CHAPTER II
TITANIA. If you will patiently dance in our round, And see our moon-light revels, go with us. MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM
Early on the following morning, the travellers set out for Turin.The luxuriant plain, that extends from the feet of the Alps to thatmagnificent city, was not then, as now, shaded by an avenue of treesnine miles in length; but plantations of olives, mulberry and palms,festooned with vines, mingled with the pastoral scenery, through withthe rapid Po, after its descent from the mountains, wandered to meetthe humble Doria at Turin. As they advanced towards this city, the Alps,seen at some distance, began to appear in all their awful sublimity;chain rising over chain in long succession, their higher points darkenedby the hovering clouds, sometimes hid, and at others seen shooting upfar above them; while their lower steeps, broken into fantastic forms,were touched with blue and purplish tints, which, as they changed inlight and shade, seemed to open new scenes to the eye. To the eaststretched the plains of Lombardy, with the towers of Turin rising at adistance; and beyond, the Apennines, bounding the horizon.
The general magnificence of that city, with its vistas of churches andpalaces, branching from the grand square, each opening to a landscape ofthe distant Alps or Apennines, was not only such as Emily had never seenin France, but such as she had never imagined.
Montoni, who had been often at Turin, and cared little about views ofany kind, did not comply with his wife's request, that they might surveysome of the palaces; but staying only till the necessary refreshmentscould be obtained, they set forward for Venice with all possiblerapidity. Montoni's manner, during this journey, was grave, and evenhaughty; and towards Madame Montoni he was more especially reserved; butit was not the reserve of respect so much as of pride and discontent.Of Emily he took little notice. With Cavigni his conversations werecommonly on political or military topics, such as the convulsed stateof their country rendered at this time particularly interesting, Emilyobserved, that, at the mention of any daring exploit, Montoni's eyeslost their sullenness, and seemed instantaneously to gleam with fire;yet they still retained somewhat of a lurking cunning, and she sometimesthought that their fire partook more of the glare of malice than thebrightness of valour, though the latter would well have harmonized withthe high chivalric air of his figure, in which Cavigni, with all his gayand gallant manners, was his inferior.
On entering the Milanese, the gentlemen exchanged their French hats forthe Italian cap of scarlet cloth, embroidered; and Emily was somewhatsurprised to observe, that Montoni added to his the military plume,while Cavigni retained only the feather: which was usually worn withsuch caps: but she at length concluded, that Montoni assumed this ensignof a soldier for convenience, as a means of passing with more safetythrough a country over-run with parties of the military.
Over the beautiful plains of this country the devastations of warwere frequently visible. Where the lands had not been suffered to lieuncultivated, they were often tracked with the steps of the spoiler;the vines were torn down from the branches that had supported them, theolives trampled upon the ground, and even the groves of mulberry treeshad been hewn by the enemy to light fires that destroyed the hamlets andvillages of their owners. Emily turned her eyes with a sigh fromthese painful vestiges of contention, to the Alps of the Grison, thatoverlooked them to the north, whose awful solitudes seemed to offer topersecuted man a secure asylum.
The travellers frequently distinguished troops of soldiers moving ata distance; and they experienced, at the little inns on the road, thescarcity of provision and other inconveniences, which are a part ofthe consequence of intestine war; but they had never reason to be muchalarmed for their immediate safety, and they passed on to Milan withlittle interruption of any kind, where they staid not to survey thegrandeur of the city, or even to view its vast cathedral, which was thenbuilding.
Beyond Milan, the country wore the aspect of a ruder devastation; andthough every thing seemed now quiet, the repose was like that ofdeath, spread over features, which retain the impression of the lastconvulsions.
It was not till they had passed the eastern limits of the Milanese, thatthe travellers saw any troops since they had left Milan, when, as theevening was drawing to a close, they descried what appeared to be anarmy winding onward along the distant plains, whose spears and otherarms caught the last rays of the sun. As the column advanced througha part of the road, contracted between two hillocks, some of thecommanders, on horseback, were distinguished on a small eminence,pointing and making signals for the march; while several of the officerswere riding along the line directing its progress, according to thesigns communicated by those above; and others, separating from thevanguard, which had emerged from the pass, were riding carelessly alongthe plains at some distance to the right of the army.
