CHAPTER XXXIX.

THE ITALIAN TOUR OF 1837.

ON the 11th of March 1837, Wordsworth arrived in town; and, after a short stay at Miss Fenwick's house he left it, on the 19th of the month, with Henry Crabb Robinson, for his fifth and last Continental tour.

The best account of that tour is contained in Robinson's Diary, and in a series of letters written by Wordsworth to his invalid sister at Rydal, and to his wife, who had gone to Brinsop Court, in Herefordshire.*

Robinson writes: "Our tour lasted from Sunday the 19th of March to Monday the 7th of August, and I have preserved short memoranda of it. It included a journey through France, along the Corniche Road to Pisa, by Volterra to Sienna, thence to Rome. After a month there, we returned by the three Tuscan monasteries to Florence. Thence through Parma to Milan, and then moving eastwards by the Lakes of Como, Iseo, and Garda to Venice. We crossed the Alps by the new road, along the valley of Ticino, and that of the Drave through Wiffe, Nillau, etc., to Salzburg. After an excursion to the Austrian Salzkammergut, we proceeded to Munich, Stutgard, and to Heidelberg, and thence through Brussels to Calais.

Paris, 23d March 1837.-I am a bad journalist. I feel unable to record even the interesting remarks W. is con

*Wordsworth took his wife with him from Rydal by Manchester to Birmingham; whence she proceeded to Brinsop Court, and be by Rugby to London.

tinually making. It is his society that will distinguish this from all other journeys, and it is to accommodate him that I have altered my usual mode of travelling. He cannot bear night-travelling, and in his sixty-ninth year needs rest. I therefore at once yielded to his suggestion to buy a carriage for the journey. It is a barouche, and Moxon offered to be our companion. He is, however, to return from Paris to England, when we leave for Italy. . . . W. only heard of Landor's satire from Quillinan in Portugal. He said he

regretted Quillinan's indiscretion, and felt much obliged to all his London friends for their never mentioning the circumstance to him. He never saw nor means to see the satire: so that it will fall ineffectual, if it was intended to wound. He had heard that the pamphlet imputed to him a depreciation of Southey's genius, but he felt a warm affection for Southey, and an admiration of his genius. He could never have said that he would not give 5s. for all S. had ever written. He had in consequence written a few lines to Southey. Notwithstanding his sense of the extreme injustice of L. toward him, he willingly acknowledged his sense of Landor's genius. As to the image of the seashell, he acknowledged no obligation to L's Gebir for it. From his childhood the shell was familiar to him; and the children of his native place always spoke of the humming sound as indicating the sea, and its greater or less loudness had a reference to the state of the sea at the time. The circumstance, however, gave him little annoyance.

27th.-W. is sleeping in an alcove, and in his sleep has been declaiming some unintelligible verses. He has been chatty to-day. He said Langhorne is one of the poets who has not had justice done him. His Country Justice has true feeling and poetry. He praised Béranger, and said all classes love him.

April 2, Avignon.-We set off to Vaucluse. W. was strongly excited, predetermined to find the charm of interest, and he did. There is no verdure. But perhaps, on looking

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more closely, Petrarch may not have praised his retreat either for shady groves or meadows, and the stream of the Sorgue is eminently beautiful. The rocks are almost sublime,—at least very romantic. W. made a long ramble among the rocks behind the fountain.

3d. At Nismes, I took W. to see the exterior of both the Maison Carrée and the Arena. He acknowledged their beauty, but experienced no great pleasure. He says, 'I am unable, from ignorance, to enjoy these sights. I receive an impression, but that is all. I have no science, and can refer nothing to principle.' He was, on the other hand, delighted by two beautiful little girls near the Arena. I wish I could take them to Rydal Mount.'

4th. I took W. to the gardens, which pleased him much more than the antiquities. The interior of the Arena did not seem strongly to affect him. Indeed he confessed that he anticipates no great pleasure from this class of objects in his tour. 12th, Mentone.-I would gladly have stayed here, but W. was rather anxious to get on.

