CHAPTER XI.

Gasthaus, Zum Bär, Dallas, Tyrol.

It is exactly seven weeks this day since I last opened my journal. I

promised Guckhardt not to look into it for a month, and so I have

well kept my word! It would seem, indeed, a small privation in most

circumstances to abstain from chronicling the ebbing hours of a life;

but Egotism is next of kin to Sickness, and I can vent mine more

harmlessly here than if spent in exhausting the patience of my friends.

Some listener must be found to the dreamy querulousness of the invalid,

and why not his own heart?

Even to those nearest and dearest to our affections, there is always

a sense of shame attendant on the confessions of our weakness, more so

than of our actual vices. But what a merciful judge is Self! how

gentle to rebuke! how reluctant to punish! how sanguine to hope for

reformation! Hence is it that I find a comfort in jotting down these

“mems” of the past; but from a friend, what shaking of the head, what

regretful sorrowings, should I meet with! How should I hear of faculties

and fortune--life itself--wasted without one object, even a wish,

compassed! When I reflect upon the position in life attainable by one

who starts with moderate abilities, a large fortune, reasonable habits

of industry, and a fair share of well-wishers, and then think of what

I now am, I might easily be discontented and dispirited; but if I had

really reached the goal, can I say that I should be happy? can I say,

that all the success within my reach could have stilled within me the

tone of peaceful solitude I have ever cherished as the greatest of

blessings? But why speculate on this? I never could have been highly

successful. I have not the temper, had I the talent, that climbs high. I

must always have done my best _at once_; put forth my whole strength on

each occasion--husbanded nothing, and consequently gained nothing.

Here I am at Dallas, in the Tyrol, a wild and lonely glen, with a deep

and rushing river foaming through it. The mountain in front of me is

speckled with wooden _chalets_, some of them perched on lofty cliffs,

not distinct from realms of never-melting snow.

All is poverty on every side; even in the little church, where Piety

would deck its shrine at any sacrifice, the altar is bare of ornament.

The Cure’s house, too, is humble enough for him who is working yonder in

his garden, an old and white-haired man, too feeble and frail for such

labour; and already the sun has set, and now he ceases from his toil:

for the “Angelus” is ringing, and soon the village will be kneeling in

prayer. Already the bell has ceased, and through the stilly air rises

the murmur of many voices.

There was somewhat of compassionate pity in the look of the old man who

has just passed the window; he stopped a moment to gaze at me--at the

only one whose unbended knee and closed lips had no brotherhood in the

devotion. He seemed very poor, and old, and feeble, and yet he could

look with a sense of pity upon me, as an outcast from the faith. So did

I feel his steady stare at least; for, at that instant, the wish was

nearest to my heart that I, too, could have knelt and prayed with the

rest. And why could |I not? was it that my spirit was too stubborn, too

proud, to mingle with the humble throng? did I feel myself better, or

nobler, or greater than the meanest there, when uttering the same words

of thankfulness or hope? No, far from it; a very different, but not less

powerful barrier interposed. Education, habits of thought, prejudices,

convictions, even party spirit, had all combined to represent Romanism

to my mind, in all the glaring colours of its superstitions, its

cruelties, and its deceptions. Then arose before me a kind of vision of

its tyranny over mankind,--its inquisitions, its persecutions, its mock

miracles, and its real bloodshed; and I could not turn from the horrible

picture, even to the sight of those humble worshippers who knelt in all

the sincerity of belief.

I actually dreaded the sway of the devotional influence, lest, when my

heart had yielded to it, some chance interruption of ceremonial, some

of those fantastic forms of the Church, should turn my feelings of trust

and worship to one of infidelity and scorn.

There, all is over now, and the villagers are returning homewards--some,

to the little hamlet--others, are wending their way upwards, to homes

high amid the mountains--and here I sit alone, in my little whitewashed

room, watching the shadows as they deepen over the glen, and gazing on

that mountain peak that glows like a carbuncle in the setting sun.

It is like a dream to me how I have come to sojourn in this peaceful

valley. The last entry I made was in Baden, the night of that party at

the Waterfall. The next day I awoke ill--fevered from a restless

night. Guckhardt came early, and thinking I was asleep, retired without

speaking to me. He laid his hand on my temples, and seemed to feel that

I required rest and quiet, for he cautioned my servant not to suffer the

least disturbance near me.

I conclude I must have been sleeping, for the sudden noise of voices and

the tramp of many feet aroused me. There was evidently something strange

and unexpected going forward in the town. What could it mean? My servant

seemed most unwilling to tell me, and only yielded to my positive

commands to speak.. Even now I tremble to recall the tidings--a murder

had been committed! One of the guests at our late _féte_, a young

Englishman named Lockwood, had been discovered dead on the side of

the road about two miles from the Waterfall; his watch, and purse with

several gold pieces, were found on his person, so that no robbery had

been the reason of the crime. I remember his having come on foot, and

hearing that I should not require my _char-à-banc_ to return, he engaged

it. The driver’s story is, that the stranger always got out to walk at

the hills, usually lingering slowly in his ascent of them; and that at

last, at the top of the highest, he had waited for a considerable time

without his appearing, and growing weary of expectancy he returned,

and at the foot of the hill discovered something dark, lying motionless

beside the pathway; he came closer, and saw it was the stranger quite

dead. Three wounds, which from their depth and direction seemed to have

been given by a dagger, were found in the chest; one, entered from the

back between the shoulders; the fingers of the right hand were also cut

nearly through, as though he had grasped a sharp weapon in his struggle.

Death must have been immediate, as the heart was twice wounded; probably

he expired almost at once. The direction and the position of the wounds

refuted every idea of a suicide--and yet how account for the crime of

murder? The stranger was scarcely a week in Baden, not known to any

one before his arrival here, and since had merely formed those chance

acquaintanceships of watering-places. There was not, so far as one could

see, the slightest ground to suspect any malice or hatred towards him..

The few particulars I have here set down were all that my servant could

tell me. But what from the terrible nature of the tidings themselves,

my own excitable state when hearing them, but, more than either, the

remembrance of the dialogue I had overheard the night before--all

combined and increased my fever to that degree that ere noon I became

half wild with delirium. What I said, or how my wandering faculties

turned, I cannot--nor would I willingly--remember. There was enough of

illness in my ravings, and of method in them too, to bring Guckhardt

again to my bedside, accompanied by a high agent of the police. The

attempt to examine a man in such a state relative to the circumstances

of a dreadful crime could only have entered the head of a _Préfet de

Police_ or a _Juge d’Instruction_. What my revelations were I know

not; but it is clear they assumed a character of independent fancy that

balked the scrutiny of the official, for he left me to the unmixed cares

of my doctor.

By his counsel I was speedily removed from Baden, under the impression

that the scene would be prejudicial to my recovery. I was indifferent

where, or in what way, they disposed of me; and when I was told I was to

try the air of the Lake of Constance, I heard it with the apathy of

one sunk in a trance. Nor do I yet know by what means the police, so

indefatigable in tormenting the innocent, abandoned their persecution of

me. They must have had their own sufficient reasons for it; so much is

certain.

And now, once more, I ask myself, Is all that I have here set down the

mere wanderings of a broken and disjointed brain? have these incidents

no other foundation than a morbid fancy? I would most willingly accept

even this sad alternative, and have it so; but here is evidence too

strong to disbelieve. Here before me lies an English newspaper, with a

paragraph alluding to the mysterious murder of an English gentleman at

Baden. The dates, circumstances, all tally in the minutest particulars.

Shall I discredit these proofs?

The Countess is married to the Marquis de Courcelles; a distant relative

of the Archduchess, it is said. Let me dismiss the theme for ever--that

is, if I can. And now for one whose interest to me is scarcely less sad,

but of a very different shade of sadness.

This is my birthday, the 31st August. “Why had the month more than

thirty days?” is a question I have been tempted to hazard more than

once. Nor is it from ingratitude that I say this. I have long enjoyed

the easy path in life; I have tasted far more of the bright, and seen

less of the shady side of this world’s high-road than falls to the share

of most men. With fortune more than sufficient to supply all that I

could care for, I have had, without any pretension to high talent,

that kind of readiness that is often mistaken for ability; and, what

is probably even more successful with the world, I have had a keen

appreciation of talent in other men--a thorough value for their superior

attainments; and this--no great gift, to be sure--has always procured me

acceptance in circles where my own pretensions would have proved feeble

supporters. And then, this delicacy of health--what many would have

called my heaviest calamity--has often carried me triumphantly through

difficulties where I must have succumbed. Even in “the House” have I

heard the prognostications of what I might have been, “if my health

permitted;” so that my weak point ministered to me what strength had

denied me.

Then, I have the most intense relish for the life of idleness I have

been leading; the lounging “do-nothingism” that would kill most men with

_ennui_, is to me inexpressibly delightful. All those castle-buildings

which, in the real world, are failures, succeed admirably in

imagination. I overcome competitors, I convince opponents, I conciliate

enemies at will, so long as they are all of my own making; and so far

from falling back disappointed from the vision, to the fact, I revel in

the conviction that I can go to work again at new fancies; and that, in

such struggles, there is neither weariness nor defeat. A small world for

ambition to range in! but I value it as Touchstone did his mistress,--“a

poor thing, but it was mine own.”

It would be a strange record if a man were to chronicle his birthdays,

keeping faithful note of his changed and changing nature as years stole

on. For myself I have always regarded them somewhat like post-stations

in a journey, ever expecting to find better horses and smoother roads

next stage, and constantly promising myself to be more equable in

temperament and more disposed to enjoy my tour. But the journey of life,

like all other journeys, puts to flight the most matured philosophy, and

the accidents of the way are always ready to divert the mind from its

firmest resolves.

Tuesday Morning, When I had written so far last night, the arrival of

a travelling carriage and four, with a Courier preceding, caused such

a commotion in the little inn that, notwithstanding all my assumed

indifference, I could not entirely escape the contagion, and, at last,

was fain to open my window and stare at the new arrival with all the

hardihood that becomes him already in possession of an apartment. “I

took little by my motion.” All I saw was a portly travelling carriage,

heavily laden with its appurtenances and imperials, well-corded springs,

rope-lashed pole, and double drag-chains,--evidences of caution and

signs of long-projected travel.

