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The Harris Family 
El don House 
London, Ont. 



HANDBOUND 
AT THE 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 



THE AUTHOR OF 



ROMANCE AND REALITY, THE VENETIAN BRACELET, 
4-c. c. 



Must we in tears 



Unwind a love knit up by many years 1 
I cannot break my faith cannot re-send 
The truest heart that lover e'er did lend." 



KING. 



IN THREE VOLUMES. 
VOL. I. 

LONDON: 

RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, 
(SUCCESSOR TO HENRY COLBURN.) 

1834. 



LONDON: 

PRINTED BY JAMES MOVES, 
Castle Street, Leicester Square. 




" 



TO 



MRS. WYNDHAM LEWIS. 

s, 

DEAR MADAM, 

May I inscribe to you the present Work ? 


a slight remembrance of your kindness to 

Your affectionate 

L. E. L. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 



CHAPTER I. 

" The remembrance of youth is a sigh." 

Arabian Proverb. 

TOIL is the portion of day, as sleep is that of 
night ; but if there be one hour of the twenty-four 
which has the life of day without its labour, and 
the rest of night without its slumber, it is the 
lovely and languid hour of twilight. The shadows 
have not yet deepened into darkness, as yet the 
boughs droop not, and the fragrant leaves of the 
flower are still unclosed. The magnificence of 
the noon which excites, the mystery of the mid- 
night which awes, are distinct from the softness 
of evening. It is earth's brief breathing space, 
after the heat and hurry of her busier time ; like 
that repose kn6wn only to the young and happy, 
when the nerves gradually compose themselves, 
the thoughts gather into some vague but delicious 

VOL. I. B 



2 FRANCESCA CARRAHA. 

train, and the eyes are closed by languor before 
sleep. 

The day had been oppressively hot, but now a 
heavy dew fell, and a cool wind stirred the trees. 
The flowers raised their heads, and repaid the 
moisture by exhaling their hoarded sweetness ; 
the thrush sang a few notes, low and soft, like 
the unconscious expression of enjoyment ; and the 
cypresses, whose spiral heads had declined in the 
heat, now stood upright, stately and refreshed. 
The last hue of crimson had died away in the 
west, and the depth of the rich purple atmo- 
sphere was unbroken. 

" It is too dark," said the young sculptor, as 
he let his hand fall listlessly by his side, and 
stood gazing on the bust, as only the lover who 
looks on the face beloved, and the artist who 
looks on his own work, can gaze. The tender- 
ness of the one, and the pride of the other, were 
blended in the youth's countenance. Again he 
resumed his seat, but not his employment; the 
lulling influence of the time was upon him. Sun- 
shine, like truth, would have been too strong for 
such dreams as those in which he was indulging ; 
but they harmonised with the dtei shades now 
flitting round. Suddenly one of those rose-edged 
clouds in which a chance sunbeam lingers to the 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 3 

last, flung, as it floated by, the full richness of its 
colouring on the marble. The artist was recalled, 
by his sense of beauty, to reality. 

" O, my sister, do come and see how exquisite 
is this effect !" exclaimed he, with all that youthful 
eagerness which is impatient for sympathy in its 
delight. 

Slowly the maiden came from the adjacent 
window, where she had been leaning silent and 
apart. But her reverie had been deeper far than 
his. He had dwelt on fancies she on thought; 
and the charm of the one was sooner removed 
than the weight of the other. 

" Very beautiful, Guido!" said she, kindly ; 
but kindness was not enough for one who wanted 
admiration. 

Strange mystery of our nature, that those in 
whom genius developed itself in imagination, thus 
taking its most ethereal form, should yet be the 
most dependent on the opinions of others ! Praise 
is their very existence ; and those who have the 
wings of the dove, with which they might " flee 
away and be at rest," delight rather to linger 
on the high road, forgetting that where the sun- 
shine falls, there too gathers the dust, and that 
the soil remains when the silver lustre has passed. 
Alas! thus ever does the weakness of our nature 



4 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

rebuke its strength, and genius is brought to the 
level ay, below the level of common human- 
ity, by an unquenchable thirst for its applause. 

" If she had been really my sister," thought 
Guido, " she would have entered into my feel- 
ings ;" and he turned almost resentfully away. 
One glance at the pale cheek and glistening 
eyelashes of his cousin (for such she really was, 
though the names of brother and sister came 
familiar to their familiar intercourse) brought 
him again to her side. 

" Why do you weep, dearest Francesca?" he 
whispered, in those low and musical tones which 
only affection can utter. 

For reply she leant her head on his shoulder ; 
and as he threw his arm round her waist, he 
could feel that strong, though suppressed, emo- 
tion shook the slight frame which he supported. 
He led her tenderly to the window, and they 
sat down together. Suddenly a few notes of 
distant music arose on the air. Both started as 
if each had some peculiar interest in the sound. 
The flush died as rapidly as it came on the cheek 
of Francesca : 

" It is not yet time for vespers it is only the 
song of some boatmen." 

Guido gazed upon her earnestly. " Francesca, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 5 

sister, dearest, you weep ! Can it be that you 
will leave us?" 

The girl raised her large eyes, yet shining 
with tears. Their affectionate reproach was an- 
swer enough. 

"Alas!" continued he, "we are not happy as 
we were once wont to he ; how indifferent are 
we grown to so much that we used to love ! how 
altered we are, and in such brief space ! No 
affection have we now for the snow-white doves, 
or the agiH squirrel, in which we once took such 
delight; we feed them, but it is as a duty, not 
as a pleasure. No longer do we nurse the last 
glimmer in the lamp, to pore over the enchanted 
page of Tasso. No more do we rise with the 
first red on the sky, and, hurrying to the green 
wood, call ourselves knights and enthralled prin- 
cesses, and our mimic sports adventures. I keenly 
feel how the actual is superseding our imaginative 
world. Already the weight of the future is upon 
us ; we plan and calculate, . rather than hope. 
We find how little we have to do with our des- 
tiny, and yet, forsooth, we seek to direct it. Ever 
since that English stranger arrived " 

A shrill, harsh voice from the farther extre- 
mity of the chamber interrupted their discourse. 
" English ! English ! who names under my roof 



6 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

the only word which is there forbidden ? Talk, 
children, of what you list, but never let my old 
ears be startled by the mention of those accursed 
islanders!" 

The speaker was an aged man aged he 
seemed beyond the common lot of humanity 
and thin, shrivelled, and contracted, as if the 
popular belief were true, that his life was pro- 
longed by chemical secrets, and that he won from 
subtle drugs and essences a meagre and protracted 
existence. The anger of Carrara (for sfteh was the 
old man's name) was of brief duration, and almost 
the following moment he became immersed in his 
former occupation. 

It was a strange scene, the contrasts which 
met in that large but dilapidated chamber. It 
had been the banqueting-hall in the ancient pa- 
lace of the La Franchi, but the revelry and the 
splendour had long since passed away. The his- 
tory of its former possessors had been the history 
of most noble families. First pomp, finally want 
the gorgeous retinue reduced to the scanty 
train daughter after daughter to convent son 
after son to the wars ; one remnant of olden state 
vanishing after another, till the last of the line 
died a forgotten exile, in some obscure skirmish 
far away from his native land. One or two aged 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 7 

dependants still lingered amid the lonely walls; 
they died too ; and for years the deserted palace 
had been left to the bird, the insect, and the weed. 
The bat and the owl made it their home, the 
spider wove its dreary tapestry, the grass made 
its way through the tessellated floors, the moss 
grew over the untrodden pavement, and the ivy 
the fragile and creeping ivy was now the 
chief support of the battlements which it had 
overrun. 

