile 
 region that the warlike Estensi ruled from the earliest 
 period of the Middle Age, and made the basis of all 
 their future fame and power. "Alberto Azzo II," says 
 Gregorovius, " who is originally mentioned as Marchio 
 di Longobardia (Marquis of Lombardy) governed the 
 territory from Mantua to the Adriatic and the region 
 about the Po, where he owned Este and Rovigo. . . . 
 These lords, . . . who first appeared about the time 
 of the Lombard invasion, were descended from a fam- 
 ily whose remote ancestor was one Albert. The names 
 Adalbert and Albert assume in Italian the form Oberto, 
 from which we have the diminutives Obizzo and Azzo. 
 . . . Alberto Azzo II married Kunigunde, daughter 
 of Count Guelph III of Swabia, and in this way the 
 famous German family of Guelph became connected 
 with the Oberti and drawn into Italian politics. When 
 Alberto Azzo died in the year 1096, — more than one 
 hundred years old, — he left two sons, Guelph and 
 Folco; Guelph inherited the property of his maternal 
 grandfather, Guelph III, in whom the male line of the 
 house became extinct in 1055. He went to Germany, 
 where he became Duke of Bavaria, and founded the 
 Guelph line. Folco inherited his father's Italian pos- 
 sessions." ^ He and his son continued to dwell at Este 
 and lord it over the Polesine; but his grandson, Azzo 
 V, married the Marchesella Adelardi, heiress of the 
 leader of the Guelphs in the city of Ferrara, toward 
 the close of the twelfth century, — and domiciled him- 
 self in Ferrara, as his father-in-law's successor. This 
 was the beginning of the Estense leadership of the 
 
 ' Gregorovius, Lucretia Borgia. 
 
MONTAGNANA 499 
 
 whole Guelphic cause, and their domination of Fer- 
 rara. Within a few years, in 1208, Azzo VI, the next 
 Marquis of Este, drove the Ghibelline faction entirely 
 from the city, and was elected by the people as their 
 hereditary ruler. "In this way the Este established 
 the first tyranny on the ruins of a commune." 
 
 While living at Este, the marquises had given the 
 most of their attention to Padua, considering them- 
 selves the champions of the Guelphic party in that 
 town, and indulging in frequent strife with the city 
 over questions of territory. After removing to Ferrara, 
 they kept up this strife, having a continuous struggle 
 to preserve their ownership of the Polesine. They re- 
 turned to Este only for an occasional villeggiatura; but 
 they did not wish to lose the fertile region upon which 
 the Paduans, Veronese, and Venetians looked with 
 such covetous eyes, and which they fought over for 
 nearly three centuries. During Ezzelino da Romano's 
 lordship of Padua, he made especial efforts to wrest the 
 towns of the Polesine from the Estensi; but Azzo VII 
 (1215-64) successfully resisted, becoming Ezzelino's 
 bitterest and most steadfast enemy, and finally effect- 
 ing the combination that pulled him to earth in 1259. 
 Azzo was so financially weakened by the long struggle 
 that in the following year he sold Este, Cerro, and 
 Calaone to the commune of Padua, receiving them 
 back as fiefs, under an annual tribute. 
 
 His son, Obizzo II (1264-93,) was a strong ruler, ex- 
 tending the Estense sway to Modena and Reggio; but 
 his grandson, Azzo VIII (1293-1308), suffered the 
 loss of various important lands and castles in this re- 
 gion, at the hands of the Paduans and Alberto della 
 Scala. The next marquis. Fresco, lost practically all of 
 the district; but Can Grande della Scala in his turn 
 despoiled the Paduans, seizing in 1317 the strongholds 
 
500 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 of Montagnana, Este, Monselice, and other towns, 
 and finally gaining possession of Padua itself. The 
 Scala dominion of the Polesine lasted twenty years. 
 In 1337, Venice, Florence, the Delia Carrara, and Es- 
 tensi entered into a secret treaty to crush Mastino II 
 della Scala, which was carried out, and by which the 
 Estensi recovered their cherished territory. Venice 
 thereafter protected the Estensi against the Paduans, 
 until she took Padua herself, in 1405; receiving in re- 
 turn many special privileges of trading and transporta- 
 tion. The Polesine, therefore, at this period enjoyed 
 about a century and a half of peace and prosperity, 
 while the Este princes flourished at Ferrara, celebrated 
 far and wide for the culture and brilliancy of their 
 Court. The classic revival, in which they took such a 
 lead, was brought by them also to Este and its sur- 
 rounding territory; they embellished the ancestral 
 town, and gave many a grand entertainment in the 
 ancient castle on its knoll, where there was usually 
 some member of the family residing. 
 
 This splendid period reached its apogee under Lion- 
 ello (1441-50), Borso (1450-71), and Ercole (1471- 
 1505), a trio of princes justly famed for their culture, 
 magnificence, and patronage of all the arts. Borso 
 was created by Emperor Frederick II the Duke of 
 Modena and Reggio, Count of Rovigo and Com- 
 machio; and by Pope Paul VII was constituted Duke 
 of Ferrara, — a nominal papal fief. Ercole, however, 
 fell into disaster, becoming embroiled in a war with 
 the Serene Republic, which had long coveted the 
 Polesine, and now seized it forcibly, about 1480. 
 From that timie till the coming of Bonaparte, Este, 
 Montagnana, and the rest of this district throve under 
 the wise and equitable rule of Venice. She rebuilt 
 those mighty walls and towers which still encircle 
 
MONTAGNANA 501 
 
 Montagnana in all their massiveness, quite undecayed, 
 and render it to-day an ideal example of the fortified 
 Renaissance town; she strengthened the old castles 
 of Este and Monselice, the main strongholds of the 
 region, which before the days of cannon were prac- 
 tically invulnerable; and she brought increased pros- 
 perity to Rovigo, Battaglia, and all the eastern part 
 of the Polesine, by reconstructing and maintaining in 
 good order that network of canals which^ still carries 
 their rich produce cheaply to market.^ 
 
 As far as Legnago, — which must not be confounded 
 with Legnano, the birthplace of Italian freedom, north 
 of Milan, — my route lay within the district of the 
 noted Austrian "Quadrilateral"; the broad Adige was 
 its eastern boundary, and the fortress of Legnago its 
 southeastern corner. On this ride the plain had as- 
 sumed its beautiful dress of autumn-gold. The lines of 
 drooping, yellow willows along the frequent streams 
 and irrigating-ditches, the occasional straight files of 
 poplars along the highways, and groves of beetling 
 cypresses around graveyards and old monastery 
 buildings, all relieved the flatness of the landscape. 
 There were russet plane trees also, shading the roads 
 and gathered about the fariijhouses and villages, with 
 now and then a small orchard of fruit trees next a 
 dwelling. The fields were mostly restricted to the 
 valuable mulberry; but everywhere surrounding them, 
 serving as divisional lines, and occupying in rows all 
 the vineyards, were those arboreal species from which 
 the people derive their scanty fuel, — elm, beech, 
 ash, birch, etc., — their knobby boles now graced 
 
 ' There are records of canals in this district as early as the days of the 
 Celts, which Rome duly enlarged and extended; but during the Middle 
 Ages they fell into disuse and ruin. Their renovation was commenced by 
 the Estensi, and completed by the Republic, which also added to their size 
 and number. 
 
502 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by the summer's growth of boughs, soon to be cut 
 away. 
 
 These last, moreover, in the vineyards, aided in pro- 
 ducing what was the fairest feature of the whole land- 
 scape, — owing to the graceful way in which the vines 
 are trained through this section : ^ around each tree, 
 with its crown of this year's tender boughs, was 
 planted a circle of stakes, leaning outward, bound to 
 the trunk and to each other by strings, along which 
 the grape tendrils clambered in the prettiest fashion. 
 This was the prevalent method, though I noticed 
 others, and occasionally an instance of the lovely 
 Umbrian fashion of swinging long festoons from tree 
 to tree. One charming feature of this countryside 
 was unusual, — the abundance of hedges everywhere, 
 along the roads and between the fields; not as trim 
 as English hedges, but still very ornamental. Water, 
 as usual, was much in evidence, the ditches and canals 
 for draining and irrigation being ever in sight, with 
 now and then a field entirely swamped; a great many 
 are flooded at the rainy season, but cultivable in the 
 others. Every foot of available ground is carefully 
 tilled in this region, not an acre being allowed for 
 woodland or pasture; and the crop, aside from the 
 vine, is always wheat, wheat, — with the sole excep- 
 tion of a very little barley, and some market-garden- 
 ing near the towns; which is curiously different from 
 the ubiquitousness of maize farther north. 
 
 Another marked difference from the northern plain 
 was the scarcity of the dwellings: but rarely did an 
 isolated farmhouse appear, and then it was of the 
 usual stained and crumbling stucco, — dwelling, 
 stables, and pig-sty under one roof, surrounding a 
 
 ' By the section here described, is meant the country around Legnago 
 and Montagnana. 
 
MONTAGNANA 503 
 
 yard heaped with manure and refuse of every kind; 
 while before it stood generally a sort of little outhouse 
 whose use I could not discern, with a queer peaked roof 
 of thatch or rushes, like a Malay hut. With these few 
 exceptions, the teeming population was still gathered 
 into villages, like the Middle Ages, — countless vil- 
 lages, each with its long history, its individuality, its 
 dialect, its characteristics of building, and labor, and 
 customs. For there is no nation so utterly gregarious 
 as the Italians, — for whom life is so much a matter 
 of human society. Their idea of a pleasant locality, 
 remarked Mrs. Piozzi, is expressed in the phrase, 
 "Cio e con un mondo d' amici cosi. . . . No human 
 being suffers solitude so ill as does an Italian. They 
 can hardly believe that there is existing a person who 
 would not willingly prefer any company to none." ^ 
 
 And how devotedly they become attached to their 
 own little town or hamlet! "The provincials," says 
 Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco, "whatever 
 be their class, still speak their own familiar idiom when 
 alone. Each separate dialect is a bond of union, a 
 freemasonry, an echo from home in distant parts, — 
 home, which in Italy is less an emotion of the hearth 
 than of the sunlight as it falls upon the native valley, 
 the village campanile, the piazza with the plane trees 
 and the bowling-ground, the fountain with the brown- 
 armed girls." ^ Yet to the stranger these numberless 
 hamlets of the plain are as alike as their railway sta- 
 tions, ever flitting by. Ah, those stations, — surely 
 they must all have been poured into a single mould: 
 the long, uncovered platform, the two-storied building 
 of creamy yellow stucco, with its half-dozen doorways 
 marked in plain black lettering, the stretch of regular, 
 
 ' Mrs. Piozzi, Glimpses from Italian Society, etc.; with an introduction 
 by Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesareseo. 
 
504 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 flowered turf at each end, separating off the little 
 cubical outhouses and the water-tank, the avenue of 
 plane trees leading, straight as a die, from the rear of 
 the building to the adjacent borough, — what traveler 
 does not know them! 
 
 Carea, — where the line from Verona to Rovigo 
 connects, with that from Mantua to Monselice, — 
 and Legnago, the former fortress, both appeared to 
 be towns of some size, with a fresh, restored look as if 
 they had been rebuilt of late. Legnago in fact has 
 nearly fifteen thousand inhabitants now, and is said to 
 be flourishing; yet there is nothing to call the stranger 
 to descend and pay it a visit. Half a dozen miles far- 
 ther on, we reached Bevilacqua, the first town of the 
 Polesine; and here on the left appeared a magnificent 
 castle, of red brick with white stone trimmings, either 
 recently built or splendidly restored; its square form 
 was heavily battlemented, with great, machicolated 
 towers at the angles; it stood amidst a park of large 
 and handsome trees, beside a stream crossed by a fine 
 double-arched bridge. Beyond it, to the far northeast, 
 I caught the first view of the Euganean Hills, their 
 gentle slopes and rounded summits wrapped in the 
 mist of distance. 
 
 Another four or five miles brought us to Monta- 
 gnana, and two minutes later I was driving up the cus- 
 tomary avenue to the town in an antiquated rattle- 
 trap of a public vettura, at the cost of eight soldi for 
 the half-mile distance. The fields on .each side were 
 rather bare of trees, giving me a clear view of the 
 grand old walls we were approaching. Far away to 
 the east and west they stretched, as straight as a 
 plumb-line, a mile or more in liength, varied at regular 
 intervals by imposing hexagonal towers, loftier than 
 the tall curtains between them; ten of these towers I 
 
MONTAGNANA 505 
 
 counted, every one as exact and unbroken as if not a 
 century had passed since its erection. Not a battle- 
 ment appeared missing from their summits, nor from 
 the even, solid lengths of wall, whose clay-colored 
 bricks seemed endowed with all the weight and dura- 
 bility of stone. I could recall no other brick fortifica- 
 tions in the land, of such exceptional size and regular- 
 ity, and such perfect preservation. They concealed 
 all the city's buildings save a few tiled roofs, and the 
 looming forms and campanili of the churches. 
 
 In this whole southern wall, it was evident, there 
 had been originally no opening whatever; for medieval 
 Montagnana had but two directions, east and west, 
 having grown up along the highway from Este to 
 Mantua, beside which it is strung out as an attenu- 
 ated rectangle, but four or five blocks in width. There 
 was little or no passage at right angles to this line, and 
 so they confined themselves to two gates only, at the 
 narrow ends, which were towered and castellated into 
 a state of invulnerability. The railroad with its sta- 
 tion had altered that condition of affairs; and so I saw 
 now before me a modern opening for the approach, 
 in the shape of two rounded archways near the middle 
 of the wall; the broad moat had been filled with earth, 
 on which we passed solidly to the inner side. A single 
 block then to the north, and we entered the one great 
 thoroughfare of the town, — the ancient highway, — 
 which runs straight between old arcades and stuccoed 
 buildings of three stories, from one principal gateway 
 to the other. A bitto the east here, on the left side, I 
 descended at the primitive little Albergo Arena, the 
 best thing in the way of an inn that the place could 
 offer. 
 
 The aged host and his dame bustled around with an 
 excitement which revealed that a forestiere in Mon- 
 
506 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tagnana is a very rare bird indeed; not that they 
 manifested any idea of plucking me, — they were too 
 simple for any such citified ideas. On one side of 
 the usual driveway entrance to the court, was the 
 clean-looking kitchen with its brick hearth and cop- 
 per utensils; on the other, the general guest-and- 
 eating-room, beside which mounted the crooked 
 narrow stairs; the first floor was a maze of winding 
 passages and different levels, amongst which I was 
 given a bare but clean front room, for the modest sum 
 — without bargaining — of one franc and a half per 
 day. My meals were cooked by the good dame her- 
 self (they had but one helper) , and, though served on 
 the coarsest of linen with iron forks, were thoroughly 
 enjoyed; for there are certain things any North-Italian 
 can cook well, — minestra, veal cutlet alia Milanese, 
 macaroni, and native vegetables, — and they nearly 
 always have some good wine to add a zest.^ 
 
 In the cool of the afternoon I started out for my pre- 
 liminary stroll, making eastward again on the main 
 thoroughfare, beneath its ancient stucco arcades, sus- 
 tained by pillars of every shape and condition; and 
 a comparatively few steps opened out the Piazza 
 Grande, stretching northward from the street to a 
 most surprising extent. It was a vast space, of great 
 age and picturesqueness; paved with cobblestones 
 around the sides, and with flagstones in the broad 
 rectangular centre, where stood the city's marble 
 monument to Vittorio Emanuele II; surrounded by 
 diversified arcades, in aged stuccoed buildings of every 
 type and color; while the huge brick mass of the 
 Duomo projected boldly into the area from its north- 
 
 ' One must, however, ask for Tuscan or Piedmont vintages, if he wishes 
 the best obtainable; the Veronese are but fair, while those of the plain in 
 general are no longer palatable. (See next chapter.) 
 
MONTAGNANA 507 
 
 east angle, reaching halfway to the monument. In 
 contrast with its simple, massive form of yellowish 
 brown brick, the houses glowed with a score and more 
 of bright and variegated hues, softened by time into 
 a certain harmony, — gray tints, cream, red, green, 
 pink, white, brown, yellow, azure, russet, vermilion, 
 dark blue, all commingled into a happy prismatic 
 sheen. 
 
 The arcades were entirely round-arched, save at the 
 northern end of the east side next the church, where 
 a very old dwelling — one of three stories, like the 
 majority — rose upon Gothic arches with ponderous, 
 spreading piers. Adjacent stood two houses of almost 
 equal antiquity, one resting upon similar stuccoed 
 piers, the other upon gray -stone Doric columns; after 
 which, going south, appeared a couple in which the 
 arcades were two-storied, — one supported by heavy, 
 rusticated, stone piers, the other by hexagonal stone 
 pillars; behind these at some distance soared a mighty, 
 medieval, brick tower, which proved to belong to the 
 castello of the eastern gate. Nearly as ancient as these 
 crumbling buildings were those of the northern por- 
 tion of the piazza, beyond the Duomo; but its south- 
 ern side was of the later Renaissance, centred by a 
 large stuccoed palazzo with brown-stone trimmings, 
 curiously painted pink upon its string-course, brown 
 with white veinings upon its entablature, and light 
 green in its upper body, veined with pink and white. 
 On its left stood another palazzo, topped with two 
 of the oddest ornamental chimneys that I have ever 
 seen, — huge stone structures upon the eaves, carved 
 like swelling Oriental turrets, — strange relics of the 
 rococo. 
 
 The first half of the western side alone was modern, 
 composed of five classic edifices of rather imposing 
 
508 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 design, with handsome arcades, cornices, and bal- 
 conies; the one upon the corner being exceedingly 
 ornate, with gray stucco relievo upon its architraves, 
 window-frames, and cornicione. Under the fifth 
 arcade I found, to my surprise and pleasure, a first- 
 class modern caffe, recently started, — the "Caffe 
 Loggia" of Pietro Stefani; a fact of much significance 
 to travelers, because here one is able to obtain good 
 cafS-au-lait in the morning, cafS noir in the evening, 
 afternoon tea when wanted, and all the customary 
 beverages, besides the daily and illustrated journals, 
 — which Montagnana had never seen before. Im- 
 mediately beyond it is the local theatre, with a noble 
 entrance loggia adorned by Doric columns of gray 
 granite, — where traveling companies often give per- 
 formances, including vaudeville. 
 
 Advancing to the northern portion of the piazza, I 
 observed two interesting Renaissance palaces on its 
 western side: the first, a small quaint edifice of Pal- 
 ladian style; the second, a most eccentric old dwelling 
 of preposterous hues. Its round arches below were 
 painted in imitation of inset red-marble panels, and 
 topped by a creamy-yellow entablature, with medal- 
 lions in the spandrils containing busts; the first-floor 
 windows were pointed, tipped with reliefs of fruit and 
 foliage, and set in rectangular frames, between which 
 the body was colored red and green in checkered 
 designs; the second-floor windows were circular, in 
 square frames, interspersed by octagonal panels of 
 reddish tint, holding white medallions with busts in 
 grisaille; the string-courses were arcaded, and the 
 fantastic cornice was upheld by sculptured bat-like 
 creatures; down the angles extended two pilaster 
 strips, painted, like all the rest, in imitation of red and 
 green veined marble. It was a weird specimen of the 
 
MONTAGNANA 509 
 
 deepest decadence of the Renaissance. On the east 
 side rose another good Palladian mansion, with a 
 Doric colonnade; and a third handsome palazzo 
 adorned the street leading northward from the left- 
 hand corner, covered with an interesting old wooden 
 roof, projecting widely on wooden consoles. The 
 street was broad, and arcaded on both sides, but ended 
 only a block away, against a grim tower of the north- 
 ern wall. 
 
 The sombre old Cathedral, amidst all this palatial 
 architecture, so surprising in a town of ten thousand 
 souls, stood solitary, massive, and uncouth, like a 
 relic of some darker, savage era, — as indeed it was; 
 the vast brick walls, supported by clumsy spreading 
 buttresses at the sides and angles, had once been 
 encased in stucco, which now was practically all crum- 
 bled away; their plainness was relieved by naught 
 but simple pilaster-strips between the buttresses, a 
 crude arcaded cornice, a marble portal, and three slen- 
 der open canopies topping the flat gable, holding each 
 a bell within its Corinthian columns. There was no 
 campanile; the transepts ended in lower apses, decor- 
 ated in Lombard fashion with pilaster-strips; and a 
 pair of simple side porches, upon low arches, snuggled 
 into the angles between transepts and nave. Further 
 evidences of the building's Gothic period, — probably 
 the early fifteenth century, — were offered in the re- 
 markable paucity and the lancet form of the windows, 
 only two or three in each side; while the stern fagade 
 had but a single one, circular in shape, without frame 
 or tracery. 
 
 The marble portal — I found, upon advancing to 
 it — was a later addition to the Gothic body, of the 
 high Renaissance : a pair of fluted Corinthian columns 
 on each side of the round-arched doorway supported 
 
510 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 a broad entablature, of which the chief feature was a 
 circular niche in the middle, holding a well-executed 
 and rather pleasing half-figure of the Madonna with 
 her Child. The two simple brick pilaster-strips rising 
 beside the portal, were oddly broken off at mid-height, 
 for a fifth of their length, and protruded like chim- 
 neys above the sloping arcaded cornice; they are, I 
 believe, absolutely unique. Another peculiar feature 
 was the huge clock-face in the gable, just above the 
 plain circular window. In the right wall of the nave, 
 externally, I found embedded several ancient marble 
 inscriptions, and two or three simple early tombs. 
 High upon a buttress of the right transept appeared 
 a strange marble relief like a coat-of-arms, showing 
 two putti or genii beside a hound, and inscribed, 
 "Divo Prothomartiri Stephano." 
 
 The interior of this unusual church, when I ex- 
 amined it next morning, proved to be equally peculiar: 
 it was very lofty, dark, and cool, and especially bare, 
 being designed in a queer mixture of Gothic and Re- 
 naissance forms, which showed the transition period. 
 The round-arched, plastered nave, without aisles or 
 chapels, ended in a still darker choir, mysteriously 
 illumined by five long blue windows of much opaque- 
 ness, and approached by three broad red-marble steps. 
 Along the side walls of the nave ran oaken panelings 
 and benches like choir seats, with prettily carved 
 cornices, broken midway by a single altar on each 
 hand; that on the left was of horrible baroque form, the 
 other had a most beautiful. Renaissance, marble frame, 
 exquisitely sculptured on every part with foliations 
 interspersed with tiny putti, and surmounted by sev- 
 eral statuettes upon the cornice. This frame held a 
 large and magnificent canvas by Buonconsiglio, — 
 signed, dated 1513, — representing Mary Magdalen 
 
MONTAGNANA 511 
 
 between St. Anthony of Padua and an archangel 
 grasping the hand of Tobias; these glorious, life-size 
 figures stood apparently in a domed rotunda, — the 
 Magdalen upon a pedestal, — and were colored with 
 delightful simplicity in rich shades of crimson, white, 
 and brown. It alone was worth the trip to Monta- 
 gnana. Above it, along the marble frieze, gamboled 
 a most charming line of cherubs in high-relief, sur- 
 passingly winsome in their grace and joyousness. I 
 did not succeed in ascertaining the sculptor's name. 
 
 The old pavement of the nave was tessellated in 
 red and white marbles; the organ-loft was perched 
 over the main entrance, and a small altar was located 
 in each front corner. There was no dome; the transepts 
 were short and apsidal, containing altars between 
 pairs of lancet windows, — baroque in form, though of 
 polished granite and Siena marble. The southern 
 pala was unimportant, but that of the high-altar was 
 by Buonconsiglio again, — another exceptionally 
 large canvas, depicting the Transfiguration: Christ is 
 shown talking with Moses and Elias, upon a cloud 
 that seems to press down upon the three dazed and 
 prostrate apostles, gazing up with awe and amazement 
 at the angels hovering above the speakers. It is not 
 so high a work as the other; for the Christ seems to be 
 posing, the apostles are distorted, convulsed, in group- 
 ing and movement, and none of them are quite life- 
 like, — doubtless due to the retouching. The stucco 
 framework of this apse was unusual, — a triumphal 
 arch, adorned with rosettes upon its soffit, upheld by 
 giant Corinthian columns on high double bases, which 
 were decorated each with a series of ten busts in 
 relievo; seven tall depressed arches extended round the 
 apse, framing the windows, and supporting an elabo- 
 rate entablature with a row of little heads upon the 
 
512 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 frieze, — while their spandrils held other busts, within 
 medallions. The half-dome contained an enormous 
 fresco of the Ascension, aged and damaged, but of 
 splendidly effective composition, — endless throngs 
 of angels being visible within the gates of the opened 
 Paradise, above the twelve heroic figures of the 
 apostles. It was powerfully conceived and drawn, and 
 once must have been sublime; its author appeared to 
 be unknown. 
 
 The sides of the choir were richly adorned with 
 oaken panelings above the double row of stalls: 
 Corinthian pilasters, formerly gilded upon their delic- 
 ate reliefs, framed five lofty panels on each wall, that 
 held painted scenic tableaux and large individual 
 figures; these were evidently by different hands, for 
 those on the left were better, — including a Flight 
 into Egypt with a charming Madonna, in a pleasing, 
 finely toned landscape. The pavement of the choir also 
 was exceptionally rich, and very old, being inlaid with 
 diamonds in black, red, and yellow marbles. 
 
 In the left transept appeared a third great canvas 
 by Buonconsiglio, — the Madonna being crowned by 
 two flying putti, seated between Saints Roch and 
 Sebastian, in a marbled hall sustained by Corinthian 
 columns; the putti and the Sebastian being retouched 
 out of any semblance to reality, but the face of St. 
 Roch still showing the power of the master. The Vir- 
 gin's form, clad simply in a red bodice and green robe, 
 remained the best of the three, although her head 
 did incline rather too sentimentally on one shoulder. 
 Another large Renaissance canvas hung in the right 
 transept, — an odd one, depicting a Venetian naval 
 battle with the Turks; probably a relic of the fame 
 of the Venetian Admiral Pisani, who had a country 
 palace at Montagnana, and lies buried here. 
 
MONTAGNANA 513 
 
 This same morning the piazza presented an appear- 
 ance very diflFerent from its vacant neatness of the pre- 
 ceding evening: it was fulfilHng its primary functions 
 as a market-ground. The whole of the paved central 
 space was a mass of booths with bright, tented cov- 
 erings, vending every variety of produce, clothing, 
 and household articles; a dense crowd thronged their 
 narrow alleys, and the surrounding streets were 
 jammed with country vehicles and peddlers' wagons. 
 In the cool of the afternoon, when the great part of 
 this gathering had already subsided, I strolled east- 
 ward on the main street, to the tall edifice of the Muni- 
 cipio close at hand upon the right. It stood somewhat 
 back from the way, a three-storied brick palazzo, 
 covered cleverly with stucco to resemble rusticated 
 stone (which was now much worn off) and of attractive 
 Renaissance design: the ground story was arcaded, 
 with triple openings and square piers, forming a loggia 
 two bays deep, in which stood the handsome portal, 
 framed by Corinthian columns; the windows above 
 were divided by Ionic pilasters, coupled at the angles. 
 This building was erected by the great Sammicheli, 
 and long occupied by the Venetian Podestas. 
 
