CHAPTER XLI

At this juncture the doors of the temple swung open with a metallic

sound, and the Invisibles entered, two and two. The magic notes of the

harmonica,[15] an instrument newly invented, the vibration of which was

an unknown wonder to Consuelo, was heard in the air, and seemed to

descend from the dome, which was open to the moon and the night wind. A

shower of flowers fell slowly over the happy couple amid this solemn

strain. Wanda stood by a tripod of gold, whence her right hand threw

brilliant flames and clouds of perfume, while in the left she held the

two ends of a chain of flowers and symbolic leaves she had cast around

the two lovers. The invisible chiefs, their faces being covered with

their long red drapery, with chaplets of the oak and accacia around

their brows, stood up to receive the brothers as they passed by them,

with a bow of veneration. The chiefs had the majesty of the old Druids,

but their hands, unstained by blood, were opened to bless alone, and

religious respect replaced the terror of old creeds. As the initiated

appeared before the venerable tribune, they took off their masks, to

salute the unknown with a bare brow. The latter were known to them only

by acts of clemency and justice, paternal love and wisdom. Faithful to

the religion of an oath, they did not seek to penetrate the mysterious

veils. Certainly, though themselves unaware, the adepts knew these magi

of a new religion, for they mingled with them in society, and, in the

very bosom of their assemblies, were the best friends and confidants of

the major portion of them--perhaps of each individual. In the practice

of their religion the priest was always veiled, like the oracle of

ancient days.

Happy childhood of innocent creeds, quasi fabulous dawn of sacred

conspiracies, enwrapped in the night of ages, and decked with poetical

uncertainty! though the space of scarcely one century separates us from

these Invisibles, their existence to the historian is enigmatical.

Thirty years after the _illuminati_ assumed those powers of which the

vulgar were ignorant, and finding their resources in the inventive

genius of the chiefs, and in the tradition of the secret societies of

mystic Germany, terrified the world by the most formidable and vast

political conspiracy that ever existed. For a moment it shook the throne

of every dynasty, and finally succumbed, bequeathing to the French

revolution an electric current of sublime enthusiasm, ardent faith, and

terrible fanaticism. Half a century before those days marked out by

fate, and while the gallant monarchy of Louis XV., the philosophical

despotism of Frederick II., the skeptic and mocking loyalty of Voltaire,

the ambition and diplomacy of Maria Theresa, and the heretical

toleration of Gangarelli, seemed to promise to the world a season of

decrepitude, antagonism, chaos, and dissolution, the French revolution

fermented and germinated in the dark. It existed in minds which were

_believing_ almost to fanaticism, under the form of one dream of

universal revolution. While debauchery, hypocrisy, and incredulity ruled

the world, a sublime faith, a magnificent revelation of the future,

profound systems of organization, perhaps wiser than our Fourierism and

Saint-Simonism, already realised in some rare groups the ideal

conception of a future society diametrically opposed to what covers and

hides their actions in history.

Such a contrast is one of the most prominent features of the eighteenth

century, which was too full of ideas, and of intellectual labor of all

kinds, for its synthesis to be made even yet, with clearness and profit,

by the historians and philosophers of our own days. The reason is, there

is a mass of contradictory documents, uninterpreted facts, not perceived

at first, sources of information disturbed by the tumult of the century,

and which must be purified before a solid bottom can be found. Many

energetic laborers have remained obscure, bearing to the tomb the secret

of their mission--so many dazzling glories absorbed the attention of

their contemporaries, so many brilliant feats even now absorbed the

retrospective attention of critics. Gradually, however, light will

emanate from chaos; and if our century sum up its own deeds, it will

also chronicle those of its predecessor--that vast logogriph, those

brilliant nebulæ, where there is so much cowardice combined with

grandeur, ignorance with knowledge, light with error, incredulity with

faith, pedantry with mocking frivolity, superstition with lofty reason.

This period of a hundred years saw the reigns of Madame de Maintenon and

Madame de Pompadour, Peter the Great, Catharine II., Maria Theresa and

Dubarry, Voltaire and Swedenborg, Kant and Mesmer, Rousseau and Dubois,

Schroeffer and Diderot, Fenelon and Law, Zinzendorf and Liebnitz,

Frederick II. and Robespierre, Louis XIV. and Philip Egalité, Marie

Antoinette and Charlotte Corday, Weishaupt, Babœf and Napoleon--a

terrible laboratory, where so many heterogeneous forms have been cast

into the crucible, that they vomited forth, in their monstrous

ebullition, a torrent of smoke, amid which we yet walk, enveloped in

darkness and confused images.

Consuelo and Albert, as well as the Invisible chiefs and the adepts,

were yet farther than we are from understanding it; they had no very

lucid idea of the result of the changes and the turmoil into which they

were anxious to precipitate themselves, with the enthusiastic hope of

completely regenerating society. They fancied themselves on the eve of

an evangelical republic, as the disciples of Jesus fancied he was about

to establish an earthly power. The Taborites of Bohemia fancied

themselves on the eve of a paradisiac condition; and the French

Convention thought their armies about to commence a march of

propagandism over the globe. Without this mad confidence, where would be

great devotion? and without great folly, where would be great results?

But for the Utopia of the divine revealer Jesus, where would be the idea

of human fraternity? But for the contagious ecstacies of Joan of Arc,

would we now be Frenchmen? But for the noble chimeras of the eighteenth

century, would we have the first notions of equality? This mysterious

revolution which the sects of the past had dreamed of, and which the

mystic conspirators of the last century had vaguely foretold, fifty

years before, as an era of renovation, Voltaire, the calm philosophical

head of his day, and Frederick II., the great realiser of logical and

cold power, did not anticipate. The most ardent and the wisest were far

from reading the future. Jean Jacques Rousseau would have repudiated his

own book, had he seen the mountain in a dream, with the guillotine

glaring above it. Albert of Rudolstadt would have become again the

lethargic madman of the Giants' Castle if the bloody glories, followed

by Napoleon's despotism, and the restoration of the ancient _régime_,

followed by the sway of the vilest material interests, had been revealed

to him; or he fancied that he toiled to overthrow, at once and for ever,

scaffolds and prisons, castles and convents, banks and citadels.

These noble children dreamed, and maintained their dream with all the

power of their souls. They no more belonged to their century than did

the shrewd politicians and wise philosophers. Their ideas of the future

were not more lucid than those of the latter. They had no idea of that

great unknown thing which each of us decks with the attributes of our

own power, which deceives us all while it confirms us. Our children see

it clad in a thousand dyes, and each keeps a shred for his own imperial

toga. Fortunately, every century sees it more majestic, because each

produces more persons to toil for its triumph. As for the men who would

tear off the purple and cover it with eternal mourning, they are

powerless, because they do not comprehend it. Slaves to the actual and

present, they are ignorant that the immortal has no age, and that he who

does not fancy it as it may be to-morrow, does not see it as it should

be to-day.

At that moment Albert--enjoying completely restored health, and joyous

in the possession of Consuelo's undivided affection--felt so supremely

elated that there was some danger of his reason reeling from excess of

happiness.

Consuelo stood at last before him, like the Galatea of that artist,

beloved by the gods, waking at once to life and love. Mute and

collected, her face beaming with a celestial glory, she seemed, for the

first time in her life, completely and unmistakably beautiful, because

for the first time she really loved. A sublime serenity shone on her

brow, and her large eyes became moist with that voluptuousness of the

soul, of which that of the body is but a reflection. She was thus

beautiful merely because she did not know what was passing in her heart

and over her face. Albert existed for her alone, or rather she did not

exist except in him; and he alone seemed worthy of entire respect and

boundless admiration. He was transformed, and, as it were, wrapped in

supernatural admiration when he saw her. She discovered in the depth of

his glance all the solemn grandeur of the bitter troubles he had

undergone, though they had left no trace of physical suffering. There

was on his brow the placidity of a resuscitated martyr, who sees the

earth made red by his blood, and a heaven of infinite rewards open to

him. Never did an inspired artist create a nobler ideal of a hero or a

saint, in the grandest days of ancient or Christian art.

