table was always covered when I was hungry; and after I had said my
three prayers properly I was allowed to run about the woods and fields
just as I pleased. Close beside the villa there was a little wood of
sweet pines, cool and dark, and filled with sweet scents and songs.
There one evening, when the sun began to sink, I threw me down beneath
a big tree, tired with running and jumping about, and stared up at the
blue sky. Perhaps I was stupefied by the fragrant smell of the
flowering herbs in the midst of which I lay; at any rate, my eyes
closed involuntarily, and I sank into a state of dreamy reverie, from
which I was awakened by a rustling, as if some one had struck a blow in
the grass beside me. I started up into a sitting posture; an angelic
child with heavenly eyes stood near me and looked down upon me, smiling
most sweetly and bewitchingly. 'O good boy,' she said, in a low soft
voice, 'how beautiful and calmly you sleep, and yet death, nasty death,
was so near to you.' Close beside my breast I saw a small black snake
with its head crushed; the little girl had killed the poisonous reptile
with a switch from a nut-tree, and just as it was wriggling on to my
destruction. Then a trembling of sweet awe fell upon me; I knew that
angels often came down from heaven above to rescue men in person from
the threatening attack of some evil enemy. I fell upon my knees and
raised my folded hands. 'Oh! you are surely an angel of light, sent by
God to save my life,' I cried. The pretty creature stretched out both
arms towards me and said softly, whilst a deeper flush mantled upon her
cheeks, 'No, good boy; I am not an angel, but a girl--a child like
you.' Then my feeling of awe gave place to a nameless delight, which
spread like a gentle warmth through all my limbs. I rose to my feet; we
clasped each other in our arms, our lips met, and we were speechless,
weeping, sobbing with sweet unutterable sadness.
"Then a clear silvery voice cried through the wood, 'Annunciata!
Annunciata!' 'I must go now, darling boy, mother is calling me,'
whispered the little girl. My heart was rent with unspeakable pain.
'Oh! I love you so much,' I sobbed, and the scalding tears fell from
the little girl's eyes upon my cheeks. 'I am so--so fond of you, good
boy,' she cried, pressing a last kiss upon my lips. 'Annunciata,' the
voice cried again; and the little girl disappeared behind the bushes.
Now that, Margaret, was the moment when the mighty spark of love fell
upon my soul, and it will gather strength, and, enkindling flame after
flame, will continue to burn there for ever. A few days afterwards I
was turned out of the house.
"Father Bluenose told me, since I did not cease talking about the
lovely child who had appeared to me, and whose sweet voice I thought I
heard in the rustling of the trees, in the gushing murmurs of the
springs, and in the mysterious soughing of the sea--yes, then Father
Bluenose told me that the girl could be none other than Nenolo's
daughter Annunciata, who had come to the villa with her mother
Francesca, but had left it again on the following day. O mother--
Margaret--help me. Heaven! This Annunciata--is the Dogess." And Antonio
buried his face in the pillows, weeping and sobbing with unspeakable
emotion.
"My dear Tonino," said the old woman, "rouse yourself and be a man;
come, do resist bravely this foolish emotion. Come, come, how can you
think of despairing when you are in love? For whom does the golden
flower of hope blossom if not for the lover? You do not know in the
evening what the morning may bring; what you have beheld in your dreams
comes to meet you in living form. The castle that hovered in the air
stands all at once on the earth, a substantial and splendid building.
See here, Tonino, you are not paying the least heed to my words; but my
little finger tells me, and so does somebody else as well, that the
bright standard of love is gaily waving for you out at sea. Patience,
Tonino--patience, my boy!" Thus the old woman sought to comfort poor
Antonio; and her words did really sound like sweet music. He would not
let her leave him again. The beggar-woman had disappeared from the
steps of the Franciscan Church, and in her stead people saw Signor
Antonio's housekeeper, dressed in becoming matronly style, limping
about St. Mark's Square and buying the requisite provisions for his
table.
