Palermo – Its streets
On the pavement there was now, as always, clean walking; but in the more retired parts of the city whither we were this day carried in pursuance of our intention of visiting the quarters which we had hitherto neglected, it was almost impossible to get along, although even here the sweeping and piling of the filth was by no means neglected.
The festival gave occasion to our visiting the principal church of the city and observing its curiosities. Being once on the move, we took a round of all the other public edifices. We were much pleased with a Moorish building, which is in excellent preservation – not very large, but the rooms beautiful, broad, and well proportioned, and in excellent keeping with the whole pile. It is not perhaps suited for a northern climate, but in a southern land a most agreeable residence. Architects may perhaps some day furnish us with a plan and elevation of it.
We also saw in most unsuitable situations various remains of ancient marble statues, which, however, we had not patience to try to make out.
Palermo, April 16, 1787.
As we are obliged to anticipate our speedy departure from this paradise, I hoped to-day to spend a thorough holiday by sitting in the public gardens; and after studying the task I had set myself out of the Odyssey, taking a walk through the valley, and at the foot of the hill of S. Rosalie, thinking over again my sketch of Nausicaa, and there trying whether this subject is susceptible of a dramatic form. All this I have managed, if not with perfect success, yet certainly much to my satisfaction. I made out the plan, and could not abstain from sketching some portions of it which appeared to me most interesting, and tried to work them out.
Palermo, Tuesday, April 17, 1787.
It is a real misery to be pursued and hunted by many spirits! Yesterday I set out early for the public gardens, with a firm and calm resolve to realize some of my poetical dreams; but before I got within sight of them, another spectre got hold of me which has been following me these last few days. Many plants which hitherto I had been used to see only in pots and tubs, or under glass-frames, stand here fresh and joyous beneath the open heaven, and as they here completely fulfil their destination, their natures and characters became more plain and evident to me. In presence of so many new and renovated forms, my old fancy occurred again to me: Might I not discover the primordial plant among all these numerous specimens? Some such there must be! For, otherwise, how am I able at once to determine that this or that form is a plant unless they are all formed after one original type? I busied myself, therefore, with examining wherein the many varying shapes differed from each other. And in every case I found them all to be more similar than dissimilar, and attempted to apply my botanical terminology. That went on well enough; still I was not satisfied; I rather felt annoyed that it did not lead further. My pet poetical purpose was obstructed; the gardens of Antinous all vanished – a real garden of the world had taken their place. Why is it that we moderns have so little concentration of mind? Why is it that we are thus tempted to make requisitions which we can neither exact nor fulfil?
Alcamo, Wednesday, April 18, 1787.
At an early hour, we rode out of Palermo. Kniep and the Vetturino showed their skill in packing the carnage inside and out. We drove slowly along the excellent road, with which we had previously become acquainted during our visit to San Martino, and wondered a second time at the false taste displayed in the fountains on the way. At one of these our driver stopped to supply himself with water according to the temperate habits of this country. He had at starting, hung to the traces a small wine-cask, such as our market-women use, and it seemed to us to hold wine enough for several days. We were, therefore, not a little surprised when he made for one of the many conduit pipes, took out the plug of his cask, and let the water run into it. With true German amazement, we asked him what ever he was about? was not the cask full of wine? To all which, he replied with great nonchalance: he had left a third of it empty, and as no one in this country drank unmixed wine, it was better to mix it at once in a large quantity, as then the liquids combined better together, and besides you were not sure of finding water everywhere. During this conversation the cask was filled, and we had some talk together of this ancient and oriental wedding custom.
And now as we reached the heights beyond Mon Reale, we saw wonderfully beautiful districts, but tilled in traditional rather than in a true economical style. On the right, the eye reached the sea, where, between singular shaped head-lands, and beyond a shore here covered with, and there destitute of, trees, it caught a smooth and level horizon, perfectly calm, and forming a glorious contrast with the wild and rugged limestone rocks. Kniep did not fail to take miniature outlines of several of them.
Alcamo
We are at present in Alcamo, a quiet and clean little town, whose well-conducted inn is highly to be commended as an excellent establishment, especially as it is most conveniently situated for visitors to the temple of Segeste, which lies out of the direct road in a very lonely situation.
Alcamo, Thursday, April 19, 1787.
Our agreeable dwelling in this quiet town, among the mountains, has so charmed us that we have determined to pass a whole day here. We may then, before anything else, speak of our adventures yesterday. In one of my earlier letters, I questioned the originality of Prince Pallagonia's bad taste. He has had forerunners and can adduce many a precedent. On the road towards Mon Reale stand two monstrosities, beside a fountain with some vases on a balustrade, so utterly repugnant to good taste that one would suppose they must have been placed there by the Prince himself.
