Minutes of remarks on subjects picturesque, moral and miscellaneous, made in a course along the Rhine and during a residence in Swisserland and Italy, in the years 1822 & 23

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MINUTES OF REMARKS, &c. &c A MINUTES OF REMARKS ON SUBJECTS PICTURESQUE, MORAL, AND MISCELLANEOUS, MADE IN A COURSE ALONG THE RHINE, AND DURING RESIDENCE IN SWISSERLAND AND ITALY, IN THE YEARS 1822 & 1823. By WILLIAM WEBB, Esq. M.R.I. A. DEPUTY commissary-general to the forces. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON : BALDWIN, CRADOCK, AND JOY ; WILLIAM FREDERICK WAKEMAN, DUBLIN. 1827. BENTHAM AND HARDY, PRINTERS, CECILIA-STREET. The Author regrets, that the pressure of an active em ployment has induce J the result of preventing him from con tributing his part to the correction of typographical errors — several of which, he finds, have escaped his notice. These errors cannot possibly prove so annoying to his readers as they are to himself. He is happy, however, to have iL in his power to express his belief, that not any one of them involves an arithmetical mis-statement, or materially inter feres with the meaning of the context.

TABLE OF CONTENTS. VOLUME I. SECT. I. PAGE. Calais — Lille — Antwerp — Malines— Brussels- Waterloo — Liege — Ai*cla-Chapelle— Cologne - Coblentz — Mentz— Frankfort — Carlsrhue— The Brisgau — Freybourg, . . . . . . . . . . 1 SECT. II. Basle — Zurich — Lucerne — Mont Righi — Swiss Costumes— Berne— Thoune — - Interlaken — Lausanne, .. .. .. .. .. 39 SECT. III. Vevey — Lake of Geneva — Meillerie Mountains — Castle of Chillon — Chatelard, .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 68 SECT. IV. Vevey— Manners, Morals, and Legislation, .. .. .. 79 SECT. V. The Valais— Valley of the Rhone— Passage of the Simplon — Lago Maggiore — Milan — Como, .. .. . . .. .. 106 SECT. VI. Lodi — Po River— Parma — Bologna — The Appennine Mountains, .. 138 SECT. VII. Florence — Fiesole— Italian morals, .. .. .. .. 154 SECT. VIII. Sienna — Radicofani — Bolsenu — Viterbo— Campania of Rome, .. [VOL. 1.

II CONTENTS. PAGE. SECT. IX. Rome — Ancient Edifices and Ruins— St. Peter's— Carnival— Englishmen in Italy -Sunday Theatre on the Continent generally — Manners ofthe Romans, .. .. .. .. .. .. •• ***** ' SECT. X. Excursion into the Campania— A ppian Way — Sepulchral Monuments — Aqueducts, . . . . . . . . . . • • ****26 SECT. XI. Rome -rLateran Church— Walls and Gates of the City— Fountains — Palaces — Assassination — Population, . . - . - • 2-I3 SECT. XII. Rome — Climate --English Cemetery Monte Testaccio St. Paul's Church — Pincian Hill — Borghese Gardens-^Volcanic formation of the Campania — Creation of Twelve Cardinals — Aurora of Guido and of Guercino, . . . . . . . . . . - • -W SECT. XIV. Rome— Catacombs— Valley of Egeria- Vatican Museum— St. Peter's Church — St. Patrick's Day at Rome -Capitoline Museum— Sistine Chapel — Michael Angelo's Last Judgment — Villa Albani— Doria Pamfili Gardens, .. .. .. .. .. .. 278 SECT.

Section I. Calais

26TH JUNE, 1822. Dinner at Meurice's table d'hote, twenty-four persons; soup and two courses, much variety in each, and abundant in itself for a large company ; a desert of at least half a dozen kinds of fruit. The table fare was a sufficient an nouncement that you were out of England, which idea was ratified by the cost — not quite three shillings, including wine. A dinner of the same description on the other side of the water would have been at least four times the money.* Calais is in a miserable strand-shore situation. Within the fortifications it is a neat well built town : the streets run strictly parallel, and are intersected by others as regularly parallel and of uniform elevation. There is here no air of antiquity, not even a coin-stone appearing of the buildings of the olden time.

