CHAPTER XXVIII. PLOTS, POLITICS, AND PRIESTCRAFT.
It would conduce but little to the business of our story were we to follow the changeful fortunes of the war, and trace the current of events which marked that important campaign. The struggle itself is already well known; the secret history of the contest has yet to be written. We have hinted at some of the machinations which provoked the conflict; we have shown the deep game by which Democracy was urged on to its own destruction; and, by the triumph of Absolutism, the return of the Church to her ancient rule provided and secured; we have vaguely shadowed out the dark wiles by which freedom and anarchy were inseparably confounded, and the cause of liberty was made to seem the denial of all religion. It would take us too far away from the humble track of our tale were we to dwell on this theme, or stop to adduce the various evidences of the truth of our assumption. We pass on, therefore, and leave D'Esmonde the task of chronicling some of the results of that memorable period.
The letter, from which we propose to make some extracts was addressed, like his former one, to his Irish correspondent, and opened with a kind of thanksgiving over the glorious events of the preceding few weeks, wherein victory succeeded victory, and the Austrians once again became the masters of haughty Milan. We pass over the exulting description the Abbé gave of the discord and dissension in the Patriotic ranks; the reckless charges of treachery made against Carlo Alberto himself, for not undertaking the defence of a city destitute of everything; and the violent insubordination of the Lombards as the terrible hour of their retribution drew nigh. We have not space for his graphic narrative of the King's escape from Milan, protected by an Austrian escort, against the murderous assaults of fellow-patriots. These facts are all before the world; nor would it contribute to their better understanding were we to adduce the partisan zeal with which the priest detailed them.
“The struggle, you will thus see,” wrote he, “is over. The
blasphemer and the democrat have fallen together, and it
will take full a century to rally from the humiliation of
such a defeat. Bethink you, my dear Michel, what that same
century may make the Church, and how, if we be but vigorous
and watchful, every breach in the glorious fortress may be
repaired, every outwork strengthened, every bastion newly
mounted, and her whole garrison refreshed and invigorated.
Without a great convulsion like this we were lost! The
torpor of peace brought with it those habits of thought and
reflection—the sworn enemies of all faith! As governments
grew more popular they learned to rely less on our aid.
The glorious sway of Belief was superseded by direct appeals
to what they called common sense, and imperceptibly, but
irrevocably, the world was being Protestantized. Do not
fancy that my fears have exaggerated this evil. I speak of
what I know thoroughly and well. Above all, do not mistake
me, as though I confounded this wide-spread heresy with what
you see around you in Ireland, those backslidings which you
so aptly called 'soup conversions.'
“By Protestantism, I mean something more dangerous than
Anglicanism, which, by the way, has latterly shown itself
the very reverse of an enemy. The peril I dread is that
spirit of examination and inquiry which, emboldened by the
detection of some trumpery trick, goes on to question the
great dogma of our religion. And here I must say, that these
miracles—as they will call them——have been most ill-
judged and ill-timed. Well adapted as they are to stimulate
faith and warm zeal in remote and unvisited villages, they
are serious errors when they aspire to publicity and
challenge detection. I have done all I could to
discountenance them; but even in the Vatican, my dear
Michel, there are men who fancy we are living in the
sixteenth century. What are you to do with a deafness that
cannot be aroused by the blast of a steam-engine, and which
can sleep undisturbed by the thunder of railroads? Well, let
us be thankful for a little breathing time; the danger from
these heretics is over for the present. And here I would ask
of you to mark how the very same result has taken place
wherever the battle was fought. The Church has been
triumphant everywhere. Is this accident, my dear friend?
