THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 
 <f 
 
 
 
 
 
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 THE BRIDE OF SIENA.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 A POEM. 
 
 Ricorditi di me c'he son La Pia: 
 Siena mi fe', disfece mi Maremma; 
 Salsi colui che'nnannellata pria, 
 Disposando, m' avea con la sua gemma. 
 
 Dante, II Pnrgatorio, c. v. st 45. 
 
 LONDON: 
 SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, 
 
 CONDUIT STREET. 
 1835.
 
 PRINTED BY RICHARD TAYLOR, 
 RED LION COURT FLEET STREET.
 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 ALL who have read the Divina Commedia must 
 have been interested by the touching but my- 
 sterious address of La Pia to the immortal poet, 
 containing as it does, in a few melancholy words, 
 the history of a life. 
 
 The spirit of pious resignation that it displays 
 to a fate which must have been severe, since the 
 awful Maremma was the scene of her death, can- 
 not fail to awaken the sympathy of those who 
 feel the power of faith to support under trial, 
 and of mercy to enable the injured to forgive ; 
 
 8703135
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 while in those who unhappily do not, such re- 
 signation will excite astonishment alone, or, as 
 has been the case with regard to La Pia, mis- 
 construction. 
 
 " Then remember me : 
 I once was Pia ; Siena gave me life, 
 Maremma took it from me ; that he knows, 
 Who me with jewelled ring did first espouse." 
 
 Cary's Dante. 
 
 The absence of all reproach in these words, so 
 touchingly beautiful in the original, has induced 
 a belief in many of the commentators on Dante 
 that La Pia was deserving of the fate she met 
 with. 
 
 Those more deeply read in the female heart, 
 when animated by undying affection, will proba- 
 bly agree that these words betray unconquered 
 love for the injurer rather than a sense of guilt 
 in the injured. 
 
 That La Pia existed, that she was the bride of
 
 PREFACE. Vll 
 
 Nello, and that she suffered death in the Ma- 
 remma for some imputed crime, are facts. The 
 details of these facts are lost ; and the Authoress 
 has endeavoured to supply that loss from her 
 imagination. The moral she has wished to de- 
 duce from her story she trusts will be apparent 
 to the reader, namely, that the entire devotion 
 of the heart to an earthly object, even though 
 that object be bound to it by the dearest ties, is 
 a species of idolatry, which brings no blessing 
 down either upon the worshipper or the wor- 
 shipped. 
 
 The subject of the following poem was sug- 
 gested, in some measure, by a Leggenda Roman- 
 tica di B. Sestini, which contains an account of 
 La Pia's sufferings in the Maremma. 
 
 London, June loth, 1835.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 
 JL WINE the orange- wreath and bring 
 Roses gemmed with dews of night, 
 Like the bride's sweet tears that spring 
 Fresh from fountains of delight. 
 
 " 'T is the heart's own April day, 
 Mingled feelings share her breast, 
 Fears by bright hopes chased away, 
 Joy, but joy that will not rest.
 
 THE BRIDE OP SIENA. 
 
 u We Siena's maids are wreathing 
 Bridal crowns, we fill the air 
 With glad strains ; the poor are breathing 
 For the chosen bride a prayer ; 
 
 sc Prayer, that all that she has given 
 To the poor (such God has said 
 Is a welcome loan to Heaven,) 
 May be now in blessings paid. 
 
 " Lowly by her Nello kneeling, 
 While his vows her love repay, 
 All her heart's deep joy revealing, 
 Blushes chase her tears away. 
 
 " Constancy ! may thy blue skies 
 O'er her head for ever shine ! 
 Sun of love, that cheers its rise ! 
 Cheer, oh ! cheer her life's decline.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 " All is sunshine ; storms are fled : 
 Rainbow of the heart ! thy hue 
 On that cheeky now pale now red, 
 In that changing glance we view. 
 
 " When that sun must sink to rest, 
 Rise, pole-star of faith ! illume 
 Her way to those regions blest 
 Whose dread portals are the tomb. 
 
 " Now we strew their path with flowers 
 Clouds ! arise not as they rove ; 
 Fortune ! with a zeal like ours 
 Deck the path of wedded love." 
 
 Such was the strain Siena's maidens sung, 
 While bridal wreaths and orange-flowers they flung ; 
 To sounds of lutes the lovers glided on, 
 She Beauty's flower, he Valour's chosen son. 
 
 b 2
 
 4 THE BRIDE OF STENA. 
 
 It was within Siena's Gothic pile, 
 
 With weeping eyes and lips that sweetly smile, 
 
 La Pia knelt her heart's first choice beside, 
 
 And rose Siena's all-unrivalled bride ; 
 
 Bride of the land where blooms the earliest rose, 
 
 Land where Ausonia's softest zephyr blows, 
 
 The temperate breeze nor sultry nor too chill : 
 
 There, from the green slope of a gentle hill, 
 
 Through the clear azure of the cloudless skies, 
 
 Siena's marble palaces arise ; (*) 
 
 There Fontebranda's silver waters play, 
 
 Dancing delighted in the opening day ; 
 
 And round those waters dark-eyed peasant-maids, 
 
 With grace by Nature taught, weave the light dance : 
 
 The garlands wreathed amid their silken braids, 
 
 The festal garb, the smile, the mirthful glance, 
 
 Proclaim a festival in bowers where reigns 
 
 Perpetual fete ; where Nature, as a bride, 
 
 With orange-blossoms crowned, 'mid jocund strains 
 
 Of wildest warblers, looks in blushing pride
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 5 
 
 The chosen of the Sun. Now list ! a choir 
 
 Of sweet young voices chaunt that bridal strain ; 
 
 Bright eyes reflect the love their charms inspire, 
 
 While smile those lips, that never smile in vain. 
 
 The maiden's blushes rise ; but there is more 
 
 Than wonted joy in the sweet notes they pour. 
 
 The bride they hail has been by many sought ; 
 
 Princes have sued ; in vain wealth would have bought 
 
 A heart worlds could not buy, all price above 
 
 Save the rich treasure of her Nello's love. 
 
 Then does the current of true love run smooth ? 
 
 And boasts the earth one pair so truly blest ? 
 
 And has La Pia now, in early youth 
 
 And first fond faith, a blushing bride, confessed 
 
 The rapture of her soul, and does he press 
 
 In his fond arms her to whose loveliness 
 
 His heart pays homage, while her virtues make 
 
 Him proud of beauty's chains for virtue's sake ? 
 
 Oh ! never since the first fond pair that trod 
 
 In Eden's bowers, so sinless yet that God
 
 5 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Held converse with them, has a wedded pair 
 Of heart so fond, of outward form so fair, 
 Offered the incense Heaven will not despise, 
 Of two young hearts the grateful sacrifice. 
 
 n. 
 
 'T is over ; in the sight of God and man 
 
 Their hands are joined : they leave the holy dome ; 
 
 A shout of rapture through the concourse ran, 
 
 As Nello led La Pia to her home. 
 
 Her silence tells a heart too full for words ; 
 
 She dares not raise her eyes to meet her lord's ; 
 
 They must reveal that heart. Now 'mid her hair 
 
 Ausonian breezes play, the sweet soft air 
 
 Lifts her white veil, and gazing throngs behold 
 
 That face which, formed in beauty's fairest mould, 
 
 Suffused with blushes and with glad tears gemmed, 
 
 Shrinks from their gaze. No longer then was stemmed 
 
 The tide of rapture, and in one wild shout 
 
 Their hopes, their prayers, the multitude pour out.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 III. 
 
 At length they reach La Pia's future home, 
 
 A paradise where Love had taught to bloom 
 
 And trained to blow each flower to charm the eye, 
 
 Or through the air diffuse its fragrant sigh. 
 
 O happy pair ! and O most blest retreat, 
 
 Where first love reigns, where kindred spirits meet ! 
 
 Each day in each bids some new virtue bloom, 
 
 Some dear domestic virtue, child of home. 
 
 Hers was that fond, undoubting, clinging love, 
 
 This world's suspicions, doubts, and fears above ; 
 
 Faith that, or wronged or slighted, would believe, 
 
 Deem all might err, but not his heart deceive, — 
 
 A fond, a trembling, yet a deep emotion, 
 
 A woman's love with all a saint's devotion. 
 
 And never has such deathless love been given 
 
 To heart that answered with a truer flame : 
 
 Her smile was all his bliss, her eye his heaven; 
 
 A warrior, yet he prized her more than fame,
 
 8 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 And in those happy hours, ah ! who might tell 
 
 Which loved the best where either loved so well ? 
 
 And yet his love, which worlds could never shake, 
 
 That love were death, should jealous fears awake : 
 
 It was a flame which for a doubt might be 
 
 Source of a life of restless agony. 
 
 Too blest for thoughts like these, while by her side, 
 
 Was Nello, and too blest the happy bride ; 
 
 Too fully blest were they as yet to know, 
 
 The price of earthly bliss is earthly woe. 
 
 And why of jealous fears should idlers dream ? 
 
 She was what others are content to seem ; 
 
 Her every thought an angel's tongue might tell, 
 
 Her only fault a heart that loved too well. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Sun is pouring now his setting beams 
 Through the tall windows of that holy dome 
 Where they that morn were wedded, and he gleams 
 On the bowed head of one who in the bloom
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Of youth and manly beauty seems as though 
 Life were a burden : traces of deep woe, 
 Of the heart's anguish, are upon his cheek ; 
 Its livid hue tells more than words could speak, 
 Strangely contrasted with his gay attire, 
 The bridesman's jewelled garb; unhallowed fire 
 Consumes his heart. He is alone : along 
 The gloomy aisles he strides ; the distant song 
 And sounds of revel make him start, and now 
 He flings him down, pressing his burning brow 
 To the cold marble : on that very spot 
 This morn La Pia's marriage sealed his lot. 
 There at his feet an orange-blossom lies, 
 Fallen from her bridal crown ; its fragrant sighs 
 Are poison to his sense, yet to his heart 
 He madly presses it ; then see him start, 
 And crush the blossom underneath his feet, 
 Which but exhales its balmy breath more sweet ; 
 Emblem of faith, which in a constant breast 
 Reveals itself the more, the more oppressed ! 
 
 b 5
 
 10 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 'T was a sad sight to see the young, the brave, 
 
 Bowed to the earthy each deadly passion's slave. 
 
 His was a form to mingle in the dance ; 
 
 His was an eye to answer beauty's glance ; 
 
 His was a smile which, like the nightshade's flower, 
 
 Had power to charm, and poison in that power. 
 
 V. 
 
 At length he raised his bowed head from his hands : 
 
 " That bridal hymn again ! *' Erect he stands : 
 
 " Revenge may yet be mine," he cried ; u she spurned 
 
 Such love, such ardent love as never burned 
 
 On the cold altar of her Nello's breast. 
 
 O Nello ! hated, — hated, yes, and blest ; 
 
 Yes, blest, but not for long, if there be power 
 
 In deadly hate, if one unguarded hour 
 
 Pay constant watching ! Now to school my brow, 
 
 To join the dance, to hear the music flow 
 
 (Oh, more than music !) from La Pia's lips ; 
 
 For not more eagerly the spring-bee sips
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 1 1 
 
 The honey from the rose, than my fond ear 
 Drinks in those strains. 'T is something to be near — 
 Near whom ? Near Nello's bride ! He calls me friend, — 
 Friend ! when the only blessing Heaven could send 
 To make life dear is his. To madness driven, 
 Despair has made a hell where hope made heaven 
 Within this breast. That hymn ! oh, far more dear 
 Were the world's knell !" 
 
 Now steals upon his ear 
 A low soft sigh ; he turns, and by his side 
 Is young Bianca. " Ha ! how fares the bride ? 
 What brings the lovely bridesmaid here tonight ? " 
 " What brings thee here, lord Ghino ? " 
 
 "The heart's blight. 
 Like the lone vigil the sad mother keeps 
 Beside her dying infant, Memory weeps 
 O'er the heart's ruined hopes." Her eyes she raised, 
 And on those tearful orbs as Ghino gazed, 
 Her secret was revealed : a subtle thought 
 Made his heart beat ; Bianca's hand he caught ;
 
 12 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Her rising blush, her bosom's hurried sighs, 
 Betray the lurking tenderness that lies, 
 And long has lain, within her lonely breast, — 
 Love till that moment hidden, unconfessed. 
 Now while the hand of all her heart holds dear 
 Thus clasps her own, love triumphs over fear : 
 K Forgive," she said, " the victim of a flame, 
 Twin-born of Sorrow and by Silence nursed ; 
 Love, hopeless Love, that withering passion's name ! 
 Leave me ! you spurn my heart, — oh ! let it burst." 
 " Burst ! No, sweet maid, I hail that smile of thine, 
 Which, like the gem that lights with glad surprise 
 The weary eyes of him who works the mine 
 In dread and darkness, bids bright hopes arise. 
 Smile ; let my heart, which is too like a flower 
 Whose growth was checked by winds and early blight, 
 Unfold at length 'neath the all-cheering power 
 Of love that gleams, — star of my spirit's night ! 
 Deem me not wayward, bear with me, and let 
 My wounded spirit wake thy sympathy ;
 
 THE ERIDE OF SIENA. 13 
 
 Remember that harsh lesson, to forget, 
 Is one that must be taught all tenderly." 
 " Bear with thee ! Yes, the clinging ivy loves 
 The ruin that it strives to wreathe with smiles. 
 Bear with thee ! Oh, the joy my bosom proves 
 In soothing thine, its own deep grief beguiles. 
 So well I know no wish of thine could stray 
 From virtue's path, to hear is to obey/' 
 
 VI. 
 
 Did not this fond, this deep devotion wake 
 
 In Ghino's breast one struggle for her sake ? 
 
 No ; slighted love and vengeance shared his heart, 
 
 And nobler, gentler feelings found no part. 
 
 He did not then reveal the web of wiles 
 
 His fancy wrought : he smiles, yes, brightly smiles ; 
 
 Again he talks of love that yet might bloom, 
 
 Like flowers that rise where Ruin makes her home. 
 
 The maid, he knew, who owns love unreturned 
 
 To him for whom her heart so fondly burned,
 
 14 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Becomes his slave, and Passion's blinded fool 
 
 In hands of Vengeance is an active tool. 
 
 Gentle, nay weak, yet in affection strong, 
 
 Was young Bianca ; and she listened long 
 
 To flowery words, but did not mark the snake 
 
 Those flowers concealed ; and for lord Ghino's sake 
 
 She promised all compliance with his will, 
 
 Without a doubt, without a dream of ill. 
 
 They leave the church : intoxicated now 
 
 With hopes of vengeance, Ghino smooths his brow : 
 
 His eye is bright, a flush is on his cheek ; 
 
 Ah ! who could dream what guile these charms bespeak ? 
 
 And as he led that evening through the dance 
 
 Bianca, who in every hurried glance 
 
 Betrayed her love, who would have deemed that he, 
 
 The young, the gay, the gallant, and the free, 
 
 Concealed a heart beneath that envied smile, 
 
 Where vengeance thirsted, where lurked restless guile, 
 
 Where disappointment wrought the work of years, 
 
 And dried the source of hopes, of smiles, of tears ?
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 15 
 
 VII. 
 