As they drew nearer, Montoni, distinguishing the feathers that wavedin their caps, and the banners and liveries of the bands that followedthem, thought he knew this to be the small army commanded by the famouscaptain Utaldo, with whom, as well as with some of the other chiefs, hewas personally acquainted. He, therefore, gave orders that the carriagesshould draw up by the side of the road, to await their arrival, andgive them the pass. A faint strain of martial music now stole by, and,gradually strengthening as the troops approached, Emily distinguishedthe drums and trumpets, with the clash of cymbals and of arms, that werestruck by a small party, in time to the march.
Montoni being now certain that these were the bands of the victoriousUtaldo, leaned from the carriage window, and hailed their generalby waving his cap in the air; which compliment the chief returned byraising his spear, and then letting it down again suddenly, while someof his officers, who were riding at a distance from the troops, came upto the carriage, and saluted Montoni as an old acquaintance. The captainhimself soon after arriving, his bands halted while he conversed withMontoni, whom he appeared much rejoiced to see; and from what he said,Emily understood that this was a victorious army, returning into theirown principality; while the numerous waggons, that accompanied them,contained the rich spoils of the enemy, their own wounded soldiers, andthe prisoners they had taken in battle, who were to be ransomed whenthe peace, then negociating between the neighbouring states, should beratified. The chiefs on the following day were to separate, and each,taking his share of the spoil, was to return with his own band to hiscastle. This was therefore to be an evening of uncommon and generalfestivity, in commemoration of the victory they had accomplishedtogether, and of the farewell which the commanders were about to take ofeach other.
Emily, as these officers conversed with Montoni, observed withadmiration, tinctured with awe, their high martial air, mingled withthe haughtiness of the nobless of those days, and heightened by thegallantry of their dress, by the plumes towering on their caps, thearmorial coat, Persian sash, and ancient Spanish cloak. Utaldo, tellingMontoni that his army were going to encamp for the night near a villageat only a few miles distance, invited him to turn back and partakeof their festivity, assuring the ladies also, that they should bepleasantly accommodated; but Montoni excused himself, adding, thatit was his design to reach Verona that evening; and, after someconversation concerning the state of the country towards that city, theyparted.
The travellers proceeded without any interruption; but it was some hoursafter sun-set before they arrived at Verona, whose beautiful environswere therefore not seen by Emily till the following morning; when,leaving that pleasant town at an early hour, they set off for Padua,where they embarked on the Brenta for Venice. Here the scene wasentirely changed; no vestiges of war, such as had deformed the plains ofthe Milanese, appeared; on the contrary, all was peace and elegance. Theverdant banks of the Brenta exhibited a continued landscape of beauty,gaiety, and splendour. Emily gazed with admiration on the villas of theVenetian noblesse, with their cool porticos and colonnades, overhungwith poplars and cypresses of majestic height and lively verdure; ontheir rich orangeries, whose blossoms perfumed the air, and on theluxuriant willows, that dipped thei
r light leaves in the wave, andsheltered from the sun the gay parties whose music came at intervals onthe breeze. The Carnival did, indeed, appear to extend from Venice alongthe whole line of these enchanting shores; the river was gay with boatspassing to that city, exhibiting the fantastic diversity of a masqueradein the dresses of the people within them; and, towards evening, groupsof dancers frequently were seen beneath the trees.
Cavigni, meanwhile, informed her of the names of the noblemen to whomthe several villas they passed belonged, adding light sketches of theircharacters, such as served to amuse rather than to inform, exhibitinghis own wit instead of the delineation of truth. Emily was sometimesdiverted by his conversation; but his gaiety did not entertain MadameMontoni, as it had formerly done; she was frequently grave, and Montoniretained his usual reserve.
Nothing could exceed Emily's admiration on her first view of Venice,with its islets, palaces, and towers rising out of the sea, whose clearsurface reflected the tremulous picture in all its colours. The sun,sinking in the west, tinted the waves and the lofty mountains of Friuli,which skirt the northern shores of the Adriatic, with a saffron glow,while on the marble porticos and colonnades of St. Mark were thrownthe rich lights and shades of evening. As they glided on, the granderfeatures of this city appeared more distinctly: its terraces, crownedwith airy yet majestic fabrics, touched, as they now were, with thesplendour of the setting sun, appeared as if they had been called upfrom the ocean by the wand of an enchanter, rather than reared by mortalhands.
