FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[44]The Gardiki massacre took place about 1799. In Ali's youth, his tower had been stormed by the people of Gardiki and his mother and sister outraged—at least, so he said. He nursed his revenge for forty years, and then gratified it by massacring the whole population of the village.[45]Author of a valuable account of Greece at this time.

[44]The Gardiki massacre took place about 1799. In Ali's youth, his tower had been stormed by the people of Gardiki and his mother and sister outraged—at least, so he said. He nursed his revenge for forty years, and then gratified it by massacring the whole population of the village.

[45]Author of a valuable account of Greece at this time.

ATHENS—TO ZANTE FOR SALE OF PHIGALEIAN MARBLES—RETURNS TO ATHENS—FEVER—SPENCER STANHOPE—TRIP TO MARATHON, ETC.—RAMAZAN—LIVING OUT IN THE COUNTRY—A PICNIC AT SALAMIS—PRESENTED WITH A BLOCK OF PANATHENAIC FRIEZE—TRIP TO ÆGINA—LEAVES ATHENS FOR ITALY.

My father seems to have got back to Athens to his old quarters at Madame Masson's with Haller and Stackelberg, and there remained. He kept a diary only under the excitement of travel or novelty, and as the sights and society of Athens were too familiar to stir him, there is no precise record of how he passed his time; but he says in a letter that he intends to spend his winter in completing the Ægina and Phigaleian drawings. After all, it was only two or three months he had to be there. The Phigaleian Marbles were to be sold in Zante in May, and this time he meant to be present. The fiasco of the Ægina Marbles in his absence was a warning of what might happen again if the sale were not properly looked after; and as Gropius after his failure had been dismissed from his functions as agent (although still part proprietor) the necessary work had to be done bythe others—each one probably communicating with his own Government. He had taken care that his (the British) should be kept properly posted up. In consequence, everything went off without a hitch. In May he went to Zante. The marbles were sold to General Campbell,[46]commandant of the Ionian Islands, acting on behalf of H.R.H. the Prince Regent, and were already packed up for transport on the 12th of July.

During his stay in Zante my father made many elaborate drawings of the Phigaleian bas-reliefs, with a view to determining their relative positions for the book, and he now returned to Athens to go on with it. He arrived on the 11th of July. But his health was no longer able to bear an Athenian summer. In August he writes:

"A most tiresome fever has been worrying me for the past month, sometimes leaving me for a few days, at others rendering me incapable of doing anything. Few people, even natives, escape it, either in this or any other summer. Such is the fine climate of Greece, which poets would persuade you is a paradise, whereas really hyperborean England, with all her fogs, has still the best in the world....

I am summing up a few observations, wonderfullysavantand deep, on the temples we are preparing for publication, and the Grecian architecture in general. Between you and me, I verily flatter myself, we understand it practically better than anybody—as indeed we ought to. I arrived from Zante on the 11th July. While I was there I received a very fresh (!) letter from home of twenty-nine days.

I was rejoiced to find here my friends and old schoolfellows, Spencer Stanhope and his brother. Conceive our pleasure talking at Athens over Westminster stories and all our adventures since we left. He, poor fellow, has been a prisoner in France for two and a half years, having been taken in Spain owing to the treachery of a Gibraltar vessel, which took him into the port of Barcelona. He is now exploring and excavating (at his own expense) for the French Government as the condition for his freedom! A few days later he and I made a trip to Marathon. We proceeded to Rhamnos, and sleeping a night at a fountain near by, visited in the morning the Temple of Nemesis and stayed there the whole day. It had been well examined, and by this time will have been published by Gell[47]and Gandy. We then went on to a village near which we had the good fortune to find Tanagra, the situation of which had never yet been known. We could trace the whole circuit of the walls and a theatre.Thence to Aulis, the walls of which are easily traceable; then we crossed the bridge over the Euripos into Eubœa. The town of Negropont is a wretched place, inhabited by nothing but Turks. The fortress is ruined and contemptible, and the cannon out of order, as usual, although it is by way of being one of the principal fortresses in these parts. The more one sees of the Turks the more one is astonished at their prolonged rule in these countries. We visited a bey in this place who had a set of maps, and was considered one of the most enlightened men in the town. He produced them immediately he saw us, and boasted of his extensive knowledge on the subject, and the respect the bystanders paid this philosopher was perfectly delightful. The usual custom, before making a visit to these great personages, is to send them an offering of two or three pounds of sugar or coffee, and I thought he seemed rather offended at our exempting ourselves, as Englishmen, from this tribute. Next day we went along the seashore, riding through delightful gardens and olive groves, to Eretria, which has not been seen by modern travellers. It must have been a great city, little less than three miles in circumference. The whole extent of the walls and theatres is still visible.

The greater part of Greece is naturally a rich and productive country. This needs no better proof than the immense population to which the ruins still remaining bear testimony. The ruins of towns of immenseextent and close to each other are found everywhere, and now it is a desert. Neither plague, pestilence, nor famine is so destructive as tyranny. We returned to Athens on the tenth day.

