Personal Recollections, from Early Life to Old Age, of Mary Somerville Part 19

FLORENCE, _29th May, 1859_.

... Everything is perfectly quiet here; the Tuscans are giving money liberally for carrying on the war. We have bought quant.i.ties of old linen, and your sisters and I spend the day in making lint and bandages for the wounded soldiers; great quant.i.ties have already been sent to Piedmont. Hitherto the war has been favourable to the allied army. G.o.d grant that England may not enter into the contest till the Austrians are driven out of Italy! After that point has been gained, our honour would be safe. To take part with the oppressors and maintain despotism in Italy would be infamous.

Tuscany is to be occupied by a large body of troops under the command of Prince Napoleon. A great many are already encamped on the meadows at the Cascine--fine, spirited, merry young men; many of them have the Victoria medal. They are a thorough protection against any attack by the Austrians, of which, however, there is little chance, as they have enough to do in Lombardy. There is to be a great affair this morning at nine o'clock; an altar is raised in the middle of the camp, and the tricolour (Italian) flag is to be blessed amidst salvoes of cannon. Your friend, Bettino Ricasoli, is thought by far the most able and statesmanlike person in Tuscany; he is highly respected. Martha and I dined with Mr. Scarlett, and met ... who said if the Grand Duke had not been the most foolish and obstinately weak man in the world, he might still have been on the throne of Tuscany; but that now he has made that impossible by going to Vienna and allowing his two sons to enter the Austrian army....

We have had a visit from Dr. Falconer, his two nieces and brother.

They had been spending the winter in Sicily, where he discovered rude implements formed by man mixed with the bones of prehistoric animals in a cave, so hermetically shut up that not a doubt is left of a race of men having lived at a period far anterior to that a.s.signed as the origin of mankind. Similar discoveries have recently been made elsewhere. Dr. Falkner had travelled much in the Himalayas, and lived two years on the great plain of Tibet; the account he gave me of it was most interesting. His brother had spent fifteen years in Australia, so the conversation delighted me; I learnt so much that was new. I am glad to hear that the Queen has been so kind to my friend Faraday; it seems she has given him an apartment at Hampton Court nicely fitted up. She went to see it herself, and having consulted scientific men as to the instruments that were necessary for his pursuits, she had a laboratory fitted up with them, and made him a present of the whole. That is doing things handsomely, and no one since Newton has deserved it so much.

FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO W. GREIG, ESQ.

FLORENCE, _5th June, 1859_.

... All is perfectly quiet; a large body of French troops are now in Tuscany, and many more are expected probably to make a diversion on this side of the Austrian army through Modena; but nothing is known; the most profound secrecy is maintained as to all military movements. Success has. .h.i.therto attended the allied army, and the greatest bravery has been shown. The enthusiasm among the men engaged is excessive, the King of Sardinia himself the bravest of the brave, but exposes himself so much that the people are making pet.i.tions to him to be more careful. The Zouaves called out in the midst of the battle, "Le roi est un Zouave!" Prince Napoleon keeps very quiet, and avoids shewing himself as much as possible. The French troops are very fine indeed--young, gay, extremely civil and well bred. The secrecy is quite curious; even the colonels of the regiments do not know where they may be sent till the order comes: so all is conjecture.... The young King of Naples seems to follow the footsteps of his father; I hope in G.o.d that we may not protect and defend him. How anxious we are to know what the House of Commons will do! Let us hope they will take the liberal side; but the conservative party seems to be increasing.

FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO W. GREIG, ESQ.

FLORENCE, _22nd August, 1859_.

... Public affairs go on admirably. A few weeks ago the elections took place of the members of the Tuscan parliament with a calm and tranquillity of which you have no idea. Every proprietor who pays 15 pauls of taxes (75 pence) has a vote. There are 180 members, consisting of the most ancient n.o.bility, the richest proprietors, the most distinguished physicians and lawyers, and the most respectable merchants. They hold their meetings in the magnificent hall of the Palazzo Vecchio--the Sala Dei Cinquecento. The first two or three days were employed in choosing a president &c., &c.; then a day was named to determine the fate of the house of Lorraine. I could not go, but Martha went with a Tuscan friend. There was no speaking; the vote was by ballot, and each member separately went up to a table before the president, and silently put his ball into a large vase. Two members poured the b.a.l.l.s into a tray, and on examination, said, "No division is necessary; they are _all_ black,"--which was followed by long and loud cheering. They have been equally unanimous in the Legations in Parma and Modena; and the wish of the people is to form one kingdom of these four states under an Italian prince, excluding all Austrians for ever. The union is perfect, and the determination quiet but deep and unalterable. If the Archduke is forced upon them, it must be by armed force, which the French emperor will not likely permit, after the Archduke was fool enough to fight against him at Solferino. All the four states have unanimously voted union with Piedmont; but they do not expect it to be granted. The destinies of Europe are now dependent on the two emperors....

FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO W. GREIG, ESQ.

FLORENCE, _23rd April, 1860_.

You would have had this letter sooner, my dearest Woronzow, if I had not been prevented from writing to you yesterday evening.... The weather has been atrocious; deluges of rain night and day, and so cold that I have been obliged to lay in a second supply of wood. The only good day, and the only one I have been out, was that on which the king arrived. It fortunately was fine, and the sight was magnificent; quite worthy of so great an historical event. No carriages were allowed after the guns fired announcing that the king had left Leghorn; so we should have been ill off, had it not been for the kindness of our friend the Marchesa Lajatico, who invited us to her balcony, which is now very large, as they have built an addition to their house for the eldest son and his pretty wife. We were there some hours before the king arrived; but as all the Florentine society was there, and many of our friends from Turin and Genoa, we found it very agreeable. The house is in the Prato, very near the gate the king was to enter. On each side of it stages were raised like steps in an amphitheatre, which were densely crowded, every window decorated with gaily-coloured hangings and the Italian flag; the streets were lined with "guardie civiche," and bands of music played from time to time. The people shouted "Evviva!" every time a gun was fired. In the midst of this joy, there appeared what resembled a funeral procession--about a hundred emigrants following the Venetian, Roman, and Neapolitan colours, all hung with black c.r.a.pe; they were warmly applauded, and many people shed tears. They went to the railway station just without the gate to meet the King, and when they hailed him as "_Re d'Italia!_" he was much affected.

At last he appeared riding a fine English horse, Prince Carignan on one hand and Baron Ricasoli on his left, followed by a numerous "_troupe doree_" of generals and of his suite in gay uniforms and well mounted. The King rides well; so the effect was extremely brilliant. Then followed several carriages; in the first were Count Cavour, Buoncompagni, and the Marchese Bartolommei. You cannot form the slightest idea of the excitement; it was a burst of enthusiasm, and the reception of Cavour was as warm. We threw a perfect shower of flowers over him, which the Marchesa had provided for the occasion; and her youngest son Cino, a nice lad, went himself to present his bouquet to the King, who seemed quite pleased with the boy. I felt so much for Madame de Lajatico herself.... I said to her how kind I thought it in her to open her house; she burst into tears, and said, though she was in deep affliction, she could not be so selfish as not offer her friends the best position in Florence for seeing what to many of them was the most important event in their lives, as it was to her even in her grief. The true Italian taste appeared to perfection in every street through which the procession pa.s.sed to the Duomo, and thence to the Palazzo Pitti.

Those who saw it declare nothing could surpa.s.s the splendour of the cathedral when illuminated; but that we could not see, nor did we see the procession again; it was impossible to penetrate the crowd.

They say there are 40,000 strangers in Florence.... I was much too tired to go out again to see the illuminations and the fireworks on the Ponte Carraja; your sisters saw it all, so I leave them to tell you all about it. The King and Prince are terribly early; they and Ricasoli are on horseback by _five_ in the morning; the King dines at twelve, and never touches food afterwards, though he has a dinner party of 60 or 80 every day at six.... Now, my dearest Woronzow, I must end, for I do not wish to miss another post. I am really wonderfully well for my age.

Your devoted mother, MARY SOMERVILLE.

FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO W. GREIG, ESQ.

FLORENCE, _19th June, 1861_.