 War ! cruel war ! Alas, that war should come, 
 
 Blasting with fiery breath young Nature's bloom. 
 
 Trampling her vineyards, laying waste the scenes 
 
 Where toiled the peasant to secure the means 
 
 Of comfort to his loved ones ! All in vain 
 
 His days of labour ; war lays waste the plain, 
 
 Tears from the widow's arms her only son, 
 
 From the young bride all she relied upon ; 
 
 Like woodbines when the oaks are felled they fall. 
 
 Children, — soon orphans ! vainly shall you call ; 
 
 Your sires reply not. And of wars most vain, 
 
 O civil war, of that first murderer Cain 
 
 Fell offspring ! of some blessing Heaven gave 
 
 Man envious hurls his brother to his grave. 
 
 The fratricidal strife now calls to arms 
 
 The noble Nello. Vain La Pia's charms ; 
 
 The trumpet's blast o'erwhelms her mournful wail : 
 
 Vain are her tears, in vain her cheek is pale \
 
 16 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 La Pia weeps, but honour calls away ; 
 
 When honour calls, her Nello cannot stay. 
 
 " I go/' he said ; " for it would ill become 
 
 One blest like me to let foes seek my home : 
 
 Farewell then, all this doating heart holds dear ! 
 
 I haste to meet them, lest they seek me here. 
 
 See ! see ! as foes, friends, even brothers, meet, 
 
 Shouts of fierce conflict echo through the street ; 
 
 Our palaces, late homes of love and faith, 
 
 Are now the scenes of civil war and death. 
 
 See the once friendly hearths with life-blood dyed, 
 
 Once tranquil palaces all fortified ; 
 
 Behold those towers that rise beside our walls, ( - ) 
 
 No foreign foe for such precautions calls ; 
 
 Those towers — O hateful discord ! — they proclaim 
 
 That kindred, friendship, faith are but a name ; 
 
 And in defiance of all truth, all ties, 
 
 Brothers 'gainst brothers, sons 'gainst parents rise." 
 
 " Then go not hence ; oh ! stay to guard thy home ; 
 
 If foes should come, by thy beloved side
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 17 
 
 I would not fear ; for, oh ! whate'er her doom, 
 
 If shared with thee, 't were welcome to thy bride." 
 
 " Weep not, my loved one ! though that may not be ; 
 
 No, let me hail a warrior's bride in thee : 
 
 On Colle's heights the adverse parties fight ; 
 
 Fear not, my bride ! God will protect the right. 
 
 Is it not better one fierce day should try 
 
 So great a cause, than that whole years should be 
 
 Poisoned by faction's feuds ? Then do not sigh; 
 
 Peace soon shall smile where all was anarchy : 
 
 Too long these haughty Florentines have sought 
 
 The lesson which ere this we should have taught. 
 
 Like fond Andromache, you plead in vain ; 
 
 Yet feel I more than Hector all the pain 
 
 Of such a parting : still, be of good cheer ; 
 
 My own, my loved one ! check that starting tear : 
 
 Soon, soon will I return, or by my friend 
 
 The earliest tidings of the fight will send. 
 
 Dream not of danger, banish every fear ; 
 
 If danger threatened, Nello would be here :
 
 18 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 But if his country's battles need him not, 
 
 Ghino shall come to guard this hallowed spot. 
 
 Then let Bianca ever by thy side 
 
 Cheer the sad hours of absence, my sweet bride ! 
 
 Ghino a brother to us both shall prove, 
 
 Bianca loves thee with a sister's love. 
 
 Then dry those tears, my loved one ! say you will 
 
 Act as a warrior's bride." 
 
 " Of coming ill 
 Caused by this absence, Nello ! my fond heart 
 Has such presentiment, these tears will start : 
 Haste back to dry them ; may these vague sad fears 
 Ne'er cost us more than these our parting tears !" 
 
 VIII. 
 
 'T is morning, and the sun refulgent pours 
 His flood of light upon Siena's towers ; 
 Though Nature smiles, how pale La Pia's face ! 
 Even he, the dauntless warrior, stops to chase 
 A gathering tear : oh ! till that trying hour
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 19 
 
 He knew not all affection's tyrant power. 
 
 He will not trust himself to gaze again, 
 
 But mounts his coal-black steed ; across the plain 
 
 He dashes, like the torrent rushing on, 
 
 And she the willow weeping that 't is gone. 
 
 Oh ! who that marked that form of manly grace, 
 
 And the all-perfect beauty of that face ; 
 
 The lofty brow ; the eye so proud, so clear, 
 
 Its lash still moist with love's own parting tear ; 
 
 The well-curved lip, of almost haughty gloom, 
 
 Yet in whose smile Love seemed to make his home ; 
 
 And the proud breast where struggled still the sigh 
 
 Which told of parting and its agony j 
 
 The stately form, in whose slight limbs we trace 
 
 The noble offspring of an ancient race ; 
 
 The graceful hand, which curbed the fiery steed, 
 
 Wielded the sword, or won a willing meed 
 
 From Beauty's lips, while o'er the light guitar 
 
 It strayed in praise of her own evening star, 
 
 Yet in whose hue and form we read that ne'er
 
 20 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Plebeian toil had been his father's share ; — 
 
 Oh ! who that saw him thus, so formed to please, 
 
 Hastening to battle with the courtly ease 
 
 With which he 'd join the evening festival, 
 
 Could marvel at the bitter tears that fall 
 
 From his young bride ? Long o'er the balcony 
 
 She leaned : in anguish wrapt, she did not see 
 
 Ghino depart ; she heard not his adieu, 
 
 Nor marked the glance of vengeance that he threw 
 
 On her, as mounting his proud steed he waved 
 
 His hand to young Bianca, who, enslaved 
 
 By passion's power, (how different from the love 
 
 That filled La Pia's breast !) resolved to prove, 
 
 By full attention to his every word, 
 
 How much her spirit bowed, her heart adored. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Ghino has joined his friend, with soul that burns 
 With long suppressed revenge : their pathway turns, 
 And with a last long gaze lord Nello waves
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 21 
 
 His snow-white plume ; a scalding tear-drop laves 
 The hand with which she answers his adieu. 
 The distance now conceals him from her view ; 
 Spurring his steed he to the field repairs, 
 And she to tears and sighs and fervent prayers. 
 'Twas a long day La Pia spent alone, 
 The first since she was wedded : he was gone 
 Who was the sun of her existence ; thought 
 Presented scenes of fondness past, or wrought 
 Pictures of frantic fears and death, and then 
 Her spirit shuddered. Hope revived again 
 When evening came ; the longest day will bring 
 Evening at last ; and, as the shadows fling 
 Their mantle o'er the sleeping flowers, she prayed 
 Long, fervently, and found in prayer that aid 
 The wretched ever find ; then to her door 
 Bianca came, and said, ei Dear lady ! pour 
 Your sorrows in my breast, and let me bear 
 You company : come to the jasmine bower, 
 And I will cheat the cruel tyrant Care,
 
 22 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Who all day long has bowed you to his power. 
 All slumber, save the moon and one small star, 
 Emblems of thee and me. Come ! my guitar 
 Shall prophesy the quick return of him 
 For whom those bright eyes are with sad tears dim." 
 
 BIANCA'S SONG. 
 
 iC The moon is awaking, the rose is asleep, 
 And the flower of midnight has burst into bloom : 
 The bride of the Sun for her lord seems to weep ; 
 She weeps not in vain, — he will come, he will come ! 
 
 "A perfumed sigh steals from the violet's breast 
 For the butterfly lover who wooed her young bloom : 
 Fold, fold thy blue leaves, faithful violet ! rest ; 
 When morning returns he will come, he will come !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 23 
 
 "Hark! hark! the stream murmurs, deprived of the breeze 
 That kissed her light waves, now all shrouded in gloom ; 
 Fair stream ! how ungrateful are murmurs like these ! 
 The breeze of the morn with the morning will come ! 
 
 " Then, lady ! since morn brings the sun to the earth, 
 And the butterfly back to the violet's bloom, 
 To the murmuring stream the young breeze in its mirth, 
 It will bring thee thy lord, — he will come,he will come!" 
 
 " Come ? O Bianca ! say when will he come ? 
 Oh, for one ray of hope to cheer this gloom ! 
 'Tis strange I cannot deem 'twas yesternight 
 He sate beside me here ; the silver light 
 Of yon fair orb making him almost seem 
 Some Grecian sculptor's proudest waking dream. 
 Oh, how unreal appear those hours of bliss ! 
 This parting day spreads like a dark abyss
 
 24 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Between a flowery island and a range 
 
 Of dark and desert land. Is it not strange 
 
 The fairy past, like a receding shore, 
 
 Grows indistinct, — the prospect spread before 
 
 Is dark, and peopled with pale forms of night? " 
 
 " But morn shall dawn, and all again be bright : 
 
 Then, lady ! seek thy couch ; w T here Heaven will send 
 
 A dream of Nello, which like kindest friend 
 
 Shall cheer sad hours." 
 
 " Bianca ' I would trace 
 On memory's tablet his dear form and face. 
 Wild power of fancy ! while I muse 't is gone ; 
 A funeral train of forms of fear comes on. 
 Farewell, Bianca ! may you never prove 
 How maddening 'tis to fear for one we love !" 
 
 X. 
 
 Night ! blessed night ! blest even to him who weeps, — 
 Night comes with poppies crowned, and Sorrow sleeps ;
 
 THE BRTDE OF SIENA. 25 
 
 The eyes with tears weighed down must close at last; 
 The future, robed in bright hues of the past, 
 Outshines the present. To how many hearts 
 That wildly throbbed by day blest night imparts 
 Visions of bliss ! a doubtful good, if still 
 They nerve the heart to struggle ; certain ill, 
 If life prolonged be but prolonged despair. 
 Sleep ! sovereign balm for sorrow, pain, and care ! 
 There yet is that o'er which thou hast no power, — 
 'T is guilt : perhaps a phantom-haunted hour 
 May bring in dreams the fate guilt waking dares. 
 He dreams he struggles in his self-spread snares ; 
 But, oh ! the sleep of guilt would seem to be 
 A foretaste of crime's dark eternity. 
 The destined dupe, the destined victim sleep, 
 And the brave Nello sleeps, though foes surround : 
 But Guilt and Ghino their sad vigils keep, — 
 Around his heart the deathless worm is wound.
 
 26 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XI. 
 
 The morning dawns, and the young warrior wakes 
 
 From a sweet dream of his fair bride ; he takes 
 
 Ghino aside, and bids him swift repair 
 
 Unto Siena. " Be that post thy care, 
 
 We have enough brave swords embattled here ; 
 
 I bid thee now protect a spot so dear : 
 
 True faithful guards my vigilance supplied, 
 
 But still I tremble for my home, my bride ; 
 
 Yes, to yon walls my restless spirit roves : 
 
 He wildly fears who loves, thus fondly loves. 
 
 Chosen as ruler of this daring host, 
 
 My duty binds me here ; this is my post ; 
 
 Go thou and guard a trust so dear to me, 
 
 Worthy thy friendship and thy bravery : 
 
 Upon thy heart, thine arm I can depend ; 
 
 He need not fear who boasts so firm a friend. 
 
 Now tarry not, dear Ghino, but repair 
 
 Unto Siena ; with a brother's care
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 27 
 
 Soothe my love's fears and dry each starting tear, 
 Prompt cheering hopes and check intruding fear ; 
 Tell her I bid her smile ; and, Ghino, say, 
 Ere long I fondly trust that conquest's ray 
 Will light me to her. If I am delayed, 
 Lend to her anxious heart true friendship's aid; 
 And if I send no tidings, Ghino, then 
 On the third night from this, in the lone glen 
 Where I lost sight of her, come forth to tell 
 That thou hast left my idolized one well ! 
 Then we will home together : Heaven reward 
 Thee as thou dealest with my heart's adored !" 
 " Now all dark fiends forbid !" (thought Ghino, while 
 He forced his lips to wear a parting smile, 
 And tried to check the throbbing of his breast,) 
 " By Nello sent, and as La Pia's guest !" 
 Then, lest his haste his guilty joy betray, 
 As if unwillingly, he went his way. 
 " Nay, use more speed, dear Ghino !" Nello cried. 
 He plunged the spurs into his charger's side : 
 
 c2
 
 28 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Responded then the steed's quick restless pace 
 
 To the wild wishes and wild thoughts that chase 
 
 Remorse, and blind the watchful Argus eyes 
 
 Of Conscience. " Object of La Pia's sighs, 
 
 Her every thought will be for him who sent 
 
 Me to her. But revenge ! I were content 
 
 To die if I could once from that bright throne, 
 
 La Pia's heart, chase Nello's form : my own 
 
 Might or might not replace it, but at least 
 
 My soul I 'd satiate with the Gods' own feast. 
 
 Fiends S I would sell me to 5<ou for one wile 
 
 Wherewith to win from Nello the pure smile 
 
 That makes his heaven. Be still, my heart! I'll school 
 
 My brow, my lip ; Bianca as a tool 
 
 I must employ, or wherefore vainly waste 
 
 Fond words on her ? — but haste, my charger, haste !" 
 
 XII. 
 
 With dreams like these all sober thoughts he chased : 
 And as around the midnight shadow falls
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 29 
 
 He finds himself before Siena's walls ; 
 
 Then straight he flung him from his reeking steed, 
 
 And, his steps winged by Hope, he passed with speed 
 
 Through the long avenue. In a bower, alone, 
 
 He found Bianca, who with rapturous tone 
 
 Of glad surprise received him ; while he said, 
 
 " Bianca ! love ! I must not be delayed ; 
 
 Where is La Pia ? from my friend I bear 
 
 A cheering message." 
 
 " Ghino ! bowed with care 
 
 And sad forebodings, she is kneeling now 
 
 Within yon hallowed dome." 
 
 " Sweet maid ! I go 
 
 To seek repose : my greetings to the bride ! 
 
 With morn I will return, — farewell !" he cried. 
 
 "Nay, go not yet, my lord," exclaimed the maid; 
 
 " If you are weary, rest." 
 
 "To rest," he said, 
 
 " In the full blaze of the meridian sun 
 
 Were easier far than when thus gazed upon
 
 30 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 By those bright eyes !" With honied words like these 
 
 He soothed the maiden's heart ; and as a breeze 
 
 That trembles o'er the flowers, and bids them pour 
 
 Rich fragrance forth, so the false sighs he bore 
 
 To that weak maid, each inmost thought subduing, 
 
 Her heart's first fondest love to such light wooing 
 
 Yielded itself. With female fondness viewing 
 
 His pallid cheek, she urged him to retire ; 
 
 And he obeyed, but not to rest ; all fire 
 
 His brain, his heart wild throbbing with delight, 
 
 His mental vision dazzled by the bright 
 
 Fond dreams he feared to ponder on. He turned 
 
 His steps towards the church : a dim light burned 
 
 Alone, illumining each long dark aisle ; 
 
 A faint sweet cloud of incense rose the while, 
 
 Awakening in his mind a train of thought 
 
 Sickening, nay, maddening ; for the air was fraught 
 
 With the same incense on that fatal day 
 
 When, like a knell of bright hopes past away, 
 
 La Pia breathed her bridal vow. How changed !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 31 
 
 A few short moons, and where gay crowds were ranged 
 
 In glittering garbs now deepest shadows dwell, 
 
 And Silence reigns where Music breathed her spell ; 
 
 And one dim lamp alone is burning now 
 
 Where the bright sun shone with unwonted glow. 
 