We hear that the plague is raging at Constantinople, Salonica, and Smyrna; whereas Athens, with the Morea and Greece in general, though surrounded on all sides by it, has escaped.

The festival of Ramazan is being celebrated. The bazaar has been well sprinkled with water, and lights are hung before every shop. The caffanee (coffee shops) are all open and lighted, as well as the balconies of the mosques. All day, if any Turks are seen, they are walking about in their best, with long wands, but looking very cross, and not lightly to be accosted by a Greek. At kinde (sunset) the imams call, and the faithful, having fasted from sunrise, not having smoked or even drunk a drop of water, sit down with holy zeal to the very best meal their funds can afford, for it is accounted a crime at this feast to deny themselves what the heart desires. After this the mosque, gaily lighted, is filled with songs and prayer and thanksgiving. Later on the streets are filled. Each in his best enjoys whatever pleasures and amusements the town has to offer—ombres chinoises, long stories from the 'Arabian Nights,' music, chess-playing, &c. Above all, the women now have liberty. They go about in parties, unmasked, visiting, feasting, and amusingthemselves, and the whole place is a continual Vauxhall from sunset to sunrise. At midnight the imam again ascends to the minaret with a chorus, who sing a solemn and beautiful hymn, far more impressive than the finest bells in Christendom. The words begin—

Arise, arise, and pray, for ye know not the hour of death.

Towards the morning passes the dumbanum, a huge drum which a man beats as he goes; while another accompanies him in a sort of sing-song, calling up each householder and bidding him eat his pillau, for the morning is near. He winds up with good wishes and kind terms, for which, at the end of the Ramazan, he expects a present. My name was brought in. What do you think of Cockarella to rhyme with Canella?

From the minaret a beggar is crying for charity and threatening to throw himself down unless he gets it. He goes there at the same hour every day till he has got what he wants.

The wife of the old disdar (commandant of the castle) died a few days ago. She was one of the first ladies of the place, and a respectable good woman. Everyone was touched with the disdar's lamentation. 'She was the ship in which all my hopes were embarked. She was the port in which I took shelter from all the storms and troubles of the world; in her my comforts and joys were confided; she was theanchor in which I trusted.' Each morning he has visited her tomb, and, causing water to be brought, has poured it around that her remains may be refreshed. Three days after, as is the custom, the elders of his relations went to him, desiring that he should marry again. But he refused, looking, as he said, soon to follow his wife.

October 30.—I have been having continual relapses of this abominable fever ever since August. The worst was in the beginning of this month, and it has taken me till now to get over it. After having leeches on, I had removed one of the bandages too soon, and lost a greater quantity of blood than was intended.

It is impossible to describe the feebleness this fever leaves. I sometimes felt as if I was breathing out my soul, and had ceased to belong to this world at all. I lost all interest in my pursuits.

I should have been badly off indeed if it had not been for Madame Masson. She had been a second mother to me, and more attentive in this and in all my other illnesses than any attendants I could have hired. As soon as I was a little better she was so good as to accompany me to a monastery in the Sacred Way, some little distance from Athens, to which I had been advised to go for change of air. There was only one old woman there to take care of the keys, and in the big deserted place we were like two owls in a barn. I cannot say it was gay. I passed most of my time insleeping, for that has been the chief effect of my weakness, and what little was left in reading. Occasionally we were favoured with a visit by some of our Athenian friends, who brought their provisions with them, as their custom is. The monastery stands in a beautiful dell or pass through the mountains. On one side is a beautiful view of the bay and mountains of Eleusis, and on the other, of the Plain of Athens, with the long forest of olive trees between us and the Acropolis, which dominates the plain and is backed by Hymettus. On the right is the Piræus, at no great distance. I could not enjoy this lovely scene. Alas! one can enjoy nothing with a low fever. And now, after a stay of a fortnight, we are just returned, and I am not much the better for it.