Was it mere chance that confounded counsels here, and dealt
out ruin to Ireland also? Why did our policy come to a
successful issue, here, by a dangerous conflict; and, with
you, by abstaining from one? Why, because it was truth—
eternal, immutable truth—for which we struggled. I must say
that if our game called for more active exertions, and
perhaps more personal hazards, yours in Ireland was
admirably devised. There never was a more complete
catastrophe than that into which you betrayed your Mitchells
and Meaghers; and does not the blind credulity of such men
strike you as a special and Divine infliction? I own I think
so. They were, with all their hot blood, and all the glow of
their youth, serious thinkers and calm reasoners. They could
detect the finger of England in every tangled scheme, and
yet they never saw the shadow of your hand as it shook in
derision over them. Yes, Michel, the game was most skilfully
played, and I anticipate largely from it. The curtain thus
falls upon the first act of the drama; let us set about to
prepare for its rising. I am far from saying that many
errors—some of the gravest kind—have not been committed in
the conduct of this affair. More than one grand opportunity
has gone by without profit; and even my suggestion about the
restoration of the States of the Church to their ancient
limits within the Venetian provinces—a demand which Rome
has formerly renewed every year since the treaty of Campo
Formio, and which might now have been pressed with success—
even this was neglected! But what could be done with a
runaway Pope and a scattered Consistory? Your letter, my
dear Michel, is a perfect catechism—all questions! I must
try a reply to some, at least, of its inquiries. You are
anxious about the endowment of the Ursulines, and so am I;
but unfortunately I can tell you little of my progress in
that direction. Lady Hester Onslow would appear to have
fallen into an entanglement of some sort with Lord Norwood;
and although I have in my possession the means of preventing
a marriage with him, or annulling it, if it should take
place, yet the very exercise of this power, on my part,
would as inevitably destroy all my influence over her, and
be thus a mere piece of profitless malice. This, therefore,
is a matter of some difficulty, increased, too, by his hasty
departure from Florence—they say for England; but I have no
clew to his destination, for he left this on the very day I
last wrote to you—the day of my visit to the Moskova—in
which you seem to be so much interested. Strangely enough,
Michel, both this man and the Russian seemed to feel that
they were in the toils, and broke away, rather than hazard
an encounter with me. And they were right, too! For the deep
game of life, there is no teaching like that of the
cloister; and if we be not omnipotent, it is owing to our
weakness of purpose. Hildebrand knew this—Boniface knew it
also; but we have fallen upon poor successors of these great
men! What might not a great Pope be in the age we live
in!—one whose ambition was commensurate with his mission,
and who had energy and courage for the task before him! Oh!
how I felt this, some nights ago, as I sat closeted with our
present ruler—would you believe it, Michel, he has no
higher guide or example than the weak and kind-hearted Pius
the Seventh? To imitate him is the whole rule of his
faith, and to resemble him, even in his misfortunes, has
become an ambition. How he strung for me the commonplaces of
that good man, as though they had been the distilled
essences of wisdom! Alas! alas! the great heritage of the
Church has not been won by Quaker Popes.
“You ask about myself. All goes well. The die is cast; and
so far, at least, a great point gained. The Austrians saw
the matter in its true light, and with justice perceived
that diplomacy is a war of reprisals. How I glory in the
anticipation of this vengeance upon England, the encourager
and abettor of all the treason against our Faith! How little
do they suspect the storm that is gathering around them; how
tranquilly are they walking over the ground that is to be
earthquaken! The letters and diplomas are all prepared. The
Bull itself is ready; to-morrow, if it were opportune, I
might be proclaimed a prince of the Church and an Archhishop
of an English see! As in every great event of life the
moment is everything, the question is now one of time.
Guardoni—and I look upon him as the shrewdest of the
cardinals—says, 'Wait! our cause is advancing every day in
England; every post brings us tidings of desertions to our
army,—men distinguished in rank, station, or intellect. In
our controversies we have suffered no defeats, while our
moderation has gained us many well-wishers; we have a tone
of general liberality to work upon that is eminently
favorable to a policy meek, lowly, and unpretending.