I might have readily forgotten the new comer--indeed, I had almost done

so ere I closed the window--had not his memory been preserved for me

by a process peculiar to small and unfrequented inns,--a species of

absorption by which the traveller of higher pretensions invariably

draws in all the stray articles of comfort scattered through the

establishment. First my table took flight, and in its place a small

and ricketty thing of white deal had arrived; next followed a

dressing-glass; then waddled forth a fat, unwieldy, old arm-chair,

that seemed by its difficulty of removal to have strong objections to

locomotion; and lastly, a chest of drawers set out on its travels, but

so stoutly did it resist, that it was not captured without the loss

of two legs, while every drawer was thrown out upon the floor, to the

manifest detriment of the waiter’s shins and ankles. These “distraints”

I bore well and equably, and it was only a summary demand to surrender a

little sofa on which I lay that at length roused me from my apathy, and

I positively demurred, asking, I suppose, querulously enough, who it

was that required the whole accommodation of the inn, and could spare

nothing for another traveller? An “English Prince” was the answer;

at which I could not help laughing, well knowing that the title is

tolerably indiscriminate in its application. Indeed, I once heard

Colonel Sibthorp called such.

It is all very well to affect indifference and apathy, to pretend that

you care nothing who or what your neighbour in an inn may be. This is

very practicable where his identity takes no more corporeal shape than

No. 42 or 53 in some great overgrown hôtel. But imagine yourself in some

small secluded spot, some little nook, of which you had half fancied you

were the first discoverer--conceiving yourself a kind of new Pérouse;

fancy, then, when in the very ecstasy of your adventure, the arrival

of a travelling carriage and four, with a belted Courier and a bearded

Valet; not only are your visions routed, but your own identity begins to

dissolve away with them. You are neither a hero to yourself nor to “mine

host.” His best smiles, his deepest reverence, are now for the last

comer, for whose accommodation a general tribute is levied. Do what you

will, say what you will, there is no remaining deaf to the incessant

turmoil that bespeaks the great man’s wants. There is a perpetual

hurry-scurry to seek this and fetch that; soda-water--tea--champagne--a

fire--hot water--are continually echoing along the corridor, and “the

Prince” seems like some vast “Maelstrom” that all the larder and the

cellar contain can never satiate. Such, certainly, the least exacting of

men appear when under the auspices of a Courier and the host of a small

inn.

The poverty of the establishment makes the commonest requirements seem

the demand of a Sybarite indulgence, and every-day wants are luxuries

where cleanliness is the highest of virtues.

I was--I own it--worried and vexed by the clamour and movement, that not

even coming night calmed down. The repose and quiet I had been so fully

enjoying were gone, and, in their place, the vulgar noises and tumult of

a little inn. All these interruptions, intimately associated in my mind

with the traveller, invested him, to me, with a character perfectly

detestable, so that there was somewhat of open defiance in my refusal to

yield up my sofa.

A pause followed. What was to come next? I listened and waited in half

anxiety, wondering what new aggression might ensue; but all was still:

nay, there was a clattering of knives and forks, and then went the pop

of a cork--“the Prince” was eating. “Well,” thought I, “there is some

vengeance here, for the _cuisine_ is detestable.” “His Highness” thought

so too, for more than one _plat_ was dismissed, accompanied by a running

commentary of abuse on the part of the Courier.

At last came a really tranquil moment. The cheese had been sent away as

uneatable, and the Courier had followed it, cursing manfully, if I might

pronounce from the odour wafted to my own chamber, not unreasonably. “Mi

Lor le Prince” was probably composing himself to a siesta; there was

a stealthy quietude in the step of his servant along the corridor that

said so much. I had scarcely made the reflection when a tap came to my

door. “The Prince” wished for an English newspaper, and the host had

seen two on my table. The “Post” and the “Chronicle” were both before

me, and I sent them, half wondering which best might suit his Highness’s

politics.

Another tap at the door! Really this is intolerable. Has he not had my

table, my arm-chair, my newspapers--what will he ask for next? “Come

in,” said I, now trying English, after in vain shouting “Entrez” and

“Herein” three times over.

An English servant entered, and in that peculiarly low, demure tone, so

distinctive of his caste, said,--

“Sir Robert Chawuth presents his compliments, and begs to know if he may

pay his respects to Mr. Templeton?”

“Is Sir Robert here? is that his carriage?” said I, hastily.

“Yes, sir; he came about an hour ago.”

“Oh, very well. Say, I shall feel great pleasure in seeing him. Is he

disengaged at present?”

“Yes, sir, he is quite alone.”

“Shew me his apartment, then.”

“So,” thought I, as I arose to seek the chamber, “this time they were

nearer right than usual; for, if not an ‘English Prince,’ he has wielded

more substantial power, and exerted a much wider sway over the destinies

of the world, than ever a ‘foreign Prince’ from the Baltic to the

Bosphorus.”

Strange enough, our last meeting was at Downing Street; he was then

Minister. I waited upon him by appointment, as I was leaving England for

the Prussian mission, and _he_ desired to give me his own instructions

before I sailed; and now, I visit him in a little Tyrol “Gasthaus,” he,

destitute of power, and myself----

*****

It would be presumptuous in one so humbly placed to hazard an opinion on

the subject; but if I were to dare it, I should say that the statesmen

of England possess a range of knowledge and a wider intimacy with the

actual condition of the world as it is than any other class, in any

country. I was greatly struck with this last evening. The topics

wandered far a-field, varying from the Poor Laws to Hong Kong, from

the Health of Towns to the state of the Peninsula: Austria, Ireland,

Switzerland, the Navigation Laws, the policy of Louis Philippe, and the

rot in the potatoes; and on each of these themes he not only spoke

well, but he spoke with a degree of knowledge that smacked of a special

study. “How comes it,” I asked myself, “that this man, with the weighty

cares of a mighty empire on his brain, has time to hear and memory to

retain little traits of various people in remote quarters of the world?

How, for instance, did he hear, or why remember, these anecdotes of the

present Landamman of Switzerland, Ochsenbein?” And yet there were good

reasons perhaps, to remember them. The man who has personally shewn the

white feather will scarcely be courageous as the head of a government,

though there is great reason to suspect that he may exhibit all the

rashness of cowardice--its worst, because its most dangerous, quality.

I had often suspected, but I never knew before, how completely this

Minister had usurped every department of the Cabinet, and concentrated

in himself the Home, the Foreign, and the Colonial Governments. The very

patronage, too, he had assumed; so that, in fact, his colleagues were

comparatively without influence or occupation. I confess that, on

hearing him talk so unconcernedly of mighty events and portentous

changes, of great interests and powerful states, that my heart beat

strongly with an ambitious ardour, and a feverish throbbing of my

temples suggested to me that the longing for rank, and station, and

power, had not yet died away within me. Was it with serious intention

that he spoke to me of again entering Parliament and taking office in

some future arrangement, or was it merely from a sense of compassion

that he ministered this meed of encouragement to the hopes of a sick

man? Whatever the motive, the result has been an increased buoyancy,

more of vitality about me, than I have known for some time--a secret

wishing for life and strength to “do something” ere I die.

He rather appeared pleased with a suggestion I threw out for augmenting

the elective franchise in Ireland, by making the qualification “an

intellectual one,” and extending the right of voting to all who should

take a certain degree or diploma in either the University of Dublin

or any of the provincial colleges, all admitted as members of learned

bodies, and all licentiates of law and physic. This would particularly

suit the condition of Ireland, where property is a most inadequate

and limited test, and at the same time, by an infusion of educated and

thinking men into the mass, serve to counterbalance and even guide the

opinions of those less capable of forming judgments. We are becoming

more democratic every day. Let our trust be in well-informed,

clearsighted democracy, and let the transition be from the aristocracy

to the cultivated middle classes, and not to the rule of Feargus

O’Connor and his Chartists.

And now, to wander down this lonely glen, and forget, if I may, these

jarring questions, where men’s passions and ambitions have more at stake

than human happiness. Do what I will, think of what I will, the image

of--Caroline Graham--yes, I must call her so, rises before me at

every step. It is a sad condition of the nervous system when slight

impressions cut deep. Like the diseased state of the mucous membrane,

when tastes and odours cling and adhere to it for days long, I suppose

that the prevalence of such images in the brain would at last lead to

insanity, or, at least, that form of it called Monomania. Let no man

suppose that this is so very rare a malady. Let us rather ask, Who is

quite free from some feature of the affection? The mild cases are the

passionate ardour we see exhibited by men in the various and peculiar

pursuits in life; the bad ones, only greater in degree, are shut up in

asylums.

The most singular instance that ever occurred within my own knowledge

was one I met several years back in Germany; and as “thereby hangs a

tale,” I will set it down in the words of the relator. This is his own

recital--in his own handwriting too!

There are moments in the life of almost every man which seem like years.

The mind, suddenly calling up the memory of bygone days, lives over

the early hours of childhood--the bright visions of youth, when all was

promise and anticipation--and traverses with a bound the ripe years of

manhood, with all their struggles, and cares, and disappointments; and

even throws a glance into the dark vista of the future, computing the

“to come” from the past; and, at such times as these, one feels that he

is already old, and that years have gone over him.

Such were to me the few brief moments in which I stood upon the Meissner

hill that overhangs my native city. Dresden, the home of my childhood,

of my earliest and my dearest friends, lay bathed in the soft moonlight

of a summer’s eve. There, rose the ample dome of the cathedral in all

the majesty of its splendid arch, the golden tracery glittering with

the night dew; here, wound the placid Elbe, its thousand eddies through

purple and blushing vineyards, its fair surface flashing into momentary

brilliancy, as the ripples broke upon the buttresses of that graceful

bridge, long accounted the most beautiful in Europe; while from the

boat that lay sleeping upon its shadow came the rich tones of some manly

voices, bearing to my ear the evening hymn of my fatherland! Oh, how

strong within the heart of the wanderer in distant lands is the love of

country!--how deeply rooted amid all the feelings which the cares and

trials of after-life scatter to the wind! It lives on, bringing to our

old age the only touch and trace of the bright and verdant feelings of

our youth. And oh, how doubly strong this love, when it comes teeming

with a flood of long-forgotten scenes--the memory of our first, best

friends--the haunts of our boyhood--the feats of youthful daring--and,

far more than all, the recollection of that happy home, around whose

hearth we met with but looks of kindness and affection, where our

sorrows were soothed, our joys shared in! For me, ‘tis true, there

remained nought of this. The parents who loved me had gone to their dark

homes--the friends of my childhood had doubtless forgotten me. Years of

absence had left me but the scenes of past happiness--the actors were

gone. And thus it was as I looked down upon the city of my native land.

