BOOK II.
CHAPTER I.
It was about a month after the date of Zicci's departure and Glyndon's
introduction to Mejnour, when two Englishmen were walking arm-in-arm
through the Toledo.
"I tell you," said one (who spoke warmly), "that if you have a particle
of common-sense left in you, you will accompany me to England. This
Mejnour is an impostor more dangerous--because more in earnest--than
Zicci. After all, what do his promises amount to? You allow that
nothing can be more equivocal. You say that he has left Naples, that he
has selected a retreat more genial than the crowded thoroughfares of men
to the studies in which he is to initiate you; and this retreat is among
the haunts of the fiercest bandits of Italy,--haunts which Justice
itself dare not penetrate; fitting hermitage for a sage! I tremble for
you. What if this stranger, of whom nothing is known, be leagued with
the robbers; and these lures for your credulity bait but the traps for
your property,--perhaps your life? You might come off cheaply by a
ransom of half your fortune; you smile indignantly well! put common-
sense out of the question; take your own view of the matter. You are to
undergo an ordeal which Mejnour himself does not profess to describe as
a very tempting one. It may, or it may not, succeed; if it does not,
you are menaced with the darkest evils; and if it does, you cannot be
better off than the dull and joyless mystic whom you have taken for a
master. Away with this folly! Enjoy youth while it is left to you.
Return with me to England; forget these dreams. Enter your proper
career; form affections more respectable than those which lured you a
while to an Italian adventuress, and become a happy and distinguished
man. This is the advice of sober friendship; yet the promises I hold
out to you are fairer than those of Mejnour."
"Merton," said Glyndon, doggedly, "I cannot, if I would, yield to your
wishes. A power that is above me urges me on; I cannot resist its
fascination. I will proceed to the last in the strange career I have
commenced. Think of me no more. Follow yourself the advice you give to
me, and be happy."
"This is madness," said Merton, passionately, but with a tear in his
eye; "your health is already failing; you are so changed I should
scarcely know you: come, I have already had your name entered in my
passport; in another hour I shall be gone, and you, boy that you are,
will be left without a friend to the deceits of your own fancy and the
machinations of this relentless mountebank."
"Enough," said Glyndon, coldly; "you cease to be an effective counsellor
when you suffer your prejudices to be thus evident. I have already had
ample proof," added the Englishman, and his pale cheek grew more pale,
"of the power of this man,--if man he be, which I sometimes doubt; and,
come life, come death, I will not shrink from the paths that allure me.
Farewell, Merton: if we never meet again; if you hear amidst our old and
cheerful haunts that Clarence Glyndon sleeps the last sleep by the
shores of Naples, or amidst the Calabrian hills,--say to the friends of
our youth, 'He died worthily, as thousands of martyr-students have died
before him, in the pursuit of knowledge.'"
He wrung Merton's hand as he spoke, darted from his side, and
disappeared amidst the crowd.
That day Merton left Naples; the next morning Glyndon also quitted the
City of Delight, alone and on horseback. He bent his way into those
picturesque but dangerous parts of the country which at that time were
infested by banditti, and which few travellers dared to pass, even in
broad daylight, without a strong escort. A road more lonely cannot well
be conceived than that on which the hoofs of his steed, striking upon
the fragments of rock that encumbered the neglected way, woke a dull and
melancholy echo. Large tracts of waste land, varied by the rank and
profuse foliage of the South, lay before him; occasionally a wild goat
peeped down from some rocky crag, or the discordant cry of a bird of
prey, startled in its sombre haunt, was heard above the hills. These
were the only signs of life; not a human being was met, not a hut was
visible. Wrapped in his own ardent and solemn thoughts, the young man
continued his way, till the sun had spent its noonday heat, and a breeze
that announced the approach of eve sprung up from the unseen ocean that
lay far distant to his sight. It was then that a turn in the road
brought before him one of those long, desolate, gloomy villages which
are found in the interior of the Neapolitan dominions; and now he came
upon a small chapel on one side of the road, with a gaudily painted
image of the Virgin in the open shrine. Around this spot, which in the
heart of a Christian land retained the vestige of the old idolatry (for
just such were the chapels that in the Pagan age were dedicated to the
demon-saints of mythology), gathered six or seven miserable and squalid
wretches, whom the Curse of the Leper had cut off from mankind. They
set up a shrill cry as they turned their ghastly visages towards the
horseman; and, without stirring from the spot, stretched out their gaunt
arms, and implored charity in the name of the Merciful Mother. Glyndon
hastily threw them some small coins, and, turning away his face, clapped
spurs to his horse, and relaxed not his speed till he entered the
village. On either side the narrow and miry street, fierce and haggard
forms--some leaning against the ruined walls of blackened huts, some
seated at the threshold, some lying at full length in the mud--presented
groups that at once invoked pity and aroused alarm; pity for their
squalor,--alarm for the ferocity imprinted on their savage aspects.