The sun, soon after, sinking to the lower world, the shadow of the earthstole gradually over the waves, and then up the towering sides of themountains of Friuli, till it extinguished even the last upward beamsthat had lingered on their summits, and the melancholy purple of eveningdrew over them, like a thin veil. How deep, how beautiful was thetranquillity that wrapped the scene! All nature seemed to repose; thefinest emotions of the soul were alone awake. Emily's eyes filled withtears of admiration and sublime devotion, as she raised them over thesleeping world to the vast heavens, and heard the notes of solemnmusic, that stole over the waters from a distance. She listened in stillrapture, and no person of the party broke the charm by an enquiry. Thesounds seemed to grow on the air; for so smoothly did the barge glidealong, that its motion was not perceivable, and the fairy city appearedapproaching to welcome the strangers. They now distinguished a femalevoice, accompanied by a few instruments, singing a soft and mournfulair; and its fine expression, as sometimes it seemed pleading with theimpassioned tenderness of love, and then languishing into the cadenceof hopeless grief, declared, that it flowed from no feigned sensibility.Ah! thought Emily, as she sighed and remembered Valancourt, thosestrains come from the heart!
She looked round, with anxious enquiry; the deep twilight, that hadfallen over the scene, admitted only imperfect images to the eye, but,at some distance on the sea, she thought she perceived a gondola: achorus of voices and instruments now swelled on the air--so sweet, sosolemn! it seemed like the hymn of angels descending through the silenceof night! Now it died away, and fancy almost beheld the holy choirreascending towards heaven; then again it swelled with the breeze,trembled awhile, and again died into silence. It brought to Emily'srecollection some lines of her late father, and she repeated in a lowvoice,
Oft I hear, Upon the silence of the midnight air, Celestial voices swell in holy chorus That bears the soul to heaven!
The deep stillness, that succeeded, was as expressive as the strainthat had just ceased. It was uninterrupted for several minutes, tilla general sigh seemed to release the company from their enchantment.Emily, however, long indulged the pleasing sadness, that had stolenupon her spirits; but the gay and busy scene that appeared, as the bargeapproached St. Mark's Place, at length roused her attention. The risingmoon, which threw a shadowy light upon the terraces, and illuminedthe porticos and magnificent arcades that crowned them, discovered thevarious company, whose light steps, soft guitars, and softer voices,echoed through the colonnades.
The music they heard before now passed Montoni's barge, in one of thegondolas, of which several were seen skimming along the moon-light sea,full of gay parties, catching the cool breeze. Most of these had music,made sweeter by the waves over which it floated, and by the measuredsound of oars, as they dashed the sparkling tide. Emily gazed, andlistened, and thought herself in a fairy scene; even Madame Montoni waspleased; Montoni congratulated himself on his return to Venice, whichhe called the first city in the world, and Cavigni was more gay andanimated than ever.
The barge passed on to the grand canal, where Montoni's mansion wassituated. And here, other forms of beauty and of grandeur, such as herimagination had never painted, were unfolded to Emily in the palaces ofSansovino and Palladio, as she glided along the waves. The air bore nosounds, but those of sweetness, echoing along each margin of the canal,and from gondolas on its surface, while groups of masks were seendancing on the moon-light terraces, and seemed almost to realize theromance of fairyland.
The barge stopped before the portico of a large house, from whencea servant of Montoni crossed the terrace, and immediately the partydisembarked. From the portico they passed a noble hall to a stair-caseof marble, which led to a saloon, fitted up in a style of magnificencethat surprised Emily. The walls and ceilings were adorned withhistorical and allegorical paintings, in fresco; silver tripods,depending from chains of the same metal, illumined the apartment, thefloor of which was covered with Indian mats painted in a variety ofcolours and devices; the couches and drapery of the lattices were ofpale green silk, embroidered and fringed with green and gold. Balconylattices opened upon the grand canal, whence rose a confusion of voicesand of musical instruments, and the breeze that gave freshness to theapartment. Emily, considering the gloomy temper of Montoni, looked uponthe splendid furniture of this house with surprise, and remembered thereport of his being a man of broken fortune, with astonishment. 'Ah!'said she to herself, 'if Valancourt could but see this mansion, whatpeace would it give him! He would then be convinced that the report wasgroundless.'
