Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-05-10
BEAUTIES OF BOLOGNA.
VENERABLE MONUMENTS AND
RARE TREASURES.
The Leaning TOWers-EGs NTemOra-
bic Churches-SOme of the Works
OF the Old NIasters-GufdO- Ra-
phael-The Sampieri Gallery and
Other objects of Interest.

Phael-The Sampieri Gallery and
Other objects of Interest.
BOLOGNA. April l5.-Edftor Morning Netcs
I find that the famous author of The limo
cents Abroad" gives the following cursory
comment on Bologna: II find no mention q
Bologna Ia my memorandum book except
that we arrived there in good season, but saw
none of the suasages for which the place is SC
justly celebrated"
If Mark Twain ever visits Bologna at an un
seasonable time, l am sure he will appreciate
more highly the blessing which was once Fis
of arriving there Sin good season" For Of all
Italian cities this is certainly the coldest in
winter. the hottest in summer. and at other
times with weather to the last degree uncer
tain and capricious Thus, in the spring
time, we have left the sunniest of skies, the
balmiest Of breezes behind us at Pisa
and Florence, and find in Bologna
clustering March wind using its utmost en-.
deayors to persuade bleak and sullen winter
that it is not time to leave.
AS for the SauSageS, our experience is in flat
contradiction of that Of our gifted writer. The
veritable eau de cologue is perhaps made an
object of more prominent attention to the un-
but only because the appeal is directly to ones
olfactoiies. whereas the Bologna sausage is to
he gaZed at from a respectful distance, and
eaten with care. Bologna boasts, as perhaps
its greatest curioSities, two leaning towers.
They are also curiositieS of uglinesS, and,
standing close together, seem to vie with each
other in the exhibition of this quality. They are
OF perfectly plain brick and mortar, and rise up,
square and uncouth, ike nothing more famous
than the chimneyS of some large manufacture
ing establishment, which had burnt down and
left them standing, knocked awry. OF course
no comparison can be instituted between the
Tower of Radont Beauty at Pisa and these
brick piles of Bologna except as possessing
in common the single quality of cleaning -
The Tore Asinelli, the talest Of all, has of ne
ceSslty the least Incline; 1t is about twice the
heighth Of lis companion, the Tore GariSen-
da, which is some fifteen feet lower than Pisa g
Tower, while the latter, by the excess over all
in its incline, asserts its right to be called par
excellence, the Leaning Tower
The fact that the GariSenda Tower
was built Intentionally to be a leaning tower,
and yet def1ed its builders to rear it higher,
whereas that at Pisa is of greater altitude and
more out of the perpendicular, should afford
weghty argument Qf it were needed) to the
many Others advanced in support of the Dropo-
sition that Plsa's Campanile does not lean by
st Petronio, the largest church ediace in
Bologna, was begun with grand flourish of
trumpets and proud proclamation that it
should outdo the famous Cathedral of Flor
ambitious design thus contemplated-a design
that has never been consummated So that tits
not surprising to find that my most enduring
remembrance of St Petronio will be as of A
grand series of chords from a full organ
which, by sudden collapse in the bellows,
terminate with few spasmodic gasps.
The Church of st. James the Greater we
found very bleak looking and barren of attrac-
ton. cannot except the chapel behind the
choir, containing the masterpiece of Francia
whose merits as painter we made another
careful effort to appreciate here, and then gave
it up in despair.
