i 
 
 OUR FLAG IS THERE ! 
 
 We trill defend it. 
 

 of 
 
 X 
 
 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 COMPRISING 
 
 TALES OF FIVE LANDS, 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF PENCILINGS BY THE WAY. 
 
 y /s 
 
 
 PUBLISHED BY S. COLMAN, 
 
 VIII ASTOR HOUSE. 
 
 1840, 
 

 . according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1839, by 
 
 S. COLMAN, 
 
 In the Clerk s Office of the District of the Uaited States, for the Southern 
 District of New- York. 
 
PS 33 A 4 ^ 
 
 INSCRIBED TO 
 
 RUFUS DAWES, 
 
 WITH THE SINCEREST FRIENDSHIP OF 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LADY RAVELGOLD, 
 
 a, . ]5 
 PALETTO S BRIDE, .... 
 
 VIOLANTA CESARINA, . . / 
 
 PASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE 
 
 139 
 THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA 
 
 159 
 
 DER HOOFDEN, OR THE UNDERCLIFF, - - - - 227 
 THE PICKER AND FILER 
 
 247 
 
 STRATFORD-ON-AVON 
 
 " 269 
 
 CHARLECOTE, - - ^ V 
 

 
a air 
 

 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 LADY RAVELCOLD. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 " What would it pleasure me to have my throat cut 
 With diamonds 1 or to be smothered quick 
 With cassia, or be shot to death with pearls !" 
 
 DUCHESS OF MALFY. 
 
 " I ve been i the Indies twice, and seen strange things 
 But two honest women ! One. I read of once !" 
 
 RULE A WIFE. 
 
 IT was what is called by people on the conti 
 nent a " London day." A thin, gray mist drizzled 
 down through the smoke which darkened the long 
 cavern of Fleet-street ; the sidewalks were slippery 
 
16 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL, 
 
 and clammy ; the drays slid from side to side on the 
 greasy pavement, creating a perpetual clamour 
 among the lighter carriages with which they came 
 in contact ; the porters wondered that " gemmen" 
 would carry their umbrellas up when there was no 
 rain, and the gentlemen wondered that porters 
 should be permitted on the sidewalks ; there were 
 passengers in box-coats though it was the first of 
 May, and beggars with bare breasts though it was 
 chilly as November ; the boys were looking wist 
 fully into the hosier s windows who were generally 
 at the pastry-cook s, and there were persons who 
 wished to know the time, trying in vain to see the 
 dial of St. Paul s through the gambage atmosphere. 
 It was twelve o clock, and a plain chariot with a 
 simple cres" on the panels, slowly picked its way 
 through the choked and disputed thoroughfare east 
 of Temple Bar. The smart glazed hat of the 
 coachman, the well-fitted drab greatcoat and gaiters 
 of the footman, and the sort of half-submissive, half- 
 contemptuous look on both their faces, (implying 
 that they were bound to drive to the devil if it were 
 miladi s orders, but that the rabble of Fleet-street 
 was a leetk too vulgar for their contact,) expressed 
 very plainly that the lady within was a denizen of a 
 more privileged quarter, but had chosen a rainy 
 day for some compulsory visit to the city." 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 17 
 
 At the rate of perhaps a mile an hour, the well- 
 groomed night horses (a pair of smart, hardy, 
 twelve-mile cabs, all bottom but little style, kept for 
 night- work and force.d journeys) had threaded the 
 tortuous entrails of London, and had arrived at the 
 arch of a dark court in Throgmorton-street. The 
 coachman put his wheels snug against the edge of 
 the sidewalk, to avoid being crushed by the passing 
 drays, and settled his many-caped benjamin about 
 him ; while the footman spread his umbrella, and 
 making a balustrade of his arm for his mistresses 
 assistance, a closely-veiled lady descended and dis 
 appeared up the wet and ill-paved avenue. 
 
 The green-baize door of Firkins and Co. opened 
 on its silent hinges and admitted the mysterious visi- 
 ter, who, inquiring if the nearest clerk of the junior 
 partner were in, was showed to a small inner room 
 containing a desk, two chairs, a coal fire, and a young 
 gentleman. The last article of furniture rose on the 
 lady s entrance, and as she threw off her veil he made 
 a low bow, with the air of a gentleman, who is neither 
 surprised nor embarrassed, and pushing aside the 
 door-check, they were left alone. 
 
 There was that forced complaisance in the lady s 
 manner on her first entrance, which produced the 
 slightest possible elevation in a very scornful lip 
 owned by the junior partner, but the lady was only 
 forty-five, high-born, and very handsome, and as she 
 2* 
 
18 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 looked at the fine specimen of nature s nobility, who 
 met her with a look as proud and yet as gentle as 
 her own, the smoke of Fleet-street passed away 
 from her memory, and she became natural and even 
 gracious. The effect upon the junior partner was 
 simply that of removing from his breast the shade 
 of her first impression. 
 
 " I have brought you," said his visiter, drawing a 
 card from her reticule, "an invitation to the dutchess 
 of Hautaigle s ball. She sent me half a dozen to 
 fill up for what she calls ornamentals and I am 
 sure I shall scarce find another who comes so deci 
 dedly under her grace s category." 
 
 The fair speaker had delivered this pretty speech 
 in the sweetest and best-bred tone of St. James s, 
 looking the while at the toe of the small brodequin 
 which she held up to the fire perhaps thinking only 
 of drying it. As she concluded her sentence, she 
 turned to her companion for an answer, and was 
 surprised at the impassive politeness of his bow of 
 acknowledgment. 
 
 " I regret that I shall not be able to avail myself 
 of your ladyship s kindness," said the junior partner, 
 in the same well-enunciated tone of courtesy. 
 
 " Then," replied the lady with a smile, " Lord 
 Augustus Fitz-Moi, who looks at himself all dinner 
 time in a spoon, will be the Apollo of the hour. 
 What a pity such a handsome creature should be 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 19 
 
 so vain ! By the way, Mr. Firkins, you live without 
 a looking-glass, I see." 
 
 " Your ladyship reminds me that this is merely a 
 place of business. May I ask at once what errand 
 has procured me the honour of a visit on so unplea 
 sant a day ?" 
 
 A slight flush brightened the cheek and forehead 
 of the beautiful woman, as she compressed her lips, 
 and forced herself to say with affected ease, " the 
 want of five hundred pounds." 
 
 The junior partner paused an instant while the 
 lady tapped with her boot upon the fender in ill- 
 dissembled anxiety, and then, turning to his desk, he 
 filled up the check without remark, presented it, and 
 took his hat to wait on her to her carriage. A gleam 
 of relief and pleasure shot over her countenance as 
 she closed her small jewelled hand over it, followed 
 immediately by a look of embarrassed inquiry into 
 the face of the unquestioning banker. 
 
 " I am in your debt already." 
 
 " Thirty thousand pounds, madam !" 
 
 " And for this you think the securities on the estate 
 ofRockland " 
 
 "Are worth nothing, madam! But it rains. I 
 regret that your ladyship s carriage cannot come to 
 the door. In the old-fashioned days of sedan-chairs, 
 now, the dark courts of Lothbury must have been 
 
20 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 more attractive. By the way, talking of Lothbury, 
 there is Lady Roseberry s/efe champetre next week. 
 If you should chance to have a spare card " 
 
 " Twenty, if you like I am too happy really, 
 Mr. Firkins " 
 
 " It s on the fifteenth ; I shall have the honour of 
 seeing your ladyship there ! Good morning ! Home, 
 coachman !" 
 
 "Does this man love me?" was Lady Ravelgold s 
 first thought, as she sank back in her returning cha 
 riot. Yet no ! he was even rude in his haste to be 
 rid of me. And I would willingly have staid, too, 
 for there is something about him of a mart that I 
 like. Ay, and he must have seen it a lighter 
 encouragement has been interpreted more readily. 
 Five hundred pounds ! Really five hundred pounds! 
 And thirty thousand at the back of it ! What does 
 he mean ? Heavens, if he should be deeper than I 
 thought ! If he should wish to involve me first !" 
 
 And spite of the horrour with which the thought 
 was met in the mind of Lady Ravelgold, the blush 
 over her forehead died away into a half smile and a 
 brighter tint in her lips; and as the carriage wound 
 slowly on through the confused press of Fleet-street 
 and the Strand, the image of the handsome and 
 haughty young banker shut her eyes from all sounds 
 without, and she was at her own door in Grosvenor- 
 
LADY RAVELGOLI). 21 
 
 square before she had changed position or wandered 
 for half a moment from the subject of those busy 
 dreams. 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 The morning of the fifteenth of May seemed to 
 have been appointed by all the flowers as a jubilee 
 of perfume and bloom. The birds had been invited 
 and sang in the summer with a welcome as full- 
 throated as a prim a donna singing down the tenor 
 in a duet ; the most laggard buds turned out their 
 hearts to the sunshine, and promised leaves on the 
 morrow, and that portion of London that had been 
 invited to Lady Roseberry s fete, thought it a very 
 fine day ! That portion which was not, wondered 
 how people would go sweltering about in such a 
 glare for a cold dinner! 
 
 At about half-past two, a very elegant dark green 
 cab without a crest, and with a servant in whose 
 slight figure and plain blue livery there was not a 
 fault, whirled out at the gate of the Regent s Park, 
 and took its way up the well-watered road leading 
 to Hampstead. The gentlemen whom it passed or 
 met turned to admire the performance of the dark 
 gray horse, and the ladie.s looked after the cab as if 
 they could see the handsome occupant once more 
 through its leather back. Whether by conspiracy 
 
22 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 among the coach-makers, or by an aristocracy of 
 taste, the degree of elegance in a turn-out attained 
 by the cab just described, is usually confined to the 
 acquaintances of Lady ; that list being under 
 stood to enumerate all " the nice young men" of the 
 West end, beside the guardsmen. (The ton of the 
 latter, in all matters that affect the style of the 
 regiment, is looked after by the club and the colonel.) 
 The junior Firkins seemed an exception to this 
 exclusive rule. No " nice man" could come from 
 
 Lothbury, and he did not visit Lady ; but his 
 
 horse was faultless, and when he turned into the 
 gate of Rose-Eden, the policeman at the porter s 
 lodge, though he did not know him, thought it 
 unnecessary to ask for his name. Away he spat 
 tered up the hilly avenue, and giving the reins to 
 his groom at the end of a green arbour leading to 
 the reception-lawn, he walked in and made his bow 
 to Lady Roseberry, who remarked, " How very 
 handsome ! Who can he be ?" and the junior partner 
 walked on and disappeared down an avenue of 
 laburnums. 
 
 Ah ! but Rose-Eden looked a Paradise that day ! 
 Hundreds had passed across the close-shaven lawn, 
 with a bow to the lady-mistress of this fair abode. 
 Yet the grounds were still private enough for Milton s 
 pair, so lost were they in the green labyrinths of hill 
 and dale. Some had descended through heavily- 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 23 
 
 shaded paths to a fancy-dairy, built over a fountain 
 in the bottom of a cool dell ; and here, amid her 
 milk-pans of old and costly china, the prettiest maid 
 in the country round pattered about upon a floor of 
 Dutch tiles, and served her visiters with creams and 
 ices ; already, as it were, adapted to fashionable 
 comprehension. Some had strayed to the orna 
 mental cottages in the skirts of the flower-garden 
 poetical abodes, built from a picturesque drawing, 
 with imitation roughness; thatch, lattice- window, 
 and low pa ling, all complete ; and inhabited by super 
 annuated dependants of Lord Roseberry, whose only 
 duties were to look like patriarchs, and give tea and 
 new cream-cheese to visiters on fete-days. Some 
 had gone to see the silver and gold pheasants in 
 their wire-houses stately aristocrats of the game 
 tribe, who carry their finely-pencilled feathers like 
 " Marmalet Madarus," strutting in hoop and farthin 
 gale. Some had gone to the kennels, to see setters 
 and pointers, hounds and terriers, lodged like gen 
 tlemen, each breed in its own apartment ; the pup 
 pies, as elsewhere, treated with most attention. 
 Some were in the flower-garden, some in the green 
 houses, some in the graperies, aviaries, and grottoes ; 
 and at the side of a bright sparkling fountain, in the 
 recesses of a fir-grove, with her foot upon its marble 
 lip, and one hand on the shoulder of a small Cupid 
 who archly made a drinking-cup of his wing, and 
 
24 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 caught the bright water as it fell, stood Lady Imogen 
 Ravelgold, the loveliest girl of nineteen that prayed 
 night and morning within the parish of May Fair, 
 listening to very passionate language from the young 
 banker of Lothbury. 
 
 A bugle on the lawn rang a recall. From every 
 alley, and by every path, poured in the gay multi 
 tude, and the smooth sward looked like a plateau of 
 animated flowers, waked by m gic from a broidery 
 on green velvet. Ah ! the beautiful demi-toikttes ! 
 so difficult to attain, yet, when attained, the dress 
 most modest, most captivating, most worthy the 
 divine grace of woman. Those airy hats, shelter 
 ing from the sun, yet not enviously concealing a 
 feature or a ringlet that a painter would draw for 
 his exhibition picture ! Those summery and shape 
 ly robes, covering the person more to show its 
 outline better, and provoke more the worship, which, 
 like all worship, is made more adoring by mystery ! 
 Those complexions which but betray their transpa 
 rency in the sun : lips in which the blood is translucent 
 when between you and the light: cheeks finer-grained 
 than alabaster, yet as cool in their virgin purity as 
 a tint in the dark corner of a Ruysdael : the human 
 race was at less perfection in Athens in the days of 
 Lais in Egypt in the days of Cleopatra, than that 
 day on the lawn of Rose-Eden. 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD* 25 
 
 Cart-loads of ribands, of every gay colour, had 
 been laced through the trees in all directions ; and 
 amid every variety of foliage, and every shade of 
 green, the tulip-tints shone vivid and brilliant, like 
 an A merican forest after the first frost. From the 
 left edge of the lawn, the ground suddenly sunk into 
 a dell, shaped like an amphitheatre, with a level 
 platform at its bottom, and all around, above and 
 below, thickened a shady wood. The music of a 
 delicious band stole up from the recesses of a grove, 
 draped as an orchestra and green-room on the lower 
 side, and while the audience disposed themselves in 
 the shade of the upper grove, a company of players 
 and dancing-girls commenced their theatricals. 
 Imogen Ravelgold, who was separated, by a pine 
 tree only, from the junior partner, could scarce tell 
 you, when it was finished, what was the plot of the 
 play. 
 
 The recall-bugle sounded again, and the band 
 wound away from the lawn, playing a gay march. 
 Followed lady Roseberry and her suite of gentlemen, 
 followed dames and their daughters, followed all 
 who wished to see the flight of my lord s falcons. 
 By a narrow path and a wicket-gate, the long music- 
 guided train stole out upon an open hill-side, looking 
 down on a verdant and spreading meadow. The 
 band played at a short distance behind the gay 
 groups of spectators, and it was a pretty picture to 
 3 
 
2 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL^ 
 
 look down upon the splendidly-dressed falconer and 
 his men, holding their fierce birds upon their wrists, 
 in their hoods and jesses, a foreground of old chivalry 
 and romance ; while far beyond extended, like a sea 
 over the horizon, the smoke-clad pinnacles of busy 
 and every-day London. There are such contrasts 
 of the eyes of the rich I 
 
 The scarlet hood was taken from the trustiest 
 falcon, and a dove, confined, at first, wit \ a string, 
 was thrown up, and brought back, to excite his 
 attention. As he fixed his eye upon him, the fright 
 ened victim was let loose, and the falcon flung off; 
 away skimmed the dove in a low flight over the 
 meadow, and up to the very zenith, in circles of 
 amazing swiftness and power, spc<5 the exulting 
 falcon, apparently forgetful of his prey, and bound 
 for the eye of the sun with his strong wings and .his 
 liberty. The falconers whistle and cry were heard ; 
 the dove circled round the edge of the meadow in his 
 wavy flight; and down, with the speed of lightning, 
 shot the falcon, striking his prey dead to the earth 
 before the eye could settle on his form. As the 
 proud bird stood upon his victim, looking around 
 with a lifted crest and fierce eye, Lady Imogen Ra- 
 vengold heard, in a voice of which her heart knew 
 the musick, "They who soar highest strike surest 
 the dove lies in the falcon s bosom." 
 
L AD Y H A VELGOLD 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 The afternoon had, meantime, been wearing on. 
 and at six the " breakfast" was announced. The 
 -tents beneath which the tables were spread were in 
 different parts of the grounds, and the guests had 
 made up their own parties. Each sped to his ren 
 dezvous, and as the last loiterers disappeared from 
 the lawn, a gentleman in a claret coat and a brown 
 study, found himself stopping to let a lady pass who 
 had obeyed the summons as tardily as himself. In 
 i white chip hat, Hairbault s last, a few lilies of the 
 valley laid among her raven curls beneath, a simple 
 white robe, the chsf-d ceuvre of Vlctotine in style 
 and toum^re, Lady Ravelgold would have been the 
 belle of th3 fete, but for her daughter. 
 
 " Well emerged from Lothbury !" she said, curt 
 sying, with a slight flush over her features, but 
 immediately taking his arm ; " I have lost my party, 
 and meeting you is opportune. Where shall we 
 breakfast ?" 
 
 There was a small tent standing invitingly open 
 on the opposite side of the lawn, and by the fainter 
 rattle of soup-spoons from that quarter, it promised 
 to be less crowded than the others. The junior 
 partner would willingly have declined the proffered 
 
8 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 honour, but he saw at a glance that there was no 
 escape, and submitted with a grace. 
 
 " You know very few people here," said his fair 
 creditor, taking the bread from her napkin. 
 " Your ladyship and one other." 
 " Ah, we shall have dancing by and by, and I 
 must introduce you to my daughter. By the way, 
 have you no name from your mother s side? * Fir 
 kins sounds so very odd. Give me some pretter 
 word to drink in this champagne." 
 " What do you think of Tremlet?" 
 "Too effeminate for your severe style of beauty 
 but it will do. Mr. Tremlet, your health ! Will you 
 give me a little of the pate before you ? Pray, if it 
 is not indiscreet, how comes that classick profile, and, 
 more surprising still, that distinguished look of yours, 
 to have found no gayer destiny than the signing of 
 Firkins and Co. to notes of hand ? Though I thought 
 you became your den in Lothbury, upon my honour 
 you look more at home here." 
 
 And Lady Ravengold fixed her superb eyes upon 
 the beautiful features of her companion, wondering 
 partly why he did not speak, and partly why she 
 had not observed before that he was incomparably 
 the handsomest creature she had ever seen. 
 
 " I can regret no vocation," he answered after a 
 moment, " which procures me an acquaintance with, 
 your ladyship s family/ 
 
LADYRAVELGOLP. 29 
 
 "" There is an arriere pensee in that formal speech, 
 Mr. Tremlet. You are insincere. I am the only 
 one in my family whom you know, and what plea 
 sure have you taken in my acquaintance ? And, 
 now I think of it, there is a mystery about you, 
 which, but for the noble truth written so legibly on 
 your features, I should be afraid to fathom. Why 
 have you suffered me to over-draw my credit so 
 enormously, and without a shadow of a protest?" 
 
 When Lady Ravelgold had disburdened her heart 
 of this direct question, she turned half round and 
 looked her companion in the face with an intense 
 interest, which produced upon her own features an 
 expression of earnestness very uncommon upon 
 their pale and impassive lines. She was one of 
 those persons of little thought, who care nothing foi 
 causes or consequences, so that the present difficul 
 ty is removed, or the present hour provided with its 
 ^ings ; but the repeated relief she had received from 
 the young banker, when total ruin would have been 
 the consequence of his refusal, and his marked cold 
 ness in his manner to her, had stimulated the utmost 
 curiosity of which she was capable. Her vanity, 
 founded upon her high rank and great renown as a 
 beauty, would have agreed that he might be willing 
 to get her into his power at that price, had he been 
 less agreeable in his own person, or more eager in 
 his manner. But she .had wanted money sufficiently 
 
SO ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 to know, that thirty thousand pounds are not a ba 
 gatelle, and her brain was busy till she discovered 
 the equivalent he sought for it. Meant me her fear 
 that he would turn out to be a lover, grew rapidly 
 into a fear that he would not. 
 
 Lady Ravelgold had been the wife of a disso 
 lute earl, who had died, leaving his estate inex 
 tricably involved. With no male heir to the title 
 or proparty, and no very near relation, the beautiful 
 . widow shut her eyes to the difficulties by which 
 she was surrounded, and at the first decent moment 
 after the death of her lord, she had re-entered the 
 gay society of which she had been the bright and 
 particular star, and never dreamed either of dimi 
 nishing her establishment, or of calculating her pos 
 sible income. The first heavy draft she had made 
 upon the house of Firkins and Co., her husband s 
 bankers, had been returned with a statement of the 
 Ravelgold debt and credit on their books, by which 
 it appeared that Lord Ravelgold had overdrawn 
 four or five thousand pounds before his death, and 
 that from some legal difficulties, nothing could be 
 realized from the securities given on his estates. 
 This bad news arrived on the morning of a fete to 
 be given by the Russian ambassador, at which her 
 only child, Lady Imogen, was to make her debut in 
 society. With the facility of disposition which was 
 peculiar to her, Lady Ravelgold thrust the papers 
 
I*ADYRAVELGOLD. 31 
 
 into her drawer, and determining to visit her banker 
 on the following morning, threw the matter entirely 
 from her mind and made preparations for the ball. 
 With the Russian government the house of Firkins 
 and Co. had long carried on very extensive fiscal 
 transactions, and in obedience to instruction^jrom 
 the emperor, regular invitations for the embassy 
 *etes were sent to the bankers, accepted occasion 
 ally by tli3 junior partner only, who was generally 
 supposed to be a natural son of old Firkins. Out 
 of the banking-house he was known as Mr. Trem- 
 let, and it was by this name, which was presumed 
 to be his mother s, that he was casually introduced 
 to Lady Imogen on the night of the fete, while she 
 was separated from her mother in the dancing- 
 room. The consequence was a sudden, d?ep, in 
 effaceable passion in the bosom of the young bank 
 er, checked and silenced, but never lessened or 
 chilled by the recollection of the obstacle of his 
 birth. The impression of his subdued manner, his 
 worshipping, yet most respectful tones, and the 
 bright soul that breathed through his handsome 
 features with his unusual excitement, was, to say 
 the least, favourable upon Lady Imogen, and they 
 parted on the night of the fate, mutually aware of 
 each other s preference. 
 
 On th3 following morn : ng Lady Ravelgold made 
 her proposed visit to tho city; and inquiring for 
 
32 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Mr. Firkins, was shown in as usual to the junior 
 partner, to whom the colloquial business of the con 
 cern had long been entrusted. To her surprise she 
 found no difficulty in obtaining the sum of money 
 which had been refused her on the preceding day 
 a result which she attributed to her powers of per 
 suasion, or to some new turn in the affairs of the 
 estate ; and for two years these visits had been re 
 peated at intervals of three or four months, with the 
 same success, though not with the same delusion as 
 to the cause. She had discovered that the estate 
 was worse than nothing, and the junior partner 
 cared little to prolong his t2tes-d-tetss with her, and, 
 up to the visit with which this tale opened, she had 
 looked to every succeeding one with increased fear 
 and doubt. 
 
 During these two years, Tremlet had seen Lady 
 Imogen ocsasionally at balls and public places, and 
 every look they exchanged wove more strongly be 
 tween them the subtle threads of love. Once or 
 twice she had endeavoured to interest her mother 
 in conversation on the subject, with the intention of 
 of making a confidence of her feelings ; but Lady 
 Ravengold, when not anxious, was giddy with her 
 own success, and the unfamiliar name never rested 
 a moment on her ear. With this explanation to 
 render the tale intelligible, " let us," as the French 
 say, " return to our muttons." 
 
LADY RAVE I, GOLD. 33 
 
 Of the conversation between Tremlet and her 
 mother, Lady Imogen was an unobserved and asto 
 nished witness. The tent which they had entered 
 was large, with a buffet in the centre, and a circu 
 lar table waited on by servants within the ring ; and, 
 just concealed by the drapery around the pole, sat 
 Lady Imogen with a party of her friends, discussing 
 very seriously the threatened fashion of tight sleeves. 
 She had half risen, when her mother entered, to 
 offer her a seat by her side, but the sight of Tremlet, 
 who immediately followed, had checked the words 
 upon her lip, and to her surprise they seated them 
 selves on the side that was wholly unoccupied, ! and 
 conversed in a tone inaudible to all but themselves. 
 Not aware that her lover knew Lady Ravelgold, 
 she supposed that they might have been casually 
 introduced, till the earnestness of her mother s man 
 ner, and a certain ease between them in the little 
 courtesies of the table, assured her that this could 
 not be their first interview. Tremlet s face was 
 turned from her, and she could not judge whether 
 he was equally interested ; but she had been so ac 
 customed to consider her mother as irrisistible when 
 she chose to please, that she supposed it of course ; 
 and very soon the heightened colour of Lady Ra 
 velgold, and the unwavering look of mingled admi 
 ration and curiosity which she bent upon the hand 
 some face of her companion, left no doubt in her 
 
34 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 mind that her reserved and exclusive lover was in 
 Ihe dangerous toils of a rival whose power sho 
 knew. From the mortal pangs of a first jealousy, 
 heaven send thee deliverance, fair Lady Imogen ! 
 
 " We shall find our account in the advances on 
 your ladyship s credit ;" said Tremlet, in reply to 
 the direct question that was put to him. " Mean 
 time permit me to ad mire the courage with which 
 you look so disagreeable a subject in the face." 
 
 " For * disagreeable subject/ read Mr. Tremlet. 
 I show my temerity more in that. Apropos effaces, 
 yours would become the new fashion of cravat. The 
 men at Crockford s slip the ends through a ring of 
 their lady-love s, if they chance to have one thus P 
 and untying the loose knot of his black satin cravat, 
 Lady Ravelgold slipped over the ends a diamond 
 of small value, conspicuously set in pearls. 
 
 " The men at Crockford s," said Tremlet, hesita 
 ting to commit the rudeness of removing the ring, 
 " are not of my school of manners. If I had been 
 so fortunate as to inspire a lady with a preference 
 for me, I should not advertise it on my cravat." 
 
 " But suppose the lady were proud of her prefer 
 ence, as dames were of the devotion of their knights 
 in the days of chivalry would you not wear her 
 favour as conspicuously as they ?" 
 
 A flush of mingled embarrassment and surprise 
 shot over the forehead of Tremlet, and he was 
 
LADYRAVELGOLu. 35 
 
 turning the ring with his fingers, when Lady Imo 
 gen, attempting to pass out of the tent, was stopped 
 by her mother. 
 
 " Imogen, my daughter ! this is Mr. TremleL 
 Lady Imogen Ravelgold, Mr. Tremlet !" 
 
 The cold and scarce perceptible bow which tht 
 wounded girl gave to her lover, betrayed no pre 
 vious acquaintance to the careless Lady Ravelgold. 
 Without giving a second thought to her daughter, 
 she held her glass for some champagne to a passing 
 servant, and as Lady Imogen and her friends cross 
 ed the lawn to the dancing tent, she resumed the 
 conversation which they had interrupted ; while 
 Tremlet, with his heart brooding on the altered look 
 he had received, listened and replied almost uncon 
 sciously ; yet from this very circumstance, in a man 
 ner which was interpreted by his companion as the 
 embarrassment of a timid and long-repressed pas 
 sion for herself. 
 
 While Lady Ravelgold and the junior partner 
 were thi s playing at cross purposes over their 
 champagne and bons-bons, Grisi and Lablanche 
 were singing a duet from / Puritani, to a full au 
 dience in the saloon ; the drinking young men sat 
 over their wine at the nearly deserted tables ; Lady 
 Imogen and her friends waltzed to Collinet s bane 
 and the artizans were busy b ;bw the lawn, erectin ; 
 the machinery for the fire-works. Meantime ever 
 
iUi ROMANCE OF T R A V K I. - 
 
 alloy and avenue, grot and labyrinth, had boon dimly 
 illuminated with coloured lamps, showing like vari 
 coloured glow-worms amid the foliage and shells; 
 ami if the bright scenery of RoeoEden had been 
 lovely by day, it xvas lay-land and \vileliery by 
 night. Fatal impulse of our nature, that these ap 
 proaches to paradise in the "delight of the eye." 
 stir only in our bosoms the passions upon which law 
 and holy \vr.it have put ban and bridle! 
 
 * Shall \ve stroll down this alley of crimson 
 lamps " said Lady Uavclgold, crossing the lawn 
 from the tent where their eollee had been brought 
 to them, and putting her slender arm far into that 
 of her now pale and silent companion. 
 
 A lady in a white dr. t the i ntranco of 
 
 that crimson a\enue. as Tromlot and his passionate 
 adtoirer disappeared beneath the clos n^ lines of the 
 long jHTspeetive, and. rem:iiniii;y a moment gazing 
 through the unbroken twinkle of the confusing 
 lamps, she pressed her hand hard upon her fore 
 head, drew up her form as if struggling with some 
 irrepressible feeling, and in another moment was 
 whirling in the wait/, with Lo-.d F.nvst Fitznnte- 
 lopc, whose mother wrote a complimentary para 
 graph about their performmuv for the next Satur 
 day s Court Journal. 
 
 The bugle soun Jed. and the band played a march 
 the lawn. From the breakfast tents, from the 
 
 
LADY RAVEL GOLD. 37 
 
 coffee-rooms, from the dance, from the card-tables, 
 poured all who wished to witness the marvels that 
 lie in saltpetre. Gentlemen who stood in a ten 
 der attitude in the darkness, held themselves ready 
 to lean the other way when the rockets blazed up, 
 and mammas who were encouraging flirtations with 
 cligibles, whispered a caution on the same subject to 
 their less-experienced daughters. 
 
 Up sped the missiles, round spun the wheels, fair 
 burned the pagodas, swift flew the fire-doves off and 
 back again on their wires, and softly floated down 
 through the dewy atmosphere of that May night 
 the lambent and many-coloured stars, flung burning 
 from the exploded rockets. Device followed device, 
 and Lady Imogen almost forgot, in her child s de 
 light at the spectacle, that she had taken into her 
 bosom a green serpent, whose folds were closing 
 like suffocation about her heart. 
 
 The finals was to consist of a new light, invented 
 by the Pyrotechnist, promised to Lady Roseberry 
 to be several degrees brighter than the sun com 
 paratively with the quantity of matter. Before this 
 last flourish came a pause ; and while all the world 
 were murmuring love and applause around her, 
 Lady Imogen, with her eyes fixed on an indefinite 
 point in the darkness, took advantage of the cessation 
 of light to feed her serpent with thoughts of passion- 
 ate and uncontrollable pain. A French attach*, 
 4 
 . 
 
38 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Phillipiste to the very tips of his mustache, addressed 
 to her ear, meantime, the compliments he had found 
 most effective in the Chaussee UAntin. 
 
 The light burst suddenly from a hundred blazing 
 points, clear, dazzling, intense illuminating, as by 
 the instantaneous burst of day, the farthest corner 
 of Rose-Eden. And Monsieur Mangepoire, with a 
 French contempt for English fire- works, took advan 
 tage of the first ray to look into Lady Imogen s 
 eyes. 
 
 "Mais, Miladi!" was his immediate exclama 
 tion, after following their direction with a glance, 
 " ce n est qu un tableau vivant, cela ! Help, gentle 
 men ! Elk s evanouit. Some salts ! Misericorde ! 
 Mon Dieu ! Mon Dieu /" And Lady Imogen Ra- 
 velgold was carried fainting to Lady Roseberry s 
 chamber. 
 
 In a small opening at the end of a long avenue 
 of lilachs, extended from the lawn in the direction 
 of Lady Imogen s fixed and unconscious gaze, was 
 presented, by the unexpected illumination, the tableau 
 vivant, seen by her ladyship and Monsieur Mange 
 poire at the same instant a gentleman drawn up 
 to his fullest height, with his arms folded, and a lady 
 kneeling on the ground at his feet with her arms 
 stretched up to his bosom. 
 
l.ADYRAVELGOLD. 39 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 A little after two o clock on the following Wed 
 nesday, Tremlet s cabriolet stopped near the perron 
 of Willis s rooms in King-street, and while he sent 
 up his card to the lady patronesses for his ticket to 
 that night s Almack s, he busied himself in looking 
 into the crowd of carriages about him, and reading 
 on the faces of their fair occupants the hope and 
 anxiety to which they were a prey till John the 
 footman brought them tickets or despair. Drawn 
 up on the opposite side of the street, stood a family 
 carriage of the old style, covered with half the arms 
 of the herald s office, and containing a fat dowager 
 and three very over-dressed daughters. Watching 
 them, to see the effect of their application, stood 
 upon the sidewalk three or four young men from the 
 neighbouring club-house, and at the moment Trem- 
 let was observing these circumstances, a foreign 
 britscka, containing a beautiful woman of a reputa 
 tion better understood than expressed in the conclave 
 above stairs, flew round the corner of St. James - 
 street, and very nearly drove into the open mouth 
 of the junior partner s cabriolet. 
 
 " I will bet you a Ukraine colt against this fine bay 
 of yours," said the Russian secretary of legation, 
 
40 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 advancing from the group of dandies to Tremlet, 
 " that miladi, yonder, with all the best blood of En 
 gland in her own and her daughter s red faces, gets 
 no tickets this morning." 
 
 " I ll take a bet upon the lady who has nearly 
 extinguished me, if you like," answered Tremlet, 
 gazing with admiration at the calm, delicate, child 
 like looking creature, who sat before him in the 
 britscka. 
 
 " No !" said the secretary, " for Almack s is a 
 republic of beauty, and she ll be voted in without 
 either blood or virtue. Par exemple, Lady Ravel- 
 gold s voucher is good here, though she does study 
 tableaux in Lothbury eh Tremlet ?" 
 
 Totally unaware of the unlucky discovery by the 
 fireworks at Lady Roseberry s fete, Tremlet colour 
 ed and was inclined to take the insinuation as an 
 affront ; but a laugh from the dandies drew off his 
 companion s attention, and he observed the dowa 
 ger s footman standing at her coach window with 
 his empty hands held up in most expressive negation, 
 while the three young ladies within sat aghast, in all 
 the agonies of disappointed hopes. The lumbering 
 carriage got into motion its ineffective blazonry 
 paled by the mortified blush of its occupants and, 
 as the junior partner drove away, philosophizing on 
 the arbitrary opinions and unprovoked insults of 
 polite society, the britscka shot by, showing him, as 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 41 
 
 he leaned forward, a lovely woman who bent on 
 him the most dangerous eyes in London, and an 
 Almack s ticket lying on the unoccupied cushion 
 beside her. 
 
 The white relievo upon the pale blue wall of Al 
 mack s showed every crack in its stucco flowers, 
 and the faded chaperons who had defects of a similar 
 description to conceal, took warning of the walls, 
 and retreated to the friendlier dimness of the tea 
 room. Collinet was beginning the second set of 
 quadrilles, and among the fairest of the surpassingly 
 beautiful women who were moving to his heavenly 
 music, was Lady Imogen Ravelgold, the lovelier to 
 night for the first heavy sadness that had ever 
 dimmed the roses in her cheek. Her lady mother 
 divided her thoughts between what this could mean, 
 and whether Mr. Tremlet would come to the ball ; 
 and when, presently after, in the dos-a-dos, she forgot 
 to look at her daughter, on seeing that gentleman 
 enter, she lost a very good opportunity for a guess 
 at the cause of Lady Imogen s paleness. 
 
 To the pure and true eye that appreciates the 
 divinity of the form after which woman is made, it 
 would have been a glorious feast to have seen the 
 perfection of shape, colour, motion and countenance 
 shown that night on the bright floor of Almack s. 
 For the young and beautiful girls whose envied 
 
42 ROMANCE OF -TRAVEL. 
 
 destiny is to commence their woman s history in this 
 exclusive hall, there exist aids to beauty known to 
 no other class or nation. Perpetual vigilance over 
 every limb from the cradle up ; physical education 
 of a perfection, discipline and judgment pursued 
 only at great expense and under great responsibility; 
 moral education of the highest kind, habitual con 
 sciousness of rank, exclusive contact with elegance 
 and luxury, and a freedom of intellectual culture 
 which breathes a soul through the face before pas 
 sion has touched it with a line or a shade these 
 are some of the circumstances which make Almack s 
 the cynosure of the world for adorable and radiant 
 beauty* 
 
 There were three ladies who had come to Al 
 mack s with a definite object that night, each of 
 whom was destined to be surprised and foiled : 
 Lady Ravelgold, who feared she had been abrupt 
 with the inexperienced banker, but trusted to find 
 him softened by a day or two s reflection ; Mrs. St. 
 Leger, the Lady of the britscka, who had ordered 
 supper for two on her arrival at home from her 
 morning s drive, and intended to have the company 
 of the handsome creature she had nearly run over 
 in King-street ; and Lady Imogen Ravelgold, as 
 will appear in the sequel. 
 
 Tremlet stood in the entrance from the tea-room 
 a moment, gathering courage to walk alone into such 
 
LADVRAVELGOLD. 43 
 
 a dazzling scene, and then, having caught a glimpse 
 of the glossy lines of Lady Imogen s head at the 
 farthest end of the room, he was advancing toward 
 her, when he was addressed by a lady who leaned 
 against one of the slender columns of the orchestra. 
 After a sweetly-phrased apology for having nearly 
 knocked out his brains that morning with her horses 
 fore feet, Mrs. St. Leger took his arm, and walking 
 deliberately two or three times up and down the 
 room, took possession, at last, of a banquette on the 
 highest range, so far from any other person, that it 
 would have been a marked rudeness to have left her 
 alone. Tremlet took his seat by her with this 
 instinctive feeling, trusting that some of her acquain 
 tances would soon approach, and give him a fair 
 excuse to leave her ; but he soon became amused 
 with her piquant style of conversation, and, not 
 aware of being observed, fell into the attitude of a 
 pleased and earnest listener. 
 
 Lady Ravelgold s feelings during this petit entre- 
 tien, were of a very positive description. She had 
 an instinctive knowledge, and consequently a jealous 
 dislike of Mrs. St. Leger s character ; and, still under 
 the delusion that the young banker s liberality was 
 prompted by a secret passion for herself, she saw 
 her credit in the city and her hold upon the affections 
 of Tremlet, (for whom she had really conceived a 
 violent affection,) melting away in every smile of 
 4* 
 
44 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 the dangerous woman who engrossed him. As she 
 looked around for a friend, to whose ear she might 
 communicate some of the suffocating poison in her 
 own heart, Lady Imogen returned to her from a 
 galopade ; and, like a second dagger into the heart 
 of the pure-minded girl, went this second proof of 
 her lover s corrupt principle and conduct. Unwil 
 ling to believe even her own eyes on the night of 
 Lady Roseberry s/efe, she had summoned resolution 
 on the road home to ask an explanation of her mother. 
 Embarrassed by the abrupt question, Lady Ravel- 
 gold felt obliged to make a partial confidence of the 
 state of her pecuniary affairs ; and to clear herself, 
 she represented Tremlet as having taken advantage 
 of her obligations to him, to push a dishonourable 
 suit. The scene disclosed by the sudden blaze of 
 the fire- works being thus simply explained, Lady 
 Imogen determined at once to give up Tremlef s 
 acquaintance altogether ; a resolution which his 
 open flirtation with a woman of Mrs. St. Leger s 
 character served to confirm. She had, however, 
 one errand with him, prompted by her filial feelings 
 and favoured by an accidental circumstance which 
 will appear. 
 
 " Do you believe in animal magnetism ?" asked 
 Mrs. St. Leger, " for by the fixedness of Lady Ravel- 
 gold s eyes in this quarter, something is going to 
 happen to one of us." 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 45 
 
 The next moment the Russian secretary approach 
 ed and took his seat by Mrs. St. Leger, and with 
 diplomatic address contrived to convey to Tremlet s 
 ear that Lady Ravelgold wished to speak with him. 
 The banker rose, but the quick wit of his companion 
 comprehended the manoeuvre. 
 
 " Ah ! I see how it is," she said, " but stay you ll 
 sup with me to-night ? Promise me parole d hon- 
 neur !" 
 
 " Parole /" answered Tremlet, making his way 
 out between the seats, half pleased and half embar 
 rassed. 
 
 " As for you, Monsieur le Secretaire" said Mrs. 
 St. Leger, " you have forfeited my favour, and may 
 sup elsewhere. How dare you conspire against 
 me?" 
 
 While the Russian was making his peace, Trem 
 let crossed over to Lady Ravelgold ; but, astonished 
 at the change in Lady Imogen, he soon broke in 
 abruptly upon her mother s conversation, to ask her 
 to dance. She accepted his hand for a quadrille ; 
 but as they walked down the room in search of a 
 vis-d-vis, she complained of heat, and asked timidly 
 if he would take her to the tea-room. 
 
 " Mr. Tremlet," she said, fixing her eyes upon the 
 cup of tea which he had given her, and which she 
 found some difficulty in holding, " I have come here 
 to-night to communicate to you some important 
 
46 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 information, to ask a favour, and to break off an 
 acquaintance which has lasted too long." 
 
 Lady Imogen stopped, for the blood had fled 
 from her lips, and she was compelled to ask his arm 
 for a support. She drew herself up to her fullest 
 height the next moment, looked at Tremlet, who 
 stood in speechless astonishment, and with a strong 
 effort, commenced again in a low, firm tone 
 
 " I have been acquainted with you some time, sir, 
 and have never inquired, nor knew more than your 
 name, up to this day. I suffered myself to be pleased 
 too blindly " 
 
 " Dear Lady Imogen !" 
 
 " Stay a moment, sir! I will proceed directly to 
 my business. I received this morning a letter from 
 the senior partner of a mercantile house in the city, 
 with which you are connected. It is written on the 
 supposition that I have some interest in you, and 
 informs me that you are not, as you yourself sup 
 pose, the son of the gentleman who writes the letter." 
 
 " Madam !" 
 
 " That gentleman, sir. as you know, never was 
 married. He informs me that in the course of many 
 financial visits to St. Petersburgh, he formed a friend 
 ship with Count Manteuffel, then minister of finance 
 to the emperour, whose tragical end, in consequence 
 of his extensive defalcations, is well known. In 
 brief, sir, you were his child, and were taken by this 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 47 
 
 English banker, and carefully educated as his own, 
 in happy ignorance, as he imagined, of your father s 
 misfortunes and mournful death." 
 
 Tremlet leaned against the wall, unable to reply 
 to this astounding intelligence, and Lady Imogen 
 went on. 
 
