Mount Benger,

Jan. 8th, 1829.

IF Rome is the chosen seat of contemplation and study, Naples is the centre of all worldly and physical gratifications. The contrast is striking, and I cannot yet accustom myself to this crowd of thoughtless beings, who seem to exist only for purposes of enjoyment.

Sir William Hamilton, who still resides here as English Ambassador, and who has so long been a worshipper of every thing beautiful in art and nature, has at length discovered the quintessence of nature's works, and, I may add, the perfection of fine art, in a beautiful girl who resides under his roof. She is an English woman, about twenty, with lovely features and a good person. Sir William has had a Greek costume made for her, which displays the symmetry of her fine figure to great advantage. Thus attired, and her unbraided hair streaming over her shoulders, she exhibits, with the aid of two shawls, a successive variety of attitudes, looks, and gestures, so novel and striking, that the astonished beholder fancies he is dreaming. This singular exhibition conveys at once, and with wondrous life and variety, all that innumerable

artists have vainly employed the best years of their existence in endeavouring to accomplish. Alternately standing, sitting, kneeling, and reclining, she displays the serious, the sad, the penitent, the gay, the joyous, the bacchanalian, the alluring, the menacing, the appalling, and the appalled, in rapid succession; the various gradations of emotion and passion succeeding, or growing out of each other. She understands also how to heighten the effect of each scene by appropriate positions and foldings of her veil, and with a single shawl contrives a hundred different head-dresses.

The old knight holds the candles to throw the most favourable lights, and enters with all his heart and soul into the spirit of this novel and classical exhibition. He discovers in the features of his fair one all the antique heads, all the fine profiles of the Sicilian coins, nay, even the Belvedere Apollo himself! Whatever he may fancy, for this I pledge myself, that the joke is exquisite and unique.

The friendship of Hamilton and his fair one towards me continues unabated. I have passed another day with

them, and in the evening Miss Hart again gratified us with her musical and mimetic talents. In compliance with the request of Hackert the painter, who dined with us, Sir William admitted me into his secret repository of works of art; a scene of wild confusion, in which specimens of human art from every age were strangely intermingled. Torsi, busts, vases, bronzes, carvings, paintings, and ornaments of Sicilian agate, amongst which I observed a miniature chapel.

In an oblong case upon the ground, the loose lid of which I had the curiosity to raise, I discovered two magnificent bronze candelabra. I shewed them unobserved to Hackert, and asked him, in a whisper, if they did not greatly resemble those we had seen at Portici. With a hint to say nothing of them to Sir William, he told me that probably they had been lost on their way from the depths of Pompeii, and had found a refuge in this museum. Doubtless the view of these and similar lucky acquisitions is reserved by the worthy knight for his most confidential friends.

While gazing around, I was struck with the appearance of a large upright case, open on one side, painted black within, and adorned in front with a gilt setting, like a magnificent picture frame. On enquiring into the purpose of this contrivance, I heard that this enthusiastic lover of fine art and fine women, not satisfied with Miss Hart's performances as an animated statue, had metamorphosed her into an infinitely varied and inimitable painting, by enclosing her within this golden frame, where she delighted him by personifying, in various attitudes and costumes, the antique figures of Herculaneum, as well as the most celebrated designs of more modern masters. In consequence, however, of the size and weight of this apparatus, and

of the difficulty of removing it into appropriate lights, these exhibitions had been for some time discontinued.

This contrivance of Sir William's reminds me of a favourite hobby of the Neapolitans-the exhibition of the manger, (presepe,) which may be seen at Christmas in every church, and displays the adoration of the shepherds, kings, and angels, grouped with various degrees of taste and magnificence. The love of the cheerful Neapolitans for out-door enjoyments, has induced them to get up this exhibition on the flat roofs of their houses, where a hutlike wooden scaffolding is reared, and adorned with bushes of evergreen. The Madonna, the Bambino, and the various standing, kneeling, and soaring accessary figures, are splendidly attired, and often at very considerable expense. What, however, conveys a real, and, elsewhere, inimitable grandeur to these mimic scenes, is the sublime view of Vesuvius and its environs, which, through the open scaffolding, forms the background of the picture.

