📔 Francesca Carrara

Quotes from this book

The prodigal heir can only waste his own substance, and the punishment falls, as it should, upon himself; but the prince has an awful responsibility,—the welfare of others is required at his hands; his faults and his follies take a wide range, and not with him does their suffering end. The Duchesse's boudoir was fitted up in a style of luxury utterly different from anything before familiar to the Carraras. One day he came not: I was told, and truly, that business the most imperative required his personal attendance; yet I could not force the ghastly terror of his illness from my mind. I dared not tempt my fate by content—the agony which I suffered seemed a sort of expiation. Francesca was soon disencumbered of her riding-hood and cloak; and the three young people, left together, became rapidly acquainted. "Do not name it!" answered he, passionately. "God forgive me! I cannot yet bear its name. But for its ill-starred birth, Henriette might now be living. What is there in that unconscious infant to replace its mother?" It was as if the countenance were for a brief while allowed to wear the likeness of the peaceful and spiritual world whither the soul had departed. The mule knows the hidden pitfalls of the morass; the swallow feels the storm ere it comes upon the air, and wings to the quiet shelter of its nest—they foresee their dangers, and avoid them; while we blindly rush forward into the depths of the pit and the fury of the tempest; for we know not what evils await us. No kind foreknowledge gives us even the choice of avoidance. Moreover, you must remember, even as children, Marie was ever more resolute than myself; and now, how little would she heed remonstrance of mine! While from their lovely climate, the poets native to their sweet south, the old ruins hallowed with the memories of other days, the lovely paintings, the still diviner statues, which had been their constant companions—the character had imperceptibly caught a tone of romance, calculated long to resist the inroads of worldliness and deceit. There was a tone, too, of pastoral poetry shed over the new scenes to which they were just introduced, that had a greater effect from the contrast to those, artificial and crowded, which they had just left. They were interrupted by the entrance of an unlooked-for visitor, the Chevalier de Joinville. Francesca gazed round, as we gaze in some half-waking dream, of whose illusion we seem aware, and yet partake. Then upsprung a single star, lonely and lovely over the far sea. I remember once, when as children we were playing together in the castle plaisaunce, a gipsy told us of our future. ...the blaze on the hearth was flickering and faint, while the pale moonlight shone quietly into that room of disappointment and death, as it had a thousand times shone on its lonely and deluding pursuits. So much for the occupant of the britscha, who waits, as all the horses are out at a ball or a scrutiny. No self-complacency can equal that of the selfish. Not content with its indulgence, they actually idolise it into being praiseworthy. If the fair Mancini manages the son as her uncle has managed the mother, France is but a heir-loom to the Mazarins. Whose funeral rites could they be that needed such mysterious and secret solemnisation? White flags waved from the windows; flowers were flung down in profusion; not a voice was raised but in huzzas—not a hand but in applause. Voiture carried this talent to perfection. His letters were charming—full of point and flattery; and his conversation sparkled with bon-mots and compliments. The human heart was never made for solitude; thoughts were meant to be expressed, feelings meant to be partaken. But the beauty of the glades was the hawthorn, in full luxuriance. The slightest motion brought down a shower of white blossoms, and the sweet air grew yet sweeter as the brothers approached the more sequestered parts. She had outraged every rule of the court, mocked their proprieties, and infringed their decorums; yet they talked of her genius, and called her la Reine philosophique. Lucy raised her face, carnationed with the most vivid blush, but hid it again. But, alas! those who are heirs of the future, destined to fill the earth with the immortal and the beautiful, what is their share in the present? the sad and the weary path—the bowed-down and broken heart! Mounted on a snow-white horse, whose trappings of scarlet and gold swept the ground, and whose curvetting served but to show the graceful management of the rider;... Close beside a tranquil pool, for the moonbeams melted harmoniously into its quiet depths, was an old tree. The golden expanse was only varied by knots of the green snake-grass, with its slender and feathery leaves—the most graceful of herbs. She felt a melancholy satisfaction