But one of the last days I was there I was tempted by my friend Linckh to ride to Piræus, to join in celebrating the anniversary of the victory of Salamis—the 25th October—by a fête on the island of Psytalia, where the thickest of the fight was waged. He had assembled a large party of Athenians, who, to tell the truth, were more intent on the feast than on the occasion of it. We embarked from Piræus in a large boat, accompanied by music—to wit, fiddles and tambourines—as is the Athenian fashion, and a great cargo of provisions which were to be prepared while the modern Athenians contemplated the interesting scene before us, and were to weep over the fall oftheir country since those glorious days, &c. &c. All set out in the greatest glee. Beyond the port, in the open sea, some countenances began to change; though we had almost a calm, some began to feel the effects of the 'gentle motion' and hung their heads over the side, while several pinched each other with fear and anxiety at our distance fromterra firma. Gradually all became silence. Then some murmurs began to arise, together with advice and recommendation to the sailors to row gently and hold fast. A council of war sat, and agreednem. con.that it would be best to return to the nearest land. A small bay was found and all leapt ashore, crossing themselves and thanking their stars for their deliverance. A fire was lighted, the lamb roasted in no time, a cloth laid on the ground, and all set to. The Greeks of old could not have attacked the Persians with more ardour than these moderns did the turkeys and lamb before us. The bottle went round apace, and all soon began to glorify themselves, the demoiselles also playing their part; and when at length, and not until at length, the desire of eating and drinking was accomplished, each one filched the remaining sweets off the table as she found her opportunity. Music's soft enchantment then arose, and the most active began a dance, truly bacchanalian, while the rest lingered over the joys of the table. Punch crowned the feast. All was rapture; moderation was no longer observed, and the day closed witha pelting of each other with the bones of the slain, amidst dancing, singing, and roars of laughter or applause. I venture to assert most positively that not one thought was given to the scene before us, or the occasion, by any one member of the party except my friend Linckh and the διδἁσκαλος [Greek: didaskalos], the schoolmaster of Athens, who, having brought tools for the purpose, carved on the rock an inscription which will one day be interesting to those who may chance to light upon it a thousand years hence—'Invitation [or repast] in memory of the immortal Salaminian combat.' Our party embarked not till after sunset; and though the sea was twice as high and the wind as contrary as it was coming, such are the powers of nectar and ambrosia that all conducted themselves with uncommon courage and resolution. Choruses, Dutch and Athenian, beguiled the way, and all was harmony except the music. So one might have hoped the day might have concluded; but no! the Greek fire, once lighted, is not so easily quenched. I, as an invalid, and exceedingly tired with so much pleasure, retired to my cell in a monastery where we were all to pass the night, and some of my friends kindly gave me a coverlet and a sort of bed, on which I threw myself; but not until long after midnight did the music or the dancing cease, or I or any sober person get a chance of sleep. We got away next day, but not without difficulty; for the Athenians are likeour journeymen: when once they are out on the spree they must carry it on for a week.

We are now in Athens again, and I have just returned to my work-table covered with the dust of so many lost days. This waste of time is terrible. Altogether, out of twenty-four months spent in Athens, seven have been passed in illness. If ever I get away from this country in health and safety, how I shall thank my stars!"

It was in these last days of his stay in Athens that he became possessed of a portion of the Panathenaic frieze of the Parthenon in the following strange manner. The disdar or commandant of the castle on the Acropolis was by now an old friend of Cockerell's, and had ended by becoming exceedingly attached to him. When he understood from the latter, who came to pay him a farewell visit, that he was leaving for good, he told him that he would make him a present. He said he knew that Cockerell was very fond of old sculptured stones, so if he liked to bring a cart to the base of the Acropolis at a certain hour at night (it could not be done in the daytime for fear of giving offence to the Greeks) he would give him something. Cockerell kept the appointment with the cart. As they drew near there was a shout from above to look out, and without further warning the block which forms the right-hand portion of Slab I. of the South Frieze now in the British Museum wasbowled down the cliff. Such a treatment of it had not been anticipated, but it was too late for regrets. The block was put on to the cart, taken down to the Piræus, and shipped at once. Cockerell presented it to the British Museum, and its mutilated appearance bears eloquent testimony to its rough passage down the precipices of the Acropolis.

"My fever continued to harass me until I took a trip to Ægina, which I made for the purpose of change of air, as well as of correcting and revising our drawings of the Temple of Jupiter Panhellenius. In both respects I have succeeded beyond my hopes. I am now in perfect health, and have made some improvements and additions to our observations which will be of importance to our work. Taking ladders from here, I have also succeeded in measuring the columns of a temple supposed to have been that of Venus—I think Hecate—which are of universally admired proportion, and so high that hitherto no travellers have been able to manage them. Only two columns still exist. They belong, I found, to the posticum between the antæ. In digging at their base to prove this, I came upon a very beautiful foot in a sandal, life-size, of Parian marble, of precisely the same school and style as those of our Panhellenian discovery.[48]You may imagineI counted on nothing less than finding a collection as interesting and extensive as the other. I procured, with some difficulty, authority from the archons of the island, and struck a bargain by which they were to have one half of the produce of the excavation, which was to be made at my expense, and I the other, with a first refusal of purchasing their portion. I dug for three days without finding the smallest fragment, and, what was worse, satisfied myself that it had been dug over and re-dug a hundred times, the foundations of the temple having served time out of mind as a quarry for the Æginetans. The money spent was not very great, the time wasted was all to the good of my health, and I was able to make a curious observation on the foundations of the building. Greek temples are commonly on rock. This was not; and the foundations were no less than 14 to 15 feet deep, the first three courses of well-cut stone, the last set in mortar on a wall of small stones in mortar, at the sides of which is a rubble-work of largish stones beaten down with sea sand and charcoal and bones of sacrifices. Underneath, again, are other courses of well-cut stones which form a solid mass under the whole temple.