The hour which in solitude and lowness of heart I had longed and prayed

for had at length arrived--that hour which I believed in my heart would

repay me for all the struggles, the cares, the miseries of fourteen

years of exile; and now I stood upon that self-same spot where I had

turned to take a farewell look of my native city, which I was leaving

poor, unfriended, and unknown, to seek in Italy those opportunities my

forlorn condition had denied to me at home. Years of toil and anxiety

had followed; the evils of poverty had fallen on me; one by one the

cheerful thoughts and bright fancies of youth deserted me; yet still I

struggled on, unshaken in courage. The thought of one day returning

to my loved Saxon land, rich in reputation, crowned with success, had

sustained and upheld me. And now that hour was come--my earliest hopes

more than realised--my fondest aspirations accomplished. Triumphant over

all the difficulties of my hard lot, I returned, bearing with me the

well-won spoils of labour and exertion. But, alas! where were they who

should rejoice with me, and share my happiness? The very home of my

infancy was tenanted by strangers; they knew me not in my poverty, they

could not sympathise in my elevation. My heart sickened within me as I

thought of my lone and desolate condition; and as the tears coursed fast

and faster down my cheeks, how gladly would I have given all the proud

triumph of success for one short and sunny hour of boyhood’s bright

anticipation, shared in by those who loved me!

Oh! how well were it for us if the bright visions of happiness our

imaginations picture forth should ever recede as we advance, and,

mirage-like, evade us as we follow! and that we might go down to the

grave still thinking that the “morrow” would accomplish the hopes of

to-day--as the Indian follows the phantom-bark, ever pursuing, never

reaching. The misery of hope deferred never equalled the anguish of

expectation gratified, only to ascertain how vain was our prospect of

happiness from the long-cherished desire, and how far short reality ever

falls of the bright colouring hope lends to our imaginings. In such

a frame of deep despondency I re-entered my native city--no friend to

greet, no voice to welcome me.

Happily, however, I was not long left to the indulgence of such regrets;

for no sooner was my arrival made known in the city, than my brother

artists waited on me with congratulations; and I learned, for the first

time, that the reputation of my successes had reached Saxony, and that

my very best picture was at that moment being exhibited in the Dresden

Gallery. I was now invited to the houses of the great, and even

distinguished by marks of my sovereign’s favour. If I walked the

streets, I heard my name whispered as I passed; if I appeared in public,

some burst of approbation greeted me. In a word, and that ere many days

had elapsed, I became the reigning favourite of a city in which the love

of “art” is an inheritance: for, possessed of a gallery second to

none in Europe, the Dresdeners have long enjoyed and profited by the

opportunity of contemplating all that is excellent in painting; and, in

their enthusiastic admiration of the fine arts, thought no praise too

exalted to bestow on one who had asserted the claim of a Saxon painter

among the schools of Italy.

To the full and unmeasured intoxication of the flattery that beset me

on every side, I now abandoned myself. At first, indeed, I did so as a

relief from the sorrowful and depressing feelings my unfriended solitude

suggested; and at last, as the passion crept in upon and grasped my very

heart-strings, the love of praise took entire possession of my being,

and in a short time the desire for admiration had so completely

supplanted every other emotion, that I only lived with enjoyment when

surrounded by flattery; and those praises which before I heard with

diffidence and distrust, I now looked for as my desert, and claimed

as my right. The “spoiled child of fortune,” my life was one round of

gaiety and excitement, For _me_, and for my amusement, _fêtes_ were

given, parties contrived, and entertainments planned, and the charmed

circle of royalty was even deserted to frequent the places at which I

was expected.

From these circumstances it may readily be believed how completely I was

beset by the temptations of flattery, and how recklessly I hurried along

that career of good fortune which, in my mad infatuation, t deemed

would last for ever. I saw my name enrolled among the great ones of my

art--myself the friend of the exalted in rank and great in wealth--my

very praise, patronage. Little knew I that such sudden popularity is

often as fleeting as it is captivating, that the mass of those who

admire and are ever loudest in their praises are alike indifferent to,

and ignorant of, art. Led along by fashion alone, they seemed delighted,

because it was the rage to appear so. They visited, because my society

was courted by others; and if their knowledge was less their plaudits

were louder than those of the discriminating few, whose caution and

reserve seemed to me the offspring of jealousy and envy.

It is well known to almost all, how, in the society of large cities,

some new source of interest or excitement is eagerly sought after to

enliven the dull routine of nightly dissipation, and awaken the palled

and jaded appetite of pleasure to some new thrill of amusement!--how

one succeeds another, and how short-lived are all! The idol of to-day is

forgotten to-morrow; and whether the object of momentary attraction be

a benefactor of mankind, or some monster of moral deformity, it

matters but little, so that for the hour he furnish an article for the

fashionable journalist, and a subject of conversation to the _coterie_;

the end and aim of his being seems to be perfectly accomplished, and

all interest for him as readily transferred to his successor, who or

whatever he may be, as though his existence had been as unreal as the

spectre of a magic lantern.

Little did I suppose when, in the full blaze of my popularity, that to

such an ordinance of fashion alone I was indebted for the proud eminence

I occupied. I was not long destined to enjoy the deception.

It chanced that about three months after my arrival in Dresden,

circumstances required my absence from the city for a few days. The

occasion which called me detained me beyond the time I had calculated

on, and it was not till after a fortnight I reached my home. I had

travelled that day from sunrise till late in the evening, being anxious,

if possible, to redeem a promise I had made to my friend and patron,

Count Lowenstein, to be present at a _fête_ in honour of his sister’s

birthday. The weather had been unusually hot and sultry, even for the

season; and although I felt much fatigued and jaded, I lost not a moment

on my arrival to dress for the _fête_, over which, calculating on my

late career, I deemed my absence would throw a gloom. Besides that, I

longed once more to drink of that Circean cup of flattery, for which

my short absence from the city had given me new zest; and it was with

a high-beating heart and fevered brain I hung upon my breast the many

crosses and decorations I had been gifted with in my hours of brilliant

success.

Lights gleamed brightly from the ample windows of the Lowenstéin palace.

Numerous equipages stood at the portico. I followed the chasseur up

the spacious marble steps which led to the ante-chamber. I stopped one

moment before a large mirror, and almost startled at the brilliancy of

my dress, which, a present from my sovereign, I now wore for the first

time. With a high-swelling heart and bounding step--for all fatigue

was long since forgotten--I approached the door; and oh! the throb with

which I heard my name now, for the first time, announced with the

title of “Baron,” which his Majesty had conferred upon me the day of my

departure! That name, which alone had, talisman-like, opened for me the

doors of all who were illustrious and exalted in rank--that name, which

heard, silenced the hum of voices, to break forth the moment after in

accents of praise and welcome! Again it rung through the crowded salon,

and I stood within the door. Formerly, when appearing in society,

the moment I made my _entrée_ I found myself the centre of a group of

friends and admirers, all eagerly pressing forward to pay their homage

to the star of fashion. Now, what was my amazement to mark no thrill

of pleasure, as of old, animate that vast assembly!--not even surprise!

group after group passed by me, as though I were unknown, and had no

claim to their attention. It is true, I heard some friendly voices

and kind inquiries; but I could neither distinguish the words nor the

speaker. My brain was in a whirl; for, alas! long since had I learned to

care less for the language of affection than the voice of the flatterer.

I stood thunderstruck and amazed; and it was some minutes before I

could, with any appearance of composure, reply to the salutations I met

with. Something must have occurred in my absence to weaken the interest

my appearance ever excited;--but what could that be? And the assembly,

too! had my own baffled hopes lent their gloomy colouring to all

around? I certainly thought it far less brilliant than usual; a sad

and depressing influence seemed to pervade all the guests, which

they appeared vainly to struggle against. Tortured with doubt and

disappointment, I hastened through the crowd to where the Count was

standing, surrounded by his suite. His quick eye instantly perceived me,

and, familiarly kissing his hand to me, he continued to converse

with those about him. Up to this moment I had borne all the chilling

indifference of manner I met with, from the secret satisfaction that

told me in my heart that he, my protector, my friend, would soon

vindicate my claim to notice and distinction, and that, in the sunshine

of his favour, I should soon receive the attention my heart thirsted

for. But now that hope deserted me, the cold distance of his manner

chilled me to the very heart’s core* Not one word of kind inquiry, no

friendly chiding for protracted absence, no warm welcome for my coming!

I looked around on every side for some clue to this strange mystery;

I felt as if all eyes were upon me, and thought for a moment I could

perceive the sneer of gratified malice at my downfall. But no: I was

unnoticed and unobserved; and even this hurt me still more. Alas! alas!

the few moments of heart-cutting, humbling misery I then endured, too

dearly paid for all the selfish gratification I reaped from being the

idol of fashion. While I remained thus the Count approached me, and,

with something like his usual tone of familiarity, said,--

“Ah, Carl!--you here? You have, of course, heard of our sad

disappointment?”

“No, my lord,” I replied, with some bitterness of tone, “I have scarcely

had time, for I have not been yet an hour in Dresden.”

Without noticing either the manner of my answer or the allusion to my

absence, the Count continued,--

“This evening we were to have had the happiness to have amongst us one

who seems to be gifted with some magic power of diffusing delight and

ecstasy on every side where she appears. Those whose hearts were cold to

beauty in all others, have yielded to the fascination of hers; and the

soul that never before was touched by melody has thrilled with transport

at her heavenly voice. Divine La Mercia! the paragon of beauty and the

soul of song! There, there stands her harp, and here you see her music;

but she is absent. Alas! we have only the wand of the magician--the

spell is not there.”

In an instant the veil was lifted from my eyes; the whole truth burst on

me like a lightning flash--the course of my popularity was run, the sun

of my favour had set for ever.

The fatigue of my journey, the heat of the salon, the confusion of my

mind, and the bitter conflict of my feelings, all conspired to unman

me, and I sank upon a sofa. As I sat thus unnoticed (for the tone of the

Count’s manner had divested the few who were previously attentive of all

interest for me), I overheard the conversation of those around me. But

one name was mentioned, but one person seemed to engross every tongue or

heart--that was La Mercia.

From what I could collect it appeared that she, a most beautiful and

interesting girl, had appeared at the Opera a few evenings since, and by

the charms of her surpassing beauty, as well as the surprising richness

and clearness of her voice, had captivated the whole city, from the

palace to the cottage. The enthusiastic repetition of her praises

gradually led to regrets for her absence, and surmises as to the cause,

while a young nobleman, who had just joined the circle, said,--

“Trust me, La Mercia would have come if _she_ alone were consulted;

but I fear that ill-tempered looking old fellow, whom she calls her

‘Dottore,’ has had much to say to this refusal.”

“Yes,” said another; “so late as yesterday evening, at the palace,

when she was surrounded by several members of the royal family, eagerly

pressing her to repeat a song she had just sung,--just as she consented,

a look from the ‘Dottore’ shot across the room and met her eyes;

she immediately hesitated, begged to be permitted not to sing, and

immediately afterwards withdrew.”

