In traversing the Alps on my way to Italy—an humble tourist, with my
staff in my hand, and my wallet on my shoulder, I remember pausing to
contemplate, near the pass of Rodoretto, a torrent swollen by the melting
of the glaciers. The tumultuous sounds produced by its course, the
foaming cascades into which it burst, the varying colors and hues created
by the movement of its waters, yellow, white, green, black, according to
its channel through marl, slate, chalk, or peat earth—the vast blocks of
marble or granite it had detached without being able to remove, around
which a thousand ever-changing cataracts added roar to roar, cascade to
cascade; the trunks of trees it had uprooted, of which the still foliaged
branches emerging from the water were agitated by the winds, while the
roots were buffeted by the waves; fragments of the very banks clothed
with verdure, and driven like floating islands against the trees, as
the trees were driven in their turn against the blocks of granite—all
this, these murmurs, clashings, and roarings, confined between narrow
and precipitous banks, impressed me with wonder and admiration. And this
torrent was the Clusone!
Skirting its shores, I pursued the course of the stream into one of the
four valleys retaining the name of “Protestant,” in the memory of the
Vaudois who formerly took refuge in their solitudes. _There_, my torrent
lost its wild irregularity; and its hundred roaring voices were presently
subdued. Its shattered trees and islands had been deposited on some
adjacent level; its colours had resolved themselves into one; and the
material of its bed no longer distinguishable on the tranquil surface.
Still strong and copious, it now flowed with decency, propriety, almost
with coquetry: affecting the airs of a modest rivulet as it bathed the
rugged walls of Fenestrella.
[Illustration]
It was then I visited Fenestrella, a large town celebrated for peppermint
water, and the fortress which crowns the two mountains between which it
is situated, communicating with each other by covered ways, but partly
dismantled during the wars of the Republic. One of the forts, however,
was repaired and refortified when Piedmont became incorporated into
France.
In this fortress of Fenestrella, was Charles Veramont, Count de Charney,
incarcerated, on an accusation of having attempted to subvert the laws of
government, and introduce anarchy and confusion into the country.
Estranged by rigid imprisonment, alike from men of science and men of
pleasure, and regretting neither—renouncing without much effort his wild
projects of political regeneration—bidding a forced farewell to his
fortune, by the pomps of which he had been undazzled—to his friends,
who were grown tiresome, and his mistresses, who were grown faithless;
having for his abode, instead of a princely mansion, a bare and gloomy
chamber—the jailer of Charney was now his sole attendant, and his
imbittered spirit his only companion.
But what signified the gloom and nakedness of his apartment? The
necessaries of life were there, and he had long been disgusted with its
superfluities. Even his jailer gave him no offence. It was only his own
thoughts that troubled him!
Yet what other diversions remained for his solitude—but self-conference?
Alas! none! Nothing around him or before him but weariness and vexation
of spirit! All correspondence was interdicted. He was allowed no
books, nor pens, nor paper; for such was the established discipline
at Fenestrella. A year before, when the count was intent only on
emancipating himself from the perplexities of learning, this loss
might have seemed a gain. But now, a book would have afforded a friend
to consult, or an adversary to be confuted! Deprived of every thing,
sequestered from the world, Charney had nothing left for it, but to
become reconciled to himself, and live in peace with that natural
enemy, his soul. For the cruelty with which that unsilenceable monitor
continued to set before him the desperateness of his condition,
rendered conciliation necessary. His case was indeed a hard one! A
man to whom nature had been so prodigal, whose cradle society had
surrounded with honours and privileges—_he_ to be reduced to such abject
insignificance—_he_ to have need of pity and protection, who had faith
neither in the existence of a God nor the mercy of his fellow-creatures!
Vainly did he strive to throw off this frightful consciousness, when in
the solitude of his reveries it alternately chilled and scorched his
shrinking bosom: and once more, the unhappy Charney began to cling for
support to the visible and material world—now, alas! how circumscribed
around him. The room assigned to his use was at the rear of the
citadel, in a small building raised upon the ruins of a vast and strong
foundation, serving formerly for defence, but rendered useless by a new
system of fortification.
[Illustration]
Four walls, newly whitewashed, so that he was denied even the amusement
of perusing the lucubrations of former prisoners, his predecessors; a
table, serving for his meals; a chair, whose insulated unity reminded
him, that no human being would ever sit beside him there in friendly
converse; a trunk for his clothes and linen; a little sideboard of
painted deal, half worm-eaten, offered a singular contrast to the
rich mahogany dressing-case, inlaid with silver, standing there as
the sole representative of his former splendours. A clean, but narrow
bed, window-curtains of blue cloth (a mere mockery, for, thanks to the
closeness of his prison bars and the opposite wall rising at ten feet
distance, there was little to fear from prying eyes or the importunate
radiance of the sun). Such was the complement of furniture allotted to
the Count de Charney.
Over his chamber was another, wholly unoccupied; he had not a single
companion in that detached portion of the fortress.
The remainder of his world consisted in a short, massive, winding stone
staircase, descending into a small paved court, sunk into what had been a
moat, in the earlier days of the citadel, in which narrow space he was
permitted to enjoy air and exercise during two hours of the day. Such was
the ukase of the commandant of Fenestrella.
