The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-11-29
REV.J.C. FLETCHER'SLETTER
Recollections of Mrs. Mary Somerville
Revived by a Newspaper Letter.
The Same Medium Causes the Journals Cor
respondent to Sketch Some Incidents Con-
nected with Goethe's Visit to Italy.
Annapolis Journal.

~s
NATURALIZATION" which took in" Robert Dale
Owen and so many others. What put me in
communication with indianapolis this time was
a recent number of the journal containing a
letter, copied from the Louisville Courier
Journal, in which an. NJ" sets forth the variety
and excellence of the literary and other intel
lectual clubs of our city tfor. though far away,
1t is my city as well as yoursl. Mention was
made of the "Woman's Club" and it was stated
that the essay for the opening meeting of the
year was devoted to the life and works of Mary
Somerville. Now, the last years of Mary
Somerville were spent here in Naples, where she
lived with her daughters until death took her.
only a few years ago. When l came to Naples,
In 1873, | saw many people who knew her, aud
her daughters (alas, now dead) still resided here.
My neighbor, Terrace, who is one Of the first
s~culptors of Italy and the world. was in 1875
engaged to make the monumental statue for Mrs.
Somerville, and it is one of the most impressive
mementoes of the kind that l ever saw. Its
simplicity and majesty are wonderful. Mrs.
Somerville is represented seated. and calmly
looking up to the heavens. There is nothing
theatrical. but sweetness and dignity prevail.
The statue is gigantic, but in such matchless
proportions that it does not appear beyond the
ordinary size of woman. l knew her intimate
friend, the late Sir Roderick Murchison, presi-
dent of the Royal Geographical Society, who, so
late as 1869, said of her: "This admirable woman.
now in her eighty-ninth year, who has been
singularly distinguished throughout her long
life by the highest attainments in physical
science, and has written admirable works on
physical geography, is even at this hour occu-
pied in solving abstruse mathematical prob
lems." 1t may be interesting to some of the lady
readers of the Journal that Mrs. Somervllle was
a model woman in every respect-in the domes-
tic matters of "woman's kingdom" as well as in
the realms of the stars.
The letter of m. M" in the Louisville
Courier-Journal also told of the Saturday
Night, or College Corner Club" and of it's &C.
voting the year of 1885 to a study of the giant
amongst German poets-Goethe. This hasmade
me wish to say something of Goethe's visit here.
Every day I see in the streets of Naples scores
of Germans who come here to go over the tracks
of Goethe in Italy. Remember that Germany has
more classic scholars to the square mile than any
other country in the world. Remember, too,
that Germany to-day is close to Italy, and round
trip tickets make the excursions cheap to all
classes. Hence the influence of classic tastes, of
Goethe and economy bringing Germans to us.
In 1856 the great German writer left his ma
tive land for the south of Europe, and in the
winter of 1857 We find him in Naples and Sicily.
Italy had a wonderful fascination for Goethe.
He was a ripe man in every respect before he
crossed the northern frontier and entered the
the land that ne had read about, thought about
and dreamed about. The visit to Italy had been
one of his greatest desires. He was thirtyseven
years old, and Hi!lard justly says:
HE had passed through his stormy and impas-
stoned youth; his mind was in a transition state;
and the kind of reputation which he had acquired
by his Stella and his Sorrows of Werther-that
of a melancholy sentimentalist-had begun to
be somewhat distasteful to his ripened judg-
ment. He had written the first part of Faust
though it was not published until 1890. But his
mind, at the time his journey was undertaken,
was teeming with two works quite unlike any of
his previous productions, the claims of which
were to rest upon their tranquil beauty and per
lection of form, his '1phigenia in Aulis' and
'Tasso;' and in order to complete these he felt
it necessary to study the remains of ancient art
preserved in the museums of Italy, and to gather
the spirit fresh upon the soil of it's growth"
Goethe wrote many private letters from Italy,
which, read by his circle of scholarly friends,
gave a great impulse to such persons, if they
possessed the means, to cross the Alps and haste
hem to the 'land Of the orange and myrtle"
lfut the account of his Italian journey was not
t'uOlLoAOo QutAi dOoQt IWCnVy yCdkc altCI, i. Cs
N 1907, and what had so charmed his own circle
now had a wide circulation, for his notes and let
ters were published in his general autobiog-
raphy. The same graceful and thoughtful writer
that / have quoted above says that Goethe's Ital-
ian journey is written in such exquisite prose
of which, if Goethe had never lived, we should
have supposed the German language to be inca
pable. The Attic bee huns over every page"
But Goethe seemed in some things to IKE a ven
geance on his first style and his sentiL- entail way
of looking at things. Hillard says tt vt in Italy,
as a general thing, 'he avoids all seltimentality
and enthusiasm, and seems determined to show
the world that the author Of 'Werther' can pass
through the most exciting country in Europe
and yet never fall into ~ecstasies nor yield
to the temptation of fine writing. He
appears half a Greek and half an Englishman,
but very httleof a German-a Greek IN his feel
ing for art, and an Englishman in his practical
sense and distaste to all sorts of humbug." There
is no mistaking it that in his sojourn in northern
Italy and in Rome he was bent on viewing and
studying the classic in scenery and in ruins rather
than in spending his time on actually" There
fore, he bestows very little attention to the glitter
ing events of the little Kingdoms and dukedoms,
or to the splendor and pomp of the ecclesiastical
court at Rome. A Western lady, visiting Naples,
some time ago, recalled a phrase that I had not
heard for a long time. Speaking of a French
chambermaid whom she wished to frighten into
due subsection, my Western friend said, 'She
didn't seem to scare worth a cent Now, that
slang term expresses precisely the impression
ability Of Goethe in the presence of the ecclesias-
teal pomp and circumstance at Rome. Goethe
did not impress worth a cent, as one may see
from his remark in his journal for Christmas,
1856: ION Christmas day / saw the Pope [Pius
VI, whom the French treated 80 harshly ten
years after Goethe's visit, and the whole con-
sistory in 81. Peters, where he celebrated high
mass partly before. and partly from his
throne: 1t is a kind of unequaled sight.
splendid and digniied enough, but 1 have
grown so old in my Protestant Diosenism, that
this pomp and splendor revolt more than they
attract me. !, like my pious forefathers, am
disposed to say TO these spiritual conquerors of
the world: Hide not me from the sun
of higher art and pure humanity = y II
/ also felt again that / am too old
for anything but truth alone. These cere-
monies and operas, these gyrations and ballet
like movements pass off from me like water
from an oilskin cloak. An influence of nature,