They gazed at him, grim and sullen, as he rode slowly up the rugged
street; sometimes whispering significantly to each other, but without
attempting to stop his way. Even the children hushed their babble, and
ragged urchins, devouring him with sparkling eyes, muttered to their
mothers, "We shall feast well to-morrow!" It was, indeed, one of those
hamlets in which Law sets not its sober step, in which Violence and
Murder house secure,--hamlets common then in the wilder parts of Italy,
in which the peasant was but the gentler name for the robber.
Glyndon's heart somewhat failed him as he looked around, and the
question he desired to ask died upon his lips. At length, from one of
the dismal cabins emerged a form superior to the rest. Instead of the
patched and ragged overall which made the only garment of the men he had
hitherto seen, the dress of this person was characterized by all the
trappings of Calabrian bravery. Upon his raven hair, the glossy curls
of which made a notable contrast to the matted and elfin locks of the
savages around, was placed a cloth cap with a gold tassel that hung down
to his shoulder; his mustaches were trimmed with care, and a silk
kerchief of gay lines was twisted round a well-shaped but sinewy throat;
a short jacket of rough cloth was decorated with several rows of gilt
filagree buttons; his nether garments fitted tight to his limbs, and
were curiously braided; while in a broad, party-colored sash were placed
four silver-hilted pistols; and the sheathed knife, usually worn by
Italians of the lower order, was mounted in ivory elaborately carved. A
small carbine of handsome workmanship was slung across his shoulder, and
completed his costume. The man himself was of middle size, athletic,
yet slender; with straight and regular features,--sunburnt, but not
swarthy; and an expression of countenance which, though reckless and
bold, had in it frankness rather than ferocity, and, if defying, was not
altogether unprepossessing.
Glyndon, after eyeing this figure for some moments with great attention,
checked his rein, and asked in the provincial patois, with which he was
tolerably familiar, the way to the "Castle of the Mountain."
The man lifted his cap as he heard the question, and, approaching
Glyndon, laid his hand upon the neck of the horse, and said in a low
voice, "Then you are the cavalier whom our patron the signor expected.
He bade me wait for you here, and lead you to the castle. And indeed,
signor, it might have been unfortunate if I had neglected to obey the
command." The man then, drawing a little aside, called out to the
bystanders in a loud voice, "Ho, ho, my friends, pay henceforth and
forever all respect to this worshipful cavalier. He is the accepted
guest of our blessed patron of the Castle of the Mountain. Long life to
him! May he, like his host, be safe by day and by night, in the hill
and on the waste, against the dagger and the bullet, in limb and in
life! Cursed be he who touches a hair of his head, or a baioccho in his
pouch. Now and forever we will protect and honor him; for the law or
against the law; with the faith, and to the death. Amen. Amen!"
"Amen!" responded in wild chorus a hundred voices, and the scattered and
straggling groups pressed up the street, nearer and nearer to the
horseman.
"And that he may be known," continued the Englishman's strange
protector, "to the eye and to the ear, I place around him the white
sash, and I give him the sacred watchword,--'Peace to the Brave.'
Signor, when you wear this sash, the proudest in these parts will bare
the head and bend the knee. Signor, when you utter this watchword, the
bravest hearts will be bound to your bidding. Desire you safety, or ask
you revenge; to gain a beauty, or to lose a foe, speak but the word, and
we are yours, we are yours! Is it not so, comrades? "And again the
hoarse voices shouted, "Amen, amen!"
"Now, signor," whispered the bravo, in good Italian, "if you have a few
coins to spare, scatter them amongst the crowd, and let us be gone."