in gazing for the last time on a scene so indelibly impressed with Madame de Mercœur's image. How many instances of her sweet and gentle temper rose so touchingly to memory! Her expectations were, however, of a more subdued kind—the very depth of a woman's affection casts its own shadow, and love and fear are with her twin-born. Had the reproaches been more biting, or the taunts more keen, Buckingham might have been amused by them; but, such as they were, they proved exceedingly tiresome; and weariness took the form of pity for Francesca. "He will certainly talk the poor girl to death," thought he; and he looked sympathisingly on her pale and melancholy countenance. "Nay," replied Louis, with a half smile, "but the ballet shall be one of the fêtes we meditate in her honour. Demi-savage as the Swede is, of course royalty must be royally entertained." But she heard the quick steps passing along the gravel-walk; she listened to their echo with anxiety, even tenderness; all became silent, and her heart filled with sorrow for the anguish she had inflicted. ...we must now show the effect of Cromwell's death on our other actors; and cross the Irish channel, to where Henry, the younger son of the Protector, resided, the government of Ireland having been intrusted to his charge. He was interested in their genuine, yet refined simplicity; and, moreover, the most worn and worldly natures vindicate their humanity by occasional preferences and motiveless likings. Francesca looked down and blushed,—first at the earnest gaze of Louis's face; and, secondly, but still deeper, at her own folly in having individualised a general expression "The Duc de Guise," said Mercœur, "is quite my beau ideal of the days of chivalry. His adventures, whether of love or war, seem like the old Provençal ballads; my only marvel is, where in these days he finds his romantic matériel." Look at the arduous exertion required of middle life; the thronging anxieties that spring up for others more than for ourselves; the constant downfal of our best-laid projects; the disappointment attending on the result of those which had mocked us with success;... The ivy, clinging round that side of the old church, shone with its broad green leaves, which caught a double radiance from the moon and from the small diamond panes of the Gothic windows which the long drooping branches enwreathed. Alas! the young patriot was soon taught a wholesome lesson of submission to the powers that be; for from. a corner-house out came his mother, a slight, active, viragoish-looking woman. The benefit has not, as yet, been equal to the evil; we have not yet succeeded to our hope—liberty is still insecure, and England is still rent by small factions, distracted by foolish bigotries, and now at the will of one man; yet the good seed has been sown. The lamp stood on the table, and Carrara leant by the huge tome spread out before him; and opposite sat Beatrice, bending over her broidery—the small head, with its rich knot of gathered hair, so exquisitely placed—the slender figure, so graceful in its attitude. Francesca felt oppressed as she gazed on the bare walls, the wooden pallet, the crucifix at the foot, where the wan light of the ill-supplied lamp gave a strange ghastliness to the dying agony of the Saviour. "Once only since my abode in this convent has my heart gone back to the things of its former life; but tenderly—not repiningly. Can I bear to write shame on that fair young brow—send him forth a wanderer from the home of which he has been the delight—sow dissension between a father and son, who now idolise each other? Good, good; I can reach that down when he comes. Madelon, burn some sandal-wood on the stairs; and, Madelon, when I look at the picture of Tragedy, with the dagger and cup, go you, without my telling, into the cellar—here is the key—and bring up a bottle of Burgundy:... Nothing could be more splendid than the marriage; but as such details are only interesting when they are personal, I shall spare you all the cloth of gold, the embroidery, and the precious stones, displayed on the occasion, and merely tell you a pretty comparison made by the young queen. And yet, so inextricably blended are happiness and sorrow on our earth, that fortunate, thrice fortunate, are they who have such ties to sever. ...A worthless mercenary in some foreign service, or an idle loiterer in stranger lands, is all that remains for a life that once believed in its higher and nobler calling." At this moment his page entered with a packet. "Lights!" said Evelyn, carelessly—for, as our readers will have already divined, he was the melancholy soliloquist—... I had been too profoundly disabused of life's dearest illusions ever again to allow of their sweet engrossment. "I have been," muttered he, "dramatising the last week: as it cannot be a comedy, and