It is a triple
church. The uppermost one, begun two years after the saint's death,
has a magnificent Gothic west front and high steps leading from the
piazza, and a rich side-portal with a still higher flight leading from
a court on a lower level. As we entered, the early afternoon sun was
streaming in through the immense rose-window and flooding the vast
nave, illumining the blue star-studded vault of the lofty roof and the
grand, simple frescoes of Cimabue and Giotto on the walls. Thence we
descended to the second church, in whose darkness our vision groped,
half blind from the sudden change; but gradually through the dusk we
began to discern low vaults stretching heavily across pillars which
look like stunted giants, so short are they and so tremendously
thick-set, the high altar enclosed by an elaborate grating, the little
side-chapels like so many black cells, and through the gloom a twinkle
and glimmer of gold and color and motes floating in furtive sunbeams
that had strayed in through the superb stained glass of the infrequent
windows. The frescoes of Giotto and his school enrich every spandril
and interspace with their simple, serious forms--no other such place
to study the art of that early day--but a Virgin enthroned among
saints by Lo Spagna, a disciple of Perugino's, made a pure light in
the obscurity: it had all the master's golden transparency, like clear
shining after the rain. From this most solemn and venerable place we
went down to the lowest church, the real sepulchre: it was darker than
the one we had left, totally dark it seemed to me, and contracted,
although--it is in the form of a Greek cross--each arm is sixty feet:
in fact, it is only a crypt of unusual size; and although here
were the saint's bones in an urn of bronze, we were conscious of a
weakening of the impression made by the place we had just left.
Pages:
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67