Chapter 1.III. The Brawl.
On an evening in April, 1347, and in one of those wide spaces in which
Modern and Ancient Rome seemed blent together - equally desolate and
equally in ruins - a miscellaneous and indignant populace were assembled.
That morning the house of a Roman jeweller had been forcibly entered and
pillaged by the soldiers of Martino di Porto, with a daring effrontery
which surpassed even the ordinary licence of the barons. The sympathy and
sensation throughout the city were deep and ominous.
"Never will I submit to this tyranny!"
"Nor I!"
"Nor I!"
"Nor by the bones of St. Peter, will I!"
"And what, my friends, is this tyranny to which you will not submit?" said
a young nobleman, addressing himself to the crowd of citizens who, heated,
angry, half-armed, and with the vehement gestures of Italian passion, were
now sweeping down the long and narrow street that led to the gloomy quarter
occupied by the Orsini.
"Ah, my lord!" cried two or three of the citizens in a breath, "you will
right us - you will see justice done to us - you are a Colonna."
"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed scornfully one man of gigantic frame, and wielding on
high a huge hammer, indicative of his trade. "Justice and Colonna! body of
God! those names are not often found together."
"Down with him! down with him! he is an Orsinist - down with him!" cried at
least ten of the throng: but no hand was raised against the giant.
"He speaks the truth," said a second voice, firmly.
"Ay, that doth he," said a third, knitting his brows, and unsheathing his
knife, "and we will abide by it. The Orsini are tyrants - and the Colonnas
are, at the best, as bad."
"Thou liest in thy teeth, ruffian!" cried the young noble, advancing into
the press and confronting the last asperser of the Colonna.
Before the flashing eye and menacing gesture of the cavalier, the worthy
brawler retreated some steps, so as to leave an open space between the
towering form of the smith, and the small, slender, but vigorous frame of
the young noble.
Taught from their birth to despise the courage of the plebeians, even while
careless of much reputation as to their own, the patricians of Rome were
not unaccustomed to the rude fellowship of these brawls; nor was it unoften
that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter whole crowds, that
had the moment before been breathing vengeance against his order and his
house.
Waving his hand, therefore, to the smith, and utterly unheeding either his
brandished weapon or his vast stature, the young Adrian di Castello, a
distant kinsman of the Colonna, haughtily bade him give way.
"To your homes, friends! and know," he added, with some dignity, "that ye
wrong us much, if ye imagine we share the evil-doings of the Orsini, or are
pandering solely to our own passions in the feud between their house and
ours. May the Holy Mother so judge me," continued he, devoutly lifting up
his eyes, "as I now with truth declare, that it is for your wrongs, and for
the wrongs of Rome, that I have drawn this sword against the Orsini."
"So say all the tyrants," rejoined the smith, hardily, as he leant his
hammer against a fragment of stone - some remnant of ancient Rome - "they
never fight against each other, but it is for our good. One Colonna cuts
me the throat of Orsini's baker - it is for our good! Another Colonna
seizes on the daughter of Orsini's tailor - it is for our good! our good -
yes, for the good of the people! the good of the bakers and tailors, eh?"
"Fellow," said the young nobleman, gravely, "if a Colonna did thus, he did
wrong; but the holiest cause may have bad supporters."
"Yes, the holy Church itself is propped on very in different columns,"
answered the smith, in a rude witticism on the affection of the pope for
the Colonna.
"He blasphemes! the smith blasphemes!" cried the partisans of that powerful
house. "A Colonna, a Colonna!"
"An Orsini, an Orsini!" was no less promptly the counter cry.
"The People!" shouted the smith, waving his formidable weapon far above the
heads of the group.
In an instant the whole throng, who had at first united against the
aggression of one man, were divided by the hereditary wrath of faction. At
the cry of Orsini, several new partisans hurried to the spot; the friends
of the Colonna drew themselves on one side - the defenders of the Orsini on
the other - and the few who agreed with the smith that both factions were
equally odious, and the people was the sole legitimate cry in a popular
commotion, would have withdrawn themselves from the approaching melee, if
the smith himself, who was looked upon by them as an authority of great
influence, had not - whether from resentment at the haughty bearing of the
young Colonna, or from that appetite of contest not uncommon in men of a
bulk and force which assure them in all personal affrays the lofty pleasure
of superiority - if, I say, the smith himself had not, after a pause of
indecision, retired among the Orsini, and entrained, by his example, the
alliance of his friends with the favourers of that faction.