end with a marriage, let it be a tragedy, and end with a death. I can be the tyrant—Evelyn the lover ordered to execution. Lord Avonleigh has a double part to sustain—the cruel father, and the minister of my vengeance; while Francesca can go mad in white satin." The morning had been one of great fatigue, so that but few of the court were admitted; and Anne of Austria herself was in that demi-toilette so favourable to the twilight of beauty. She wore a loose dress of gray silk, edged with black, and fastened with loops of pearl. The Chevalier de Joinville made a third in every tête-à-tête, and was de trop in none; for he always talked to them of themselves, or entertained them at the precise moment when there was, though unconfessed, some slight approach to ennui. Bells ringing, flags waving, may-poles—so long unseen—bonfires in due preparation for night, morris-dancers, who had practised for the last four-and-twenty hours unremittingly to refresh their ancient craft, an ox roasted whole, cakes, ale, crowds, confusion,—all assembled in and about Avonleigh Park, to greet the master's return. Her manner to Francesca was very unequal. Sometimes it had all the frankness of their early intimacy; at other times it was forbidding, and even petulant. The pale, chill glimmering of earliest morning was faint in the east, from which the clouds were slowly breaking; there was just light enough to enable her to find her way. She recalled the old hall, with its storied frescoes—the woods, where so many mornings had passed so happily away—the little river, where they used to launch their light boats, made of the green rushes which grew beside; she recalled the blithe chirp of the cicala in the fragrant grass—and the gleam of the fire-flies, glittering by twilight amid the boughs of the myrtle. He was roused from his brief rest by a violent fit of coughing, which seemed to shake the whole system. It was one which in England is so simply, yet so emphatically, denominated a churchyard cough. It was hollow, like the echo of the grave. A few days brought time into that general routine of small observances which make up ordinary existence; but never had Francesca felt herself in a more uncongenial atmosphere. The prisoner flung him off with a force scarcely to be expected from one of his slight figure, and, turning quickly, said, "Let me die like a man!—whatever is my death, let me face it!" No further effort was made to blindfold him; but the carbineers formed their deadly rank, looking, however, towards their commander for the signal. Now, the cheerful sun looks in mockingly; we rejoice not in the face of day; it brings not hope, but memory to our minds; and we only watch the gladdening beams to think that they are shining on the narrow grave. Lord Avonleigh was an angry rather than a vindictive man. Vindictiveness requires more energy of character than he possessed. Indeed, it may be questioned whether he would of himself have taken the violent measures of the preceding evening. On one table were Indian cabinets, wrought in ivory, ebony, tortoise-shell, and amber; on another were the exquisite porcelain of Dresden and Sèvres; a third was heaped with gold and silver stuffs; a fourth, with the colours of the rainbow, in embroidered taffetas; close beside were perfumed gloves, and the rich ribands of Lyons, and velvets from Genoa fit for the mantle of a Queen The host himself was one of those very quiet men whom we usually see linked to the most active helpmates. "Well," said the Duc, with that outward calmness of manner which anger often affects; "so you do not like me? I am sorry for your bad taste! and I bid you good night, quite convinced that you will repent your refusal; and I dare say you will never get married at all." So saying, he left the terrace; while Francesca remained for a few minutes, bewildered by the suddenness of the scene, and half inclined to laugh at the Duc's parting denunciation. Evelyn was but one of many. Reckless, loving pleasure and ease; with much of worldly wealth and aggrandisement to tempt him on the other side of the question; yet was he heart and soul devoted to the Stuarts... It is odd how easily the common-places of morality or of sentiment glide off in conversation. Well, they are "exceedingly helpful," and so Lord Avonleigh found them. It was a boast of Napoleon, that the very weather owned the influence of his auspicious star—his triumphal entry, his procession, or his fête, were always marked by sunshine. We are mortified by not being thought worthy of trust; and there is also a feeling of small triumph in circumventing those who doubt either our inclination or our power of service. I made but one error—giving way to petulance in the earlier instance; that lost me the Prince of Conti. Temper is bourgeois indulgence, though I own to a predilection