Therefore, I say, Wait; and do not forfeit such advantages
for the glory of a pageant' Against this it might be urged,
that the hour is come to proclaim our victory; and that it
would be a craven policy not to unfurl our banner above the
walls we have won! I repose less trust in the force of this
reasoning than in another view of the subject; and it is to
the ricochet of our shot, Michel, that I look for the damage
of our enemy. My calculation is this: the bold pretensions
we advance will arouse the passions of the whole island;
meetings and addresses and petitions will abound. All the
rampant insolence of outraged bigotry, all the blatant
denunciations of insulted protestantism, will burst forth
like a torrent. We shall be assailed in pamphlets and
papers; caricatured, hooted, burned in effigy. A wily and
well-conducted opposition on our part will fan and feed this
flame. Some amongst us will assume the moderate tone: invoke
the equality that pertains to every born Briton, and ask for
the mere undisturbed exercise of our faith. Others, with
greater boldness, will adventure sorties against the enemy,
and thus provoke reply and discussion. To each will be
assigned his suited task. A laboring for the one great
object,—to maintain the national fever at a white heat, to
suffer no interval of calm reflection to come, and to force
upon the Parliament, by the pressure of outward opinion,
some severe or at least some galling act of legislation.
This once accomplished, our game is won, and the great
schism we have so long worked for effected! It will then be
the Government on one side and the Church on the other.
Could you wish for anything better? For myself, I care
little how the campaign be then conducted; the victory must
be our own. I have told you again and again there is no such
policy against England as that of hampering the course of
her justice. It was O'Connell's secret; he had no other; and
he never failed till he attempted something higher. First,
provoke a rash legislation, and then wait for the
discomfiture that will follow it! With all the boasted
working of the great constitution, what a mere trifle
disturbs and disjoints it! Ay, Michel, a rusty nail in the
cylinder will spoil the play of the piston, although the
engine be rated at a thousand horse-power. Such a conflict
with Protestantism is exactly like the effect of a highly
disciplined army taking the field against a mob. With us all is preconcerted, prearranged, and planned; with them everything is impulsive, rash, and ill-advised. This
glorious prerogative of private judgment becomes a capital
snare, when measures should be combined and united. Fancy, I
ask of you,—fancy all the splendid errors of their hot
enthusiasm; think of the blunders they will commit on
platform or pulpit; reflect upon the folly and absurdity
that will fill the columns of the public journals, and all
the bigoted balderdash the press will groan under! What
coarse irony, what Billingsgate shall we hear of our Holy
Church,——her saints, her miracles, and her dogmas,—what
foul invectives against her pious women and their lives of
sanctity! And then think of the glorious harvest that will
follow, as we reply to insult by calm reasonings, to bigotry
by words of charity and enlightenment, appealing to the
nation at large for their judgment on which side truth
should lie,—with intolerance, or with Christian meekness
and submission?
“Prepare, then, I say, for the coming day; the great
campaign is about to open, and neither you nor I, Michel,
will live to see the end of the battle. On this side the
Alps, all has happened as we wished. Italian Liberalism is
crushed and defeated. The Piedmontese are driven back within
their frontier, their army beaten, and their finances all
but exhausted, and Austria is again at the head of Northern
Italy. Rome will now be grander and more glorious than ever.
No more truckling to Liberalism, no more faith in the false
prophets of Freedom. Our gorgeous 'Despotism' will arise
reinvigorated by its trials, and the Church will proclaim
herself the Queen of Europe!
“It is an inestimable advantage to have convinced these meek
and good men here that there is but one road to victory, and
that all alliance with what are called politicians is but a
snare and a delusion.
“The Pope sees this at last, but nothing short of wounded
pride could have taught him the lesson.
“Now to your last query, my dear Michel, and I feel all
gratitude for the warm interest with which you make it.
What is to be done I know not. I am utterly ignorant of my
parentage, even of my birthplace. In the admission-book of
Salamanca I stand thus:
'Samuel Eustace, native of Ireland, aged thirteen years and
seven months; stipendiary of the second class.' There lies
my whole history. A certain Mr. Godfrey had paid all the
expenses of my journey from Louvain, and, up to the period
of his death, continued to maintain me. From Louvain I can
learn nothing. I was a 'Laic' they believed,——perhaps
No. 134 or 137—they do not know which; and these are but
sorry facts from which to derive the baptismal registry of a
future cardinal. And yet something must be done, and
speedily too. On the question of birth the Sacred College is
peremptory. You will say that there ought to be no
difficulty in devising a genealogy where there are no
adverse claims to conflict; and if I could go over to
Ireland, perhaps the matter might be easy enough. At this
moment, however, my presence here is all-essential, while I
am not without a hope that accident may afford me a clew to
what I seek. A few days ago I was sent for from Malgherra to
attend the dying bed of a young officer, whose illness had
so completely disordered his brain that he forgot every word
of the foreign language he was accustomed to speak, and
could only understand or reply in his native English.
