Foreign Correspondence

ROME, Dec. 13, 1872. Friend Pond: We bado good-by to Venice in onr last, and at 8 o'elock A. m. we woro on our way, having taken tickets to Bologna in the BeOond elass ooupè, as we had always done in Germany. ïhe cars of Italy are not quito so softly upholstered and corafortable as those of the samo class in Geruany but we noticed no ajparent difference in the charaoter of the passengers. 4.s far as Padua the road wp.S tüö direct route to Hilan. Cros3Íng the ong bridge and gradually losing sight of the once proud "Bride of the Sea," we passód through a long' stretch of of level country but little variod in character, and following a course nearly directly west. The grape is grovm everywhere, gracefully trailed froui tree to tree n rows moró or less distant fïoni each other, tho intermedíate space being generally oultivated in a somewhat diminu;ive species of Indiaii corn or maizo. We did not stop long at Padua, and only had a view of its inore promüiënt chiHehes and public edifiees as the train approach:d and departed in a way to nearly encirclo the city. We now took a direction nearly south, with a frequent sight of the Canal di iattaglia, whioh is made navigable and aords a water comniunication bet ween Venice and these interior towns, which in :ormer times were its tributarios. The whole country appears to be fortile upon ihe plains, but there is also a prevailing ippeárauoe of its being so low as to be unpleaaantly wet. In part, doubtless, the excessivo rains hive tended to iill every depression in the surface, and water was covering large tracts in which trees and vinsyards had evidently been cultivated and growing tho present 5öasou) but 3 iability to such wide-spread submer3ion must detract much f'rom its intrinsic value, cen if it does not affect the health of :he people. An hour brought us opposité the Euganean hills, celebrated in poesy, and esiecially notable as the homo and favorito resort of Petrareh. And at their northc'iu extremity, also, was bom the historian Livy, whose prose it has ever boen one of the earliest ambitions of the youthful student to overeóme; This range of I1ÜI3 extonds lor about twclve miles quite near to and parallel with the road, and although stripped for tho most part of its forests and presenting no apjearance of great fertility, were yet very mteresting from their great variety of contour and the deep blue vistas which were ever and anon opening into the more distant background ; besides the charm of the picturesque, which gray old castles frowning from an oocasional lofty ookout always give to tho moro nioun;ainous country of Italy as well as Gorman land. At the small villago of Arqua, amoug these hills, whore the slopes appear less abrupt and barren and the prossect opens more widely, was tho' once favorite home of tho celebrated poet, and whore, in 1374, he died in his house, which is said to bo still standing. We are in the habit of associating the names of Petrarch, Tasso, Ariosto, í?ante and Boocacio wheaever either is mentionod, and one suggests the other. But it is quito observable that of all these in Itily tho one most honoTed by public ïrionuments and thus kopt most constan tly in memoryis Dante. Just before reaching Eovigo we crossed ;he Adige, whose acquaintanco anfi companionship we had enjoyed in the Tyrol, and side by side had enterea the plains of Lombardy at Verona. Eovigo is a small village pleasantly situated on a small tributary of tho Adige. About ;hirty-three miles distant is tho Adriatic, yet only about sixteen miles east is the very ancient little town of Adria, once of sufficient importance to givo its name to ;he sea which then washod its borders. - The vi'lage is now over seventeen miles distant from the same sea. The country exhibits evidences of having but recently escapedfrom a protty general submersion. We crossed the Fo a few miles nort.rt of Ferrara. It is a fine streara, not much la'fger than the Huron, and very poaceFully wkids its way to the sea, notwithgtanöiog the havoc its' lieadwaters have boen creating. Ferrara is a placo whose fortunes are sadly changed from those happy days when the dukes of this city were the equals of kings, and the court of tho famous IIouso of Este was the best patrón of learning and poetry and art, as it was also once an asylum for tho f eformer Calvin. Once a ffoiírishing city of 100,000 inhabitants, it has now less than 30,000, and " its glory has deparfed."