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Isola di San Giulio, Orta.

THE SANCTUARIES OF THE PENNINE ALPS By Edith Wharton

ILLUSTRATIONS BY E. C. PEIXOTTO

WHEN June is Mountain streams flow down between hot on the long alder-fringed banks, white oxen doze un­ yellow streets of der the acacia-hedges, and in the almond Turin, it is pleas­ and cherry orchards the vine hangs its ant to take train Virgilian garlands from blossoming tree for the Biellese, to tree. This pastoral land rolls westward that romantic hill- to the Graiian Alps in an undulating sea country where the of green; while to the north it breaks ab­ last slopes of the ruptly into the height against which rises Pennine Alps melt the terraced outline of Biella. into the Piedmon- The cliffs of the Biellese are the haunt tese plain. of ancient legend, and on almost every The line, cross­ ledge a church or monastery perpetuates Nostra Signora d'Oropa. ing the lowland the story of some wonder-working relic. with its red-tiled Biella, the chief town of this devout dis­ farm-houses and mulberry orchards, rises trict, covers a small conical hill and gradually to a region of rustling verdure. spreads its suburbs over the surrounding VOL. XXXI.—34 353

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 354 The Sanctuaries of the Pennine Alps level. Its hot sociable streets are full of the picturesqueness mistakenly associated the shrill activity of an Italian watering- with Italian rural architecture; but every place; but the transalpine traveller will window displays its pot of lavender or of probably be inclined to push on at once carnations, and the arched doorways re­ veal gardens flecked with the blue shadows of the vine-pergola. Andorno itself is folded in hills, rounded, umbrage­ ous, cooled with the song of birds. A sylvan hush envelops the place and the air one breathes seems to have travelled over miles of forest freshened by unseen streams. It is all as still and drowsy as the dream of a tired brain. There is noth­ ing to see but the country itself—acacia-fringed banks sloping to the stream below the village; the arch of a ruinous bridge ; an old hex­ agonal chapel with red-tiled roof and arcade of stunted . columns; and, beyond the bridge and the chapel, rich upland meadows, where all day long the peasant women stoop to the swing of the scythe. In June, in this high coun­ try (where patches of snow still he in the shaded hol­ lows), the wild flowers of spring and summer seem to meet : narcissus and forget- me-not lingering in the grass, while yellow broom—Leo- pardi's lover of sad solitudes —sheets the dry banks with gold, and higher up, in the folds of the hills, patches of crimson azalea mix their shy scent with the heavy fra­ grance of the acacia. In the to Andorno, an hour's drive deeper in the meadows the trees stand in well-spaced hills. majestic groups, walnut, chestnut and Biella overhangs the plain ; but Andor­ beech, tenting the grass with shade. The no hes in a valley which soon contracts ivy hangs its drapery over garden walls to a defile between the mountains. The and terraces, and the streams rush down drive thither from Biella skirts the Cervo, under a quivering canopy of laburnum. a fresh mountain stream, and passes The scenery of these high Pennine val­ through villages set on park-Kke slopes leys is everywhere marked by the same in the shade of chestnut groves. The nobleness of color and outline, the same thouses of these villages have Kttle of atmosphere of spaciousness and poet-

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED Among the Chapels, Orta. ry. It is the rich studied landscape of flow with irises, roses and peonies, set in Bonifazio's idyls : a scene of peace and box-hedges and shaded by the long mauve plenitude, not the high-colored southern panicles of the wistaria. Presently the opulence but the sober wealth poured road leaves the valley, and ascends the from a glacial horn of plenty. There is beech-clothed flank of the mountain on none of the Swiss abruptness, of the Swiss which San Giovanni is perched. The accumulation of effects. The southern coolness and hush of this verdant tunnel aspect softens and expands. There is no are delicious after the noise and sunshine crowding of impressions, but a stealing of the open road, and one is struck by the sense of sufficiency. civic amenity which, in this remote soh- From Andorno the obvious excursion is tude, has placed benches at intervals be­ to the shrine of San Giovanni; a "sight" neath the trees. taking up eight pages in the excellent At length the brow of the hill is reached. " Guida del Biellese," but remaining in The beeches recede, leaving a grassy plat­ the traveller's memory chiefly as the ob­ eau flanked by a long monastic fagade; jective point of a charming walk or drive. and from the brink of this open space the The road leads up the Val d'Andorno, eye drops unhindered down the long leafy between heights set with villages hung reaches of the Val d'Andorno. The scene aloft among the beech groves, or thrust­ is one of the tenderest gradations of color ing their garden-parapets above the spray and line : beeches blending with walnuts, and tumult of the Cervo. The densely these with the tremulous laburnum thick­ wooded cliffs are scarred with quarries of ets along the stream, and the curves of sienite, and the stream, as the valley nar­ the hills flowing into one another till they rows, forces its way over masses of rock lose themselves in the aerial distances of and between shelving stony banks; but the plain. The building which commands the little gardens dashed by its foam over­ this outlook is hardly worthy of its station :