Holy Thursday was come. It was to be celebrated on this occasion in
more magnificent fashion than it had ever been before. In the middle of
the Piazzetta of St. Mark's a high staging was erected for a special
kind of artistic fire--something perfectly new, which was to be
exhibited by a Greek--a man experienced in such matters. In the evening
old Falieri came out on the balcony along with his beautiful lady,
reflecting his pride and happiness in the magnificence of his
surroundings, and with radiant eyes challenging all who stood near to
admire and wonder. As he was about to take his seat on the chair of
state he perceived Michele Steno actually on the same balcony with him,
and saw that he had chosen a position whence he could keep his eyes
constantly fixed upon the Dogess, and must of necessity be observed by
her. Completely overmastered by furious rage, and wild with jealousy,
Falieri shouted in a loud and commanding tone that Steno was to be at
once removed from the balcony. Michele Steno raised his hand against
Falieri, but that same moment the guards appeared, and compelled him to
quit his place, which he did, foaming with rage and grinding his teeth,
and threatening revenge in the most horrible imprecations.
Meanwhile Antonio, utterly beside himself at sight of his beloved
Annunciata, had made his way out through the crowd, and was striding
backwards and forwards in the darkness of the night alone along the
edge of the sea, his heart rent by unutterable anguish. He debated
within himself whether it would not be better to extinguish the
consuming fire within him in the ice-cold waves than to be slowly
tortured to death by hopeless pain. But little was wanting, and he had
leapt into the sea; he was already standing on the last step that goes
down to the water, when a voice called to him from a little boat, "Ay,
a very good evening to you, Signor Antonio." By the reflection cast by
the illuminations of the Square, he recognised that it was merry
Pietro, one of his former comrades. He was standing in the boat, his
new cap adorned with feathers and tinsel, and his new striped jacket
gaily decorated with ribbons, whilst he held in his hand a large and
beautiful nosegay of sweet-scented flowers. "Good evening, Pietro,"
shouted Antonio back, "what grand folks are you going to row to-night
that you are decked off so fine?" "Oh!" replied Pietro, dancing till
his boat rocked; "see you, Signor Antonio, I am going to earn my three
sequins to-day; for I'm going to make the journey up to St. Mark's
Tower and then down again, to take this nosegay to the beautiful
Dogess." "But isn't that a risky and break-neck adventure, Pietro, my
friend?" asked Antonio. "Well," he replied, "there is some little
chance of breaking one's neck, especially as we go to-day right through
the middle of the artificial fire. The Greek says, to be sure, that he
has arranged everything so that the fire will not hurt a hair of
anybody's head, but"---- Pietro shrugged his shoulders.
Antonio stepped down to Pietro in the boat, and now perceived that he
stood close in front of the machine, which was fastened to a rope
coming out of the sea. Other ropes, by means of which the machine was
to be drawn up, were lost in the night. "Now listen, Pietro," began
Antonio, after a silent pause, "see here, comrade, if you could earn
ten sequins to-day without exposing your life to danger, would it not
be more agreeable to you?" "Why, of course," and Pietro burst into a
good hearty laugh. "Well then," continued Antonio, "take these ten
sequins and change clothes with me, and let me take your place, I will
go up instead of you. Do, my good friend and comrade, Pietro, let me go
up." Pietro shook his head dubiously, and weighing the money in his
hand, said, "You are very kind, Signor Antonio, to still call a poor
devil like me your comrade, and you are generous as well. The money I
should certainly like very much; but, on the other hand, to place this
nosegay in our beautiful Dogess's hand myself, to hear her sweet
voice--and after all that's really why I am ready to risk my life.
Well, since it is you, Signor Antonio, I close with your offer." They
both hastily changed their clothes; and hardly was Antonio dressed when
Pietro cried, "Quick, into the machine; the signal is given." At the
same moment the sea was lit up with the reflection of thousands of
bright flashes, and all the air along the margin of the sea rang with
loud reverberating thunders. Right through the midst of the hissing
crackling flames of the artificial fire, Antonio rose up into the air
with the speed of a hurricane, and shot down uninjured upon the
balcony, hovering in front of the Dogess. She had risen to her feet and
stepped forward; he felt her breath on his cheeks; he gave her the
nosegay. But in the unspeakable delirious delight of the moment he was
clasped as if in red-hot arms by the fiery pain of hopeless love.
Senseless, insane with longing, rapture, anguish, he grasped her hand,
and covered it with burning kisses, crying in the sharp tone of
despairing misery, "O Annunciata!" Then the machine, like a blind
instrument of fate, whisked him away from his beloved back to the sea,
where he sank down stunned, quite exhausted, into Pietro's arms, who
was waiting for him in the boat.
