While in his subterranean abode, Maroncelli had composed a variety of poems of high merit. He recited them and produced others. Many of these I committed to memory. It is astonishing with what facility I was enabled, by this exercise, to repeat very extensive compositions, to give them additional polish, and bring them to the highest possible perfection of which they were susceptible, even had I written them down with the utmost care. Maroncelli did the same, and, by degrees, retained by heart many thousand lyric verses, and epics of different kinds. It was thus, too, I composed the tragedy of Leoniero da Dertona, and various other works.
CHAPTER LXXVI.
Count Oroboni, after lingering through a wretched winter and the ensuing spring, found himself much worse during the summer. He was seized with a spitting of blood, and a dropsy ensued. Imagine our affliction on learning that he was dying so near us, without a possibility of our rendering him the last sad offices, separated only as we were by a dungeon-wall.
Schiller brought us tidings of him. The unfortunate young Count, he said, was in the greatest agonies, yet he retained his admirable firmness of mind. He received the spiritual consolations of the chaplain, who was fortunately acquainted with the French language. He died on the 13th of June, 1823. A few hours before he expired, he spoke of his aged father, eighty years of age, was much affected, and shed tears. Then resuming his serenity, he said, “But why thus lament the destiny of the most fortunate of all those so dear to me; for he is on the eve of rejoining me in the realms of eternal peace?” The last words he uttered, were, “I forgive all my enemies; I do it from my heart!” His eyes were closed by his friend, Dr. Fortini, a most religious and amiable man, who had been intimate with him from his childhood. Poor Oroboni! how bitterly we felt his death when the first sad tidings reached us! Ah! we heard the voices and the steps of those who came to remove his body! We watched from our window the hearse, which, slow and solemnly, bore him to that cemetery within our view. It was drawn thither by two of the common convicts, and followed by four of the guards. We kept our eyes fixed upon the sorrowful spectacle, without speaking a word, till it entered the churchyard. It passed through, and stopped at last in a corner, near a new-made grave. The ceremony was brief; almost immediately the hearse, the convicts, and the guards were observed to return. One of the last was Kubitzky. He said to me, “I have marked the exact spot where he is buried, in order that some relation or friend may be enabled some day to remove his poor bones, and lay them in his own country.” It was a noble thought, and surprised me in a man so wholly uneducated; but I could not speak. How often had the unhappy Count gazed from his window upon that dreary looking cemetery, as he observed, “I must try to get accustomed to the idea of being carried thither; yet I confess that such an idea makes me shiver. It is strange, but I cannot help thinking that we shall not rest so well in these foreign parts as in our own beloved land.” He would then laugh, and exclaim, “What childishness is this! when a garment as worn out, and done with, does it signify where we throw it aside?” At other times, he would say, “I am continually preparing for death, but I should die more willingly upon one condition—just to enter my father’s house once more, embrace his knees, hear his voice blessing me, and die!” He then sighed and added, “But if this cup, my God, cannot pass from me, may thy will be done.” Upon the morning of his death he also said, as he pressed a crucifix, which Kral brought him, to his lips; “Thou, Lord, who wert Divine, hadst also a horror of death, and didst say, If it be possible, let this cup pass free me, oh, pardon if I too say it; but I will repeat also with Thee, Nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou willest it!”
CHAPTER LXXVII.
After the death of Oroboni, I was again taken ill. I expected very soon to rejoin him, and I ardently desired it. Still, I could not have parted with Maroncelli without regret. Often, while seated on his straw-bed, he read or recited poetry to withdraw my mind, as well as his own, from reflecting upon our misfortunes, I gazed on him, and thought with pain, When I am gone, when you see them bearing me hence, when you gaze at the cemetery, you will look more sorrowful than now. I would then offer a secret prayer that another companion might be given him, as capable of appreciating all his worth.
I shall not mention how many different attacks I suffered, and with how much difficulty I recovered from them. The assistance I received from my friend Maroncelli, was like that of an attached brother. When it became too great an effort for me to speak, he was silent; he saw the exact moment when his conversation would soothe or enliven me, he dwelt upon subjects most congenial to my feelings, and he continued or varied them as he judged most agreeable to me. Never did I meet with a nobler spirit; he had few equals, none, whom I knew, superior to him. Strictly just, tolerant, truly religious, with a remarkable confidence in human virtue, he added to these qualities an admirable taste for the beautiful, whether in art or nature, and a fertile imagination teeming with poetry; in short, all those engaging dispositions of mind and heart best calculated to endear him to me.
Still, I could not help grieving over the fate of Oroboni while, at the same time, I indulged the soothing reflection that he was freed from all his sufferings, that they were rewarded with a better world, and that in the midst of the enjoyments he had won, he must have that of beholding me with a friend no less attached to me than he had been himself. I felt a secret assurance that he was no longer in a place of expiation, though I ceased not to pray for him. I often saw him in my dreams, and he seemed to pray for me; I tried to think that they were not mere dreams; that they were manifestations of his blessed spirit, permitted by God for my consolation. I should not be believed were I to describe the excessive vividness of such dreams, if such they were, and the delicious serenity which they left in my mind for many days after. These, and the religious sentiments entertained by Maroncelli, with his tried friendship, greatly alleviated my afflictions. The sole idea which tormented me was the possibility of this excellent friend also being snatched from me; his health having been much broken, so as to threaten his dissolution ere my own sufferings drew to a close. Every time he was taken ill, I trembled; and when he felt better, it was a day of rejoicing for me. Strange, that there should be a fearful sort of pleasure, anxious yet intense, in these alternations of hope and dread, regarding the existence of the only object left you on earth. Our lot was one of the most painful; yet to esteem, to love each other as we did, was to us a little paradise, the one green spot in the desert of our lives; it was all we had left, and we bowed our heads in thankfulness to the Giver of all good, while awaiting the hour of his summons.
CHAPTER LXXVIII.
It was now my favourite wish that the chaplain who had attended me in my first illness, might be allowed to visit us as our confessor. But instead of complying with our request, the governor sent us an Augustine friar, called Father Battista, who was to confess us until an order came from Vienna, either to confirm the choice, or to nominate another in his place.