After passing Mon Reale, we left behind us the beautiful road, and got into the rugged mountain country. Here some rocks appeared on the crown of the road, which, judging from their gravity and metallic incrustations, I took to be ironstone. Every level spot is cultivated, and is more or less prolific. The limestone in these parts had a reddish hue, and all the pulverized earth is of the same colour. This red argillaceous and calcareous earth extends over a great space; the subsoil is hard; no sand underneath; but it produces excellent wheat. We noticed old very strong, but stumpy, olive trees.
Under the shelter of an airy room, which has been built as an addition to the wretched inn, we refreshed ourselves with a temperate luncheon. Dogs eagerly gobbled up the skins of the sausages we threw away, but a beggar-boy drove them off. He was feasting with a wonderful appetite on the parings of the apples we were devouring, when he in his turn was driven away by an old beggar. Want of work is here felt everywhere. In a ragged toga the old beggar was glad to get a job as house-servant, or waiter. Thus I had formerly observed that whenever a landlord was asked for anything which he had not at the moment in the house, he would send a beggar to the shop for it.
However, we are pretty well provided against all such sorry attendance; for our Vetturino is an excellent fellow – he is ready as ostler, cicerone, guard, courier, cook, and everything.
On the higher hills you find every where the olive, the caruba, and the ash. Their system of farming is also spread over three years. Beans, corn, fallow; in which mode of culture the people say the dung does more marvels than all the Saints. The grape stock is kept down very low.
Alcamo is gloriously situated on a height, at a tolerable distance from a bay of the sea. The magnificence of the country quite enchanted us. Lofty rocks, with deep valleys at their feet, but withal wide open spaces, and great variety. Beyond Mon Beale you look upon a beautiful double valley, in the centre of which a hilly ridge again raises itself. The fruitful fields lie green and quiet, but on the broad roadway the wild bushes and shrubs are brilliant with flowers – the broom one mass of yellow, covered with its pupilionaceous blossoms, and not a single green leaf to be seen; the white-thorn cluster on cluster; the aloes are rising high and promising to flower; a rich tapestry of an amaranthine-red clover, of orchids and the little Alpine roses, hyacinths, with unopened bells, asphodels, and other wild flowers.
Sicily – Segeste
The streams which descend from M. Segeste leave deposits, not only of limestone, but also of pebbles of horn-stone. They are very compact, dark blue, yellow, red, and brown, of various shades. I also found complete lodes of horn, or fire-stone, in the limestone rocks, edged with lime. Of such gravel one finds whole hills just before one gets to Alcamo.
Segeste, April 20, 1787.
The temple of Segeste was never finished; the ground around it was never even levelled; the space only being smoothed on which the peristyle was to stand. For, in several places, the steps are from nine to ten feet in the ground, and there is no hill near, from which the stone or mould could have fallen. Besides, the stones lie in their natural position, and no ruins are found near them.
The columns are all standing; two which had fallen, have very recently been raised again. How far the columns rested on a socle is hard to say; and without an engraving it is difficult to give an idea of their present state. At some points it would seem as if the pillars rested on the fourth step. In that ease to enter the temple you would have to go down a step. In other places, however, the uppermost step is cut through, and then it looks as if the columns had rested on bases; and then again these spaces have been filled up, and so we have once more the first case. An architect is necessary to determine this point.
The sides have twelve columns, not reckoning the corner ones; the back and front six, including them. The rollers on which the stones were moved along, still lie around you on the steps. They have been left in order to indicate that the temple was unfinished. But the strongest evidence of this fact is the floor. In some spots (along the sides) the pavement is laid flown, in the middle, however, the red limestone rock still projects higher than the level of the floor as partially laid; the flooring, therefore, cannot ever have been finished. There is also no trace of an inner temple. Still less can the temple have ever been overlaid with stucco; but that it was intended to do so, we may infer from the fact that the abaci of the capitals have projecting points probably for the purpose of holding the plaster. The whole is built of a limestone, very similar to the travertine; only it is now much fretted. The restoration which was carried on in 1781, has done much good to the building. The cutting of the stone, with which the parts have been reconnected, is simple, but beautiful. The large blocks standing by themselves, which are mentioned by Riedesel, I could not find; probably they were used for the restoration of the columns.
