According to her promise, Volunnia came to fetch me, that I might be introduced in form to her own apartments, which were on the second floor. On our way to them, we passed through the two saloons and large entrance-hall appropriated to the marchesa, which had evidently been the state-rooms of the palazzo in its palmy days, and in their general arrangements resembled others of the same description with which I had become familiar in Ancona: gilded sofas and arm-chairs, covered with faded damask, stationed immovably along the walls, a profusion of pictures and carved consoles, embellished by tall mirrors. In the one, where she told me her sister-in-law habitually received, there were a few modern additions, some light chairs, a round table, strewn with such newspapers as she could contrive to get together, and a number of little squares of carpet placed in array before the grim, high-backed seats, that seemed to look frowningly on these tokens of that modern degeneracy which shrank from contact with the marble floor whereon, in their day, the feet of the best and fairest had contentedly reposed.
Volunnia's sitting-room contained tokens of her tastes and attainments, which, to do her justice, were of no common order, especially when it is borne in mind how much difficulty she must have overcome in acquiring the accomplishments of which a piano, or rather spinet, a harp, and a number of paintings on ivory, gave the indication—to say nothing of the severer studies that a score or two of Latin and old French and English authors, on a dusty book-shelf, revealed to my gaze.
After she had played a sonata from Paesiello, and taken down some of her paintings, framed in those circles of ebony familiar to our childhood as containing effigies of old gentlemen in bag-wigs and white frills, for my approving inspection; after reading aloud a page of English to show me her proficiency, and obtaining a promise that I would give her a lesson every day while I remained there; after permitting me to turn over her books in the vain hope of finding anything more modern than Young's Night Thoughts and the Spectator in the English department, or Pascal and Madame de Sévigné in the French, while she proffered, as some light reading in Italian, Alfieri's translation of Sallust's Conspiracy of Catiline—after, I say, all these preliminaries, Volunnia laid aside her homage to the Sacred Nine, and, betaking herself to a minute inspection of my toilet, seemed more intent upon a sacrifice to the graces, than the singular négligé of her attire had at first led me to anticipate.
Having made her very happy by the assurance that she might have whatever she liked in my wardrobe copied for her own wear, she took me into her bed-room to see an elaborate bonnet that had just come from Rome, which she intended to appear in at Easter. As she tried it on complacently, the droll effect of the smart coiffure over the dingy wrapper and coarse woollen shawl pinned round her throat to conceal all sorts of deficiencies, irresistibly reminded me of Miss Charity Pecksniff in the wedding-bonnet and dimity bed-gown. The one in question was a bright yellow, and Volunnia asked me, as she adjusted it before the glass, whether it did not become her complexion, which, she had been told, was quite Spanish in its tints.
Of course I did not disturb the harmless conceit, and we went down-stairs to turn over my stock of finery as lovingly as possible.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Volunnia's inquisitiveness—Her strictures on English propriety—The Marchesa Silvia's dread of heretics—The dinner—The Marchesa Gentilina knits stockings and talks politics.
I was very much diverted, during the investigation of my wardrobe, at noticing how keenly Volunnia eyed the make and quality of my garments, as if furnishing some clue to my position in society; still further to elucidate which, she proceeded to a diligent cross-examination respecting my birth, parentage, and the reasons which had brought me so far from my own country.
Strange as it may seem, there was nothing I felt disposed to take offence at in these interrogatories. They showed so much ignorance of the world beyond the narrow limits in which she lived; so much curiosity to learn something of a country that, despite her school-learning, was almost as much an Ultima Thule to her as to her Roman ancestors; and displayed besides so amusingly the impression left upon foreigners by some of our everyday customs, that I should have been foolishly sensitive, as well as have deprived myself of a good deal of entertainment, had I resented Volunnia's inquiries, or her comments upon my answers. But I was evidently an enigma to her, which it would have required a second Œdipus to unravel.
“Ma, ma,” she said at length, as if musing upon the subject—“when you return to England, will it not hinder your ever marrying to have it said that you have been abroad, away from your nearest relations?—and who, after all, will be able to certify where? We, in these parts, know and respect your uncle and his family, and can answer for their manner of life; but supposing a partito in your own country is found for you, might not injurious inferences be drawn from your long absence? Who will vouch for your having been really under the care of your uncle, or furnish proofs of his excellence and fitness for the charge?”