All the Invisibles, filled with admiration, paused, after having formed

a circle around them, and for some moments abandoned themselves to the

contemplation of this pair, so pure in the eyes of God, and so chaste

before man. More than twenty vigorous male voices sang, to a measure of

ancient lore and style--"O Hymen! O Hymene!" The music was Porpora's,

the words having been sent to him with orders for an epithalamium on the

occasion of an illustrious marriage. He had been well paid, without

being aware to whom he was under obligations. As Mozart, just before he

died, was to receive the sublimest inspiration for a requiem

mysteriously required, old Porpora regained all his youthful genius to

write an epithalamium the poetic mystery of which had aroused his

imagination. In the very first passage, Consuelo remembered her old

master's style, and looking around, she sought for her adopted father

among the choristers. Among those who were its interpreters, Consuelo

recognised many friends--Frederick Von Trenck, Porporino, Young Benda,

Count Golowkin, Schubert, the Chevalier D'Eon, (whom she had met at

Berlin, but of whose sex she, like all Europe, was ignorant,) the Count

St. Germain, the Chancellor Coccei, (husband of Barberini,) the

bookseller Nicolai, Gottlieb, (whose voice predominated above all the

others,) and Marcus, whom a gesture of Wanda pointed out to her, and

whom, from some instinctive sympathy, she had recognised in her guide,

and who discharged the functions of putative father or sponsor. All the

Invisibles had opened and thrown back on their shoulders their long

melancholy robes, and a neat white costume, which was elegant and

simple, relieved by a chain of gold, to which hung the insignia of the

order, gave to the whole scene the appearance of a festival. Their masks

hung around their wrists, ready to be replaced at the slightest signal

of the watcher, who was on the dome of the edifice.

The orator who communicated between the adepts and chief of the order,

unmasked, and came to wish the couple happiness. This was the Duke of

****, who had consecrated his enthusiasm and immense fortune to the

undertaking of the Invisibles. He was owner of their place of meeting,

and at his house Wanda and Albert had frequent interviews, unseen by any

profane eyes. This house was also the head-quarters of the operations of

the chief of the order, though there were other places at which there

were smaller gatherings. Initiated into all the secrets of the order,

the duke acted with and for them. He did not betray their incognito, but

assumed all the dangers of the enterprise, being himself their visible

means of contact with the members of the association.

When Albert and Consuelo had exchanged the gentle evidence of joy and

affection with their brethren, all took their places, and the duke

having resumed his functions of brother orator, thus spoke, as with

crowns of flowers they knelt before the altar:--

"Very dear and beloved children--In the name of the true God--all power,

love, and intelligence; and after him, in the name of the three virtues

which reflect divinity in the human soul, Activity, Charity, and

Justice, translated in effect by our formula, _Liberty, Fraternity,_ and

_Equality_; finally, in the name of the tribunal of the Invisibles,

devoted to the triple duty of zeal, faith, and study--that is, to the

triple search of the three divine moral and political virtues--Albert

Podiebrad, Consuelo Porporina, I pronounce the ratification and

confirmation of the marriage already contracted before God and your

kindred, and before a priest of the Christian religion, at the Giants'

Castle, 175--. Three things however were wanting: first, the absolute

wish of the wife to live with the husband, seemingly _in extremis_;

second, the sanction of a moral and religious society received and

acknowledged by the husband; third, the consent of a person here

present, the name of whom I am not permitted to mention, but who is

closely bound to one of the party by the ties of blood. If now these

three conditions be fulfilled, and neither of you have aught to object,

join your hands, and, rising, call on heaven to testify to the liberty

of your act and the holiness of your love."

Wanda, who continued unknown among the brothers of the order, took the

hands of the two children. An impulse of tenderness and enthusiasm made

all three rise, as if they had been but one.

The formulæ of marriage were pronounced, and the simple and touching

rite of the new church performed quietly but fervently. This engagement

of mutual love was not an isolated part amid indifferent strangers who

were careless of what passed. Those present were called to sanction the

religious consecration of two beings bound together by one faith. They

extended their arms over the couple and blessed them; then, taking hold

of each other's hands, they made a living circle, a chain of paternal

love, swearing to protect and defend their honor and life, to preserve

them as much as possible from seduction and persecution, on all

occasions and under all circumstances: in fine, to love them purely,

cordially, and seriously, as if they were united to them by name and

blood. The handsome Trenck pronounced this formula for all the others,

in elegant and simple terms. He then added, as he spoke to the husband--

"Albert, the profane and guilty law of old society, from which we

separate ourselves, some day to lead it back to us, wills that the

husband impose fidelity on his wife by humiliation and despotic

authority. If she fail, he must kill his rival; he has even the right to

kill his wife; and this is called washing out the stain of his honor in

blood. In the blind and corrupt world, every man is the enemy of

happiness thus savagely and sternly guarded. The friend, the brother

even, arrogates to himself a right to wrest honor and happiness from his

friend or brother; or, at least, a base pleasure is experienced in

exciting his jealousy and sowing distrust and trouble between him and

the object of his love. Here, you know that we have a better

understanding of honor and family pride. We are brothers in the sight of

God; and any one who would look impurely on the wife of his brother has

in his heart already committed the crime of incest."

All the brothers, moved and excited, then drew their swords, and were

about to swear to use their weapons on themselves, rather than violate

the oath they had just sworn at Trenck's dictation.

The sibyl--agitated by one of those enthusiastic impulses which gave her

so much influence over their imaginations, and which often modified the

opinions and decisions of the chiefs themselves--broke the circle, and

rushed into the midst. Her language, always energetic and burning; her

tall form, her floating drapery, her thin frame trembling yet majestic,

the convulsive tremor of her ever veiled head, and withal, a grace which

at once betokened the former existence of beauty which moves the mind

when it ceases to appeal to the senses;--in fine, even her broken voice,

which at once assumed a strange expression, had conspired to make her a

mysterious being, and invested her with persuasive power and

irresistible prestige.

All were silent to hear the voice of her inspiration. Consuelo was

perhaps more moved than others, because she was aware of her singular

story. She asked herself, shuddering with strange emotion, if this

spectre, escaped from the tomb, really belonged to the world, and if,

after having spoken, she would not disappear in the air, like the flame

on the tripod, which made her appear so blue and transparent.

"Hide from the light these affirmations," said Wanda, with a shudder.

"They are impious oaths when what is invoked is an instrument of hatred

and murder. I know the old world attached the sword to the side of all

reputed free, as a mark of independence and virtue. I well know that, in

obedience to the ideas you have here preserved in spite of yourselves,

the sword is the symbol of honor--that you deem you make holy

engagements when, like citizens of old Rome, you swear on the sword. But

here you would profane a solemn vow. Swear, rather, by this flame and

tripod--the symbol of life, light, and divine love. Do you yet need

emblems and visible signs? Are you yet idolators? Do the figures around

this temple represent aught but ideas? O! swear rather by your own

sentiments, by your better instincts, by your own heart; and if you dare

not swear by the living God, the true, eternal, and holy religion, swear

by pure humanity, by the glorious promptings of your courage, by the

chastity of this young woman and her husband's love--swear by the genius

and beauty of Consuelo, that your desire, that even your thoughts will

never profane this holy arc of matrimony, this invisible and mystic

altar on which the hand of an angel engraves the vow of love.

"Do you know what love is?" said the sibyl, after having paused for an

instant, in a voice which every moment became more clear and

penetrating. "If you did, oh! you venerable chiefs of our order and

priests of our worship, you would never suffer that formula, which God

alone can ratify, to be pronounced before you; and which, consecrated by

men, is a kind of profanation of the divinest of mysteries. What power

can you give to an engagement which in its very nature is miraculous?

Yes, the confounding of two wills in one is in itself a miracle, for

every heart is in itself free by virtue of a divine right. Yet when two

souls yield and become bound to each other, their mutual possession

becomes sacred, and as much a divine right as individual liberty. You

see this is a miracle--that God reserves its mystery to himself, as he

does that of life and death. You are about to ask this man and woman if

during their lives they will belong respectively to each other. Their

fervor is such that they will reply, 'Not only for life, but forever.'

God then inspires them, by the miracle of love, with more faith, power,

virtue, than you can or dare to ask. Away, then, with sacrilegious oaths

and gross laws. Leave them their ideal, and do not bind them to reality

by chains of gold. Leave the care of the continuation of the miracle to

God. Prepare their souls for its accomplishment; form the ideal of love

in them; exhort, instruct; extol and demonstrate the glory of fidelity,

without which there is no moral honor, no sublime love. Do not come

between, however, like Catholic priests, like magistrates, to interfere

by the imposition of an oath. I tell you again, men cannot make

themselves responsible, or be guardians of the perpetuity of a miracle.

What know you of the secrets of the Eternal? Have we already penetrated

the temple of the future, in that celestial world where, beneath sacred

groves, man will converse with God as one friend does with another? Has

a law for indissoluble marriage emanated from the mouth of God? Have his

designs been proclaimed on earth? Have you, children of men, promulgated

this law unanimously? Have the Roman pontiffs never dissolved marriage?

They call themselves infallible! Under the pretext of the nullity of

certain engagements, have they not pronounced real divorces, the scandal

of which history has preserved in its records? The Christian societies,

the reformed sects, the Greek church, following the example of the

Mosaic dispensation, and all ancient religions, frankly introduced

divorce into modern law. What then becomes of the holiness and efficacy

of a vow to God, when it is maintained that man can release us from it?