 I mounted the main staircase just within the por- 
 tal, and succeeded in finding a considerate official to 
 show me about. The principal apartment was the 
 large Sala del Consiglio on the second floor, to the 
 right, which retained its original marble pavement and 
 noble carved oak roof. Here I found Buonconsiglio's 
 remaining picture, very little retouched and in fine 
 condition: it depicted the throned Madonna, with 
 two charming child-angels playing musical instru- 
 ments at her feet, — Saints Paul and Sebastian and a 
 bishop standing to the right. Saints Peter and John 
 the Baptist and another on the left, — all posed 
 
514 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 within a small vaulted rotunda sustained by columns. 
 The tone was deliciously golden; the life-size figures 
 were of great naturalness and splendid beauty, su- 
 perbly colored, in a subdued golden light. Especially 
 lovely was the face and form of the Madonna, and 
 all of them were expressive of celestial bliss; — truly 
 an extraordinary picture to preside over the meetings 
 of a small town council.^ The adjacent hall of the Ar- 
 chivio Vecchio, upon the front, contained a beautiful 
 red-marble chimney-piece by Sammicheli; the other 
 rooms were modernized and of no special interest. 
 
 The main street continued eastward between aged 
 stucco houses of two and three stories, colored with 
 kaleidoscopic effect, and arcaded on both sides, — inter- 
 spersed with an occasional colonnade without arches; 
 and down each side street to the right, but one block 
 distant, was seen the accompanying city wall, sur- 
 mounted by its tall battlements and mighty towers, 
 with its fighting-platform sustained by a succession 
 of huge brick arches. Finally the way debouched 
 into a broad piazza before the great castle of the 
 eastern gate, called the Porta S. Zeno, — a typical 
 aggregation of medieval embattled structures, trans- 
 porting one bodily to the bellicose sixteenth century. 
 Somewhat to the right and far to the left stretched the 
 three-storied, battlemented, brick edifice of the castello, 
 pierced by the three successive ports of the dark, tun- 
 neled gateway, — the third, or anteport, extending 
 beyond the walls. To the right the old building was 
 
 ' This masterpiece appears to me Buonconsiglio's finest surviving work, 
 surpassing even his beautiful jiala of S. Rocco at Vicenza. In it he ap- 
 proaches nearest to the ineffable grace and coloring of Palma Vecchio, 
 upon whom he clearly modeled his style, after his study of the latter's 
 methods at Vicenza and Venice. This was one of the master's last works; 
 and makes us sorrowful indeed that he died at the early age of thirty - 
 three, with such a promise of future glories unfulfilled. 
 
MONTAGNANA 515 
 
 entered by a ponderous rusticated archway, above 
 which opened handsome double-arched windows in the 
 upper stories; beyond this extended a lower structure 
 of stucco, — marked "Cavallerizza" over its entrance, 
 — which embraced the whole southeastern angle of 
 the city walls; to the left the castle was pierced by 
 another grand archway, but the deep windows were 
 square-headed and plain. Two massive keeps soared 
 behind the more southern buildings, — one in the rear 
 of the "Cavallerizza," the hexagonal corner tower 
 of the ramparts; the other just beside the anteport, 
 the square guard-tower of the entrance and donjon 
 of the fortress. 
 
 Through all these edifices and the piazza poured 
 an abundance of martial life, — for here was located 
 the large garrison of Montagnana, consisting mostly 
 of cavalry. Soldiers lounged everywhere, in doors, in 
 windows, in the open; scores were rubbing down their 
 horses before the castle, and exercising them in the 
 square; through the momentarily opened gate of the 
 "Cavallerizza" I saw its vast yard filled with other 
 steeds and troopers, similarly engaged. On traversing 
 the deep dark gateway, over whose well-like ports the 
 mighty donjon loomed like a menacing Colossus, I 
 found the same scenes being enacted in the broad dry 
 bed of the fosse: a hundred or two of cavalrymen were 
 currying their chargers in the shade of the tall horse- 
 chestnuts along the outer bank, and trying to teach 
 them various feats and tricks. The walls had been 
 pierced with rows of modern windows and doorways, 
 and a modern extension of the castle encroached upon 
 the sward. As for the gateway, it was untouched, con- 
 serving still its massive cinquecento gates of bolted 
 wood, between the first and second ports; although 
 the approach was a later bridge of masonry, on whose 
 
516 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 parapets sat a throng of citizens watching the 
 soldiers. 
 
 From this the highway extended straightaway to the 
 east, between an indefinite succession of villas and large 
 dwellings, with occasional gardens; and the first edi- 
 fice on the left was an imposing Palladian palace 
 adorned with Doric half-columns below and Ionic 
 above, all of creamy stucco. It was the villa of Ad- 
 miral Pisani, whose arms were visible in the pediment, 
 flanked by two reclining female figures of marble. On 
 its farther side extended a baroque, one-storied chapel, 
 which contains the Admiral's tomb, — said to be an 
 excellent piece of Renaissance sculpture. This was a 
 branch of the same opulent family that built the Palazzo 
 Stra on the Brenta; it existed until recent years, when 
 by the marriage of a sole surviving daughter its pos- 
 sessions passed to the Conti Giusti. The Count was 
 not now in residence, and without his personal per- 
 mission I was unable to enter. 
 
 I strolled for half a mile down the road, admiring 
 the graceful vagaries of villa architecture, — the ar- 
 cades, logge, towers, and dainty cotta-work, the walls 
 overhung by draperies of vine, and the beautiful gar- 
 dens adorned with statues and pavilions. On return- 
 ing to Piazza Grande, I inspected the street leading 
 southward from it, which was one startling rainbow of 
 vivid hues, including rose, lavender, bistre, ochre, 
 and various other gaudy tints, all recently renewed. 
 At its end, backing upon the city wall, rose the old, 
 abandoned Church of S. Francesco, a brick edifice 
 of pleasing Gothic lines, topped by a handsome 
 campanile, with a belfry of double ogive arches on 
 coupled marble shafts. Near by on the west I found 
 the strangest garden wall that I ever saw, resembling 
 a vermilion postage-stamp from Turkey or Persia. 
 
MONTAGNANA 517 
 
 Immediately west of the albergo, on the main street, 
 rose an interesting Gothic palazzo of the early quat- 
 trocento: its charming feature was a colonnaded win- 
 dow of five ogive arches with rectangular cusps, in 
 the middle of the piano nobile, — their points relieved 
 with foliated caps, — and two balconies of exquisite, 
 marble, open-work railings, extending at the window's 
 ends, upon elaborate marble consoles. Flanking these 
 were single windows of similar design, underset by 
 frescoed red busts in panels; and the ground-floor 
 arcade upon Corinthian columns, contained a delight- 
 ful Renaissance portal. This handsome palace, and a 
 number of others upon the main thoroughfare, of more 
 purely Renaissance design, gave proofs of the extens- 
 ive use of Montagnana in earlier days as a place of 
 villeggiatura for the noble Venetian families. 
 
 I walked on, toward sunset, to the western city 
 gate. Porta Legnago, which as a gateway, pur et 
 simple, proved more formidable than the eastern, 
 though not accompanied by any castle; it had five 
 ports, — two without the wall, one within its breadth, 
 and two inside, all surrounded by lofty battlemented 
 erections; the outer ports protruding upon the bridge 
 of masonry that spanned the now grassy moat. Domi- 
 nating these was the customary great tower, of colos- 
 sal height, splendidly machicolated and crenelated. 
 The preservation here, as elsewhere, was very re- 
 markable. Beyond it the highway plunged at once into 
 the luxuriant open country. 
 
 The little city has a couple of parallel back streets, 
 north of the main one, and half a dozen widely spaced 
 at right angles; all without arcades, save for a few 
 solitary houses, and well interspersed with gardens. 
 These I wandered through in the sunset-hour, glancing 
 over the several additional churches, of uninteresting 
 
518 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 rococo design; — and the next morning early, was 
 away for Este, catching a train -at 7 or 8 a.m. The 
 journey contained nothing noteworthy, — only a 
 gradual nearing of the rounded Euganean Hills, which 
 rose slowly higher and more distinct, till I descended 
 at their very feet. On emerging from the little station 
 I saw the two southernmost peaks towering immedi- 
 ately to the north, — the end of the chain, obscuring 
 the others by their bulk; they were smoothly topped, 
 verdant cones, checkered by grain-fields here and there, 
 with one white-walled village perched upon a shoulder 
 halfway up, and another ensconed in the far saddle 
 between the twin summits, fifteen hundred feet in air. 
 From the lower slopes a long sharp ridge projected 
 southward into the plain, and upon the end of this 
 was located, I found, the ancient castle of the Estensi. 
 The town grew up along its western side, reaching now 
 half a mile farther south, to the railway; — a sleepy 
 but prosperous little city of eleven thousand people. 
 Ariosto made a famous play of words upon its name, 
 and its prosperity of his day: — 
 
 And because Charles shall say in Latin, " Eaie I" — 
 
 (That is, — be lords of the dominion round!) 
 
 Entitled in a future season Este 
 
 Shall with good omen be that beauteous ground; 
 
 And thus its ancient title of Ateste 
 
 Shall of its two first letters lose the sound.' 
 
 Taking a vettura, I drove north along the main 
 thoroughfare. Via Principe Umberto, which was lined 
 at first by comparatively modern buildings, but later 
 ran between aged stucco houses of faded hues, arcaded 
 on both sides, till it debouched into the spacious Piazza 
 Maggiore. This stretched westward from the street, 
 
 ' Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, canto Lxv; Rose's translation. — "Charles" 
 is Charlemagne. This is a double pun, tor by the second "Este" the poet 
 refers to the Italian word meaning summer-time, — hence, fertility. 
 
ESTE 519 
 
 which continued again beyond it for several blocks; 
 but I had not to go so far, for half a block beyond 
 the square, on the left hand, I was set down at the 
 town's best hostelry, — as it was recommended to me, 
 
 — the "Albergo Cavallino," conducted by the good 
 dame Giuseppina Zannini. She gave me her principal 
 guest-room, a large and comfortable chamber on the 
 first-floor front; and I had naught to complain of but 
 the inevitable company at meal-times of the usual ob- 
 streperous citizens. Of course one can always escape 
 such company by dining in one's room, but I prefer 
 to observe the life of these small places. 
 
 It being still early at my arrival, I soon returned to 
 Piazza Maggiore, which, as I now observed, lay just 
 a block west of the foot of the ruined fortress of the 
 Estensi, — being connected with the latter by a short 
 street. The broad square was paved, as at Monta- 
 gnana, by medieval cobbles around the sides and gray 
 flags reticulated with white lines in the middle; at its 
 north centre stood a handsome relic of the Old Regime, 
 
 — a tall, red Venetian mast upheld by a gray sand- 
 stone base, carved with four lions couchant at the 
 corners. Roundabout stretched a picturesque assort- 
 ment of old stuccoed buildings, variegated in design 
 and color, and in the form of their ground-story 
 arcades. The supports of the latter were bewilderingly 
 varied, showing every epoch from the Romanesque 
 to the basest rococo; there was but one instance of 
 pointed arches, — the fine old Gothic palazzo at the 
 left end of the western side, with windows in painted 
 trefoil frames, upon a checkered body of red and 
 cream. Under the arcade of the adjacent bright red 
 building I later found the town's first-class caffe, 
 frequented by the officers and signori. 
 
 The eastern row of edifices was the most ancient and 
 
520 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 mouldering, with shops occupying the ground floors. 
 The northern was centred by a pretentious Renais- 
 sance palace, adorned with balustrades and Corin- 
 thian pilasters on the upper stories, and topped by a 
 line of dwarf obelisks. In the middle of the southern 
 side stood the Palazzo Municipale, thrusting its pon- 
 derous bulk forward from the row, — a stuccoed edi- 
 fice with baroque windows, and a clock-face in its 
 gable, resting upon a broad deep loggia of granite 
 columns; these were of polished dark gray, arranged 
 in couples, and sustaining flat rounded arches. The 
 ringhiera-halcony projected before a central window 
 of triple arches, over which was an inscription stating, 
 "Da qui— Garibaldi— parlo — 26 Febbraio, 1867." 
 Where did he not speak, — that tireless patriot.'' 
 
 At the back of this loggia I observed a lifelike bronze 
 bust of Vittorio Emanuele II, before a marble niche; 
 and upon the third story of the right wing I noticed 
 the old Estense arms in large relief, — a Roman warrior 
 and a female standing beside a shield carved with a 
 heavily battlemented castle of three towers, the cen- 
 tral highest. There being nothing of importance to 
 see within this palace, which was so long the seat of 
 the Venetian Podestas, I took the short eastern street 
 to the foot of the hillside, gazing as I walked at the 
 picture afforded by its verdant slope. The broad 
 grassy descent was dotted with small trees, and en- 
 folded by the ancient, battlemented walls of the Este 
 fortress, which curved down on each hand from the 
 ruined citadel at the summit. Of this citadel, the 
 primary residence of that great family in the Dark 
 Ages, there remained visible but a semicircular brick 
 wall, concave in shape, tall and crenelated, reaching 
 from one shattered square tower to another, with the 
 lofty donjon of the castle still soaring skyward from 
 
ESTE 521 
 
 the middle; all were beautifully covered with ivy, 
 climbing over every part and drooping from the battle- 
 ments.^ From the flanking keeps the enceinture walls 
 descended in successive steps to the plain; each step 
 marked by another tower, broken and overgrown, a 
 mere shell of its quondam solidity. 
 
 The Estensi themselves descended, as time ad- 
 vanced, from that primeval rocca to a more civilized 
 habitation at the bottom of the slope, built just within 
 the basic line of the fortress; by the time they removed 
 to Ferrara this had been extended to nearly the full 
 length of that line, and embraced the outer wall itself, 
 over which the palace looked westward upon the town 
 with a myriad of grim windows, turrets and towers. 
 Of what stirring scenes and princely pageants was it 
 not the theatre, — that vanished medieval abode, so 
 picturesque and celebrated, furnished in the most 
 lavish manner of the later Middle Age. In the Renais- 
 sance epoch, when its owners had removed to Ferrara, 
 it was covered with stucco and gradually altered ac- 
 cording to the ideas of the classic revival, to fulfill 
 its new position as the villa of a cultured prince. But 
 following the transfer of Este to Venice, during the war 
 of the League of Cambrai and other troublous times of 
 the cinquecento, the deserted palace several times took 
 fire, burning wing by wing, till naught remained stand- 
 ing but the central portion. This was finally acquired 
 by Doge Mocenigo, who remodeled it to serve his 
 family as a country villa, and the ruined parts were 
 cleared away. So it has continued to the present day, 
 the villa being seized by the authorities of late, for 
 use as a museum of the antiquities of the town; beside 
 
 1 These three ancient towers, it is very interesting to note, were without 
 doubt the originals of the three depicted on that coat-of-arms which 
 became one of the most famous in the world. 
 
522 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 which they have built a new "Istituto Fefnminile," 
 on a portion of the ground once covered by the pal- 
 ace's left wing. 
 
 What I now beheld, therefore, as I advanced to the 
 street running north and south along the foot of the 
 slope, — the street that formerly bordered the basic 
 wall of the fortress, — was the original, battlemented, 
 brick wall itself, still standing, except in the middle 
 portion, where it was broken by the edifices of the 
 Villa Mocenigo; at the far angles, two blocks distant 
 from each other, stood the old corner towers of the 
 enceinture, square and shattered. The central build- 
 ings were in three parts, all relics of the Estense Pal- 
 ace : at the left rose a two-storied structure, of rough 
 brick and cobblestones below, in alternate courses, 
 and stucco-work above, with rusticated windows; 
 next came a brick wall of five filled arches containing 
 three doors and two windows, behind which rose a 
 two-storied brick edifice apparently unaltered from 
 Estense days, decorated with five small white-stucco 
 shields of the family arms; before it stood the life-size 
 plaster figure of a Roman warrior, astride of a shield 
 in Perugino's manner. The left-hand doorway here was 
 marked, "Museo"; before it on a column, standing 
 upon a heap of rocks surrounded by evergreen shrubs, 
 was posed a modern bronze bust of the poet-patriot, 
 Felice Cavallotti, who was a resident of Este. To the 
 right of this stretched what was apparently a low, 
 stuccoed common dwelling. The old brick wall on 
 each side of these buildings was prettily draped with 
 ivy, which at the northern end hung like a scarlet 
 blanket from the battlements. 
 
 Two gateways were visible in these stretches of 
 wall, closed by iron grilles. Advancing to the south- 
 ern one, I saw within a sort of little park covering the 
 
ESTE 523 
 
 level space, shaded by fine trees, clearly a remnant of 
 the princely grounds of the Estensi. The other 
 wicket, near the northern end, proved to open into 
 the area taken for the female institute; behind a fair 
 extent of turf and flower-beds stood the modern 
 building, — a quietly designed edifice of stucco; and 
 behind that rose the picturesque old northern wall 
 of the fortress, climbing the verdurous hillside in suc- 
 cessive steps, with ivy-grown towers. 
 
 Continuing northward on this same street, through 
 a block of decayed stucco dwellings, I reached at its end 
 a cross-street, up which, to the right, was seen an 
 ornamental yellow-sandstone gateway of the Renais- 
 sance; behind this a charming shady avenue extended 
 up the hillside, here increased in height, and covered 
 with verdant terraces and stately groves. Amidst these 
 bowers a large villa was glimpsed to the left, and 
 near by a marble bust of Carducci gleamed against a 
 sylvan background. It seemed, in the noon-heat, like 
 a vista of paradise, blissful with its warblings of count- 
 less unseen birds. It was — so a passer-by told me 
 — the Villa Benvenuti, celebrated for its beautiful 
 views across the plain, as far as the Apennines 
 and the snowy Alps. The proprietors, unfortunately, 
 chanced to be away, so that I could not procure 
 admission. 
 
 Turning westward upon this cross-street, and pass- 
 ing the Via Cavour, upon which my inn was located, 
 I reached an enormous red brick church on the right 
 side of the way, of strange oval form, with a false 
 front rising to three-quarter height, left rough for a 
 facing never put on. It was the Cathedral of S. Tecla. 
 Attached to its rear was a tall, rounded choir chapel, 
 seen from one side. The fagade held three oblong 
 doorways, simply framed in marble, and two unframed 
 
524 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 square windows over the side portals. At the left 
 rear soared the handsome brick campanile to a great 
 height, smoothly faced without windows, but with an 
 unfinished belfry of two arches per side; before this 
 stood a small stuccoed structure, of baroque lines and 
 reddish hue, covering the side entrance. The baroque 
 interior I visited later: its form, of a lofty oval rotunda 
 capped by. a flat dome, is peculiar but effective; a large 
 oval fresco adorns the centre of the domed roof, from 
 which radiating ribs descend to a gallery upon the 
 cornice, running beneath the five oblong windows 
 there inserted on each side; over the main doorway 
 is a rich oaken music-loft, fiamboyantly carved, de- 
 corated on the bottom with six paintings in baroque 
 frames; opposite opens the choir, through an arch 
 nearly as lofty as the dome, its square recess having 
 a separate cupola, and an apse four times taller than 
 its width. Five depressed archways run along each 
 side of the nave, three of them holding altars, the fourth 
 holding a pulpit on one hand, the side entrance on the 
 other, and the fifth framing a chapel on each hand 
 beside the choir ; between these archways ascend 
 Corinthian pilasters to the high cornice, which con- 
 tinue also around the choir. 
 
 The paintings were poor, with two exceptions: the 
 high-altar piece was an exceptionally fine work of 
 Gian Battista Tiepolo, — a huge canvas represent- 
 ing Este prostrate under the plague, and the demons 
 of the latter being driven away by the Almighty, 
 thanks to the prayers of Santa Tecla; her upturned, 
 imploring countenance was very holy and beautiful, 
 and the dramatic disposition and action were quite 
 successful. On the third altar to the left stood a simi- 
 lar, smaller work, of golden tone, but poor in facial 
 beauty save for the enchanting swarm of putti around 
 
ESTE 525 
 
 the Father. The baptismal font of sohd porphyry was 
 also noteworthy. 
 
 The second morning I devoted to the Museum, 
 which proved surprisingly rich in Roman and pre- 
 Roman relics. The ground-floor vestibule contained 
 two interesting sculptures of the duecento, evidently 
 the supports of holy-water basins; the one portraying 
 a bearded saint, the other holding three figures back 
 to back, in three-quarter relief, — Adam, Eve, and the 
 female tempter. The latter piece was truly remarkable. 
 Mounting the grand staircase of Mocenigo's period, 
 I inspected several spacious halls filled with remains 
 of the stone and bronze ages, — with cases of imple- 
 ments of every nature, and many vases of great value; 
 the famed "graffiti" vases were specially noticeable; 
 also those studded with blue nails, and the earliest 
 ceramics in red and black. These Pelasgian relics are 
 not surpassed anywhere, and constitute a revelation 
 of the handicrafts of that mysterious race which ante- 
 dated the Etruscans, — the same that built the Cyclo- 
 pean walls of Spoleto and Amelia. ^ 
 
 On the ground story I was then shown two halls of 
 artistic Roman remains, all — like the prehistoric ob- 
 jects above — discovered in this neighborhood, and 
 together establishing its occupation by civilized 
 communities for thirty centuries past. The numerous 
 bronzes of Latin culture, including several heads finely 
 individualized and expressive, the excellent glassware, 
 with specimens of Egyptian style, and especially the 
 superior mosaics, all indicated a Roman settlement of 
 large size and wealth, corresponding to the reports of 
 history. Mosaic-work, it appears, was a, prominent 
 industry of Ateste, which was long famed for its deli- 
 
 ' See Hill-Towns of Italy, — Spoleto and Amelia; the Etruscan Mu- 
 seum of Perugia. 
 
526 PLAIN-TOWNS OP ITALY 
 
 cate materials and artistic productions. Quite a num- 
 ber of their sarcophagi and cinerary urns also were 
 here, dug up in the adjacent necropolis. There was 
 further a large quantity of the anterior Etruscan 
 relics, including many good vases, — though not equal 
 to the collections of Perugia and central Italy. ^ 
 
 During the afternoons I sought out three interesting 
 short walks from the piazza. One led southward on the 
 main street, investigating the heterogeneous variations 
 in its old arcades and polychromatic houses, which 
 showed every sort of pier, column, and pillar, some- 
 times colonnaded without arches, and reflecting the 
 changes of twenty generations. Thus I reached the 
 ancient, ruinous Church of S. Martino, on the right 
 of the way, surmounted by a picturesque leaning tower 
 in the centre. It appeared parallel with the street, 
 behind a little close, and exhibited traces of vanished 
 frescoing. The nave was extremely low and gabled, 
 its narrow arched entrance being framed by two pil- 
 asters and a cornice; to the left of the tottering tower 
 was a Lombard drum upon the roof, with a Roman- 
 esque, arcaded, brick cornice. This edifice must come 
 from at least the thirteenth century. Its interior is 
 said to be modernized and uninteresting; but it was 
 filled with scaffolding for repairs, and I could not 
 enter. 
 
 Another stroll was westward from the piazza's 
 northern end, along the broad, arcaded Via Vittorio 
 Emanuele, which soon narrowed to a fantastic stuc- 
 coed tower of Renaissance days, spanning the street 
 with a stone archway through its ground story. The 
 latter was heavily rusticated, the second story held 
 a huge clock-face, and the third was an open belfry 
 of double arches, framed by rusticated Doric pilasters 
 
 > HiU-Towna of Italy. 
 
ESTE 527 
 
 of pinkish hue, and topped by forked battlements. 
 It was the Porta Vecchia, — a city gate, and at the 
 same time the city clock- and bell-tower; its erection 
 took place, according to an inscription, in the year 
 1690. Just beyond it flowed the old city moat, still 
 a broad and freshly running stream, arched by a 
 heavy bridge; it was the Frussine, which rises in the 
 Valdagno.^ The brick garden walls extending along 
 its eastern bank to the right and left, were the only 
 remains of the quondam ramparts. To the west for 
 some distance stretched the later quarter of the town, 
 several blocks wide and long. 
 
 To the left of the Porta Vecchia, within, stood the 
 small baroque Church of S. Rocco, with a queer 
 Byzantine-domed campanile like a minaret; beside it 
 ran the narrow Via Monache southward, just inside 
 the former town wall, lined by a series of mouldering 
 dwellings of vast age, with exterior corbelled chimneys. 
 At its end rose the dismantled old Church of the 
 Archangel Gabriel, from which another ancient way, 
 the Via S. Rocco, ran east between crumbling ar- 
 cades to the Municipio; the Gothic arches showed their 
 longevity. Seldom anywhere have I seen a quarter 
 more forlornly aged and picturesquely decrepit. 
 
 The third walk was westward into the newer sec- 
 tion, along the street of the Duomo, through another 
 former city gate. Inquiries brought me to the Chiesa 
 dei Socqui, or S. Maria delle Consolazioni; in which 
 large and queerly shaped edifice I found a splendid 
 gem of painting, — a most beautiful specimen of Cima 
 
 • Vide the end of chapter iv. It is formed by the junction, near Mon- 
 tecchio, of the Agno and two other streams. Somewhat northwest of Este 
 it is joined by the Liana, from Monti Berici, whose northern branch was 
 originally the main outlet of the Bacchiglione, and was on several occasions 
 utilized by the Vicentines, when at war with the Paduans, for an entire 
 diversion this way of the Bacchiglione's water. See chapter il 
 
528 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 da Conegliano. It was a panel of the Madonna hold- 
 ing her Child, dressed as a nun and seated before a 
 dark curtain, with a slight vista of Cima's beloved 
 mountains on the left. The babe looks appealingly into 
 the sad, tender face of the mother, who bends her head 
 to him lovingly and thoughtfully; — a scene of the 
 truest simplicity and sweetest sentiment. And, for- 
 tunately, it is still in good preservation. 
 
 Another and very pleasant walk, or rather climb, 
 affording inspiring views across the plain, is that to 
 the village mentioned as located halfway up the hill- 
 side. This may be prolonged, by trained pedestrians, 
 through the saddle with the other village, and over 
 the hills to Arqua, the home of Petrarch, which is 
 about seven miles distant on the southeastern slopes 
 of the Euganai; or the journey may be taken by 
 carriage, — a delightful drive, which can be finished 
 at Battaglia or Monselice. Arqua is but five miles 
 from either of the latter places, so that the excursion 
 to it is usually performed from one of them, — pre- 
 ferably Battaglia. That was my plan; so the third 
 morning found me again aboard an early train, on my 
 way to Monselice, which I was resolved to visit in 
 that one day, and reach a comfortable hotel at Ro- 
 vigo by nightfall. 
 
 Monselice (the Mons Silicis of the Romans), another 
 town of eleven thousand inhabitants, owes its modern 
 importance to being the junction of the railway from 
 Mantua with the main line from Bologna to Padua; 
 also to its location at the head of the Battaglia Canal 
 to Padua, — to feed which a part of the waters of the 
 Frussine are diverted eastward along the foot of the 
 hills. But in olden times Monselice was far more im- 
 portant, because the protecting castle which gave it 
 being was until the days of modern cannon the 
 
MONSELICE 529 
 
 acknowledged key to the whole region, and the chief 
 defense of Padua upon the south; its position was prac- 
 tically invulnerable, upon an isolated rocky pinnacle 
 five hundred feet high, ^- at the foot of whose slope 
 the town collected. This crag rises just opposite the 
 southeastern angle of the Euganean Range, from 
 which it is divided by only a narrow pass ; and with its 
 crowning, castellated ruins, is a familiar memory to 
 all travelers approaching Venice from the south. Tas- 
 soni wrote of it long ago: — 
 
 Vien poi Monselice, in contra I'armi e i sacchi 
 Sicuro gia per frode e per battaglia. 
 