 " Your title and estates have been restored to you 
 at the request of your kind benefactor, and you are 
 now the heir to a princely fortune, and a count of 
 the Russian empire. Here is the letter, sir, which 
 is of no value to me now. Mr. Tremlet ! one word 
 more, sir." 
 
 Lady Imogen gasped for breath. 
 
 " In return, sir, for much interest given you here 
 tofore in return, sir, for this information " 
 
 " Speak, dear Lady Imogen !" 
 
 " Spare my mother !" 
 
 " Mrs. St. Leger s carriage stops the way !" shout 
 ed a servant at that moment, at the top of the stairs ; 
 and as if there were a spell in the sound to nerve 
 her resolution anew, Lady Imogen Ravelgold shook 
 the tears from her eyes, bowed coldly to Tremlet, 
 and passed out into the dressing-room. 
 
 " If you please, sir," said a servant, approaching 
 the amazed banker, " Mrs. St. Leger waits for you 
 jn her carriage." 
 
48 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 " Will you come home and sup with us ?" said 
 Lady Ravelgold at the same instant, joining him in 
 the tea-room. 
 
 " I shall be only too happy, Lady Ravelgold." 
 The bold coachman of Mrs. St. Leger continued 
 to " stop the way," spite of policemen and infuriated 
 footmen, for some fifteen minutes. At the end of 
 that time Mr. Tremlet appeared, handing down 
 Lady Ravelgold and her daughter, who walked to 
 their chariot, which was a few steps behind ; and 
 very much to Mrs. St. Leger s astonishment, the 
 handsome banker sprang past her horses heads a 
 minute after, jumped into his cabriolet, which stood 
 on the opposite side of the street, and drove after 
 the vanish ; ng chariot as if his life depended on over 
 taking it. Still Mrs. St. Leger s carriage " stopped 
 the way." But, in a few minutes after, the same 
 footman who had summoned Tremlet in vain, re 
 turned with the Russian secretary, doomed in blessed 
 unconsciousness to play the pis aller at her tete-a- 
 tete supper in Spring Gardens. 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 40 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 If Lady Ravelgold showed beautiful by the 
 uncompromising light and in the ornamented halj 
 of Almack s, she was radiant as she came through 
 the mirror door of her own loved-contrived and 
 beauty-breathing boudoir. Tremlet had been show 
 ed into this recess of luxury and elegance on his 
 arrival, and Lady Ravelgold and her daughter, 
 who preceded her by a minute or two, had gone to 
 their chambers, the first to make some slight changes 
 in her toilette, and the latter (entirely ignorant of her 
 lover s presence in the house,) to be alone with a 
 heart never before in such painful need of self-aban 
 donment and solitude. 
 
 Tremlet looked about him in the enchanted room 
 in which he found himself alone, and, spite of the 
 prepossessed agitation of his feelings, the voluptuous 
 beauty of every object had the effect to divert and 
 tranquillize him. The light was profuse, but it came 
 softened through the thinnest alabaster ; and while 
 every object in the room was distinctly and minutely 
 visible, the effect of moonlight was not more soft 
 and dreamy. The general form of the boudoir 
 was an oval, but within the pilasters of folded silk 
 with their cornices of gold, lay crypts containing 
 5 
 
50 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 copies exquisitely done in marble of the most grace 
 ful statues of antiquity, one of which seemed, by 
 the curtain drawn quite aside and a small antique 
 lamp burning near it, to be the divinity of the place 
 the Greek Antinous, with his drooped head and 
 full, smooth limbs, the most passionate and life-like 
 representation of voluptuous beauty that intoxicates 
 the slumberous air of Italy. Opposite this, another 
 niche contained a few books, whose retreating 
 shelves swung on a secret door, and as it stood half 
 open, the nodding head of a snowy magnolia leaned 
 through, as if pouring from the lips of its broad 
 chalice the mingled odours of the unseen conserva 
 tory it betrayed. The first sketch in crayons of a 
 portrait of Lady Ravelgold by young Lawrence, 
 stood against the wall, with the frame half buried 
 in a satin ottoman ; and, as Tremlet stood before it, 
 idmiring the clear, classic outline of the head and 
 bust, and wondering in what chamber of his brain 
 the gifted artist had found the beautiful drapery in 
 which he had drawn her, the dim light glanced 
 faintly on the left, and the broad mirror by which 
 he had entered swung again on its silver hinges, 
 and admitted the very presentment of what he gazed 
 on. Lady Ravelgold had removed the jewels from 
 her hair, and the robe of wrought lace, which she 
 had worn that night over a boddice of white satin 
 laced loosely below the bosom. In the place of this 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 51 
 
 she had thrown upon her shoulders a flowing wrap 
 per of purple velvet, made open after the Persian 
 fashion, with a short and large sleeve, and embroi 
 dered richly with gold upon the skirts. Her admi 
 rable figure, gracefully defined by the satin petticoat 
 and boddice, showed against the gorgeous purple 
 as it flowed back in her advancing motion, with a 
 relief which would have waked the very soul of 
 Titian ; her complexion was dazzling and faultless 
 in the flattering light of her own rooms ; and there 
 are those who will read this who know how the 
 circumstances which surround a woman luxury, 
 elegance, taste, or the opposite of these enhance 
 or dim, beyond help or calculation, even the highest 
 order of woman s beauty. 
 
 Lady Ravelgold held a bracelet in her hand as 
 she came in. . - 
 
 " In my own house," she said, holding the glitter 
 ing jewel to Tremlet, " I have a fancy for the style 
 antique. Tasseline, my maid, has gone to bed, and 
 you must do the devoir of a knight, or an abigail, 
 and loop up this Tyrian sleeve. Stay look first 
 at the model that small statue of Cytheris, yonder ! 
 Not the shoulder for you are to swear mine is pret 
 tier but the clasp. Fasten it like that. So! Now 
 take me for a Grecian nymph the rest of the evening. 
 
 " Lady Ravelgold !" 
 
52 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " Hermione or Aglae, if you please ! But let us 
 ring for supper !" 
 
 As the bell sounded, a superb South American 
 trulian darted in from the conservatory, and, spread 
 ing his gorgeous black and gold wings a moment 
 over the alabaster shoulder of Lady Ravelgold, as if 
 he took a pleasure in prolonging the first touch as 
 he alighted, turned his large liquid eye fiercely on 
 Tremlet. 
 
 " Thus it is," said Lady Ravelgold, " we forget 
 our old favourites in our new. See how jealous he 
 is!" 
 
 " Supper is served, miladi !" said a servant enter 
 ing. 
 
 " A hand to each, then, for the present," she said, 
 putting one into Tremlet s, and holding up the trulian 
 with the other. " He who behaves best shall drink 
 first with me." 
 
 " I beg your ladyship s pardon," said Tremlet, 
 drawing back, and looking at the servant, who 
 immediately left the room. "Let us understand 
 each other! Does Lady Imogen sup with us to 
 night?" 
 
 " Lady Imogen has retired," said her mother, in 
 some surprise. 
 
 " Then, madam, will you be seated one moment 
 and listen to me ?" 
 
I 
 LADY RAVELGOLD. 53 
 
 Lady Ravelgold sat down on the nearest ottoman, 
 with the air of a person too high bred to be taken 
 by surprise, but the colour deepened to crimson in 
 the centre of her cheek, and the bird on her hand 
 betrayed by one of his gurgling notes that he was 
 held more tightly than pleased him. With a calm 
 and decisive tone, Tremlet went through the explan 
 ation given in the previous parts of this narration. 
 He declared his love for Lady Imogen, his hopes 
 (while he had doubts of his birth) that Lady Ravel- 
 gold s increasing obligations and embarrassments 
 and his own wealth might weigh against his disad 
 vantages, and now, his honourable descent being 
 established, and his rank entitling him to propose 
 for her hand, he called upon Lady Ravelgold to 
 redeem her obligations to him by an immediate 
 explanation to her daughter of his conduct toward 
 herself, and by lending her whole influence to the 
 success of his suit. 
 
 Five minutes are brief time to change a lover 
 into a son-in-law ; and Lady Ravelgold, as we have 
 seen in the course of this story, was no philosopher. 
 She buried her face in her hands, and sat silent for 
 awhile after Tremlet had concluded ; but the case 
 was a very clear one. Ruin and mortification were 
 in one scale, mortification and prosperity in the 
 other. She rose, pale but decided, and requesting 
 
 5* 
 
54 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Monsieur le Conte Manteuffel to await her a few 
 minutes, ascended to her daughter s chamber. 
 
 " If you please, sir," said a servant, entering in 
 about half an hour, "miladi and Lady Imogen beg 
 that you will join them in the supper-room." 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 The spirit of beauty, if it haunt in such artificial 
 atmospheres as Belgrave-square, might have been 
 pleased to sit invisibly on the vacant side of Lady 
 Ravelgold s table. Tremlet had been shown in by 
 the servant to a small apartment, built like a belvi- 
 dere over the garden, half boudoir in its character, 
 yet intended as a supper-room, and at the long win 
 dow (opening forth upon descending terraces laden 
 with flowers and just now flooded with the light of 
 a glorious moon) stood Lady Imogen, with her 
 glossy head laid against the casement, and the palm 
 of her left hand pressed close upon her heart If 
 those two lights the moon faintly shed off from 
 the divine curve of her temple, and the stained rose- 
 lamp pouring its mellow tint full on the heavenly 
 shape and whiteness of her shoulder and neck if 
 those two lights, I say, could have been skilfully 
 
LADY RAVELGOLD. 55 
 
 managed, Mr. Lawrence ! what a picture you 
 might have made of Lady Imogen Ravelgold ! 
 
 " Imogen, my daughter ! Mr. Tremlet !" said her 
 mother as he entered. 
 
 Without changing her position, she gave him the 
 hand she had been pressing on her heart. 
 
 " Mr. Tremlet !" said Lady Ravelgold, evidently 
 entering into her daughter s embarrassment, " trou 
 ble yourself to come to the table and give me a bit 
 of this pheasant. Imogen, George waits to give 
 you some champagne." 
 
 " Can you forgive me ?" said the beautiful girl, 
 before turning to betray her blushing cheek and 
 suffused eyes to her mother. 
 
 Tremlet stopped as if to pluck a leaf from the 
 verbena at her feet, and passed his lips over the 
 slight fingers he held. 
 
 " Pretty trulian !" murmured Lady Ravelgold, to 
 her bird, as he stood on the edge of her champagne 
 glass, and curving his superb neck nearly double, 
 contrived to drink from the sparkling brim, " pretty 
 trulian ! you will be merry after this ! What an 
 cient Sybarite, think you, Mr. Tremlet, inhabits the 
 body of this bright bird ? Look up, mignon, and 
 tell us if you were Hylas or Alcibiades ! Is the 
 pheasant good, Mr. Tremlet ?" 
 
 " Too good to come from Hades, miladi. Is it true 
 that you have your table supplied fromCrockford s ?" 
 
56 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " Tout bonnement ! I make it a principle to avoid 
 all great anxieties, and I can trust nobody but 
 Ude. He sends my dinners quite hot, and if there 
 is a particular dish of game, he drives round at the 
 hour and gives it the last turn in my own kitchen. 
 I should die to be responsible for my dinners. I 
 don t know how people get on that have no grand 
 artiste. Pray, Mr. Tremlet, (I beg pardon Mon 
 sieur le Conte, perhaps I should say ?") 
 
 " No, no, I implore you ! * Tremlet has been 
 spoken too musically to be so soon forgotten. Trem 
 let or Charles, which you will !" 
 
 Lady Ravelgold put her hand in his, and looked 
 from his face to her daughter s wit i a smile, which 
 assured him that she had obtained a victory over 
 herself. Shrinking immediately, however, from 
 anything like sentiment, (with the nervous dread of 
 pathos so peculiar to the English,) she threw off her 
 trulian, that made a circle and alighted on the eme 
 rald bracelet of Lady Imogen, and rang the bell for 
 coffee. 
 
 " I flatter myself, Mr. Tremlet," she said, " that I 
 have made a new application of the homoeopathic 
 philosophy. Hahnemann, they say, cures fevers by 
 aggravating the disease ; and when I cannot sleep> 
 I drink coffee. J en suis passablement fiere ! You 
 did not know I was a philosopher V 
 
 "No, indeed!" 
 
L A D Y R A V E T, G O L D . 57 
 
 " Well, take some of this spiced mocha. I got it 
 of the Turkish ambassador, to whom I made beaux 
 yeux on purpose. Stop ! you shall have it in the 
 little tinsel cups he sent me. George, bring those 
 filagree things ! Now, Mr. Tremlet, imagine your 
 self in the serail du Bosphore Imogen and I, two 
 lovely Circassians, par exemple ! Is it not delicious ? 
 Talking of the Bosphorus, nobody was classical 
 enough to understand the device in my coiffure to 
 night." 
 
 " What was it ?" asked Tremlet absently, gazing 
 while he spoke, with eyes of envy at the trulian, 
 who was whetting his bill backward and forward 
 on the clear bright lips of Lady Imogen. 
 
 " Do you think my profile Grecian ?" asked Lady 
 Ravelgold. 
 
 " Perfectly !" 
 
 " And my hair is coifed a la Grec" 
 
 " Most becomingly." 
 
 " But still you won t see my golden grasshopper ! 
 Do you happen to know, sir, that to wear the golden 
 grasshopper was the birthright of an Athenian ? I 
 saw it in a book. Well ! I had to explain it to 
 everybody. By the way, what did that gambler, 
 George Heriot, mean by telling me that its legs 
 should be black. All Greeks have black legs, said 
 he, yawning in his stupid way. What did he mean, 
 Mr. Tremlet?" 
 
58 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 - * Greeks and blacklegs are convertible terms. 
 He thought you were more aufait of the slang dic 
 tionary. Will you permit me to coax my beautiful 
 rival from your hand, Lady Imogen ?" 
 
 She smiled, and put forward her wrist, with a 
 bend of its slender and alabaster lines which would 
 have drawn a sigh from Praxiteles. The trulian 
 glanced his fiery eyes from his mistress s face to 
 Tremlet s, and as the strange hand was put out to 
 take him from his emerald perch, he flew with the 
 quickness of lightning into the face of her lover, and 
 buried the sharp beak in his lip. The blood follow 
 ed copiously, and Lady Imogen, startled from her 
 timidity, sprang from her chair and pressed her 
 hands one after the other upon the wound, in pas 
 sionate and girlish abandonment. Lady Ravelgold 
 hurried to her dressing-room for something to 
 staunch the wound, and, left alone with the divine 
 creature, who hung over him, Tremlet drew her to 
 his bosom and pressed his cheek long and closely to 
 hers, while to his lips, as if to keep in life, clung her 
 own crimsoned and trembling fingers. 
 
 " Imogen !" said Lady Ravelgold, entering, " take 
 him to the fountain in the garden and wash the 
 wound ; then put on this bit of gold-beater s skin. 
 I will come to you when I have locked up the tru 
 lian. Is it painful, Mr.. Tremlet ?" 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 59 
 
 Tremlet could not trust his voice to answer, but 
 with his arm still around Lady Imogen, he descend 
 ed by the terrace of flowers to the fountain. 
 
 They sat upon the edge of the marble basin, and 
 the moonlight striking through the jet of the foun 
 tain, descended upon them like a rain of silver. 
 Lady Imogen had recovered from her fright and 
 buried her face in her hands, remembering into what 
 her feelings had betrayed her ; and Tremlet, some 
 times listening to the clear bell-like music of the 
 descending water, sometimes uttering the broken 
 sentences which are most eloquent in love, sat out 
 the hours till the stars began to pale, undisturbed 
 by Lady Ravelgold, who, on the upper stair of the 
 terrace, read by a small lamp, which, in the calm of 
 that heavenly summer night, burned unflickeringly 
 in the open air. 
 
 It was broad daylight when Tremlet, on foot, 
 sauntered slowly past Hyde Park corner on his way 
 to the Albany. The lamps were still struggling 
 with the brightening approach to sunrise, the cab 
 men and their horses slept on the stand by the Green 
 Park, and with cheerful faces the labourers went 
 to their work, and with haggard faces the night- 
 birds of dissipation crept wearily home. The well- 
 ground dust lay in confused heel-marks on the side 
 walk, a little dampened by the night-dew; the 
 
60 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 atmosphere in the street was clear, as it never is 
 after the stir of day commences ; a dandy, stealing 
 out from Crockford s, crossed Piccadilly, lifting up 
 his head to draw in long breaths of the cool air. 
 after the closeness of over-lighted rooms and excite 
 ment ; and Tremlet, marking none of these things, 
 was making his way through a line of carriages 
 slowly drawing up to take off their wearied master? 
 from a prolonged fete at Devonshire-house, when a 
 rude hand clapped him on the shoulder. 
 
 " Monsieur Tremlet !" 
 
 " Ah, Baron ! bien bon jour /" 
 
 "Bien rencontre, Monsieur ! You have insulted 
 a lady to-night, who has confided her cause to my 
 hands. Madam St. Leger, sir, is without a natural 
 protector, and you have taken advantage of her 
 position to insult her giossly,Mr. Tremlet ! grossly !" 
 
 Tremlet looked at the Russian during this extraor 
 dinary address, and saw that he was evidently highly 
 excited with wine. He drew him aside into Berke 
 ley-street, and in the calmest manner attempted to 
 explain what was not very clear to himself. He had 
 totally forgotten Mrs. St. Leger. The diplomate. 
 though quite beyond himself with his excitement 
 had sufficient perception left to see the weak point 
 of his statement, and infuriated with the placid man 
 ner in which he attempted to excuse himself, sud 
 denly struck his glove into his face, and turned upon 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 61 
 
 his heel. They had been observed by a policeman, 
 and at the moment that Tremlet, recovering from 
 his astonishment, sprang forward to resent the blow, 
 the gray-coated guardian of the place laid his hand 
 upon his collar and detained him till the baron had 
 disappeared. 
 
 More than once on his way to the Albany, Trem 
 let surprised himself forgetting both the baron and 
 the insult, and feeding his heart in delicious aban 
 donment with the dreams of his new happiness. 
 He reached his rooms and threw himself on t}ie bed, 
 forcing from his mind, with a strong effort, the pre 
 sence of Lady Imogen, and trying to look calmly 
 on the unpleasant circumstance before him. A 
 quarrel which, the day before, he would have looked 
 upon merely as an inconvenience, or which, under 
 the insult of a blow, he would have eagerly sought, 
 became now an almost insupportable evil. When 
 he reflected on the subject of the dispute a conten 
 tion about a woman of doubtful reputation taking 
 place in the same hour with a first avowal from the 
 delicate and pure Lady Imogen when he remem 
 bered the change in his fortunes, which he had as 
 yet scarcely found time to realize on the consequen 
 ces to her who was so newly dear to him, and all on 
 he might lose, now that life had become invaluable* 
 his thoughts were almost too painful to bear. How 
 seldom do men play with an equal stake in the game 
 6 
 
ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 of taking life, and how strange it is that equality of 
 weapons is the only comparison made necessary by 
 the laws of honour ! 
 
 Tremlet was not a man to be long undecided. He 
 rose after an hour s reflection and wrote as follows : 
 
 " BARON Before taking the usual notice of the occur 
 rence of this morning, I wish to rectify one or two points in 
 which our position is false. I find myself, since last night, 
 the accepted lover of Lady Imogen RaVelgold, and the mas 
 ter of estates and title as a count of the Russian empire. 
 Under the etourdissement of such sudden changes in feelings 
 and fortune, perhaps my forgetfulness of the lady in whose 
 cause you are so interested, admits of indulgence. At any 
 rate, I am so newly in love with life that I am willing to 
 suppose for an hour that had you known these circumstan 
 ces you would have taken a different view of the offence in 
 question. I shall remain at home till two, and it is in your 
 power till then to make me the reparation necessary to my 
 honour. Yours, etc. TREMLET." 
 
 There was a bridal on the following Monday at 
 1 >t. George s Church, and the Russian secretary stood 
 behind the bridegroom. Lady Ravelgold had never 
 been seen so pale, but her face was clear of all 
 painful feeling ; and it was observed by one who 
 knew her well, that her beauty had acquired, during 
 the brief engagement of her daughter, a singular 
 and undefinable elevation. As the carriages with 
 their white favours turned into Bond-street, pn their 
 way back toBelgrave-square.the cortege was check- 
 
LADYRAVELGOLD. 63 
 
 ed by the press of vehicles, and the Russian, who 
 accompanied Lady Ravelgold in her chariot, found 
 himself opposite the open britscka of a lady who 
 fixed her glass full upon him without recognising a 
 feature of his face. 
 
 " I am afraid you have affronted Mrs. St. Leger, 
 baron !" said Lady Ravelgold. 
 
 "Or I should not have been here !" said the Rus 
 sian ; and as they drove up Piccadilly, he had just 
 time between Bond-street and Milton Crescent to 
 tell her ladyship the foregone chapter of this story. 
 
 The trulian, on that day, was fed with wedding- 
 cake, and the wound on Mr. Tremlet s lip was not 
 cured by letting alone. 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL- 
 
 PALETTO S BRIDE. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 " As a fish will sometimes gather force, and, with a long 
 ing, perhaps, for the brightness of upper air, leap from its- 
 prescribed element, and glitter a moment among the birds, 
 so will there be found men whose souls revolt against 
 destiny, and make a fiery pluck at things above them. But, 
 like the fish, who drops, panting, with dry scales, backward, 
 the aspiring man oftenest regrets the native element he has 
 left; and, with the failure of his unnatural effort, drops 
 back, content, to obscurity." Jeremy Taylor. 
 
 "My daughter !" said the Count Spinola. 
 
 The lady so addressed threw off a slight mantle 
 and turned her fair features inquiringly to her father. 
 Heedless of the attention he had arrested, the ab 
 stracted count paced up and down the marble pave- 
 
68 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 ment of his hall, and when, a moment after, Fran- 
 cesca came to him for his good-night kiss, he imprinted 
 it silently on her forehead, and stepped out on the 
 balcony to pursue, under the aiding light of the stars, 
 thoughts that were more imperative than sleep. 
 
 There had been a fete of great splendour in the 
 ducal gardens of the Boboli, and Francesca Spinola 
 had shown there, as usual, the most radiant and 
 worshipped daughter of the ndbilita of Florence. 
 The melancholy duke himself (this was in the days 
 of his first marriage) had seemed even gay in pre 
 senting her with flowers which he had gathered at 
 her side, with the dew on them, (in an alley glittering 
 with the diamonds on noble bosoms, and dewdrops 
 on roses that would slumber, though it was the birth- 
 night of a princess,) and marked as was the royal 
 attention to the envied beauty, it was more easily 
 forgiven her than her usual triumphs for it cost no 
 one a lover. True to his conjugal vows, the sad- 
 featured monarch paid to beauty only the homage 
 exacted alike by every most admirable work of 
 nature. 
 
 The Grand Duke Leopold had not been the only 
 admirer whose attentions to Francesca Spinola had 
 been remarked. A stranger, dressed with a mag 
 nificence that seemed more fitted for a masquerade 
 than a court-ball, and yet of a mein that promised 
 
PAL ETTOS BRIDE. 69 
 
 danger to the too inquisitive, had entered alone, and, 
 marking out the daughter of the haughty count from 
 the first, had procured an introduction, no one knew 
 how, and sought every opportunity which the inter" 
 vals of the dance afforded, to place himself at her 
 side. Occupied with the courtly devoirs of his 
 rank, the count was, for a while, unaware of what 
 struck almost every one else, and it was only when 
 the stranger s name was inquired of him by the 
 duke, that his dark and jealous eye fell upon a face 
 whose language of kindling and undisguised admi 
 ration a child would have interpreted aright. It 
 was one of those faces that are of no degree that 
 may belong to a barbaric king, or to a Greek slave 
 that no refinement would improve, and no servile 
 habits degrade ; faces which take their changes from 
 an indomitable and powerful soul, and are beyond 
 the trifling impression of the common usages of life. 
 Spinola was offended with the daring and passionate 
 freedom of the stranger s gaze upon his daughter ; 
 but he hesitated to interrupt their conversation too 
 rudely. He stayed to exchange a compliment with 
 some fair obstruction in his way across the crowded 
 saloon, and, in the next moment, Francesca stood 
 alone. 
 
 " Who left you this moment, my Francesca ?" ask 
 ed the count, with affected unconcern. 
 
TO ROMANCE OF TRAVEL* 
 
 " I think, a Venetian," she answered. 
 
 "And, his name?" 
 
 " I know not, my father P 
 
 The count s face flashed. 
 
 "Who presented him to my darling?" he asked, 
 again forcing himself to composure. 
 
 Francesca coloured ; and, with downcast eyes, 
 answered 
 
 " No one, my father ! He seemed to know me, 
 and I thought I might have forgotten him. 
 
 Spinola turned on his heel, and after a few vain 
 enquiries, and as vain a search for the stranger, 
 ordered his attendants, and drove silently home. 
 
 It was close upon the gray of the morning, and 
 the count still leaned over the stone-railing of his 
 balcony. Francesca had been gone an hour to her 
 chamber. A guitar-string sounded from the street 
 below, and, a moment after, a manly and mellow 
 voice broke into a Venetian barcarole, and sang with 
 a skill and tenderness which a vestal could scarce 
 have listened to unmoved. Spinola stepped back 
 and laid his hand upon his sword ; but, changing 
 his thought, he took a lamp from the wall within, 
 and crept noiselessly to his daughter s chamber. 
 She lay within her silken curtains, with her hands 
 crossed on her bosom, and from her parted lips 
 came the low breath of innocent and untroubled 
 sleep. Reassured, the count closed her window airf 
 
P ALETTO S B RIDE. 71 
 
 extinguished his lamp; and, when the guitar was 
 no longer heard echoing from the old palace walls, 
 and the rich voice of the serenader had died away 
 with his footsteps, the lord of the Palazzo Spinola 
 betook himself to sleep with a heart somewhat 
 relieved of its burden. 
 
 On the following day, the count pleaded the early- 
 coming heats of summer ; and, with slight prepara 
 tion, left Florence for his summer-palace in the 
 Appenines. When Francesca joined him cheer 
 fully, and even gaily, in his sudden plan, he threw 
 aside the jealous fears that had haunted his breast, 
 and forgot the stranger and his barcarole. The old 
 trees of his maison de plaisance were heavy with 
 the leaves of the Italian May ; the statues stood 
 cool in the shade ; the mountain rivulets forgot their 
 birth in the rocky brooks, and ran over channels of 
 marble, and played up through cactus-leaves and 
 sea-shells, and nereids horns, all carved by the con 
 temporaries of Donatello. " And here," thought the 
 proud noble, " I arn a Vecart of the designs of ad 
 venturers, and the temptations and dangers of gaiety, 
 and the child of my hopes will refresh her beauty and 
 her innocence, under the watchful eye, ever present, 
 of my love." 
 
 Francesca Spinola was one of those Italian natures 
 of which it is difficult for the inhabitants of other 
 climes to conceive. She had no feelings. She had 
 
 
72 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 passions. She couki love but it sprang in an in 
 stant to its fullest power and maidenly reserve 
 and hesitation were incompatible with its existence. 
 She had listened, unmoved, to all the adulation of 
 the duke s court, and- had been amused with the 
 devotion of all around her but never touched. The 
 voice of the stranger at the fete of the Boboli the 
 daring words he had addressed to her had arrested 
 her attention ; and it needed scarce the hour which 
 flew like a. moment at his side to send a new sen 
 sation, like a tempest, through her heart. She 
 reasoned upon nothing asked nothing ; but, while 
 she gave up her soul wholly to a passion hitherto 
 unfelt, the deep dissimulation which seems a natural 
 part of the love of that burning clime, prompted 
 her, by an unquestioned impulse, to conceal it en 
 tirely from her father. She had counterfeited sleep 
 when nearly surprised in listening to the barcarole, 
 and she had little need to counterfeit joy at her depar 
 ture for the mountains. 
 
 The long valley of the Arno lay marked out upon 
 the landscape by a wreath of vapour, stealing up as 
 if enamoured of the fading colour of the clouds : 
 and far away, like a silver bar on the rim of the 
 horizon, shone the long line of the Mediterranean. 
 The mountain sides lay bathed in azure ; and, echo 
 ing from the nearest, came the vesper-bells of Val- 
 
 
PALETTO S BRIDE. 73 
 
 lombrosa. Peace and purity were stamped upon 
 
 the hour. 
 
 "My child," said the softened count, drawing 
 
 Francesca to his bosom, as they stood looking off 
 
 upon this scene from the flowery terrace beneath the 
 
 portico ; " does my child love me ?" 
 
 Francesca placed her hands upon his shoulders and 
 
 kissed him for reply. 
 
 " I feel impelled," he continued, " to talk to you 
 
 while this beautiful hour is around us, of an affection 
 
 that resembles it." 
 
 " Resembles the sunset, my father ?" 
 4; Yes ! Shall I tell you how ? By affecting with 
 its soft influence every object under the bend of the 
 sky ! My Francesca ! there are parents who love 
 their children, and love them well, and yet find feel 
 ings for other attachments, and devotion for every 
 other interest in life. Not so mine ! My love for 
 my child is a whole existence poured into hers. 
 Look at me, Francesca ! I am not old. I am capa 
 ble, perhaps, of other love than a parent s. There 
 are among the young and beautiful who have looked 
 on me with favouring eyes. My blood runs warm 
 yet, and my step is as full of manhood perhaps my 
 heart as prompt to be gay as ever. I mean to 
 say, that I am not too old for a lover. Does my 
 daughter think so ?" 
 
74 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 I have been long vain of your beauty, dear 
 father," said Francesca, threading her hand in his 
 dark curls. 
 
 There are other things that might share your 
 empire in my heart politics, play, the arts a hun 
 dred passions which possess themselves of men 
 whose fortune or position gives them means and 
 leisure. Now listen, my daughter! You have 
 supplanted all these ! You have filled my heart 
 with yourself. I am tempted to love my heart is 
 my daughter s. I am asked to play my thoughts 
 are with my child. I have neither time for politics, 
 nor attention for the arts my being breathes 
 through my child. I am incapable of all else. Do 
 you hear me, Francesca?" 
 I do, dear father !" 
 
 Then, one moment more ! I cannot conceal my 
 thoughts from you, and you will pardon love like 
 mine for ungrounded fears. I liked not the stranger 
 at the duke s palace." 
 
 Francesca stole a quick look at her father, and. 
 with the rapidity of light, her dark eye resumed its 
 tranquillity. 
 
 " I say I liked him not ! No one knew him ! He 
 is gone, no one knows whither ! I trust he will 
 never be seen more in Florence. But I will not 
 disguise from you that I thought you pleased with 
 him !" 
 
PALETTO S BRIDE. 75 
 
 * Father !" 
 
 " Forgive me if I wrong you but, without pur 
 suing the subject, let your father implore you, on his 
 knees, for the confidence of your heart. Will you 
 tell me your thoughts, Franoesca ? Will you love 
 me with but the thousandth part of my adoration, 
 my devotion, for my child ?" 
 
 " Father ! I will !" 
 
 The count rose from the knee on which he had 
 fallen, gave his daughter a long embrace, and led 
 her in. And that night she fled over the Tuscan 
 border, into neighbouring Romagna, and, with the 
 stranger at her side, sped away, under the cover of 
 night, toward the shores of the Brenta. 
 
 Like a city of secrets, sleeps silent Venice. Her 
 sea- washed foundations are buried under the smooth 
 glass of the tide. Her palace-entrances are dark 
 caverns, impenetrable to the eye. Her veiled dames 
 are unseen in their floating chambers, as they go 
 from street to street ; and mysteriously and silently 
 glide to and fro those swift gondolas, black as night, 
 yet carrying sadness and mirth, innocence and guilt, 
 alike swiftly, mysteriously, and silently. Water, 
 that betrays no footstep, and covers all with the; 
 same mantle of light, fills her streets. Silence, that 
 is the seal of secresy, reigns day nnd night over her 
 thousand palaces. 
 
76 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 For an hour the smooth mirror of the broad canal 
 that sweeps under the Rialto, had not been divided 
 by the steel prow of a gondola. Francesca Spinola 
 stood at the window of a chamber in a palace of 
 gorgeous magnificence, watching that still water 
 for the coming of her husband. The silver lines of 
 the moon stole back imperceptibly, as her full orb 
 sailed up the heavens, and the turrets of the old 
 architecture of Venice, drawn clearly on the unruf 
 fled bosom of the canal, seemed retiring before a 
 consuming sheet of silver. The silence seemed 
 painful. To the ear of the beautiful Florentine, the 
 want of the sound of a footstep, of the echo of some 
 distant wheel, the utter death of all sound common 
 to even the stillest hour of a paved city, seemed 
 oppressive and awful. Behind her burned lamps of 
 alabaster, and perfumes filled the chamber, and on 
 a cushion of costly velvet lay a mean and unorna- 
 mented guitar. Its presence in so costly a palace 
 was a secret yet withheld. She wished to touch 
 its strings, if only to disperse the horror of silence. 
 But she raised her fingers, and again, without touch 
 ing it, leaned out and watched the dark arch of the 
 Rialto. 
 
 A gondola, with a single oar, sped swiftly from 
 its black shadow. It could not be Paletto. He 
 had gone with his two faithful servants to St. 
 Marc s. The oar censed the bark headed in the 
 
PA LETTo s BRIDE. 77 
 
 water splashed on the marble stair and the gon 
 dolier stepped on shore. Ah, who but Paletto had 
 such a form as stood there in the moonlight ? 
 
 "Are we to be married again," said Francesca, 
 as her husband entered the chamber, " that you 
 have once more disguised yourself as a fisherman?" 
 Paletto turned from the light, and took up the 
 mysterious guitar. " It is no night to be in-doors, 
 my Francesca ! Come with me to the lagoon, and 
 I will tell you the story of this despised instrument. 
 Will you come ?" he pursued, as she stood looking 
 at him in wonder at his strange dress and disturbed 
 look. " Will you come, my wife 1" 
 
 "But you have returned without your gondo 
 liers !" she said, advancing a step to take his hand. 
 " I have rowed a gondola ere now," he answered ; 
 and, without further explanation, he led her down 
 the lofty staircase, and seating her in the stern of 
 the bark which he had brought with him, stepped 
 upon the platform, and, with masterly skill and 
 power, drove it like a shadow under the Rialto. 
 
 He who has watched the horn of a quarter-moon 
 gliding past the towers, pinnacles and palaces of the 
 drifting clouds, and in his youthful and restless brain, 
 fancied such must be the smooth delight and chang 
 ing vision of a traveller in strange lands one who 
 has thus dreamed in his boyhood will scarce shoot 
 through Venice for the first time in a gondola, with- 
 7* 
 
78 H O M A N C E OF T R A V Lv 
 
 out a sense of familiarity with the scene and motion. 
 The architecture of the clouds is again drifting past, 
 and himself seems borne onward by the silver shal- 
 Jop of the moon. 
 
 Francesca sat on the low cushion of the gondola, 
 watching and wondering. How should her luxu 
 rious Paletto have acquired the exquisite skill with 
 which he drove the noiseless boat like a lance-fly 
 over the water-* Another gondola approached or 
 was left behind, the corner of a palace was to be 
 rounded, or the black arch of a bridge to be shot 
 Bunder, a*nd the peculiar warning-cry of the gondo- 
 Siers, giving notice of their unheard approach, fell 
 from his lips so mechanically, that the hireling oars 
 men of the city, marvelling at his speed, but never 
 doubting that it was a comrade of the Piazza, added 
 the "fratello mio" to their passing salutation. She 
 saw by every broad beam of light, w r hich, between 
 the palaces, came down across them, a brow cloud 
 ed and a mind far from the oar he turned so skilfully. 
 She looked at the gondola in which she sat. It was 
 old and mean. In the prow lay a fisher s net, and 
 the shabby guitar, thrown upon it, seemed now, at 
 least, not out of place. She looked up at Paletto 
 once more, and, in his bare throat and bosom, his 
 loose cap and neglected hair, she could with diffi 
 culty recognize the haughty stranger of the Boboli. 
 She spoke to him. It was necessary to break the 
 
PALETTO SBRIDE. 70 
 
 low-born spell that seemed closing around her. Pal- 
 <etto started at her voice, and suspending his oar, 
 while the gondola still kept way as if with its own 
 irresistible volition, he passed his hand over his eyes, 
 and seemed waking from some painful dream. 
 
 The gondola was now far out in the lagoon. 
 Around them floated an almost impalpable vapour, 
 just making the moonlight visible, and the soft click 
 of the water beneath the rising and dropping prow 
 was the only sound between them and the cloudless 
 heaven. In that silence Paletto strung his guitar 
 and sang to his bride with a strange energy. She 
 listened and played with his tangled locks, but there 
 seemed a spell upon her tongue when she would ask 
 the meaning of this mystery. 
 
 " Francesca !" he said at last, raising his head from 
 her lap. 
 
 " What says my fisherman ?" she replied, holding 
 up his rough cap with a smile. 
 
 Paletto started, but recovering his composure, in 
 stantly took the cap from her jewelled fingers and 
 threw it carelessly upon his head. 
 
 " Francesca ! who is your husband ?" 
 
 " Paletto." 
 
 " And who is Paletto ?" 
 
 " I would have asked sometimes, but your kisses 
 have interrupted me. Yet I know enough." 
 
 " What know you ?" 
 
80 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " That he is a rich and noble seignior of Venice !" 
 
 " Do I look one to-night ?" 
 
 " Nay for a masquerade, I have never seen a 
 better ! Where learned you to look so like a fisher 
 man and row so like a gondolier ?" 
 
 Paletto frowned. 
 
 " Francesca !" said he folding his arms across his 
 bosom, " I am the son of a fisherman, and I was 
 bred to row the gondola beneath you !" 
 
 The sternness of his tone checked the smile upon 
 her beautiful lip, and when she spoke it was with a 
 look almost as stern as his own. 
 
 " You mock me too gravely, Paletto ! But come ! 
 I will question you in your own humour. Who edu 
 cated the fisherman s son ?" 
 
 " The fisherman." 
 
 " And his palace and his wealth whence came 
 they, Signor Pescatore ?" 
 
 The scornful smile of incredulity with which this 
 question was asked, speedily fled from her lip as 
 Paletto answered it. 
 
 " Listen ! Three months since I had never known 
 other condition than a fisherman of the lagoon, nor 
 worn other dress than this in which you see me. 
 The first property I ever possessed beyond my day s 
 earnings, was this gondola. It was my father s, 
 Giannotto the fisherman. When it became mine 
 by his death, I suddenly wearied of my tame life, 
 
BRIDE. 81 
 
 sold boat and nets, and with thoughts which you 
 cannot understand, but which have brought you 
 here, took my way to the Piazza. A night of 
 chance, begun with the whole of my inheritance 
 staked upon a throw, left me master of wealth I 
 had never dreamed of. I became a gay signore. 
 It seemed to me that my soul had gone out of me, 
 and a new spirit, demoniac if you will, had taken 
 possession. I no longer recognized myself. I pass 
 ed for an equal with the best-born, my language 
 altered, my gait, my humour. One strong feeling 
 alone predominated an insane hatred to the rank 
 in which you were born, Francesca ! It was strange, 
 too, that I tried to ape its manners. I bought the 
 palace you have just left, and filled it with costly 
 luxuries. And then there grew upon me the desire 
 to humiliate that rank to pluck down to myself 
 some one of its proud and cherished daughters 
 such as you !" 
 
 Francesca muttered something between her teeth, 
 and folded her small arms over her bosom. Paletto 
 went on. 
 
 " I crossed to Florence with this sole intention. 
 Unknown and uninvited, I entered the palace at the 
 fete of the Boboli, and looked around for a victim. 
 You were the proudest and most beautiful. I chose 
 you and you are here." 
 
82 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Paletto looked at her with a smile, and never 
 sunbeam was more unmixed with shadow than the 
 smile which answered it on the lips of Spinola s 
 daughter. 
 
 " My Paletto !" she said, " you have the soul of 
 a noble, and the look of one, and I am your bride. 
 Let us return to the palace !" 
 
 " I have no palace but this !" he said striking his 
 hand like a bar of iron upon the side of the gondola, 
 " You have not heard out my tale." 
 
 Francesca sat with a face unmoved as marble. 
 
 " This night, at play, I lost all. My servants are 
 dismissed, my palace belongs to another, and with 
 this bark which I had repurchased, I am once more 
 Paletto the fisherman !" 
 
 A slight heave of the bosom of the fair Florentine 
 was her only response to this astounding announce 
 ment. Her eyes turned slowly from the face of 
 the fisherman, and fixing apparently on some point 
 far out in the Adriatic, she sat silent, motionless and 
 cold. 
 
 " I am a man, Francesca !" said Paletto after a 
 pause which, in the utter stillness of the lagoon 
 around them, seemed like a suspension of the breath 
 ing of nature, and " I have not gone through this 
 insane dream without some turning aside of the 
 heart. Spite of myself, I loved you, and I could 
 not dishonour you. We are married, Francesca !" 
 
BRIDE. 
 
 83 
 
 The small dark brows of the Florentine lowered 
 till the silken lashes they overhung seemed starting 
 from beneath here forehead. Her eyes flashed fire 
 below. 
 
 "Bene!" said Paletto, rising to his feet; "one 
 word more while we have silence around us and 
 are alone. You are free to leave me, and I will so 
 far repair the wrong I have done you, as to point 
 out the way. It will be daylight in an hour. Fly 
 to the governor s palace, announce your birth, 
 declare that you were forced from your father by 
 brigands, and claim his protection. The world will 
 believe you, and the consequences to myself I will 
 suffer in silence." 
 
 With a sudden, convulsive motion, Francesca 
 thrust out her arm, and pointed a single finger to 
 ward Venice. Paletto bent to his oar, and quivering 
 in every seam beneath its blade, the gondola sped 
 on its way. The steel prow struck fire on the gra 
 nite steps of the Piazza, the superb daughter of Spi- 
 nola stepped over the trembling side, and with a 
 half-wave of her hand, strode past the Lion of St. 
 Mark, and approached the sentinel at the palace- 
 gate. And as her figure was lost among the ara 
 besque columns shaded from the moon, Paletto s 
 lonely gondola shot once more silently and slowly 
 from the shore. 
 
