I am the Cavaliere Paolo, of Casteluccio, one of the fairest patrimonies in Naples. No young man entered life with brighter prospects than mine, when, at the age of twenty, I found myself master of a handsome fortune and the love of Laura Molina, my fair cousin. I had been betrothed to her in infancy by my father; who, as her guardian, wished to keep her ducats in the family. When at college, the idea of being compelled to marry my little cousin was a source of continual vexation to me; and from very obstinacy made me prone to fall in love with every other girl. My marriage seemed the commencement of something terrible, and I saw with dismay the arrival of my twentieth birthday; when throwing aside gown and tocque, and after spending a year amid the gaieties of Florence and Naples, I should have to demand my bride at the convent where she boarded.
"Per Baccho!" thought I; "if this repugnance is mutual, what a happy couple we shall be!"
On reaching the convent of St. Sabina, I found the inmates were hearing mass performed by Father Petronio, the great ecclesiastical orator of Cosenza. I entered the chapel in no pleasant mood, conning over the compliments which courtesy required should be paid to Laura; who I had been informed was the prettiest girl in a convent which was famous for its fashionable beauties.
"Ah! if Laura is like thee, young girl, what a happy rogue wilt thou be, Signor Paolo!" thought I, as the veil of a young lady (who occupied a stool near a column against which I leaned) was blown aside, revealing to me a face of such mild and perfect beauty that I became quite bewitched, and wished my unlucky cousin in the crater of Etna. Her complexion was extremely fair; her eyes blue and tender, and a quantity of light-brown hair fell curling around a face which had all that softness and bloom of feature one might imagine in a seraph. Enough! for the time, she banished all thoughts of Laura.
At last Father Petronio made an end of his discourse, of which I had not heard a syllable. The people dispersed, and in the crowd of nuns, novices, and boarders, I lost sight of my fair unknown. I turned away with a sigh to visit this provoking cousin, whom I was bound, by my father's will, to espouse, or my ducats would every one be forfeited to the altar of Madonna.
I sent in my card to the abbess, and presented myself at the grate. The Signora Molina was called, and imagine my joy on discovering my betrothed to be the same fair girl whose beauty had impressed me so favourably at church. I conversed with her for an hour, kissed her hand respectfully, and withdrew; thinking myself a most fortunate fellow in being compelled to espouse so handsome a girl, whose fortune was almost equal to my own.
Petronio was the confessor at the convent, and officiated in the same capacity to all the beauties of Cosenza; the ladies would confess their peccadilloes to none other than this celebrated churchman, whose learning, talent, and supposed sanctity, made him the pride of the province: but he was a subtle fiend at heart, as my story will show. He was the confessor of Laura, and to him she confided all her little secrets; until for some cause she dismissed him, and preferred an aged and decrepit Basilian. I remonstrated, but she said there were reasons: adding, with a sweet smile, that I must be her humble servant then if I would have her obey me by-and-bye.
I allowed her to please herself, and passed the time in alternately visiting the convent and my villa, which I was fitting up suitably for the reception of such a bride. The more we saw and knew of each other, the stronger our mutual love became; and often, hand and hand, have we blessed my good and provident father who betrothed us in our childhood.
One night when returning from a café, where I had spent some hours joyously with my friend Captain Valerio and a few of his brother officers, old fellow-students, all choice spirits and roisterers, with whom I had a farewell supper, I had a singular encounter.
It was a lovely Italian night; the brilliancy of the pale moon eclipsed the light of the stars, which disappeared as she rose in her silver glory above the Apennines, and poured her lustre on Cosenza's seven hills—on its steep and lofty streets, and on the round towers of its hoary castello, where Alaric the Goth gave up his soul to God—whilst their giant shadows fell, frowning and dark, on the shining waters of the Bussiento and the Gratis. Midnight tolled from the steeple of Sabina, and the most profound repose pervaded the moonlit city. I gazed on the towering hills, on the wild and ample forest—which in the days of the Brutti extended to the promontory of Rhegium, but is now shrunk to the wood of La Syla—where the wood-cutter and carbonari have replaced the nymphs and satyrs of the ancients; I looked towards the distant sea sparkling in the moonlight, as its waves rolled round the Campo di Mare, and everything slept in silence, beauty, and repose: I was disposed for meditation and reverie—I thought of Laura, and my heart beat happily.