THE CAPTIVES.
In a moment they were on a house adjoining the monastery, at the gate
of which there was a vast concourse of persons, of all ages and of
both sexes. "Here's a crowd!" exclaimed Leandro Perez. "What ceremony
can call so many good folks together?" "Why," replied Asmodeus, "it
is one which you have never witnessed, though it may be seen from
time to time within Madrid. Three hundred slaves, all subjects of the
crown of Spain, are expected to arrive each minute: they return from
Algiers, where they have been recently purchased by some fathers of the
Redemption. Every street through which they are to pass will be lined
with spectators to welcome them."
"It is true, indeed," replied Zambullo, "that I have never had the
curiosity to behold a similar exhibition; and, if this be the treat
which your worship has reserved to gratify my taste, I must tell you
frankly that you need not have so boasted of its piquancy." "Oh! I
know you well enough," replied the Devil, "not to be aware that it is
no joyous spectacle for you to look upon the misery of your fellows;
but when I tell you that, in bringing you here to view it under its
present form, I am about to reveal certain singular circumstances
attending the captivity of some, and the equally curious embarrassment
in which others will find themselves on returning to their homes, I
am persuaded that you will not be unthankful for the amusement I have
provided." "Certainly not," replied the Student; "you put another face
upon the matter; and you will afford me much pleasure by your promised
revelations."
During this discussion, loud shouts were suddenly heard from the
populace as they beheld the approaching captives, who marched two
by two, in their slaves' dresses, each bearing his chain upon his
shoulders. They were preceded by a considerable number of monks of
the order of Mercy, who had been to meet them, and who rode on mules
caparisoned in black serge, as if they headed a funeral: one of these
good fathers carried the standard of Redemption. The younger captives
came first; the more aged followed; and the procession was closed
by an aged monk of the same order as the first, who, mounted on a
diminutive steed, had all the air of a prophet: this was the chief of
the missionary expedition. To him every eye was attracted, as much
by his excessive gravity, as by a long white beard which flowed down
his bosom, and gave to the features of this Moses of the Spaniards a
venerable aspect, lighted as they were by a heartfelt joy at having
been the instrument of restoring so many of his Christian brethren to
their country.
"The captives whom you see," commenced the Cripple, "are not all
equally rejoiced at their restoration to liberty. If there be some
whose hearts beat with pleasure at the thought that they are about
to see once more their dearest friends, there are others not a little
fearful that, during the time they have been estranged from their
families, events may have occurred which will bring tortures to their
minds more cruel than the most refined of slavery itself.
[Illustration: the procession]
"For instance, the two who first approach are in the latter category.
The one, a native of the little town of Velilla in Aragon, after having
passed ten years in bondage with the Turk, without once hearing of his
much-loved wife, comes home to find her bound again in wedlock, and the
mother of five little ones who can claim no kin with him. The other,
son of a wool-merchant of Segovia, was carried off by a corsair nearly
twenty years ago: he returns with a lively apprehension that matters
have gravely changed during that time with his family, and he will find
himself a prophet in his loss. His father and mother are dead; and
his brothers, who shared their wealth, have dissipated it foolishly
enough."
"My attention is rivetted," exclaimed the Student, "upon a slave whom,
by his looks, I judge to be delighted that he is no longer exposed to
the seducing influence of the bastinado." "The captive whom you speak
of," replied the Devil, "has good reason to rejoice at his deliverance:
he has learnt, since his return, that an aunt to whom he is sole heir
has just been released from her troubles, and that he is consequently
about to enjoy the free use of her brilliant fortune. This it is which
now occupies his thoughts so agreeably, and gives to his appearance
that air of satisfaction which you remark.
"How all unlike is he to the unhappy cavalier who walks beside him;
the tortures of suspense fill his bosom incessantly: I will tell you
on what they impend. When he was taken by a pirate of Algiers, as he
was passing into Italy from Spain, he loved a maiden and by her was
loved: he dreads lest, while he was in chains, his fair one's constancy
may have failed her." "Has he been long a slave then?" asked Zambullo.
