The celebrated name which forms the title to this work will sufficiently
apprise the reader that it is in the earlier half of the fourteenth
century that my story opens.
It was on a summer evening that two youths might be seen walking beside
the banks of the Tiber, not far from that part of its winding course
which sweeps by the base of Mount Aventine. The path they had selected
was remote and tranquil. It was only at a distance that were seen the
scattered and squalid houses that bordered the river, from amidst which
rose, dark and frequent, the high roof and enormous towers which marked
the fortified mansion of some Roman baron. On one side of the river,
behind the cottages of the fishermen, soared Mount Janiculum, dark with
massive foliage, from which gleamed at frequent intervals, the grey
walls of many a castellated palace, and the spires and columns of a
hundred churches; on the other side, the deserted Aventine rose abrupt
and steep, covered with thick brushwood; while, on the height, from
concealed but numerous convents, rolled, not unmusically, along the
quiet landscape and the rippling waves, the sound of the holy bell.
Of the young men introduced in this scene, the elder, who might have
somewhat passed his twentieth year, was of a tall and even commanding
stature; and there was that in his presence remarkable and almost noble,
despite the homeliness of his garb, which consisted of the long, loose
gown and the plain tunic, both of dark-grey serge, which distinguished,
at that time, the dress of the humbler scholars who frequented the
monasteries for such rude knowledge as then yielded a scanty return for
intense toil. His countenance was handsome, and would have been rather
gay than thoughtful in its expression, but for that vague and abstracted
dreaminess of eye which so usually denotes a propensity to revery and
contemplation, and betrays that the past or the future is more congenial
to the mind than the enjoyment and action of the present hour.
The younger, who was yet a boy, had nothing striking in his appearance
or countenance, unless an expression of great sweetness and gentleness
could be so called; and there was something almost feminine in the
tender deference with which he appeared to listen to his companion.
His dress was that usually worn by the humbler classes, though somewhat
neater, perhaps, and newer; and the fond vanity of a mother might be
detected in the care with which the long and silky ringlets had been
smoothed and parted as they escaped from his cap and flowed midway down
his shoulders.
As they thus sauntered on, beside the whispering reeds of the river,
each with his arm round the form of his comrade, there was a grace
in the bearing, in the youth, and in the evident affection of the
brothers--for such their connexion--which elevated the lowliness of
their apparent condition.
“Dear brother,” said the elder, “I cannot express to thee how I enjoy
these evening hours. To you alone I feel as if I were not a mere
visionary and idler when I talk of the uncertain future, and build up my
palaces of the air. Our parents listen to me as if I were uttering fine
things out of a book; and my dear mother, Heaven bless her! wipes her
eyes, and says, ‘Hark, what a scholar he is!’ As for the monks, if I
ever dare look from my Livy, and cry ‘Thus should Rome be again!’ they
stare, and gape, and frown, as though I had broached an heresy. But you,
sweet brother, though you share not my studies, sympathize so kindly
with all their results--you seem so to approve my wild schemes, and to
encourage my ambitious hopes--that sometimes I forget our birth, our
fortunes, and think and dare as if no blood save that of the Teuton
Emperor flowed through our veins.”
“Methinks, dear Cola,” said the younger brother, “that Nature played us
an unfair trick--to you she transmitted the royal soul, derived from
our father’s parentage; and to me only the quiet and lowly spirit of my
mother’s humble lineage.”
“Nay,” answered Cola, quickly, “you would then have the brighter
share,--for I should have but the Barbarian origin, and you the Roman.
Time was, when to be a simple Roman was to be nobler than a northern
king.--Well, well, we may live to see great changes!”
“I shall live to see thee a great man, and that will content me,” said
the younger, smiling affectionately; “a great scholar all confess you
to be already: our mother predicts your fortunes every time she hears of
your welcome visits to the Colonna.”
“The Colonna!” said Cola, with a bitter smile; “the Colonna--the
pedants!--They affect, dull souls, the knowledge of the past, play the
patron, and misquote Latin over their cups! They are pleased to welcome
me at their board, because the Roman doctors call me learned, and
because Nature gave me a wild wit, which to them is pleasanter than the
stale jests of a hired buffoon. Yes, they would advance my fortunes--but
how? by some place in the public offices, which would fill a dishonoured
coffer, by wringing, yet more sternly, the hard-earned coins from our
famishing citizens! If there be a vile thing in the world, it is a
plebeian, advanced by patricians, not for the purpose of righting his
own order, but for playing the pander to the worst interests of theirs.
