Chapter 7.VII. Vaucluse and its Genius Loci. - Old Acquaintance Renewed.
The next day at early noon the Cavalier, whom our last chapter presented to
the reader, was seen mounted on a strong Norman horse, winding his way
slowly along a green and pleasant path some miles from Avignon. At length
he found himself in a wild and romantic valley, through which wandered that
delightful river whose name the verse of Petrarch has given to so beloved a
fame. Sheltered by rocks, and in this part winding through the greenest
banks, enamelled with a thousand wild flowers and water-weeds, went the
crystal Sorgia. Advancing farther, the landscape assumed a more sombre and
sterile aspect. The valley seemed enclosed or shut in by fantastic rocks
of a thousand shapes, down which dashed and glittered a thousand rivulets.
And, in the very wildest of the scene, the ground suddenly opened into a
quaint and cultivated garden, through which, amidst a profusion of foliage,
was seen a small and lonely mansion, - the hermitage of the place. The
horseman was in the valley of the Vaucluse; and before his eye lay the
garden and the house of PETRARCH! Carelessly, however, his eye scanned the
consecrated spot; and unconsciously it rested, for a moment, upon a
solitary figure seated musingly by the margin of the river. A large dog at
the side of the noonday idler barked at the horseman as he rode on. "A
brave animal and a deep bay!" thought the traveller; to him the dog seemed
an object much more interesting than its master. And so, - as the crowd of
little men pass unheeding and unmoved, those in whom Posterity shall
acknowledge the landmarks of their age, - the horseman turned his glance
from the Poet!
Thrice blessed name! Immortal Florentine! (I need scarcely say that it is
his origin, not his actual birth, which entitles us to term Petrarch a
Florentine.) not as the lover, nor even as the poet, do I bow before thy
consecrated memory - venerating thee as one it were sacrilege to introduce
in this unworthy page - save by name and as a shadow; but as the first who
ever asserted to people and to prince the august majesty of Letters; who
claimed to Genius the prerogative to influence states, to control opinion,
to hold an empire over the hearts of men, and prepare events by animating
passion, and guiding thought! What, (though but feebly felt and dimly
seen) - what do we yet owe to Thee if Knowledge be now a Power; if MIND be
a Prophet and a Fate, foretelling and foredooming the things to come! From
the greatest to the least of us, to whom the pen is at once a sceptre and a
sword, the low-born Florentine has been the arch-messenger to smooth the
way and prepare the welcome. Yes! even the meanest of the aftercomers -
even he who now vents his gratitude, - is thine everlasting debtor! Thine,
how largely is the honour, if his labours, humble though they be, find an
audience wherever literature is known; preaching in remotest lands the
moral of forgotten revolutions, and scattering in the palace and the
marketplace the seeds that shall ripen into fruit when the hand of the
sower shall be dust, and his very name, perhaps, be lost! For few, alas!
are they, whose names may outlive the grave; but the thoughts of every man
who writes, are made undying; - others appropriate, advance, exalt them;
and millions of minds unknown, undreamt of, are required to produce the
immortality of one!
Indulging meditations very different from those which the idea of Petrarch
awakens in a later time, the Cavalier pursued his path.
The valley was long left behind, and the way grew more and more faintly
traced, until it terminated in a wood, through whose tangled boughs the
sunlight broke playfully. At length, the wood opened into a wide glade,
from which rose a precipitous ascent, crowned with the ruins of an old
castle. The traveller dismounted, led his horse up the ascent, and,
gaining the ruins, left his steed within one of the roofless chambers,
overgrown with the longest grass and a profusion of wild shrubs; thence
ascending, with some toil, a narrow and broken staircase, he found himself
in a small room, less decayed than the rest, of which the roof and floor
were yet whole.
Stretched on the ground in his cloak, and leaning his head thoughtfully on
his hand, was a man of tall stature, and middle age. He lifted himself on
his arm with great alacrity as the Cavalier entered.
"Well, Brettone, I have counted the hours - what tidings?"
"Albornoz consents."
"Glad news! Thou givest me new life. Pardieu, I shall breakfast all the
better for this, my brother. Hast thou remembered that I am famishing?"
Brettone drew from beneath his cloak a sufficiently huge flask of wine, and
a small panier, tolerably well filled; the inmate of the tower threw
himself upon the provant with great devotion. And both the soldiers, for
such they were, stretched at length on the ground, regaled themselves with
considerable zest, talking hastily and familiarly between every mouthful.
"I say, Brettone, thou playest unfairly; thou hast already devoured more
than half the pasty: push it hitherward. And so the Cardinal consents!
What manner of man is he? Able as they say?"
"Quick, sharp, and earnest, with an eye of fire, few words, and comes to
the point."
"Unlike a priest then; - a good brigand spoilt. What hast thou heard of
the force he heads? Ho, not so fast with the wine."
"Scanty at present. - He relies on recruits throughout Italy."