 Without, all, all is changed ; for where is he, 
 
 The lordly bridegroom, — where ? and where is she, 
 
 The pure, the fond, the lovely ? Lowly kneeling 
 
 Before the altar, with clasped hands, and eyes 
 
 From which the holy drops are slowly stealing 
 
 O'er cheeks as moonlight pale, and breast whose sighs 
 
 Are deep though low, — there, with no guard, unless 
 
 Of viewless angels who protect the good, 
 
 Virtue, the spotless shield of loveliness, 
 
 Was o'er her spread ; for, awed and trembling, stood 
 
 Ghino within the shaded dark recess 
 
 Of a confessional ; his guilty sighs 
 
 Fearing to breathe for one whom angels bless. 
 
 Toward the Madonna's raising her sad eyes, 
 
 Reflecting back their dewy looks of love,
 
 32 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 He marked her from her bent knee slowly rise, 
 
 Yet spell-bound dared nor breathe, nor speak, nor move. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Slowly she turned, to wend her weary way 
 
 To her lone home : the cold night-breezes play 
 
 In her ambrosial hair ; one sable tress 
 
 Is wafted to his lips, while of her dress 
 
 The silken folds are rustled by the air, 
 
 Which quenched her lamp, and all was darkness there. 
 
 In darkness and alone, — yet such the power 
 
 Of Heaven-protected virtue in that hour, 
 
 No breath, no word announced that by her side 
 
 Lurked one who, like the tempter when he lay 
 
 Close by the ear of Earth's first blushing bride, 
 
 Breathed but to blast and burned but to betray : 
 
 The difference this, — to sorrow, not to sin, 
 
 Shall this new tempter lure. But, oh ! within 
 
 There is a power now granted to her prayer 
 
 To warn her steps from every earth-spread snare.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 33 
 
 She passed into the moonlight pure and pale, 
 But not more pure and not more pale than she ; 
 Then at her door Bianca bade her hail, 
 And, as a balm to heal all misery, 
 Presented Nello's greetings ; said, next morn 
 These greetings by lord Ghino would be borne : 
 And, as she spoke, a dream of rapture stole 
 Over the anguish of La Pia's soul. 
 Fond unsubstantial joy ! as e'er will prove 
 All earth-born joys, all faith in mortal love : 
 Yet it suffices now with smiles to wreathe 
 The lips so lately taught sad sighs to breathe ; 
 And happy slumbers, and hope-prompted dreams, 
 Weigh down her eyelids till bright morning beams. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 How beautiful is Nature to the blest ! 
 Sunbeams ! that seem to mock the sad at heart, 
 Flowers ! whose bright hues but sadden the opprest, 
 Birds ! whose fond music bids the hot tears start 
 
 c 5
 
 34 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Of those who once were glad, — how great your power, 
 
 As ministers of rapture, in the hour 
 
 Of hope awaked and happiness restored ! 
 
 Rising from dreams of love and of her lord, 
 
 La Pia placed with more than wonted care 
 
 (For hope had whispered that he soon might come,) 
 
 Pearls on a brow they only proved more fair, 
 
 And in her raven hair one snow-white plume, 
 
 Graceful like her ! Thus lovely she is gone, 
 
 Rambling delighted o'er her wide domains, 
 
 So happy, that she longed to be alone, 
 
 To brood on all her joy. At length she gains 
 
 A chosen spot, a spot that Nello loved : 
 
 A fountain sparkled, and its waters roved 
 
 O'erarched by orange-trees and vines, whence hung 
 
 The amethystine clusters. There among 
 
 The flowers, that she outshone, she sate her down : 
 
 Unconsciously she plucked the buds, and gave, 
 
 Unheeding that she did so, a bright crown 
 
 Of dew-gemmed blossoms to the gliding wave.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 35 
 
 As on they float, the fresh, the fair, the gay, 
 
 She marked them glide, borne by the stream away : 
 
 Too late regretted they are gone. ce And such 
 
 The fate of joys !" she thought; "and oft as much 
 
 In thoughtless sport we cast them on the tide, 
 
 The ne'er returning tide of time. Be wise, 
 
 My heart ! take warning by those flowers that glide ; 
 
 Guard well the happiness you 've learnt to prize." 
 
 What could be lovelier ? bending o'er the stream, 
 
 Like some fair fountain-nymph in poet's dream, 
 
 While of her azure robe each silken fold 
 
 Seemed to have won its hue from the blue heaven, 
 
 A veil of finest lace flowed uncontrolled, 
 
 Marking the outline of a form which given 
 
 To marble had immortalized a name. 
 
 Her glance betrayed a soft surprise, while came 
 
 Upon the breeze the tones of a guitar : 
 
 She sees none near, yet he cannot be far 
 
 Who wakes those strains, for wafted by the air 
 
 These words come fraught with love and with despair.
 
 36 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 GHINO'S SONG. 
 
 " Ye birds ! would the strains ye so gaily are chaunting 
 Were changed for the knell of a heart too sincere ! 
 Ye flowers ! that in freshest of colours are flaunting, 
 Oil, would ye were strewed on a wretched one's bier ! 
 
 " Alas ! what a desert this garden of splendour ! 
 'T is sunless to me, though the monarch of day 
 Comes forth in his glory, — the sun that could render 
 This garden an Eden ! wild visions, away ! 
 
 "Oh ! would that this passion- tost heart were now resting 
 (If rest can be found for despair,) in the grave, 
 All weary as tempest-tost sailor of breasting, 
 Though hopeless of rescue, the lone central wave ! 
 
 " I have known but one faith, — a lone pillar unshaking 
 Amid the heart's ruins ; I have known but one care. 
 Alas ! my sad heart, thou too slowly art breaking, — 
 Hasten then, hasten my doom, O Despair ! "
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 3/ 
 
 XV. 
 
 The strain was sweety the words were very sad. 
 
 Is it not strange, the eye most brightly glad 
 
 With hopes of bliss is readiest to shed 
 
 Its pitying drops upon affliction's head, — 
 
 Even as the flower-cup, filled with tears from heaven. 
 
 Its honey-dew to the parched earth has given, 
 
 Or as the rainbow, offspring of the sun, 
 
 Pours out its glories the dark skies upon ? 
 
 La Pia's eyes were moist. "And is it so ?" 
 
 (She thought 't was Ghino's voice.) "But such deep woe. 
 
 Can it be his ? I deemed that he was blest, 
 
 Loved by Bianca, and that love confest : 
 
 And if she loves him, wherefore this despair ? 
 
 Oh ! love has power to chase all earth-born care. 
 
 There was a time I feared that he had given 
 
 His heart elsewhere ; but soon such fears were driven 
 
 Away, — long since, when first my heart avowed 
 
 Nello its lord, proud of that love, how proud !
 
 38 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Poor Ghino ! have thy hopes again been wrecked ? ' ' 
 She turned : advancing, but with step oft checked, 
 His lip, his cheek pale, and the fever now 
 Exhausted that had flushed his lofty brow, 
 He comes. 
 
 She rose, and through her tearful eyes 
 Shone the bright beams of welcome and surprise. 
 He came from Nello ! O the magic charm 
 Of aught that comes from one so fondly loved ! 
 Long talked she of her lord ; with kind alarm 
 Asked what was Ghino's grief : his bent eyes roved 
 To that sweet face, where a soft sadness stole 
 For him o'er the pure rapture of her soul ; 
 The searching light of the meridian day, 
 Which few, though fair, can brook, shone to display 
 A thousand unmarked charms ; the sunbeams seemed 
 Anxious to show that through the raven hair, 
 In shade as dark as night, a gold light gleamed, 
 Lending its folds a tint more rich and rare. 
 Fair as aught human could be, but as warm,
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 39 
 
 She boasted not the poet's fancied charm, 
 
 The skin of lily hue, or unsunned snow 
 
 Of cold ideal beauty ; the warm glow 
 
 Of youth and health mantled her fair soft skin, 
 
 So clear, that you could trace the blue veins start, 
 
 Bearing like rivers their rich offering 
 
 To that pure ocean, her devoted heart ! 
 
 The lofty brow, for such a mind fit shrine ; 
 
 The nose, so delicately aquiline ; 
 
 The nostril, exquisitely curved, whose hue 
 
 Seemed borrowed from the sea-shell ; the arched mouth, 
 
 So softly red, whose smiles gave to the view 
 
 Teeth that might vie with pearls ! Of the warm South 
 
 Breathed the sweet voice, whose gentle music stole, 
 
 Ruling the spirit with its soft control. 
 
 Her beauty had been proud, but for those eyes 
 
 So large, so soft, and so imploring, where 
 
 Each change was beautiful ; sadness, surprise, 
 
 Love, meek devotion, even earthly care, 
 
 Seemed sanctified. Her perfect form was all
 
 40 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Painters and poets dream and fain would trace ; 
 Where harmony did so the eye enthral 
 That nought seemed loveliest in form or face : 
 'T was blended beauty. On the dark grass lay 
 A hand of hue so fair, such matchless form, 
 It seemed that Nature, anxious to display 
 A masterpiece, had wrought each separate charm 
 To form a whole no art could imitate. 
 And Ghino gazed upon her as she sate, 
 Radiant in her unconsciousness of charms. 
 She spoke : " Lord Ghino ! lovers seek alarms 
 Where dwells no cause of fear. It must be so ; 
 Bianca's heart is yours ; some girlish pride 
 Bids her conceal all that you pant to kiiow. 
 But fear not ; for this coyness I will chide : 
 You shall be happy." 
 
 " Pause, La Pia ! pause : 
 Vain is the struggle to conceal my heart ; 
 Vain honour's, friendship's, virtue's, duty's laws. 
 Oh ! know me wretched, — undisguised by art !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 41 
 
 Start not, for you shall listen, while I pour 
 
 The long-suppressed confession, — I adore, 
 
 I worship, idolize thee, with a love 
 
 All language, all expression far above. 
 
 Long years I 've nourished this devouring flame, 
 
 Once fed by hope, now fanned by fierce despair : 
 
 This love supplants ambition, glory, fame, — 
 
 My dream by night, by day my only care : 
 
 Thus has it been for years, and I had thought 
 
 To bear this fatal secret to the tomb ; 
 
 My bursting heart in this confession sought 
 
 ( Spite of my will, spite of the gathering gloom 
 
 Upon thy scornful brow,) to tell thee here, 
 
 One who has loved thee holds no other dear ! 
 
 Bianca, soulless toy ! No, thou shalt know, 
 
 Proud, scornful as thou art, the drops that flow 
 
 From these sad eyes spring from the heart's deep woe." 
 
 " Cease ! and no more thus impiously offend 
 
 All laws divine and human ! Can it be ? 
 
 Is this my Nello's favoured, chosen friend ?
 
 42 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 How false to him ! how more than false to me ! 
 
 I cannot tell thee half the scorn I feel. 
 
 How my soul spurns thee, traitor as thou art ! 
 
 Hence, slave of vice ! and should I not reveal 
 
 To Nello all the baseness of thy heart, 
 
 'T is that 'twould grieve his generous soul to know 
 
 Such falsehood dwells in one he deemed his friend. 
 
 Frame what excuse thou canst : for ever, go ! 
 
 And better feelings may reflection send ! 
 
 Go, earn thy pardon by thy penitence. 
 
 Nay, urge not me : 'gainst Heaven is this offence; 
 
 To Heaven address thy prayers, and may they win 
 
 Pardon for thee through him who died for sin ! " 
 
 XVI. 
 
 There is a moment, when upon the watch, 
 Fraught with betrayal of all deeds of wrong, 
 Fell opportunity is prompt to snatch 
 The mask from vice, the mask worn well and long. 
 And such was this - } the secret long concealed
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 43 
 
 In one mad moment Ghino has revealed. 
 
 He trembles at his rashness, — pours a prayer 
 
 Full of contrition, — supplicates, entreats. 
 
 La Pia, shrinking as from some new snare, 
 
 Hurries away ; close by the fount she meets 
 
 Heralds from Nello, who proclaim, ere night 
 
 He will return. O heralds of delight ! 
 
 Then wild with joy she hastens from the spot, 
 
 Ghino and guilt all in that hour forgot. 
 
 Those heralds seek him ; from their lord they bear 
 
 A message, bidding him at eve repair 
 
 To the lone glen. They go : alone he stands, 
 
 Pale with revenge ; then, raising his clenched hands, 
 
 He cries, " La Pia ! thou hast sealed thy doom : 
 
 I swear by Heaven, Nello shall never come, — 
 
 Or come to spurn thee, with a heart all hate ; 
 
 The scorn I writhe beneath shall be thy fate. 
 
 Compunction, hence ! c My spirit scorns thee !' Well ! 
 
 Thou didst not deem those words should be the knell 
 
 Of all thy heart holds dear. Time hurries on ;
 
 44 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 I must be gone ; Bianca must be won ; 
 
 The promise of this hand shall make her play 
 
 The part my vengeance needs. Away, away ! 
 
 No, no, La Pia ! Nello shall not come 
 
 To drive me as a serpent from his home, 
 
 To listen to the tale thy lips can tell, 
 
 In the full confidence he loves so well : 
 
 By this green earth, this sky, these flowerets' bloom, 
 
 I vow thy Nello changed in heart shall come !" 
 
 XVII. 
 
 'T is evening : through the fragrant orange-groves 
 
 Bianca wanders with the youth she loves. 
 
 The glorious sunset of Italia' s clime 
 
 Lends each proud scene a hue still more sublime ; 
 
 The monarch of the day retires to rest, 
 
 And, like a golden palace, all the West, 
 
 With regal crimson and with purple hung, 
 
 Opens its portals wide : twilight has flung 
 
 A veil o'er every flower; the air is balm.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 45 
 
 Around how beautiful, how pure, how calm 
 Each spot by memory hallowed ! (and what spot 
 Of Italy has memory hallowed not ? ) 
 How fraught with rapture was that evening hour 
 To young Bianca, who with Ghino roved, 
 Inhaling the rich incense of each flower, 
 Which ever with the thought of him she loved, 
 And that soft twilight, in her heart will dwell 
 United ! for there 's magic in the spell 
 Of a sound heard, a scent inhaled, with one 
 That woman's heart first fondly doats upon. 
 Were both in unison with scenes so fair ? 
 In Ghino's breast, ah ! what a war was there ! 
 But she was innocent, save that she loved 
 Wildly, unboundedly : such hearts have proved 
 Oft in the worthlessness of him to whom 
 They give their every thought, that such a love, 
 Engrossing heart and soul, meets with a doom 
 That tells of disapproval from above.
 
 46 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Through the soft air a gentle echo stole ; 
 
 It breathed the rapture of La Pia's soul : 
 
 And as on Ghino's ear that echo fell. 
 
 Revenge and envy bade his bosom swell. 
 
 Those notes, his heart replied, confirm her doom, — 
 
 Those notes, that seem to welcome Nello home. 
 
 " Bianca !" in his tones of softest art, — 
 
 u Bianca, dearest !" whispered he, u we part. 
 