Fifteen years previous to the commencement 
of this narrative, a stranger far advanced in years 
had suddenly arrived in the neighbourhood, and 
had taken up his abode in the left wing, which 
part of the building was by some chance in a 
better state of preservation than the rest. There 
were none to dispute his place of refuge, whose 
principal attraction seemed to be a high tower 
yet remaining, where he could take his astrono- 
mical observations. It was soon ascertained that 
he subsisted on a moderate sum of money, lodged 
in the .hands of a Lombard merchant, and that 
his habits were eccentric and unsocial to a degree 
that almost denoted an unsettled mind. 

Francisco da Carrara was in reality one of 
those visionaries whose imagination gave its own 
fascination to science ; he gazed on the stars with 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

the eye of the sage but the heart of the poet, till 
he deemed that to him was given the key of their 
mysteries, and that he read on their bright scroll 
the secrets of the future. His life had for years 
been devoted to one mystic search the discovery 
of the philosopher's stone and, like most of the 
enthusiasts in that wild pursuit, he firmly believed 
that every hour brought him nearer to an im- 
mortality upon earth, which in reality drew him 
closer and closer to the grave. Enduring poverty 
at least privation unremitting in his toil at 
the furnace, or his watch upon the night worn, 
withered, and become what would now be but an 
object of pity and derision that pale alchemist 
was happier than many of those whose triumphs 
over science in our day win the gold medal, and 
the alphabet for an array to their name. He suf- 
ficed unto himself; no mortification, that inevitable 
result of competition, embittered even success. 

I do believe there is no existence so content 
as that whose present is engrossed by employment, 
and whose future is filled by some strong hope, 
the truth of which is never proved. Toil and 
illusion are the only secrets to make life toler- 
able, and both of these were his. 

He had, too, his own small sphere of useful- 
ness; for his advice and medicines were eagerly 



FRANCESCA CARRARA, 

sought by his neighbours, and their vague dread 
of his. mysterious pursuits and supposed spiritual 
intercourse was merged in thankfulness for kind- 
ness and assistance. Two lovely companions had 
he in his solitude, his grandchildren. When he 
first arrived, the boy was five, and the girl nearly 
two, years of age. They were cousins ; Guido 
being the child of Carrara's son, and Francesca 
of his daughter. More than this no 1 one knew. 
The nurse who arrived with him died before she 
had become sufficiently confidential with any of 
the peasantry round to do more than hint at 
terrible domestic misfortunes, which had driven 
them from their dwelling in Padua. 

The old man himself never alluded to his 
former life. When he went back upon the past, 
it was to recall honours long departed, and the 
deeds of an heroic house, whose splendour he 
often vaguely hinted he was destined to revive. 
There was an antique parchment, illuminated 
with various devices illustrative of the records of 
the Carrara family there was the banner with 
its red fish from which they took their name 
there was the celebrated Francisco, in full armour, 
mounted on a steed whose head was covered 
with white plumes there was the likeness of the 
heroic Madonna Tadie and last, not least in 

B2 



10 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

interest, the gloomy dungeons of Venice, where 
perished the brave and youthful chieftains of 
Padua. From this parchment, the history of the 
house of Carrara, he delighted to hear his young 
descendants read. Thus from childhood was their 
imagination filled with the honours of the past 
and the hopes of the future hopes the more 
magnificent, from the vague hints which at times 
escaped froiH their usually taciturn parent. 

The side of the Tiber on which they lived was 
thinly inhabited ; a family of decayed nobility, 
named Mancini, and a convent of poor nuns, 
where the little Francesca acquired some know- 
ledge oi embroidery and of music, were their only 
neighbours. Guido had been entirely educated 
by his grandfather, who applied to the task by 
fits and starts; and in like manner the boy had 
taken frequent fancies of instructing his cousin, 
or, as she was always called, his sister. Guido was 
twenty, and Francesca seventeen. The three were 
now assembled in the old banqueting-hall, which, 
from its state of better preservation, had become 
their ordinary chamber. 

The old man was seated in a large low arm- 
chair, whose rich carvings of black oak were 
almost architectural in their dimensions ; it was 
drawn close to the huge and gloomy chimney, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

where was placed a small pan of charcoal, whose 
red glare served to shew rather than disperse the 
gloom around. Over this was simmering a pre- 
paration of herbs, which diffused a strong but 
pleasant odour. A single line of light wandered 
amid the obscurity it came from an open door, 
beyond which a winding staircase led to the tower 
where Carrara spent much of his time. 

Farther on, the room became lighter ; it was 
just the contrast between youth and age. The 
two oriel windows were especially appropriated 
by the cousins. At the one the day was ad- 
mitted fjfeely, and fell on the various products 
of the apulptor's skill ; all touched with some- 
thing of melancholy, which in youth seems to 
prophesy the fate it afterwards, perhaps, serves 
to fulfil. There were casts of the Gladiator 
he whose native courage struggled against the 
doom which was yet welcome a mournful al- 
legory of honour. The Niobe stricken by that 
inexorable destiny which the ancients so well 
knew was never yet shunned nor propitiated by 
human effort. The Antinoiis, where death is 
in a face of youthful beauty the shadow of the 
tomb resting upon hope and love. Below were 
two or three graceful urns, but wreathed with 
cypress ; and a vase, but a serpent was coiled 



12 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

around it. In the midst was a nearly finished 
bust, and the sculptor might well direct the eye 
to mark the spiritual expression it wore in the 
purple shadows of evening ; so pale, so pure, yet 
so tender. Another moment, and that transparent 
cheek would surely redden into blushes. The 
hair fell in curls over the face, and was gathered 
up behind in a knot, from which hung some rich 
ringlets. These, however, did not conceal the 
haughty turn of the head, erect like that of a 
young Semiramis. The features were somewhat 
less regular than is usual with an Italian face, 
but their expression in the marble wa,s full of 
sweetness. 

Over the other window an odoriferous creep- 
ing-plant had been carefully trained, and the 
slender leaves and clusters of pale blue flowers 
were like a fretted arabesque on the clear and 
amber-hued air. A few books were ranged on 

D 

one side; a lute leant against the other, near 
which was a frame half hidden by a piece *of un- 
finished embroidery. In the centre was a email 
table, and on it was placed a vase filled with 
roses. 

The two cousins were resting on the window- 
seat. The family likeness between them was 
slight, though it might be traced in the. Greek 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 13 

nose and short upper lip. The youth had the 
clear olive skin of the south, but warmed with 
that flushed and variable crimson which is the 
outward sign of the feverish and sensitive tempera- 
ment while the large dark eyes were strangely 
mournful for one whose years and sorrows had 
been so few. The girl was without a tinge of 
colour, but very fair ; the soft white of the Parian 
marble strongly contrasted with hair of the most 
ebon black at first, the long and shadowy lashes 
made the downcast eye. seem also dark, Taut when 
raised it was of that intense and violet blue, so 
rarely seen but in children, or in April skies. 
There was more energy, and therefore more hope, 
in her face than in that of Guido. The mind 
depends more on the body than we like to admit 
and Francesca's childhood had been unbroken 
by the weakness and pain which had so often 
stretched Guido on a bed of sickness, beside which 
only affection could have hoped affection, that 
believes not in death, until it be present in the 
house. 