Touch not love by the profanation of marriage. You cannot stifle it in

pure hearts. Consecrate the conjugal tie by exhortations, by prayers, by

a publicity which will make it respectable, by touching ceremonies. You

should do so, if you be our priests--that is to say, our aids, our

guides, our advisers, our consolers, our lights. Prepare souls for the

sanctity of a sacrament; and, as a father of a family seeks to establish

his children in positions of prosperity, dignity, and security, occupy

yourselves--our spiritual fathers--assiduously in fixing your sons and

daughters in circumstances favorable to the development of true love,

virtue, and sublime fidelity. When you shall have analysed them by

religious ordeals, and ascertained that in their mutual attraction there

is neither cupidity, vanity, nor frivolous intoxication, nor that

sensual blindness that is without ideality--when you have convinced

yourselves that they appreciate the grandeur of their sentiments, the

holiness of their duty, and the liberty of their choice, then permit

them to endow each other with their own inalienable liberty. Let their

families, their friends, and the vast family of the faithful, unite to

ratify this sacrament. Attend to my words! Let the sacrament be a

religious permission, a paternal and social permission, an

encouragement, an exhortation to perpetuate the engagement. Let it not

be a command, an obligation, a law, with menaces and punishments--a

forced slavery, with scandal, prisons and chains if it be violated; for

in this way you would reverse the whole miracle in all its entirety

accomplished on earth. Eternally fruitful providence--God, the

indefatigable dispenser of grace, always will conduct before you young,

fervent, and innocent couples, ready to bind themselves for time and

eternity. Your anti-religious law and your inhuman sacrament will always

abrogate the effect of grace in them. The inequality of conjugal rights

between the sexes--impiety made venerable by social laws--the difference

of duty in public opinion--all the absurd prejudices following in the

wake of bad institutions, will ever extinguish the faith and enthusiasm

of husband and wife. Those who are most sincere, who are most inclined

to fidelity, will be the first to grow sad, and become terrified at the

duration of the engagement, and thus disenchant each other. The

abjuration of individual liberty is in effect contrary to the will of

nature and the dictates of conscience when men participate in it, for

they oppress it with the yoke of ignorance and brutality. It is in

conformity with the will of generous hearts, and necessary to the

religious instincts of strong minds, when God gives us the means to

contend against the various snares man has placed around marriage, so as

to make it the tomb of love, happiness, and virtue, and a "sworn

prostitution," as our fathers the Lollards, whom you know and often

invoke, called it. Give to God what is God's, and take from Cæsar what

is not his."

"And you, my children," said she, turning towards Albert and Consuelo,

"you, who have sworn to reverence the conjugal tie, did not, perhaps,

know the true meaning of what you did. You obeyed a generous impulse,

and replied with enthusiasm to the appeal of honor. That is worthy of

you, disciples of a victorious faith! You have performed more than an

act of individual virtue--you have consecrated a principle without which

there can be neither chastity nor conjugal fidelity.

"O love! sublime flame--so powerful and so fragile, so sudden and so

fugitive! light from heaven, seemingly passing through our existence, to

die before we do, for fear of consuming and annihilating us, we feel you

are a vivifying fire, emanating from God himself, and that whoever would

fix it in his bosom and retain it to his last hour, always ardent,

always in its pristine vigor, would be the happiest and noblest of men.

Thus the disciples of the ideal will always seek to prepare sanctuaries

for you in their bosoms, that you may not hasten to return to heaven.

But alas! you whom we have made it a virtue to honor, have declined to

be renewed at the dictate of our institutions, and have remained free as

the bird of the air, capricious as the flame on the altar. You seem to

laugh at our oaths, our contracts and our will. You fly from us in spite

of all we have invented to fix you in your manners. You no longer

inhabit the harem, guarded by the vigilant sentinels which Christian

society places between the sentence of the magistrate and the yoke of

public opinions. Whence, then, comes your inconstancy and your

ingratitude? Oh! mysterious influence! oh, love! cruelly symbolised

under the form of an infant and blind god! what tenderness and what

contempt inspire human hearts you enkindle with your blaze; and whom you

desert, leaving them to wither amid the anguish of repentance, and, more

frightful yet, of disgust! Why is it that man kneels to you in every

portion of the globe--that you are exalted and deified--that divine

poets call you the soul of the world--that barbarous nations sacrifice

human victims to you, precipitating wives on the fire at the husband's

funeral--that young hearts call you in their gentlest dreams, and that

old men curse life when you abandon them to the horror of solitude?

Whence comes that adoration--sometimes sublime, sometimes

fanatical--which has been decreed you from the golden infancy of

humanity to our age of iron, if you be but a chimera, the dream of a

moment of intoxication, an error of the imagination, excited by the

delirium of the sense. Ah! it is not a vulgar instinct, a mere animal

want. You are not the blind child of Paganism, but the true son of God,

and very essence of the divinity. You have not yet revealed yourself to

us, except through the mist of errors; and you would not make your abode

among us, because you were unwilling to be profaned. You will return to

us, as in the days of the fabulous Astrea, as in the visions of poets,

to fix your abode in our terrestrial paradise, when we shall, by our

sublime virtues, have merited the presence of such a guest. How blessed

then will this abode be to man! and then it will be well to have been

born."

"We will then be brothers and sisters, and unions, freely contracted,

will be maintained by your own power. When, in place of this terrible

contest, whose continuance is impossible--conjugal fidelity being forced

to resist infamous attempts at debauch, hypocritical seduction or mad

violence, hypocritical friendship and wise corruption--every husband

will find around him chaste sisters, himself the jealous and delicate

guardian of the happiness of a sister confided to him as a companion;

while every wife will find in other men so many brothers of her husband,

proud of her happiness and protectors of her peace; then the faithful

wife will no longer be the fragile flower that hides herself to maintain

the treasures of her chastity, often a deserted victim, wasting in

solitude and tears, unable to revive in her husband's mind the flame she

has preserved in purity in her own. The brother then will not be forced

to avenge his sister, and slay him she loves and regrets, in obedience

to the dictates of false honor. The mother will not tremble for her

daughter, nor the child blush for its parent. The husband then will be

neither suspicious nor despotic; and, on her part, the wife will escape

the bitterness of the victim and the rancor of the slave; atrocious

suffering and abominable injustice will cease to sully the peace of the

domestic hearth. It may be some day, that the priest and the magistrate,

relying with reason on the permanent miracle of love, will consecrate in

God's name indissoluble unions, with as much wisdom and justice as they

now ignorantly display impiety and folly.

"But these glorious days are not yet come. Here, in this mysterious

temple, where we are now united in obedience to the evangelists, three

or four in the name of the Lord, we can only dream of divinest joys. It

is an oracle which then escapes from their bosoms. Eternity is the ideal

of love, as it is of faith. The human soul never comes nearer to the

apex of its power and lucidity than in the enthusiasm of a great love.

The _always_ of lovers is an eternal revelation, a divine manifestation,

casting its sovereign light and blessed warmth over every instant of

their union. Woe to whoever profanes this sacred formula! He falls from

grace to sin--extinguishes the faith, power and light in his heart."

"Albert," said Consuelo, "I receive your promise, and adjure you to

accept mine. I feel myself under the power of a miracle, and the

_always_ of our brief lives does not resemble the eternity for which I

give myself to you."

"Sublime and rash Consuelo," said Wanda, with a smile of enthusiasm,

which seemed to pass through her veil, "ask God for eternity with him

you love, as a recompense of your fidelity to him in this brief life."

"Ah! yes," said Albert, lifting his wife's hand, clasped in his own, to

heaven, "that is our end, hope, and reward--to love truly in this phase

of existence, to meet and unite in others. Ah! I feel that this is not

the first day of our union--that we have already loved, and loved in

other lives. Such bliss is not the work of chance. The hand of God

reunites us, like two parts of one being inseparable in eternity."

After the celebration of the marriage, though the night was far

advanced, they proceeded to the final initiation of Consuelo in the

order of the Invisibles, and, then, the members of the tribunal having

dispersed amid the shadows of the holy wood, soon reassembled at the

castle of fraternal communion. The prince (_Brother Orator_) presided,

and took care to explain to Consuelo the deep and touching symbols. The

repast was served by faithful domestics, affiliated with a certain grade

of the order. Karl introduced Matteus to Consuelo, and she then saw bare

his gentle and expressive face; she observed with admiration that these

respectable servants were not treated as inferiors by their brothers of

the other grades. No personal distinction separated them from the higher

grades of the order, of whatever rank. The _brother servitors_, as they

were called, discharged willingly the duty of waiters and butlers. It

was for them to make all arrangements for the festivity, as being best

prepared to do so; and this duty they considered a kind of religious

observance--a sort of eucharistic festival. They were then no more

degraded than the Levites of a temple who preside over the details of

sacrifice. When they arranged the table, they sat at it themselves, not

at peculiar isolated places, but in chairs retained among the others for

them. All seemed anxious to be civil to them, and to fill their cups and

plates. As at masonic banquets, the cup was never raised to the lip

without invoking some noble idea, some generous sentiment, some august

patronage. The cadenced noises, the puerile conduct of the freemasons,

the mallet, the jargon of the toasts, and the vocabulary of tools, were

excluded from this grave yet costly entertainment. The servitors were

respectful without constraint, and modest without baseness. Karl sat

during one of the services between Albert and Consuelo. The latter saw

with emotion that besides his sobriety and good behavior, he had made

progress in healthy religious notions, by means of the admirable

education of sentiment.