In popular commotions, each man is whirled along with the herd, often half
against his own approbation or assent. The few words of peace by which
Adrian di Castello commenced an address to his friends were drowned amidst
their shouts. Proud to find in their ranks one of the most beloved, and
one of the noblest of that name, the partisans of the Colonna placed him in
their front, and charged impetuously on their foes. Adrian, however, who
had acquired from circumstances something of that chivalrous code which he
certainly could not have owed to his Roman birth, disdained at first to
assault men among whom he recognised no equal, either in rank or the
practice of arms. He contented himself with putting aside the few strokes
that were aimed at him in the gathering confusion of the conflict - few;
for those who recognised him, even amidst the bitterest partisans of the
Orsini, were not willing to expose themselves to the danger and odium of
spilling the blood of a man, who, in addition to his great birth and the
terrible power of his connexions, was possessed of a personal popularity,
which he owed rather to a comparison with the vices of his relatives than
to any remarkable virtues hitherto displayed by himself. The smith alone,
who had as yet taken no active part in the fray, seemed to gather himself
up in determined opposition as the cavalier now advanced within a few steps
of him.
"Did we not tell thee," quoth the giant, frowning, "that the Colonna were,
not less than the Orsini, the foes of the people? Look at thy followers
and clients: are they not cutting the throats of humble men by way of
vengeance for the crime of a great one? But that is the way one patrician
always scourges the insolence of another. He lays the rod on the backs of
the people, and then cries, 'See how just I am!'"
"I do not answer thee now," answered Adrian; "but if thou regrettest with
me this waste of blood, join with me in attempting to prevent it."
"I - not I! let the blood of the slaves flow today: the time is fast
coming when it shall be washed away by the blood of the lords."
"Away, ruffian!" said Adrian, seeking no further parley, and touching the
smith with the flat side of his sword. In an instant the hammer of the
smith swung in the air, and, but for the active spring of the young noble,
would infallibly have crushed him to the earth. Ere the smith could gain
time for a second blow, Adrian's sword passed twice through his right arm,
and the weapon fell heavily to the ground.
"Slay him, slay him!" cried several of the clients of the Colonna, now
pressing, dastard-like, round the disarmed and disabled smith.
"Ay, slay him!" said, in tolerable Italian, but with a barbarous accent,
one man, half-clad in armour, who had but just joined the group, and who
was one of those wild German bandits whom the Colonna held in their pay;
"he belongs to a horrible gang of miscreants sworn against all order and
peace. He is one of Rienzi's followers, and, bless the Three Kings! raves
about the People."
"Thou sayest right, barbarian," said the sturdy smith, in a loud voice, and
tearing aside the vest from his breast with his left hand; "come all -
Colonna and Orsini - dig to this heart with your sharp blades, and when you
have reached the centre, you will find there the object of your common
hatred - 'Rienzi and the People!'"
As he uttered these words, in language that would have seemed above his
station (if a certain glow and exaggeration of phrase and sentiment were
not common, when excited, to all the Romans), the loudness of his voice
rose above the noise immediately round him, and stilled, for an instant,
the general din; and when, at last, the words, "Rienzi and the People" rang
forth, they penetrated midway through the increasing crowd, and were
answered as by an echo, with a hundred voices - "Rienzi and the People!"
But whatever impression the words of the mechanic made on others, it was
equally visible in the young Colonna. At the name of Rienzi the glow of
excitement vanished from his cheek; he started back, muttered to himself,
and for a moment seemed, even in the midst of that stirring commotion, to
be lost in a moody and distant revery. He recovered, as the shout died
away; and saying to the smith, in a low tone, "Friend, I am sorry for thy
wound; but seek me on the morrow, and thou shalt find thou hast wronged
me;" he beckoned to the German to follow him, and threaded his way through
the crowd, which generally gave back as he advanced. For the bitterest
hatred to the order of the nobles was at that time in Rome mingled with a
servile respect for their persons, and a mysterious awe of their
uncontrollable power.