 Start not : a few long hours, I come again. 
 
 Seest thou yon turtle-dove sail o'er the plain, 
 
 The stream, the precipice, the dark ravine, 
 
 All, all unheeded whilst her mate is seen ? 
 
 O sweet confiding love ! can woman's heart 
 
 Act so devoted and so fond a part ? " 
 
 " Ghino !" she blushing answered, " is it you 
 
 That thus can doubt what woman's love can do ?" 
 
 " No, dear Bianca ! no ; but what I ask, — 
 
 For I must crave a boon,— although a task
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 47 
 
 Performed with ease, is one that would awake 
 
 The fatal curiosity enshrined 
 
 In woman's breast : then couldst thou, for my sake, 
 
 Conquer that Argus of the female mind, 
 
 And grant what I require, thy heart resigned 
 
 To wait the time when I can all unfold ? 
 
 I know, Bianca, that when I have told 
 
 What I would crave, a thousand doubts will start ; 
 
 But if this worthless hand, this faithful heart, 
 
 Can pay in aught the trusting love of thine, 
 
 I offer both, Bianca, at thy shrine. 
 
 This secret all inviolate must be, 
 
 And not one doubt or question even from thee ; 
 
 Trusting, however strange what I desire, 
 
 I would not of my destined bride require 
 
 Aught unbecoming/' 
 
 " Ghino !" she exclaimed, 
 " How can you doubt me ? Could that boon be named 
 Which you would think it right to ask, and I, 
 Your future bride, could question or deny ?
 
 48 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 No look, no word of yours ere bade awake 
 
 One fear, one scruple, for your honour's sake : 
 
 Shall he, so true a guardian of his own, 
 
 Shall he be careless of his bride's ? Make known 
 
 This most mysterious boon, — be what it will, 
 
 If in my power, your wish I will fulfill." 
 
 " Then listen, dear Bianca ! while we rove 
 
 Through the dark windings of this cypress-grove. 
 
 I first would have thee let La Pia know, 
 
 But not till late, her lord awaits the morn : 
 
 When disappointment's tears have ceased to flow, 
 
 Urge her to seek her couch, and then adorn 
 
 Thy sylph-like form in the blue robe that she 
 
 Has laid aside ; permit to wander free, 
 
 Loosed from those envious bands, each sable tress 
 
 That well may rival hers in loveliness ; 
 
 Fling over all her veil, and even bear 
 
 The chain, the locket, now her only care ; 
 
 But chiefly check, oh ! check that sportive grace, 
 
 Assume La Pia's slow majestic pace ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 49 
 
 And when past midnight one long hour shall toll, 
 Take her small silver lamp, and gently stroll 
 With noiseless step to that sweet spot she loves, 
 That summer-house embowered in the groves 
 Of orange and of myrtle : start not now ; 
 Remember, dearest, that your willing vow 
 Forbids one question. In that spot you '11 meet 
 One who has often sighed at those fair feet : 
 Grant him a hearing ; tell him, if you will 
 That you are my affianced one, but still 
 Patiently hear him : when all this is done, 
 Slowly and cautiously return alone. 
 Think that perhaps, blest in thy love, I fain 
 Would gently soothe a wretched rival's pain; 
 And that, lest thou be watched by curious eyes, 
 I fain would have thee borrow this disguise. 
 Think as thou wilt ; ere long I will reveal 
 All that I now so cautiously conceal." 
 He paused perplexed, but all unshaken she 
 Replied, u You may on my fidelity 
 
 D
 
 50 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Safely repose ; too happy if it proved, 
 Arrayed like her, I were like her beloved. " 
 Of these few words the melancholy strain 
 Ghino seemed not to mark : fondly again 
 He poured his thanks, his vows, then hurried on, 
 And left Bianca and her fears alone. 
 
 XIX. 
 
 With all the restlessness of wild delight 
 La Pia watched the coming shades of night, 
 Now culled the fairest fruit for him she loved, 
 And now in search of fairer vainly roved ; 
 Now hurried forth to tend some favoured flower, 
 Then back to watch the slow-progressing hour ; 
 Now climbed an eminence to see him pass, 
 Then, flushed with haste, her tresses disarranged, 
 She quickly sought her maidens and her glass ; 
 And then with fond and nerveless fingers ranged 
 Across her harp, singing some song that he 
 Delighted in ; but all in vain ; the tone
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 51 
 
 Of that sweet voice her spirit's ecstasy 
 
 Had for the moment hushed, — its power was gone. 
 
 Then, as she paced the terrace, Ghino passed : 
 
 At first she did not heed his deep low bow, 
 
 But the proud flush and glance betrayed at last 
 
 That she perceived him, and remembered how 
 
 They last had parted. "Ah !" thought he, "ere morn, 
 
 To bitter tears I '11 change that galling scorn." 
 
 XX. 
 
 Dark as the deeds he meditated, now 
 Closed in the night : over the moon's fair brow 
 Hung the thick clouds, and when he reached the glen 
 The thunder roared. O basely daring men ! 
 How can ye plan your deeds of guilt, while He, 
 The Omnipresent, the Almighty, seems 
 To hurl his thunderbolts thus wrathfully ? 
 Pause, rash impiety ! The lightning gleams, 
 And by its flash Ghino descries the form 
 Of a tall horseman at his fullest speed. 
 
 D 2
 
 52 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 A moment, and the voice of welcome warm 
 
 Assures him 'tis his injured friend indeed. 
 
 " Ghino !" he cries, " the day is lost : in vain 
 
 The young, the brave have bled upon yon plain ; 
 
 They fought as Italy's proud sons will fight 
 
 For liberty and for their country's right. 
 
 They fell around me, fiercely struggling fell ; 
 
 This life of mine seemed guarded by a spell ; 
 
 But few remain on either side to tell 
 
 The conflict of this day. ( 3 ) O luckless doom ! 
 
 But from dark night a brighter dawn shall come ; 
 
 Our cause shall triumph : yet, alas ! I bear 
 
 No wreath of triumph to my loved one's feet. 
 
 Oh ! tell me of my bride : say, does she share 
 
 This fond, this wild anxiety to meet ? 
 
 You answer not ! Speak, speak ! say, is she well ? ' ' 
 
 " Be calm, my lord ; I left her so but now — " 
 
 " What then ? that tone of thine, like some cold spell, 
 
 Enchains my senses." On his manly brow 
 
 The large drops stood : that voice, that deep rich voice
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 53 
 
 Trembles, and that strong grasp becomes unnerved. 
 " Your bride is well/' Ghino replied ; " rejoice ! 
 Right well in health, and you have well deserved 
 That she should long to meet you." 
 
 " Ghino !" cried 
 The gasping Nello, " speak ! your words awake 
 A thousand killing doubts, — speak of my bride : 
 Oh! be explicit, for thy best friend's sake." 
 " What would you have me say, my lord ? I know 
 How hateful he who wakes love's jealous wrath ; 
 I cannot bear to change that joy to woe, 
 With thorns to strew a home-bound bridegroom's path." 
 " Now, Ghino ! mark ; by all I hold most dear, 
 So maddening to my heart is this wild fear, 
 That if this moment you reveal not all, 
 Nello no more his friend will Ghino call." 
 " Then let me grasp your hand. Alas, how chill ! 
 How keen the night-wind blows o'er this bleak hill, 
 Fickle as woman's sighs !" 
 
 " What mean you now ?
 
 54 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Speak !" and he grasped his arm : " Oh ! dare to say, 
 To hint one word against her, and I vow — " 
 He loosed his hold, then sadly added, " Nay, 
 Forgive me, Ghino, I am sobered now ; 
 Forgive a frantic wretch, and tell me all, 
 If I can live and hear it." 
 
 " I must call 
 First for a promise, nay, a vow, that be 
 My tidings what they may, you make no stir, 
 Nor seek to meet with him, nor let her see 
 That you at length have fathomed even her." 
 ' ' With him ! with him ! Oh, speak ! what means all this ? ' ' 
 " I told you that my tale would change your bliss 
 To lamentation ; but if you will vow 
 To take no step, to breathe no word to her, 
 To your young bride, no, nor to let her know 
 Aught you have seen — " 
 
 "Speak ! this by Heaven I swear." 
 "Then bear to hear your bride another loves, 
 And that this night, where meet the fragrant groves,
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 55 
 
 In that pavilion, — at this very hour, — 
 La Pia meets — " 
 
 XXI. 
 
 They reach young Ghino's door : 
 The casements of his mansion overlook 
 That summer-house. How Nello's tall form shook ! 
 How pale, how ghastly pale ! He took his stand 
 At a small window, grasped with cold moist hand 
 The casement bars, and silent, panting, tried 
 To trample love beneath the power of pride. 
 He hears a step ; a light steals slowly there ; 
 La Pia's robe, her gait, her long dark hair, 
 And on her chain and treasured locket gleams 
 The lamp's dim light. Expectant now she seems. 
 Another step, — a muffled form appears ! 
 Nello bursts forwards as that step he hears ; 
 Then Ghino grasps his arm and wildly flings 
 His form between him and the door, and clings 
 Around him with a power his cold heart gave
 
 56 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Over the reckless fury of the brave. 
 "Thy vow ! thy vow !" he cried. 
 
 " And what are vows 
 To the wronged husband of a faithless spouse ? 
 Vows/' — and he struggled fiercely — " vows are air ! 
 Detain me not ! what vows are worth see there ! 
 Loose me !" he cried, " and soon the bower that gave 
 Shelter to them shall be of both the grave." 
 There was a fierce long struggle ; but the strength 
 Of Nello's wrath o'ercame cool skill at length. 
 The door was barred by Ghino's crafty care, 
 But, yielding to his arm's resistless power, 
 He burst it open ; then the winding stair 
 Cleared with abound, with drawn sword sought the bower. 
 No form was there; the parting scene was over, 
 There was no trace of lady or her lover. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 For a few moments there lord Nello stood 
 
 Like one transfixed, then hastened through the wood ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 57 
 
 By sound of distant footsteps hurried on, 
 
 And gliding figure the moon shone upon. 
 
 Then Nello came into the open plain, 
 
 And in the moonlight saw that form again. 
 
 He hastened forwards ; he is on the shore 
 
 Of a cool stream ; he hears a splashing oar, 
 
 And by the moon's now bright now clouded ray 
 
 He sees a boat glide down the stream away. 
 
 Baffled and burning with revenge he stood, 
 
 Then shrank into the darkness of the wood. 
 
 "Oh, had I died," he groaned, "on Colle's plain !" 
 
 Oh, that these eyes might ne'er behold again 
 
 One human face ! Alas, my broken vow ! 
 
 It well becomes this wretched spirit now. 
 
 He has escaped me : but his hour shall come ! 
 
 Thee, traitress ! thee awaits an earlier doom. 
 
 Come then Revenge ! and rend all tender ties ; 
 
 For thee I live, — for thee my false bride dies !" 
 
 d5
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 UNHAPPY Woman ! still your lot must be 
 
 A dream of love, or a reality 
 
 Of unshared sorrow. Raise your heart ! you need 
 
 A firmer pillar than the broken reed 
 
 Of man's affection. Why will you bestow 
 
 On him the worship which to God you owe ? 
 
 Know you the cause of all your care-worn years, 
 
 Your days of watching and your nights of tears ? 
 
 Love you, and are you sad ? and would you know 
 
 W T hy tale of love is ever traced in woe ? 
 
 Ask, ask your heart; you've raised an idol there :
 
 60 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Yet God would reign alone ; your love, your care. 
 
 Each meek attention earthly love may share ; 
 
 But ye mistake your worship when ye pour 
 
 At earthly shrine your prayers ; while ye adore 
 
 A self-raised idol, bow before it too, 
 
 Ye give the creature the Creator's due, 
 
 Ye lay up treasures with mistaken zeal 
 
 Where moth and rust corrupt, where thieves break 
 
 through and steal. 
 To love, to cherish, to endure, beguile 
 The hours of suffering with a patient smile, 
 To watch in sickness and in grief to cheer, 
 This should be woman's occupation here : 
 Yet still to look beyond this chequered scene, 
 On Faith's firm arm in confidence to lean, 
 Yes ! and to lead the thoughts of earthly love 
 With meek persuasion to a home above, — 
 This sanctifies affection, and in life 
 This wreathes with smiles the meek lips of the wife. 
 In death — and death will come — the parting hour
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 61 
 
 Is cheated thus of half its bitter power. 
 Those who on earth together fondly prayed, 
 Those who in virtue's paths together strayed, 
 May hope to wander ever side by side 
 Where all is love, where every tear is dried. 
 But a mistaken worship w T ill awake 
 The wrath of God : how oft his phials break 
 On such idolatry ! We weep to see 
 How often love is mixed with misery, 
 Nor deem why He who chastens not in vain 
 Has taught the young, the fond, to taste of pain. 
 Oh, if your hearts to earthly love be given, 
 Let your devotion be reserved for Heaven ! 
 
 IT. 
 
 Yes ! it is sad to watch ; but where, ah ! where 
 Is not sad watching woman's constant share ? 
 Long had La Pia watched, and when at last 
 Bianca told her Nello would not come 
 Till the next mom, and on her couch she cast
 
 62 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Her wearied frame, soon was her cheek's soft bloom 
 Bedewed with tears. 'Twas long ere she could sleep; 
 At length a slumber, soft, serene and deep, 
 Closed her sad eyes, whose long dark lashes lay, 
 Wet with those tears, upon a cheek whose hue 
 Like a fair Provence rose appeared, and they, 
 Those crystal drops, like evening's gentle dew. 
 Her raven hair hung round her matchless form, 
 An ample veil ; her fair pure cheek grew warm 
 With some fond dream, her soft lips breathed a tone, — 
 *T was Nello's name ! — and her hand caught the flowers 
 Which she had placed beside her : they were gone, 
 Save thorns and faded leaves. She dreamed of bowers 
 Where she with Nello strayed. With one deep sigh 
 She woke, and waking met lord Nello's eye 
 There gazing on her, but with looks how changed ! 
 How haggard, how severe, and how estranged ! 
 " Oh ! art thou come ? " she cried : "what ! come at last ? 
 Thrice welcome, dearest V and her arms she cast 
 Around his shuddering form ; she tried to clasp
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 63 
 
 His cold unwilling hand, but from her grasp 
 He tore himself. " My Nello ! my dear lord ! 
 What means this meeting }•' Tears of anguish poured 
 From her dark eyes ; and wildly flinging then 
 Herself, all trembling, at her Nello 's feet, 
 She cried, " Oh ! look upon me once again 
 As you were wont to look : one word to greet 
 Your most unhappy bride !" He but perceives 
 In that deep grief, that kneeling form, those tears, 
 The consciousness of guilt : his bosom heaves 
 With every deadly passion, as he hears 
 Her fond appeal, her sobs ; but, oh ! his cheek 
 Was paler than her own, save where a streak 
 Of crimson told the fever of his mind. 
 His fierce eyes glared upon her : to unwind 
 Her fond fair arms, to tear himself away, 
 Was but a moment's work : and there she lay, 
 No trace now left of her late brilliant bloom, 
 Like sorrow's semblance carved upon a tomb. 
 Half-choked with passion, he exclaimed, "This joy
 
 64 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Of meeting me seems mixed with some alloy ! " 
 " How wild this language, my dear lord !" she cried : 
 " Ah ! is it thus you greet your anxious bride ? 
 Tell me, oh ! tell me, what the battle's fate ? 
 And tell me why my loved one comes so late ? " 
 " Why he is come at all ! Ah, would you know 
 Why death has spared him for a keener blow ? 
 On yon lost field a brighter dawn may shine, 
 But no bright dawn awaits such days as thine : 
 Great God ! 't was for her sake this life was dear, 
 'T is for her sake this quenchless fire burns here : 
 O treacherous fondness, and more treacherous tear!" 
 