- - An unen viable farne attaches itself to the place as havhig once boen the residence of that fiend in témale form, Lucretia Borgia, and of the faithless Parasina wliom Lord Byron has made iho subject of one of his poeins. Froni its many associations with tho naines of Tasso and Ariosto it would have been gratif'ying to stop for a few hours about the dilapidated old city, and particularly to have visited that house of the latter whioh bears tho inscription, written by hiinself, beginning, " Parva, sed apta mihi, sed nulli obnoxia," and also to have lookod into the coll in which the fermer Was fel scven long years irnprisoned in order to cool his ardor for the Duke's sister, the beautiful Kleonora. But in Italy there are no layover tickets, and to stop one must m-'kc that his destirtation for the timo, and stop with bag and baggage ; so We hied to Bologna, bearing away a mere panoranïa1 of the rec'cóing towii?. Bologna is situated at the very base oi the Appenines, and the country round ,bout the city is greatly superior to of that we had iassed over.and the outlying villas, which are scattered upon the sloping hillsides in its vicinity, gave its approach conssdera'blo attractiveness. We were disappointed in Bologna. We know that it was one of the oldest cities of Italy, having been a placo of large pretensious bcfori) the Christian ora, that its universityranked anraigthe most antiquated of this class of institutions, and 8ome eix hundred years ago numberod 10,000 in its list of students instead of 400 as no' - trom all wKish we expooted to find it largely charrwterizod hj its remains - damp arcadea and departed glories, instead of whioh we met with unusual lifü and business stir on its streets, everything neat and substantial in its buildings, and its arcades really charining for thoir height and width and general amplitude aud airiness: this was our disappointment. These arcades are the striking features of this splid old town that first attract the stranger's attontion ; they are projected over the sidewalks on either pide of all the more important streets. This is 80 generally the case that a person could spend hours in tho aggravating labor of shopping, and walk miles without being exposed to rain or the heat of the sun. Lfuring the heats of summer they must be a luxurious convenience, but in tho cooler days of tho year, whon overybody delights in the sunlight there would seem o be a corrospondmg disadvantago. Anothor feature is tïM general prevalence óf one tint or ratherone color of various tints iu all the buildings of the city - a light buff or pain cream being its most expressive designation, and one, by tho way, which is a groat favorite iu all these southern cities - in the Tyrol, and even f urther north, at Munich and elsewhofe. Tho streets are olean, boggars Are scarce, and an air of great wea'th and reliatlo solidity is noticeable in the palaces and palatial residences which abound. But of all the cities we havo visited there ia none in which the external architecture of the churohcs presented so littlo attrcctivoness - looking as hluch like strongholds and fortresses of medieval times as like places of worship. Our hotel being near the Piazza Tictor Emmanuel - tho old forum of the ancient city and its present center, - we gave our first attentvon to it. It presented a lively scène, with hundredi of a,mings, eaoh with a notion establishment or fruit stand beneath in addition to its usual local opeyations, but thore was a dinginess about the old buildings on this square, aud that want of all architectural einbcllishment, is well as comeliness in its surroundinga, which doprived it of any claims to beauty. The f buntain was the only object of art visible, and this is a very commendablo production indeed - executed in 1651 by Giovani da Bologna, ono of tho eelebrated artists of that period of revived art. The bronze statue of Neptune is colossal in size and so berimed by the constant dampness and exposuro that we at Srst mistook its material for marble. Seven palaces of his;orical noto surround the Piazza - one of whieh, tho íalazzo del Padesta, erocted n 1201, is noted as the place in which ling Euzio, son of the Emperor Prederick [I., captured in 1207 ,was imprisoned during the long period of twenty-two years. But the most conspicuous building on ihe square is the immense structure of ;he chureh of San Petronio, who is the aatron saint oj Bologna. The interior of ;his church is very eflPectiTe and interestïng, owing to its entire devotion to one vast nave with equally noble aisles, and reaching in grand proportions to the apse or semi-circular choir immediately beyond tho transept, 383 feet, and expandïng in width 146 feet. with no deeply recessed chapéis or passages to diminish the impression of magnitude. The lighting, ;oo, was vefy fino, and the pointed vaulting of its lofty ceiling all combined to promoto the magnificent uffect. It was originally designed to continue the nave üeyond tho transept, making its entire length 798 feet, and had this been carried out with a s'Tccess corresponding tö tho effect produced by the edfiice in its present form it would have been a wonderful struoture indeed. A series of twelve chapéis on cach side extend the whole length of the church and are all of boautiful inarble, differing f rom eaoh other, but each one coiripleted throughout with pillars, frisze, altar-railing and screen of one variety of marble. The general ' introduction of beaütifully wrought marble soreens about twelve feet in front of each altar is not usual, and presented a striking feature, being about eight feet high and sculptured in a great varioty of delicate