It disappoints an Englishman's anticipations, whose historic recollections would pour tray Calais * It may be right to state here, that these minutes were commenced at the foot and on the back of inn-keeper's bills, and have from this pigmy origin, with progressive audacity, increased to their present size. I! ST. OMER7S. as the frontier fortress of France, bearding the British cliffs, and tempting British Quixotism, of which it was for cen turies the prize and trophy, as Gibraltar is at the present day. 27tb.— On the road to St. Omer's, some corn-fields appear already cut: the houses all along in this garden country are excellent in their respective kinds, and in the best state of repair ; the people are well elothed and comfortable looking ; the men in cocked hats, and coats of antique cut.

The long stretches of road are guarded by fosse, and lined with elms or tall poplars. Special care is taken in pruning these trees and restraining them to a head, the most promising shoot being trained for a leader — a most judicious practice. In the salon of the Inn at St. Omer's a large printed sheet is appended to the wall, with the heading " To the glory of France — three victories per day." These victories are catalogued as won from 1793 to 1815. The average of three is most modest, since in just arithmetic the number in the list would cover nearly four. It remains to state that, as memorials of this national glory are specified the naval victories of Earl Howe of the 1st of June, of Lord Nelson at Aboukir and Trafalgar, and the land battles of Maida, Vimiera, Vittoria and Waterloo. These are but stray samples of French glory placarded on this sheet, as won at the expense of their enemies. 28th.— To Cassel and Lille.

Much wheat reaped and some flax : the corn-stubbles mostly ploughed, and in some fields cabbages already put in ; others covering with manure ; the country most rich and wooded. From Cassel a cheerful town on the crown of a high hill, the view is most extensive, the wood so grouped as to occupy in appearance more than two-thirds of the expanse, whereas the reality must be the converse of this. I understand that seventeen fortified towns, including Dover Castle, are visible CASSEL and lille. from the noble mansion of General Vandamrrie here, together with fifty open towns and one hundred villages. Lille. — At the garrison parade in the evening, on the esplanade, I observed a practice which struck me as of very unmilitary precision— the regimental bands performing with their music-books held spread before them by boys, and when in march extended by their own contrivance in the best way they could : this practice I understand to be general on the Continent. 29th June. — To Menin, in two hours, a barrier town of the kingdom of the Netherlands, begirt with newly-erected fortifications.

In two hours more to Courtrai, an excellent town for its size, and deserving of notice, even after Lille. In the evening to Ghent : and on the following day, Sunday, ranged fully through this extensive city, now in the dead ebb of energy and departed wealth: — And this half-alive aggre gate of palaces and superb public structures was once a sort of London, — proud, turbulent, pouring forth armies out of its own streets, and assertingits mi§ht, and exer cising its dictation in the congresses of kings. The re trospection of these past realities is like the phantoms of a dream. One instance among many of the preference given by our continental neighbours to the shewy rather than the useful, is exhibited in the clocks appended to the public buildings, and which are very numerous in every town.

These proclaim with loud hurdy-gurdy tune the hour, and chime in prolonged base music each division of time down to the half-quarter, but are invariably without a minute hand, or any help to indicate time to the eye except by guess from the place of the hour-hand on the dial. 1st July. — To Antwerp. Till within four miles of this town the country is extremely rich ; its flats not disagreeable to the eye from the number of trees spreading over the expanse and coming up to the road, the avenue ranges of b ANTWERP. which give effect and dress to the general landscape. The oaks are all lopt : this discipline, as well as the want of age of all the timber of this country is explained by the great demand for house fuel. Crops of corn immense: towns and villages along the road superior in style to any thing I had hitherto seen ; the road itself— as if ground was of higher value — much narrower.