"Ah, my friend," said she to her husband, when the deserter had changed

his place, and her husband drew near to her, "this is the slave beaten

by the Prussian corporals, the savage woodman of Boehmer-wald, and the

would-be murderer of Frederick the Great. Enlightenment and charity have

in a few days converted into a sensible, pious, and just man, a bandit,

whom the precocious justice of nations pushed to murder, and would have

corrected with the lash and gallows."

"Noble sister," said the Prince, who had placed himself on Consuelo's

right, "you gave at Roswald, to this mind crazed by despair, great

lessons on religion and prudence. He was gifted with instinct. His

education has since been rapid and easy; and when we've essayed to teach

him, his reply was, 'So the signora said.' Be sure the rudest men may be

enlightened more easily than is thought. To improve their condition--to

inoculate them with self-respect by esteeming and encouraging them,

requires but sincere charity and human dignity. You see that as yet they

have been initiated merely in the inferior degrees. The reason is, we

consult the extent of their minds and progress in virtue when we admit

them into our mysteries. Old Matteus has taken two degrees more than

Karl; and if he does not pass those he now occupies, it is because his

mind and heart can go no farther. No baseness of extraction, no humility

of condition, will ever stop them. You see here Gottlieb the cobbler,

son of the jailer at Spandau, admitted to a grade equal to your own,

though in my house, from habit and inclination, he discharges his

subordinate functions. His imagination, fondness for study and

enthusiasm for virtue--in a word, the incomparable beauty of soul

inhabiting that distorted body, renders him almost fit to be treated, in

the interior of the temple, as a brother and as an equal. We had

scarcely any ideas and virtues to impart to him. On the contrary, mind

and heart were too teeming, and it became necessary to repress them and

soothe his excitement, treating at the same time the moral and physical

causes which would have led him to folly. The immorality of those among

whom he lived, and the perversity of the official world, would have

irritated without corrupting him. We alone, armed with the mind of James

Boehm and the true explanation of his sacred symbols, were able to

undeceive and convince him, and to direct his poetic fancy without

chilling his zeal and faith. Remark how the cure of his mind has reacted

on his body, and that he has regained health as if by magic. His strange

face is already transformed."

After the repast they resumed their cloaks, and walked along the gentle

slope of the hill, which was shaded by the sacred wood. The ruins of the

old castle, reserved for ordeals, was above it; and gradually Consuelo

remembered the path she had passed so rapidly over, on a night of storm,

not long before. The plenteous stream--which ran from a cavern rudely

cut in the rock, and once reserved for superstitious devotion--murmured

amid the undergrowth towards the valley, where it formed the brook the

prisoner in the pavilion knew so well. Alleys covered by nature with

fine sand, crossed under the luxuriant shade where the various groups

met and talked together. High barriers, but which did not intercept the

river, shut in the enclosure, the kiosque of which might be considered

the study. This was a favorite retreat of the duke, and was forbidden to

the idle and indiscreet. The servitors also walked in groups around the

barriers, watching to prevent the approach of any _profane_ being. Of

this there was no great danger. The duke seemed merely occupied with

masonic mysteries; as was the case, in a manner. Free masonry was then

tolerated by the law and protected by the princes who were, or thought

themselves, initiated in it. No one suspected the importance of the

superior grades; which, after many degrees, ended in the tribunal of the

Invisibles.

Besides, at this moment the ostensible festival which lighted up the

façade of the palace too completely absorbed the attention of the

numerous guests of the prince, for any to think of leaving his brilliant

halls and the new gardens, for the rocks and ruins of the old park. The

young Margravine of Bareith, an intimate friend of the duke, presided

over the honors of the entertainment. To avoid appearing, he had feigned

sick, and after the banquet of the Invisibles supped with his numerous

guests in the palace. As she saw the glare of the lights in the

distance, Consuelo, who leaned on Albert's arm, remembered Anzoleto and

accused herself innocently in presence of her husband, who charged her

with having become too ironical and stern to the companion of her

childhood. "Yes, it was a guilty idea, but then I was most unhappy. I

had resolved to sacrifice myself to Count Albert, and the malicious and

cruel Invisibles again cast me into the arms of the dangerous Leverani.

Wrath was in my heart; gladly I met him from whom I was to separate in

despair, and Marcus wished to soothe my sorrow by a glance at the

handsome Anzoleto. Ah! I never expected to be so indifferent to him. I

fancied I was about to be doomed to sing with him, and could have hated

him for thus depriving me of my last dream of happiness. Now, my friend,

I could see him without bitterness and treat him kindly; happiness makes

us so merciful. May I be useful to him some day, and inspire him with,

a serious love of art, if not virtue."

"Why despair? Let us wait for him in the scene of want and misery. Now,

amid his triumphs, he would be deaf to the voice of reason. Let him lose

his voice and his beauty, and we will take possession of his soul."

"Do you take charge of this conversion, Albert?"

"Not without you, my Consuelo."

"Then you do not fear the past?"

"No; I am presumptuous enough to fear nothing. I am under the power of a

miracle."

"I, too, Albert, cannot doubt myself."

Day began to break, and the pure morning air to exhale a thousand

exquisite perfumes. It was the most delicious period of the summer; the

birds singing amid the trees and flying from hill to valley. Groups

formed every moment around the couple and far from being importunate,

added to the pleasure of their fraternal friendship, to their pure

happiness. All the Invisibles present were introduced to Consuelo as

members of her family. They were the most eminent in virtue, talent, and

intelligence in the order. Some were illustrious, and others obscure in

the world, but were known in the temple by their labors. The noble and

the peasant mingled together in close intimacy. Consuelo had to learn

their true names, and the more poetical titles of their fraternal

association. They were Vesper, Ellops, Peon, Hyas, Euryalus,

Bellerophon, etc. Never had she around her so many pure and noble souls,

so many interesting characters. The stories told of their conversion,

the dangers they had run, and what they had done, charmed her as poems,

the tenor of which she could not have reconciled with actual life, they

appeared so touching and moving. There was, however, no portion of the

common-place gallantry, and not the slightest approach to dangerous

familiarity. Lofty language, inspired by equality and fraternity, was

realised in its purest phase. The beautiful golden dawn rising over

their souls as over the world, was, as it were, a dream in the existence

of Consuelo and Albert. Enlaced in each other's arms, they did not think

of leaving their beloved brethren. A moral intoxication, gentle and

bland as the morning air, filled their souls. Love had expanded their

hearts too amply to make them tremble. Trenck told them the dangers of

his captivity and escape in Glatz. Like Consuelo and Haydn in the

Boehmer-wald, he had crossed Poland, but in the midst of cold, covered

with rags, with a wounded companion--the _amiable_ SHELLES, whom his

memoirs make known to us as an affectionate friend. To earn his bread,

he had played on the violin, and, like Consuelo on the Danube, had been

a minstrel. He then spoke in a low tone of the Princess Amelia, his love

and hope. Poor Trenck! the terrible storm which overhung him, neither he

nor his happy friends foresaw. He was doomed to pass from the

midsummer's night's dream to a life of combat, deception, and suffering.

Porporino sang beneath the cypress-trees an admirable hymn composed by

Albert, to the memory of the martyrs of their cause. Young Benda

accompanied him on the violin; Albert took the instrument and delighted

his hearers with a few notes; Consuelo could not sing, but wept with joy

and enthusiasm; Count Saint Germain told of conversations with John Huss

and Jerome of Prague, with such warmth, eloquence, and probability, that

it was impossible not to have faith in him. In such seasons of emotion

and delight, reason does not prohibit poetry. The Chevalier d'Eon

described with refined taste the miseries and absurdities of the great

tyrants of Europe, the vices of courts, and the weakness of the

scaffolding of the social system that enthusiasm fancied so easy to

break. Count Golowkin described the great soul and strange

contradictions of his friend, Jean Jacques Rousseau.

