Another trait of character occurred afterwards, which amused me, but in a very different style.  Our new Danish friend, the Baron B——­, told us he had once been present at the decapitation of nine men, having first fortified himself with a large goblet of brandy.  After describing the scene in all its horrible details, and assuring us in his bad German French that it was “une chose bien mauvaise a voir,” I could not help asking him with a shudder, how he felt afterwards; whether it was not weeks or months before the impressions of horror left his mind?  He answered with smiling naivete and taking a pinch of snuff, “Ma foi! madame, je n’ai pas pu manger de la viande toute cette journee-la?”

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27.—­We drove to the Palazzo Spada, to see the famous Spada Pompey, said to be the very statue at the base of which Caesar fell.  I was pleased to find, contrary to my expectations, that this statue has great intrinsic merit, besides its celebrity, to recommend it.  The extremities of the limbs have a certain clumsiness which may perhaps be a feature of resemblance, and not a fault of the sculptor; but the attitude is noble, and the likeness of the head to the undisputed bust of Pompey in the Florentine gallery, struck me immediately.  The Palazza Spada, with its splendid architecture, dirt, discomfort, and dilapidation, is a fair specimen of the Roman palaces in general.  It contains a corridor, which from an architectural deception appears much longer than it really is.  I hate tricks—­in architecture especially.  We afterwards visited the Pantheon, the Church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, (an odd combination of names,) and concluded the morning at Canova’s.  It is one of the pleasures of Rome to lounge in the studj of the best sculptors; and it is at Rome only that sculpture seems to flourish as in its native soil.  Rome is truly the city of the soul, the home of art and artists.  With the divine models of the Vatican ever before their eyes, these inspiring skies above their heads, and the quarries of marble at a convenient distance—­it is here only they can conceive and execute those works which are formed from the beau-ideal; but it is not here they meet with patronage:  the most beautiful things I have seen at the various studj have all been executed for English, German, and Russian noblemen.  The names I heard most frequently were those of the Dukes of Bedford and Devonshire, Prince Esterhazy, and the King of England.

Canova has been accused of a want of simplicity, and of giving a too voluptuous expression to some of his figures:  with all my admiration of his genius, I confess the censure just.  It is particularly observable in the Clori svegliata (the Nymph awakened by Love), the Cupid and Psyche, for Prince Yousouppoff, the Endymion, the Graces, and some others.

In some of Thorwaldson’s works there is exquisite grace, simplicity, and expression:  the Shepherd Boy, the Adonis, the Jason, and the Hebe, have a great deal of antique spirit.  I did not like the colossal Christ which the sculptor has just finished in clay:  it is a proof that bulk alone does not constitute sublimity:  it is deficient in dignity, or rather in divinity.