“How strange!” said the nobleman who spoke before, “how very strange! It

was but a few nights since, at the Opera, I witnessed the deference and

submission with which she addressed him, and the cold indifference with

which he met looks and heard tones that, would have made another’s heart

beat beyond his bosom. It must, indeed, be a strange mystery that unites

two beings so every way unlike;--one all beauty and loveliness, and

the other the most sarcastic, treacherous-looking wretch, ever my eyes

beheld.”

The deep interest with which I listened to those particulars of my

rival--for such I now felt her to be--gradually yielded to a sense of

my own sunken and degraded condition; and envy, the most baleful and

pernicious passion that can agitate the bosom, took entire possession of

me: envy of one whose very existence one hour before I was ignorant of.

I felt that _she--she_ had injured me,--robbed me of all for which life

and existence was dear. But for _her_, I should still be the centre

of this gay and brilliant assembly, by whom I am already forgotten and

neglected: and, with a fiendish malignity, I thought how soon this new

idol of a fickle and ungrateful people would fall from the pinnacle from

which she had displaced me, and suffer in her own heart the cruel pangs

I was then enduring.

I arose from where I had been sitting, my brain maddened with my sudden

reverse of fortune, and fled from the salon to my home* In an agony of

grief I threw myself upon my bed, and that night was to me like years of

sorrowing and affliction.

When morning broke, my first resolve was to leave Dresden for ever; my

next to remain, until, by applying all my energies to the task, I had

accomplished something beyond all my former efforts; and then, spurning

the praise and flattery my success would inspire, take a proud farewell

of my fickle and ungrateful countrymen. The longer I thought upon,

the more was I pleased with, this latter resolution, and panted with

eagerness for the moment of contemptuous disdain, in which, flinging

off the caresses of false friends, I should carry to other lands those

talents which my own was unworthy to possess. It was but a few days

before this the Prior of the Augustine monastery had called upon me, to

beg I would paint an altar-piece for their chapel: they wished to have

a kneeling figure of Mary, to whom the shrine was dedicated; but the

subject, being a favourite one of Titian’s, had at that time deterred

me. Its difficulty was now its charm; and as I pondered over in my mind

the features I wished to transfer to my canvass, I suddenly remembered

a painting which I had had for some years in my possession, and which,

from the surpassing loveliness of the countenance it represented, as

well as the beauty of its execution, had long fascinated me. I now

reverted to it at once, and opening a secret drawer in my cabinet,

took out the picture and placed it before me. It was a small and most

beautifully painted enamel, representing two figures--one that of an old

and stern-visaged man, upon whose harsh and severe features there played

a scowl of deadly hate and scorn: he stood, drawn up to his full height,

his hands and arms widely extended before him, as if in the act of

performing some mystic or sacred rite over the lovely being who knelt

at his feet in an attitude of the deepest and most reverential

supplication. This was a lovely girl, her age scarcely eighteen years:

her forehead, fair as alabaster, was shaded by two braids of dark brown

hair, which hung back in heavy locks upon her neck and shoulders. Her

eyes, of the deepest blue, were upraised and tearful, and the parted

lips seemed almost to utter a murmured prayer, as her heaving bosom told

some inward anguish; her hands were firmly clasped, but the arms hung

powerless before her, and the whole figure conveyed the most perfect

abandonment to grief it was possible to conceive. Here were the

features, here the very attitude, I desired. Could I only succeed in

imparting to my Madonna the lovely and sorrow-struck countenance before

me, my triumph were certain. I had walked every gallery of Europe, from

one end to the other; I had visited every private collection where a

good picture was to be found, yet never had I beheld the same magic

power of conveying, in one single scene, so much of storied interest as

this small picture displayed. The features of that beautiful girl,

too, bad the semblance of being copied from the life. There are certain

slight and indescribable traits by which a painter will, in almost every

case, distinguish when nature and when only fancy have lent the subject;

and here, every thing tended to make me believe it to be a portrait. The

manner in which I became possessed of it, also, contributed to invest

it with a more than common interest in my eyes. The circumstances were

these:--When a very young man, and only a short time settled at Rome,

whither I had gone to prosecute my studies as a painter, the slender

state of my purse had compelled me to take up my residence in one of the

less known suburbs of the city. In the same humble dwelling in which

I took up my abode there lived an old and paralytic man, whom age and

infirmity had rendered bed-ridden for years. At first, my occupation

being entirely without doors, left me but little opportunity to see or

know much of him; but when winter closed in, and confined me whole days

to the house, my acquaintance with him gradually increased, and, to my

great surprise, I discovered in this poverty-struck and decrepid old man

one who possessed the most intimate and critical knowledge of art; every

gallery was familiar to him--he knew the history of each celebrated

picture, and distinguished originals from their copies by such traits

of discernment as evinced the most consummate intimacy with the deepest

secrets of colouring, and, in a word, shewed himself to be, what

I afterwards learned he was, a most accomplished artist: but the

circumstances which threw him into his present mean and wretched

condition ever remained a mystery. Various little acts of kindness and

attention, which I had in my power to bestow, seemed to make a great

impression on him, while my own friendless and solitary situation

drew me into closer intimacy with one who seemed to have fewer of this

world’s comforts than myself. To him, therefore, I confided all the

circumstances which led me to Rome--my ardent desire for distinction--my

longing for eminence in art: while he, by his advice and counsel, which

he was well qualified to afford, directed my studies and encouraged my

efforts.

Our acquaintance thus formed, rapidly ripened into friendship, and it

was with pleasure I hurried from my gayer and more volatile companions

to the poor and humble abode, where my old and feeble friend awaited me

with impatience.

As the winter advanced, the infirmities of the old painter rapidly

gained ground; he became daily weaker, and, by degrees, the calm

serenity of his mind, which was his most remarkable trait, yielded

to fits of impatience, in which, sometimes, his very reason seemed to

struggle for empire: and at such times as these he would drop hints, and

give vent to thoughts, that were awful and appalling to listen to.

It appeared to me that he regarded his present afflicted state as the

dreadful retribution of some real or imaginary crime; for, in addition

to the unceasing depression which seized him, his fears of death were

incessant, and great beyond measure* Sometimes, the thought that there

was no future state would shoot across his mind, and a species of

reckless gaiety would follow; but in a moment after, the strong and full

conviction of his self-deception would visit him--and then his agony was

frightful to witness. In the sad alternation of these states of hope and

fear, in which the former was, if possible, more affecting to witness,

weeks rolled on. One night when recovering from a nervous attack, which,

by its duration and severity seemed to threaten more fatally than usual,

he called me to him, and desired me to bring, from a concealed drawer in

his trunk, a small ebony box clasped with silver. I did so. He took it

with trembling hands, and placed it beside him on the pillow, while,

with a voice scarcely audible from agitation, he whispered:--

“Leave me, Carl--leave me to myself! There is in this box what may

meet no other eye than mine. And oh! would to Heaven that its bright

lightnings had struck and blighted me, rather than I should ever have

looked upon it.”

The energy with which these words were spoken seemed to weary and

overcome him, and he was barely able to say:--

“Leave me now, my friend. But stay: ere you go, promise me--swear to me,

as you hope--ay, as you hope your death-bed may be not like mine--swear,

when all is at rest within this torn and afflicted heart, that you will,

with your own hands, place this box within my coffin,--swear to place

it there unopened: better far you had not enjoyed the blessed gift

of sight, than look upon what it contains. I grow weaker,--promise me

this.”

“I do,” I replied hurriedly. “I promise.”

“Swear it,” he said; while the large drops of sweat stood upon his brow,

and his bloodshot eyes glared upon me like a maniac.

“I swear,” said I, anxious to relieve the terrific convulsion which his

eagerness brought on; “I swear.” And as he lay back slowly upon the bed,

I left the room.

When again, after a considerable time, I entered the chamber, he had

turned his face towards the wall--his head buried between both his

hands; while sobs, which he appeared struggling to control, burst from

him at intervals. The casket lay locked beside him. I took it up, and

placed it within my portmanteau; and, not daring to interfere with the

course of that sorrow, the cause of which he had not confided to me, I

stole noiselessly from the room.

When next I saw him he appeared to be somewhat better; but the feeble

powers of life had received a severe shock, and his haggard and broken

look shewed how much a few hours had hastened the approach of death.

That evening he never once alluded to the subject which had agitated

him, and bade me “Good night” earlier than usual, wishing to relieve his

fatigue by sleep.--I never saw him after.

I had scarcely composed myself to sleep, my mind full of the events of

the day, when an express arrived from an English nobleman, who had been

my most influential and steadiest friend, requiring me immediately to

set out for Naples, to make a picture of his only daughter ere her body

was committed to the earth. She had died of the malaria, and her funeral

could not be long delayed. I immediately set out, taking with me the

portmanteau that contained the casket, and such requisites for painting

as I could hurriedly collect. With all my anxiety to return to my old

companion, I was unable to leave Naples before the tenth day; I then

turned my face homewards, with a heart beating with anxiety, lest his

death should have taken place in my absence. The diligence in which

I travelled was attacked near Calvi by Banditti. Several of the

passengers, being well armed, made resistance, and a dreadful conflict

took place. Severely wounded in the side with a stiletto, I remained for

dead upon the ground, and lost all remembrance of every thing till the

moment I discovered myself a patient in the public hospital of Naples.

Several weeks of fever and delirium had passed over me, and I lay now

weak and powerless. By degrees my strength was restored, and as I lay,

one day, meditating a speedy departure from the hospital, the intendant

of the police came to inform me that several articles of value,

contained in a portmanteau bearing my initials, had been discovered near

the scene of the late encounter, where they had probably been dropped

by the robbers in their flight, and that, on my identifying and claiming

them as mine they should be restored to me. Among other things he

mentioned the ebony casket.

I dared not ask if it were opened, lest my agitation might occasion

surprise or suspicion, and promised to inspect them the following

morning, and identify such as were my property.

The next day I appeared at the bureau of the police. The portmanteau was

produced and unlocked, and the very first thing I set my eyes upon

was the picture. The case had been rudely torn open, and it lay there

exposed to all. My promise--my solemnly pledged oath, came instantly to

my mind, and all the awful denunciations the old man had spoken of, as

in store for him who should look upon that picture! I was horror-struck

and speechless, and only remembered where I was, as the _Commissaire_,

who stood behind me and looked at it, asked if I were the painter? I

replied not.

“The likeness is, indeed, wonderful,” said he.

I started; but immediately recovering myself, said:--

“You must be under some mistake. You could scarcely have seen the person

for whom this was intended?” I said this because, from the attentive

consideration I had given it, as well as the initials in the corner of

the drapery, I perceived it to be one of the most beautifully executed

enamels of Julio Romano, and must, at least, have been nearly two

centuries old.

