CHAPTER V. CUTTING A KING—MARGHERITA, QUEEN OF HEARTS.
One does not often have the chance of being uncivil to a king. But it was my misfortune on one occasion to be, or to seem, downright rude to Humbert the First.
We were taking a carriage-ride in the Villa Borghese. The sun glared intensely. The broad drives in the grounds had not been sprinkled, and the dust rose in clouds under the few wheels that stirred it up. My eyes were sheltered with blue glasses, and a light umbrella held against the sun cut into the view very seriously. The coachman, after the manner of his race, had been pointing out objects of interest with which we were already perfectly familiar, clothing his superfluous information in a Tuscan patois. We paid no attention to the numerous remarks delivered at us over his left shoulder, as our exhaustive study of the Villa Borghese on previous visits had qualified us as first-class guides to the place. Therefore, when he said something that sounded like “Eel R-ray” (Il Rè), I did not associate the words with the instant approach of the King of Italy.
A moment later a two-horse carriage dashed past us. The horses were black and beautiful, throwing out their fore-legs with a free and splendid action. A gentleman (whom I should not have failed to recognize, but for my blue glasses and the whirl of dust) sat bolt upright on the front seat, guiding his spirited team with a firm hand. The seat behind was occupied by a servant in quiet livery. The equipage came and went like a flash; but, quick as it was, the accomplished driver had time to take off his hat at us, moving it through an arc of about two feet, and replace it. Before I could answer this remarkably courteous salute from an entire stranger, he was off. Meantime coachee had, in his humble way, atoned for my short-coming. He had lifted his hat and bowed profoundly. When all was over, he turned clear round and said again (this time almost reproachfully), “Eel R-ray, signor.” Then I knew that I had cut a king, and that our driver, who had observed my discourtesy with a side eye, was, in effect, chiding me for it.
The good fellow saw that I was flustered by this unpleasant incident; for I really burned with shame to think that I should be guilty of rudeness to the politest of kings in his own capital. So he hastened to explain to me, as nearly as I could make out from his provincial Italian, that the King would be sure to pass us again in a few minutes. For you see the Villa Borghese is not very large, and carriages keep circling about and returning on their tracks. Well, this time I determined to be ahead of the King, and doff my hat first, through as ample a curve as my arm would allow. I shut up the umbrella and pocketed the blue glasses, that nothing might impede the grace of the atoning action. Sure enough, just as we turned the end of a long oval, there was the King bearing down on us again.
Looking at him over my box-seat, I identified him easily by the front view. In all Italy there is no second pair of mustaches like his; they curl like rams’ horns, and are almost as thick. His horses were trotting a two-and-a-half-minute gait, and his piercing black eyes sparkled with pleasure as he watched them. A second more, and he was on our port-bow, as sailors would say. Then was my time. Having the brim of my Derby well in hand, I made a tremendous flourish with it at His Majesty. If gestures convey ideas, then he must have seen that I meant to pay the utmost respect to him as the democratic King of Italy. The monarch instinctively raised his hand to his hat as if to take it off; then, catching a clear sight of my face, he evidently remembered me as the ill-bred person whom he had met in his rounds five minutes before. His eyes were instantly averted. He did not remove his hat. This time the King of Italy had cut me, and had served me just right.
The most affable of coachmen then managed to explain that we should probably intersect the orbit of the King for the third time, if we kept on driving around the grounds. For my own part I had had about enough of it. The King and I were even. So, to avoid the embarrassment of a third meeting, I ordered the man to leave the Villa and go over to the Pincian Hill. He turned the horses for the purpose, but had not proceeded far before the well-known stiff figure and the flaring mustaches intercepted our retreat by dashing down a side-road out of a little piece of woods. I would have given something to avoid the encounter. But there was no escaping it. As the King drew into the main road, the salute I felt bound to make was an awkward one, and I was conscious of a slight tingling in the tips of my ears. His Majesty must have noticed my confusion, for there was an amused look in his eyes, and his mustaches were not thick enough to mask the slight upward curves at the corners of his mouth. And then, in the off-hand way which has made him so genuinely popular, he doffed his hat and returned my bow with accrued interest. So happily ended my first exchange of civilities with a king.
A short ride transferred us from the Villa Borghese to the Pincian Hill. We reached the crest in time to hear the four-o’clock concert, performed before an attentive audience of a hundred persons in carriages and a thousand on foot. The selections were all from Italian composers, and probably known by heart by most of the people present, who stood or sat like statues as if entranced by the music. The band, which belongs to the finest regiment of the Roman garrison, played divinely. But all the charm of their performance could not keep my eyes and thoughts from the Eternal City basking in the warm sunshine below—a wide expanse of churches, palaces and ruins. Almost every church is crowned with a dome, and each of these huge bulbs, whose slates reflect the sun with a dull glow, looks like a feeble imitation of Michael Angelo’s great work. But not one of them detracts from the grandeur of St. Peter’s, which, from whatever point of view it is seen, dwarfs all the rest into insignificance. St. Angelo Castle—in shape a snuff box—the uplifted swell of the Pantheon, the Capitol, the Quirinal Palace, are easily identified through the haze which envelopes all. The blue Campagna is dimly seen in the distance. Through the foreground the yellow Tiber makes its serpentine curves, flashing like gold under the westering sun.