"These are bad symptoms for you, dearest Louis," continued the letter of Ferdinand; "but if any thing can be done to protect your paternal rights in this country, my father will do it. And, as to my mother, I believe she thinks of you more than she does of me; but that is because you deserve it better. Write to me from Gibraltar; and say that you will gladly welcome to England your friend,
Ferdinand d'Osorio."
Louis received these packets from Lorenzo, at the house of a Spanish merchant residing in the town of Gibraltar. The Spaniard was known to Santa Cruz, and recommended by him, as a person well adapted to assist in the accomplishment of Louis's views in visiting the rock. He found the house in a retired part of the town, and preferred such a residence before the military bustle of the British quarters.
Having read the letters of his Spanish friends, he put them into a bosom that had long been accustomed so to hide the sorrows of his heart; and, having seen, the Count de Patinos respectfully attended to by Lorenzo, and the other captives comfortably disposed under the care of Martini, he quitted the merchant's house, to seek his first conference with the British Governor.
He had no occasion for other introduction to General ****, than the announcement of his name. The gazettes of Ceuta had been daily in the hands of the British garrison; and the tremendous bombardment of the Spanish fortress having been seen from the heights of Calpe, its gallant defence was read with avidity by the generous spectators. The Marquis de Montemar filled every line in the two last reports; and General **** rose to receive him, with that respect in his deportment, which is the brightest meed that veteran glory can bestow on youthful fame.
While Louis sat with the English Commander, in spite of his late inattention to objects of trifling import, the furniture and style of the apartment struck him as what he had not seen since he left England;—and, he was conscious to an emotion, as if he had drawn at once near to his home; and even felt the atmosphere of this room, different from that in the Spanish quarter of the rock.
It was not necessary, in his conversation with the Governor, to pain himself by any elaborate explanation of his father's rupture with the Spanish Court, and his fatal engagement with that of Morocco. The pillars of Hercules were too near to each other, for what was transacted under the shadow of the one, to be unknown to the inhabitants at the foot of the other. The Governor of Gibraltar admired the greatness of the Duke de Ripperda, when his virtues guided the Spanish helm; and his own virtues did not prevent him pitying the fallen statesman, when his ill-directed resentment made him dictator to a horde of barbarians.
Louis pleaded to himself the partial phrenzy of his father's mind, as some extenuation of his conduct. He learnt from Martini, that the Duke's passions had always been strong; but, until he received the wound on his head in the porch of the Jesuits at Vienna, they were always under his controul. From that perilous hour, his temper became more irritable; and in every way he shewed himself more vulnerable to the attack of circumstances. These circumstances at last overwhelmed him; and, disappointed, insulted, and betrayed, madness contended with reason in his brain. With just enough of the one, to shew him the enormity of his retaliation, and of the other to precipitate him into its commission, he became the desperate victim of revenge; a renegade, and a slave.
Nought of this passed the lips of Louis to the English general; but he understood it all, from the report of certain Jews from the coast of Barbary; and, in conversing with the son of the unhappy Duke, he delicately implied, that he knew his illustrious father had been led to his last fatal step, by the false lights of a distempered mind.
"In his latter hours," replied Louis, "that, indeed fatal disorder was taken away. He was restored to the upright principle of his former character; and his penitence for the effect of his dereliction, was as deep, as his injuries were indelible. But, in that hour of terrible recollections, he forgave all, as he hoped to be forgiven. And I saw him die in the faith of the church."
Louis spoke this with a steady voice; and a certain dignity elevating the sadness of his countenance, which convinced his auditor, that the son of Ripperda felt the honour of his name returned to him, in the restoration of his father to the religion and pardon of his God.