It is as truly as it is beautifully said, that 
" perfect love casteth out fear" even in our frail 
nature; and the love between those two orphans 
was as perfect as human love could be. At no 
sacrifice* for the one could the other have hesi- 



14 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

tated, and no sacrifice would it have seemed 
the most entire devotion would have appeared a 
simple act of their ordinary affection. Guido 
knew that the image of another was graven on 
the inmost heart of each. With that knowledge 
came no coldness no distrust but firmer re- 
liance and deeper confidence. 

Again music rose on the air ; this time they 
really heard the convent chimes. Francesca rose 
from her seat, and took her veil . 

" Shall I go with you, dearest ?" 

" Not now ; I will tell you all, to-morrow," 
was the almost inaudible reply. Both turned 
from the door, though each took a different path. 

At first, Guide's step was slow, and he walked 
as one absorbed in mournful thought ; but at a 
turn in his path, which commanded the country 
below, his face brightened, and he sprung on his 
way, as if every moment of his time were pre- 
cious. He soon arrived at the villa of the Mancini, 
where his evenings were usually spent; how much 
more cheerful was it than his own home ! 

The Marchese was, as usual, closeted in his 
own chamber, where, since his wife's death at 
least, he enjoyed that indolent quiet in which 
he delighted. His daughters were assembled in 
a large hall, opening on the garden j ^le two 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 15 

younger were seated by a cage of rare foreign 
birds from the golden isles of Canary, half- ca- 
ressing, half-teasing them the two elder were 
standing beneath the verandah, seemingly in ear- 
nest discourse. It was easy to recognise in the 
tallest, the original of the- bust ; but either the 
look she bent on the young sculptor was not such 
as she often wore, or else he had given its softness 
from his own heart, for scorn was native to those 
features, and disdain familiar to her keen and 
falcon-like eyes. 

" Ah, no !" said her sister, a fair, timid-look- 
ing girl, who though in reality the elder by two 
years, yet appeared the junior ; " I should like a 
home like a nest, in some quiet valley. Do you 
remember the fairy tale of the two lovers, who, 
surrounded by enemies, were saved from the terri- 
ble giant who pursued the princess, by being 
turned into doves ? How happily must they have 
dwelt in the greenwood together !" 

" Yes ; hunting for worms or barleycorns, 
hatching their eggs, and trembling at every school- 
boy that came near. Give me the vest glittering 
with jewels ; the high place at the tournament, the 
gaze of every knight turned upon me, till even he 
who fought against the one wearing my colours, 
felt, as he laid lance in rest, that the strife was 



16 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

vain ; how could he combat in honour of that 
beauty which his own eyes saw was far surpassed?" 

" And he who wore your colours?" 

" That five hundred should be proud to do; 
the best and proudest of the land. Pity it were 
for starry eyes not to emulate the stars, and shine 
on many. I own one lover is difficult to manage ; 
for to one lover you may have yielded more of 
your heart than 1 care to surrender of mine. But 
the many why, I should hold them as we do 
yonder branch of roses we like their general 
effect, and care not if one drop off, so that another 
supply its place. Fancy now a lighted hall, and 
a group of white-plumed cavaliers ; I would have 
a smile for one, a sigh for a second, a frown for a 
third." 

" And in the meantime, till these honours 
arrive, you have me to rehearse with, and Guido 
Carrara to practise upon." 

" Nonsense !" 

" Yes, to you, who have no stronger motive 
than amusement no deeper feeling than vanity ; 
but, Marie, you are cruel to trifle with a love so 
earnest, so devoted 

" That you would like to be its object. Pray 
take him you are very welcome ; ah, yonder he 
comes ! now I will be disinterested, confide to 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 17 

him the passion he has inspired, protest against 
being your rival, and generously resign him." 

" The sacrifice would be too great, for there is 
no one here to supply his place," interrupted her 
sister, somewhat more angrily than the occasion 
required : but at this moment Guido ascended 
the steps which led to the little terrace where they 
now stood. 

" We have been expecting you some time," 
said Henrietta, kindly. 

" I saw you in eager discourse, as I ap- 
proached." 

" We were," replied Marie, " employed in 
aerial architecture the future for our ground- 
work ; I was fancying a lover for myself." 

" A lover!" answered Guido, in a low and 
altered voice. 

" Ay, such a lover as these degenerate times 
are little likely to produce ; one who, as the 
princely Medici, or the gallant Doria, were the 
glory of their cities, would be the glory of his. 
One to whom superiority was a birth-right, and 
success a comrade ; brave, generous, aspiring ; 
one to whom nothing could seem impossible. 

" And what," exclaimed the youth, gazing 
upon her, " could be impossible with such inspi- 
ration ? Love lends its own strength to the effort 



18 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

it excites. I have ever deemed it was for love's 
sweet sake that Columbus sought and found the 
bright world so long parted from her paler sister, 
that even tradition had forgotten the cause. What 
but some delicious dream, whose hues rose only 
dazzling upon solitude, made him linger on the 
twilight coast? When he marked the waves 
swallow up the leaf and bough that floated upon 
them what looked he on the waters to see, but 
one beloved face mirrored by his fancy ? Deem 
you not, in after-years, his glorious triumph 
brought a dearer joy than pride was not that 
sunny hemisphere a worthy offering to the proud- 
est beauty in Castile?" 

Henrietta had left her sister's side, whose eyes 
sank beneath those of Guido and she now wore 
the look of the exquisite marble he had fashioned 
into softness. There are some moments, the hues 
of which are like those on the wing of a butterfly 
a touch brushes them away. There are words to 
paint the misery of love, but none to paint its 
happiness ; that childish, glad, and confiding time 
to which youth gave its buoyancy, and hope its 
colours. Its language repeated, ever seems exag- 
gerated or foolish ; albeit there are none who have 
not thought such sounds " honey-sweet" in their 
time. The truth is, we never make for others 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 19 

the allowance we make for ourselves ; and we 
should deny even our own words, could we hear 
them spoken by another. We will therefore 
leave the young Italian to paint thefuture as the 
imagination ever paints. Troth but it was fitting 
speech for the moonlight : moonlight, the bright 
and clear, but the cold which, unlike the sun, 
opens no flowers, and ripens no fruit. 



20 



CHAPTER II. 

" Farewell ! 

For ia that word that fatal word howe'er 
We promise, hope, believe there breathes despair." 

BYRON. 

THE history of a minute why it would give a 
bird's-eye view of everj^possible variety in human 
existence. Wonderful the many events that are 
happening together life and death ; joy and sor- 
row ; the great and the mean ; the common and 
the rare ; good and evil ; are all in the record of 
that brief segment of time. 