 In former times, therefore, the first object of all 
 captains seeking to conquer the Polesine, or the dis- 
 trict of Padua, was the reduction of this formidable 
 fortress.^ Padua was once actually its dependency, 
 under the Lombard seigneurs of the seventh century. 
 It belonged from the ninth century to the Marquises 
 of Este, and was consequently an object of ceaseless 
 contention on the part of the Paduans, who dreaded 
 its eternal menace, and often sought to capture it by 
 force or stratagem. This was finally effected by Ezze- 
 lino in 1237, we know not how, when he was over- 
 running the territory prior to taking Padua herself; 
 and the castle's seizure was the signal for the city's 
 
 ' The Romans had a stronghold on this height, and doubtless the Celts 
 and Etruscans before them; the same foundations endured through all the 
 ages, and still exist. Having passed through the hands of the Ostrogoths, 
 into those of Narses and the Byzantines, it was desperately held by the 
 latter against the Lombards for thirty-four years after their arrival on the 
 plain, constituting thus practically the last point in Italy over which 
 floated the flag of the Eastern Empire, At last, in 602, the Lombards suc- 
 ceeded in efifecting its capture, but only — it is believed — after a long- 
 drawn-out siege which won its way through hunger. Upon the conquest 
 of Charlemagne the castle became the property of the Estensi, because he 
 made them his feudatory lords of the whole district. 
 
530 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 yielding. The Estensi never forgave this wrong, nor 
 rested till they had brought Ezzelino low, and recov- 
 ered their fortress; but about the end of that century 
 they lost it again, to the Paduans, during the disasters 
 of Azzo VIII and Fresco. The commune did not long 
 enjoy its coveted possession, for Can Grande della Scala 
 descended upon the city in 1317, and "Monselice, the 
 key of the defense of Padua, was taken by Della Scala 
 through the bribery and cowardice of the garrison. 
 One by one all the castles of the district came into his 
 hands'';^ he manned them with powerful garrisons, 
 and held them till the city gave in. 
 
 When the Delia Carrara, with the aid of their allies, 
 recovered Padua from the weak grasp of Mastino II, 
 in 1337, "only the castle of Monselice remained to 
 the Scalas ; and soon Marsilio (della Carrara) and the 
 Rossi besieged it as the most strategic point in the 
 territory. It was, moreover, the key to the Polesine 
 and part of the lagoons, and therefore of great political 
 importance. But the fortress withstood all attacks, 
 and only surrendered to Ubertino a year later," ^ 
 presumably from famine. In due course thereafter it 
 passed, with Padua, into the strong hands of Venice, 
 which held it until gunpowder had annihilated its 
 importance; whereupon it was suffered to decay. 
 
 It was only about a twenty minutes' ride from Este, 
 straight east along the foot of the hills, accompanied by 
 the slender branch of the Frussine on the left; the curv- 
 ing lofty slopes, hardly a mile away, never looked more 
 beautiful, in their variegated blanket of green fields 
 and yellow foliage, combined with the livelier glisten 
 of white-walled villages. We joined the main line, turned 
 north upon it, and running a short distance between 
 the hills and the precipitous crag of Monselice, which 
 
 ' Cesare Foligno, Story of Padua. ' Ibid. 
 
MONSELICE 531 
 
 now appeared on the right, stopped at its station, to 
 the northwest of the town. Depositing my luggage, 
 I at once walked down the tree-lined highway of ap^ 
 proach, which wound toward the southwestern base 
 of the mighty rock; its jvestern face was sheer preci- 
 pice for the first two or three hundred feet, showing 
 the bright feldspathic stone uncovered by vegetation, 
 which made the ruined fortress on the pointed summit 
 appear quite inaccessible. No one could here discern 
 that the other sides were gentle, verdurous declivities. 
 I reached that reminder of ancient civilization, still 
 in excellent condition, — the Battaglia Canal, — and 
 saw before me the old western city wall, stretching 
 along its farther bank; this was built of stone, and 
 still preserved its grim battlements, and shattered 
 towers rising at intervals. Shortly to the left it ended 
 at the northwestern bastion, whence I saw the north- 
 ern rampart running east toward the rock. The former 
 city gate, — if there was any, — at the end of the 
 bridge which I now traversed, had entirely vanished. 
 One block to the east I reached the main street, 
 running south to the town's centre; this was the Via 
 Umberto I, lined by three-storied stucco houses with- 
 out arcades, with a modern look because of repainting; 
 but the colors here had not the vividness of Este and 
 Montagnana. A few minutes more brought me to a 
 striking Renaissance palazzo, rising to the left on the 
 first incline of the hill, opposite a short arcade filled 
 with shops and caffes; it was a stuccoed edifice with 
 curious, heavy, gray-stone trimmings, and faced by a 
 colonnaded portico of the latter material. To the left 
 of the portico opened a massive, rusticated, arched por- 
 tal, twenty feet high, and across the first floor stretched 
 an enormously heavy, balustraded, stone balcony, 
 fully forty feet long. Immediately beyond came the 
 
532 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 central cross-roads, whose left arm climbed the hill- 
 side in steps for fifty yards, between the Palazzo Muni- 
 cipale on its left and the Monte di Pieta on its right. 
 The former was a simple stucco building, entered by 
 its right side, from the steps, holding beside the portal 
 a tablet to Garibaldi adorned with dainty bronze 
 foliage; another tablet, on the front, was inscribed to 
 Vittorio Emanuele II, saying that he carried the 
 Italian arms here on August 1, 1866, and concluding 
 rhapsodically, — "Oh! Momento! — Dieci lustri di 
 lutti e catene — vendicati!"^ 
 
 This was a remarkably picturesque spot. The build- 
 ing of the Monte di Pieta bore on its second story a 
 charming Renaissance loggia, three arches wide and 
 two bays deep, approached by a handsome open 
 stairway of two flights, — all in creamy stucco, with 
 gray sandstone trimmings; and in its side wall it held a 
 graceful double-arched window, with a balustrade and 
 diamond bars. The broad street-stairway mounted 
 past the latter, to the face of an imposing Gothic 
 palace fifty yards up the steep slope, before which it 
 turned abruptly to the right, and continued ascending 
 southeastward. The piano nobile of the palace con- 
 tained a stately row of six double-arched trefoil 
 windows, on a body of red and creamy blocks 
 formed into large diamonds ; over its roof rose a grand 
 old battlemented stone tower, and far above that 
 soared the precipitous hillside, to its castellated peak. 
 
 Turning round from this vista, I saw the central 
 Piazza Vittorio Emanuele extending eastward, and 
 then south, in the shape of a broad "L"; lined on the 
 right side by mouldering stucco arcades and houses, 
 and dominated by the picturesque old city clock-tower 
 
 ' "Oh! Illustrious Moment! — Fifty years of sorrows and chains — 
 revenged!" 
 
MONSELICE 533 
 
 at the farther end. This was also of crumbHng stucco, 
 with no opening below its belfry of triple arches, 
 crowned by forked battlements; before its base curved 
 a graceful white loggia of Renaissance design, orna- 
 mented with Corinthian half-columns between the 
 arches. To its left, after two buildings, was visible a 
 section of the ancient city wall close behind, of the im- 
 pressive height of three full stories. The piazza was 
 well flagged in gray stone, and the aged edifices round- 
 about were gayly colored in soft tints of pink, lavender 
 rose, orange, and vermilion. 
 
 I followed the Via Umberto farther southward, 
 through arcades on the right hand only, to another and 
 smaller piazza, of triangular form, where the main 
 street forked; one branch continuing along the south- 
 ern base of the hill, the other running southward to 
 Rovigo; each leading between simple houses, soon 
 broken by shady gardens of villas. To the left here 
 rose a ponderous Renaissance palazzo of four stories, 
 resting upon an arcade of heavy square stone pillars, 
 with equally heavy balustrades, fancifully wrought 
 in sandstone or cement, adorning all the round-arched 
 windows. Clearly the aristocracy of this place in 
 Venetian days were families of much wealth. Return- 
 ing to the main piazza, I climbed the street-stairs up 
 the hillside, veering southward before the Gothic 
 palace, where the way became a sloping promenade. 
 The huge grim tower behind the palace proved to be 
 a Gothic dwelling itself, very aged and ruinous, its 
 windows mostly blocked or boarded up; it was — so 
 I learned — the ancient Palazzo Marcello of eventful 
 history, where the Princes of Este used to reside 
 when staying in the town. Whether they erected it I 
 could not ascertain; but from their possession it passed 
 to other noble families, who have occupied it to the 
 
534 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 present time. Its owner now is the Contessa Geraldi; 
 but so dilapidated has its whole structure recently 
 become, through vast age, that she usually resides 
 in another palace on the plain. The interior is said 
 to be still richly furnished, with many memorials of 
 its historic past. 
 
 Beyond its grounds came those of some hidden 
 villa, stretching up the steep slope to the left in a wood 
 of young trees, with cultivated turf, amongst whose 
 groves a balustraded white terrace was discernible, 
 crested by gleaming statues; while a long dark file of 
 pointed cypresses descended along the farther bound- 
 ary. Here, then, I was turning the southwestern angle 
 of the hill, and reaching its more gentle and arboreous 
 declines; the way continued always upward, curving 
 gradually to the left, with more precipitous descents 
 upon the right. Via Duomo, it was named; for it led 
 to the Cathedral. Four contiguous medieval buildings 
 of strange design now appeared, the last two shaped 
 like battlemented towers, with other towers attached 
 irregularly to their rear; it was evidently once a forti- 
 fied manor, though now inhabited by families of the 
 poorest class. There followed a high stuccoed waU, 
 crowned with the most droll and eccentric stone stat- 
 ues of misshapen dwarfs, in a long row, with enormous, 
 grimacing heads and humped backs; a fine Renaissance 
 archway, framed in Doric columns, permitted a vista 
 of a very long stairway of many flights, flanked every 
 few feet by stone statues in couples, leading straight- 
 away through a greenwood to a far ornamental grotto; 
 this was adorned with Doric columns and statuary 
 upon its face, and topped by a balustrade with more 
 statues, — a fair sight, indeed, against the sylvan 
 background. To the right of it appeared a decaying 
 stucco palazzo of the Renaissance, the successor of 
 
MONSELICE 535 
 
 the medieval stronghold just passed, and the seat — 
 as I was told — of the Conti Nani. The dwarfs were, 
 therefore, a play upon the family name.^ 
 
 On the right hand here, there extended a little shady 
 terrace, whose parapet overlooked the streets of the 
 town below, lying amidst a sea of dying foliage; across 
 the luxuriant plain Este was clearly visible, with the 
 towers of its ruined castle. TheDuomo next appeared, 
 upon a similar and broader terrace, rising behind a 
 paved court with its left side to the road, — a singular 
 location for the principal church of the town. It was a 
 fair-sized, stuccoed edifice, decorated with brick pilas- 
 ter-strips, an arcaded cornice along the gable, and a 
 porch over the single doorway consisting of detached 
 marble columns sustaining a rounded stucco archway. 
 Its interior, I found, had been entirely remodeled : the 
 low broad nave was without aisles or transept, and 
 freshly whitewashed; over an altar against the right 
 wall stood a quaint early polyptich, showing S. Gius- 
 tina among six other saints, — retouched out of recog- 
 nition of the original work; a second and later picture 
 of S. Giustina — the church's patron — hung between 
 the windows of the little choir, — a well-moulded, 
 rather prepossessing figure, of the later Venetian 
 school. The under side of the high-altar canopy had a 
 still better painting, in the style of Palma Vecchio, re- 
 presenting the Almighty in clouds, surrounded hy putti, 
 with his right hand outstretched in benediction; and 
 over the altar to the left of the choir was a pleasing 
 cinquecento Venetian panel, of the Madonna and Child, 
 uninjured by any retouching. The authors of these 
 works appeared to be unknown. 
 
 On continuing beyond the Duomo, its fine old cam- 
 panile was revealed, at a rear corner, rising in five divi- 
 
 ' "Nani" is the Italian word for dwarfs. 
 
536 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 sions of red brick, with as many arcaded cornices, and 
 a double-arched battlemented belfry. Here the high- 
 way ended at a Renaissance gateway, whose stone 
 pillars were crowned by huge sculptured lions; behind 
 which opened a terrace with a bayed stone parapet, 
 commanding a wide view; at its back a white stuccoed 
 archway admitted me to a private road extending on 
 upward along the southern face of the hill, with the 
 stone parapet on its right and a row of seven white 
 chapels at regular intervals on the left, rising upon 
 flights of steps. These were backed and separated by 
 a line of delightful old cypresses. At the end loomed 
 a huge mass of buildings perched on a projecting crag, 
 behind which the ancient city wall descended steeply 
 from the fortress to the plain. 
 
 The walk had assumed a character of fascinating, 
 unique beauty; the view was an inspiration: sprinkled 
 afar through the sea of verdure below were gleaming 
 towns and villages surmounted by their campanili, 
 interspersed with the countless red tiles and white 
 walls of separate farmhbuses, ensconced in groves of 
 poplars and cypresses, looking very serene and bliss- 
 ful in the warm golden sunlight. Directly below lay 
 the square, walled cemetery of Monselice, cypress- 
 bound, with its shining chapels, stones, and monu- 
 ments; and straightaway to the distant south, like a 
 plumb-line, extended the ancient highway to Rovigo, 
 — a splendid, unending avenue of tall golden maples or 
 plane trees. I felt like Rogers, when he cried: — 
 
 The promised land 
 Lies at my feet in all its loveliness. — 
 And lo! the sun is shining; and the lark 
 Singing aloud for joy, — to him is not 
 Such sudden ravishment as now I feel 
 At the first glimpse of fair Italy! ^ 
 
 ' Rogers, Italy. 
 
MONSELICE 537 
 
 The chapels contained only little cubicles, with sim- 
 ple altars, surmounted each by an old canvas portrait 
 of a saint; but over them were prettily draped thick 
 curtains of honeysuckle vines. At the top of the ascent 
 opened a flowered courtyard, backed by a handsome 
 Renaissance palace covered with columns and statu- 
 ary, having a dark Gothic tower at its left end. It was 
 the Villa Valier, formerly Duodo; owned for centuries 
 by the Conti Duodo, but now passed by the marriage 
 of a surviving daughter to the historic Venetian family 
 of Balbi- Valier. It had a stuccoed fagade of 1740. 
 with trimmings and sculptures of gray and light-brown 
 stone; the three arched portals below and the windows 
 above were all flanked by pairs of half-columns em- 
 bracing niches with statues; and rectangular panels of 
 varied reliefs extended above the niches. On the right 
 stood the small private church of the villa, with its 
 apse on the very verge of the abyss, — a glistening 
 white ediflce with yellow garniture, faced by a three- 
 arched portico, and topped by a cupola and a slender 
 campanile; if was connected with the mansion by the 
 latter's projecting right wing. 
 
 The strange sight was upon the left : here there rose 
 a high balustraded stone terrace, approached at the 
 ends by two heavy opposing stairways, topped by 
 giant statues, — between which opened a triple- 
 arched grotto; behind it mounted a very broad and 
 lofty flight of steps, to another terrace adorned with an 
 artificial pyramid of rough rocks, backed by a semicir- 
 cular pink wall containing a row of empty niches and 
 crowned by a row of statues. The hollow pyramid 
 held a shrine dedicated to St. Francis of Assisi; hence 
 the whole queer construction is called the "Grotta di 
 S. Francesco." Above it soared the steep upper hill- 
 side, covered with vines, to the ruinous circular en- 
 
538 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ceinture of the castle, within which naught remained 
 but the empty, massive donjon. A long straight flight 
 of narrow steps climbed to it, at the left side of the 
 Grotta, entered by a locked iron wicket; all this sum- 
 mit of the hill belongs now to the Conte Valier, with- 
 out whose permission one cannot ascend, — and at 
 present he was away. To the left of the wicket ex- 
 tended another wall, beautifully overgrown with vines, 
 containing three niches with marble busts of the last 
 Counts of Duodo. 
 
 The custodian of the place, who had now appeared, 
 conducted me through the little church, which was 
 erected, he said, about 1600. It was a graceful edifice, 
 decorated with some taste and in perfect repair; but the 
 only noteworthy feature was the presence of twenty- 
 five mummified martyrs, — that is, early Roman 
 Christians, — who were dug out of the Catacombs by 
 Pope Paul V, about 1607, and sent to the Conte Duodo 
 of that day as an invaluable gift. They reposed in cof- 
 fins with glass sides, inserted in the walls of the little 
 nave; and were one and all dressed in 5ie gaudiest, 
 cheapest "circus-clothes," ornamented with an abund- 
 ance of tinsel and gilt fringe, — the tawdry breeches, 
 stockings, and coat-arms being slit, to expose the des- 
 sicated limbs. The withered toes were purposely pro- 
 truded from the shoes, but the hands were inclosed in 
 coarse white gloves, — the right holding the palm- 
 leaf of martyrdom, the left the cup of the Vinum San- 
 guince. Above the ridiculous gilt epaulettes and neck- 
 gauds projected the grinning, eyeless, fleshless skulls; 
 which combined with the childish finery and exposed 
 limb-bones to render the whole exhibit at once lud- 
 icrous, horrible, and repulsive. 
 
 As for the palace, I was obliged to be satisfied with 
 the information that it was furnished in a style of 
 
MONSELICE 539 
 
 "royal magnificence." So I returned to the town, 
 procured a very late lunch, and catching a south- 
 ward train about 5 p.m., arrived well before sunset 
 at the pleasant old inn of the "Corona Ferrea" in 
 Rovigo. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 EOVIGO, AKQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 
 
 I leave thee, beauteous Italy! — no more 
 From the high terraces at eventide 
 To look supine into thy depths of sky, — 
 Thy golden moon between the cliff and me. 
 Or the dark spires of fretted cypresses 
 Bordering the channel of the milky way. 
 
 — Walter Savage Landoe. 
 
 There seems to be a peculiar natural law amongst 
 northern Italians that restricts their small cities to be- 
 tween ten and eleven thousand population. Rovigo is 
 still another of its numerous examples. This is surpris- 
 ing, because Rovigo has the history, the reputation, 
 and the appearance of a considerably larger town. It 
 is the stately capital of a province, and of the whole 
 region of the Polesine, — located about fifteen miles 
 south of Monselice, three miles south of the Adige, 
 and ten north of the Po, upon the canalized stream 
 called the Naviglio Adigetto, whicji lends to the place 
 a sort of Venetian aspect. Its history, its extent, its 
 palaces, churches, monuments, and artistic riches, all 
 indicate a past in which it was a much larger city, of 
 influence and coveted wealth. Its origin goes back 
 beyond Roman times, when the Latin name of the 
 town — from which the Italian is derived — was 
 Rhodigium, whose flowery significance bespeaks the 
 fertility of the soil. Ariosto mentioned it, in the Or- 
 lando Furioso, canto XLi, — 
 
 And that fair town, whose produce is the rose, 
 The rose which gives its name in Grecian speech. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 541 
 
 By situation the centre and natural metropolis of 
 that fertile district, Rovigo was certainly during the 
 Middle Ages the most opulent and cherished town of 
 the Estensi, and following their removal to Ferrara, 
 remained first in their possessions, after Modena and 
 Reggio. In 1308 it was seized from the unfortunate 
 Fresco by his uncle Francesco, through a cowp de main, 
 and sold at once by the latter to Padua; nine years 
 later it was taken with the rest of the Paduan fiefs by 
 Can Grande della Scala; but with the fall of the Scala 
 kingdom after Can Grande's death, it was repos- 
 sessed by the house of Fste. In 1404, during a war 
 waged by the Marchese Niccolo III and the Pope 
 against Venice, Rovigo was violently attacked by the 
 Republic's army, and her territory overrun with fire 
 and sword; Niccolo, "beset by Venetian forces on land 
 and water, his capital threatened by starvation, his 
 subject cities in flames, was compelled to purchase 
 peace by the surrender of the city and territory of 
 Rovigo to Venice."^ In 1438 they were restored to 
 Niccolo by the Republic, in order to secure his alliance 
 against Filippo Maria Visconti. In 1481, during the 
 war of Pope Sixtus IV against the Republic, in which 
 Duke Ercole d'Este had the ill- judgment to support 
 the former's side, the arms of Venice once more as- 
 cended the Po, ravaged the Polesine, and besieged 
 its unfortunate capital. 
 
 "By the middle of the summer [of that year] the tri- 
 umph of the Venetians all along the Po was complete, 
 and Rovigo became isolated. An attempt to send re- 
 inforcements from Ferrara failed, and the Venetians, 
 apparently not realizing its helpless situation, offered 
 generous conditions if the citizens would surrender 
 spontaneously. On August 14, Casparo da San Seve- 
 
 1 E. Noyes, Story of Ferrara. 
 
542 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 rino entered the town in the name of the Signoria of 
 Venice."^ The Peace of Bagnolo, shortly after, con- 
 firmed its cession to the Republic, with the greater 
 part of the Polesine. " The loss of Rovigo was a bitter 
 and humiliating blow for the Duke, — but he was too 
 weak to protest. — The Golden Age [of Este] was 
 gone, never to return." Alfonso, the next duke, made 
 a desperate effort to recover these domains during the 
 War of the League of Cambrai; but Venice, beaten and 
 exhausted as she was, refused to relax her grip; and 
 Rovigo remained a part of her territories until the end 
 of the Republic. The city, therefore, as we now be- 
 hold it, is a thoroughly Venetian town: which was 
 reconstructed and adorned by its suzerain during the 
 sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 
 
 The railway station, where the main line connects 
 with branches to Verona and Chioggia, lies some dis- 
 tance to the northwest of the city; which is approached 
 by an avenue of plane trees bending alternately to the 
 south and the east, and finally settling itself in the 
 latter direction upon entering the old town itself. Here 
 it becomes the Via Umberto I, — a broad straight 
 thoroughfare without arcades, running between four- 
 storied stucco dwellings and Venetian palaces; and 
 here upon the left is located the excellent " Corona 
 Ferrea," — or Inn of the Iron Crown, — recently re- 
 christened, by the man who has endowed it with mod- 
 ern comforts and cleanliness, as "Bracchi's Hotel." It 
 was the best hostelry that I had found since leaving 
 Verona, at the same time of very reasonable prices ; and 
 the usual traveler could do no better than make it his 
 head-quarters, while visiting the various places in the 
 vicinity. 
 
 On the morning after my arrival, I started eastward 
 
 ' E. G. Gardner, Ariosto: the King of CouH-Poets. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 543 
 
 to the central piazza, examining, as I slowly proceeded, 
 the interesting edifices of the street. Immediately to 
 the right, at the angle of the Via Minilli, rose a splen- 
 did old Gothic palazzo of the Venetian type: four sto- 
 ries high, of stucco, with colonnaded trefoil windows 
 in the middle of the first two floors, flanked by 
 single windows of the same design with balconies of 
 flamboyant tracery; the eaves being graced by a curi- 
 ous parapet made of large stucco fieurs-de-lys. Back 
 of this on the side street was a contrasting Renais- 
 sance palace, of stucco, red brick, and terra-cotta, 
 equally charming in design; each of its three stories 
 held a large central archway, flanked by two pairs of 
 double arched windows, all with bright frames and 
 pillars of brick, — the windows topped by winged cotta 
 medallions with busts; another feature was the four 
 beautiful pilaster-strips reaching from ground to bat- 
 tlements, made of brick with fine open tracery of terra- 
 cotta. 
 
 A pretty little terraced garden on its left looked 
 down upon a dark stream that here appeared, flowing 
 eastward between quays shaded by endless rows of 
 big horse-chestnut trees; it was the Naviglio Adigetto. 
 Thoroughly Venetian was this picturesque scene: the 
 muddy water, twenty yards in breadth, was sunk 
 deeply between its old brick embankments, broken at 
 intervals by steps descending to landings; a succession 
 of bridges, of stone, brick, and iron, marked the long 
 vista on each hand, dusky beneath its dense, arching 
 foliage, — so dense that it concealed all but the first 
 stories of the aged stucco buildings facing the quays. 
 Here was the original grand thoroughfare of the town, 
 that gave it life and prosperity for many ages before 
 the present; and still there remained a fair part of 
 that water-borne traflic, — evidenced by the three 
 
544 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 barges which I saw slowly advancing. Their method 
 of propulsion was the laboring one of four centuries 
 ago, — long poles thrust against the bottom by men 
 walking from prow to stern. The innumerable bridges 
 prevent the use of the tow-line. Silent, however, were 
 the confining rows of houses, and nearly deserted were 
 the shady quays; on the southern bank a medieval 
 brick tower soared far into the sky, broad, windowless, 
 and shattered at the top, — the donjon-keep, as I 
 later found, of the ruined Venetian citadel. 
 
 As I retook my way eastward on Via Umberto, which 
 now changed its name to Via Angeli, continuous ar- 
 cades sprang up on the left side, and on the right ap- 
 peared a great Renaissance palace of imposing lines; 
 its stuccoed body emphasized the ponderous arched 
 portal of rusticated stone, topped by a balustrade, the 
 stone-framed baroque windows, and the third-story 
 pediment with its shield of arms and Roman trophies. 
 Opposite this rose a handsome palazzo of unique de- 
 sign, — every brick of its fagade being separately rus- 
 ticated, and of lavender hue with light-gray trimmings, 
 over a dark-brown stucco arcade. There followed it 
 an impressive, long colonnade of heavy Doric columns, 
 extending before many different edifices. 
 
 Then the street ended; and a short turn to the north 
 debouched at once into the central piazza. But at this 
 very angle on the left, fronting eastward, I found the 
 splendid Palazzo Roncalli, erected by Sammicheli in 
 1555 : three huge rusticated arches, of stucco cleverly 
 imitating stone, with mouthing bearded heads upon 
 the keystones, formed the ground loggia; in the piano 
 nobile opened six handsome arched windows, with bal- 
 ustrades, divided by Ionic pilasters, all in dark-gray 
 stucco or cement; and the third story held a series of 
 small quadrangular windows, below the heavy cornice. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 545 
 
 Immediately beyond it, through a lofty archway, I 
 entered the southwest corner of the spacious, impos- 
 ing, and picturesque Piazza Vittorio Emanuele. 
 
 It was delightfully Venetian, in its characteristics 
 of size, dignity, and grace, combined with a manifest 
 unaltering age. The southern third was paved with 
 cobbles for horse-traflSc, the rest, with worn gray flags; 
 the greater length of the parallelogram, however, 
 was from east to west. In the centre stood a heroic 
 marble figure of the victorious king, and south of it 
 rose the glorious old Venetian Lion, upon a tall marble 
 shaft. On all sides extended tall arcades, — those at 
 the north including the second-story windows. The 
 arches were all rounded; the first columns of the 
 southern side were a splendid Corinthian series, of 
 marble; in the middle of the western side stretched 
 a ponderous, stuccoed, Doric colonnade; but] else- 
 where the supports were chiefly quadrangular stuccoed 
 piers or pillars. The buildings were likewise stuccoed, 
 of three or four stories, colored in soft tints of brown 
 and green. At the left end of the northern side the prin- 
 cipal caffe was in evidence, protruding its throng of 
 tables and chairs far out upon the pavement. 
 
 In the adjacent angle, facing east, stood the Palazzo 
 Comunale with the bell-tower on its left; the latter 
 rose in four divisions, — a rusticated stone base, two 
 long stages of plain, windowless stucco, and a balus- 
 traded Renaissance belfry, of a single arch on each side. 
 Beside its base extended two broad stucco arches of 
 brown hue, the right one covering a narrow street dart- 
 ing west, with an open marble stairway from the street 
 to the upper floor; to the left of the latter on the rear 
 wall of the loggia I saw a marble medallion with a 
 fair bust of Dante, and an inscription dated 1865. The 
 upper floor was adorned with a beautiful nine-arched 
 
546 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 window on square pillars, of brown stucco; the central 
 arch forming a niche in which stood a life-size marble 
 statue of the Madonna, in the style of Sansovino, 
 holding a Child that gazed forth very prettily and 
 naturally; before it projected a baroque ringhiera- 
 balcony, whose heavy balustrade continued along the 
 entire colonnade. The frieze overhead was a series of 
 frescoed panels, — coats-of-arms and medallions, in 
 varying brown shades, centred by a relief of the shield 
 of Rovigo. Two more reliefs, modern busts, graced the 
 opposing end walls of the loggia : one of the poet, Felice 
 Cavallotti, with adornments in the way of wreaths, 
 a spread eagle, a lion's head, etc. ; the other of Giuseppi 
 Mazzini, likewise decorated. All this was really but 
 the ornamental portion of the Municipio's fagade; 
 for the city occupied also the upper floors of the plain 
 building on the right, up to and beyond the corner, 
 including the suites devoted to the city library and 
 art collection^ the latter being approached by another 
 entrance, marked "Accademia dei Concordi," ad- 
 jacent to the cafPe upon the left. 
 