84 ROMANCEOF TRAVEL.. 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 The smooth, flat pavement of the Borg ognisanti 
 had been covered since morning with earth, and the 
 windows and balconies on eit :er side were flaunting 
 with draperies of the most gorgeous colours. The 
 riderless horse-races, which conclude the carnival 
 in Florence, were to be honoured by the presence 
 of the court. At the far extremity of the street, 
 close by the gate of the Cascine, an open veranda,, 
 painted in fresco, stood glittering with the prepara 
 tions for the royal party, and near it the costlier 
 hangings of here and there a window or balustrade, 
 showed the embroidered crests of the different 
 nobles of Tuscany. It was the people s place and 
 hour, and beneath the damask and cloth of gold, 
 the rough stone windows were worn smooth by the 
 touch of peasant hands, and the smutch d occupants, 
 looking down from the balconies above, upon the 
 usurpers of their week-day habitations, formed, to 
 the stranger s eye, not the least interesting feature 
 of the scene* 
 
 As evening approached, the balconies began to 
 show their burden of rank and beauty, and the street 
 below filled with the press of the gay contadini. 
 The ducal cortege, in open carriages, drove down 
 the length of the course to their veranda at the gate, 
 
PALETTO S BRIDE. 85 
 
 but no other vehicle was permitted to enter the ser 
 ried crowd ; and, on foot like the peasant-girl, the 
 noble s daughter followed the servants of her house, 
 who slowly opened for her a passage to the balcony 
 she sought. The sun- light began to grow golden. 
 The convent-bell across the Arno rang the first peal 
 of vespers, and the horses were led in. 
 
 It was a puzzle to any but an Italian how that 
 race was to be run. The entire population of Flor 
 ence was crowded into a single narrow street, men, 
 women and children, struggling only for a foothold. 
 The signal was about to be given for the start, yet 
 no attempt was made to clear a passage. Twenty 
 high-spirited horses fretted behind the rope, each 
 with a dozen spurs hung to his surcingales, which, 
 at the least motion, must drive him onward like the 
 steed of Mazeppa. Gay ribands were braided in 
 their manes, and the bets ran high. All sounded and 
 looked merry, yet it would seem as if the loosing of 
 the start-rope must be like the letting in of destruc 
 tion upon the crowd. 
 
 In a projecting gallery of a house on the side next 
 the Arno, was a party that attracted attention, 
 somewhat from their rank and splendid attire, but 
 more from the remarkable beauty of a female, who 
 seemed their star and idol. She was something 
 above the middle height of the women of Italy, and 
 of the style of face seen in the famous Judith of 
 8 
 
86 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 the Pitti dark, and of melancholy so unfathomable 
 as almost to affray the beholder. She looked a 
 brooding prophetess, yet through the sad expression 
 of her features there was a gleam of fierceness, that 
 to the more critical eye betrayed a more earthly 
 gleam of human passion and suffering. As if to 
 belie the maturity of years of which such an expres 
 sion should be the work, an ungloved hand and arm 
 of almost child-like softness and roundness lay on 
 the drapery of the railed gallery ; and stealing from 
 that to her just-perfected form, the gazer made a 
 new judgment of her year.-, while he wondered 
 what strange fires had forced outward the riper 
 lineaments of her character. 
 
 The Count Fazelli, the husband of this fair dame, 
 stood within reach of her hand, for it w s pressed 
 on his arm with no gentle touch, yet his face was 
 turned from her. He was a slight youth, little 
 older, apparently, than herself, of an effeminate and 
 yet wilful cast of countenance, and would have been 
 pronounced by women (what a man would scarce 
 allow him to be) eminently handsome. Effeminate 
 coxcomb as he was, he had power over the stronger 
 nature beside him, and of such stuff, in courts and 
 cities, are made, sometimes, the heroes whose suc 
 cess makes worthier men almost forswear the wor 
 ship due to women. 
 
BRIDE. 87 
 
 There were two other persons in the balconies of 
 the Corso, who were actors in the drama of which 
 this was a scene. The first was the prima donna 
 of the Cocomero, to whose rather mature charms 
 the capricious Fazelli had been for a month paying 
 a too open homage ; and the second was a captain 
 in the duke s guard, whose personal daring in the 
 extermination of a troop of brigands, had won for 
 him some celebrity and his present commission. 
 What thread of sympathy rested between so hum 
 ble an individual and the haughty Countess Fazelli, 
 will be shown in the sequel. Enough for the pre 
 sent, that as he stood leaning against the pillar of an 
 opposite gallery, looking carelessly on the prepara 
 tions for the course, that proud dame saw and 
 remembered him. 
 
 A blast from a bugle drew all eyes to the starting- 
 post, and in another minute the rope was dropped 
 and the fiery horses loosed upon their career. Right 
 into the crowd, as if the bodies of the good citizens 
 of Florence were made of air, sprang the goaded 
 troop, and the impossible thing was done, for the 
 suffocating throngs divided like waves before the 
 prow, and united again as scatheless and as soon. 
 The spurs played merrily upon the flanks of the 
 affrighted animals, and in an instant they had swept 
 through the Borg ognisanti, and disappeared into 
 the narrow lane leading to the Trinita. It was 
 
88 ROMANGEOF TRAVEL* 
 
 more a scramble than a race, yet there must be $ 
 winner, and all eyes were now occupied in gazing 
 after the first glimpse of his ribands as he was led 
 back in triumph. 
 
 Uncompelled by danger, the suffocating crowd 
 made way with more difficulty for the one winning 
 horse than they had done for the score that had 
 contended with him. Yet, champing the bit, and 
 tossing his ribands into the air, he came slowly back, 
 and after passing in front of the royal veranda, 
 where a small flag was thrown down to be set into 
 the rosette of his bridle, he returned a few steps, and 
 was checked by the groom under the balcony of 
 the prim a donna. A moment after, the winning 
 flag was waving from the rails above, and as the 
 sign that she was the owner of the victorious horse 
 was seen by the people,, a shout arose which thrilled 
 the veins of the fair singer, more than all the plau 
 dits of the Cocomero. It is thought to be pleasant 
 to succeed in that for which we have most struggled 
 that for which our ambition and our efforts are 
 known to the world to be eminent, in short, in our 
 metier our vocation. I am inclined to think it nat 
 ural to most men, however, and to all possessors of 
 genius, to undervalue that for which the world is 
 most willing to praise them, and to delight more in 
 excelling in that which seems foreign to their usual 
 pursuits, even if it be a trifle. It is delightful to dis- 
 
BRIDE. 89 
 
 appoint the world by success in anything. Detrac 
 tion, that follows genius to the grave, sometimes 
 admits its triumph, but never without the " back 
 water" that it could do no more. The fine actress 
 had won a shout from assembled Florence, yet off 
 the scene. She laid one hand upon her heart, and 
 the other, in the rash exultation of the moment, ven 
 tured to wave a kiss of gratitude to the Count 
 Fazelli. 
 
 As that favoured signor crossed to offer his con 
 gratulations, his place beside the countess was filled 
 by a young noble, who gave her the explanatory 
 
 information that the horse was Fazelli s gift. 
 
 Calmly, almost without a sign of interest or emotion, 
 she turned her eyes upon the opposite balcony. A 
 less searching and interested glance would have dis 
 covered, that if the young count had hitherto shared 
 the favour of the admired singer with his rivals, he 
 bad no rival now. There was in the demeanour of 
 both an undisguised tenderness that the young 
 countess had little need to watch long, and retiring 
 from the balcony, she accepted the attendance of her 
 communicative companion, and was soon whirling 
 in her chariot over the Ponte St. Angelo, on her 
 way to the princely palace that would soon cease to 
 call her its mistress. 
 
 8* 
 
90 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Like square ingots of silver, the moonlight came 
 through the battlements of the royal abode of the 
 Medici. It was an hour before day. The heavy 
 heel of the sentry was the only sound near the walls 
 of the Pitti, save, when he passed to turn, the rip 
 ple of the Arno beneath the arches of the jeweller s 
 bridge broke faintly on the ear. The captain of the 
 guard had strolled fron\ the deep shadow of the 
 palace into the open moonlight, and leaned against a 
 small stone shrine of the Virgin set into the opposite 
 wall, watching musingly the companionable and 
 thought-stirring empress of the night. 
 
 " Paletto !" suddenly uttered a voice near him 1 
 
 The guardsman started, but instantly recovered 
 his position ; and stood looking over his epaulet at 
 the intruder, with folded arms. 
 
 " Paletto !" she said again, in a lower and more 
 appealing tone ; " will you listen to me ?" 
 
 " Say on, Countess Fazelli !" 
 
 " Countess Fazelli no longer, but Paletfto s wife !" 
 
 " Ha ! ha !" laughed the guardsman bitterly, "that 
 story is old, for so false a one." 
 
 " Scorn me not ! I am changed." The dark eyes 
 of Francesca Cappone lifted up, moist and full, into 
 the moonlight, and fixing them steadfastly on the 
 soldier s, she seemed to demand that he should read 
 her soul in them. For an instant, as he did so, a 
 troubled emotion was visible in his own features, 
 
PALETTOS BRIDE. 
 
 but a new thought seemed to succeed the feeling 
 and turning away with a cold gesture, he said, " I 
 knew you false, but till now I thought you pure. 
 Tempt me not to despise as well as hate you !" 
 
 " I have deserved much at your hand," she ans 
 wered, with a deeper tone, " but not this. You are 
 my husband, Paletto !" 
 
 " One of them !" he replied with a sneer. 
 
 Francesca clasped her hands in agony. " I have 
 come to you," she said, " trusting the generous 
 nature which I have proved so well. I cannot live 
 unloved. I deserted you, for I was ignorant of my 
 self. I have tried splendour and the love of my 
 own rank, but one is hollow and the last is selfish. 
 Oh Paletto ! What love is generous like yours !" 
 
 The guardsman s bosom heaved, but he did not 
 turn to her. She laid her hand upon his arm, " I 
 have come to implore you to take me back, Paletto. 
 False as I was to you, you have been true to me. 
 I would be your wife again. I would share your 
 poverty, if you were once more a fisherman on the 
 lagoon. Are you inexorable, Paletto 1 
 
 Her hand stole up to his shoulder; she crept 
 closer to him, and buried her head, unrepelled, in 
 his bosom. Paletto laid his hand upon the mass of 
 raven hair whose touch had once been to him so 
 familiar, and while the moon drew their shadows as 
 one on the shrine of the Virgin, the vows of early 
 
92 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 love were repeated with a fervour unknown hither 
 to to the lips of Cappone s daughter, the Paletto 
 replied, not like a courtly noble, but like that which 
 was more eloquent his own love-prompted and 
 fiery spirit. 
 
 The next day there was a brief but fierce rencontre 
 between Count Fazelli and the guardsman Paletto, 
 at the door of the church of Santa Trinita. Fran- 
 cesca had gone openly with her husband to ves 
 pers, attended by a monk. When attacked by the 
 young count as the daring abducer of his wife, he 
 had placed her under that monk s protection till the 
 quarrel should be over, and, with the same holy 
 man to plead his cause, he boldly claimed his wife 
 at the duke s hands, and bore her triumphantly from 
 Florence. 
 
 I heard this story in Venice. The gondolier 
 Paletto they say still rows his boat on the lagoon, 
 and sometimes his wife is with him, and sometimes 
 a daughter, whose exquisite beauty, though she is 
 still a child, is the wonder of the Rialto as he passes 
 under. I never chanced to see him, but many a 
 stranger has hired the best oar of the Piazza, to pull 
 out toward the Adriatic in the hope of finding 
 Paletto s boat and getting a glimpse of his proud 
 and still most beautiful wife a wife, it is said, than 
 whom a happier or more contented one with her lot, 
 lives not in the " city of the sea." 
 

 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL- 
 
 VIOLAIMTA CESARINI. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 " When every feather sticks in its own wing, 
 Lord Timon will be left a naked gull." 
 
 IT was an eve fit for an angel s birthnight, (and we 
 know angels are born in this loving world,) and 
 while the moon, as if shining only for artist s eyes, 
 drew the outlines of palace and chapel, stern turret 
 and serenaded belvidere, with her silver pencil on the 
 street, two grave seniors, guardians in their own 
 veins of the blood of two lofty names known long to 
 Roman story, leaned together over a balcony of 
 fretted stone, jutting out upon the Corso, and affian- 
 
96 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 ced a fair and noble maid of seventeen summers to a 
 gentleman whose character you shall learn, if we 
 come safe to the sequel. 
 
 " The cardinal has offered me a thousand scudi 
 for my Giorgione," said the old Count Malaspina, at 
 last, changing his attitude and the subject at the same 
 
 time. 
 
 " Anima di porco !" exclaimed the other, u what 
 stirs the curtain ? The wind is changing, Malaspina. 
 Let us in ! So, he offers but a thousand ! I shall 
 feel my rheumatism to-morrow with this change. 
 But a thousand ! ha ha ! Let us in ! Let us in !" 
 
 " Let us out, say I !" murmured two lips that were 
 never made of cherries, though a bird would have 
 pecked at them; and stealing from behind the curtain, 
 whose agitation had persuaded her father that the 
 wind was rising, Violanta Cesarini, countess in her 
 own right, and beautiful by heaven s rare grace, 
 stepped forth into the moonlight. 
 
 She drew a long breath as she looked down into 
 the Corso. The carriages were creeping up and 
 down at a foot-pace, and the luxurious dames, thrown 
 back on their soft cushions, nodded to the passers by, 
 as they recognized friends and acquaintances where 
 the moonlight broke through ; crowds of slowprome- 
 naders loitered indolently on, now turning to look at 
 the berry-brown back of a Contadina,with her stride 
 like a tragedy-queen, and her eyes like wells of jet, 
 
VIOLANTACESARINI. 97 
 
 and now leaning against a palace wall, while a wan 
 dering harp-girl sung better for a baiocco than noble 
 ladies for the praise of a cardinal ; at one corner 
 stood an artist with his tablet, catching some chance 
 effect perhaps in the drapery of a marble saint, 
 perhaps in the softer drapery of a sinner; the cafes 
 far up and down, looked like festas out of doors, with 
 their groups of gaily dressed idlers, eating sherbets 
 and buying flowers ; a gray friar passed now with 
 his low toned benedicite; and again a black cowl 
 with a face that reddened the very moonbeam that 
 peeped under ; hunchbacks contended testily for the 
 wall and tall fellows (by their long hair and fine 
 symmetry, professed models for sculptors and paint 
 ers) yielded to them with a gibe. And this is Rome 
 when the moon shines well, and on this care cheat 
 ing scene looked down the Countess Violanta, with 
 her heart as full of perplexity as her silk boddice- 
 lace would bear without breaking. 
 
 I dare say you did not observe, if you were in 
 Rome that night, and strolling, as you would have 
 been, in the Corso, (this was three years ago last 
 May, and if you were in the habit of reading the 
 Diario di Roma, the story w r ill not be new to you ;) 
 you did not observe, I am sure, that a thread ran 
 across from the balcony I speak of, in the Palazzo 
 Cesarini, to a high window in an old palace opposite, 
 inhabited, as are many palaces in Rome, by a 
 
 
98 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 decayed family and several artists. On the two 
 sides of this thread, pressed, while she mused, the 
 slight fingers of Violanta Cesarini ; and, as if it 
 descended from the stars at every pull which the 
 light May-breeze gave it in passing, she turned her 
 soft blue eyes upwards, and her face grew radiant 
 with hope not such as is fed with star-gazing ! 
 
 Like a white dove shooting with slant wings 
 downwards a folded slip of paper flew across on 
 this invisible thread, and, by heaven s unflickering 
 lamp, Violanta read some characters traced with a 
 rough crayon, but in most sweet Italian. A look 
 upwards, and a nod, as if she were answering the 
 stars that peeped over her, and the fair form had 
 gone with its snowy robes from the balcony, and 
 across the high window from which the messenger 
 had come, dropped the thick and impenetrable folds 
 of the gray curtain of an artist. 
 
 It was a large upper room, such as is found in the 
 vast houses of the decayed nobility of Rome, and of 
 its two windows one was roughly boarded up to 
 exclude the light, while a coarse gray cloth did 
 nearly the same service at the other, shutting out all 
 but an artist s modicum of day. The walls of rough 
 plaster were covered with grotesque drawings, done 
 apparently with bits of coal, varied here and there 
 with scraps of unframed canvass, nailed carelessly 
 
VIOLANTACESARINI. 99 
 
 np, and covered with the study of some head, by a 
 famous master. A large table on one side of the 
 room was burdened with a confused heap of brushes^ 
 paint-bags, and discoloured cloths, surmounted with 
 a clean pallette ; and not far off stood an easel, 
 covered with thumb-marks of all dyes, and support 
 ing a new canvass, on which was outlined the figure 
 of a nymph, with the head finished in a style that 
 would have stirred the warm blood of Raphael 
 himself with emulous admiration. A low flock bed, 
 and a chair without a bottom, but with a large cloak 
 hung over its back, a pair of foils and a rapier, com 
 pleted so much of the furniture of the room as 
 belonged to a gay student of Corregio s art, who 
 wrote himself Biondo Amieri. 
 
 By the light of ths same antique lamp, hung on a 
 rusty nail against the wall, you might see a very 
 good effect on the face of an unfinished group in 
 marble, of which the model, in plaster, stood a little 
 behind, representing a youth with a dagger at his 
 heart, arrested in the act of self-murder by a female, 
 whose softened resembled to him proclaimed her at 
 the first glance his sister. A mallet, chisels, and 
 other implements used in sculpture, lay on the rough 
 base of the unfinished group, and half disclosed, half 
 concealed, by a screen covered with prints by some 
 curious female hand, stood a bed with white curtains, 
 and an oratory of carved oak at its head, supporting 
 
100 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 a clasped missal. A chair or two, whose seats of 
 worked satin had figured one day in more luxurious 
 neighborhood, a table covered with a few books and 
 several drawings from the antique, and a carefully 
 locked escritoire, served, with other appearances, to 
 distinguish this side of the room as belonging to a 
 separate occupant, of gentler taste or nurture. 
 
 While the adventurous Violanta is preparing her 
 self to take advantage of the information received 
 by her secret telegraph, I shall have time, dear 
 reader, to put you up to a little of the family history 
 of the Cesarini, necessary no less to a proper under 
 standing of the story, than to the herione s character 
 for discretion. On the latter point, I would suggest 
 to you, you may as well suspend your opinion. 
 
 It is well known to all the gossips in Rome, that, 
 for four successive generations, the Marquises of 
 Cesarini have obtained dispensations of the Pope for 
 marrying beautiful peasant girls from the neighbor 
 hood of their castle, in Romagna. The considera 
 ble sums paid for these dispensations, reconciled the 
 Holy See to such an unprecedented introduction of 
 vulgar blood into the veins of the nobility, and the 
 remarkable female beauty of the race, (heightened 
 by the addition of nature s aristocracy to its own,) 
 contributed to maintain good-will at a court, devoted 
 above all others to the cultivation of the fine arts, 
 of which woman is the Eidolon and the souk The 
 
VIOL Atf TA CESARINA. 101 
 
 last marquis, educated like his fathers, in their wild 
 domain among the mountains, selected, like them, 
 the fairest wild-flower that sprung at his feet, and 
 after the birth of one son, applied for the tardy dis 
 pensation. From some unknown cause, (possibly 
 a diminished bribe, as the marquis was less lavish 
 in his disposition than his predecessors,) the Pope 
 sanctioned the marriage, but refused to legitimatize 
 the son, unless the next born should be a daughter. 
 The marchioness soon after retired, (from mortifi 
 cation it is supposed,) to her home in the mountains, 
 and after two years of close seclusion, returned to 
 Rome, bringing with her an infant daughter, then 
 three months of age, destined to be the heroine of our 
 story. No other child appearing, the young Cesa- 
 rini was legitimatized, and with his infant sister pass 
 ed most of his youth at Rome. Some three or four years 
 before the time when our tale commences, this youth, 
 who had betrayed always, a coarse and brutal tem 
 per, administered his stiletto to a gentleman on the 
 Corso, and flying from Rome, became a brigand 
 in the Abruzzi. His violence and atrocity in this 
 congenial life, soon put him beyond hope of pardon, 
 and on his outlawry by the Pope, Violanta became 
 the heiress of the estates of Cesarini. 
 
 The marchioness had died when Violanta was 
 between seven and eight years of age, leaving her, 
 by a deathbed injunction, in the charge of her own 
 9* 
 
102 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 constant attendant, afaithful servant from Romagno, 
 supposed to be distant kinswomen to her mistress. 
 With this tried dependant, the young countess was 
 permitted to go where she pleased, at all hours 
 when not attended by her masters, and seeing her 
 tractable and lovely, the old marquess, whose pride 
 in the beauty of his family was the passion next to 
 love of money in his heart, gave himself little trouble, 
 and thought himself consoled for the loss of his son 
 in the growing attractions and filial virtues of his 
 daughter- 
 On a bright morning in early spring, six years 
 before the date of our tale, the young countess and 
 her attendant were gathering wild flowers near the 
 Fountain of Egeria, (of all spots of earth, that on 
 which the wild flowers are most profuse and sweet 
 est,) when a deformed youth, who seemed to be 
 no stranger to Donna Bettina, addressed Violanta 
 in a tone of voice so musical, and with a look so 
 kindly and winning, that the frank child took his hand, 
 and led him off in search of cardinals and Hue-bells, 
 with the familiarity of an established playfellow. 
 After this day, the little countess never came home 
 pleased from a morning drive and ramble in which 
 she had not seen her friend Signor Giulio ; and the 
 romantic baths of Caracalla v and the many delici 
 ous haunts among the ruins about Rome, had borne 
 witness to the growth of a friendship, all fondness 
 
VIOLANTACESARINA, 103 
 
 and impulse on the part of Violanta, all tenderness 
 and delicacy on that of the deformed youth. By 
 what wonderful instinct they happened always to 
 meet, the delighted child never found time or thought 
 to inquire. 
 
 Two or three years passed on thus, and the old 
 marquess had grown to listen with amused fami 
 liarity to his daughter s prattle about the deformed 
 youth, and no incident had varied the pleasant 
 tenour of their lives and rambles, except that, Giulio 
 once falling ill, Bettina had taken the young coun 
 tess to his home, where she discovered that, young 
 as he was, he made some progress in moulding in 
 clay, and was destined for a sculptor. This visit to 
 the apartment of an obscure youth, however, the 
 marquis had seen fit to object to ; and though, at his 
 daughter s request, he sent the young sculptor an 
 order for his first statue, he peremptorily forbade all 
 further intercourse between him and Violanta. In 
 the paroxysm of her grief at the first disgrace she 
 had ever fallen into with her master, Bettina dis 
 closed to her young mistress, by way of justification, 
 a secret she had been bound by the most solemn 
 oaths to conceal, and of which she now was the sole 
 living depository that this deformed youth was born 
 in the castle of the Cesarini, inRomagna, of no less 
 obscure parentage than the castle s lord and lady, 
 and beingthe first child after the dispensation of 
 
104 R OM A N CE OF T R A VEL, 
 
 marriage, anda son, he was consequently the right 
 ful heir to the marquisate and estates of Cesarini ; 
 and the elder son, by the terms of that dispensation, 
 was illegitimate. 
 
 This was astounding intelligence to Violanta, 
 who, nevertheless, child as she was, felt its truth in 
 the yearnings of her heart to Giulio ; but it was 
 with no little pains and difficulty on Bettina s part, 
 that she was persuaded to preserve the secrc t from 
 her father. The Romagnese knew her master s 
 weakness ; and as the birth of the child had occurred 
 during his long absence from the castle, and the 
 marchioness, proud of her eldest-born, had deter 
 mined from the first that he alone should enjoy the 
 name and honours of his father, it was not very 
 probable that upon the simple word of a domestic, 
 he would believe a deformed hunchback to be his 
 son and heir. 
 
 The into] mediate history of Giulio, Bettina knew 
 little about, simply informing her mistress, that dis 
 gusted with his deformity, the unnatural mother had 
 sent him to nurse in a far-off village of Romagna, 
 and that the interest of a small sum which the mar 
 quess supposed had been expended on masses for 
 the souls of his ancestors, was still paid to his foster- 
 parents for his use. 
 
 From the time of this disclosure, Violanta s life 
 had been but too happy. Feeling justified in con- 
 
V I O L A N T A C E S A 11 INI. 
 
 105 
 
 triving secret interviews with her brother ; and pos 
 sessing the efficient connivance of Bettinti, who grew, 
 like, herself, almost to worship the pure-minded 
 and the gentle Giulio, her heart and her time were 
 blissfully crowded w th interest^ So far, the love 
 that had welled from her heart had been all joyous 
 and untroubled. 
 
 It was during the absence of the marquis and his 
 daughter from Rome, and in an unhealthy season, 
 that Giulio, always delicate in health and liable to 
 excessive fits of depression, had fallen ill in his soli 
 tary room, and, but for the friendly care of a young 
 artist whom he had long known, must have died of 
 want and neglect. As he began to recover, he ac 
 cepted the offer of Amicri, his friend, to share with 
 him a lodging in the more elevated air of the Cor- 
 so, and, the more readily, that this room chanced to 
 overlook the palace of Cesarina. Here Violanta 
 found him on her return, and though displeased that 
 he was no longer alone, she still continued, when 
 Amieri was absent, to see him sometimes in his 
 room, and their old haunts without the walls were 
 frequented as often as his health and strength would 
 permit. A chance meeting of Violanta and Amierj 
 in his own studio, however, made it necessary that 
 he should be admitted to their secret, and the conse 
 quence of that interview, and others which Violanta 
 found it impossible to avoid, was a passion in the 
 
106 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 heart of the enthusiastic painter, which consumed, 
 as it well might, every faculty of his soul. 
 
 We are thus brought to an evening of balmy May, 
 when Giulio found himself alone. Biondo had been 
 painting all day on the face of his nymph, endea 
 voring in vain to give it any other features than those 
 of the lady of his intense worship, and having gone 
 out to ramble for fresh air and relaxation in the Cor- 
 so, Giulio thought he might venture to throw across 
 his ball of thread and send a missive to his sister, 
 promising her an uninterrupted hour of his society. 
 
 With these preliminaries, our story will now run 
 smoothly on. 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 " COME in, carissima /" said the low, silver- toned 
 voice of the deformed sculptor, as a female figure, 
 in the hood and cloak of an old woman, crossed the 
 threshold of his chamber. 
 
 " Dear Giulio !" And she leaned slightly over the 
 diminutive form of her brother, and first kissing his 
 pale forehead, while she unfastened the clasp of 
 Bettina s cloak of black silk, threw her arms about 
 him as the disguise fell off, and multiplied, between 
 her caresses, the endearing terms in which the laix" 
 guage of that soft clime is so prodigal.. 
 
VIOLANTA CESARINI. 107 
 
 They sat down at the foot of his group in marble, 
 and each told the little history of the hours they had 
 spent apart. They grew alike as they conversed ; 
 for theirs was that resemblance of the soul, to which 
 the features answer only when the soul is breathing 
 through. Unless seen together, and not only toge 
 ther, but gazing on each other in complete abandon 
 ment of heart, the friends that knew them best 
 would have said they were unlike. Yet Amieri s 
 nymph on the canvass was like both, for Amieridrew 
 from the picture burnt on his own heart by love, and 
 the soul of Violanta lay breathing beneath every 
 lineament. 
 
 "You have not touched the marble to-day!" said 
 the countess, taking the lamp from its nail, and shed 
 ding the light aslant on the back of the statue. 
 
 " No ! I have lifted the hammer twenty times to 
 break it in pieces." 
 
 " Ah ! dearest Giulio ! talk not thus ! Think it is 
 my image you would destroy !" 
 
 " If it were, and truly done, I would sooner strike 
 the blessed crucifix. But, Violanta ! there is a link 
 wanting in this deformed frame of mine ! The sense 
 of beauty, or the power to body it forth wants room 
 in me. I feel it I feel it !" 
 
 Violanta ran to him and pressed the long curls 
 that fell over his pallid temples to her bosom. There 
 
108 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 was a tone of conviction in his voice that she knew 
 not how to answer. 
 
 He continued, as if he were musing aloud : 
 
 " I have tried to stifle this belief in my bosom, and 
 have never spoken of it till now but it is true ! 
 Look at that statue ! Parts of it are like nature 
 but it wants uniformity it wants grace it wants 
 what / want proportion ! I never shall give it 
 that, because I want the sense, the consciousness, 
 the emotion, of complete godlike movement. It is 
 only the well formed who feel this. Sculptors may 
 imitate gods ! for they are made in God s image. 
 But oh, Violanta ! / am not !" 
 
 " My poor brother !" 
 
 "Our blessed Saviour was not more beautiful 
 than the Apollo," he passionately continued, " but 
 could / feel like the Apollo ! Can / stand before 
 the clay and straighten myself to his attitude, and 
 fancy, by the most delirious effort of imagination, 
 that I realize in this frame, and could ever have 
 conceived and moulded his indignant and lofty beau 
 ty?" No no no!" 
 
 " Dear dear Giulio." He dropped his head 
 again, and she felt his tears penetrate to her bosom. 
 
 " Leave this melancholy theme," she said, in an 
 imploring tone, " and let us talk of other things, J 
 have something to tell you, Giulio !" 
 
VIOEANTA CE8ARINI. 109 
 
 "Raphael was beautiful," he said, raising himself 
 up, unconscious of the interruption, " and Giorgione, 
 and Titian, both nobly formed, and Michael Angelo 
 had the port of an archangel ! Yes, the soul inha 
 bits the whole body, and the sentiment of beauty 
 moves and quickens through it all. My tenement is 
 cramped ! Viola nta !" 
 
 "Well dear brother!" 
 
 " Tell me your feelings when you first breathe the 
 air in a bright morning in spring. Do you feel 
 graceful ? Is there a sensation of beauty ? Do you 
 lift yourself and feel swan-like and lofty, and worthy 
 of the divine image in which you breathe. Tell me 
 truly, Violanta." 
 
 " Yes, brother !" 
 
 " I knew it ! I have a faint dream of such a feel 
 ing a sensation that is confined to my brain some 
 how which I struggle to express in motio n but 
 *f I lift my finger, it is gone. I w r atch Amieri 
 sometimes, when he draws. He pierces my very 
 soul by assuming, always, the attitude on his can 
 vass. Violanta ! how can / stand like a statue 
 that would please the eye ?" 
 
 "Giulio! Giulio!" 
 
 " Well, I will not burden you with my sadness. 
 Let us look at Biondo s nymph. Pray the Virgin he 
 come not in the while for painting, by lamp-light, 
 shows less fairly than marble." 
 10 
 
110 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 He took the lamp, and while Violanta shook the 
 tears from her eyes, he drew out the pegs of the 
 easel, and lowered the picture to the light. 
 
 " Are you sure Amieri will not come in, Giulio ?" 
 inquired his sister, looking back timidly at the door 
 while she advanced. 
 
 " I think he will not. The Corso is gay to night, 
 and his handsome face and frank carriage, win greet 
 ings, as the diamond draws light. Look at his 
 picture, Violanta ! With what triumph he paints ! 
 How different from my hesitating hand! The 
 thought that is born in his fancy, collects instant fire 
 in his veins and comes prompt and proportionate to 
 his hand. It looks like a thing born, not wrought ! 
 How beautiful you are, my Violanta ! He has done 
 we ll brave Biondo !" 
 " It is like me, yet fairer." 
 
 " I wish it were done ! There is a look on the lips 
 that is like a sensation I feel sometimes on my own 
 I almost feel as if I should straighten and grow fair 
 as it advances. Would it not be a blessed thing, 
 Violanta?" 
 
 " I love you as you are, dear Giulio !" 
 
 But I thirst to be loved like other men ! I would 
 
 pass in the street and not read pity in all eyes. I 
 
 would go out like Biondo, and be greeted in the 
 
 street with Mio bravo ! Mio bello ! I would be 
 
 beloved by some one that is not my sister, Violanta ! 
 
 I would have my share only my share of huma 
 
V 10 L A N T A C E S ARIN I . Ill 
 
 joy and regard. I were better dead than be a 
 hunchback. I would die, but for you to-night 
 yes, to night." 
 
 With a convulsive hand he pulled aside the cur 
 tain, and sent a long, earnest look up to the stars. 
 Violanta had never before heard him give words to 
 his melancholy thoughts, and she felt appalled and 
 silenced by the inexpressible poignancy of his tones, 
 and the feverish, tearless, broken-heartedness of his 
 whole manner. As she took his hand, there was a 
 noise in the street below, and presently after, a hur_ 
 ried step was heard on the stair, and Amieri rushed 
 in, seized the rapier which hung over his bed and 
 without observing Violanta, was flying again from 
 the apartment. 
 
 " Biondo !" cried a voice which would have stayed 
 him were next breath to have been drawn in heaven. 
 
 " Contessa Violanta !" 
 
 " What is it Amieri? Where go you now ?" 
 asked Giulio, gliding between him and the door. 
 Biondo s cheek and brow had flushed when first 
 arrested by the voice of the countess, but now he 
 stood silent and with his eyes on the floor, pale as 
 the statue before him. 
 
 " A quarrel, Giulio ! he said at length. 
 
 " Biondo !" The countess sprang to his side with 
 the simple utterance of his name, and laid her small 
 hand on his arm. " You shall not go ! You are 
 
112 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 dear to us dear to Guilio, Signor Amieri ! If you 
 love us if you care for Giulio nay, I will say it 
 if you care for me, dear Biondo, put not your life in 
 
 peril." 
 
 " Lady !" said the painter, bowing his head to his 
 wrist, and kissing lightly the small white fingers 
 that pressed it, " if I were to lose my life this hour, 
 I should bless with my dying lips the occasion which 
 had drawn from you the blessed words I hear. But 
 the more life is valuable to me by your regard, the 
 more need you should not delay me. I am waited 
 for. Farewell !" 
 
 Disengaging himself from Viol anta s grasp, quickly 
 but gently, Amieri darted through the door, and was 
 gone. 
 
 CHAP. 111. 
 
 BIONDO had readily found a second in the first 
 artist he met on the Corso, and after a rapid walk 
 they turned on the lonely and lofty wall of the 
 Palatine, to look back on the ruins of the Forum. 
 At a fountain side, not far beyond, he had agreed to 
 find his antagonist ; but spite of the pressing business 
 of the hour, the wonderful and solemn beauty of the 
 ruins that lay steeped in moonlight at his feet, awoke, 
 for an instant, all of the painter in his soul. 
 
VIOLANTA CESARINI. US 
 
 Is it not glorious, Lenzoni ?" he said, pointing with 
 his rapier to the softened and tall columns that carried 
 their capitals among the stars. 
 
 "We have not come out to sketch, Amieri !" was 
 the reply. 
 
 " True, caro ! hut my fingers work as if the pencil 
 was in them, and I forget revenge while I see what I 
 shall never sketch again!" 
 
 Lenzoni struck his hand heavily on Amieri s 
 shoulder, as if to wake him from a dream, and looked 
 close into his face. 
 
 " If you fight in this spirit, Biondo " 
 
 " I shall fight with heart and soul, Lenzoni ; fear 
 me not ! But when I saw, just now, the bel ejfetto 
 of the sharp-drawn shadows under the arch of Con- 
 stantine, and felt instinctively for my pencil, some 
 thing told me, at my heart s ear you will never 
 trace line again, Amieri !" 
 
 " Take heart, caro amico /" 
 
 My heart is ready, but my thoughts come fast ! 
 What were my blood, I cannot but reflect, added to 
 the ashes of Rome ? We fight in the grave of an 
 empire ! But you will not philosophize, dull Lenzoni ! 
 Come on to the fountain !" 
 
 The moon shone soft on the greensward rim of 
 
 the neglected fountain that once sparkled through 
 
 the " gold palace" of Nero. The white edges of 
 
 half buried marble peeped here and there from the 
 
 10* 
 
114 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 grass, and beneath the shadow of an ivy-covered ancf 
 tottering arch, sang a nightingale, the triumphant 
 possessor of life amid the forgotten ashes of the 
 Caesars. Amieri listened to his song. 
 
 " You are prompt, signor !" said a gay-voiced 
 gentleman, turning the corner of the ruined wall, as 
 Biondo, still listening to the nightingale, fed his heart 
 with the last sweet words of Violanta. 
 
 " < Sempre pronto, 9 is a good device," answered 
 Lenzoni, springing to his feet. " Will you fight, side 
 to the moon, signors, or shall we pull straws for the 
 choice of light?" 
 
 Amieri s antagonist was a strongly made man of 
 thirty, costly in his dress, and of that class of features 
 eminently handsome, yet eminently displeasing. 
 The origin of the quarrel was an insulting observa 
 tion, coupled with the name of the young Countess 
 Cesarini, which Biondo, who was standing in the 
 shadow of a wall, watching her window from the 
 Corso, accidentally overheard. A blow on the mouth 
 was the first warning the stranger received of a 
 listener s neighbourhood, and after a momentary 
 struggle they exchanged cards, and separated to 
 meet in an hour, with swords, at the fountain, on the 
 Palatine. 
 
 Amieri was accounted the best foil in the ateliers 
 of Rome, but his antagonist, the Count Lamba 
 Malaspina, had just returned from a long residence 
 
VIOLANTACESARINI. 115 
 
 in France, and had the reputation of an accomplished 
 swordsman. Amieri was slighter in person, but well 
 made, and agile as a leopard ; but when Lenzoni 
 looked into the cool eye of Malaspina, the spirit and 
 fire which he wouli have relied upon to ensure his 
 friend success in an ordinary contest, made him 
 tremble now r . 
 
 Count Lamba bowed, and they crossed swords. 
 Amieri had read his antagonist s character, like his 
 friend, and, at the instant their blades parted, he 
 broke down his guard with the quickness of lightning, 
 and wounded him in the face. Malapina smiled as 
 he crossed his rapier again, and in the next moment 
 Amieri s sword flew high above his head, and the 
 count s was at h s breast. 
 
 " Ask for your life, mio bravo /" he said, as calmly 
 as if they had met by chance in the Corso. 
 
 "A jnorte! villain an I slanderer !" cried Amieri, 
 and striking the sword from his bosom , he aimed a 
 a blow at Malaspina, which by a backward move 
 ment, was recieved on the point of the blade. Trans 
 fixed through the wrist, Amieri struggled in vain 
 against the superior strength and coolness of his 
 antagonist, and falling on his knee, waited in silence 
 for his death-blow. Malaspina drew his sword 
 gently as possible from the wound, and recommend 
 ing a tourniquet to Lenzom till a surgeon could be 
 procured, washed the blood from his face in the 
 
116 ROMANCE OF 1 R A V E L . 
 
 fountain,and descended into the Forum, humming the 
 air of a new song. 
 
 Faint with loss of blood, and with his left arm 
 around Lenzoni s neck, Biondo arrived at the sur 
 geon s door. 
 
 "Can you save his hand?" was the first eager 
 question. 
 
 Amieri held up his bleeding wrist with difficulty, 
 and the surgeon shook his head as ho laid the helpless 
 fingers in his palm. The tendon was entirely parted. 
 
 " I may save the hand," he s-id, "but hewittnever 
 use it more!" 
 
 Amieri gave his friend a look full of anguish, and 
 fell back insensible. 
 
 " Poor Biondo !" said Lenzoni, as he raised his 
 pallid head from the surgeon s pillow. "Death were 
 less misfortune than the loss of a hand like thine. 
 The foreboding was too true, alas that thou never 
 wouldst use pencil more !" 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 THE frowning battlements of St. Angelo were 
 brightened with the glare of lamps across the Tiber, 
 and the dark breast of the river was laced with bars 
 of gold like the coat of acaptain of dragoons. Here 
 

 VIOLANTA CESARINI. 117 
 
 and there lay a boat in mid-stream, and while the 
 drift of the current was counteracted by an occa 
 sional stroke at the oar, the boatmen listened to the 
 heavenly strains of a waltz, dying and triumphing 
 in alternate cadences upon the breath of night and 
 the pope s band. A platform was built out over the 
 river, forming a continuation of the stage, the pit was 
 floored over, and all draped like a Persian harem ; 
 and thus began a masquerade at the Teatro della 
 Pergola at Rome, which stands, if you will take the 
 trouble to remember, close by the bridge and castle 
 of St. Angelo upon the bank of the " yellow Tiber." 
 
 The entrance of the crowd to the theatre was like 
 a procession intended to represent the things of which 
 we are commanded, not to make graven images, nor 
 to bow down and worship them. There was the 
 likeness of everything in heaven above and on the 
 earth beneath, and in the waters under the earth. 
 There were angels, devils, serpents, birds, beasts, 
 fishes and fair women of which none except the 
 last occasioned much transgression of the com 
 mandment. Oddly enough, the fishes waltzed 
 and so did the beasts and fair women, the serpents 
 and birds pairing ofFas they came \\ithin sound of 
 the musick, with a defiance of natural antipathies 
 which would have driven a naturalist out of his 
 senses. 
 
 A chariot drove up with the crest of the Cesarini 
 
118 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 on the pannel, and out of it stepped rather a stiff 
 figure dressed as a wandering palmer, with serge 
 and scallop-shells, followed by a masked hunchback 
 whose costume, even to the threadbare spot on the 
 ridge of his deformity, was approved, by the loungers 
 at the door, in a general " bravissimo." They entered 
 the dressing-room, and the cloak-keeper was not 
 surprised when the lump was withdrawn in the 
 shape of a pad of wool, and by the aid of a hood 
 and petticoat of black silk, the deformed was trans 
 formed into a slender domino, undistinguished but 
 for the grace and elasticity of her movements. The 
 attendant was surprised, however, when having 
 stepped aside to deposite the pad given in charge to 
 her, she turned and saw the domino flitting from the 
 room, but the hunchback with his threadbare hump 
 still leaning on the palmer s arm ! 
 
 " Santissima Vergine!" she exclaimed, pulling out 
 her cross and holding it between herself and Giulio-, 
 "the Fiend the unholy Fiend !" 
 
 Donna Bettina laughed under her palmer s cowf, 
 and drawing Giulio s arm within her own, they 
 mingled in the masquerade. 
 
 The old Oount Cesarini arrived a few miriutes 
 after in one of the equipages of the Malaspina, 
 accompanied by a red-cross knight in a magnificent 
 armour, his sword-hilt sparkling with diamonds, and 
 the bars of his visor half drawn, yet showing a 
 
VI OLA XT A CES ARINX* 119 
 
 beard of jetty and curling black, and a mouth of the 
 most regular, yet unpleasant beauty. The upper 
 part of his face was quite concealed, yet the sneer 
 on his lips promised a cold and unfeeling eye. 
 
 " As a hunchback, did you say, count ?" 
 
 " It was her whim," answered Cesarini. " She 
 has given arms to a poor sculptor with that deformi 
 ty till her brain is filled with it. Pray the saints to 
 affect not your offspring, Lamba !" 
 
 Malaspina surveyed himself in the long mirror at 
 the entrance of the saloon, and smiled back incredu 
 lously with his white teeth. 
 
 "I gave Bettina strict orders not to leave her side," 
 said Cesarini. " You will find the old donna by her 
 palmer s dress. The saints speed your suit, Lamba! 
 I will await you in the card-room when the dance 
 wearies you !" 
 
 It was not for some time after the two old nobles 
 had affianced their children, that Cesarini had found 
 a fitting opportunity to break the subject to his 
 daughter. When he did so, somewhat to his embar 
 rassment, Violanta listened to it without surprise; 
 and after hearing all he had to say upon the honour 
 able descent, large fortune and courtly accomplish 
 ments of the young Count Lamba, she only permitted 
 her father to entertain any future hope on the subject, 
 upon the condition, that, till she was of age, her 
 proposed husband should not even be presented to 
 
120 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 her. For this victory over the most cherished 
 ambition of the old count, Violonta was indebted 
 partly to the Holy See, and partly to some qualities 
 in her own character, of which her father knew the 
 force. He w r as aware with what readiness the car 
 dinals would seize upon the slightest wish she might 
 express to take the veil and bring her possessions 
 into the church, and he was sufficiently acquainted 
 with the qualities of a Cesarini, not to drive one of 
 their daughters to extremity. 
 
 With some embarrassment the old count made a 
 clean breast to Malaspina and his son, and was 
 exhausting language in regrets, when he was reliev 
 ed by an assurance from Lamba that the difficulty 
 increased his zest for the match, and that, Cesarini s 
 permission, he would find opportunitie to encounter 
 her in her walks as a stranger, and make his way 
 after the romantic taste which he supposed was 
 alone at the bottom of her refusal. For success in 
 this, Count Lambo relied on his personal beauty and 
 on that address in the arts of adventure which is 
 acquired by a residence in France. 
 
 Since his duel, Atnieri had been confined to his 
 bed with a violent fever, dangerously aggravated by 
 the peculiar nature of his calamity. The love of 
 the pencil was the breath of his soul, and in 
 all his thoughts of Violanta, it was only as a rival 
 of the lofty fame of painters who had made them- 
 
VIOLANTA CESARINI. 121 
 
 selves the companions of kings, that he could ima 
 gine himself a claimant for her love. It, seemed 
 to him that his nerveless hand had shut out heaven s 
 intire light. 
 
 Giulio had watched by his friend with the faithful 
 fondness of a woman, and had gathered from his 
 moments of delirium, whatBiondo had from delicacy 
 to Violanta never revealed to his second, Lenzoni 
 the cause of his quarrel with Malaspina. Touched 
 with this chivalric tenderness toward his eioter the 
 kind Giulio hung over h : m with renewed affection, 
 and when, in subsequent ravings, the maimed 
 youth betrayed the real sting of his misfortune 
 the death of his hopes of her love the unambitious 
 brother resolved in his heart that if he could aid him 
 by service or sacrifice, by influence with Violanta, 
 or by making the almost desperate attempt to esta 
 blish his own claims to the name and fortunes of 
 Cesarini, he would devote himself to his service 
 heart and soul. 
 
 During the confinement of Amieri to his room, the 
 young countess had of course, been unable to visit 
 her brother, and as he scarce left the patient s side 
 for a moment, their intercourse for two or three 
 weeks had been entirely interrupted. On the first 
 day the convalescent youth could walk out, she had 
 stolen to the studio, and heard from Giulio the whole 
 history of the duel and its consequences. When he 
 11 
 
122 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 had finished his narrative, Violanta sat, for a few 
 minutes, lost in thought. 
 
 " Giulio !" she said at last, with a gaiety of tone* 
 which startled him. 
 
 Violanta !" 
 
 " Did you ever remark that our voices are very 
 much alike ?" 
 
 " Biondo often says so." 
 
 " And you have a foot almost as small as mine/ 
 
 " I have not the proportions of a man, Violanta !" 
 
 " Nay, brother, but I mean that that we might 
 pass for each other, if we were masked. Our 
 height is the same. Stand up, Giulio !" 
 
 " You would not mock me !" said the melancholy 
 youth with a faint smile, as he rose and set his bent 
 back beside the straight and lithe form of his sister. 
 
 " Listen to me, amato-bene /" she replied, sitting 
 down and drawing him upon her knee, after satisfy 
 ing himself that there was no perceptible difference 
 in their height. " Put your arm about my neck, and 
 love me while I tell you of rny little plot." 
 
 Giulio impressed a kiss upon the clear, alabaster 
 forehead of the beautiful girl, and looked into her 
 face inquiringly. 
 
 " There is to be a masquerade at La Pergola, 
 she said " a superb masquerade given to some 
 prince ! And I am to go, Giulio mio /" 
 
 " Well," answered the listener, sadly. 
 
VIOL.ANTA CESARINI. 
 
 123 
 
 But do you not seem surprised that I am permit 
 ted to go ! Shall I tell you the reason why papa 
 gave me permission ?" 
 
 If you will, \fiolonta!" 
 
 A little bird told me that Malaspina means to 
 be there !" 
 
 " And you will go to meet him ?" 
 
 " You shall go to meet him, and I " she 
 
 hesitated and cast down the long dark fringes of her 
 eyes. " I will meet Biondo !" 
 
 " Giulio clasped her passionately to his heart. 
 
 I se e ! I see !" he cried, springing upon his feet, 
 as he anticipated the remaining circumstances of 
 the plot. " We shall be two hunchbacks they will 
 little think that we are two Cesarini. Dear, noble 
 Violanta ! you will speak kindly to Biondo. Send 
 Bettina for the clothes, carina mia! You will get 
 twin masks in the Corso. And, Violanta ?" 
 
 "What, Giulio?" 
 
 " Tell Bettina to breathe no word of our project 
 to Amieri ! 1 will persuade him to go but to see you 
 dance ! Poor Amieri ! Dear, dear sister ! Farewell 
 now ! He will be returning, and you must be gone. 
 The Holy Virgin guard you, my Violanta !" 
 
124 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 THE reader will long since have been reminded, 
 by the trouble we have to whip in and flog up the 
 lagging and straggling members of our story, of a 
 flock of sheep driven unwillingly to market. In 
 deed, to stop at the confessional, (as you will see 
 many a shepherd of the Campagna, on his way to 
 Rome,) this tale of many tails should have been a 
 novel. You have, in brief, what should have 
 heen well elaborated, embarrassed with difficulties, 
 relieved by digressions, tipped with a, moral, and 
 bound in two volumes, with a portrait of the author. 
 We are sacrificed to the spirit of the age. The 
 eighteenth century will be known in hieroglyphics 
 by a pair of shears. But, "to return to our muttons." 
 
 The masquerade went merrily on, or, if there 
 were more than one heavy heart among those light 
 heels, it was not known, as the newspapers say, " to 
 our reporter." One, there certainly was heavy 
 as Etna on the breast of Fnceladus. Biondo Amie- 
 ri sat in a corner of the gallery, with his swathed 
 hand laid before him, pale as a new statue, and with 
 a melancholy in his soft dark eyes, which would have 
 touched the executioners of St. Agatha. Beside 
 him sat Lenzoni, who was content to forego the 
 
VIOLANTA CE3ARINA. ^ 125 
 
 waltz for a while, and keep company for pity with a 
 friend who was too busy with his own thoughts to 
 give him word or look, but still keeping sharp watch 
 on the scene below, and betraying by unconscious 
 ejaculations how great a penance he had put on him. 
 self for love and charity. 
 
 "JL/i, la bella musica, Biondo!" he exclaimed 
 drumming on the banquette, while his friend held 
 up his wounded hand to escape the jar, " listen to that 
 waltz, that might set fire to the heels of St. Peter. 
 Corpo di Bacco ! look at the dragon ! a dragon 
 making love to a nun, Amieri ! Ah ! San Pietro ! 
 what a foot ! Wait till I come, sweet goblin ! That 
 a goblin s tail should follow such ankles, Biondo ! 
 Eh ! bellissimo ! the knight ! Look at the red-cross 
 knight. Amieri ! and what ? il gobbo, by St. An 
 thony ! and the red-cross takes him for a woman ! 
 It is Giulio, or there never were two hunchbacks so 
 wondrous like ! JEcco, Biondo !" 
 
 But there was little need to cry "look" to Amie 
 ri, now. A hunchback, closely masked, and leaning 
 on a palmer s arm, made his way slowly through 
 the crowd, and a red-cross knight, a figure gallant 
 enough to have made a monarch jealous, whispered 
 with courteous and courtly deference in his ear. 
 
 " Cielo ! it is she !" said Biondo, with mournful 
 earnestness, not heeding his companion, and laying 
 11* 
 
126 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 his hand upon his wounded wrist, as if the sight he 
 looked on gave it a fresher pang. 
 
 "She?" answered Lenzoni, with a laugh. "If it 
 is not he not gobbo Giulio I ll eat that cross-hiked 
 rapier ! What she should it be, caro Biondo!" 
 
 " I tell thee," said Amieri, " Giulio is asleep at the 
 foot of his marred statue ! I left him but now, he is 
 too ill with his late vigils to be here but his clothes* 
 I may tell thee, are borrowed by one who wears 
 them as you see. Look at the foot, Lenzoni !" 
 
 "A woman, true enough, if the shoe were all? 
 But I ll have a close look ! Stay for me, dear Amie 
 ri! I will return ere you have looked twice at 
 them!" 
 
 And happy, with all his kind sympathy, to find a 
 fair apology to be free, Lenzoni leaped over the 
 benches and mingled in the crowd below. 
 
 Left alone, Biondo devoured with his eyes, every 
 movement of the group in which he was so deeply 
 interested, and the wound in his hand seerried burn 
 ing with a throb of fire, while he tried in vain to de 
 tect, in the manner of the hunchback, that coyness 
 which might show, even through a mask, dislike or 
 indifference. There was even, he thought, (and he 
 * delivered his soul over to Apollyon in the usual phrase- 
 for thinking such ill of such an angel ;) there was 
 even in her manner a levity and freedom of gesture 
 for which the mask she wore should be no apology. 
 
VIOT, ANTA CESAR INT. 127 
 
 He was about to curse Malaspina for having spar 
 ed his life at the fountain, when some one jumped 
 lightly over the seat, and took a place beside him. 
 It was a female in a black domino, closely masked, 
 and through the pasteboard mouth protruded the bit 
 of ivory, commonly held in the teeth by maskers, 
 to disguise the voice. 
 
 " Good evening to you, fair signor !" 
 
 " Good even to you, lady !" 
 
 "I am come to share your melancholy, signor !" 
 
 " I have none to give away unless you will take 
 all ; and just now, my fair one, it is rather anger 
 than sadness. If it please you, leave me !" 
 
 " What if I am more pleased to stay !"" 
 
 " Briefly, I would be alone ! I am not of the fes- 
 ta. I but look on, here !"" And Biondo turned his 
 shoulder to the mask, and fixed his eyes again on 
 the hunchback, who having taken the knight s arm, 
 was talking and promenading most gaily between 
 him and the palmer. 
 
 " You have a wounded hand, signor !" resumed 
 his importunate neighbor. 
 
 "A useless one, lady. Would it were well! 
 
 "Signor Melancholy, repine not against provi 
 dence. I that am no witch, tell thee that thou wilt 
 yet bless heaven that this hand is disabled." 
 
 Biondo turned and looked at the bold prophetess, 
 but her disguise was impenetrable. 
 
128 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " You are a masker, lady, and talk at random !" 
 " No ! I will tell you the thought uppermost in 
 your bosom !" 
 
 "What is it?" 
 
 " A longing for a pluck at the red-cross, yonder !" 
 
 " True, by St. Mary !" said Biondo, starting en 
 ergetically : " but you read it in my eyes !" 
 
 " I have told you your first thought, signor, and I 
 will give you a hint of the second. Is there a like 
 ness between a nymph on canvass, and a gobbo in a 
 mask !" 
 
 " Giulio !" exclaimed Amieri, turning suddenly 
 round ; but the straight back of the domino met his 
 eye, and totally bewildered, he resumed his seat, 
 and slowly perused the stranger from head to foot. 
 
 " Talk to me as if my mask were the mirror, of 
 your soul, Amieri," said the soft but undisguised 
 voice. " You need sympathy in this mood, and I am 
 your good angel. Is your wrist painful to-night ?" 
 
 " I cannot talk to you," he said, turning to resume 
 his observation on the scene below. " If you know 
 the face beneath the gobbo s mask, you know the 
 heaven from which I am shut out. But I must gaze 
 on it still." 
 
 " Is it a woman?" 
 
 " No ! an angel." 
 
 " And encourages the devil in the shape of Ma- 
 laspina ? You miscall her, Amieri !" 
 
VIOLANTA CESARINT. 129 
 
 The answer was interrupted by Lenzoni, who ran 
 into the gallery, but seeing his friend beset by a 
 mask, he gave him joy of his good luck, and refus 
 ing to interrupt the tete-a-tete, disappeared with a 
 laugh. 
 
 " Brave, kind Lenzoni !" said the stranger. 
 " Are you his good angel, too ?" asked Amieri, 
 surprised aga^n at the knowledge so mysteriously 
 displayed. 
 
 " No ! Little as you know of me you would not 
 be willing to share me with another ! Say, Amie 
 ri ! love you the gobbo on the knight s arm ?" 
 
 " You have read me riddles less clear, my fair 
 incognita ! I would die at morn but to say farewell 
 to her at midnight !" 
 
 " Do you despair of her love ?" 
 " Do I despair of excelling Raphael with these 
 unstrung fingers ? I never hoped but in my 
 dreams, lady !" 
 
 " Then hope, waking ! For as there is truth in 
 heaven, Violanta Cesarini loves you, Biondo !" 
 
 Laying his left hand sternly on the arm of the 
 stranger, Biondo raised his helpless wrist and point 
 ed towards the hunchback, who, seated by the red- 
 cross night, played with the diamond cross of his 
 sword-hilt, while the palmer turned his back, as if 
 to- give two lovers aa opportunity.. 
 
130 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 With a heart overwhelmed with bitterness, he 
 then turned to the mocking incognito. Violanta sat 
 beside him ! 
 
 Holding her mask between her and the crowd 
 below, the maiden blush mounted to her temples, 
 and the long sweeping lashes dropped over her eyes 
 their veiling and silken fringes. And while the red- 
 cross knight still made eloquent love to Giulio in the 
 saloon of the masquerade, Amieri and Violanta, in 
 their unobserved retreat, exchanged vows, faint and 
 choked with emotion on his part, but all hope, en 
 couragement and assurance on hers. 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 " Will you waltz ?" said a merry- voiced domino 
 to the red-cross knight, a few minutes after tapping 
 him smartly on the corslet with her black fan, and 
 pointing, for the first step, a foot that would have 
 tempted St. Anthony. 
 
 " By the mass !" answered Malaspina, " I should 
 pay an ill compliment to the sweetest voice that 
 ever enchanted human ear," (and he bowed low to 
 Giulio) " did I refuse invitation so sweetly toned. 
 Yet my Milan armour is not light !" 
 
 "I have been icfusing his entreaties this hour, * 
 said Giulio, as the knight whirled away with Vio- 
 
VIOL ANT A CES ARIN I. 131 
 
 lanta, " for though I can chatter like a woman, 1 
 should dance like myself. He is not unwilling to 
 show his grace to his lady-mistress ! Ha ! ha ! 
 It is worth while to sham the petticoat for once to 
 see what fools men are when they would please a 
 woman ! But, close mask ! Here comes the Count 
 Cesarini!" 
 
 " How fares my child ?" said the old noble, lean 
 ing over the masked Giulio, and touching with his 
 lips the glossy curl which concealed his temple. 
 "Are you amused, idolo mio ?" 
 
 A sudden tremour shot through the frame of poor 
 Giulio at the first endearment ever addressed to his 
 ear by the voice of a parent. The tears coursed 
 down under his mask, and for all answer to the ques 
 tion, he could only lay his small soft hand in his 
 fathers and return his pressure with irresistible 
 strength and emotion. 
 
 " You are not well, my child !" he said, surprised 
 at not receiving an answer, " this ugly hump 
 oppresses you ! Come to the air ! So lean on me, 
 caro tesoro ! We will remove the hump presently. 
 A Cesarini with a hump indeed ! Straighten your 
 self, my life, my child, and you will breathe more 
 freely !" 
 
 Thus entered, at one wound, daggers and balm 
 into the heart of the deformed youth ; and while 
 Bettina, trembling in every limb, grew giddy with 
 
132 ROMANCE OPT RAVEL. 
 
 fear as they made their way through the crowd, 
 Giulio, relieved by his tears, nerved himself with 
 a strong effort and prepared to play out his difficult 
 part with calmness. 
 
 They threaded slowly the crowded maze of 
 waltzers, and, emerging from the close saloons, 
 stood at last in the gallery overhanging the river. 
 The moon was rising, and touched with a pale light 
 the dark face of the Tiber ; the music came faintly 
 out to the night air, and a fresh west wind, cool and 
 balmy from the verdant campagna, breathed softly 
 through the lattices. 
 
 Refusing a chair, Giulio leaned over the balustrade, 
 and the count stood by his side and encircled his 
 waist with his arm. 
 
 " I cannot bear this deformity, my Violanta !" he 
 said, " you look so unlike my child with it ; I need 
 this Lttle hand to re-assure me." 
 
 " Should you know that was my hand, father ?" 
 said Giulio. 
 
 " Should I not ! I have told you a thousand times 
 that the nails of a Cesarini were marked let me see 
 you again by the arch of this rosy line ! See, my 
 little Gobbo ! They are like four pink fairy shells 
 of India laid over rolled leaves of roses. What was 
 the poet s name who said that of the old Countess 
 Giulia Cesarini la bella Giulia ?" 
 
 " Should you have known my voice, father?" asked 
 Giulio, evading the question. 
 
 
VIOLANTA CE8ARINI. 133 
 
 " Yes my darling, why ask me ?" 
 
 " But, father ! if I had been stolen by brigands 
 from the cradle or you had not seen me for many, 
 many years and I had met you to night as a gobbo 
 and had spoken to you only in sport and had 
 called you father, dear father / should you have 
 known my voice ? would you have owned me for a 
 ^Cesarini?" 
 
 " Instantly, my fair child !" 
 
 " But suppose my back had been broken suppose 
 I were a gobbo a deformed hunchback indeed, in 
 deed but had still nails with a rosy arch, and the 
 same voice with which I speak to you now and 
 pressed your hand thus and loved you would 
 you disown me, father ?" 
 
 Giulio had raised himself while he spoke, and ta 
 ken his hand from his father s with a feeling that life 
 or death would be in his answer to that question. 
 
 Cesarini was disturbed, and did not reply for a 
 moment. 
 
 "My child!" said he at last "there is that in 
 your voice that would convince me you are mine, 
 against all the evidence in the universe. I cannot 
 imagine the dreadful image yon have conjured up, 
 for the Cesarini are beautiful and straight by long 
 inheritance. But if a monster spoke to me thus, I 
 should love him ! Come to my bosom, my blessed 
 child ! and dispel those wild dreams ! Come, Vio- 
 
 1 anta !" 
 
 12 
 
I 
 134 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 " Giulio attempted to raise his arms to his father s 
 neck, but the strength that had sustained him so 
 well, began to ebb from him. He uttered some in 
 distinct words, lifted his hand to his mask as if to 
 remove it for breath, and sunk slowly to the floor. 
 
 " It is your son, my lord !" cried Bettina. " Lift 
 him, Count Cesarini ! Lift your child to the air be 
 fore he dies !" 
 
 She tore off his mask and disclosed to the thun 
 der-stricken count the face of the stranger ! As he 
 stood pale and aghast, too much confounded for ut 
 terance or action, the black domino tripped into the 
 gallery, followed by the red-cross knight, panting 
 under his armor. 
 
 " Giulio ! my own Giulio !" cried Violanta, throw 
 ing herself on her knees beside her pale and insen 
 sible brother, and covering his forehead and lips 
 with kisses. " Is he hurt? Is he dead? Water! 
 for the love of heaven ! Will no one bring water ?" 
 And tearing away her own mask, she lifted him 
 from the ground, and totally regardless of the as 
 tonished group who looked on in petrified silence, 
 fanned and caressed him into life and consciousness. 
 
 " Come away, Violanta ! said her father at last, 
 in a hoarse voice. 
 
 * Never, my father ! he is our own blood ! How 
 feel you now, Giulio ?" 
 
 " Better, sweet ! where is Biondo ?" 
 
VIOLANTA CESARINI. 135 
 
 "Near by! But you shall go home with me. 
 Signor Malaspina, as you hope for my favor, lend 
 my brother an arm. Bettina, call up the chariot. 
 Nay, father ! he goes home with me, or I with him. 
 we never part more !" 
 
 The red-cross knight gave Giulio an arm, and 
 leaning on him and Violanta, the poor youth made 
 his way to the carriage. Amieri sat at the door, 
 and received only a look as she passed, and helping 
 Giulio tenderly in, she gave the order to drive swift 
 ly home, and in a few minutes they entered toge 
 ther the palace of their common inheritance. 
 
 It would be superfluous to dwell on the incidents 
 of the sequel, which were detailed in the Diario di 
 Roma, and are known to all the world. The hunch 
 back Count Cesarini has succeeded his father in his 
 title and estates, and is beloved of all Rome. The 
 next heir to the title is a son (now two years of age) 
 of the Countess Amieri, who is to take the name of 
 Cesarini on coming to his majority. They live toge 
 ther in the old palazzo, and all strangers go to see 
 their gallery of pictures, of which none are bad, ex 
 cept some well intended but not very felicitously ex 
 ecuted compositions by one Lenzoni. 
 
 Count Lamba Malaspina is at present in exile 
 having been convicted of drawing a sword on a 
 disabled gentleman, on his way from a masquerade 
 
136 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 at La Pergola. His seclusion is rendered the more 
 tolerable by the loss of his teeth, which were rudely 
 thrust down his throat by this same Lenzoni (fated 
 to have a finger in every pie) in defence of the at 
 tacked party on that occasion. You will hear Len- 
 zoni s address (should you wish to purchase a pic 
 ture of his painting) at the Caffe del Gioco, opposite 
 the trattoria of La, Bella Donna in the Corso, 
 
Dasqttalf, tfte bailor of &rnfcr. 
 
 13 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 PASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE. 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 GIANNINO PASCIUALI was a smart tailor some five 
 years ago, occupying a cool shop on one of the 
 smaller canals of Venice. Four pairs of suspend 
 ers, a print of the fashions, and a motley row of the 
 gay colored trousers worn by the gondoliers, orna 
 mented the window looking on the dark alley in the 
 rear, and, attached to the post of the water-gate on 
 the canal side, floated a small black gondola, the 
 possession of which afforded the same proof of 
 prosperity of the Venetian tailor which is expressed 
 by a horse and buggy at the door of a snip in Lon 
 don. The place-seeking traveller, who, nez en Fair. 
 threaded the tangled labarynth of alleys and bridges 
 
140 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 between the Rialto and St. Marc s, would scarce 
 have observed the humble shop- window of Pasqua 
 li, yet he had a consequence on the Piazza, and the 
 lagoon had seen his triumphs as an amateur gondo 
 lier. Giannino was some thirty years of age, and 
 his wife Fiametta, whom he had married for her 
 zecchini, was on the shady side of fifty. 
 
 If the truth must be told, Pasquali had discovered 
 that, even with a bag of sequins for eye-water, Fi 
 ametta was not always the most lovely woman in 
 Venice. Just across the canal lived old Donna 
 Bentoccata, the nurse, whose daughter Turturilla 
 was like the blonde in Titian s picture of the Mary s; 
 and to the charms of Turturilla, even seen through 
 the leaden light of poverty, the unhappy Pasquali 
 was far from insensible. 
 
 The festa of San Antonio arrived after a damp 
 week of November, and though you wold suppose 
 the atmosphere of Venice not liable to any very 
 sensible increase of moisture, Fiametta, like people 
 who live on land, and who have the rheumatism as 
 a punishment for their age and ugliness, was usually 
 confined to her b azero of hot coals till it was dry 
 enough on the Lido for the peacocks to walk abroad. 
 On this festa, however, San Antonio being, as eve rv 
 one knows, the patron saint of Padua, the Padovese 
 were to come down the Brenta, as was their cus 
 tom, and cross over the sea to Venice to assist in 
 
FASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE. 141 
 
 the celebration ; and Fiametta once more thought 
 Pasquali loved her for herself alone when he swore 
 by his rosary that unless she accompanied him to the 
 festa in her wedding dress, he would not turn an oar 
 in the race, nor unfasten his gondola from the door 
 post. Alas ! Fiametta was married in the summer 
 solstice, and her dress was permeable to the wind as 
 a cobweb or gossamer, Is it possible you could 
 have remembered that, oh, wicked Pasquali ? 
 
 It was a day to puzzle a barometer ; now bright, 
 now rainy ; now gusty as a corridor in a novel, and 
 now calm as a lady after a fit of tears. Pasquali 
 was up early and waked Fiametta with a kiss, and, 
 by way of unusual tenderness, or by way of ensur 
 ing the wedding dress, he chose to play dressing 
 maid, and arranged with his own hands her jupon 
 and fezzoktta. She emerged from her chamber 
 looking like a slice of orange-peel in a flower-bed* 
 but smiling and nodding, and vowing the day warm 
 as April, and the sky without a cloud. The widen 
 ing circles of an occasional drop of rain in the ca 
 nal were nothing but the bubbles bursting after a 
 passing oar, or perhaps the last flies of summer. 
 Pasquali swore it was weather to win down a peri. 
 
 As Fiametta stepped into the gondola, she glanced 
 her eyes over the way and saw Turturilla, with a 
 face as sorrowful as the first day in Lent, seated at 
 her window. Her lap was full of work, and it was 
 
142 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 quite evident that she had not thought of being at the 
 festa. Fiametta s heart was already warm, and it 
 melted quite at the view of the poor girl s loneliness. 
 
 " Pasquali mio !" she said, in a deprecating tone, 
 as if she were uncertain how the proposition would 
 be received, "I think we could make room for poor 
 Turturilla !" 
 
 A gleam of pleasure, unobserved by the confid 
 ing sposa, tinted faintly the smooth olive cheek of 
 Pasquali, 
 
 " Eh ! diavolo /" he replied, so loud that the sor 
 rowful seamstress heard, and hung down her head 
 still lower ; " must you take pity on every cheese 
 paring of a regczza who happens to have no lover ! 
 Have reason ! have reason ! The Gondola is nar 
 rower than your brave heart my fine Fiametta !" 
 And away he pushed from the water-steps. 
 
 Turturilla rose from her work and stepped out 
 upon the rusty gratings of the balcony to see them 
 depart. Pasquali stopped to grease the notch of 
 his oar, and between that and some other embar 
 rassments, the gondola was suffered to float directly 
 under her window, The compliment to the gener 
 ous nature of Fiametta, was, meantime, working, 
 and as she was compelled to exchange a word or 
 two with Turturilla while her husband was getting 
 his oar into the socket, it resulted, (as he thought it 
 very probable it would,) in the good wife s renewing 
 
PASdUAALI, THE TAIPOR OF VENICE. 143 
 
 her proposition, and making a point of sending the 
 deserted girl for her holiday bonnet. Pasquali 
 swore through all the saints and angels by the time 
 she had made herself ready, though she was but five 
 minutes gone from the window, and telling Fiametta 
 in her ear that she must consider it as the purest obli 
 gation, he backed up to the steps of old Donna Ben. 
 toccata, helped in her daughter with a better grace 
 than could have been expected, and with one or two 
 short and deep strokes, put forth into the grand ca 
 nal with the velocity of a lance-fly. 
 
 A gleam of sunshine lay along the bosom of the 
 broad silver sheet, and it was beautiful to see the 
 gondolas with their gay colored freights all hastening 
 in one direction, and with swift track to the festa. 
 Far up and down they rippled the smooth water, 
 here gliding out from below a palace-arch, there 
 from a narrow and unseen canal, the steel beaks 
 curved and flashing, the water glancing on the oar- 
 blades, the curtains moving, and the fair women of 
 Venice leaning out and touching hands as they near- 
 ed neighbor or acquaintance in the close-pressing 
 gondolas. It was a beautiful sight, indeed, and 
 three of the happiest hearts in that swift gliding 
 company were in Pasquali s gondola, though the 
 bliss of Fiametta, I am compelled to say, was en 
 tirely owing to the bandage with which love is so 
 significantly painted. Ah ! poor Fiametta ! 
 
144 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 From the Lido, from Fusina, from under the 
 Bridge of Sighs, from all quarters of the lagoon, 
 and from all points of the fl< >ating city of Venice, 
 streamed the flying gondolas to the Giudecca. The 
 narrow walk along the edge of the long and close- 
 built island was thronged with booths and promen- 
 aders, and the black barks by hundreds bumped their 
 steel noses against the pier as the agitated water rose 
 and fell beneath them. The gondolas intended for 
 the race pulled slowly up and down, close to the 
 shore, exhibiting their fairy-like forms and their sin 
 ewy and gaily dressed gondoliers to the crowds on 
 land and water ; the bands of music, attached to 
 different parties, played here and there a strain ; the 
 criers of holy pictures and gingerbread made the air 
 vocal with their lisping and soft Venetian ; and all 
 over the scene, as if it was the light of the sky or 
 some other light as blessed but less common, shone 
 glowing black eyes, black as night, and sparkling as 
 the stars on night s darkest bosom. He who thinks 
 lightly of Italian beauty should have seen the wo 
 men of Venice on St. Antonio s day 32, or on any 
 day or at any hour when their pulses are beating 
 high and their eyes alight for they are neither one 
 nor the other always. The women of that fair 
 clime, to borrow the similie of Moore, are like lava- 
 streams, only bright when the volcano kindles. 
 Their long lasnes cover lustreless eves, and their 
 
PASaUALI, THE TAILOR OFVENICE. 145 
 
 blood shows dully through the cheek in common 
 and listless hours. The calm, the passive tranquil 
 lity in which the delicate graces of colder climes 
 find their element are to them a torpor of the heart 
 when the blood scarce seems to flow. They are 
 wakeful only to the energetic, the passionate, the 
 joyous movements of the soul. 
 
 Pasquali stood erect in the prow of his gondola, 
 and stole furtive glances at Turturilla while he 
 pointed away with his finger to call off the sharp 
 eyes of Fiametta ; but Fiametta was happy and 
 unsuspicious. Only when now and then the wind 
 came up chilly from the Adriatick, the poor wife 
 shivered and sat closer to Turturilla, who in her 
 plainer but thicker dress, to say nothing of younger 
 blood, sat more comfortably on the black cushion 
 and thought less about the weather. An occasional 
 drop of rain fell on the nose of poor Fiametta, but if 
 she did not believe it was the spray from Pasquali s 
 oar, she at least did her best to believe so ; and the 
 perfidious tailor swore by St. Anthony that the 
 clouds were as dry as her eyelashes. 1 never was 
 very certain that Turturilla was not in the secret of 
 this day s treacheries. 
 
 The broad centre of the Giudecca was cleared, 
 and the boats took their places for the race. Pas 
 quali ranged his gondola with those of the other 
 spectators, and telling Fiametla in her ear that he 
 13 
 
146 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 should sit on the other side of Turturilla as a punish 
 ment for their malapropos invitation, he placed him 
 self on the small remainder of the deep cushion on 
 the farthest side from his now penitent spouse, and 
 while he complained almost rudely of the narrowness 
 of his seat, he made free to hold on by Turturilla s 
 waist which no doubt made the poor girl s mind 
 more easy on the subject of her intrusion. 
 
 Who won and who lost the race what was the 
 device of each flag, and what bets and bright eyes 
 changed owners by the result, no personage of this 
 tale knew or cared, save Fiametta. She looked 
 on eagerly. Pasquali and Turturilla, as the French 
 say trouvaient autress chats a frotter. 
 
 After the decision of the grand race, St. Antonio 
 being the protector, more particularly of the humble^ 
 (" patron of pigs" in the saints calendar,) the seig- 
 noria and the grand people generally, pulled away 
 for St. Marc s, leaving the crowded Giudecca to 
 the people. Pasquali, as was said before, had some 
 renown as a gondolier. Something what would be 
 called in other countries a scrub race, followed the 
 departure of the winning boat, and several gondolas, 
 holding each one person only, took their places for 
 the start. The tailor laid his hand on his bosom, 
 and, with the smile that had first stirred the heart 
 and the sequins of Fiametta, begged her to gratify 
 his love by acting as his make- weight while he turned 
 
PASdUALI,THETAlLOROFVENICE. 147 
 
 an oar for the pig of St. Antonio. The prize 
 roasted to an appetizing crisp, stood high on a platter 
 in front of one of the booths on shore, and Fiametta 
 smacked her lips, overcame her tears with an effort, 
 and told him, in accents as little as possible like the 
 creak of a dry oar in the socket, that he might set 
 Turturilla on shore. 
 
 A word in her ear, as he handed her over the 
 gunwale, reconciled Donna Bentoccata s fair daugh 
 ter to this conjugal partiality, and stripping his manly 
 figure of its upper disguises, Pasquali straightened 
 out his fine limbs, and drove his bark to the line in a 
 style that drew applause from even his competitors. 
 As a mark of their approbation, they offered him an 
 outside place where his fair dame would be less 
 likely to be spattered with the contending oars ; but 
 he was too generous to take advantage of this con 
 siderate offer, and crying out as he took the middle, 
 " ben pronto, signori /" gave Fiametta a confident 
 look and stood like a hound in the leash. 
 
 Off they went at the tap of the drum, poor Fia 
 metta holding her breath and clinging to the sides of 
 the gondola, and Pasquali developing skill and 
 muscle not for Fiametta s eyes only. It was a 
 short, sharp race, without jockeying or management, 
 all fair play and main strength, and the tailor shot 
 past the end of the Giudecca a boat s length ahead. 
 Much more applauded than a king at a coronation 
 
148 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 or a lord -mayor taking water at London stairs, I*e 
 slowly made his way back to Turturilla, and it was 
 only when that demure damsel rather shrunk from 
 sitting down in two inches of water, that he discover 
 ed how the disturbed element had quite filled up the 
 hollow of the leather cushion and made a peninsula 
 of the uncomplaining Fiametta. She was as 
 well watered, as a favourite plant in a flower- 
 garden. 
 
 " Pasquali mio !" she said in an imploring tone, 
 holding up the skirt of her dress with the tips of her 
 thumb and finger, " could you just take me home 
 while I change my dress. 
 
 " One moment, Fiametta cara ! they are bringing 
 
 the pig r 
 
 The crisp and succulent trophy was solemnly 
 
 placed in the prow of the victor s gondola, and pre 
 paration was made to convoy him home with a 
 triumphant procession. A half hour before it was 
 in order to move- an hour in first making the circuit 
 of the grand canal, and an hour more in drinking a 
 glass and exchanging good wishes at the stairs of the 
 Rialto, nd Donna Fiametta had sat too long by two 
 hours and a half with scarce a dry thread on her 
 body. What afterwards befell will be seen in the* 
 more melancholy sequel. 
 
L I,.TMI ETA.ILOROF VENICE, 149 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 The hospital of St. Girolamo is attached to the 
 convent of that name, standing on one of the canals 
 which put forth on the seaward side of Venice. It 
 is a long building, with its low windows and latti ced 
 doors opening almost on the level of the sea, and the 
 wards for the sick are large and well aired ; but. 
 except when the breeze is stirring, impregnated with 
 a saline dampness from the canal, which, as Pasquali 
 remarked, was good for the rheumatism. It was- not 
 so good for the patient. 
 
 The loving wife Fiametta grew worse and worse 
 after the fatal festa, and the fit of rheumatism brought 
 on by the slightness of her dress and the spattering he 
 had given hsr in the race, had increased by the end of 
 the week, to a rheumatic fever. Fiametta was old 
 and tough, however, and struggled manfully (woman 
 as she was) with the disease, but being one night a 
 little out of her head, her loving husband took 
 occasion to shudder at the responsibility of taking 
 care of her, and jumping into his gondola, he pulled 
 across to St. Girolamo and bespoke a dry bed and 
 a sister of charity, and brought back the pious father 
 Gasparo and a comfortable litter. Fiametta was 
 dozing when they arrived, and the kind hearted 
 tailor willing to spare her the pain of knowing that 
 13* 
 
ISO ROMANCE OF TRAVEL- 
 
 she was on her way to the hospital for the poor, 
 set out some meat and wine for the monk, and send 
 ing over for Turturilla and the nurse to mix the 
 salad, they sat and eat away the hours till the poor 
 dame s brain should be wandering again. 
 
 Toward night the monk and dame Bentoccata 
 were comfortably dozing with each other s support, 
 (having fallen asleep at table.) and Pasquali with a 
 kiss from Turturilla, stole softly up stairs. Fiametta 
 was muttering unquietly, and working her fingers in. 
 the palms of her hands, and on feeling her pulse he 
 found the fever was at its height. She took him, 
 besides, for the prize pig of the festa, for he knew 
 her wits were fairly abroad. He crept down stairs, 
 gave the monk a strong cup of coffee to get him, 
 well awake, and, between the four of them, they got 
 poor Fiametta into the litter, drew the curtains ten 
 derly around and deposited her safely in the bottom 
 of the gondola. 
 
 Lightly and smoothly the winner of the pig pulled 
 away with his loving burden, and gliding around the 
 slimy corners of the palaces, and hushing his voice 
 as he cried out "right!" or "left!" to guard the 
 coming gondoliers of his vicinity, he arrived, like a 
 thought of love to a maid s mind in sleep, at the door 
 of St. Girolamo. The abbess looked out and said, 
 benedicite /" and the monk stood firm on his brown 
 sandals to receive the precious burden from the arms 
 
PASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE. 151 
 
 of Pasquali. Believing firmly that it was equivalent 
 to committing her to the hand of St. Peter, and of 
 course abandoning all hope of seeing her again ir* 
 this world, the soft-hearted tailor wiped his eye as 
 she was lifted in, and receiving a promise from father 
 Gasparo that he would communicate faithfully the 
 state of her soul in the last agony, he pulled, with 
 lightened gondola and heart, back to his widower s 
 home and Turturilla. 
 
 For many good reasons, and apparent as good f 
 it is a rule in the hospital of St. Girolamo, that the 
 sick under its holy charge shall receive the visit of 
 neither friend nor relative. If they recover, they 
 return to their abodes to earn candles for the altar 
 of the restoring saint. If they die, their clothes are 
 sent to their surviving friends, and this affecting me-^ 
 morial, besides communicating the melancholy news, 
 affords all the particulars and all the consolation they 
 are supposed to require upon the subject of their 
 loss. 
 
 Waiting patiently for Father Gasparo and his 
 bundle, Pasquali and Turturilla gave themselves up 
 to hopes, which- on the tailor s part, (we fear it must 
 be admitted,) augttred a quicker recovery from grief 
 than might be credited to an elastic constitution. 
 The fortune of poor Fiametta was sufficent to war 
 rant Pasquali in neglecting his shop to celebrate every 
 festa that the church acknowledged, and for tendays 
 
152" ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 subsequent to the committal of his wife to the tender 
 mercies of St. Girolamo, five days out of seven was 
 the proportion of merry holidays with his new 
 betrothed. 
 
 They were sitting one evening in the open piazza 
 of St. Mark, in front of the most thronged cafe of 
 that matchless square. The moon was resting her 
 silver disk on the point of the Campanile, and the 
 shadows of thousands of gay Venetians fell on the 
 immense pavement below, clear and sharply drawn 
 as a. black cartoon. The four extending sides of the 
 square lay half in shades half in light, with their 
 innumerable columns and balconies and sculptured 
 work, and, frowning down on all, in broken light and 
 shadow, stood the arabesque structure of St. Mark s 
 itself dizzying the eyes with its mosaicksand confused 
 devices, and thrusting forth the heads of her four 
 golden-collared steeds into the moonbeams, till they 
 looked on that black relief, like the horses of Pluto 
 issuing from the gates of Hades. In the centre of 
 the square stood a tall woman, singing, in rich con 
 tralto, an old song of the better days of Venice ; and 
 against one of the pillars, Polichinello had backed 
 his wooden stage, and beat about his puppets with 
 an energy worthy of old Dandolo and his helmeted 
 galley-men. To those who wore not the spectacles 
 of grief or discontent, the square of St. Mark s that 
 night was like some cozeningtableau. /never saw 
 anything so gay ! 
 
PASdUALI,THE TAILOR OF VENICE 153 
 
 Every body who ha? " swam in a gondola," 
 knows how the cafes of Venice thrust out their 
 checkered awnings over a portion of the square, and 
 fill the shaded space below with chairs and marble 
 tables. In a corner of the shadow thus afforded, with 
 jce and coffee on a small round slab between them, 
 and the flat pavement of the public promenade under 
 their feet, sat our two lovers. With neither hoof nor 
 wheel to drown or interrupt their voices, (as in cities 
 whose streets are stones, not water,) they murmured 
 their hopes and wishes in the softest language under 
 the sun, and with the sotto voce acquired by all the in 
 habitants of this noiseless city. Fiametta had taken 
 ice to cool her and coffee to take off the chill of her 
 ice, and a bicchiere del perfetto amove to reconcile 
 these two antagonists in her digestion, when the 
 slippers of a monk glided by, and in a moment the 
 recognized father Gasparo made a third in the 
 shadowy corner. The expected bundle was under 
 his arm, and he was on his way to Pasquali s dwel 
 ling. Having assured the disconsolate tailor that 
 she had had unction and wafer as became the wife 
 of a citizen of Venice like himself, he took heart and 
 grew content that she was in heaven. It was a 
 better place, and Turturilla for so little as a gold 
 ring, would supply her place in his bosom. 
 
 The moon was but a brief week older when Pas- 
 quali and Turturilla stood in the church of our Lady 
 
154 ROMAN C E OF TRAVEL. 
 
 of Grief, and father Gasparo within the palings of 
 the altar. She was as fair a maid as ever bloomed 
 in the garden of beauty beloved of Titian, and the 
 tailor was nearer worth nine men to look at, than 
 the fraction of a man considered usually the expo 
 nent of his profession. Away mumbled the good 
 father upon the matrimonial service, thinking of the 
 old wine and rich pastries that were holding their 
 sweetness under cork and crust only till he had 
 done his ceremony, and quicker by some seconds 
 than had ever been achieved before by priest or 
 bishop, he arrived at the putting on of the ring. 
 His hand was tremulous, and (oh unlucky omen !) 
 he dropped it within the gilden fence of the chan 
 cel. The choristers were called, and father Gas 
 paro dropped on his knees to look for it but if the 
 devil had not spirited it away, there was no other 
 reason why that search was in vain. Short of an 
 errand to the goldsmith on the Rialto, it was at last 
 determined the wedding could not proceed. Fa 
 ther Gasparo went to hide his impatience within the 
 restiary, and Turturilla knelt down to pray against 
 the arts of Sathanas. Before they had settled sev 
 erally to their pious occupations. Pasquali was half 
 way to the Rialto. 
 