 III. 
 
 A wild suspicion flashes o'er her mind : 
 
 She marks his livid hue, his glaring eyes. 
 
 " Heavens I" she exclaims, " the glorious spirit shrined 
 
 In that proud brow has left its home !" Surprise 
 
 Gave way to anguish at that awful thought ; 
 
 And, rising, she long, fondly, wildly sought
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 65 
 
 To win another word. At last he cried, 
 " So, then, that base one feared the fierce wild tide 
 Less than the avenger's sword : ere this the wave 
 Has borne the dastard from a certain grave." 
 These words confirmed her fears : then Nello cried, 
 " La Pia ! let us sally forth ; my bride 
 Should see all my demesnes, and there is one 
 Well worthy of her : come, let us be gone ! 
 I long to bear thee to a spot where all, 
 The air itself, will harmonize with thee. 
 Nay, nay, thou shalt no vain attendants call, 
 All thou wilt need can be supplied by me. 
 Yet 'twill be long ere you return ; then take 
 All you may need. Come quickly ! do not wake 
 The vainly curious : haste ! what do you fear ? 
 What need you more ? is not your chosen here ?" 
 The words were kind, but a chill feeling stole 
 Over La Pia's heart, which to control 
 She vainly tried to smile. Then came her lord 
 Leading her palfrey, and without one word
 
 66 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 She left the happy home where all the joy 
 This world can give it had been hers to taste. 
 But is there earthly bliss without alloy ? 
 Was it a phantom-joy she had embraced ? 
 
 IV. 
 
 They had not travelled since their bridal day, 
 For happy hearts are the least prone to stray. 
 How altered now the warrior and his bride 
 From that glad pair who, moving side by side, 
 The air resounding with the praise they won, 
 O'er paths strewed thick with flowers had glided on ! 
 Their way was by the sea, o'er which there hung 
 A mournful mist : its thickening vapours flung 
 A gloom o'er all the scene. Still, on they went, 
 Till night drew near. La Pia's strength was spent : 
 They were compelled to rest a few long hours, 
 Though Nello seemed with supernatural powers 
 Endowed, and urged her on, said soon that she 
 Would meet fit welcome and fit company.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 6/ 
 
 When morning dawned, surprised, La Pia gazed; 
 
 The distant Apennines their summits reared ; 
 
 Nearer, his glorious brow St. Giulian raised ; 
 
 Giglio, Argento through the mists appeared. 
 
 Toward noon a ruined castle met their view, 
 
 Grey in the distance : Nello on his bride 
 
 A look of mingled rage and triumph threw : 
 
 " There stands the castle meet for thee !" he cried, 
 
 " And wide domains where nothing human lives, 
 
 Save one old guardian of yon goodly pile, 
 
 But where the wild fox with the serpent thrives, 
 
 And poisonous herbs beneath bright flow'rets smile. " 
 
 She cast a glance around ; 't was even so : ( 4 ) 
 
 Numberless reptiles in the sunbeams played, 
 
 The snake's green scales seemed in the sun to glow, 
 
 The wild wolf's eyes glared on them from the shade ; 
 
 No human form was seen. Nature appeared 
 
 To glory that the tyrant of the world 
 
 Disturbed her not : luxuriantly she reared 
 
 Her tallest, proudest trees ; each plant unfurled
 
 68 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Its varied hues ; the marshes round were seen 
 
 With hemlock^ moss, and lichens richly green ; 
 
 And birds and beasts of prey seemed there to throng, 
 
 And every kind of reptile crawled along : 
 
 But far as eye could reach, she could not trace 
 
 One human creature in that boundless space. 
 
 And there was something awful in a spot 
 
 So full of life where man appeared not : 
 
 It seemed Corruption's kingdom, and the breeze 
 
 Was as a noxious vapour, while the trees 
 
 Were choked with ivy whose embraces kill, 
 
 And Atropa the deadly flowering still. 
 
 " Nello !" La Pia cried, " this noxious air, 
 
 This scorching sun, I feel, I sink beneath." 
 
 " Nay, say not so : see ! see the castle there, — 
 
 It is the fittest air that thou canst breathe." 
 
 They stood before the castle-gates. He cried, 
 
 " Welcome, thrice welcome, my own faithful bride.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 69 
 
 To the Maremma ! here, where serpents dwell, 
 
 The falsest of her sex will thrive full well." 
 
 " What mean you ? " she exclaimed. " Is this to me, 
 
 Whose life has been one dream of love for thee ? 
 
 And the Maremma ! Nello, know you not 
 
 'T is death to dwell in this infected spot ? 
 
 Oh, let us hence ! " 
 
 " Hence ? no, no ; here dwells one, 
 An alien from mankind, but yet to me 
 Faithful and true 5 and he has dwelt upon 
 This spot, and lived, — it is more meet for thee. 
 Come ! ere I leave thee — " 
 
 " Leave me ! what, alone ? 
 God grant me patience ! let thy will be done \" 
 
 VI. 
 
 The seneschal appeared, a withered man, 
 With sunken cheek, but of gigantic frame. 
 Across his brow the deep-worn furrows ran; 
 He seemed scarce human, yet he proudly came
 
 /O THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 To welcome his young lord. " Come ! " Nello cried, 
 " Produce your best of cheer for my fair bride : 
 Be quick ! I must away. Now, ere I go, 
 Sing me that song you warbled long ago, 
 That song in praise of fickleness and change.' ' 
 " Nello ! I never loved that song ; 't is strange 
 That, sad and sick at heart, you bid me now 
 Sing such a song." 
 
 " No matter, love ! I vow 
 It suits those lips, and I must crave again, 
 As a last boon, that gay and sprightly strain." 
 " Oh, 't is a mockery ! but I cannot choose, 
 Nor what my Nello asks can I refuse." 
 
 LA PIAS SONG. 
 
 a I saw the bright beautiful Spirit of Change 
 
 Set out on a fair April dawn, 
 In search of new pleasures, new beauties to range, 
 
 In a gay car by butterflies drawn.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 71 
 
 "His car was of opal, and seemed to have won 
 
 Its tints from the rainbow above ; 
 He caught with a glance Beauty's sigh, and was gone ! 
 
 O Woman, how light is thy love ! 
 
 " How welcome this beautiful Spirit appeared ! 
 
 How worshiped by Pleasure and Youth ! 
 And how often his bright brittle temple was reared 
 
 On the overthrown altar of Truth ! 
 
 "Thus he sported, and made each fair bosom his home 
 
 And every bright lip he had pressed ; 
 He stole Passion's first vow and young Beauty's best 
 bloom, 
 
 Yet only in roving was blest.' , 
 
 " 'Tis a sweet song V he cried ; " sing it again. ,: 
 She paused a moment, then took up the strain.
 
 72 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 " I saw that bright beautiful Spirit at last ; 
 
 He had tasted of all that was fair, 
 He had found even novelty palling when past, 
 
 And he folded his wings in despair. 
 
 " Just then in a car, but of adamant, came 
 
 The Spirit of Faith and of Truth ; 
 He gave all his care to the feeding one flame, 
 
 That was kindled in earliest youth. 
 
 " He was drawn by a pair of young beautiful doves; 
 
 It appeared that he panted for rest : 
 The Spirit of Change and his false fickle loves 
 Seem to melt in the air, as this true Spirit moves 
 
 To his own chosen home in my breast !" 
 
 Now as these unexpected verses stole 
 Upon his ear, a doubt came o'er his soul ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 73 
 
 Her eyes were full of tears, and, oh ! if e'er 
 
 The heart can speak, it spoke sincerely there ; 
 
 But as he gazed upon her came the thought 
 
 Of that dread night, and, to distraction wrought, 
 
 He drained the cup that to his lips he bore, 
 
 Then cried, " Farewell ! we part, to meet no more/' 
 
 VII. 
 
 He rose. "Ah, no !" she cried, " thou wilt not go ; 
 While thou art here, even this spot has charms : 
 What have I done, that thou shouldst spurn me so ? 
 Nelio ! that look confirms my worst alarms. 
 My lord ! when trustingly, without one fear, 
 Spite of each wild look and each wilder word 
 Alone I followed thee, — yes, even here, — 
 Could I have dreamt of this, from one adored 
 As few have been adored ? Learn that I came 
 Thus willingly because suspicion grew 
 That thy mind wandered, and that thy proud name 
 Might suffer should the world suspect it too :
 
 74 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 And, oh ! I hoped tranquillity and love 
 Would, with the blessing of the God above, 
 Restore thee, dearest Nello !" 
 
 " Hush !" he cried, 
 " I cannot hear those lips profane the name 
 Of Him whose laws, whose power thou hast defied. 
 O lost to virtue, lost to sense of shame ! 
 Ask, ask thy conscience why, to madness driven, 
 Hatred and scorn replace the fondest love 
 That e'er to trusting mortal's heart was given, 
 That e'er made woman all her falsehood prove." 
 " Nello ! what is this falsehood ? for my heart, 
 Guiltless of all save loving thee too well, 
 Is open now before thee I" 
 
 " Matchless art ! 
 If conscience lives within thee, let it tell ; 
 My vow forbids. And now farewell once more !" 
 He rose, he crossed the hall, he reached the door, 
 But round his form her arms she wildly flung, 
 And kneeling, weeping, to her lord she clung.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 75 
 
 " Cast me not off !" she cried, " but hear me swear 
 By our young loves, by every fervent prayer 
 These lips have breathed for thee, by hours of bliss, 
 Now paid for by the agony of this, — 
 Oh ! hear me swear my love has been for thee 
 Not love alone but fond idolatry. 
 All that devotion now my heart reveals : 
 It is your bride, it is La Pia kneels. 
 Oh ! if I ever, best-beloved ! have given 
 One thought elsewhere, crush me, avenging Heaven ! 
 If my life has not been one dream of thee, 
 Leave me to perish, Nello ! — thou art free." 
 She had been kneeling, her long hair unwound, 
 In silken luxury it swept the ground, 
 And from her upraised eyes the large drops fell, 
 And heaved her bosom with convulsive swell. 
 But suddenly those arms unloose their hold, 
 Nor longer sought her doubting lord to fold ; 
 Her eyelids closed, her head sank on her breast, 
 As sinks beneath the storm the lily's crest ; 
 
 E 2
 
 76 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Her cheeks grew deadlier, and her lips more wan ; 
 Prostrate she fell, — sense, consciousness were gone ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 And Nello raised her, bore her to a couch, 
 Then shrank as from the adder's deadly touch. 
 While fainting there she lay, his fancy caught 
 Suspicion that she sank beneath the thought 
 Of seeing that false love no more for whom 
 Her home is changed for this too certain tomb. 
 Oh, how all pity turned to withering scorn 
 As this thought came, of jealous frenzy born ! 
 And how her lifeless form, her livid cheek, 
 Speaking an anguish words could never speak, 
 Roused wrath to rage, turned sorrow to despair ! 
 " She is not dead ;" " no, God her life will spare 
 For slow-consuming Sorrow ; aye, and worse, 
 Thy certain but protracted sting, Remorse ! 
 Shall he escape ? shall not his life's blood slake 
 This thirst ? Base vow ! it shall not, for thy sake.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 77 
 
 But thou canst not forbid that I should trace 
 
 The treacherous dastard to his hiding-place : 
 
 And when this sullied flower sleeps in the grave, 
 
 Then farewell Italy ! across the wave 
 
 I '11 bear this tortured heart : it will not burst ; 
 
 The hope of seeing him yet deeply curst 
 
 Shall bid it live. Yes, I will live to see 
 
 What I myself will work, his misery : 
 
 No web by spider cast his victim round 
 
 Shall with more cautious deadly care be wound. 
 
 I almost deem that I could smile once more, 
 
 If, while he grovelling mourned his prospects o'er, 
 
 He owned the avenger's power o'er his fate, 
 
 Who let him live, his crime to expiate !" 
 
 IX. 
 
 Oh, what a scene for painter's hand to trace ! 
 
 That fainting form, and that still beauteous face ; 
 
 That passion-writhing youth that o'er her bent, 
 
 On whose proud brow grief, wrath, despair were blent ;
 
 78 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 That antique hall, wrapt in the deepest gloom, 
 
 Now destined to be breathing beauty's tomb j 
 
 While through the turret loop-holes on them fell 
 
 The sun that shines on welcome and farewell. 
 
 A low moan issues from La Pia's heart, 
 
 Returning blushes to her pale cheek start : 
 
 " Adored one !" breathed she, then sank back again. 
 
 " Adored !" he cried, "yes, but adored in vain ! 
 
 Unequalled wrongs ! even before her lord 
 
 Her false lips own another is adored ! 
 
 And now, ere life returning treachery bring, 
 
 Thou fatal one, farewell !" He did not fling 
 
 One glance upon the form where life and death 
 
 Seemed still contending in her gasping breath. 
 
 He sought the seneschal : " I go," he cried, 
 
 u And to your vigilance consign my bride. 
 
 Know, she is faithless ; she has proved a blot 
 
 Upon the fame of an unsullied race." 
 
 " What woman," answered he_, " my lord, is not ? 
 
 Does not false heart belong to fairest face ?"
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 79 
 
 " Let her not pass the portal ; strictly guard ; 
 
 Thy faith, thy vigilance, I will reward : 
 
 While yet she lives she must not want for aught ; 
 
 When she has ceased to live, let me be sought. 
 
 This poisonous air will slowly work her doom ; 
 
 Living or dead, this castle is her tomb. 
 
 I must be gone, lest she revive too soon ; 
 
 She is recovering from a fearful swoon. 
 
 Go to her, watch her, but beware lest she 
 
 Win by her matchless wiles e'en such as thee." 
 
 He marks the old man draw each rusty bar, 
 
 And mounts his steed, although a shriek he hears ; 
 
 Then spurs him fiercely on, and quickly far 
 
 From the Maremma his sad lord he bears. 
 
 X. 
 
 What words can tell the anguish of her soul, 
 The frantic grief, defying all control, 
 When to new sorrow and new life she woke, 
 And found her Nello gone ! A wild shriek broke
 
 80 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 As from her very heart; for o'er her leant, 
 
 Not he, the loved one, who so lately bent, 
 
 In whose dark lustrous eyes were strangely mixed 
 
 Changing emotions and a purpose fixed, 
 
 But that old seneschal, who bent on her 
 
 His cold grey eyes, so calmly sinister. 
 
