THE MICHAEL-ANGELO FESTIVAL AT FLORENCE.
THE commemoration of the Fourth Centenary of the birth of Michael Angelo at Florence (he was actually born in March, 1474,—and we do not know why the Centenary was not celebrated last year), has now lasted several days, and proved in every way a worthy tribute of national affection and homage to the great Floren- tine. The season chosen was not one in which large numbers of strangers visit Italy, and it was observable that very few represen- tatives of foreign nations were present. The celebration, for that reason, partook more essentially of a domestic and national charac- ter, every important town and every flourishing society or academy for the promotion of art and literature in the peninsula having sent one or more delegates to the Festival. On Sunday, the 12th, there was a charming concert in the great Hall of the Cinque Cento, in the Palazzo Vecchio, to which the public were admitted by payment, and guests and foreigners on the invitation of the Syndic. Occasion was taken to introduce into the programme one or two of Michael Angelo's own songs, one of which, Deb ! dimmi sailor !" was rendered with touching effect. The pro- cession in the afternoon through the streets to Santa Croce, the "Mecca of Italy," as Byron called it, where the great artist is buried, and to the house in the Via Ghibellini, so piously con- secrated to his memory by his descendant, was full of interest, though less outwardly striking and theatrical, owing to the entire absence of all ceremonial or official costume, than might have been expected. Perhaps, however, the want of distinctive dress or of mediaeval trappings brought into stronger relief the true character of the demonstration, as one in which men of the nine7 teenth century desired to show a living interest. Any one who stood under the Campanile of Giotto, its coloured marbles glistening in the sunlight like a jewelled casket, saw for nearly an hour passing before him, the representatives of every form of social, political, artistic, and municipal life in North Italy. First of all, the companies of the several trades marched, each with its name in- scribed on a banner, and with other emblems and inscriptions in honour of Michael Angelo. After the various crafts and guilds, came musical and choral unions, benefit clubs, societies for divers benevolent objects, the pupils of colleges and technical schools, artistic societies, a club ostentatiously proclaiming itself as "the lovers of free thought," and finally, a group of two or three hundred grave, responsible-looking men, in what we should call evening dress, consisting mainly of representatives of other towns, of muni- cipal functionaries, and other official personages, the Syndic, and the City Council. We have said that every element in the national and social life was represented, but this is not strictly true. One element was conspicuously absent. No religious symbol, no clerical person- age, no sign that Christianity was or ever had been the religion of Italy, was visible in that long and varied procession. It may be that the Church voluntarily held aloof from an act of homage to the least ecclesiastical and pietistic of Italian artists, or that it was the deliberate intention of the promoters of the file to give to it a completely secular and artistic character, and to exclude from it all chance of religious discord. Or the fact may be but one more among many tokens of the manifest divorce between the Church in Italy, and all that is active and progressive in the intellectual and political life of the people. Whatever be the cause, it is significant and not cheering that no part of these cere- monials has assumed the form of a religious service, that no recognition has been made on the part of the Church of the contribution which the hero of the hour had once made to her adornment and her dignity, nor of the part which he had played in identifying her with centuries of European culture, and that so far as the Michael-Angelo Festival shows anything, the Christian Church and the Roman faith might, as factors in the national life of modern Italy, be absolutely non-existent.
What struck a stranger most in the Festival was the keen interest taken by all classes, especially the humblest, in the object of the demonstration. The shop-windows were filled with portraits and memorials of all kinds and prices. Besides the more expensive books, engravings, and photographs illustrative of the artist's work, which were produced to meet the demands of richer people, a little handbook, containing an admirable summary of his literary and artistic life, was hawked about for two soldi, and sold in large numbers in the streets. Crowds of the poorest townspeople and of the peasantry from the surrounding district passed through the special exhibitions in the Buonarotti House and in the Academia. In this last exhibition were shown the famous statue of David, casts of most of the artist's other works, a careful copy of "The Last Judgment" in the Sistine Chapel, and a very complete series of photographic repro- ductions of Michael Angelo's frescoes and other works at Rome and elsewhere. Of the official eulogies, the fervid congratulations of provincial deputies charged with the duty of expressing sym- pathy with the Florentines in their homage to the illustrious artist, the newspaper correspondents seem to have given to the English public a very just description ; but they have failed to recognise the zest with which the whole community, especially the humbler classes, entered into the spirit of the Festival, and evinced pride in the memory and achievements of their great countryman.
No Englishman who was so fortunate as to be present on the evening of the 14th at the great illumination and concert on the Piazzale Michelangiolo will ever forget the scene. On that fair eminence he saw all the heights around Florence, from Fiesole to St. Miniato and the tower of Galileo; illuminated with lime- light or coloured fires. The outlines of the grand old tower of the Palazzo Vecchio were also traced in long lines of light, and the whole of the city was spread out before him in enchanting loveliness. On the Piazzale itself the concert took place, in a reserved terraced garden, scarcely separated from the public promenade by a low fence, one or two fountains, and a line of coloured lamps. Here, till midnight, all Florence assembled, and walked to and fro under a cloudless sky, to the strains of sweet music, and within sight of such a blaze of colours and lights and feux d'artiftee as gave to the entire scene the aspect of a dreamy and most lovely pageant. As one felt the soft warm air, listened to the hum of the cheerful and orderly crowd, and saw overhead the "broad circumference" which on the very same spot had once suggested to Milton one of his most striking images :—
"The moon, whose orb
Through optic glass the Tuscan artist views At evening from the top of Fesole Or in Valdarno, to descry new lands, Rivers, or mountains in her spotty globe,"
it was impossible to avoid being touched with a sense of the glory of the scene, and at the same time impressed with the moral significance of the whole celebration of which it formed so fitting a conclusion. Here in Italy, at least, the spirit of hero-worship is not dead. And the powerful and manly Buonarotti, who rebelled with such calm majesty against whatever seemed to be ignoble or enervating in the Christian art of the Francias, the Angelicoa, and Peruginos of the elder time, who rejoiced rather in effort than Us contemplation, and who to the love of beauty added in yet higher measure the love of force, of strength, and of greatness, is of all the noble dead whom Italy cherishes the fittest hero for worship at the present era of her history,—an era of awakening life, of emancipation from burdensome ecclesiasticism, and of suc- cessful aspiration after intellectual freedom and national unity.
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