My love looks well under his helmet's crest;
He went to war, and did not let them see
His back, and so his wound is in the breast:
For one he got, he struck and gave them three.
When he came back, I loved him, hurt so, best;
He married me and loves me tenderly.
When he goes by, and people give him way,
I thank God for my fortune every day;
When he goes by he seems more grand and fair
Than any crossed and ribboned cavalier:
The cavalier grew up with his cross on,
And I know how my darling's cross was won!
This poem, like that of La Livornese and La Donna Lombarda, is a vivid
picture: it is a liberated city, and the streets are filled with
jubilant people; the first victorious combats have taken place, and
it is a wounded hero who passes with his ribbon on his breast. As the
fond crowd gives way to him, his young wife looks on him from her
window with an exultant love, unshadowed by any possibility of harm:
Mi menò a moglie e mi vuol tanto bene!
This is country and freedom to her,--this is strength which despots
cannot break,--this is joy to which defeat and ruin can never come
nigh! It might be any one of the sarcastic and quickwitted people
talking politics in the streets of Rome in 1847, who sees the
newly elected Senator--the head of the Roman municipality, and the
legitimate mediator between Pope and people--as he passes, and speaks
to him in these lines the dominant feeling of the moment: