Ricciardo, the son of Messer Tommaso de’ Manelli; he that lived o’th’
Arno, and baked for all that Sesto, when Count Guido de Giudi was
_Vicario_. By this token, that Messer Tommaso went to Milan with Ubaldo
de’ Gargalandi, and Ricciardo, who went with his father, must now be
sixteen. He had the fame of kneading with as light a hand as his father,
but he liked better to follow arms with the Gargalandi. He was a fair,
likely youth, they said; and so, to say the truth, was our youngster of
this morning. But Monna Lissa will have it that it must be Corradino
himself.”
Cincolo listened as if the gossip of two old women could unravel his
riddle. He even began to doubt whether the last conjecture, extravagant
as it was, had not hit the truth. Every circumstance forbade such an
idea; but he thought of the youth and exceeding beauty of the stranger,
and he began to doubt. There was none among the Elisei who answered to
his appearance. The flower of their youth had fallen at Monte Aperto;
the eldest of the new generation was but ten; the other males of that
house were of a mature age. Gegia continued to talk of the anger that
Beppe de’ Bosticchi evinced at being accused of the murder of Arrigo de’
Elisei. “If he had done that deed,” she cried, “never more should he
have stood on my hearth; but he swore his innocence; and truly, poor
man, it would be a sin not to believe him.” Why, if the stranger were
not an Elisei, should he have shown such horror on viewing the supposed
murderer of the head of that family? Cincolo turned from the fire; he
examined whether his knife hung safely in his girdle, and he exchanged
his sandal-like shoes for stronger boots of common undressed fur. This
last act attracted the attentions of Gegia.
“What are you about, good man?” she cried. “This is no hour to change
your dress, but to come to bed. To-night you will not speak; but
to-morrow I hope to get it all out from you. What are you about?”
“I am about to leave you, my dear Gegia; and Heaven bless and take care
of you! I am going to Pisa.”
Gegia uttered a shriek, and was about to remonstrate with great
volubility, while the tears rolled down her aged cheeks. Tears also
filled the eyes of Cincolo, as he said, “I do not go for the cause you
suspect. I do not go into the army of Corradino, though my heart will be
with it. I go but to carry a letter, and will return without delay.”
“You will never return,” cried the old woman: “the Commune will never
let you enter the gates of this town again, if you set foot in that
traitorous Pisa. But you shall not go; I will raise the neighbours; I
will declare you mad”—
“Gegia, no more of this! Here is all the money I have. Before I go, I
will send your Cousin ’Nunziata to you. I must go. It is not the
Ghibelline cause, or Corradino, that obliges me to risk your ease and
comforts; but the life of one of the Elisei is at stake; and if I can
save him, would you have me rest here, and afterwards curse you and the
hour when I was born?”
“What! is he——? But no; there is none among the Elisei so young as he;
and none so lovely, except her whom these arms carried when an
infant—but she is a female. No, no; this is a tale trumped up to deceive
me and gain my consent; but you shall never have it. Mind that! you will
never have it! and I prophesy that if you do go, your journey will be
the death of both of us.” She wept bitterly. Cincolo kissed her aged
cheek, and mingled his tears with hers; and then recommending her to the
care of the Virgin and the saints, he quitted her; while grief choked
her utterance, the name of the Elisei had deprived her of all energy to
resist his purpose.
It was four in the morning before the gates of Florence were opened and
Cincolo could leave the city. At first he availed himself of the carts
of the _contadini_ to advance on his journey; but as he drew near Pisa,
all modes of conveyance ceased, and he was obliged to take by-roads, and
act cautiously, not to fall into the hands of the Florentine outposts,
or of some fierce Ghibelline, who might suspect him, and have him
carried before the Podesta of the village; for if once suspected and
searched, the packet addressed to Corradino would convict him, and he
would pay for his temerity with his life. Having arrived at Vico Pisano,
he found a troop of Pisan horse there on guard; he was known to many of
the soldiers, and he obtained a conveyance for Pisa; but it was night
before he arrived. He gave the Ghibelline watchword, and was admitted
within the gates. He asked for Prince Corradino: he was in the city, at
the palace of the Lanfranchi. He crossed the Arno, and was admitted into
the palace by the soldiers who guarded the door.