for it. The young King looked tenderly at Mademoiselle Mancini, who gave him a glance quite as tender in return—not, however, unobserved. His mother had been for some time past a displeased spectator of a predilection which might become dangerous. I must take my leave, for the Cardinal holds a levee to-day, and let those fail in attendance who want nothing. It was a strange scene, the contrasts which met in that large but dilapidated chamber. It had been the banqueting-hall in the ancient palace of the La Franchi, but the revelry and the splendour had long since passed away. Again she felt a return of that utter despondency which had fallen upon her after Guido's death: but then she could indulge in it unmolested, and that was something of relief: now she was forced into exertion... It recalled all the vivid hopes and beliefs of her childhood, when she was wont to kneel before some lovely image, till the face seemed to smile encouragement, and the little supplicant felt as if beneath a mother's eye. The bat and the owl made it their home, the spider wove its dreary tapestry, the grass made its way through the tessellated floors, the moss grew over the untrodden pavement, and the ivy—the fragile and creeping ivy—was now the chief support of the battlements which it had overrun. Charles followed the girl into the gallery, down which she was slowly proceeding, holding the little twisted scroll in her hand, and looking at it with that expression of fear and curiosity which seems to say, "Now, if you were not so intricately folded, I would open you and see your contents; but I shall not be able to replace these folds in proper order if I do—still, I have a great mind to try." The glittering crowd, whose high-sounding names ever and anon reached her ear—the magnificent room—the splendour of the dresses—the diamonds shining amid the elaborately curled tresses she had been accustomed to see in their native darkness, their summer ornament the half-blown rose, and their winter-wreath the myrtle-branch—all oppressed her with the sense of change. She commenced her conversation with the King and his companion by saying, "Pray, do not suspend your fleurettes on my account; next to being in love myself, I like to see other people in love. I shall be a charming confidante.....Christina drew to the card-table, and, lolling upon it with her usual indifference, began to watch the progress of the game, which was now resumed." She was delicately fair, with an aquiline nose, and a mouth the size of which was forgotten in its white teeth and pleasant smile. She wore a peruke of very fair golden hair; and herein was shown the lurking spirit of female vanity: her own tresses had been very beautiful;... With how much lighter a step, with how much brighter an eye, did Francesca wander through the forest, even in the last desolation of autumn, than she did in all the bloom and buoyancy of spring! The very phrase of "generous forbearance" shocked her as overstrained; but she did marvel that Lord Avonleigh felt neither pained nor embarrassed in a situation where such sensations seemed inevitable. And yet it was possible he might love her—love her truly and deeply: if so, of what avail would it be to lower him in her esteem? It were best for Lucy still to gaze with sightless eyes on her idol. Still less has it the dreary moan, the cry as of one in pain, which is borne on a November blast; but it has a music of its own—sad, low, and plaintive, like the last echoes of a forsaken lute—a voice of weeping, but tender and subdued, like the pleasant tears shed over some woful romance of the olden time, telling some mournful chance of the young knight falling in his first battle, or of a maiden pale and perishing with ill-requited love. She looked with a grudging eye on this waste of life and beauty—there was none for him; and the sight of the coffin, with its deep black pall borne slowly along the glancing path, was a contrast of unutterable misery. It was a relief to change the cheerful meadow for the dark umbrage of the forest which they now entered. "It were against all rules, whether of history or romance—whether I look to my grandfather Henri Quatre, or to the less veracious chronicles of Scuderi, and copy Oroondates—to depart without some favour." Louis's brow wore its deepest gloom as he said, "There are few in yonder room who would so cavalierly reject my love." After all, the English hostel owes much of its charms to Chaucer; our associations are of his haunting pictures—his delicate Lady Prioress, his comely young squire, with their pleasant interchange of tale and legend, rise upon the mind's eye in all the fascination of his vivid delineations. He kissed her brow, and left her. She watched him unconsciously, till the winding walk hid him from her sight, and then sank back on her seat, every