But There Is Nothing Very Extraordinary Either In The Contrivance
Or Execution Of This Corridore.
If I resided in Florence I would give something extraordinary for
permission to walk every day in the gallery, which I should much
prefer to the Lycaeum, the groves of Academus, or any porch or
philosophical alley in Athens or in Rome.
Here by viewing the
statues and busts ranged on each side, I should become acquainted
with the faces of all the remarkable personages, male and female,
of antiquity, and even be able to trace their different
characters from the expression of their features. This collection
is a most excellent commentary upon the Roman historians,
particularly Suetonius and Dion Cassius. There was one
circumstance that struck me in viewing the busts of Caracalla,
both here and in the Capitol at Rome; there was a certain
ferocity in the eyes, which seemed to contradict the sweetness of
the other features, and remarkably justified the epithet
Caracuyl, by which he was distinguished by the antient
inhabitants of North-Britain. In the language of the Highlanders
caracuyl signifies cruel eye, as we are given to understand by
the ingenious editor of Fingal, who seems to think that Caracalla
is no other than the Celtic word, adapted to the pronunciation of
the Romans: but the truth is, Caracalla was the name of a Gaulish
vestment, which this prince affected to wear; and hence he
derived that surname. The Caracuyl of the Britons, is the same as
the upodra idon of the Greeks, which Homer has so often applied
to his Scolding Heroes. I like the Bacchanalian, chiefly for the
fine drapery. The wind, occasioned by her motion, seems to have
swelled and raised it from the parts of the body which it covers.
There is another gay Bacchanalian, in the attitude of dancing,
crowned with ivy, holding in her right hand a bunch of grapes,
and in her left the thyrsus. The head of the celebrated Flora is
very beautiful: the groupe of Cupid and Psyche, however, did not
give me all the pleasure I expected from it.
Of all the marbles that appear in the open gallery, the following
are those I most admire. Leda with the Swan; as for Jupiter, in
this transformation, he has much the appearance of a goose. I
have not seen any thing tamer; but the sculptor has admirably
shewn his art in representing Leda's hand partly hid among the
feathers, which are so lightly touched off, that the very shape
of the fingers are seen underneath. The statue of a youth,
supposed to be Ganymede, is compared by the connoisseurs to the
celebrated Venus, and as far as I can judge, not without reason:
it is however, rather agreeable than striking, and will please a
connoisseur much more than a common spectator. I know not whether
it is my regard to the faculty that inhances the value of the
noted Esculapius, who appears with a venerable beard of delicate
workmanship. He is larger than the life, cloathed in a
magnificent pallium, his left arm resting on a knotted staff,
round which the snake is twined according to Ovid.
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