 Another interesting structure I observed at the 
 piazza's southeastern angle, facing north, — the pa- 
 lazzo of the "Universita Popolare": this was faced by 
 an extravagant, nondescript portico, fan-shaped in 
 plan, rising upon a flight of seven or eight steps; the 
 tall, rusticated arches, of gray stucco simulating stone, 
 were separated by half-columns that continued above 
 the cornice, bearing plaster Roman trophies, of odd 
 appearance. Back of this rose a lofty gabled wall, 
 adorned solely with two great shields of arms, be- 
 tween reclining figures, flags, and warlike instruments, 
 all modeled in stucco. Under the portico were some 
 modern busts in circular niches. Judicious was Lord 
 Broughton's remark, that "there is no country which 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 547 
 
 can contend with Italy in the honors heaped upon the 
 great men of past ages. • . . There is scarcely a vil- 
 lage in which the traveler is not reminded of the birth, 
 or the residence, or the death, or the actions of one 
 or more of the offspring of a soil fruitful in famous 
 men." ^ 
 
 From the right end of the northern side of the piazza, 
 the Via Orefici led me in one block to the Piazza Gari- 
 baldi, — a smaller space, yet of good general size; in 
 its centre I observed a splendid equestrian bronze 
 statue of the hero, very lifelike and powerful. On its 
 west side rose the new, stuccoed building of the post- 
 oflBce, in Renaissance style, with a trio of handsome 
 arched windows. From its east side another street 
 conducted me shortly to the Porta S. Bartolommeo 
 in the old city wall, — a huge round archway topped 
 by brick battlements; the wall itself was vanished, 
 supplanted by a line of houses toward the south. Fol- 
 lowing the narrow way before these, I quickly crossed 
 the Adigetto, — a fair vista with its long straight 
 quays and luxuriant shade trees; to the left an an- 
 cient dwelling of purple hue, crowned by pointed 
 battlements, backed upon the stream a garden that 
 was one great mass of rose-bushes and -vines, the lat- 
 ter shaped into an arcaded parapet along the water. 
 Beyond this soared far into the blue a colossal old 
 guard-tower of the ramparts, occupied by a modern 
 five-storied habitation, two windows broad, which 
 nevertheless did not reach to its summit. Another 
 ponderous arched gateway succeeded, spanning a 
 street upon which I returned to the west; very soon 
 it brought me to an enormous brick church on the 
 left, facing westward over a small, dilapidated piazza. 
 It was Rovigo's Cathedral, — "II Redentore." 
 
 ' Lord Broughton, Remarks Made in Several Visits to Italy (1816-54). 
 
548 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 This edifice — which is more directly reached by 
 turning southward at the end of Via Angeli (sopra) — 
 has an apse, a drum, and a transept, all of massive size 
 commensurate with the nave. It is a recent building, 
 not a hundred years old. The unfinished fagade is of 
 rough brickwork, with three plain doorways, crowned 
 by a statue of Christ in the middle; the vast interior 
 is well proportioned and designed, in pleasing Renais- 
 sance lines that avoid over-adornment and escape the 
 baroque. The lofty vaulted nave has three deep altar 
 recesses in each whitened wall, arched, and divided 
 by huge Corinthian columns, that sustain the contin- 
 uous, heavy block cornice. The dark semicircle of 
 choir stalls is richly carved, and near by stands a 
 magnificent bronze candelabrum of the high-Renais- 
 sance, sculptured in the lavish style of Riccio; three 
 bound slaves are figured around the base, charming 
 little putti sit with folded arms about the upper shaft, 
 and other delicate forms of exceeding grace and nat- 
 uralness are wrought throughout the luxuriance of 
 ornamentation. Although I made every effort for sev- 
 eral days to ascertain the sculptor, nothing appeared 
 to be known except that it had been handed down for 
 centuries in the chapter. The paintings here were 
 decadent and uninteresting. 
 
 Continuing westward from the Duomo, I reached in 
 another block the so-called Piazza del Castello, on the 
 southern bank of the Naviglio, — a long narrow space 
 fronted by aged, grimy, stucco dwellings; directly back 
 of which, entered through a short alley, stretched the 
 enceinture of the ancient citadel. Of its buildings 
 naught remained but two shattered brick towers, lean- 
 ing in opposite directions, — the taller of which I had 
 remarked from the opposite bank, — and the southern 
 wall of the castle, some twenty feet high, curving out- 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 549 
 
 wardly from one keep to the other. The enormous 
 height of the stern windowless donjon — fully two 
 hundred and fifty feet — indicates the former size 
 and power of this medieval fortress of the Estensi; 
 here their governors resided, and the princes them- 
 selves, when visiting the town; here the Venetian 
 Podestas in their turn held for centuries a semiregal 
 sway. The scene of so much grandeur was now a re- 
 fuse-littered farmyard, with a few stunted trees and 
 a weedy, neglected garden. 
 
 That afternoon I paid my visit to the most import- 
 ant church of the town, both historically and artist- 
 ically, by returning to Piazza Garibaldi and strik- 
 ing north from it a short distance. Here, behind a 
 small area, rose the grand old edifice of S. Francesco, 
 fronted by a later, eighteenth-century fagade of 
 stucco; four massive Ionic half -columns supported the 
 pediment of the nave, and two Ionic pilasters adorned 
 each of the lower wings; the pediment was filled with 
 a group of large plaster figures representing the Ma- 
 donna amidst various saints, and five statues of other 
 saints graced the eaves. The interior was of similar 
 lines to the Duomo, but somewhat smaller, — a work, 
 however, truly of the High-Renaissance period, and 
 of attractive dignity and graceful proportions. Its 
 importance lay in the paintings that remained from 
 the same period. 
 
 The chief of these I found over the first altar to the 
 right, a picture so glorious that it alone was well worth 
 the journey to Rovigo: it was an exceptionally large 
 panel by Cima da Conegliano, depicting the Baptism 
 of Christ, — and remarkably well preserved. The 
 Christ stands at the left in a small pool of water, and 
 St. John at the right, slightly higher, emptying with 
 one hand the blessed cup; at the extreme left kneels 
 
550 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 a small winged angel holding a garment; overhead is 
 a brilliant burst of golden sun -rays, from whose centre 
 appears the descending Dove, with two tiny angels 
 visible just above it, extending a white scarf in crescent 
 form; in thfe rolling masses of red-gold clouds many 
 little flying cherubs are seen; the background exhibits 
 a fair blue lake, with a walled and towered city on its 
 verge, overhung by an immense, rocky, and fantastic 
 crag. The work is most admirable for its peculiar tone 
 of burnished bronze, its luminous color-scheme and 
 glossy finish, its effective composition, and its grace- 
 ful, lifelike, finely modeled figures, agitated by sin- 
 cere emotions. It has many points of likeness with 
 the master's great Baptism in S. Giovanni in Bragora, 
 Venice; and was executed considerably later than that 
 masterpiece, in 1513, — according to the date at the 
 top of the unique Renaissance frame. 
 
 This frame was the original inclosure adopted by 
 Cima, because he adorned it with several figures: on 
 the pedestals of the columns are painted St. Louis and 
 St. Anthony of Padua to the right. Saints Roch and 
 Francis to the left; on the middle of the base is a me- 
 dallion containing a crowned and crucified Christ, 
 most beautiful and touching, full of tenderest feeling 
 and expression; and in the pediment is visible the aw- 
 ful form of the Almighty, seated with one hand upon 
 a globe, the other pointing heavenward, the hair and 
 beard flying, and the cloak blown above his head, by 
 a gale so realistic that one seems to hear it roar. — The 
 second altar to the right held another large tavola, also 
 excellent, by Domenico Panetti, the Ferrarese : it re- 
 presented the Madonna throned between Saints Peter 
 and Andrew, with a vase of the prettiest, most natural 
 flowers standing on the pavement before the throne, 
 and two crowns depending by beads from the front 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 551 
 
 corners of the surmounting canopy. The Virgin was 
 quite Peruginesque in face and attitude, very grace- 
 fully moulded, with folded hands and little feet peep- 
 ing from under her simple blue robe, — altogether a 
 most enchanting figure. The Babe and the two elderly 
 saints were not of so high a standard; but the tone 
 and finish were richly golden, and the background dis- 
 played the far Lombard plain, poetically shrouded in 
 the blue haze of a summer's day. 
 
 At the end of the right transept I found a large and 
 dramatic Descent of the Holy Ghost, by that rare 
 artist, Girolamo Carpi of Ferrara, — ' a work of ex- 
 traordinary vividness and intensity, with most real- 
 istic and expressive figures. The Madonna, for once 
 at least, is portrayed at her proper age; the apostles 
 are plainly stricken with awe and amazement; there 
 is no visible background, but overhead hangs a dark- 
 lined cloud with a blazing centre, whose flames burst 
 downward through a dozen apertures. The high-altar 
 piece was another fine work, though much injured by 
 time: in a glory of clouds appeared a very lovely 
 Madorma, surrounded by a group of charming angels; 
 below stood Francis of Assisi between two other 
 saints, accompanied by the two kneeling donors, — 
 Cavaliere Amelio Silvestri and his wife. It was an ex- 
 ceptionally good specimen of Benvenuto Tisi, called 
 Garofalo. 
 
 Adjacent to the left transept I was shown a hand- 
 some sacristy. Here there was a large stone relief of 
 1572, representing the Virgin between Saints Lawrence 
 and John the Baptist, — fairly well done. Over one 
 doorway hung a beautiful though damaged canvas by 
 Giovanni Cariani of Bergamo, in his most Palmesque 
 style, depicting St. Francis presenting the donor to 
 the throned Madonna; the attractive Virgin exhib- 
 
552 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ited a decided resemblance to Palma's celebrated 
 model, and the Child, leaning forward with an inter- 
 ested look, was unusually winsome and intelligent. 
 Over another door was an anonymous picture of the 
 same school, — a Holy Family with St. Catherine, 
 to whom the Babe stretches forth his tiny hands, in 
 delight; though not of so high an order as the other, 
 it was prettily designed and of good significance. The 
 chamber was filled with a lot of fine old carved fur- 
 niture, richly foliated, — presses, tables, and chairs. 
 
 A little to the northeast of this I found the curious 
 church called La Rotonda, or La Chiesa Municipale, 
 because it was reconstructed and adorned by the city 
 in 1887. It is a huge octagon, both inside and out, sit- 
 uated at the northern end of an astonishingly broad 
 avenue lined by even files of stuccoed dwellings, — 
 named the Piazza Venti Settembre. It is surrounded 
 by a broad one-storied portico, also octagonal, whose 
 level roof is upheld by a continuous colonnade of 
 massive Doric columns of stucco, which lend to the 
 edifice a peculiar dignity. On its north side, detached, 
 in a little shady court, rises the tremendous brick cam- 
 panile to a gigantic height, embellished with white 
 stone trimmings, a baroque belfry, and an octagonal 
 Byzantine lantern. In the corridor of the portico I ob- 
 served many old monuments, tombs, and inscriptions, 
 of every epoch. The interior presented a unique ap- 
 pearance, — a vast rotunda without aisles or columns, 
 encircled by choir stalls and rows of immense can- 
 vases, capped by a flat painted roof. 
 
 The stalls were of carved oak, against an oaken wain- 
 scoting, separated by benches from the central space; 
 they were broken by simple doorways on three sides, 
 and a single huge gilt altar on the fourth; over the 
 paneling extended a line of decadent, seicenio paintings. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 553 
 
 then a circle of niches in gilded frames, seven per side, 
 — three occupied by black wooden statues and four 
 by smaller pictures ; then another row of large canvases, 
 two per side; and finally, the line of windows, three 
 per side, in gilt frames with Corinthian pilasters, just 
 beneath the cornice of blue and gold. A quadrangular 
 space before the altar was railed oflE for the choir, upon 
 the old marble pavement of checkered red and cream. 
 The painted roof, I was told, was a modern work of 
 stretched canvas. All these pictures were more or less 
 poor, even ugly, but the edifice itself was a most in- 
 teresting freak of neo-classicism. 
 
 I beheld some first-class paintings, however, when I 
 repaired to the city gallery, on the second morning. 
 Entering by the door beside the caffe, I mounted a grand 
 staircase at the end of a dark passage, and at its top 
 found the municipal library occupying a spacious rear 
 chamber; the front chamber, still larger, contained 
 the body of the art collection, but the flower of it was 
 gathered in a small room between the others. This 
 gallery is a recent aggregation of old pictures, which 
 a generation ago were scattered through Rovigo's 
 churches and convents, and in private collections of 
 noble families that had descended from Renaissance 
 days; the palaces of the Campanari, the Mattomi, 
 the Ferrari, the Silvestri, the Basaiti, all had accumu- 
 lations of note, which, as Lanzi remarked, "abounded 
 with many celebrated figure painters, no less of the 
 Venetian than of other Italian schools," and which 
 to-day, save for some alienations, are here assembled. 
 The Casa Barufi alone seems to have kept its paintings 
 at home. 
 
 The exhibit in the smaller room was of amazing 
 value, for so small a town and gallery. Nearly every 
 picture of the several score was worth careful atten- 
 
554 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 tion, and a large proportion were works of the first 
 class. Of a special interest were the few specimens of 
 the earliest Venetian school; foremost among them a 
 singular panel of St. Lucy and her miracles, signed by 
 "Quiricius De Joanes d' Alemagna, 1462,"^ — the 
 full-length figure of the saint, in her dress of cloth-of- 
 gold, being moulded with much charm, and crowned 
 by two tiny putti; while the miracles are depicted in 
 six small tableaux at the sides. There were also of that 
 period a Coronation of the Virgin by Luigi Vivarini 
 the Elder, in bad condition (number 158) and a Ma- 
 donna with S. Agnese byBartolommeo Vivarini, really 
 graceful in its lines (number 204). By Carpaccio there 
 was a Holy Family, of finely modeled half -figures, now 
 much faded (number 205); by Cima da Conegliano, 
 a lovely seated half-figure of the Madonna with her 
 Child, before a pleasant far landscape of green slopes 
 and blue mountains (number 207) ; by Gentile Bellini 
 (signed, 1501) a beautiful Madonna, with the Babe 
 posed before her on a table, seated on white cushions, 
 — showing what enchanting pietistic work he could do 
 when he wished (number 208) ; and by Giovanni Bellini 
 were two splendid specimens : a well-preserved, glow- 
 ing panel of the Madonna and Child (signed, 1516), 
 she clad in a scarlet cloak, and of exquisite flesh-work, 
 the Babe extremely winsome (number 206); and a 
 Marriage of St. Catherine, somewhat retouched but 
 still very attractive, with the faces of the women 
 charmingly rounded and seraphic (number 210). 
 
 Of the succeeding generation there were equally 
 grand examples, — chief among them four delightful 
 Palma Vecchios : two were lifelike portraits (numbers 
 
 • According to Crowe and Cavalcaselle, this Quiricius was a pupil of 
 Giovanni d' Alemannus. The painting is esteemed of priceless value: it 
 came from the Campanari collection. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 555 
 
 183-84) ; the third, a group of the Madonna and Saints 
 Elena and Girolamo, nearly life-size, in good condi- 
 tion, with forms and countenances of striking beauty, 
 in his usual warm golden tone (number 186) ; and the 
 fourth, a similar group, of the Madonna between 
 Saints Roch and John, unfortunately mostly ruined, 
 but the Virgin still of tender loveliness (ndmber 187). 
 There were three Pordenones, — two of them poor 
 portrait heads (numbers 159-60), the third a group 
 of Saints Lucy, Agnes, and Catherine, all from the 
 same model, pleasingly rounded but of no expression, 
 and badly faded (number 161). There were five por- 
 traits by Tintoretto, the best being of Doge Andrea 
 Gritti, — a powerful head (number 163) ; a life-size, 
 impressive figure of St. Paul by Sebastiano del Pi- 
 ombo (number 182) ; a Circumcision in the manner of 
 Catena, signed by Marco Belli (number 211) ; a splen- 
 did large Scourging of Christ, by Bonifazio, so su- 
 perior that it was long accredited to Giorgione (num- 
 ber 200), and a picture of the infants, Jesus and John, 
 playing with a lamb, by Titian, badly darkened but 
 still of much charm (number 192). I observed further 
 a retouched copy of one of Titian's Madonnas (num- 
 ber 194); a copy of the famous head in Giorgione's 
 Bearing of the Cross, formerly at Vicenza, — executed 
 by Basaiti, according to Crowe and Cavalcaselle ^ 
 (number 202) ; a small head of a young man, very nat- 
 ural and strong, from the school of Giorgione, — and 
 perhaps by himself (number 203) ; and a very effective 
 portrait by G. B. Tiepolo (number 185). From the 
 Veronese school, finally, came a very quaint though 
 confused Adoration of the Magi, by Paolo's master, 
 
 ' "In which Lombard regularity of features and gloss of surface are so 
 marked, that the picture has been thought worthy of Leonardo da Vinci. 
 The execution betrays the hand of Basaiti, or Previtali." 
 
556 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Badile (number 176). In a case at one side there 
 reposed a few old illuminated books, including a 
 Bible with unusually large pictures, by the school of 
 Giotto; and at another side lay a glass-covered Re- 
 naissance mould, relieved with the most exquisite pos- 
 sible arabesques and minute figures. The front hall, 
 many times larger and loftier, was filled with a throng 
 of inferior works; but amongst them my eye caught at 
 once a fine example of the rare Jacopo Valentina, of 
 Ceneda, — a small Madonna and Child (number 61) ; 
 also a panel of Christ bearing the Cross, by Mantegna, 
 much injured but still very characteristic (number 
 107), and a good Ecce Homo by Gianpetrino (number 
 109). Of further interest were a Domenichino, — 
 St. Jerome in the desert, of his usual manner (number 
 131), an interesting large canvas of the Magi by Fe- 
 derigo Zuccari (number 114), and four life-size figures 
 of saints by Dosso Dossi, of conspicuous grace and col- 
 oring (numbers 147, 151) ; also a copy of one of Peru- 
 gino's Madonnas, and an admirable Madonna with two 
 infants from the school of Raphael (number 90) . By 
 foreign masters there were several pieces of note: a 
 small Nativity, very quaint and interesting, signed by 
 Holbein Luca von Leyden (number 71), a Madonna 
 crowned by S. Zaccaria, by Jan Mabuse, 1528 (num- 
 ber 76), a Christ crowned with thorns by Jan Holbein 
 (77), a superb portrait of Ferdinand I by the same, 
 — or, as some critics assert, by Hans von Schwaz 
 (number 75), and three excellent small studies said to 
 be by Albrecht Diirer, — which is doubtful, — depict- 
 ing a Venus, a Christ bearing the Cross, and Adam 
 and Eve (numbers 78, 79, 80). — Altogether, as before 
 remarked, this is an astonishing gallery for its size and 
 location, and well worth a day's examination. 
 
 On my last day at Rovigo I paid a visit to the old 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 557 
 
 Casa Barufi, situated shortly beyond the Duomo, 
 within whose walls that prominent and once wealthy 
 family have dwelt since Renaissance times. I found 
 the mansion divided by a broad hallway running to 
 the shady garden in the rear; narrow stairs at the left 
 conducted me to a similar hall above, where the fam- 
 ily's collection of pictures had hung apparently undis- 
 turbed for four hundred years. Frames and panels 
 alike were worm-eaten, and all were obscured by the 
 agglomerated dirt of centuries. The several score of 
 paintings were productions almost entirely of the cin- 
 quecento, with a remarkable predominance of great 
 names, to whom for the most part they seemed to me 
 justly accredited; though not works of the first import- 
 ance, they were valuable for their freedom from re- 
 touching, and a thorough cleaning would soon remove 
 the accumulated grime. The most valuable specimen 
 was an undeniable, attractive panel of Giovanni Bel- 
 lini, representing the Madonna with her Child and St. 
 Anne, between two standing, manly figures in graceful 
 quattrocento costume, of deep-red hue; it was evidently 
 an early work, and, aside from the worm-holes, was in 
 excellent condition. 
 
 Two other early panels were in the manner of the 
 Vivarini, both Madonnas, — one really of exceptional 
 beauty; and a third, depicting the Adoration of the 
 Child, with three little angels singing on the roof over- 
 head, was apparently by the rare Lorenzo Parentino. 
 By Paolo Veronese there were two indubitable por- 
 traits, — a splendidly moulded female and a lifelike 
 warrior, — as well as two life-size canvases of a charm- 
 ing sibyl and a young saint. Of Tiepolo the elder 
 there were three examples, — two peculiar Madonnas, 
 and a Holy Family full of delightful paternal feeling; 
 another Holy Family, exceedingly dirtied but still of 
 
558 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 true loveliness in the Madonna and the romantic land- 
 scape, was unmistakably by Paris Bordone. Of more 
 doubtful authority than these — executed perhaps by 
 pupils, or imitators — were the two pictures in the 
 style of Palma Vecchio, and the single specimens of 
 the manner of Perugino, Van Dyke, Garofalo, Luca 
 von Leyden, and Guido Reni; some of these, however, 
 possessed very pleasing qualities, which would be 
 greatly enhanced by cleansing, and could then be more 
 surely passed upon. — As this curious old collection 
 was under negotiation for sale when I beheld it, it will 
 very likely be removed from Rovigo by the time these 
 lines are read. Inquiry by any traveler of the learned 
 director of the city gallery will establish the fact with- 
 1 out trouble. 
 
 An interesting trip may be taken from Rovigo over 
 the eastern branch railway to Adria and Chioggia, 
 whence the lagoon may be crossed by steamer to Ven- 
 ice. Adria, from which the Adriatic derived its name, 
 is now situated some fifteen miles from the ever ad- 
 vancing coast-line, upon which it was in ancient times 
 an important port; it is a larger place than Rovigo, 
 having fifteen thousand inhabitants, yet has only two 
 things, besides its old palaces, to attract the traveler's 
 attention, — the collections of antiquities in the Museo 
 Civico and the house of Signor Bocchi. These, how- 
 ever, are not distinguished for their rarities or beauties, 
 consisting in great part of Etruscan vases more or less 
 shattered, whose number serves to show the size of 
 the city in pre-Roman days. Chioggia is even less 
 noteworthy; but it is picturesque in location and in 
 its old arcaded houses, and the sail up the lagoon is 
 delightful. 
 
 On the present occasion, however, I retraced my 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 559 
 
 steps as far as Monselice, and continued five miles be- 
 yond the latter place, to the village of Battaglia, lying 
 at the eastern foot of the Euganei, upon the canal 
 named after it. Padua is but eleven miles to the north- 
 east, and Arqua but four miles to the west, unon a 
 shoulder of the outer line of hills. In itself an insigni- 
 ficant hamlet, Battaglia is distinguished by the pre- 
 sence of two famous chateaux, — the great Castle of 
 Cattajo, and the Villa S. Elena, of the Counts of Emo; 
 it is further renowned for its therapeutic mineral 
 springs of boiling temperature, to whose Stabilmento 
 dei Bagni invalids flock for the cure of disorders of the 
 blood and skin. 
 
 These baths date from the days of the Romans, as 
 do those of Abano six miles to the north; for since 
 primeval times the whole district has continued to 
 show signs of volcanic origin and activity, in the shape 
 of boiling springs of water and mud, sulphuric emana- 
 tions, exudations of gas, and grottoes of heated vapor; 
 and in Imperial days the wide fame of its healing pow- 
 ers brought enormous throngs to the various baths, 
 and marked them with the seal of fashion. Abano — 
 whose very name comes from hagno, or bath — was 
 the Aquae Patavinse of the Romans, and a resort still 
 more popular than Battaglia.' The historian Livy was 
 bom there. But to-day it is a little, forgotten village 
 
 1 The buildings erected by the ancients at Abano were of imposing 
 grandeur and beauty, — baths, palaces, temples, theatres, etc. ; and in the 
 gardens of her attractive villas countless great men sought reinvigoration. 
 Theodoric so appreciated the healing powers of the waters that he thor- 
 oughly restored the then decaying edifices. But under the Lombards, in 
 601, " Agilulf burned the very ancient Baths of Abano, and destroyed the 
 famous buildings raised there by the Romans." — F. Manzano, Annali del 
 Friuli. — Now, in consequence, there is naught to see there worth a visit. 
 There have been recent excavations, yielding returns of some value; but 
 the latter have been carried away to museums. 
 
560 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 and the springs of Battaglia alone are still frequented. 
 Ariosto wrote: — 
 
 — 'Twixt Brenta and Athesis, beneath those hills 
 (Which erst the good Antenor so contented 
 With their sulphurous veins and liquid rills. 
 And mead, and field, with furrows glad indented. 
 That he for these left pools which Xanthus fills. 
 And Ida, and Ascanius long lamented) 
 Till she a child should in the forests bear, 
 Which little distant from Ateste are.' 
 
 The railway station proved to be several hundred 
 yards west of the village; but the 'bus of the Grand 
 H6tel des Thermes was in waiting, and quickly trans- 
 ported me to the first houses of the borough, then 
 through a gateway on the right into the beautiful park 
 of the hotel. I saw its stately trees extending east to 
 the high dyke of the Battaglia Canal, and southward 
 in a magnificent avenue half a mile in length, to the 
 right of whose termination soared a sugar-loaf hill 
 crowned by a lordly Renaissance chS,teau, visible far 
 above the foliage. This was the Castello of S. Elena, 
 to which the grounds really appertained; and the 
 springs, I was informed, gushed forth at the eastern 
 foot of the solitary eminence, where the baths are lo- 
 cated. The Grand Hotel, then, was a speculative erec- 
 tion by the proprietor of the chateau a generation or 
 two ago, designed with its modern luxuries to form an 
 additional attraction for wealthy invalids. It occupies 
 the northeastern corner of the park, facing toward the 
 street to the station, with its right wing overlooking 
 the canal: an enormous, stuccoed edifice of three sto- 
 ries, surrounded on the park side by pleasant flowered 
 gardens, through which winds the graveled drive to 
 its main entrance at the southwest angle. 
 
 From this portal, along the south side of the main 
 ' Orlando Furioso, canto xli; Rose's translation. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 561 
 
 structure, extends a vast hallway, or winter garden, 
 exceedingly long and broad, and so lofty that it em- 
 braces three tiers of windows on the left; on the right 
 it is lighted by a row of glass-closed arches as big as 
 the choir windows of a Gothic cathedral; the marble 
 pavement is covered with palms and other potted 
 plants, interspersed with statues and wicker tables and 
 chairs. Here the hundreds of guests lounge away their 
 time; and very pleasant lounging I found it. The great 
 windows open upon a wide charming flower-garden, 
 backed by a grove of forest monarchs, amongst which 
 is seen a grassy mound topped by an ancient ruin; to 
 the west of the grove commences the superb quadru- 
 ple avenue of plane trees leading southward to the 
 baths. Beyond this hall one crosses a court to the long 
 eastern wing, stretching southward, on whose farther 
 side (or rather, front) another portal opens directly 
 upon the quay of the canal. Through this I sallied 
 forth soon after my arrival, — for it was still morning, 
 — to take a look at the village. 
 