The custodian of this church, who had rem
dered us literally no service beyond removing
the drop curtain from Francia's Madonna (it
might well seem to have been painted for the
sole benefit Of a custodan's pocket flew into
violent passion at the smaliness of the fee we
presented to him
We lher upon suggested that if it did not
please him he could return it, which acting
upon the impulse, he very fooishIy did. Then
he got nothing and cut a remarkably sorry
figure as he foil wed us down the nave and out
of the door of this house of Divire Worship
with blatant imprecations. We have met his
like before, but he must be written down as
the worst of an altogether contempt, bic class
We shall remember the church of St. Domen-
leo, not so much as containing the ashes of
the founder of the Inquistion, or for the hand
some SarcophaguS that enshrines them; al
though we shall not forget the two marble
angels that kneel above it, one designed by
Michael Angelo OF these angels one is far
more attractive than the other and great is
ores chagrin to be informed that that great
master, who ought of course to have designed
the attractive angel, designed the other No;
our interest in this editice centres In the fact
that it is the last resting place of the great
painter, Guido Reni
At that mast RS name what visions of
beauty pass before the enraptured mind, as by
the waving of magcians wand
His reputed masterpiece, the Aurora, proud
est ornament of the RospiglioSi Palace: the
Beatrice Cenc in the Palace Barberini a face
that ANNALS does Ofhar an
to the deepest SympathieS eff the human heart:
the triumphant beauty of the conquering
Archapgei, in his painting for the Capuchin
Church.; the wonderful crucifxion, that rivets
the gaze to the high altar. in the church of
Lorenzo in Lucina; the grand freSco of the
martyrdom of st. Andrew opposite the same
subject by his rival Dominichino in st Grego-
rvs Church; the majesty of the Eternal
Father, loftiest ornament Of St Peters dome
These and countless others, that would cover
pages in the mere recital, appeal to our re-
membrance of Guido, from bis works in Rome
And here in Bologna, his home, we have
studied msny OF his important and elaborate
works, bearing the impress Of great
thought and, skill and evidently the pro-
sem many unworthy paintings from this
masters brush in the course of our travels
many the outcome Of that greed of gain,
born OF the besetting passion for gaming that
clouded with shame his later years. 1t is not
for us to Judge him in the matter of human
frailty and error; and as for those unworthy
productions, he would be the first to join in
the censure given them, and to blot them ont
If he could. His ashes repose here in a church
to whose adornment his brush has largely cor |
tributed; and the altar of the chapel Of his |
rest supports painting whose frame Is a |
series OF psnel pictures by him and Others. |
The memorial tablet gives US the date of his |
birth and death, and so reminds us of she NOR |
talitY of human genius. But the paintings |
there bid us know that the master lives, and
StralghtWaY the magic wand waved. and |
there pass before the mind those great |
works. some of which have cted-that shall
continue to instruct and engven the souls of |
men; works that can never de-.
| have sp ken of our study of Guido's |
paintings in Bologna; thS most important and |
interesting are to- be ound in the Academy |
Of Fine ne Ar bt They Te With d large tSs RRa3dtg
and another at TIE foot Of the cross did not |
impress me as folcibly as his smaller picture
of the same SUBJECT, in the Lorenzo in-Lucina
Church in Rene. where there is but the solita-
~ cross wifi its Divine burden. afI er the exnir
ing 1T is Enished' had passed away amid the
OF the elements. In both paintings
the background of lurid tempest is in grand |
accord with the subject
or greater dramatic power is his Massacre of
The lnnocentS, subject as favorite with the
as that of The Ohaste Susanna, if not
lead infant in the foreground Git has the flesh
.intS peculiar to death, and the inactivity of
ieath, as distinct from that Of sleep
IS life itself could beD is in strik-
he distracted fury of the mother beyond,
Those figures OF the agonized mothers con-
ending with the slayers of their babes who
will cut them down and stab or strangIe them
before their very eyes and at their very
breasts. have been criticised as exaggerated in
his and in every other presentation of the
scene, not excepting that in Raphael's tapes
ry-cartoons If the critics would Just stop a
moment and imagine the scene enacted before
hem ; their own wives or mothers or sisters
)r daughters the despairing actors, their own
iesh and blood the innocent Victims l think
hey would feel the horror of that scene could
lever be exaggerated. rank Guido's con-
,eption of il here wi Raphael's and
have seen no finer.
The madonna della Pieta is one of the most
important by Guido in this collection. II is
,hus mentioned by Mr. Hillard: "A noble pic
,ure OF some twenty-five or thirty feet high,
parts. Below are the patron saints of Bologna,
and the city in the background; above, the
Saviour is lying on a bier, partially draped,
the Madonna standing on the farther side |
facing the spectator, her face raised to heaven
and hlled with the deepest grief aud the most
trusting resignation"
must confess to having wished this paint
ng had not been in two parts; and that the
beauty of the upper subject had not been dis
surbed by the incopgruous conjunction of the
saints and the city of Bologna
Paul Potter's Bull and Paul Veronese's
Feast at the House of Levi. are each master
,ether! And, yet, the Bull would be lust as
appropriate aa adjunct to the Feast as are the |
collection OF Patron Saints in Bologna, as spec
ators Of the grief of the Madonna over her
Divine Son.
have not touched on half of Guido's works
n this one room; cannot even dwell on his
Sampson Triumphant; mot so much q strong
nan as seraph, who has ''slain his foes BY
IN effort of the will, and not by strength of
lrm -
No. the sdiofnino room dra1vs ,1s Tn Rolon-