THE COUNT MONTE-LEONE: OR, THE SPY IN SOCIETY.[4]
TRANSLATED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL MONTHLY MAGAZINE FROM THE FRENCH OF H. DE ST. GEORGES.
Continued from page 211
VIII.—THE FOUR PULCINELLI.
Doctor Matheus, as the reader must have guessed from the previous chapter, was Freiderick von Apsberg, one of the four Pulcinelli of the ball of San Carlo, the young German who was the son of the venerable pastor of the city of Ellogen, in Bohemia.
Freiderick von Apsberg had been educated in one of the most celebrated universities of Germany, that of Leipsic,—where he had imbibed that very social contagion, a passion for detestable demagogic fancies, with which all those scientific lazaretti of Germany were filled. The dreamy and often poetic forms in which those ideas were enunciated, easily touched the heart of that long peaceable nation, and opened to it a field of mad and resistless hopes which could not but plunge it into that abyss of disorder, trouble, and crime, in which it has been recently seen sweltering.
Freiderick, not thinking his country yet prepared for the propagation of his principles, sought for an echo among other European nations. The rising Carbonarism of Italy opened its arms to him, and received him as one of its future supporters. There he had become acquainted with Monte-Leone, and participated in the religion of which he was the high priest. On his return to Germany, after his expulsion from Italy, he had discovered that the work had advanced during his absence, that the myth had been personified, and that the seed had germinated. Germany, especially the poor of Germany, began to be deeply agitated; the Carbonaro made many proselytes, and won many new members to the association. The death of his father having endowed him with some fortune, he completed his studies, and became one of the most fervent apostles of that mysterious science of which he spoke to the Duke d'Harcourt; but, being made uncomfortable by the German police, he left his country, after having established a connection with the Vente which had been formed there. He then came to France, where we find him under the name of Doctor Matheus, and living in the awful No. 13 of Babylonne street;—his house was the rendezvous of the principal members of the Vente of Paris, where his profession amply accounted for the many visitors he received. His three friends, however, fearing that their frequent visits would be remarked, often had recourse to disguises. Thus it is that we saw the Englishman, the Auvergnot, and the peasant, so cavalierly treated by Mlle Crepineau.
"This is the hour of consultation, my dear Doctor," said the Viscount to Von Apsberg; "where are the patients?" In a serious tone the latter replied, "In France, Italy, Germany, and all the continent.—Their disease is a painful oppression, an extreme lassitude in every member of the social body, a slow fever, and general feeling of indisposition."
"What physician will cure so many diseases?" asked the Viscount.
"Carbonarism!"