 Save for the few houses along the road to the sta- 
 tion, I found the hamlet to consist of two picturesque 
 rows of old buildings facing each other across the 
 canal, and extending northward from the hotel for sev- 
 eral hundred yards; — the most unique little village, 
 and one of the most pleasing in vista, that it has ever 
 been my lot to encounter. Except for the architecture 
 and the absence of trees, it might have been bodily 
 transplanted from Holland. The recently painted 
 stucco houses, of two and three stories, had also 
 much of the neatness of the Dutch. The quays they 
 lined so solidly were only about twenty feet wide, bor- 
 dered next the water by stout brick parapets; between 
 which, at a depth of several yards, the stream flowed 
 peacefully to the north, mirroring in its surface the 
 
562 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 intense blue of the sky. It was perhaps twenty yards 
 in width. A graceful brick bridge spanned it midway 
 of the village with a single high arch, mounted by steps; 
 a similar crossing was visible in the distance, beyond 
 which the vista was terminated by a solitary group of 
 very tall poplars, stripped of branches to their tufted 
 summits. The files of dwellings also were relieved of 
 monotonous lowness by the lofty tower and drum 
 of the parochial church upon the right; this exhibited 
 a dignified Late-Renaissance f agade, beside which the 
 campanile soared gracefully aloft, in stucco trimmed 
 with stone, to an octagonal, arcaded belfry with a 
 Byzantine cupola. 
 
 A few simple little shops occupied the ground floors 
 of the central buildings, and a single country inn — 
 the Albergo Italia — displayed its sign on a clean, 
 comfortable-looking house. A dozen or more of farm- 
 ers' two-wheeled carts were scattered about the quays, 
 drawn by horses, oxen, aud diminutive gray donkeys. 
 The watery highway was deserted save for a solitary 
 old barge, blunt-nosed and decayed, but loaded with 
 fresh produce, which was being laboriously poled along 
 by a man and a boy. — I reentered the hotel, passed 
 through to the garden, and strolled southward down 
 the splendid avenue of planes. 
 
 A broad expanse of turf led straightaway between 
 the two inner rows of arching verdure, flanked by 
 promenades between the outer rows; it was a beauti- 
 ful vista, accentuated by the domed and towered cha- 
 teau on its green knoll to the right. This was built by 
 the rich Selvatico family of Venice, about 1690, passed 
 to the ownership of the German Counts of Wimpffen 
 about 1850, and from them, not long after, to the 
 present Counts of Emo, who are likewise occasionally 
 spoken of as the Conti di S. Elena. At the end of the 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 5&3 
 
 avenue the buildings of their contadini appeared first 
 upon the right, in an open field, — long brick struct- 
 ures faced with colonnades of brick pillars, under 
 which were lofts for the storage of grain and hay; and 
 some of the laborers themselves were visible near by, 
 — men and women clad in bright-hued garments and 
 red kerchiefs, reaping and raking a meadow of rich 
 grass, with light-hearted song and laughter. 
 
 Beyond this field succeeded the dense woodland 
 reaching to the hill, through which led a graveled 
 path bearing westward from the avenue's end. This 
 shady alley, as I later found, led directly to the bath- 
 ing establishment at the foot of the eminence, passing 
 along the outer bank of the narrow canal inclosing the 
 private gardens of the count, which occupy the middle 
 portion of the wood. A short turn to the left along the 
 eastern arm of this stream, brought me to a point 
 aflfording an exquisite vista of the castle: the water 
 itself was delightfully banked with dense rose-bushes ; 
 behind it there opened through the wold a long narrow 
 perspective of alternating flower-beds and shrubberies, 
 firamed on each hand by ornamental trees of many 
 species, intersected by winding paths; at its far end 
 rose a magnificent flight of stone steps, climbing the 
 hillside straightaway for over a hundred yards' ascent, 
 between innumerable potted cacti ; and at the summit, 
 upon a wide balustraded terrace, stood the imposing, 
 stuccoed chS,teau, with its central dome and battle- 
 mented corner towers. These last were square and 
 ponderous, and between them the fagade was orna- 
 mented by a sort of two-storied portico, of triple 
 arches divided by massive columns, approached by a 
 double stairway from the terrace. No view more 
 charmingly picturesque could be conceived. 
 
 Circling the wall of roses guarding this enchanted 
 
564 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 ground, I found a rustic bridge upon the south side 
 that invited me within; strolling then through its fairy 
 glades, I reached finally a broad expanse of flower- 
 beds only, extending along the base of the height, and 
 almost entirely devoted to roses, — still partly bloom- 
 ing. What could be fairer than such a garden below 
 one's castle windows, at the foot of its grand stairway! 
 The Stabilmento dei Bagni stood upon the right, be- 
 hind a stuccoed wall ; to the left stretched an extension 
 of the wood, beyond a row of hot-houses. This proved 
 to be the loveliest grove of the park, intersected by 
 grand "cathedral aisles," enlivened by heavenly carol- 
 ings from a host of feathered songsters. Here amongst 
 the oleanders, ilexes, and magnolias, sleeping duskily 
 under overhanging boughs, I found the four "lakes," 
 or irregularly shaped basins, within which the saline 
 waters bubble forth from beds of mineral ooze. Only 
 to-day is the secret of their mysterious healing powers 
 at last revealed: they are strongly radio-active. 
 
 The Conte Emo, I learned from a gardener, was 
 now in residence at the chS,teau, so that visiting it was 
 for the time suspended; later I saw his three pretty, 
 fair-haired children, playing amongst the glades of the 
 sequestered weald, in the company of a costumed 
 bonne. Recrossing the rose-garden I inspected the 
 Stabilmento, — a long, plain stuccoed building of two 
 stories, with a gateway at its left leading to a small 
 grotto in the base of the hill, where two hot springs 
 gurgled from the rocks into hewn basins, from which 
 steam arose in clouds. Cups attached to chains showed 
 that here the habitues drink their daily potions. At 
 this season, however, none were to be seen; they flock 
 here in the winter-time and the spring, — the present 
 guests of the hotel being the last of the summer so- 
 journers. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 565 
 
 Within the building the keeper showed me the bath- 
 rooms, with their individual modern tubs, and couches 
 for massaging; the lounging room in the centre; the 
 cooling reservoirs of water; the bedrooms upstairs for 
 those too ill to stay at the hotel; and finally, in the hill- 
 side at the back, the two large grottoes, or rather caves, 
 raised to a fearful temperature by the steam from the 
 boiling springs. Here the patients linger from eight to 
 twenty minutes, passing from the less heated cave 
 to the greater; then they enter the outer chambers to 
 be douched and massaged. The very same method, as 
 far as can be known, and pursued on the very same 
 spot, in the identical grottoes, used by the ancient Ro- 
 mans, — whose long white robes, in fact, still wrap the 
 courageous bathers. 
 
 In the cool of the afternoon I set forth again,through 
 the village, northward along the dike of the canal, to 
 the Castle of Cattajo. This famous relic of the Renais- 
 sance period has a double interest, as being the only 
 Veneto residence remaining to that princely family 
 which once owned the whole district, — the House of 
 Este. It was first erected by the wealthy Obizzi, of 
 Padua, by whose name it was long known, and from 
 the Estensi it finally passed to the possession of the 
 Austrian branch of their house, which alone survives. 
 It, however, is in reality Estense through the distaff 
 only: Beatrice, the sole child of Duke Ercole III, the 
 last ruling prince of Modena and Reggio (died 1803), 
 married the Archduke Ferdinand, of the younger 
 branch of the House of Austria, who came therefore 
 into possession of that duchy on the fall of Napoleon. 
 His descendants, though they lost the duchy again by 
 the unification of Italy, have retained the name of 
 Este. The present representative of the name. Arch- 
 duke Francis Ferdinand, confines himself to his 
 
566 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Austrian estates, not having visited Cattajo, I was 
 told, for a space of fourteen years. 
 
 My way led along the stream's eastern bank, through 
 a rich and beautiful countryside, ennobled by the 
 lofty hills looming closely on the west. A picturesque 
 farmhouse was passed on the water's edge, ensconsed 
 in trees, quickened by numerous geese and ducks pad- 
 dling noisily along the shore. A quarter of an hour's 
 walking brought the castle into sight, perched majes- 
 tically on the left behind a broad deep fosse, and 
 backed by a densely wooded hillside on the north. It 
 was an imposing spectacle: an enormous rectangle of 
 cream-colored stucco, three stories in height, whose 
 top windows were visible over the battlements of the 
 southern wall of enceinture, — which was three or four 
 times as long as the eastern front; at its northeastern 
 corner rose the original, earlier building, shaped gen- 
 erally like a giant cube five stories in height, con- 
 structed of yellow, stained, and crumbling stucco; its 
 bare walls with their simple oblong windows were 
 crested by no relieving cornice, but grimly crenel- 
 ated.^ Sentry boxes stood at intervals along the 
 extended southern parapet, significant of the days of 
 incessant war. Picturesqueness was added by the lofty 
 woodland sweeping close behind, and the shrouding 
 grove of smaller trees cresting the inner bank of the 
 vast fosse. The latter was spanned by a graceful brick 
 bridge of three large arches, adorned at the eastern 
 end by an ornamental stone gateway, and at the west- 
 ern by two massive pillars holding heroic statues of 
 Hercules and Silenus. 
 
 ' Behind this again, on the upper part of the isolated hill, concealed by 
 its thick groves of tall trees, stands the preceding fortified residence of the 
 Middle Ages, — a ruinous, frowning old keep of dark stone, distinguishable 
 only from the sunken gardens on the south. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 567 
 
 When I reached and advanced upon this bridge, I 
 saw a private road leading straight westward from it 
 before the long southern wall, evidently crossing the 
 estates to the slopes of the hills several miles distant. 
 To the right of the statued pillars extended the castle's 
 eastern front, rising upon a stone-banked terrace 
 overlooking the deep moat, which carried a parapet 
 crowned with a row of huge stone balls, and a grove of 
 low but stout evergreens cut into sugar-loaf forms. 
 These evidences of Renaissance culture contrasted 
 forcibly with the grim, lofty, battlemented fagade 
 behind, soaring "much in the style of the old castles 
 of Provence. Lofty rooms," wrote Eustace, "long 
 galleries, winding staircases, and dark passages, fit it 
 admirably for the purposes of a novelist, and render it 
 equally proper for the abode of a great baron, for the 
 receptacle of a band of robbers, for the scene of nightly 
 murders, or for the solitary walk of ghosts and of spec- 
 tres." 1 
 
 On crossing the bridge, the wide sunken gardens of 
 the chS,teau were revealed to the left of the road, strik- 
 ingly embellished with ordered flowerbeds, hedges, 
 potted plants, shrubberies, orangeries, clumps of mag- 
 nolias, groves and avenues of stately trees, and pretty 
 basins of water, — stretching away for many acres to 
 the south and west. On this fair prospect looked down 
 the upper windows, over the battlements of the south- 
 ern wall. In the latter appeared the main entrance, — 
 a monumental Renaissance archway two stories in 
 height, adorned with four Doric half-columns, two 
 statues at the sides, and four weather-beaten statues 
 
 1 Eustace, Classical Tour through Italy, vol. i. — How the reality of all 
 this, he might have added, would have delighted the terror-loving soul of 
 Mrs. Radcliffe; it would surely have inspired her with a tale more weird 
 and dreadful than the Mysteries of Udolpho, — which, for that matter, 
 might well itself have been placed here. 
 
568 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 on the top. Beyond it the southern wall continued 
 westward for three hundred yards and more, relieved 
 by crenelated towers at its middle and farther corner. 
 Near the first of these was an open gateway, entering 
 which I found myself in an outer court of almost equal 
 length, extending between the wall and the castle; to 
 the right there mounted a flight of stone steps to a 
 high balustraded terrace shaded by rows of clipped 
 evergreens, and decorated by Doric columns tipped 
 with stone balls, — the private garden of the seigneurs. 
 The custodian, who now appeared, informed me that 
 visitors were not at present admitted, because the Arch- 
 duke was engaged in transferring to Austria all of the 
 chateau's portable objects d'art, and everything was in 
 confusion. As evidence I saw numerous packing-cases 
 lying about, and sculptures nailed up in crates. The 
 collection of antiquities, I knew, had been transported 
 to Vienna in 1895 : this further stripping would leave 
 the historic place with naught but the valueless por- 
 tion of its old furniture, and the frescoes on the walls; 
 it was saddening, — and a proof of the Archduke's 
 decision to return here no more. I asked if he were 
 here now, and learned that only his orders had arrived. 
 It was a disappointment which no offers of mine 
 — strange to say — had any success in overcoming; 
 and I trust that other travelers will be more fortunate. 
 The three fine portraits on canvas by Paolo Veronese 
 may have vanished, but his large ceiling-painting will 
 remain, which covers one of the royal suite of five grand 
 salons; these are otherwise decorated by a magnificent 
 series of frescoes by Zelotti, depicting the achieve- 
 ments and the glorification of the Obizzi; and in the 
 private chapel, or Oratorio di S. Michele, there should 
 remain a number of good pictures by the Venetian 
 school of the later cinquecento. — But though I failed 
 
ARljT.V A PEASANT'S HOT'S?: 
 
 ARQI-'A. TAKISII llll IKH AXU T'KTRAKrirS Tnllll. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 569 
 
 in this, I was amply repaid for my walk by a long stroll 
 through the sunken gardens, which yielded new and 
 varied beauties at every turn of the paths; the woods 
 alone were delightful, composed of monarchs of vast 
 age and size; and the views afforded of the full extent 
 of the great chateau were picturesque beyond the or- 
 dinary, revealing over the main buildings the mighty 
 old keep and embattled fortress concealed in the 
 bushy elms of the upper hillside. 
 
 As I walked slowly back to Battaglia in the sunset 
 hour, my gaze was turned upon those lovely green hills 
 so close upon the right, "still retaining the name of 
 one of the earliest tribes that peopled Paduan terri- 
 tory. . . . They were formerly, it seems, inhabited 
 by a race of soothsayers, who vied with the Tuscans 
 in the art of looking into futurity." ^ How proper, 
 then, that they should have become the final residence 
 of that grandest of all seers, whom Symonds called 
 "the great awakener of Europe from mental lethargy, 
 — the apostle of scholarship, the inaugurator of the 
 humanistic impulse of the fifteenth century." In their 
 verdurous recesses high above the plain, Petrarch 
 spent the last five years of that wonderful life which 
 struck off the age-long fetters of the human intellect, 
 and ushered mankind into the rebirth of its mentality. 
 To-morrow I should make my pilgrimage to that 
 sacred shrine, where the poet's genius blazed its last 
 fire upon the adoring world; — my final pilgrimage, 
 of all these months of journeying, which had brought 
 me thus back, in an enormous circle, to the point of 
 my departure. Over there to the northeast, I could 
 almost see upon the level horizon the domes and 
 towers of Venice, whence I had started. Since they 
 receded from my view, I had visited all that hinterland 
 ' Eustace, Classical Tour, vol. i. 
 
570 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 which she so gloriously made her own, and the scores 
 of towns and cities that bore in their piazzas the white 
 Lion of St. Mark. Venetia had been traversed from 
 end to end, presenting to my retrospection one vast 
 exposition of the arts and science of the Renaissance. 
 What more fitting end to all this wandering, then, 
 than a pilgrimage to the tomb of that immortal who 
 opened to men the gates of this world of culture. 
 
 On the shoulder of one of those fair hills reposed 
 that tomb, and close by it the modest home in which 
 the great poet breathed his last; that home to which 
 Francesco della Carrara the elder so often repaired 
 for consultation and advice, and so many illustrious 
 men came to sit at the feet of genius. It is difficult for 
 one not a student to comprehend what a tremendous 
 influence was diffused from that humble house through 
 the Italian world of the trecento, an influence which has 
 ever since gone on widening and increasing. Petrarch 
 had "inspired ideas and modes of thought which pre- 
 ceding scholars had possessed in their own brains, 
 but could not communicate to society." ^ "The study 
 of Latin writers had never been wholly neglected in 
 Italy; but Petrarch introduced a more profound, 
 liberal, and elegant scholarship, and communicated to 
 his countrymen that enthusiasm for the literature, the 
 history, and the antiquities of Rome, which divided 
 his own heart with a frigid mistress and a more frigid 
 muse." ^ " He was the first to understand the value 
 of public libraries, the first to accumulate coins and 
 inscriptions as the sources of accurate historical in- 
 formation, the first to preach the duty of preserving 
 ancient monuments." ' 
 
 ' H. C. Hollway-Calthorp, Petrarch; Eis Life and Times. 
 ^ Macaulay, Essays on Machiavelli, and Petrarch. 
 ' Symonds, Revival of Learning. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 571 
 
 "With Petrarch, and because of him, the classical 
 spirit resumed its sway. . . . Charm defies analysis. 
 It is evident from his whole career that he possessed 
 both intellectual and personal charm to a rare degree; 
 he fascinated men's imagination and fired their hearts. 
 Entire strangers came as pilgrims — and having seen 
 the poet, went back to spread the fame of him through 
 all lands. So his reputation grew, and his influence 
 became more potent every day; and the studies that 
 he loved, from being the monopoly of a handful of 
 scholars, became the inspiration of the world's cul- 
 ture." ^ " From this time, the admiration of learning 
 and genius became almost an idolatry among the people 
 of Italy. Kings and republics, cardinals and doges, 
 vied with each other in honoring and flattering Pe- 
 trarch. Embassies from rival states solicited the honor 
 of his instructions. His coronation agitated the Court 
 of Naples and the people of Rome as much as the most 
 important political transaction could have done. . . . 
 To the man who had extended the dominion of her 
 ancient language — who had erected the trophies of 
 philosophy and imagination in the haunts of ignorance 
 and ferocity — whose spoils were the treasures of an- 
 cient genius rescued from obscurity and decay — the 
 Eternal City offered the just and glorious tribute of 
 her gratitude. . . . He who had restored the broken 
 link between the two ages of human civilization was 
 crowned with the wreath which he deserved from the 
 moderns who owed to him their refinement, from the 
 ancients who owed to him their fame." ^ 
 
 It was at the height of this celebrity and power that 
 Petrarch came to dwell at Padua, and shortly after- 
 ward, tired of the life of court and city, retired to "the 
 hospitable house of the Augustinian friars at Arqua. 
 
 ' H. C. HoUway-Calthorp, sopra. * Macaulay, sopra. 
 
572 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 He was so charmed with the beauty of the place, that 
 he got Lombardo da Serico to negotiate for the pur- 
 chase of a plot of ground, comprising a vineyard 
 and an orchard of olives and other fruit trees. Here 
 he built a house, which still stands, structurally un- 
 altered, and bears witness to the simplicity of his 
 domestic habits and his appreciation of beautiful 
 scenery." ^ This was in 1369. Francesco della Carrara 
 senior, the Despot of Padua, who, like his predecessor, 
 Jacopo II, always manifested towards Petrarch a 
 peculiar reverence and affection, frequently took his 
 place in the stream of pilgrims which henceforth 
 wended steadily to Arqua; and that Petrarch returned 
 the esteem, became evident when he left for a while 
 this beloved retirement to go as Francesco's envoy 
 to Venice, and there secured peace for him from the 
 menacing Senate. That memorable occasion was the 
 poet's last appearance in the world. On the morning 
 of his seventieth birthday, July 20, 1374, he was found 
 in his library sleeping his last sleep, with an open book 
 on the desk before him. 
 
 Early upon the following morning I was en voiture, 
 and driving down the canal-road on my way to Arqua. 
 The cloudless sky presaged one of those glorious days 
 that often bless the Italian autumn. The route fol- 
 lowed the crest of the dike southward for a mile or so, 
 toward the isolated cone of Monselice, plainly visible 
 across the plain, then turned directly westward to the 
 hills. The land that we traversed was of the usual 
 deep fertility, sparsely dotted with stuccoed farm- 
 houses of modern look, — small, poverty-marked 
 dwellings, attached to barns faced by porticoes of 
 brick pillars, which sheltered empty lofts for grain 
 
 ■ H. C. HoUway-Calthorp, sopra. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 573 
 
 and hay. This sad poverty of crop and people was 
 vastly increased all over Venetia and Lombardy of late 
 years, ever since the great blights that began to strike 
 the vines and the silkworms in the middle of the past 
 century. Those bUghts, a direct result of the extermina- 
 tion of the birds, destroyed at their first attack prac- 
 tically all the vines of the plain, which till then had 
 been among the sweetest and most delicate of Italy, 
 and in subsequent attacks have devastated the re- 
 plantings again and again, so that the vintages of to- 
 day are not a third of what they once were, and their 
 products are coarse and heavy. These wines, now so 
 inferior to the once despised Piedmont vintages, that 
 the latter constitute the delicacy of the present, are 
 yet so dear that the peasants can no longer drink them 
 save on grand occasions. The last blight I had my- 
 self seen in this very year, — the grapes hanging gray 
 and withered throughout so many sections that their 
 produce would amount to almost nothing. As for the 
 silkworms and the mulberry trees, they too have 
 steadily suffered from increasing insect scourges, that 
 have reduced many districts to destitution. When one 
 adds the terrible summer hailstorms, which have be- 
 come much more frequent of late years, the reasons 
 for poverty are apparent. 
 
 But behind these physical afflictions lie the condi- 
 tions of peasant life that have kept the tillers of the 
 soil from rising up again with new determination: 
 firstly, their profound ignorance, and use of antedi- 
 luvian methods; secondly, their unhappy subjection 
 to usurers, in the absence of any sensible system of 
 finance; thu-dly, the wretched system of taxation, and 
 its heaviness, which press hardest of all upon the 
 farmer; fourthly, and chiefly, the conditions of land 
 ownership and tenure. Nearly all of the plain is still 
 
574 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 in the hands of large proprietors, to an unhappy 
 extent absentees, whose broad acres are looked after 
 by a class of middlemen, or factors. From these the 
 peasants rent their little farms, which usually have 
 been in the tenancy of the same family for genera- 
 tions; but those who pay their rent entirely in money 
 are as rare as the individual peasant proprietors, 
 whose numbers have been greatly reduced by the 
 hard times. A fair percentage pay partly in money, 
 partly in wheat or other crops, — which is called the 
 contralto misto. The mezzaria system, which prevails 
 in Tuscany and central Italy, is more used upon the 
 plain than any other: by it the landlord furnishes the 
 land and buildings, the repairs, the draft animals, and 
 occasionally certain implements, and receives one-half 
 the crops, — from which again he has to pay the taxes; 
 when oxen die or vines wither, he has to replace them, 
 and when crops fail, from hail or blight, he has to supply 
 provisions to keep his contadini alive. This system 
 did very well in the old times of plenty, but of late 
 it has impoverished the owners and tenants together, 
 the latter falling continually deeper in debt to the 
 former, who receive little or no income. 
 
 The other forms of contract, variations of this sys- 
 tem, are beyond enumeration, altering with every 
 district and nearly every estate; the differences being 
 in the things which the proprietor is bound to furnish, 
 and the varying shares into which the different crops 
 are to be divided. But all these methods have achieved 
 the same result, — an ignorant, improvident de- 
 pendence on and indebtedness to the master, who is 
 thus pulled downhill along with his tenants. Under 
 such conditions a single disaster — a blight, a fire, 
 or hailstorm — sends the peasant to the village 
 usurer for money to buy new implements or stock, or 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 575 
 
 even clothes and food; and having taken this down- 
 ward step, he can never recover himself, but ends 
 in complete ruination. The equal division of land 
 which the Italian law enforces between all the heirs 
 of a decedent owner, has greatly added to this evil 
 state of affairs, by its continual parceling out of farms 
 into smaller and smaller pieces, with-the concomitant 
 changes in tenancy and heavy transfer taxes. 
 
 The peasants, it is well known, no longer have the 
 stamina to work as they once did, on account of their 
 impoverished diet; this again results in poorer crops, 
 and still less food. They live chiefly, save in the 
 Lombard wheat districts, on polenta, or corn flour, 
 with the addition of a little rice, and cabbages, turnips, 
 onions, or other cheap vegetables, generally eaten 
 raw, or in soup. Eggs, chickens, cheese, and meat 
 are too dear for home consumption, save on vaxefestas; 
 and then only do they take a little of the coarse wine, 
 which does not suflfice, as did the former abundance 
 and fine quality, to make up for the deficiences of their 
 diet. As for coffee and tea, they are practically un- 
 known; even salt is a grudged luxury, so heavily is it 
 taxed. The farm servants fare worse than their mas- 
 ters, receiving their wages in the shape of the simplest 
 possible food, with lodging, firewood, and a fraction 
 of the crops they raise. In such a state of society it 
 is not a matter for wonder that the educated parish 
 priests obtain an emolument of only £20 a year, and 
 fall victims to the pellagra with their flocks. It is easy 
 to see how the noble landlords of the Veneto, who had 
 already incurred so many sacrifices under the Aus- 
 trians and the Risorgimento, through their patriotism, 
 have since then been gradually reduced to comparative 
 penury. And one can judge how vastly were needed 
 those model farms with modern methods, established 
 
576 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 by Marchese Stangi and Baron Franchetti, near Cre- 
 mona and Mantua, to prove to Italians that the fault 
 has lain with the men, not the soil, and that the an- 
 cient adage is still true, — " La vanga ha la punta 
 d' oro." 1 
 
 "The drive to Arqua," wrote Symonds, "takes 
 one through a country which is tenderly beautiful, 
 because of its contrast between little peaked mountains 
 and the plain. It is not a grand landscape. . . . Its 
 charm is a certain mystery and repose, — an unde- 
 fined sense of the neighboring Adriatic, a pervading 
 consciousness of Venice unseen, but felt from far 
 away." ^ The description of the final approach written 
 by Hobhouse (later Lord Broughton) when he and 
 Byron made their visit of September, 1817, presents 
 an accurate picture: "Across a flat, well-wooded 
 meadow, you come to a little blue lake, clear but 
 fathomless, and to the foot of a succession of acclivi- 
 ties and hills, clothed with vineyards and orchards, 
 rich with fir and pomegranate trees, and every sunny 
 forest shrub. From the banks of the lake the road 
 winds into the hills, and the church of Arqua is soon 
 seen between a cleft where two ridges slope towards 
 each other, and nearly inclose the village. The houses 
 are scattered at intervals on the steep sides of these 
 summits." ' All this is more than a thousand feet 
 above the plain, — a long slow climb, — on the slope 
 of the great hill sustaining the twin peaks. 
 
 Mounting thus from the east into the straggling 
 hamlet, but a few houses had been passed when we 
 debouched suddenly into a piazza upon a small pla- 
 teau somewhat below the notch, extending to the left 
 
 ' " The spade has the point of gold." 
 
 * J. A. Symonds, Sketches and Studies in Italy. 
 
 ' Broughton, Remarks Made in Several Visits to Italy. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 577 
 
 from the narrow street; at its end, upon a broad ter- 
 race flanked by cypresses, behind a semicircular 
 yard inclosed by a stone-capped parapet, stood the 
 queer old parochial church, built of stucco, painted a 
 soft blue. Its central body appeared a simple cube, 
 a story and a half in height, in which opened two cor- 
 niced doorways topped by fan-lights; at its sides were 
 small square wings of a single story, containing two 
 shorter doorways topped by round lights; and over 
 the left of these, in the rear, rose the modest, stuccoed 
 campanile, — its single-arched belfry, adorned with 
 pilasters, being surmounted by an octagonal lantern 
 with a Byzantine cupola. In the centre of the rounded 
 fore-court stood the tomb of Petrarch. 
 
