“Trust not the frantic, or mysterious guide,
Nor stoop a captive to the schoolman’s pride.”
SAVAGE.
Before we remove the scene of our narrative to Brigland again, it will be
necessary to let our readers into the secret of the ill-omened appearance
of the priest, at whose aspect our friend Markham so instinctively
shuddered.
If the slight and occasional notice which we have taken of Clara
Rivolta’s character and circumstances have conveyed to the minds of
our readers those impressions which we have designed that it should
convey; they will see that the poor girl, from circumstances over which
she had no control, and from a natural timidity and diffidence, had
been painfully and severely tried. They will also readily imagine that
she had experienced no slight inconvenience from the difference between
the religion of her birthplace and the religion of her present home.
They will easily imagine that her mind could not be so passionately and
fervently devoted to the old religion as was the mind of her mother; and
they will also be able to apprehend that she could not be very hostile
to the faith which Markham professed. Now, though Signora Rivolta was a
woman of good natural understanding, of great discernment, and of strong
mind; and though she could reason well and talk liberally, yet she had
by constitutional temperament a strong tincture of fanaticism. Her mind
was naturally enthusiastic; and though fanaticism and enthusiasm may be
managed with a better grace in minds of an exalted character than in
those of inferior powers, yet where these feelings do exist in strong
and superior minds they are exceedingly obstinate and unchangeable.
It was therefore with no agreeable feelings that Signora Rivolta had
contemplated the possibility, and indeed the great probability, that her
daughter would give her hand to a Protestant.
A conversation which the mother of Clara once had with Lady Woodstock
on this subject by no means reconciled her to the anticipation. The
substance of the conversation was as follows: Lady Woodstock had
prevailed with Clara for two or three successive Sundays to attend with
her at Mr. Henderson’s chapel; and on their return from the chapel one
morning, Lady Woodstock observing that Signora Rivolta looked unusually
morose, addressed her as if her ill looks were from mere bodily
indisposition.
“My dear Signora, I am afraid you are not well this morning.”
“Lady Woodstock, I am unwell; but it is the malady of mind. I am not
pleased that my daughter should forsake the religion in which she was
educated. I have not seen in this country sufficient proofs that the
Protestant religion is so superior to the Catholic, as to make me wish
that my daughter should renounce the faith of her native land.”
Lady Woodstock was not one of those good-humored people who are never out
of humor except when they are displeased: her good-humor was perpetual;
and it was by no means her habit to snatch eagerly at an opportunity of
being affronted. With the greatest cheerfulness of manner, therefore, she
replied to this pettish speech of Signora Rivolta.
“My very good lady, why should you imagine that I have any wish to
withdraw your daughter from her own religion? But even suppose that such
an event should take place, you are not so illiberally inclined as to
believe that salvation is not attainable in the Protestant church; and as
it is not impossible that your daughter may be married to a Protestant,
it is well that she should at least learn to regard that religion with
complacency.”
The mother of Clara was by no means softened by that reply, but with
unabated asperity replied, “I must entreat you, my Lady Woodstock, not
to speak so slightingly of religion. Would you have a woman renounce her
religion for a husband?”
“I think seriously,” said Lady Woodstock, “that the religion of the wife
should conform to that of the husband.”
“Abominable!” exclaimed Signora Rivolta.
“Nay, nay, my good friend, I see nothing so very abominable in the
matter. No woman ought to marry a man whose religion will be his
condemnation; and the religion which may be made effectual to the
salvation of the husband is equally capable of saving the wife.”
“Sophistry, not worth refuting;” was the only answer which Signora
Rivolta made to this last speech.
The cause of this ill-humor in the mother of Clara, and of this
ebullition of bigotry, was the appearance in London of an Italian priest
named Martini, whom Signora Rivolta had known in Italy, and from whose
fanaticism her mind had received there a strong religious impulse. This
Father Martini had, on the Sunday morning in question, officiated at
the chapel where Signora Rivolta attended, and his discourse had been
on the subject of religious indifference; and that part of religious
indifference on which priests are most eloquent, and with which they
are generally most angry, is an inattention to sectarian theories or
peculiarities. By the eloquence of Father Martini the zeal of Signora
Rivolta had been revived, and with that zeal there also arose a feeling
of hostility and bitterness towards heretics.
This conversation took place just after the elopement of the Countess of
Trimmerstone with Mr. Tippetson: and as after that event Horatio Markham,
from circumstances already noticed, did not pay such constant attention
as in former days he had paid to Clara, Signora Rivolta began to have
hopes that the attachment on Markham’s part was dying away. With respect
to Clara, it was evident that her mind was in a painfully unsettled
state; and her mother thought that no better remedy could be applied,
than removing her from those scenes and associations from whence her
unhappiness arose; and as Father Martini was a man of some consideration
in his own country, and a person in whom the Signora could confide, it
entered into her mind that it might be desirable to send Clara back
to her native land under his guardianship, till such time as in the
revolution of events Colonel Rivolta and herself might be able to return
to Italy.
It would indeed have been a gratification to her mother, could Clara
have been easily induced to take the veil; but the Signora had more
consideration for her daughter’s feelings than to use, or to suffer to
be used, any urgent importunities on the subject. And here we are quite
willing and most happy to render to Signora Rivolta the justice which
acknowledges and commends the gentle and unimportunate mode in which
her wishes on this subject were always expressed. Every body knows that
there is a mode of importunity which wearies and worries into compliance,
when the judgment and inclination are equally and strongly adverse to
that compliance. And this importunity is so expressed, and with such
jesuitical dexterity is it oftentimes managed, that when it has gained
its object, its victim is thought and spoken of as acting from its own
free will. Beautifully is this importunity pictured in that touching song
called “Auld Robin Gray.”