We left the moonlight shining on the bright 
eye and the crimsoning blush we proceed to 
where it fell on the glittering lash and the pale 
and tearful cheek. There was something cheerful 
in the scene which we have just left the window 
opening into the garden-room filled with many 
gladdening signs of daily amusement and occu- 
pation, and the silence broken by the light laugh 
and mirthful tones of the children who were 
watching the birds. But here all was mournful 
and desolate for nothing is more mournful than 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 21 

man's work and man's skill going to ruin for 
want of man's care and nothing is more desolate 
than the moss and the green weed choking the 
fountain, and half hiding the fallen column. 

The silver waters of the spring had long since 
disappeared, but there still were left a few of the 
Corinthian pillars, some stretched on the ground 
and overgrown with creeping-plants, while two or 
three yet remained erect, and shewed how graceful 
the whole must have been. There was a frag- 
ment, too, of broken wall, on which were seated 
Francesca and a young cavalier, one whose long 
fair hair and clear blue eye spoke of a more 
northern clime than her own. 

" Let my father once see you, "urged the youth, 
" and I am sure of his consent ; we will then 
return hither, where you will be the dearer for 
your brief absence ; your grandfather will renounce 
his strange antipathy to my country in witnessing 
your happiness and for the stars shine as 
brightly on Evelyn Abbey as they do on yonder 
old tower who knows but the philosopher's stone 
may be discovered in England?" 

Francesca let him speak on ; she was happy at 
least while she listened; but silence was no an- 
swer, for here, at least, it gave no consent. 



22 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" You forget the other side," said she ; " what 
if Sir Robert Evelyn refuse to receive for his 
daughter the unknown and ^portionless Italian ; 
how shall I brook to be the first cause of differ- 
ence between a father and son, to whom the 
averted look and the harsh word have been 
hitherto unknown ?" 

The young Englishman gazed for a moment 
tenderly on her beautiful face. 

" The averted look, the harsh word, such are 
not for you, Francesca !" 

" Methinks," returned the Italian, " they 
would be but my fitting reward. How could your 
father expect a daughter's love from one who had 
left her own in his old age ; left him, too, without 
his blessing ; nay, without his knowledge ; his 
solitude embittered by anxiety for one who had 
no pity on his age, no memory for his care. I 
have heard, Evelyn, and have often read, in the 
tales of my own land, how, for her strange and 
sudden passion, a maiden has left home and 
parents, forgetting how her infancy was watched, 
and her youth cherished. So could not I. Few 
and feeble are the steps which my father must 
measure towards the grave ; but during those few, 
I must be at his side, Evelyn. How holy the 



ERANCESCA CARRARA. 23 

claim, when age asks from youth but a little 
time, and a little tendance to smooth the pass- 
age to the tomb!" 

Both were silent a pause which was broken 
by the convent-clock striking nine. 

" It is late!" exclaimed Francesca, forcing a 
smile. "I must not stay here talking of duty 
and all my household ones awaiting me ; you 
do not know what an important person I am at 
home !" but the effort was too much, and dropping 
her head on Evelyn's arm, she gave way to a 
burst of weeping. 

" Look up, love," at length said her com- 
panion ; " I would fain link the memory of our 
parting with something less earthly than word 
or gift. Do you see yonder large clear star near 
the moon, it shines here as I have seen it shine 
a thousand times in my own island let it be a 
token between us. When, dim and cloudy, its place 
is not seen in the sky we will be sorrowful, and 
think even so are we far away and hidden from 
each other ; but when it looks forth rejoicing and 
glorious, it shall be unto us as a sign and as a 
hope, and we will believe in a bright future and 
a fair destiny." 

" I shall watch it to-morrow night," whispered 
Francesca. 



24 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

A few more hurried words blessings scarce 
noted at the time, but dearly remembered after- 
wards, and they parted. The ilex boughs closed 
behind the light form of the maiden, while the 
young Englishman sprang rapidly down the nar- 
row path leading to the inn whence he was to 
start on the morrow by daybreak. 

It matters little to trace the rapidity of the 
land journey, or the monotony of the sea voyage 
alike unmarked by adventure. Robert Evelyn 
landed at Southampton, and immediately procured 
horses for himself and two servants ; for his father's 
house lay some twenty miles inland. 

" I would have you look to your pistols, young 
gentleman," said the landlord. Robert stared at 
such advice in England ; but the many suspicious- 
looking individuals and groups that he passed, made 
him rejoice at having followed it. It was obvious 
that their bold and prepared bearing kept more 
than one party at bay. 

Well known as every inch of the country was 
to Evelyn, he paused more than once to gaze 
upon its unfamiliar appearance. Fields which he 
remembered yellow with the waving corn, lay fat- 
low, though the month was June ; and one or two 
that bore signs of a luxuriant crop, were trampled 
down, and the wheat was rotting on the ground. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 25 

The hedges were full of gaps, made in the most 
reckless manner ; and the meadows, which had 
evidently not been mown, were either quite bare, 
or covered with irregular patches of rank, coarse 
grass, whose vegetation was exhausting itself. 
Many of the cottages were deserted, and the 
thatch blackening with neglect and damp ; the 
lattices gone from their frames, the pear-trees 
loosened from the walls, and their branches, grey 
with moss, and heavy with leaves, not fruit, trail- 
ing upon the grass-grown walks, told that the de- 
solation was no work of yesterday. A few dwell- 
ings of the very lowest order were yet inhabited, 
but at the riders' approach the doors were hastily 
closed, and not a creature could be seen, even at 
the windows. " And yet this is market-day !" and 
the traveller remembered what a cheerful scene the 
road used to present from the substantial yeo- 
man on his good brown cob, to the peasant girls, 
with baskets and red cloaks, whose voices and 
laughter were heard long before themselves were 
seen. Now the chief occupiers of the path were a 
few meagre cows, picking up a scanty subsistence. 

A sudden turn in the road brought them oppo- 
site a spot where Robert had passed many a hjfppy 
day. Involuntarily he drew his horse to a stand, 
and remained gazing with speechless dismay on 

VOL. i. c 



26 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

the scene before him. The house had been burned 
to the ground : the mouldering walls of the 
lower floor, and huge heaps of ashes, from which 
the weeds were beginning to spring up, were all 
that remained of the former hospitable dwelling. 
The garden, which sloped down to the highway, 
was utterly destroyed, and the skeletons of two 
large trees stood charred and blackened from the 
effects of fire. Robert was roused from his trance 
by a hand rudely laid on his bridle-rein, while a 
hoarse voice exclaimed, 

" So, my young cavalier, regaling yourself 
with a sight of the ruin you and yours have 
wrought. Speak, your name, and business 
here ?" 

Evelyn had been so lost in contemplation of 
the melancholy scene before him, that he had not 
observed the approach of a detachment of cavalry, 
by whom he and his attendants were now sur- 
rounded. He looked upon the officer, whose hand 
was yet upon his rein; but the idea which pre- 
sented itself was too improbable. " The son of 
Sir Robert Evelyn," said he, after a moment, " can- 
not be an intruder in these parts ! " 

" Sir Robert Evelyn is a good man and true : 
his son is welcome let him pass !" 

