FOOTNOTES:

King Joseph and King Joachim have been depicted by grave historians, and I will not add anything regarding their public and private character. But, for truth’s sake, I may say that here in London I was very well acquainted with Joseph Bonaparte, after he had returned from America in 1831, and that I found many personal gifts in him to admire. In his house I saw a good deal not only of him but of his brother Lucian, his nephew Louis (the present President of the French Republic), Lucian’s daughter Lady Dudley Stuart, with whom I became intimately acquainted, and who, at the baptismal font, gave her own name, Christina, to my younger daughter. I might say that I have known all the members of that renowned family, either in Naples or in London, except the great Napoleon, whom I never saw. Joseph was kind-natured and cultivated in mind; but in Naples, spoiled by courtiers, he was a bad king. One evening, while I was improvising in his house, his daughter, Princess Charlotte, made a pencil sketch of me, and she sent it me framed as a present: I still preserve it. [I also have preserved it, and have given it to my youngest daughter.—W.] I could here relate many dialogues which I had with Lucian, his son Pierre, etc., and with the present French President. But I will only say that Lucian was a republican, but with many prejudices, and the present President was and is of a character all puffed up with ambition. Never did I hear from his lips a single word indicating a liberal spirit.

“Fourth thou wast and now art Third:—

By subtraction’s rule I’m taught—

Second—First—may yet be heard,

Till at last remains a nought.”

When King Charles came to visit the Museum—announced by a formal dispatch, the beating of drums, and a call to arms by the piquette stationed at the gate—we presented ourselves to receive him, with Cavalier Arditi, Director-General of the institution, at our head. The first section which is ordinarily inspected there is the collection of statues in marble and bronze, both Latin and Greek—a most important department on the ground floor, entrusted to my custody. Thus it became my work to show first those admired treasures to the Spanish monarch, who spoke Italian very fairly. In the discharge of my office I pointed out to him the leading objects; and I recollect that in the first portico I stopped before the statue of Trajan, and I referred to his rare excellences, saying that he had been the honour of the Roman Empire and of the Spanish nation. “What, was Trajan a Spaniard?” he exclaimed with surprise. “Certainly, your majesty, if Suetonius and other historians did not deceive us.” [N.B.—“Suetonius” appears to have been a random shot; he has left us nothing about Trajan.—W.] He visited the three porticoes and the five galleries, and showed much pleasure in my explanations. Having gone through the whole, I said that others would have the honour of showing him the picture-gallery, the Etruscan vases, the bronze implements, the collection of papyri, and the immense library, which were kept in the upper apartments. He said in a determined tone, “Come yourself.” I felt much embarrassed in obeying, because I knew how jealous were Don Giuseppe Campi, Canon Jorio, and others, if any one encroached on their departments, and especially on so solemn an occasion; but I made a bow and obeyed. He remained on that long visit upwards of four hours, and, highly satisfied, he left. The following day, towards the same hour, a fresh beating of drums and a fresh call to arms announced a visitor of importance. It was again the King of Spain. On his arrival I alone received him, as neither Cavalier Arditi nor any one else had been apprised by a dispatch, as on the preceding day, of this unexpected visit. Entering my small apartment, he asked for a seat, which I at once gave him. He sat down, and affably added, “Sit down also,” and, seeing that I hesitated, “Sit down, sit down,” he repeated. He said that he had returned to re-inspect some of the objects which had most struck him the previous day, and chiefly the Emperor Trajan—adding: “Now that I know he was a Spaniard, tell me all you know about him.” And I failed not to inform him that that Emperor, elected by the unanimous vote of the Roman Army, was surnamed Optimus; and that after his death, at the election of every new Cæsar, the senate installed him in the Empire with the salutation, “Sis bonus ut Trajanus, sis felix ut Augustus.” That on his accession to the throne he entered Rome on foot, to denote his disregard of worldly pomp; that, confident in the love of the entire nation, he abolished the offence of high treason; that he embraced any persons who came to visit him, and had his residence inscribed “Public Palace,” in order that all might enter without the least scruple, as though the house were their own. In short, I narrated what history sets down about him. On the third day the King renewed his visit. He remained alone with me, as on the preceding day, and, assuming a more confidential tone, he enquired whether I was married. I replied, No. He then told me that a Congress of Sovereigns was about to assemble in Verona, at which he meant to claim his throne which had been usurped by his son, with whom he showed himself very much displeased. “If I return to Spain, of which I am almost certain,” he added, “you shall come with me, and I will make you Director of the Escurial.” “But, your sacred Majesty, so many distinguished Spaniards—” “The one who is there now is my enemy, and I mean to dismiss him.”—“But I am in employ here, and your august brother—”—“Oh, I spoke to him about that last evening, and he will willingly concede you to my wishes.” I bowed, and thanked him for so much good-will. But a few days passed, and Charles IV. lay a frigid corpse in his brother’s palace. He was a simple, kindly man, given to talking, and he held with others the same sort of conversation that he had held with me. His right was manifest, and his son schemed to get rid of him by means of his Minister Labrador. This was the rumour which then ran through Naples. I could relate many other anecdotes of what happened to me in the Museum, but I leave them alone. I will only mention that I elucidated those admired monuments in two volumes entitled Catalogue Raisonné of the Royal Museum. In order to give some credit to a young man whom I liked much—Giovanni Finati, son of the Controller—I allowed him to have his name on the title-page, with the condition that the two volumes should be printed at his expense, while the receipts from the sale should be halved between us. After my departure he took advantage of my misfortune, and wholly defrauded me of that labour of mine. The profits became and are entirely his; whereas he had no share in the work, except only the measuring of the statues and busts—nothing else. [I possess the book in question.—W.]

“Sei pur bella cogli astri sul crine”—

“Fratelli, all’armi, all’armi!”

I also composed more than sixty manifestoes upon various occurrences; they circulated in print throughout the whole Carboneria, in which I was a member of the General Assembly; likewise a brochure of some length entitled Alla Difesa, O Cittadini. This inflamed all hearts, when the treachery of the perfidious Bourbon King came to be known. [I possess the brochure in question. It was printed towards the end of 1820, at the time when Ferdinand I. was still professing to adhere cordially to the Constitution, notwithstanding the threatening attitude assumed by Austria. Consequently the tone of the author is highly respectful towards Ferdinand, at the same time that the nation is urged to prepare energetically for a war—possible, though as yet not exactly probable—against Austria.—W.]

“Here lies a man of prying peering art,

Who in other folk’s affairs made endless pother:

And he from this world did at last depart,

Merely to fathom what is done in t’other.”

[I may add that on 18th March 1821, midway between the military disaster at Rieti on 7th March, and the dissolution of the Parliament on 21st March, Rossetti procured a Neapolitan passport for either Spain or Malta; but it seems that he never attempted to use it, but lay perdu instead, until shipped off to Malta by Admiral Sir Graham Moore.—W.]

“I read that tragedy whereof you wist;

And wept in pity ... for the dramatist.”—W.