designs. Looking through theae screens as we passed, each chapel presented some interesting object in soulpture or painting, Ve derived most satisfaction in viewing tho window of stained glass, by the celebratod artist in this work, Jacob of Ulm, and tho inlaid stalls by Fra ïtaphael da Breffcia, and especially in examining the monuments in tlïe Cappolïa Bacciocchi, where are the tombs of the Grand Duches Eliza, sister of Napoleon, and her husband Felix, Duke of Tuscany; and opposite this that of their two ehildren, both executsd by Franzoni. The former is erocted against the wall. Three life-sïze symboliojfemale figures form a fine group, standing in attitudes of profound grief by the sarcophagus. But by far tho most intereffting objeel in the church is the celebrated moridian line which is laid off in grand proportions on the white marble pavemeiït of tha chuxch, extonding obliq-uely from ono of the side chapéis in the aisle passing by orto of the columns irt'to the navo and flnaliy terminating at the door a distancc of about 250 feet - the centra! line of the diagram ceing of fine brass sunk in the marble, all tho other lines figures, zodiacal signs and lottering being clearly cut and traced in tho pavoment And surely no more splendid expanse o: shining inarblo could be fouird in all Europe where a diagram on such gïgantio scalo could bc projected without obstrucitionand in such a beautiful light. I was originally drawn by tho astronomer Cassini, in 16Ó3. On the same side of the church are also placed two plain but neat clocks, ono oi' which gives the solar and ;he other the mean time, made by Fornasini in 17.Ï6. ThuB it would seem that j heru is a doublé chance for this church I ,o accomplish some good, and aptly reminds tho observor that science and ion may and ought to go hand in hand. ?rom this we went to the church of St. ; dominio. The whito marblo sarcophaus coutiining the remains of tho saint, ' who died at Bologna in 1221, has some excellont reliëfs of incidents in the saint's ife, byPisani and Loinbardi, and akneelng angel-figure as woll as that of St. ?etronius are by the hand of Michael Angelo. The chapel being closed wo could not uiako any satisfactory examination of those. Above, in the arch of the : dome, is a "Transttguraticti of St. ; c," by that fainoua artist Guido Reni. - The stalla of the choir, of dark wood ; aid wiïh wood of a much lighter color, : n an ondloss varioty of dolicate and jeautiful designs, soemod fiuo enough to adorn a drawing room. But more interest in this church ceutered in the Capella dol Kosario thari afiywhore elso, though unfortunately the light was very poor. - Hiis chapel is fiescoed by the hand of Guido, and beneath is his own tomb. The leftnijig towers of Bologna are nearly aa celebrated as that of Pisa, but unfortunately aro quite plain shafts and do not appear so well in pictures and jrints, atid henee their fame is more circumscribed: Thesü towors are in close proximity, at the end of the street Mercato di Mezzo. The taller one, called ' Torre Asinelle," after its architect, was erected in 1109 and is 272 feet high and 3 1-2 feet out of tho perpendicular - a iluin square shaft, without ornament of any kind, but pierced with openings spmewhat irregularly in its sides, to light tho interior staircase leading to the top. Tho other, eructed in 1110, and also namod aiter its archttoct, " Torre Garisenda," is only 138 feot high, but inclines from its perpendicular eight feet toward the south and three feot toward the east, having settlcd in the direction a littlo sontV' of oast. This also aupoars to havo been intended to be entirely plain and unadorned, anl Hot beiiig completod comes to a somewhat abrupt termination. Why there were two towefs constructed so closoly together, separated by less than lift y feet, and both of brick, of similar size upon the base, doo3 not appear. No controversy has ever arisen as to the cause of their leaning. in fact leaning towors are the heritago of a great many Continental cities and villages, and their novelty would be soarcely suflicieut to induce the Pisan architect to construct ouo purposely about two oonturies later. Of kSéíte we enterod the Tinifersity which had the foundations laid within ten years after the date of the towers, but we ónly took the lowest courso in its curriculum. Looking through the lower corridors and oourt we saw the busts of some of the professors, but could not obtain sdmission to the University rooms above at the hour of our arrival. The present building, formerly the Palazzo Cellesi, has only jibèfi occupied since 1803, and thero is now a corps of fiftyeight professors to only four hundred students. In the earlier history of this Univeraity it is notably truo that at different times several 0f ïfcs professorships have been succossfully posaossed by ladies - though at the same time the gentier sex was not numbered among those who were eligible as studonts. Among the moSt curious of the objects we saw at Bologna waj itt singular confraternity of churchos known at the present