frefco on the wall by Antonio Viviani d'Urbino; and on the marble table is this infcription: "Bis fenos hic Gregorius pafcebat egenos, Angelus decimus tertius accubuit. "Whilst Gregory here was feeding twelve indigent men at "this table, an angel condefcended to fit down and make the "thirteenth," At St. Maria del popolo, the marble fkeleton reprefenting death, and the tomb made by Giov. Baptifta Gisleni for himfelf, are worth obferving. The Epitaph is as follows: Johannes Baptifta Giflenus, Romanus, "Quam non nifi pulvis & umbra fingeret, "A Te nec plaufus exacturus nec planetus. "Sed in aditu "AVE In exitu "John Baptifta Gifleni, a native of Rome, and rather a citi"zen of the world than a traveller in it, having been the archi"tect of feveral capital buildings to Sigifmund III. Uladislaus "IV. and John Cafimir I. kings of Poland and Sweden, car"ried his good and ill qualities with him, feeking an habita❝tion of a short duration here, but an eternal manfion in another world. Taught by the fhort-liv'd flowers, fruit, "&c. &c. which he fo well imitated, that this life is fhort and ❝continually running to decay; he carved his image while "living, and being fenfible he was but meer duft, a fhadow, "he made use of stone as a more durable material for this "specimen of his art; but even this will at last be destroyed "by all-devouring time. Grown bold by this victory over "death, he took him prifoner, and fixed him in stone. He "equally excelled in painting, fculpture and architecture, fo "that a connoiffeur would be dubious for which of these arts "he was most celebrated, while he deserved the palm in all "the three. He first sketched out this performance as an "amusement in the year 1660, when he was in the 70th year of his age, and finished the course of his life in 1672. "Reader, he requires neither thy applause nor thy tears, but "the bare falutation of an AVE at thy approach, and a SALVE "at thy departure.” Rome, that feat of taste and literature, that noble repository of arts and sciences, has been so often and fo accurately described by a variety of modern writers, that we are not to expect any thing new in Mr. Keyfler's account of it, though it is perhaps more compleat than any other, the learned author having omitted nothing that could raise the attention or gratify the curiosity of his readers. His description of that most noble edifice St. Peter's church is too exact and circumftantial to be inferted here at full length. We have extracted, however, from our author the general form and dimensions of it, which are as follows: • This incomparable church (fays he) is built in the form ' of a Latin cross, and the proportion is fo exactly observed in the length, height, and breadth, that the eye cannot perceive any thing extraordinary large in any of the three dimensions, although the whole taken together be of very ' uncommon bulk and extent. The middle ifle is about thirtyeight common paces broad, and the whole length of the 'church two hundred and eighty-eight; of which the distance 'from the entrance of the church to the center of the cupola takes up a hundred and eighty. According to the chevalier Carlo Fontana's geometrical 'computation, the whole length of the edifice, the breadth Dd4 • of of the portico and the thickness of the walls included, is 970 Roman palmi, which are equal to 666 pieds de roy de Paris, or French feet, and 722 English feet, as cal culated by Miffon. I fhall now obferve, once for all, that a Roman palmo is about an inch more than a common span; or, according to a geometrical computation, it is 8 inches and 3 lines, that is, fomething above of a Paris foot. 43 The length within, from pope Eugenius's brafs door to the fartheft altar, where St. Peter's pulpit ftands, is 829 Roman palmi, or 571 Paris, and 594 English feet. The breadth of the great nave or middle ifle, which runs the whole length of the church, is 123 palmi, or 84 French, and 86 English feet; but the whole breadth of the church, from the Capella del Coro to that of the Holy Sacrament, exclufive of the thickness of the walls, is 414 palmi, or 284 Paris, and 291 English feet. The length of St. Pe ter's church to the crofs ifle is 258 palmi, or 170 French, and 174 English feet. The length of the cross isle is 615 palmi, or 410 French, and 438 English feet; and, including the walls, 671 palmi, or 461 French feet, and, 490 Englifh. The breadth of the cross ifle within is 103 palmi, or 70 French feet, and 73 English. The height of the church from the pavement to the roof (not including the cupola) is 200 palmi, or 137 French, and 144 English feet. The • breadth of the façade or front is 390 palmi; the height of the * statues on the frontispiece 22 palmi, or 16 French, and 18 English feet; and the outward circumference of the church. 