BELLS ITALY.

THE first edition of this work was published several years since.The second has reached us (we know not through that chan nel) from Naples, where it has been reprinted, with additions by the editor, Mrs. BELL, from her husband's manuscripts, and some illustrative notes gleaned from an Italian translation of the original

edition. Though favourably noticed on its first publication, the work is less known than it deserves to be. This circumstance alone would justify a recurrence to it at some length. But the best justification is the merit of the production. It may not only be read with pleasure, but advantage; and very many passages will not only bear, but moire twice reading. The author was well known in Edinburgh as a skilful surgeon, an accomplished anatomist, and a character. The pointed husk, however, covered a rich fruit. From his youth he had been an ardent lover of nature, whether in storm or sunshine. In his earher years, he was wont to wander in search of the picturesque, " amongst the wild and grani scenery of his native land;" arAl he obtained by practice the power of looking at landscapes with learned eyes. A knowledge ot' drawing, acquired, it would appear,

for professional purposes, gave him at once a taste for the fine arts and the skill to criticize them ; his craft as an anatomist adding another and a rarer qualification to the connoisseur. Educated for a learned profession in a country where learning is easily obtained, he was of course a classical scholar : what is of flumore consequence, he possessed a classical taste, and imbibed the spirit of the ancient authors as well as construed their words. Judging from his work, be must have studied the Italian writers of the Middle Ages, or his imagination enabled him by a slight acquaintance with a subject to tinge his thoughts with the colour of the age. It was his business to be a keen investigator and a close observer; he bad the habit of daily committing the result of his observations to paper ; and this, with an extensive course of reading, seems to have given him a full mastery of language, and to have formed a style accurate without formality or stiffness, and free without looseness. These were high qualifications for a traveller,. especially in Italy ; but they would have uselessly combined in a medical practitioner, had not a fatal disorder attacked their possessor. "Circumstances "—we more than infer, embarrassed circumstances—aggravated his somplaint : the time that would not have been given to relaxation was perforce granted to health ; he went to Italy, wrote the memoranda from a selection of which these volumes are formed, and died.

It will be seen that the work is posthumous: it may he opined that it is one of impressions : it may be conjectured that it is fragmentary rather than a complete succession of well-considered and harmonized parts. But though not in strictness and in form a whole, there is nothing jumbled, nothing discordant. It is not what the author would have published had be lived and determined to publish at all ; but it presents a perfect reflection of his intentions at the time of writing. Custom, that second nature, triumphed over the weakness and lassitude of disease. Day by day he noted down every thing which he saw, and the impression which the seeing produced. These of course changed with the scenery and the place. In France, and on first entering Italy, the beauties of nature, occasionally varied by customs, antiquities, or manufactures, are his theme : as he advances, the wonders of art divide his attention with those of nature; at Florence and at Rome, the creations of Italian and the remains of Grecian genius almost supersede his admiration of the original ; but at Naples the mixture is again revived; and Naples is the termination of his book, though we believe his life and his labours closed at Rome. Such are the subjects of his work : they are presented to the reader with a congenial spirit. There is great freshness in his pictures of nature. His criticisms are descriptive and analytical, uniting high enthusiasm for excellence with perfect independence of great names and popular notions. Of manners there are only a few scattered and incidental touches; and his few sketches of social life relate to masses, and either directly or indirectly have some bearing upon his profession—hospitals, prisons, and asylums for the insane. The whole book is pervadedby a classical spirit,— not meaning by the term the introduction of a string of unapt quotations or pedantic references to obscure names and places which exist no longer, or oaths by deities whose priests and worshippers have both perished, or a boyish or monkish imitation of modes which passed away some fifteen hundred years ago ; but a fulness of matter, a natural selection of essential circumstances, a sensible view of all that is considered, and a style strong without straining, simple without baldness. It will of course be understood that the volumes have not the excitement of a continuous story, or of that

which results from vivid exhibitions of existing manners, especially when conjoined with celebrated persons: it has, however, an interest of another kind. Except in the passages of pure criticism, a tone of pleasing melancholy pervades the whole,— arising from our foreknowledge of the writer's fate, and because his own mind seemed tinged with the presaging sadness of death, or to speak more truly, the weakness of decaying functions. In picking out specimens, we shall endeavour to exhibit something of each kind. First we shall take

A COMPARISON OF THE LANDSCAPE FEATURES OF PRANCE AND ITALY.