I have also with great difficulty, since there are no carpenters in this country, ascertained what I spoke of before as a matter of conjecture—viz. the entasis or swelling of the Greek columns. A straight line stretched from the capital to the base showed theswelling at about a third of the height to be in the Temple of Minerva an inch, in that of Ægina half an inch, which is the same proportion in both. The ruined state of the columns of the Theseum makes it less easy to ascertain the exact swelling. Those of Minerva Polias and the Erechtheum are also swelled. I have no doubt that it was a general rule with the Greek architects, though it has hitherto escaped the eyes of Stuart and our most accurate observers."

Cockerell had long been anxious to get into Italy. There alone could he see and study an architecture in some measure applicable to modern needs, if he was ever to become a practical architect. For four years he had been studying abstract beauty, practising his hand in landscape painting, interesting himself in archæology, and generally, except for his vigour and perseverance, behaving as many a gentleman at large might have done whose place in the English world was already made for him. But he had a position to win, and in one of the most arduous of professions, for which all this unsettling life was not merely not preparing him but actually making him unfit.

Since his first startling success at Ægina, he had been led on from one expedition to another, losing sight for months together, in the easy life and simple conditions which surrounded him, of the keen competition in the crush of London for which he ought to be girding himself. He had been forming a taste, but ataste in the externals and details of building only. Of composition and of planning he had seen as yet no fine example and had learnt nothing. There was nothing left for him to do in Greece. He had traversed it in all directions, seen every place of interest, and whenever there appeared a prospect of finding anything with the moderate means at his disposal, he had tried digging.

Under Napoleon's continental system Italy of course was closed to Englishmen, but to Bavarians it was accessible, and Cockerell had often talked with Haller of the possibility of smuggling himself as his servant into the country under cover of his (Haller's) passport. Fortunately this was never attempted. Even if they had succeeded in passing the frontiers under Governments where every foreigner was subjected to continual espionage, the delusion would soon have been discovered. It was a boy's scheme. He had also tried to engage the good offices of Louis of Bavaria to obtain him admission as an artist, but nothing had come of it; and finally, when he heard that Lady Hester Stanhope had got leave to travel in Italy, he had applied to Lord Melville for a similar indulgence. But with the abdication of Napoleon, which took place in April 1814, the whole prospect changed. France was at once thrown open to Englishmen, and the rest of the Continent by degrees. It is not easy to discover at what precisedate the kingdom of Naples and Rome became accessible, but it must have been during the summer. Western news took time to percolate into Greece, but as soon as he learnt that there was a possibility of penetrating into Italy, he had begun making preparations for doing so. And now that there was nothing left to detain him, he arranged to start with Linckh for Rome on the 15th of January, 1815. When the appointed day came, Madame Masson saw him off at the Piræus, and shed floods of tears. She was very fond of him. Two years after she writes: "Non si sa cosa è Carnovale dopo la vostra partenza."

A curious fact about the journey is that they brought away with them a German of Darmstadt of the name of Carl Rester, who appears to have been a fugitive slave, of whom more hereafter.

The party was joined by a Mr. Tupper. This young gentleman had been lodging at Madame Makri's, and had fallen in love, as it was the indispensable fashion for young Englishmen to do, with one or all of the charming daughters. He left them in tears, vowing to return, but it does not appear that he ever did.

The diary of this journey is kept in a sketch-book in pencil, and is not everywhere legible. The country was one well traversed by tourists and minutely described by Gell. There were no discoveries to be made or new impressions to be felt. They had no adventures. The weather was odious. The entriesconsist largely of the kind of information—estimates of population, accounts of products, and possibilities—which for the modern traveller is "found" by Murray or Baedeker, and would never figure in his diary. At the mouth of the Alpheus he remarks how well suited the situation would be for a naval dockyard, close to vast forests of oak and fir—forests, all of which must have disappeared in the devastations of Mehemet Ali, for there are none there now.

The route taken was by Corinth, Argos, Tripolizza, Caritzena, Phigaleia, which they found buried in snow, Olympia, Patras, Ithaca, Corfu, Otranto, Lecce, Bari, and Foggia. The Pass of Bovino, between Foggia and Naples, was considered exceedingly dangerous, on account of banditti, and perhaps the most interesting thing in the whole diary is the extravagant size of the escort considered necessary to see the travellers through it. It consisted of no less than sixty men—thirty cavalry and thirty infantry.

But on the whole the diary of the journey, which was through interesting places and at an interesting moment, could hardly be duller. It may be due to Cockerell's having been in poor health, or to Tupper's having been a stupid, unstimulating companion.

They arrived at Naples on the 14th of April, 1815.

FOOTNOTES:[46]General Sir James Campbell, Bart. (1763-1819), Governor of the Ionian Islands till 1816.[47]Sir William Gell (1777-1836), traveller, author of theItinerary of Greece,Pompeiana, and other works. The Augustus Hare of his day.[48]This foot was presented to the Glyptothek at Munich.

[46]General Sir James Campbell, Bart. (1763-1819), Governor of the Ionian Islands till 1816.

[47]Sir William Gell (1777-1836), traveller, author of theItinerary of Greece,Pompeiana, and other works. The Augustus Hare of his day.