Although I had other and more pressing cases to attend to,
the order coming from an archduke made obedience imperative,
and so I hastened over to Verona, where the sick youth lay.
Conceive my surprise, Michel, to discover that he was the
same Dalton,—the boy whom I have so often adverted to, as
eternally crossing my path in life,—the relative of that
Godfrey who was my early patron. I have already confessed to
you, Michel, that I felt towards this youth in a way for
which my calmest reason could render no account. Gamblers
have often told me of certain antipathies they have
experienced, and that the mere presence of an individual—
one totally unknown to them, perhaps—has been so ominous of
ill-luck that they dare not risk a bet while he remained in
the room. I know you will say that men who pass their lives
in the alternation of hope and fear become the slaves of
every shadow that crosses the imagination, and that they are
sorry pilots to trust to. So they are, Michel; they art
meanly minded, they are sordid, and they are low; their
thoughts never soar above the card or the hazard table; they
are dead to all emotions of family and affection; the very
events that are convulsing the world are less audible to
their ears than the ring of the dice-box; and yet, with all
this—would you believe it?—they are deep in the mysteries
of portents. Their intense study of what we call chance has
taught them to combine and arrange and discipline every atom
and accident that can influence an event. They have their
days of good and evil fortune, and they have their agencies
that sway them to this side or to that. Chemistry shows us
that substances that resemble metals are decomposed by the
influence of light alone,—do not, then, despise the working
of that gleam that darts from a human eye and penetrates
within the very recesses of your brain.
“Be the theory true or false, the phenomena exercise a deep
influence over me, and I have never ceased to regard this
boy as one inextricably interwoven with myself and my own
fortunes; I felt a degree of dread at his contact, which all
my conscious superiority of mind and intellect could not
allay. In vain have I endeavored to reason myself out of
these delusions, but in the realm of imagination reason is
inoperative; as well might a painter try to commit to his
palette the fleeting colors of the rainbow. Shall I own to
you that in moments of illness or depression this terror
magnified itself to giant proportions, and a thousand wild
and incongruous fancies would fill my mind? I bethought me
of involving him in such difficulty that he would no longer
be at large; as a prisoner or an exile, I should never see
him more. Every snare I tried was a failure; the temptations
that were most adapted to his nature he resisted; the wiles
I threw around him he escaped from. Was there not a fate in
all this? Assuredly there was and is, Michel. I cannot tell
you the relief of mind I should feel if this boy had shared
the fate of your patriots, and that the great sea was to
roll between him and Europe forever. Twenty times a day I
think of Dirk Hatteraick's expression with respect to Brown:
'That boy has been a rock ahead of me all through life;' and
be assured that the characters of fiction are often powerful
teachers.
“And now to my narrative. The same note which requested my
visit at Verona begged of me, if I possibly could accomplish
it, to provide some English person who should sit up with
the sick youth and nurse him. I was not sorry to receive
this commission; I wished to learn more about this boy than
the confessional at such a time could teach; and could I
only find a suitable agent, this would not be difficult.
Chance favored me strangely enough. Amongst the prisoners
taken at Ancona I found an Irish fellow, who, it appears,
had taken service in the Piedmontese navy. He had been some
years in America and the West Indies, and from the scattered
remarks that he let fall, I perceived that he was a man of
shrewd and not over-scrupulous nature. He comprehended me in
an instant; and, although I was most guarded in giving my
instructions, the fellow read my intentions at once. This
shrewdness might, in other circumstances, have its
inconveniences, but here it gave me no alarm. I was the
means of his liberation, and were he troublesome, I could
consign him to the prison again,—to the galleys, if needed.