Garlands and other gauds in honour of St. Peter's day, hung across the streets and roads every where as we advanced. This festival—celebrated also with music and dancing — they call the Kermesse: in character it reminds me of the Irish Roman Catholic festivals which they call patrons. Near Antwerp the country is a forlorn fiat, intersected by vile plashes and dikes, without one tree to relieve the eye ; fit domain for a stern fortified place which has frowned from its contiguity all vestige of human industry or habita tion. Crossed the Scheldt by a ferry, about half the breadth of the Mersey at Liverpool. Antwerp, its buildings and lanes, very mean after the magnificence of Ghent ; but it is all activity and bustle of trade. In Churches it is beyond any Flemish town I have yet seen. Of the interior of its Cathedral I will not pretend to speak, inasmuch as its ex terior has to me a clumsiness and coarseness, for which I was not prepared in a structure extolled without reserve.

Harsh weather and a strong wind, precluded my ascent of its steeple. I could have much wished to have had the view from thence, of which a friend long ago told me that while the cultivated and densely peopled expanse, to the utmost verge of the horizon around, occupied the gaze and drew the continued expression of amazement of his party for a whole hour, one individual alone had not uttered a syllable till the moment of descending,— when he imparted, as the sum of his observations, that not one tile or slate was wanting or required re-setting on the roof of house or of out-house of all that had been under his eye. The MALINES. had its meaning, and I believe it is equally true of every view from every other steeple throughout Flanders. To Malines in the afternoon : its floridly rich and venerable Cathedral and some other relics of dignity and state, commensurate with stir and ambition long fallen asleep, give I know not what painful spasm to check the otherwise lethargic cast of this place.

The country thence on to Vil verde is as dull as the city. From Vilverde, the road ranges for six miles to Brussels along a noble canal, with rows of tall beech on one side, and on the other poplar and after wards elm. Here all corn disappears, and no other crop but grass is seen ; the expanse rich in woods breaks into beautiful hills. In front to the canal lie, in thick succession, houses of entertainment handsomely built, and still more numerous villas laid out with finely-kept gardens. Well dressed people in abundance, sitting toping and smoking in front in open air ; and crowds of hackney carriages and private equipages in full motion over the spacious roads. The splendour of the villas increases as you proceed, and the bold and rich features of the country also prominently increase until you come in view of the Royal Palace of Lacken ; its facade shewn with dignity from the brow of one of those fine hills, — large accompaniments of wood supporting it, and extensive pleasure grounds with water diffused in the English garden style ranging around and in front down to the road.

More than a mile farther on rises another of the noble swells of ground tli rough which you move, with the plain at its foot, occupied in its full breadth, and from summit to flat, by the gay metropolis itself, Brussels. In the Hotel de Flandres, in the Place Royale, crowning the topmost elevation of the whole, I have my quarters fixed. The Place Royale is an oblong of moderate dimensions, environed by palace structures and a fine modern Church. Close to it is Belle-vue Pare, of somewhat less extent than BRUSSELS. Stephen's-green in Dublin. Round its four sides ranges a suite of magnificent houses, one of them a town palace of <' Sa Majestt. le Roi," as with full expectoration of his dignity was stated to me, buttressed on one side by the Palace of the Corp Legislatif, and on the other by that of the British Ambassador.

The rest of the series is in a style which by no means derogates from these. The inner area, intersected with walks and embellished by numerous marble statues, is distributed into divisions, some of open and gay extension, others of retirement in groves so tall and thick as to shut out the sun, and with underwood so close as to seclude each portion of it from every other, and to give to the entire the impression of immense. What is still more strange in a town site, the surface is so broken, and, in spots, the dells so strongly featured as to impart the character of remote and wild woodland scenery. I may fairly anticipate my farther experience, and pronounce this Pare of Belle-vue a thing unrivalled. July 4. — Left Brussels at five in the morning for Water loo : a charming drive through cheerful villages and rich farms ; and the wood a grove of the tall slender elm so common in this country, soon yielding to beech exclusively.

At Waterloo, a portion of ground like common taken in for a cemetery, where some of our heroes lie. Waterloo Church, a structure of mere village dimensions, — without, imposing, from the boldness of its cupola; within, miserable save for the garniture of inscriptions round its walls, tributes of affection to relatives or comrades fallen in the battle. Some of these are deeply affecting ; Canning, and a hero who was killed by the side of his brother, especially ;— not forgetting the tablet of names furnished by the Royal Scots which most properly includes their gallant Sergeant-Major— killed in supporting the colors which had passed successively from one victim bearer to another of some five or six commis sioned officers. The Scots and the Germans (of which last WATERLOO. we had a legion in the action) have been laudably national in their inscriptions — the English and the Irish quite un national, but not on that account I ween unfeeling.