Leaving these sublime objects, and looking in the opposite direction, we distinguished the highest points of the numerous steeples and spires of Turin, tipped with the reddening rays of the setting sun. No smoke ascends, as in Northern countries, indicating the spot on which the city stauds; but a light transparent haze seeined to bang over it in the pure still air ; while magnificent and tufty trees marked its boundaries with a dusky line. The whole of this Sue scenery receives an added charm in the softening features of the rich fields and• woody plains, which reaching fir to the west, spread out below, enlivened by imiumerable white dwellinp, giving life and animation to the picture. While thus, after a sultry day, iuhaling the refreshing breeze of the evening, and contemplating the varied beauty of the suirounding landscape, we were naturally led to compare it with the climate and aspect of the country we had left; and could not hesitate to prefer Italy, with its splendid sun, its soft, balmy, and clear atmosphere, vast motintaius, and noble rivers. France is like a maritime country, broad, flat, and unprotected ; the soil is comparatively barren, the sky cloudless; and there are no mountains to have effect on the landscape, or influence on the air. Susceptible as I have ever been of tranquil or perturbed landscape, or the beauties of opening or declining day, I never remember, during my residence in France, to have been charmed with the rooming or evening sun ; I never recollect any difference of light but in intensity : the sky is ever uniform—like that of Coleridge, in his enchanted ship ; the sun rises in the east, mounts to noontide, and descends in the west, without producing any other variation than that of length of shadow. That which has been praised by the ignorant, asky ever clear and tiansparent, distinctly marking the outline of every building, is, to the painter's eye, destructive of all richness or grandeur.

The splendid edifices which adorn Paris, the Louvre, the bridges, Notre Dame, are ever seen clear and well-defined, presenting the same uniform aspect. From Cambray to Paris, from Paris to Lyons, from Lyons to the western aide of the Alps, I never saw a sky in which the beholder could take delight, or which an artist would wish to copy. Their finest weather offers a clear,spotless, burning atmosphere ; and in a bird's eye view of the country, each city, spire, or tree, is seen distinct as in a map. The storm rises with no portentous point to which you can trace the coming mischief; no vast clouds appear bursting over the scene ; but a uniform and dusky atmosphere covers the whole hemisphere down to the horizon. There are no mountains to attract clouds, no vallies to give cunt:ids of air, and changeful variety to ,enliven the landscape. No one who has nut passed the Alps can know how te ecious variety is, or how great a share it has in forming pleasing impressions on the mind. I speak of the lvorth of France : the middle and South—dm department of the Rhone, from Grenoble to Nice, and Marseilles, must of course partake of the atmosphere of Italy.

Proceeding onwards, and passing over Turin, we find at Florence some sound observations on the Florentine-Tuscan style of architecture. They are passages over which the student should ponder, and by which the self-styled professor might profit. They show the mode by which the celebrated Florentine style was formed: the old Etruscan, the indigenous mode of building, was imitated or garbled, but adapted to the climate of the country, the wants of the people, and the customs of the time. When the Grecian, or rather the Classical (for we think Mr. BELL confounds together Roman and Grecian) orders were introduced, they were not servilely copied in whole or in parts, but skilfully engrafted on the native mode of building. We must refer to the work for the detailed view, but the following passages exhibit the results.