The voice harsh, changed as it was con- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 27 

firmed Robert's first suspicion ; though he might 
well hesitate to recognise the cheerful, cordial 
friend of yore, in the cold, pale, and stern-looking 
horseman before him. " Surely you will not let 
me pass," said the youth, " without some token 
of remembrance, Mr. Johnstone ? " 

" Call me not," exclaimed the officer fiercely, 
" by the appellations of the ungodly! My name 
is now, * Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord : I 
will repay!' and am not I His instrument on 
earth? Ride on, ride on, young man spare 
neither whip nor spur ; for the aged is even now 
in the valley of the shadow of death. Robert 
Evelyn," added he, in a softened and kinder tone, 
" must be sorely changed, if he speed not, that his 
father may bless him ere he die." 

Evelyn waited no answer, but rode on; and 
the clang of heavy horse-tramp was faint in the 
distance before his companion recovered from his 
surprise. " My father ill!" thought he, " he 
hinted not at this in his letter : ah, he knew the 
wish he expressed for . my return was enough, and 
he was fain to spare my anxiety. Ill dying, 
and I not there!" 

His horse was urged to its utmost speed, and 
in one hour arrived, covered with foam, at the 
abbey gate. It was barred, and he could hear 



28 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

within the measured step of the sentinel ; his 
challenge was, however, instantly answered, and 
the courtyard was filled with domestics, all eager 
with words of welcome. 

" My father?" exclaimed he. 

" Better much better," was the steward's 
reply. 

Robert's eyes swam with tears ; and he could 
only wave with his hand an answer to the many 
greetings around. He ran forwards to the library, 
and in another moment was in his father's arms. 



29 



CHAPTER III. 



" So we began to set every thing to rights." 

Ordinary Plans. 



" CHANGES, many, indeed, and sad changes," said 
Sir Robert Evelyn, " have chanced since you left 
us. I have seen our peaceful England, on whose 
shore warfare had become but a dark tradition, 
or a gallant hope to the young and adventurous 
spirits who sought for honour abroad I have 
seen it become the field of deadly battle, where 
the father raised his hand against the son, and 
the son against the father. I have seen the beacon 
blazing instead of the Christmas hearth ; and the 
ivy, which for more than a century had wreathed 
.undisturbed round these old battlements, has been 
pretty well cut away by the musketry during the 
last siege." 

" Siege, my father! and I not at your side!" 
exclaimed Robert reproachfully. 

" In truth, dear child, I wished not for you. 



30 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

My lot has been cast in troubled times, and glad 
should I have been to have saved you from the 
responsibility of that decision which I have found 
a heavy burden. In private conduct you are 
called upon to act according to your conscience, 
and your guide is infallible. In public you act 
according to your ability, and, God knows! that 
is often insufficient to decide amid conflicting 
events. How differently, at different times, do we 
view the same things ! Now, who can admit this, 
yet not distrust his judgment? I had hoped that, 
our troubles being ended, you might on your 
return to England have seen no cause for hesi- 
tation ; but such is the unsettled state of affairs, 
that, alas ! expediency seems now your mean but 
only guide." 

" Methinks, my father, I need do little but 
follow in your steps, and ask for your advice." 

" Alas, Robert ! it is for the aged, they say, 
to give advice ; the aged, who, perforce, must 
know its inefficiency for advice to be useful it 
must suit the circumstances ; and when do cir- 
cumstances fall out according to expectation ? 
When I stood by the side of Hampden, contending 
against a heavy oppression, and for an undeniable 
right, who could have thought that his refusal to 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 31 

pay that twenty shillings ship-money would be the 
first act of a resistance that was destined to arouse 
a whole nation, and kindle civil war from one end 
of our island to the other V 

" Yet, surely," interrupted his listener, " you 
do not repent of one of the noblest acts to which 
patriotism ever stimulated an individual ?" 

" Never! during the many troubles that fol- 
lowed the scenes of bloodshed that ensued, I have 
looked back to the pure and honourable motives, 
and to the enlightened views, with which our re- 
sistance commenced, in a spirit of great consola- 
tion and the perfect conviction of its necessity. 
I have never doubted for a moment but that we 
acted fojHtiie best. The benefit has not, as yet, 
been eqtM to the evil ; we have not yet suc- 
ceeded to our hope liberty is still insecure, 
and England is still rent by small factions, dis- 
tracted by foolish bigotries, and now at the will 
of one man ; yet the good seed has been sown. 
We have shewn what opposition may effect, and 
what individual exertions may achieve. We have 
awakened men to the knowledge of their rights ; 
and though for a while the energy of this nation 
may sleep after its fierce struggle, a lesson has 
been given which may never be forgotten. The 



32 FHANCESCA CARRARA. 

great names of our day will long be the watch- 
words of England's freedom. We have left be- 
hind us a legacy of right, which will accumulate. 
Still, I look around with disappointment. Judi- 
ciously avoiding the name of king, Cromwell 
rules us with a power far exceeding that of the 
monarch we dethroned." 

" But why," asked the younger Evelyn, " yield 
to Cromwell, when you resisted Charles?" 

" From exhaustion, and the force of individual 
character. Cromwell is the master-spirit of his 
age ; he has the bodily courage which inspires in 
the field, and the moral courage which sways in 
the council. Deeply imbued with the prevailing 
fanaticism, what would be to another |Apbstacle 
is to him a motive. He is not deterad by its 
absurdity, for he perceives it not ; he is not dis- 
gusted by its pretensions, for they are his own. 
Like all great leaders in political convulsions, he 
has reached its high places by flinging himself, 
with all the force of powerful talents, into the 
errors, the passions, and the prejudices of his time. 
But, however his power may have been won, all 
must allow that it is most worthily worn. During 
the brief period of his vigorous administration, 
how altered is the position of England ! Security 



FRANCE3CA CARRARA. 33 

at home, and respect abroad, these are the first- 
fruits of Cromwell's sway. The miserable state 
of the country around, the consequence of the late 
rising, sufficiently shews its folly." 

" Was Mr. Johnstone's house then destroyed?" 
" No, long before ; that was the cause of my 
taking up arms. It is foolishness to say, that no 
private feelings shall actuate us in a public cause. 
I had resolved on a neutral position ; I deemed 
that what influence I might possess would be best 
exerted in mediation : but this outrage put aside 
all my cooler plans. Johnstone's relatives were 
more puritanically given than himself; and one 
of them, a preacher, was residing with him, when 
a detachment ofGoring's dragoons demanded, or 
rather took shelter' there for the night. Their 
profane jesting and loud oaths called forth a. 
rebuke from the saint, which was received with 
the utmost contumely. Johnstone deemed he was 
called upon to resent the insults offered to his 
guest ; one word led to others ; swords were 
drawn, and a fierce contest ensued. Ere morn- 
ing, his house was burnt to the ground ; his two 
children perished in the flames, and his own life 
was only preserved by the fidelity of a servant, who 
bore him insensible to a hovel near. The next 
day he was brought hither, and that very evening 
c2 



34 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

I too was favoured with a visit from the same 
regiment. But they found the closed gate and 
the loaded gun ; and their attack was beaten off 
with considerable loss. Since then my military 
career has been tolerably active." 

" And I not at your side !" said Robert, 
bitterly. 