time as St. Stephano. It is quite impossible to convey any intelligiblo description of this actual combination beneath a single roof of seven churches of estirely different plans and arrangemont. In the short space of an aour we were escorted by tho affable and amusing sacristán from No. 1 to No. Tt eeparated only by a single short passage qr door, and constan tly surprised by the singularity of all we saw, so that when it was all finished we feit liko adopting tho sacristan's only Btiglish eiaculation and pronounce all we had seen as " very cürious ! very curious ! " Entering from the street there is nothing unusual in tho interior arrangement that appears greatly different from other churches, excopt ihat it was not so large as to be iinpressive on that acootmt. It was circular in its general plan and evidently in constant use, being that portion of the edifice most anciont, dating from the fifth century ana founded by St. Petronius himseW, -vrhose tomb is its greatest treasüro. The next into which wo passed, or somo ono of the number, was femarkable for having its grand altar modeled aftor the Teinple of Solomon in all its authentic dotails. Another had its domo supported on columns of variüui styles of architecture, the altar ropresonting Mt. Calvary. Doric, Ionic, Coriithian, and Lombard oolumns were all to be seen side by sidc, and were indeed " very curious." Another had its altar constructed after the sepülchre at Jerusalem as it is said to appoar at tho present day. In others very old pictures, sacred relic3, ancient columns and strango devices, among theKf a pillar showing .the exact height of the Saviour, about live feet eight inohes, were exhibited, and finally wo descended into No. 7, wbich, strange to say, though last constructed lies bonoath soiae portions of the other six, and though not having so high a ceiling had yet all the nocessary space and appurtenanoes of sido chapéis and confessionals that made it complete as a place of worship. Thoso various structures embrace a court denominated tb.e " Oourt of Pilate, " in wtich that worthy is represented as sitting in judg'ment, and a oarved rooster was perched near by, ready to crow if Poter denied his master, aso. None of the churches aro abandoned asunfit for occupation, but are all kopt in order and some are in daily use. The Academy of Fine Arts, occupying former college of the Jebuits, we found to bo quite inteiesting, and it had in its possession soine exceedingly valüable pioturos besides a good colleotion óf arinor, casts, and a few marbles. We asïended at once to the picture gallery. - Df the raany admirable pictures in the jallery, only a few can be particularisod. First of all that celebrated work of Kaahael, " St. Cecilia." We had seen it ivith the singlo figure óf the snint, and ;hought it beautiful, but infinitely more o is that same figure standing contrally in the group around,. with the choir of mgols overhead, and, entranoed by the tieavenly musio, unconsciously letting "all her own forgotten harp. The attiiudo, the upfurned face, and the intense aeauty of the countenanco are wonder:'ul in their oxprussivouess. This picture Napoleon transferred to Paris, but it was returned after nis 'lownfall. A Madonna, by Anni bal Caracei ; " The Commulion of St. Jeromc," by Agostino Caracei, jnco thought to be ivcithy of comparson with Ilaphael's " TransfiguratiOi. ;" several Madonnas hj Francio ; " Conrer-iion of St. Paul," by Ludovico Uaracoi, re all very bcautiful. But after the ' St. Cecilia " the most exqnïsite and efi'ective pictures were thoso of Guido Iteni. Most of the specimens we had seen of this great artist had been heads only, or very small works. Hero, at Bologna, thü home of the artist, we were not disappointed, for here was his "Sampson" - a grand figure. His " Crucifixion," one of his finest works, and one of the best renderings of that subject, so often treated by all the greatest artists; His "Madonna dëlla Piëta," a very largo painting and bearing in every part evidences of that perfection of finish and marvelous beauty of general effect -which especially characterize hia works ; his " Slaughter of the Innocents," in which his pencil has seized evory expression of matnral affection in defense of the offspring, as well as every form of childish innocence and loveliness, and given to it a most wonder ful reality. But pleasant as it is to stop in such a nice old city, and to have an opportunity to see these productions of the highest art, it is not to bo com pared to that greater center of these treasures of genius toward which we were hastoning, and having in this brief stay of twenty-four hours completed a survey of the most interes ting sights of Bologna, we again resumed our seats in the train for Florence The road makes a wide detour about the city and up the Eeuo, near where the compromise was effected which resulted in the Triumvirato of Anthony, Octavius and Lepidus, 43 B. C , and sealed the dooiö of Cicero while it inade Augustus üctavianus Cecsar Einporor of Bome, in its brightest period.