In company with this respectable ally, I set out for the
headquarters. On my arrival I waited on the Count von
Auersberg, in whose house the sick boy lay. This old man,
who is Irish by birth, is more Austrian in nature than the
members of the House of Hapsburg.
I found him fully convinced that the white-coated legions
had reconquered Lombardy by their own unaided valor, and I
left him in the same pleasant delusion. It appeared that a
certain Count von Walstein was enabled to clear young
Dalton's character from all taint of treason, by exhibiting,
in his own correspondence, some letters and documents that
related to the events detailed in Frank's writing, and of
which he could have had no possible knowledge. This avowal
may be a serious thing for Walstein, but rescues the young
Dalton at once, and proves that he was merely the writer of
Ravitzky's sentiments; so that here, again, Michel, he
escapes. Is not this more than strange?
“It was not without anxiety that I passed the threshold of
the sick-chamber; but happily it was darkened, and I soon
saw that the sick youth could never recognize me, were his
senses even unclouded. He lay motionless, and I thought
insensible; but after I spoke to him he rallied a little,
and asked after his father and his sisters. He had not yet
heard that his father was dead; and it was affecting to hear
the attempt he made to vindicate his honor, and show that he
had never been disloyal. By degrees I brought him to talk of
himself. He saw that he was dying, and had no fears of
death; but there seemed as if his conscience was burdened by
some heavy weight, less like guilt than the clew to some
strange and dark affair. The revelation—if it deserved the
name, for it was made in broken sentences—now uttered with
rapid vehemence, now scarcely audible——was of the vaguest
kind. You may imagine, however, the interest I felt in the
narrative as the name Godfrey passed his lips. To know my
anxiety to trace some tie of family to these Godfreys. They
were gentry of ancient blood and good name, and would amply
satisfy the demands of the Sacred College; so that when the
boy spoke of Godfrey, I listened with intense curiosity;
but—shall I own it?—all my practised skill, all my science
of the sick-bed, was unable to tell me what were the
utterings of an unclouded intellect, and what the wild
fitful fancies of fever. I know, for I have repeatedly heard
it from his sister's lips, that this youth has never been in
Ireland, and yet he spoke of the peculiar scenery of a
certain spot just as if he had traversed it yesterday. Mind,
that I am carefully distinguishing between what might be the
impression left by often hearing of a scene from others, and
that which results from personal observation. His was
altogether of the latter kind. As, for instance, when
describing a garden, he mentioned how the wind wafted the
branches of a weeping ash across a window, so as to confuse
the scene that went on within; and then he shuddered
terribly, and, with a low sigh, exclaimed, 'The light went
out after that.' These are not ravings, Michel. This boy
knows something of that dark mystery I have more than once
alluded to in my letters. Could it be that his own father
was in some way implicated in the affair? Bear in mind how
he came to live abroad, and never returned to Ireland. From
all I can learn, the old Dalton was a bold and reckless
character, that would scarcely have stopped at anything.
Assuredly, the son's conscience is heavily burdened! Now,
there is an easy way to test the truth or fallacy of all
this; and herein you must aid me, Michel. I have carefully
noted every word the boy spoke; I have treasured every
syllable that fell from him. If his description of the scene
be correct, the mystery may be unravelled. This you can
speedily ascertain by visiting the spot. It is not more than
twenty miles from you, and about three or four, I believe,
from the little village of Inistioge; it is called Corrig-
O'Neal,—a place of some importance once, but now, as I
hear, a ruin. Go thither, Michel, and tell me correctly all
these several points. First, does the character of the river
scenery suddenly change at this spot, and, from an aspect of
rich and leafy beauty, exhibit only dark and barren
mountains without a tree or a shrub? Is the old manor-house
itself only a short distance from the stream, and backed by
these same gloomy mountains? The house itself, if unaltered,
should be high-peaked in roof, with tall, narrow windows,
and a long terrace in front; an imitation, in fact, of an
old French château. These, as you will see, are such facts
as might have been heard from another; but now I come to
some less likely to have been so learned.
