CHAPTER XXXIV
MARKET DAY IN PERUGIA
Perugia, on its lofty hilltop, was reached by the two travellers beforethe sun had quite kissed away the early freshness of the morning. Sincemidnight, there had been a heavy, rain, bringing infinite refreshment tothe scene of verdure and fertility amid which this ancient civilizationstands; insomuch that Kenyon loitered, when they came to the gray citywall, and was loath to give up the prospect of the sunny wilderness thatlay below. It was as green as England, and bright as Italy alone. Therewas all the wide valley, sweeping down and spreading away on all sidesfrom the weed grown ramparts, and bounded afar by mountains, which layasleep in the sun, with thin mists and silvery clouds floating abouttheir heads by way of morning dreams.
"It lacks still two hours of noon," said the sculptor to his friend, asthey stood under the arch of the gateway, waiting for their passportsto be examined; "will you come with me to see some admirable frescos byPerugino? There is a hall in the Exchange, of no great magnitude, butcovered with what must have been--at the time it was painted--suchmagnificence and beauty as the world had not elsewhere to show."
"It depresses me to look at old frescos," responded the Count; "it is apain, yet not enough of a pain to answer as a penance."
"Will you look at some pictures by Fra Angelico in the Church of SanDomenico?" asked Kenyon; "they are full of religious sincerity, Whenone studies them faithfully, it is like holding a conversation aboutheavenly things with a tender and devout-minded man."
"You have shown me some of Fra Angelico's pictures, I remember,"answered Donatello; "his angels look as if they had never taken a flightout of heaven; and his saints seem to have been born saints, and alwaysto have lived so. Young maidens, and all innocent persons, I doubt not,may find great delight and profit in looking at such holy pictures. Butthey are not for me."
"Your criticism, I fancy, has great moral depth," replied Kenyon; "andI see in it the reason why Hilda so highly appreciates Fra Angelico'spictures. Well; we will let all such matters pass for to-day, and strollabout this fine old city till noon."
They wandered to and fro, accordingly, and lost themselves among thestrange, precipitate passages, which, in Perugia, are called streets,Some of them are like caverns, being arched all over, and plunging downabruptly towards an unknown darkness; which, when you have fathomedits depths, admits you to a daylight that you scarcely hoped to beholdagain. Here they met shabby men, and the careworn wives and mothersof the people, some of whom guided children in leading strings throughthose dim and antique thoroughfares, where a hundred generations hadpassed before the little feet of to-day began to tread them. Thence theyclimbed upward again, and came to the level plateau, on the summit ofthe hill, where are situated the grand piazza and the principal publicedifices.
It happened to be market day in Perugia. The great square, therefore,presented a far more vivacious spectacle than would have been witnessedin it at any other time of the week, though not so lively as to overcomethe gray solemnity of the architectural portion of the scene. In theshadow of the cathedral and other old Gothic structures--seeking shelterfrom the sunshine that fell across the rest of the piazza--was a crowdof people, engaged as buyers or sellers in the petty traffic of acountry fair. Dealers had erected booths and stalls on the pavement,and overspread them with scanty awnings, beneath which they stood,vociferously crying their merchandise; such as shoes, hats and caps,yarn stockings, cheap jewelry and cutlery, books, chiefly little volumesof a religious Character, and a few French novels; toys, tinware,old iron, cloth, rosaries of beads, crucifixes, cakes, biscuits,sugar-plums, and innumerable little odds and ends, which we see noobject in advertising. Baskets of grapes, figs, and pears stood on theground. Donkeys, bearing panniers stuffed out with kitchen vegetables,and requiring an ample roadway, roughly shouldered aside the throng.
Crowded as the square was, a juggler found room to spread out a whitecloth upon the pavement, and cover it with cups, plates, balls, cards,w the whole material of his magic, in short,--wherewith he proceeded towork miracles under the noonday sun. An organ grinder at one point, anda clarion and a flute at another, accomplished what their could towardsfilling the wide space with tuneful noise, Their small uproar,however, was nearly drowned by the multitudinous voices of the people,bargaining, quarrelling, laughing, and babbling copiously at random;for the briskness of the mountain atmosphere, or some other cause, madeeverybody so loquacious, that more words were wasted in Perugia on thisone market day, than the noisiest piazza of Rome would utter in a month.
Through all this petty tumult, which kept beguiling one's eyes and upperstrata of thought, it was delightful to catch glimpses of the grandold architecture that stood around the square. The life of theflitting moment, existing in the antique shell of an age gone by, has afascination which we do not find in either the past or present, taken bythemselves. It might seem irreverent to make the gray cathedral andthe tall, time-worn palaces echo back the exuberant vociferation of themarket; but they did so, and caused the sound to assume a kind ofpoetic rhythm, and themselves looked only the more majestic for theircondescension.