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San Giovanni d'Andorno. unless, indeed, the traveller feels its sober landscape with wonder-working images. lines to be an admission of art's inferiority When did a miracle take place on a barren to nature in such aspects. To the con­ plain or in a circumscribed hollow? The firmed apologist of Italy there is indeed manifestations of divine favor invariably a certain charm in finding so insignificant sought the heights, and those who dedi­ a building in so rare a spot: as though in cated themselves to the commemoration a land thus amply dowered no architect­ of such holy incidents did so in surround­ ural exclamation point were needed to ings poetic enough to justify their faith call attention to any special point of view. in the supernatural. The church, with its Yet a tenderness for the view, one cannot dignified front and sculptured portal, ad­ but infer, must have guided the steps of joins the hospice, and shows within little those early cenobites who peopled the of interest but the stone grotto containing 356

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The Sacro Monte, Varallo. the venerated image of St. John, discov­ tainty is not without its practical advan­ ered in the third century by St. Eusebius, tages ; and one reads that the hospice is Bishop of Vercelli. This grotto is protect­ open the year round, and that an excellent ed by an iron grating, and its dark recess meal may always be enjoyed in the ^rai- twinkles with silver hearts and other votive toria above the arcade; while on the offerings. The place is still a favorite pil­ feasts of the respective saints it is necessa­ grimage, but there seems to be some ry for the devotee to bespeak his board doubt as to which St. John has chosen it as and lodging in advance. the scene of his posthumous thaumaturgy; If San Giovanni appeals chiefly to the for, according to the local guide-book, it is lover of landscape, the more famous equally frequented on the feast of the Bap­ sanctuary of Oropa is of special interest tist and of the EvangeKst. This uncer­ to the architect; for thither, in the eigh- 357

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED Between Biella and Varallo. Vast undulating reach of the Piedraontese plain. teenth century, the piety of the house of pled with forest, with Biella, Novara and Savoy sent Juvara, one of the greatest Vercelli like white fleets anchored on a architects of his time, to add a grand misty sea. This view, with its fold on fa9ade and portico to the group of monas­ fold of woodland, dusky-shimmering in tic buildings erected a hundred years the foreground, then dark blue with dashes earlier by Negro di Pralungo. The ascent of tawny sunlight and purple streaks of to the great mountain-shrine of the Black rain, till it fades into the indeterminate Virgin leads the traveller back to Biella, light of the horizon, suggests some heroic and up the hills behind the town. The landscape of Poussin's or the boundless drive is long, but so diversified, so abound­ russet distances of Rubens's " Chateau of ing in beauty that in nearing its end one Stein." feels the need of an impressive monument Meanwhile the foreground is changing. to close so nobly ordered an approach. The air freshens, the villages with their As the road rises above the vineyards of flower gardens and their guardian images Biella, as the house-roofs, the church- of the Black Virgin are left behind, and steeples and the last suburban villas drop between the thinly-leaved beeches rise below the line of vision, there breaks on bare gravelly slopes backed by treeless the eye the vast undulating reach of the hills. The Loreto of Piedmont hes nearly Piedmontese plain. From the near mass­ 4,000 feet above the sea, and even in ing of cultivated verdure—the orchards, June there is a touch of snow in the air. gardens, groves of the minutely pencilled For a moment one fancies one's self in foreground—to the far limit where earth Switzerland ; but here, at the bend of the and sky converge in silver, the landscape road, is a white chapel with a classic porch, within which a group of terra-cotta ligures glides through every gradation of sun-lit enact some episode of the Passion. Italy cloud-swept loveliness. First the Val d'An- has reasserted herself and art has human­ dorno unbosoms its depths; then the dis­ ized the landscape. More chapels are scat- tances press nearer, blue-green and dap- 358