THE ARCHITECTURE OF FLORENCE

Is grand and gloomy beyond that of all the other cities in Italy. Were these singular buildings displayed by greater breadth of street, or if these imposing fabrics could be translated to other cities, the vast and magnificent character which distinguishes the Tuscan style would then be seen. To this hour Florence bears the aspect of a city filled with nobles and their domestics ; a city of bridges, churches, and palaces. Each building has a superb and architectural form: the streets are short, narrow, and angular, and each angle presents an architectural view, fit to be drawn for a scene in a theatre : each house is a palace ; and a palace in Florence is a ruagnificent pile of a square and bulky form, of a grand and gloomy aspect, with a plain front, extending from two to three hundred feet, built of huge dark gray stone, each measuring three or four feet. A coarse rubble work rises in a solid form to twenty or thirty feet in height. . A great grooved stone, or stybolate, sets off the building from the street, forming a scat which runs the whole length of the front ; and which, in feudal times, was occupied by the dependants of the family, who, there loitering in the sultry hours of the day, lay asleep under the shelter of the broad, deep cornice, which projecting from the roof threw a wide shade below. The immense stones of this coarse front bear huge iron rings in capacious circles, in which sometimes were planted the banners of the family ; at others they were filled with enormous torches, which in times of rejoicing, burned and glared, throwing a lengthened mass of light along the walls. Not unfrequently merchandise was displayed drawn through these rings ; and sometiniea also they served fur tying up the ;horses of the guests. The first range of windows, which are ten feet from the ground, are grated .and barred with massive frames of iron, resembling those of a prison, and proAlining an effect singularly sombre and melancholy. The front of this building bas, on the second floor, styled piano noirile, a plain and simple architrave. The windows are high and arched, placed at a considerable distance from each other, and are ten or fifteen in number, according to the extent of the front. They were often so high from the floor within, that in turbulent times, when the house was itself a fortress, the besieged telling up three or four steps to the window would from thence view and annoy the enemy. The third story is like the second in plainness and in the size of the windows. The roof is of a flat form with a deep cornice and bold projected SOffiifl, which give.s a grand, square, and magnificent effect to the whole edifice. The chimnies are grouped Into stacks : the tops of which, increasing in bulk as they rise in height, resemble a crown ; the slates with which they are constructed are placed in such a manner as to produce the effect of ventilation, having a plaited form, resembling the fan heads of the inside of a mushroom. This gives a rich and finished aspect to the most trivial or most uudignified part of the building. . Immense leaden spouts that project three or four feet, collect the waters which, in the greet rains of these countries, fall with -extreme violence, descending with the rush aud noise of torrents from the roof. Two or three long flat steps lead to the porch of the palace ; and the entrance is by a high, arched, massive, iron gate ; the doom of which are erosa-barred,

studded with iron and bronze nails, and the ornaments of the pannels are richly

covered and embossed. The effect a these gates is very splendid. They open into a cortile or court, the base of which is encircled by a high arched colon

nade, supported by marble columns. Beautiful gardens often adjoin the palace ; and through a corresponding gate or iron-railings the eye rests on the luxurieut verdure of rich foliage.

It was under these arcades, shaded from the noontide and cooled by the waters of the fountain which occupies the centre of the court, that the rich meichan. dise of the East, and the rich silks and shawls and fine linen and all the valuable manufactures of Tuscany, lay spread out as in a place of exchange ; while under vast, arched, and vaulted chambers, was stored the wealth which was there brought for sale. Entering from this court, a great staircase leads to a suite of noble chambers, halls, and saloons, hung with silks and richly adorned. The lofty ceilings are finely painted; the beams are alwirvs displayed, but are carved, ornamented, and gilded, so as to form a splendid part of the

whole. The arcades of the court support the galleries, which, in former times, were generally filled with fine paintings, statues, vases, and precious relies of antiquity. In such palaces, the rulers, the magistrate, the noble, and the merchant, dined, surrounded by their family and adherents. The manner of the time.e bore a elmracter of manly simplicity, which singularly contrasted with the splendour of the rich possessions, and the importance of their political sway among nations. The guests were seated not by rule, rank, or birth, hue in the order in which they

happened to arrive. • • • One thing is peculiarly worthy of notice: the divisions and coarse chisellings of the rubble-work, with which the bases of these great edifices are ornamented, are essential to the effect and composition. It is like a wash in drawing, which however slight, takes off the cold white glare, end gives a colour such as etching does in engraving. 'f he gravity and solemnity of the stately masses is thus insured, and the glare of an ardent sun, which often proves injuriously dazzling, is corrected. Were it not owing to this, such vast edifices as the palaces of the Strozzi or Ricardi, smooth and fair as a villa, would present a tame and insipid front ; vast without gi anddur, and requiring columns or other massive enrich. Inents to give relief. These etchings contribute to gravity as well as ornament, uniting the whole, and giving the bases apparent strength to support the weight above.

