52. LETTER LII.
SIENNA — POGGIOBONSI — BONCONVENTO — ENCOURAGEMENT
OF FRENCH ARTISTS BY THEIR GOVERNMENT—
ACQUAPENDENTE—POOR BEGGAR, THE ORIGINAL OF
A SKETCH BY COLE—BOLSENA—VOLSCINIUM—SCENERY—CURIOUS
STATE OF THE CHESTNUT WOODS.
Sienna.—A day and a half on my second journey to
Rome. With a party of four nations inside, and two
strangers, probably Frenchmen, in the cabriolet, we
have jogged on at some three miles in the hour, enjoying
the lovely scenery of these lower Appenines at our
leisure. We slept last night at Poggiobonsi, a little
village on a hill-side, and arrived at Sienna for our
mid-day rest. I pencil this note after an hour's ramble
over the city, visiting once more the cathedral,
with its encrusted marbles and naked graces, and the
three shell-shaped square in the centre of the city, at
the rim of which the eight principal streets terminate.
There is a fountain in the midst, surrounded with
bassi relievi much disfigured. It was mentioned by
Dante. The streets were deserted, it being Sunday,
and all the people at the Corso, to see the racing of
horses without riders.
Bonconvento.—We sit, with the remains of a traveller's
supper on the table—six very social companions.
Our cabriolet friends are two French artists, on their
way to study at Rome. They are both pensioners of
the government, each having gained the annual prize
at the academy in his separate branch of art, which
entitles him to five years' support in Italy. They are
full of enthusiasm, and converse with all the amusing
vivacity of their nation. The academy of France
send out in this manner five young men annually, who
have gained the prizes for painting, sculpture, architecture,
music, and engraving.
This is the place where Henry the Seventh of Germany
was poisoned by a monk, on his way to Rome.
The drug was given to him in the communion cup.
The “ave marie” was ringing when we drove into
town, and I left the carriage and followed the crowd,
in the hope of finding an old church where the crime
might have been committed. But the priest was
mumbling the service in a new chapel, which no romance
that I could summon would picture as the
scene of tragedy.
Acquapendente.—While the dirty customhouse
officer is deciphering our passports, in a hole a dog
would live in unwillingly, I take out my pencil to
mark once more the pleasure I have received from the
exquisite scenery of this place. The wild rocks enclosing
the little narrow valley below, the waterfalls,
the town on its airy perch above, the just starting vegetation
of spring, the roads lined with snowdrops, crocuses
and violets, have renewed, in a tenfold degree,
the delight with which I saw this romantic spot on
my former journey to Rome.
We crossed the mountain of Radicofani yesterday,
in so thick a mist that I could not even distinguish the
ruin of the old castle, towering into the clouds above.
The wild, half-naked people thronged about us as before,
and I gave another paul to the old beggar with
whom I became acquainted by Mr. Cole's graphic
sketch. The winter had, apparently, gone hard with
him. He was scarce able to come to the carriage
window, and coughed so hollowly that I thought he
had nearly begged his last pittance.
Bolsena.—We have walked in advance of the vetturino
along the borders of this lovely and beautiful lake
till we are tired. Our artists have taken off their coats
with the heat, and sit, a quarter of a mile further on,
pointing in every direction at these unparalleled views.
The water is as still as a mirror, with a soft mist on
its face, and the water-fowl in thousands are diving
and floating within gunshot of us. An afternoon in
June could not be more summer-like, and this, to a
lover of soft climate, is no trifling pleasure.
A mile behind us lies the town, the seat of ancient
Volscinium, the capital of the Volscians. The country
about is one quarry of ruins, mouldering away in
the moss. Nobody can live in health in the neighborhood,
and the poor pale wretches who call it a home
are in melancholy contrast to the smiling paradise
about them. Before us, in the bosom of the lake, lie
two green islands, those which Pliny records to have
floated in his time; and one of which, Martana, a
small conical isle, was the scene of the murder of the
queen of the Goths by her cousin Theodatus. She
was taken there and strangled. It is difficult to imagine,
with such a sea of sunshine around and over it,
that it was ever anything but a spot of delight.
The whole neighborhood is covered with rotten
trunks of trees—a thing which at first surprised me
in a country where wood is so economised. It is accounted
for in the French guide-book of one of our
party by the fact, that the chestnut woods of Bolsena
are considered sacred by the people from their antiquity,
and are never cut. The trees have ripened and
fallen and rotted thus for centuries—one cause, perhaps,
of the deadly change in the air.
The vetturino comes lumbering up, and I must
pocket my pencil and remount.