On one side, there was an immense edifice devoted to public purposes,with an antique gallery, and a range of arched and stone-mullionedwindows, running along its front; and by way of entrance it had acentral Gothic arch, elaborately wreathed around with sculpturedsemicircles, within which the spectator was aware of a stately andimpressive gloom. Though merely the municipal council-house and exchangeof a decayed country town, this structure was worthy to have held inone portion of it the parliament hall of a nation, and in the other, thestate apartments of its ruler. On another side of the square rose themediaeval front of the cathedral, where the imagination of a Gothicarchitect had long ago flowered out indestructibly, in the first place,a grand design, and then covering it with such abundant detail ofornament, that the magnitude of the work seemed less a miracle than itsminuteness. You would suppose that he must have softened the stoneinto wax, until his most delicate fancies were modelled in the pliantmaterial, and then had hardened it into stone again. The whole was avast, black-letter page of the richest and quaintest poetry. In fitkeeping with all this old magnificence was a great marble fountain,where again the Gothic imagination showed its overflow and gratuity ofdevice in the manifold sculptures which it lavished as freely as thewater did its shifting shapes.
Besides the two venerable structures which we have described, there werelofty palaces, perhaps of as old a date, rising story above Story, andadorned with balconies, whence, hundreds of years ago, the princelyoccupants had been accustomed to gaze down at the sports, business, andpopular assemblages of the piazza. And, beyond all question, they thuswitnessed the erection of a bronze statue, which, three centuries since,was placed on the pedestal that it still occupies.
"I never come to Perugia," said Kenyon, "without spending as much timeas I can spare in studying yonder statue of Pope Julius the Third. Thosesculptors of the Middle Age have fitter lessons for the professors ofmy art than we can find in the Grecian masterpieces. They belong to ourChristian civilization; and, being earnest works, they always expresssomething which we do not get from the antique. Will you look at it?"
"Willingly," replied the Count, "for I see, even so far off, that thestatue is bestowing a benediction, and there is a feeling in my heartthat I may be permitted to share it."
Remembering the similar idea which Miriam a short time before hadexpressed, the sculptor smiled hopefully at the coincidence. They madetheir way through the throng of the market place, and approached closeto the iron railing that protected the pedestal of the statue.
It was the figure of a pope, arrayed in his pontifical robes, andcrowned with the tiara. He sat in a bronze chair, elevated high abovethe pavement, and seemed to take kindly yet authoritative cognizanceof the busy scene which was at that moment passing before his eye. Hisright hand was raised and spread abroad, as if in the act of sheddingforth a benediction, which every man--so broad, so wise, a
nd so serenelyaffectionate was the bronze pope's regard--might hope to feel quietlydescending upon the need, or the distress, that he had closest at hisheart. The statue had life and observation in it, as well as patriarchalmajesty. An imaginative spectator could not but be impressed withthe idea that this benignly awful representative of divine and humanauthority might rise from his brazen chair, should any great publicexigency demand his interposition, and encourage or restrain the peopleby his gesture, or even by prophetic utterances worthy of so grand apresence.
And in the long, calm intervals, amid the quiet lapse of ages, thepontiff watched the daily turmoil around his seat, listening withmajestic patience to the market cries, and all the petty uproar thatawoke the echoes of the stately old piazza. He was the enduring friendof these men, and of their forefathers and children, the familiar faceof generations.
"The pope's blessing, methinks, has fallen upon you," observed thesculptor, looking at his friend.
In truth, Donatello's countenance indicated a healthier spirit thanwhile he was brooding in his melancholy tower. The change of scene, thebreaking up of custom, the fresh flow of incidents, the sense of beinghomeless, and therefore free, had done something for our poor Faun;these circumstances had at least promoted a reaction, which might elsehave been slower in its progress. Then, no doubt, the bright day, thegay spectacle of the market place, and the sympathetic exhilarationof so many people's cheerfulness, had each their suitable effect on atemper naturally prone to be glad. Perhaps, too, he was magneticallyconscious of a presence that formerly sufficed to make him happy. Be thecause what it might, Donatello's eyes shone with a serene and hopefulexpression while looking upward at the bronze pope, to whose widelydiffused blessing, it may be, he attributed all this good influence.
"Yes, my dear friend," said he, in reply to the sculptor's remark, "Ifeel the blessing upon my spirit."
"It is wonderful," said Kenyon, with a smile, "wonderful and delightfulto think how long a good man's beneficence may be potent, even after hisdeath. How great, then, must have been the efficacy of this excellentpontiff's blessing while he was alive!"
"I have heard," remarked the Count, "that there was a brazen image setup in the wilderness, the sight of which healed the Israelites of theirpoisonous and rankling wounds. If it be the Blessed Virgin's pleasure,why should not this holy image before us do me equal good? A wound haslong been rankling in my soul, and filling it with poison."
"I did wrong to smile," answered Kenyon. "It is not for me to limitProvidence in its operations on man's spirit."
While they stood talking, the clock in the neighboring cathedral toldthe hour, with twelve reverberating strokes, which it flung down uponthe crowded market place, as if warning one and all to take advantageof the bronze pontiff's benediction, or of Heaven's blessing, howeverproffered, before the opportunity were lost.
"High noon," said the sculptor. "It is Miriam's hour!"