The site of the temple is singular; at the highest end of a broad and long valley, it stands on an isolated hill. Surrounded, however, on all sides by cliffs, it commands a very distant and extensive view of the land, but takes in only just a corner of the sea. The district reposes in a sort of melancholy fertility – every where well cultivated, but scarce a dwelling to be seen. Flowering thistles were swarming with countless butterflies, wild fennel stood here from eight to nine feet high, dry and withered of the last year's growth, but so rich and in such seeming order that one might almost take it to be an old nursery-ground. A shrill wind whistled through the columns as if through a wood, and screaming birds of prey hovered around the pediments.
The wearisomeness of winding through the insignificant ruins of a theatre took away from us all the pleasures we might otherwise have had in visiting the remains of the ancient city. At the foot of the temple, we found large pieces of the horn-stone. Indeed, the road to Alcamo is composed of vast quantities of pebbles of the same formation. From the road a portion of a gravelly earth passes into the soil, by which means it is rendered looser. In some fennel of this year's growth, I observed the difference of the lower and upper leaves; it is still the same organisation that develops multiplicity out of unity. They are most industrious weeders in these parts. Just as beaters go through a wood for game, so here they go through the fields weeding. I have actually seen some insects here. In Palermo, however, I saw nothing but worms, lizards, leeches, and snakes, though not more finely coloured than with us – indeed, they are mostly all gray.
Castel Vetrano,Saturday, April 21, 1787.
From Alcamo to Castel Vetrano you come on the limestone, after crossing some hills of gravel. Between precipitous and barren limestone mountains, lie wide undulating valleys, everywhere tilled, with scarcely a tree to be seen. The gravelly hills are full of large bolders, giving signs of ancient inundations of the sea. The soil is better mixed and lighter than any we have hitherto seen, in consequence of its containing some sand. Leaving Salemi about fifteen miles to our right, we came upon hills of gypsum, lying on the limestone. The soil appears, as we proceed, to be better and more richly compounded. In the distance you catch a peep of the Western sea. In the foreground the country is everywhere hilly. We found the fig-trees just budding, but what most excited our delight and wonder was endless masses of flowers, which had encroached on the broad road, and flourish in large variegated patches. Closely bordering on each other, the several sorts, nevertheless, keep themselves apart and recur at regular intervals. The most beautiful convolvuluses, hibiscuses, and mallows, various kinds of trefoil, here and there the garlic, and the galega-gestrauche. On horseback you may ride through this varied tapestry, by following the numberless and ever-crossing narrow paths which run through it. Here and there you see feeding fine red-brown cattle, very clean-limbed and with short horns of an extremely elegant form.
The mountains to the north-east stand all in a line. A single peak, Cuniglione, rises boldly from the midst of them. The gravelly hills have but few streams; very little rain seems to fall here; we did not find a single gully giving evidence of having ever overflowed.
In the night I met with a singular incident. Quite worn out, we had thrown ourselves on our beds in anything but a very elegant room. In the middle of the night I saw above me a most agreeable phenomenon – a star brighter, I think, than I ever saw one before. Just, however, as I began to take courage at a sight which was of good omen, my patron star suddenly disappeared, and left me in darkness again. At daybreak, I at last discovered the cause of the marvel: there was a hole in the roof, and at the moment of my vision one of the brightest stars must have been crossing my meridian. This purely natural phenomenon was, however, interpreted by us travellers as highly favourable.
Sciacca, April 22, 1787.
Sicily – Sciacca
The road hither, which runs over nothing but gravelly hills, has been mineralogically uninteresting. The traveller here reaches the shore from which, at different points, bold limestone rocks rise suddenly. All the flat land is extremely fertile; barley and oats in the finest condition; the salsola-kali is here cultivated; the aloes since yesterday, and the day before, have shot forth their tall spikes. The same numerous varieties of the trefoil still attended us. At last we came on a little wood, thick with brushwood, the tall trees standing very wide apart; – the cork-tree at last!
Girgenti, April 23, 1787. Evening.
From Sciacca to this place is a hard day's ride. We examined the baths at the last named place. A hot stream burst from the rock with a strong smell of sulphur; the water had a strong saline flavour, but it was not at all thick. May not the sulphureous exhalation be formed at the moment of its breaking from the rock? A little higher is a spring, quite cool and without smell; right above is the monastery, where are the vapour baths; a thick mist rises above it into the pure air.
The shingles on the shore are nothing but limestone: the quartz and hornstone have wholly disappeared. I have examined all the little streams: the Calta Bellota, and the Maccasoli, carry down with them nothing but limestone; the Platani, a yellow marble and flint, the invariable companion of this nobler calcareous formation. A few pieces of lava excited my attention, but I saw nothing in this country that indicated the presence of volcanic action. I supposed, therefore, they must be fragments of millstones, or of pieces brought from a distance for some such use or other. Near Monte Allegro, the stone is all gypsum and selenite; whole rocks of these occurring before and between the limestone. The wonderful strata of Calta Bellota!
