Rule of the Monk Part 21

The stains of slavery are only to be finally washed out with blood. The more intelligent and wealthier cla.s.ses ought once for all to understand this, and to spare humanity the false solutions which settle nothing.

In other days, Venice, following the impetus given by her sister Lombardy, effaced the many years of her humiliation and servility in blood. It is not so now. She emerges from foreign dominion, not through her own acts, but by the courage of others. Oh! if only her liberty had been won by the valor of her brethren! But no, she was redeemed by foreign swords. Sadowa, the glory of Prussia, freed Venice, and the Italian nation asks no veil to hide this dishonor.

Nations, like individuals, require dignity to live--require the life of the soul besides mere physical existence, to which our rulers would condemn us.

Once the Queen of the Adriatic carried her proud lion into the far east, repressed the victorious Ottoman, and dictated laws to him. The monarchs of Europe, invoked and backed by the jealous Italian States, conspired together against Venice, and were driven off by the amphibious and brave republicans. Who would now recognize those proud compatriots of the Dandoli and the Morosini in the ranks of men who require the foreigner to free them, and, when free, throw themselves among the offscourings of "the Moderates"--a party ready for any abas.e.m.e.nt, for any infamy.

How tyranny alters the n.o.blest beings, and emasculates them! Take comfort, however, Venetians; you do not stand alone, for such as you have I seen the descendants of Leonidas and Cincinnatus. Slavery impressed on the forehead of man such a mark of infamy as to confound him with the beasts of the forest.

However, humbled as they have been, and still are, the Italians do not neglect their amus.e.m.e.nts and their festivals. "Bread and pleasure!" they cry to their tyrants, as of old they cried to their tribunes; and the priest, to please, cheat, and corrupt them, has surrounded himself by a ma.s.s of ostentatious ceremonies, surpa.s.sing all that the impostors of old furnished, to conceal fraud by magnificent display. Do not talk of politics, do not even think of them, but pay, and despoil yourselves with a good grace, so as to support your masters richly, then they will give you to satiety ma.s.ses, processions, festas, games, amus.e.m.e.nts, and sensual pleasures.

The sailing of the Bucentaur was one of the ceremonies very dear to the people when Venice was free, when it had its own Government and Doge. On the day fixed for the festival, the Bucentaur, the most splendid galley of the Republic, decked out with as much ornament and as many banners as possible, glittering with gilding and rich hangings, bore the Doge, the Ministers of State, and the most remarkable beauties of the day, all in gala costume. They started from the palace of St. Mark, and rowed towards the Adriatic. Many other galleys formed a procession, following in the wake of the Bucentaur, as well as a large number of gondolas decked for the holiday, and containing the largest part of the population, male and female.

Oh, beautiful wert thou in those days, ill-fated Queen! when thy Dandoli, thy Morosini, sought, in the name of Venice, to propitiate the waves on behalf of the bold navigators of the Adriatic. Hail to thee, Republic of nine centuries! true mother of Republics! Yet if in thy greatness thou hadst a.s.sociated with thine Italian sisters instead of hating them, the foreigner would not have trodden us all down and enslaved us. Hide the wounds that your chains have made, smooth the lines that misery has impressed on your forehead. Do not forget, whether rejoicing or sorrowing, those humiliations through which you have pa.s.sed, and henceforth remember that only when united can Italy defy the great foreign powers who are jealous of her uprise.

General Garibaldi stood leaning against a balcony of St. Mark's Palace, which looked over the lagoon, in the company of our fair Romans, with Muzio, Orazio, and Gasparo. He was listening to an old cicerone, who was dilating on the ancient glories of the Republic, and after having spoken on a variety of subjects, this individual had arrived at the description of the festival of the Bucentaur. He expressed his regret at not being able to see one of them nowadays, and pointed to the spot whence from the mole started the famous craft, when suddenly Muzio's eye was arrested by a well-known face, which appeared at the entrance of the cabin of a gondola drawn up at the gates of the palace. Muzio disappeared like lightning, and stood before Attilio, who descended, pressed his friend's right hand, and could only articulate the melancholy word, "Dead!"

"It was fated, then, that this relic of Roman greatness should come here to die," murmured the ex-President, having partly heard, partly guessed the tidings of Attilio.

"He died like a brave man," said the chief of the Three Hundred.

"And many Italians know how to die so," thought Muzio; "but it is sweeter to die fighting against the oppressors!"

"I will return to our party," said Muzio, "and consult with the General, that he may turn our excursion in another direction, so as not to expose Irene and Orazio to the shock of meeting the remains of their beloved one; I will afterwards rejoin you with Gasparo."

CHAPTER LX. THE BURIAL

Foscolo has these lines--

A stone to mark my bones from the vaut crop That death soirs on the land or in the sea.

Admiring the mournful poems of this great singer, we are, like him, advocates for honoring the great dead, and truly we believe that doing homage to departed virtue is an incentive to make the living follow in its path. When one thinks, however, of the gaudy pageants with which the priesthood deck the last journey of the dead, one can not help deploring the useless show and the expenditure.

Death that true type of the equality of human beings--death which effectually destroys all worldly superiority, and confounds in one democracy of decay the emperor and the beggar--death, the leveller, must be astonished at so much difference between the funerals of the rich and the poor! He must wonder at so much preparation for the burial of a corpse, and laugh, if death can laugh, at so much mockery of woe, which is frequently the cover for secret joy in the soul of the greedy heir, while in the largest number it is mere indifference. Then the hired weepers--what a pitiful spectacle those are!

We have seen in Moldavia, and we believe the custom is adopted in other countries, that at the funeral of a Bojar a number of women are hired to weep, and what tears they shed! what shouts do those miserable beings utter! As to the grief they must have felt, it was measured by their pay.

These mourners have sometimes returned to our memory while reading parliamentary debates during which certain hired people, or those who hope for hire, burst out into a profusion of "_bravi" and "bravissimi_"

at the insulting speeches, or often at the unprincipled projects, of this or that prime minister.

Prince T------'s funeral was largely attended, because it was known that he was a man of mark. Among the crowd of people who followed the remains, most of them with the greatest indifference, there could be distinguished a few really sad faces. Those were the friends of the dead man, Attilio, Muzio, and Gasparo. The latter especially had eyes swollen by weeping.

The strong nature of the old Roman chief had been shaken by the loss of his friend and master to whom he had been sincerely attached--a proof at once of the kindly nature of the prince, and of the faithful heart of the exile. Was he weeping for the prince? No; for the friend and benefactor.

Oh, how many true friends might the great of the world possess, if they would but open their hearts to generosity--if they would soften the injustice of fate towards those upon whom she lays an unequal hand!

Many there are among the higher cla.s.ses, I know, who are beneficence itself, and some of the women of the n.o.blest houses are distinguished for their amiability and goodness. But these instances are not sufficient for the suffering mult.i.tude; and the majority of the favorites of fortune are not only indifferent to the unfortunate--they seem to add voluntarily to their trials.

The duty and the care of good government should be to ameliorate the poor man's condition; but, unhappily, that duty is unfulfilled, that care is not undertaken. Government thinks only of its own preservation, and of strengthening its own position; to this end it exercises corruption to obtain satellites and accomplices.

The ma.s.s of the prosperous might, to a great extent, correct the capital defect of administration by relieving misery and improving the condition of the people. If the rich would thus only deprive themselves of but a small portion of their superfluities! While the poor want the very necessaries of existence, the tables of the wealthy abound with endless varieties of food, and the rarest and most costly wines. Does the rich man never feel the compunction of conscience which such shameless contrasts ought to bring?

"Why such grief for the loss of one of our enemies, capitano?"

These words were accompanied by a tap on Gasparo's shoulder, both proceeding from an odd-looking man, who was following in the funeral procession. Gasparo turned round, stood for a moment considering his familiar interlocutor, then uttering an exclamation little suited to the solemnity of the scene, and very surprising to those around him--"Evil be to the seventy-two! (a Roman oath), and is it really thee, Marzio?"

"Who else should it be, if not your lieutenant, capitano mio?"

The acquaintance of Gasparo had the type of the regular Italian brigand.