He who is of the people but makes himself a traitor to his birth, if he
furnishes the excuse for these tyrant hypocrites to lift up their hands
and cry--‘See what liberty exists in Rome, when we, the patricians, thus
elevate a plebeian!’ Did they ever elevate a plebeian if he sympathized
with plebeians? No, brother; should I be lifted above our condition, I
will be raised by the arms of my countrymen, and not upon their necks.”
“All I hope, is, Cola, that you will not, in your zeal for your
fellow-citizens, forget how dear you are to us. No greatness could ever
reconcile me to the thought that it brought you danger.”
“And I could laugh at all danger, if it led to greatness. But
greatness--greatness! Vain dream! Let us keep it for our night sleep.
Enough of my plans; now, dearest brother, of yours.”
And, with the sanguine and cheerful elasticity which belonged to him,
the young Cola, dismissing all wilder thoughts, bent his mind to listen,
and to enter into, the humbler projects of his brother. The new boat and
the holiday dress, and the cot removed to a quarter more secure from the
oppression of the barons, and such distant pictures of love as a dark
eye and a merry lip conjure up to the vague sentiments of a boy;--to
schemes and aspirations of which such objects made the limit, did the
scholar listen, with a relaxed brow and a tender smile; and often, in
later life, did that conversation occur to him, when he shrank from
asking his own heart which ambition was the wiser.
“And then,” continued the younger brother, “by degrees I might save
enough to purchase such a vessel as that which we now see, laden,
doubtless, with corn and merchandise, bringing--oh, such a good
return--that I could fill your room with books, and never hear you
complain that you were not rich enough to purchase some crumbling old
monkish manuscript. Ah, that would make me so happy!” Cola smiled as he
pressed his brother closer to his breast.
“Dear boy,” said he, “may it rather be mine to provide for your wishes!
Yet methinks the masters of yon vessel have no enviable possession,
see how anxiously the men look round, and behind, and before: peaceful
traders though they be, they fear, it seems, even in this city (once the
emporium of the civilised world), some pirate in pursuit; and ere the
voyage be over, they may find that pirate in a Roman noble. Alas, to
what are we reduced!”
The vessel thus referred to was speeding rapidly down the river, and
some three or four armed men on deck were indeed intently surveying the
quiet banks on either side, as if anticipating a foe. The bark soon,
however, glided out of sight, and the brothers fell back upon those
themes which require only the future for a text to become attractive to
the young.
At length, as the evening darkened, they remembered that it was past the
usual hour in which they returned home, and they began to retrace their
steps.
“Stay,” said Cola, abruptly, “how our talk has beguiled me! Father
Uberto promised me a rare manuscript, which the good friar confesses
hath puzzled the whole convent. I was to seek his cell for it this
evening. Tarry here a few minutes, it is but half-way up the Aventine. I
shall soon return.”
“Can I not accompany you?”
“Nay,” returned Cola, with considerate kindness, “you have borne toil
all the day, and must be wearied; my labours of the body, at least, have
been light enough. You are delicate, too, and seem fatigued already; the
rest will refresh you. I shall not be long.”
The boy acquiesced, though he rather wished to accompany his brother;
but he was of a meek and yielding temper, and seldom resisted the
lightest command of those he loved. He sat him down on a little bank by
the river-side, and the firm step and towering form of his brother were
soon hid from his gaze by the thick and melancholy foliage.
At first he sat very quietly, enjoying the cool air, and thinking over
all the stories of ancient Rome that his brother had told him in their
walk. At length he recollected that his little sister, Irene, had begged
him to bring her home some flowers; and, gathering such as he could find
at hand (and many a flower grew, wild and clustering, over that desolate
spot), he again seated himself, and began weaving them into one of those
garlands for which the southern peasantry still retain their ancient
affection, and something of their classic skill.
While the boy was thus engaged, the tramp of horses and the loud
shouting of men were heard at a distance. They came near, and nearer.