"Eighteen months," replied Asmodeus. "Pooh!" exclaimed Leandro Perez,
"I fancy our gallant is a prey to causeless fear; he has hardly put his
mistress's fidelity to such a test as to have need for great alarm."
"There you are mistaken," replied the Cripple; "his princess no sooner
heard that he was captive to the Moor, than she hastened to provide
herself with a more fortunate lover.
"Would you credit now," continued the Demon, "that the man who follows
immediately behind the two we have been speaking of, and whom that
thick and sandy beard so horribly disfigures, was once a very handsome
man? Nothing, however, can be more certain; and you see, in that bent
and hideous figure, the hero of a story remarkable enough to induce me
to relate it to you.
[Illustration: Fabricio]
"His name is Fabricio, and he was hardly fifteen years of age when
his father, a wealthy cultivator of Cinquello, a large village of the
kingdom of Leon, died. He lost his mother shortly afterwards; so that,
being an only son, he became thus early the master of a considerable
property, the management of which was confided to an uncle, who
happened to be honest. Fabricio completed his studies at Salamanca,
where he had been previously placed; he then particularly devoted
himself to the noble accomplishments of riding and fencing; in a word,
he neglected nothing which might concur to render him worthy the sweet
regards of Donna Hippolita, sister of a vegetating signor, whose
cottage was about a couple of gun-shots from Cinquello.
"This lady was beautiful in the extreme, and about the age of Fabricio,
who, having seen her from his infancy, had, to speak vulgarly, sucked
in with his mother's milk the love which occupied his soul in manhood.
Hippolita, on her side, could not help perceiving that Fabricio was not
ill-made; but, knowing him to be the son of a husbandman, she had never
deigned to look on him with attention. Her pride was only equalled by
her loveliness, and by the haughty bearing of her brother, Don Thomaso
de Xaral, who was probably unsurpassed, even in Spain, for his lordly
want of money, and his beggarly pride.
"This inflated country gentleman lived in a small house which he
dignified by the name of castle, but which to speak properly was a
ruin, so little had the winds respected his nobility. However, although
his means did not enable him to repair his mansion, and although he had
hardly enough to sustain himself, he must needs keep a valet to attend
upon his person; nay, he even kept a Moorish female to wait upon his
sister.
"It was a refreshing sight to witness, in the village, on Sundays and
at every festival, Don Thomaso habited in crimson velvet, but sadly
faded, and a little hat, overshadowed with an ancient plume of yellow
feathers, which were carefully enshrined, like relics, on the common
days of the year. Disporting this frippery, which to him was proof
apparent of his noble birth, he would affect the grandee, and seemed to
think that he amply repaid the reverence that was offered to him when
he condescended to notice it by an approving smile. His fair sister was
not less vain than himself of the antiquity of her race; and she joined
to this folly that of such self-congratulation on her charms, that she
lived in the most perfect confidence that ere long some noble signor
would come to beg the honour of her hand.
"Such were the characters of Don Thomaso and the beauteous Hippolita.
Fabricio, aware of their foibles, and in order to insinuate himself
into the estimation of persons so exalted, lost no opportunity of
flattering their pride by the most respectful seeming; and so well
did he manage, that the brother and sister at last were graciously
pleased to allow him frequent occasions for paying his homage to them.
As he was as well informed of their poverty as of their vanity, he was
tempted every day to make offer of his purse; and was only withheld
from doing so by the uncertainty as to which of their failings was
the greater: nevertheless, his ingenious generosity found a way of
relieving the one without causing the other to blush. 'Signor,' said he
one day to Don Thomaso in private, 'I have a thousand ducats which I
would entrust in safe hands: have the kindness to take care of them for
me;--permit me to owe this obligation to you.'