Glyndon, not displeased at the concluding sentence, emptied his purse in
the street; and while, with mingled oaths, blessings, shrieks, and
yells, men, women, and children scrambled for the money, the bravo,
taking the rein of the horse, led it a few paces through the village at
a brisk trot, and then turning up a narrow lane to the left, in a few
minutes neither houses nor men were visible, and the mountains closed
their path on either side. It was then that, releasing the bridle and
slackening his pace, the guide turned his dark eyes on Glyndon with an
arch expression, and said,--
"Your Excellency was not, perhaps, prepared for the hearty welcome we
have given you."
"Why, in truth, I ought to have been prepared for it, since my friend,
to whose house I am bound, did not disguise from me the character of the
neighborhood. And your name, my friend, if I may call you so?"
"Oh, no ceremonies with me, Excellency. In the village I am generally
called Maestro Paulo. I had a surname once, though a very equivocal
one; and I have forgotten that since I retired from the world."
"And was it from disgust, from poverty, or from some some ebullition of
passion which entailed punishment, that you betook yourself to the
mountains?"
"Why, signor," said the bravo, with a gay laugh, "hermits of my class
seldom love the confessional. However, I have no secrets while my step
is in these defiles, my whistle in my pouch, and my carbine at my back."
With that the robber, as if he loved permission to talk at his will,
hemmed thrice, and began with much humor; though, as his tale proceeded,
the memories it roused seemed to carry him further than he at first
intended, and reckless and light-hearted ease gave way to that fierce
and varied play of countenance and passion of gesture which characterize
the emotions of his countrymen.
"I was born at Terracina,--a fair spot, is it not? My father was a
learned monk, of high birth; my mother--Heaven rest her!--an innkeeper's
pretty daughter. Of course there was no marriage in the case; and when
I was born, the monk gravely declared my appearance to be miraculous. I
was dedicated from my cradle to the altar; and my head was universally
declared to be the orthodox shape for a cowl. As I grew up, the monk
took great pains with my education, and I learned Latin and psalmody as
soon as less miraculous infants learn crowing. Nor did the holy man's
care stint itself to my interior accomplishments. Although vowed to
poverty, he always contrived that my mother should have her pockets
full; and between her pockets and mine there was soon established a
clandestine communication; accordingly, at fourteen, I wore my cap on
one side, stuck pistols in my belt, and assumed the swagger of a
cavalier and a gallant. At that age my poor mother died; and about the
same period, my father, having written a 'History of the Pontifical
Bulls,' in forty volumes, and being, as I said, of high birth, obtained
a cardinal's hat. From that time he thought fit to disown your humble
servant. He bound me over to an honest notary at Naples, and gave me
two hundred crowns by way of provision. Well, signor, I saw enough of
the law to convince me that I should never be rogue enough to shine in
the profession. So instead of spoiling parchment, I made love to the
notary's daughter. My master discovered our innocent amusement, and
turned me out of doors,--that was disagreeable. But my Ninetta loved
me, and took care that I should not lie out in the streets with the
lazzaroni. Little jade, I think I see her now, with her bare feet, and
her finger to her lips, opening the door in the summer nights, and
bidding me creep softly into the kitchen, where--praised be the saints!-
-a flask and a manchet always awaited the hungry amoroso. At last,
however, Ninetta grew cold. It is the way of the sex, signor. Her
father found her an excellent marriage in the person of a withered
picture-dealer. She took the spouse, and very properly clapped the door
in the face of the lover. I was not disheartened, Excellency; no, not
I. Women are plentiful while we are young. So, without a ducat in my
pocket, or a crust for my teeth, I set out to seek my fortune on board
of a Spanish merchantman. That was duller work than I expected: but
luckily we were attacked by a pirate; half the crew were butchered, the
rest captured. I was one of the last,--always in luck, you see, signor,
monks' sons have a knack that way! The captain of the pirate took a
fancy to me. 'Serve with us,' said he. 'Too happy,' said I. Behold me
then a pirate. Oh jolly life! how I blest the old notary for turning me
out of doors! What feasting! what fighting! what wooing! what
quarreling! Sometimes we ran ashore and enjoyed ourselves like princes;
sometimes we lay in a calm for days together, on the loveliest sea that
man ever traversed. And then, if the breeze rose, and a sail came in
sight, who so merry as we? I passed three years in that charming
profession, and then, signor, I grew ambitious. I caballed against the
captain; I wanted his post. One still night we struck the blow. The
ship was like a log in the sea,--no land to be seen from the mast-head,
the waves like glass, and the moon at its full. Up we rose,--thirty of
us and more. Up we rose with a shout; we poured into the captain's
cabin,--I at the head. The brave old boy had caught the alarm, and
there he stood at the doorway, a pistol in each hand; and his one eye
(he had only one) worse to meet than the pistols were.