As Adrian passed through that part of the crowd in which the fray had not
yet commenced, the murmurs that followed him were not those which many of
his race could have heard.
"A Colonna," said one.
"Yet no ravisher," said another, laughing wildly.
"Nor murtherer," muttered a third, pressing his hand to his breast. "'Tis
not against him that my father's blood cries aloud."
"Bless him," said a fourth, "for as yet no man curses him!"
"Ah, God help us!" said an old man, with a long grey beard, leaning on his
staff: "The serpent's young yet; the fangs will show by and by."
"For shame, father! he is a comely youth, and not proud in the least. What
a smile he hath!" quoth a fair matron, who kept on the outskirt of the
melee.
"Farewell to a man's honour when a noble smiles on his wife!" was the
answer.
"Nay," said Luigi, a jolly butcher, with a roguish eye, "what a man can win
fairly from maid or wife, that let him do, whether plebeian or noble -
that's my morality; but when an ugly old patrician finds fair words will
not win fair looks, and carries me off a dame on the back of a German boar,
with a stab in the side for comfort to the spouse, - then, I say, he is a
wicked man, and an adulterer."
While such were the comments and the murmurs that followed the noble, very
different were the looks and words that attended the German soldier.
Equally, nay, with even greater promptitude, did the crowd make way at his
armed and heavy tread; but not with looks of reverence: - the eye glared as
he approached; but the cheek grew pale - the head bowed - the lip quivered;
each man felt a shudder of hate and fear, as recognizing a dread and mortal
foe. And well and wrathfully did the fierce mercenary note the signs of
the general aversion. He pushed on rudely - half-smiling in contempt,
half-frowning in revenge, as he looked from side to side; and his long,
matted, light hair, tawny-coloured moustache, and brawny front, contrasted
strongly with the dark eyes, raven locks, and slender frames of the
Italians.
"May Lucifer double damn those German cut-throats!" muttered, between his
grinded teeth, one of the citizens.
"Amen!" answered, heartily, another.
"Hush!" said a third, timorously looking round; "if one of them hear thee,
thou art a lost man."
"Oh, Rome! Rome! to what art thou fallen!" said bitterly one citizen,
clothed in black, and of a higher seeming than the rest; "when thou
shudderest in thy streets at the tread of a hired barbarian!"
"Hark to one of our learned men, and rich citizens!" said the butcher,
reverently.
"'Tis a friend of Rienzi's," quoth another of the group, lifting his cap.
With downcast eyes, and a face in which grief, shame, and wrath, were
visibly expressed, Pandulfo di Guido, a citizen of birth and repute, swept
slowly through the crowd, and disappeared.
Meanwhile, Adrian, having gained a street which, though in the
neighbourhood of the crowd, was empty and desolate, turned to his fierce
comrade. "Rodolf!" said he, "mark! - no violence to the citizens. Return
to the crowd, collect the friends of our house, withdraw them from the
scene; let not the Colonna be blamed for this day's violence; and assure
our followers, in my name, that I swear, by the knighthood I received at
the Emperor's hands, that by my sword shall Martino di Porto be punished
for his outrage. Fain would I, in person, allay the tumult, but my
presence only seems to sanction it. Go - thou hast weight with them all."
"Ay, Signor, the weight of blows!" answered the grim soldier. "But the
command is hard; I would fain let their puddle-blood flow an hour or two
longer. Yet, pardon me; in obeying thy orders, do I obey those of my
master, thy kinsman? It is old Stephen Colonna - who seldom spares blood
or treasure, God bless him - (save his own!) - whose money I hold, and to
whose hests I am sworn."