 Half an hour elapsed, and the^n instead of the 
 light grazing of a swift-sped gondola along the 
 church stairs, the splash of a sullen oar was heard, 
 
PASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE. 155 
 
 and Pasquali stepped on shore. They had hasten 
 ed to the door to receive him monk, choristers 
 and bride and to their surprise and bewilderment, 
 he waited to hand out a woman in a strange dress, 
 who seemed disposed, bridegroom as he was, to 
 make him wait her leisure. Her clothes fitted her 
 ill, and she carried in her hand a pair of shoes, it 
 was easy to see were never made for her. She 
 rose at last, and as her face became visible, down 
 dropped Turturilla and the pious father, and motion 
 less and aghast stood the simple Pasquali. Fiamet- 
 ta stepped on shore ! 
 
 In broken words Pasquali explained. He had 
 landed at the stairs near the fish market, and 
 with two leaps reaching the top, sped off past the 
 buttress in the direction of the goldsmith, when his 
 course was arrested by encountering at full speed, 
 the person of an old woman. Hastily raising her 
 up, he recognized his wife, who, fully recovered, 
 but without a gondola, was threading the zig-zag 
 alleys on foot, on her way to her own domicil. Af 
 ter the first astonishment was over, her dress ex 
 plained the error of the good father and the extent 
 of his own misfortune. The clothes had been hung 
 between the bed of Fiametta and that of a smaller 
 woman who had been long languishing of a con 
 sumption. She died, and Fiameta s clothes, brought 
 to the door by mistake were recognized by father 
 Gasparo and taken to Pasquali. 
 
1 56 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL* 
 
 The holy monk, chop-fallen and sad, took his sol 
 itary way to the convent, but with the first step he 
 felt something slide into the h3el of his sandal. He 
 sat down on the church stairs and absolved the de 
 vil from theft it was the lost ring, which had fall 
 en upon his foot and saved Pasquali the tailor from 
 the pains of bigamy. 
 
Efie itattUit of atustrta* 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 
 
 "Affection is a fire which kindleth as well in the bram 
 ble as in the oak, and catcheth hoM where it first lighteth, 
 not where it may best burn. Larks that mount in the air 
 build their nests below in the earth ; and women that cast 
 their eyes upon kings, may place their hearts upon vassals." 
 
 MARLOWE. 
 
 i 
 
 L agrement est arbitraire : la beaute est quelque chose 
 e plus reel et de plus independent du gout et de I" 1 opinion." 
 
 LA BRUYERE. 
 
 FAST and rebukingly rang the matins from the 
 towers of St. Etienne, and, though unused to wake, 
 much less to pray, at that sunrise hour, I felt a com. 
 punctious visiting as, my postillion -cracked his whip 
 and flew past the sacred threshold, over which trip 
 ped, as if every stroke would be the last, the tardy 
 
160 ROMANCE O F T R A V E L . 
 
 yet light-footed mass-goers of Vienna. It was my 
 first entrance into this Paris of Germany, and I 
 stretched my head from the window to look back 
 with delight upon the fretted gothic pile, so cumbered 
 with ornament, yet so light and airy so vast .in the 
 area it coverd, yet so crusted in every part with 
 delicate device and sculpture. On sped the merci 
 less postillion, and the next moment we rattled into 
 the court-yard of the hotel. 
 
 I gave my keys to the most faithful and intelligent 
 of valets an English boy of sixteen, promoted from 
 white top-boots and a cabriolet in London, to a plain 
 coat and almost his master s friendship upon the 
 continent and leaving him to find rooms to my 
 taste, make them habitable and get breakfast, I re 
 traced my way to ramble a half hour through the 
 aisles of St. Etienne. 
 
 The lingering bell was still beating its quick and 
 monotonous call, and just before me, followed close 
 ly by a female domestic, a veiled and slightly-formV. 
 ed lady stepped over the threshold of the cathedral, 
 and took her way by the least-frequented aisle to the 
 altar. I gave a passing glance of admiration at the 
 small ankle and dainty chaussure betrayed by her 
 hurried step ; but remembering with a slight effort 
 that I had sought the church with at least some fee 
 ble intentions of religious worship, I crossed the 
 broad nave to the opposite side, and was soon lean- 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 161 
 
 ing against a pillar, and listening to the heavenly- 
 breathed music of the voluntary, with a confused, 
 but I trust, not altogether unprofitable feeling of de 
 votion. 
 
 The peasants, with their baskets standing beside 
 them on the tesselated floor, counted their beads up 
 on their knees ; the murmur, low-toned and univer 
 sal, rose through the vibrations of the anthem with 
 an accompaniment upon which I have always 
 thought the great composers calculated, no less than 
 upon the echoing arches, and atmosphere thickened 
 with incense ; and the deep-throated priest muttered 
 his Latin prayer, more edifying to me that it left my 
 thoughts to their own impulses of worship, unde- 
 meaned by the irresistible littleness of criticism, and 
 unchecked by the narrow bounds of another s com 
 prehension of the Divinity. Without being in any 
 leaning of opinion a son of the church of Rome, I 
 confess my soul gets nearer to heaven ; and my re- 
 
 ous tendencies, dulled and diverted from improve- 
 nt by a life of travel and excitement, are more 
 gratefully ministered to, in the indistinct worship of 
 the catholics. It seems to me that no man can pray 
 well through the hesitating lips of another. The 
 inflated style or rhetorical efforts of many, addres 
 sing heaven with difficult grammar and embarrass 
 ed logic and the weary monotony of others, re 
 peating without interest and apparently without 
 14* 
 
162 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 thought, the most solemn appeals to the mercy of 
 the Almighty are imperfect vehicles, at least ta 
 me, for a fresh and apprehensive spirit of worship: 
 The religious architecture of the catholics favors the 
 solitary prayer of the heart. The vast floor of the 
 cathedral, the far receding aisles with their solemn 
 light, to which penetrate only the indistinct murmur 
 of priest and penitent, and the affecting wail or tri 
 umphant hallelujah of the choir ; the touching atti 
 tudes and utter abandonment of all around to their 
 unarticulated devotions ; the freedom to enter and 
 depart, unquestioned and unnoticed, and the won 
 derful impressiveness of the lofty architecture, clus 
 tered with mementos of death, and presenting 
 through every sense, some unobtrusive persuasion 
 to the duties of the spot all these, I cannot but 
 think, are aids, not unimportant to devout feeling, 
 nor to the most careless keeper of his creed and 
 conscience, entirely without salutary use. 
 
 My eye had been resting unconsciously on 
 drapery of a statue, upon which the light of a p 
 ed oriel window threw the mingled dyes of a pea 
 cock. It was the figure of an apostle ; and curious 
 at last to see whence the colours came which turn 
 ed the saintly garb into a mantle of shot silk, 1 stray 
 ed towards the eastern window, and was studying 
 the georgeous dyes and grotesque drawing of an art 
 !ostto the world, when: I discovered^ that I was in 
 
TH E 1 B AN D lT OF AUSTRIA. 163? 
 
 the neighbourhood of the pretty figure that had trip* 
 ped into church so lightly before me. She knelt 
 near the altar, a little forward from one of the hea 
 vy gothic pillars, with her maid beside her, and, 
 close behind knelt a gentleman, who I observed at 
 a second glance, was paying his devotions exclu 
 sively to the small foot that peeped from the edge of. 
 a snowy peignoir, the dishabille of which was cover 
 ed and betrayed by a lace- veil arid mantle. As 1 
 stood thinking what a graceful study her figure 
 would make for a sculptor, and what an irreligious 
 impertinenee was visible in the air of the gentleman 
 behind, he leaned forward as if to prostrate his face 
 upon the pavement, an I pressed his lips upon the 
 slender sole of (I have no doubt) the prettiest shoe 
 in Vienna. The natural aversion which all men 
 have for eaeh other as strangers, was quickened in 
 my bosom by a feeling much more vivid, and said 
 to be quite as natural resentment at any demon- 
 tration by another of preference for the woman one 
 admired. If I have not mistaken human nature, 
 there is a sort of imaginary property which every 
 man feels in a woman he has looked upon with even 
 the most transient regard, which is violated malgre 
 hi, by a similar feeling on the part of any other in 
 dividual. 
 
 Not sure that the gentleman, who had so sudden 
 ly become my enemy^ had any warrant in the lady s 
 
164 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 connivance for his attentions, I retreated to the shel 
 ter of the pillar, and was presently satisfied that he 
 was as much a stranger to her as myself, and was 
 decidedly annoying her. A slight advance in her 
 position to eseape his contact gave me the opportu 
 nity I wished, and stepping upon the small space be 
 tween the skirt of her dress and the outpost of his- 
 ebony cane, I began to study the architecture of the 
 roof with great seriousness. The gothic order, it is 
 said, sprang from the first attempts at constructing 
 roofs from the branches of trees, and is more per 
 fect as it imitates more closely the natural wilder 
 ness with its tall tree-shafts and interlacing limbs. 
 With my eyes half shut I endeavoured to transport 
 myself to an American forest, and convert the 
 beams and angles of this vast gothic structure into a 
 primitive temple of pines, with the sunshine coming 
 brokingly through ; but the delusion, otherwise easy 
 enough, was destroyed by the cherubs roosting on. 
 the cornices, and the apostles and saints perched as 
 it were in the branches ; and, spite of myself, 
 thought it represented best Shylock s " wilderness 
 of monkeys." 
 
 " S il vous plait, monsieur /" said the gentleman, 
 pulling me by the pantaloons as I was losing myself 
 in these ill-timed speculations. 
 
 I looked down. 
 
 " Vous me genez, monsieur /" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 165 
 
 " .7*671 suis Men sure, monsieur /" and I resumed 
 my study of the roof, turning gradually round till my 
 heels were against his knees, and backing peu-a-peu. 
 
 It has often occurred to me as a defect in the sys 
 tem of civil justice, that the time of the day at which 
 a crime is committed is never taken into account by 
 judge or jury. The humours of an empty stomach 
 act so energetically on the judgment and temper of 
 a man, and the same act appears so differently to 
 him, fasting and full, that I presume an inquiry into 
 the subject would prove that few offences against 
 law and human pity were ever perpetrated by vil 
 lains who had dined. In the adventure before us, 
 the best-disposed reader will condemn my interfer 
 ence in a stranger s gallantries as impertinent and 
 quixotick. Later in the day, I should as soon have 
 thought of ordering water-cresses for the gentle 
 man s dindon aux truffes. 
 
 I was calling myself to account something after 
 ^the above fashion, the gentleman in question stand 
 ing near me. drumming on his boot with his ebony 
 cane, when the lady rose, threw her rosary over her 
 neck, and turning to me with a grateful smile, cour- 
 tesied slightly and disappeared. I was struck so 
 exceedingly with the intense melancholy in the ex 
 pression of the face an expression so. totally at 
 variance with the elasticity of the step, and the pro 
 mise of the slight and riante figure and air that \ 
 
166 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 quite forgot I had drawn a quarrel on myself, and 
 was loitering slowly toward the door of the church,, 
 when the gentleman I had offended touched me on 
 the arm, and in the politest manner possible requested 
 my address. We exchanged cards, and I hastened 
 home to breakfast, musing on the facility with which 
 the current of our daily life may be thickened. I 
 fancied 1 had a new love on my hands, and I was 
 telerably sure of a quarrel yet I had been in Vienna 
 but fifty-four minutes by Breguet. 
 
 My breakfast was waiting, and Percie had found 
 time to turn a comb through his brown curls, and 
 get the dust off his gaiters. He was tall for his age, 
 and, (unaware to himself, poor boy !) every word and 
 action reflected upon the handsome seamstress in 
 Cranbourne Alley, whom he called his mother for 
 he showed blood. His father was a gentleman, or 
 there is no truth in thorough-breeding. As I looked 
 at him. a difficulty vanished from my mind. 
 
 " Percie !" 
 
 "Sir!" 
 
 " Get into your best suit of plain clothes, and if a 
 foreigner calls on me this morning, come in and for 
 get that you are a valet. I have occasion to use you 
 for a gentleman." 
 
 "Yes, sir!" 
 
 " My pistols are clean, I presume ?" 
 
 "Yes, sir!" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 167 
 
 I wrote a letter or two, read a volume of " Ni 
 jamais, ni toujours" and about noon a captain of 
 dragoons was announced, bringing me the expected 
 cartel. Percie came in, treading gingerly in a pair 
 of tight French boots, but behaving exceedingly 
 like a gentleman, and after a little conversation, 
 managed on his part strictly according my instruc 
 tions, he took his cane and walked off with his friend 
 of the steel scabbard to become acquainted with the 
 ground. 
 
 The gray of a heavenly summer morning was 
 brightening above the chimneys of the fair city of 
 Vienna as I stepped into a caleche, followed by Per 
 cie. With a special passport (procured by the 
 politeness of my antagonist) we made our sortie at that 
 early hour from the gates, and crossing the glacis, 
 took the road to the banks of the Danube. It was 
 but a mile from the city, and the mist lay low on the 
 face of the troubled current of the river, while the 
 towers and pinnacles of the silent capital cut the sky 
 in clear and sharp lines as if tranquillity and purity, 
 those immaculate hand-maidens of nature, had 
 tired of innocence and their mistress and slept in 
 town ! 
 
 I had taken some coffee and broiled chicken before 
 starting, and (removed thus from the category of 
 the savage unbreakfasted) I was in one of those 
 moods of universal benevolence, said (erroneously) 
 
168 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 to be produced only by a clean breast and milk diet. 
 I could have wept, with Wordsworth, over a violet. 
 
 My opponent was there with his dragoon, and Per- 
 cie, cool and gentlemanlike, like aman who " had serv 
 ed," looked on at the loading of the pistols, and gave 
 me mine with a very firm hand, but with a moisture 
 and onxiety in his eye which I have remembered 
 since. We were to fire any time after the counting 
 of three, and having no malice against my friend, 
 whose impertinence to a lady was (really!) no business 
 of mine, I intended, of course, to throw away my 
 fire. 
 
 The first word was given and I looked at my an 
 tagonist, who, I saw at a glance, had no such gentle 
 intentions. He was taking deliberate aim, and in the 
 four seconds that elapsed between the remaining two 
 words, I changed my mind (one thinks so fast when 
 his leisure is limited !) at least twenty times whether 
 I should fire at him or no. 
 
 " Trois r pronounced the dragoon, from a throat 
 like a trombone, and with the last thought, up flew 
 my hand, and as my pistol discharged in the air, 
 my friend s shot struck upon a large turquoise which 
 I wore on my third finger, and drew a slight pencil- 
 line across my left organ of causality. It was well 
 aimed for my temple, but the ring had saved me. 
 
 Friend of those days, regretted and unforgotten ! 
 days of the deepest sadness and heart-heaviness, yet 
 
THE BAN:-; IT OF AUSTRIA. 169 
 
 somehow dearer in remembrance than all the joys 
 I can recall there was a talisman in thy parting gift 
 thou didst not think would be, one day, my angel ! 
 
 " You will be able to wear your hair over the 
 scar, sir !" said Percie, coming up and putting his 
 finger on the wound. 
 
 " Monsieur !" said the dragoon, advancing to Per 
 cie after a short conference with his principal, and 
 looking twice as fierce as before. 
 
 " Monsieur !" said Percie, wheeling short upon 
 him. 
 
 " My friend is not satisfied. He presumes that 
 monsieur V Anglais wishes to trifle with him." 
 
 " Then let your friend take care of himself," said I, 
 roused by the unprovoked murderousness of the 
 feeling. Load the pistols, Percie ! In my country," 
 I continued, turning to the dragoon, " a man is dis 
 graced who fires twice upon an antagonist who has 
 spared him ! Your friend is a ruffian, and the con 
 sequences be on his own hand !" 
 
 We took our places and the first word was given, 
 when a man dashed between us on horseback at 
 top-speed. The violence with which he drew rein 
 brought his horse upon his haunches, and he was on 
 his feet in half a breath. 
 
 The idea that he was an officer of the police was 
 immediately dissipated by his step and air. Of the 
 finest athletic form I had ever seen, agile, graceful 
 15 
 
170 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 and dressed pointedly well, there was still an inde 
 finable something about him, either above or below 
 a gentleman which, it was difficult to say. His 
 features were slight, fair, and, except a brow too 
 heavy for them and a lip of singular and (I thought) 
 habitual defiance, almost feminine. His hair grew 
 long and had been soigne, probably by more cares 
 sing fingers than his own, and his rather silken mous 
 tache was glossy with some odorent oil. As he 
 approached me and took my hand, with a clasp like 
 a smith s vice, I observed these circumstances, and 
 could have drawn his portrait without ever seeing 
 him again so marked a man was he, in every point 
 and feature. 
 
 His business was soon explained. He was the 
 husband of the lady my opponent had insulted, 
 and that pleasant gentleman could, of course, make 
 no objection to taking my place. I officiated as 
 temoin and, as they took their positions, I anticipated 
 for the dragoon and myself the trouble of carrying 
 them both off the field. I had a practical assurance 
 of my friend s pistol, and the stranger was not the 
 looking man to miss a hair s breadth of his aim. 
 
 The word was not fairly off my lips when both 
 pistols cracked like one discharge, and high into the 
 air sprang my revengeful opponent, and dropped 
 like a clod upon the grass. The stranger opened 
 his waistcoat, thrust his fore-finger into a wound in 
 
T H E B A N D I T O F AU STRI A. 171 
 
 his left breast, and slightly closing his teeth, pushed 
 a bullet through, which had been checked by the 
 bone and lodged in the flesh near the skin. The 
 surgeon who had accompanied my unfortunate an 
 tagonist, left the body, which he had found beyond 
 his art, and readily gave his assistance to stanch 
 the blood of my preserver ; and jumping with the 
 latter into my caleche, I put Percieupon the stranger s 
 horse, and we drove back to Vienna. 
 
 The market people were crowding in at the gate, 
 the merry peasant girls glanced at us with their blue, 
 German eyes, the shopmen laid out their gay wares 
 to the street, and the tide of life ran on as busily and 
 as gaily, though a drop had been extracted, within 
 scarce ten minutes, from its quickest vein. I felt a 
 revulsion at my heart, and grew faint and sick. Is a 
 human life is my life worth anything, even a thought, 
 to my fellow-creatures? was the bitter question 
 forced upon my soul. How icily and keenly the 
 unconscious indifference of the world penetrates to 
 the nerve and marrow of him who suddenly real 
 izes it. 
 
 We dashed through the kohl-market, and driving 
 l nto the porte-cochere of a dark-looking house in one 
 of the cross streets of that quarter, were ushered 
 into apartments of extraordinary magnificence. 
 
172 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 CHAP. 11. 
 
 * What do you want, Percie?" 
 
 He was walking into the room v^th all the deli 
 berate politeness of a " gold-stick-in-waiting." 
 
 "I beg pardon, sir, but I was asked to walk up, 
 and I was not sure whether I was still a gentleman." 
 
 It instantly struck me that it might seem rather 
 infra dig to the chevalier (my new friend had thus 
 announced himself) to have had a valet for a second, 
 and as he immediately after entered the room, having 
 stepped below to give orders about his horse, I pre 
 sented Percie as a gentleman and my friend, and 
 resumed my observation of the singular apartment 
 in which I found myself. 
 
 The effect on coming first in at the door, was that 
 of a small and lofty chapel, where the light struggled 
 in from an unseen aperture above the altar. There 
 were two windows at the farther extremity, but cur 
 tained so heavily, and set so deeply into the wall, 
 that I did not at first observe the six richly-carpeted 
 steps which led up to them, nor the luxuriously cush 
 ioned seats on either side of the casement, within 
 the niche, for those who would mount thither for 
 fresh air. The walls were tapestried, but very 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 173 
 
 ragged and dusty, and the floor, though there were 
 several thicknesses of the heavy-piled, small, Tur 
 key carpets laid loosely over it, was irregular and 
 sunken. The corners were heaped with various 
 articles I could not at first distinguish. My host 
 fortunately gave me an opportunity to gratify my 
 curiosity by frequent absences under the housekeep 
 er s apology ( odd I thought for a chevalier) of 
 expediting breakfast; and with the aid of Percie, I 
 tumbled his chatties about with all necessary free 
 dom. 
 
 " That," said the chevalier, entering, as I turned 
 out the face of a fresh coloured picture to the light, 
 " is a capo d* opera of a French artist, who painted 
 it, as you may say by the gleam of the dagger." 
 
 " A cool light, as a painter would say !" 
 
 " He was a cool fellow, sir, and would have han 
 dled a broad sword better than a pencil." 
 
 Percie stepped up while I was examining the 
 exquisite finish of the picture, and asked very re 
 spectfully if the chevalier would give him the par 
 ticulars of the story. It was a full-length portrait 
 of a young and excessively beautiful girl, of apa- 
 rently scarce fifteen, entirely nude, and lying upon 
 a black velvet couch, with one foot laid on a broken 
 diadem, and her right hand pressing a wild rose 
 to her heart. 
 
 " It was the fancy, sir," continued the chevalier, 
 15* 
 
174 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " of a bold outlaw, who loved the only daughter 
 of a noble of Hungary, 
 
 "Is this the lady sir?" asked Percie, in his politest 
 valet French. 
 
 The chevalier hesitated a moment and looked 
 over his shoulder as if he might be overheard. 
 
 " This is she copied to the minutest shadow of 
 a hair ! He was a bold outlaw, gentlemen, and had 
 plucked the lady from her father s castle with his 
 awn hand." 
 
 "Against her will?" interrupted Percie, rather 
 energetically. 
 
 "No !" scowled the chevalier, as if his lowering 
 brows had articulated the word, " by her own will 
 and connivance; for she loved him." 
 
 Percie drew a long breath, and looked more close 
 ly at the taper limbs and the exquisitely-chiselled 
 features of the face, which was turned over the 
 shoulder with a look of timid shame inimitably true 
 to- nature. 
 
 " She loved him," continued our fierce narrator, 
 who, I almost began to suspect was the outlaw him 
 self, by the energy with which he enforced the tale, 
 " and after a moonlight ramble or two with him in 
 the forest of her father s domain, she fled and be 
 came his wife. You are admiring the hair, sir ! It 
 is as luxuriant and glossy now !" 
 
 " If you please, sir, it is the villain himself !" said 
 Percie in an undertone* 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 175 
 
 " Bref" continued the chevalier, either not under 
 standing English or not heeding the interruption, "an 
 adventurous painter, one day hunting the picturesque 
 in the neighbourhood of the outlaw s retreat, surpris 
 ed this fair creature bathing in one of the loneliest 
 mountain-streams in Hungary. His art appeared to 
 be his first passion, for he hid himself in the trees 
 and drew her as she stood dallying on the margin of 
 the small pool in which the brook loitered ; and so 
 busy was h^ with his own work, or so soft was the 
 mountain moss under its master s tread, that the 
 outlaw looked, unperceived the while, over his 
 shoulder, and fell in love anew with the admirable 
 counterfeit. She looked like a naiad, sir, new-born 
 of a dew-drop and a violet." 
 
 I nodded an assent to Percie. 
 
 "The sketch, excellent as it seemed, was still un 
 finished when the painter, enamoured as he might 
 well be, of these sweet limbs, glossy with the shining 
 water, flung down his book and sprang toward her. 
 The outlaw " 
 
 "Struck him to the heart? Oh heaven!" said 
 Percie, covering his eyes as if he could see the 
 murder. 
 
 "No ! he was a student of the human soul, and 
 deferred his vengeance." 
 
 Percie looked up and listened, like a man whose 
 wits were perfectly abroad. 
 
1 76 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " He was not unwilling since her person had been 
 seen irretrievably, to know how his shrinking Imin- 
 ild (this was her name of melody) would have es 
 caped, had she been found alone." 
 
 " The painter" prompted Percie, impatient for 
 the sequel 
 
 " The painter flew over rock and brake, and 
 sprang into the pool in which she was half immersed ; 
 and my brave girl " 
 
 He hesitated, for he had betiayed himself. 
 
 " Ay she is mine, gentlemen ; and I am Yvain, 
 the outlaw my brave wife, I say with a single 
 bound, leaped to the rock where her dress was con 
 cealed, seized a short spear which she used as a staff 
 in her climbing rambles, and struck it through his 
 shoulder as he pursued !" 
 
 " Bravely done !" I thought aloud.. 
 
 " Was it not ? I came up the next moment, but the 
 spear stuck in his shoulder, and I could not fall upon 
 a wounded man. We carried him to our ruined 
 castle in the mountains, and while my Iminild cured 
 her own wound, I sent for his paints, and let him 
 finish his bold beginning with a difference of my own. 
 You see the picture." 
 
 " Was the painter s love cured with his wound !" 
 I asked with a smile. 
 
 " No, by St. Stephen ! He grew ten times more 
 enamoured as he drew. He was as fierce as a 
 
THE BANDIT OP AUSTRIA. 177 
 
 welk hawk, and as w lling to quarrel for his prey. 
 I could have driven my dagger to his heart a hun 
 dred times for the mutter of his lips and the flash of 
 his dark eyes as he fed his gaze upon her : but he 
 finished the picture, and I gave him a fair field. He 
 chose the broadsword, and hacked away at me like 
 a man." 
 
 And the result" I asked. 
 
 " I am here !" replied the outlaw significantly. 
 
 Percie leaped upon the carpeted steps, and pushed 
 back the window for fresh air ; and, for myself, I 
 scarce knew how to act under the roof of a man, 
 who. though he confessed himself an outlaw and 
 almost an assassin, was bound to me by the ties of 
 our own critical adventure, and had confided his 
 condition to me with so ready a reliance on my 
 honour. In the midst of my dilemma, while I was 
 pretending to occupy myself with examining a silver 
 mounted and peaked saddle, which I found behind 
 the picture in the corner, a deep and unpleasant 
 voice announced breakfast. 
 
 " Wolfen is rather a grim chamberlain," said the 
 chevalier, bowing with the grace and smile of the 
 softest courtier, " but he will usher you to breakfast 
 and I am sure you stand in need of it. For myself, 
 I could eat worse meat than my grandfather with 
 this appetite." 
 
 Percie gave me a look of inquiry and uneasiness 
 
178 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 when he found we were to follow the rough domes 
 tic through the dark corridors of the old house, and 
 through his underbred politeness of insisting on fol 
 lowing his host, I could see that he was unwilling to 
 trust the outlaw with the rear ; but a massive and 
 broad door, flung open at the end of the passage, let 
 in upon us presently the cool and fresh air from a 
 northern exposure, and, stepping forward quickly to 
 the threshold, we beheld a picture which changed 
 the current and colour of our thoughts. 
 
 In the bottom of an excavated area, which, as 
 well as I could judge, must be forty feet below the 
 level of the court, lay a small and antique garden, 
 brilliant with the most costly flowers, and cooled by 
 a fountain gushing from under the foot of a nymph in 
 marble. The spreading tops of six alleys of lindens 
 reaching to the level of .the street, formed a living 
 roof to the grot-like depths of the garden, and con 
 cealed it from all view but that of persons descend 
 ing like ourselves from the house ; while, instead of 
 walls to shut in this Paradise in the heart of a city, 
 sharply-inclined slopes of green-sward leaned in 
 under the branches of the lindens, and completed the 
 fairy-like enclosure of shade and verdure. As we 
 descended the rose-laden steps and terraces, I ob 
 served, that, of the immense profusion of flowers in- 
 the area below, nearly all were costly exo ticks, whose 
 pots were set in the earth, and probably brought 
 
THEB A NDITOF AUSTRIA. 179 
 
 away from the sunshine only when in high bloom ; 
 and as we rounded the spreading basin of the foun 
 tain which broke the perspective of the alley, a table, 
 which had been concealed by the marble nymph, 
 and a skilfully-disposed array of rhododendrons lay 
 just beneath our feet, while a lady, whose features 
 I could not fail to remember, smiled up from her 
 couch of crimson cushions and gave us a graceful 
 welcome. 
 
 The same taste for depth which had been shown 
 in the room sunk below the windows, and the garden 
 below the street, was continued in the kind of mar 
 ble divan in which we were to breakfast. Four steps 
 descending from the pavement of the alley introduc 
 ed us into a circular excavation, whose marble seats, 
 covered with cushions of crimson silk, surrounded a 
 table laden with the substantial viands which are 
 common to a morning meal in Vienna, and smoking 
 with coffee, whose aroma (Percie agreed with me) 
 exceeded even the tube roses in grateful sweetness. 
 Between the cushions at our backs and the pave 
 ments just above the level of our heads, were piled cir 
 cles of thickly-flowering geraniums, which enclosed 
 us in rings of perfume, and, pouring from the cup of 
 a sculptured flower, held in the hand of the nymph 
 a smooth stream like a silver rod supplied a channel 
 grooved around the centre of the marble table, 
 through which the bright water, with the impulse of 
 
180 m ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 its descent, made a swift revolution and disappeared. 
 
 It was a scene to give memory the lie if it could 
 have recalled the bloodshed of the morning. The 
 green light flecked down through the leafy roof upon 
 the glittering and singing water ; a nightingale in a 
 recess of the garden, gurgled through his wires as if 
 intoxicated with the congenial twilight of his prison ; 
 the heavy-cupped flowers of the tropics nodded with 
 the rain ofihe fountain spray ; the distant roll of 
 wheels in the neighbouring streets came with an 
 assurance of reality to this dream-land, yet softened 
 by the unreverberating roof and an air crowded with 
 flowers and trembling with the pulsations of falling 
 water ; the lowering forehead of the outlaw cleared 
 up like a sky of June after a. thunder-shower, and his 
 voice grew gentle and caressing ; and the delicate 
 mistress of all (by birth, Countess Iminild,) a crea 
 ture as slight as Psyche, and as white as the lotus, 
 whose flexile stem served her for a bracelet, wel 
 comed us with her soft voice and humid eyes, and 
 saddened by the event of the morning, looked on her 
 husband with a tenderness that would have assoiled 
 her of her sins against delicacy, I thought even in the 
 mind of an angel. 
 
 " We live, like truth, here, in the bottom of a well," 
 said the countess to Percie, as she gave him his cof 
 fee ; ** how do you like my whimsical abode, sir?" 
 
 " I should like anyplace where you were,Miladi !" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 181 
 
 he answered, blushing and stealing his eyes across 
 at me, either in doubt how far he might presume 
 upon his new character, or suspecting that I should 
 smile at his gallantry. 
 
 The outlaw glanced his eyes over the curling 
 head of the boy, with one of those just perceptible 
 smiles which developed, occasionally, in great beau 
 ty, the gentle spirit in his bosom ; and Iminild, pleased 
 with the compliment or the blush, threw off her pen 
 sive mood, and assumed in an instant, the coquettish 
 air which had attracted my notice as she stepped 
 before me into the church of St. Etienne. 
 
 " You had hard work," she said to keep up with 
 your long-legged dragoon yesterday, Monsieur 
 Percie !" 
 
 " Miladi ?" he answered, with a look of inquiry. 
 
 " Oh, I was be hind you, and my legs are not much 
 longer than yours. How he strided away with his 
 long spurs, to be sure ! Do you remember a smart 
 young gentleman with a blue cap that walked past 
 you on the glacis occasionally." 
 
 Ah, with laced boots, like a Hungarian ?" 
 
 " I see I am ever to be known by my foot," said 
 she, putting it out upon the cushion, and turning it 
 about with naive admiration ; " that poor captain of 
 the imperial guard payed dearly for kissing it, holy 
 virgin !" and she crossed herself and was silent for a 
 moment 
 
 16 
 
182 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " If I might take the freedom, chevalier," I said, 
 pray how came I indebted to your assistance 
 in this affair?" 
 
 " Iminild has partly explained," he answered. 
 u She knew, of course, that a challenge would follow 
 your interference, and it was very easy to know that 
 an officer of some sort would take a message in the 
 course of the morning to Le Prince Charles, the 
 only hotel frequented by the English (Fun certain 
 gens. 
 
 I bowed to the compliment. 
 
 " Arriving in Vienna late last night, I found Iminild 
 (who had followed this gentleman and the dragoon 
 unperceived) in possession of all the circumstances ; 
 and, but for oversleeping myself this morning,! should 
 have saved your turquoise, mon seigneur 7" 
 
 " Have you lived here long, Miladi ?" asked Per- 
 cie, looking up into her eyes with an unconscious 
 passionateness which made the Countess Iminild 
 colour slightly, and bite her lips to retain an expres 
 sion of pleasure. 
 
 " I have not lived long, anywhere, sir !" she 
 answered half archly, "but I played in this garden 
 when not much older than you !" 
 
 Percie looked confused and pulled up his cravat. 
 
 " This house said the chevalier, willing apparent 
 ly to spare the countess a painful narration, " is the 
 property of the old Count Ildefert, my wife s father, 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 183 
 
 He has long ceased to visit Vienna, and has left it, he 
 supposes, to a stranger. When Iminild tires of the 
 forest, she comes here, and I join her if I can find 
 time. I must to the saddle to-morrow, by St. 
 Jacques !" 
 
 The word had scarce died on his lips when the 
 door by which we had entered the garden was flung 
 open, and the measured tread of gens-d armes re 
 sounded in the corridor. The first man who stood 
 out upon the upper terrace was the dragoon who 
 had been second to my opponent. 
 
 " Traitor and villain !" muttered the outlaw be 
 tween his teeth, " I thought I remembered you ! It 
 is that false comrade Berthold, Iminild !" 
 
 Yvain had risen from the table as if but to stretch 
 his legs ; and drawing a pistol from his bosom he 
 cocked it as he quietly stepped up into the garden. 
 I saw at a glance that there was no chance for his 
 escape, and laid my hand on his arm. 
 
 " Chevalier !" I said, " surrender and trust to op 
 portunity. It is madness to resist here." 
 
 "Yvain !" said Iminild, in a low voice, flying to 
 his side as she comprehended his intention, " leave 
 me that vengeance, and try the parapet. 1,11 kill 
 him before he sleeps ! Quick ! Ah, heavens !" 
 
 The dragoon had turned at that instant to fly, and 
 with suddenness of thought the pistol flashed, and 
 the traitor dropped heavily on the terrace. Spring- 
 
184 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 ing like a cat up the slope of green sward, Yvain 
 stood an instant on the summit of the wall, hesitat 
 ing where to jump beyond, and in the next moment 
 rolled heavily back, stabbed through and through 
 with a bayonet from the opposite side. 
 
 The blood left the lips and cheek of Iminild ; but 
 without a word or a sign of terror, she sprang to 
 the side of the fallen outlaw and lifted him up against 
 her knee. The gens-d armes rushed to the spot, but 
 the subaltern w r ho commanded them yielded instant 
 ly to my wish that they should retire to the skirts 
 of the garden ; and, sending Percie to the fountain 
 for water, we bathed the lips and forehead of the 
 dying man and set him against the sloping parapet. 
 With one hand grasping the dress of Iminild and fa e 
 other clasped in mine, he struggled to speak. 
 
 " The cross !" he gasped, " the cross!" 
 
 Iminild drew a silver crucifix from her bosom. 
 
 " Swear on this," he said, putting it to my lips and 
 speaking with terrible energy, " swear that you will 
 protect her while you live !" 
 
 " I swear !" 
 
 He shut our hands together convulsively, gasped 
 slightly as if he would speak again, and, in another 
 instant sunk, relaxed and lifeless, on the shoulder of 
 Iminild. 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 185 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 The fate and history of Yvain, the outlaw, be 
 came, on the following day, the talk of Vienna. 
 He had been long known as the daring horse-stealer 
 of Hungary ; and, though it was not doubted that 
 his sway was exercised over plunderers of every 
 description, even pirates upon the high seas, his own 
 courage and address were principally applied to rob 
 bery of the well-guarded steeds of the emperor and 
 his nobles. It was said that there was not a horse 
 in the dominions of Austria whose qualities and 
 breeding were not known to him, nor one he cared 
 to have which was not in his concealed stables in 
 the forest. The most incredible stories were told 
 of his horsemanship. He would so disguise the 
 animal on which he rode, either by forcing him into 
 new paces or by other arts only known to himself, 
 that he would make the tour of the Glacis on the 
 emperor s best horse, newly stolen, unsuspected 
 even by the royal grooms. The roadsters of his 
 own troop were the best steeds bred on the banks 
 of the Danube ; but, though always in the highest 
 condition, they would never have been suspected to 
 be worth a florin till put upon their mettle. The 
 16* 
 
186 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 extraordinary escapes of his band from the vigilant 
 and well-mounted gens-cFarmes were thus accounted 
 for; and, in most of the villages in Austria, the peo 
 ple, on some market-day or other, had seen a body 
 of apparently ill -mounted peasants suddenly start 
 off with the speed of lightning at the appearance of 
 gens-d armes, and, flying over fence and wall, draw 
 a straight course for the mountains, distancing their 
 pursuers with the ease of swallows on the wing. 
 
 After the death of Yvain in the garden, I had 
 been forced with Percie into a carriage, standing in 
 the court, and accompanied by a guard, driven to 
 my hotel, where I was given to understand that I was 
 to remain under arrest till further orders. A sen 
 tinel at the door forbade all ingress or egress except 
 to the people of the house : a circumstance which 
 was only distressing to me, as it precluded my inqui 
 ries after the Countess Iminild, of whom common 
 rumour, the servants informed me, made not the 
 slightest mention. 
 
 Four days after this, on the relief of the guard at 
 noon, a subaltern entered my room and informed 
 me that I was at liberty. I instantly made prepara 
 tions to go out, and was drawing on my boots when 
 Percie, who had not yet recovered from the shock 
 of his arrest, entered in some alarm, and informed 
 me that one of the royal grooms was in the court 
 with a letter, which he would deliver only into my 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 187 
 
 own hands. He had orders beside, he said, not to 
 leave his saddle. Wondering what new leaf of my 
 destiny was to turn over, I went below and received 
 a letter, with apparently the imperial seal, from a 
 well-dressed groom in the livery of the emperor s 
 brother, the king of Hungary, He was mounted on 
 a compact, yet fine-limbed horse, and both horse 
 and rider were as still as if cut in marble. 
 
 I returned to my room and broke the seal. It 
 was a letter from Iminild, and the bold bearer was 
 an outlaw disguised ! She had heard that I was to 
 be released that morning, and desired me to ride out 
 on the road to Gratz. In a postscript she begged I 
 would request Monsieur Percie to accompany me. 
 
 I sent for horses, and, wishing to be left to my 
 own thoughts, ordered Percie to fall behind, and 
 rode slowly out of the southern gate. If the Coun 
 tess Iminild were safe, 1 had enough of the adven 
 ture for my taste. My oath bound me to protect 
 this wild an unsexed woman, but farther intercourse 
 with a band of outlaws, or farther peril of my head 
 for no reason that either a court of gallantry or of jus 
 tice would recognize, was beyond my usual pro 
 gramme of pleasant events. The road was a gen 
 tle ascent, and with the bridle on the neck of my 
 hack I paced thoughfully on, till, at a slight turn, we 
 stood at a fair height above Vienna. 
 
 " It is a beautiful city, sir," said Percie, riding up. 
 
188 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " How the deuce could she have escaped 1" said 
 I, thinking aloud. 
 
 " Has she escaped, sir ? Ah, thank heaven !" ex 
 claimed the passionate boy, the tears rushing to his 
 eyes. 
 
 " Why, Percie !" I said with a tone of surprise 
 which called a blush into his face, " have you really 
 found leisure to fall in love amid all this imbroglio T 
 
 "I beg pardon, my dear master !" he replied in a 
 confused voice, " I scarce know what it is to fall in 
 love ; but I would die for Miladi Iminild." 
 
 "Not at all an impossible sequel, my poor boy ! 
 But wheel about and touch your hat, for here comes 
 some one of the royal family !" 
 
 A horseman was approaching at an easy canter, 
 over the broad and unfenced plain of table-land 
 which overlooks Vienna on the south, attended by 
 six mounted servants in the white kerseymere frocks? 
 braided with the two-headed black eagle, which 
 distinguish the members of the imperial household. 
 
 The carriages on the road stopped while he passed, 
 the foot-passengers touched their caps, and, as he 
 came near,,! perceived that he was slight and young, 
 but rode with a confidence and a grace not often 
 attained. His horse had the subdued, half-fiery 
 action of an Arab, and Percie nearly dropped from 
 his saddle when the young horseman suddenly 
 drove in his spurs, and with almost a single vault 
 stood motionless before us. 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 189 
 
 " Monsieur !" 
 
 Madame la Contesse /" 
 
 I was uncertain how to receive her, and took re 
 fuge in civility. Whether she would be overwhelm 
 ed with the recollection of Yvain s death, or had 
 put away the thought altogether with her masculine 
 firmness, was a dilemma for which the eccentric con 
 tradictions of her character left me no probable solu 
 tion. Motioning with her hand after saluting me, 
 two of the party rode back and forward in differ 
 ent directions, as if patrolling; and giving a look 
 between a tear and a smile at Percie, she placed 
 her hand in mine, and shook off her sadness with a 
 strong effort. 
 
 " You did not expect so large a suite with your 
 protegee, 11 she said, rather gaily, after a moment. 
 
 " Do I understand that you come now to put 
 yourself under my protection !" I asked in reply. 
 
 " Soon, but not now, nor here. I have a hundred 
 men at the foot of Mount Semering, whose future 
 iate, in some important respects, none can decide 
 but myself. Yvain was always prepared for this, 
 and everything is en train. I come now but to ap 
 point a place of meeting* Quick ! my patrole 
 comes in, and some one approaches whom we must 
 fly. Can you await me at Gratz ?" 
 
 " I can and will !" 
 
 She put her slight hand to my lips, waved a kiss 
 
190 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 at Percie, and away with the speed of wind, flew her 
 swift Arab over the plain, followed by the six horse 
 men, every one of whom seemed part of the animal 
 that carried him he rode so admirably. 
 
 The slight figure of Iminild in the close fitting 
 dress of a Hungarian page, her jacket open and her 
 beautiful limbs perfectly defined, silver fringes at 
 her ankles and waist, and a row of silver buttons 
 gallonne down to the instep, her bright, flashing eyes, 
 her short curls escaping from her cap and tangled 
 over her left temple, with the gold tassel, dirk and 
 pistol at her belt and spurs upon her heels it was 
 an apparition I had scarce time to realize, but it seem 
 ed painted on my eyes. The cloud of dust which 
 followed their rapid flight faded away as I watched 
 it, but I saw her still., 
 
 " Shall I ride back and order post-horses, sir !" 
 asked Percie standing up in his stirrups. 
 