[48]This foot was presented to the Glyptothek at Munich.

NAPLES—POMPEII—ROME—THE GERMAN RESTER GOT RID OF—SOCIAL SUCCESS IN ROME—LEAVES FOR FLORENCE—BARTHOLDY AND THE NIOBE GROUP—LADY DILLON—THE WELLINGTON PALACE—PISA—TOUR IN THE NORTH—MEETS STACKELBERG AGAIN—RETURNS TO FLORENCE AND ROME—HOMEWARD BOUND—CONCLUSION.

With one exception there were no Englishmen, artists or others, in Naples at that time, but a number of Frenchmen, with some of whom Cockerell struck up a great intimacy. In spite of national feeling, which was running very high at the time, he got on very well with them, but he says in a letter from Rome they were dreadful time-servers in their political views. Of course it was a difficult moment for Frenchmen. After Napoleon's abdication at Fontainebleau in April 1814, they had had to accommodate themselves to a revival of the ancient monarchy, which could not be very satisfactory to anyone, and now Napoleon was back again in France. Between two such alternatives no wonder that their judgment oscillated; but to Cockerell—patriotic, enthusiastic, and troubled by no awkward dilemmas—their vacillation was unintelligible.

The one Englishman was Gell (afterwards SirWilliam), who speaks of a stay they made together at Pompeii as the pleasantest time he had spent in his three years' tour.

During this time Cockerell worked hard, and besides what he did which could only be of use to himself, he made himself so familiar with Pompeii that Gell proposed to him to join him in writing an itinerary of that place.

Altogether, leaving Athens on the 15th of January, it was six months before Cockerell got to Rome. Between Naples and Rome the country seems to have been in a very unquiet state, and Carl Rester, who was still with him, writes afterwards: "You remember how anxious about brigands we all were on the journey."

Soon after they arrived, Rester, who must by now have become an irksome burden, started from Rome to walk to his own home at Frankfort. He took a long time about it, but he got there at last in December, only to find his family so reduced by the wars that he determined, as he says, not to be a burden to them, but to show his gratitude to his benefactor by asking for more favours and throwing himself as a burden upon him. So he determined to extend his walk to England. Before leaving his native town, however, he says he published in the local newspaper the following strange tribute to Cockerell's generosity:

"Magna Britannia victoriosa, gloriosa, bene merens, felix. Carolus Robertus Cockerell nobilis Anglus et moribus et scientiis praeclarus me infelicem perditum Germaniae prolem, primis diebus 1815 e Morea barbaris deportavit. Ad Corfum deinde amicis meis Anglis restituit et patriae advicinavit per Napolem universum, Romae me secum ducentem [for ducens] humaniter semper et nobili amicitia me tractavit a London, Old Burlington Street, No. 8, nobilissimi parentes ipsum progenuerunt dignissimum membrum magnae nationis et hominem ubicunque aestimatissimum

Pro gratia universis Anglis et ipsiCarolus Rester germanus.

Gallis merentibus, Britannia juncta Germanis felix Auspicium semper semperque erit." (Are these two last lines elegiacs?—Ed.)

He arrived at Bois le Duc early in March 1816, and after an illness there of seven weeks, writes to Cockerell to beg his assistance to get him over to England, that he might be the better able to sponge upon him there. I never heard what became of him afterwards.

Cockerell then was in Rome, and here he first began to enjoy the harvest of his labours. He says there were no English there at the time except Lady Westmoreland, mother of the British minister at Florence, but there was a large society of foreign artists, into which he threw himself. There were thebrothers Riepenhausen, painters; Schadow, a sculptor from Berlin; Ingres, who drew his portrait;[49]Cornelius of Munich, and others of his school; Knoering, a Russian; Mazois, author of "Le Palais de Scaurus" and an itinerary of Pompeii; Catel, a French architect; Thorwaldsen, Overbeck, Vogel, portrait painter; Bartholdy, Prussian consul-general; Hess, a painter from Vienna; Canova, and Checcarini, who did the Neptune and Tritons in the Piazza del Popolo at the bottom of the drive up to the Pincio. The air of Rome was steeped in classicism. In this company every event was described in classical figures: their café was the Café Greco, which still exists; the front half was called the Pronaos. There all the artistic world collected and made acquaintance.

"If I were a little more vain I should be out of my wits at the attention paid me here. I have a daily levee of savants, artists and amateurs come to see my drawings; envoys and ambassadors beg to know when it will be convenient for me to show them some sketches; Prince Poniatowski and the Prince of Saxe-Gotha beg to be permitted to see them. I say they are slight, and in truth poor things, but at any rate they were done on the spot, and they, 'C'est la Grèce enfin, c'est là le véritable pays. Ah, Monsieur, que vous êtes heureux d'avoir parcouru ce beau pays!' Then I explain to them some constructions or beauties which theydon't understand. 'Ah, que c'est merveilleux, mais vous les publierez, vous nous donnerez le bonheur de les posséder, mais ce sont des choses fort intéressantes, enfin c'est de la Grèce.' And in truth publishers and readers have been so long restricted to the Roman antiquities, which have been published and read over and over again a thousand times, that the avidity for novelty is beyond measure, and Greece is the fashion here as everywhere else.