"'Yield,' cried I, 'your life shall be safe.'
"'Take that,' said he, and whiz went the pistol; but the saints took
care of their own, and the ball passed by my cheek, and shot the
boatswain behind me. I closed with the captain, and the other pistol
went off without mischief in the struggle; such a fellow he was, six
feet four without his shoes! Over we went, rolling each on the other.
Santa Maria!--no time to get hold of one's knife. Meanwhile, all the
crew were up, some for the captain, some for me; clashing and firing,
and swearing and groaning, and now and then a heavy splash in the sea!
Fine supper for the sharks that night! At last old Bilboa got
uppermost: out flashed his knife; down it came, but not in my heart.
No! I gave my left arm as a shield, and the blade went through and
through up to the hilt, with the blood spirting up like the rain from a
whale's nostril. With the weight of the blow the stout fellow came
down, so that his face touched mine; with my right hand I caught him by
the throat, turned him over like a lamb, signor, and faith it was soon
all up with him; the boatswain's brother, a fat Dutchman, ran him
through with a pike.
"'Old fellow,' said I, as he turned up his terrible eye to me, 'I bear
you no malice, but we must try to get on in the world, you know.' The
captain grinned and gave up the ghost. I went upon deck; what a sight!
Twenty bold fellows stark and cold, and the moon sparkling on the
puddles of blood as calmly as if it were water. Well, signor, the
victory was ours, and the ship mine; I ruled merrily enough for six
months. We then attacked a French ship twice our size; what sport it
was! And we had not had a good fight so long we were quite like virgins
at it! We got the best of it, and won ship and cargo. They wanted to
pistol the captain: but that was against my laws; so we gagged him, for
he scolded as loud as if we were married to him; left him and the rest
of his crew on board our own vessel, which was terribly battered:
clapped our black flag on the Frenchman's, and set off merrily, with a
brisk wind in our favor. But luck deserted us on forsaking our own dear
old ship. A storm came on; a plank struck; several of us escaped in the
boats; we had lots of gold with us, but no water. For two days and two
nights we suffered horribly: but at last we ran ashore near a French
seaport; our sorry plight moved compassion, and as we had money we were
not suspected; people only suspect the poor. Here we soon recovered our
fatigues, rigged ourselves out gayly, and your humble servant was
considered as noble a captain as ever walked deck. But now, alas, my
fate would have it that I should fall in love with a silk-mercer's
daughter. Ah! how I loved her,--the pretty Clara! Yes, I loved her so
well, that I was seized with horror at my past life; I resolved to
repent, to marry her, and settle down into an honest man. Accordingly,
I summoned my messmates, told them my resolution, resigned my command,
and persuaded them to depart. They were good fellows; engaged with a
Dutchman, against whom I heard afterwards they made a successful mutiny,
but I never saw them more. I had two thousand crowns still left; with
this sum I obtained the consent of the silk-mercer, and it was agreed
that I should become a partner in the firm. I need not say that no one
suspected I had been so great a man, and I passed for a Neapolitan
goldsmith's son instead of a cardinal's. I was very happy then, signor,
very,--I could not have harmed a fly. Had I married Clara I had been as
gentle a mercer as ever handled a measure."
The bravo paused a moment, and it was easy to see that he felt more than
his words and tone betokened. "Well, well, we must not look back at the
Past too earnestly,--the sun light upon it makes one's eyes water. The
day was fixed for our wedding, it approached; on the evening before the
appointed day, Clara, her mother, her little sister, and myself were
walking by the port, and as we looked on the sea I was telling them old
gossip tales of mermaids and sea-serpents,--when a red-faced bottle-
nosed Frenchman clapped himself right before me, and placing his
spectacles very deliberately astride his proboscis, echoed out, 'Sacre,
mille tonnerres! This is the damned pirate that boarded the "Niobe"!'
"None of your jests,' said I, mildly. 'Ho, ho,' said he. 'I can't be
mistaken. Help there,' and he gripped me by the collar. I replied, as
you may suppose, by laying him in the kennel; but it would not do. The
French captain had a French lieutenant at his back, whose memory was as
good as his master's. A crowd assembled; other sailors came up; the
odds were against me. I slept that night in prison; and, in a few weeks
afterwards, I was sent to the galleys. They had spared my life because
the old Frenchman politely averred that I had made my crew spare his.
You may believe that the oar and the chain were not to my taste. I, and
two others, escaped; they took to the road, and have, no doubt, been
long since broken on the wheel. I, soft soul, would not commit another
crime to gain my bread, for Clara was still at my heart with her soft
eyes; so, limiting my rogueries to the theft of a beggar's rags, which I
compensated him by leaving my galley attire instead, I begged my way to
the town where I left Clara. It was a clear winter's day when I
approached the outskirts of the town. I had no fear of detection, for
my beard and hair were as good as a mask. Oh, Mother of Mercy! there
came across my way a funeral procession! There, now, you know it. I
can tell you no more. She had died, perhaps of love, more likely of
shame. Do you know how I spent that night? I will tell you; I stole a
pickaxe from a mason's shed, and, all alone and unseen, under the frosty
heavens I dug the fresh mould from the grave; I lifted the coffin; I
wrenched the lid, I saw her again--again. Decay had not touched her.
She was always pale in her life! I could have sworn she lived! It was
a blessed thing to see her once more,--and all alone too! But then at
dawn, to give her back to the earth,--to close the lid, to throw down
the mould, to hear the pebbles rattle on the coffin,--that was dreadful!
Signor, I never knew before, and I don't wish to think now, how valuable
a thing human life is. At sunrise I was again a wanderer; but now that
Clara was gone my scruples vanished, and again I was at war with my
betters. I contrived, at last, at O--, to get taken on board a vessel
bound to Leghorn, working out my passage. From Leghorn I went to Rome,
and stationed myself at the door of the cardinal's palace. Out he
came,--his gilded coach at the gate. "'Ho, father,' said I, 'don't you
know me?'
"'Who are you?'
"'Your son,' said I, in a whisper.
"The cardinal drew back, looked at me earnestly, and mused a moment.
'All men are my sons,' quoth he then, very mildly; 'there is gold for
thee. To him who begs once, alms are due; to him who begs twice, jails
are open. Take the hint and molest me no more. Heaven bless thee!'
With that he got into his coach and drove off to the Vatican. His
purse, which he had left behind, was well supplied. I was grateful and
contented, and took my way to Terracina. I had not long passed the
marshes, when I saw two horsemen approach at a canter.
"'You look poor, friend,' said one of them, halting; 'yet you are
strong.'
"'Poor men and strong are both serviceable and dangerous, Signor
Cavalier.'
"'Well said! follow us.'
"I obeyed and became a bandit. I rose by degrees; and as I have always
been mild in my calling, and have taken purses without cutting throats,
bear an excellent character, and can eat my macaroni at Naples without
any danger to life and limbs. For the last two years I have settled in
these parts, where I hold sway, and where I have purchased land. I am
called a farmer, signor; and I myself now only rob for amusement, and to
keep my hand in. I trust I have satisfied your curiosity. We are
within a hundred yards of the castle."
"And how," asked the Englishman, whose interest had been much excited by
his companion's narrative, "and how came you acquainted with my host?
and by what means has he so well conciliated the goodwill of yourself
and your friends?"
Maestro Paulo turned his black eyes gravely towards his questioner.
"Why, signor," said he, "you must surely know more of the foreign
cavalier with the hard name than I do. All I can say is, that about a
fortnight ago I chanced to be standing by a booth in the Toledo at
Naples, when a sober-looking gentleman touched me by the arm, and said,
'Maestro Paulo, I want to make your acquaintance; do me the favor to
come into yonder tavern.' When we were seated, my new acquaintance thus
accosted me: 'The Count d' O-- has offered to let me hire his old castle
near B--. You know the spot?'