 " Why are you here ?" she cried in frantic tone ; 
 
 " Where is my lord, — say, where }" 
 
 "Your lord is gone." 
 " Gone ! " and she tried to rise, but sank again, 
 And for a while was lost to sense and pain. 
 When she recovered, all around was gloom, 
 One sickly lamp lighted the antique room ; 
 On a once costly crimson couch she lay, 
 Which moths and time conspired to decay. 
 She rose, with trembling footsteps sought the door ; 
 'Twas barred. "Great God !"she cried," thenalliso'er!" 
 Through grated loop-holes the bright moonbeams stole, 
 Their calm light roused the anguish of her soul ; 
 In happier hours how oft, in stillest night,
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 81 
 
 With Nello she had watched that silver light ! 
 She grasped the bars and gazed, and gazed again ; 
 The placid moon had made that desert plain 
 Look lovely, but her thoughts were with the hours 
 When she had watched it light the jasmine bowers 
 By Nello' s side, or seen its silver ray 
 O'er Fontebranda's crystal waters play. 
 Oh, for those waters, that pure air, those bowers, 
 The heavenly peace of those enraptured hours ! 
 Ah ! how she pants to taste them once again ; 
 Her lips are parched, and fevered is her brain. 
 She flung herself against that massive door, 
 Then sank exhausted on the marble floor. 
 With frantic energy again she tried 
 To force the massy iron bars aside : 
 The moonbeams, on her slender fingers shining 
 As she was seeking those huge bolts to clasp, 
 Taught her 't was all in vain ; and then resigning 
 The fruitless effort, she unloosed her grasp : 
 Her wild, exhausting, frantic grief gave way, 
 
 e 5
 
 82 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 And in unconscious apathy she lay. 
 At length she slept : but what avails the sleep 
 Of those who needs must wake, and wake to weep 
 The morning dawned ; her jailor came ; even he 
 Was startled at such withering agony: 
 Cold, motionless upon the marble floor, 
 Dishevelled all her dark luxuriant hair, 
 And her fair arms folded her bowed head o'er, 
 Her pale cheek resting on a time-worn chair, 
 She knelt ; he bore her to her couch, and flung 
 Some drops of water on her death-like brow : 
 And she unclosed her eyes ; her nerves unstrung, 
 Torrents of tears from her sad eyelids flow ; 
 Then to her pillow turning from his sight, 
 She tried to shut out consciousness and light. 
 And days passed on, and still unheeded there 
 She lay, the victim of the heart's despair. 
 
 XI. 
 'T is sad to part with what the heart holds dear,
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 83 
 
 To part in kindness, and when friends are near. 
 
 Lavishing consolation ; but to this, 
 
 All other partings seemed like scenes of bliss. 
 
 Without one kind farewell, left thus alone 
 
 In that fell spot where Death had reared his throne] 
 
 No word of explanation ! — could it be ? 
 
 Was it some frightful dream ! Ah, no ; for see 
 
 From those corrupted marshes to the skies 
 
 A dense, a noxious vapour seems to rise ; 
 
 All forms of dread, all loathsome things were there, 
 
 That haunt the earth, the water, and the air. 
 
 A wild anxiety to leave that spot 
 
 O'ermastered her fatigue, and she essayed, 
 
 With efforts that, alas ! availed not, 
 
 To burst her prison doors. The lengthening shade 
 
 That the barred casement's deep recesses threw 
 
 Convinced her that the sun had almost made 
 
 His daily course. Then first upon her view 
 
 Came all the awful horrors of her fate. 
 
 Yet what the crime these pangs must expiate ?
 
 84 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Still, even in the anguish of that hour, 
 
 While through the mists of fear hope's lamp burned dim, 
 
 Her heart, still faithful to love's deathless power, 
 
 Accused not Nello ; but the thought of him 
 
 Softened despair to grief. She who was late 
 
 Like prisoned bird that beats against the cage 
 
 Its fluttering form, thus adding to its fate 
 
 New pangs, new tortures, — she now ceased to wage 
 
 A fruitless war with fate ; and, sinking then 
 
 Beside the seat where late her Nello sate, 
 
 Reviewed her past life o'er and o'er again. 
 
 And in that awful solitude the thought, 
 
 The startling thought, first flashed across her mind, 
 
 That happiness she long had vainly sought 
 
 Where none who seek can justly hope to find. 
 
 To this world's emptiness now first awake, 
 
 She turned to Him who never would forsake. 
 
 Her earthly love had so engrossed her heart, 
 
 That Heaven and heavenly things had found small part 
 
 Since first the bridal wreath bad bound her brow.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 85 
 
 Had she breathed deeply, fervently, as now, 
 One warm unmingled prayer, — oh ! had she given 
 All her heart's deep devotion unto Heaven, 
 How safely now the arm of Faith would bear 
 And guide her through this region of despair ! 
 Then first her heart laid down all worldly pride, 
 Humbled and bowed before the Crucified ! 
 The tears of Heaven wash out the lily's stain, 
 The breeze unfurls its snow-white leaves again ; 
 Can tears of penitence, can contrite sighs 
 Wash out this stain of earth, and bid her rise ? 
 
 XII. 
 
 As thoughts like these stole o'er her troubled mind, 
 
 She ceased to struggle and became resigned. 
 
 Time glided on, and Nello did not come ; 
 
 She dwelt unheeded in her living tomb, 
 
 Save that a scanty pittance every morn 
 
 By that severe old seneschal was borne; 
 
 And as he gazed upon her, from his eyes
 
 $6 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Glowered malignant vengeance, and surprise 
 That Death yet spared his victim. Once she tried 
 To win a word from him ; he fiercely cried, 
 " Speak not to me ! I hate you that you share 
 With me my solitude, entailing care 
 On one who hates all men, and even more 
 The frail false idols whom those men adore." 
 " But oh! in mercy," cried she, "tell me when 
 My lord, my Nello will be here again ? " 
 " When there is faith in woman, when her sighs 
 Are not more deadly than the gales that rise 
 From yon empoisoned marshes ; when this wild, 
 Where nothing human has for ages smiled, 
 Invites mankind, when cities chase this gloom, — 
 Then, lady, not till then, thy lord shall come." 
 "Hast thou no pity ?" 
 
 " Pity ! and for what ? 
 The sorrows of a woman, who has wronged 
 The only being who betrayed me not ? 
 Pity, indeed! Ha, ha! why, I have longed
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 8/ 
 
 To see the hue of death upon thy brow, 
 
 And marvel that thou breathest yet, for know 
 
 I am the only human thing that e'er 
 
 Was known to live and breathe this death-fraught air; 
 
 I well nigh died, but Heaven a wretch reserved 
 
 For sufferings which his crimes had well deserved. 
 
 Curst days ! curst nights ! curst seasons, green or sere ! 
 
 But doubly curst the hour that brought thee here ! 
 
 Oh, may it add new anguish to thy pain 
 
 To know thou ne'er shalt see thy lord again !" 
 
 " May God forgive thee, cruel as thou art, 
 
 For wounding thus afresh a stricken heart ! 
 
 I blame not thy devotion to thy lord ; 
 
 Full well I know that he must be adored : 
 
 Harsh as thou art, this true regard of thine 
 
 Wins thee a useless unsought place in mine. 
 
 Look on me ; I am innocent as when 
 
 My eyes first opened on this world of pain : 
 
 Some fatal mystery obscures my name, 
 
 Some blot I know not of stains my fair fame ;
 
 88 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 I am brought here to die by slow decay, 
 
 But grief will quickly wear this life away ; 
 
 Nor doubt I but the sun of truth at last 
 
 Will clear the clouds that hover o'er the past. 
 
 I shall not live to see it, — no, I feel 
 
 This air's slow poison through my heart's blood steal; 
 
 Yet, to this fatal certainty awake, 
 
 Not for my own, but for my Nello's sake 
 
 I bid thee bear in mind what now I say, 
 
 As last words spoken by one past away. 
 
 I feel prophetic certainty that fate 
 
 Will do a wronged one justice when too late ; 
 
 Yes, and I feel, I know, the time will come 
 
 When he will weep upon La Pia's tomb; 
 
 Then will it bring sad comfort to his breast 
 
 To know she not alone forgave, but blessed, 
 
 Yes, dying blessed him, — her last earthly care, 
 
 The thought of his approaching wild despair. 
 
 Oh ! let him know that even through this gloom 
 
 Faith cheered and smoothed my passage to the tomb ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 89 
 
 Tell him from me, that there is but one source 
 
 Of hope and peace, one balm for his remorse ; 
 
 Tell him, with her last breath La Pia prayed 
 
 That he might look above for strength and aid. 
 
 And that she humbly hoped that both forgiven 
 
 Might meet — though not on earth — at last in heaven I" 
 
 XIII. 
 
 She paused, exhausted ; and that old man stood, 
 
 Even when she ceased, in listening, altered mood, 
 
 Waiting to hear those silver tones again ; 
 
 But on her couch she sank ; a sense of pain, 
 
 And, in that scorching air, a deadly chill 
 
 Seemed in her heart and through her veins to thrill. 
 
 Even nature sought to hasten to the tomb 
 
 This hapless victim of an early doom. 
 
 Seldom the air, even in this deadly spot, 
 
 Had been so sultry, so intensely hot ; 
 
 Like poisonous vapours rose the death-fraught gales, 
 
 A dark steam seemed to issue from the vales,
 
 90 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 And the corn grew unheeded. Hope of gain 
 
 Had bid the half-starved peasant plant the plain 
 
 In cooler seasons, but too oft to reap 
 
 With that rich harvest an eternal sleep; ( 6 ) 
 
 But through this summer all unheeded waved 
 
 The golden corn ; no rash adventurer braved 
 
 That fatal air ; if, hurried by the chase, 
 
 The huntsman viewed afar that fatal plain, 
 
 With terror-stricken limbs and death-pale face 
 
 He speeded to the haunts of man again. 
 
 Hapless La Pia ! what a doom for thee, 
 
 The object of such fond idolatry ! 
 
 The loved, the gently-nurtured, left to die 
 
 A death of slow protracted agony ! 
 
 While she had strength to leave her couch, each day 
 
 She sought the turret with morn's earliest ray ; 
 
 And oft she deemed that on the horizon's verge 
 
 His steed she saw a distant horseman urge : 
 
 Was it not Nello ? O that blissful thought ! 
 
 But her fair arms wildly extended caught
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 91 
 
 No fond returning lord. The densest gloom 
 
 Adds to the horrors of her living tomb. 
 
 The light is shrouded to exclude the air ; 
 
 At noon the gloom of night is reigning there : 
 
 When the moon rose, she to the loop-hole pressed, 
 
 And wooed the night-breeze to her panting breast. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 The old man spake few words, but they were kind, 
 A change had stolen o'er his stubborn mind ; 
 All that could soften the poor victim's fate, 
 All that could soothe her or alleviate 
 That old man tried ; a distant rill he sought, 
 And to the sufferer's parched lips he brought 
 The cool clear stream ; then rising with the sun 
 The fresh fruit with the morning dew thereon 
 He culled for her : and oft his grey cold eye 
 Was moistened by the tear of sympathy, 
 While he beheld how, in that awful hour, 
 Meek resignation aided faith's firm power. 
 

 
 92 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 La Pia ! even with thy latest breath 
 
 Thou hast won his spirit from eternal death. 
 
 XV. 
 
 One evening, far beyond the accustomed time 
 
 La Pia lingered in the shades of night : 
 
 The moon came forth, and wan, but how sublime ! 
 
 Appeared her features in that silver light ; 
 
 A sad, an earnest seriousness supplied 
 
 The place of her eye's darkly glorious ray, 
 
 From their long silken lashes slowly glide 
 
 Tears, that some fond regrets yet cause to stray ; 
 
 In large loose folds her faded form around 
 
 Her silk robe hung ; neglected and unbound, 
 
 (But oh, how beautiful !) her dark hair streamed. 
 
 She knelt, her hands were clasped, and the moon beamed 
 
 On a small silver crucifix, which taught 
 
 Of pangs which made all other pangs seem nought, 
 
 Pangs of the sinless, suffered for the sake 
 
 Of those who sleep in Christ, with God to wake.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 93 
 
 The moonbeams fell upon her faithful breast, 
 
 As though they deemed it a pure fitting shrine, 
 
 And to the cross her cold pale lip she pressed : 
 
 " Lord ! " she exclaimed, "make my heart wholly thine ; 
 
 Forgive and bless him whom in thy great name! 
 
 I vowed to love ; restore my sullied fame ; 
 
 And for the sake of him Thy blessed Son, 
 
 O Father, take a broken-hearted one \" 
 
 XVI. 
 
 With morn the old man came : surprised to see 
 
 La Pia prostrate on the turret floor, 
 
 He knelt, and placed her head upon his knee, 
 
 Which trembled, though so slight the weight it bore : 
 
 The lifeless hand fell from her cold still breast, 
 
 To which the cross proclaimed eternal rest. 
 
 There was a holy smile upon that face, 
 
 And tears yet wet on those dark lashes lay, 
 
 But grief had left a calm, a heavenly trace, — 
 
 La Pia's soul had passed in peace away.
 
 94 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 Ye who have known how desolate appears 
 
 A home deserted by what made it blest ; 
 
 Ye who have shed the bitter heart-wrung tears 
 
 For one ye fain would banish from your breast ; 
 
 Ye whom the fierce conflicting passions move, 
 
 Revenge, despair, and yet undying love; 
 
 Ye may conceive how awful was the gloom 
 
 That hung o'er Nello's lately happy home. 
 
 While her uncertain doom weighed on his mind, 
 
 But half revenged, and oh ! not half resigned, 
 
 He knew no rest, he shrank from every eye, 
 
 His was a ceaseless, sleepless misery. 
 
 He could not tear himself from that lone home, 
 
 But waited there the tidings of her doom ; 
 
 With lips compressed, and with contracted brows, 
 
 Pale cheek, quick pulse, and heart that scorned repose, 
 
 He sate for hours, and no one dared intrude 
 
 Upon his strange, his fearful solitude.
 
 THE ERIDE OF SIENA. 95 
 
 And every spot awaked some wild regret ; 
 
 The flowers she loved to tend were blooming yet ; 
 
 Those he had planted spoke her constant care, 
 
 They decked the walls, their fragrance filled the air. 
 
 One fatal thought haunted his tortured mind : 
 
 If nature sought a fitful rest to find, 
 
 Some fearful dream, some maddening vision came, 
 
 And he awoke shrieking La Pia's name. 
 
 Often at eve, unable to control 
 
 The wild, the restless anguish of his soul, 
 
 He sprang upon his fleetest steed : when day 
 
 Rose in the east, he viewed the turrets grey 
 
 Rise from the distant fatal marshes where 
 
 La Pia pined, and oft he fancied there 
 
 A white-robed form, with arms extended, wooed 
 
 The distant horseman to her solitude ; 
 
 He deemed those arms were for another spread, 
 
 And at the thought, turning his horse's head, 
 
 Without one sigh, one glance, he hastened home, 
 
 His heart all anguish and his brow all gloom.
 
 96 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 Ghino was absent, — none could answer where : 
 
 In Nello's heart was locked his gnawing care. 
 
 Once only to his side Bianca came, 
 
 And spoke in anxious tone La Pia's name ; 
 
 But at that name so wildly on her glared 
 
 Nello's dark eyes, with such fierce tone he said, 
 
 " Forget she ever lived !" the maid was scared 
 
 And terror-stricken ; from his sight she fled. 
 