Meanwhile the Doge's balcony was the scene of tumult and confusion. A
small strip of paper had been found fastened to the Doge's seat,
containing in the common Venetian dialect the words:
Il Dose Falier della bella muier,
I altri la gode é lui la mantien.
(The Doge Falieri, the husband of the beautiful lady; others kiss her,
and he--he keeps her.)
Old Falieri burst into a violent fit of passion, and swore that the
severest punishment should overtake the man who had been guilty of this
audacious offence. As he cast his eyes about they fell upon Michele
Steno standing beneath the balcony in the Square, in the full light of
the torches; he at once commanded his guards to arrest him as the
instigator of the outrage. This command of the Doge's provoked a
universal cry of dissent; in giving way to his overmastering rage he
was offering insult to both Seignory and populace, violating the rights
of the former, and spoiling the latter's enjoyment of their holiday.
The members of the Seignory left their places; but old Marino Bodoeri
mixed among the people, actively representing the grave nature of the
outrage that had been done to the head of the state, and seeking to
direct the popular hatred upon Michele Steno. Nor had Falieri judged
wrongly; for Michele Steno, on being expelled from the Duke's balcony,
had really hurried off home, and there written the above-mentioned
slanderous words; then when all eyes were fixed upon the artificial
fire, he had fastened the strip of paper to the Doge's seat, and
withdrawn from the gallery again unobserved. He maliciously hoped it
would be a galling blow for them, for both the Doge and the Dogess, and
that the wound would rankle deeply--so deeply as to touch a vital part.
Willingly and openly he admitted the deed, and transferred all blame to
the Doge, since he had been the first to give umbrage to _him_.
The Seignory had been for some time dissatisfied with their chief, for
instead of meeting the just expectations of the state, he gave proofs
daily that the fiery warlike courage in his frozen and worn-out heart
was merely like the artificial fire which bursts with a furious rush
out of the rocket-apparatus, but immediately disappears in black
lifeless flakes, and has accomplished nothing. Moreover, since his
union with his young and beautiful wife (it had long before leaked out
that he was married to her directly after attaining to the Dogate) old
Falieri's jealousy no longer let him appear in the character of heroic
captain, but rather of _vechio Pantalone_ (old fool); hence it was that
the Seignory, nursing their swelling resentment, were more inclined to
condone Michele Steno's fault, than to see justice done to their
deeply-wounded chief. The matter was referred by the Council of Ten to
the Forty, one of the leaders of which Michele had formerly been. The
verdict was that Michele Steno had already suffered sufficiently, and a
month's banishment was quite punishment enough for the offence. This
sentence only served to feed anew and more fully old Falieri's
bitterness against a Seignory which, instead of protecting their own
head, had the impudence to punish insults that were offered to him as
they would offences of merely the most insignificant description.
As generally happens in the case of lovers, once a single ray of the
happiness of love has fallen upon them, they are surrounded for days
and weeks and months by a sort of golden veil, and dream dreams of
Paradise; and so Antonio could not recover himself from the stupefying
rapture of that happy moment; he could hardly breathe for delirious
sadness. He had been well scolded by the old woman for running such a
great risk; and she never ceased mumbling and grumbling about exposure
to unnecessary danger.
But one day she came hopping and dancing with her staff in the strange
way she had when apparently affected by some foreign magical influence.
Without heeding Antonio's words and questions, she began to chuckle and
laugh, and kindling a small fire in the stove, she put a little pan on
it, into which she poured several ingredients from many various-
coloured phials, and made a salve, which she put into a little box;
then she limped out of the house again, chuckling and laughing. She did
not return until late at night, when she sat down in the easy-chair,
panting and coughing for breath; and after she had in a measure
recovered from her great exhaustion, she at length began, "Tonino, my
boy Tonino, whom do you think I have come from? See--try if you can
guess. Whom do I come from? where have I been?" Antonio looked at her,
and a singular instinctive feeling took possession of him. "Well now,"
chuckled the old woman, "I have come from her--her herself, from the
pretty dove, lovely Annunciata." "Don't drive me mad, old woman!"
shouted Antonio. "What do you say?" continued she, "I am always
thinking about you, my Tonino.