This philosophical noble (they will to-day call him eccentric) had a

very beautiful daughter, whom he educated according to his ideas, and

who was at once Emile and Sophie, now as handsome a boy, then as

charming a girl as possible. He wished to have her initiated, and for

Consuelo to instruct her. The illustrious Zinzendorf explained the

evangelical constitution of his colony of Moravian Hernhuters.--He

consulted Albert with deference about many particulars, and wisdom

seemed to speak by Albert's mouth. He was inspired by the presence and

smile of his mistress. To Consuelo he seemed divine. All advantages to

her seemed to deck him. He was a philosopher, an artist, a martyr, who

had survived the ordeal; grave as a sage of the Portico, beautiful as an

angel, joyous and innocent as a child or happy lover--perfect, in fine,

as the one we love always is.

Consuelo, when she knocked at the door of the temple, had expected to

die of fatigue and emotion. Now she felt herself aroused and animated as

when, on the shore of the Adriatic, she used to sport in the sands in

full health beneath a bright sun moderated by the evening breeze. It

seemed that life in all its power, happiness in all its intensity, had

taken possession of her, and that she breathed them at every pore. Why

cannot the sun be stopped in the sky over certain valleys, where we feel

all the plentitude of being, and where the dreams of imagination seem

realised, or about to be?

The sky at last became purple and gold, and a silver bell warned the

Invisibles that night withdrew its protecting cloak. They sang a hymn to

the rising sun, emblematical to them of the day they dreamed of, and

prepared for the world. All then made them adieux, promising to meet,

some at Paris, others at London, Madrid, Vienna, Petersburg, Dresden,

and Berlin. All promised on a year from that day to meet again at the

door of the blessed temple, either with neophytes or with brethren now

absent. They then folded their cloaks to conceal their elegant costumes,

and silently dispersed by the shadowy walks of the park.

Albert and Consuelo, guided by Marcus, went down the ravine to the

stream. Karl received them in his closed gondola, and took them to the

door of the pavilion. There they paused for a moment to contemplate the

majesty of the orb of day which rose in the sky. Until now, Consuelo,

when she replied to Albert had called him by his true name; when,

however, she was awakened from the musing in which she seemed delighted

to lose herself, as she pressed her burning cheek on his shoulder, she

could only say:

_"Oh Leverani!"_

[Footnote 15: The harmonica, when first invented, created such a

sensation in Germany, that poetical imaginations fancied they heard in

it supernatural voices, evoked by the consecrators of certain mysteries.

This instrument, which, before it became popular, was thought to be

magical, was elevated by the adepts of German theosophy, to the same

honor with the lyre among the ancients, and many other instruments among

the primitive people of Himalaya. They made it one of the hieroglyphic

figures of their mysterious iconography. They represented it under the

form of a fantastic chimera. The neophytes of secret societies, hearing

it for the first time after the rude shocks of their terrible ordeals,

were so much impressed by it that many of them fell into ecstacies. They

fancied they heard the song of invisibile powers, for both the

instrument and the performer were concealed from them most carefully.

There are extremely curious stories told of the employment of the

harmonica in the reception of adepts of illuminatism.]

EPILOGUE

Had we been able to procure faithful documents in relation to Albert and

Consuelo after their marriage, like those which have guided us up to

this point, we might, doubtless, have written a long history, telling of

all their adventures and journeys. But, most persevering readers, we

cannot satisfy you; and of you, weary reader, we only ask a few moments

of patience. Let neither of you reproach nor praise us. The truth is,

that the materials by means of which we have so far been able to connect

the items of this story, entirely disappear from the dates of the

romantic night which blessed and consecrated the union of the two great

characters of our story amid the Invisibles. Whether the engagements

contracted by them in the temple prevented them from yielding to

friendship in their letters; or that their friends, being affiliated in

the same mysteries, in the days of persecution thought it proper to

destroy their correspondence, we cannot say; but henceforth we see them

through the maze of a cloud, under the veil of the temple or the mask of

adepts. Without examining the traces of their existence which we find in

manuscripts, it would often have been difficult to follow them;

contradictory evidence shows both to have been at the same time at two

different geographical points, or following different objects. However,

we can easily understand the possibility of their voluntarily creating

such errors, from the fact that they were secretly devoted to the plans

of the Invisibles, and often were forced, amid a thousand perils, to

avoid the inquisitorial policy of governments. In relation to the

existence of this one soul, with two persons, called Consuelo and

Albert, we cannot say whether love fulfilled all its promises, or if

fate contradicted those which it had seemed to make during the

intoxication of what they called "_The Midsummer Night's Dream._" They

were not, however, ungrateful to Providence, which had conferred this

rapid happiness, in all its plentitude, and which, amid reverses,

continued the miracle of love Wanda had announced. Amid misery,

suffering and persecution, they always remembered that happy life, which

seemed to them a celestial union, and, as it were, a bargain made with

the divinity, for the enjoyment of a better existence after many toils,

ordeals, and sacrifices.

In other respects, all becomes so mysterious to us that we have been

quite unable to discover in what part of Germany this enchanted

residence was, in which, protected by the tumult of the chase and

festivals, a prince unknown in documents became a rallying point and a

principal mover of the social and philosophical conspiracy of the

Invisibles. This prince had received a symbolical name, which, after a

thousand efforts to discover the cypher used by the adepts, we presume

to be Christopher, or Chrysostom, or the Golden Mouth. The temple where

Consuelo was married and initiated was particularly called _Saint

Graal_, and the chiefs of the tribunal _Templists._ These were

Romanesque emblems, renewed from the old legends of the age of gold and

chivalry. All the world knows that in these charming fictions, Saint

Graal was hidden in a mysterious sanctuary, amid a grotto unknown to

men. There the _Templists_, illustrious saints of primitive

Christianity, devoted even in this world to immortality, kept the

precious cup which Jesus had used in the consecration of the Eucharist,

when he kept the passover with his disciples. This cup doubtless

contained the celestial grace, represented sometimes by blood and then

by the tears of Christ; a divine ichor or eucharistic substance, the

mystic influence of which was inexplicable, but which it was sufficient

merely to see, to be transformed, both morally and physically, so as to

be forever sheltered from death and sin. The pious paladins, who, after

terrible macerations and exploits sufficient to make the earth tremble,

devoted themselves to the career of _knight-errantry_, had the idea of

reaching _Saint Graal_ at the end of their peregrinations. They looked

for it amid the ices of the north, on the shores of Armorica, and in the

depths of the forests of Germany. To realise this sublime conquest, it

was necessary to confront danger, equal to those of the Hesperides--to

overcome monsters, elements, barbarous people, hunger, thirst, and even

death. Some of these Christian Argonauts discovered, it is said, the

sanctuary, and were regenerated by the divine cup; they never, however,

betrayed the terrible secret. Their triumph was known by the power of

their invincible arm, by the transfiguration of all their existence:

few, however, survived this glorious initiation. They disappeared from

among men as Jesus did after his resurrection, and passed from earth to

heaven without undergoing the bitter transition of death.

This magical symbol was, in fact, well adapted to the object of the

Invisibles. For many years, the new Templists hoped to make Saint Graal

accessible to all mankind. Albert toiled constantly to diffuse the true

ideas of his doctrine. He reached the highest grades of the order, for

we find the list of his titles showing that he had time enough to reach

them. Now all know that eighty-one months are needed to pass through the

twenty-three degrees of masonry, and we think it certain that a much

longer time was required for the higher grades of Saint Graal. The

number of masonic degrees are now a mystery to no one; yet it will not

be out of place here to recount a few, as they paint the enthusiastic

genius and smiling fancy which presided over their first creation:

"Apprentice and Master Mason, Secret and Perfect Master, Provost and

Judge, English and Irish Master, Master in Israel, Master Elect of the

Nine and Fifteen, Elect of the Unknown, Grand Master Architect, Royal

Arch, Grand Scotch Master of the Sublime or Master Masons, Knight of the

Sword, Prince of Jerusalem, Knight of Orient and Occident, Rose-Cross of

France, Heredom and Kilwinning, Grand Pontiff or Sublime Scot, Architect

of the Sacred Roof, Pontiff of Jerusalem, Sovereign Prince of Masonry

and Master _ad vitam_, Naochite, Prince of Libon, Chief of the

Tabernacle and Knight of the Iron Serpent, Trinitarian Scot or

Prince of Mercy, Grand Commander of the Temple, Knight of the

Gun, Patriarch of the Crusades, Grand Master of Light, Knight

Kadosch, Knight of the White Eagle and of the Black Eagle, Knight

of the Phœnix and Knight of the Argonauts, Knight of the Golden Fleece,

Grand-Inspector-Inquisitor-Commander-Sublime, Prince of the Royal Secret

and Sublime Master of the Luminous King," &c.[16]

These titles, or at least the majority of them, we find connected with

the name of Albert Podiebrad, in the most illegible rolls of the

freemasons. There are also many less known; such as Knight of St John,

Sublime Johannite, Master of the New Apocalypse, Doctor of the Gospel,

and Elect of the Holy Ghost, Templist, Areopagite, Magus, and Man of the

People, Man-Pontiff, Man-King, and New-man, &c.[17] We have been

surprised here to find some titles which seemed anticipated from the

illuminatism of Weishaupt: this peculiarity, however, was explained at a

later day, and will not, when this story is concluded, need any

explanation to our readers.