"I need hardly tell you that Xaral consented; but besides being short
of money, he had the very soul for a trustee. He therefore made no
scruple of taking charge of the sum proposed; and no sooner was it in
his possession, than, without ceremony, he employed a good part of
it in putting his house in order, and adding thereto sundry little
conveniences. A new dress of splendid light blue velvet was bought, and
made at Salamanca; and a green plume, also purchased there, came to
snatch from the olden plume of yellow the glory which had pertained to
it from time immemorial, of adorning the noble front of Don Thomaso.
The lovely Hippolita had also her compliment, and was entirely
new-rigged. And thus did Xaral quickly melt the ducats which had been
confided to him, not once reflecting that they did not belong to him,
or that he would never be able to restore them. Indeed, he would not
have scrupled thus to use them, had such extraordinary thoughts
occurred to him; he would have felt that it was perfectly proper a
plebeian should pay for the patronage of so noble a person as himself.
"Fabricio had foreseen all this; but had at the same time flattered
himself, that out of love for his money, if not for himself, Don
Thomaso would live with him on terms of greater intimacy; that
Hippolita by degrees would become accustomed to his attentions, and
finally pardon the audacity which had inspired him to elevate his
thoughts to her. In effect, his intercourse with them certainly
increased, and they displayed for him a consideration that he had
never before appeared to deserve: a rich man is ever appreciated by
the great, when he will consent to act for them the part of the wolf
to Romulus and Remus. Xaral and his sister, who until now had nothing
known of riches but the name, had no sooner tasted the intoxicating
draught, than they deemed Fabricio, the source whence it flowed, an
object not to be neglected; and they therefore exhibited towards him
such marks of respect, and almost affection, as made him think his
money well bestowed. He was soon convinced that he had really won upon
them; and that wisely reflecting it is the lot of the proudest signors
to be obliged, in order to sustain their pretensions, to graft their
noble scions on the stocks of the fortunate vulgar, they now looked
on him without disdain. With this notion, which flattered his own
self-love, Fabricio resolved to propose for Hippolita to her brother.
"On the first favourable opportunity which offered to speak with Don
Thomaso on the subject, he informed him that he had dared aspire to
the honour of becoming his brother-in-law; and that, as the price of
such concession, not only would he abandon all claim to the money
deposited in his hands, but that he would add to it a present of a
thousand pistoles. The haughty Xaral coloured at this proposition,
which awakened his slumbering pride; and in the excitation of the
moment, could scarcely refrain from displaying the utter contempt in
which he held the son of an industrious father. But, however insulted
he felt at the temerity of Fabricio, he constrained himself; and, as
respectfully as his nature would permit, replied that in a matter of
such importance he could not at once determine; that he must consult
Hippolita, and that it would even be necessary to summon a conclave of
his noble relatives thereupon.
"With this answer he dismissed the gallant, and forthwith convoked
a diet composed of certain hidalgos of his neighbourhood, with whom
he claimed affinity, and who, like himself, were all infected with
demophobia. With these he consulted, not as to whether they were of
opinion that he should bestow his sister upon Fabricio, but on the most
proper steps to be adopted in order sufficiently to punish the insolent
young man, who, forgetful of the meanness of his origin, had dared
pretend to the hand of a lady of the rank of Hippolita.
"As soon as he had exposed to the assembly this presumptuous
demand,--as he mentioned the name of Fabricio, and uttered the words,
'Son of a husbandman,'--you should have seen how the eyes of all the
nobles lighted up with fury. Each of them vomited fire and flame
against the audacious groundling; and with one voice they all insisted,
that his death beneath the cudgels of their domestics alone could
expiate the vile affront he had offered to their family by the proposal
of so scandalous an union. However, on mature consideration, the
offended members of the diet agreed to spare the culprit's life; but,
in order to teach him that first and far most useful knowledge--of
himself, they resolved to play him such a trick as he should have
reason to remember while he lived.
