On the road to Rome, leading out into the Campagna, a young man might
have been seen wending his way towards the hill country where shoot down
the spurs of the Apennines. At a glance he was not an Italian. A fine
open face, with cheeks of ruddy hue, curls caressing them, of a rich
auburn colour; but, above all, a frame of strong, almost herculean,
build, borne forward by a free unfettered step, pronounced a son of the
north--a Saxon! A portfolio under his arm, a palette carried in his
left hand alongside, some half-dozen camel's-brushes, clearly proclaimed
his profession--a painter in search of a subject.
There was nothing in all this to attract the attention of those he met
or passed upon the route--neither the personal appearance of the painter
nor the paraphernalia that declared his calling. An artist on the roads
around Rome is an entity that may be often encountered--though perhaps
not so often as a bandit.
If any one took notice of the individual in question, it was merely to
remark that he was a stranger--_un Inglese_--and perhaps wonder why he
was trudging out towards the hills, while he might be enjoying himself
ten times better in the cabarets and inns of the Eternal City.
That the artist in question was "_Inglese_," no one who saw him doubted;
nor will the reader, when told that he was no other than Henry Harding.
Why he was upon a Roman instead of an English road is already known.
Flung upon his own resources in the great city of London--too proud to
return to his father's home, stung by what he fancied to have been a
refusal to his last request--he had, under the tutelage of his Italian
friend, now taken to painting as his profession. He had not stained
canvas without some success--enough to justify him in following the
advice of Luigi Torreani, and completing his studies under the bright
skies of Italy, and amid the classic scenes of the seven-hilled city.
Thither had he found his way, with no other support than the precarious
earnings of his pencil. This was fully evidenced by his threadbare coat
and chafed _chaussure_, as he trudged afoot along the dusty road of the
Romagna.
Whither was he going? He was far enough out to have almost lost sight
of the Eternal City, and those classic monuments that only give proof of
its decay. These, one would think, should have been the objects of his
study--the subjects upon which to perfect it. And so they had been. He
had painted them one after another--portal and palace, sculptured figure
and fresco, Capitol and Coliseum--till his head was tired with such art
delineation; and he was now on his way to the hills, to drink from the
pure fountain of Nature--to fling rock and stream and tree upon the
canvas, under the light of an Italian sun, and the canopy of an azure
sky.
It was his first journey to the Campagna; he was going without a guide,
only inquiring now and then for Valdiorno, a small mountain town lying
near the Neapolitan frontier. To the "_sindico_" of this place he
carried a letter of introduction, obtained from his son, who was the
young Italian artist he had left behind him in London. But the chief
object of this country excursion was to find some scene _paintable_, and
worthy of being painted.
He had not made many miles along his route before he was tempted to
stop, and this more than once. Every turn of the road presented him
with a landscape; every peasant would have made a picture. He resisted
these allurements with the thought, that these landscapes, so near to
the city, might all have been sketched before; while the peasants could
be caught at any time, in the streets of Rome itself, and there painted
in all their picturesqueness.
On towards some shaggy hills he saw looming out in the distance; and on
went he, until near the close of the day he found himself toiling up a
steep ravine, whose every turn gave him a tableau worthy of being
transferred to canvas, framed, and conspicuously suspended against the
walls of the Royal Academy.
After a slight repast drawn from his wallet, and a smoke from his
meerschaum pipe, he set about painting a scene, he had at length
selected. He fought against the fatigue of his journey, for the sake of
catching a magnificent mellow sunset that had welcomed his approach to
the place. He had no need to add to the "composition" of his picture.
Rocks, trees, cliffs, torrents foaming over them, points of _chiaro_ and
_oscuro_, abruptly contrasted--all were under his eye. If there was
aught wanting to give life to the landscape, it was only a few figures--
animal or human--and these he could fill in according to his fancy.
"Ah," he reflected aloud, "just the scene for a band of brigands. I'd
give something to have a half-dozen of them in the foreground. I could
then make a picture of these fantastic Turpins drawn from real life--a
thing, I take it, which has never been done before. That would be
something to hang up in the Royal Academy--something worth wasting
colour and canvas on. I'd give--"
"How much?" answered a voice that seemed to issue out of the rocks
behind him. "How much would you give, Master Painter, for that you
speak o'? If you bid high enough, I dare say I mout find the means o'
accommodatin' you."
Along with the voice came the footsteps of a man--not in soft, stealthy
tread, as of one approaching unawares, but with a quick thump, as the
man himself dropped down from a rock above upon the little platform
where the artist had planted his sticks. The latter looked up, at first
in surprise, then rather in pleased admiration. He was thinking only of
his art, and before him stood the very model of his imagination--a man
clad in a complete suit of plush and coloured velvet, breeched,
bandaged, and belted, with a plumed hat upon his head, and a short
carbine across his arms--in costume and caparison the beau-ideal of a
brigand. Two things alone hindered him from appearing the true heroic
type of stage representation, such as we are accustomed to see in
"Mazzaroni" and the "Devil's Brother." There was a broad Saxon face,
and a tongue unmistakably from the shire of Somerset. Both were so
marked, that but for the velveteen knee-breeches, the waist-belt, the
elaborately buttoned vest, and the plumed hat upon his head, Henry
Harding might have thought himself at home, and in the presence of a man
he had met before.
Ere the young artist had sufficiently recovered from his surprise to
respond to the unexpected salutation, the picturesque stranger
continued--
"Want to paint brigands, do ye? Well, there's a chance for ye now. The
band's close by. Jess wait a bit; I'll call 'em down. Hey, there,
captin!" he cried, changing his English to Italian, "ye may come on.
It's only one o' them poor devils o' daubers from the city. He wants to
take our likenesses. I s'pose you've no objection to his doin' it?"
Before the painter could make response, or remove his paraphernalia out
of the way, the ledge he had selected for his "point of view" was
crowded with figures--one and all of them so picturesquely attired, that
had they stood in the Corso, or elsewhere within police protection, he
would have been only too delighted to have painted them with the most
Pre-Raphaelitish detail. As it was, all thoughts of art were chased out
of his mind. He saw that he was encircled by banditti!
To attempt to retreat was out of the question. They were above, below,
on all sides of him. Even had he been swifter than any of the gang,
their carbines were slung handy _en bandouliere_; and a volley from
these would certainly have checked his flight. There was no alternative
but to resign himself to his fate--which was now to be made a captive.