 Strange rumours were afloat, but who would dare 
 
 To question one so fierce in his despair. 
 
 No brother ever blest the orphan bride, 
 
 She ne'er had lingered by a sister's side, 
 
 In whispers only now was breathed her name, 
 
 A fearful mystery hung o'er her fame. 
 
 And Nello seemed to take a strange delight 
 
 In every spot that she had loved, and yet 
 
 For hours he fixed his wild, his aching sight 
 
 Upon the fatal bower where they had met.
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 97 
 
 One day he entered the deserted room 
 
 Where 't was La Pia's wont to watch alone ; 
 
 There reigned the sickly stillness of the tomb, 
 
 Where late her sweet voice joined her harp's soft tone. 
 
 All lay around as she had left it last, 
 
 All spoke the maddening language of the past. 
 
 Books he had given, songs he had loved lay there, 
 
 A chain unfinished formed of Nello's hair. 
 
 One volume partly open caught his eye, 
 
 A withered flower forbade its leaves to close ; 
 
 It was his favourite book, and with a sigh 
 
 His favourite page, through blinding tears, he knows. 
 
 There stood an antique cabinet inlaid 
 
 With curious woods ; a feeling undefined 
 
 Made Nello burst it open : it displayed 
 
 Affection's offerings, hallowed and enshrined ; 
 
 And long- forgotten trifles caught his eye, 
 
 Each gift of love a pledge of misery ! 
 
 Nought but these treasured offerings met his view : 
 
 By chance he pressed a spring, and open flew
 
 98 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 A secret drawer. How his pale cheek was fired ; 
 
 For letters there were stored. Should they contain 
 
 The confirmation dreaded yet desired ! 
 
 He grasped them with a sickening sense of pain. 
 
 A long black tress of her unrivalled hair 
 
 Was bound around them with a woman's care. 
 
 He rent that silken cord : with glaring eyes, 
 
 And hands convulsed, he turned each treasured page, 
 
 And for a moment love and wild surprise 
 
 Replaced his jealous heart's consuming rage. 
 
 These letters his own hand had traced, when he, 
 
 With all a youthful lover's ecstasy, 
 
 First from admiring rivals sought to bear 
 
 Siena's idolized, unequalled fair. 
 
 There the first violets he gave were stored ; 
 
 Though faded, they a rich perfume impart. 
 
 Ah ! thought he, how had my fond heart adored 
 
 Her charms, though faded thus, if true her heart ! 
 
 And could she treasure up each early token 
 
 Of love and faith, by her own falsehood broken !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 99 
 
 Bowed by despair he sat him down and tried 
 
 From his own heart his deathless love to hide, 
 
 Rested his brow upon his folded arms, 
 
 And closed his eyes ; as though La Pia's charms 
 
 Were not so firmly stamped on memory's leaf, 
 
 That outward darkness could bring no relief. 
 
 A low, a gentle moan stole on his ear ; 
 
 He started : Whose that moan ? for none are near. 
 
 It was the winds which o'er her harp-strings glide ; 
 
 But to his ear it seemed La Pia sighed. 
 
 And closing eve still found him lingering there, 
 
 For what is time to victims of despair ? 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 He heard approaching footsteps and his name 
 Pronounced in haste : 't was Ghino's squire ; he came 
 To summon Nello to his lord, who lay 
 The wounded victim of some fatal fray. 
 " How wounded ?" Nello cried, and rose to go 
 With anxious haste to join his dying friend. 
 
 f 2
 
 100 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 " My lord," the squire replied, "as yet none know 
 
 Whether for public cause or private end 
 
 The fatal blow was struck, but he was found 
 
 By home-bound peasants bleeding on the ground. 
 
 Three days and nights he has been doomed to feel 
 
 Pangs that no mortal tongue can ere reveal, 
 
 Now in delirium raving fiercely loud, 
 
 Now trembling and with causeless terrors bowed." 
 
 " Then why so late didst thou to seek me come ?" 
 
 " My lord, I deemed you absent still from home ; 
 
 But with such wild delirium on your name 
 
 Lord Ghino called, I to your palace came 
 
 To know where I might seek you." 
 
 XIX. 
 
 They are nou 
 In Ghino' s halls : a frantic shriek they hear. 
 The large cold drops stand upon Nello's brow 
 As that wild frenzied sound breaks on his ear : 
 " Great God !" lord Nello cried, " is this his doom ?'
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 101 
 
 Unmarked he glided through the darkened room. 
 
 And by a curtain shrouded paused to catch 
 
 A lucid interval^ — a weary. watch ! 
 
 Writhing upon his couch lord . Ghino" lay/. ■ 
 
 A ghastly wound upon his breast appears, I 
 
 Bloodshot his eyes, and wild and fierce their ray. 
 
 The staunching bandage from his breast he tears, 
 
 And the blood trickles from that frightful wound : 
 
 " Ah ! ah ! " he shrieks, " the earth-worms crawl around ! 
 
 This is the grave : who said the grave would be 
 
 A place of rest ? O endless misery !" 
 
 All his attendants scarce could hold him, while 
 
 The surgeon bound the gaping wound anew. 
 
 With deadly glaring eyes and ghastly smile 
 
 He called for priestly aid. When to his view 
 
 The holy men their pious offerings spread, 
 
 " Away !" he cried, " what can avail the dead ? 
 
 O hateful darkness ! See ! see, through the gloom, 
 
 She beckons from her own untimely tomb. 
 
 Bring light !" and lights were brought; and then "Ah me !' ;
 
 102 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Shrieked Ghino, ? in this glaring light I see 
 
 The noon-day, and the fount where I revealed 
 
 The fatal secret for long years concealed. 
 
 The glorious heavens receive her, by her side 
 
 Are angels, not more brightly pure than she. 
 
 See ! see ! through azure clouds she seems to glide 
 
 I sink! I sink to dread eternity IV 
 
 From his attendants' arms he tried to burst, 
 
 Then sank exhausted back upon his bed : 
 
 " O my doomed soul ! " he cried, u for ever curst ! 
 
 To what has one fierce, guilty passion led?" 
 
 On his exhausted frame a slumber crept, 
 
 And for a while the guilty victim slept. 
 
 XX. 
 
 And Nello watched him, but could scarcely trace 
 His former friend in that contracted face : 
 And from his ghastly lips a low tone came, 
 It seemed to Nello's ears La Pia's name. 
 At length he woke, and Nello met his view ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 103 
 
 His wild delirious rage had passed away ; 
 Upon his friend an eager glance he threw, 
 And grasped him with a hand of death-cold clay : 
 " Can you forgive }" he said in hollow tone ; 
 " My time is short ; ere long I shall be gone — 
 Gone/' and he almost groaned, " to meet a fate 
 Deserved by crimes no pangs can expiate." 
 " Forgive thee, dearest Ghino," Nello cried, 
 " What have I to forgive ? M 
 
 " Where is your bride )" 
 " Speak not of her : in the Maremma she 
 Pines now, the victim of her treachery." 
 u Nello, I deem that she is now at rest, 
 Joined with the faithful and the ever blest ; 
 For see where, robed in white, she calls me now, 
 With beckoning hand and menace on her brow — 
 I come ! I come !" 
 
 " Thy senses, Ghino, rove. 
 Tell me who aimed this blow." 
 
 "Within yon grove
 
 104 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 I met Anselmo, whom I deemed the wave 
 
 Bore hence long since, but adverse winds had cast 
 
 Him back upon our shore. I, Passion's slave, 
 
 Fearing he might investigate the past, 
 
 Aimed at his breast a base, a deadly thrust : 
 
 In mine he sheathed his sword, and on the dust 
 
 I sank, a dying man/' 
 
 "No, Ghino, no! 
 Live for your friend/' 
 
 ce My friend ! and is it so ? 
 Can you forgive ?" 
 
 "Forgive what?" 
 
 "Lend thine ear; 
 My eyesight fails me ; oh ! come near, come near. 
 Know that a guiltier wretch ne'er feared to die. 
 Long had I loved with fond idolatry ; 
 She whom I loved another's bride became. 
 In one mad moment I revealed my flame : 
 Her galling scorn my fierce revenge awoke, 
 And at her peace I aimed a fatal stroke.
 
 THE BRIDE OF STENA. 105 
 
 I won her unsuspecting friend to wear 
 
 Her robes, her veil, and to assume her air, 
 
 And thus disguised at dead of night to meet 
 
 A muffled lover. Her adoring lord 
 
 I sought, as home he sped, with hopes how sweet ! 
 
 But ere to happiness and her restored 
 
 I roused his fears ; I made him deem that she 
 
 Was false to him, — bade him their meeting see. 
 
 He deemed it was his bride. Ah, now forgive ! 
 
 It was disguised Bianca met his view. 
 
 Now would you bid the guilty Ghino live ? 
 
 La Pia was that victim, and my dupe were you." 
 
 " Monster ! " lord Nello cried, (but as he gazed 
 
 On that cold brow, those eyes already glazed,) 
 
 " No, rather monstrous vision ! false as vain, 
 
 The wild delirium of thy fevered brain ! 
 
 Compose thyself; demons these phantoms send 
 
 To rob thee of thy last, thy faithful friend." 
 
 f 5
 
 106 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 " Friend ! if you are my friend, say you forgive ! 
 
 And haste, begone ! yet, yet your bride may live. 
 
 Kill me and I will bless you, but believe : 
 
 Can it avail the dying to deceive ? 
 
 Ha ! whose that shriek ? Bianca comes ; 't is she ! 
 
 Now, now believe, and curse a fiend in me !" 
 
 Death's ear was quick ; those accents of despair, 
 
 They were Bianca's : " Oh !" she cried, " if e'er 
 
 Love, pity, moved your hearts, do not deny 
 
 To one who lived for him, with him to die." 
 
 To his attendants, who had forward pressed, 
 
 Forbidding entrance, she these words addressed ; 
 
 Her energetic grief prevailed at last, 
 
 And by his couch her kneeling form she cast. 
 
 " Welcome!" in hollow tone lord Ghino said, 
 
 " Unconsciously betrayer and betrayed !" 
 
 " O my best love ! " the maiden cried, and clasped 
 
 His clammy hand. Her trembling arm he grasped
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 107 
 
 (C By this my dying hour \" he groaned, " while wait 
 
 For this doomed soul fiends watching and elate, 
 
 By all the endless torments I shall bear, 
 
 By the cold earth-worm, maid, I bid thee swear 
 
 That night when Nello from the battle came 
 
 (Oh, night of endless guilt and deathless shame !) 
 
 That she, his bride, did her lone vigil keep, 
 
 Weeping such tears as angel mourners weep, 
 
 While you assumed her garb, and in yon bower 
 
 Met young Anselmo at the midnight hour. 
 
 Speak, wretched girl!" with Death's hoarse tones he 
 
 cried. 
 " I did ; you wished it, love \" the maid replied. 
 
 XXII. 
 
 " Great God!" lord Nello cried, " can this be so r 
 
 Then may you both through endless ages know 
 
 Each torturing variety of woe !" 
 
 Ere the last words passed from his lips away, 
 
 Nello was gone. "Stay!" Ghino groaned, " oh, stay!
 
 108 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Say you forgive me — see ! that form again, 
 It beckons me across a tomb-strewn plain. 
 I come, La Pia ! " His wild eyes were raised ; 
 One moment they were fixed and coldly glazed. 
 Bianca, fainting, sank upon the floor; 
 All was a blank, lord Ghino w r as no more. 
 And when new life returning suffering brought, 
 With all the martyrdom entailed by thought, 
 The doubtful fate (and wrought perhaps by her) 
 Of one too fond to fear, too pure to err, — 
 From early youth the guardian, sister, friend, — 
 " Oh! if she die, her memory shall blend," 
 She cried, ci with every thought ; and every hour 
 Add to that fatal memory deadlier power. 
 Then o'er her heart swept like the simoon's blast 
 The thought of Ghino's guilt, her slighted faith ; 
 Robbed of the wretch's heritage, the past! 
 Robbed of the cheering hope, that conquers death ! 
 One hour of burning anguish has more power 
 To ripen virtue than calm quiet years :
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 109 
 
 Called forth by anguish, Faith bursts into flower, 
 Watered by Penitence's ceaseless tears. 
 Thus sorrow-taught Bianca, first aware 
 That she was weak, cast every earth-born care 
 On Him who cared for her : " Lord ! " she cried, 
 " Temptations hover round the earthly bride ; 
 A clinging faith tempts mortals to deceive, 
 But thou wilt bless the fond hearts that believe. 
 Oh, let me seek the convent's quiet shade, 
 There train for Heaven the heart on earth betrayed. 
 Farewell, vain scenes ! I go by God forgiven ; 
 Henceforth Bianca is the bride of Heaven." 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 O anguish of suspense ! is there an hour 
 That concentrates in its malignant power 
 The very essence of despair and grief, 
 And pangs for which no tears can bring relief ? 
 It is the hour when, yet uncertain, we, 
 Upon the very brink of misery,
 
 110 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Now buoyed by hope, and now by fears depressed, 
 With heart that will not break, yet cannot rest, 
 Hurry along a frame that keeps no pace 
 With terrors that new deadlier terrors chase. 
 How fleetly Nello's steed now scoured the plain ! 
 And yet how slow to Nello seemed its pace ; 
 And, oh, what frantic fears crowd on his brain 
 As he draws near unto that fatal place ! 
 In vain his eyes the white-robed figure sought, 
 While from its absence he an omen caught 
 He scarcely dared to his own heart avow. 
 And now the castle rears its lofty brow, — 
 How awful is the death-like silence there ! 
 Now the raised drawbridge adds to his despair : 
 In vain he calls, — none answer. From his horse 
 He flings himself, and up a winding road, 
 With steps urged on by terror and remorse, 
 He gains the court-yard of that dread abode. 
 He seeks the seneschal,— no form appears ; 
 He calls, — an echo only meets his ears ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. Ill 
 
 He breathes La Pia's name, and from the hall 
 
 That awful echo answers to his call, 
 
 With sounds that on his ear prophetic fell . 
 
 And seemed of all his dearest hopes the knell. 
 
 He stood one moment 'numbed by maddening thought. 
 
 Then with quick step he sought -the turret-room, — 
 
 A moment told him life for him was nought 
 
 But a dark dreary passage to the tomb. 
 
 XXIV, 
 
 On a white bier, but whiter than that bier, 
 
 Lay all his soul adored, his heart held dear : 
 
 Fresh flowers around and o'er her form were spread. 
 
 There was a holy calm upon that face 
 
 So like soft slumber, — is the true one dead ! 
 
 Has the soul left its pure fair dwelling-place ! 
 
 Oh, wrong her not ! while yet she lived; that cheek 
 
 At his approach told joy no words could speak ; 
 
 Warni from her heart the quick pure current came 
 
 Responsive to his whisper of her name.
 
 1 12 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Oh, how that lovely form, now stilly cold, 
 
 Was wont with quick delight her lord to meet, 
 
 And those fair arms in warm embrace to fold, 
 
 And those closed eyes with smiling joy to greet ! 
 
 Silent reproach of Death ! oh, what to thee 
 
 Are living strains of soul-wrought agony ? 
 
 What power have all the tears the wronged can weep, 
 
 Like those pale lids now closed in Death's long sleep ? 
 