" Nay, my child," replied his father, in a sad 
and earnest tone ; " never lament that you have 
had no part in civil war ; it is terrible to be asked 
for quarter in your native tongue, and yet spare 
not. To know that the corn-field over which you 
hurry in pursuit of a flying enemy has been sown 
by your near neighbour to see the sky redden 
at midnight, and fear lest the crimson blaze arise 
from your own home to watch the desolation of 
.familiar things to become acquainted with waste 
and want, and worse, with the crime and reckless- 
ness, their inevitable consequences and then re- 
member how brief a period has elapsed since such 
things seemed impossible in the land." 

" But must the blessing ever be bought by 
the curse ? Is civil war, then, the fearful sacrifice 
demanded by liberty?" 

" Not so," replied Sir Robert ; " England's 
next struggle will be bloodless. We have left 
one great experience, that the straggle which is to 



FRAXCESCA CARRARA. 35 

be decided by the sword will bring repentance for 
the strife. Surely men will learn from the events 
of our time, how much to dread excitement, and 
to eschew passion. Opinion should guide in pub- 
lic affairs, not feeling. Opinion is grounded on 
circumstance, on observation, and on reflection. 
Feeling acts from impulse, which sees but half. 
Excitement leads to enthusiasm, that moral intoxi- 
cation, whose effects seem incredible to the sober, 
while the influence which produces the extrava- 
gance appears more extraordinary than the act 
itself. The demon of fanaticism was the shape 
which it took with us ; and verily, what with reli- 
gious republicans, harmonists, quakers, fifth-mo- 
narchy men, presbyterians, and the reign of the 
saints upon earth, it needs the strong hand of a 
Cromwell to reduce the spiritual chaos to any 
sort of order." 

The conversation, which had been continued 
in the soft dimness of a summer evening, was 
now interrupted by the appearance of supper. 
Evelyn was struck with the alteration in his 
father's habits ; it had been so constant a rule 
for the household to sup together. " It keeps up 
that feeling of attachment which is the best bond 
of society, a humane and frequent intercourse," 
was wont to be a frequent exclamation ; 



36 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

the rich and the poor never dwell so far apart 
as to be in equal ignorance of each other's real 
condition !" But as the light fell on Sir Robert's 
emaciated figure, and wan though still fine 
face, no longer animated by the joy of his son's 
return, the ravage of disease became visible ; and 
it was no marvel that bodily weakness shunned 
exertion. 

" To-morrow," said the invalid, " you shall 
take my place at the board ; to-night I cannot 
spare you." 

Perhaps there is no moment when beloved ob- 
jects are so much beloved, as on the return from 
a long absence. When the thousand fears for 
their health, their safety, and their welfare, have 
all been proved to be vain ; while the reaction 
from their depression is so exhilarating. When 
the many merits which fancy has added to their 
own, are all warm from the thought ; all fresh, 
too, with the gloss of novelty, untarnished with 
recent differences, and unworn by daily use. How 
pleasant the hurry of their arrival, and the many 
preparations to receive them ! In winter, the 
warmest seat by the fire ; in summer, the coolest 
by the open lattice. Then the supper, where all 
former likings are so carefully remembered ; the 
cheerful flutter of spirits, the disposition to talk, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 37 

the still greater desire to listen, the flushed cheek, 
the eager yet glistening eye ; and for the future 
will ever intrude upon the mortal present the 
delight of thinking, " we shall still be together 
to-morrow." Assuredly meeting after absence is 
one of ah, no ! it is life's most delicious feeling. 



38 



CHAPTER IV. 



" Look on this picture, and on this 

The counterfeit presentment of two brothers." 

HAMLET. 



IT is wonderful how some words ever were in- 
vented, for they express what does not exist 
confidence is among the number ; confidence is 
what no human being ever really had in another. 
Robert Evelyn felt his heart swell, and the tears 
swim in his eyes, at the touching tenderness 
with which his father received him; and yet 
he could not force himself to rely on that ten- 
derness as a guarantee for consent to a mar- 
riage now the horizon which bounded his future 
of happiness. He shrank from mentioning his 
pledge to Francesca. It is a painful thing both 
to parent and child, when the one must own, 
and the other must hear, the avowal of a love 
which is dearer than all old ties, and all former 
affection. There was as much delicacy as distrust 
in his hesitation. He wandered thoughtfully in 



FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 39 

the plaisance adjoining the house, planning, as 

we all plan, circumstances which never arrive ; 

and framing speeches which, when the time comes, 

we never make. His musings were interrupted 

by a summons from Sir Robert, whom he found 

seated in a small oratory that had been his 

mother's favourite room. It was panelled in black 

oak, but on each panel the arms of the family 

were painted in bright colours. The mantel-piece 

was of great rarity, being pure white marble, 

like an arch wreathed around with palm branches ; 

and above it was a Venetian mirror, set in a 

silver frame, and surmounted by a dove with 

outspread wings. A large picture hung opposite 

the fire-place ; it represented Sir Robert and Lady 

Evelyn, and had been painted soon after their 

marriage. He was dressed in a rich suit of purple 

velvet, a short cloak laced with gold, and his 

hair flowing down in waving curls, with a brow 

open as the morning ; a firm, compressed lip, and 

an eye full of spirit and intelligence. The robe 

of the lady was of pearl-white satin, and her 

bright golden tresses played in small corkscrew 

ringlets round her face. Her hands, remarkable 

for their delicate size arid colour, were filled with 

flowers, her fondness for which amounted to a 

passion if that feverish word may be applied to 



40 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

a love so gentle and innocent. The portrait was 
far more like the young cavalier just entering the 
chamber than the original who sat opposite, watch- 
ing his once resemblance with a fixed and mourn- 

o 

ful gaze. 

" My youth is renewed," said the old man, 
taking his son's hand ; " but draw near your seat, 
for my voice is weak, and I have yet much to say." 
Robert placed a low stool beside, but his heart 
was too full to speak ; for daylight shewed more 
forcibly than ever the alteration in his parent. 
" Your brother is my last and my greatest sorrow. 
He was to have joined you in Germany, but he 
loitered at Paris, and my first letter from my 
forgetful child was a confession of heavy debts 
incurred at the gaming-table. My remittance and 
my remonstrance were alike unanswered ; and I 
heard no more of Francis, till some prisoners, 
dragoons in Goring's regiment, were brought 
hither he was one of them. Great God ! but 
that my arm was then disabled, we should have 
met face to face in the battle ; and who may 
say on whose head the sin of blood might have 
rested ? With some difficulty I obtained a pardon ; 
but, weary of the restraint which circumstances 
rendered inevitable, he again left my roof; and 
at this moment I know not how to find my wil- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 41 

ful child, even though the summons were to my 
death-bed." 

Robert's first impulse was to frame excuses 
for his brother ; but what could he say, he who 
from childhood had so well known his reckless 
and selfish temper? We talk of the influence of 
education in what does it consist? Here were 
two with the same blood flowing in their veins, 
born under the same roof, nursed by the same 
mother, play-mates in the same nursery, sur- 
rounded by the same scenes, pursuing the same 
studies, subject to the same rules, rewarded by 
the same indulgences never till the age of eighteen 
having been parted for a day ; and yet were these 
two as opposite as if they had never known one 
circumstance in common. Robert was grave, 
thoughtful, and affectionate ; with the shyness 
always attendant on deep feeling, and the sensi- 
tiveness which is ever the best guard against 
wounding that of others such have known the 
suffering too well to inflict it ; enthusiastic in his 
admirations, imaginative in his tastes, and there- 
fore solitary in his habits. 