“Impossible I can be mistaken!” said he: “that is not only the Comtess

d’Alvini herself, but there, and even more like, stands her uncle, ‘Il

Dottore Albretto,’ as he was called. Why, I remember as well as

though it were but yesterday, though I was only a boy at the time, her

marriage--with one of your own profession, too. How can I forget his

name!--ah, I have it--Antonio Gioventa! By the by, they said, too, the

union was none of the happiest, and that they separated soon after. But

of that I know nothing myself, for they never appeared in Naples after

the morning they were married.”

How I longed to make one or two inquiries! but fear prevented me;--fear

lest my own ignorance concerning the history of the picture might be

discovered, and I confess, too, something like dread; for, the evident

age of the picture tallied but ill with the account the _Commissaire_

gave of the characters represented; and I longed for the moment I should

put into execution, at least, so much of my promise as was yet in

my power: putting it up, therefore, with such of my effects as I

recognised, I returned to my hôtel.

The entire evening I could think of nothing but the story of the

_Commissaire_. The artist could have been none other than my old friend

Nichola Calertio--for by this name I had known him,--and that lovely

creature must have been his wife! And what was her fate? and what could

have been the awful mystery that wrapt their history? These thoughts

dwelt in my mind, and, framing ten thousand solutions of the secret, I

at last sunk into sleep.

The following day I took my departure for Rome. On my arrival, what was

my horror to discover that Nichola had died the day after my

departure from Naples, and that he had been buried in the strangers’

burial-ground; but in what spot, no one knew--nor had he one left who

could point out his grave. Again my oath came to my mind, and I could

not divest myself of the thought, that in the series of events which

prevented its accomplishment chance had nothing to do; and that the hand

of a guiding Providence had worked these apparent accidents for His own

wise ends.

From that hour I guarded, how closely I cannot say, this picture from

all human eye; but if I did so, the very impulse which drove me to

conceal it from all others led me to look upon it myself. Like the miser

who possesses a hidden treasure, ten thousand times dearer that it

is known to him alone, I have sat, hour by hour, in the silent

contemplation of it in my chamber; I have studied the features one by

one, till I almost thought the figure lived and breathed before me;

and often have I left the crowded and brilliant salon to seek, in the

stillness of my own home, the delicious calm and dreamy tranquillity

that painting ever inspired me with.

And so it had been my custom, when first I returned to Dresden, to sit

for days long with that picture open before me. As a work of art, it

possessed undoubted excellence; but I could not help feeling that its

mysterious history had invested it with an interest altogether deeper

and more powerful than the beauty of the execution could alone account

for. This habit had been first broken in upon by the numerous and varied

occupations my newly-arisen popularity brought upon me; and amid

the labours of the painting-room, and the gay hours of fashionable

dissipation, I had been now some weeks without once having seen it, when

the events I have just detailed, and my determination to copy from it,

brought it again fully to my mind.

The day which followed that long night of misery passed I know not how.

When I awoke from the deep musing my thoughts had fallen into, it was

already evening: the sun had set, and a soft twilight was sleeping on

all around. I opened my window, and let the cool breeze of the evening

blow upon my heated and fevered brain; and as I sat thus, lost in

reverie, the last traces of daylight gradually faded away, and a thin,

crescent-like moon, shewed itself over the hill of the Meissner. The

city lay in deep shadow, and almost in silence; the mournful plashing of

the river being plainly heard above all other sounds. There is something

sad, and almost awful, in the sight of a large and populous city bathed

in the silence and sleep of night; its busy voice hushed, its streets

untrodden, or echoing to the tread of a solitary passer-by. To me this

was now most welcome. The dreamy melancholy of my mind felt pleasure

in the death-like stillness about me, and I wandered forth to enjoy the

free air and balmy breeze upon the bank of the Elbe. After some time I

crossed the bridge, and continued my walk through the suburb, intending

to return by a beautiful garden which lies on that side of the river. As

I approached the Elbe I was struck by the bright glare of light which,

proceeding from some building near, illuminated the river nearly the

whole way across, displaying upon its glassy surface several boats, in

which the people sat resting on their oars, and scarcely moving in

the gentle tide of the stream. I remembered for a moment, and then it

occurred to me that the brilliant glare of light proceeded from the

villa of Count Lowenstein, which stood upon a small promontory of

land, about two miles from Dresden, this being the night of a private

_soiree_, to which only his nearest and most intimate friends were ever

invited. Report had spoken loudly of the singular beauty of the villa

itself, the splendour of its decorations, the richness and taste of its

furniture; and, indeed, around the whole character of the place, and the

nature of the entertainments held there, the difficulty of _entrée_,

and the secrecy observed by the initiated, had thrown an air of the most

romantic interest. To these _soirées_ although honoured by marks of the

greatest distinction, and even admitted to the closest intimacy, the

Count never invited me, and in the days of my prosperity it had ever

been with a sense of pique I called to mind the circumstance. Thither I

now inadvertently bent my steps, and it was only when the narrowness

of the path which lay between the hedge of the garden and the river

required my caution in walking, that I remembered I must have entered

the grounds, and was then actually within a few paces of the villa.

While I stood for a moment, uncertain whether to retreat or advance,

I was struck by observing that the boats had gradually and noiselessly

approached the bank, a short way from where I was, and, by the attitudes

of the figures I could perceive that they were listening most eagerly

and attentively. I approached a few steps, till, at the sudden turning

of the walk, I found myself beneath the terrace of a splendid salon,

brilliantly lighted, and crowded by numerous and full-dressed guests.

The rarest plants and most beautiful exotics stood in jars along the

balustrade, diffusing their perfume around, and the cheerful hum of

voices was heard in the still night air as parties walked to and fro

upon the balcony. Suddenly the din of voices was hushed, those that

were walking stood still, as if spell-bound,--a few seconds of the most

perfect silence followed--then two or three chords of a harp, lightly

but tastefully struck,--and then flowed forth a burst of melody,

so full, so rich, so swelling, in the recitative of Rossini, “Oh,

Patria!--oh, dolce ingrata Patria!”--that it filled my heart with

transport, and my eyes with tears; and to my wounded and broken spirit

there came a holy and delicious calm, as if by some magic spell another

had divined my inward sorrow, and, in giving it expression, had given it

relief.

The recitative over, oh with what triumphant gladness came the brilliant

_aria_, diffusing joy and happiness through every fibre of my frame!

and, as one delicious cadence succeeded another, I felt my heart beat

strong and stronger against my side. My sorrow--my deep, depressing

sorrow--was forgotten; a very heaven of brilliant hopes was opened

before me, and peace flowed in upon my soul once more. The singer

paused; then came a melting cadence, followed by a thrilling shake--so

low, so plaintive, and so clear, I felt as if the last emotion of

happiness fled with it. A silence of a moment followed, and then a

thunder of applause flowed in on every side; and the words, “_Divine La

Mercia!_” burst from every voice around.

I stood amazed and thunderstruck. The quick transition of my feelings

had completely overpowered me, and I was only aroused by hearing a

voice so near me as to startle me. It was the Count who spoke: he

stood directly above me, leaning against a pillar of the portico, and

supported upon his arm a lady, but, from her position, I could not catch

her features. From his soft, low, and earnest tone of voice, it was

plain the nature of his suit was one of heartfelt interest; while the

few words she spoke in answer, from their soft tones and foreign accent,

left me no doubt they came from La Mercia. I crept nearer the balcony,

and, concealed behind the balustrades, waited anxiously to catch a

glance at her as she passed. The light fell strongly from an open

window upon this part of the terrace; and I could perceive, as she came

forward, that, disengaging herself from the Count’s arm, she assumed

a more gay and lively manner. She was now within a few feet of where I

stood eagerly waiting for the moment she would turn to enter the salon.

She curtsied deeply to some persons in the crowd; and ere I could

recover from the effect of the graceful and beautiful attitude she

assumed, she turned. Merciful Heaven! could it be true? I almost

screamed aloud, and, but for the hold I took of the balcony, should have

fallen. The picture was La Mercia: the same calm brow, the same melting

look, that beautiful outline of neck and throat, and, above all, that

lovely contour of head, to see which once was never to forget. She was

gone! the guests disappeared one by one from the terrace, the salon

became again crowded, and the windows were closed against the now

chilling night air; and yet so suddenly all seemed to happen, I could

scarcely believe but that still that lovely voice and beauteous form

were before me; and I could not help thinking, as I left the spot, that

to an excited brain and fevered imagination the likeness of the picture

to La Mercia must have been owing, as with slow steps I retraced my way

homeward.

The next morning early I left Dresden for the Augustine monastery at

Tetchen, and ardently commenced the intended altar-piece; but, fearing

lest the likeness to La Mercia might have been real, I did not copy from

the painting as I had resolved. For three months I laboured unceasingly;

and, whether from the perfect occupation of my time, or that the

peaceful and tranquil life of the holy men with whom I lived had its

influence, I know not, but my mind once more regained its calmness and

serenity, and I felt almost happy again.

In this frame of mind I was, when, one morning, one of the fathers,

entering my apartment, informed me that my old friend and patron, Count

Lowenstein, was about to be married. I started, and hurriedly asked to

whom, while the deep blush which suffused my cheek told too plainly the

interest I took in the answer.

“I know not,” said the monk; “but report speaks of her as eminently

beautiful.”

“Would you recognise the name if you heard it?” I asked.

“I have heard it but once, but think I might remember it again,” said

he.

“Then it is La Mercia,” I replied.

“The same--La Mercia was the name; and they say a more splendid wedding

Dresden has never witnessed than this will be.”

I cannot explain why, but never did I feel, at any period of my life, so

completely overcome as when I listened to this report. Never before had

I confessed to myself how I had felt towards La Mercia, nor even now

could I tell: it was not love; I had never seen her but for a few brief

seconds, and yet in my heart she lived, the guiding-star of all my

thoughts and aspirations; and though my most sanguine dreams never

anticipated my calling her mine, yet I could not bear the thought that

she was to belong to another. I resolved at once to set out for Dresden,

and, if possible, see her once before the wedding would take place. I

thought it would he a balm to my feelings should I look upon her, before

she was lost to me for ever, and I longed ardently to trace, with what

calmness I was able, how far the likeness with the picture was real or

imaginary. With these intentions I left the monastery that evening, and

returned to Dresden.