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED The Sanctuaries of the Pennine Alps 359 tered through the trees, but one forgets vara's marble portico unfolds its double to note them as the carriage turns into a flight of steps. wide grassy forecourt, bordered by stone Passing through this gateway one stands pyramids and dominated at its farther in an inner quadrangle. This again is en­ end by the great colonnade of the hospice. closed in low buildings resting on arcades, A rampe douce with fine iron gates leads their ahgnment broken only by the modest up to the outer court enclosed in the fagade of the church. Outside there is the arcaded wings of the building. Under profane bustle of life, the clatter of glasses these arcades are to be found shops in at the doors of rival trattorie, the cracking which the pilgrim may satisfy his various of whips, the stir of buying and selling; wants, from groceries, wines and cotton but a warm silence holds the inner court. umbrellas (much needed in these showery Only a few old peasant women are hob­ hills), to rosaries, images of the Black Vir­ bling, rosary in hand, over the sun-baked gin, and pious histories of her miracles. flags to the cool shelter of the church. Above the arcades the pilgrims are lodged; The church is indeed cavernously cold, and in the centre of the inner facade Ju- with that subterranean chill peculiar to re-

The Principal Group of Statues in Gaudenzio's Crucifixion, Varallo.

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The Outer Court, Oropa. ligious buildings. The interior is smaller throned behind the high altar, in a tiny and plainer than one had expected ; but chapel built by her discoverer. The presently it is seen to be covered with a crypt-Kke interior is divided by a grating decoration beside which the rarest tapestry behind which, in a blaze of altar-lights, or fresco might sink into insignificance. the miraculous image, nimbused in jewels This covering is composed of innumerable and gold, sheds its brightness on the votive offerings, crowding each other from groups who succeed each other at the floor to vaulting over every inch of wall, iron lattice. The incense-laden air and the lighting the chapels with a shimmer of sweating stone walls encrusted with votive silver and tinsel, the yellow of old wax offerings recall at once the chapel of Lo- legs and arms, the gleam of tarnished pict­ reto ; but here the smaller space, the deep­ ure-frames : each overlapping scale of er dusk, heighten the sense of solemnity; this strange sheath symbolizing some im­ and if a few white-capped Sisters are pulse of longing, grief or gratitude, so grouped against the grating, while before that as it were the whole church is lined the altar a sweet-voiced young priest in­ with heart-beats. Most of these offerings tones the mystic are the gift of the poor mountain-folk, and the paintings record with artless realism Mater purissima, Mater admirabile, the miraculous escapes of carters,, quarry- Mater prudentissima, men and stone-cutters. In the choir, however, hang a few portraits o£ noble punctuated by the wailing Ora pro nobis ! donators in ruffs and Spanish jerkins; of the nuns, it would be hard to picture a and one picture, rudely painted on the scene richer in that minghng of suavity wall itself, renders with touching fidelity and awe with which the Church composes the interior of a peasant's house in the six­ her incomparable effects. teenth or seventeenth century, with the After so complex an impression the mother kneeling by a cradle over which the pleasures of the eye may seem a trifle thin; Black Virgin sheds her reassuring Hght. yet there is a great charm in the shaded The ebony Virgin (another "find" of walks winding through the colony of the indefatigable St. Eusebius) is en- chapels above the monastery. Nothing 360