 " No ; but you may order dinner at six. And 
 Percie, !" he was riding away with a gloomy air ; 
 " you may go to the police and get our passports 
 for Venice." 
 
 " By the way of Gratz, sir!" 
 
 " Yes, simpleton !" 
 
 There is a difference between sixteen and twenty- 
 six, I thought to myself, as the handsome boy 
 flogged his horse into a gallop. The time is 
 gone when I could love without reason. Yet I 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 191 
 
 remember when a feather, stuck jauntily into a bon 
 net, would have made any woman a princess ; and 
 in those days heaven help us ! I should have loved 
 this woman more for her galliardize than ten times 
 a prettier one with all the virtues of Dorcas. For 
 which of my sins am I made guardian to a robber s 
 wife, I wonder ! 
 
 The heavy German postillions, with their cocked 
 hats and yellow coats, got us over the ground after 
 a manner, and toward the sunset of a summer s 
 evening the tall castle of Gratz, perched on a 
 pinnacle of rock in the centre of a vast plain, stood 
 up boldly against the reddening- sky. The rich 
 fields of Styria were ripening to an early harvest, 
 the people sat at their doors with the look of house 
 hold happiness for which the inhabitants of these 
 " despotic countries" are so remarkable ; and now 
 and then on the road the rattling of steel scabbards 
 drew my attention from a book or a reverie, and the 
 mounted troops, so perpetually seen on the broad 
 roads of Austria, lingered slowly past with their 
 dust and baggage-trains. 
 
 It had been a long summer s day, and, contrary to 
 my usual practice, I had not mounted, even for half a 
 post, to Percie s side in the rumble. Out of humour 
 
192 ROMANCEOF TRAVEL. 
 
 with fate for having drawn me into very embaras- 
 sing circumstances out of humour with myself for 
 the quixotic step which had first broughtiton me 
 and a little out of humour with Percie, (perhaps from 
 an unacknowledged jealously of Iminild s marked 
 preference for the varied) I left him to toast alone 
 in the sun, while I tried to forget him and myself in 
 " Le Marquis de Pontanges" What a very cle 
 ver book it is, by the way ! 
 
 The pompous sergeant of the guard performed 
 his office upon my passport at the gate giving me 
 at least a kreutzer worth of his majesty s black sand 
 in exchange for my florin and my English curse ; 
 (I said before I was out of temper, and he was half 
 an hour writing his abominable name,) and leaving 
 my carriage and Percie to find their way together 
 to the hotel, I dismounted at the foot of a steep street 
 and made my way to the battlements of the castle, 
 in search of scenery and equanimity. 
 
 Ah ! what a glorious landscape ! The precipitous 
 rock on which the old fortress is built seems drop 
 ped by the Titans in the midst of a plain, extending 
 miles in every direction, with scarce another peb 
 ble. Close at it? base run the populous streets, 
 coiling about it like serpents around a pyramid, and 
 away from the walls of the city spread the broad 
 fields, laden, as far as the eye can see, with tribute 
 for the emperor ! The tall castle, with its armed 
 crest, looks down among the reapers. 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 193 
 
 " You have not lost your friend and lover, yet yon 
 are melancholy !" said a voice behind me, that 1 
 was scarce startled to hear. 
 
 " Is it you, Iminild 1" 
 
 " Scarce the same for Iminild was never before 
 so sad. It is something in the sunset. Come away 
 while the woman keeps down in me, and let us 
 stroll through the Plaza, where the band is playing. 
 Do you love military music?" 
 
 I looked at the costume and figure of the extra 
 ordinary creature before I ventured with her on a 
 public promenade. She was dressed like one of 
 the travelling apprentices of Germany, with cap 
 and bleuzer, arii had assumed the air of the craft 
 with a success absolutely beyond detection. I gave 
 her my arm and we sauntered through the crowd, 
 listening to the thrilling music of one of the finest 
 bands in Germany. The priviliged character and 
 free manners of the wandering craftsmen whose 
 dress she had adopted, I was well aware, recon 
 ciled, in the eyes of the inhabitants, the marked 
 contrast betwen our conditions in life. They would 
 simply have said, if they had made a remark at all, 
 that the Englishman was bon enfant and the crafts 
 man bon camarade. 
 
 " You had better look at me, messieurs !" said the 
 dusty apprentice, as two officers of the regiment 
 passed and gave me the usual strangers stare; " I 
 
 17 
 
194 ROMANCE OPTRAVEL. 
 
 am better worth your while by exactly five thou 
 sand florins." 
 
 " And pray how ?" I asked. 
 
 " That price is set on my head !" 
 
 " Heavens ! and you walk here !" 
 
 " They kept you longer than usual with your pass 
 port, I presume?" 
 
 " At the gate ? yes." 
 
 " I came in with my pack at the time. They have 
 orders to examine all travellers and passports with 
 unusual care, these sharp officials ! But I shall get 
 out as easily as I got in!" 
 
 " My dear countess !" I said, in a tone of serious 
 remonstrance, t " do not trifle with the vigilance of 
 the best police in Europe ! I am your guardian, and 
 you owe my advice some respect. Come away 
 from the square and let us talk of it in earnest." 
 
 "Wise seignior! suffer me to remind you how 
 deftly I slipped through the fingers of these gentry 
 after our tragedy in Vienna, and pay my opinion some 
 respect ! It was my vanity that brought me, with 
 my lackeys, to meet you a la prince royale so near 
 Vienna; and hence this alarm in the police, for I was 
 seen and suspected. I have shown myself to you 
 in my favourite character, however, and have done 
 with rash measures. You shall see me on the road 
 to-morrow, safe as the heart in your bosom. 
 Where is Monsieur Percie !" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 195 
 
 "At the hotel. But stay! can I trust you with 
 yourself?" 
 
 " Yes, and dull company, too ! A revoir /" 
 And whistling the popular air of the craft she had 
 assumed, the Countess Iminild struck her long staff 
 on the pavement, and with the gait of a tired and 
 habitual pedestrian, disappeared by a narrow street 
 leading under the precipitory battlements of the cas 
 tle. 
 
 Percie made his appearance with a cup of coffee 
 the following morning, and, with the intention of post, 
 ing a couple of leagues to breakfast, I hurried through 
 my toilet and was in my carriage an hour after sun 
 rise. The postillion was in his saddle and only wai 
 ted for Percie, who, upon enquiry, was nowhere to 
 be found. I sat fifteen minutes, and just as I was 
 beginning to be alarmed he ran into the large court of 
 the hotel, and, crying out to the postillions that all 
 was right, jumped into his place with an agility, 
 it struck me, very unlike his usual gentlemanlike 
 deliberation. Determining to take advantage of the 
 first up-hill to catechize him upon his matutinal 
 rambles, I read the signs along the street till we 
 
 pulled up at the gate. 
 
 Iminild s communication had prepared me for 
 
 unusual delay with my passport, and I was not 
 surprised when the officer, in returning it to me. 
 
196 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 requested me as a matter of form, to declare, upon 
 my honour, that the servant behind my carriage was 
 an Englishman, and the person mentioned in my 
 passport. 
 
 " Foi d honneur, monsieur," I said, placing my 
 hand politely on my heart, and off trotted the postil 
 lion, while the captain of the gaurd, flattered with 
 my civility, touched his foraging-cap, and sent me 
 a German blessing through his mustache. 
 
 It was a divine morning, and the fresh and dewy" 
 air took me back many a year, to the days when I 
 was more familiar with the hour. We had a long 
 trajet across the plain, and unlooping an antivibration 
 tablet, for the invention of which my ingenuity took 
 great credit to itself, (suspended on caoutchouc cords 
 from the roof of the carriage and deserving of a 
 patent I trust you will allow !) I let off my poetical 
 vein in the following beginning to what might have 
 turned out, but for the interruption, a very edifying 
 copy of verses : 
 
 Ye are not what ye were to me, 
 Oh waning night and morning star! 
 
 Though silent still your watches flee 
 Though hang yon lamp in heaven as far 
 
 Though live the thoughts ye fed of yore 
 
 I m thine, oh starry dawn no more! 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 197 
 
 Yet to that dew-pearl d hour alone 
 
 I was not folly s blindest child; 
 It came when wearied mirth had flown, 
 
 And sleep was on the gay and wild ; 
 And wakeful with repentant pain, 
 
 I lay amid its lap of flowers, 
 And with a truant s earnest brain 
 
 Turned back the leaves of wasted hours. 
 The angels that by day would flee, 
 Returned, oh morning star ! with thee ! 
 
 Yet now again * * * 
 
 * 
 
 A foot thrust into my carriage- window rudely 
 broke the thread of these delicate musings. The 
 postillion was on a walk, and before I could get my 
 wits back from their wool-gathering, the Countess 
 Iminild, in Percie s clothes, sat laughing on the 
 cushion beside me. 
 
 " On what bird s back has your ladyship descended 
 from the clouds ?" I asked with unfeigned astonish 
 ment. 
 
 " The same bird has brought us both down c est 
 a dire, if you are not still en Fair" she added, look 
 ing from my scrawled tablets to my perplexed face. 
 
 " Are you really and really the Countess Iminild?" 
 I asked with a smile, looking down at the trowsered 
 feet and loose-fitting boots of the pseudo-valet. 
 17* 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " Yes, indeed ! but I leave it to you to swear, 
 /oi d honneurj that a born countess is an English 
 valet !" And she laughed so long and merrily that 
 the postillion looked over his yellow epaulettes in 
 astonishment. 
 
 " Kind, generous Percie !" she said, changing her 
 tone presently to one of great feeling, I would scarce 
 believe him last night when he informed me, as as in 
 ducement to leave him behind, that he was only a ser 
 vant ! You never told me this. But he is a gentle 
 man, in every feeling as well as in every feature, 
 and, by heavens ! he shall be a menial no longer !" 
 
 This speech, begun with much tenderness, rose, 
 toward the close, to the violence of passion ; and 
 folding her arms with an air of defiance, the lady- 
 outlaw threw herself back in the carriage. 
 
 " I have no objection," I said, after a short silence, 
 " that Percie should set up for a gentleman. Nature 
 has certainly done her part to make him one ; but 
 till you can give him means and education, the coat 
 which you wear, with such a grace, is his safest shell. 
 Ants live safely till they have gotten wings, says 
 the old proverb." 
 
 The blowing of the postillion s horn interrupted 
 the argument, and, a moment after, we were rolled 
 up, with German leisure, to the door of the small inn 
 where I had designed to breakfast. Thinking it 
 probable that the people of the house, in so small a 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 199 
 
 village, would be too simple to make any dangerous 
 comments upon our appearance, I politely handed the 
 countess out of the carriage, and ordered plates for 
 two. 
 
 " It is scarce worth while," she said, as she heard 
 the order, " for I shall remain at the door on the 
 look out. The eil-wa^gen, for Trieste, which 
 was to leave Gratz an hour after us, will be soon 
 here, and, (if my friends have served me well,) Per- 
 cie in it. St. Mary speed him safely !" 
 
 She stode away to a small hillock to look out for 
 the lumbering diligence, with a gait that was no 
 stranger to, " doublet and hose." It soon came on 
 with its usual tempest of whip-cracking and bugle- 
 blasts, and nearly overturning a fat burgher, who 
 would have profferred the assistance of his hand, 
 out jumped a petticoat, which, I saw. at a glance, 
 gave a very embarrassed motion to gentleman 
 Percie. 
 
 " This young lady," said the countess, dragging 
 the striding and unwilling damsel into the little par 
 lour where I was breakfasting " travels under the 
 charge of a deaf old brazier, who has been requested 
 to protect her modesty as far as Laybach. Make 
 a curtsy, child !" 
 
 " I beg pardon, sir !" began Percie. 
 
 "Hush, hush ! no English ! Walls have ears, and 
 your voice is rather gruffish, mademoiselle. Show 
 
200 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 me your passport? Cunegunda Von Krakenpate, 
 eighteen years of age, blue eyes, nose and chin mid 
 dling, etc! There is the conductor s horn ! Allez vite!" 
 We meet a Laybach. Adieu, charmante femme ! 
 Adieu ! 
 
 And with the sort of caricatured elegance which 
 women always assume in their imitations of our sex, 
 Countess Iminild, in frock-coat and trowsers, helped 
 into the diligence, in hood and petticoat, my " tiger" 
 from Cranbourne-alley ! 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 Spite of remonstrance on my part, the imperative 
 countess, who had asserted her authority more than 
 once on our way to Laybach, insisted on the com 
 pany of Miss Cunegunda Von Krakenpate, in an 
 evening walk around the town. Fearing that Per- 
 cie s masculine stride would betray him, and object 
 ing to lend myself to a farce with my valet, 1 
 opposed the freak as long as it was courteous but 
 it was not the first time I had learned that a spoiled 
 
 woman would have her own way, and, too vexed 
 
 .* 
 
 to laugh, I soberly promenaded the broad avenue of 
 the capital of Styria, with a valet en demoiselle, and 
 a dame en valet. 
 
 It was but a few hours hence to Planina, and Imi- 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 201 
 
 nild, who seemed to fear no risk out of u walled city, 
 waited on Percie to the carriage the following 
 morning, and in a few hours we drove up to the 
 rural inn of this small town of Littorale. 
 
 I had been too much out of humour to ask the 
 countess, a second time, what errand she could have 
 in so rustic a neighbourhood. She had made a 
 mystery of it, merely requiring of me that I should 
 defer all arrangements for the future, as far as she 
 was concerned, till we had visited a spot in Littorale, 
 upon which her fate in many respects depended. 
 After twenty fruitless conjectures, I abandoned my 
 self to the course of circumstances, reserving only 
 the determination, if it should prove a haunt of 
 Yvain s troop, to separate at once from her company 
 and await her at Trieste. 
 
 Our dinner was preparing at the inn, and tired of 
 the embarrassment Percie exhibited in my presence, 
 I walked out and seated myself under an immense 
 linden, that every traveller will remember, standing 
 in the centre of the motley and indescribable clusters 
 of buildings, which serve the innkeeper and black 
 smith of Planina for barns, forge, dwelling, and 
 outhouses. The tree seems the father of the village. 
 It was a hot afternoon, and I was compelled to 
 dispute the shade with a congregation of cows and 
 double-jointed postborses; but finding a seat high up 
 on the root, at last I busied myself with gazing down 
 
202 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 the road, and conjecturing what a cloud of dust 
 might contain, which, in an opposite direction from 
 that which we had come, was slowly creeping 
 onward to the inn. 
 
 Four roughly-harnessed horses at length, ap 
 peared, with their traces tied over their backs one 
 of them ridden by a man in a farmers frock. They 
 struck me at first as fine specimens of the German 
 breed of draught-horses, with their shaggy fetlocks 
 and long manes ; but while they drank at the trough 
 which stood in the shade of the linden, the low tone 
 in which the man checked their greedy thirst, and the 
 instant obedience of the well-trained animals, awa 
 kened at once my suspicions that we were to become 
 better acquainted. A more narrow examination 
 convinced me that, covered with dust and disguised 
 with coarse harness as they were, they were four 
 horses of such bone and condition, as were never 
 seen in a farmer s stables. The rider dismounted 
 at the inn door, and very much to the embarrassment 
 of my suppositions, the landlord, a stupid and heavy 
 Boniface, greeted him with the familiarity of an old 
 acquaintance, and in answer, apparently to an in 
 quiry, pointed to my carriage, and led him into the 
 house. 
 
 "Monsieur Tyrell," said Iminild, coming out to 
 me a moment after, " a servant whom I had ex 
 pected has arrived with my horses, and with your 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 203 
 
 consent, they shall be put to your carriage immedi 
 ately." 
 
 "To take us where?" 
 
 "To our place of destination." 
 
 " Too indefinite, by half, Countess ! Listen to me ! 
 I have very sufficient reason to fancy that, in leaving 
 the post-road to Trieste, I shall leave the society of 
 honest men. You and your * minions of the moon 
 may be very pleasant, but you are not very safe 
 companions ; and having really a wish to die quietly 
 in my bed " 
 
 The countess burst into a laucrh. 
 
 o 
 
 "If you will have the character of the gentleman 
 you are about to visit from the landlord here " 
 
 "Who is one of your ruffians himself, I ll be 
 sworn !" 
 
 " No, on my honour ! A more innocent old beer- 
 guzzler lives not on the road. But I will tell you 
 thus much, and it ought to content you. Ten miles 
 to the west of this dwells a country gentleman, who, 
 the landlord will cgrtify, is as honest a subject of his 
 gracious majesty as is to be found in Littorale. He 
 lives freely on his means, and entertains strangers 
 occasionally from all countries, for he has been a 
 traveller in his time. You are invited to pass a day 
 or two with this Mynheer Krakenpate, (who, by the 
 way, has no objection to pass for father of the young 
 lady you have so kindly brought from Laybach,) 
 
204 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 and he has sent you his horses, like a generous host, 
 to bring you to his cbor. More seriously, this was 
 a retreat of Yvain s, where he would live quietly 
 and play bon citoyzn, and you have nothing earthly 
 to fear in accompanying me thither. And now will 
 you wait and eat the greasy meal you have ordered, 
 or will you save your-appstite for la fortune de pot 
 at Mynheer Kraken pate s, and get presently on the 
 road !" 
 
 I yielded rather to the seducing smile and capti 
 vating beauty of my pleasing ward, than to any 
 confidence in the honesty of Myneer Krakenpate ; 
 and Percie being once more ceremoniously handed 
 in, we left the village at the sober trot becoming 
 the fat steeds of a landholder. A quarter of a 
 mile of this was quite sufficient for Iminild, and 
 a word to the postillion changed, like a metamorpho 
 sis, both horse and rider. From a heavy unelastic 
 figure, he rose into a gallant and withy horseman, 
 and, with one of his low-spoken words, away flew 
 the four compact animals, treading lightly as cats, 
 and, with the greatest apparent ease, putting us over 
 the ground at the rate of fourteen miles in the hour. 
 
 The dust was distanced, a pleasant breeze was 
 created by the motion, and when at last we turned 
 from the main road, and sped off to the right at the 
 same exhilarating pace, I returned Iminild s arch 
 look of remonstrace with mv best-humoured smile 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 20f> 
 
 and an affectionate je me fie a vous ! Miss Kraken- 
 pate, I observed, echoed the sentiment by a slight 
 pressure of the countess s arm, looking very inno 
 cently out of the window all the while. 
 
 A couple oi miles, soon done, brought us round 
 the face of a craggy precipice, forming the brow oi 
 a hill, and with a continuation of the turn, we drew 
 up at the gate of a substantial-looking building, 
 something between a villa and a farm-house, built 
 against the rock, as if for the purpose of shelter from 
 the north winds. Two beautiful Angora hounds 
 sprang out at the noise, and recognized Iminild 
 through all her disguise, and presently, with a look of 
 forced courtesy, as if not quite sure whether he 
 might throw off the mask, a stout man of about fifty, 
 hardly a gentleman, yet above a common peasant 
 in his manners, stepped forward from the garden to 
 give Miss Krakenpate his assistance in alighting. 
 
 " Dinner in half an hour !" was Iminild s brief 
 greeting, and, stepping between her bowing depen 
 dant and Percie, she led the way into the house. 
 
 I was shown into a chamber, furnished scarce 
 above the common style of a German inn, where I 
 made a hungry man s despatch in my toilet, and de 
 scended at once to the parlour. The doors were all 
 open upon the ground floor, and, finding myself quite 
 alone, I sauntered from room to room, wondering 
 at the scantiness of the furniture and general air of 
 18 
 
Wti ROMANCE OF TKAVEL, 
 
 discomfort, and scarce able to believe that the same 
 mistress presided over this and the singular paradise 
 in which I had first found her at Vienna. After visiting 
 every corner of the ground floor with a freedom 
 which I assumed in my character as guardian, it 
 occurred to me that I had not yet found the dining- 
 room, and I was making a new search, when Imi- 
 nild entered. 
 
 I have said she was a beautiful woman. She was- 
 dressed now in the Albanian costume, with the ad r 
 aitionai gorgeousness of gold embroidery, which 
 might distinguish the favourite chjld of a chief of 
 Suli. It was the male attire, with a snowy white 
 juktanilla reaching to the knee, a short jacket of 
 crimson velvet, and a close-buttoned vest of silver 
 cloth, fitting admirably to her girlish bust, and leav 
 ing her slender and pearly neck to rise bare and 
 swan-like into the masses of her clustering hair. 
 Her slight waist was defined by the girdle of fine 
 linen edged with fringe of gold, which was tied co- 
 quettishly over her left side and fell to her ankle 
 and below the , embroidered leggin appeared the 
 fairy foot, which had drawn upon me all this long 
 train of adventure, thrust into a Turkish slipper 
 with a sparkling emerald on its instep. A feroniere 
 of the yellowest gold sequins bound her hair back 
 from her temples, and this was the only confinement 
 to the dark brown meshes which, in wavv lines and 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 201 
 
 in the richest profusion, fell almost to her feet. Th*. 
 only blemish to this vision of loveliness was a flus! 
 about her eyes. The place had recalled Yvain t 
 her memory. 
 
 " I am about to disclose to you secrets ," said shr 
 laying her hand on my arm, " which have neve 
 been revealed but to the most trusty of Yvain s con 
 federates. To satisfy those whom you will mee 
 you must swear to me on the same cross which h 
 pressed to your lips when dying, that you will neve 
 violate, while I live, the tiust we repose in you." 
 
 " I will take no oath," I said ; " for you are leadin: 
 me blindfolded. If you are not satisfied with th; 
 assurance that I can beti^iy no confidence whic: 
 honour would preserve, hungry as I am, I will \< 
 dine in Planina." 
 
 " Then I will trust to the faith of an Englishman. 
 And now I have a favour, not to beg, but to insist 
 upon that from this moment you consider Perch: 
 as dismissed from your service, and treat him, whil< 
 here at least, as my equal and friend." 
 
 44 Willingly !" I said ; and ns the word left in\ 
 lips, enter Percie in the counterpart dress of Iminild 
 with a silver-sheathed ataghan at his side, and the 
 blueish muzzles of a pair of Egg s linir-trigger;< 
 peeping from below his girdle. To do the rasca; 
 justice, h<;- was .as han.Isrmio in his runv toggery a 
 Hs mistress, and carried it as irallantlv. The 1 , 
 
208 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL* 
 
 would have made the prettiest tableau as Juan and 
 llaidee. 
 
 " Is there any chance that these * persuaders may 
 be necessary," I asked, pointing to his pistols which 
 awoke in my mind a momentary suspicion. 
 
 " No none that I can foresee but they are 
 loaded. A favourite, among men whose passions 
 are professionally wild," she continued with a mean 
 ing glance at Percie ; " should be ready to lay his 
 hand on them, even if stirred in his sleep !" 
 
 I had been so accustomed to surprises of late, that 
 I scarce started to observe, while Imimld was speak 
 ing, that an old-fashioned clock, which stood in a 
 niche in the wall, was slowly swinging out upon 
 hinges. A narrow aperture of sufficient breadth to 
 admit one person at a time, was disclosed when it 
 had made its entire revolution, and in it stood with 
 a lighted torch, the stout landlord Von Krakenpate. 
 Iminild looked at me an instant as if to enjoy my 
 surprise. 
 
 " Will you lead me in to dinner, Mr. Tyrell ?" she 
 said at last, with a laugh. 
 
 " If we are to follow Myneer Von Krakenpate," 
 I replied, "give me hold of the skirt of yomjukta- 
 nilla, rather, and let me follow ! Do we dine in the 
 cellar?" 
 
 I stepped before Percie, who was inclined to take 
 advantage of my hesitation to precede me, and fol- 
 
f H E B A N D I T O F A U S T 1 1 A . 
 
 lowed the countess into the opening, which, from 
 *he position of the house, I saw must lead directly 
 into the face of the rock. Two or three descending 
 steps convinced me that it was a natural opening en 
 larged by art ; and after one or two sharp turns, and 
 a descent of perhaps fifty feet, we came to a door 
 which, suddenly flung open by our torch-bearer^ 
 deluged the dark passage with a blaze of light which 
 the eyesight almost refused to bear. Recovering 
 irom my amazement, I stepped over the threshold 
 of the door, and stood upon a carpet in a gallery of 
 sparkling stalactites, the dazzling reflection of inu- 
 merable lamps flooding the air around, and a long 
 snow-white vista of the same briU ancy and effect 
 streching downward before me. Two ridges of 
 the calcareous stratta running almost parallel over 
 >ur heads, formed the cornices of the descending 
 corridor, and from these with a regularity that 
 seemed like design, the sparkling pillars, white as 
 alabaster, and shaped like inverted cones, dropped 
 nearly to the floor, their transparent points resi- 
 ng on the peaks of the corresponding stalagmites, 
 which of a darker hue and coarser grain, seemed 
 designed as bases to a new order of architectural 
 columns. The reflection from the pure crystalline 
 rock gave to this singular gallery a splendor which 
 only the palace of Aladdin could have equalled. The 
 18* 
 
210 ROMANCE j OF TRAVEL. 
 
 lamps were hung between in irregular but effective 
 ranges, and in our descent, like Thalaba, who re 
 freshed his dazzled eyes in the desert of snow by 
 loo king on the green wings of the spirit bird, I was 
 compelled to bend my eyes perpetually for relief up 
 on the soft, dark masses of hair which floated upon 
 the lovely shoulders of Iminild. 
 
 At the e xtremity of the gallery we turned short to 
 the right, and followed an irregular passage, some- 
 tim3S S3 low that we could scarce stand upright, 
 but all lighted with the same intense brilliancy, and 
 formed of the same glittering and snow-white sub 
 stance. We had be en rambling on thus far perhaps 
 ten minutes, when sudd enly the air, which I had felt 
 uncomfortably chill, gre w warm and soft, and the 
 low reverberation of running water fell delighfully 
 on our ears. Far a-he ad we could see two sparry 
 columns standing close together, and apparently 
 closing up the wa y. 
 
 " Courage ! my ven erable guardian !" cried Im : - 
 nild, laughing over her shoulder ; ** you will see your 
 dinner presently. Are you hungry, Percie 1" 
 
 tk Not while you look back, Madame la Comtes- 
 S3 I" answered th-3 callow gentleman, with an in 
 stinctive tact at his new vocation. 
 
 We stood at the two pillars which formed ths 
 extremity of tin passage, and looked down upon a 
 scene of which all cbscription mast b? faint and im- 
 
THE BAND IT OF AUSTRIA. 
 
 perfect. A hundred feet below ran a broad subter 
 raneous river, whose waters sparkling in the blaze 
 of a thousand torches, sprang into light from the 
 deepest darkness, crossed with foaming rapidity the 
 bosom of the vast illuminated cavern, and disappear 
 ed again in the same inscrutable gloom. Whence it 
 it came or whither it lied was a mystery beyond the 
 reach of the eye. The deep recesses of the cavern 
 seemed darker for the intense light gathered about 
 the centre. 
 
 After the first few minutes of bewilderment, 1 en 
 deavoured to realize in detail the wondrous scene be 
 fore me. The cavern was of an irregular shape, but 
 all studded above with the same sparry incrustation, 
 thousands upon thousands of pendant stalactites glit 
 tering on the roof, and showering back light upon the 
 clusters of blazing torches fastened everywhere 
 upon the shelvy sides. Here and there vast 
 columns, alabaster white, with bases of gold colour, 
 fell from the roof to the floor, like pillars left stand 
 ing in the ruined aisle of a cathedral, and from cor 
 ner to corner ran their curtains of the same brjlliant 
 calcareous spar, shaped like the sharp edge of u 
 snow-drift, and almost white. It was like laying* 
 bare the palace of some king- wizard of the mine to 
 gaze down upon it. 
 
 What think you of Myneer Krakenpate s taste 
 in a dining-room, Monsieur Tyrell?" asked the OOUD- 
 
,12 
 
 ftOMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 less, who stood between Percie and myself, with 
 a hand on the shoulder of each. 
 
 I had scarce found time, as yet, to scrutinize the 
 artificial portion of the marvellous scene, but, at the 
 question of Iminild, I bent my gaze on a broad plat 
 form, rising high above the river on its opposite 
 bank, the rear of which was closed in by perhaps 
 forty irregular columns, leaving between them and 
 the sharp precipice on the river-side, an area, in 
 height and extent of about the capacity of a ball 
 room. A rude bridg-3, of very light construction, 
 rose in a single arch across the river, forming the 
 only possible access to the platform from the side- 
 where we stood, and, following the path back witli 
 my eye, I observed a narrow and spiral staircase, 
 partly of wood and partly cut in the rock, ascending 
 irom the bridge to the gallery we had followed 
 hither. The platform was carpctted richly, and 
 flooded with intense light, and in it s centre stood ;; 
 gorgeous array of smoking dishes, served after the 
 Turkish fashion, with a cloth upon the floor and sur 
 rounded with cushions and ottomans of every shape 
 and colour. A troop of black slaves, whose silver 
 anklets, glittered as they moved, were busy bringing 
 wines and completing I lie arrangements for the 
 meal. 
 
 " Allans, million /" cried Iminild, getting impati 
 ent arid seizing Percie s arm. " let us get over the" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 
 
 river, and perhaps Mr. Tyrell will look down upon 
 us with his grands yeux while we dine. Oh, you 
 will come with us ! Suivez done /" 
 
 An iron door, which I had not hitherto observed^ 
 jet us out from the gallery upon the staircase, and 
 Myneer Von Krakenpate carefully turned the key 
 behind us. We crept slowly down the narrow 
 staircase and reached the edge of the river, where 
 the warm air from the open sunshine came pouring 
 through the cavern with the current, bringing with 
 [t a smell of green fields and flowers, and removing 
 entirely the chill of the cavernous and confined at 
 mosphere I had found so uncomfortable above 
 We crossed the bridge, and stepping upon the elas 
 tic carpets piled thickly on the platform, arranged 
 ourselves about the smoking repast, Myneer Von 
 Krakenpate sitting down after permission from Imi- 
 nild, and Percie by order of the same imperative 
 dictatress, throwing his graceful length at her feet. 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 " TAKE a lesson in flattery from Percie, Mr. Tyrell, 
 and be satisfied with your bliss in my society with 
 out asking for explanations. I would fain have the 
 use of my tongue (to swallow) for ten minutes, and 
 I see you making up your mouth for a question, 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 Try this pilau ! It is made by a Greek cook, 
 who fries, boils and stews in a kitchen with a river 
 for a chimney." 
 
 " Precisely what I was going to ask you. I was 
 wondering how you cook without smoking your 
 snow-white roof." 
 
 " Yes, the river is a good slave, and steals wood 
 as well. We have only to cut it by moonlight and 
 commit it to the current." 
 
 " The kitchen is down stream, then ?" 
 
 " Down stream ; and down stream lives jolly Per- 
 dicaris the cook, who having lost his nose in a sea- 
 fight, is reconciled to forswear sunshine and man 
 kind, and cook rice for pirates." 
 
 " Is it true then that Yvain held command on the 
 sea ?" 
 
 " No, not Yvain, but Tranchcoeur his equal in 
 command over this honest confederacy. By the 
 way, he his your countryman, Mr.Tyrell, though he 
 tights under a nom de guerre. You are very likely 
 to see him, too, for his bark is at Trieste, and he is 
 the only human being besides myself (and my com 
 pany here) who can come and go at wiil jn this 
 robber s paradise. He is a lover of mine, parbleu, ! 
 and since Yvain s death, heaven knows what fancy 
 he may bring hither in his hot brain ! I have armed 
 Percie for the hazard ?" 
 
 The thin nostrils of rnv friend from Cranbournr- 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 5 
 
 Alley dilated with prophetic dislike of a rival thus 
 abruptly alluded to, and there was that in his face 
 which would have proved, against all the nurses 
 oaths in Christendom, that the spirit of a gentleman s 
 blood ran warm through his heart. Signor Tran- 
 chcoeur must be gentle in his suit, I said to myself 
 or he will find what virtue lies in a hair-trigger ! 
 Percie had forgot to eat since the mention of the 
 pirate s name, and sat with folded arms and his right 
 hand on his pistol. 
 
 A black slave brought in an oindletfe soufflw, as 
 light and delicate as the chef-d asuvre of an artiste in 
 the Palais Royal. Iminild spoke to him in Greek ^ 
 as he knelt and placed it before her. 
 
 " I have a presentiment," she said, looking at me 
 as the slave disappeared, " that Tranchcreur wilj 
 be here presently. I have ordered another omeleff<> 
 on the strength of the feeling, for he is fond of it, 
 and may be soothed by the attention." 
 
 "Yor fear him, then?" 
 
 " Not if I were alone, for he is as gentle as a wo 
 man when he has no rival near him but I doubt 
 his relish of Percie. Have you dined ?" 
 
 Quite." 
 
 " Then come and look at my garden, and hare a 
 peep at old Perdicaris. Stay here, Percie, and finish 
 your grapes, mon-mignon ! I have a word to say- 
 to Mr. Tvrell." 
 
210 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 t 
 
 We walked across the platform, and passing be 
 tween two of the sparry columns forming its bound 
 ary, entered upon a low passage which led to a large 
 opening, resembling singularly a garden of low 
 shrubs turned by some magic to sparkling marble. 
 
 Two or three hundred of these stalagmite cones, 
 formed by the dripping of calcareous water from 
 t he roof, (as those on the roof were formed by the 
 same fluid which hardened and pondered,) stood 
 about in the spacious area, every shrub having an 
 answering cone on the roof, like the reflection of the 
 same marble garden in a mirror. One side of this 
 singular apartment was used as a treasury for the 
 spoils of the band, and on the points of the white 
 cones hung pitchers and altar lamps of silver, gold 
 drinking-cups, and chains, and plate and jewellery 
 of every age and description. Farther oil were piled, 
 in unthrifty confusion, heaps of velvets and silks, fine 
 broadcloths, French gloves, shoes and slippers, 
 brocades of Genoa, pieces of English linen, damask 
 curtains still fastened to their cornices, a harp and 
 mandolin, cases of damaged bons-bons, two or three 
 richly-bound books, and, (last and most valuable in 
 my eyes.) a minature bureau, evidently the plunder 
 of some antiquary s treasure, containing in its little 
 drawers antique gold coins of India, carefully dated 
 and arranged, with a list of its contents half-torn 
 from the lid. 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA 21? 
 
 %< You should hear Tranchcoeur s sermons on 
 these pretty texts," said the countess, trying to thrust 
 open a bale of Brusa silk with her Turkish slipper, 
 
 "He will beat off the top of a stalagmite with his 
 sabre-hilt, and sit down and talk over his spoils and 
 the adventures they recall, till morning dawns." 
 
 " And how is that discovered in this sunless 
 cave ?" 
 
 " By the perfume. The river brings news of it. 
 and fills the cavern with the sun s first kisses. Those 
 violets kiss and tell, Mr. Tyrell ! Apropos des 
 bottes, let us look into the kitchen." 
 
 We turned to the right, keeping on the same level, 
 and a few steps brought us to the brow of a consider 
 able descent forming the lower edge of the carpeted 
 platform, but separated from it by a wall of close 
 stalactites. At the bottom of the descent ran the 
 river, but just along the brink, forming a considerable 
 crescent, extended a flat rock, occupied by all the 
 varied implements of a kitchen, and lighted bv the 
 glare of two or three different fires blazing against 
 the perpendicular limit of the cave. The smoke of 
 these followed the inclination of the wall, and was 
 swept entirely down with the current of the river. 
 At the nearest fire stood Perdicaris, a fat, long-haired 
 and sinister-looking rascal, his noseless face glowing 
 with the heat, and at his side waited, with a silver 
 dish, the Nubian slave who had been sent for 
 Tranchcoeur s omelette. 19 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 " One of the most bloody fights of my friend the 
 rover," said Iminild, "was with an armed slaver, 
 from whom he took these six pages of mine. They 
 have reason enough to comprehend an order, but 
 too little to dream of liberty. They are as contented 
 as tortoises, ici-bas" 
 
 " Is there no egress hence but by the iron door ?" 
 
 " None that I know of, unless one could swim up 
 this swift river like a salmon. You may have sur 
 mised by this time, that we monopolize an unex 
 plored part of the great cave of Adelsberg. Com 
 mon report says it extends ten miles under ground, 
 but common report has never burrowed as far as 
 this, and I doubt whether there is any communica 
 tion. Father Krakenpate s clock conceals an en 
 trance, discovered first by robbers, and handed 
 down by tradition, heaven knows how long. But 
 hark ! Tranchcoeur, by heaven ! my heart foreboded 
 it!" 
 
 I sprang after the countess, who, with her last 
 exclamation, darted between two of the glittering 
 columns separating us from the platform, and my 
 first glance convinced me that her fullest anticipa 
 tions of the pirate s jealousy were more than realis 
 ed. Percie stood with his back to a tall pillar on the 
 farther side, with his pistol levelled, calm and 
 unmoveable as a stalactite; and, with his sabre 
 
THE BANDIT OP AUSTRIA. 219 
 
 drawn and his eyes flashing fire, a tall powerfully- 
 built man in a sailor s preks, was arrested by Iminild 
 in the act of rushing on him. " Stop ! or you die, 
 Tranchcoeur !" said the countess, in a tone of trifling 
 command. He is my guest !" 
 
 " He is my prisoner, madame !" was the answer 
 as the pirate changed his position to one of perfect 
 repose and shot his sabre into his sheath, as if a brief 
 delay could make little difference. 
 
 " We shall see that," said the countess, once more* 
 with as soft a voice as was ever heard in a lady s 
 boudoir ; and stepping to the edge of the platform 
 she touched with her slipper a suspended gong, 
 which sent through the cavern a shrill reveberation 
 heard clearly over the rushing music of the river. 
 
 In an instant the click of forty muskets from the 
 other side fell on our ears ; and, at a wave of her 
 hand, the butts rattled on the rocks, and all was still 
 again. 
 
 " I have not trusted myself within your reach, 
 Monsieur Tranchcceur," said Iminild, flinging her 
 self carelessly on an ottoman, and motioning to Per- 
 cie to keep his stand, " withont a score or two of 
 my free riders from Mount Semering to regulate 
 your conscience. I am mistress here, sir! You 
 may sit down !" 
 
 Tranchcoeur had assumed an air of the most gen 
 tlemanly tranquillity, and motioning to one of the 
 
220 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 slaves for his pipe, he politely begged pardon for 
 smoking in the countess s presence, and filled the 
 enamelled bowl with Shiraz tobacco. 
 
 " You heard of Yvain s death ?" she remarked 
 after a moment passing her hand over her eyes. 
 
 "Yes, at Venice." 
 
 "With his dying words, he gave me and mine in 
 charge to this Englishman. Mr. Tyrell, Monsieur 
 Tranchcceur." 
 
 The pirate bowed. 
 
 " Have you been long from England 7" he asked 
 with an accent and voice that even in that brief 
 question, savoured of the nonchalant English of the 
 West End. 
 
 " Two years P ? I answered. 
 
 " I should have supposed much longer from your 
 chivalry in St. Etienne, Mr. Tyrell. My country 
 men generally are less hasty. Your valet there," he 
 continued, looking sneeringly at Percie, " seems as 
 quick on the trigger as his master." 
 
 Percie turned on his heel, and walked to the edge 
 of the platform as if uneasy at the remark, and Im- 
 inild rose to her feet. 
 
 " Look you, Tranchco3ur ! I ll have none of your 
 sneers. That youth is as well-born and better bred 
 than yourself, and with his consent, shall have the 
 authority of the holy church ere long to protect my 
 property and me. Will you aid me in this, Mr.. 
 Tyrell I" 
 
THE BANDIT OF AUSTRIA. 221 
 
 " Willingly, countess !" 
 
 " Then, Tranchcoeur, farewell ! I have withdrawn 
 from the common stock Yvain s gold and jewels, 
 and I trust to your sense of honour to render me at 
 Venice whatever else of his private property may 
 be concealed in the island." 
 
 " Iminild !" cried the pirate, springing to his feet, 
 " I did not think to show a weakness before this 
 stranger, but I implore you to delay !" 
 
 His bosom heaved with strong emotion as he 
 spoke, and the colour fled from his bronzed features 
 as if he were struck with a mortal sickness. 
 
 " I cannot lose you, Iminild ! I have loved you 
 too long. You must " 
 
 She motioned to Percie to pass on. 
 
 " By heaven, you shall !" he cried, in a voice sud 
 denly become hoarse with passion ; and reckless of 
 consequences, he leaped across the heaps of cushions , 
 and, seizing Percie by the throat, flung him with 
 terrible and headlong violence into the river. 
 
 A scream from Iminild, and the report of a mus 
 ket from the other side, rang at the same instant 
 through the cavern, and as I rushed forward to 
 seize the pistol which he had struck from Percie s 
 hand, his half-drawn sabre slid back powerless into 
 the sheath, and Tranchcceur dropped heavily on his 
 knee. 
 
 " I am peppered, Mr. Tyrell !" he said, waving me 
 19* 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVfit. 
 
 off with difficult effort to smile, "look after the 
 boy, if you care for him ! A curse on her German 
 wolves !" 
 
 Percie met me on the bridge, supporting Iminild, 
 who hung on his neck, smothering him with kisses. 
 
 " Where is that dog of a pirate V she cried, sud 
 denly snatching her ataghan from the sheath and 
 flying across the platform. " Tranchcoeur !" 
 
 Her hand was arrested by the deadly pallor and 
 helpless attitude of the wounded man, and the wea 
 pon dropped as she stood over him. \ 
 
 " 1 think it is not mortal," he said, groaning as he 
 pressed his hand to his side. " but take your boy 
 out of my sight! Iminild!" 
 
 Well^ranchcceur !" 
 
 " I have not done well but you know my nature 
 and my love ! Forgive me, and farewell ! Send 
 Bertram to stanch his blood I get faint ! A little 
 wine, Iminild !" 
 
 He took the massive flagon from her hand, and 
 drank a long draught, and then drawing to him a 
 cloak which lay near, he covered his head and drop 
 ped on his side as if to sleep. 
 
 Iminild knelt beside him and tore open the shirt 
 beneath his jacket, and while she busied herself in 
 stanching the blood, Perdicaris, apparently well pre 
 pared tor such accidents, arrived with a surgeon s 
 probe, and, on examination of the wound, assured 
 
THE BANDIT OF AU-STRIA. 
 