When I reached home I learned that the Count had been married, and found

upon my table a most pressing invitation from him to his _soirée_ at

the villa that evening. At first I resolved not to accept it. The

full measure of my loneliness had never so pressed on me before; for

although, in reality, La Mercia was not, nor could ever have been, aught

to me, yet I felt as if my fate and happiness were, by some inexplicable

ties, wound up with hers; and now that tie was to be broken. I had begun

to believe that the extraordinary impression she had made upon my mind

had entirely suggested the resemblance with the picture, which some

chance trait of likeness might have contributed to, and I longed

ardently to see her;--but then, to see her the bride of another! These

conflicting thoughts agitated me during the entire day, and I knew not

what to decide on.

When evening came I embarked upon the Elbe, and, after a half-hour’s

rowing, reached the villa of the Count. Lights gleamed from every

window, and delicious music was borne on the night wind, that blew

gently along the river. Numerous servants, in gorgeous liveries, passed

and repassed along the spacious veranda, which ran the entire length of

the building, carrying fruit, wine, and ices to those who preferred the

balmy air and starry sky without, to the heat and glitter of the crowded

salon within.

With difficulty I made my way through the dense mass that filled the

antechamber, and at length reached one of the reception-rooms, scarcely

less crowded. On every side I beheld some of the highest persons of the

city: groups of officers in splendid uniforms, ambassadors glittering

in orders and crosses, distinguished foreigners, artists, authors, were

all mingled together in thick profusion, enjoying the magnificence

and splendour which unbounded wealth, guided and directed by the

most cultivated taste, could create. Standing in mute admiration of

a beautiful figure of Psyche, which seemed fresh from the chisel of

Canova, I was roused by a voice addressing me, while at the same moment

my shoulder was gently tapped. I turned;--it was the Count himself.

“Ah, Monsieur le Baron,” said he, “‘_Enfin après un an!_’ as Racine has

it. Where have you buried yourself and all your agreeability these

ages past? But come, I shall not tax your invention for excuses and

apologies; follow me--the Countess has heard me frequently speak of you,

and longs to make your acquaintance. This way--after me as well as you

can.”

The friendly tone of the Count, as well as its being almost the first

time of my being addressed by my new title, brought a deep blush to my

cheek, which fortunately was unobserved as I followed him in the crowd.

He passed through this room to one still larger, filled with parties

playing at several small tables, and thence into an oval salon, where

waltzing was going on. With great difficulty we got through this, and

arrived at a curtain of white cloth, fringed at the bottom with deep

and massive silver lace; this he drew gently aside, and we entered the

boudoir. Upon a small ottoman, over which was thrown a rich Persian

shawl, sat the Countess.

“Isadora,” said the Count, as he approached--“Isadora, ‘_carissima

mia_,’ this is my friend, Carl Stelling.”

She lifted her head from the picture she was shewing to a lady beside

her, and as her eye beamed fully upon me and her lips parted to address

me, I fell fainting to the ground.

“It is!--it is!” I muttered, as the last ray of consciousness was

leaving my whirling brain.

When I recovered, the Count was standing over me bathing my temples. I

looked wildly around. I saw we were still in the boudoir, although all

but one or two had departed; and from the window, now opened, there

came a cool and refreshing breeze. I looked anxiously around for the

Countess: she stood at a table, her cheek deadly pale, and I thought

her appearance evinced great agitation. I heard her, in a low whisper,

ask,--

“What can this mean?”

I immediately recovered myself sufficiently to say, that, overcome by

the heat of the salon, in my then weak state, that I felt completely

overpowered. But I saw my explanation seemed incomplete, and that some

words must have fallen from me which I did not remember.

The Count, at the same instant, putting his lips to my ear, said,--

“Carl, this must be explained at another and more fitting moment.”

This increased my agitation, for I now perceived that my merely being

taken suddenly ill could never have given rise to such a feeling as all

around seemed to labour under. Before, then, I could at all determine

how to act, the Countess approached me, and, in her softest and kindest

manner, asked if I were better.

In a moment all my agitation was forgotten; and, indeed, every one of

the party seemed to participate, as if by magic, in the balmy influence

her few words shed around. Conversation soon resumed its course. For

some time the Count’s manner was constrained and uncertain, but that

soon wore away, as the joyous tone and sparkling gaiety of his lovely

bride seemed to have their effect upon every one about her; and even

I--torn, as I was, by feelings I could neither trace nor divine--felt

under the mystic spell that so much beauty and grace diffused on every

side. With a wonderful tact she alluded at once to such subjects that

compelled me, as an artist, to speak, and speak warmly; and, seemingly,

catching the enthusiasm from me that she herself had created, she spoke

of Venice--its thousand recollections--its treasures of art--its rich

historical associations--its ancient glory; and then, taking up her

guitar, played with such tenderness and feeling one of the well-known

gondolier _canzonette_, as made the very tears stand in my eyes.

The victory was complete: I forgot the past--I knew no longer where I

was. A bright Elysium of bliss had opened before me; and even now, after

years of such misery as few have known, I could say that one hour of

such intoxicating happiness would be, almost, cheaply bought by even

such affliction.

I started from my trance of pleasure on observing that the guests were

taking leave. I at once arose, and, as she extended her hand to me, I

felt the blood rush to my face and forehead. I barely dared to touch it

with my lips, and retired. I hurried from the villa, and, springing into

my boat, was soon landed at the bridge of Dresden.

From that time my visits at the villa were frequent; seldom a week

elapsed without my receiving one or two invitations from the Count; and,

at last, to such an extent did my intimacy proceed, and so superior in

attraction was the society there, that for it I deserted all other, and

only felt happy when with my kind patrons. During this, by far the most

delightful period of my life, I was not entirely free from unhappiness.

Sometimes the likeness of the Countess to the picture would appear to

me so striking as not to be mistaken: one day particularly, when some

sudden intelligence was brought to her that caused momentary alarm

for the Count’s safety, her pale cheek and quivering lip brought the

portrait so perfectly before me, that I was unable to speak or offer her

advice when she asked my opinion; and then, vague and horrid doubts,

and a dread of some unknown and unforeseen calamity, would flash upon my

mind; and those who have experienced how deeply they can be impressed

by a presentiment of evil, can tell how little it is in their power to

rally their spirits against terrors which take every or any shape. And

while I reasoned with myself against what might be mere groundless fear,

yet I never could look upon the picture and call to mind the death-bed

sorrow of the old artist, without feeling that some dreadful fate was

connected with its history, in which, as its mere possessor, I might be

involved. Sometimes to such a degree did this anxiety prevail upon

me, that I had fully determined to shew it to the Countess, and either

endeavour to trace its history from her, or at once rid myself of all

apprehension concerning it, if she disclaimed all knowledge of it;

but then, if she really were connected with its story--if, as it was

possible, a mother’s fate (for the resemblance could warrant such a

relationship) were wound up’ with the story,--what right had I, or how

could I answer to myself, for the mere satisfaction of my own doubts, to

renew the sorrows, and, perhaps, even be the means of publishing to the

world the sad detail of forgotten crime or misfortune? Perhaps, however,

the picture was not, as I supposed, an antique: it might be an admirable

copy. But this idea was relinquished at once: the more I examined, the

more fully did it corroborate my opinion of its being the work of a

master. Such thoughts as these--and they grew upon me daily more and

more--embittered the happiest moments of my intercourse with my friends;

and often, when the merry laugh and the joyous glee which pervaded our

parties at the villa were at the highest, I thought of that picture,

and my heart sank at the recollection, and I would hasten to my home

to conceal from every eye the terror and anguish these thoughts ever

inspired me with.

One evening when dressing for the Count’s villa I received a _billet_,

written in pencil and evidently in haste; it came from himself, and

informed me that the Countess, who had that morning made a short

excursion upon the river, had returned home so ill that the

entertainment was deferred. I was, however, requested to call the

following morning, to take some sketches of Pirna from the villa,

which I had long since promised to make for them. So completely had I

withdrawn myself from all other society during my great intimacy with

Count Lowenstein, that I now felt the _billet_ I received left me unable

to say where or how I should pass my evening.

In this uncertainty I wandered forth, and without thinking whither my

steps led me, it was only on hearing the boatman ask if I were ready,

that I perceived I had strolled to the steps beside the bridge, where I

usually took my departure for the villa. Lost in reverie and led captive

by habit, I had walked to this spot unconsciously to myself.

I was about to dismiss the boatmen for the night, when a whim seized me

to drop on board and visit those small and wooded islands that lie about

a league up the river. It was a calm and beautiful night; and in the

wild and untrodden solitude of these romantic islands I remained till

near midnight.

As we passed the grounds of the Count, I or-dered the boatmen to land me

at a spot remote from the house, whence I could proceed on foot, wishing

to make some inquiry for the Countess before I returned home. They

accordingly put me on shore at a small flight of steps which descended

to the water’s edge, from a terraced path that ran a considerable

distance through the park, and was concealed in its entire length by

tall hedges of beech, completely overgrown with flowering creeping

shrubs, and so impenetrable, that, even in noon-day, it was

impossible for those without, to see persons walking within, while the

closely-shaven sod effectually prevented footsteps being heard. The

moon was up, and nearly at the full, and all beneath me in the

richly-ornamented flower-garden was bathed in a sea of mellow light. The

marble statues that adorned the walks threw their lengthened shadows

at their bases, while their own whiteness seemed purer and fairer than

ever. The villa itself, half obscured by trees, seemed, in its tranquil

beauty, the very emblem of peace; and as the pillars of the portico

threw a deeper shadow, gave a broadness to the effect which struck me

as wonderfully beautiful. I gazed around me with momentarily increasing

admiration. The gentle murmuring of the leaves agitated by the breeze,

and the plash of the river, made the silence around me even more

striking. I stood lost in the enjoyment of the delicious repose of

the whole scene, when a slight noise upon the gravel walk attracted my

attention; I listened, and now distinctly heard footsteps approaching,

and also the voices of persons whispering in a low and much-suppressed

tone. They came nearer, and were now only concealed from my view by

the tall hedge, beneath which they walked; and soon the shadow of two

figures were cast along the broad walk in the bright moonlight. For a

moment they stopped speaking, and then I heard a laugh, in a low and

under tone--but such a laugh! My very blood ran chilled back upon my

heart as I heard it. Oh, if the fiend himself had given that dreadful

and heart-appalling laugh, it could not be more awful! It scarcely died

away in the faint echo, ere I heard the sobs, deep and low, of another

and far different voice. At this instant the figures emerged from the

darkness and stood in the bright moonlight. They stood beside an old

and broken pillar, which had once supported a sun-dial, and around whose

shaft the clustering ivy had wound itself. They were entirely concealed

by large cloaks which enveloped their entire figures, but still I could

perceive that one was much larger and more robust than the other. This

latter taking a small lamp, which was concealed beneath the folds of his

cloak, placed it upon the pillar, while at the same instant the other

figure, throwing off the cloak, knelt at his feet. Oh, that reason had

left me, or that life itself had parted from me, ere I should look

upon that scene! She--she who knelt and held her suppliant hands was La

Mercia; and he who, now divested of his mantle, stood over her, was the

dark and awful-looking man of the picture! There they stood. The dresses

of both were copied to the life; their looks--oh, Heaven! their very

looks were pictured as they stood. She spoke: and as she did so, her

arms fell powerless before her; he scowled the same horrid scowl of hate

and scorn. My brain was turning; I tried to scream out, my voice failed

me--I was mute and powerless; my knees rocked and smote each other;

convulsive tremor shook me to the centre, and with a groan of agony I

sank fainting to the earth.