Madame Montoni seemed to assume the air of a princess; but Montoni wasrestless and discontented, and did not even observe the civility ofbidding her welcome to her home.
Soon after his arrival, he ordered his gondola, and, with Cavigni, wentout to mingle in the scenes of the evening. Madame then became seriousand thoughtful. Emily, who was charmed with every thing she saw,endeavoured to enliven her; but reflection had not, with Madame Montoni,subdued caprice and ill-humour, and her answers discovered so much ofboth, that Emily gave up the attempt of diverting her, and withdrew toa lattice, to amuse herself with the scene without, so new and soenchanting.
The first object that attracted her notice was a group of dancers on theterrace below, led by a guitar and some other instruments. The girl, whostruck the guitar, and another, who flourished a tambourine, passedon in a dancing step, and with a light grace and gaiety of heart, thatwould have subdued the goddess of spleen in her worst humour. Afterthese came a group of fantastic figures, some dressed as gondolieri,others as minstrels, while others seemed to defy all description. Theysung in parts, their voices accompanied by a few soft instruments. At alittle distance from the portico they stopped, and Emily distinguishedthe verses of Ariosto. They sung of the wars of the Moors againstCharlemagne, and then of the woes of Orlando: afterwards the measurechanged, and the melancholy sweetness of Petrarch succeeded. Themagic of his grief was assisted by all that Italian music and Italianexpression, heightened by the enchantments of Venetian moonlight, couldgive.
Emily, as she listened, caught the pensive enthusiasm; her tears flowedsilently, while her fancy bore her far away to France and to Valancourt.Each succeeding sonnet, more full of charming sadness than the last,seemed to bind the spell of melancholy: with extreme regret she saw themusicians move on, and her attention followed the strain till thelast faint warble died in air. She then remained sunk in that pensivetranquillity which soft music leaves on the mind--a state like thatpr
oduced by the view of a beautiful landscape by moon-light, or by therecollection of scenes marked with the tenderness of friends lost forever, and with sorrows, which time has mellowed into mild regret. Suchscenes are indeed, to the mind, like 'those faint traces which thememory bears of music that is past'.
Other sounds soon awakened her attention: it was the solemn harmony ofhorns, that swelled from a distance; and, observing the gondolas arrangethemselves along the margin of the terraces, she threw on her veil, and,stepping into the balcony, discerned, in the distant perspective of thecanal, something like a procession, floating on the light surface ofthe water: as it approached, the horns and other instruments mingledsweetly, and soon after the fabled deities of the city seemed to havearisen from the ocean; for Neptune, with Venice personified ashis queen, came on the undulating waves, surrounded by tritons andsea-nymphs. The fantastic splendour of this spectacle, together with thegrandeur of the surrounding palaces, appeared like the vision of a poetsuddenly embodied, and the fanciful images, which it awakened in Emily'smind, lingered there long after the procession had passed away. Sheindulged herself in imagining what might be the manners and delights ofa sea-nymph, till she almost wished to throw off the habit of mortality,and plunge into the green wave to participate them.
'How delightful,' said she, 'to live amidst the coral bowers and crystalcaverns of the ocean, with my sister nymphs, and listen to the soundingwaters above, and to the soft shells of the tritons! and then, aftersun-set, to skim on the surface of the waves round wild rocks and alongsequestered shores, where, perhaps, some pensive wanderer comes to weep!Then would I soothe his sorrows with my sweet music, and offer him froma shell some of the delicious fruit that hangs round Neptune's palace.'
She was recalled from her reverie to a mere mortal supper, and couldnot forbear smiling at the fancies she had been indulging, and at herconviction of the serious displeasure, which Madame Montoni would haveexpressed, could she have been made acquainted with them.