“Some baron’s procession, perhaps, returning from a feast,” thought the
boy. “It will be a pretty sight--their white plumes and scarlet mantles!
I love to see such sights, but I will just move out of their way.”
So, still mechanically platting his garland, but with eyes turned
towards the quarter of the expected procession, the young Roman moved
yet nearer towards the river.
Presently the train came in view,--a gallant company, in truth; horsemen
in front, riding two abreast, where the path permitted, their steeds
caparisoned superbly, their plumes waving gaily, and the gleam of their
corselets glittering through the shades of the dusky twilight. A large
and miscellaneous crowd, all armed, some with pikes and mail, others
with less warlike or worse fashioned weapons, followed the cavaliers;
and high above plume and pike floated the blood-red banner of the
Orsini, with the motto and device (in which was ostentatiously displayed
the Guelfic badge of the keys of St. Peter) wrought in burnished gold.
A momentary fear crossed the boy’s mind, for at that time, and in that
city, a nobleman begirt with his swordsmen was more dreaded than a wild
beast by the plebeians; but it was already too late to fly--the train
were upon him.
“Ho, boy!” cried the leader of the horsemen, Martino di Porto, one of
the great House of the Orsini; “hast thou seen a boat pass up the
river?--But thou must have seen it--how long since?”
“I saw a large boat about half an hour ago,” answered the boy, terrified
by the rough voice and imperious bearing of the cavalier.
“Sailing right a-head, with a green flag at the stern?”
“The same, noble sir.”
“On, then! we will stop her course ere the moon rise,” said the baron.
“On!--let the boy go with us, lest he prove traitor, and alarm the
Colonna.”
“An Orsini, an Orsini,” shouted the multitude; “on, on!” and, despite
the prayers and remonstrances of the boy, he was placed in the
thickest of the crowd, and borne, or rather dragged along with the
rest--frightened, breathless, almost weeping, with his poor little
garland still hanging on his arm, while a sling was thrust into his
unwilling hand. Still he felt, through all his alarm, a kind of childish
curiosity to see the result of the pursuit.
By the loud and eager conversation of those about him, he learned that
the vessel he had seen contained a supply of corn destined to a fortress
up the river held by the Colonna, then at deadly feud with the Orsini;
and it was the object of the expedition in which the boy had been thus
lucklessly entrained to intercept the provision, and divert it to
the garrison of Martino di Porto. This news somewhat increased his
consternation, for the boy belonged to a family that claimed the
patronage of the Colonna.
Anxiously and tearfully he looked with every moment up the steep ascent
of the Aventine; but his guardian, his protector, still delayed his
appearance.
They had now proceeded some way, when a winding in the road brought
suddenly before them the object of their pursuit, as, seen by the light
of the earliest stars, it scudded rapidly down the stream.
“Now, the Saints be blest!” quoth the chief; “she is ours!”
“Hold!” said a captain (a German) riding next to Martino, in a half
whisper; “I hear sounds which I like not, by yonder trees--hark! The
neigh of a horse!--by my faith, too, there is the gleam of a corselet.”
“Push on, my masters,” cried Martino; “the heron shall not balk the
eagle--push on!”
With renewed shouts, those on foot pushed forward, till, as they had
nearly gained the copse referred to by the German, a small compact body
of horsemen, armed cap-a-pie, dashed from amidst the trees, and, with
spears in their rests, charged into the ranks of the pursuers.
“A Colonna! a Colonna!” “An Orsini! an Orsini!” were shouts loudly
and fiercely interchanged. Martino di Porto, a man of great bulk and
ferocity, and his cavaliers, who were chiefly German Mercenaries, met
the encounter unshaken. “Beware the bear’s hug,” cried the Orsini, as
down went his antagonist, rider and steed, before his lance.