Amid this labyrinth of obscure facts--which, however, are profound, and

connected with the labor, success, and apparent extinction of the

Invisibles--we can with difficulty follow the adventurous story of the

young couple. Yet by supplying what we need by a prudent imagination,

the following is nearly the abridged commentary of the chief events of

their lives. The fancy of the reader will supply the deficiency of the

text, and following our experience, we doubt not that the best

_dénoûements_ are those for which the reader and not the narrator will

be responsible.[18]

Probably, after leaving _Saint Graal_, Consuelo went to the little court

of Bareith, where the Margravine, sister of Frederick, had palaces,

gardens, kiosques, and cascades, in the same style as those of Count

Hoditz at Roswald, though less sumptuous and less expensive. This

intellectual princess had been married without a dower to a very poor

prince; and not long before she had worn robes with trains of reasonable

length, and had pages whose doublets were not threadbare, her gardens,

or rather her garden, to speak without metaphor, was situated amid a

beautiful country, and she indulged in the Italian Opera in an antique

temple _à la Pompadour._ The margravine was fond of philosophy--that is

to say, she was a disciple of Voltaire. The young hereditary margrave,

her husband, was the zealous head of a masonic lodge. I am not sure

whether Albert was connected with him, or whether his incognito was

observed by the secresy of the brothers, or whether he remained away

from this court and joined his wife afterwards. Certainly Consuelo had

some secret mission there. Perhaps, also, for the purpose of preventing

attention from being attracted to her husband, she did not live publicly

with him for some time. Their loves, then, had all the attraction of

mystery; and if the publicity of their union, consecrated by the

fraternal sanction of the Templists, seemed gentle and edifying to them,

the secrecy they maintained in a hypocritical and licentious world, at

first, was a necessary _ægis_ and kind of mute protestation in which

they found their enthusiasm and power.

Many male and female Italian singers at that time delighted the little

court of Bareith. Corilla and Anzoleto appeared there, and the vain

prima donna again became enamored of the traitor she had previously

devoted to all the furies of hell. Anzoleto, however, while he cajoled

the tigress, sought with a secret and mysterious reserve to find favor

with Consuelo, whose talent, enhanced by such profound revelations, now

eclipsed all rivalry. Ambition had become the dominant passion of the

young tenor; love had been stifled by mortification, and voluptuousness

by satiety. He then loved neither the chaste Consuelo nor the passionate

Corilla, but kept terms with both, ready to attach himself to either of

the two, who would serve his purpose, and make him advantageously known.

Consuelo treated him kindly, and neither spared good advice nor such

instructions as would enable him to exhibit his talent. She never,

though, felt uneasy when she was with him, and the completeness of her

pardon exhibited how completely she had mastered her passion. Anzoleto

was not re-installed, and having listened with emotion to the advice of

his friend, lost all patience when he lost all hope, and his deep

mortification and sorrow, in spite of himself, became evident in his

words.

Under these circumstances, it appears that Amelia of Rudolstadt came to

Bareith with the Princess of Culmbach, daughter of the Countess Von

Hoditz. If we may believe some exaggerating and indiscreet witnesses,

some strange scenes took place between Consuelo, Amelia, Corilla, and

Anzoleto. When she saw the handsome tenor appear unexpectedly on the

boards of the opera of Bareith, the young baroness fainted. No one

observed the coincidence, but the lynx-eyed Corilla discovered on the

brow of Anzoleto a peculiar expression of gratified vanity. He missed

his _point_; the court, disturbed by the accident, did not applaud the

singer, and instead of growling between his teeth, as was his fashion on

such occasions, there was an unequivocal smile of triumph on his face.

"See," said Corilla, in an angry voice to Consuelo, as she went behind

the scenes, "he loves neither you nor me, but that little fool who has

been playing her part in the boxes. Do you know her? who is she?"

"I do not know," said Consuelo, who had observed nothing: "I can assure

you, however, neither you, nor she, nor I, occupy him."

"Who then does?"

"Himself _al solito_," said Consuelo with a smile.

The story goes on to say that on the next day Consuelo was sent for to

come to a retired wood to talk with Amelia. "I know all," said the

latter, angrily, before she permitted Consuelo to open her mouth; "he

loves you, unfortunate scourge of my life--you, who have robbed me of

Albert's love and his."

"_His_, madame? I do not know----"

"Do not pretend. Anzoleto loves you. You were his mistress at Venice,

and yet are----"

"It is either a base slander, or a suspicion unworthy of you."

"It is the truth. I assure you; he confessed it to me last night."

"Last night! What do you say, madame?" said Consuelo, blushing with

shame and chagrin.

Amelia shed tears; and when the kind Consuelo had succeeded in calming

her jealousy, she obtained in spite of her diffidence, the confession of

this unfortunate passion. Amelia had heard Anzoleto sing at Prague, and

became intoxicated with his beauty and success. Being ignorant of music,

she took him for one of the first musicians in the world. At Prague he

was decidedly popular. She sent for him as her singing-master, and while

her father the old Baron Frederick, paralysed by inactivity, slept in

his chair dreaming of wild boars, she yielded to a seducer. _Ennui_ and

vanity ruined her. Anzoleto, flattered by this illustrious conquest, and

wishing to make the scandal public in order to secure popularity,

persuaded her that she might become the greatest singer of the age, that

an artist's life was a paradise on earth, and that she could not do

better than fly with him, and make her _début_ at the Haymarket Theatre

in Handel's operas.

Amelia at first viewed with horror the idea of deserting her old father,

but when Anzoleto was about to leave Prague, feigning a despair he did

not feel, she yielded to his solicitations, and fled with him.

The intoxication of her love for Anzoleto was but of brief duration. His

insolence and coarse manners, when he no longer played the part of

seducer, recalled her to her senses; and it was not without a feeling of

pleasure mingled with remorse at her conduct, that, three months after

her escape, she was arrested at Hamburg, and brought back to Prussia,

where, at the instance of her Saxon kin, she was incarcerated in the

fortress of Spandau. Her punishment was both long and severe, and in a

measure rendered her mind callous to the agony she would otherwise have

felt at hearing of her father's death. At last her freedom was granted,

and it was not till then that she heard of all the misfortunes which had

afflicted her family. She did not dare to return to the canoness, and

feeling utterly incapable of leading a life of retirement and repose,

she implored the protection of the Margravine of Bareith; and the

Princess of Culmbach, who was then at Dresden, assumed the

responsibility of taking her to her kinswoman. In this frivolous yet

philosophical court she found that amiable toleration of vice which then

was the only virtue. Here she again met with Anzoleto, and again

submitted to the ascendancy which he seemed to have acquired over the

fair sex, and which the chaste Consuelo found so difficult to resist. At

first she avoided him, but gradually became again fascinated, and made

an appointment to meet him one evening in the garden, and once more

yielded to his solicitations.

She confessed to Consuelo that she yet loved him, and related all her

faults to her old singing mistress with a mixture of feminine modesty

and philosophical coolness.

It seems certain that Consuelo by her earnest appeals found the way to

her heart, and that she made up her mind to return to the Giants'

Castle, and to shake off her dangerous passion in solitude, by soothing

her old aunt in her decline.

After this adventure Consuelo could remain at Bareith no longer. The

haughty jealousy of Corilla, who was always imprudent, yet at the same

time kind-hearted, induced the prima donna sometimes to find fault, and

then to humble herself. Anzoleto, who had fancied that he could avenge

for her disdain by casting himself at Amelia's feet, never pardoned her

for having removed the young baroness from danger. He did her a thousand

unkind offices, contriving to make her miss the cue on the stage,

preventing her from taking up the key in a _duo_, and by a

self-sufficient air attempting to make the unwary audience think she was

in error. If he had a stage effect to perform with her, he went to her

right instead of her left hand, and tried to make her stumble amid the

properties. All these ill-natured tricks failed, in consequence of

Consuelo's calmness. She was, however, less stoical when he began to

calumniate her, and when she knew that there were persons, who could not

believe in the chastity of an actress, to listen to him. Hence

libertines of every age were rude towards her, refusing to believe in

her innocence; and she had to bear with Anzoleto's defamation,

influenced as he was by mortification and revenge.

