"For God only--his son, for God in him!"
He loved and honoured him without measure. On the night of his
arrival, he learnt that his prison was the castle of Madrid. But it was
not necessary for him to enquire how strict, or how apparently long,
was to be his confinement. Hour after hour, day after day, wore away;
and no person was suffered to approach him; no letter permitted to
reach his hand; and when he attempted to question his goaler, whether
the Marchioness Santa Cruz had visited his prison; or if tidings had
yet transpired of the Duke de Ripperda; his only answers were gloomy
denials of all communication.
Though his portmanteau had been brought to him, the writing materials
and money it contained, were taken out in his presence, and even his
books of devotion shared the same fate. Indeed, the latter seemed a
prize of some moment to the officer who superintended the search, for
when the little bible, which had been the gift of his Pastor uncle,
opened its title page to the eye of superstition, the alarmed fanatic
ordered it to be carried under a strong guard, to the grand inquisitor.
Remonstrance on this, or on any other head, was vain; and under a
suspense that increased to torture, three weeks dragged away their
anxious days. At times, he almost suspected that the Marchioness Santa
Cruz had forgotten him; then, that Lorenzo had arrived in Gibraltar,
and failed of convincing Ripperda of the truth of his son. Every
frightful apprehension of doubted honour; of absolute abandonment to
his enemies; and an endless captivity in this dreary dungeon, assailed
him in the gloom of his uncompanioned thoughts.
Every rigor of hard fare, and severe usage, was inexorably brought
upon him. His bed was on the flinty pavement; his food, the scanty
portion of a criminal. But the conscience of Louis was at rest; and
he soon found that "man does not live by bread alone!" Though his
gaolers seemed inclined to do so much wrong in their treatment of him,
he never repented that he had done rightly in submitting to the law
of his new country, by yielding himself to their power. But when he
writhed under the tyrannous grasp with which they held him, he could
not but remember, with many a yearning comparison, the country which
had fostered his infancy. There he had imbibed the mingled tides of
freedom and of equity, as from the breast of a mother. Here the proud
state that claimed him as her own offspring, met him with the injustice
of a malignant step-dame.
"Noble, regretted England!" cried he, "I had rather be a door-keeper in
thy courts, than a prince in this land of despotism!"
In these lingering weeks of anxious loneliness, every impetuous
passion, and daring wish; every motive and action, or his short
but eventful life, passed in review before him; his impatience to
plunge into the world, and the readiness with which he gave way
to its delusions. While reflection humbled him to the dust; the
consciousness of having, in all his transgressions, erred from mistake
or inconsideration, but never from wilfulness, raised his head to
that Being, whom the precepts of Mr. Athelstone had so often told
him to "Remember in the days of his youth; and in his extremity, he
should not be forgotten," These thoughts were heavenly visitants to
the young captive, who lay like Joseph in bonds, with Faith, and Hope,
and Innocence, his comforters. The cheering lamp which these immortal
sisters lit in his heart, illumined the dark eclipse with which the
recent treacheries of man had overshadowed it. Yet he never thought
of Wharton but with a horror that shook his soul. He durst not look
steadily on his image; for no light was there.
A fourth week commenced. It was the anniversary of that day in the
past autumn, when Santa Cruz took his leave of Lindisfarne; and Louis
stood gazing on his departing vessel, vehemently wishing to hang
upon its sails, and so be transported to his father and to action!
It was also the Sabbath-day! And the uncle, who a year ago had then
stood by his side, admonishing the intemperate desire; he, at this
dismal anniversary, was, even at that hour, in the little church of
Lindisfarne, beseeching Heaven's "pity on all prisoners and captives!"
unconscious he was then putting up a prayer for his own darling child!
The tears were not without balm, that filled the eyes of his nephew at
the recollection.
In the midst of these meditations, the dungeon door opened, and Santa
Cruz himself appeared on the threshold. Louis started from his seat,
and could have cried aloud:--"Then my God has remembered me!"
But tidings from his father were also in his thoughts, and he only
ejaculated that revered name.
Santa Cruz embraced him, with more agitation than his stately mien
might have announced.
"The Duke de Ripperda has not been heard of;" returned he, "he must
therefore be safe. By any other means than that of flight, I would his
son were equally secure from his enemies!"
Fearless for himself, Louis entered at once upon his father's case.