Traversed the field from centre to the farm-house of La Belle Alliance, close opposite to it; from that farm house to Hugoumont ; and returned by the opposite hill and the valley, in which, after the action, 130 pieces of French artillery were collected. At Hugoumont (round which the slaughter of the enemy was frightfully immense in attempt ing to penetrate the precincts) I was shewn the family Chapel, where the foot — and nothing more — of the wooden image of the Virgin Mother was scorched by the fire ofthe French shells, which had consumed the straw-roofs and whatever else was combustible in the out-buildings, of which this Chapel formed a portion. The proprietor of this mansion, Baron de Goumont, 1 think they called him, died from a broken heart, so affected was he by the devastation of the day to the premises and his surrounding property.

La Haye Sainte — along the left of the field— of which we have heard so much, makes now a miserable fence. It had been a hedge, thick and strong below, while it shot to the height of lofty sapling trees. So utterly was it beaten down by the battle-hail, and so numerous were the perfora tions from the passage of our troops, that it remains a ragged outline, its gaps unclosed, and the shoots cut for fuel as they rise above the unsightly level. It has been imputed to the Duke of Wellington as an oversight, that he left to its own resources a German force, stationed within the farm-house of La Haye Sainte, the consequence of which was, that being at length without ammunition while their post was surrounded, they were overpowered and put to the sword. The admission of the fact by his Grace, and the taking of the blame on himself, are characteristic of the unobtrusiveness of his pretensions.

WATERLOO. The house in question was not twenty perches from the British centre ; yet so severe was the French onset, and so stub bornly was it maintained on our front, that they mastered, and in their turn garrisoned a post almost in our contact. - My guide over the field, a very intelligent man, had two or three days before accompanied a son of Lucien Buona parte, recently married to his cousin, a daughter of Louis, and now in Flanders. He mentioned that having detailed to the young man the particulars connected with the different localities, with a fidelity which could be in no way flattering to French vanity, inasmuch as facts could not on the spot be made to sort with illusion — his hearer received all with seeming fixed attention, butwithoutmovingamuscleof his countenance, or being once betrayed into the slightest syllable of remark.

So far as I may depend on the statement of my guide, and he seems a man of accurate mind, the approach ofthe Prus sians was first ascertained about five o'clock, and the Duke of Wellington made his grand charge two hours after ; the Prussians not arriving to co-operate with it otherwise than by the discharge of their cannon as they came within range.* At Waterloo an Englishman is subject to all the an- * On this often debated point, the British and Prussian official accounts accurately agree. The latter describe the French to be " fighting with desperate " fury at half-past seven ; but some uncertainty to be perceived in their " movements, and some of their cannon to be retreating. At this moment the " first columns of General Ziethen arrived at the point of attack, and instantly " charged the enemy ; his right was broken in three places ; our troops rushed " forward at the charge-step, while at the same moment the whole English " line advanced."

In the London Gazette, the Duke of Wellington states that, " about seven, the enemy made a desperate attack which was defeated ; " and having observed that they retired in great confusion, and that the march " of General Bulow's corps had begun to take effect," e_c. his Grace " determined to attack the enemy, and immediately advanced with his whole "line: the attack succeeded in every point." Can any event be more con sentaneously stated by two different relators ? and do not both accounts establish, that, at the close of the day the British army had completely repelled their an tagonists, had made then, retire '< iu great confusion" after their fiercest and expiring effort, and were in condition to advance in their entire extent of line and to retaliate in their unbroken strength on a recoiling and disorganised WATERLOO. noyances which give pain at every point of strong attrac tion on the Continent.