There is not a single English artist here and only a few passengers. Lady Westmoreland is one. She is a very clever, well-bred, agreeable chatterer, who has been very civil to me, and made me lose several hours which might have been better employed. Fortunately she is going away. I have several letters for the Roman nobles, but I have not presented them that I may have my time to myself.

So Canova is gone to England. I hope it is not to execute the paltry monument of Lord Nelson which he has published here. It would be a disgrace to us all. Fancy the great Nelson as a Roman in petticoats! I do trust whenever a monument is erected to him it may be as original, national, and characteristic as was the man and the great nation he sprang from. Every age hitherto has had ingenuity enough to make its costume interesting in sculpture; we are the first who have shown such poverty of ideas as to despise our age and our dress.

I hope he will not be made too much of in England. It is true that nobody ever worked the marble as he does, and it is this finish of his which has deceived and captivated the world, but it is nothing but artificiality, and there is no nature about it. When he attempts the sublime he is ludicrous. In seeking grace he is more successful; but, after all, his Terpsichore was conceived in the Palais Royal, and her headdress is exactly the latest hairdressers' fashion. It is exasperating to think of his success when Flaxman, as far his superior as Hyperion to a satyr, an artist looked up to by the schools of the Continent as a great and extraordinary genius, is neglected by us because he is not a foreigner.

It is exceedingly gratifying to me to find everything in my portfolio turning to account. I had the pleasure of showing to Colonel Catinelli, who lately fortified Genoa, my fortifications of Syracuse, and the sketches I made of that subject in Greece. He assures me that they are invaluable notices new to modern warfare, and that they prove that, compared to the ancients, we who imagine ourselves so well informed on the matter, know nothing at all.

Then I have above 150 inscriptions among my papers, and I find most of them are unpublished. I have had them copied fairly, and they are now in the hands of a great savant, M. Akerblad, for his perusal. He promises to give me his notes on them.

I do think I have not made a bad use of my opportunities, if I may judge by the interest taken in the various new notices on different subjects I have brought with me, and the flattering consideration everywhere shown me, I get so many invitations, and am so harassed to show distinguished persons of all nations my drawings, that I can get no time to myself. And in order to have something to show I have been obliged to finish up some of my sketches, which has occupied the whole of the last two months. I have now a portfolio of about fifteen of some of the most interesting scenes in Greece fit to show, and I generally find them as much as my visitors want to see.

Finding at last that my time and occupations were too much infringed upon by gaieties, I left Rome to seek more quiet in Florence. I found it at first, and for more than six weeks was as busy as it was possible to be. My life was a curious one. I rose early, and after working all day, dined alone at a trattoria, refusing frequently three or four invitations in a day. Then I slept three or four hours on a sofa, and rose in the night to work calmly until four or five in the morning, when I took another nap, and rose at seven. This odd life got wind; and as I was a great deal known here, either by reputation or by name and family, I occasioned a good deal of wonder, particularly among those who are astonished at anyone's occupyinghimself earnestly except for a necessity. The interest in me was also increased rather than diminished by my shyness when I did show in company. I had so much lost the habit of society by the long sojourn in Turkey, and, looking on it with a new eye, was often so disgusted with the follies of it, and showed my disgust, that I got a character for being a cynic. But instead of taking offence people only made the more of me, and I was constantly invited out, more to gratify my hosts' curiosity than to give pleasure to me. To have travelled in Greece, still more to have been a discoverer there, is enough to make a lion; while the fame of my drawings, which few of the many who saw them understood and all were therefore willing to think wonderful, completed the business. It was at this time that I brought out my drawing of the Niobe and the etchings from it."

B. Bartholdy, Prussian consul-general in Rome, an intelligent man and much interested in art, had travelled up from Rome to Florence with Cockerell and made himself one of his most intimate acquaintances. Walking together one day in the Uffizi, they examined the group of the Niobe. It is now neglected and forgotten, but in those days it occupied, in the estimation of artists, the place to-day held by the Elgin Marbles. With the Venus de' Medici, the Apollo Belvedere, and the Torso in the Vatican, these statues were regarded as the greatest remains antiquity hadbequeathed to the modern world. But, prized and studied as they were, the purpose of so many figures, evidently meant to stand together, had never yet dawned on the minds of their admirers. The figure of Niobe, which is the largest, had been placed in the middle, and the rest in a circle round her. It was felt indeed that this could not be right, but no one had anything better to suggest, and it remained one of the favourite puzzles for art lovers to wrangle over. Into the middle of this clouded state of intelligences Cockerell dropped as from another planet. The experience of the Æginetan statues, which he had arranged so laboriously, besides the constant sight of what remained of the Parthenon and other Greek monuments, made the notion of a pediment or ἁετὁς [Greek: haetos] so familiar as to present itself to his mind at once as the only possible destination for so many statues. He says the first suggestion came on that occasion from Bartholdy. "I have told Schlegel and all parties that it was first proposed by you;" to which Bartholdy replies: "J'aurai le plaisir de pouvoir dire que vous avez fait fructifier un petit grain tombé de la main d'un amateur des beaux arts qui sans cela serait resté stérile." But it was probably the company of Cockerell and the associations with Ægina &c. which suggested the notion to Bartholdy. At all events, beyond that first suggestion, Bartholdy did nothing. It was Cockerell who measured the statues, arranged them, proved the case, and made the etchingwhich hangs to this day in the Niobe Room in the Uffizi Gallery, showing the arrangement which he proposed. In recognition, however, of the part Bartholdy had had in it, the plate was dedicated to him.