3000 palmi. In the temple of Solomon were included feveral large < courts, and it was enriched with prodigious ornaments of gold and filver; but the main building was by no means to be compared with St. Peter's at Rome. St. Paul's church at London is a noble piece of architecture, but much less in its ⚫ dimenfions than St. Peter's; its length, according to Chamberlain, being only 690 English feet, which make about 646 feet of Paris; but if we follow the measurement and defign of Colin Campbell, in the firft volume of his Vitruvius Britannicus, which feems to come nearest the truth, the length of St. Paul's will be found not to exceed 520 English feet; feet; whereas St. Peter's (of which he gives the neweft and most exact plan and elevation) takes up 650 English feet, exclufive of the portico; but in both the thickness of the walls is included. St. Peter's according to my meafure, is 228 common paces in length, of which paces the length of St. Paul's at London, from the façade to the cen⚫ter of the cupola, is 124, and the whole length 222. Thẹ 'length of the cross ifle from the north to the fouth door is 115, and the breadth of the church in other parts is 46 fuch paces. The diameter of the cupola is 53, and the • circumference of the firft gallery 156 common paces, In an * apartment in the upper part of St. Paul's is a wooden model of St. Peter's church; but fo inaccurate, that they who judge of the two churches by it will be greatly mistaken. • After all the attention and charge in building St. Peter's, it has not been preserved from the common fate of all sublunary things; i. e, it has a mixture of imperfections; • but instead of enlarging on them, or examining the juftness of fuch cenfures on this fuperb edifice, give me leave to refer you to the introduction to the first part of the abovementioned Mr. Campbell's Vitruvius Britannicus. • It is univerfally agreed that the cupola of St. Peter's is a work of astonishing art and grandeur, and at a confiderable • distance impreffes on the mind a magnificent idea of the city in which it ftands. The height from the pavement of the church to the top of the crofs is 593 palmi, or 405 French, and 432 English feet. The outward circumference of the dome is 620 English feet; and the inward diameter, which is equal to that of the Pantheon, is 191 Roman palmi, or 131 French, and 143 English feet. The first gallery in 'the cupola I found to be 214 common paces round.' Mr. Keyfler's obfervations on Mofaic work cannot but be agreeable to all the lovers of art. That the ancients (fays he carried their representations of inlaid precious ftones to great perfection, appears from Pliny, lib. 37. where he fays, That Pompey in a triumphal * proceffion had his effigy, confifting of pearls, curioufly arranged, carried in the fpectacle, veriore luxuriæ triumpho, which was " rather the triumph of luxury than valour," as that author adds. But this I do not take to have been the fort of work in question, which was rather what the Romans • called Lithoftrata or Opera Mufiva teffellata, vermiculata, fectilia, and the artifans Mufearios, or Mufvarios. The materials used by the moderns for thefe works are little pieces of glafs of all the different fhades in every tint or colour, like those of the fine English worsted used in needle-work. The glass is firft caft into thin cakes, which are afterwards cut • into long pieces of a different thickness. Many of these pieces used in the works on roofs and cielings, which are confequently feen only at a great diftance, appear to be a finger's breadth; but the finer works confift only of glafs pins, if I may call them fo, not thicker than a common fewing needle, fo that a portrait of four feet fquare fhall take up two millions of fuch pins or ftuds. Thefe pins are fo clofely joined together, that after the piece is polished (which is done in the fame manner as looking-glaffes are polifhed,) it can hardly be difcerned to be an arrangement of an infinite number of particles of glass; but • rather looks like a picture painted with the finest colours, with cryftal placed before it. The ground in which these • vitreous pieces are inlaid, is a paste compounded of calcined marble, fine fand, gum tragacanth, whites of eggs and oil. It is at firft fo foft, that the pieces are eafily inferted, and upon any overfight, may be taken out again, • and the paste new moulded for the admiffion of other pins or ftuds; but by degrees it grows as hard as a ftone, fo that This no impreffion can be made on the work. This paste is fpread within a wooden frame, which, for the large pieces, • must not be less than a foot in breadth and thickness. frame is fastened with brafs tacks to a plate of the fame metal, or a stone flab; and as in capital pieces, which are often twenty feet by fifteen, this pafte-ground must be above three quarters of a foot deep, and the pins or ftuds as long, it may cafily be conceived of what weight fuch a piece must be. The pieces defigned for roofs, or any diftant place, are not polished; but in the altar-pieces, &c. nothing is wanting to give them the most beautiful and fplendid appearance. A piece of about eighty fquare fect, if perform . 3 • ed |