"What his designs for Rome? There, my brother, there tends my secret soul!
As for these petty towns and petty tyrants, I care not how they fall, or by
whom. But the Pope must not return to Rome. Rome must be mine. The city
of a new empire, the conquest of a new Attila! There, every circumstance
combines in my favour! - the absence of the Pope, the weakness of the
middle class, the poverty of the populace, the imbecile though ferocious
barbarism of the Barons, have long concurred to render Rome the most
facile, while the most glorious conquest!"
"My brother, pray Heaven your ambition do not wreck you at last; you are
ever losing sight of the land. Surely with the immense wealth we are
acquiring, we may - "
"Aspire to be something greater than Free Companions, generals today, and
adventurers tomorrow. Rememberest thou, how the Norman sword won Sicily,
and how the bastard William converted on the field of Hastings his baton
into a sceptre. I tell thee, Brettone, that this loose Italy has crowns on
the hedge that a dexterous hand may carry off at the point of the lance.
My course is taken, I will form the fairest army in Italy, and with it I
will win a throne in the Capitol. Fool that I was six years ago! - Instead
of deputing that mad dolt Pepin of Minorbino, had I myself deserted the
Hungarian, and repaired with my soldiery to Rome, the fall of Rienzi would
have been followed by the rise of Montreal. Pepin was outwitted, and threw
away the prey after he had hunted it down. The lion shall not again trust
the chase to the jackal!"
"Walter, thou speakest of the fate of Rienzi, let it warn thee!"
"Rienzi!" replied Montreal; "I know the man! In peaceful times or with an
honest people, he would have founded a great dynasty. But he dreamt of
laws and liberty for men who despise the first and will not protect the
last. We, of a harder race, know that a new throne must be built by the
feudal and not the civil system; and into the city we must transport the
camp. It is by the multitude that the proud Tribune gained power, - by the
multitude he lost it; it is by the sword that I will win it, and by the
sword will I keep it!"
"Rienzi was too cruel, he should not have incensed the Barons," said
Brettone, about to finish the flask, when the strong hand of his brother
plucked it from him, and anticipated the design.
"Pooh," said Montreal, finishing the draught with a long sigh, "he was not
cruel enough. He sought only to be just, and not to distinguish between
noble and peasant. He should have distinguished! He should have
exterminated the nobles root and branch. But this no Italian can do. This
is reserved for me."
"Thou wouldst not butcher all the best blood of Rome?"
"Butcher! No, but I would seize their lands, and endow with them a new
nobility, the hardy and fierce nobility of the North, who well know how to
guard their prince, and will guard him, as the fountain of their own power.
Enough of this now. And talking of Rienzi - rots he still in his dungeon?"
"Why, this morning, ere I left, I heard strange news. The town was astir,
groups in every corner. They said that Rienzi's trial was to be today, and
from the names of the judges chosen, it is suspected that acquittal is
already determined on."
"Ha! thou shouldst have told me of this before."
"Should he be restored to Rome, would it militate against thy plans?"
"Humph! I know not - deep thought and dexterous management would be
needed. I would fain not leave this spot till I hear what is decided on."
"Surely, Walter, it would have been wiser and safer to have stayed with thy
soldiery, and intrusted me with the absolute conduct of this affair."
"Not so," answered Montreal; "thou art a bold fellow enough, and a cunning
- but my head in these matters is better than thine. Besides," continued
the Knight, lowering his voice, and shading his face, "I had vowed a
pilgrimage to the beloved river, and the old trysting-place. Ah me! - But
all this, Brettone, thou understandest not - let it pass. As for my
safety, since we have come to this amnesty with Albornoz, I fear but little
danger even if discovered: besides, I want the florins. There are those
in this country, Germans, who could eat an Italian army at a meal, whom I
would fain engage, and their leaders want earnest-money - the griping
knaves! - How are the Cardinal's florins to be paid?"
"Half now - half when thy troops are before Rimini!"
"Rimini! the thought whets my sword. Rememberest thou how that accursed
Malatesta drove me from Aversa, (This Malatesta, a signior of illustrious
family, was one of the most skilful warriors in Italy. He and his brother
Galeotto had been raised to the joint-tyranny of Rimini by the voice of its
citizens. After being long the foes of the Church, they were ultimately
named as its captains by the Cardinal Albornoz.) broke up my camp, and made
me render to him all my booty? There fell the work of years! But for
that, my banner now would be floating over St. Angelo. I will pay back the
debt with fire and sword, ere the summer has shed its leaves."
The fair countenance of Montreal grew terrible as he uttered these words;
his hands griped the handle of his sword, and his strong frame heaved
visibly; tokens of the fierce and unsparing passions, by the aid of which a
life of rapine and revenge had corrupted a nature originally full no less
of the mercy than the courage of Provencal chivalry.
Such was the fearful man who now (the wildness of his youth sobered, and
his ambition hardened and concentered) was the rival with Rienzi for the
mastery of Rome.