After supper, her aunt sat late, but Montoni did not return, and sheat length retired to rest. If Emily had admired the magnificence of thesaloon, she was not less surprised, on observing the half-furnishedand forlorn appearance of the apartments she passed in the way to herchamber, whither she went through long suites of noble rooms, thatseemed, from their desolate aspect, to have been unoccupied for manyyears. On the walls of some were the faded remains of tapestry; fromothers, painted in fresco, the damps had almost withdrawn both coloursand design. At length she reached her own chamber, spacious, desolate,and lofty, like the rest, with high lattices that opened towards theAdriatic. It brought gloomy images to her mind, but the view of theAdriatic soon gave her others more airy, among which was that of thesea-nymph, whose delights she had before amused herself with picturing;and, anxious to escape from serious reflections, she now endeavouredto throw her fanciful ideas into a train, and concluded the hour withcomposing the following lines:
THE SEA-NYMPH
Down, down a thousand fathom deep, Among the sounding seas I go; Play round the foot of ev'ry steep Whose cliffs above the ocean grow.
There, within their secret cares, I hear the mighty rivers roar; And guide their streams through Neptune's waves To bless the green earth's inmost shore:
And bid the freshen'd waters glide, For fern-crown'd nymphs of lake, or brook, Through winding woods and pastures wide, And many a wild, romantic nook.
For this the nymphs, at fall of eave, Oft dance upon the flow'ry banks, And sing my name, and garlands weave To bear beneath the wave their thanks.
In coral bow'rs I love to lie, And hear the surges roll above, And through the waters view on high The proud ships sail, and gay clouds move.
And oft at midnight's stillest hour, When summer seas the vessel lave, I love to prove my charmful pow'r While floating on the moon-light wave.
And when deep sleep the crew has bound, And the sad lover musing leans O'er the ship's side, I breathe around Such strains as speak no mortal means!
O'er the dim waves his searching eye Sees but the vessel's lengthen'd shade; Above--the moon and azure sky; Entranc'd he hears, and half afraid!
Sometimes, a single note I swell, That, softly sweet, at distance dies; Then wake the magic of my shell, And choral voices round me rise!
The trembling youth, charm'd by my strain, Calls up the crew, who, silent, bend O'er the high deck, but list in vain; My song is hush'd, my wonders end!
Within the mountain's woody bay, Where the tall bark at anchor rides, At twilight hour, with tritons gay, I dance upon the lapsing tides:
And with my sister-nymphs I sport, Till the broad sun looks o'er the floods; Then, swift we seek our crystal court, Deep in the wave, 'mid Neptune's woods.
In cool arcades and glassy halls We pass the sultry hours of noon, Beyond wherever sun-beam falls, Weaving sea-flowers in gay festoon.
The while we chant our ditties sweet To some soft shell that warbles near; Join'd by the murmuring currents, fleet, That glide along our halls so clear.
There, the pale pearl and sapphire blue, And ruby red, and em'rald green, Dart from the domes a changing hue, And sparry columns deck the scene.
When the dark storm scowls o'er the deep, And long, long peals of thunder sound, On some high cliff my watch I keep O'er all the restless seas around:
Till on the ridgy wave afar Comes the lone vessel, labouring slow, Spreading the white foam in the air, With sail and top-mast bending low.
Then, plunge I 'mid the ocean's roar, My way by quiv'ring lightnings shewn, To guide the bark to peaceful shore, And hush the sailor's fearful groan.
And if too late I reach its side To save it from the 'whelming surge, I call my dolphins o'er the tide, To bear the crew where isles emerge.
Their mournful spirits soon I cheer, While round the desert coast I go, With warbled songs they faintly hear, Oft as the stormy gust sinks low.
My music leads to lofty groves, That wild upon the sea-bank wave; Where sweet fruits bloom, and fresh spring roves, And closing boughs the tempest brave.
Then, from the air spirits obey My potent voice they love so well, And, on the clouds, paint visions gay, While strains more sweet at distance swell.
And thus the lonely hours I cheat, Soothing the ship-wreck'd sailor's heart, Till from the waves the storms retreat, And o'er the east the day-beams dart.
Neptune for this oft binds me fast To rocks below, with coral chain, Till all the tempest's over-past, And drowning seamen cry in vain.
Whoe'er ye are that love my lay, Come, when red sun-set tints the wave, To the still sands, where fairies play; There, in cool seas, I love to lave.