An old beggar-retainer of the Church mumbled out a demand for a contribution for it on some score or other, in such a way as if he wished it not to be understood. The file at the auberge, who also shews the grave-ground, when she contended for a fee of a franc and half, when a franc would have been most liberal payment, pleaded also somewhat about the Church : I called her quietly, " avare," to which imputation she resignedly sub mitted, but had her franc and half in full. But such a cloud of mendicants as distribute themselves over the field, under pretext of being hawkers of relics alleged to have been found there ; or of paltriest child's toys, fabricated of pot metal, or as they tell yo\i, from frag ments of cannon and other appointments that seven years ago strewed the field. Then their pertinacity in chase of you, through all your windings of a mile, in defiance alike of intreaty or refusal, and to the utter confounding of all accurate communication with your guide : and such a torrent of deep-mouthed scurrility against your nation and yourself, before they give place to another miscreant swarm which relieves them in an ever-circling round of chatter and disgust !

Can it be, in sober fact, that they are vam pire exhalations from the heaps of defeated corpses below, who have thus succeeded in still wreaking on us their hate unquenched in death ! These memoranda are but of trifles ; and I find myself taking refuge in trifles : for 1 recoil from tracing the feeling dominant on the spot, even as materials for future and less enemy ? In what produced or regarded the relative situation of the British and French armies — the confusion and route of the one contrasted with the determined front and power for forward offensive operations of the other — the Prussiau army had nothing whatever to do. In co-operating in those final offensive operations they had a large share, and, fresh as they were numerous, a much larger in the consummation which crowned the day of the 18th of June.

BRUSSELS. excited reflection. Crecy, Poictiers, Agincourt, our greatest achievements of the chivalrous ages, have here been fully equalled, and our rival nation, or, in customary phrase, natural enemy, is laid low in a contest sacred from national animosities. Yet still, England having, here, wrested the palm of victory from the Attila of our day, and thereby put an end to that tyranny which had debased and kept in thraldrom all Europe save itself — England, the sole nation which had throughout held cheap this proudest and vainest and most successful of boasters, and finally beat him and his enthusiastic myrmidons to the ground and to powder; — the localities and the name of Waterloo must ever kindle the justest and honestest pride in the bosom of Britons. This pride will swell higher the more they reflect, that the surpassing glory of their nation is built on their home institutions, results as these are of liberty invigorating law, and being invigorated by it, and developing themselves to the utmost in thought and in deed, in moral sentiment, manners, gesture, almost features and look, in guise so unequivocal, that Englishmen stand the conscious and the recognised " Lords of human kind."

What a fearful weight of debt is theirs, individually and collectively, for blessings at home unknown to every other age and people of Christen dom—for might abroad, and for that protection under which this their exercise of it became deliverance to the world from wrong and robbery. To feel that they owe, is here how ever to pay : to act, each and all, under a due sense of their obligations— multiplied and mighty as they are— will be taken in full acquittance of their debt. Returned to Brussels in the forenoon. Of the public structures here beyond the precincts of the Place Royale and Belle-vue, little can be said. None of the Churches, not even the principal one, struck me with interest. It has, in common with every other town of the Netherlands, its Maison de Ville-a description of edifice prodigious in LIEGE dimensions, of imposing architecture — being a mixture of Gothic and Moorish — and venerable from antiquity.

The Guildhall of Ghent is stupendously noble. That of Brussels stands on the more open site of the Grande Place ; and the opposite and contiguous structures, of Brobdignag massiveness, with devices and inscriptions still extant on their front — memorials of the achievements of generations long since gone to sleep— come in aid of the uncouthness of its Maison de Ville so that, if somewhat less in size, it yields not in impressive character. Its curious gothic tower contributes to this impressiveness ; it is in height nearly 400 feet, and serves to guide the strangers in Brussels through its dense labyrinth of streets. But more fantastic far than all this, is the roof with which the building is capped ; so monstrous in elevation, and of such consequent inclined plane, as to exceed in superficies the elevation of front which it surmounts.

