XXX.
A long and serious illness.—My recovery.—The doctors differ.—One of my sisters takes the veil.—Beginnings of literary squabbles, and other trifles.
In the midst of these annoyances, I found the time and strength to pursue my literary studies, especially in the now neglected art of poetry, and enjoyed excellent health; when suddenly, one night, a violent hemorrhage from the lungs warned me that the life of mortals hangs upon the frailest thread.
Bleeding, vegetable diet, and a frugality in food, which few, I think, are capable of continuing for as long a space of time as I can, together with my philosophical indifference to death, restored me to something like a tolerable state of health.
It seemed to me at this period that my two brothers and I, who always kept together, were in a position to settle down again into our paternal home. Mme. Ghellini Balbi, who had rented the house for more than five years, politely retired at my request, and found another habitation at S. Agostino. I furnished our ancestral nest as decently as I was able; and we were soon installed there. It was then that I invited my youngest sister to leave her convent and join us, travelling myself to Pordenone for this purpose.
Whether through weakness, or human influence, or Divine inspiration, I know not; but I found the good girl obstinate against my prayers, my anger, and my threats. She entreated with a holy stubbornness to be left in prison, to be indulged in her desire to pass her lifetime in that blessed aviary of virgins. I commanded her to come home for at least three or four months. At the end of that time, if she still persisted in her pious fanaticism, I promised to play the part of executioner at her request. She replied with a serious enthusiasm, which made me laugh, that she knew enough of the world to be experienced in its wickedness; and when I insisted, she met me with rather less than heavenly doggedness by remarking that nothing short of cutting her in pieces would make her quit the convent-gratings. Though I did not believe that this ultimatum was dictated by the angels, I bent my head in order to avoid a scandal. On taking the veil, she received those appointments and allowances which are usually bestowed upon the brides of Christ.
Were I to fix my thoughts upon the troubles which my four married sisters have had to suffer and still suffer—and I am only too well informed about them—I should be obliged to admit that the youngest chose the better part in life. They were always in straits, always weeping, with their gentle natures and their illimitable powers of endurance. One of them died before my eyes, to my deep sorrow, only because she was a wife. Meanwhile, the nun, beloved by her sisters, placidly smiled at things which we, refined in pleasures, finding nowhere solid pleasure for our satisfaction, would call barbarous tortures, and took delight in little treats, which we philosophers, past-masters in the arts of greed, are wont to scorn and turn our backs upon. In due course she attained the highest rank of Abbess in her convent; and I believe she was more gratified with this honour than Louis XVI. with his titles of King of France and of Navarre.[146]
Time had at length allayed the discords of our family. My two remaining sisters found husbands. My brother Gasparo obtained a post at the University of Padua, which brought him six hundred ducats a year, besides pecuniary gratifications for extraordinary services.[147] This proves that literature is not wholly unremunerated in Venice. In addition to these emoluments, he found another way, legitimate indeed, but one which seems incredible, for accumulating the sequins so much needed after his theatrical disaster. There was not a marriage, a taking of the veil among our noble families, an election of a Doge, or procurator, or grand chancellor, without my brother being engaged to produce the panegyrics or poems which are usual on such occasions—more sought perhaps by fashion than by studious readers. The patricians made it their custom to reward him with a hundred sequins, which contributed to the splendour of their families, but did him little good, for in his hands money found wings and flew away.
These details have little to do with my Memoirs; yet they are honourable to my nation, and are not without a certain bearing on my subject. Poetical trifles, published by me in collections, found favour by some aspect of novelty and by genial satire on contemporary fashions. Unluckily, they got me the reputation of a good poet and good writer. Accordingly, many of our lords tried to press me into the ranks of the Raccoglitori—collectors and compilers of occasional verse-books. They did not know that I had adopted for my motto that line of Berni:—
| "Voleva far da se, non comandato." |
| "His master he would be, and no man's man." |
Whenever they did me the honour to force this function on me, I civilly declined, and sent their messengers on to my brother, without, however, refusing compositions of my own, which swelled the collections, to their gain or loss as chance might have it.