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in nature is loveher than a beech-wood cheap villas, now leads from the station rusthng with streams; and to come, in to the edge of the old town ; and the such a setting, on one graceful tempietto beautiful slope facing the Sacred Moun­ after another, to discover, in their semi- tain has been cleared of its natural growth pagan porches, groups of peasants pray­ and planted with moribund palms and ing before some dim presentment of the camelhas, to form the "pleasure" grounds Passion, gives a renewed sense of the way of a huge stucco hotel with failure written in which, in Italy, nature, art and religion over every inch of its pretentious fagade. combine to enrich the humblest lives. One knows not whether to lament the These Sacred Mounts, or Stations of the impairment of such completeness, or to Cross, are scattered everywhere on the find consolation in the fact that Varallo is Italian slopes of the Alps. The most rich enough not to be ruined by its losses. famous is at Varallo, and to find any ar­ Ten or fifteen years ago every aspect was tistic merit one must go there, or to the enchanting ; now one must choose one's vmknown hill-village of Cerveno in the point of view, but one or two of the finest are still intact. Turning one's back, for Val Camonica. At Oropa the groups are instance, on the offending hotel, one has crude and uninteresting ; but the dusk in still, on a summer morning, the rarest vi­ which they are seen, and the surrounding sion of wood and water and happily murmur of leaves and water, give them blended architecture : the Sesia, with its a value quite independent of their plas­ soft meadows and leafy banks, the old tic quahties. houses huddled above it, and the high cliff crowned by the chapels of the Sacred Way. At night all melts to a diviner love­ Varallo itself is but a day's journey from liness.. The clustered darkness of the Andorno. In June weather the drive town, twinkling with hghts, lies folded in thither is beautiful. The narrow country hills delicately traced against a sky mauve road mounts through chestnut groves as with moonlight. Here and there the fine as those which cast their velvet shade moon burnishes a sombre mass of trees, for miles about Promontogno. At first or makes a campanile stand out pale and the eye dips from one green ravine to an­ definite as ivory ; while high above, the other, but at Mosso Santa Maria, the high­ cliff projects against the sky, with an al­ est point of the ascent, the glorious plain most Greek purity of outline, the white again bursts into view, with white roads domes and arches of the Sanctuary. winding toward distant cities, and the near flanks of the hills clothed in unbroken for­ The centre of the town is also undis­ est. The Val Sesia is broader than the turbed. Here one may wander through Val d'Andorno, and proportionately less cool narrow streets with shops full of de­ picturesque ; but its expanse of wheat and votional emblems and of the tall votive vine, checkered with shade and overhung candles gaily spangled with gold and paint­ by piled-up mossy rocks, contrasts efliec- ed with flower-wreaths and mandorle of tively enough with the landscape of the the Virgin. These streets, on Sundays, higher valleys. As Varallo is neared the are thronged with the peasant women of hills close in and the scenery regains its the neighboring valleys in their typical sub-Alpine character. Unforgettable is costumes : some with cloth leggings and the first glimpse of the old town, caught short dark-blue cloth petticoats embroid­ suddenly at a bend of the road, with the ered in colors ; others in skirts of plaited Sanctuary lifted high above the river, and black silk, with embroidered jackets, sil­ tiled roofs and church-towers clustered ver necklaces and spreading head-dresses ; at its base. The near approach is a dis­ for nearly every town has its distinctive enchantment ; for few towns have suffered dress, and some happy accident seems to more than Varallo imder the knife of have preserved this slope of the Alps from " modern improvement," and those who the depressing uniformity of modern fash­ did not know it in earlier days would never ions. In architectural effects the town is guess that it was once the most pict­ little richer than its neighbors ; but it has uresque town in North Italy. A dusty that indescribable " tone " in which the wide-avenued suburb, thinly scattered with soft texture of old stucco and the bloom VOL. XXXI.—35