 Iminild that she might safely leave him. Washing 
 her hands in the flagon of wine, she threw a cloak 
 over the wet and shivering Percie, and, silent with 
 horror at the scene behind us, we made our way 
 over the bridge, and in a short time, to my infinite 
 relief, stood in the broad moonlight on the portico 
 of Myneer Krakenpate. 
 
 My carriage was soon loaded with the baggage 
 and treasure of the countess, and with the same 
 swift horses that had brought us from Planina, we 
 regained the post-road, and sped on toward Venice 
 by the Friuli. We arrived on the following night 
 at the fair city so beloved of romance, and with 
 what haste I might, I procured a priest and mar 
 ried the Countess Iminild to gentleman Percie. 
 
 As she possessed now a natural guardian, and a 
 sufficient means of life, I felt released from my death 
 vow to Yvain, and bidding farewell to the "happy 
 couple," I resumed my quiet habit of travel, and 
 three days after my arrival at Venice, was on the 
 road to Padua by the Brenta. 
 
, or tfte 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 OONDER-HOOFDEN, O.I THE UNDERCLIFF. 
 
 A TALE OF THE VOYAGE OF HKNDRICK HUDSON. 
 
 CHAP. 1. 
 
 " It is but an arm of the sea, as I told thee, skip 
 per," said John Fleming, the mate of the " Halve- 
 Mane," standing ready to jam down the tiller and 
 bring-to, if his master should agree with him in opi 
 nion. 
 
 Hudson stood by his steersman, with folded arms, 
 now looking at the high-water mark on the rocks, 
 which betrayed a falling tide, now turning his ear 
 slightly forward to catch the cry of the man who 
 stood heaving the lead from the larboard bow. The 
 wind drew lightly across the starboard quarter, and, 
 with a counter-tide, the little vessel stole on scarce 
 perceptibly, though her mainsail was kept full the 
 
228 OONDER-HOOFDEtt* 
 
 4 
 
 slowly passing forest trees on the shore giving the 
 lie to the merry and gurgling ripple at the prow. 
 
 The noble river, or creek, which they had follow 
 ed in admiring astonishment for fifty miles, had hith 
 erto opened fairly and broadly before them, though, 
 once or twice, its widening and mountain-girt bosom 
 had deceived the bold navigator into the belief, 
 that he was entering upon some inland lake. The 
 wind still blew kindly and steadily from the south 
 east, and the sunset of the second day a spectacle 
 of tumultuous and gorgeous glory which Hudson 
 attributed justly to the more violent atmospheric 
 laws of an unsettled continent had found them appa 
 rently closed in by impenetrable mountains, and run 
 ning immediately on the head shore of an extended 
 arm of the sea. 
 
 " She ll strike before she can follow her helm, " 
 cried the young sailor in an impatient tone, yet still 
 with hab ! tual obedience keeping her duly on her 
 course. 
 
 " Port a little !" answered the skipper, a moment 
 after, as if he had not heard the querulous comment 
 of his mate. 
 
 Fleming s attention was withdrawn an instant by 
 a low gutteral sound of satisfaction, which reached 
 his ear as the head of the vessel went round, and. 
 casting his eye a-mid-ships, he observed the three 
 Indians who had come off to the Half-Moon in a 
 
OONDER-HOOFDEN. 220 
 
 canor and had been received onboard by the master, 
 standing together in the chains, and looking for 
 ward to the rocks they were approaching with 
 countenances of the most eager interest. 
 
 "Master Hendrick!" he vociferated in the tone of 
 a man who can contain his anger no longer, " will 
 you look at these grinning red-devils, who are re 
 joicing to see you run so blindly ashore ?" 
 
 The adventurous little bark was r>y this time 
 within a biscuit toss of a rocky point that jutted 
 forth iiiio rhe river with the grace of a ^cidy ; c root 
 dallying with the water in her bath ; and, beyond 
 the sedgy bank disappeared in an apparent inlet, 
 barely deep enough, it seemed to the irritated steers 
 man, to shelter a canoe. 
 
 As the Half-Moon obeyed her last order, and 
 headed a point more to the west, Hudson strode 
 forward to the bow, and sprang upon the windlass, 
 stretching his gaze eagerly into the bosom of the 
 hills that were now darkening with the heavy sha 
 dows of twilight, though the sky was still gorgeously 
 purple overhead. 
 
 The crew had by this time gathered with uncon 
 scious apprehension at the halyards, ready to let go 
 at the slightest gesture of the master, but, in the 
 slow progress of the little bark, the minute or two 
 which she took to advance beyond the point on 
 which his eye was fixed, seemed an age of suspense. 
 20 
 
230 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 The Half-Moon seemed now almost immoveable 
 for the current, which convinced Hudson there was 
 a passage beyond, set her back from the point with 
 increasing force, and the wind lulled a little with the 
 sunset. Inch by inch, however she crept on, till at 
 last the silent skipper sprang from the windlass upon 
 the bowsprit, and, running out with the agility of a 
 boy, gave a single glance ahead, and the next mo 
 ment had the tiller in his hand, and cried out with a 
 voice of thunder, "Stand bv the halvards! helm s- 
 alee!" 
 
 In a moment, as if his words had been lightning, 
 the blocks rattled, tho heavy boom swung round lik^ 
 a willow spray, and the white canvass, after flutter 
 ing an instant in the wind, filled and drew steadily 
 on the other tack. 
 
 Looks of satisfaction were exchanged between 
 the crew, who expected the next instant an order 
 to take in the sail and drop anchor but the master 
 was at the helm, and to their utter consternation, he 
 kept her steadily to the wind and drove straight on 
 while a gorge, that in the increasing darkness, 
 seemed the entrance to a cavern, opened its rocky 
 sides as they advanced. 
 
 The apprehensions of the crew were half lost in 
 their astonishment at the grandeur of the scene. 
 The cliffs seemed to close up behind them ; a moun 
 tain, that reached apparently to the now colourless 
 
ObNliEk-HOOFDEN. 231 
 
 clouds, rose up gigantic, in the increasing twilight, 
 over the prow; on the right, where the water seemed 
 to bend, a craggy precipice extended its threaten 
 ing wall ; and in the midst of this round bay, which 
 seemed to them to be an enclosed lake in the bottom 
 of an abyss, the wind suddenly took them aback, 
 the Halve Mane lost her headway, and threatened 
 to go on the rocks with the current, and audible cur 
 ses at his folly reached the ears of the determined 
 master. 
 
 More to divert their attention than with a prognos 
 tic of the direction of the wind, Hudson gave the 
 order to tack, and, more slowly this time, but still 
 with sufficient expedition, the movement was execut 
 ed, and the flapping sails swung round. The hal 
 yards, were not belayed before the breeze, rush 
 ing down a steep valley on the left, struck full 
 on the larboard quarter, and, running sharp past 
 the face of the precipice over the starboard bow, 
 Hudson pointed out, exultingly, to his astonished 
 men, the broad waters of the mighty river, extend 
 ing far through the gorge beyond the dim purple 
 of the lingering day, which had been long lost to the 
 cavernous and overshadowed pass they had pene 
 trated, tinting its far bosom like the last faint hue of 
 the expiring dolphin. 
 
 The exulting glow of triumph suffused the face 
 of the skipper, and relinquishing the tiller once more 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 to the mortified Fleming, he walked forward to look 
 out for an anchorage. The Indians, who still stood 
 in the chains together, and who had continued to 
 express their satisfaction as the vessel made her way 
 through the pass, now pointed eagerly to a little 
 bay on the left, across which a canoe was shooting 
 like the reflection of a lance in the air, and, the wind 
 dying momently away, Hudson gave the order to 
 round to, and dropped his anchor for the night. 
 
 In obedience to the politic orders of Hudson the 
 men were endeavouring, by presents and s : gns, to 
 induce the Indians to leave the vessel, and the mas 
 ter himself stood on the poop with his mate, gazing 
 back on the wonderful scene they had passed 
 through. 
 
 " This passage," said Hudson, musingly, " has 
 been rent open by an earthquake, and the rocks look 
 still as if they felt the agony of the throe." 
 
 " It is a pity the earthquake did its job so rag 
 gedly, then !" answered his sulky companion, who 
 had not yet forgiven the mountains for the shame 
 their zig-zag precipices hnd put upon his sagacity. 
 
 At that instant a sound, like that of a heavy body 
 sliding into the water, struck the ear of Fleming, 
 and looking quickly over the stern, he saw one of 
 the Indians swimming from the vessel with a pillow 
 in his hand, which he had evidently stolen from the 
 cabin window. To seize a musket, which lay ready 
 
OONDER-HOOFDEN. 233 
 
 for attack on the quarter-deck, and fire upon the 
 poor savage, was the sudden thought and action of a 
 man on the watch, for a vent to incensed feelings. 
 
 The Indian gave a yell which mingled wildly with 
 the echoes of the report from the reverberating hills, 
 and springing waist-high out of the water, the gurg 
 ling eddy closed suddenly over his head. 
 
 The canoe in which the other savages were 
 already embarked shot away, like an arrow, to the 
 shore, and Hudson, grieved and alarmed inexpres 
 sibly at the fool-hardy rashness of his mate, ordered 
 all hands to arms, and established a double watch 
 for the night. 
 
 Hour after hour, the master and the non-repent 
 ant Fleming paced fore and aft, each in his own 
 quarter of the vessel, watching the shore and the 
 dark face of the water with straining eyes : but no 
 sound came from the low cliff round which the fly 
 ing canoe had vanished, and the stars seemed to 
 wink almost audibly in the dread stillness of nature. 
 The men alarmed at the evident agitation of Hud 
 son, who, in these pent-up waters, anticipated a 
 most effective and speedy revenge from the sur 
 rounding tribes, drowsed not upon their watch, and 
 the gray light of the morning began to show faintly 
 over the mountains before the anxious master with 
 drew his aching eyes from the still and star 
 waters. 
 
 20* 
 
234 ROMANCE TRAVEL. 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 LIKE a web woven of gold by the lightning, the 
 sun s rays ran in swift threads from summit to sum 
 mit of the dark green mountains, and the soft mist 
 that slept on the breast of the river began to lift like 
 the slumberous lid from the eye of woman, when 
 her dream is broken at dawn. Not so poetically 
 were these daily glories regarded, however, by the 
 morning watch of the Half-Moon, who, between 
 the desire to drop asleep with their heads on the 
 capstan, and the necessity of keeping sharper watch 
 lest the Indians should come off through the rising 
 mist, bore the double pains of Tantalus and Sysi- 
 phus ungratified desire at their lips and threaten 
 ing ruin over their heads. 
 
 After dividing the watch at the break of day, 
 Hudson, with the relieved part of his crew, had 
 gone below, and might have been asleep an hour, 
 when Fleming suddenly entered the cabin and laid 
 his hand upon his shoulder. The skipper sprang 
 from his birth with the habitual readiness of a sea 
 man, and followed his mate upon deck, w!: re he 
 found his men standing to their arms, and watching 
 an object that, to his first glance, seemed like a canoe 
 sailing down upon them through the air. The rash 
 homi cide drew close to Hendrick as he regarded it ? 
 
OONDER-HOOFDEN. 235 
 
 and the chatter of his teeth betrayed that during the 
 long and anxious watches of the night, his conscience 
 had not justified him for the hasty death he had 
 awarded to a fellow creature. 
 
 " She but looms through the mist !" said the skip 
 per, after regarding the advancing object for a 
 moment. " It is a single canoe, and can scarce 
 harm us. Let her come alongside !" 
 
 The natural explanation of the phenomenon at 
 once satisfied the crew, who had taken their super- 
 stitous fears rather from Fleming s evident alarm 
 than from their own want of reflection ; but the 
 guilty man himself still gazed on the advancing 
 phantom, and when a slight stir of the breeze raised 
 the mist like the corner of a curtain, and dropped 
 the canoe plain upon the surface of the river, he 
 turned gloomily on his heel, and muttered in an 
 undertone to Hudson, " It brings no good, Skipper 
 Hendrick !" 
 
 Meanwhile the canoe advanced slowly. The 
 single paddle which propelled her paused before 
 every turn, and as the mist lifted quite up and show 
 ed a long green line of shore between its shadowy 
 fringe and the water, an Indian, highly painted, and 
 more ornamented than any they had hitherto seen, 
 appeared gazing earnestly at the vessel, and evident 
 ly approaching with fear and caution. 
 
 The Half-Moon was heading up the river wi tn 
 
236 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 the rising tide, and Hudson walked forward to the 
 bows to look at the savage more closely. By the 
 eagle and bear, so richly embroidered in the gay- 
 coloured quills of the porcupine on his belt of wam 
 pum, he presumed him to be a chief; and glancing 
 his eye into the canoe, he saw the pillow which had 
 occasioned the death of the plunderer the night 
 before, and on it lay two ears of corn, and two 
 broken arrows. Pausing a moment as he drew 
 near, the Indian pointed to these signs of peace, and 
 Hudson, in reply, spread out his open hands and 
 beckoned him to come on board. In an instant the 
 slight canoe shot under the starboard bow, and with 
 a noble confidence which the skipper remarked 
 upon with admiration, the tall savage sprang upon 
 the deck and laid the hand of the commander to 
 his breast. 
 
 The noon arrived, hot and sultry, and there was 
 no likelihood of a wind till sunset. The chief had 
 been feasted on board, and had shown, in his delight, 
 the most^unequivocal evidence of good feeling; and 
 even Fleming, at last, who had drank more freely than 
 usual during the morning, abajadoned his suspicion, 
 and joined in amusing the superp savage who was 
 their guest. In the course of the forenoon, another 
 canoe came off, paddled by a single young woman, 
 whom Fleming, recognised as having accompanied 
 
OONDER-HOOFDEN. 
 
 the plunderers the night before, but in his half-intox^ 
 icated state, it seemed to recall none of his previous 
 bodings, and to his own surprise, and that of the 
 crew, she evidently regarded him with particulai 
 favour, and by pertinacious and ingenious signs, 
 endeavoured to induce him to go ashore with her 
 in the canoe. The particular character of her face 
 and form would have given the mate a clue to her 
 probable motives, had he been less reckless from his 
 excitement. She was taller than is common for 
 females of the savage tribes, and her polished limbs, 
 as gracefully moulded in their dark hues as those of 
 the mercury of the fountain, combined, with their 
 slightness, a nerve and steadiness of action which 
 betrayed strength and resolution of heart and frame. 
 Her face was highly beautiful, but the voluptuous 
 fulness of the lips was contradicted by a fierce fire 
 in her night- dark eyes, and a quickness of the brow 
 to descend, which told of angry passions habitu 
 ally on the alert. It was remarked by Hans Chris- 
 taern, one of the crew, that when Fleming left her 
 for an instant, she abstracted herself from the other 
 joyous groups, and, with folded arms and looks of 
 brooding thoughtfulness, stood looking over the stern ; 
 but immediately on his re-appearance, her snowy 
 teeth became visible between her relaxing lips, and 
 she resumed her patient gaze upon his countenance, 
 and her occasionl efforts to draw him into the canoe, 
 
238 ROMANCE OF TRAVfiL. 
 
 Quite regardless of the presence of the woman, 
 the chief sat apart with Hudson, communicating his 
 ideas by intelligent signs, and after a while, the skip 
 per called his mate, and informed him that, as far as 
 he could understand, the chief wished to give them 
 a feast on shore. " Arm yourselves well, " said 
 he, " though I look for no treachery from this noble 
 pagan ; and if chance should put us in danger, we 
 shall be more tKan a match for the whole tribe. 
 Come with me, Fleming," he continued, after a 
 pause, " you are too rash with your fire-arms to be 
 left in command. Man the watch, four of you, 
 and the rest get into the long-boat. We ll while 
 away these sluggish hours, though danger is in it." 
 
 The men sprang gaily below for their arms, and 
 were soon equipped and ready, and the chief, with 
 an expression of delight, put offin his canoe, followed 
 more slowly by the heavy long-boat, into which 
 Hudson, having given particular orders to the watch 
 to let no savages on board during his absence, was 
 the last to embark. The woman, whom the chief had 
 called to him before his departure by the name of 
 Kihyalee, sped off before in her swift canoe to ano 
 ther point of the shore, and when Fleming cried out 
 from the bow of the boat, impatiently motioning her 
 to follow, she smiled in a manner that sent a momen 
 tary shudder through the veins of the skipper who 
 chanced to observe the action, and by a circular 
 
OONDER-HOOPDEN. 239 
 
 movement of her arm conveyed to him that she 
 should meet him from the other side of the hill. As 
 they followed the chief, they disco verd the wig 
 wams of an Indian village behind the rocky point 
 for which she was making, and understood that the 
 chief had sent her thither on some errand connected 
 with his proposed hospitality. 
 
 A large square rock, which had the look of hav 
 ing been hurled with some avalanche from the 
 mountain, lay in the curve of a small beach of sand, 
 surrounded by the shallow water, and, on the left of 
 this, the chief pointed out to the skipper a deeper 
 channel, hollowed by the entrance of a mountain* 
 torrent into the river, through which he might bring 
 his boat to land. At the edge of this torrent s bed, 
 the scene of the first act of hospitality to our race 
 upon the Hudson, stands at this day the gate to the 
 most hospitable mansion on the river, as if the spirit 
 of the spot had consecrated it to its first association 
 with the white man. 
 
 The chief led the way when the crew had disem 
 barked, by a path skirting the deep-worn bed of the 
 torrent, and after an ascent of a few minutes, through 
 a grove of tall firs, a short turn to the left brought 
 them upon an open table of land, a hundred and fifty 
 feet above the river, shut in by a circle of forest-trees, 
 and frowned over on the east by a tall and bald cliff, 
 which shot up in a perpendicular line to the height 
 
40 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 of three hundred feet. From a cleft in the face of* 
 this precipice a natural spring oozed forth, drawing 
 a darker line down the sun-parched rock, and feeding 
 a small stream that found its way to the river on the 
 northern side of the platform just mentioned, creating 
 between itself and the deeper torrent to the south, 
 a sort of highland peninsula, now constituting the 
 estate of the hospitable gentleman above alluded to. 
 Hudson looked around him with delight and sur- 
 piise when he stood on the highest part of the broad 
 natural table selected by the chief for his entertain 
 ment. The view north showed a cleft through the 
 hills, with the river coiled like a lake in its widening 
 bed, while a blue and wavy line of mountains form 
 ed the far horizon at its back ; south, the bold eminen 
 ces, between which he had found his adventurous 
 way, closed in like the hollowed sides of a bright- 
 green vase, with glimpses of the river lying in its 
 bottom like crystal; below him descended a sharp 
 and wooded bank, with the river at its foot, and 
 directly opposite rose a hill in a magnificent cone 
 to the very sky, sending its shadow down through 
 the mirrored water, as if it entered to some inner 
 world. The excessive lavishness of the foliage 
 clothed these bold natural features with a grace and 
 richness altogether capt vating to the senses, and 
 Hudson long stood, gazing around him, believing 
 that the tales of brighter and happier lands were 
 
OONDER-HOOFDBN. 241 
 
 truer than he had deemed, and that it was his lucky 
 destiny to have been the discoverer of a future 
 Utopia. 
 
 A little later, several groups of Indians were seen 
 advancing from the village, bearing the materials 
 for a feast, which they deposited under a large tree, 
 indicated by the chief. It was soon arranged, and 
 Hudson with his men surrounded the dishes of shell 
 and wood, one of which, placed in the centre, con 
 tained a roasted dog, half buried in Indian-corn. 
 While the chief and several of his warriors sat down 
 in company with the whites, the young men danced 
 the calumet-dance to the sound of a rude drum, 
 formed by drawing a skin tightly over a wooden 
 bowl, and near them, in groups, stood the women 
 and children of the village, glancing with looks of 
 curiosity from the feats of the young men to the 
 unaccustomed faces of the strangers. 
 
 Among the women stood Kihyalee, who kept her 
 large bright eyes fixed almost fiercely upon Fleming 
 yet when he looked towards her, she smiled and 
 turned as if she would beckon him away a bid 
 ding which he tried in vain to obey, under the vi 
 gilant watch of his master. 
 
 The feast went on, and the Indians having pro 
 duced gourds, filled with a slight intoxicating liquor 
 made from the corn, Hudson offered to the chief 
 some spirits from a bottle which he had entrusted 
 21 
 
242 ROBAWCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 to one of the men to wash down the expected rough 
 ness of the savage viands. The bottle passed in 
 turn to the mate, who was observed to drink freely, 
 and, a few minutes after, Hudson rising to see more 
 nearly a trial of skill with the bow and arrow, Flem 
 ing found the desired opportunity, and followed the 
 tempting Kihyalee into the forest. 
 
 The sun began to throw the shadows of the tall 
 pines in gigantic pinnacles along the ground and the 
 youths of the friendly tribe, who had entertained the 
 great navigator, ceased from their dances and feats 
 of skill, and clustered around the feast- tree. Intend 
 ing to get under weigh with the evening breeze and 
 proceed still farther up the river, Hudson rose to col 
 lect his men, and bid the chief farewell. Taking the 
 hand of the majestic savage and putting it to his 
 breast, to express in his own manner the kind feel 
 ings he entertained for him, he turned toward the 
 path by which he came, and was glancing round at 
 his men, when Hans Christaern enquired if he had 
 sent the mate back to the vessel. 
 
 " Der teufel, no !" answered the skipper, missing 
 him for the first time ; " has he been long gone ?" 
 
 " A full hour !" said one of the men. 
 
 Hudson put his hand to his head, and remember- 
 ed the deep wroug Fleming had done to the tribe. 
 Retribution, he feared, had over-taken him but 
 
OONDEE-HOPDBN. 243 
 
 how was it done so silently ? How had the guilty 
 man been induced to leave his comrades, and acce 
 lerate his doom by his own voluntary act? 
 
 The next instant resolved the question. A distant, 
 and prolonged scream, as of a man in mortal agony, 
 drew all eyes to the summit of the beetling cliff, 
 which overhung them. On its extremest verge, out 
 lined distinctly against the sky, stood the tall figure of 
 Kihyalee, holding from her, yet poised over the pre 
 cipice, the writhing form of her victim, while in the 
 other hand, flashing in the rays of the sun, glittered 
 the bright hatchet she had plucked from his girdle. 
 Infuriated at the sight, and suspecting collision on 
 the part of the chief, Hudson drew his cutlass and 
 gave the order to stand to arms, but as he turned? 
 the gigantic savage had drawn an arrow to its head 
 with incredible force, and though it fell far short of 
 its mark, there was that in the action and in his look 
 which, in the passing of a thought, changed the mind 
 of the skipper. In another instant, the hesitating 
 arm of the widowed Kihyalee descended, and loose- 
 ening her hold upon the relaxed body of her victim, 
 the doomed mate fell heavily down the face of the 
 precipice. 
 
 The chief turned to Hudson, who stood trembling 
 and aghast at the awful scene, and plucking the re 
 maining arrows from his quiver, he broke them and 
 threw himself on the ground. The tribe gathered 
 
244 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 around their chief, Hudson moved his hand to them 
 in token of forgiveness, and in a melancholy silence 
 the crew took their way after him to the shore. 
 

ROMANCE OF TRAVEL, 
 
 THE PICKER AND FILER. 
 
 The nature of the strange incident I have to relate 
 forbids me to record either place or time. 
 
 On one of the wildest nights in which I had ever 
 been abroad, I drove my panting horses through a 
 snow drift breast high, to the door of a small tavern 
 in the western country. The host turned out un 
 willingly at the knock of my whip handle on the 
 outer door, and, wading, before the tired animals to 
 the barn, which was nearly inaccessible from the 
 banks of snow, he assisted me in getting off their 
 frozen harnesses, and bestowing them safely for the 
 night 
 
 The "bar-room" fire burnt brightly, and never was 
 fire more welcome. Room was made for me by 
 four or five rough men who sat silent around it, and 
 
 
$4$ ROMANCE OF* TRAVEL, 
 
 with a keen comprehension of " pleasure after pain, 
 I took off my furs and moccasins, and streched my 
 cold contracted limbs to the blaze. When, a few 
 minutes after, a plate of cold salt beef was brought 
 hie, with a corn cake and a mug of " flip" hissing 
 from the poker, it certainly would have been hard to 
 convince me that I would have put on my coats and 
 moccasins again to have ridden a mile to Paradise* 
 
 The faces pf my new companions, which I had 
 not found time to inspect very closely while my sup 
 per lasted, were fully revealed by the light of a pitch- 
 pine knot, thrown on the hearth by the landlord 
 and their grim reserve and ferocity put me in mind* 
 for the first time since I had entered the room, of my 
 errand in that quarter of the country. 
 
 The timber-tracts which lie convenient to the 
 rivers of the west, offer to the refugee and desperado 
 of every description, a resource from want, and, (in 
 their own opinion,) from crime, which is seized upon 
 by aH at least who are willing to labour. The own 
 ers of the extensive forests, destined to - become so 
 valuable, are mostly men of large speculation, living 
 in citeis, who> satisfied with the constant advance.-in 
 the price of lumber, consider their pine-trees as liable 
 to nothing but the laws of nature, and leave them 
 unfenced and unprotected, to increase in size and 
 value till the land beneath them is wanted for culture, 
 It is natural enough that solitary settlers, living in the 
 
TUB PICKER A X D FILER. 249 
 
 neighborhood of miles of apparently unclaimed land, 
 should think seldom of the owner, and in time grow 
 to the opinion of the Indian, that the Great Spirit 
 gave the land, the air, and the water, to all his 
 children, and they are free to all alike. Furnishing 
 the requisite teams and implements therefore, the 
 inhabitants of these tracts collect a number of the 
 stragglers through the country, and forming what 
 is called a " bee," go into the nearest woods, and 
 for a month or more, work laboriously at selecting, 
 and felling the tallest and straightest pines. In their 
 rude shanty at night they have bread, pork, and 
 whiskey, which hard labour makes sufficiently palat 
 able, and the time is passed merrily till the snow is 
 right for sledding. The logs are then drawn to the 
 water sides, rafts are formed, and the valuable 
 lumber, for which they paid nothing but their labour, 
 is run to the cites for their common advantage. 
 
 The only enemies of this class of men are the agents 
 who are sometimes sent out in the winter to detect 
 them in the act of felling or drawing off timber, and 
 in the dark countenances around the fire, I read this 
 as the interpretation of my own visit to the woods. 
 They soon brightened and grew talkative when they 
 discovered that I was in search of hands to fell and 
 burn, and make clearing for a farm ; and after a 
 talk of an hour or two, I was told in answer to my 
 inquiries, that all the" men people" in the country 
 
250 ROMANCE OF TEAVEL. 
 
 were busy "lumbering for themselves," unless it 
 were the " Picker and Filer." 
 
 As the words were pronounced, a shrill neigh 
 outside the door pronounced the arrival of a new 
 comer. 
 
 " Talk of the devil" said the man in a lower tone, 
 and without finishing the proverb he rose with a 
 respect which he had not accorded to me, to make 
 room for the Picker and Piler. 
 
 A man of rather low stature entered, and turned to 
 drive back his horse, who had followed him nearly 
 in. I observed that the animal had neither saddle 
 uor bridle. Shutting the door upon him without 
 violence, he exchanged nods with one or two of the 
 men, and giving the landlord a small keg which he 
 had brought, he pleaded haste for refusing the 
 offered chair, and stood silent by the fire. His fea 
 tures were blackened with smoke, but I could see 
 that they were small and regular, and his voice, 
 though it conveyed in its deliberate accents an 
 indefinable resolution, was almost femininely soft 
 and winning. 
 
 " That stranger yonder has got a job for you, " 
 said the landlord, as he gave him back the keg and 
 received the money. 
 
 Turning quickly upon me, he detected me in a 
 very eager scrunity of himself, and for a moment I 
 was thrown too much off my guard to address him. 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER. 251 
 
 " Is it you, sir ?" he asked, after waiting a mo 
 ment. 
 
 Yes, I have some work to be done hereabouts, 
 but you seem in a hurry. Could you call here to 
 morrow." 
 
 " I may not be here again in a week." 
 
 " Do you live far from here ?" He smiled. 
 
 " I scarce know where I live, but I am burning a 
 piece of wood a mile or two up the run, and if you 
 would like a warmer bed than the landlord will give 
 you " 
 
 That personage decided the question for me by 
 telling me in so many words that I had better go. 
 His beds were all taken up, and my horses should 
 be taken care of till my return. I saw that my pre 
 sence had interrupted something, probably the for. 
 mation of a " bee," and more willingly than I would 
 have believed possible an hour before, I resumed my 
 furs and wrappers, and declared that I was ready. 
 The Picker and Filer had inspired me, and I knew 
 not why, with an involuntary respect and liking. 
 
 " It is a rough night, sir," said he, as he shoulder 
 ed a rifle he had left outside, and slung the keg by 
 a leather strap over the neck of his horse, "but I 
 will soon show you a better climate. Come, sir, 
 jump on !" 
 
 "And you?" I said inquisitively, as he held his 
 horse by the mane for me to mount. It was a 
 
252 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 Canadian pony, scarce larger than a Newfoundland 
 dog. 
 
 " I am more used to the road, sir, and will walk. 
 Come?" 
 
 " It was no time to stand upon etiquette, even if 
 it had been possible to resist the strange tone of 
 authority with which he spoke. So without more 
 ado, I sprang upon the animal s back, and holding 
 on by the long tuft upon his withers, suffered him 
 passively to plunge through the drift after his 
 master. 
 
 Wondering at the readiness with which I had 
 entered upon this equivocal adventure, but never for 
 an instant losing confidence in my guide, I shut my 
 eyes to the blinding cold, and accommodating my 
 limbs as well as I could to the bare back and scram 
 bling paces of the Canadian. The Picker and 
 Filer strode on before, the pony following like a 
 spaniel at his heels, and after a half hour s tramp, 
 during which I had merely observed that we were 
 rounding the base of a considerable hill, we turned 
 short to the right, and were met by a column of 
 smoke, which, lifting, the moment after, disclosed 
 the two slopes of a considerable valley enveloped 
 in one sea of fire. A red, lurid cloud, overhung it 
 at the tops of the tallest trees, and far and wide, 
 above that, spread a covering of black smoke, heav 
 ing upward in vast and billowy masses, and rolling 
 away on every side into the darkness. 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER. 253 
 
 We approached a pine of gigantic height, on fire 
 to the very peak, not a branch left on the trunk, 
 and its pitchy knots distributed like the eyes of the 
 lamprey, burning pure and steady amid the irregu 
 lar flame. I had once or twice, with an instinctive 
 wish to draw rein, pulled hard upon the tangled 
 tuft in my hand, but master and horsa* kept on. 
 This burning tree, however, was the first of a thou 
 sand, and as the pony turned his eyes away from 
 the intense heat to pass between it and a bare rock, 
 I glanced into the glowing labyrinth beyond, and 
 my faith gave way. I jumped from his back and 
 hailed the Picker and Filer, with a halloo scarcely 
 audible amid the tumult of the crackling branches* 
 My voice did not evidently reach his ear, but the 
 pony, relieved from my weight, galloped to his side, 
 and rubbed his muzzle against the unoccupied hand 
 of his master. 
 
 He turned back immediately. " I beg pardon," 
 he said, "I have that to think of just now which 
 makes me forgetful. I am not surprised at your 
 hesitation, but mount again and trust the pony." 
 
 The animal turned rather unwillingly at his mas 
 ter s bidding, and a little ashamed of having shown 
 fear, while a horse would follow, I jumped again 
 on his back. 
 
 " If you find the heat inconvienent, cover your 
 face." And with this laconic advice, the Picker 
 22 
 
254 
 
 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 and Filer turned on his heel, and once more strode 
 away before us. 
 
 Sheltering the sides of my face by holding up the 
 corners of my wrapper with both hands, I aban 
 doned myself to the horse. He overtook his master 
 with a shuffling canter, and putting his nose ag 
 close to the ground as he could carry it without 
 stumbling, followed closely at his heels. I observed, 
 by the green logs lying immediately along our path, 
 that we were following an avenue of prostrate 
 timber which had been felled before the wood was 
 fired ; but descending presently to the left, we 
 , struck at once into the deep bed of a brook, and 
 by the lifted head and slower gait of the pony, as 
 well as my own easier respiration, I found that the" 
 hollow through which it ran, contained a body 
 of pure air unreached by the swaying curtains of 
 smoke or the excessive heat of the fiery currents 
 above. The pony now picked his way leisurely 
 along the brookside, and while my lungs expanded 
 with the relief of breathing a more temperate 
 atmosphere, I raised myself from my stooping post 
 ure in a profuse perspiration, and one by one disem- 
 barassed myself from my protectives against the 
 cold. 
 
 I had lost sight for several minutes of the Picker 
 and Filer, and presumed by the pony s desultory 
 movements that he was near the end of his journey y 
 
THE PICKER AND PILBR. 
 
 when, rounding a shelvy point of rock, we stood 
 suddenly upon the brink of a slight waterfall, where 
 the brook leaped four or five feet into a shrunken 
 dell, and after describing a half circle on a rocky 
 platform, resumed its onward course in the same 
 direction as before. This curve of the brook and 
 the platform it enclosed lay lower than the general 
 level of the forest, and the air around and within it, 
 it seemed to me, was as clear and genial as the 
 summer noon. Over one side, from the rocky wall, 
 a rude and temporary roof of pine slabs drooped 
 upon a barricade of logs, forming a low hut, and 
 before the entrance of this, at the moment of my 
 appearance, stood a woman and a showily dressed 
 young man, both evidently confused at the sudden 
 apparition of the Picker and Filer. My eyes had 
 scarce rested on the latter, when, from standing at 
 his fullest height with his rifle raised as if to beat 
 the other to the earth, he suddenly resumed his 
 stooping and quiet mien, set his rifle against the 
 rock, and came forward to give me his hand. 
 " My daughter !" he said, more in the way of 
 explanation than introduction, and without taking 
 further notice of the young man whose presence 
 seemed so unwelcome, he poured me a draught 
 from the keg he had brought, pointed to the water 
 falling close at my hand, and threw himself at his 
 length upon the ground. 
 
256 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 The face and general appearance of the young 
 man, now seated directly opposite me, offered no 
 temptation for more than a single glance, and my 
 whole attention was soon absorbed by the daughter 
 of my singular host, who, crossing from the plat 
 form to the hut, divided her attention between a 
 haunch of venison roasting before a burning log of 
 hickory, and the arrangement of a few most primi 
 tive implements for our coming supper. She was 
 slight, like her father, in form, and as far as I had 
 been able to distinguish his blackened features, 
 resembled him in the general outline. But in the 
 place of his thin and determined mouth, her lips were 
 round and voluptuous, and though her eye looked 
 as if it might wake, it expressed, even in the pre 
 sence of her moody father, a drowsy and soft indo 
 lence, common enough to the Asiatics, but seldom 
 seen in America. Her dress was coarse and 
 careless, but she was beautiful with every possible 
 disadvantage, and, whether married or not, evi 
 dently soon to become a mother. 
 
 The venison was placed before us on the rock, 
 and the young man, uninvited, and with rather an 
 air of bravado, cut himself a steak from the haunch 
 and broiled it on the hickory coals, while the daugh 
 ter kept as near him as her attention to her father s 
 wants would permit, but neither joined us in eating, 
 nor encouraged my attempts at conversation. The 
 
THE PICKER AND P I L E R. 257 
 
 Picker and Filer ate in silence, leaving me to be 
 my own carver, and finishing his repast by a deep 
 draught from the keg which had been the means of 
 our acquaintance, he sprang upon his feet and dis- 
 ppaeared. 
 
 "The wind has changed," said the daughter, 
 looking up at the smoke, " and he has gone to the 
 western edge to start a new fire. It s a full half 
 mile, and he ll be gone an hour." 
 
 This was said with a look at me which was any 
 thing but equivocal. I was de trop. I took up the 
 rifle of the Picker and Piler, forgetting that there 
 was probably nothing to shoot in a burning wood, 
 and remarking that I would have a look for a deer, 
 jumped up the water-fall side, and was immediately 
 hidden by the rocks. 
 
 I had no conception of the scene that lay around 
 me. The natural cave or hollow of rock in which 
 the hut lay embosomed, was the centre of an area 
 of perhaps an acre, which had been felled in the 
 heart of the wood before it was set on fire. The 
 forest encircled it with blazing columns, whose 
 capitals were apparently lost in the sky, and cur 
 tains of smoke and flame, which flew as if lashed 
 into ribands by a whirlwind. The grandeur, the 
 violence, the intense brightness of the spectacle, 
 outran all imagination. The pines, on fire to the 
 peak, and straight as arrows, seemed to resemble, 
 22* 
 
258 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 at one moment the conflagration of an eastern city, 
 with innumerable minarets abandoned to the de 
 vouring element. At the next moment," the wind, 
 changing its direction, swept out every vestige of 
 smoke, and extinguished every tongue of flame, 
 and the tall trees, in clear and flameless ignition, 
 standing parallel in thousands, resembled some 
 blinding temple of the genii, whose columns of 
 miraculous rubies, sparkling audibly, outshone the 
 day. By single glances, my eye penetrated into 
 aisles of blazing pillars, extending far into the forest, 
 and the next instant, like a tremendous surge 
 alive with serpents of fire, the smoke and flame 
 swept through it, and it seemed to me as if some 
 glorious structure had been consumed in the passing 
 of a thought. For a minute, again, all would be 
 still except the crackling of the fibres of the wood, 
 and with the first stir of the wind, like a shower of 
 flashing gems, the bright coals rained down 
 through the forest, and for a moment the earth 
 glowed under the trees as if its whole crust were 
 alive with one bright ignition^ 
 
 With the pungency of the smoke and heat, and 
 the variety and bewilderment of the spectacle, I 
 found my eyes and brain growing giddy. The 
 brook ran cool below, and the heat had dried the 
 leaves in the small clearing, and with the abandon 
 ment of a man overcome with the sultriness of 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER. 259 
 
 summer, I lay down on the rivulet s bank, and 
 dipped my head and bathed my eyes in the running 
 water. Close to its surface there was not a parti 
 cle of smoke in the air, and, exceedingly refreshed 
 with its temperate coolness, I lay for sometime in 
 luxurious ease, trying in vain to fancy the winter 
 that howled without. Frost and cold were never 
 more difficult to realize in midsummer, though 
 within a hundred rods, probably, a sleeping man 
 would freeze to death in an hour. 
 
 "I have a better bed for you in the shanty," said 
 the Picker and Filer, who had approached unheard 
 in the noise of the fires, and suddenly stood over 
 me. 
 
 He took up his rifle, which I had laid against a 
 prostrate log, and looked anxiously towards the 
 descent to the hut. 
 
 " I am little inclined for sleep," I answered, " and 
 perhaps you will give me an hour of conversation 
 here. The scene is new to me" 
 
 "I have another guest to dispose of," he ans 
 wered, " and we shall be more out of the smoke 
 
 near the shanty." 
 
 I was not surprised, as I jumped upon the 
 
 platform, to find him angrily separating his daugh 
 ter and the stranger. The girl entered the hut, 
 and with a decisive gesture, he pointed the young 
 man to a " shake-down" of straw in the remotest 
 corner of the rocky enclosure. 
 
260 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 "With your leave, old gentleman," said the 
 intruder, after glancing at his intended place of 
 repose, " I ll find a crib for myself." And springing 
 up the craggy rock opposite the door of the shanty 
 he gathered a slight heap of brush, and threw it 
 into a hollow left in the earth by a tree, which, 
 though full grown and green, had been borne to the 
 earth and partly uprooted by the falling across it of 
 an overblown and gigantic pine. The earth and 
 stones had followed the uptorn mass, forming a 
 solid upright wall, from which, like struggling 
 fingers, stretching back in agony to the ground 
 from which they had parted, a few rent and naked 
 roots pointed into the cavity. The sequel will 
 show why I am so particular in this description. 
 
 "When peace was declared between England 
 and this country," said the Picker and Filer (after 
 an hour s conversation, which had led insensibly to 
 his own history,) 1 was in command of a privateer. 
 Not choosing to become a pirate, by continuing the 
 cruise, I was set ashore in the West Indies by a 
 crew in open mutiny. My property was all on 
 board, and I was left a beggar. I had one child, a 
 daughter, whose mother died in giving her birth. 
 
 " Having left a sufficient sum for her education 
 in the hands of a brother of my own, under whose 
 roof she had passed the first years of her life, I 
 determined to retrieve my fortunes before she or- 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER. 261 
 
 my friends should be made acquainted with my 
 disaster. 
 
 * Ten years passed over, and I was still a wand 
 erer and a beggar. 
 
 "I determined to see my child, and came back, 
 like one from the dead, to my brother s door. He 
 had forgotten me, and abused his trust. My 
 daughter, then seventeen, and such as you see her 
 here, was the drudge in the family of a stranger 
 ignorant and friendless. My heart turned against 
 mankind with this last drop in a bitter cup, and, 
 unfitted for quiet life, I looked around for some 
 channel of desperate adventure. But my daughter 
 was the perpetual obstacle. What to do with her? 
 She had neither the manners nor the education of a 
 lady, and to leave her a servant was impossible. I 
 started with her for the West, with the vague 
 design of joining some tribe of Indians, and chance 
 and want have thrown me into the only mode of 
 life on earth that could now be palatable to me." 
 
 " Is it not lonely," I asked, " after your stirring 
 adventures ?" 
 
 " Lonely ! If you knew the delight with which I 
 live in the wilderness, with a circle of fire to shut 
 out the world ! The labour is hard it is true, but I 
 need it, to sleep and forget. There is no way else 
 in which I could seclude my daughter. Till lately, 
 ihe has been contented, too. We live a month 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 together in one place the centre like this of a burn 
 ing wood. I can bear hardship, but I love a high 
 temperature the climate of the tropics and I have 
 it here. For weeks I forget that it is winter, tend 
 ing my fires and living on the game I have stored 
 up. There is a hollow or a brook a bed or a 
 cave, in every wood, where the cool air, as here, 
 sinks to the bottom, and there I can put up my 
 shanty, secure from all intrusion but such as I 
 bring upon myself." 
 
 The look he gave to the uprooted ash and the 
 sleeper beneath it, made an apology for this last 
 clause unnecessary. He thought not of me. 
 
 " Some months since," continued the Picker and 
 Filer, in a voice husky with suppressed feeling, " I 
 met the villain who sleeps yonder, accidentally, as I 
 met you. He is the owner of this land. After 
 engaging to clear and burn it, I invited him, as I 
 did yourself, from a momentary fever for company 
 which sometimes comes over the solitary, to go 
 with me to the fallow I was clearing. He loitered 
 in the neighborhood awhile, under pretext of hunt 
 ing, and twice on my return from the village, I 
 found that my daughter had seen him. Time has 
 betrayed the wrong he inflicted on me. 
 