 I glanced, as I dismounted from the vettura, at the 
 two buildings flanking the piazza : that to the left was 
 a ruinous Gothic palazzo, evidently now used as a barn, 
 holding in its upper floor many fair ogive trefoil 
 windows, of stucco frames with terra-cotta labels, — 
 double-arched on the fagade, with slender stone shafts, 
 and single-arched at the sides; that to the right was 
 the village inn, an aged, two-storied, stucco building, 
 carrying the sign, — " Albergo-Trattoria-al Petrarco." 
 Before its northern side the street continued up the 
 hill to the notch; into the yard at its southern side 
 my vetturino disappeared with his horse. As I ad- 
 vanced to the churchyard the unique beauty of its 
 position was revealed: the terrace on which it lay 
 was raised between steep descents, — that on the left 
 being covered with massed orange trees, from which 
 soared two of the tall pointed cypresses, while on the 
 right fell a roadway from the face of the inn, to a 
 line of dwellings down the slope. The other three 
 cypresses rose from a narrow terrace between it and 
 the court parapet. 
 
578 PLAIN TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 Over this southern declivity of the mountain, then, 
 the church was perched on a narrow shoulder, looking 
 straight down into the valley, which opens eastward 
 into the plain. Over the orangery on the left I saw 
 the variegated beauties far below, — the rich, check- 
 ered fields, the patches of yellow foliage, and the 
 gleaming farmhouses and hamlets, — which clam- 
 bered also up the opposite mountainside, and spread 
 eastward from the vale into the hazy, distant level 
 of the plain. To the right my gaze was higher led, 
 to the twin summits just above, encircled by their 
 joint necklace of bright stuccoed dwellings, which 
 in spite of their vivid hues were clearly of mouldering 
 age, — save only two huge modern structures of cream 
 color, at the extreme left. Some of the old buildings 
 penetrated the cleft, where another church was pic- 
 turesquely posed. A third churchly edifice, of imme- 
 morial age, lay at my feet across the falling road, the 
 plaster long crumbled from its medieval stones; the 
 pointed arch of its portal, and those of the four tre- 
 foil windows above — the central one double-arched, 
 the fourth in the gable — showed an erection of the 
 early Gothic period. Now it was a ruinous dwelling, 
 which added to its quaint appearance. 
 
 With this glance around, I stepped up to the storied 
 sepulchre, — a sense of veneration strong upon me, at 
 the realization that I stood in the presence of that 
 illustrious dust, greater than all the princes of earth. 
 It was surrounded by an iron railing, upheld by four 
 stone posts at the corners; upon a plain double base 
 rose the four stocky, quadrangular pillars sustaining 
 the large sarcophagus, of simple Paduan form. All 
 was of red Verona marble; but on the front centre of 
 the gabled lid, some eight or nine feet from the ground, 
 stood a bronze bust of the poet, above a bronze scroll. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 579 
 
 There was no other adornment, beyond the Latin 
 inscriptions. Three more inscriptions and a shield of 
 arms hung on the church's fagade directly behind, 
 one of which commemorated the celebration of the 
 fifth centenary of the poet's death, held here by United 
 Italy on July 18, 1874. The entire simplicity of this 
 monument was most satisfying, aggrandized as it is 
 by its lofty, wind-swept throne, girdled by the eter- 
 nal volcanic hills. "Fit resting-place," said Symonds, 
 "for what remains to earth of such a poet's clay! It 
 is as though archangels, flying, had carried the marble 
 chest and set it down here on the hillside, to be a sign 
 and sanctuary for after-men. Bending here, we feel 
 that Petrarch's own winged thoughts and fancies, 
 eternal and aerial, have congregated to be the ever- 
 ministering and irremovable attendants over the 
 shrine."^ 
 
 It is a late day to quote those beautiful lines which 
 Byron wrote after that first visit of 1817; but what 
 account of this place would be complete without a 
 reference to them? — 
 
 There is a tomb in Arqua; reared in air. 
 
 Pillared in their sarcophagus, repose 
 
 The bones of Laura's lover. . . . He arose 
 
 To raise a language, and his land reclaim 
 
 From the dull yoke of her barbaric foes. 
 
 Watering the tree which bears his lady's name 
 
 With his melodious tears, he gave himself to fame.' 
 
 It was the poet Petrarch, the singer of a hopeless 
 love, that appealed to Byron rather than the scholar. 
 He came later upon a second visit, "when he brought 
 the lady of his love," the fair Contessa Guiccioli; — 
 "she who knows his sonnets by heart," said Byron, 
 "and who recites them as only an Italian mouth can. 
 
 1 J. A. Symonds, sojrra. ' ChUde Harold's Pilgrimage, iv, xxs. 
 
580 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 . . . Petrarch is the poetical idol of the women of 
 Italy." ^ "Though Dante was an admirable sonnet- 
 eer," wrote Sidney Lee, "it was his successor, Pe- 
 trarch, whose example gave the sonnet its lasting 
 vogue in Europe. . . . Every sonneteer of western 
 Europe acknowledged Petrarch to be his master; and 
 from Petrarchian inspiration came the form and much 
 of the spirit of Shakespeare's sonnets." ^ 
 
 As I gazed upon the tomb, I thought of that sad 
 day of 1374 when the bard's remains were carried here 
 from his house. The "funeral was celebrated with great 
 pomp; Francesco da Carrara might be trusted to see 
 to that. He himself attended, with a train of cour- 
 tiers; four bishops took part in the ceremony, and the 
 bier was carried by sixteen doctors of law. Petrarch's 
 body was dressed in a red gown, — according to some, 
 the royal robe which Robert of Naples had given 
 him for his crowning, according to others, the dress 
 of a Canon of Padua. . . . The sarcophagus [was] 
 constructed by his son-in-law." Long afterward, "at 
 a time when the tomb stood in need of repair, an 
 arm was stolen [by a Florentine, through a rent still 
 visible] which is said to be now preserved at Madrid; 
 and among the relics kept in Petrarch's house, the 
 caretaker shows with misplaced satisfaction a box 
 which contains one of the poet's fingers." ^ This, how- 
 ever, is the only disturbance that the remains have 
 suffered. 
 
 Entering the church, I found it cubical in form, 
 with a cubical high-altar recess on the east side, and 
 an organ-loft on the west side, supported on four gray 
 
 • The Countess of Blessington, The Idler in Italy (1828). 
 ' Sidney Lee on Sir Philip Sidney, in his Greai Englishmen of the Sixteenth 
 Century. 
 ' H. C. HoUway-Calthorp, «oyro. 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 581 
 
 columns of imitation marble; against each of the other 
 walls stood a modest side altar, one of which was a 
 pleasing Renaissance work of sculptured marble, with 
 a pair of life-size cherubs at its front angles; upon 
 it was a seicentisi Baptism of the Saviour, somewhat 
 in Palma Giovane's style, within a rich frame of the 
 same epoch, elaborately carved with putti, human 
 faces, festoons of flowers, etc. The walls and flat roof 
 were whitewashed, and the former hung with a curi- 
 ous array of small modern pictures, mainly lithographs. 
 Two old canvases, however, flanked the chancel arch, 
 of which the left one was evidently from the school 
 of Paolo Veronese, — depicting the Madonna in glory 
 between Saints Francis and Clara, above a throng 
 of persons, including a pope, a princess, and several 
 cardinals; the figures were really excellent, being both 
 natural and of considerable grace and expression. 
 
 Petrarch's famous fountain, of which he wrote and 
 drank, I found a little below the church, springing 
 from the slope under an archway of masonry, doubt- 
 less added since his day. The sweetness of the water 
 justified all his praises. After this I mounted the 
 main street to the upper piazza in the notch, following 
 a couple of housewives carrying water home in the 
 Euganean fashion, — with a pail slung at each end of 
 a long wooden bow across the shoulders. An odd thing 
 about this village was that it was not solidly built, 
 but the houses were scattered separately about the 
 hillside, amongst gardens. From the ruined fragments 
 of an ancient castle at the top, which a native informed 
 me had once been the Venetian citadel, another street 
 bearing southward led me quickly to the poet's house, 
 perched, like the church, on a narrow terrace overlook- 
 ing the southern valley. It stood at the end of a small 
 garden, now densely overgrown with trees and shrubs, 
 
PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 save for the confined walk leading to the modern gates 
 of ornamental ironwork. The two-storied stucco dwell- 
 ing, two rooms deep and four in breadth, appeared 
 wonderfully preserved, as if but one or two generations 
 had passed since Petrarch's occupancy; its present ex- 
 cellent condition is due to an association which years 
 ago purchased the place, to conserve it as a lasting 
 memorial. The entrance is by a narrow portico pro- 
 jecting from the middle of the fagade, consisting of 
 a single archway below, and a double-arched loggia 
 above, approached by a flight of steps from the left. 
 Ascending these, escorted by the well-informed cus- 
 todian whom my ring had brought to the gates, I found 
 myself before three handsome, trefoil, ogive arches, 
 supported by slender white stone columns, in the 
 middle of which was the door, and at the sides two 
 sixteenth-century windows of circular leaded panes.^ 
 Within opened the wide entrance hall, with a red tiled 
 floor, brown stucco walls, and a wooden ceiling which 
 Petrarch had painted with countless little squares 
 containing brown circles. Around the upper walls 
 extended a cinquecento frieze of frescoed panels, three 
 per side, illustrating the story of Petrarch and Laura, 
 as set forth in his sonnets. One or both of them appear 
 in each scene, amidst charming landscapes through 
 which winds the Sorga River, with the town of Vau- 
 cluse discerned in the distance, where the poet saw 
 and loved his ideal; and under each tableau are writ- 
 ten its appropriate verses from the Canzoni di Laura. 
 This charming idea is well carried out, the work hav- 
 ing been skillfully retouched about twenty years ago. 
 
 ' Restorations, or reproductions, of the original trecento windows. In 
 several rooms, however, the framework of Petrarch's day is still preserved; 
 and here and there, especially in his study, linger a number of tie little 
 round trecento panes, distinguished by their yellowish opaqueness. 
 
ARQUA. THI 
 
:SE or PETRARCH, 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 583 
 
 The entrance hall runs through to the rear wall, 
 in which opens another doorway, between two win- 
 dows. Roundabout stand two tables, a desk and two 
 chairs of the trecento, heavily framed and carved all 
 over with curious scrolls, — recently brought here to 
 exemplify the furniture of Petrarch's day. In a cen- 
 tral, modern, glass case repose the visitors' books bear- 
 ing illustrious signatures, amongst which I saw those of 
 Byron, Queen Margherita, King Umberto, etc.; also 
 a photographic reproduction of a page of Petrarch's 
 original manuscript in the Vatican, and a fine copy 
 of the first printed edition of his works, from the press 
 of Aldo Manutio at Venice. 
 
 The back room on the right was the poet's bed- 
 chamber, now unfurnished; here there were similar 
 cinquecento frescoes, illustrating the canzoni on 
 Laura's death. Adjacent in front was the kitchen, 
 with the handsome chimney-piece of soft creamy stone 
 (from the neighborhood), under which the poet's meals 
 were cooked; here the frescoes illustrated his poem on 
 Africa. The wooden ceiling retained his painted de- 
 signs; and over one doorway stood the beautiful terra- 
 cotta bust of the dead Lucrezia, which he so much 
 admired, — an excellent piece of sculpture, with its 
 head thrown back toward the right shoulder, and eyes 
 closed. On the chimney-front was painted a reclining, 
 Titianesque Venus, representing the suicide of Cleo- 
 patra. The left front chamber was the poet's dining- 
 room, adorned with a similar chimney-piece, which in 
 the Late-Renaissance had been painted with a copy 
 of Titian's group of Venus, Cupid, and Vulcan, — now 
 retouched and of graceful effect. The other frescoes 
 here were very crude. Over the rear doorway, in a 
 baroque frame with a glass cover, rested the cele- 
 brated mummy of Petrarch's cat, underwrit by an 
 
584 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 inscription in Latin which testifies that she was the 
 poet's first love, not Laura, and that to her are due the 
 thanks of humanity for saving from the rats his pre- 
 cious manuscripts. The ceiling was a modem imita- 
 tion of the others; and on the north wall was a modern 
 bronze bust of Petrarch, dated 1902. 
 
 In the left rear were two undersized rooms, entered 
 only from the last; the larger was his study, or library, 
 illumined still by the window of his day, with its little 
 round leaded panes ; the smaller was his retreat for 
 writing and reading, especially at night, lighted by a 
 similar but smaller window.-"^ Here it was that he was 
 found dead, before his unfinished epitome of the Lives 
 of Illustrious Men. The armchair in which he worked, 
 and died, is preserved in a glass case in the study, 
 together with the desk at which he sat, — the former 
 being exquisitely carved on the back with the most 
 delicate designs. Here also I saw his bookcase, whose 
 two doors were relieved with countless tiny square 
 panels, having perforations of "X" shape, — nearly all 
 destroyed by early visitors. On the wall was pointed 
 out to me the remaining decipherable stanza of the 
 sonnet which Alfieri wrote there on his visit, with his 
 signature barely visible underneath.'' 
 
 Wonderful indeed it was to reflect that in this very 
 room, half a thousand years ago, with the aid of this 
 
 ' This was really a closet, between the study and the hall, entered solely 
 from the former; just wide enough to contain his desk and armchair, before 
 the window. 
 
 ' These famous lines are as admirable for their tenderness of sentiment 
 as for their melody; they began, — 
 
 O Cameretta, che gii in te chiudesti 
 Quel Grande alia cui fama &, angusto il mondo — 
 
 Alfieri's memorandum at this time also shows his feelings: "I visited, 
 once more, the tomb of our master in love, the divine Petrarch; and then, 
 as at Ravenna," consecrated a day to meditation and verse." 
 
ROVIGO, ARQUA, AND BATTAGLIA 585 
 
 same furniture, the thouglits were penned which led 
 the way for mankind from the darkness of barbarism 
 to the light of culture. "Even after death [that of 
 Laura] had placed the last seal on his misery," said 
 Macaulay, "we see him devoting to the cause of the 
 human mind all the strength and energy which love 
 and sorrow had spared. He lived the apostle of liter- 
 ature; — he fell its martyr: — he was found dead with 
 his head reclined on a book." ^ 
 
 There were two more rooms to be seen, added on to 
 the west end after Petrarch's time, and filled now 
 with portraits, busts, relics of the Delia Carrara, early 
 editions of Petrarch's works. Renaissance furniture, 
 etc., all more or less connected in interest with his 
 life and fame. Finally, I stepped from the rear door 
 upon the balcony above the valley, guarded still by its 
 original curved iron railing, upon which the poet loved 
 to lean and gaze at his view: there directly below 
 spread the little field which was laden with his cher- 
 ished vines and olive trees, — now a vineyard only; be- 
 yond stretched "the glowing gardens in the dale im- 
 mediately beneath, [and] the wide plain, above whose 
 low woods of mulberry and willow, thickened into a 
 dark mass by festoons of vines, tall single cypresses 
 and the spires of towns are seen in the distance, 
 stretching to the mouths of the Po and the shores of 
 the Adriatic." ^ 
 
 Glorious indeed was this view which lured the poet 
 here to dwell, — all unchanged from the days when his 
 eyes rested upon it: the girdling conical peaks soaring 
 in majesty to the right, the pastoral vale below, the 
 vast mountain-side opposite climbing from fertile 
 meadows to the bare summit, the red-tiled village clam- 
 bering up the hither slope to the left, and the immense, 
 » Macaulay, Essay on Petrarch. ' Lord Broughton, eopra. 
 
586 PLAIN-TOWNS OF ITALY 
 
 green, haze-shrouded, plain extending indefinitely be- 
 yond the valley's end, with its eternal sense of mystery 
 and menace of the sea. When I had bidden good-by to 
 the sanctuary, regained my vettura, and started from 
 the village down the far descent, the beauty of that 
 sublime panorama came upon me with redoubled feel- 
 ing; and at the first knoll I stopped, to gaze upon it 
 once more. My journeying was over; behind me lay 
 all that wonderful hinterland which Venice conquered 
 with the sword, and clothed in the loveliness of the 
 Renaissance; and ahead of me, just below that dim 
 horizon which seemed to bear the murmur of the 
 waves, soared the golden domes and spires of the 
 Suzeraine herself, — the Immortal Republic, beckon- 
 ing me back to her glorious rest. In this final look, 
 the great plain seemed to grow more lustrous, — still 
 more like an emerald velvet strown with the spark- 
 ling diamonds of its innumerable hamlets, as if to dis- 
 play to me for the last time its full and matchless 
 charm. And as I gazed farewell, the melody of the 
 poet was ringing in my ears, like the silver chimes of 
 monastery bells across a shadow-stealing vale : — 
 
 Farewell, land of love, Italy, 
 
 Sister-land of Paradise: 
 With mine own feet I have trodden thee. 
 
 Have seen with mine own eyes; 
 I remember, thou forgettest me, — 
 
 I remember thee.' 
 
 1 C. G. Rosaetti. 
 
 THE END 
 
INDEX 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abano, town of, 550. 
 Accoramboni, Vittoria, 48, 49. 
 Adige river, 322-325, 347-349, 395, 
 
 396. 
 Adria, town of, 558. 
 Agilulf, 559. 
 Agriculture of the plain, 13, 15, 97, 
 
 98, 260, 501, 502, 572-576. 
 Alaric, 224, 272, 326, 459. 
 Alberic da Romano, 139, 178. 
 Alboin, 224, 273, 324, 329. 
 Aleardi, 344. 
 Aleotti, G. B., 128. 
 Altichieri da Zevio, 22, 69, 70, 71, 78, 
 
 79, 344, 358, 367, 391. 
 Amalteo, Pomponio, 191, 248, 256, 
 
 277, 284, 291, 292, 303, 313. 
 Amusements of townspeople, 142, 
 
 143, 145, 182-184, 480, 481. 
 Aquileia, 271, 272, 276; Patriarchs 
 
 of, 260, 274, 275, 278, 299, 308, 
 
 312. 
 Antenor, 16, 28, 60, 61, 85. 
 Antharis, 330, 349. 
 Antonello da Messina, 83. 
 Arcole, 347. 
 
 Arnold of Brescia, 420, 468. 
 Arqua, buildings of, 577, 678; 
 
 church, 577, 580, 581; drives to, 
 
 628, 672, 676; fountein, 681; 
 
 Petrarch, 569-572, tomb of, 677- 
 
 580, house of, 681-686 • situation, 
 
 628, 559, 572, 576. 
 Asolo, 153, 154. 
 Attila, 16, 224, 272, 326, 452, 461, 
 
 462. 
 Avars, the, 273, 274. 
 
 Bacchiglione, the, 25, 26, 30, 60, 80, 
 
 109, 110, 627. 
 Badile, Antonio, 346, 391, 402, 656. 
 
 Barbarelli, Gior^o {see Giorgione). 
 
 Bardi, Giovanni Minelli de', 146. 
 
 Banizzi, 489. 
 
 Basaiti, 251, 555. 
 
 Bassano: albergo, 142; art of, 140; 
 Bardi, Minelli de', 145; Bellini, 
 Giovanni, 152; bicycle meet, 142, 
 143, 145; Bonifazio, 152; Brenta, 
 the, 138, 139, 145, 146; bridge, the 
 old wooden, 145, 146; Buonamici, 
 house of, 149; Ca' Rezzonico, 152; 
 camposanto, 147; Canova, 150, 
 153; cinematograph, 142, 143; Da 
 Ponte, family of, 140; Da Ponte, 
 Francesco, 140, 150, 151; Da 
 Ponte, Francesco, Jr., 140, 159; 
 Da Ponte, Girolamo, 140, 144; Da 
 Ponte, house of the family, 147; 
 Da Ponte, Jacopo, 140, 145, 151; 
 Da Ponte, Leandro, 140, 148, 151, 
 268; Duomo, 148; excursions 
 from, 152, 163, 154; Ezzelino, 139, 
 141; castle of, 147, 148; S. Giov- 
 anni Battista, church of, 144, 145; 
 Guariento, 152; Guarinai, G., 148; 
 history, 139, 140; hotel, 142; jour- 
 ney to, 137, 138; Madonna delle 
 Grazie, church of, 153; Minelli de' 
 Bardi, 145; Museo Civico, 150; 
 Palazzo Pretorio, 149; piazzas, 
 central, 143, 145, 149; Piteti, Bon- 
 ifazio, 152; Pordenone, 150; Pos- 
 sagno, 160; Roberti, Roberto, 
 151; situation, 139; street paint- 
 ing, 149; SS. Trinity, 153; view 
 from castle, 147; Villa Parolini, 
 153; western quarter, 145, 146, 
 147. 
 
 Bassano family, 140. 
 
 Bassano, Francesco, 140, 150, 151, 
 212. 
 
590 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Bassano, Francesco, Jr., 140, 159. 
 
 Bassano, Girolamo, 140, 144. 
 
 Bassano, Jacopo, 36, 96, 130, 131, 
 140, 145, 151, 153. 
 
 Bassano, Leandro, 126, 140, 148, 
 151, 159, 213, 268. 
 
 Baths of Recoaro, 137. 
 
 Battaglia: Albergo Italia, 562; as- 
 pect of, 561, 562; baths, history of, 
 559; canal, 528, 531, 660, 561, 662; 
 Castle of Cattajo, 665-569; Es- 
 tensi, the, 665; Grand Hotel des 
 Thermes, 660, 561; Obizzi, the, 
 665, 668; parish church, 562; situ- 
 ation of, 559; springs of, 659, 664; 
 Stabilmento dei Bagui, 559, 664; 
 vapor grottoes, 666; Villa S. 
 Elena, 559, 562; Veronese, Paolo, 
 668; Zelotti, 568. 
 
 Bayard, Chevalier, 426. 
 
 Bellano, Bart., 47, 76, 77, 95, 96. 
 
 Belli, Marco, 555. 
 
 Bellini, Gentile, 83, 654. 
 
 Bellini, Giovanni, 83, 107, 126, 127, 
 130, 152, 198, 209, 210, 410, 490, 
 554, 557. 
 
 Bellunello, Andrea, 276, 284. 
 
 Belluno, 214, 215. 
 
 Bembo, Cardinal, 10, 154; tomb of, 
 67. 
 
 Benaglio, Francesco, 346, 367, 390, 
 402. 
 
 Benaglio, Girolamo, 346. 
 
 Berengarius, 331. 
 
 Bergamo, 4. 
 
 Berici, Monti, 100, 105, 106, 120, 
 133-136, 346. 
 
 Bevilacqua, 200, 604. 
 
 Bissolo, 192. 
 
 Boccaccino, Boccaccio, 83. 
 
 Bonifacio, S., village of, 347. 
 
 Bonifazio, 162, 410, 665. 
 
 Bonsignori, Francesco, 346, 346, 
 390, 401, 402. 
 
 Bordone, Paris, 180, 190, 191, 192, 
 213. 
 
 Bosco del CoDsiglio, 258. 
 
 Boselli, Antonio, 67. 
 
 Bozen, 154, 323. 
 
 Brandolin Castle, 258. 
 
 Bregni, brothers, 191. 
 
 Brenta Canal, 25. 
 
 Brenta River, 6, 8-10, 12, 138, 189, 
 145, 146. 
 
 Brescia : S. Af ra, church of, 469-471 ; 
 S. Agostino, church of, 442; Alaric, 
 452; S. Alessandro, church of, 472; 
 amusements, 480, 481 ; Ansilperga, 
 464, 459, 463; Arnold of Brescia, 
 420, 468; art of, 429-431; Attila, 
 
 462, 461; Barbieri (Guercino), 
 491; ' Baruzzi, 489; Bayard, 
 Chevalier, 426; Bellini, Giovanni, 
 490; Broletto, 439-443; caf& and 
 bars, 480; Camposanto, 495; Car- 
 magnola, 424, 425; Carrara, della, 
 the, 421, 424; castle and castle 
 hill, 433, 434, 491-494; Catullus, 
 419; character of the people, 431; 
 Charlemagne, 464; Civerchio, 
 Vincenzo, 429, 472, 478, 491; S. 
 Clemente, church of, 466, 467; 
 clock tower, 438; Cornaro, Queen 
 Caterina, 427; Corso Zanardelli, 
 433, 434, 435, 481; S. Cristo, 
 church of, 487; cross of Galla 
 Placidia, 467, 458, 469; customs of 
 the people, 480, 481; Desiderata, 
 
 463, 464; Desiderius, 420, 454, 
 459, 463; Duomo Nuovo, 440, 
 443-446; Duomo Vecchio, 440, 
 446; Ezzelino, 420, 421; Ferra- 
 mola, 429, 430, 456; Ferrari, 489; 
 Foppa, Vincenzo, 429, 477, 484, 
 489; Foppa the Younger, 456; 
 fortress, 491, 492; Forum, Roman, 
 449-452; S. Francesco, church of, 
 486, 486; Francia, 477, 490; Fred- 
 erick Barbarossa, 420; Fromen- 
 tone, 437; Galleria Martinengo, 
 469, 489-491; Galla Placidia, 
 467-462; Gambara, Lattanzio, 
 431; Garibaldi, 429, 494; Gaston 
 de Foix, 426; S. Giovanni Evan- 
 
INDEX 
 
 591 
 
 gelista, church of, 477-479; S. 
 Guilia, church of, 454-458, 462; 
 Gregoletti, 445; Haynau, General, 
 428, 429; history, 419-429, 450, 
 452, 453; hotel, 433; Lotto, Lor- 
 enzo, 490; Lumi, Bernardino, 465; 
 Madonna dei MiracoU, church of, 
 485; Mantegna, 490; manufactur- 
 ing, 487, 488; Marco Palmesano 
 da Forli, 490; S. Maria Calchera, 
 church of, 467; S. Maria del Car- 
 mine, church of, 479; S. Maria del 
 Solan, church of, 454, 464, 465; S. 
 Maria delle Grazie, church of, 
 475-477; Martinengo, Count, 427, 
 428, 469, tomb of, 456, 457; Mer- 
 cato dei Grani, 468; Mercato 
 Nuovo, 468; II Moretto (Alessan- 
 dro Bonvicini), 430, 447, 448, 466, 
 467, 468, 469, 477, 478, 484, 485, 
 486, 489, 490; Moretto, statue of, 
 469; Moroni, G. B., 431, 490; 
 Museo Civico Et4 Romana, 450, 
 451; Museo del Risorgimento, 
 492-494; Museo Medioevale, 449, 
 454^58, 462; SS. Nazzaro e Celso, 
 church of, 483-485; Palazzo 
 Calzavellio, 474; Palazzo F^, 485; 
 Palazzo Masperi, 474; Palazzo 
 Municipale, 436^39; Palazzo To- 
 sio, 473; Palladio, 437; Palma 
 Vecchio, 447, 448; Pampaloni, 
 489; patron saints, 445; Piazza, 
 Calisto, 468; Piazza Comune, 434, 
 436; Piazza del Duomo, 434, 439; 
 Piazza del Museo, 449; Piazza 
 della Posta, 449; Piazza Moretto, 
 469; Piazza Nuova, 435; Piazza 
 Tito Speri, 442, 486; S. Pietro, 
 church of, 488, 489; plan of, 434; 
 Porta Milano, 475; Porta Stazi- 
 one, 433, 495; Prato, Francesco 
 da, 486; Queriniana Library, 449; 
 Raphael, 490; Risorgimento, 418, 
 428; Roman Brescia, 419, 434, 
 449^53; Roman painting, 448; 
 Roman theatre, 452; Romanino, 
 
 Girolamo, 430, 447, 448, 463, 467, 
 468, 478, 479, 486, 490; S. Salva- 
 tore, church of, 454, 455, 463, 493; 
 Sansovino, 437, 489; Savoldo, 
 Geronimo, 430, 431, 491; Scali- 
 gers, the, 421; Sforza, Francesco, 
 424, 425; shops, the, 481; situa- 
 tion, 419; socialism of the people, 
 481, 482; Speri, Tito, 428, 429, 
 442, 492, 494, tomb of, 442; Tem- 
 ple of Hercules, 434, 449; Ten 
 Days of, 429; Ten Days monu- 
 ment, 438; Thorvaldsen, 489; 
 Tintoretto, 470; Titian, 471, 484; 
 Torre della Pallata, 475; tram- 
 ways, 483; Venice, rule of, 424- 
 427; Veronese, Paolo, 470; Ves- 
 pasian, 449, 450; Via delle Spa- 
 derie, 435, 436; Via Gambara, 487; 
 Victory, statue of, 450, 451; Vis- 
 conti, Gian Galeazzo, 437; Vis- 
 conti, the, 421, 422, 424, 425; 
 Viti, Timoteo, 490; wine-presses of 
 the streets, 479, 480; Zanardelli 
 monument, 495, 496; Zoppo, 
 Paolo, 429, 456, 489. 
 