This base and narrow-minded persecution was the commencement of a long

martyrdom which the unfortunate prima donna submitted to during all her

theatrical career. As often as she met Anzoleto, he annoyed her in a

thousand ways. Corilla, too, from envy and ill-feeling, gave her

trouble. Of her two rivals, the female was the least in the way, and

most capable of a kind emotion. Whatever may be said of the misconduct

and jealous vanity of actresses, Consuelo discovered that when her male

companions were influenced by the same vices, they became even more

degraded, and less worthy of their relative position. Arrogant and

dissipated nobles, managers and people of the press, depraved by such

connection, fine ladies, curious and whimsical patronesses, ready to

deceive, yet offended at finding in an actress more virtue than they

could themselves boast of--in fact, and most unjust of all, the public

rose _en masse_ against the wife of Leverani, and subjected her to

perpetual mortification. Persevering and faithful in her profession as

she was in love, she never yielded, but pursued the tenor of her way,

always increasing in musical knowledge, and her virtuous conduct

remaining unaltered. Sometimes she failed in the thorny path of success,

yet often won a just triumph. She became the priestess of a purer art

than even Porpora himself was acquainted with; and found immense

resources in her religious faith, and vast consolation in her ardent and

devoted love to her husband.

The career of her husband, though a parallel to her own, for he

accompanied her in her wanderings, is enwrapped in much mystery. It may

be presumed that he was not sentenced to be the slave of her fortune and

the book-keeper of her receipts and disbursements. Consuelo's profession

was not very lucrative. At that time the public did not reward artists

with as much munificence as it does now. Then they were remunerated by

the presents they received from princes and nobles, and women who knew

how to take advantage of their position had already begun to amass large

fortunes. Chastity and disinterestedness are, however, the greatest

enemies an actress can have. Consuelo was successful, respected, and

excited enthusiasm in some, when those who were about her did not

interfere with her position before the true public. She owed no triumph

to gallantry, however, and infamy never crowned her with diamonds or

gems. Her laurels were spotless, and were not thrown on the stage by

interested hands. After ten years of toil and labor, she was no richer

than when she began her career. She had made no speculations, for she

neither could nor would do so. She had not even saved the fruit of her

labors, to get which she often had much trouble, but had expended it in

charity, or for the purposes of secret but active propagandism, for

which her own means had not always sufficed. The central power of the

Invisibles had often provided for her.

What may have been the real success of the ardent and tireless

pilgrimage of Albert and Consuelo, in France, Spain, England and Italy,

there is nothing to tell the world; and I think we must look twenty

years later, and then use induction, to form an idea of the result of

the secret labors of the societies of the Invisibles. Had they a greater

effect in France than in the bosom of that Germany where they were

produced? The French Revolution loudly says Yes. Yet the European

conspiracy of Illuminism, and the gigantic conceptions of Weishaupt,

prove that the divine dream of Saint Graal did not cease to agitate the

German mind for thirty years, in spite of the dispersion and defection

of the chief adepts.

Old newspapers tell us that Porporina sang with great success in

Pergolese's operas at Paris, in the oratorios and operas of Handel at

London, with Farinelli at Madrid, with La Faustina at Dresden, and with

Mergotti at Venice. At Rome and Naples she sang the church music of

Porpora and other great masters, with triumphant applause.

Every item of Albert's career is lost. A few notes to Trenck or Wanda

prove this mysterious personage to have been full of faith, confidence,

and activity, and enjoying in the highest degree lucidity of mind. At a

certain epoch all documentary information fails. We have heard the

following story told, in a coterie of persons almost all of whom are now

dead, relative to Consuelo's last appearance on the stage.

"It was about 1760, at Vienna. The actress was then about thirty years

old, and it was said was handsomer than she had been in her youth. A

pure life, moral and calm habits, and physical prudence, had preserved

all the grace of her beauty and talent. Handsome children accompanied

her, but no one knew their father, though common report said that she

had a husband, and was irrevocably faithful to him. Porpora having gone

several times to Italy, was with her, and was producing a new opera at

the Imperial Theatre. The last twenty years of the maestro's works are

so completely unknown, that we have in vain sought to discover the name

of his last productions. We only know Porporina had the principal part,

that she was most successful, and wrung tears from the whole court. The

empress was satisfied. On the night after this triumph, Porporina

received from an invisible messenger news that filled her with terror

and consternation. At seven in the morning--that is to say, just at the

hour when the empress was awakened by the faithful valet known as the

sweeper[19] of her majesty, (for his duty consisted in opening the

blinds, making the fire, and cleaning the room, while the empress was

awaking,) Porporina, by eloquence or gold, passed through every avenue

of the palace, and reached the door of the royal bed-chamber."

"'My friend,' said she to the servant, 'I must throw myself at the

empress's feet. The life of an honest man is in danger. A great crime

will be committed in a few days, if I do not see her majesty at once. I

know that you cannot be bribed, but also know you to be generous and

magnanimous. Everybody says so. You have obtained favors which the

greatest courtiers dared not ask.'

"'Kind heaven! my dear mistress! I will do anything for you,' said the

servant, clasping his hands and letting his duster fall.

"'Karl!' said Consuelo. 'Thank God I am saved! Albert has a protecting

angel in the palace!'

"'Albert! Albert!' said Karl. 'Is he in danger? Go In, madame, if I

should lose my place. God knows I shall be sorry; for I am enabled to do

some good and serve our holy cause better than I could do anywhere else.

Listen! The empress is a good soul, when she is not a queen. Go in: you

will be thought to have preceded me. Let those scoundrels bear the

burden of it, for they do not deserve to serve a queen. They speak

lies."

"Consuelo went in; and when the empress opened her eyes, she saw her

kneeling at the foot of the bed.

"'Who is that?' said Maria Theresa, as, gathering the counterpane over

her shoulders, she rose up as proud and as haughty in her night-dress,

and on her bed, as if she sat on her throne, decked with the Imperial

crown on her brow, and the sword by her side.

"'Madame,' said Consuelo, 'I am your humble subject, an unfortunate

mother, a despairing wife, who begs on her knees her husband's life and

liberty.'

"Just then Karl came in, pretending to be very angry.

"'Wretch,' said he, 'who bade you come hither?'

"'I thank you, Karl, for your vigilance and fidelity. Never before was I

awakened with such insolence.'

"'Let not your majesty say a word, and I will kill this woman at once.'

"Karl knew the empress. He was aware that she liked to be merciful

before others, and that she always played the great queen and the great

woman before even her valets.

"'You are too zealous,' said she, with a majestic smile. 'Go, and let

this poor weeping woman speak. I am not in danger in the company of my

subjects. What is the matter, madame? But, are you not the beautiful

Porporina? You will spoil your voice, if you weep thus.'

"'Madame,' said Consuelo, 'ten years ago I was married in the Catholic

Church. I have never once disgraced myself. I have legitimate children,

whom I have educated virtuously. I dare to say----'

"'Virtuously I know you have, but not religiously. You are chaste, they

tell me, but you never go to church. Tell me, however, what has befallen

you?'

"'My husband, from whom I have never been separated, is now in Prague,

and I know not by what infamous means he has been arrested in that city

on the charge of usurping a name and title not his own, of attempting to

appropriate an estate to which he had no claim--in fine, of being a

swindler, a spy, and an impostor. Perhaps even now he has been sentenced

to perpetual imprisonment, or to death.'

"'Prague? and an impostor?' said the empress. 'There is a story of that

kind in the reports of the secret police. What is your husband's name?

for you actresses do not bear them.'

"'Leverani.'

"'That is it! My child, I am sorry that you are married to such a

wretch. This Leverani is in fact a swindler and a madman, who, taking

advantage of a perfect resemblance, attempts to personate the Count of

Rudolstadt, who died ten years ago. The fact is proved. He introduced

himself into the home of the old Canoness of Rudolstadt, and dared to

say he was her nephew, he would have succeeded in getting possession of

her inheritance, if just then the old lady had not been relieved of him

by friends of the family. He was arrested and very properly. I can

conceive your mortification, but do not know how I can help it. If it be

shown that this man is mad, and I hope he is, he will be placed in an

hospital, where you will be able to see and attend him. If, however, he

be a scamp, as I fear, he must be severely treated, to keep him from

annoying the true heiress of Rudolstadt, the young Baroness Amelia, who

I think, after all her past errors, is about to be married to one of my

officers. I hope, _mademoiselle_, that you are ignorant of your

husband's conduct, and are mistaken in relation to his character,

otherwise I would be offended at your request. I pity you too much to

humiliate you, however. You may retire.'

"Consuelo saw she had nothing to expect, and that in seeking to

establish the identity of Albert and Leverani she would injure his

position. She arose and walked towards the door, pale as if she was

about to faint. Maria Theresa, however, who followed her with an anxious

eye, took pity on her, and called her back.