"Various were the schemes proposed: the one on which they at last
decided was as follows. Hippolita was to feign a sensibility for the
passion of Fabricio; and, under pretence of consoling her unhappy lover
for the refusal which Don Thomaso would have given to his proposal for
her hand, she was to make an assignation for some particular evening to
receive him at the castle; where, at the moment of his introduction by
the Moorish female, the friends of the signor would surprise him with
the waiting-maid, and compel him to espouse her.
"The sister of Xaral at first inclined to favour this piece of
rascality; she even joined in thinking that her reputation demanded of
her to consider as an insult the addresses of a person in a station so
inferior to her own. But these haughty feelings soon yielded to others
more gentle, prompted by pity; or rather, love suddenly vanquished all
pride of heart in the bosom of Hippolita.
"From that moment, she looked on all things with a different eye. The
obscure origin of Fabricio now appeared to her more than compensated
by a nobility of disposition; and she perceived in him but a cavalier
worthy of her tenderest affection. Remark again, Signor Student,
and with all due admiration, how prodigious are the changes which
this passion can effect: the very girl who yesterday imagined that a
monarch's heir scarce merited the honour of possessing her, to-day is
all enamoured of a ploughman's son, and is flattered by pretensions
which before she had regarded as disgraceful.
Far therefore from assisting her brother in his purposed revenge, and
yielding to the new-born passion which now reigned supreme within her
soul, Hippolita entered into secret correspondence with Fabricio, by
means of her Moorish attendant, who frequently of an evening introduced
the gallant into the cottage. Thus baffled in his design, Don Thomaso
soon became suspicious of the truth; and watching his sister, he was
convinced by his own eyes that, instead of fulfilling the wishes of her
relations, she had betrayed them.
[Illustration: Hippolita's Moorish servant admits Fabricio]
"He instantly informed two of his cousins of the discovery he had made:
'Vengeance! Don Thomaso, vengeance!' they exclaimed, infuriate at such
baseness in one of their illustrious race. Xaral, who did not require
urging to exact satisfaction for an indignity of this nature, replied,
with true Spanish modesty, 'that they should find he knew well how to
use his sword when its employment was called for to avenge his honour;'
and he entreated them to come to his house on a particular night.
[Illustration: Don Thomaso and his cousins surprise Fabricio and
Hippolita]
"They came at the appointed time, and were secretly received and
concealed in a small room by Don Thomaso; who left them, saying that
he would return the instant the lover entered his doors, should he
think fit to come at all that evening. This did not fail to happen; the
unlucky stars of our lovers had decreed that they should choose that
very night for their meeting.
"Don Fabricio was already with his dear Hippolita, listening to and
repeating for the hundredth time those sweet avowals which make up the
dialogue of lovers, but which, though spoken from eternity, have still
the charm of novelty, when they were disagreeably interrupted by the
cavaliers who waited to surprise them. Don Thomaso and his cousins,
with all the courage of three against one, rushed upon Fabricio, who
had scarcely time to draw in his defence; but perceiving at once that
their object was to assassinate him, he fought with a courage which
makes one equal to three; he wounded all his assailants, and exerting
the skill he had acquired at Salamanca, managed to keep them at his
sword's point till he had gained the door, when he made off at full
speed.
"Upon this, Xaral, maddened with rage at beholding his enemy escape
him, after having with impunity dishonoured his house, turned all his
fury against the unfortunate Hippolita, and plunged his sword into
her heart. After which his two relatives returned to their homes,
extremely mortified at the bad success of their plot, and with no other
consolation than their wounds. There we will leave them," continued
Asmodeus. "When we have passed in review the other captives, I will
finish the history of this one. I will relate to you how, after
justice, or rather the law, had possessed itself of his effects on
account of this mournful event, the pirates seized his person, with
about as good reason, when he happened to be making a voyage."