It may appear ungrateful in one, who has experienced so much hospitality from Sir William, to make the remark, but I must acknowledge, that his amusing fair one appears to me a most unenlightened personage; abounding, certainly, in personal fascinations, but destitute of mind, and of that fine harmony of feeling which conveys soul and pathos to voice and language. In singing, too, her tones are deficient in the essential quality of fulness.

Fine forms and features abound: but how rare is the combination of a fine organ with intense and tasteful perceptions; and how much more uncommon is the union of these advantages with distinguished personal beauty!

GOETHE'S Journal, 1787.

I must dissent from the commonly received opinion, that Naples contains from 30 to 40,000 idle paupers. This impression has originated with travellers from northern Europe, who, ignorant or unmindful of the habits and necessities inseparable from hot climates, are too prone to call every man an idler who is not toiling throughout the day. During frequent and ac

curate observation, at all hours, of the lower classes in Naples, I certainly discovered many in the garb of pover ty; but none of them, save the infirm and superannuated, were unemployed. Commencing my hours of inspection early in the morning, I ascertained that the apparent idlers in the streets were labourers and porters, on the stands allotted to them, waiting for

employers; calessaros, or drivers of one-horse vehicles, lounging with their assistant boys, but at the beck of any one; sailors on the Mole, enjoying a pipe in their hours of leisure; fishermen, basking in the sun, because the wind was unfavourable to their object. Of the numbers walking in all directions, almost every cne had about him some indication that he was employed; and all the beggars were either cripples, or very aged, or otherwise disabled. Even the children are employed as soon as they can walk, in gathering chips and shavings near the arsenals, or bits of wood thrown up on the beach, which are sent to Naples, and sold to the poor artisans. Children of tender years carry fish from St Lucia, and take their stand in the markets of Naples; while some carry to the city for sale the sulphureous waters, which are in great request during the spring; and others traffic in fruits, honey, cakes, and sweetmeats, with customers of their own age. It is both comic and interesting to watch one of these trading urchins, whose whole stock and utensils consist of a board, a knife, and a water-melon, when he is surrounded by a crowd of boy-customers. Putting down his board, he begins to carve his fruit into small and equal portions, while the buyers are loudly telling him to cut fairly, and the young fruit-dealer keeps a sharp look-out upon his receipts, lest any of his riotous customers should abscond without paying him his due. The collection of manure and garbage in the streets of Naples employs a multitude of men and boys, who toil early and late, and convey their gatherings, in large panniers upon asses, to the immense and productive market gardens which environ the city, and which derive from this source their luxuriant and beautiful vegetation: nor is it uncommon for some of these street-scavengers, who have no resource but their industry, their ass, and two panniers, to rent a piece of garden-ground on their own account, and reach a higher level in society. The number of small traders and pedlars employed in carrying about refreshments in the hot seasons, and articles of domestic necessity at all seasons, is incredible. Many of the poor obtain permanent or occasional employment from the merchants and shopkeepers; and even the people called Lazaroni are not a shade behind

any other class in industry. In short, the result of my observations was a conviction, that, amongst the petty traders and poorest classes of society in Naples, there were few of either sex, or of any capable age, who could fairly be termed idlers. I admit, that the stranger meets at every turn numbers of ill-dressed, and even ragged people, but they are certainly not without employment during some portion of the day; and, however paradoxical it may appear, I am inclined to be lieve, that in Naples the greatest relative industry will be found in the lowest classes of society. By industry, however, I do not mean the toiling, never-ending labour of northern nations, where the necessities, not only of the passing day, but of the winter season, must be, in some measure, provided for: I mean that moderate amount of daily labour which suffices for support in a climate on which the bounty of nature has bestowed a neverceasing vegetation, and a consequent abundance and cheapness of provisions, which raises the poorest classes above the necessity of constant toil. Thus they repose during the midday heats for hours, and labour, not for existence, but for enjoyment. The remarks on the Cynic philosophers in De Paw's" Recherches sur les Grecs," are well illustrated by this condition of human society. "In northern Europe," he says, we cannot comprehend the real condition of these men, whose principle of abstinence from luxuries was no hardship in a climate which yielded so abundantly all the comforts of life. In a country so favoured by nature, these apparently destitute Cynics could readily command, not merely enough to sustain life, but greatly to enjoy it." Would not a Neapolitan Lazarone, by parity of circumstances and feelings, disdain the governorship of Siberia, or the regency of Norway? A natural consequence of the want of persevering application, in all classes, is a comparative inferiority in the arts of life. The mechanics and manufacturers will bear no comparison with those of northern Europe; and, with few exceptions, learning is confined to physicians and official persons. The clergy abandon themselves to a life of indolence, and the nobility are devoted to luxurious and sensual gratifications.