 Brusasorci, 345, 346, 371, 372, 378, 
 381, 391, 399, 402, 405. 
 
 Buonconsiglio, Giovanni, 106, 132, 
 133, 510, 511, 512, 513, 614. 
 
 Caf^-life, 182-184, 480. 
 Calderari, 107, 131. 
 Calisto (St. Calixtus), 308, 309, 310. 
 Cambrai, League of, 4, 20, 29, 104, 
 
 105, 342, 427. 
 Campione, Ugo da, 446. 
 Campagna, Girolamo, 72, 212, 361. 
 Campagnola, Dario, 94. 
 Campagnola, Domenico, 33, 36, 80, 
 
 91, 92, 95, 96, 129. 
 Campagnola, Giulio, 95. 
 Campo Formio, 278. 
 Canova, 150, 153. 
 Capelletti (Capulets), the, 332, 337, 
 
 397. 
 Carea, town of, 504. 
 
592 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Cariani, Giovanni, 551, 552. 
 
 Carmagnola, 424, 425. 
 
 Carnio, Antonio, 277. 
 
 Caroto, F., 345, 374, 377, 390, 399, 
 401, 404, 409. 
 
 Carpaccio, V., 248, 554. 
 
 Carpi, Girolamo, 551. 
 
 Carrara, della, the, 19, 103, 139, 164, 
 178, 226, 261, 341, 421, 500. 
 
 Carrara, della, Francesco, 19, 179, 
 341, 424, 570, 572, 580. 
 
 Carrara, della, Francesco Novello, 
 19, 30. 
 
 Carrara, della, Jaoopo 1, 19, 103. 
 
 Carrara, della, Jacopo 11, 21, 33, 35, 
 47. 
 
 Carrara, della, Ubertino, 33, 47. 
 
 Casarsa, 280. 
 
 Castelfranco: albergo, 162, 163, 168- 
 170; castle, 160, 161, 163, 171; 
 church, 171-174; conclave of, 164; 
 Costanza house, 175; Costanza, 
 Matteo, 165, 166, 172, 174; Cos- 
 tanza, Tuzio, 161, 165, 172; fairs 
 of, 175; festa, 170; fortress, 161, 
 164, 171; eastern gate of, 175; 
 Giorgione, life and work, 165-167, 
 statue of, 165, pala of, 173, 174, 
 frescoes of, 175, 176, house of, 175; 
 history, 161, 164, 166; Municipio, 
 171; lottery-drawing, 163; Palma 
 Giovane, 173; piazza, 160, 175; 
 Pordenone, 176; promenade along 
 the fosse; 170; unpleasant experi- 
 ence, 168-170; Veronese, Paolo, 
 172, 173; walls and battlements, 
 160, 164, 185. 
 
 Cattajo, Castle, 565-569. 
 
 Catullus, 344, 419, 432. 
 
 Cavallotti, Felice, bust of, 522. 
 
 Cavazzola, 345, 366, 390, 402, 405, 
 406, 409, 410. 
 
 Ceneda (see Serravalle): Amalteo, 
 266; aspect, 252; counts of, 244, 
 247, 248; Duomo, 252, 253; 
 Fiori, Jacobello del, 251, 253; 
 Marchese Costantini, gardens of. 
 
 252, 256, 257; Municipio, 262; 
 Palazzo Municipale, 255, 256; 
 Palma Giovane, 253; Tiepolo, 
 253; Titian, 253-255; Valentina, 
 Jacopo, 253; Vescovodo, 252. 
 
 Charlemagne, 274, 330, 331, 464, 
 518, 529. 
 
 Chaucer, 30. 
 
 Chioggia, 668. 
 
 Cima da Conegliano, 107, 130, 226, 
 227, 230, 231, 410, 528, 549, 550, 
 664. 
 
 Cittadella: Bassano, Francesco, 159; 
 Bassano, Leandro, 169; church, 
 158, 159; fosse, 159; history, 155, 
 166; main streets, 157; Municipio, 
 158; piazza, 168; Porta Bassano, 
 157, 158; Porta Padovana, 156, 
 157; Porta Trevisaua, 168; Pre- 
 fettura, 158; situation, 156; Vene- 
 tian Lion, 158; walls, city, 141, 
 155, 166, 157. 
 
 Civerchio, Vincenzo, 429, 430, 472, 
 '478,491. 
 
 Cividale : Amalteo, 313; Baptistery of 
 Calixtus, 310; Calisto (Calixtus), 
 308, 309; Chapel of St. Peltrudis, 
 307, 313-318; Convent of the 
 Ursulines, 313-318; Duomo, 309; 
 310-313; history, 273-275, 307, 
 308; S. Maria de' Battuti, 318, 
 319; S. Maria in Valle, 319; S. 
 Martino, church of, 318, 319; 
 S. Martino, quarter of, 314; Meri, 
 Pietro, 311; Museo Civico, 319- 
 321; Palazzo Municipale, 309; 
 Palma Giovane, 311, 312, 313; 
 Palma Vecchio, 311; Patriarchs, 
 274, 275, 308, 312; Pellegrino, 319; 
 Poute del Diavolo, 318; Seccante, 
 Sebastiano, 311; situation, 308, 
 314; Tiepolo, G. B., 313. 
 
 Codroipo, 280. 
 
 Colalto, castle and counts of, 236- 
 243. 
 
 Conegliano: aspect, 226; Casa Borgo 
 della Madonna, 231; castle, 225, 
 
INDEX 
 
 593 
 
 226. 232, tower of, 232, 233, view 
 from, 233; Cima, Gian Battista, 
 life and work, 226, 227, pala of, 
 230, 231; Dario, 232; Duomo, 
 
 227, 228, 230; history, 226; opera- 
 house, 229; Palazzo Mimicipale, 
 229; Piazza Venti Settembre, 229; 
 situation, 226. 
 
 Constantine, 272, 326. 
 
 Cormor river, 277. 
 
 Comaro, Queen Caterina, 164, 427. 
 
 Costanzi, the, 161, 165, 166, 172, 
 
 174, 175. 
 Crivelli, Carlo, 410. 
 Customs of citizens, 375, 480-482. 
 Custozza, 343, 416. 
 
 Dandolo, Enrico, 4. 
 
 Daniele, S., town of, 306. 
 
 Dante, 21, 22, 46, 60, 179, 201, 336, 
 
 337, 358, 372, 411, 414. 
 Da Ponte, Francesco, 140, 150, 
 
 151, 212. 
 Da Ponte, Francesco, Jr., 140, 159. 
 Da Ponte, Girolamo, 140, 144. 
 Da Ponte, Jacopo, 36, 96, 130, 131, 
 
 140, 145, 151, 153. 
 Da Ponte, Leandro, 126, 140, 148, 
 
 151, 159, 213, 268. 
 Dario, 180, 232, 269. 
 D'Avanzo, Jacopo, 22, 33, 69, 70, 
 
 78, 344, 367. 
 D'Azelio, Massimo, 106. 
 Delia Scala (see Scala). 
 Desenzano, 433. 
 
 Desiderius, 330, 420. 454, 459, 463. 
 Domenichino. 129, 666. 
 Donatello, 24, 55, 64, 66, 68, 74, 76, 
 
 76. 
 Dorando, General, 106. 
 Dossi, Dogso, 656. 
 Dlirer, Albrecht, 556. 
 
 Elena, S., Castle, 569, 660, 563, 564. 
 
 Este: albergo, 619; Archangel Ga- 
 briel, church of. 527; Bacchiglione 
 River, 527; castle, 520; Cathedral 
 
 of S. Tecla, 523, 624; Cima da 
 Conegliano, 628; clock and bell 
 tower, 526, 627; Estensi, history 
 of the, 498-500; Frussine River, 
 527; history, 498-501; S. Maria 
 delle Consolazioni, church of, 627, 
 528; S. Martino, church of, 526; 
 moat, 627; mosaics, Roman, 626; 
 Museum, 625; Palazzo Munici- 
 pal, 520; Piazza Maggiore, 518, 
 519; Pelasgian relics, 526; Porta 
 Vecchia, 527; S. Rocco, church of, 
 527; Roman relics, 525; situa- 
 tion, 518; Tiepolo, G. B., 524; Via 
 Monache. 627; Via Principe Um- 
 berto. 518; Via Vittorio Emanu- 
 ele, 626; Villa Benvenuti, 523. 
 
 Estensi, arms of, 620. 
 
 Estensi, castle of (see Este). 
 
 Estensi, the, 498-600, 618, 619, 629, 
 530, 633, 541, 642, 665. 
 
 Euganean Hills, 25, 100, 497, 504, 
 518, 628, 629, 530, 669, 569. 
 
 Eusebio di S. Giorgio. 410. 
 
 Ezzelino da Romano, 17-19, 62, 59, 
 63, 88, 89, 101, 102, 139, 141, 178, 
 226, 333, 387, 420, 421, 499, 529, 
 530. 
 
 Falconetto, 32, 69, 92, 96, 346, 369, 
 
 372, 402. 
 Farinato, P., 346, 371, 399, 401, 
 
 402. 
 Farming systems of plain, 573-576. 
 
 See Agriculture; Peasant-life. 
 Fasolo, 121. 
 
 Ferramola, 429, 430, 453. 
 Ferrara, Bono da, 60, 52. 
 Ferrari, Gaudenzio, 137, 489. 
 Fiore, Jacobello del, 251, 253. 
 Floods of Venetia, 224, 259, 280, 
 
 348, 349. 
 Fogazzaro, A., 107. 
 Fogolino, 125, 267. 
 Foppa, the younger, 453. 
 Foppa, Vincenzo, 429, 477, 484, 489. 
 Forli, Ansuino da, 60, 52. 
 
594 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Forum Julii, 271, 273, 274. See 
 
 Cividale. 
 Fra Giocondo of Verona, 193, 360. 
 Fra Giovanni da Verona, 406. 
 Fra Giovanni of Viceuza, 101, 102, 
 
 333. 
 Fra Girolamo da Brescia, 89. 
 Francia, 83, 410, 477, 478, 490. 
 Frederick I, Barbarossa, 101, 332, 
 
 420. 
 Frederick II, Emperor, 17, 88, 89, 
 
 101, 332, 333, 420. 
 Freedom of person, speech, and 
 
 press, 482. 
 Friuli, art of, 276, 277; description 
 
 of, 258-260; history of, 260, 261, 
 
 271-276. 
 Frizimelaga, Francesco, 251. 
 Fromentone, Tommaso, 107, 437. 
 Frussine river, 527. 
 Fusina, 6, 7. 
 
 GaUleo, 30, 54. 
 
 Galla Placidia, Hfe and cross of, 457- 
 
 462. 
 Gambara, Lattanzio, 431. 
 Garda, Lake, 431-433. 
 Garofalo, 83, 404, 551. 
 Gaston de Foix, 426. 
 Gattamelata, 24, 425; statue of, 55, 
 
 56, 64, 65. 
 Gemona, 306. 
 
 GiacomelU, Villa, see Maser. 
 Gianpetrino, 556. 
 
 Giocondo, Fra, da Verona, 193, 360. 
 Giolfino, Niccolo, 346, 368, 370, 382, 
 
 390, 391, 405, 409. 
 Giolfino, Paolo, 346. 
 Giordano, Luca, 90. 
 Giorgione, 82, 165-167, 172, 173- 
 
 175, 186,187, 555. 
 Giotto, 21, 22, 37-46, 56, 336, 358. 
 Giovanni, Fra, da Verona, 406. 
 Giovanni, Fra, da Vieenza, 101, 102, 
 
 333. 
 Giovanni da Udine, 291, 298, 299, 
 
 300, 306. 
 
 Girolamo da Santa Croce, 94, 95. 
 Girolamo da Treviso, 180, 191. 
 Girolamo da Udine, 277, 284, 295, 
 
 296. 
 Girolamo dai Libri, see Libri. 
 Girolamo del Toso, 130. 
 Gisulf, 273, 307. 
 Giuseppini, F., 296. 
 Goldsmith, Oliver, 21. 
 Gonzaga, Vespasiano, 128. 
 Grado, 274, 275, 307. 
 Grassi, 291. 
 
 Guariento, 33, 35, 47, 152. 
 Guercino, 405, 406, 491. 
 
 Haynau, General, 428, 429. 
 Holbein, Jan, 556. 
 Honoria, 458, 461, 462. 
 Honorius, 459, 460, 461. 
 
 niasi, 347, 415. 
 
 Jones, Inigo, 108. 
 
 Justinian, Emperor, 273, 329. 
 
 Landlords of Venetia, 574, 575. 
 Legnago, 501, 504. 
 Leopardi, Alessandro, 89. 
 Leyden, Luca von, 556, 558. 
 Liberale, 345, 346, 356, 368, 370, 
 
 373, 404, 409. 
 Libri, Girolamo dai, 345, 355, 366, 
 
 367, 376, 377, 400, 402, 404, 407, 
 
 409. 
 Livenza river, 259. 
 Livy, 16, 56, 57, 559. 
 Lombard League, 101, 102, 332, 420. 
 Lombard!, the, 189, 190, 191, 209. 
 Lombardo, Antonio, 72. 
 Lombardo, Pietro, 189, 191, 209. 
 Lombardo, TuUio, 72, 209. 
 Lombardy, Plain of, see Plain. 
 Lotto, Lorenzo, 180, 213, 490. 
 Luini, Bernardino, 465. 
 
 Mabuse, Jan, 556. 
 Macer, iSlmilius, 344. 
 
INDEX 
 
 595 
 
 Maffei, Scipione, 344. 
 
 Maggi, Bishop Berardo, tomb of, 
 446. 
 
 Malamocco, 1. 
 
 Mansueti, 410. 
 
 Mantegna, Andrea, 23, SO, 51, 62, 
 66, 106, 367, 371, 388, 410, 490, 
 556. 
 
 Manufacturing, modem, 488. 
 
 Marco Falmesano da Forli, 490. 
 
 Marconi, Rocco, 180. 
 
 Marostica, town of, 137, 153, 154. 
 
 Martinengo, Count, 427, 428, 469. 
 
 Martini, Giovanni, 276, 284, 291. 
 
 Martini of Verona, 344, 367. 
 
 S. Martino, 416. 
 
 Maser, village of, 214; frescoes by P. 
 Veronese, 214, 219; trip to, from 
 Treviso, 214; Villa Giacomelli, 
 214, 216-223, erected by Palladio, 
 214, 216, stucco work by A. Vit- 
 toria, 214, 216. 
 
 Meri, Pietro, 311. 
 
 Michiel, Domenico, 3, 4. 
 
 Minelli, Giovanni, 69, 145. 
 
 Mocetto, 130, 407. 
 
 Monselice: Balbi-Valier, villa and 
 family, 537, 538; Battaglia canal, 
 631; castle, history and aspect, 
 628, 529, 530; castle hill, 531, 534, 
 537, 538; cemetery, 536; city clock- 
 tower, 532, 533; Duodo, Conti, 
 537, 538; Duomo, 535; Estensi, 
 the, 629, 530, 533; Frussine, 627, 
 528; Garibaldi Memorial, 632; 
 Geraldi, Contessa and Palazzo, 
 533, 534; S. Giustina, 635; Grotta 
 di S. Francesco, 637; history, 529, 
 630; main street, 631; martyrs, 
 bodies of, 638; Monte de PietA, 
 632; palaces, noble, 633; Palazzo 
 dei Conti Nani, 635; Palazzo 
 Marcello, 633; Palazzo Munici- 
 pale, 632; Piazza Vittorio Eman- 
 uele, 632, 533; situation, 628, 529; 
 Villa Valier, 637, 638; walls, 
 631. 
 
 Montagna, Bart. , 96, 106, 107, 116, 
 126, 130, 135, 402. 
 
 Montagnana: albergo, 505; aspect 
 of the country, 497, 498, 502, 503; 
 Buonconsiglio, 510, 611, 612, 513, 
 514; castello, 514; Cavallerizza, 
 515; district of the Polesine, 497; 
 Duomo, 606, 509-612; S. Fran- 
 cesco, church of, 616; history of 
 the Polesine, 497-501; main street, 
 514; Municipio, 513; Piazza 
 Grande, 506-508, 513,516; Porta 
 Legnago, 517; Porta S. Zeno, 614; 
 Sammicheli, 613, 514; tomb of 
 Admiral Pisani, 512; Villa Pisani, 
 616; Vittorio Emanuele II, monu- 
 ment to, 606; walls of, 500, 501. 
 
 Montagues, the, see Montecchi. 
 
 Monte Berici, 100, 105, 106, 120, 
 133, 134, 135, 136, 346. 
 
 Monte Cisone, 258. 
 
 Montebello, 347. 
 
 Montecchi, the, 332, 346; castles of, 
 137, 346. 
 
 Montecchio, village of, 137, 346. 
 
 Montorio, 411. 
 
 Moretto, 377, 381, 402, 410, 430, 447, 
 448, 466, 467, 468, 469, 477, 478, 
 484, 485, 486, 489, 490. 
 
 Morone, Andrea, 89. 
 
 Morone, Domenico, 411. 
 
 Morone, Francesco, 346, 390, 405, 
 409, 410. 
 
 Moroni, G. B., 431, 490. 
 
 Music, regimental, 183. 
 
 Napoleon the Great, 14, 15, 105, 139, 
 179, 278, 298, 343, 347, 354, 493. 
 
 Narses, 329, 529. 
 
 Naviglio Adigetto, 540, 543, 547, 
 648. 
 
 Newspapers of Venetia, 481. 
 
 Nugent, General, 106. 
 
 Odroi duties, 280. 
 Odoacer, 273, 326, 327, 328. 
 Olivi, Giuseppe, 192. 
 
596 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Orderliness of Venetia, 482. 
 Orseolo, Pietro, 3. 
 
 Padovanino, Alessandro Varotari, 
 36, 93, 95, 268. 
 
 Padovano, Giusto, 22, 23, 37-59. 
 
 Padua: Accoramboni, Vittoria, 48, 
 49; Altichieri, 22, 69-72, 78, 79; An- 
 tenor, 16, 28, 60, 85; Antonello da 
 Messina, 83; S. Antonio, 62-64, 
 87, 88; S. Antonio, church of, 19, 
 22, 24, 47, 64-77; Area Vallaresso, 
 35; Archbishop's Palace, 34, 35; 
 Arena, 26, 37; Ariosto, 18; art of, 
 22-24; Attila, 16; Bacchiglione 
 river, 25, 26, 60, 80; Baptistery, 
 19, 35, 36, 57-59; Barriera Maz- 
 zini, 26, 29; Bassano, Jacopo, 96; 
 Bellano, 47, 75, 95, 96; Bellini, 
 Gentile, 83; Bellini, Giovanni, 83; 
 Bellini, Jacopo, 23; Boccaccino, 
 Boccaccio, 83; Boselli, Antonio, 67; 
 Brenta Canal, 25; Caffe Pedroc- 
 chi, 37, 82; Campagna, G., 72; 
 Campagnola, Dom., 33, 36, 80, 
 91, 92, 95, 96; Cappella S. Giorgio. 
 78; Carmine, church of, 29, 93; 
 Carmine, Scuola del, 93-95; Car- 
 rara, della, Francesco, 19, 20; 
 Carrara, della, Francesco Novello, 
 19, 20, 30; Carrara, della, Jacopo 
 I, 19; Carrara, della, Jacopo II 
 (Minore), 21, 33, 47; Carrara, 
 della, Ubertino, 33, 47; Carrara, 
 delle (Jacopo Minore and Uber- 
 tino), tombs of, 47; castle of Ezze- 
 lino, 18, 59; Chaucer, 30; collec- 
 tions, various, of city, see Museo 
 Civico; Dante, 16, 17, 18, 21, 22, 
 60; D'Avanzo, Jacopo, 22, 33, 69, 
 70, 78, 79; Delesmanini Palace, 38; 
 Donatello, 24, 55, 56, 64, 66, 74, 
 75, 76; Dondi, Giacomo, clock, 32; 
 Duomo, 35, 67-59; Eremetani, 
 church of the, 19, 24, 46, 49-52; 
 Ezzelino, 17, 18, 19, 52, 59, 63, 88, 
 89; Ezzelino's prisons, 18, 29; 
 
 Falconetto, 32, 69, 92, 96; Fer- 
 rara. Bona da, SO, 52; Forli, An- 
 suino da, 50, 52; Fra Giovanni, 
 47, 56; Fra Girolamo of Brescia, 
 89; S. Ffancesca, 96; Fraucia, 
 83; Frederick II, 17, 88, 89; Gali- 
 leo, 30, 54; gallery of art, see 
 Museo Civico; Garofalo, 83; Gatta 
 di S. Andrea, 52; Gattamelata, 
 statue, 24, 55, 64; Giordano, Luca, 
 90; Giorgione, 82; Giotto, 21, 22, 
 38-46, 56; Girolamo del Santo, 
 96; S. Giustina, 88, 90, 91; S. 
 Giustina, church of, 88, 89; Gua- 
 riento, 33, 47; history, 16-24, 499, 
 500, 529, 530; hotel, 27, 28; 
 League of Cambrai, 20; Leopardi, 
 A., 89; Livy, 16, 56; Loggia del 
 Consiglio, 34; Loggia Municipale, 
 87; Lombardo, Antonio, 72; Lom- 
 bardo, Tullio, 72; Madonna dell' 
 Arena, church of, 22, 37-46; main 
 streets, 28, 29; Mantegna, 23, 24, 
 50, 51, 66; S. Maria in Vanzo, 
 church of, 96; S. Massimo, church 
 of, 96; S. Michele, church of, 96; 
 Minello, G., 69; Miretto, Zuan, 56; 
 moats, 25, 26, 27, 28, 59, 60; Mon- 
 tagna, B., 96; Monte di Pieta, 34; 
 Morone, A., 89; Museo Civico, 
 82-85; Orto Botanico, 80, 81; 
 Padovano, Giusto, 22, 57; Pado- 
 vanino, 36, 93, 95; Palazzo Cav- 
 alli, 48; Palazzo del Capitanio, 31, 
 32, 34; Palazzo Giustinian, 92; 
 Palladio, 32; Palma Giovane, 90, 
 96; Palma Vecchio, 82, 95; Parodi, 
 73, 91; Pironi, G., 72; Petrarch, 
 
 21, SO, 33, 35, 47; Piazza dei 
 Frutti, 36, 57; Piazza del Duomo, 
 83, 34; Piazza delle Erbe, 86, 55; 
 Piazza UnitA, d'ltalia (deiSignori), 
 9; S. Pietro, church of, 95; Pisano, 
 Giovanni, 22, 46; Pisano, Niccolo, 
 
 22, 65; Pizzolo, Niccolo, 50, 52; 
 plain of, 25, 26; Ponte Molino, 
 26, 30; Pordenone, 84; Porta 
 
INDEX 
 
 597 
 
 Altinate, 27; Porta Portello, 96; 
 Porta S. Giovanni, 96; Porta 
 Savonarola, 96; Prato della Valle, 
 85, 87; Previtali, 85; S. Prosdo- 
 cimo, 88, 89, 90;Reggia Carrarese, 
 31, 33; Riccio, A., 69, 75, 77, 89, 
 96; Ridolfi, Bart., 92, 93; Rocca- 
 bonella, Pietro, tomb of, 96; Ro- 
 man Forum, 32, 37, 82; Roman- 
 ino, 84; Salone, 17, 22, 36, 47, 55; 
 Sammicheli, 68; Sansovino, J., 37, 
 53, 69, 72; Santi, Andriolo de', 47, 
 69; Scala, della, the, 19; Sehia- 
 vone, 36; Scrovegno, Enrico, 38, 
 39, 46; Scuola del Santo, 79; 
 Scuola S. Rocco, 95; Squarcione, 
 23, 24, 50, 51, 77; Tasso, Tor- 
 quato, 21; Tiepolo, 85, 96; Tin- 
 toretto, 84; Titian, 80, 83, 84, 94, 
 95; University, 17, 20, 21, 37, 52- 
 55, 86, 87; University, library of, 
 33; Venetian Lion, 31, 32; Vene- 
 tian rule, 20; Veronese, Paolo, 85, 
 91, 96; Via Dante, 26. 29, 30, 31; 
 Via Garibaldi, 28, 29, 37; Visconti, 
 Gian Galeazzo, 19, 20; Vittorio 
 Emanuele II, statue of, 34; walls 
 of, 26, 27, 29, 30; ZUie (by Zilio, 
 and his fate), 59, 60. 
 
 Palladio, Andrea, 10, 12, 32, 107, 
 108, 110, 114, 115, 117, 118, 120, 
 121, 125, 127, 128, 130, 131, 132, 
 133, 134, 136, 216, 293, 437. 
 
 Palma Giovane, 90, 95, 173, 198, 
 202, 211, 212, 253, 300, 304, 311, 
 312, 313. 
 
 Palma Vecchio, 82, 95, 107, 124, 198, 
 213, 311, 410, 447, 448, 554, 
 555. 
 
 Pampaloni, 489. 
 
 Panetti, Domenico, 550. 
 
 Parodi, 73, 91. 
 
 Paterani, sect of, 393. 
 
 Patriarchs of Aquileia, see Aquileia. 
 
 Peasant life, 98, 99, 216, 269, 502, 
 603, 573-575. 
 
 Felasgian relics, 525. 
 
 Pellegrino da S. Daniele, 276, 284, 
 
 303, 306, 307, 308, 319. 
 Pensabene, 210. 
 Pepin, 330, 331. 
 Perugino, 410. 
 Peschiera, 431, 432. ■• 
 Petrarch, 21, 30, 33, 35, 47, 372, 570, 
 
 571, 572, 577, 579-585. 
 Piave, the, 138, 177, 214, 215, 224. 
 Piazza, Calista, 468. 
 Piazza-life, 182-184. 
 Pindemonte, 344. 
 Fiombo, Sebastiano del, 208, 555. 
 Pironi, G., 72, 116, 118. 
 Pisanello, 344, 345, 367, 409. 
 Pisani, the, 6, 11, 14, 516. 
 Pisano, Giovanni, 22, 46. 
 Fisano, Niccolo, 22, 65. 
 Pizzolo, N.. 60, 52. 
 Plagues, 343, 349. 
 Plain, description of, 15, 97-100, 
 
 215, 216, 259, 260, 501-503, 572, 
 
 576. 
 Pliny, 344. 
 
 Polesine, canals of, 601. 
 Polesine, history of, 497-501. 
 Police of Venetia, 282, 436. 
 Fompei, Conti and Castle of, 414. 
 Popular rule, 158, 482. 
 Pordenone: Bassano, L., 268; Dario, 
 
 269; Duomo, 267; Fogolino, 267; 
 
 history, 260, 261; II Pordenone, 
 
 life of, 261, 262, paintings of, 265- 
 
 270; Palazzo Municipale, 263; 
 
 picture gallery, 268; town of, 260; 
 
 Varotari, A. (Fadovanino), 268. 
 Pordenone, II, 84, 160, 176, 187, 191, 
 
 207, 240, 243, 261-263, 265-270, 
 
 277, 280, 284, 285, 290, 291, 296, 
 
 301, 302, 306, 555. 
 Possagno, town of, 150. 
 Prato, Francesco da, 486. 
 Previtali, 86, 256. 
 
