April 10th, 1830
In the morning to St. John Lateran, where, as my laquais de place said, ‘converted Jews, or Turks, or Lutherans’ were baptised; got too late for the baptism, which I believe is a farce regularly got up, but heard the High Mass. The churches were crowded all this week with pilgrims, whose appearance is always very picturesque. Went into the cloisters, and was shown by the monk or priest (whichever he was) some very remarkable articles that they possess—a bit of the column on which the cock stood when he crowed after Peter’s three denials; a slab showing the exact height of Jesus Christ, as he could just stand under it,19 and two halves which had once been a whole column, but which was broken when the veil of the Temple was rent on the death of Christ. The column is adorned with sculpture, which they say is Jewish, and was brought to Rome with the Holy Stairs. Then to Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, where they were performing High Mass, with many assistants and a full choir, but without a congregation; there were not six people in the church. To Minerva Medica, a questionable and uninteresting ruin, and besides falling to pieces. To the Barberini Palace, where there is little besides the Cenci, which is worth going any distance to see. To the Doria, a magnificent palace, with an immense number of pictures, and some very fine ones, which I was hurried through. To the Pyramid of Caius Cestius, which is in the middle of the wall of Aurelian, and forms the back of a very pretty Protestant burial ground, the greatest number of those who have been buried there being of course English. It is on the side of a hill with high, turreted walls behind it. There are two rows of white marble tombs, whose diminutive proportions form a contrast with the enormous sepulchre of PROTESTANT BURIAL GROUND the Roman. Round some of the tombstones rose-trees and other shrubs have been planted, and all but one adorned with epitaphs and inscriptions in Latin, English, German, and Italian. That one is the tomb of the pretty Miss Bathurst who was drowned in the Tiber. Her mother was to have returned to Rome and supply the epitaph, but she has never come, and it has not even her name inscribed upon it. I copied the following, which are apparently intended for Latin verses, from one of the tombs—of Frederica Ursulina Arabella de Montmorency, by her father, Colonel Raymond Henry de Montmorency, whose feelings set quantity at defiance:—
Frederica quæ Claris fueram prælata puellis
Illa ego hoc brevi condita sum tumulo;
Cui formam pulcherrimam, charites tribuere decoram
Quam Deus cunctis artibus erudiit.
Clambered up Monte Testaccio, from which the view is beautiful, and then went on to the ruins of San Paolo fuori le Mure. The church, which was the finest in Rome except St. Peter’s, was entirely destroyed by fire; but although it is near three miles from the gates, and not the least wanted, and that there are hundreds of churches, half of which seldom or never have congregations to fill them, they are already rebuilding this at an enormous cost, and the priest told me, to my great disgust, that they had got all the materials ready, and in ten years they expected the work to be finished. There are plenty of fools found to contribute to the expense, the greatest part of which, however, is supplied by the Government. It is to be built just as it was before, but they cannot replace the enormous marble columns which were its principal ornament. To a church to hear the Armenian Mass. The priests arrived in splendid oriental dresses, but I did not stay it out. Walked to the Borghese Gardens, the fine weather being something of which no description can convey an idea, and in it the beauty of Rome and its gardens and environs are equally indescribable. Groups of pilgrims in their odd dresses, with staves, and great bundles on their heads, were lounging about, or lying under the trees. At night to the Coliseum (but the moon never will shine properly), and back by the Forum and the Capitol. The columns in the Forum look beautiful, but St. Peter’s gains at least as much as the ancient ruins by the light of the moon. The views from different hills, and sunset from the Pincian in such weather as this, and with spring bursting in every direction, are things never to be forgotten.
Notes
19 He must have been just six feet high.