“My mither didna speak,
But she looked in my face
Till my heart was nigh to break.”
Now there was no such species of tender worrying as this in Signora
Rivolta’s conduct towards her daughter. The Signora was somewhat
fanatical, but she was straightforward and honest.
The presence of Father Martini in London at this juncture certainly led
the mother of Clara to thoughts concerning her daughter; and, knowing
that Mr. Martindale was not very partial to the priests of her religion,
she took occasion of his absence to hold frequent intercourse with this
zealous supporter and advocate of that faith in which she had been
educated. Father Martini had made frequent visits, and had held long
consultations. In those consultations mention had been made of Markham
and Tippetson; and when the priest made the last visit, he took it for
granted that the person whom he met at the drawing-room door was Markham:
for that reason he looked at him with such inquisitorial scrutiny.
It has been stated that Sir Andrew Featherstone had met this Father
Martini, and had informed him of the dangerous state in which Mr.
Martindale was, at Brigland. This information the priest of course
conveyed to Signora Rivolta. But before he had well finished speaking, a
letter came from Brigland, addressed to Colonel Rivolta, and by him it
was immediately handed over to the Signora.
The suddenness of the information, and the unexpectedness of the event,
gave a painful shock to her feelings. At the first meeting of father
and daughter, as mentioned in an early part of our narrative, there
was comparatively little emotion. They had not been acquainted with
or accustomed to each other, and therefore all the emotion which was
excited was merely by force of imagination, in which faculty neither of
them much abounded. But when Signora Rivolta had resided for a year or
two with her lately-discovered father, and had experienced from him so
much more kindness, attention, and even homage, than the circumstances of
her birth could have led her to anticipate; when she had observed in his
mind those traits and features, which are really and substantially good;
and when she had seemed to be essential to his happiness and comfort:
then indeed it was painful to her that he had been thus suddenly snatched
away from her, and that he had breathed his last at a distance from every
relative; and that the only farewell had been the parting for a short
journey.
When Signora Rivolta had read the letter, she gave it to her daughter,
and covered her face, and wept bitterly, but not loudly. The contents of
the letter were thus made known to Clara before she read it. There is
sometimes a consolation springing from the suddenness of an afflictive
announcement; for if the first shock is well sustained, the details
and particulars frequently act as alleviations. But Clara’s nerves were
not strong, and her susceptibility was acute; and as her mother was not
ordinarily passionate in grief or profuse of tears, the deep sobbings
which the poor girl now witnessed overcame her self-possession, and she
uttered a slight scream and fainted. The usual restoratives were promptly
applied, and the stern-looking Father Martini was deeply moved at the
scene of distress before him.
Clara was presently removed to her own apartment; and when she was
sufficiently recovered to be left alone, Signora Rivolta returned to
the priest. Now though this man had a stern and forbidding aspect,
and though he was most zealously and exclusively devoted to that form
of Christianity which he professed, yet he had the kindly feelings of
humanity about him; and even the sternness of his bigotry had mercy for
its motive.
“Lady,” said the priest to Signora Rivolta, “I can pity you. I can make
allowance for the frailty and weakness of human feeling; but you must,
in the midst of your grief, remember and adore the hand which sends
affliction. And you should consider whether there be not some peculiar
spiritual good to be derived and drawn from temporal and worldly sorrow.
You have lost a parent. Pray for his soul. His errors might have shaken
the stability of your faith; and if he endeavoured, while living, to
poison your soul with heresy, now return good for evil, and pray for him.
Who can tell how much the prayers of the faithful may avail!”
Signora Rivolta listened calmly, and replied, “But, father, will my
prayers be successful for a heretic?”
“Daughter,” replied the priest, “there are no heretics in the grave.”
There was a pause in the conversation; and Father Martini anxiously
watched the countenance of Signora Rivolta to see when there might be
an opportunity of speaking concerning the daughter, of the steadiness
of whose faith there was some ground of doubt. As there appeared some
symptoms of composure, the priest, after a short interval, said,
“Daughter, when afflictions come upon us, it is for our own good, or for
the good of the church, most frequently for both. You have a child who
was brought up in the bosom of the holy church; the faith of that child
has been endangered. It is now more than ever in your power to secure and
establish it. Whereinsoever you doubt your own influence in this land of
heresy, that defect may be supplied and that evil remedied by removal of
your child into a country where heresy is unknown.”
There followed this address a much longer and more embarrassing interval
of silence, which at length was slowly broken by Signora Rivolta in a
subdued and almost whispering tone. “Father Martini, I reverence the
faith in which I have been reared from my infancy, and I feel it to
be a faith of holy and sustaining power; but I fear that it has no
influence where it does not rule the will; and I cannot, dare not, use
an importunity of persuasion to urge my child to the steps which you
suggest. If the church receives her wholly, it shall receive her freely.”
At this speech there was a slight frown upon the brow of the holy man;
but Signora Rivolta saw it not, nor was she aware of any unpleasant
feeling in the mind of Father Martini, when in reply he said, “Lady, you,
as a mother, have power to influence; and the influence which you can use
is more than authority and weightier than command. A child cannot long
resist a parent.”
With much quickness and promptitude, Signora Rivolta replied, “My child
shall not resist me.”
Father Martini was pleased; and with an agreeable feeling he rose to take
his leave, saying, “Now, lady, I leave you; and when you have performed
your duty to the dead, you will not forget your duty also to the living.”
There was a meaning in the Signora’s last expression which the priest did
not observe. To his ear it sounded as if it was intended to say that
resistance would be hopeless and ineffectual. From the lips of Clara’s
mother it was intended to say, that no importunity of persuasion should
be used. It was a pleasant misunderstanding on both sides.