The old man, during the few months of his city life, had somewhat re-polished his appearance; but Marzio, on the contrary, presented the rude aspect of the Roman bandit pure and simple. Tall and squarely-built, it was difficult to meet without a shudder the fierce look darted from those densely black eyes. His hair, black and glossy as a raven, contrasted with his beard, once as dark, now sprinkled with gray. His costume, though somewhat cleaner, differed in other respects very little from that rustic masquerade worn when he had filled the whole country with terror. The famous doublet of dark velvet was not wanting, and if there were not visible externally those indispensable brigand accessories, pistols, dagger, or a two-edged knife, it was a sign that those articles were carefully hidden within. Hats are worn in different fas.h.i.+ons, even by brigands, and Marzio wore his a little inclined towards the right side, like a workman's. Leathern gaiters had been abandoned by Marzio, and he wore his pantaloons, loose ones of blue, with ample pockets.

The occasion did not offer the two men much opportunity of conversation; but it was evident that they met with mutual pleasure and sympathy.

In these times when Italian honor and glory are a mockery, the handful of men called brigands, who have for seven years sustained themselves against one large army, two other armies of carabiniers, a part of another army of national guards, and an entire hostile population--that handful of men, call them what you will, is at least brave. If you rulers, instead of maintaining the disgraceful inst.i.tution of the priest, had occupied yourselves in securing the instruction of the people, these very brigands, instead of becoming the instruments of priestly reaction, would at this moment have been in our ranks, teaching us how one stout fellow can fight twenty.

This, my kind word for the "honest" brigands, is not for the a.s.sa.s.sins, be it understood. And one little piece of comment upon you who sit in high places. When you a.s.saulted the Roman walls--for religious purposes of course--robbing and slaying the poor people who thought you came as Mends, were you less brigands? No, you were worse than banditti--you were traitors.

But you will tell me, "those were republicans and revolutionists, men who trouble the world." And what were you but troublers of the world, and false traitors? This difference exists between your majesties and the bandit: he robs, but seldom kills, while you have not only robbed, but stained your hands for plunder's sake in innocent blood!

Pardon, reader, that this digression has left you in the midst of a funeral, and that the writer has too pa.s.sionately diverged from his path to glance at brigandage on the large as well as the small scale.

When the funeral party reached the cemetery, the remains of the dead were lowered into a grave, over which no voice spoke a word of eulogy.

With all the will to effect good, the action of this young life had been cut short by a premature and rash death. What could be said of the blossom of n.o.ble qualities to which time was denied to bring forth their fruits?

CHAPTER LXI. THE NARRATIVE

We will leave our friends occupied in consoling the afflicted Irene for the loss of her brother, whom she had sincerely loved.

The last of a proud race! This thought would press upon the mind of the fair lady, who, despite her willingness to form a plebeian alliance, still valued, as we have seen, the high rank of her family.

Of the personal fortune which came to her through her brother's death she had not thought, for she was of too generous a nature to mingle an idea of interest with the life or death of a beloved object. The prince's family property, besides, which was in the Roman territory, had been confiscated by those worthy servants of G.o.d whose possessions are "not of this world."

It was not until the friends had returned from the funeral that Attilio and Muzio had consulted with the General about imparting to his sister the knowledge of the fatal catastrophe. The General, calling Orazio and his wife into his room, then first informed them gently of the sad occurrence.

Gasparo, who, with the exception of Irene, grieved the most, found some relief to his sorrow in the newly-acquired society of his former lieutenant. He was also full of the desire to hear the adventures of the man whom he had thought lost forever. The two _ci-devant_ banditti closely shut themselves up in Gasparo's room at the Victoria Hotel, at first conversing eagerly in interrogations and answers, nearly all monosyllabic, oratory not being the forte of brigands, who are more accustomed to deeds than words. After a time, the lieutenant began the following consecutive narrative:-

"After you had informed me, capitano mio, that you were tired of a forest life, and felt disposed to return to a private one, I continued my usual mode of existence, without ever deviating from the plan of action you had enjoined, which was to despoil the rich and the powerful, and to relieve the needy and wretched. Our companions, formed in your school, gave me little cause to reprove them; but if one failed in duty, I punished him without pity; and thus, by the grace of G.o.d, we lived for several years. The charms of womankind were always the rock on which our hearts split; and well you know it, capitano."

At these words, Gasparo began pointing to his snow-white mustache, doubtless remembering more than one gallant adventure in his career of peril.

The lieutenant continued: "You remember that Nanna, the girl that I adored, and on whose account I was so much persecuted by her parents?

Don't for a moment suppose that that dear creature betrayed me; no, her soul was pure as an angel's." And the bold bandit chief put his hand to his eyes.