After

14th, Savona.-W. and I set out early on a walk through this quiet and agreeable town. There is a fort, and before it a greensward, just at this season-which delighted W. more than objects more extraordinary and generally attractive. From the lower part of the fortress the views are fine. rambling through the town, which is nicely paved with flagstones, and is agreeable to walk in, having a sort of college air about it, we ascended to a couple of monasteries-the one of Capuchins, with an extensive view of the sea, and then to a former Franciscan monastery, now desecrated. W. took a great fancy to this place, thought it a fit residence for such a poet as Chiabrera, who lived here, and whose epitaph is near to Savona. W. sauntered here a long time. In the same street no remarkable building, nor any person who looked as if he knew anything of the great Savona poet.

20th, Pisa.-Early in the morning we set out on a walk which W. found most interesting, being in a glen through which a stream flowed, and I soon found that it was in fact the glen in which runs the river Trizardo. We went on, and were so much delighted with the romantic beauties of this glen, terminating in mountains covered with snow, that, in spite of a violent rain, we went on to the wretched village of Torno, beyond which we saw a fall called the Sorgenté, and I at last came to a spot of wonderful sublimity, but still not the most famous spot visited by travellers. W. deems it one of the most remarkable spots he has seen on his journey, and he did not see the very finest point. At that point the mountain was very precipitous, and near, and awfully grand, and a path led to the ravine in which the stream had its origin, called the Sorgenté (?).

W. has little

25th. We proceeded to Aquapendente. pleasure in antiquities, but any form of natural beauty attracts him. W. took a look at the cascade which gives a name to this place, and took a walk to see it again, and he had a glimpse of it on the road.

26th, Rome. We entered Rome under a brilliant sun. We took a walk before the sun went down on my favourite haunt, the Pincian Hill. W. seemed disposed to enjoy Rome, and felt quite as much as I expected at the sight of St. Peter's, and at the view from the Pincian.

27th. This has been a very interesting day. To W. it must have been unparalleled, in the number and importance of new impressions. We entered the Campo Vaccino, noticing all the well-known objects in that sublimest of low fields; and having walked round the Coliseum, by which W. seemed sufficiently impressed, the Temples of Janus, Vesta, Fortuna Virilis; the porch of the Postern (?) Gate, and also the Pantheon, which W. seemed to think unworthy of notice compared with St. Peter's, we rode to St. Peter's, by which W. was more

impressed than I expected he would be. We also looked into the Church of St. Onofrio, where Tasso lies buried. W. is no hunter after sentimental relics. He professes to be regardless of places that have merely a connection with a great man, unless they had also an influence on his works. Hence he cares nothing for the burial-place of Tasso, but he has a deep. interest in Vaucluse. The distinction is founded on just views, and real, not affected, sympathy.

May 3.-W. drove to the baths of Caracalla. Visited the burial-place of Shelley and Keats,-"two foolish inscriptions."

I introduced W. to Bunsen. He talked his best to W., and with great facility and felicity of expression pointed out to us monuments from the history of Rome from his own window.

6th. After breakfast we made call on Severn, who had a subject to talk on with W. besides Art,-poor Keats, his friend. He informs us that the foolish inscription on his tomb is to be superseded by one worthy of him. He denies. that his death was hastened by the article in the Quarterly.

Planned to go to the Vatican; Gibson, Severn, etc., accompanying us.

8th. I never saw the marble antiques to greater advantage, for Gibson pointed out to Wordsworth all the prime objects— the Minerva, Apollo, young Augustus, Laocoön, Torso, etc.

10th. We ascended the Coliseum. The view of the building from above enhances greatly the effect, and W. then seemed fully impressed with the grandeur of the structure, though he seemed still more to enjoy the fine view of the country beyond. He now wishes to make the ascent by moonlight. Certainly no other amphitheatre (and I have seen all that still exist), leaves so strong an impression. . . . Meeting Dr. Carlyle by chance, W. and I took a drive with him to the Corsini Palace.