The contest was short and fierce; the complete armour of the horsemen
protected them on either side from wounds,--not so unscathed fared the
half-armed foot-followers of the Orsini, as they pressed, each pushed on
by the other, against the Colonna. After a shower of stones and darts,
which fell but as hailstones against the thick mail of the horsemen,
they closed in, and, by their number, obstructed the movements of the
steeds, while the spear, sword, and battle-axe of their opponents made
ruthless havoc amongst their undisciplined ranks. And Martino, who cared
little how many of his mere mob were butchered, seeing that his foes
were for the moment embarrassed by the wild rush and gathering circle
of his foot train (for the place of conflict, though wider than the
previous road, was confined and narrow), made a sign to some of his
horsemen, and was about to ride forward towards the boat, now nearly out
of sight, when a bugle at some distance was answered by one of his enemy
at hand; and the shout of “Colonna to the rescue!” was echoed afar off.
A few moments brought in view a numerous train of horse at full speed,
with the banners of the Colonna waving gallantly in the front.
“A plague on the wizards! who would have imagined they had divined us
so craftily!” muttered Martino; “we must not abide these odds;” and the
hand he had first raised for advance, now gave the signal of retreat.
Serried breast to breast and in complete order, the horsemen of Martino
turned to fly; the foot rabble who had come for spoil remained but for
slaughter. They endeavoured to imitate their leaders; but how could they
all elude the rushing chargers and sharp lances of their antagonists,
whose blood was heated by the affray, and who regarded the lives at
their mercy as a boy regards the wasp’s nest he destroys. The crowd
dispersing in all directions,--some, indeed, escaped up the hills, where
the footing was impracticable to the horses; some plunged into the river
and swam across to the opposite bank--those less cool or experienced,
who fled right onwards, served, by clogging the way of their enemy, to
facilitate the flight of their leaders, but fell themselves, corpse upon
corpse, butchered in the unrelenting and unresisted pursuit.
“No quarter to the ruffians--every Orsini slain is a robber the
less--strike for God, the Emperor, and the Colonna!” such were the
shouts which rung the knell of the dismayed and falling fugitives. Among
those who fled onward, in the very path most accessible to the cavalry,
was the young brother of Cola, so innocently mixed with the affray. Fast
he fled, dizzy with terror--poor boy, scarce before ever parted from his
parents’ or his brother’s side!--the trees glided past him--the banks
receded:--on he sped, and fast behind came the tramp of the hoofs--the
shouts--the curses--the fierce laughter of the foe, as they bounded over
the dead and the dying in their path. He was now at the spot in which
his brother had left him; hastily he glanced behind, and saw the couched
lance and horrent crest of the horseman close at his rear; despairingly
he looked up, and behold! his brother bursting through the tangled
brakes that clothed the mountain, and bounding to his succour.
“Save me! save me, brother!” he shrieked aloud, and the shriek reached
Cola’s ear;--the snort of the fiery charger breathed hot upon him;--a
moment more, and with one wild shrill cry of “Mercy, mercy” he fell
to the ground--a corpse: the lance of the pursuer passing through and
through him, from back to breast, and nailing him on the very sod where
he had sate, full of young life and careless hope, not an hour ago.
The horseman plucked forth his spear, and passed on in pursuit of
new victims; his comrades following. Cola had descended,--was on the
spot,--kneeling by his murdered brother. Presently, to the sound of
horn and trumpet, came by a nobler company than most of those hitherto
engaged; who had been, indeed, but the advanced-guard of the Colonna. At
their head rode a man in years, whose long white hair escaped from his
plumed cap and mingled with his venerable beard. “How is this?” said the
chief, reining in his steed, “young Rienzi!”
The youth looked up, as he heard that voice, and then flung himself
before the steed of the old noble, and, clasping his hands, cried out
in a scarce articulate tone: “It is my brother, noble Stephen,--a boy,
a mere child!--the best--the mildest! See how his blood dabbles the
grass;--back, back--your horse’s hoofs are in the stream! Justice, my
Lord, justice!--you are a great man.”
“Who slew him? an Orsini, doubtless; you shall have justice.”
“Thanks, thanks,” murmured Rienzi, as he tottered once more to his
brother’s side, turned the boy’s face from the grass, and strove wildly
to feel the pulse of his heart; he drew back his hand hastily, for it
was crimsoned with blood, and lifting that hand on high, shrieked out
again, “Justice! justice!”