Corradino had just returned from a successful skirmish in the Lucchese
states, and was reposing; but when Count Gherardo Doneratico, his
principal attendant, saw the seal of the packet, he immediately ushered
the bearer into a small room, where the prince lay on a fox’s skin
thrown upon the pavement. The mind of Cincolo had been so bewildered by
the rapidity of the events of the preceding night, by fatigue and want
of sleep, that he had overwrought himself to believe that the stranger
youth was indeed Corradino; and when he had heard that that prince was
in Pisa, by a strange disorder of ideas he still imagined that he and
Ricciardo were the same; that the black litter was a phantom, and his
fears ungrounded. The first sight of Corradino, his fair hair and round
Saxon features, destroyed this idea: it was replaced by a feeling of
deep anguish, when Count Gherardo, announcing him, said, “One who brings
a letter from Madonna Despina dei Elisei, waits upon your Highness.”
The old man sprang forward, uncontrolled by the respect he would
otherwise have felt for one of so high lineage as Corradino. “From
Despina! Did you say from her? Oh! unsay your words! Not from my
beloved, lost foster-child.”
Tears rolled down his cheeks. Corradino, a youth of fascinating
gentleness, attempted to reassure him. “Oh! my gracious Lord,” cried
Cincolo, “open that packet, and see if it be from my blessed child—if in
the disguise of Ricciardo I led her to destruction.” He wrung his hands.
Corradino, pale as death with fear for the destiny of his lovely and
adventurous friend, broke the seal. The packet contained an inner
envelope without any direction, and a letter, which Corradino read,
while horror convulsed every feature. He gave it to Gherardo. “It is
indeed from her. She says that the bearer can relate all that the world
will probably know of her fate. And you old man, who weep so bitterly,
you to whom my best and lovely friend refers me, tell me what you know
of her!”
Cincolo told his story in broken accents. “May these eyes be for ever
blinded!” he cried, when he had concluded, “that knew not Despina in
those soft looks and heavenly smiles. Dotard that I am! When my wife
railed at your family and princely self, and the sainted Manfred, why
did I not read her secret in her forbearance? Would she have forgiven
those words in any but her who had nursed her infancy, and been a mother
to her when Madonna Pia died? And when she taxed Bosticchi with her
father’s death, I, blind fool, did not see the spirit of the Elisei in
her eyes. My Lord, I have but one favour to ask you. Let me hear her
letter, that I may judge from that what hopes remain;—but there are
none—none.”
“Read to him, my dear count,” said the prince; “I will not fear as he
fears. I dare not fear that one so lovely and beloved is sacrificed for
my worthless cause.” Gherardo read the letter.
“Cincolo de’ Becari, my foster-father, will deliver this letter into
your hands, my respected and dear Corradino. The Countess Elizabeth
has urged me to my present undertaking; I hope nothing from it,
except to labour for your cause, and perhaps, through its event, to
quit somewhat earlier a life which is but a grievous trial to my
weak mind. I go to endeavour to arouse the feelings of fidelity and
generosity in the soul of the traitor Lostendardo; I go to place
myself in his hands, and I do not hope to escape from them again.
Corradino, my last prayer will be for your success. Mourn not for
one who goes home after a long and weary exile. Burn the enclosed
packet without opening it. The Mother of God protect thee!”
“DESPINA.”
Corradino had wept as this epistle was reading, but then, starting up,
he said, “To revenge or death! we may yet save her!”
A blight had fallen on the house of Swabia, and all their enterprises
were blasted. Beloved by their subjects, noble, and with every advantage
of right on their side, except those the Church bestowed, they were
defeated in every attempt to defend themselves against a foreigner and a
tyrant, who ruled by force of arms, and those in the hands of a few
only, over an extensive and warlike territory. The young and daring
Corradino was also fated to perish in this contest. Having overcome the
troops of his adversary in Tuscany, he advanced towards his kingdom with
the highest hopes. His arch-enemy, Pope Clement IV., had shut himself up
in Viterbo, and was guarded by a numerous garrison. Corradino passed in
triumph and hope before the town, and proudly drew out his troops before
it, to display to the Holy Father his forces, and humiliate him by this
show of success. The cardinals, who beheld the lengthened line and good
order of the army, hastened to the papal palace. Clement was in his
oratory praying. The frightened monks, with pale looks, related how the
excommunicated heretic dared to menace the town where the Holy Father
himself resided; adding, that if the insult were carried to the pitch of
an assault, it might prove dangerous warfare. The pope smiled
contemptuously. “Do not fear,” he said; “the projects of these men will
dissipate in smoke.” He then went on the ramparts, and saw Corradino and
Frederic of Austria, who defiled the line of knights in the plain below.