His first wish was to induce the Marquis to solicit the King to hear
the son in defence of the parent; or, if that were denied, to allow
Santa Cruz to present a written vindication of Ripperda's Austrian
ministry. He gave the Marquis a simple narrative of every transaction,
from the beginning of the business to the stage in which he left it at
his recall; and, in the course of the explanation, he could not avoid
noticing the destructive mystery into which the double conduct of Duke
Wharton had involved every proceeding, even to those in which he had no
explicable concern.
"You are already avenged of him," replied the Marquis, "General
Stanhope transmitted to his government all the Duke de Ripperda
reported to him of Wharton's secret practices in favour of the exiled
Sovereign. George of Brunswick has taken alarm at so deep a scheme; and
the consequence is, the confiscation of your enemy's estates, and a
reward offered for his apprehension."
Louis was planet-struck at this information. The words which Wharton
had spoken to him in the park of Bamborough, murmured in his ears,--"_I
put my life in your hands!_"
"And my father has accused him!--Has set that life at a price!--The
country in which we first met, is now no more to him than to me. He is
an out-law,--I, a prisoner!"
Louis was silent under these thoughts; a stricture was on his heart,
but he recovered himself, while Santa Cruz proceeded in his discourse.
He had been only a few days returned to Spain. The Marchioness lost no
time in informing him of all she knew relative to the fall of Ripperda,
and the arrest of his son; and, urged by her, as well as his own zeal,
he hastened to Madrid. He there investigated the affair. Among other
nefarious particulars respecting the overthrow of the ex-minister, he
learnt what was to have been its bloody consequence. The king was so
pressed by the British Ambassador on the outrageous seizure of his
guest; and some of the northern envoys openly pleading their conviction
of the Duke de Ripperda's general integrity; the Spanish ministers
feared to stem such an opposition of opinion, should they venture their
predecessor in a public trial; and aware of their inability to convict
him of treachery, peculation, and unlawful ambition, (the grounds of
his impeachment,) they had recourse to the _Lettres de cachet_ of the
Inquisition.
"Did I believe that your father's reconciliation to the Romish Church
were hypocrisy," continued the Marquis, "I should be the first to
approve his sentence. But I know the spring of these accusations; and
that the penalty of imputed heresy would soon have been paid."
Santa Cruz did not stop at this observation, but candidly acknowledged
that if ever the flight of an innocent man from the bonds of his
country, were an act of compulsive prudence, it was in the case of
Ripperda. He added,
"It is not here, as in England, that the laws govern the prince.
Arbitrary power holds them in check; and, when once a man is seized, if
he cannot attain the grace of his judge, he has little dependance on
his justice."
The Marquis then informed Louis, that he had made personal applications
to the ministers and to the queen, to beg their interference with
Philip for his trial or enlargement. The ministers were inflexible;
and Isabella not less firm in her refusal. All that he could extract
from their clemency, (or rather from that of the queen alone,) was a
hard-wrung permission to visit Louis in his cell.
"Yet," said the Marquis, "my hopes do not stop there. One step in
humanity warrants the expectation of a second. I am in favour with Her
Majesty. I came to be, what you propose, the medium of your father's
vindication; and that will comprehend your own."
Impressed with the deepest gratitude, Louis confided to his
disinterested friend, the whole contents of the packet he had left in
the care of the Marchioness. According to his previous request, she
had entrusted her husband with the secret of Ripperda's asylum; and now
he acknowledged, that one object of his present visit, was to obtain
Louis's permission to confide it also to the Queen. He urged, that it
would flatter the peculiarities of her character, and might conciliate
her good offices for his liberty. Being at Gibraltar, Ripperda was
out of the reach of personal danger, even should the secret transpire
beyond herself; and, meanwhile, the measure might do every thing for
his son, and his son's final wishes in the assertion of his father's
fame.
"Should her influence be seriously aroused in your behalf," said
the Marquis, "you would find it resistless with the King, therefore
peremptory with his ministers."
Sensible as he was that his father's asylum was chosen with honour, and
that its divulgement could be productive of no possible harm, Louis
had every disposition to yield to this advice. But his eagerness to
adopt any honourable means of facilitating his release, ran before the
progressive hopes of his zealous friend, when he found that his father
was yet ignorant of his being in Spain.
He learnt from the Marquis, that as soon as he was taken from the Val
del Uzeda, a reserve guard had forcibly seized Lorenzo; and borne away
him also, to prison.
Soon after imparting the latter information, Santa Cruz rose to
retire; promising to use his endeavours for the enlargement of the
servant, as well as the master: and, bearing with him many respectful
acknowledgements to the Marchioness, he embraced the grateful son of
Ripperda, and bade him adieu.