For the introduction of Cockerell as a lion into society—if that be a thing to be desired—this discovery was most opportune. He had arrived with a great reputation as a traveller, a discoverer, and unraveller of age-long puzzles, as in the case of the Temple of the Giants, and now here was a proof of his powers exhibited in the centre of artistic Europe.

"I had shown my drawing to several people and amongst the ambassadors and distinguished persons here—all of whom,de rigueur, more or less pretend to understand the arts—and it gained universal approbation. It was talked about by all, and written about by Demetrius Schinas and other obscure poets and prose writers. I was flattered, invited, and made much of. Our ambassador boasts that the solution has been proved by an Englishman; others bow and beg to be allowed to send copies of my etching to their Governments, to Metternich, &c. It was formally presented to the Grand Duke, and I have received from the Academy here a handsome letter and diploma of Academician of Florence. It is to be published in the official work on the Gallery. I have presented it myself to Madame de Staël, and my friends have sent it to all parts of the Continent."

He was now regularly launched in the fashionable society of Florence.

The reigning beauty at this time, the centre of all jollity and brightness, was Lady Dillon. All the young men were at her feet, and Cockerell was as deeply smitten as anybody. As already mentioned, during the time that he was in Syracuse he had learnt the art of cameo-cutting. He now made use of it—or at least of the preliminary stage, which is to make a model in wax—to execute a highly finished portrait of her, which still exists in the possession of her descendants. It shows a head of great beauty, and is executed with admirable skill and minuteness.

The whole English nation was now jubilant over the success of its army at Waterloo, and was considering the rewards to be offered to its idol, the Duke of Wellington. He was to have a magnificent palace, surpassing the glories of Blenheim, and architects were called upon to give reins to their imagination in preparing designs in competition. The celebrity which my father had by now made for himself obtained him, through the medium of Lord and Lady Burghersh, his fast friends, a formal invitation to send in designs for the Wellington Palace.

The opportunity was of course magnificent, but nothing he had been doing for years had in the least adapted him to take advantage of it.

"Although my occupation in the Wellington Palaceis a very honourable one, and the study and exercise of invention in the course of it may be profitable, yet I cannot help wishing I had never been invited to give an idea for it, for I have spent a vast deal of time over it, and it will add nothing to my reputation, even if it does not detract from it. If such a design was difficult to everyone, you may imagine what it was to me who have never attempted anything original before. I consulted every architectural work of Europe (they are all in the library here), and I would have consulted every professional man I could get at if there had been any here whose opinion was worth having. Then I composed general ideas, and finally fixed on one which pleased Mr. North and several other persons to whom I showed it; but when I went into detail I found the difficulties increase immeasurably, and the notions which were plausible while they were vague could not be put into execution. Plan would not agree with elevation. Doors and windows would not come into their right places. I invented roundabout ways for simple ends. In fact I worked furiously, and for the first time realised the practical difficulties of the profession. At last, when I had filled a portfolio with sketches and schemes, I completed a set and showed them to Lord and Lady Burghersh, who said they were pleased with them.

I began to feel that I had too large an acquaintance in Florence—too many visits and invitations.My wound [?], of which I did not get the better, confined me, and that made me generally unwell and obliged me to go through a course of physic. Altogether I got out of heart with my work and determined to get away. I went to Pisa for the month of July, and except for visits from Pigou I was quite alone. There I undid all I had done before, and finding that to do the thing well I should need more time than I could possibly give, I determined to make some small sketches which, prettily finished, might attract attention and show that I was in some sort capable. Finally, I made some sketches and sent them with an explanation to Lady Burghersh and a request to forward them to the proper quarter."

The difficulties he had encountered over these drawings so disgusted him with architecture that he seems to have even proposed to his father to throw it up and become a painter, as that, he thought, was the profession for which he was best suited. But Mr. Cockerell, who was a steady business man, had no notion of his son becoming what he would have considered a bohemian, and refused to sanction any such change.