He watched them for a time; then turning to his cardinals, he said,
“They are victims, who permit themselves to be led to sacrifice.”
His words were a prophecy. Notwithstanding the first successes of
Corradino, and the superior numbers of his army, he was defeated by the
artifice of Charles in a pitched battle. He escaped from the field, and,
with a few friends, arrived at a tower called Asturi, which belonged to
the family of Frangipani, of Rome. Here he hired a vessel, embarked, and
put out to sea, directing his course for Sicily, which, having rebelled
against Charles, would, he hoped, receive him with joy. They were
already under weigh, when one of the family of the Frangipani, seeing a
vessel filled with Germans making all sail from shore, suspected that
they were fugitives from the battle of Taglicozzo. He followed them in
other vessels, and took them all prisoners. The person of Corradino was
a rich prey for him; he delivered him into the hands of his rival, and
was rewarded by the donation of a fief near Benevento.
The dastardly spirit of Charles instigated him to the basest revenge;
and the same tragedy was acted on those shores which has been renewed in
our days. A daring and illustrious prince was sacrificed with the mock
forms of justice, at the sanguinary altar of tyranny and hypocrisy.
Corradino was tried. One of his judges alone, a Provençal, dared to
condemn him, and he paid with his life the forfeit of his baseness. For
scarcely had he, solitary among his fellows, pronounced the sentence of
death against this prince, than Robert of Flanders, the brother-in-law
of Charles himself, struck him on the breast with a staff, crying, “It
behoves not thee, wretch, to condemn to death so noble and worthy a
knight.” The judge fell dead in the presence of the king, who dared not
avenge his creature.
On the 26th of October Corradino and his friends were led out to die in
the market-place of Naples, by the seaside. Charles was present with all
his court, and an immense multitude surrounded the triumphant king, and
his more royal adversary, about to suffer an ignominious death. The
funereal procession approached its destination. Corradino, agitated, but
controlling his agitation, was drawn in an open car. After him came a
close litter, hung with black, with no sign to tell who was within. The
Duke of Austria and several other illustrious victims followed. The
guard that conducted them to the scaffold was headed by Lostendardo; a
malicious triumph laughed in his eyes, and he rode near the litter,
looking from time to time first at it and then at Corradino, with the
dark look of a tormenting fiend. The procession stopped at the foot of
the scaffold, and Corradino looked at the flashing light which every now
and then arose from Vesuvius, and threw its reflection on the sea. The
sun had not yet risen, but the halo of its approach illuminated the bay
of Naples, its mountains, and its islands. The summits of the distant
hills of Baiæ gleamed with its first beams. Corradino thought, “By the
time those rays arrive here, and shadows are cast from the persons of
these men—princes and peasants—around me, my living spirit will be
shadowless.” Then he turned his eyes on the companions of his fate, and
for the first time he saw the silent and dark litter that accompanied
them. At first he thought, “It is my coffin.” But then he recollected
the disappearance of Despina, and would have sprang towards it. His
guards stopped him; he looked up, and his glance met that of
Lostendardo, who smiled—a smile of dread; but the feeling of religion
which had before calmed him again descended on him; he thought that her
sufferings, as well as his, would soon be over.
They were already over; and the silence of the grave is upon those
events which had occurred since Cincolo beheld her carried out of
Florence, until now that she was led by her fierce enemy to behold the
death of the nephew of Manfred. She must have endured much; for when, as
Corradino advanced to the front of the scaffold, the litter being placed
opposite to it, Lostendardo ordered the curtains to be withdrawn, the
white hand that hung inanimate from the side was thin as a winter leaf,
and her fair face, pillowed by the thick knots of her dark hair, was
sunken and ashy pale, while you could see the deep blue of her eyes
struggle through the closed eyelids. She was still in the attire in
which she had presented herself at the house of Cincolo. Perhaps her
tormentor thought that her appearance as a youth would attract less
compassion than if a lovely woman were thus dragged to so unnatural a
scene.