The day was breaking ere I came to myself; I arose, all was quiet around

me. I walked to the boat--the boatmen were sleeping; I awoke them, and

we returned to Dresden. I threw myself upon my bed--my brain seemed

stupified and exhausted--I fell into a profound sleep, and woke not

till late the following evening. A messenger had brought a note from the

Count--“The Countess is worse.” The note detailed briefly that she had

passed a feverish and disturbed night, and that the medical attendants

had never left the villa. Was it then but a dream, my dreadful vision of

the past night? and had my mind, sorrowing for the affliction of my best

friend, conjured up the awful scenes I believed to have witnessed? How

could it be otherwise? The _billet_ I received told most distinctly that

she was confined to her bed, severely, dangerously ill; and of course

watched with all the care and attention the most sedulous anxiety

could confer. I opened the picture, and then conviction flashed with

lightning’s rapidity upon me, that it was not delusion--that no dream

had brought these images before my mind. “Ah,” I cried, “my friend, my

patron, how have I betrayed thee? Why did I not earlier communicate

the dreadful story of the picture, and thus guard you against the

machinations by which the fiend himself has surrounded you? But then,

what had I to tell? how embody the vague and shadowy doubts that took,

even in my own mind, no palpable shape or form?”

That entire day was passed in alternate resolution and abandonment;

now, determined to hasten to the villa, and disclose to the Count

every circumstance I had seen, and then thinking how little such mere

suspicion would gain credence, and how unfit the present moment to

obtrude upon his breaking and distracted heart the horrid dread that

haunted mine. Towards evening a messenger arrived, breathless with

haste. He brought no note, but merely bade me hasten to the villa, as

the Count wished to see me with all possible despatch. I mounted the

servant’s horse, and in a few minutes reached the place. Servants were

running hither and thither distractedly. I asked, eagerly, How was the

Countess? No one could tell, but all seemed to imply that there was

no hope of recovery. I entered the large spacious and hall, and threw

myself upon a sofa; and as I looked around upon the splendid hangings,

the gilded cornices, and marbled pillars, and thought upon that sorrow

such splendour surrounded, my heart sickened. A shadow fell upon the

brightly polished floor. I looked up--a figure stood at the window of

the hall, and stared me steadily in the face. The eyes glared wildly,

and the dark, malignant features were lit up with a scornful scowl of

more than human hate and triumph. It was the incarnation of the Evil

One exulting over a fallen and lost spirit. A loud shriek rent the air

behind me. I dared not turn my eyes from the horrid sight before me.

“Oh, Heavens! it is true!--he is, he is the Tutore!” I cried, as the

features, convulsed for an instant with fiendish triumph, resumed their

cold and even more appalling aspect. A threatening gesture from his hand

arrested me, as I was about to call aloud. My voice came not, though

my lips moved. I could not rise from the seat--a dreadful scream rang

through the building--another, and another followed--the figure was

gone. At the same moment the Count rushed forward--his dress disordered,

his hair falling loosely upon his shoulders--madness, wild insanity,

in his look. He turned and saw me; and bursting into a torrent of

hysterical laughter, cried out,--

“Ha, ha, Carl!--welcome to our abode of pleasure; here, all is gaiety

and happiness. What sorrow ever crosses this threshold?” and then, with

a sudden revulsion, he stared me fixedly, and said in a low sepulchral

voice, “She is dead--dead! But the time is passing--a few minutes more,

and ‘twill be too late. This, Carl, will explain all. Take this, and

this--these papers must be your care--promise me to observe them to the

letter; they were her--her last wishes, and you knew her. Oh, is this

a dream? it is too, too horrible to be real. Ah!” said he, after a

moment’s pause; “I am ready!” and springing from me wildly, rushed

through the door towards the inner apartments.

I started up and followed him--I knew not which way he took in the

corridor; and as I stood uncertain, a loud report of fire-arms crashed

on my ear. I flew to the sick chamber--servants stood gasping and

trembling without, I tore open the door; there, lay the Count upon the

floor, his head rent asunder by the bullets from the pistol his hand

still grasped. He had endeavoured to reach the bed, and fell half upon

a chair. In the bed lay the still warm corpse of the Countess, beautiful

as in life. I looked from one to the other; my seared and stony heart,

turned to apathy by the horrors I had witnessed, gave no relief to its

feeling in tears, and I spoke not as I slowly left the room.

For two days I spoke not to any one. A dreamy unconsciousness seemed to

wrap my faculties, and I felt not the time passing. On the third day I

rallied sufficiently to open the papers the Count had entrusted to me.

One contained an affectionate farewell to myself, from the Count, with

a dying bequest; the other, was in a lady’s hand--it bore the Countess’s

signature; and here I discovered with surprise and horror, that to

the performance of the rash act, by which the Count had terminated his

existence, he was bound by a solemn oath. I ready and re-read, to assure

myself of the fact. It was true! Such was the terrible promise she

extorted from the wretched lover, under the delusive hope of their

meeting in another and happier life. Then followed the directions for

the funeral, which were minute to a degree. The bodies of both, when

coffined, were to be placed in a small temple in the garden, near the

river; the key of which was to be sent to a Dominican monk, who lived in

an obscure part of the city. By him were the coffins to be closed, which

it was strictly enjoined should be done by him, alone and unaccompanied,

the night before the burial.

All was done as the wish of the deceased enjoined, and the key

despatched by a trusty servant of my own to the friar, who appeared to

be in expectation of it, and knew its import.

I sat in the lonely and desolate room, which had formerly been mine, in

the villa of the Count; that long and dreary night the wind poured its

mournful wailing through the pine-trees in dirgeful memory of him who

was no more. From the window of the temple a bright light gleamed

till near morning, when it gradually faded away. Thither I repaired at

day-break, with the household. All was still--the door lay open--the

coffins were closed and screwed down. The friar was gone; we afterwards

found that he had not returned to his lodgings in the city, nor was he

ever after seen in Dresden. The bodies were committed to the earth, and

I returned to my home alone in the world.

It was several years after this--the awful death of my earliest, best

friend--that I arrived in Paris to exhibit, in the gallery of the

Luxembourg, an historical picture, upon which I had laboured for

years. I must be brief--my picture was exhibited, and my most sanguine

expectations surpassed by its success; and in a few short days the whole

scene of my early triumph was re-enacted. Praise and flattery poured in

upon me; and as in Dresden before, so now in Paris, I became the fashion

and the rage. But how changed was I! No longer exulting in my success,

and buoyant with hopes, I received all the adulation I met with, with

cold indifference and apathy.

Among the many attentions which my popularity had conferred upon me,

was an invitation to the Hôtel de Rohan. The Duke, a most distinguished

connoisseur in painting, having seen and applauded my picture, waited

on me. Thus bound in duty, I went; and fatigued by the round of soulless

gaiety, in what I could no longer feel happy, or even forgetful, I was

retiring early, when the Duke met me and said,--

“Ah, monsieur, I have been looking for you. The Comtesse de Julliart has

desired me to present you to her; and when I tell you that she is the

most beautiful woman in Paris, I need not say how much you must prize

the honour among all the distinctions your talents have earned. Come

this way.”

I followed mechanically--my heart took no interest in the scene--and I

only longed to be once more alone and unobserved. As I walked after

the Duke, he gave me a short account of the beautiful Countess, whom he

mentioned as the last descendant of an old and honoured family, supposed

to have been long since extinct, when she, a few months before, appeared

in Paris, and laid claim to the title. As she possessed unbounded

wealth, and had no great favours to ask any where, the Court were

charmed with her beauty, and readily admitted her claims, which some

were ill-natured enough to say were, perhaps, merely assumed without

foundation.

I took little interest in the story. My thoughts were far away, as they

ever were for many years, from every thing of the present; and ‘twas

only as I heard the Duke announce my name, among a group who stood near

a sofa, that I remembered why I was there.

The Countess sat with her back to us, but rose immediately on hearing

my name. I bowed deeply as she stood up; and recovering myself from

my obeisance, looked up. Oh, merciful Heaven, with what horror I

looked!--It was no other than La Mercia! With one loud cry of “Tis she!

‘tis she!” I fell fainting to the floor.

Weeks of wild raving and delirium followed. I left Paris!--I returned

to Dresden. There, all reminded me of the past. I fled from my home; and

now, after years of wandering in solitary and distant lands, I feel deep

in my heart the heavy curse that has followed upon my broken oath, and

which has made me an outcast and a broken-hearted wanderer in the world

for ever.

THE PASS OF THE ARLBERG.

Before leaving the Vorarlberg, and while now on its very frontier,

I would wish to keep some record of two very different but yet very

characteristic actions, of which this place was the scene. As you begin

the ascent of the Arlberg from the westward the road makes two very

abrupt zigzags, being carried along the edge of a deep precipice. On

looking down over the low battlements that guard the side of the way,

you discover, immediately under you, the spire and roofs of a small

village several hundred feet below. The churchyard, the little gardens,

the narrow streets, and the open “Platz,” where stands a fountain, are

all mapped out distinctly. This is the village of Steuben. A strange

spot you would deem it for any to have chosen as a dwelling-place,

hemmed in between lofty mountains, on whose bleak sides the snow is

seen in the very midsummer; surrounded by wild crags and yawning clefts,

without even pasturage for any thing save a goat: but your surprise will

increase on learning that twice within the last century has this village

been swept away by falling avalanches. The first time, the snow meeting

in its descent from the mountains on either side actually formed a

bridge over a portion of the village; and the houses thus saved were

long regarded as under the special favour of the Virgin, with whose

image they were most bounteously decorated. The next calamity, however,

destroyed the prestige, for they were mingled in the common destruction.