"'Extremely well; no one has inhabited it for a century at least; it is
half in ruins, signor. A queer place to hire; I hope the rent is not
heavy.'
"'Maestro Paulo,' said he, 'I am a philosopher, and don't care for
luxuries. I want a quiet retreat for some scientific experiments. The
castle will suit me very well, provided you will accept me as a
neighbor, and place me and my friends under your special protection. I
am rich; but I shall take nothing to the castle worth robbing. I will
pay one rent to the count, and another to you.'
"With that we soon came to terms, and as the strange signor doubled the
sum I myself proposed, he is in high favor with all his neighbors. We
would guard the old castle against an army. And now, signor, that I
have been thus frank, be frank with me. Who is this singular cavalier?"
"Who?--he himself told you, a philosopher."
"Hem! Searching for the philosopher's stone, eh? A bit of a magician;
afraid of the priests?"
"Precisely. You have hit it."
"I thought so; and you are his pupil?"
"I am."
"I wish you well through it," said the robber, seriously, and crossing
himself with much devotion; "I am not much better than other people, but
one's soul is one's soul. I do not mind a little honest robbery, or
knocking a man on the head if need be,--but to make a bargain with the
devil!--Ah! take care, young gentleman, take care."
"You need not fear," said Glyndon, smiling; "my preceptor is too wise
and too good for such a compact. But here we are, I suppose. A noble
ruin! A glorious prospect!"
Glyndon paused delightedly, and surveyed the scene before and below with
the eye of a poet and a painter. Insensibly, while listening to the
bandit, he had wound up a considerable ascent, and now he was upon a
broad ledge of rock covered with mosses and dwarf shrubs. Between this
eminence and another of equal height, upon which the castle was built,
there was a deep but narrow fissure, overgrown with the most profuse
foliage, so that the eye could not penetrate many yards below the rugged
surface of the abyss; but the profoundness might well be conjectured by
the hoarse, low, monotonous sound of waters unseen that rolled below,
and the subsequent course of which was visible at a distance in a
perturbed and rapid stream that intersected the waste and desolate
valleys. To the left, the prospect seemed almost boundless; the extreme
clearness of the purple air serving to render distinct the features of a
range of country that a conqueror of old might have deemed in itself a
kingdom. Lonely and desolate as the road which Glyndon had passed that
day had appeared, the landscape now seemed studded with castles, spires,
and villages. Afar off, Naples gleamed whitely in the last rays of the
sun, and the rose-tints of the horizon melted into the azure of her
glorious bay. Yet more remote, and in another part of the prospect,
might be caught, dim and shadowy, and backed by the darkest foliage, the
ruined village of the ancient Possidonia. There, in the midst of his
blackened and sterile realms, rose the dismal Mount of Fire; while, on
the other hand, winding through variegated plains, to which distance
lent all its magic, glittered many a stream, by which Etruscan and
Sybarite, Roman and Saracen and Norman, had, at intervals of ages,
pitched the invading tent. All the visions of the past the stormy and
dazzling histories of Southern Italy--rushed over the artist's mind as
he gazed below. And then, slowly turning to look behind, he saw the
gray and mouldering walls of the castle in which he sought the secrets
that were to give to hope in the Future a mightier empire than memory
owns in the Past. It was one of those baronial fortresses with which
Italy was studded in the earlier middle ages, having but little of the
Gothic grace of grandeur which belongs to the ecclesiastical
architecture of the same time; but rude, vast, and menacing even in
decay. A wooden bridge was thrown over the chasm, wide enough to admit
two horsemen abreast; and the planks trembled and gave back a hollow
sound as Glyndon urged his jaded steed across.
A road that had once been broad, and paved with rough flags, but which
now was half obliterated by long grass and rank weeds, conducted to the
outer court of the castle hard by; the gates were open, and half the
building in this part was dismantled, the ruins partially hid by ivy
that was the growth of centuries. But on entering the inner court,
Glyndon was not sorry to notice that there was less appearance of
neglect and decay: some wild roses gave a smile to the gray walls; and
in the centre there was a fountain, in which the waters still trickled
coolly, and with a pleasing murmur, from the jaws of a gigantic triton.
Here he was met by Mejnour with a smile.
"Welcome, my friend and pupil," said he; "he who seeks for Truth can
find in these solitudes an immortal Academe."