“From this boy's wanderings, I collect that there is a
woodland path through these grounds, skirting the river in
some places, and carried along the mountain-side by a track
escarped in the rock itself. If this ever existed, its
traces will still be visible. I am most curious to know this
fact. I can see the profound impression it has made on the
youth's mind, by the various ways in which he recurs to it,
and the deep emotion it always evokes. At times, indeed, his
revelations grow into something like actual descriptions of
an event he had witnessed; as, for instance, last night he
started from his sleep, his brow all covered with
perspiration, and his eyes glaring wildly. 'Hush!' he cried;
'hush! He is crossing the garden, now; there he is at the
door; lie still—lie still.' I tried to induce him to talk
on, but he shuddered timidly, and merely said, 'It's all
over, he has strewn leaves over the spot, let us go away.'
you will perhaps say that I attach undue importance to what
may be the mere outpourings of a fevered intellect, but
there is an intensity in the feeling which accompanies them,
and, moreover, there is a persistence in the way he always
comes back to them, that are not like the transient terrors
that haunt distracted minds. No, Michel, there is a mystery,
and a dreadful one, connected with this vision. Remember!
that the secret of Godfrey's death has never been cleared
up; the breach which separated him from these Daltons was
then at its widest. Dalton's character you are familiar
with; and, although abroad at that time, who can say what
agencies may not have worked for him? Give your serious
consideration to these facts, and tell me what you think.
You know me too well and too long to suppose that I am
actuated by motives of mere curiosity, or simply the desire
to trace the history of a crime. I own to you, that with all
my horror of blood, I scarcely grieve as I witness the
fruitless attempts of English justice to search out the
story of a murder. I feel a sort of satisfaction at the
combat between Saxon dulness and Celtic craft—between the
brute force of the conqueror and the subtle intelligence of
the conquered—that tells me of a time to come when these
relations shall be reversed. Acquit me, therefore, of any
undue zeal for the observance of laws that only remind me of
our slavery. However clear and limpid the stream may look, I
never forget that its source was in foulness! I am impelled
here by a force that my reason cannot account for. My
boyhood was, in some manner, bound up with this Godfrey's
fate. I was fatherless when he died! could he have been my
father? This thought continually recurs to me! Such a
discovery would be of great value to me just now; the
question of legitimacy would be easily got over, as I seek
for none of the benefits of succession. I only want what
will satisfy the Sacred College. My dear Michel, I commit
all this to your care and industry; give me your aid and
your advice. Should it happen that Dalton was involved in
the affair, the secret might have its value. This old field-
marshal's pride of name and family could be turned to good
account.
“I must tell you that since I have overheard this boy's
ravings, I have studiously avoided introducing my Irish
protégé into the sickroom. My friend, Paul Meekins, might
be a most inconvenient confidant, and so I shall keep him
under my own eye till some opportunity occurs to dispose of
him. He tells me that his present tastes are all
ecclesiastical. Do you want a sacristan? if so, he would
be your man. There is no such trusty subordinate as the
fellow with what the French call 'a dark antecedent;' and
this I suspect to be his case.
“I have well wearied you, my dear friend, and yet have I not
told you half of what I feel on this strange matter. I am
little given to tremble at shadows, and still there are
terrors over me that I cannot shake off. Write to me, then,
at once; tell me all that you see, all that you can hear.
Observe well the localities; it will be curious if the boy
be correct. Mark particularly if there be a spot of rising
ground from which the garden is visible, and the windows
that look into it, and see if there be a door out of the
garden at this point. I could almost map out the scene
from his description.
“I have done, and now, I scarcely know whether I should feel
more relief of heart to know that all this youth has said
were fever wanderings, or words of solemn meaning. It is
strange how tranquilly I can move through the great events
of life, and yet how much a thing like this can shake my
nerve; but I suppose it is ever so, and that we are great or
little as the occasion makes us.