"This morning, whilst I was haggling for some fine fruit under the
peristyle of the Palace, I heard the people talking with bated breath
of the accident that had befallen the beautiful Dogess. I inquired
again and again of several people, and at last a big, uncultivated, red
haired fellow, who stood leaning against a column, yawning and chawing
lemons, said to me, 'Oh well, a young scorpion has been trying its
little teeth on the little finger of her left hand, and there's been a
drop or two of blood shed--that's all. My master, Signor Doctor
Giovanni Basseggio, is now in the palace, and he has, no doubt, before
this cut off her pretty hand, and the finger with it.' Just as the
fellow was telling me this there arose a great noise on the broad
steps, and a little man--such a tiny little man--came rolling down at
our feet, screaming and lamenting, for the guards had kicked him down
as if he had been a nine pin. The people gathered round him, laughing
heartily; the little man struggled and fought with his legs in the air
without being able to get up; but the red-haired fellow rushed forward,
snatched up the little doctor, tucked him under his arm, and ran off
with him as fast as his legs could carry him to the Canal, where he got
into a gondola with him and rowed away--the little doctor screaming and
yelling with all his might the whole time. I knew how it was; just as
Signor Basseggio was getting his knife ready to cut off the pretty
hand, the Doge had had him kicked down the steps. I also thought of
something else--quick--quick as you can--go home make a salve--and then
come back here to the Ducal Palace.
"And I stood on the great stairs with my bright little phial in my
hand. Old Falieri was just coming down; he darted a glance at me, and,
his choler rising, said, 'What does this old woman want here?' Then I
curtsied low--quite down to the ground--as well as I could, and told
him that I had a nice remedy which would very soon cure the beautiful
Dogess. When the old man heard that, he fixed a terrible keen look upon
me, and stroked his grey beard into order; then he seized me by both
shoulders and pushed me upstairs and on into the chamber, where I
nearly fell all my length. O Tonino, there was the pretty child
reclining on a couch, as pale as death, sighing and moaning with pain
and softly lamenting, 'Oh! I am poisoned in every vein.' But I at once
set to work and took off the simple doctor's silly plaster. O just
Heaven! her dear little hand--all red as red--and swollen. Well, well,
my salve cooled it--soothed it. 'That does it good; yes, that does it
good,' softly whispered the sick darling. Then Marino cried quite
delighted, 'You shall have a thousand sequins, old woman, if you save
me the Dogess;' and therewith he left the room.
"For three hours I sat there, holding her little hand in mine, stroking
and attending to it. Then the darling woman woke up out of the gentle
slumber into which she had fallen, and no longer felt any pain. After I
had made a fresh poultice, she looked at me with eyes brimming with
gladness. Then I said, 'O most noble lady, you once saved a boy's life
when you killed the little snake that was about to attack him as he
slept.' O Tonino, you should have seen the hot blood rush into her pale
face, as if a ray of the setting sun had fallen upon it--and how her
eyes flashed with the fire of joy. 'Oh! yes, old woman,' she said, 'oh!
I was quite a child then--it was at my father's country villa. Oh! he
was a dear pretty boy--I often think of him now. I don't think I have
ever had a single happy experience since that time.' Then I began to
talk about you, that you were in Venice, that your heart still beat
with the love and rapture of that moment, that, in order to gaze _once_
more in the heavenly eyes of the angel who saved you, you had faced the
risk of the dangerous aerial voyage, that you it was who had given her
the nosegay on Holy Thursday. 'O Tonino, Tonino,' she cried in an
ecstasy of delight, 'I felt it, I felt it; when he pressed my hand to
his lips, when he named my name, I could not conceive why it went so
strangely to my heart; it was indeed pleasure, but pain as well. Bring
him here, bring him to me--the pretty boy.'" As the old woman said this
Antonio threw himself upon his knees and cried like one insane, "O good
God! pray let no dire fate overtake me now--now at least until I have
seen her, have pressed her to my heart." He wanted the old woman to
take him to the Palace the very next day; but she flatly refused, since
old Falieri was in the habit of paying visits to his sick wife nearly
every hour that came.
Several days went by; the old woman had completely cured the Dogess;
but as yet it had been quite impossible to take Antonio to see her. The
old woman soothed his impatience as well as she could, always repeating
that she was constantly talking to beautiful Annunciata about the
Antonio whose life she had saved, and who loved her so passionately.