nerve relaxing from its high-strained excitement into utter and still despondency. The demon of fanaticism was the shape which it took with us; and verily, what with religious republicans, harmonists, quakers, fifth-monarchy men, presbyterians, and the reign of the saints upon earth, it needs the strong hand of a Cromwell to reduce the spiritual chaos to any sort of order. That ceiling was covered with square compartments, each filled with strange figures, flowers, fruit, heraldic devices—all blazoned in the richest colours,... And the man who had just been engaged in the most time-serving neglect of former, and a most cringing anticipation of new patrons, became forthwith the kind and hospitable host of strangers who had no claim upon him beyond their own isolated situation. One of his attendants had found no little favour in the eyes of Alice, who expressed her suspicions that her mistress had some secret correspondence, for two reasons; first, to satisfy a naturally communicative temper—all common people are communicative: and secondly, in hopes of gaining such assistance as might ultimately gratify her own curiosity, now most uncomfortably excited. It was now settled that every body was to be amused by her coarse jest and her odd expressions, and therefore everybody was amused. Moreover, there was another great secret of her popularity; all in her company luxuriated in a little complacent sense of their own superiority,—one of the most agreeable of the senses to indulge. Such was the enterprising individual whose saloon was to-night a representation of the Field of the Cloth of Gold. Madame de Mercœur was at first unwilling that Francesca should share her seclusion; but her young companion was too much in earnest to be refused. Francesca was still depressed by her recent parting with Guido, and clung to Henriette as her only friend,—she would have felt so utterly alone with Marie; besides, she too wished to pray for the absent and the dear. He then added a few general offers of service, but offered as if he would be glad if they were accepted; and when Guido knelt for his parting benediction, it was given with a warmth and sincerity not often used by the apathetic and haughty minister. I heard that she left off powder, patches, and rouge, for a month when his third consort died, and he grew religious—whether out of grief or gratitude, I never heard; then she grew factious, for the sake of your own King, and thought to strew the way to the altar with straws instead of flowers. I applaud her spirit in fighting for a crown. 'Madam, I have a secret to tell you.' Now the very word secret is enough to rouse any one's curiosity; and, giving a quick glance round to see if her duennas were on the alert, she prepared to listen, and I saw that her eye had caught sight of the letter. Again she felt a return of that utter despondency which had fallen upon her after Guido's death: but then she could indulge in it unmolested, and that was something of relief: now she was forced into exertion, that sort of exertion of all the most tiresome, because the least interesting... "We were," replied Marie, "employed in aërial architecture—the future for our groundwork; I was fancying a lover for myself." Francesca, from where she stood, could hear the Queen giving a laughing account of the Due de Domville's attachment to Mademoiselle Menneville, the prettiest of her maids of honour, all of whom were pretty. "It is a passion of the good old time, and has already lasted some four years; but Madame la Duchesse de Vantadour, his mother, will not hear of it. Never before was a lover of fifty so put out, to think that he cannot yet have his own way. Not content with his own cares, when obliged to be absent he leaves his almoner to take charge of her. It is gallantry equally antediluvian and interminable; I suppose they will be married one day, and buried the next." It is commonly said that love never lasts. Now, that is not so much from change, or that it exhausts itself, as that it is mixed up with the paltry cares and daily interests of life; thus losing its ideality, which constitutes its great charm. Francis was enraged at the interference, and opposition made him more in earnest; but just at this time, the civil war, which had hitherto left their part of the country comparatively quiet, arose with great virulence in their immediate vicinity. Francesca wrung her hands in suppressed anguish, and seated herself by the bed-side; it was evident, from the look of gratitude, that her friend recognised her; and she never afterwards moved from her sad watch beside the dying sufferer. What an extraordinary mental delusion jesting is; that sort of laboured vivacity which fancies it is pointed when it is only personal; and more extraordinary still, it is always the resource of stupid people. Suddenly