Accordingly I made up a story, such as I thought would sound favourably in their ears. I pretended that the convent to which I belonged in Germany had been recently broken up; that consequently I had been thrown on the wide world, and wished to be received into some other monastery, under the same laws.
With that hospitality and cheerfulness which are peculiar to the Italian clergy, they, in the first place, entertained me sumptuously, and the Prior formally said, that if no fulfilment of a sacred vow obliged me to travel farther, I was welcome to remain there as long as I chose.
It was now the hour of vespers. The monks went to their appointed places in the choir, and I walked into the church. I was deeply impressed by the bold and magnificent architecture of the great aisle—but, alas! my spirit could now no more be exalted by those raptures which in early days attended me in the church of the Holy Lime-Tree, to which this bore a marked and mysterious resemblance!
When I had completed my devotions at the high altar, I indulged myself in walking through the different subsidiary aisles, contemplating the paintings at various shrines, which, as usual, represented the martyrdoms of the saints, to whom they were severally consecrated. At last I was attracted by a small and retired chapel, where the altar was exquisitely illuminated by the beams of the now setting sun, that streamed in through the painted window.
I wished to examine the picture, and devoutly making the sign of the cross, mounted up the marble steps. Oh, heaven! It was precisely the same, the fatal altar-piece of my own convent—the martyrdom of St Rosalia! Methought, however, the figure was yet more beautiful, more exquisitely attractive and seducing. It was Aurelia, in her fullest bloom of beauty, that I beheld; and my whole past life, which I had begun to forget, with all its wanderings and crimes—the murder of Euphemia, of Hermogen, and of Aurelia, revived on my recollection, as if concentrated instantaneously into one horrible thought, that penetrated my heart and brain, like a burning hot implement of torture.
I threw myself prostrate on the stone floor. I was convulsively shook and torn by my inward conflicts, as if I had been laid on the rack of the most cruel and relentless inquisition. Death would have been welcome—but, alas! death would not come to my relief! Hereupon I began to tear my garments, in the furious rage of despair. I howled in hopeless anguish, so that my voice resounded through the vaulted aisles of the church.
"I am cursed," cried I aloud—"I am cursed for ever. There is for me no grace, no consolation more—neither in this world nor in the next. To hell—to hell am I doomed! Sentence of eternal damnation has gone forth against me—an accursed and abandoned sinner!"
My cries of course alarmed the whole community. People came, lifted me up, and carried me from the altar of St Rosalia. The service was now over, and the monks assembled in the chapel. At their head was the Prior. He looked at me with an indescribable mildness and gravity of expression, which reminded me of Leonardus. He then advanced and took me by the hand, while to me it seemed as if some blessed saint, hovering in the air, held up the miserable sinner above the fiery and bottomless pool of destruction into which he was about to plunge.
"You are ill and feverish, brother," said the Prior; "the fatigues of your long pilgrimage have been too great a trial of your strength, but we shall carry you safely into the sick ward of the convent, where you will be faithfully attended by our physician, and restored to health."