112 BURIAL GROUNDS. more familiar to the English ear, from those wise institutions of the present day, which interdicting the inanimate remains of Mortality from the aisles and even the precincts of the Place of Prayer, appoint to them in exchange those sunny slopes, those shadowy vales, those sepulchral groves, and those dewlaved tombs, where, in the pictorial language of the Prince of Uz, "The shady Trees cover them with their shadow, the Willows of the Brook compass them about." The English Cemetery in Rome, though small, is one of the most beautiful specimens of a Burial place. When I first saw it, it was showered and overshadowed by a tremendous thunderstorm. Heavy mournful clouds seemed to weigh down the heavens to the very earth. Every tree and flower declined its head under the oppressive moisture, the thunder shook the very tombs, and the lightning darted amongst them a spectral splendour. But nought disturbed the tranquil slumbers of The Dead. Pale but impassive stood those Monumental Altars, and, seeming to sympathize with the tears of Heaven, protected their poor cold inmates from its wrathful artillery. They do indeed "Fear no more the Lightning flash, Fear not Slander's censure rash, They have done with Joy and Moan." * * Cymbeline. SUNSHINE AND RAIN. 113 The Weather seemed quite in keeping with the melancholy Scene, and one thought that brighter Skies would only shine in mockery here. What have lively breezes and sunlight and songs of happy Birds to do with these Dwellings of Mortality, scarcely one of which has not received its sacred deposit from trembling hands, streaming eyes, and withered hearts!" Let this pall of mourning Nature," one felt inclined to exclaim, "for ever extend its congenial darkness above this place of tears! Let the Grass grow long and rank with her bursts of tears! Let the Cypress and Yew overcanopy each column and altar consecrated to the Memories of Affection! Let the Ivy interlace, and the Moss embroider, and the Lichens enamel with vegetable Ore each Marble Record of the Departed! And let no thing flourish here that grows not by Gloom, and Wind, and Rain." But this afternoon we saw the Necropolis displayed beneath the tenderest and most brilliant sunshine. It was overlaid with one mellow blaze of light, and the hoary Roman Rampart, its protector, and the Pyramid of Caius, its colossal centinel, rejoiced in the same balmy lustre. Situated somewhat to the south-east of the City, this beautiful Retreat enjoys the privilege of the sun's earliest and latest beams. The orient Orb pays there his first state visit, and it receives the affectionate farewell of his fading lustre in the 114 THE SEPULCHRES AT SUNSET. west. But to me, as to many others, the Evening hour with its pensive recollections, is always more grateful than the Morning with its fallacious promises. And this evening I thought I never saw so apt an emblem of the golden calm, the saintly Aureola that embalms the Memory of the Just, as in that tranquil but transcendent sunshine that seemed to occupy the four walls of the Necropolis with its sacred glory. It was from the summit of the Monte Testaccio; and you discerned every Deathstone in gleaming whiteness contrasted with the evergreens that formed at once their umbrage and their ornament, and which participated in the same benevolent splendour; as they seemed before to mourn with the rain, so seemed they now to sympathize with the sunlight. Not so versatile, alas! were their slumbering Inhabitants! Times and Seasons brought to them no change, save that the Earth, once so instinct with intellect, glowing with virtues, or adorned with beauty, becomes more and more an integral portion of that dull Dust from which it came, and to which, according to its Doom, it has long ago returned! Death hides all men, protects all men, hallows all men! Death puts a diadem upon poor mean Mortality, for it is that Death which makes it Immortality! and solemnly letting fall the curtain upon all, to which even perhaps our most deliberate judgment had made us unjust, turns the Grave into a Shrine, and bequeaths to con DEATH THE DELIVERER. 115 jecture a dreamy, wild, and touching mystery of self-upbraiding admiration. I should not like to be a Mummy. "The Thracians," says Sterne, "wept when a child was born, and feasted and made merry when a man went out of the world. And with reason; Death opens the gates of fame, and shuts the gates of envy after it; unlooses the chain of the Captive, and puts the Bondman's task into another man's hand!" "Release me gently from the world, oh Lord! Let the Joys, The Fears, the Hopes, the Pleasures, the Annoys, Change to one calm contented thankful mood, Submissive to Thy Rod, or grateful for Thy Rest." T. H. W. The sense of Vastitude in the Baths of Caracalla becomes absolutely oppressive: and when you add to it Solitude and Silence and impending Night, judge, my dear A-, whether the place. possessed a master-spell for me. I stood alone in its Southern Hemicycle, conscious that while the red walls soared high as the heavens above me, their foundations descended a 116 THE BATHS OF CARACALLA. hundred feet below! Saloons that should have been Forums; Corridors like Streets; and Walls that might have fortified a City; each in turn led the Imagination through a labyrinth of pictured thoughts, almost ecstatic! while, through those earthquake chasms, waving with herbage and trees, you discerned a Space as large again, which, now occupied by Vineyards, once formed a portion of this prodigious Pile. I know not what I saw, but much my Mind did see of Cæsars, and stoled Senators, and scarlet Warriors, and holy-day Plebeians, which, with their chequered groupes of pomp and pleasure, filled up that vast and solitary Void! A sound no louder than the humming of a bee disturbed the dream, and I was rapidly relapsing into enchantment, when once more the solemn tolling of the Ave Maria from a hundred campaniles far and near recalled me from the Romance to the Reality of Rome. The skies, from roseate sunset, were already exchanging their purple into black, and, like the veil extended by the Antients over their Amphitheatres, seemed to draw, with considerate hand, a starry canopy over the verdurous circlet of this Arched Wilderness. The Ghost, the very Skeleton of Magnificence, this stupendous Edifice baffles conjecture, as to its detail, and defies even imagination to fathom. its transcendent luxuries! |