the calm current of their ordinary existence is disturbed by a visit from the reigning monarch; all the little, mean, and malevolent passions—vices, we should rather say—engendered of vanity and vexation of spirit, rise at once to the surface of the troubled waters—troubled by the demon of ambition; and the poor princess is left in mute dismay, to wonder what has become of the humility, the independence, and the content which she had so rashly eulogised. So does hope spring from the burning passions, which consume their home and themselves—so does it wander through the future, making its own charmed path—and so does it evanish away: lost in the horizon, it grows at last too faint for outline. A maiden was seated apart from her companion, the very flowers scattered neglected by her side; but it was obvious that idlesse—that first sweet symptom of love—was pleasanter than her graceful task; for the colour was rich upon her cheek, and the smile parted her scarce conscious lips. But her assertion soon proved its truth. That very evening I met both the Duc de Joyeuse and Mademoiselle Guerchy;—a slight embarrassment on his part, a little air of triumphant impertinence on hers, and an affected but insolent commiseration from Mademoiselle de Guise, told the whole. Monaldeschi staggered against the wall, and remained for a few minutes in a state of almost insensibility, when the Chevalier, drawing his sword, pointed to the Father, who stood nearly as pale and aghast as the man whose confession he was called upon so suddenly to receive. The prisoner sprung forwards, and throwing himself at the Confessor's feet, implored him piteously to hasten to Christina, and intercede for his life. At first, the Captain Sentinelli objected to Mantuony leaving the room with his penitent unshriven; but respect for the holy man at last induced him to allow his proceeding on what he warned him would be a fruitless mission. There was a third class, small indeed when compared to those vast multitudes actuated by fanaticism or interest, but destined to exercise the most beneficial and lasting influence—the reflecting and theoretic few, who saw in universal freedom the only tie between man and his kind—the only rational hope whereon to ground the dissemination of equitable principles among the human race. The present sorrow always exceeds its predecessors—not so the present joy; comparison exaggerates the one, while it diminishes the other; and people talk of their youth as if it had not been a period of feverish sensitiveness, awkward embarrassments, many heart-burnings, and an utter want of that self-reliance which alone can ensure content. And though the annals of the period do not shew us that there was less ale drawn, or less canary called for; men got dry with the heat of polemical discussion, and drunk with a text, not the fag end of a ballad, in their mouths; and people made a sort of morality of straight hair, long faces, and sad-coloured garments. Three children, with the rich brown and richer crimson colour, and the bright black eyes which mark a southern extraction, were rolling on the grass at a little distance; and close beside the fire were seated two men, with red kerchiefs knitted round their close-curled dark hair. There was something in the complexions and the out-of-doors life that at once carried the Italians back to their own country. There might be benefit on one side, and obligation on the other; but their reciprocity of affection, their mutual exchange of small kindnesses—those strongest rivets of common attachment—were no more. Some slight noise had awakened Francesca, and opening her casement, she looked through the thick and misty air, and saw him riding slowly over the heath. The speakers were three men, rather beyond middle life. One was pale and cadaverous, as if every feature gave testimony to the length of his vigils and the rigour of his fasts, while straight black hair hanging down on each side his face added to his wild and neglected appearance. The love of the inanimate is a general feeling. True, it makes no return of affection, neither does it disappoint it; its associations are from our thoughts and emotions. I have scarcely recovered the surprise of the ingenious question, before I meet another surprise in the still more ingenious answer The moon, which had been slowly ascending, now shone through an open space between the trees; and the rippling waters of the brook gave back her light in luminous vibrations. Beside stood seneschals, the appointed witnesses of the ensuing games. Their faults grew suddenly perceptible, and their absurdities an unfailing subject of mimicry. All these, in his hands, became singularly amusing. Francesca, who had little knowledge, and no envy, of the individuals so relentlessly caricatured, could not help being entertained.