"While you were telling me this story of love and pride," said Don
Cleophas, "I observed a young man whose countenance bespeaks such
sorrow at his heart, that I wonder I did not interrupt you to inquire
its cause." "You will lose nothing by your discretion," replied the
Demon; "I can tell you now all you desire to know. The captive whose
dejection attracted your notice, is a youth of family from Valladolid.
Two years was he in slavery, but with a patron who possessed a very
pretty wife. The lady looked with favour on the slave, and the slave,
as in duty bound, repaid the lady's favours with interest. The patron,
becoming suspicious as to the nature of his slave's labours, hastened
to sell the Christian to the brothers of the Redemption, lest he should
be irreligiously employed in the propagation of Mahometanism. The
tender Castilian, ever since, has done nothing but weep for the loss of
his patroness; liberty itself cannot console him."
"An old man of good appearance attracts my attention there," said
Leandro Perez; "who, and what, is he?" The Devil replied: "He is
a barber, of Guipuscoa, who is about to return to Biscay after a
captivity of forty years. When he fell into the hands of a corsair,
in going from Valencia to the island of Sardinia, he had a wife, two
sons, and a daughter. Of all these, one son alone remains; and he,
more lucky than his father, has been to Peru, whence he has safely
returned with immense wealth to his native province, in which he has
recently purchased two handsome estates." "What pleasure!" exclaimed
the Student, "what delight awaits this happy son, to behold again his
long-lost parent, and to be enabled to render his declining years
peaceful and agreeable!"
"You," replied the Cripple, "speak like a child whom tenderness and
duty prompt; the son of the Biscayan barber is of a sterner mould:
the unlooked-for coming of his sire to him will bring more grief than
joy. Instead of welcoming him to his mansion at Guipuscoa, and sparing
nothing to mark the bliss he feels at pressing him once more to his
bosom, he will probably be filial enough to make him steward of one of
his estates.
"Behind this captive, whose good looks you admire so much, is another
as like an old baboon as are two drops of water to each other: he is
a little Aragonese physician. He has not been a fortnight in Algiers;
for as soon as the Turks knew what was his profession, they resolved,
rather than suffer him to remain among them, to place him without
ransom in the hands of the fathers of Mercy, who would certainly never
have purchased him, and who bring him back with compunction to Spain.
"You who feel so sensibly the woes of others, ah! how would you grieve
for that other slave, he who wears upon his head that little cap of
brown cloth, did you but know the ills he has endured during twelve
years, in the house of an English renegade, his patron." "And who is
this unhappy captive?" asked Zambullo. "He is a cordelier of Navarre,"
replied the Demon. "I must own, however, that for myself, I rejoice
that he has suffered so severely; since, by his eternal preaching, he
has prevented more than a hundred Christian slaves from adopting the
turban."
"Well! to imitate your frankness," replied Don Cleophas, "I must say
that I am really afflicted to think that this good father should have
been so long at the mercy of the barbarian." "As to that," replied
Asmodeus, "you are as unwise to regret it, as I to rejoice. The good
monk has turned his dozen years' captivity to so good account, that he
will find his advantage in having passed that time in suffering instead
of in his cell, where he would have striven with temptations that he
would not at all times have vanquished."
"The first captive after the monks," said Leandro Perez, "has a most
complacent air for a man who returns from slavery: he excites my
curiosity to know his history." "You anticipate me," replied the
Cripple; "I was just about to tell you all about him. You see in him,
a citizen of Salamanca, an unfortunate father, a mortal rendered
insensible to misfortune by the weight of those he has experienced.
I am tempted to relate to you the painful details of his life, and
to leave the rest of the captives to their fates; besides, there is
scarcely another whose adventures are worth the trouble of telling."
The Student, who began to tire of this sombre procession, stated that
he asked for nothing better; whereupon, the Devil began the history
contained in the following chapter.
[Illustration: tailpiece of the Aragonese physician and the cordelier
of Navarre]