It had been arranged between us that each should, in his habits, be perfectly uncontrolled, and independent of the other. Our excursions were alternately separate, and in company, and Colonna was often absent from the villa for one or more days and nights, without exciting observation or surprise.
He delighted in ranging over the green pastures of Lombardy, hedged in by lofty trees, festooned with vines, and irrigated by transparent streams innumerable. The young Tuscan had never before seen nature in a garb so lovely and inviting; he wandered through the picturesque villages which margin or overhang the lake of Garda, sojourned with the peasantry, and sketched their figures and costume. From these rambles he would often return at sunset over the lake in a small bark, crowned like a youthful Bacchus with vine leaves and ivy, and singing wild Dithirambics to his guitar, while the surrounding villagers, by whom he was idolised, followed him in their boats with shouts of joy and festivity.
During the cool nights which, in this hilly region, temper the sickly heat of an Italian summer, we often wandered along the breezy shores of our classic Benacus, or sought refreshment in its dark blue waters. Colonna was an adept in the delightful exercise of swimming, and his instructions soon imparted to me requisite skill and self-possession. We plunged from the marble terraces of the villa into the delicious element, cleaving its moonlit waves, and sporting over its wide surface like water-gods.
The Madonna for my mother was finished in August. The artist had selected the incident of the flight into Egypt, and the mother of Jesus was reposing in deep shade, under the giant arms and dense foliage of a maple tree. In the middle distance, a few ilex and cypress trees were effectively and naturally distributed. The background was mountain scenery; and from a lofty cliff a river was precipitated, in a bold and picturesque fall. The waters rebounded from the gulf below in silver spray, and flowed through a verdant level into a tranquil and beautiful lake. The most romantic features of the wilderness around the lake of Garda were faithfully and beautifully introduced; and the brilliant rays of a sun approaching the horizon, threw a flood of gold over rock, and wood, and water. The Madonna was a young and lovely woman, giving nourishment to her first-born son, and bending over her pleasing task with delighted attention. The head of the Virgin was after a sketch from life, but developed and elevated in character, and invested with a breathing tenderness, a hallowed innocence and purity of expression, which at once thrilled and saddened the beholder. The boy was a model of infantine beauty; he supported himself with one little hand on his mother's breast, which was partially veiled with red drapery, and he had raised his cherub head and glossy curls from the sweet fount of life, to look with bright and earnest gaze upon the glowing landscape. The luxuriant brown hair of the Madonna was confined in a net, from which a few locks had strayed over her brow and cheek; and her blue mantle flowed with modest grace over her fine person, revealing, through its light and well-distributed folds, the graceful and easy position of the limbs. The eyes of both were radiantly bright, and in the large, well-opened orbs of the infant Saviour, the painter had introduced a something never seen in life--a premature and pathetic seriousness, awfully indicative of his high and hallowed destiny. Above the stately plane-tree were soaring three angels of more than Grecian beauty; and their features, in which a sacred innocence of look was blended with feminine grace and softness, reminded me powerfully of that exquisite design in Raffaelle's pictorial Bible--the "three angels before Abraham's threshold."