... Italy has been thrown into the deepest affliction by the death of Cavour. In my long life I never knew any event whatever which caused so universal and deep sorrow. There is not a village or town throughout the whole peninsula which has not had a funeral service, and the very poorest people, who had hardly clothes on their backs, had black c.r.a.pe tied round their arm or neck. It was a state of consternation, and no wonder! Every one felt that the greatest and best man of this century has been taken away before he had completely emanc.i.p.ated his country. All the progress is due to him, and to him alone; the revolution has called forth men of much talent, yet the whole are immeasurably his inferior in every respect--even your friend, Ricasoli, who is most able, and the best successor that can be found, is, compared with Cavour, as Tuscany to Europe. Happily the sad loss did not occur sooner. Now things are so far advanced that they cannot go back, and I trust that Ricasoli, who is not wanting in firmness and moral courage, will complete what has been so happily begun. I am sorry to say he is not in very good health, but I trust he will not fall into the hands of the physician who attended Cavour, and who mistook his disease, reduced him by loss of blood, and then finding out his real illness, tried to strengthen him when too late. There was a most excellent article in the "Times" on the two statesmen.

[My mother's recollections continue thus:--]

One night the moon shone so bright that we sent the carriage away, and walked home from a reception at the Marchesa Ginori's. In crossing the Piazza San Marco, an acquaintance, who accompanied us, took us to the Maglio, which is close by, to hear an echo. I like an echo; yet there is something so unearthly in the aerial voice, that it never fails to raise a superst.i.tious chill in me, such as I have felt more than once as I read "Ossian" while travelling among our Highland hills in my early youth. In one of the grand pa.s.ses of the Oberland, when we were in Switzerland, we were enveloped in a mist, through which peaks were dimly seen. We stopped to hear an echo; the response came clear and distinct from a great distance, and I felt as if the Spirit of the Mountain had spoken. The impression depends on accessory circ.u.mstances; for the roar of a railway train pa.s.sing over a viaduct has no such effect.

I lost my husband in Florence on the 26th June, 1860.... From the preceding narrative may be seen the sympathy, affection, and confidence, which always existed between us....

[After what has already been said of the happiness my mother enjoyed during the long years of their married life, it may be imagined what grief was her's at my father's death after only three days' illness.

My mother's dear friend and correspondent, Miss F.P. Cobbe, wrote to her as follows on this occasion:--]

"I have just learned from a letter from Captain Fairfax to my brother the great affliction which has befallen you. I cannot express to you how it has grieved me to think that such a sorrow should have fallen on you, and that the dear, kind old man, whose welcome so often touched and gratified me, should have pa.s.sed away so soon after I had seen you both, as I often thought, the most beautiful instance of united old age. His love and pride in you, breaking out as it did at every instant when you happened to be absent, gives me the measure of what his loss must be to your warm heart."

[The following letter from my mother, dated April, 1861, addressed to her sister-in-law, was written after reading my grandfather's "Life and Times," the publication of which my father did not live to see.]

FROM MRS. SOMERVILLE TO MRS. ELLIOT, OF ROSEBANK, ROXBURGHs.h.i.+RE.

FLORENCE, _28th April, 1861_.

MY DEAR JANET,--

I received the precious volume[14] you have so kindly sent to me some days ago, but I have delayed thanking you for it till now because we all wished to read it first. We are highly pleased, and have been deeply interested in it. The whole tone of the book is characteristic of your dear father; the benevolence, warm-heartedness, and Christian charity which appeared in the whole course of his life and ministry. That which has struck us all most forcibly is the liberality of his sentiments, both religious and political, at a time when narrow views and bigotry made it even dangerous to avow them, and it required no small courage to do so.

He was far in advance of the age in which he lived; his political opinions are those of the present day, his religious opinions still before it. There are many parts of the book which will please the general reader from the graphic description of the manners and customs of the time, as well as the narrative of his intercourse with many of the eminent men of his day. Your most dear father's affectionate remembrance of me touches me deeply. I have but one regret, dear Jenny, and that is that our dear William did not live to see the accomplishment of what was his dying wish; but G.o.d's will be done.... We are all much as usual: I am wonderfully well, and able to write, which I do for a time every day. I do not think I feel any difference in capacity, but I become soon tired, and then I read the newspapers, some amusing book, or work.... Everything is flouris.h.i.+ng in Italy, and the people happy and contented, except those who were employed and dependent on the former sovereigns, but they are few in comparison; and now there is a fine army of 200,000 men to defend the country, even if Austria should make an attack, but that is not likely at present. Rome is still the difficulty, but the Pope must and soon will lose his temporal power, for the people are determined it shall be so....