Over this roof, to make it yet more grotesque, are distributed in regular ranges, tier after tier of windows, laid thick, side by side, in the manner of projecting sky-lights, and answering no doubt to stories of garret apartments. The number of these stories, though I counted them but three hours back, it staggers me to minute on the credit of my memory ; they cannot be less than half a score. Thus possibly it was that, in the same old fashioned times, the doublet of satin which cased the frame of Lord Keeper Hatton, or other antique courtier, was not more brave to view than the " high crowned hat," which surmounted his person. Quitted Brussels on the evening of the 5th, for Aix-la- Chapelle ; the first part of the journey of course by night, but with such a moon as to display a continued expanse of undulating country under corn cultivation and with but few trees.

Passed through Louvaine, the features of which presented nothing remarkable, with exception of its Maison de Ville, nobly gothic in feature, its surface rich in tracery, LIEGE its general aspect cap.tivatingly picturesque. Through Tir lemont also, which possibly looked handsomer than by day; its streets, regard being had to their minor scale, superior to those of Louvaine— superior, if the moon mocked me not, to many in Brussels. The barred gate of this city, on our going out, was opened by a female, in burlesque I presume of its walled and fortified apparatus of protection. Breakfasted at Orey, at three in the morning ; a most miserable safeguard against the privation of all food, which awaited me till the close of the day and end of my journey. To Liege at 9 a. m. The view from the hill on which the city is built, overlooking the valley of the Maese, is extensive and magnificent.

Liege itself is a large ugly city, forcibly reminding me of some of our principal Irish towns in the character of its streets, in the appearance and detail of dress of the lower orders of women and perhaps of men, and, I am sorry to say, in their squalidness, which forms a shocking contrast with the cleanly and healthy ap pearance of the population in every other place I have seen since my landing. Mendicity is excessive here, and extends onward to the Prussian frontier in the vicinity of Aix-la- Chapelle, the road to which, for a tormentingextent of leagues, is lined with hordes of most sturdy beggars. Beyond the Prussian frontier, the open exercise of mendicity is prohibited. The Ecclesistical Government of this country is at an end : the vast and magnificent Palace of its Prince Bishop is converted to municipal purposes : a territory in which the fruits of imbecile administration have so grievously prospered is added to the Sovereignty of the Netherlands : and let us hope that a policy totally different will gradually conform its institutions, its practices, its habits, even its morals, to those of that nation of industry and comfort.

A succession of hills of bewitching beauty continues from hence to Aix-la-Chapelle :— little corn ; grass generally ; the fields in small enclosures ; luxuriant hedges and hedge-row AIX-LA-CHAPELLE 13 trees, and numerous scattered tufts of wood grouping with them; — a tract of exquisitely lovely and most productive farm country, for which, perhaps, I should vainly seek a parallel in England, so much more varied is its surface than any thing which England generally can shew. Ample time has been given me to gaze on this charming scenery, so far at least as the movement of our coach, or as it is right fitly named, post-wagon was concerned. The course from Liege has been a crawl, a something short of walk, if that be possible ; " because," as the conductor explained to me, " there were but two sets of horses for the entire line, and they could not be worked harder," The equipment I suggested, of a third set, was an extravagance to him at first incomprehensible, but which, when he could be brought to view as a mere supposition, he scouted as ri diculously absurd.* From time to time as, winding upward from the bosom of each delightful vale, we gained the terrace eminence of the successive hills, I remarked in front towards the horizon a lofty range of mount — of austere coloring which, on nearer approach, proved to be mantle of forest investing a barren ridge that cuts across the softer featured expanse.

On the off side of this stern ridge, which is traversed partly by steep ascent and partly through a natural gap, lies Aix-la-Chapelle, in a region equally charming with that which the ridge shuts out. The antique fortress walls, and manifold architectural peculiarities of this city, carry back the mind without effort, to the days of its youth and domination under Charlemagne— whose seat of empire it was. J uly 7th, Sunday— The shops all open and business-like ; not in the manner of Ghent, where I remarked, that though * This nuisance I learn has been since abated by the Government, which has substituted a Diligence that positively moves. AIX-LA-CHAPELLE. open they appeared to serve rather as front parlours, from whence to gaze upon the street loungers. Stiolled into the Great Room, called the Salle des Redoutes — ao large perhaps as the Great Room at Bath, and better proportioned.