 Quadrilateral, 343, 432, 501. 
 Quiricius de Joanes d' Alemagna, 
 564. 
 
598 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Radetsky, Marshal, 105, 135, 136. 
 
 Raphael, 490. 
 
 Recoaro, 137. 
 
 Retrone river, 109. 
 
 Riccio, Andrea, 69, 75, 89, 96, 899. 
 
 Ridolfi, Bart., 92. 
 
 Risorgimento, 105, 119, 134, 136, 
 192, 393, 427-429. 
 
 Ristori, Adelaide, 321, 393. 
 
 Rivers and dikes of Veneto, 224, 225, 
 259, 280. 
 
 Roads of Venetia, 234, 235. 
 
 Eoggia Canal, 277, 278, 279, 300, 
 303. 
 
 Romanino, Girolamo, 84, 377, 430, 
 447, 448, 463, 467, 478, 479, 486, 
 490. 
 
 Romeo and Juliet, 332, 337, 346; 
 tomb of, 396. 
 
 Romilda, 274. 
 
 Rosamund, 329, 330. 
 
 Rovigo: Accademia dei Concordi, 
 546; Badile, A., 555, 556; Basaiti, 
 SS5; Belli, M., 655; Bellini, Gen- 
 tile, 554; Bellini, Giovanni, 554; 
 Bonif azio, 555 ; Cariani, Giovanni, 
 551; Carpaccio, 554; Carpi, Giro- 
 lamo, 551; Casa Barufi, 553, 557; 
 Cathedral, 647, 548; Cima da 
 Conegliano, 549, 550, 564; citadel, 
 548; Domenichino, 556; Dossi, 
 Dosso, 556; S. Francesco, church 
 of ,'549 ; Garof alo, 651; Gianpetrino, 
 556; Giorgione, 555; history, 540- 
 642; Holbein, Jan, 556; hotel, 542; 
 La Rotonda, 562; Luca von Ley- 
 den, 656; Mabuse, Jan, 566; Man- 
 tegna, 566; Naviglio Adigetto, 
 540, 543, 647, 648; Palazzo Com- 
 unale, 545; Palazzo Roncalli, 544; 
 Palma Vecchio, 554; Panetti, 
 Domenico, 650; Piazza del Cas- 
 tello, 548; Piazza Garibaldi, 647, 
 549; Piazza Venti Settembre, 662; 
 Piazza Vittorio Emanuele, 545;* 
 picture gallery, 653-556; Porde- 
 none, 656; Porta S. Bartolommeo, 
 
 547; Quiricius d'Alemagna, 564; 
 Sammicheli, 644; von Schwaz, 
 Hans, 556; Sebastianoidel Piombo, 
 555; situation, 540; Tiepolo, 555; 
 Tintoretto, 555; Titian, 565; Uni- 
 versity Popolare, 546; Valentina, 
 Jacopo, 556; Venetian Lion, 645; 
 Vivarini, Bart., 564; Vivarini, 
 Luigi, 554; Zuccari, Federigo, 556. 
 
 Salvatore, S., castle: Colalti, the, 
 236, 241, 242; description of, 236- 
 243; history of, 236; legend of, 
 238, 239; paintings of Pordenone, 
 240. 
 
 Sammicheli, Michele, 68, 342, 368, 
 369, 381, 382, 384, 389, 390, 394, 
 513, 514, 544; tomb of, 404. 
 
 Sansovino, Jacopo, 37, 53, 67, 72, 
 192, 437, 489. 
 
 Santi, Andreolo de', 47, 69. 
 
 Savoldo, G., 210, 211, 406, 491. 
 
 Scala, Can Grande della, 103, 139, 
 178, 261, 335-337, 411, 412, 413, 
 414, 421, 630, 541. 
 
 Scala, the della, 19, 103, 139, 179, 
 226, 261, 333-341, 347, 411, 412. 
 416, 421, 500, 530, 541. See also 
 Verona. 
 
 Scamozzi, Vincenzo, 107, 111, 114, 
 129. 
 
 Schiavone, 36. 
 
 Schio, town of, 137. 
 
 Serravalle (see Ceneda): albergo, 
 246, 249; Amalteo, 248; art of, 
 248; aspect, 246; Basaiti, 248, 261 
 Bosco del Consiglio, 268 ; Brandolin 
 Castle, 268; Carpaccio, 248 
 castle, 247; Duomo, 247, 248, 249 
 252; excursions from, 258; Fiore, 
 Jacobello del, 251; Frizimelaga, 
 Francesco, 261; S. Giovanni Bat- 
 tista, church of, 250; history, 248 
 S. Lorenzo, church of, 251; main 
 streets, 246, 249; Milano, Fran- 
 cesco da, 248, 251; Palazzo Muni- 
 cipale, 247; situation 245; Titian, 
 
INDEX 
 
 599 
 
 248, 249; Valentina. J. da, 248, 
 251 ; Venetian Lion, 248; walk out- 
 side the gates, 249, 250. 
 
 Sforza, Francesco, 424. 
 
 Sforzas, the, 424-426. 
 
 Shakespeare, 332, 337. 
 
 Shops of Venetia, 375. 481. 
 
 Sidney, Sir Philip, 21. 
 
 Sirmione, 415, 432. 
 
 Soave, 347, 411-414. 
 
 Socialism, spread of, 158, 481, 482. 
 
 Solferino, 416. 
 
 Speranza, Giovanni, 106. 
 
 Speri, Tito, 428, 429, 442, 492, 494. 
 
 Squarcione, 23, 24, 50, 51. 
 
 Steno, Michele, 4. 
 
 Stra, Palace of, 6, 11, 12-15. 
 
 Susegana, church of, 243; village of, 
 235; Pordenone, 243. 
 
 Tagliamento river, 280. 
 Tasso, Torquato, 21. 
 Theodolinda, 330, 349. 
 Theodoric the Great, 224, 273, 324, 
 
 327, 328, 348. 378, 379, 380, 559. 
 Theodosius, 459, 461. 
 Thiene, town of, 137. 
 Thorvaldsen, 489. 
 Tiepoli, the, 99. 
 Tiepolo, G. B., 14, 85, 96, 136, 285, 
 
 298, 299, 304, 313, 555. 
 Tintoretto, 84, 125, 213, 305. 470, 
 
 555. 
 Titian, 80, 83, 84, 95, 190, 214, 248, 
 
 249, 253-255, 370, 471, 484, 555. 
 Tolmezzo, Domenico da, 276, 284. 
 Tommaso da Modena, 180. 205. 206. 
 
 207. 208. 209. 212. 
 Torbido. 345, 346. 370, 410. 
 Torcello. 3. 
 Torre river. 277, 308. 
 Tramway systems, 483. 
 Tregnano, 347, 415. 
 Trento. 154. 
 Treviso: S. Agnese, church of, 203; 
 
 Alberic, 178; Amalteo, 191; S. 
 
 Andrea, church of, 200; Antonio 
 
 da Treviso, 208; art of, 179, 180; 
 bands, Italian (music), 183; Bas- 
 sano, F., 212; Bassano, L., 213; 
 Bellini, Giovanni, 198, 200, 209, 
 213; Bevilacqua, 200; Biblioteca, 
 203; Bissolo, 192; Bordone, Paris. 
 180. 190, 191, 192, 213; Botteniga 
 river, 179, 180, 182, 194, 198, 201; 
 Botteniga and Sile, confluence of, 
 201; Bregni, the, 191; caf^ and 
 cafe life, 183; cafes, 182, 184; Cam- 
 pagna, G., 212; Casa Alessandrini, 
 187; Casa Lezze Casellati, 197; 
 S. Cristina, 213; Dante, monu- 
 ment to, 201; Dario, 180; Duomo, 
 
 188, 189, 202; Ezzelino, 178; Fra 
 Giocondo of Verona, 193; Gior- 
 gione, 186; Girolamo da Treviso, 
 180, 191; S. Gregorio, church of, 
 202; history, 178, 179; hospital. 
 198; hotel, 181; Lombard!, the, 
 190, 191, 209; Lombardo, Pietro, 
 
 189, 191; Lotto, Lorenzo, 180, 
 213; S. Lucia, church of, 186; 
 Marconi, Rocco, 180; S. Maria 
 Maddalena, church of, 195; S. 
 Maria Maggiore, church of, 197; 
 moat, 180, 181, 194; Monte di 
 Pieta, 186; Municipio, 193; Museo 
 Comunale, 203-206; S. Niccolo, 
 church of. 206-212; Olivi, Giu- 
 seppe, house of, 192; Onigo, Count 
 Antonio, palazzo, 200, tomb of, 
 209; Palma Giovane, 198, 202, 
 211, 212; Palma Vecchio, 198, 
 213; Pennachi, Pietro, 180; Pensa- 
 bene, Fra Marco, 210; Piazza dei 
 Signori, 181, 182-184, 187, 212; 
 piazza life, 182-184; Piazza Pola, 
 202; picture gallery, 213; plan of, 
 180; Pordenone, 187, 191, 197, 
 207; Porta Cavour, 203; Porta 
 Mazzini, 196; Porta S. Tomtk, 196; 
 Pozzasaretto, 187; Prefettura, 182, 
 184, 186, 187; rampart-walk, with 
 view, 193, 194, 195, 196; Sanso- 
 vino, 192; Savoldo, 210; Sebas- 
 
600 
 
 INDEX 
 
 tiano del Piombo, 208; Sile river, 
 179, 181, 182, 201; situation, 178; 
 suburb, 194; Tintoretto, 213; 
 Titian, 191, 197; Tommaso da 
 Modena, 180, 206, 207, 212; tribu- 
 nale, 189; Vecellio, Marco, 186, 
 212; Veronese, Paolo, 195, 213; 
 Vescovado, 189; Via Cornarotta, 
 193; Via Regina, 200; Via Venti 
 Settembre, 181, 182; Via Vittorio 
 Emanuele, 181, 182; S. Vito, 
 church of, 186; walls, 180, 193. 
 
 Udine: Amalteo, 277, 284, 291, 292, 
 303; archbishop, and palace, 298, 
 301; art of, 276; Attila, 272; 
 Banca d'ltalia, 305; Beata Vir- 
 gine delle Grazie, church of, 297; 
 Bellunello, Andrea, 276, 284; 
 Carnio, A., 277; Casa di Respar- 
 mio, 304; castle, 272, 278, 286, 
 287, 293, 294; castle archway, 293; 
 Cormor river, 277; Duomo, 282; 
 gallery of paintings, 295, 296; S. 
 Giacomo, church of, 292; Giar- 
 dino Pubblico, 298, 300; Giovanni 
 da Udine, 277, 291, 298, 299, 306; 
 Girolamo da Udine, 277, 284, 295; 
 Giuseppini, F., 296; Grassi, 291; 
 history of, 271-275, 278; hotel, 
 280; library, city, 295, 304, 305; 
 Martini, Giovanni, 276, 284, 291; 
 Mercato Nuovo, 292; Mercato 
 Vecchio, 279, 292; moat, 298, 300, 
 303; museum of sculpture, 294; 
 Palladio, 293; Palazzo Bartolini, 
 304; Palazzo Caiselli, 305; Pal- 
 azzo Municipale, 288-292; Pal- 
 azzo Tinghi, 301 ; Palma Giovane, 
 300, 304; Patriarchs, 274, 275, 
 278, 298, 299; Pellegrino, 276, 284, 
 303, 308; Piazza d'Armi, 279, 297; 
 Piazza Garibaldi, 302; Piazza 
 Venti Settembre, 280, 281; Piazza 
 Vittorio Emanuele, 279, 286; S. 
 Pietro, church of, 308; S. Pietro 
 Martire, church of, 304; plan, 278, 
 
 279; Pordenone, 277, 284, 285, 
 290, 296, 299, 301, 302; Porta 
 Aquileia, 279, 308; Prefettura, 
 301; Roggia Canal, 277, 278, 298, 
 300, 303; S. Spirito, church of. 
 303; Tiepoli, the, 285; Tiepolo, 
 G. B., 285, 298, 299, 304, 305; 
 Tintoretto, 305; Tolmezzo, Do- 
 menico da, 276, 284; Torre river, 
 277; Venetian Lion, 287, 288; 
 Vescovado, 298, 301; Via Gorgni, 
 300, 303; Via Posta, 286; Vittorio 
 Emanuele, statue of, 288; walls, 
 earliest, 298, 300; walls. Renais- 
 sance, 279. 
 
 Val d'Asti, 137. 
 
 Val Sugana, 139, 146, 154. 
 
 Valdagno, 137. 
 
 Valeggio, 416. 
 
 Valentina, Jacopo da, 248, 251, 253, 
 556. 
 
 Valentinian III, 458, 461, 462. 
 
 Van Dyke, 129. 
 
 Varotari, Alessandro, see Padovan- 
 ino. 
 
 Vecellio, Marco, 212. 
 
 Veneziano, Lorenzo, 24, 116. 
 
 Venice, history, 3-5, 20, 104, 105, 
 139, 226, 274, 275, 278, 341, 342, 
 424-427, 500, 541, 542. 
 
 Venzone, 306. 
 
 Verona: Adige, the, 323, 325, 347, 
 348, 349, 384; Alaric, 326; Alboin, 
 324, 329, 330; Aleardi, 344; Altich- 
 ieri, 344, 358, 367, 391; Amphi- 
 theatre, see Arena; S. Anastasia, 
 church of, 365, 366; Antharis, 330, 
 349; SS. Apostoli, church of, 382; 
 Arco de' Gavi, 368; Arco Leoni, 
 396; Arena, 328, 340, 343, 392, 
 393; art of, 344; Attila, 326; Ba- 
 dile, Antonio, 346, 391, 402; Bap- 
 tistery, 371; Bellini, Gian, 410; 
 Benaglio, Francesco, 345, 367, 
 390, 402; Benaglio, Girolamo, 345; 
 Berengarius, 331; S. Bernardino, 
 
INDEX 
 
 601 
 
 church of, 389, 390; Bertolini, 407; 
 Biblioteca Capitolare, 372; Boni- 
 fazio, 410; Bonino, 363; Bonsig- 
 nori, 345, 346. 390, 401, 402; 
 Brusasorci, 345, 346, 371, 372, 
 374, 378, 381, 383, 391, 399, 402, 
 405; Campagna, G., 361; Capel- 
 letti (Capulets), the, 332, 337, 
 397; Caroto, 345, 374, 377, 378, 
 381, 390, 399, 401, 404, 409; Car- 
 rara, Francesco della, 341; Casa 
 dei Mercanti, 353; Casa dei Moz- 
 zanti, 353; castel S. Pietro, 324, 
 327, 348, 379; castel Vecchio, 
 338, 380, 384; castle of lUasi, 414; 
 castle of Moutorio, 411; castle of 
 Sirmione, 415; castle of Soave, 
 347, 411-414; Castle Tregnano, 
 415; castle of Valeggio, 416; castle 
 of Villafranca, 415, 416; Catullus, 
 344; Cavazzola, 345, 366, 390, 
 402, 405, 406, 409; cemetery, 400; 
 Charlemagne, 330, 331; S. Chiara, 
 church of, 408; Cima da Cone- 
 gliano, 410; Congress of Sover- 
 eigns, 393; Crivelli, Carlo, 410; 
 Dante, 336, 347, 372, 411, 414, 
 statue of, 358; D' Avanzo, 344, 367; 
 Duomo, 368-371; S. Elena, church 
 of, 371; Ezzelino, 333, 387; S. Eu- 
 temia, church of, 371, 372, 380, 
 381; Eusebio di S. Giorgio, 410 
 Falconetto, 346, 369, 372, 402 
 Farinato, 346, 371, 399, 401, 402 
 S. Fermo, church of, 349, 396-399 
 floods of the Adige, 348, 349; Fra 
 Giocondo, 360; Fra Giovanni da 
 Verona, 406; Fra Giovanni da Vi- 
 cenza, 333; Francia, 410; Freder- 
 ick II, 332, 333; Frederick Bar- 
 barossa, 332; gallery of art, 399, 
 408-410; Gallienus, 325, 382; gar- 
 dens, public, 339; Garibaldi, statue 
 of, 365; Garofalo, 404; Giardini 
 Giusti, 403; Giolfino, Nic- 
 colo, 346, 368, 370, 382, 390, 
 391, 405, 409, house of, 382; 
 
 Giolfino, Paolo, 346; S. Giorgio in 
 Braida, church of, 376; Giotto, 
 336, 358; S. Giovanni in Foro, 
 church of, 381; S. Giovanni in 
 Valle, church of, 407; Gran 
 Guardia Vecchia, 394; Guercino, 
 405; history, 322-344; hotel, 349; 
 Justinian, 329; Lanzani, 410; Lib- 
 erale, 345, 353, 356, 368, 370, 373, 
 399, 404, 409; Libri, Girolamo 
 dai, 345, 353, 355, 366, 376, 400, 
 402, 404, 407, 409; S. Lorenzo, 
 church of, 383; Macer, ^milius, 
 344; Maffei, Scipione, 344, 395, 
 statue of, 359; Mansueti, 410; 
 Mantegna, 367, 371, 388, 410; 
 S. Maria Antica, church of, 361; 
 S. Maria della Scala, church of, 
 391; S. Maria in Organo, church 
 of, 404^07; S. Maria Matricu- 
 lata, 371, 372; Martmi of Verona, 
 344, 367, 399; Michele da Verona, 
 368; moat, the Visconti, 396; 
 Montagna, Bart., 402; Montagues, 
 the,»eeMontecchi;Montecchi,the, 
 332, 337, 346; Moretto, 377, 381, 
 402, 410; Morone, Francesco, 345, 
 390, 391, 405, 406, 409, 410; Museo 
 Civico, 408-410; Museo Lapi- 
 dario, 395; Napoleon the Great, 
 343, 393; Narses, 329; SS. Naz- 
 zaro e Celso, 401, 402; Odoacer, 
 326, 327; Palazzo Bevilacqua, 
 382; Palazzo Canossa, 384; Pal- 
 azzo dei Canonici, 372; Palazzo 
 dei Giuriconsulti, 356, 359; Pal- 
 azzo del Consiglio, 356, 360, 361; 
 Palazzo del Tribunale, 356, 357; 
 Palazzo della Posta, 365; Palazzo 
 MaSei, 354; Palazzo Municipale, 
 393; Palazzo Pompei, 399; Pal- 
 azzo Ponzoni, 382; Palazzo Ra- 
 gione, 353, 356, 357; Palazzo 
 Zamboni, 373 ; Palma Vecchio, 410; 
 S. Paolo di Campo Marzo, church 
 of, 400; Paterani, massacre of the, 
 393; Pepin, 330; Perugino, 410; 
 
602 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Petrarch, S72; Piazza Bri, 352, 
 392, 393; Piazza Brolo, 374; Pi- 
 azza dei Signori, 356; Piazza dell' 
 Independenza, 365; Piazza delle 
 Erbe, 349, 355; Piazza Vittorio 
 Emanuele, see Piazza Brsl; S- 
 Pietro Martire, church of, 365; 
 Pinacoteca, 408-410; Pinde- 
 monte, 344; Pisanello, 344, 367, 
 398, 409; plagues of Venetia, 343, 
 349; Pliny, 344; Pompei, Conti, 
 414; Pompei, the poet, 344; Pom- 
 ponius Secundus, 344; Ponte 
 Aleardi, 395, 400; Ponte delle 
 Navi, 338, 339, 347, 374, 397; 
 Ponte di Pietra, 374, 379; Ponte 
 Garibaldi, 376; Porta Borsari, 
 382;PorU Nuova, 394,395; Porta 
 S. Bernardino, 389; Porta S. Zeno, 
 389, 394; Porta Vescovo, 325, 347; 
 Portoni, the, 394, 395; Prefettura. 
 
 356, 358; Riccio, 399; Risorgi- 
 mento, 343, 393; Roman baths 
 and mosaics, 372; Roman theatre, 
 379, 408; Romanino, 377; Ro- 
 mano, Giulio, 370; Romeo and 
 Juliet, 332, 337, 346, tomb of, 
 396; Rosamund, 329, 330; Saints 
 Fermo and Rustica, 328, 393; 
 Sammicheli, 342, 358, 369, 381, 
 382, 384, 389, 390, 394, tomb of, 
 404; Sansovino, 370; Savoldo, 
 405; Scala, della, 333-341, 356, 
 tombs of, 361-364; Scala, Alberto 
 della, 334, 353; Scala, Alboino 
 della, 334, 335; Scala, Antonio del- 
 la, 339, 340, 341; Scala, Bartolom- 
 meo della, 335, 340, 358; Scala, 
 Can Grande della, 335-337, 358, 
 tomb of, 362, 363; Scala, Can 
 Grande II della, 338, 384; Scala, 
 Consignorio della, 338, 839, 354, 
 
 357, tomb of, 362, 363; Scala, 
 Mastino della, 333, 334, 368, 359. 
 393; Scala, Mastino II della, 337, 
 tomb of, 362, 363, 364; Scaligers, 
 the, tombs of, 361-364; Shake- 
 
 speare, 332, 337; SS. Siro e Libera, 
 church of, 408; situation, 322, 
 323; S. Stefano, church of, 378, 
 379; Teatro Filarmone, 395; Theo- 
 dolinda, 330, 349; Theodoric the 
 Great, 324, 327, 348, 379; Titian, 
 370; tomb of Count of Castel- 
 barco, 365; tombs of the Scaligers, 
 361-364; S. Tommaso Cantuari- 
 ense, 403; Torbido, 345, 370, 399, 
 410; Torre Lamberti, 353; Tri- 
 buna, 354; Venetian Lion, 354; 
 Venetian rule, 341-343; Veronese, 
 Paolo, 346, 361, 377, 400, 409, 
 410, statue of, 365; Veronese Ves- 
 pers, 343; Veronetto, 324, 375, 
 401, 403; Vescovado, 373; Via 
 Nuova, 352; Via PontePietra, 375; 
 Victor Emmanuel II, entry of, 
 344, 393, statue of, 394; Visconti, 
 Gian Galeazzo, 335, 341; Volte 
 Barbaro, 334, 359; wall, the Vis- 
 conti, 324, 352, 394; walls. Re- 
 naissance, of SammicheU, 324, 342, 
 376, 389, 394, 395; walls, Roman, 
 324, 328, 382, 392, 397; S. Zeno, 
 328, 349, church of, 385-389; 
 Zevio, Stefano da, 345, 367, 377, 
 379, 399, 407. 
 
 Veronese, Paolo, 85, 91, 96, 126, 126, 
 135, 137, 172, 196, 213, 218-222, 
 346, 361, 377, 400, 401, 409, 410, 
 470, 568. 
 
 Vespasian, 325, 449, 450. 
 
 Vicenza: art of, 106-109; Arco delle 
 Scalette, 134; Bacchiglione, the, 
 109; Banca Populare, 131; Basil- 
 ica, 108, 117-120, 122; Bassano, 
 J., 130, 131; Bassano, L., 126; 
 Bellini, Giovanni, 126, 130; Buon- 
 consiglio, G., 106, 132; Calderari, 
 107, 131; Campagnola, Dom., 129; 
 Casa Pigafetti, 123; Cima da 
 Conegliano, 107, 130; S. Corona, 
 church of, 125; Corso Porti, 132-, 
 D'Azelio, Massimo, 106; Domeni- 
 chino, 129; Duomo, 115-117; 
 
INDEX 
 
 603 
 
 Ezzelino, 101, 102; Episcopal 
 palace, 116; Fasolo, 121; Fogaz- 
 zaro. A., 107; Fogolino, 125; Fra 
 Giovanni, 101, 102; Fromentone, 
 Tommaso, 107, 116; gallery of 
 art, 129; Girolamo del Toso, 130; 
 history, 100-106; Jones, Inigo, 
 108; S. Lorenzo, church of, 132; 
 Madonna del Monte, 134; Manteg- 
 na, Andrea, 106; Mocetto, 130; 
 Monte Berici, 100, 105, 106, 120, 
 133, 134, 135; Montagna, Bart., 
 106,116, 126, 130, 135; Montagna, 
 tomb of, 132; Monte di Pieta, 120; 
 Museo Civico, 129; Palazzo Bo- 
 nin. 111; Palazzo Braschi, 113; 
 Palazzo Chieregati, 114; Palazzi 
 CoUeoni, 132; Palazzo da Schio, 
 114; Palazzo del Capitanio, 121; 
 Palazzo del Conte Porto al Castello, 
 110; Palazzo Loschi, 112; Palazzo 
 Porto-Barbarano, 132; Palazzo 
 Quirini,113; Palazzo Thiene, 113, 
 132; Palazzo Valmarana, 132; 
 Palladio, Andrea, 107, 108, 110, 
 114, 117, 118, 120, 121, 127, 131, 
 132, 133, 134; Palladio, tomb and 
 statue of, 125; Palma Vecchio, 
 107, 124; Piazza dei Signori, 117; 
 Piazza delle Erbe, 122, bridge of, 
 123; Picutti, 129; Pironi, Giro- 
 lamo, 72, 116, 118; Ponte S. 
 Michele, 133; Porta Castello, 110; 
 Porta del Luzzo, 133; Porto, Conte 
 Orazio, 129; Retrone, the, 109, 
 133; S. Rocco, church of, 132; 
 Scamozzi, V., 107, 111, 114, 129; 
 Scamozzi, tomb of, 132; situation, 
 100; Speranzi, Giovanni, 106, 125; 
 
 S. Stefano, church of, 124; Teatro 
 Olympico, 115, 127; Tintoretto, 
 125; Titian, 130; trip to, 97-100; 
 Van Dyke, 129; Venetian Lion, 
 120; Venetian rule, 104; Vene- 
 ziano, Lorenzo, 116; Veronese, 
 Paolo, 125, 135; Via Garibaldi, 
 117; S. Vicenzo, church of, 122; 
 Villa of Marchese Salvi, 113; 
 Villa Rotonda, 136; Viti, Timoteo, 
 130; Vittorio Emanuele, tomb of, 
 116; Zanella, G., statue of, 132. 
 
 Villa Cordellina, 137. 
 
 Villa Giacomelli, 214, 216-223. 
 
 Villa S. Salvatore, 235, 236. 
 
 Villafranca, 416. 
 
 Villages of the Plain, 97-99, 603. 
 
 Vine culture, 502, 573-576. 
 
 Visconti, Gian Galeazzo, 19, 20, 103, 
 139, 261, 341, 422, 423, 437. 
 
 Visconti, the, 103, 139, 261, 341, 
 421-426. 
 
 Viti, Timoteo, 130, 490. 
 
 Vittoria, Alessandro, 214, 219, 220. 
 
 Vittorio, town of, see Ceneda and 
 Serravalle. 
 
 Vivarini, Bartolommeo, 554. 
 
 Vivarini, Luigi, 554. 
 
 Wine-presses of the streets, 479, 480. 
 Wines of Venetia, see Vine culture. 
 Wormser, General, 139. 
 Wotton, Sir Henry, 11, 90. 
 
 Zelotti, Battista, 137, 668. 
 
 Zevio, Stefano da, 345, 367, 377, 
 
 379, 399, 407. 
 Zoppo, Paolo, 429, 456, 489. 
 Zuccari, Federigo, 556. 
 
CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS 
 U . S . A 
 
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