"At the age of ten, I began to sing in the streets. One day, as I sang a little piece in Saint Mark's-place at Venice, Maestro Porpora, who was at a café, struck with the accuracy of my voice, and the natural manner my mother had transmitted to me, called me to him, questioned me, followed me to my garret, gave me some little pecuniary aid, and promised to have me admitted into the Scoula dei Mendicanti, one of the free musical schools, of which there are so many in Italy, and whence come eminent artists of both sexes, for the best maestri have the direction of them. I made rapid progress, and Maestro Porpora conceived a friendship for me which soon exposed me to the jealousy and ill-feeling of my companions. Their unjust spite at my rags soon taught me the habit of patience and reserve.
"I do not remember the first day I saw him; but it is certain that at the age of seven or eight years, I already loved—loved a young man, an orphan, friendless, and, like myself, learning music by protection and charity, and living in the streets. Our friendship, or our love, (for it was the same thing), was a chaste and delicious sentiment. We passed together in innocent wanderings all the time not devoted to study. My mother, after having vainly opposed it, sanctioned our intimacy by an oath she made us take to marry as soon as we should be able to support a family.
"At the age of eighteen or nineteen, I was far advanced in singing. Count Zustiniani, a noble Venetian, owner of the Theatre of Saint Samuel, heard me sing at church, and engaged me to replace La Corilla, the prima donna—a beautiful and robust woman, who had been his mistress, and who had been unfaithful to him. This Zustiniani was the protector of my lover Anzoleto, who was engaged with me to sing the chief male parts. Our début was brilliant. He had a magnificent voice, extraordinary ease, and an attractive exterior. All the fine ladies protected him. He was idle, however, and his professor was neither as skillful nor as zealous as mine. His success was less brilliant. He was grieved at first, afterwards he was angry, and at last he became jealous, and I lost his love."
"Is it possible?" said the Princess Amelia, "for such a cause? He was, then, very vile."
"Alas! no, madame, but he was vain and an artiste. He won the protection of Corilla, the dismissed and furious artiste, who took possession of his heart, and made him rapidly lacerate and tear mine. One evening, the Maestro Porpora, who had always opposed our sentiments, because he maintains that a woman, to be a great artiste, must be a stranger to every passion and every preoccupation of the heart, unfolded Anzoleto's treason to me. On the evening of the next day, Count Zustiniani made a declaration of love, which I was far from expecting, and which wounded me deeply. Anzoleto pretended to be jealous, and to say that I was corrupted. He wished to break with me. I left my house in the night: I went to seek my maestro, who is a man prompt to act, and who had used me to act decidedly, he gave me letters, a small sum of money, and a guide-book: he put me in a gondola, accompanied me to the mainland, and, at dawn, I set out alone for Bohemia."
"For Bohemia!" said the Baroness Von Kleist, whom the virtue of Porpora filled with surprise.
"Yes, madame," said the young girl, "in our artistic language, we have the phrase, to travel in Bohemia,"[8] which expresses that one runs through all the risks of poverty, labor, and not unfrequently crime, like the Zingari, whom you call in French Bohemians. I set out, not for this symbolical Bohemia, for which fate seemed to destine me, like many others; but for the chivalric country of the Tcheques, the land of Huss and Ziska, for the Boehmer-wald, for the Giants' Castle, where I was generously received by the family of Rudolstadt."
"Why did you go thither?" said the princess, who listened attentively. "Would any one remember to have seen a child?"
"No, no, I did not remember it myself until long after, when Count Albert by chance discovered, and aided me in discovering the key to this adventure. My master, Porpora, in Germany, had been very intimate with the good Count Christian, the head of the house. The young Baroness Amelia, his niece, wished a governess, that is to say, a companion, who should teach her music and entertain her, in the dull life she led at Riesenberg. Her noble and kind relations received me like a friend, and almost like a relation. I taught nothing, in spite of my disposition, to my beautiful and capricious pupil, and——"
"Count Albert fell in love with you? That must have happened."