Rome.

Fragment of a Dream.—The great Painters supposed to be Magicians.—The

Beginnings of the Art.—Gildings on the Glories and Draperies.—

Improvements under Giotto, etc.—The first Dawn of the true Style in

Masaccio.—Studied by all the great Artists who followed him.—Leonardo da

Vinci, with whom commenced the Golden Age of Painting.—His Knowledge of

Mathematics and of Music.—His female heads all like each other.—

Triangular Faces.—Portraits of Mona Lisa, etc.—Picture of Vanity and

Modesty.—His chef-d'oeuvre, the Last Supper.—Faded and almost

effaced.

Filled with the wonders I had seen

  In Rome's stupendous shrines and halls,

I felt the veil of sleep serene

Come o'er the memory of each scene,

  As twilight o'er the landscape falls.

Nor was it slumber, sound and deep,

  But such as suits a poet's rest—

That sort of thin, transparent sleep,

  Thro' which his day-dreams shine the best.

Methought upon a plain I stood,

  Where certain wondrous men, 'twas said,

With strange, miraculous power endued,

  Were coming each in turn to shed

His art's illusions o'er the sight

And call up miracles of light.

The sky above this lonely place,

  Was of that cold, uncertain hue,

The canvas wears ere, warmed apace,

  Its bright creation dawns to view.

But soon a glimmer from the east

  Proclaimed the first enchantments nigh;[1]

And as the feeble light increased,

  Strange figures moved across the sky,

With golden glories deckt and streaks

  Of gold among their garments' dyes;[2]

And life's resemblance tinged their cheeks,

  But naught of life was in their eyes;—

Like the fresh-painted Dead one meets,

Borne slow along Rome's mournful streets.

But soon these figures past away;

  And forms succeeded to their place

With less of gold in their array,

  But shining with more natural grace,

And all could see the charming wands

Had past into more gifted hands.

Among these visions there was one,[3]

Surpassing fair, on which the sun,

That instant risen, a beam let fall,

  Which thro' the dusky twilight trembled.

And reached at length the spot where all

  Those great magicians stood assembled.

And as they turned their heads to view

  The shining lustre, I could trace

The bright varieties it threw

  On each uplifted studying face:[4]

While many a voice with loud acclaim

Called forth, "Masaccio" as the name

Of him, the Enchanter, who had raised

This miracle on which all gazed.

'Twas daylight now—the sun had risen

  From out the dungeon of old Night.—

Like the Apostle from his prison

  Led by the Angel's hand of light;

And—as the fetters, when that ray

Of glory reached them, dropt away.[5]

So fled the clouds at touch of day!

Just then a bearded sage came forth,[6]

  Who oft in thoughtful dream would stand,

To trace upon the dusky earth

  Strange learned figures with his wand;

And oft he took the silver lute

  His little page behind him bore,

And waked such music as, when mute,

  Left in the soul a thirst for more!

Meanwhile his potent spells went on,

  And forms and faces that from out

A depth of shadow mildly shone

  Were in the soft air seen about.

Tho' thick as midnight stars they beamed,

Yet all like living sisters seemed,

So close in every point resembling

  Each other's beauties—from the eyes

Lucid as if thro' crystal trembling,

  Yet soft as if suffused with sighs,

To the long, fawn-like mouth, and chin,

  Lovelily tapering, less and less,

  Till by this very charm's excess,

Like virtue on the verge of sin,

  It touched the bounds of ugliness.

Here lookt as when they lived the shades

Of some of Arno's dark-eyed maids—

Such maids as should alone live on

In dreams thus when their charms are gone:

Some Mona Lisa on whose eyes

  A painter for whole years might gaze,[7]

Nor find in all his pallet's dyes

  One that could even approach their blaze!

Here float two spirit shapes,[8] the one,

With her white fingers to the sun

Outspread as if to ask his ray

Whether it e'er had chanced to play

On lilies half so fair as they!

This self-pleased nymph was Vanity—

And by her side another smiled,

  In form as beautiful as she,

But with that air subdued and mild,

  That still reserve of purity,

Which is to beauty like the haze

  Of evening to some sunny view,

Softening such charms as it displays

  And veiling others in that hue,

  Which fancy only can see thro'!

This phantom nymph, who could she be,

But the bright Spirit, Modesty?

Long did the learned enchanter stay

  To weave his spells and still there past,

As in the lantern's shifting play

Group after group in close array,

  Each fairer, grander, than the last.

But the great triumph of his power

  Was yet to come:—gradual and slow,

(As all that is ordained to tower

  Among the works of man must grow,)

The sacred vision stole to view,

  In that half light, half shadow shown,

Which gives to even the gayest hue

  A sobered, melancholy tone.

It was a vision of that last,[9]

Sorrowful night which Jesus past

With his disciples when he said

  Mournfully to them—"I shall be

"Betrayed by one who here hath fed

  "This night at the same board with me."

And tho' the Saviour in the dream

Spoke not these words, we saw them beam

Legibly in his eyes (so well

The great magician workt his spell),

And read in every thoughtful line

Imprinted on that brow divine.

The meek, the tender nature, grieved,

Not angered to be thus deceived—

Celestial love requited ill

For all its care, yet loving still—

Deep, deep regret that there should fall

  From man's deceit so foul a blight

Upon that parting hour—and all

  His Spirit must have felt that night.

Who, soon to die for human-kind,

  Thought only, mid his mortal pain,

How many a soul was left behind

  For whom he died that death in vain!

Such was the heavenly scene—alas!

That scene so bright so soon should pass

But pictured on the humid air,

Its tints, ere long, grew languid there;[10]

And storms came on, that, cold and rough,

  Scattered its gentlest glories all—

As when the baffling winds blow off

  The hues that hang o'er Terni's fall,—

Till one by one the vision's beams

  Faded away and soon it fled.

To join those other vanisht dreams

  That now flit palely 'mong the dead,—

The shadows of those shades that go.

Around Oblivion's lake below!

[1] The paintings of those artists who were introduced into Venice and Florence from Greece.

[2] Margaritone of Orezzo, who was a pupil and imitator of the Greeks, is said to have invented this art of gilding the ornaments of pictures, a practice which, though it gave way to a purer taste at the beginning of the 16th century, was still occasionally used by many of the great masters: as by Raphael in the ornaments of the Fornarina, and by Rubens not unfrequently in glories and flames.

[3] The works of Masaccio.—For the character of this powerful and original genius, see Sir Joshua Reynolds's twelfth discourse. His celebrated frescoes are in the church of St. Pietro del Carmine, at Florence.

[4] All the great artists studies, and many of them borrowed from Masaccio. Several figures in the Cartoons of Raphael are taken, with but little alteration, from his frescoes.

[5] "And a light shined in the prison … and his chains fell off from his hands."—Acts.

[6] Leonardo da Vinci.

[7] He is said to have been four years employed upon the portrait of this fair Florentine, without being able, after all, to come up to his idea of her beauty.

[8] Vanity and Modesty in the collection of Cardinal Fesch, at Rome. The composition of the four hands here is rather awkward, but the picture, altogether, is very delightful. There is a repetition of the subject in the possession of Lucien Bonaparte.

[9] The Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci, which is in the Refectory of the Convent delle Grazie at Milan.

[10] Leonardo appears to have used a mixture of oil and varnish for this picture, which alone, without the various other causes of its ruin, would have prevented any long duration of its beauties. It is now almost entirely effaced.