"What worthier standard of the Cause "To guard it, while a curl shall stand? "Behold, my friends" (while thus he cried, A curtain, which conceal'd this pride Of Princely Wigs was drawn aside) "Behold that grand Perruque - how big "With recollections for the world "For France for us Great LOUIS' Wig "By HIPPOLYTE new frizz'd and curl'd— "New frizz'd! alas, 'tis but too true, "Well may you start at that word new "But such the sacrifice, my friends, "The' Imperial Cossack recommends; "Thinking such small concessions sage, To meet the spirit of the age, 66 "Wherefore, to please the Czar, and show "What liberalism in Monarchs is, "And D'ANGOULÈME our worthy leader, "Let rebel Spain do all she can, "Let recreant England arm and feed her, "Urg'd by that pupil of HUNT's school, "That Radical, Lord LIVERPOOL"France can have nought to fear- far from it "When once astounded Europe sees "The wig of Louis, like a Comet, "Streaming above the Pyrenees, "All's o'er with Spain-then on, my sons, "On, my incomparable Duke, "And, shouting for the Holy Ones, "Cry Vive la guerre et la Perruque!" PREFACE.* THE series of trifles entitled "Rhymes on the Road," were written partly as their title implies, and partly at a subsequent period from memorandums made on the spot. This will account for so many of those pieces being little better, I fear, than “prose fringed with rhyme." The journey to a part of which those rhymes owed their existence was commenced in company with Lord John Russell in the autumn of the year 1819. After a week or two passed at Paris, to enable Lord John to refer to Barillon's Letters for a new edition of his Life of Lord Russell then preparing, we set out together for the Simplon. At Milan, the agreeable society of the late Lord Kinnaird detained us for a few days; and then my companion took the route to Genoa, while I proceeded on a visit to Lord Byron at Venice. It was during the journey, thus briefly described, I addressed the well-known Remonstrance to my noble friend †, which has of late been frequently coupled with my prophetic verses on the Duke of Wellington, from the prescient spirit with which it so confidently looked forward to all that Lord John has since become in the eyes of the world. Of my visit to Lord Byron,- -an event to me so memorable,-I have already detailed all the most interesting particulars in my published Life of the poet; and shall here only cite, from that work, one passage, as having some reference to a picture mentioned in the following pages. "As we were conversing after dinner about the various collections of paintings I had seen that morning, on my saying that, fearful as I was of ever praising any picture, lest I should draw on myself the • [From the Preface to the Seventh Volume of the collected edition of 1841, 1842.] + See Miscellaneous Poems. connoisseur's sneer, for my pains, I would yet, to him, venture to own that I had seen a picture at Milan, which—The Hagar!'§ he exclaimed, eagerly interrupting me; and it was in fact, that very picture I was about to mention to him as having awakened in me, by the truth of its expression, more real emotion than any I had yet seen among the chefs-d'œuvre of Venice." In the society I chiefly lived with, while at Rome, I considered myself singularly fortunate; though but a blind and uninitiated worshipper of those powers of Art of which my companions were all high priests. Canova himself, Chantrey, Lawrence, Jackson, Turner, Eastlake,—such were the men of whose presence and guidance I enjoyed the advantage in visiting all that unrivalled Rome can boast of beautiful and grand. That I derived from this course of tuition any thing more than a very humbling consciousness of my own ignorance and want of taste, in matters of art, I will not be so dishonest as to pretend. But, to the stranger in Rome every step forms an epoch; and, in addition to all its own countless appeals to memory and imagination, the agree able auspices under which I first visited all its memorable places could not but render every impression I received more vivid and permanent. Thus, with my recollection of the Sepulchre of St. Peter, and its ever-burning lamps, for which splendid spot Canova was then meditating a statue, there is always connected in my mind the exclamation which I heard break from Chantrey after gazing, for a few moments, in silence, upon that glorious site,—"What a place to work for!" See p. 115. of this edition. § Abraham dismissing Hagar, by Guercino. A statue, I believe, of Pius VI. In one of the poems* allusion is made to an evening not easily forgotten, when Chantrey and myself were taken by Canova to the Borghese Palace, for the purpose of showing us, by the light of a taper-his favourite mode of exhibiting that work-his beautiful statue of the Princess Borghese, called the Venere Vincitrice. In Chantrey's eagerness to point out some grace or effect that peculiarly struck him, he snatched the light out of Canova's hand; and to this circumstance the following passage of the poem referred to was meant to allude: When he, thy peer in art and fame, The best of fame - a rival's praise. One of the days that still linger most pleasantly in my memory, and which, I trust, neither Lady Calcott nor Mr. Eastlake have quite forgotten, was that of our visit together to the Palatine Mount, when, as we sauntered about that picturesque spot, enjoying the varied views of Rome which it commands, they made me, for the first time, acquainted with Guidi's spirited Ode on the Arcadians, in which there is poetry enough to make amends for all the nonsense of his rhyming brethren. Truly and grandly does he exclaim, – "Indomita e superba ancor è Roma --- With Canova, while sitting to Jackson for a portrait ordered by Chantrey, I had more than once some interesting conversation,or, rather, listened while he spoke, respecting the political state of Europe at that period, and those "bricconi," as he styled them, the sovereigns of the Holy Alliance; and, before I See Extract XV. + A slight alteration here has rendered these verses more true to the actual fact than they were in their original form. left Rome, he kindly presented to me a set of engravings from some of his finest statues, together with a copy of the beautifully printed collection of Poems, which a Roman poet, named Missirini, had written in praise of his different "Marmi." When Lord John Russell and myself parted, at Milan, it was agreed between us, that after a short visit to Rome, and (if practicable within the allowed time) to Naples, I was to rejoin him at Genoa, and from thence accompany him to England. But the early period for which Parliament was summoned, that year, owing to the violent proceedings at Manchester, rendered it necessary for Lord John to hasten his return to England. I was, therefore, most fortunate under such circumstances, in being permitted by my friends Chantrey and Jackson to join in their journey homeward; through which lucky arrangement, the same precious privilege I had enjoyed, at Rome, of hearing the opinions of such practised judges, on all the great works of art I saw in their company, was continued afterwards to me through the various collections we visited together, at Florence, Bologna, Modena, Parma, Milan, and Turin. To some of those pictures and statues that most took my fancy, during my tour, allusions will be found in a few of the poems. But the great pleasure I derived from these and many other such works arose far more from the poetical nature of their subjects than from any judgment I had learned to form of their real merit as works of art, ‚—a line of lore in which, notwithstanding my course of schooling, I remained, I fear, unenlightened to the last. For all that was lost upon me, however, in the halls of Art, I was more than consoled in the cheap picture gallery of Nature; and a glorious sunset I witnessed in ascending the Simplon is still remembered by me with a depth and freshness of feeling which no one work of art I saw in the galleries of Italy has left behind. |