PRODUCED BY UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED 362 The Sanctuaries of the Pennine Alps of weather-beaten marble combine with a chill stone corridors and up and down in­ hundred happy accidents of sun and shade terminable stairs; a dark subterranean to produce what might be called "Ca^ patine passage leading at last to the image of the of Italy. There is, indeed, one unusual buried Christ. church, with a high double flight of steps Of the groups themselves it is difficult leading to its door; but this (though it to speak dispassionately, for they are so contains a fine Gaudenzio) passes as a much a part of their surroundings that one mere incident in the general picturesque- can hardly measure them by any conven­ ness, and the only church with which the tional standard. To do so, indeed, would sightseer seriously reckons is that of Santa be to miss their meaning. They must be Maria delle Grazie, frescoed with the ar­ studied as a reflection of the Bible story tist's scenes from the Passion. in the hearts of simple and emotional peas­ There is much beauty of detail in these ants ; for it was the piety of the mountain- crowded compositions; but, to the inex­ folk that called them into being, and the pert, Gaudenzio lives perhaps chiefly as the modellers and painters who contributed to painter of the choiring angels of Saronno : the work were mostly natives of Val Sesia so great there that elsewhere he seems or of the neighboring valleys. The art of relatively unimportant. At V^rallo, at clay modelling is peculiarly adapted to the least, one associates him first with the Sa­ rendering of strong and direct emotions. cred Mountain. To this great monument So much vivacity of expression do its rap­ of his native valley he contributed some of id evocations permit that one might al­ his most memorable work, and it seems most describe it as intermediate between fitting that on turning from his frescoes in pantomime and sculpture. The groups Santa Maria one should find one's self at at Varallo have the defects inherent in the foot of the path leading to the Sanct­ such an improvisation : the crudeness, the uary. The wide approach, paved with violence, sometimes the seeming absurd­ tiny round pebbles polished by the feet ities of an instantaneous photograph. of thousands of pilgrims, leads round the These faults are redeemed by a simplicity, flank of the cliff to the park-hke enclos­ a realism, which have not had time to ure on its summit. Here, on the ledge harden into conventionality. The Virgin overlooking the town, stands the church and St. Elizabeth are low-browed full-stat- built by St. Charles Borromeo {now dis­ ured peasant women ; the round-cheeked figured by a modern fa9ade), and grouped romping children, the dwarfs and hunch­ about it are the forty-two chapels of the backs, the Roman soldiers and the Jewish " New Jerusalem." These littie buildings, priests, have all been transferred ahve to which one mounts or descends by mossy from the market-places of Borgo Sesia and winding paths beneath the trees, present Arona. These expressive figures, dressed every variety of pseudo-classical design. in real clothes, with real hair flowing about Some, placed at different levels, are con­ their shoulders, seem like the actors in nected by open colonnades and long flights some miracle-play arrested at its crowning of steps; some have airy loggias, over­ moment. looking gardens tufted with blush-roses Closer inspection brings to light a marked and the lilac iris ; while others stand with­ difference in quality between the different drawn in the deep shade of the beeches. groups. Those by Tabacchetti and Fermo Each chapel contains a terra-cotta group Stella are the best, excepting only the re­ representing some scene in the divine his­ markable scene of the Crucifixion, attrib­ tory, and the architecture and the site of uted to Gaudenzio, and probably executed each building have been determined by a from his design. Tabacchetti is the artist, fine sense of dramatic fitness. Thus, the of the Adam and Eve surrounded by the chapels enclosing the earher episodes— supra-terrestrial flora and fauna of Eden : the Annunciation, the Nativity and the a curious composition, with a golden- scenes previous to the Last Supper—are haired Eve of mincing elegance and re­ placed in relatively open sites, with patches finement. To Stella are due some of the of flowers about their doorsteps ; while simplest and most moving scenes of the as the drama darkens the pilgrim descends series : the Adoration of the Magi, the into deep shady hollows, or winds along message of the angel to Joseph, and

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Christ and the woman of Samaria. Es­ After these homely details the scenes of pecially charming is the Annunciation, the Passion, where Gaudenzio's influence where a yellow-wigged angel in a kind of probably prevailed, seem a trifle academic; celestial dressing-gown of flowered bro­ but even here there are local touches, such cade, advances, lily in hand, toward a as the curly white dog at the foot of gracefully startled Virgin, dressed (as one Herod's throne, the rags of the beggars, is told) in a costume presented by a pious the child in the Crucihxion holding a. lady of Varallo. In another scene the spotted hound in leash. The Crucifixion Mother of God, this time in peasant-dress, is fitly the culminating point of the series. looks up smilingly from the lace-cushion Here Gaudenzio hned the background on which she is at work; while the Last with one of his noblest frescoes, and the Supper, probably a survival of the older figures placed before it are worthy, in wooden groups existing before Gaudenzio expression and attitude, to carry out the and his school took up the,work, shows a master's conception. lace-trimmed linen table-cloth, with bread The gold-bucklered Roman knight on and fruit set out on Faenza dishes. his white charger, the eager gaping throng, 363