Corradino was kneeling and praying when her form was thus exposed. He
saw her, and saw that she was dead! About to die himself; about, pure
and innocent, to die ignominiously, while his base conqueror, in pomp
and glory, was spectator of his death, he did not pity those who were at
peace; his compassion belonged to the living alone; and as he arose from
his prayer he exclaimed, “My beloved mother, what profound sorrow will
the news thou art about to hear cause thee!” He looked upon the living
multitude around him, and saw that the hard-visaged partisans of the
usurper wept; he heard the sobs of his oppressed and conquered subjects;
so he drew his glove from his hand and threw it among the crowd, in
token that he still held his cause good, and submitted his head to the
axe.
During many years after those events, Lostendardo enjoyed wealth, rank,
and power. When suddenly, while at the summit of glory and prosperity,
he withdrew from the world, took the vows of a severe order in a convent
in one of the desolate and unhealthy plains by the sea-shore in
Calabria; and after having gained the character of a saint, through a
life of self-inflicted torture, he died murmuring the names of
Corradino, Manfred, and Despina.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
VIII.
_THE MORTAL IMMORTAL._
JULY 16, 1833.—This is a memorable anniversary for me; on it I complete
my three hundred and twenty-third year!
The Wandering Jew?—certainly not. More than eighteen centuries have
passed over his head. In comparison with him, I am a very young
Immortal.
Am I, then, immortal? This is a question which I have asked myself, by
day and night, for now three hundred and three years, and yet cannot
answer it. I detected a grey hair amidst my brown locks this very
day—that surely signifies decay. Yet it may have remained concealed
there for three hundred years—for some persons have become entirely
white-headed before twenty years of age.
I will tell my story, and my reader shall judge for me. I will tell my
story, and so contrive to pass some few hours of a long eternity, become
so wearisome to me. For ever! Can it be? to live for ever! I have heard
of enchantments, in which the victims were plunged into a deep sleep, to
wake, after a hundred years, as fresh as ever: I have heard of the Seven
Sleepers—thus to be immortal would not be so burthensome: but, oh! the
weight of never-ending time—the tedious passage of the still-succeeding
hours! How happy was the fabled Nourjahad!—But to my task.
All the world has heard of Cornelius Agrippa. His memory is as immortal
as his arts have made me. All the world has also heard of his scholar,
who, unawares, raised the foul fiend during his master’s absence, and
was destroyed by him. The report, true or false, of this accident, was
attended with many inconveniences to the renowned philosopher. All his
scholars at once deserted him—his servants disappeared. He had no one
near him to put coals on his ever-burning fires while he slept, or to
attend to the changeful colours of his medicines while he studied.
Experiment after experiment failed, because one pair of hands was
insufficient to complete them: the dark spirits laughed at him for not
being able to retain a single mortal in his service.
I was then very young—very poor—and very much in love. I had been for
about a year the pupil of Cornelius, though I was absent when this
accident took place. On my return, my friends implored me not to return
to the alchymist’s abode. I trembled as I listened to the dire tale they
told; I required no second warning; and when Cornelius came and offered
me a purse of gold if I would remain under his roof, I felt as if Satan
himself tempted me. My teeth chattered—my hair stood on end;—I ran off
as fast as my trembling knees would permit.
My failing steps were directed whither for two years they had every
evening been attracted,—a gently bubbling spring of pure living water,
beside which lingered a dark-haired girl, whose beaming eyes were fixed
on the path I was accustomed each night to tread. I cannot remember the
hour when I did not love Bertha; we had been neighbours and playmates
from infancy,—her parents, like mine, were of humble life, yet
respectable,—our attachment had been a source of pleasure to them. In an
evil hour, a malignant fever carried off both her father and mother, and
Bertha became an orphan. She would have found a home beneath my paternal
roof, but, unfortunately, the old lady of the near castle, rich,
childless, and solitary, declared her intention to adopt her. Henceforth
Bertha was clad in silk—inhabited a marble palace—and was looked on as
being highly favoured by fortune. But in her new situation among her new
associates, Bertha remained true to the friend of her humbler days; she
often visited the cottage of my father, and when forbidden to go
thither, she would stray towards the neighbouring wood, and meet me
beside its shady fountain.
