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Page 33
"I paid three pence at the door,
And since I came in a great deal more:
Upon my honour you have emptied my purse,
St. Paul's Cathedral could not do worse."
I felt inclined to join in this sentiment before I left the church. A
fine statue of "Surly Sam" Johnson was one of the first things that
caught our eyes on looking around. A statue of Sir Edward Packenham,
who fell at the Battle of New Orleans, was on the opposite side of the
great hall. As we had walked over the ground where this General fell, we
viewed his statue with more than ordinary interest. We were taken from
one scene of interest to another, until we found ourselves in the
"Whispering Gallery." From the dome we had a splendid view of the
Metropolis of the world. A scaffold was erected up here to enable an
artist to take sketches from which a panorama of London was painted. The
artist was three years at work. The painting is now exhibited at the
Colosseum; but the brain of the artist was turned, and he died insane!
Indeed, one can scarcely conceive how it could be otherwise. You in
America have no idea of the immensity of this building. Pile together
half-a-dozen of the largest churches in New York or Boston, and you will
have but a faint representation of St. Paul's Cathedral.
* * * * *
I have just returned from a stroll of two hours through Westminster
Abbey. We entered the building at a door near Poets' Corner, and,
naturally enough, looked around for the monuments of the men whose
imaginative powers have contributed so much to instruct and amuse
mankind. I was not a little disappointed in the few I saw. In almost any
church-yard you may see monuments and tombs far superior to anything in
the Poets' Corner. A few only have monuments. Shakspere, who wrote of
man to man, and for man to the end of time, is honoured with one.
Addison's monument is also there; but the greater number have nothing
more erected to their memories than busts or medallions. Poets' Corner
is not splendid in appearance, yet I observed visiters lingering about
it, as if they were tied to the spot by love and veneration for some
departed friend. All seemed to regard it as classic ground. No sound
louder than a whisper was heard during the whole time, except the verger
treading over the marble floor with a light step. There is great
pleasure in sauntering about the tombs of those with whom we are
familiar through their writings; and we tear ourselves from their ashes,
as we would from those of a bosom friend. The genius of these men
spreads itself over the whole panorama of Nature, giving us one vast and
varied picture, the colour of which will endure to the end of time. None
can portray like the poet the passions of the human soul. The statue of
Addison, clad in his dressing-gown, is not far from that of Shakspere.
He looks as if he had just left the study, after finishing some chosen
paper for the _Spectator_. This memento of a great man, was the work of
the British public. Such a mark of national respect was but justice to
one who has contributed more to purify and raise the standard of English
literature, than any man of his day. We next visited the other end of
the same transept, near the northern door. Here lie Mansfield, Chatham,
Fox, the second William Pitt, Grattan, Wilberforce, and a few other
statesmen. But, above all, is the stately monument to the Earl of
Chatham. In no other place so small, do so many great men lie together.
To these men, whose graves strangers from all parts of the world wish to
view, the British public are in a great measure indebted for England's
fame. The high pre-eminence which England has so long enjoyed and
maintained in the scale of empire, has constantly been the boast and
pride of the English people. The warm panegyrics that have been lavished
on her constitution and laws--the songs chaunted to celebrate her
glory--the lustre of her arms, as the glowing theme of her warriors--the
thunder of her artillery in proclaiming her moral prowess, her flag
being unfurled to every breeze and ocean, rolling to her shores the
tribute of a thousand realms--show England to be the greatest nation in
the world, and speak volumes for the great departed, as well as for
those of the living present. One requires no company, no amusements, no
books in such a place as this. Time and death have placed within those
walls sufficient to occupy the mind, if one should stay here a week.
On my return, I spent an hour very pleasantly in the National Academy,
in the same building as the National Gallery. Many of the paintings here
are of a fine order. Oliver Cromwell looking upon the headless corpse of
King Charles I., appeared to draw the greatest number of spectators. A
scene from "As You Like it," was one of the best executed pieces we saw.
This was "Rosalind, Celia, and Orlando." The artist did himself and the
subject great credit. Kemble, in Hamlet, with that ever memorable skull
in his hand, was one of the pieces which we viewed with no little
interest. It is strange that Hamlet is always represented as a thin,
lean man, when the Hamlet of Shakspere was a fat, John Bull-kind of a
man. But the best piece in the Gallery was "Dante meditating the episode
of Francesca da Rimini and Paolo Malatesta, S'Inferno, Canto V." Our
first interest for the great Italian poet was created by reading Lord
Byron's poem, "The Lament of Dante." From that hour we felt like
examining everything connected with the great Italian poet. The history
of poets, as well as painters, is written in their works. The best
written life of Goldsmith is to be found in his poem of "The Traveller,"
and his novel of "The Vicar of Wakefield." Boswell could not have
written a better life of himself than he has done in giving the
Biography of Dr. Johnson. It seems clear that no one can be a great poet
without having been sometime during life a lover, and having lost the
object of his affection in some mysterious way. Burns had his Highland
Mary, Byron his Mary, and Dante was not without his Beatrice. Whether
there ever lived such a person as Beatrice seems to be a question upon
which neither of his biographers have thrown much light. However, a
Beatrice existed in the poet's mind, if not on earth. His attachment to
Beatrice Portinari, and the linking of her name with the immortality of
his great poem, left an indelible impression upon his future character.
The marriage of the object of his affections to another, and her
subsequent death, and the poet's exile from his beloved Florence,
together with his death amongst strangers--all give an interest to the
poet's writings, which could not be heightened by romance itself. When
exiled and in poverty, Dante found a friend in the father of Francesca.
And here, under the roof of his protector, he wrote his great poem. The
time the painter has chosen is evening. Day and night meet in mid-air:
one star is alone visible. Sailing in vacancy are the shadows of the
lovers. The countenance of Francesca is expressive of hopeless agony.
The delineations are sublime, the conception is of the highest order,
and the execution admirable. Dante is seated in a marble vestibule, in a
meditating attitude, the face partly concealed by the right hand upon
which it is resting. On the whole, it is an excellently painted piece,
and causes one to go back with a fresh relish to the Italian's
celebrated poem. In coming out, we stopped a short while in the upper
room of the Gallery, and spent a few minutes over a painting
representing Mrs. Siddons in one of Shakspere's characters. This is by
Sir Joshua Reynolds, and is only one of the many pieces that we have
seen of this great artist. His genius was vast, and powerful in its
grasp. His fancy fertile, and his inventive faculty inexhaustible in its
resources. He displayed the very highest powers of genius by the
thorough originality of his conceptions, and by the entirely new path
that he struck out in art. Well may Englishmen be proud of his name. And
as time shall step between his day and those that follow after him, the
more will his works be appreciated. We have since visited his grave,
and stood over his monument in St. Paul's.
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