 What all the heart-wrung anguish words can pour 
 
 To those cold silent lips that part no more ? 
 
 What dagger at the heart can aim a blow 
 
 Like that the loved, the injured, and the dead 
 
 Unconsciously on writhing hearts bestow 
 
 By that chill couch we seek, yet seeking dread ? 
 
 Oh, what appeals to Nello's writhing mind 
 
 Are those pale relics of the dead, the loved ! 
 
 That face, where resignation seemed enshrined 
 
 Amid a wreck, an awful wreck that proved, 
 
 Pangs long protracted, sufferings bestowed — 
 
 By whom ? oh, what a harrowing thought was there !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 113 
 
 Beside the faded form lord Nello bowed : 
 It was not calm, it was the soul's despair. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 Though not by virgin hands, the pure, the dead 
 
 Was laid to rest upon her flower-strewn bier ; 
 
 By that old convert her last couch was spread, 
 
 His the last office, his regret's last tear, 
 
 And had not feeling hallowed for that task 
 
 One rude by nature, and of mind uncouth ? 
 
 Oh, who could doubt its power ? oh, who would ask 
 
 Why immortelles, proclaiming deathless truth, 
 
 Now crown her brow, and with their lasting V.oom 
 
 Speak of a love that lives beyond the tomb ; 
 
 And roses, late so fresh in beauty's charm, 
 
 Drooping betray the latent power to harm; 
 
 There sickly rosemary and woful rue 
 
 Were twined with wreaths of cypress and of yew ? 
 
 But Nello marked not these ; he only saw, 
 
 And saw with thrilling anguish, that pale form;
 
 114 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 Marked each sad change, and gazed with trembling awe 
 
 Upon her altered features' marble charm ! 
 
 Oh ! what sad tale of suffering was revealed 
 
 By that sunk cheek, those lips in silence sealed. 
 
 Those eyes, oh ! shall he never meet their ray ? 
 
 Then life is endless night — they formed his day. 
 
 Then came quick crowding thoughts of her despair, 
 
 Her horror of that spot if left alone ; 
 
 Her sweet content if he were with her there : 
 
 He seemed to hear her voice's thrilling tone. 
 
 He gazed w T ith tearless burning eyes, until 
 
 He deemed she smiled, and that her bosom rose : 
 
 He seized her hand ; but — O the death-cold chill 
 
 Of those unconscious fingers that still close 
 
 O'er flowers of death ! — he let it fall, and he 
 
 Shuddered to hear it sink all heavily. 
 
 Her long black hair in still luxuriance hung ; 
 
 Oh, how his memory to those glad hours clung 
 
 When first she gave, with blushing loveliness, 
 
 The long-implored, the long-expected tress !
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 115 
 
 " Great God !" at length in fierce despair he cried, 
 " Let Death restore me to my injured bride : 
 Let me not live the prey of this fierce thought, 
 That this sad awful wreck my wrongs have wrought. 
 Here, by my loved one's side, I vow that ne'er 
 These lips accursed shall breathe a purer air ; 
 Here, where La Pia breathed her last pure sigh, 
 Here living will I mourn, and mourning die!" 
 He sank exhausted by that pallid form, 
 And bowed his head upon her clay-cold breast ; 
 The sunbeams seemed to lend a glow, a charm 
 To the unconscious cheek he madly pressed ; 
 Then in the folds of her luxuriant hair 
 He hid his face and yielded to despair. 
 Is this the young, the noble, and the proud, 
 Before whom beauty blushed and valour bowed,— 
 Object of woman's love, of warrior's fear r 
 Come, human pride, and learn a lesson here, — 
 Here, where his awful vigil Nello keeps, 
 Where reigns remorse, where injured beauty sleeps. 
 

 
 116 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 XXVI. 
 
 It was the depth of night ; long hours had passed, 
 And Nello lingered still beside the dead, 
 And solemn steps approach the bier at last, 
 The glare of torches flashes o'er his head, 
 And many voices chant the solemn strain, 
 And clouds of incense fill the turret-room. 
 From distant convent came the funeral train 
 To bear the pure one to her early tomb : 
 Long weary miles the poor old man had trod 
 To seek these pious ministers of God. 
 A chapel near the ancient castle rose, 
 The dead of by-gone ages there repose ; 
 Within its cemetery her grave they spread, 
 Then came to bear her to that quiet bed. 
 Now slowly draw they near, but at the sound, 
 With madly flashing eyes, lord Nello rose, 
 And flung his arms his cold pale bride around 
 As though to shield her from approaching foes ;
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA: 11/ 
 
 Then cried, while all stood rooted by surprise, 
 
 " He who draws near, or dares to touch her, dies !" 
 
 u Hush, impious man !" an aged priest replied, 
 
 u Hush, vengeful murderer of a spotless bride ! - 
 
 Wouldst thou deny to one betrayed like her . • ■-■ 
 
 The last sad rites, the Christian's sepulchre ? " 
 
 " Away, old man! where should the wronged one rest ? 
 
 Where, or in life or death, but on this breast ? 
 
 This cold pale form, that ne'er knew taint of sin, 
 
 Clasped to this heart shall quench the fire within." 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 "He raves," the priest replied ; "come, brethren, all — " 
 
 But at that moment the old seneschal 
 
 Slowly drew nigh and said, " My lord, I come 
 
 Like one who bears a message from the tomb, — 
 
 A message from that sainted one ! If e'er 
 
 Beauty and virtue lived, then lived they there ; 
 
 The purest, chastest, that e'er shed a tear, 
 
 She lies a corpse, my lord, upon that bier.
 
 118 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 She bade me tell thee that, by her forgiven, 
 
 Her last fond prayer for thee was raised to Heaven ; 
 
 She knew that thou would'st mourn, and bade thee turn 
 
 To him who taught that blest are they who mourn ; 
 
 She died, my lord, as spotless virtue dies, — 
 
 There the pure shrine of a pure spirit lies. 
 
 It was her wish, her hope, to lie at rest 
 
 In consecrated ground beside the blest. 
 
 And I, a recreant, by her virtues taught 
 
 To seek for peace where none have vainly sought, 
 
 I charge thee, by the pardon that she gave, 
 
 Deny her not that last sad boon, the grave !" 
 
 While thus the old man spake, in altered mood, 
 
 Pale as the form he clasped, lord Nello stood ; 
 
 With hollow voice he said, " Then be it so ! 
 
 She wished it, 'tis enough; but pause awhile, — 
 
 In mercy do not lay the loved one low 
 
 Till on her early grave bright morn shall smile : 
 
 Leave me awhile with all my heart holds dear, 
 
 When morn comes forth, like her once radiant bloom,
 
 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 119 
 
 Then shall ye bear her from this fatal bier. 
 Bear her, O God! to a more fatal tomb!" 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 When morning came they bore her to the grave,. 
 And Nello followed : but that awful night ; .. 
 Had done the work of years. Is this- the; brave r 
 Oh, what a wreck ! the eye, so darkly bright, 
 Is dim and glazed ; the noble form is bowed ; 
 Yet was it proudest once where all were proud. 
 They laid her in the grave, and like a flower 
 Cropped in its pride on earth's cold breast she lay. 
 And months passed by, and still at evening hour 
 Lord Nello watched, and watched at dawn of day : 
 His last sad solace now was when he heard 
 From the old man each oft-repeated word 
 Of his pure bride. Oh, she had said a source 
 Of hope and peace awaited his remorse ; 
 Humbled he prayed such source might be revealed — 
 Who prays in earnest finds that fount unsealed. 
 
 
 '
 
 120 THE BRIDE OF SIENA. 
 
 It was his only care to tend her grave, 
 To bid fresh flowers like emblems o'er her wave. 
 At length one morning, when the old man sought 
 His widowed lord, and his scant pittance brought, 
 He found him kneeling at the grave, but glazed 
 Were his dark eyes and stiff his hands, though raised 
 Breathing that prayer the broken-hearted pray, 
 The Penitent had calmly passed away !
 
 NOTES. 
 
 Note 1, page 4, line 10. 
 " Siena's marble palaces arise." 
 
 The city of Siena, which derives its origin from a Roman colony 
 mentioned by Pliny and Tacitus, lies about thirty miles south of 
 Florence. It is most salubriously situated on a hill of moderate 
 height, and is abundantly supplied with water by numerous foun- 
 tains, of which the principal one is named Fontebranda, and is 
 remarkable for the beauty of the sculpture with which it is orna- 
 mented. The Duomo, or cathedral, of Siena is a stately edifice built 
 in the Gothic style, and, like that of Milan, covered both within and 
 without with marble. Siena is also famous for its marble palaces. 
 
 The river Arbia, celebrated for the great defeat which the Floren- 
 tines sustained at Monte Aperti on its banks from the Sienese in 
 the year 1260, flows to the east of the town at a distance of little 
 more than a mile, and after receiving the Tressa, a stream that runs 
 under the town on the south, enters the Ombrone, the principal 
 river of the territory. 
 
 Siena is named the City of the Virgin and the Queen of the 
 Maremma. Its inhabitants are remarkable for the purity of their 
 language and the courtesy of their manners. In personal beauty 
 also they have the advantage of their neighbours. 
 
 Note 2, page 16, line 13. 
 " Behold those towers that rise beside our walls." 
 
 On account of the incessant feuds among the nobles of the Italian 
 cities of the Middle Ages, their houses were all strong fortresses, 
 and able to stand a siege if necessary. Many of these strongholds 
 may yet be seen in Florence and other cities.
 
 122 NOTES. 
 
 Note 3, page 52, line 10. 
 
 " The conflict of this day. luckless doom ! " 
 
 The battle of Colle, which Dante has made celebrated, like that 
 of the Arbia, by a reference to it in his immortal poem, (see II 
 Purgatorio, canto xiii.), was fought in the year 1269, nine years after 
 that on the Arbia. 
 
 In the month of June 1269, the people of Siena, aided by the 
 
 Pisans and some Spanish and German troops, and the Ghibelline 
 
 exiles of Florence and other towns, in all 8000 foot and 1400 horse, 
 
 under the command of their governor Provinzano de' Silvani and of 
 
 count Guido Novello, came and encamped at the abbey of Spugnole 
 
 near Colle, in the Val d' Elsa. For the Guelfic exiles of Siena and 
 
 other towns, having fixed themselves at Colle, did their enemies 
 
 much injury. The news reached Florence on a Friday evening, 
 
 and Giambertaldo, the vicar of Charles of Anjou in that town, set 
 
 out for Colle next morning with 400 French horsemen whom he had 
 
 with him : the Florentine Guelfs, horse and foot, assembled and 
 
 followed him as fast as they could ; and on Sunday evening their 
 
 horse, about 800, reached Colle, but the greater part of the foot did 
 
 not yet arrive. On Monday morning the Sienese, not thinking 
 
 their position sufficiently secure, were moving to occupy a stronger 
 
 one ; but Giambertaldo dashed over the bridge at the head of his 
 
 1200 horse, and fell on and routed them with great slaughter ; and 
 
 it was said that if the Florentine infantry had arrived, not one of 
 
 the enemy would have escaped. Count Guido fled, Provinzano 
 
 Silvani was taken, and his head cut off and carried on a lance 
 
 through the camp. It was reported that before setting out he had 
 
 by incantations forced the devil to give him a response touching 
 
 the fate of the expedition, and that he had replied, Andrai, combat- 
 
 terai, vincerai, no, serai preso alia battaglia, e la tua testa sera la piii 
 
 alta del campo. He went forth confident of victory, not aware of the 
 
 fallacy in the placing of the no which might be joined with serai or 
 
 not. This victory was considered a full compensation for the
 
 NOTES. 123 
 
 great defeat sustained by the Florentines at Monte Aperti on the 
 Arbia. See G. Villani, Historie Florentine, lib. vii. cap. 31 ; Male- 
 volti, Historia de' Sanesi, lib. ii. pag. 38. 
 
 Colle is about eleven miles west of Siena, in the Val d' Elsa, not 
 far from that river. 
 
 Note 4, page 67, line 13. 
 " She cast a glance around ; 'twas even so." 
 
 By the Maremma is understood that part of the coast of Italy 
 extending from the Magra to the Tiber, equally distinguished for 
 the fertility of its soil and the insalubrity of its climate ; whence 
 the saying, " In Maremma si arricchisce in un anno, si muore in sei 
 mesi." Its insalubrity is owing partly to natural, partly to moral 
 causes. It would seem that the volcanic nature of the soil of the 
 west coast of Italy, by disengaging carbonic acid gas, and other 
 noxious vapours, may be the original cause, and that the crimes or 
 the negligence of man in depopulating the country, and thus suffer- 
 ing it to be overrun with forests, which check ventilation, and al- 
 lowing the streams to stagnate and form marshes, whence mephitic 
 vapours exhale, have greatly tended to augment it. 
 
 Perhaps 3000 years ago Nature here was not so fatal to the human 
 species, or the skill of man had succeeded better in overcoming her, 
 than in later times ; for some of the most flourishing towns of an- 
 cient Etruria, such as Vetulonium, Populonia, Rusellae, Saturnia, 
 Tarquinii, lay in the Maremma, now so pestiferous and so thinly 
 inhabited. Under the dominion of the Romans, especially after 
 the Social War and the confiscations of Sulla, when the population 
 of Etruria was so greatly thinned, the woods were suffered to en- 
 croach and the waters to stagnate, and the Maremma became what 
 it was in the Middle Ages and is at the present day. When, 
 during the Middle Ages, liberty aroused the energies of man, the 
 Maremma also felt their effects ; and it was cultivated and inhabited 
 to an extent far beyond what it is at present, as is proved by the
 
 124 NOTES. 
 
 number of ruined castelli, or strong towns, with their deserted 
 bandite, or districts, scattered over it. Various efforts, but without 
 success, have been made in the last and present century to reclaim 
 the Maremma. The oaks, chestnuts, and other trees of the forests 
 which cover a great part of it, attain an immense size; and the 
 parts which are cultivated yield most abundant crops. 
 
 The Maremma of Siena extends for a space of thirty miles on each 
 side of the Ombrone, and its divisions are named the Maremma di 
 qua, and the Maremma di la. It is less pestiferous than that of the 
 Patrimony to the south of it. 
 
 For a full account of the Maremma, see the Viagyj in Toscana 
 of Targioni Tozzetti, vols. iv. and ix. See also Sir R. Colt Hoare's 
 Classical Tour through Italy and Sicily. 
 
 Note 5, page 90, line 3. 
 
 " .... too oft to reap 
 With that rich harvest an eternal sleep." 
 
 The hardy peasantry of the Apennines come down every year into 
 the Maremma to sow and cut the corn, and to saw the timber or 
 reduce it to charcoal ; but they are sure, sooner or later, to pay the 
 penalty with their lives, dying of fevers and other diseases produced 
 by the effluvia of the place. It will easily be seen, that the pestilen- 
 tial vapour of the Maremma is analogous to the malaria which pre- 
 vails on the south of the Tiber. The worst season, as at Rome, is 
 from the summer solstice to the autumnal equinox. Even the 
 sparrows are then observed to quit the houses and retire, it is not 
 known whither, to escape the deleterious atmosphere. 
 
 THE END, 
 
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