“I have just heard that Lady Hester Onslow has gone over to
Ireland. She will probably be at Corrig-O'Neal. If so, you
can present yourself to her as my old and intimate friend,
and this will afford you an opportunity of examining the
scene at leisure. I enclose you a few lines to serve as an
introduction. Adieu, my dear friend.
“You have often sighed over the obscurity of your position,
and the unambitious life of a parish priest. Believe me, and
from my heart I say it, I would willingly exchange all the
rewards I have won, all that I could ever hope to win, for
one week—one short week—of such calm quiet as breathes
under the thatched roof of your little cottage.
“I leave this for Vienna to-morrow, to thank the minister;
and with good reason, too, since without his assistance the
Pope would have shrunk from the bold policy. Thence I go to
Rome; but within a fortnight I shall be back in Florence,
where I hope to hear from you. If all goes well, we shall
meet soon.—Yours, in much affection,
Mathew D'Esmonde.”
As the Abbé finished this letter, he turned to look at a short note, which, having opened and scanned over, he had thrown on the table beside him. It was from Albert Jekyl, who wrote to inform him that Lord Norwood had just arrived in Florence from Ireland, where he had left Lady Hester; that so far as he, Jekyl, could make out, the Viscount had made an offer of marriage, and been accepted.
“It will be for you, my dear Abbé,” added he, “to ascertain
this fact positively, as, independently of the long journey
at this inclement season, it would be a very serious injury
to me were it known that I advanced pretensions that were
not responded to. He who has never failed must not risk a
defeat. Pray lose no time in investigating this affair, for
Florence is filling fast, and my future plans will depend on
your reply.”
The priest bestowed little attention on the small gossipry that filled up the page. His eye, however, caught the name of Midchekoff, and he read,——
“The Prince returned last Tuesday to the Moskova, but no one
has seen him, nor has any one been admitted within the
gates. Of course there are a hundred rumors as to the why
and the wherefore,——some alleging that he has received
orders of 'réclusion,' as they call it, from home, the
Emperor not being quite satisfied with his political
campaign; some, that he has taken up a grudge against the
court here, and shows his spleen in this fashion. But what
shallow reason would this be for a hermit life? and what
legitimate ground of complaint have not we, who, so to say,
possess a vested interest in his truffles and ortolans and
dry champagne? I assure you that such conduct rouses all the
democracy of my nature, and I write these lines with a red
silk cap on my head. After all, the real good he effected
was a kind of reflected light. He crushed little people, and
ground down all their puny efforts at balls, dinners, and
déjeuners. He shamed into modest insignificance such a
world of snobbery, and threw an air of ridicule over 'small
early partyism' and 'family dinners.' What a world of
dyspepsia has he thus averted,——what heartburns and
heartburnings! Oh, little people! little people! ye are a
very dreadful generation, for ye muddy the waters of
society, so that no man can drink thereof.
“Politically, we are calm and reactionary; and whether it be
thrashing has done it, I know not, but some of the Tuscans
are 'Black and Yellow' already. Not that the dear Austrians
promise to make Florence better or pleasanter. They mix
badly with our population. It is as if you threw a spoonful
of 'sauerkraut' into your 'potage à la reine!' Besides, the
Italians are like the Chinese,——unchanged and
unchangeable,—and they detest the advent of all strangers
who would interfere with their own little, soft, sleepy, and
enervating code of wickedness.
“Pray send me three lines, just to say——Is it to be or
not to be? Rose, the tailor, is persecuting me about a
mocha-brown, for a wedding garment, which certainly would
harmonize well with the prevailing tints of my hair and
eyebrows, but I am too prudent a diplomatist to incur
'extraordinaires' till I be sure of 'my mission.' Therefore
write at once, for such is my confidence in your skill and
ability that I only wait your mandate to launch into kid
gloves and lacquered leather, quite regardless of expense.
“Yours, most devotedly,
“Albert JEKYL.
“I open this to say that Morlache was seen going to the
Moskora last night with two caskets of jewels. Will this
fact throw any light on the mysterious seclusion?”
These last two lines D'Esmonde read over several times; and then, crashing the note in his hand, he threw it into the fire. Within an hour after he was on his way to Florence.