CHAPTER XIII.

THE PAINTED VENUS.

We hardly ever drove over the streets of Rome, without one of the horses, or sometimes both, coming down; none but a Roman horse is safe on this classic ground; it is quite extraordinary how difficult it is for foreigners of the equine race. It was a thing of such very frequent occurrence with us, that latterly nobody took any notice of it. I would strongly recommend selecting a clean public carriage, and there are plenty to be found in the Piazza di Spagna, to hiring any carriage by the month. Riding over the Roman pavement is a business of danger, and walking, excepting in the Corso, and one or two favoured spots, is a chance for the doctors; the most desperate hunters generally mount outside of the city.

In walking through the streets, the eye is constantly attracted by the various prints of all that is to be seen; and if you can set the pickpockets at defiance, you will be much amused by the variety which is offered to view. There are no very remarkable shops in Rome, as are seen in London and Paris; and the pontifical government, in its paternal care of the innocence of its subjects, has taken precaution that modesty should not be offended; but I doubt if in any city, with a similar population of 175,838 souls, there is more immorality than in Rome; if it does not meet you in the streets, it is suggested at every corner, and carried into every house. It not unfrequently happens, that a too strict legislation against vice leads to greater immorality; and every traveller who is well acquainted with Stockholm, would admit the truth of the remark.

It by no means follows that because a city has four thousand five hundred priests and friars, and one thousand nine hundred nuns, that either piety or chastity prevail; some writers declare that the constant exhibition of nude statues excites to vice, whilst others look at the cold marble with a colder look, and de

clare that "to the pure in mind all things are pure;" but I strongly recommend those who are wavering between virtue and a slight inclination to vice, to beware of the painted Venus.

There seldom, if ever, has been an English sculptor of more just renown than John Gibson; and any man who has studied the beauties of his atelier, in the Via della Fontanella, will place him, without any hesitation, on a level with Canova. What varied beauties attract the eye at every turn! what grace, what symmetry, what modesty (there is nothing so dangerous as that modesty), beam in every form; one might wish, with Pygmalion, to find the statues warm, for very few people could say with Byron :

"I've seen more pretty women ripe and real,

Than all the nonsense of their stone ideal."

Byron never saw Gibson's painted Venus; and it is a very dangerous Venus to gaze upon.

This colouring of statues is very old; in the studii, at Naples, there are plenty of Grecian marbles which were coloured, and which two thousand years of time have not yet rubbed off. Gibson, in imitation, for it is impossible

to give him the originality of the invention, has, with consummate skill, managed to give the Venus the exact colouring of human flesh, and he has given also, the clear blue eye, the rosy lip, and peach-bloom cheek of youth and beauty. The form is not that of one personthere is not such perfection alive, in spite of Byron; and this Venus, like that of Zeuxis, is the result of several models, all exquisite in some particular part; for in the living beauty, no one ever yet found perfection. It is rather dangerous to mention it, but I believe the principal model is alive and blooming.

Mr. Gibson is not only a sculptor, but a man of refinement of mind, and therefore not a man "to hide his light under a bushel." The statue is placed upon a pedestal exactly in proportion to the figure, and the Venus is covered with a transparent gauze; this, as Gibson remarked, was merely to keep off the dust; but it has a very extraordinary effect, and I really think I should have been obliged to look through my fingers, as Spanish ladies peep through the small glass holes in their fans, had any of the young and modest specimens of sentimental females been present, when this slight covering was removed.

VOL. III.

Z

Behold the nude in all its nudity-you could almost swear it was alive; and if any fanatic had declared he had seen this virgin wink her eyes, I should have thought it a very probable event. Of all the statues, ancient or modern, -and that Grecian slave was a dangerous one, although ladies and gentlemen turned and twisted her about most unceremoniously at the Exhibition,-I have never seen anything so exquisitely natural as this of Gibson; and if from any determination not to believe perfection possible, I must find a fault, it would be in the coiffure of this inimitable statue. The Venus de Medicis has not rounder limbs, or finer proportions, and this is much more stately; the Florentine Venus is too small; this is the exact proportion of a fine womannot a pigmy on the one hand, or clumsy on the other and the features are beautiful. Around you are thousands of lovely designs and exquisitely finished statues; but you will stand before this Venus, and never take your eyes from her. I have not the least doubt, that if Gibson placed this statue in a room covered with dark velvet, and admitted the light from a small aperture, so as only to fall upon the Venus, he would require a strong body of police to keep order at the door, and