The only thing to do, then, was to continue his studies. The Wellington Palace drawings had at any rate weaned him of any idea that pure Greek architecture was applicable to modern architectural designing, and he had little knowledge of any other. He startedfor a tour of the north of Italy. His letters contain few criticisms. Palladio, probably as being most akin to what he had hitherto studied, pleased him more than any other architect. In Venice he fell in with Stackelberg, who had been home to Russia while his travels in Greece were still fresh enough to claim attention, and had been received with every sort of distinction. He was now on his way back to Rome to settle there and bring out the various books he subsequently published.

The two joined forces, and having run through all the principal towns, returned southwards to Florence.

Shortly after, in company with Lord and Lady Dillon, he went to Rome. He was now a recognised lion, everywhere fêted and made much of. Bartholdy writes of him: "Cockerell est gâté par les femmes." Nevertheless he worked hard. Amongst other things he finished the drawing of the Forum Romanum, the engraving of which is well known. The Duchess of Devonshire wished to insert a reduction of it in her "Virgil," and writes to thank him for "the beautiful drawing youwasso good as to do for me."

He had left also in Rome the bulk of his, and Haller's, drawings for the intended book on Greek architecture. These he picked up, and having seen all the architecture Italy had to show him, he started in March for England. In Paris he remained somelittle time. A letter from his father during his stay there is worth transcribing in part.

"I send a few hints as to what you should observe in Paris; not things of that high order to which you have so long been used, but yet important to study in order to supply the luxurious indulgence so much coveted by the great here, by whom a complete knowledge of them in their professors of architecture is expected.

You have raised a name here so high that everything in perfection will be expected of you; at least in all that relates to taste in the arts, and in all the subordinate degrees of contrivances, as well as in decoration. The last is that which affords the most extensive employment, and you will be surprised to find more importance attached to the decorations of a salon than to the building of a temple. If, therefore, you can bend to the consideration of what is called the 'fittings up' of the interior of the best hotels and palaces of Paris, the graces of theirmeubles, and the harmony of their colours in hangings, painting, and gilding, you may be the general arbiter of taste here; and as there are very few persons who are real judges of compositions even classical, much less sublime, and there must be few opportunities of exercising those parts of your studies here, it will be really useful if you allow yourself to look at those minor objects at Paris which in truth they judge well of.

Percier[50]is the first architect in Paris; he will tell you what is worth seeing. Dismalter & Jacob are the first decorators in furniture &c., 57 Rue Meslée.

Your friends Lord Burghersh and Lord Dillon proclaim your name without ceasing, and much is expected of you. The Duke of Gloucester has commanded me to introduce you to his acquaintance. You have been spoken of at Carlton House, where I have reason to think there is great likelihood of your being noticed advantageously; but you must not be disappointed to find very common things occupying the minds of a large majority of a nation ofboutiquiers, and we must take the world as we find it, believing always that good sense, refined judgment, and true taste will ultimately prevail.

Do not imagine that I am thinking of money as the only thing worth your attention. I consider that as the last object. The first, a higher order of taste and information, you possess amply. The second is to learn to suit in some measure the times we live in and the objects which occupy the multitude, and it is worth attending to. The third and last is the profit which follows; but that must come of itself, and is not worth pursuing.

You will think me lecturing to the last, but I reallymean no more than to express my hope that you will not despise trifles, if elegant, finding yourself for the moment amongst a nation of triflers, because they have long been considered and imitated by ourselves and the rest of Europe as accomplished in matters of ornament, though not in subjects of use.

Your family are now on tiptoe for your arrival, and daily drink their affectionate good wishes to the homeward bound. None is behind another in their impatience; for myself, it is always present to me. Nevertheless, I am not selfish enough to wish you to leave unseen, for the sake of a few days more, anything which you ought to be acquainted with."

My father arrived in London on the 17th of June, 1817, having left it on the 10th of April, 1810. Besides his own, he had brought with him all Haller's drawings for the intended book which was to be the complete and final authority on Greek architecture and the grand result of his seven years of travel. Haller was to come to England to see it through the press. Had it appeared at once it would have been mostà propos. Greek architecture was all the fashion. Unhappily, the intention was thwarted by the sudden death of Haller, which took place at Ambelakia, in the Vale of Tempe, of a congestion of the lungs, caught while making excavations in the month of September 1818. The loss of this valuable help disheartened my father, who had no taste for the work. He was already busy in otherways, and the task which should have had his first attention gradually sank into the background. One by one those who had taken part in the discoveries died: Stackelberg in 1836, Linckh and Foster not many years after. But the book remained a load on my father's conscience all his life, and it was not till 1859, more than forty years later, that it saw the light. The interest in the events and actors had died down, and the novelties had become common property. His unfortunate dislike for writing lost him much of the credit he might have reaped, while others profited by his experience. His collection of inscriptions was picked over by Walpole; Hughes fills out his pages with his letters; Bronstedt uses his drawings. It is Stackelberg who relates how he discovered the bas-reliefs at Phigaleia; Beaufort anticipates anything he might have had to tell of Karamania; Wordsworth plundered his portfolio; and in the absence of any consecutive account of his own, it has been often only by the help of the writings of others that it has been possible for me to piece together his disjointed and often undated diaries.

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