Girgenti, Tuesday, April 24, 1787.
Such a glorious spring view as we enjoyed at sunset to-day will most assuredly never meet our eyes again in one life-time. Modern Girgenti stands on the lofty site of the ancient fortifications, an extent sufficient for the present population. From our window we looked over the broad but gentle declivity, on which stood the ancient town, which is now entirely covered with gardens and vineyards, beneath whose verdure it would be long before one thought of looking for the quarters of an ancient city. However, towards the southern end of this green and flourishing spot the Temple of Concord rears itself, while on the east are a few remains of the Temple of Juno. Other ruins of some ancient buildings, which lying in a straight line with those already spoken of, are scarcely noticed by the eye from above, while it hurries over them southwards to the shore, or ranges over the level country, which reaches at least seven miles from the sea-mark. To-day we were obliged to deny ourselves the pleasure of a stroll among the trees and the wild rockets and over this region, so green, so flourishing, and so full of promise for the husbandman, because our guide, (a good-natured little parish priest,) begged us before all things to devote this day to the town.
Sicily-Girgenti
He first showed us the well-built streets; then he took us to the higher points, from which the view, gaining both in extent and breadth, was still more glorious, and lastly, for an artistic treat, conducted us to the principal church. In it there is an ancient sarcophagus in good preservation. The fact of its being used for the altar has rescued from destruction the sculptures on it – Hippolytus attended by his hunting companions and horses, has just been stopped by Phædra's nurse, who wishes to deliver him a letter. As in this piece the principal object was to exhibit beautiful youthful forms, the old woman as a mere subordinate personage, is represented very little and almost dwarfish, in order not to disturb the intended effect. Of all the alto-relivoes I have ever seen, I do not, I think, remember one more glorious, and at the same time, so well preserved as this. Until I meet with a better it must pass with me as a specimen of the most graceful period of Grecian art.
We were carried back to still earlier periods of art by the examination of a costly vase of considerable size, and in excellent condition. Moreover, many relics of ancient architecture appeared worked up here and there in the walls of the modern church.
As there is no inn or hotel in this place, a kind and worthy family made room for us, and gave up for our accommodation an alcove belonging to a large room. A green curtain separated us and our baggage from the members of the family, who, in the more spacious apartment were employed in preparing macaroni, of the whitest and smallest kind. I sat down by the side of the pretty children, and caused the whole process to be explained to me, and was informed that it is prepared from the finest and hardest wheat, called Grano forte. That sort they also told me fetches the highest price, which, after being formed into long pipes, is twisted into coils, and by the tip of the fair artiste's fingers made to assume a serpentine shape. The preparation is chiefly by the hand; machines and moulds are very little used. They also prepared for us a dish of the most excellent macaroni, regretting, however, that at that moment they had not even a single dish of the very best kind, which could not be made out of Girgenti, nor indeed, out of their house. What they did dress for me appeared to me to be unequalled in whiteness and tenderness.
By leading us once more to the heights and to the most glorious points of view, our guide contrived to appease the restlessness which during the evening kept us constantly out of doors. As we took a survey of the whole neighbourhood, he pointed out all the remarkable objects which on the morrow we had proposed to examine more nearly.
Girgenti, Wednesday, April 25, 1787.
With sun rise we took our way towards the plain, while at every step the surrounding scenery assumed a still more picturesque appearance. With the consciousness that it was for our advantage, the little man led us, without stopping, right across the rich vegetation over a thousand little spots, each of which might have furnished the locale for an idyllic scene. To this variety of scene the unevenness of the country greatly contributed, which undulated as it passed over hidden ruins, which probably were very quickly covered with fertile soil, as the ancient buildings consisted of a light muscheltufa. At last we arrived at the eastern end of the city, where are the ruins of the Temple of Juno, of which, every year must have accelerated the decay, as the air and weather are constantly fretting the soft stone of which it is built. To-day we only devoted a cursory examination to it, but Kniep has already chosen the points from which to sketch it to-morrow. The temple stands on a rock which is now much worn by the weather. From this point the city walls stretched in a straight line eastwards, to a bed of limestone, that rises perpendicular from the level strand, which the sea has abandoned, after having shaped these rocks and long washed the foot of them. Hewn partly out of the native rock, and partly built of it were the walls of ancient Agrigentum, from behind which towered a line of temples. No wonder, then, if from the sea the lower, middle, and upper tows, presented together a most striking aspect.