[Illustration]
From this confined spot, however, the prisoner was able to extend his
glance towards the summits of the mountains, and command a view of the
vapours rising from the plain; for the walls of the ramparts, lowering
suddenly at the extremity of the glacis, admitted a limited proportion
of air and sunshine into the court. But once shut up again in his room,
his view was bounded by an horizon of solid masonry, and a surmise of the
majestic and picturesque aspect of nature it served to conceal. Charney
was well aware that to the right rose the fertile hills of Saluces; that
to his left were developed the last undulations of the valley of Aorta
and the banks of the Chiara; that before him lay the noble plains of
Turin; and behind, the mighty chain of Alps, with its adornment of rocks,
forests, and chasms, from Mount Genevra to Mount Cenis. But, in spite of
this charming vicinage, all he was permitted to behold was the misty sky
suspended over his head by a frame-work of rude masonry; the pavement
of the little court, and the bars of his prison, through which he might
admire the opposite wall, adorned with a single small square window, at
which he had once or twice caught glimpses of a doleful human countenance.
What a world from which to extract delight and entertainment! The unhappy
Count wore out his patience in the attempt! At first, he amused himself
with scribbling with a morsel of charcoal on the walls of his prison the
dates of every happy event of his childhood; but from this dispiriting
task he desisted, more discouraged than ever. The demon of scepticism
next inspired him with evil counsel; and having framed into fearful
sentences the axioms of his withering creed, he inscribed them also on
his wall, between recollections consecrated to his sister and mother!
Still unconsoled, Charney at length made up his mind to fling aside his
heart-eating cares, adopt, by anticipation, all the puerilities and
brutalization which result from the prolongation of solitary confinement.
The philosopher attempted to find amusement in unravelling silk or linen;
in making flageolets of straw, and building ships of walnut-shells. The
man of genius constructed whistles, boxes, and baskets, of kernels;
chains and musical instruments, with the springs of his braces; nay,
for a time, he took delight in these absurdities; then, with a sudden
movement of disgust, trampled them, one by one, under his feet!
[Illustration]
To vary his employment, Charney began to carve a thousand fanciful
designs upon his wooden table! No school-boy ever mutilated his desk by
such attempts at arabesque, both in relief and intaglio, as tasked his
patience and address. The celebrated portal of the church of Candebee,
and the pulpit and palm trees of St. Gudula at Brussels, are not adorned
with a greater variety of figures. There were houses upon houses, fishes
upon trees, men taller than steeples, boats upon roofs, carriages upon
water, dwarf pyramids, and flies of gigantic stature,—horizontal,
vertical, oblique, topsy-turvy, upside down, pell-mell, a chaos of
hieroglyphics, in which he tried to discover a sense symbolical, an
accidental intention, an occult design; for it was no great effort on
the part of one who had so much faith in the power of chance, to expect
the development of an epic poem in the sculptures on his table, or a
design of Raphael in the veins of his box-wood snuff-box.
It was the delight of his ingenuity to multiply difficulties for
conquest, problems for solution, enigmas for divination; but even in the
midst of these recreations, ennui, the formidable enemy, again surprised
the captive.
The man whose face he had noticed at the grated window might have
afforded him food for conjecture, had he not seemed to avoid the
observation of the Count, by retiring the moment Charney made his
appearance; in consequence of which, he conceived an abhorrence of the
recluse. Such was his opinion of the human species, that the stranger’s
desire of concealment convinced him he was a spy, employed to watch the
movements of the prisoners, or, perhaps, some former enemy, exulting over
his humiliation.
On interrogating the jailer, however, this last supposition was set at
rest.
[Illustration]
“’Tis an Italian,” said Ludovico, the turnkey. “A good soul—and, what is
more, a good Christian; for I often find him at his devotions.”
Charney shrugged his shoulders: “And what may be the cause, pray, of his
retention?” said he.
“He attempted to assassinate the Emperor.”
“Is he, then, a patriot?”
“A patriot! Rubbish! Not he. But the poor soul had once a son and
daughter: and _now_ he has only a daughter. The son was killed in
Germany. A cannon-ball broke a tooth for him. _Povero figliuolo!_”
“It was a paroxysm of selfishness, then, which moved this old man to
become an assassin?”
“You have never been a father, _Signor Conte_!” replied the jailer.
“_Cristo Santo!_ if my Antonio, who is still a babe, were to eat his
first mouthful for the good of this empire of the French (which is a
bantling of his own age, or thereabouts), I’d soon—— But _basta_! I’ve no
mind to take up my lodging at Fenestrella, except as it may be with the
keys at my girdle or under my pillow.”
“And how does this fierce conspirator amuse himself in prison?” persisted
Charney.
“Catching flies!” replied the jailer, with an ironical wink.
Instead of detesting his brother in misfortune, Charney now began to
despise him. “A madman, then?” he demanded.
“_Perche pazzo, Signor Conte?_ Though you are the last comer, you excel
him already in the art of hacking a table into devices. _Pazienza!_”
In defiance of the sneer conveyed in the jailer’s remark, Charney soon
resumed his manual labors, and the interpretations of his hieroglyphics;
but, alas! only to experience anew their insufficiency as a kill-time.
His first winter had expired in weariness and discontent: when, by the
mercy of Heaven, an unexpected object of interest was assigned him.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]