Frank had made love to all the pretty girls 
in the neighbourhood, while Robert was dreaming, 
in the summer glades of the New Forest, of the 
ideal mistress, whose perfection was poetry. High 



42 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

toned in all his sentiments, from native generosity 
of disposition ; he was strict in principle, from 
habit ; he was too good and too honourable him- 
self not to appreciate the uprightness and sincerity 
of his father. Francis, on the contrary, was lively, 
false, and uncertain ; his own pleasure, interest, or 
even ease, were ever uppermost in his mind. It 
was not that he would not be kind, but it seldom 
came into his head to be so. That certain sign of 
intense selfishness he never gave any one credit 
for a good motive, for he believed no one better 
than himself. He had an exaggerated opinion 
of his own talents ; but his idea of ability was 
deceit. As there are some naturally deficient in 
the power of computation, others in an ear for 
harmony, so Francis Evelyn was utterly devoid 
of truth he neither understood its moral beauty 
nor its actual utility. He felt no shame at detec- 
tion he only envied the discoverer's shrewdness, 
or his luck in finding a clew. He would neglect 
your wishes, wound your feelings, partly, though, 
from very ignorance of their existence ; while he 
would do even mean things to win a momentary 
applause. Robert was proud, but of extraneous 
circumstances of his ancient lineage, his noble 
father ; while the vanity of Francis centred in 
himself he was vain of his person, his dress, or 



FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 43 

any thing that was his. He would have felt none 
of his brother's sensitiveness in revealing the 
dearest and deepest secret of his heart ; none of 
his remorseful fear of giving pain to his father. 

Who has not observed in the daily intercourse 
of domestic life, that the very subject we have been 
striving to avoid, or planning to disclose, is sure 
to defeat our best-laid scheme, and start up- before 
us when least expected ? Thus it happened in 
the present case. 

" I had hoped," said Sir Robert, turning sud- 
denly from the window which commanded one 
of those wide panoramic views where hill and 
dale, dwelling, heath, and road, mingle toge- 
ther, " to have drawn our old alliance with 
yonder house yet closer; but individual hatreds 
are the legacies left by civil war strange how 
public can be stronger than private feeling ! The 
play-mate of my boyhood, the companion of my 
first campaign in the Low Countries, he who 
wedded with my sister, is now worse than a 
stranger ; we meet in the highway, and each 
passes on the other side. The present is embit- 
tered, not softened, by the memories of the past. 
Lord Maltravers has maintained an ostensibly 
neutral position ; but all his predilections are in 
favour of the cavaliers. The consciousness that 



44 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

he has not himself acted upon his principles, must 
create an invidious sentiment towards those who 
have. Alas, what slight cause will suffice to break 
up the friendship of years ! First came the disputed 
opinion, next the angry, then the cold word. 
Gradually we sought to avoid meeting, silence 
became habitual, and the epithets ' fanatic' and 
' malignant' took the place of friend and brother. 
Yet, though the faces of his children are turned 
away when we meet, I see how very fair they 
are. I never look to the turrets of Avonleigh 
Abbey without somewhat of the kindliness of for- 
mer days ; and I yet cling, Robert, to the thought 
of a union between one of those blue-eyed girls 
and yourself." 

" Not so, my father," replied the youth ; and 
he hurriedly commenced his avowal. His voice 
grew firmer as he proceeded, he remembered the 
worthiness of the Italian maiden, and was encou- 
raged by the affectionate interest with which his 
father listened to the narrative, which was only in- 
terrupted by a gentle sign of attention, or a kind 
look. A feeling of disappointment might arise in 
Sir Robert's mind as he heard this unexpected 
confession, but he was not one to weigh ambition 
against affection. He knew how, in his own case, 
the united heart had made the happy home ; and 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 45 

he was sufficiently aware of the strength and depth 
of his son's character to know that his would be 
no transitory attachment. What, then, remained 
but pardon and approval ? both of which were 
instantly given. 

" I lament that your Francesca should be a 
Catholic, chiefly from the circumstances which 
surround us. I have long since known that it is 
the faith, not the creed, which imports in religious 
belief. But in these days of fanaticism, that harsh 
and violent spirit is abroad, when men clothe their 
own angry passions in the garb of righteousness, 
and call persecution vindicating the honour of 
God. Alas ! what must be their idea of the Al- 
mighty power, when they deem it needs assistance 
from the arm of flesh ?" 

But his son was too happy to heed aught but 
the present : to a naturally sincere person, the op- 
pression of concealment is intolerable. 

" My dearest father, you then forgive me?" 

" What, my sage brother suing for forgive- 
ness? the very time for me to plead as well." 
And a young cavalier, who had entered unper- 
ceived, dropt on one knee beside. 

" Francis !" they both exclaimed in equal 
surprise at the change in, and the suddenness of, 
his appearance. He had ever affected great 



46 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

gaiety and richness of apparel, to mark his disdain 
of the Roundheads, whose custom was the reverse ; 
and his bright auburn hair had been carefully 
trained in long love-locks. Now he wore a sad- 
coloured cloak and a dark-grey suit, and his hair 
clipped close to the head, still, however, shewing a 
most unorthodox tendency to curl ; but his whole 
ettire and bearing was in strict conformity with 
the severe and grave fashion of the period. 

" Nay, I will increase your wonder," said he, 
laughing at their evident surprise ; " I come from 
Whitehall, and trust, my dear father, you will 
approve of my conversion as much as if it had 
been your own work instead of Sir Harry Vane's, 
with whom I came over from Paris. He desired 
me to greet you well in the name of the Lord," 
added he, in a snuffling tone. 

" I understand this disguise, for such I can- 
not but consider it, as little as I approve of this 
mockery." 

" Nay, dearest father," returned the youth 
caressingly, " blame me not that I have seen the 
folly of leaguing with your enemies, and that a 
little experience has taught me the necessity of 
conforming to general usage ; and surely, to my 
partial parent I may indulge in the relief of 
a laugh at the solemn sanctity which I know he 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 47 

himself holds but lightly. You drew your sword 
for higher motives than that hats should be worn 
without feathers, and sermons preached without 
surplices." 

Sir Robert might have said, that if there be 
one habit more than another the dry-rot of all 
that is high and generous in youth, it is thi? habit 
of ridicule. The lip ever ready with the sneer, 
the eye ever on the watch for the ludicrous, must 
always dwell upon the external ; and most of 
what is good and great ever lies below the sur- 
face. But, rejoiced at his child's return, he had 
little inclination to moralise ; he was now again 
under his own roof, and he trusted, as affection 
ever trusts, that the future would make him all 
he could wish. Ah, the future ! the dreaming, 
the deceiving future, which promises every thing, 
and performs nothing what would the present be 
without it? 



48 



CHAPTER V. 



" And Love, that leaves where'er he lights 
A burned or broken heart behind." 

MOORE. 



BOTH the brothers were early risers, for Robert 
longed to wander through the old familiar scenes,, 
and Francis had so many plans to carry into exe- 
cution, that it was impossible to begin them too 
soon. Breakfast was hurried over, for the day was 
too bright for in-doors discourse ; the elastic spirits 
born of the glad clear atmosphere required motion, 
and the look wandered after the sunshine. At 
first they walked rapidly ; the glorious morning 
caused, as it were, its own neglect they rather felt 
than saw the beauty around them ; but the buoyant 
step, the breath drawn lightly, and the freshness 
of eye and colour, shewed its influences were upon 
them. 

