The Old Yellow Book: Source of Robert Browning's The Ring and the Book

by Unknown

Mrs. Orr has published somewhat less than half of the pamphlet in her Handbook in translation, which has been reprinted in the Camberwell Browning, and in the Browning Guide Book by G. W. Cook. The present version is made directly from the Italian text of the Philobiblion Society reprint.

THE
DEATH OF THE WIFE-MURDERER GUIDO
FRANCESCHINI, BY BEHEADING

Guido Franceschini, a nobleman of Arezzo, in Tuscany, had stayed for some time here in Rome in the service of a person of some eminence. He decided to take a wife with dowry enough to be of advantage to his own house. When he had revealed this desire to a certain hairdresser near the Piazza Colonna, she proposed to him the Signora Francesca Pompilia, thirteen years of age, the daughter of a certain Pietro Comparini and Violante Peruzzi. For beside the promised dowry, she was heir to the reversionary interest in bonds and other properties worth about 12,000 scudi. When he had heard of this advantageous dowry, which seemed to him to be quite to his point, he lost no time in revealing it to his brother Abate Paolo, who had dwelt here in Rome for many years in the service of a Cardinal. He went along with Guido to the mother of the young woman, as they flattered themselves that they would succeed better in this way than by demanding her of the father, who was somewhat hard to approach. When they had made it appear that their income was of considerable amount, they succeeded in their intent; although it was then found out that their entire capital did not amount to the total of their income as given in that note.

It was easy for Franceschini to win over this woman, as she was driven by the ambition of establishing her daughter in the home of persons of good birth. She gave her own consent, and so worked upon her husband as to induce him to sign the marriage bond. Then when Comparini had been informed by a person who knew the resources of Franceschini, that they were quite different from what they had been represented to him, he changed his mind, nor did he wish under any consideration to carry out the marriage. He gave as a pretext the very tender age of his daughter, along with other reasons. The mother of Francesca, however, not seeing any chance to give her daughter to Franceschini, had her secretly married during December, 1693, in San Lorenzo in Lucina.

When this marriage reached the ears of Comparini, he was much angered at Violante. But she had such a gift of gab that Comparini not only agreed to it, but beside the dowry of 2,600 scudi, on which he had already paid700 scudi, he also made gift of his entire possessions to the couple.

After several days, Franceschini decided to conduct his wife and her parents back to Arezzo, and this took place in the same December. When they had arrived there, the parents of the wife could see that the state of their son-in-law was much worse than they had imagined it. Therefore they were all the more embittered at the penuriousness they showed in the food, and many other matters. One morning while they were at the table they heard their daughter [Violante according to The Book] denied fire for warming her bed, and saw the Franceschini practise many other cruelties toward her. They were much troubled at it, and all the more so when they saw a Canon of the Franceschini household, a brother of the husband, rush upon their daughter [Violante according to The Book]. He struck Francesca with a dagger in his hand, who had to make her escape by running into a room and shutting the door. Then one evening her father went to visit a friend, and when he had come back home he found the door shut. Therefore his daughter, who was still awake, was obliged to go downstairs to open it for him, but not without first having called her husband, who never even opened an eye. Then when she had gone down to open the door and had gone outside a few steps to meet her father, all of a sudden she found herself shut outside the house along with her father. For that reason they were both of them obliged to sleep outside of the house that night, her father at the inn and the daughter at one of the neighbours. Therefore, more and more, as the days passed, the Comparini decided to return to Rome. But as they were without money they were obliged to beg it of Franceschini, who scarcely gave them the necessary expenses of the journey.

When the old Comparini had departed, Franceschini thought to hide what had happened. He constrained his wife to write to Rome to the Abate, his brother, to tell him that she cherished in her heart his memory. This letter was dictated by the husband himself. The ignorant girl did as Guido wished, whose purpose was to have it believed that his parents-in-law were the fomentors of the dissension which prevailed between the couple and the relatives of Franceschini.

When the Comparini had reached Rome, ill-contented as they were with the house of their son-in-law, for whom they now saw they had sacrificed their daughter, they did not know how to hold their peace about that matter, of which they themselves had been the cause. All the more so when they were harassed for the remainder of the dowry, beside the fact that they saw the rest of their property in danger. While affairs were in this state a Jubilee was announced; under these circumstances Violante Comparini revealed in confession that Francesca Pompilia, who was married to Franceschini, was not their daughter, but that the birth had been pretended. She had in fact been born of a poor widow, a foreigner, and had then been adopted to bring it about that the reversionary interest would fall to their house, and hence to make good the many debts of her husband. When the confessor heard this, he charged her to reveal all the affair to her husband himself. Violante obeyed, and Comparini was greatly surprised at it, and rebuked his wife sharply. He then submitted the matter to judgment before Monsignor Tomati; the following was spoken in sentence: It should be maintained that Francesca Pompilia shall be and is in quasi-possession of her relationship as daughter. Therefore appeal was taken by Comparini to the Tribunal of the Sacred Rota, but the suit still remains undecided. In the meantime the Franceschini, seeing that they had been deluded by this circumstance, since they could not get possession of the residue of the dowry, redoubled their cruelties to the poor Pompilia even to the point of threatening her with death. Hence she was very often obliged to save herself by fleeing into some other house, or before the authorities, or even into the presence of the Bishop, whom she finally begged to save her by putting her in some monastery. But this prelate thought it better to send her back to her husband's home, urging him not to mistreat her.

When the unfortunate woman saw that the admonitions of this Bishop had been useless, and that this way of softening the heart of her husband and his relatives had proved vain, and when they reproved her for sterility and for coquetry, and for other faults of their own imagining, she betook herself to an Augustinian, Romano, that he might write to his Superiors or to her parents to find some provision for her. But although the Father promised to do as she desired, his letters never reached their destination. The wretched woman was therefore desperate and determined to get to Rome in some manner or other. She told the whole matter to Canon Conti, a relative of the Franceschini, to whom she made a most pathetic picture of her situation. He was moved thereby, and answered that he would aid her, as he did, by offering to have her taken to Rome by Canon Caponsacchi, his friend, since he himself ought not and could not do it. When the circumstances had been told to Caponsacchi, he was opposed to it, for fear of incurring the anger of the Franceschini; but when he had been urged both by Conti and the woman, he consented thereto. And on the last Monday of April the wife arose from bed as soon as day dawned, without her husband knowing about it. She took some things of her own, some jewels, and money, left the house, and at the gate of the city found Caponsacchi, who was awaiting her with a carriage. They mounted together and set out on the road toward Rome.

When Franceschini awoke and discovered the flight of his wife, as he already suspected that she had started for Rome, he began to pursue her, and on the following Tuesday [should be Wednesday] overtook her at Castelnuovo in the post-house, where she was in company with Caponsacchi. The young woman was not at all terrified at the sight of her husband, but on the contrary she mustered her courage and reproved him for all the cruelties practised upon her, because of which she had been forced to this step. Then Franceschini was thunderstruck, and did not know how or what to respond. Hence he thought it best to have recourse to the authorities. The fugitives were arrested by the Governor of the place, and both of them were taken to Rome and placed in the New Prisons, and were charged with adultery because they had run away together. He tried to prove the charge by certain love-letters which had been found, and by the deposition of the driver. But as the adultery was not proved, the Canon was condemned for three years to Civita Vecchia, and the wife was shut into the monastery of the Scalette on the Lungara.