It would be difficult for “Gentlemen of England, who live at home

in ease,” to fancy any reason for this unaccountable selection of a

residence which adds the highest amount of peril to all the woes of

poverty. But every traveller has seen many such instances. In every

mountain land they are to be met with, and in each of the Alpine passes

little groups of houses--they can scarcely be called villages--can

be detected in spots where access is most difficult, where no

feature around indicates any means of supporting life, and where the

precautions--simple and ineffectual enough--against avalanches, shew

that danger to be among their calculations. How explain this? By

what associations have these dreary spots become hallowed into homes?

Possibly the isolated lives of these little families of men give them

the same distaste to mixing with their brethren of the great world, that

is felt by a solitary recluse to entering into society. Mayhap, too,

the sense of peril itself has its share in the attraction. There is

no saying how far this feeling may go, so strange and wayward are the

caprices of human nature.

If you enter any of these villages, the narratives of snow storms, of

falling precipices, and “Lavines,” as avalanches are called, meet you

at every step. They are the great topics of these communities, as the

movements of Politics or the vacillations of the Bourse are elsewhere.

Scarcely one who has reached the middle term of life has not been, at

least once, in the most imminent peril; and these things are talked of

as the common accidents of existence, the natural risks of humanity!

Very strange does it sound to us who discuss so eagerly the perils of a

wooden pavement in our thoroughfares!

It is curious, too, to hear, as one may, most authentically, the length

of time life can be preserved beneath the snow. Individuals have been

buried so long as three entire days, and yet taken out alive. The

cold, of which it would be supposed they had suffered dreadfully, seems

scarcely very great; and the porous nature of the snow, and possibly the

chinks and crevices left between falling masses, have usually left air

sufficient for respiration. That individuals in such circumstances

of peril are not, always at least, devoid of their exercise of the

faculties, I remember one instance which is sufficiently convincing.

It was in the Via Mala, about five miles from the village of Splügen,

where, in the year 1829, the little cabriolet that conveyed the mail was

swept away by an avalanche. The calamity was not known for full seven

or eight hours afterwards, when some travellers from Andeer reaching the

spot, found the road blocked up by snow, and perceived a portion of the

wooden rail of the road, and a fragment of a horse-harness adhering

to it, half-way down the precipice. The guides of the party, well

accustomed to reason from such sad premises, at once saw what had

happened. Conceiving, however, that the driver had been carried down

over the cliff, and consequently to certain death, they directed their

sole care to clearing a passage for the travellers. In so doing, they

proceeded with long poles to sound the snow, and ascertain to what depth

it lay unhardened. It was in one of these “explorations,” and when the

pole had sunk above ten feet deep into a mass of soft unfrozen snow,

that the man who held it found himself unable to withdraw the staff, and

called his comrades to aid him. They soon perceived, however, that the

resistance gradually yielded, and from the instinct peculiar to the

“hand”--another illustration for Sir Charles Bell--they recognised that

it must be the grip of human fingers which held the other end of the

pole. They immediately began to excavate on the spot, and in half an

hour liberated the poor postilion of the mail car, who, although hearing

the shouts and cries of the party for nearly an hour over his head,

could not succeed in making his own voice heard, and but for the

fortunate accident of the pole must have perished.

Many curious escapes were told to me, but this appeared most singular

of all; and now I come back to Steuben, or rather to the wild mountain

above it, over which, by a succession of windings, the road leads

which joins the Vorarlberg to the Tyrol. About one third of the ascent

accomplished, you come upon an abrupt turning of the way, in rounding

which a wide carriage can scarcely escape grating on the rock on one

side, while from the window on the opposite, the traveller looks down

upon * gorge actually yawning at his feet; the low barrier of wall,

which does not rise above the nave of the wheel, is a very frail and

insignificant protection ok such a spot, but when hid from view, as

it is to those seated in a carriage, the effect of the gulf is really

enough to shake common nerves. A little inscription upon a stone in

this wall records the name of the engineer--Donegani, if I remember

aright--who, deeming this spot the triumph of his skill, has selected it

whereon to inscribe his achievement. There is another meaning connected

with the place, but unrecorded; it could not, indeed, have been

transmitted like that of the Engineer, for when the event of which it

treats occurred, there was neither wall nor railing, and the road passed

some twelve feet higher up, over a ledge of rock, and actually seemed

to jut out above the precipice. There is, indeed, a memorial of the

transaction to which I allude, but it stands about twelve hundred feet

down in the gorge below,--a small wooden cross of rudest workmanship,

with the equally rudely inscribed words, “Der Vorspann’s Grab.”

Now for the story, which happily is short.

It was late on a severe evening of winter, as a _calèche_ drawn by two

horses drew up to the door of the post-house at Steuben; for then, as

now, Steuben was the last post-station before commencing the ascent of

the Arlberg. The travellers, two in number, wore military cloaks and

foraging caps; but what the precise rank, or to what arm of the service

they belonged, not even the prying observations of the host could

fathom. Their orders were for fresh horses immediately to cross the

mountain, and although the snow-drift was falling fast, and the night

dark as pitch, they peremptorily insisted on proceeding. The post

regulations of those days were not very stringent and arbitrary; as a

post-master may seem nowadays, he was nothing to the autocrat that once

ruled the comings and goings of unhappy travellers.

When he averred that his horses had done enough--that it was a

saint’s-day--that the weather was too bad or his postilions too weary,

the case was hopeless, and the traveller was consigned, without appeal,

to the consolations of his own philosophy.

It chanced that on this occasion the whole disposable cavalry of the

Post consisted of two blind mares, which were both too old and weak to

tempt the cravings of the Commissary, who a few days before had seized

on all the draught-cattle to convey stores to Feldkirch, at that time

menaced by a French force under Massena.

The officers, however, were urgent in their demand; it was of the last

importance that they should reach Inspruck by the following evening. At

last, half by menace, half by entreaty, it was arranged that the two old

mares should be harnessed to the carriage, the host remonstrating all

the while on the inability of the expedient, and averring that, without

a Vorspann, a relay of horses, to lead at the steepest parts of the

mountain, the attempt would be fruitless. “Nay,” added he, “if you

doubt me, ask the boy who is sleeping yonder, and has been driving the

Vorspann for years over the Arlberg.” The travellers turned and beheld

on a heap of straw, in the corner of the kitchen, a poor little boy,

whose ragged uniform of postilion had evidently reached him at third or

fourth hand, so large and loosely did it hang around his slender figure.

He was sleeping soundly, as well he might, for he had twice crossed the

mountain to St. Cristoph on that same day.

“And this book,” said one of the travellers, taking a very tattered and

well-thumbed volume which had dropped from the sleeper’s fingers, “has

this poor little fellow time to read?”

“He contrives to do it somehow,” said the host, laughing; “nay, more, as

you may see there, he has begun to teach himself French. Since he heard

that the French army was about to invade us, he has never ceased his

studies, sitting up half the night working at that old grammar there,

for which he gave all his month’s earnings.”

“And what maybe his reason for this?” said the elder traveller,

evidently interested in the recital.

“He has got the notion, that if the French succeed in forcing the pass

of Feldkirch and enter the Tyrol, that, as he will be constantly engaged

as Vorspann on the mountain, his knowledge of French would enable him

to discover many secrets of the enemy, as no one would ever suspect a

poor creature like him of having learned a foreign language.

“And his motive was then purely a patriotic one?”

“Purely; he is poor as you see, and an orphan, but his Tyrol blood runs

warm and thick in his veins.”

“And what progress has he made?”

“That I cannot answer you, mein Herr; for no one hereabouts knows any

thing of French--nor, I suppose, had he ever the opportunity of testing

the acquirement himself. They are driven back, I am told.”

“For the present,” said the elder stranger, gravely; “but we shall need

all the reserves at Inspruck to hold our ground whenever they renew the

attack.”

The sleeper was now aroused to take the saddle; for in the absence of

the regular postilion the Vorspann was obliged to take his place.

Still but half awake, the little fellow stood up, and mechanically

buttoning up his worn jacket, he took down his whip and prepared for the

road.

The travellers were soon ready, and ere many minutes elapsed the

_calèche_ had left the village, and, with the best pace the old mares

could accomplish, was breasting the snow-drift and the first rise of

the mountain. After about an hour’s driving, during which Joseph had

exhibited his utmost skill in taking advantage of every available bit

of trotting ground, they came at length to the commencement of the

steep ascent; and there, hanging his whip on the saddle-peak, the little

fellow got down, to relieve his cattle as they toiled up the precipitous

ascent. He had not gone far, when, happening to drop behind beside the

_calèche_, what did he hear but the sounds of that very language upon

which all his day and night dreams were set! All that he had remarked

of the two travellers was, that they wore cloaks of military cut and

foraging caps, and now he heard them conversing in French. The whole

train of events on which his mind so long had been dwelling came now

forcibly before him. “Feldkirch had been forced, the French were already

masters of the pass; in a few days they would be over the Arlberg and in

possession of all Tyrol!” Such was the terrible series of events a

few words of French revealed to his excited imagination. With this

conviction he drew nearer and nearer the door, till he could hear the

very words they spoke. Now he returned to accomplish the great purpose

he had planned.

This “Zuflucht-Haus” or Hospice of Heinrich “Findelkind”--for he was

named the “Foundling,” having none to claim or acknowledge him--has been

superseded by a more commodious and better endowed edifice under the

auspices of the Imperial Government, who have gracefully preserved the

memory of the first founder; thus shewing themselves not ashamed to be

reminded of their own _devoirs_ by a poor orphan.

And now from the heights of St. Christopher I look down upon the winding

glens and bold mountains of Tyrol! The great cross yonder on the rock

marks the boundary. And now, adieu! the square fur caps of the Bregenzer

Walderin; the huge silver filigree leaves, which look like peacocks’

tails of frosted silver, fastened to the back of the head; the

short-waisted dresses, gaily embroidered with the wearer’s initials

upon the stomacher; and the stockings, so piously adorned with saintly

emblems; and last, but not least, the peaceful quietude of a primitive

people--to have lived among whom is to carry away for life-long a

pleasant memory of a simple-minded, kindly peasantry.

On descending the Arlberg by the eastward, or the Tyrol side, there is a

little low ruin not far from the road. It stands nestled in a small nook

between the hills, and shews the stunted and cattle-cropped remains of

a few fruit-trees around. This was an ancient shrine where four monks

formerly lived, devoting their lives to aiding the travellers of

the pass; and some say that its foundation dates from that of the

establishment of St. Gallen in Switzerland, and that both owe their

origin to the same pious hand--an Irish monk. So is it incontestably

true that the great monastery of St. Gall, and the spacious convents

of Mehrer-Au and Loch-Au on the borders of the Lake of Constance, were

founded by an Irishman. What a destiny, that the nation whose mission

should have been the spread of Christianity in the earliest centuries,

should present such a spectacle of crime and God-forgetfulness in our

own!