The group round the old Stephen Colonna, hardened as they were in such
scenes, were affected by the sight. A handsome boy, whose tears ran
fast down his cheeks, and who rode his palfrey close by the side of the
Colonna, drew forth his sword. “My Lord,” said he, half sobbing, “an
Orsini only could have butchered a harmless lad like this; let us lose
not a moment,--let us on after the ruffians.”
“No, Adrian, no!” cried Stephen, laying his hand on the boy’s shoulder;
“your zeal is to be lauded, but we must beware an ambush. Our men have
ventured too far--what, ho, there!--sound a return.”
The bugles, in a few minutes, brought back the pursuers,--among them,
the horseman whose spear had been so fatally misused. He was the leader
of those engaged in the conflict with Martino di Porto; and the gold
wrought into his armour, with the gorgeous trappings of his charger,
betokened his rank.
“Thanks, my son, thanks,” said the old Colonna to this cavalier, “you
have done well and bravely. But tell me, knowest thou, for thou hast
an eagle eye, which of the Orsini slew this poor boy?--a foul deed; his
family, too, our clients!”
“Who? yon lad?” replied the horseman, lifting the helmet from his
head, and wiping his heated brow; “say you so! how came he, then, with
Martino’s rascals? I fear me the mistake hath cost him dear. I could but
suppose him of the Orsini rabble, and so--and so--”
“You slew him!” cried Rienzi, in a voice of thunder, starting from
the ground. “Justice! then, my Lord Stephen, justice! you promised me
justice, and I will have it!”
“My poor youth,” said the old man, compassionately, “you should have had
justice against the Orsini; but see you not this has been an error? I
do not wonder you are too grieved to listen to reason now. We must make
this up to you.”
“And let this pay for masses for the boy’s soul; I grieve me much for
the accident,” said the younger Colonna, flinging down a purse of gold.
“Ay, see us at the palace next week, young Cola--next week. My father,
we had best return towards the boat; its safeguard may require us yet.”
“Right, Gianni; stay, some two of you, and see to the poor lad’s
corpse;--a grievous accident! how could it chance?”
The company passed back the way they came, two of the common soldiers
alone remaining, except the boy Adrian, who lingered behind a few
moments, striving to console Rienzi, who, as one bereft of sense,
remained motionless, gazing on the proud array as it swept along, and
muttering to himself, “Justice, justice! I will have it yet.”
The loud voice of the elder Colonna summoned Adrian, reluctantly
and weeping, away. “Let me be your brother,” said the gallant boy,
affectionately pressing the scholar’s hand to his heart; “I want a
brother like you.”
Rienzi made no reply; he did not heed or hear him--dark and stern
thoughts, thoughts in which were the germ of a mighty revolution, were
at his heart. He woke from them with a start, as the soldiers were now
arranging their bucklers so as to make a kind of bier for the corpse,
and then burst into tears as he fiercely motioned them away, and clasped
the clay to his breast till he was literally soaked with the oozing
blood.
The poor child’s garland had not dropped from his arm even when he fell,
and, entangled by his dress, it still clung around him. It was a sight
that recalled to Cola all the gentleness, the kind heart, and winning
graces of his only brother--his only friend! It was a sight that
seemed to make yet more inhuman the untimely and unmerited fate of that
innocent boy. “My brother! my brother!” groaned the survivor; “how shall
I meet our mother?--how shall I meet even night and solitude again?--so
young, so harmless! See ye, sirs, he was but too gentle. And they will
not give us justice, because his murderer was a noble and a Colonna.
And this gold, too--gold for a brother’s blood! Will they not”--and the
young man’s eyes glared like fire--“will they not give us justice?
Time shall show!” so saying, he bent his head over the corpse; his lips
muttered, as with some prayer or invocation; and then rising, his face
was as pale as the dead beside him,--but it was no longer pale with
grief!
From that bloody clay, and that inward prayer, Cola di Rienzi rose a new
being. With his young brother died his own youth. But for that event,
the future liberator of Rome might have been but a dreamer, a scholar, a
poet; the peaceful rival of Petrarch; a man of thoughts, not deeds. But
from that time, all his faculties, energies, fancies, genius, became
concentrated into a single point; and patriotism, before a vision, leapt
into the life and vigour of a passion, lastingly kindled, stubbornly
hardened, and awfully consecrated,--by revenge!