"'You are much to be pitied,' said she, in a less dry tone. 'All this is

not your fault, I am sure. Be at ease and be calm. The affair will be

conscientiously investigated; and if your husband does not ruin himself,

I will have him treated as a kind of madman. If you can communicate with

him, have this understood. That is my advice.'

"'I will follow it, and thank your majesty, without whose protection I

am quite powerless. My husband is imprisoned at Prague, and I am engaged

at the Imperial Theatre at Vienna. If your majesty will but give me

leave of absence and an order to see my husband, who is in strict

confinement----'

"'You ask a great deal. I do not know whether Kaunitz will give you

leave of absence, or if your place at the theatre can be supplied. We

will see all about it in a few days.'

"'A few days!' said Consuelo, boldly. 'Then, perhaps, he will be no

more. I must go now!--now!'

"'That is enough,' said the empress. 'Your urgency would injure you in

the minds of judges less calm than I. Go, _mademoiselle._'

"Consuelo went to the old Canon ***, and entrusted her children to his

charge, at the same time saying she was about to leave for she knew not

how long a time.

"'If you go for a long time,' said he, 'so much the worse for me. As for

the children, they will give me no trouble, for they are perfectly well

brought up, and will be company to Angela, who begins to be subject to

_ennui._'

"The good canon did not attempt to ascertain her secret. As, however,

his quiet easy mind could not conceive a sorrow without a remedy, he

attempted to console her. Finding that he did not succeed in inspiring

her with hope, he sought at least to make her easy about her children.

"'Dear Bertoni,' said he, kindly, and striving in spite of his tears to

smile, 'remember, if you do not come back, your children are mine. I

take charge of their education. I will marry the girl, and that will

diminish Angela's portion a little, and make her more industrious. The

boys, I warn you, I will make musicians.'

"'Joseph Haydn will share that burden with you,' said Consuelo, 'and old

Porpora will yet be able to give them some lessons. My children are

docile and seem intellectual; so that their physical existence does not

trouble me. They will be able to support themselves honestly. You must

replace my love and advice.'

"'I promise to do so,' said the canon. 'I hope to live long enough to

see them established. I am not very fat, and I can yet walk steadily. I

am not more than sixty, although Bridget insists that I should make my

will. Then have courage, my daughter, and take care of your health. Come

back soon, for God takes care of the pure-hearted.'

"Consuelo, without any trouble about her leave of absence, had horses

put to her carriage. Just as she was about to set out, Porpora came to

know whither she was going. She had been unwilling to see him, knowing

as she did that he would seek to prevent her departure. He was afraid,

notwithstanding her promises, that she would not be back in time for the

opera next day."

"'Who the devil dreams of going to the country in the winter time,' said

he, with a nervous tremor caused as much by fear as old age. 'If you

take cold you will endanger my success. I do not understand you. We

succeeded yesterday, and you travel to-day.'

"This conversation made Consuelo lose a quarter of an hour, and enabled

the directors to inform the authorities of her intention. She was in

consequence forced to submit to a picket of Hulans, who immediately

surrounded the house and stood sentinels at her door. She was soon

seized with fever caused by this sudden check on her liberty, and

frantically paced the room while she replied to the questions of Porpora

and the directors. She did not sleep that night, but passed it in

prayer. In the morning she was calm, and went to the rehearsal as she

was desired. Her voice was never more melodious, but she was so mentally

abstracted that Porpora became alarmed.

"'Cursed marriage! Cursed lovers' folly!' murmured he to the orchestra,

striking the keys of his instrument as if he would break it. Porpora was

unchanged, and would have willingly said, 'Perish all lovers and

husbands in the world, so that my opera succeeds.'

"At night Consuelo made her toilet as usual, and went on the stage. She

placed herself in proper attitude, and she moved her lips, but the voice

was gone--she could not speak!

"The audience was amazed. The court had heard something vague about her

attempt at flight, and pronounced it an unpardonable whim. There were

cries, hisses, and applause at every effort she made. Still she was

inaudible. She stood erect not thinking of the loss of her voice, nor

feeling humiliated by the indignation of her tyrants, but resigned and

proud as a martyr condemned to an unjust punishment; while she thanked

God for having so afflicted her, that she could leave the stage and join

her husband.

"It was proposed to the empress that the rebellious artist should be

imprisoned, there to recover her voice and good temper. Her majesty was

angry for a moment, and the courtiers thought to ingratiate themselves

with her by advising cruelty; but the empress did not like unnecessary

severity, though she could connive at remunerative crime.

"'Kaunitz,' said she, 'permit the poor woman to leave, and say nothing

more about it. If her loss of voice is feigned, her duty seems to

require it. Few actresses would sacrifice professional success at the

altar of conjugal affection and duty.'

"Consuelo thus authorised set out. She was unwell, without being

apparently aware of it."

Here again we lose the thread of events. The cause of Albert may have

been public or secret. It is probable that it was analogous to the suit

which Trenck made and lost, after so many years' dispute. Who in France

would not know the details of this affair, had not Trenck himself

published and spread his complaints abroad for thirty years? Albert left

no documents. We must then turn to Trenck's story, he too being one of

our heroes. It is probable his troubles may throw some light on those of

Albert and Consuelo.

About a month after the meeting at St. Graal, of which in his memoirs

Trenck says nothing, he was recaptured and imprisoned at Magdenbourg,

where he passed ten years of his life, loaded with eighty pounds of

irons. The stone to which he was bound bears the inscription "Here lies

Trenck." All know his terrible fate, and the sufferings he underwent, as

also his wonderful attempts at escape, and his incredible energy, which

never left him, but which his chivalric imprudence counteracted. His

sister was subjected to the cruelty of paying for the erection of a

dungeon for him, because she afforded him a refuge in his flight.

Trenck's works of art in prison, the wonderful engravings he made with

the point of a nail on the tin cups, which are allegories or verses of

great beauty, are also well known.[20] In fine, from his secret

relations with the princess Amelia--the despair in which she wasted

away, and her care to disfigure her face by means of a corrosive fluid,

which almost destroyed her sight--the deplorable state of health to

which she reduced herself to avoid marriage--the remarkable change

effected on her character--the ten years of agony, which made him a

martyr, and her an old woman, ugly and malicious, instead of the angelic

creature she was, and would have been had she been happy[21]--the

misfortunes of the lovers are historical; but they are generally

forgotten when the character of Frederick the Great is written. These

crimes, committed with such refined cruelty, are indelible spots on the

character of that monarch.

At length Trenck was released, as is known, by the intervention of Maria

Theresa, who claimed him as her subject. This was accomplished by the

influence of Karl, her majesty's valet. In relation to the curious

intrigues of this magnanimous man with his sovereign, some of the

strangest, most touching and pathetic pages of the memoirs of the age

have been written.

During the first part of the captivity of Trenck, his cousin, the famous

Pandour, a victim of truer though not less hateful accusations, died it

is said at Spielberg of poison. As soon as Trenck was free, the Prussian

came to ask for his cousin's vast estate; but Maria Theresa had no idea

of yielding it. She had taken advantage of the exploits of Pandour, and

profited by his death. Like Frederick and other crowned tyrants, while

the power of position dazzled the masses, she paid no attention to the

secret offences for which God will call her to account at the day of

judgment, and which will at least weigh as heavy as her official

virtues.

The avarice of the empress was exceeded by her agents, the ignoble

persons she had made curators of Pandour's estate, and the prevaricating

magistrates who decided on the rights of the heir. Each had a share of

the spoil, but the empress secured the largest. It was in vain that,

years after, she sent to prison and the galleys all her accomplices in

this fraud, as she never made complete restoration to Trenck. Nothing

describes the character of the empress better than that portion of

Trenck's book, in which he speaks of his interviews with her. Without

divesting himself of the loyalty which was then a kind of patrician

religion, he makes us feel how very avaricious and hypocritical this

deceitful woman was. He exhibits an union of contrasts, a character at

once base and sublime, innocent and false, like all those naturally pure

hearts which become captivated by the corruption of absolute power--that

great river of evil, on the breakers of which the noblest impulses of

the human heart have been dashed to pieces. Resolved to thwart him, she

yet afterwards deigned to console and encourage him, and promise him

protection against his infamous judges;--and, finally, pretending not to

have been able to discover the truth she sought, she bestowed on him the

rank of major, and offered the hand of an ugly old woman who was both

devout and gallant. On the refusal of Trenck, the royal _matrimomaniac_

told him he was a presumptuous madman, that she had no means of

gratifying his ambition, and coldly turned her back upon him. The

reasons assigned for the confiscation of his estate varied under

circumstances. One court said that Pandour, undergoing an infamous

sentence, could make no will. Another, that if there were a will, the

claimant, as a Prussian, could not benefit by it; and that the debts of

the deceased absorbed everything. Incident after incident was got up;

but after much disputing Trenck never received justice.[22]