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where beggars and cripples jostle turbaned sheet of water enclosed in richest verdure, fine ladies and their dwarfs, where oval- with the wooded island of San Giuliano faced Lombard women with children at on its bosom. Orta has a secret charm the breast press forward to catch a glimpse of its own : a quality of soHtude, of re­ of the dying Christ, while the hideous sol­ moteness, that makes it seem the special diers at the foot of the cross draw lots for property of each traveller who chances to the seamless garment—all these crowding discover it. Here too is a Sacred Way, careless figures bring out with strange in­ surmounting the usual shady knoll above tensity the mute agony uplifted in their the town ; but its groups have little artistic midst. Never, perhaps, has the popular, merit. The chief " feature " of Orta is the the unimpressed, unrepentant side of the incredibly complete little island, with its scene been set forth with more tragic di­ ancient church embosomed in gardens ; rectness. One can fancy the gold-armored yet even this counts only as a detail in the knight echoing in after years the musing general composition, a last touch to the words of Anatole Y-ranct'^ Frocurateur de prodigal picturesqueness of the place. In Judee:—"Jesus? Jesus de Nazareth? any other country the next turn of the Je ne me rappelle pas." road must lead to an anti-climax ; but the wanderer who turns eastward from Orta may pass through scenes of undiminished From Varallo the fortunate traveller beauty till, toward sunset, the hills divide to show Lake Maggiore at his feet, with may carry his impressions unimpaired the Isola Bella moored like a fantastic through the chestnut woods and across pleasure-craft upon its waters. the hills to the lake of Orta—a small

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The Inner Quadrangle, Oropa.

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By Clara Bellinger Green

ILLUSTRATIONS BY D. U. WILCOX

I his complaint neuralgic rheumatism and some rheumatic neuralgia : it was all the HERE was no question about the same to him, for it was as tormenting lot in Mr. Barney's mind. It just under one name as the other. To his T suited him. fancy it was his personal devil, who played It lay along the southern slope of the pranks on his members one after the other hill, looking down on the broad valley of —now his arm, now his eye, now his knee, Elba, and upon Marcy, Mclntyre, and now his temples. It neglected none, nor other dignified peaks beyond. had it any preference. Neither, in truth, The whole expanse of the heavens had its victim, for wherever it lodged he smiled upon it. It was flanked on the would have preferred it somewhere else. north by deep woods, but on the east, When it chose his arm, he would have it south, and west it lay open to the friendly in his eye ; when it seized his eye, he rays of the sun, which covered it with longed to banish it to his knee, and when glory from the moment it peeped over the it was in his knee, he wished it in his Sleeping Giant in the morning till it sank temples. behind the hemlocks at the foot of the For the past three weeks Mr. Barney hill. It was generously sprinkled with bal­ had not felt a twinge from his familiar sam shrubs, moss-grown logs and stumps. demon, and his face was already begin­ Mr. Barney liked stumps. He could ning to lose those meek outlines which sit on a stump hour after hour, and feel pain draws on the features of its asso­ the sun pour down on his back, warming ciates. If his had been the only voice in him to the very centre of his being. He the matter of the lot, he would not have always felt as though each ray went hesitated; but there were two other im­ straight through him and came out on portant members of the Barney house­ the other side—albeit he cast a distinct, if hold, each having a distinct mind of her narrow, shadow on the grass. own. He had discovered in the sun a spirit Mr. Barney was fond and proud of his antagonistic to his old foe, rheumatism, wife and daughter, but there were mo­ which cowered beneath its beams as the ments—and this was one of them—when devil cowers before the strains of the Te he felt that if one or both had been a Deum Laudamus. little weak-minded his life would have Some of Mr. Barney's doctors called been easier. VOL. XXXI.—36 36s

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