 The voice of the agitated father sank almost to 
 a whisper as he pronounced the last few words, 
 and, rising from the rock on which we were sitting, 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER. 263 
 
 he paced for a few minutes up and down the plat 
 form in silence. 
 
 The reader must fill up from his own imagination 
 the drama of which this is but the outline, for the 
 Picker and Filer was not a man to be questioned, 
 and I can tell but what I saw and heard. In the 
 narration of his story he seemed but recapitulating 
 the prominent events for his own self-converse, 
 rather than attempting to tell a tale to me, and it 
 was hurried over as brokenly and briefly as I have 
 put it down. I sat in a listening attitude after he 
 concluded, but he seemed to have unburthened his- 
 bosom sufficiently, and his lips were closed with 
 stern compression. 
 
 " You forget," he said, after pacing awhile, " that 
 I offered you a place to sleep. The night wears 
 late. Stretch yourself on that straw, with your 
 cloak over you. Good night !" 
 
 I lay down and looked up at the smoke rolling 
 hca-vily into the sky till I slept. 
 
 I awoke, feeling chilled, for the rock sheltered me 
 from the rays of the fire. 1 stepped out from the 
 hollow. The fires were pale with the gray of the 
 morning, and the sky was visible through the smoke. 
 I looked around for a place to warm myself. 
 The hickory log had srriouldered out, but a fire 
 had been kindled under the overblown pine, aid 
 its pitchy heart was now flowing with the steady 
 
264 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 brilliancy of a torch. I took up one of its broken 
 branches, cracked it on my knee, and stirring up 
 the coals below, soon sent up a merry blaze, which 
 enveloped the whole trunk. 
 
 Turning my back to the increasing heat, I 
 started, for, creeping to vvards me, with a look of 
 eagerness for which I was at a loss to account, 
 came the Picker and Filer. 
 
 " Twice doomed !" he muttered between his 
 teeth, " but not by me !" 
 
 He threw down a handful of pitch pine knots, 
 laid his axe against a burning tree, and with a 
 branch of hemlock, swept off the flame from the 
 spot where the fire was eating through, as if to see 
 how nearly it was divided. 
 
 I began to think him insane, for I could get no 
 answer to my questions, and when he spoke, it was 
 half audible, and with his eyes turned from me 
 fixedly. I looked in the same direction, but could 
 see nothing remarkable. The seducer slept sound 
 ly beneath his matted wall, and the rude door of the 
 shanty was behind us. Leaving him to see phan 
 toms in the air, as I thought, I turned my eyes to 
 the drips of the waterfall, and was absorbed in 
 memories of my own, when I saw the girl steal 
 from the shanty, and with one bound overleap the 
 rfcky barrier of the platform. I laid my hand on 
 the shoulder of my host, and pointed after her, as 
 
 . 
 
THE PICKER AND FILER* 265 
 
 with stealthy pace looking back occasionally to the 
 hut, where she evidently thought her father slept, 
 she crept round toward her lover. 
 
 "He dies !" cried the infuriated man; but as he 
 jumped from me to seize his axe, the girl crouched 
 out of sight, and my own first thought was to 
 awake the sleeper. I made two bounds and look 
 ed back, for I heard no footstep. 
 
 " Stand clear!" shouted a voice of almost super 
 natural shrillness! and as I caught sight of the 
 Picker and Filer standing enveloped in smoke upon 
 the bnrning tree, with his axe high in the air, the 
 trnth flashed on me. 
 
 Down came the axe into the very heart of the 
 pitchy flame, and trembling with the tremendous 
 smoke, the trunk slowly bent upwards from the fire. 
 
 The Picker and Piler sprang clear, the overborne 
 ash creaked and heaved, and With a sick giddiness 
 in my eyes, I look at the unwarned sleeper. 
 
 One half of the dissevered pine fell to the earth, 
 and the shock startled him from his sleep. A 
 whole age seemed to me elapsing while the other 
 rose with the slow lift of the ash. As it slid heavi 
 ly away, the vigorous tree righted, like a giant 
 springing to his feet. I saw the root pin the hand 
 of the seducer to the earth a struggle a contor 
 tion and the leafless and waving top of the fecov^ 
 ered and upright tree rocked with its effort, and a 
 
266 ROMANCE OP fttAVEL. 
 
 long, sharp cry had gone out echoing through the 
 woods, and was still. I felt my brain reel 
 
 Blanched to a livid paleness, the girl moved 
 about in the sickly daylight when I recovered ; but 
 the Picker and Filer, with a clearer brow thaft I 
 had yet seen him wear, was kindling fires beneath 
 the remnants of the pine. 
 

ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 
 
 " One-p un -five outside, sir, two pun in." 
 It was a bright, calm afternoon in September, 
 promising nothing but a morrow of sunshine and 
 autumn, when I stepped in at the "White-Horse 
 cellar," in Piccadilly, to take my place in the 
 Tantivy coach for Stratford-on-Avon. Preferring 
 the outside of the coach, at least by as much 
 as the difference in the prices, and accustomed from 
 long habit to pay dearest for that which most 
 pleased me, I wrote myself down for the outside, 
 and deposited my two pound in the horny palm of 
 the old ex-coachman, retired from the box, and 
 playing clerk in this dingy den of parcels and port 
 manteaus. Supposing my buisness concluded, \ 
 stood a minute speculating on the weather-beaten, 
 23* 
 
$70 ROM A NOB OF T1AVBL. 
 
 cramp-handed old Jehu before me, and trying to 
 reconcile his ideas of "retirement from office* 
 with those of his almost next door neighbour, the 
 hero of Strathfieldsaye, He was at least as "soft 
 a gentleman" to look at as the duke; but compare 
 his crammed and noisesome cellar with the lordly 
 parks and spacious domains of a king s bounty ! 
 Yet for the mere courage of the man, there are 
 exigencies in the life of a coachman that require as 
 much as might have served his grace at Waterloo . 
 The broad rimmed beaver set knowingly on the 
 ex-Jehu s forehead, forebade a comparison between 
 their sculls. 
 
 I had mounted the first stair toward daylight, 
 when a touch on the shoulder with the end of a 
 long whip a technical "reminder," which proba 
 bly came easier to the old driver than the phrasing 
 of a sentence to a " gemman "-recalled me to the 
 cellar. 
 
 "Fifteen shillin , sir," said he laconically, pointing 
 with the same expressive exponent of his profession 
 to the change for my out side place, which I had 
 left lying on the counter. 
 
 " You are at least as honest as the duke," I soli 
 loquized, as I pocketed the six bright and substan 
 tial half-crowns, " and if a long life of honesty and 
 courage are to be rewarded but with a seat in a 
 gloomy cellar, while the addition of brain- work to 
 
BTE ATPO1D-OK-A V O If . 571 
 
 these is paid with the princely possessions of a 
 duke, there is a mistake somewhere in the scale of 
 merit." 
 
 I was at the White-Horse cellar again the fol 
 lowing morning at six, promising myself with great 
 sincerity never to rely again on the constancy of 
 an English sky. It rained in torrents. The four 
 inside places were all taken, and with twelve 
 fellow-outsides, I mounted to the wet seat, and 
 begging a little straw by way of cushion from the 
 ostler, spread my umbrella/abandoned my knees 
 with a single effort of mind to the drippings of the 
 driver s weather- proof upper Benjamin, and away 
 we sped. I was " due" at the house of a hospitable 
 old Catholic Baronet, a hundred and two miles 
 from London, at the dinner-hour of that day, and 
 to wait till it had done raining in England, is to 
 expect the millenium. 
 
 London in the morning I mean the poor man s 
 morning, daylight is to me matter for the most 
 speculative and intense melancholy. Hyde Park 
 in the sunshine of a bright afternoon, glittering with 
 equipages and gay with the Aladdin splendours of 
 rank and wealth, is a scene which sends the mer 
 curial qualities of the blood trippingly through the 
 veins. But Hyde Park at daylight seen from 
 Piccadilly through fog and rain, is perhaps, of all 
 contrasts, to one who has frequented it in its bright 
 
72 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 hours, the most dispiriting and dreary. To remem 
 ber that, behind the barricaded and wet windows 
 of Apsley House, sleeps the hero of Waterloo ; that 
 within the dripping and close-shuttered balcony 
 visible beyond, slumbers and dreams in her splen 
 did beauty the gifted woman, to whom Moore has 
 swung his censer of glorious incense, whom Byron 
 has sought, whom all the genius of England gath 
 ers about and acknowledges supreme over minds 
 like her own that under these crowded and fog- 
 wrapped houses lie in their dim chambers, breath 
 ing of perfume and luxury, the high-born and nobly- 
 moulded creatures who preserve for the aristo 
 cracy of England the palm of the world s beauty 
 to remember this, and a thousand other associa 
 tions linked with the spot, is not at all to dimmish, 
 but rather to deepen the melancholy of the picture. 
 Why is it that the deserted stage of a theatre, 
 the echo of an empty ball-room, the loneliness of a 
 frequented promenade in untimely hours any 
 scene, in short, of gayety gone by but remember 
 edoppresses and dissatisfies tfye hrvirt! One 
 would think memory should re-bright HI and re- 
 populate such places. 
 
 The wheels hissed through the shn ! v, pools in 
 the Macad irn road, the regular patl of the 
 small hoofs in the wei, carriage-trap ntained 
 
 its quick aad monotomous beat, on " ar; the 
 
BTRATFOKD-ON-AYON. 273 
 
 silent driver kept his eye on the traces, and " remin 
 ded" now and then with but the weight of his silk 
 snapper a lagging wheeler or leader, and the 
 complicated but compact machine of which the 
 square foot that I occupied had been so nicely 
 calculated, sped on its ten miles in the hour with 
 the steadfastness of a star in its orbit, and as inde 
 pendent of clouds and rain. 
 
 " Est ce que monsieur parle Francois ?" asked 
 at the end of the first stage my right-hand neigh 
 bour, a little gentleman, of whom I had hitherto 
 only remarked that he was holding on to the iron 
 railing of the seat with great tenacity. 
 
 Having admited in an evil moment that I had 
 been in France, I was first distinctly made to 
 understand that my neighbour was on his way to 
 Birmingham purely for pleasure, and without the 
 most distant object of business a point on which 
 he insisted so long, and recurred to so often, that 
 he succeeded at last in persuading me that he was 
 doubtless a candidate for the French clerkship of 
 some exporter of buttons. After listening to an 
 amusing dissertation on the rashness of committing 
 one s life to an English stage-coach, with scarce 
 room enough for the perch of a parrot, and a 
 velocity so diabkment dangereux, I tired of my 
 Frenchman \ and, * ince I could not have my own 
 thought* in peace, opened a conversation with a 
 
274 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 
 straw-bonnet and shawl on my left the property, I 
 soon discovered, of a very smart lady s maid, very 
 indignant at having been made to change places 
 with Master George, who, with his mother and her 
 mistress, were dry and comfortable inside. She 
 "would not have minded the outside place," she 
 said, " for there were sometimes very agreeable 
 gentlemen on the outside, very! but she had been 
 promised to go inside, and had dressed accordingly ; 
 and it was very provoking to spoil a nice new 
 shawl and best bonnet, just because a great school 
 boy, that had nothing on that would damage, chose 
 not to ride in the rain. " 
 
 " Very provoking, indeed ! " I responded, letting 
 in the rain upon myself unconsciously, in extending 
 my umbrella forward so as to protect her on the 
 side of the wind. 
 
 " We should have gone down in the carriage 
 sir," she continued, edging a little closer to get the 
 full advantage of my umbrella; "but John the 
 coachman has got the hinfluenzy, and my missis 
 won t be driven by no other coachman ; she s as 
 obstinate as a mule, sir. And that isn t all I could 
 tell, sir ; but I scorns to hurt the character of one of 
 my own sex. " And the pretty Abigal pursed up 
 her red lips, and looked determined not to destroy 
 her mistress s character unless particularly re 
 quested. 
 
STB ATFORD-ON-A VON. 275 
 
 I detest what may be called a proper road-book 
 ^- even would it be less absurd than it is to write 
 one on a country so well conned as England. 
 
 I shall say nothing therefore of Marlow, which 
 looked the picture of rural lovliness though seen 
 through fog, nor of Oxford, of which all I remem 
 ber is that I dined there with my teeth chattering, 
 and my knees saturated with rain. All England is 
 lovely to the wild eye of an American unused to 
 high cultivation ; and though my enthusiasm was 
 somewhat damp, I arrived at the bridge over the 
 Avon, blessing England sufficiently for its beauty, 
 and much more for the speed of its coaches. 
 
 The Avon, above and below the bridge, ran 
 brightly along between low banks, half sward, half 
 meadow; and on the other side lay the native town 
 of the immortal wool-comber a gay cheerful-look 
 ing village, narrowing in the centre to a closely 
 built street, across which swung, broad and fair, 
 the sign of the Red Horse. More ambitious hotels 
 lay beyond, and broader streets ; but while Wash 
 ington Irving is remembered, (and that will be, 
 while the language lasts,) the quiet inn in which the 
 great Geoffrey thought and wrote of Shakespeare, 
 will be the altar of the pilgrim s devotions. 
 
 My baggage was set down, the coachman and 
 guard tipped their hats for a shilling, and, chilled to 
 the bone, I raised my hat instinctively to the cour- 
 
276 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 tesy of a slender gentlewoman in black, who, by 
 the keys at her girdle, should be the landlady. 
 Having expected to see a rosy little Mrs. Boniface, 
 with a brown pinafore and worstedjnittens, I made 
 up my mind at once that the inn had changed 
 mistresses. On the right of the old-fashioned 
 entrance blazed cheerily the kitchen fire, and with 
 my enthusiasm rather dashed by my disappoint 
 ment, I stepped in to make friends with the cook, 
 and get a little warmth and information. 
 
 " So your old mistress is dead, Mrs. Cook, " said 
 I, rubbing my hands with great satisfaction between 
 the fire and a well-roasted chicken. 
 
 " Lauk, sir, no, she isn t 1" answered the rosy lass, 
 pointing with a dredging-box to the same respect 
 able lady in black who was just entering to look 
 after me. 
 
 " I beg pardon, sir," she said, dropping a cour 
 tesy; "but are you the gentleman expected by Sir 
 Charles ?" 
 
 "Yes, madam! And can you tell me anything 
 of your predecessor who had the inn in the days of \ 
 Washington Irving?" 
 
 She dropped another courtesy, and drew up her 
 thin person to its full height, while a smile of grati- , 
 fied vanity stole out at the corners of her mouth. 
 
 "The carriage has been waiting some time for * 
 you, sir, "she said, with a softer tone than that in r 
 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVOW. 277 
 
 which she had hitherto addressed me; and you 
 
 will scarce be at C in time for dinner. You 
 
 will be coming over to-morrow or the day after 
 perhaps, sir; and then, if you would honor my little 
 room by taking a cup of tea with me, I should be 
 pleased to tell you all about it, sir." 
 
 I remembered a promise I had nearly forgotten, 
 that I would reserve my visit to Stratford till I 
 
 could be accompanied by Miss J. P , whom I 
 
 was to have the honor of meeting at my place of 
 destination, and promising an early acceptance of 
 the kind landlady^ invitation, I hurried on to my 
 appointment over the fertile hills of Warwickshire. 
 
 I was established in one of those old Elizabethan 
 country houses, which, with their vast parks, their 
 self-sufficing resources of subsistence and company, 
 and the absolute deference shown on all sides to 
 the lord of the manor, give one the impression 
 rather of a little kingdom with a castle in its heart, 
 than of an abode for a gentleman subject. The 
 house itself (called like most houses of this size and 
 consequence in Warwickshire, a "Court,") was n 
 Gothic, half castellated square, with four roum 1 
 towers, and innumerable embrasures and windows : 
 two wings in front, probably more modern than tho 
 body of the house, and again two long win^s 
 extending to the rear, at right angles, and enclosing 
 a flowery and formal parterre. There had been a 
 24 
 
278 ROMANCE! of TRAVEL. 
 
 trench about it, now filled up, and at a short distance 
 from the house stood a polyangular and massive 
 structure, well calculated for defence, and intended 
 as a stronghold for the retreat of the family and ten 
 ants in more troubled times. One of these rear 
 wings enclosed a Catholic chapel, for the worship 
 of the baronet and those of his tenants who professed 
 the same faith ; while on the northern side, between 
 the house and the garden, stood a large Protestant 
 stone church, with a turret and spire, both chapel 
 and church, with their clergyman and priest, depen 
 dent on the estate, and equally favoured by the 
 liberal and high-minded baronet. The tenantry 
 formed two considerable congregations, and lived 
 and worshipped side by side, with the most perfect 
 harmony an instance of real Christianity, in my 
 opinion, which the angels of heaven might come 
 down to see. A lovely rural graveyard for the 
 lord and his tenants, and a secluded lake below the 
 garden, in which hundreds of wild duck swan and 
 screamed unmolested, completed the outward fea 
 tures of C - Court. 
 
 There are noble houses in England, with a door 
 communicating from the dining-room to the stables, 
 that the master and his friends may see their fa 
 vourites, after dinner, without exposure to the 
 weather. In the place of this rather bizarre luxury, 
 the oak pannelled and spacious dining-hall of C 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 279 
 
 is on a level with the organ loft of the chapel, and 
 when the cloth is removed, the large door between 
 is thrown open, and the noble instrument pours the 
 rich and thrilling music of vespers through the 
 rooms. When the service is concluded, and the 
 lights on the altar extinguished, the blind organist 
 (an accomplished musician, and a tenant on the 
 estate) continues his voluntaries in the dark until 
 the hall-door informs him of the retreat of the 
 company to the drawing-room. There is not only 
 refinement and luxury in this beautiful arrangement? 
 but food for the soul and heart. 
 
 1 chose my room from among the endless vacant 
 but equally luxurious chambers of the rambling old 
 house; my preference solely directed by the por 
 trait of a nun, one of the family in ages gone by a 
 picture full of melancholy beauty, which hung 
 opposite the window. The face was distinguished 
 by all that in England marks the gentlewoman of 
 ancient and pure descent; and while it was a 
 woman with the more tender qualites of her sex 
 breathing through her features, it was still a lofty 
 and sainted sister, true to her cross, and sincere in 
 her vows and seclusion. It was the work of a 
 master, probably Vandyke, and a picture in which 
 the most solitary man would find company and 
 communion. On the other walls, and in most of 
 the other rooms and corridors were distributed 
 
280 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 portraits of the gentleman and soldiers of the fa 
 mily, most of them bearing some resemblance to the 
 nun, but differing, as brothers in those wild times 
 may be supposed to have differed, from the gentle 
 creatures of the same blood, nursed in the privacy 
 of peace. 
 
 One of the first visits in the neighbourhood was 
 naturally to Stratford-on-Avon. It lay some ten 
 miles south of us, and I drove down, with that dis 
 tinguished literary friend I have before mentioned, 
 in the carriage of our kind host, securing, by the 
 presence of his servants and equippage, a degree of 
 respect and attention which would not have been 
 accorded to us in our simple character of travellers. 
 The prim mistress of the Red Lion, in her close 
 black bonnet and widow s weeds, received us at 
 the door with a deeper courtesy than usual, and a 
 smile of less wintry formality; and proposing to 
 dine at the inn, and "suck the brain" of the hostess 
 more at our leisure, we started immediately for the 
 house of the wool-comber the birthplace of Shaks- 
 peare. 
 
 Stratford should have been forbidden ground to 
 builders, masons, shopkeepers, and generally to all 
 people of thrift and whitewash. It is now rather 
 a smart town, with gay calicoes, shawls of the last 
 pattern, hardware, aiyl millinery, exhibited in all 
 
alRATFaD-ON- AVON. 
 
 their splendour down the widened and newer 
 streets ; and though here and there remains a glori 
 ous old gloomy and inconvenient abode, which 
 looks as if Shakspeare might have taken shelter 
 under its eaves, the gayer features of the town 
 have the best of it, and flaunt their gaudy and 
 unrespected newness in the very windows of that 
 immortal birthplace. I stepped into a shop to 
 inquire the way to it. 
 
 "Shiksper s ouse, sir? Yes, sir!" said a drap- 
 per clerk, with his hair astonished into the most 
 impossible directions by force of brushing; "keep 
 to the right, sir ! Shiksper lived in the white ouse, 
 sir the ouse, you see beyond, with the windy 
 swung up, sir." 
 
 A low, old-fashioned house, with a window sus 
 pended on a hinge, newly whitewashed and scrub 
 bed, stood a little up the street. A sign over the 
 door informed us in an inflated paragraph, that the 
 immortal Will Shakspeare was . born under this 
 roof, and that an old woman within would show it 
 to us for a consideration. It had been used until 
 very lately, 1 had been told, for a butcher s shop. 
 
 A "garrulous old lady" met us at the bottom of 
 the narrow stair leading to the second floor, and 
 began not to say anything of Shakspeare but to 
 show, us the names of Byron, Moore, Rogers, etc., 
 written among thousands of others on the wall! 
 24* 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 She had worn out Shakspeare ! She had told that 
 story till she was tired of it! or (what perhaps is 
 more probable) most people \vho go there fall to 
 reading the names of the visitors so industriously, 
 that she has grown to think some of Shakspeare s 
 pilgrims greater than Shakspeare. 
 
 " Was this old oaken chest here in the days of 
 Shakspeare, madam," I asked. 
 
 "Yes, sir," and here s the name of Byron here 
 with a capital R Here s a curiosity, sir." 
 
 "And this small wooden box?" 
 
 "Made of Shakspeare s mulberry, sir. I had 
 sich a time abort!, that box, sir. Two young gem- 
 maii were here tfn other day just run up while 
 the coach was changing horses, to see the house. 
 As soon as they were i^ono I misses the box. Off 
 scuds my son to- the Red Lion, and there they sat 
 on the top looking as innocent as may be. " Stop 
 the coach," says my son. "What do you want," 
 says the driver. "My mother s mulberry box? 
 Shakspeare s mulberry box f One of them ere 
 young men s got it in his pocket." And true 
 enough^ sir* one on< *em had the imperence to take 
 it out of his po-. ket and ffings it into my son s 
 fece; and you kn >w the coach nev^r stops a min- 
 Bit for nothing sir, or he d a* smarted for it." 
 
 Spirit of Sh;ikroare! dost thou n->t sometimes 
 w.ilk. alone in this humble ohambo Must one s 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 283 
 
 inmost soul be fretted and frighted always from its 
 devotion by an abominable old woman? Why 
 should not such lucrative occupations be given in 
 charity to the deaf and dumb? The pointing of a 
 finger were enough in such spots of earth ! 
 
 I sat down in despair to look over the book of 
 visiters, trusting that she would tire of my inatten 
 tion. As it was of no use to point out names to 
 those who would not look, however, she commen 
 ced a long story of an American, who had lately 
 taken the whim to sleep in Shakspeare s birth- 
 chamber. She had shaken him down a bed on 
 the floor, and he had passed the night there. It 
 seemed to bother her to comprehend why two- 
 thirds of her visiters should be Americans a cir 
 cumstance that was abundantly proved by the 
 books. 
 
 It was only when we were fairfy in the street 
 that I began to realize that I had seen one of the 
 most glorious altars of memory -that deathless Will 
 Shakspeare, the mortal, who was, perhaps, (not to 
 speak profanely) next to his Maker, in the divine 
 faculty of creation, first saw the light through the 
 low lattice om which we turned back to took. 
 
 The single window of the room in which Scott 
 died at Abottsford, and this in the birth-chamber 
 of Shakspeare, have seemed to me almost marked 
 with the touch of the tire ot those great 
 
284 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 think we have an instinct which tells us on the spot 
 where mighty spirits have come or gone, that they 
 came and went with the light of heaven. 
 
 We walked down the street to see the house 
 where Shakspeare lived on his return to Strat 
 ford. It stands at the corner of a lane, not far 
 from the church were he was buried, and is a new 
 ish un-Shaksperian looking place no doubt, if it 
 li c indeed the same house, most profanely and con- 
 * derably altered. The present proprietor or occu 
 pant of the house or site, took upon himself some 
 -ime since the odium of cutting down the famous mul- 
 oerry tree planted by the poet s hand in the garden. 
 I forgot to mention in the beginning of these notes 
 that two or three miles before coming to Strat 
 ford, we passed through Shottery,. where Anne 
 Hathaway lived. A nephew of the excellent baro 
 net whose guests we were, occupies the house. 
 I looked up and down the green lanes about it, and 
 glanced my eye round upon the hills over which 
 the sun has continued to set and the moon to ride 
 in her love-inspiring beauty ever since. There 
 were doubtless outl nes in the landscape which had 
 been followed by the eye of Shakspeare when com 
 ing, a trembling lover, to Shottery-doubtless. teints 
 in the sky, crops on the fields, smoke-wreaths from 
 the old homesteads on the hill-sides, which are little 
 altered now. How daringly the imagination plucks 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 285 
 
 back the past in such places ! How boldly we ask 
 of fancy and probability the thousand questions we 
 would put, if we might, to the magic mirror of 
 Agrippa? Did that great mortal love timidly, like 
 ourselves? Was the passionate outpouring of his 
 heart simple, and suited to the humble condition of 
 Anne Hathaway, or was it the first fiery coinage of 
 Romeo and Othello? Did she know the immortal 
 honour and light poured upon woman by the love 
 of genius? Did she know how this common and 
 oftenest terrestrial passion becomes fused in the 
 poet s bosom with celestial fire, and, in its won 
 drous elevation and purity, ascends lambently and 
 musically to the very stars ! Did she coy it with 
 him? Was she a woman to him, as commoner 
 mortals find woman capricious, tender, cruel, 
 intoxicating, cold everything by changes impossi 
 ble to calculate or foresee I Did he walk home to 
 Stratford, sometimes, despairing in perfect sick- 
 heartedness of her affection, and was he recalled 
 by a message or a lover s instinct to find her weep 
 ing and passionately repentant? 
 
 How natural it is by such questions and specula 
 tions to betray our innate desire to bring the lofty 
 spirits of our common mould to our own inward 
 level to seek analogies between our affections, pas 
 sions, appetites and theirs-to wish they might have 
 been no more exalted, no more fervent, no more 
 
286 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 worthy of the adorable love of woman than our 
 selves ! The same temper that prompts the depre 
 ciation, the envy, the hatred exercised toward the 
 poet in his lifetime, mingles, not inconsiderably, in 
 the researches so industriously prosecuted after his 
 death into his youth and history. To be admired 
 in this world, and much more to be beloved for 
 higher qualites than his fellow-men, ensures to 
 genius not only to be persecuted in life, but to be 
 ferretted out with all his frailties and imperfections 
 from the grave. 
 
 The church in which Shakspeare is buried stands 
 near the banks of the Avon, and is a most pictu 
 resque and proper place of repose for his ashes. 
 An avenue of small trees and vines, ingeniously 
 over-laced, extends from the street to the principal 
 door, and the interior is broken up into that confus 
 ed and accidental medley of tombs, pews, cross- 
 lights, and pillars, for which the old churches of 
 England are remarkable. The tomb and effigy of 
 the great poet, lie in an inner chapel, nnd are as 
 described in every traveller s book. I will not 
 take up room with the repetition. 
 
 It gives one an odd feeling to see the tomb of his 
 wife and daughter beside him. One does not real 
 ize before, that Shakspeare had wife, children, 
 kinsmen, like other men that there were those 
 who had a right to lie in the same tomb; to whom 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 287 
 
 he owed the charites of life ; whom he mny have 
 beriefitted or offended ; who may have influenced 
 materially his destiny, or he theirs ; who were the 
 inheritors of his household goods, his wardrobe, 
 his books people who looked on him on Shaks- 
 peare as a landholder, a renter of a pew, a towns 
 man ; a relative, in short, who had claims upon 
 them, not for the eternal homage due to celestial 
 inspiration, but for the charity of shelter and bread 
 had he been poor, for kindness and ministry had he 
 been sick, for burial and the tears of natural affection 
 when he died. It is painful and embarrassing to the 
 mind to go to Stratford to reconcile the immor 
 tality and the incomprehensible power of genius like 
 Shakspeare s, with the space, tenement and cir 
 cumstance of a man ! The poet should be like the 
 sea-bird, seen only on the wing his birth, his slum 
 ber and his death mysteries alike. 
 
 I had stipulated with the hostess that my bag 
 gage should be put into the chamber occupied by 
 Washington Irving. I was shown into it to dress 
 for dinner a small, neat room, a perfect specimen 
 in short of an English bed-room, with snow-white 
 curtains, a looking glass the size of the face, a well- 
 polished grate and poker, a well fitted carpet, and 
 as much light as heaven permits to the climate. 
 
 Our dinner for two was served in a neat parlor 
 on the same floor an English inn dinner simple, 
 
288 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 neat and comfortable in the sense of that word 
 unknown in other countries. There was just fire 
 enough in the grate, just enough for two in the 
 different dishes, a servant who was just enough in 
 the room, and just civil enough in short, it was, 
 like every thing else in that country of adaptation 
 and fitness, just what was ordered and wanted, and 
 no more. 
 
 The evening turned out stormy, and the rain 
 pattered merrily against the windows. The shut 
 ters were closed, the fire blazed up with new 
 brightness, the well fitted wax-lights were set on 
 the table, and when the dishes were removed, we 
 replaced the wine with a tea-tray, and sent for the 
 hostess to give us her company and a little gossip 
 over our cups. 
 
 Nothing could be more nicely understood and 
 defined than the manner of English hostesses 
 generally in such situations, and of Mrs. Gardiner 
 particularly in this. Respectful without servility, 
 perfectly sure of the propriety of her own manner 
 and mode of expression, yet preserving in every look 
 and word the proper distinction between herself 
 and her guests, she ensured from them that kindness 
 and ease of communication which would make a 
 long evening of social conversation pass not only 
 without embarrassment on either side, but with 
 mutual pleasure and gratification. 
 
STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 289 
 
 " I have brought up, mem," she said, producing 
 a well-polished poker from under her black apron 
 before she took the chair set for her at the table, " I 
 have brought up a relic for you to see that no 
 money would buy from me." 
 
 She turned it over in my hand, and I read on one 
 of the flat sides at the bottom, " GEOFFREY CRAYON S 
 SCEPTRE. " 
 
 "Do you remember Mr. Irving," asked my 
 friend, "or have you supposed, since reading his 
 sketch of Stratford-on-Avon, that the gentleman in 
 number three might be the person?" 
 
 The hostess drew up her thin figure, and the 
 expression of a person about to compliment herself 
 stole into the corners of her mouth. 
 
 " Why, you see, mem, I am very much in the 
 habit of observing my guests, and I think I may 
 say I knows a super.or gentleman when I sees him. 
 
 "If you remember, mem," (and she took down 
 from the mantle piece a much worn copy of the 
 Sketch-Book,) GeofFery Crayon tells the circum 
 stance of my stepping in when it was getting late 
 and asking if he had rung. I knows it by that, 
 and then the gentleman I mean was an America^ 
 and I th ; nk, mem, besides," (and she hesitated a 
 little as if she was about to advance an original 
 and rather ventursome opinion,) " I think I can see 
 
 that gentleman s likeness all through this book," 
 25 
 
290 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 A truer remark or a more just criticism 
 perhaps never made on the Sketch-Book. We 
 smiled, and Mrs. Gardiner preceded : 
 
 " I was in and out of the coffee-room the night he 
 arrived, mem, and I sees directly by his modest 
 ways and timid look that he was a gentleman, and 
 not fit company for the other travellers. They 
 were all young men, sir, and business travellers, and 
 you know, mem, ignorance takes the advantage of 
 modest merit, and after their dinner they were very 
 noisy and rude. So, I says to Sarah, the chamber 
 maid, says I, that nice gentleman can t get near the 
 fire, and you go and light a fire in number three 
 and he shall sit alone, and it shan t cost him nothing 
 for I like the look on him, Well, mem, he seemed 
 pleased, to be alone, and after his tea, he puts his 
 legs up over the grate, and there he sits with the 
 poker in his hand till ten o clock. The other 
 travellers went to bed, and at last the house was 
 as still as midnight, all but a poke in the grate now 
 and then in number three, and every time I heard 
 it I jumped up and lit a bed-candle, for I was 
 getting very sleepy, and I hoped he was getting 
 up to ring for a light,. Well, rn^m. I nodded and 
 nodded, and still no ring at th^ boll. At last I 
 says to Sanh, says I, go into irimber three and 
 upset something, for I am sure tJrit gentleman has 
 fallen asleep. La, ma am, s;iys Sarah, I don t 
 
STRATFORD- ON-AVON. 29 1 
 
 dare. Well, then, says I, I ll go. So I opens 
 the door, and I says, If you please sir, did you 
 ring little thinking that question would ever be 
 written down in such a beautiful book, mem. He 
 sat with his feet on the fender poking the fire, and 
 a smile on his face, as if some pleasant thought 
 was in his mind. No, ma am, says he, I did not. 
 I shuts the door, and sits down again, for I hadn t 
 the heart to tell him that it was late, for he was a 
 gentleman not to speak rudely to, mem. Well, it 
 was past twelve o clock, when the bell did ring. 
 There, says I to Sarah, thank heaven he has done 
 thinking, and we can go to bed. So he walked up 
 stairs with his light, and the next morning he was 
 up early and off to the Shakspeare house, and he 
 brings me home a box of the mulberry tree, and 
 asks me if I thought it was genuine, and said it was 
 for his mother in America. And I loved him still 
 more for that, and I m sure I prayed she might live 
 to see him return." 
 
 "1 believe she did, Mrs. Gardiner; but how soon 
 after did you set aside the poker." 
 
 "Why, sir, you see there s a Mr. Vincent that 
 comes here sometimes, and he says to me one day, 
 4 So, Mrs. Gardiner, you re finely immortalized. 
 Read that. So the minnit I read it, I remembered 
 who it was and all about it, and I runs and gets 
 the number three poker, and locks it up safe and 
 
292 ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 sound, and by and by I sends it to Brummagem, 
 and has his name engraved on it, and here you see 
 it, sir, and I would t take no money for it." 
 
 1 had never the honor to meet or know Mr. Irving^ 
 and I evidently lost ground with the hostess of the 
 Red Horse for that misfortune. I delighted her,, 
 however, with the account which I had seen in a 
 late newspaper, of his having shot a buffalo in the 
 praries of the west, and she soon courtesied herself 
 out and left me to the delightful society of the dis 
 tinguished lady who had accompanied me. Among 
 all my many loiterings in many lands, I remember 
 none more intellectually pure and gratifying, than 
 this at Stratford-on-Avon. My sleep, in the little 
 bed consecrated by the slumbers of the immortal 
 Geoffery, was sweet and light, and I write myself 
 his debtor far a large share of the pleasure which 
 genius like his lavishes on the workU 
 
 
Cfiarlccotr, 
 
ROMANCE OF TRAVEL. 
 
 CHARLECOTE. 
 
 ONCR more posting through Shottery and Strat- 
 ford-on-Avon, on the road to Kenilworth and War 
 wick, I felt a pleasure in becoming an habitu6 in 
 Shakspeare s town in being recognized by the 
 Stratford post-boys, known at the Stratford Inn, 
 and remembered at the toll-gates. It is pleasant to 
 be welcomed byname any where ; but at Stratford- 
 on-Avon, it is a recognition by those whose fathers 
 or predecessors were the companions of Shak- 
 speare s frolics. Every fellow in a slouched hat 
 every idler on a tavern bench every saunterer 
 with a dog at his heels on ihe highway, should be a 
 deer-stealer from Charlecote. You would I most ask 
 him, "Was Will Shakspeare with you last night?" 
 " The Lucys still live at Charlecote, immortalized 
 by a varlet poacher who was tried before old Sir 
 
296 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL.. 
 
 Thomas for stealing a buck. They have drawn an? 
 apology from Walter Savage Landor for making 
 too free with the family history, under cover of an, 
 imaginary account of the trial. I thought, as we 
 drove along in sight of the fine old hal!, with its broad 
 park and majestic trees (very much as it stood in 
 the days of Sir Thomas, I believe) that most pro 
 bably the descendants of the old justice look even 
 now upon Shakspeare more as an offender against 
 the game-laws, than as a writer of immortal plays. 
 I venture to say, it would be bad tact in a visiter to 
 Charlecote to felicitate the family on the honour of 
 possessing a park in which Shakspeare had stolen 
 deer to show more interest in seeing the hall in 
 which he was tried, than in the family portraits. 
 
 On the road which I was travelling, (from Strat 
 ford to Charlecote,) Shakspeare had been dragged 
 as a culprit. What were his feelings before Sir 
 Thomas ! He felt, doubtless, as every possessor of 
 the divine fire of genius must feel, when brought 
 rudely in contact with his fellow-men, that he was 
 too much their superior to be angry. The humour 
 in which he has drawn Justice Shallow, proves 
 abundantly that he was more amused than displeas 
 ed with his owft trial. But was there no vexation 
 at the moment? A reflection, it might be, from the 
 estimate of his position in the minds of those who 
 were about him who looked on him simply as a 
 
CHARLECOTE. 279 
 
 stealer of so much venison. Did he care for Anne 
 Hatha way s opinion, then? 
 
 How little did Sir Thomas Lucy understand the 
 relation between judge and culprit on that trial! 
 How littld did he dream he was sitting for his pic 
 ture to the pestilent varlet at the bar; that the 
 deer-stealer could better afford to forgive him, than 
 he the deer-stealer. Genius forgives, or rather for 
 gets, all wrongs done in ignorance of its immortal 
 presence. Had Ben Johnson made a wilful jest on 
 a line in his new play, it would have rankled longer 
 than fine and imprisonment for deer-stealing. Those 
 who crowd back and trample upon men of genius 
 in the common walk of life ; who cheat them, mis 
 represent them, take advantage of their inattention 
 or their generosity in worldly matters, are some 
 times surprised how their injuries, if not themselves, 
 are forgotten. Old Adam Woodcock might as well 
 have held malice against Roland Graeme for the 
 stab in the stuffed doublet of the Abbot of Misrule. 
 
 Yet, as I might have remarked in the paragraph 
 gone before, it is probably not easy to put conscious 
 and secret superiority entirely between the mind 
 and the opinions of those around who think differ 
 ently. It is one reason why men of genius love 
 more than the common share of solitude to recover 
 self-respect. In the midst of the amusing travesty 
 he was drawing in his own mind of the grave scen u 
 
298 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 about him, Shakspeare possibly felt at moments as 
 like a detected culprit as he seemed to the game 
 keeper and the justice. It is a small penalty to pay 
 for the after worship of the world ! The ragged and 
 proverbially ill-dressed peasants who are selected 
 from the whole campagna, as models to the sculp 
 tors of Rome, care little what is thought of their 
 good looks in the Corso. The disguised proportions 
 beneath their rags will be admired in deathless mar 
 ble, when the noble who scarce deigns their posses 
 sor a look, will lie in forgotten dust under his stone 
 scutcheon. 
 
 Were it not for the " out-heroded" descriptions 
 in the Guide-Books, one might say a great deal of 
 Warwick Castle. It is the quality of over-done 
 or ill-expressed enthusiasm, to silence that which is 
 more rational and real. Warwick is, perhaps, the 
 best kept of all the famous old castles of England. 
 It is superb and admirably appointed modern dwel 
 ling, in the shell, and with all the means and appli 
 ances preserved, of an ancient strong-hold. It is a 
 curious union, too. My lady s maid and my lord s 
 valet, coquet upon the bartizan, where old Guy of 
 Warwick stalked in his coat of mail. The London 
 cockney, from his two days watering at Leaming 
 ton, stops his poney-chaise, hired at half-a-crown 
 the hour, and walks Mrs. Popkins over the old 
 
CHARLECOTE* 299 
 
 draw-bridge as peacefully, as if it were the threshold 
 of his shop in the Strand. Scot and Frenchman 
 saunter through fosse and tower, and no ghost of 
 the middle ages stalks forth, with closed visor, to 
 challenge these once natural foes. The powdered 
 butler yawns through an embrazure, expecting 
 " miladi," the countess of this fair domain, who in 
 one day s posting from London, seeks relief in War 
 wick Castle from the routs and soirees of town. 
 What would old Guy say, or the "noble imp" whose 
 effigy is among the escutcheoned tombs of his fa 
 thers, if they could rise through their marble slabs, 
 and be whirled over the drawbridge in a post- 
 chaise? How indignantly they would listen to the 
 reckoning within their own portcullis, of the rates 
 for chaise and postillion ! How astonished they 
 would be at the butler s bow, and the proffered 
 officiousness of the valet. " Shall I draw off your 
 lordship s boots. Which of these new vests from 
 Staub will your lordship put on for dinner. 
 
 Among the pictures at Warwick, I was interested 
 by a portrait of Queen Elizabeth, (the best of that 
 sovereign I ever saw ;) one of Michiavelli, one of 
 Essex, and one of Sir Philip Sidney, The delight 
 ful and gifted woman whom I had accompanied to 
 the castle, observed of the latter, that the hand alone 
 expressed all his character. I had often made the 
 remark in real life, but I had never seen an instance 
 
300 ROMANCE OP TRAVEL. 
 
 on painting where the likeness was so true. No 
 one could doubt, who knew Sir Philip Sidney s 
 character, that it was a literal portrait of his hand. 
 In our day, if you have an artist for a friend, he 
 makes use of you while you call, to "sit for the 
 hand" of the portrait on his easel. Having a pre 
 ference for the society of artists myself, and fre 
 quenting their studios considerably, I know of some 
 hundred and fifty unsuspecting gentlemen on can 
 vass, who have procured for posterity and their 
 children, portraits of their own heads and dress-coats 
 to be sure, but of the hands of other persons ! 
 
 The head of Machiavelli is, as is seen in the 
 marble in the gallery of Florence, small, slender, 
 and visibly "made to creep into crevices." The 
 facn is impassive and calm, and the lips, though 
 slight and [almost feminine, have an indefinable 
 firmness and character. Essex is the bold, plain, 
 and blunt soldier history makes him, and Elizabeth 
 not unqueenly, nor (to my thinking) of an uninter 
 esting countenance ; but, with all the artist s flattery, 
 ugly enough to be the ab^de of the murderous 
 envy that brought Mary to the block. 
 
 We paid our five shillings for having been 
 walked through the marble hall of Castle Warwick, 
 and the dressing-room of its modern lady, and gra 
 tified much more by our visit than I have expressed 
 in this brief description, posted on to Kenilworth. 
 
LOAN DEPT. 
 
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