66

GOETHE.

The improvisatori of the people, whose lutes vibrate in the streets of Rome on fine summer evenings, are not unworthy of notice. Sitting near my open window, I was observed by one of these wandering poets, who struck a few chords, waved his hat, and requested my commands, "Commanda qualche cosa di serio, di malinconico, o una canzone graziosa e dilettevole? Io le posso servire con tutto!" Meanwhile all my neighbours of both sexes grouped themselves around him, and awaited in pleasurable excitement my determination. I ordered him to make a declaration of love to the finest woman in the assemblage, and the people shouted with delight at the proposal. The cunning improvisatore, however, unwilling to offend the fair ones present, avoided any serious enactment of the character of Paris. Selecting the oldest and ugliest woman, he addressed to her a most fervent declaration of his passion, accompanied with gestures and grimaces of extravagant absurdity. The old lady betrayed no tokens of displeasure, and the younger ones were convulsed with merriment. "Bravo, bravissimo! Voi siete l'asso di tutti gli Improvisatori d'Italia!" was the universal shout as the poet concluded.

I then requested, as a specimen of his tragic powers, the lamentation of a young woman for the death of her lover, who had lost his life in a shipwreck. "Sarà servita, Signoria!" Commencing with a slow and melancholy prelude, he sighed deeply several times, and then he wept, and sang, and screamed his tragic poem with such effective pathos, that his listeners stood

aghast with wonder and sympathy. The women began to shed tears, while the men laughed at them, and the poet, after reprobating the hard-heartedness of the men, thanked the tender fair ones for their sympathy. The indefatigable singer now proposed to find subjects for given rhymes, and even after I had rewarded his exertions with a silver coin, he celebrated the Generosità de' Forestieri in a valedictory poem.

Most of the popular ballads of Italy are the creations of these itinerant im provisatori. It is the just and natural privilege of oral delivery, to lay a stronger hold of the memory than manuscript and printed poems. How greatly have the retentive faculties of nations, as well as individuals, declined since the inventions of writing and printing! And how much it is to be feared, that the continually increasing mass of printed works will eventually sacrifice the end to the means, and crush, under its weight, the learning which it is intended to preserve and assist! To return, however, to the Italian ballads; whenever the song of an improvisatore fits the measure of a popular aria, or is associated with a new and striking melody, it is often repeated and improved upon by the poet, and becomes gradually current amongst the people. It experiences various alterations in its progress; is at length printed, and, ere long, forgotten, unless retained in the popular memory, by some powerful charm in the melody, in which alone resides the real spell,-the preserving salt of song. Letters from Rome in 1818.

A short time before my departure from Rome, I became acquainted with a young Neapolitan, who held a provisional situation in the Vatican library, and was introduced to me as a dis. tinguished improvisatore. He appeared to take pleasure in my society, and in various ways shewed me so much attention, that a considerable degree of intimacy was soon established. I found in him an agreeable and valuable companion, intimately acquainted with Rome, and quite at home in every

ruin, convent, and hotel within its bounds. He conversed in Latin with fluency and elegance, and was well versed in the provincial dialects of Italy-a rare accomplishment amongst Italian literati. The classic poets of Greece and Rome were all familiar to him, and he could repeat Virgil from beginning to end. He was a member of the Arcadia, and of the Academia Tibernia; and, as a Latin improvisatore, surpassed all competitors. His name I withhold, for reasons which