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CHAPTER XXXVII.

BOLOGNA-BRONZA NEPTUNE-TWO TOWERS-MATCHLESS PICTURES-UNIVERSITY—CHURCHES-ARCADE OF THREE MILES-HISTORY OF, AND OF THE MIRACULOUS PICTURE— ERECTION OF ARCADE, AND NOBLE CHURCH-SACRED PICTURE-BOLOGNA GENERALLY, AND PHOSPHORESCENT STONE -FERRARA-HISTORY-AZO I, AND II.-GUELPH-DUCHY OF MAINE-THE FIVE DUKES OF FERRARA-LOSS OF SOVEREIGNTY-PARASINA, AND HUGO-ARIOSTO, AND RELICS ―TASSO, AND PRISON-LAGO SCURO, AND ACCIDENT-PADUA -ORIGIN, AND ANTENOR-CHURCH, AND MIRACLES OF ST. ANTHONY-CHURCH OF ST. GIUSTINA-TOWN HALL, AND LIVY-SINGULAR SCULPTURE-ST. ANTHONY'S MIRACLES, AND SERMON TO THE FISH-FUSINA-POSTING REGULATIONS VENICE.

IN the days of the Romans, Bologna was known as Bononia, or Bononia Felsina. As may be supposed, it has undergone almost as many vicissitudes as its former Imperial Mistress, but at the present day it is subject to the papal power, and has been so since the period of Nicholas III, in 1278, though generally under a limited and peaceable sway.

The city is entirely surrounded with a wall, while the general appearance of Bologna is more clean, and regularly neat, than perhaps any town 1 have yet seen in Italy. One uniform beauty pervades almost all the streets; Arcades; and certainly no arrangement is more commodious, no object more pleasing, than these long vistas of corridors.

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The Bronze Neptune.

Of the remarkable public buildings and decorations, first we notice the famous fountain of Neptune in the great square, executed by John of Bologna. The bronze figure of the God is noble ; the expression majestic; all that is worthy of so great an artist, whose mighty chisel could so well fashion the raging Ocean-God, is here displayed; but the accompaniments seemed to us insignificant. At the angles of the pedestal of the statue are four children; beneath them four syrens with dolphins. The little boys spurt a pigmy stream; the syrens, if so they can be called, compress the water from their bosom. I cannot altogether admire this aquatic design in an inland town, little consistent also, owing to the want of a sufficient volume of water, with the terrors of this earth-shaking deity 'with trident in his mighty grasp, thus surmounting, or governing, only these petty figures; and I must add that this otherwise sublime statue is greatly indelicate.

Two other public objects are also stared at by all, though I should think, admired but by very few; the two towers, close to each other, Il Torre Garrisenda, and Il Torre Asinelli, both built between the years 1110 and 1120, the first being about 140 feet high, and nearly nine feet out of the perpendicular; the next about 330 feet high, and two feet and a half out of the upright. They are both of brick, and square of form, while around

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their base are a circle of dirty shops. Any erections more clumsy, more frightful, or deformed, I do not know; the smaller one seems like the smoky chimney of a manufactory, blown aside by some explosion; for the other, the head aches as it bends backwards, and the eye is fatigued as it travels upwards to the top of a shapeless load of bricks, apparently piled one upon the other till of their own weight they warped from the upright, and now terrify all beneath least they should tumble down and crush them.

But enough, let us now speak of beauties; of the pictures of the Gallery of Bologna; a city ever so famed for its excellence in this art; second perhaps only to Rome; the birth place of Guido, and containing his immortal paintings and chefs d'œuvre, in company with those of the Caracci, Domenichino, Guercino, Albano.

The first corridors entered are hung with the earliest specimens of the art; among which are chiefly those of Giotto, who painted 500 years ago, and of the two brothers, Vivarini, a century afterwards. The productions of this æra are much the same; harsh lines, unbending forms; no expression; but plenty of gold laid on every where, instead of grace. Here is, however, as a greater curiosity, Guido's first effort at twenty years of age,

The other galleries contain, though compara

tively few, yet some of the very choicest pictures that the world can boast.

First and greatest is the divine Guido. Here is his Murder of the Innocents; and his Crucifixion, introducing the Virgin, the Magdalen, and St. John. Of the first picture that were a cold character indeed that could look upon it only with a technical eye. Rather let me gaze, and feel the sorrows it pourtrays. The mother in the foreground, whose innocent babes lie cold and pallid at her feet; her hands clasped in silent despair, her head uplifted to the God above. What expression! what dignity! the intensest grief! the most exquisite feminine loveliness! The four other mothers, each diplaying the same agonized feelings, though each so differently expressed, yet in all how sublime the conception, how exquisite the execution!

There is also his picture of Saints imploring the Virgin to stay the pestilence.

Thou Prince of Painters! some ministering angel seems to have expanded thy conceptions, and shed celestial grace upon thy colours; and heretics might worship the Virgin as thou hast painted her!

Next comes Domenichino: Wonderful contrast, with equal power, force, and variety of colour; the painter is similarly great, but the art is more evident. His large allegorical pictures of Il Rosario,

or the Persecution of the Albigenses; with his Martyrdom of St. Agnes are equally grand, striking, and inimitably finely coloured.

Such is the boldness, energy, and perfection displayed in the works of this great artist, that although I may prefer Guido, yet I cannot venturę to style Domenichino second.

By Ludovico Caracci there is the Conversion of St. Paul; most spirited; and the Transfiguration: -there is Raphael's famed St. Cecilia, and Guercino's St. Bruno, the founder of the order of Certosa, imploring the Virgin.

These are some which most struck me; and which perhaps are efforts of the pictorial art that no future ages can surpass. As they have all been engraved, it is not necessary to say more.

After the Gallery of Pictures we explored every other department of the national museums, but found nothing which may not be seen in equal, if not in greater variety, and perfection in the similar public institutions of Europe. 'T'he collection of philosophical instruments is very good; and there are also some excellent specimens of the old Faenza china, once so celebrated because it had no rivals; but to which the modern French faience is so incomparably superior.

Bologna has many literary academies, and its University was at one time the most celebrated, as well as by repute the oldest in Europe. Though