Men of talents, different from those of St. Gallo, or Michael Angelo, at. tempted to amend and refine, by polishing and smoothing a grave and magnifi. cent front, which derived grandeur from its dimensions. To this professional discovery, they gave the dignified name of l'ietta Serene; and this, which suited well with small houses, or rich and delicate ornaments, they extended over fronts that were consistent only with rude masonry and stones of great embossment, such as mark the antique and majestic style.

There are very many descriptive, critical, and reflective passages, written at Florence, which are worth quoting; but we must burry on to Rome. Mr. BELL was there during both Christmas and Easter weeks; and though art was his passion, and disease strong upon him, he found time to be present at all the gorgeous or imposing ceremonies of the Roman Catholic Church. From these we will select his account of the Miserere,—a wonderful performance, which when once heard, ranks foremost amongst the unforgotten passages of life. Eulogistic as the description is, it does not equal the reality : the service, the darkness, the excitement, the religious fervour, and the associations connected with the place, produce an 'effect which is like nothing ever felt elsewhere.

HOLY THURSDAY—THE

The service opens by a portion of the Lamentations of Jeremiah sung by the choristers ; after which the Poise recites the Paternoster in a low voice; then, being seated on the throne and crowned with the mitre, the theme is con. tinued, sung loud and sweet by the first soprano, in a tone so long sustained, so high, so pure, so silvery and mellifluous, as to produce the most exquisite effect, in contrast with the deep choruses, answering in rich harmony at the conelmion of every strophe ; and then again the lamenting voice is heard, tender and pathetic, repeating one sweet prolonged tone, sounding clear and high in the distance, till brought down again by the chorus. The exquisite notes of the soprano almost charmed away criticism ; but yet we could not help being conscious of the difficulties attending a coniposition of this nature, even in the halide of so great a master as Allegri, whose music it was; nor of perceiving that, after a time, the continued strain and measured answering chorus becomes monotonous, and the mind insensibly sinks into languor. Yet the whole is yelp fine : it is as if a being of another world were heard lamenting over a ruined city, with the repooses of a dejected people, and forms a grand and mournful preparation for the Miserere.

The last light 'wing extinguished, the chorus, in hurried sounds, proclaims that our Saviour is betrayed ; then, for a moment, as a symbol of the darkness in which the moral woi Id is left, the deepest obscurity prevails; when at the words " Christus factus est pro nobis obedieos usque ad meetem," the Pope, the whole body of clergy, and the people knelt (in former times they fell down on the earth), and all was silent ; when the solemn pause was broken by the C911i. mencing of the Miserere, in low, rich, exquisite strains, rising softly on the ear and gently swelling into powerful sounds of seraphic h arrnony.

The effect produced by this music is finer and greater than that of any admired art ; no painting, statue, or poem,—no imagination of man, can equal its wonderful power on the mind. The silent solemnity of the scene, the touching import of the words, " take pity on me, 0 God," passes through to the inmost soul with a thrill of the deepest sensation, unconsciously moistening the eye and paling the cheek. The music is composed of two choruses of four voices; the strain begins low and solemn, rising gradually to the clear tones of the first soprano, which at times are heard alone; at the couclusion of the verse, the second chorus joins, and then by degrees the voices fade and die away. The soft and almost imperceptible accumulation of sound, swelliug in mournful tones of rich harmony Into powerful effect, and then receding, as if in the distant sky, like the lamenting song of angels and spirits, conveys, beyond all conception to those who have heard it, the idea of darkness, of desolation, and of the dreary solitude of the tomb. A solemn silence ensues, and not a breath is heard while the inaudible prayer of the kneeling Pope continues. When he rises, slight sounds are heard, by degrees breaking on the stillness, which has a pleasing effect, restoring, as it were, the zapt mind to the existence and feelings of the present life. These extracts must show that the home-reading qualities.of the Observations on Italy are of no slight order. The most distinguished use of the work, however, is as a superior guide-hook to the specimens of the arts at those cities which the author visited. Those who gallop through the country, of course•will not require it, The speediest, as the joke bas it, may be awakened by their courier whets there is any thbs& to see. Thosgothe,etur.