Tormented by all the pangs of desire and yearning love, Antonio spent
his time in going about in his gondola and restlessly traversing the
squares. But his footsteps involuntarily turned time after time in the
direction of the Ducal Palace. One day he saw Pietro standing on the
bridge close to the back part of the Palace, opposite the prisons,
leaning on a gay-coloured oar, whilst a gondola, fastened to one of the
pillars, was rocking on the Canal. Although small, it had a comfortable
little deck, was adorned with tasteful carvings, and even decorated
with the Venetian flag, so that it bore some resemblance to the
Bucentaur. As soon as Pietro saw his former comrade he shouted out to
him, "Hi! Signor Antonio, the best of good greetings to you; your
sequins have brought me good luck." Antonio asked somewhat absently
what sort of good luck he meant, and learned the important intelligence
that nearly every evening Pietro had to take the Doge and Dogess in his
gondola across to Giudecca, where the Doge had a nice house not far
from San Giorgio Maggiore. Antonio stared at Pietro, and then burst out
spasmodically, "Comrade, you may earn another ten sequins and more if
you like. Let me take your place; I will row the Doge over." But Pietro
informed him that he could not think of doing so, for the Doge knew him
and would not trust himself with anybody else. At length when Antonio,
his mind excited by all the tortures of love, began to give way to
unbridled anger, and violently importune him, and to swear in an insane
and ridiculous fashion that he would leap after the gondola and drag it
down under the sea, Pietro replied laughing, "Why, Signor Antonio,
Signor Antonio, why, I declare you have quite lost yourself in the
Dogess's beautiful eyes." But he consented to allow Antonio to go with
him as his assistant in rowing; he would excuse it to old Falieri on
the ground of the weight of the boat, as well, as being himself a
little weak and unwell, and old Falieri did always think the gondola
went too slowly on this trip. Off Antonio ran, and he only just
returned to the bridge in time, dressed in coarse oarsman's clothing,
his face stained, and with a long moustache stuck above his lips, for
the Doge came down from the Palace with the Dogess, both attired most
splendidly and magnificently. "Who's that stranger fellow there?" began
the Doge angrily to Pietro; and it required all Pietro's most solemn
asseverations that he really required an assistant, before the old man
could be induced to allow Antonio to help row the gondola.
It often happens that in the midst of the wildest delirium of delight
and rapture the soul, strengthened as it were by the power of the
moment, is able to impose fetters upon itself, and to control the
flames of passion which threaten to blaze out from the heart. In a
similar way Antonio, albeit he was close beside the lovely Annunciata
and the seam of her dress touched him, was able to hide his consuming
passion by maintaining a firm and powerful hold upon his oar, and,
whilst avoiding any greater risk, by only glancing at her momentarily
now and then. Old Falieri was all smirks and smiles; he kissed and
fondled beautiful Annunciata's little white hands, and threw his arm
around her slender waist. In the middle of the channel, when St. Mark's
Square and magnificent Venice with all her proud towers and palaces lay
extended before them, old Falieri raised his head and said, gazing
proudly about him, "Now, my darling, is it not a grand thing to ride on
the sea with the lord--the husband of the sea? Yes, my darling, don't
be jealous of my bride, who is submissively bearing us on her broad
bosom. Listen to the gentle splashing of the wavelets; are they not
words of love which she is whispering to the husband who rules her?
Yes, yes, my darling, you indeed wear my ring on your finger, but she
below guards in the depths of her bosom the ring of betrothal which I
threw to her." "Oh! my princely Sir," began Annunciata, "oh! how can
this cold treacherous water be your bride? it quite makes me shiver to
think that you are married to this proud imperious element." Old
Falieri laughed till his chin and beard tottered and shook. "Don't
distress yourself, my pet," he said, "it's far better, of course, to
rest in your soft warm arms than in the ice-cold lap of my bride below
there; but it's a grand thing to ride on the sea with the lord of the
sea!" Just as the Doge was saying these words, the faint strains of
music at a distance came floating towards them. The notes of a soft
male voice, gliding along the waves of the sea, came nearer and nearer;
the words that were sung were--
Ah! senza amare,
Andare sul mare,
Col sposo del' mare
Non puo consolare.
Other voices took up the strain, and the same words were repeated again
and again in every-varying alternation, until the song died away like
the soft breath of the wind as it were. Old Falieri appeared not to pay
the slightest heed to the song; on the contrary, he was relating to the
Dogess with much prolixity the meaning and history of the solemnity
which takes place on Ascension Day when the Doge throws his ring from
the Bucentaur and is married to the sea.