She often declared that she owed no duty to her new protectress equal in
sanctity to that which bound us. Yet still I was too poor to marry, and
she grew weary of being tormented on my account. She had a haughty but
an impatient spirit, and grew angry at the obstacles that prevented our
union. We met now after an absence, and she had been sorely beset while
I was away; she complained bitterly, and almost reproached me for being
poor. I replied hastily,—
“I am honest, if I am poor!—were I not, I might soon become rich!”
This exclamation produced a thousand questions. I feared to shock her by
owning the truth, but she drew it from me; and then, casting a look of
disdain on me, she said,—
“You pretend to love, and you fear to face the Devil for my sake!”
I protested that I had only dreaded to offend her;—while she dwelt on
the magnitude of the reward that I should receive. Thus
encouraged—shamed by her—led on by love and hope, laughing at my late
fears, with quick steps and a light heart, I returned to accept the
offers of the alchymist, and was instantly installed in my office.
A year passed away. I became possessed of no insignificant sum of money.
Custom had banished my fears. In spite of the most painful vigilance, I
had never detected the trace of a cloven foot; nor was the studious
silence of our abode ever disturbed by demoniac howls. I still continued
my stolen interviews with Bertha, and Hope dawned on me—Hope—but not
perfect joy; for Bertha fancied that love and security were enemies, and
her pleasure was to divide them in my bosom. Though true of heart, she
was somewhat of a coquette in manner; and I was jealous as a Turk. She
slighted me in a thousand ways, yet would never acknowledge herself to
be in the wrong. She would drive me mad with anger, and then force me to
beg her pardon. Sometimes she fancied that I was not sufficiently
submissive, and then she had some story of a rival, favoured by her
protectress. She was surrounded by silk-clad youths—the rich and gay.
What chance had the sad-robed scholar of Cornelius compared with these?
On one occasion, the philosopher made such large demands upon my time,
that I was unable to meet her as I was wont. He was engaged in some
mighty work, and I was forced to remain, day and night, feeding his
furnaces and watching his chemical preparations. Bertha waited for me in
vain at the fountain. Her haughty spirit fired at this neglect; and when
at last I stole out during the few short minutes allotted to me for
slumber, and hoped to be consoled by her, she received me with disdain,
dismissed me in scorn, and vowed that any man should possess her hand
rather than he who could not be in two places at once for her sake. She
would be revenged! And truly she was. In my dingy retreat I heard that
she had been hunting, attended by Albert Hoffer. Albert Hoffer was
favoured by her protectress; and the three passed in cavalcade before my
smoky window. Methought that they mentioned my name; it was followed by
a laugh of derision, as her dark eyes glanced contemptuously towards my
abode.
Jealousy, with all its venom and all its misery, entered my breast. Now
I shed a torrent of tears, to think that I should never call her mine;
and, anon, I imprecated a thousand curses on her inconstancy. Yet, still
I must stir the fires of the alchymist, still attend on the changes of
his unintelligible medicines.
Cornelius had watched for three days and nights, nor closed his eyes.
The progress of his alembics was slower than he expected: in spite of
his anxiety, sleep weighed upon his eyelids. Again and again he threw
off drowsiness with more than human energy; again and again it stole
away his senses. He eyed his crucibles wistfully. “Not ready yet,” he
murmured; “will another night pass before the work is accomplished?
Winzy, you are vigilant—you are faithful—you have slept, my boy—you
slept last night. Look at that glass vessel. The liquid it contains is
of a soft rose-colour: the moment it begins to change its hue, awaken
me—till then I may close my eyes. First, it will turn white, and then
emit golden flashes; but wait not till then; when the rose-colour fades,
rouse me.” I scarcely heard the last words, muttered, as they were, in
sleep. Even then he did not quite yield to nature. “Winzy, my boy,” he
again said, “do not touch the vessel—do not put it to your lips; it is a
philter—a philter to cure love; you would not cease to love your
Bertha—beware to drink!”