"Diavolo!" muttered the cavalier, and the angry spot was on his cheek; but,
with the habitual self-control of the Italian nobles, he smothered his
rising choler, and said aloud, with calmness, but dignity -
"Do as I bid thee; check this tumult - make us the forbearing party. Let
all be still within one hour hence, and call on me tomorrow for thy reward;
be this purse an earnest of my future thanks. As for my kinsman, whom I
command thee to name more reverently, 'tis in his name I speak. Hark! the
din increases - the contest swells - go - lose not another moment."
Somewhat awed by the quiet firmness of the patrician, Rodolf nodded,
without answer, slid the money into his bosom, and stalked away into the
thickest of the throng. But, even ere he arrived, a sudden reaction had
taken place.
The young cavalier, left alone in that spot, followed with his eyes the
receding form of the mercenary, as the sun, now setting, shone slant upon
his glittering casque, and said bitterly to himself - "Unfortunate city,
fountain of all mighty memories - fallen queen of a thousand nations - how
art thou decrowned and spoiled by thy recreant and apostate children! Thy
nobles divided against themselves - thy people cursing thy nobles - thy
priests, who should sow peace, planting discord - the father of thy church
deserting thy stately walls, his home a refuge, his mitre a fief, his court
a Gallic village - and we! we, of the haughtiest blood of Rome - we, the
sons of Caesars, and of the lineage of demigods, guarding an insolent and
abhorred state by the swords of hirelings, who mock our cowardice while
they receive our pay - who keep our citizens slaves, and lord it over their
very masters in return! Oh, that we, the hereditary chiefs of Rome, could
but feel - oh, that we could but find, our only legitimate safeguard in the
grateful hearts of our countrymen!"
So deeply did the young Adrian feel the galling truth of all he uttered,
that the indignant tears rolled down his cheeks as he spoke. He felt no
shame as he dashed them away; for that weakness which weeps for a fallen
race, is the tenderness not of women but of angels.
As he turned slowly to quit the spot, his steps were suddenly arrested by a
loud shout: "Rienzi! Rienzi!" smote the air. From the walls of the
Capitol to the bed of the glittering Tiber, that name echoed far and wide;
and, as the shout died away, it was swallowed up in a silence so profound,
so universal, so breathless, that you might have imagined that death itself
had fallen over the city. And now, at the extreme end of the crowd, and
elevated above their level, on vast fragments of stone which had been
dragged from the ruins of Rome in one of the late frequent tumults between
contending factions, to serve as a barricade for citizens against citizens,
- on these silent memorials of the past grandeur, the present misery, of
Rome, stood that extraordinary man, who, above all his race, was the most
penetrated with the glories of the one time, with the degradation of the
other.
From the distance at which he stood from the scene, Adrian could only
distinguish the dark outline of Rienzi's form; he could only hear the faint
sound of his mighty voice; he could only perceive, in the subdued yet
waving sea of human beings that spread around, their heads bared in the
last rays of the sun, the unutterable effect which an eloquence, described
by contemporaries almost as miraculous, - but in reality less so from the
genius of the man than the sympathy of the audience, - created in all, who
drank into their hearts and souls the stream of its burning thoughts.
It was but for a short time that that form was visible to the earnest eye,
that that voice at intervals reached the straining ear, of Adrian di
Castello; but that time sufficed to produce all the effect which Adrian
himself had desired.
Another shout, more earnest, more prolonged than the first - a shout, in
which spoke the release of swelling thoughts, of intense excitement -
betokened the close of the harangue; and then you might see, after a
minute's pause, the crowd breaking in all directions, and pouring down the
avenues in various knots and groups, each testifying the strong and lasting
impression made upon the multitude by that address. Every cheek was
flushed - every tongue spoke: the animation of the orator had passed, like
a living spirit, into the breasts of the audience. He had thundered
against the disorders of the patricians, yet, by a word, he had disarmed
the anger of the plebeians - he had preached freedom, yet he had opposed
licence. He had calmed the present, by a promise of the future. He had
chid their quarrels, yet had supported their cause. He had mastered the
revenge of today, by a solemn assurance that there should come justice for
the morrow. So great may be the power, so mighty the eloquence, so
formidable the genius, of one man, - without arms, without rank, without
sword or ermine, who addresses himself to a people that is oppressed!