I am, dear sister, Most affectionately yours, MARY SOMERVILLE.

To MRS. ELLIOT, of Rosebank, Roxburghs.h.i.+re.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 14: The Rev. P. Somerville's "Life and Times."]

CHAPTER XVII.

SPEZIA--GENOA--BEGINS MOLECULAR AND MICROSCOPIC SCIENCE--TURIN--SPEZIA--BRITISH FLEET--LETTERS FROM MRS.

SOMERVILLE--GARIBALDI--SEVERE ILLNESS--FLORENCE--MY BROTHER'S DEATH--NAPLES--ERUPTION OF VESUVIUS--J.S. MILL--CHANGE IN PUBLIC OPINION ON WOMEN'S EDUCATION--EIGHTY-NINTH YEAR--DESCRIBES HER OWN CHARACTER--THOUGHTS ON A FUTURE LIFE--PROGRESS IN KNOWLEDGE OF GEOGRAPHY--VICTORIA MEDAL--MEDAL FROM ROYAL ITALIAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY--LETTER FROM MENABREA--ROME, CAPITAL OF ITALY--AURORA BOREALIS.

Soon after my dear husband's death, we went to Spezia, as my health required change, and for some time we made it our headquarters, spending one winter at Florence, another at Genoa, where my son and his wife came to meet us, and where I had very great delight in the beautiful singing of our old friend Clara Novello, now Countess Gigliucci, who used to come to my house, and sing Handel to me. It was a real pleasure, and her voice was as pure and silvery as when I first heard her, years before.

Another winter we spent at Turin. On returning to Spezia in the summer of 1861, the beautiful comet visible that year appeared for the first time the very evening we arrived. On the following, and during many evenings while it was visible, we used to row in a small boat a little way from sh.o.r.e, in order to see it to greater advantage. Nothing could be more poetical than the clear starlit heavens with this beautiful comet reflected, nay, almost repeated, in the calm gla.s.sy water of the gulf. The perfect silence and stillness of the scene was very impressive.

I was now unoccupied, and felt the necessity of having something to do, desultory reading being insufficient to interest me; and as I had always considered the section on chemistry the weakest part of the connection of the "Physical Sciences," I resolved to write it anew. My daughters strongly opposed this, saying, "Why not write a new book?" They were right; it would have been lost time: so I followed their advice, though it was a formidable undertaking at my age, considering that the general character of science had greatly changed. By the improved state of the microscope, an invisible creation in the air, the earth, and the water, had been brought within the limits of human vision; the microscopic structure of plants and animals had been minutely studied, and by synthesis many substances had been formed of the elementary atoms similar to those produced by nature. Dr. Tyndall's experiments had proved the inconceivable minuteness of the atoms of matter; Mr. Ga.s.siot and Professor Plucher had published their experiments on the stratification of the electric light; and that series of discoveries by scientific men abroad, but chiefly by our own philosophers at home, which had been in progress for a course of years, prepared the way for Bunsen and Kirchhof's marvellous consummation.

Such was the field opened to me; but instead of being discouraged by its magnitude, I seemed to have resumed the perseverance and energy of my youth, and began to write with courage, though I did not think I should live to finish even the sketch I had made, and which I intended to publish under the name of "Molecular and Microscopic Science," and a.s.sumed as my motto, "Deus magnus in magnis, maximus in minimis," from Saint Augustin.

My ma.n.u.script notes on Science were now of the greatest use; and we went for the winter to Turin (1861-1862), where I could get books from the public libraries, and much information on subjects of natural history from Professor De Filippi, who has recently died, much regretted, while on a scientific mission to j.a.pan and China, as well as from other sources. I subscribed to various periodicals on chemical and other branches of science; the transactions of several of our societies were sent to me, and I began to write. I was now an old woman, very deaf and with shaking hands; but I could still see to thread the finest needle, and read the finest print, but I got sooner tired when writing than I used to do. I wrote regularly every morning from eight till twelve or one o'clock before rising. I was not alone, for I had a mountain sparrow, a great pet, which sat, and indeed is sitting on my arm as I write these lines.