It was now the first week in June, and a late 
spring had kept its beauty till all but merged 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 49 

in summer. The steep and narrow path which 
they were threading wound down the side of a 
sloping heath, covered with the furze, now in full 
blossom a sea of gold, with wave-like shadows, 
as the wind bent them to and fro. The golden 
expanse was only varied by knots of the green 
snake-grass, with its slender and feathery leaves 
the most graceful of herbs. A peculiar perfume 
for the scent of the furze, when first in bloom, 

" Might vie 
With fabled sweets from purple Araby," 

was on the air; while every now and then the 
yellow butterflies rose upon the wing, till then 
confounded with the glittering buds on which they 
rested. The silence would have been profound, 
had it not been broken by a low but perpetual 
murmur, like rippling water, which told that the 
fragrant artisans of summer, the bees, were busy 
gathering in their honey-harvest at once labour- 
ers and manufacturers. Far in the distance lay 
the mighty forest, gloomy and solid, as if some 
dark mountain girdling in the valley. The sun- 
shine went sweeping rapidly from the foreground 
to the utmost extent of the horizon ; the shadow 
coiled up before it ; gradually the breaks among 
the wood became distinct, the dense blackness 

VOL. I. D 



60 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

vanished, and the green woods shone out in the 
transparent atmosphere. The furze now became 
broken with patches of grass, and with occasional 
trees, and clumps of firs, whose sombre and wiry 
foliage had nothing in common with the cheerful 
aspect of their companions. 

I cannot love evergreens they are the misan- 
thropes of nature. To them the spring brings no 
promise, the autumn no decline ; they are cut off 
rom the sweetest of all ties with their kind sym- 
pathy. They have no hopes in common, but. stand 
apart very emblems for the fortunate and worldly 
man, whose harsh temper has been unsoftened by 
participating in general suffering, existing alone in 
his unshared and sullen prosperity. I will have 
no evergreens in my garden ; when the inevitable 
winter comes, every beloved plant and favourite 
tree shall droop together no solitary fir left to 
triumph over the companionship of decay. 

Far as the boundaries of the forest spread on 
either side, it yet lay just below the heath ; a few 
more windings of the little path brought them 
directly into one of its glades. The first indication 
was a change of the perfumed air ; the furze- 
blossom was merged in the delicious breath of the 
may, now in full bloom the most aromatic of 
English flowers. The extreme stillness, relieved 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 51 

rather than interrupted by the bees plying their 
sounding wings, existed no longer. Every branch 
was musical with birds, whose perpetual chirpings 
served as chorus to the rich and prolonged cadences 
of the black-bird ; while the least stir not of their 
own making filled the air with fluttering pinions, 
which let in a shower of sunshine through the 
leaves. 

One characteristic of the New Forest is its 
freedom from underwood ; hence the height of 
the stately trees is undiminished, and the sweep 
of the open place unbroken. Architecture, the 
first of sciences, took, in our northern world, its 
earlier lessons in the forest the Gothic aisle and 
arch were found amid the beach and oak. The 
foilage was in the utmost variety of expanded 
spring ; the leaves of the beach, though destined 
to a deeper shade, wore already their polished 
green ; but the oak had yet put forth little more 
than those pale primrose-tinted buds, the faint 
promise of its future spreading shade. Here and 
there a shining holly reared its fairy " clump of 
spears," and round many a leafless trunk the 
slender English ivy twined its graceful wreaths 
in such profusion as to mimic the tree on whose 
life it had fed. But the beauty of the g-lades 

/ 

was the hawthorn, in full luxuriance. The 



52 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

slightest motion brought down a shower of white 
blossoms, and the sweet air grew yet sweeter as 
the brothers approached the more sequestered 
parts. The deer gazed on them for a moment 
with their large, tremulous eyes, and then bound- 
ed off, gradually slackening their graceful speed 
when a tree or a growth of fern served as a 
barrier; while here and there a pair of antlers 
were tossed up, glancing like ivory in the sun. 

" Every thing here is the very same as the 
morning I went away," said Robert Evelyn ; 
" but, good heavens, the change in the country 
around ! The house deserted, the field uncul- 
tivated, the peasant starting with a look of fear 
at the sound of your horse's hoofs, have little in 
common with the England which I left. But 
here I feel at home again ; I could almost dream 
that not a flower had faded, and not a leaf fallen 
these three years." 

" Now," returned Francis, " begin to moralise 
according to your mood. Rob Cowley of some 
quaint phrase touching the mutability of man, 
and the immutability of nature. But here, where 
these old oaks look too respectable to enact the 
part of evesdroppers, I shall rather say, Out on 
the fanatic knaves that brought the country to 
this pass, with their seeing of visions, and dreaming 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 53 

of dreams ! By the eyes of our beautiful Queen, 
I hate to look on their serge cloaks and close- 
cropped crowns." 

" And yet, methinks," answered the other, 
" I could as ill have brooked the hypocrisy and 
the oppression more delicately clad in cloth of 
silver and embroidery of gold." 

" Why, one would suppose you thought my 
father was listening," interrupted his brother. 
" Loyalty may well be an old song in England, 
when a young cavalier like yourself wears a 
sheathed rapier and a grave brow, and talks 
sagely of oppression !" 

" I have lived long enough in Italy to loathe 
the tyranny of old prescription. What, there, is the 
result of the exclusive privilege of one class, and 
the hereditary bondage of another, and the igno- 
rance of both what but cruelty, indolence, and 
debasing superstition? I stayed at Venice, and, 
even in that gay city my blood ran cold to retrace 
the crime and craft which are the staple of her 
annals. And yet her people were once free and 
bold, winning adventurous wealth from the sea, 
which they mastered. Now, to what a state of 
crippled slavery are they reduced! and by what, 
but the depression of a gradual and secret despo- 
tism ? Ah ! my brother, we do well to watch our 



54 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

birthright jealously ; the least invasion on the 
meanest peasant, the slightest encroachment of the 
powerful, are not matters to be neglected such 
are the first steps of tyranny. Woe betide the 
people who allow such invasion on their freedom 
to gain courage from endurance, or strength from 
time!" 

" Out, out upon this oration, or homily I 
should rather call it, to suit the spirit of the time ! 
I have heard too much of the blessings of liberty 
not to hate their very name. I own to you I can- 
not force myself to care for the fancied rights of 
low-born churls whom I despise. Mankind have, 
from all antiquity, been divided into two classes 
the ruling and the ruled ; why should we attempt 
to set all experience at defiance ? I see no cause 
for reversing the good old plan, provided I can 
manage to be one of the rulers. I will leave you 
a few noble sentiments (I hope you like the phrase) 
for our worthy father's especial service ; but trust 
your practice will suit more with my own." 

" I should, if you please, rather prefer my 
practice and my theory going together." 

" Mere matter of taste. But surely I know 
that solid iron-grey horse, and its still more solid 
rider, Major Johnsone ! take his entertainment oil 
yourself." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 55 

" Nay!" exclaimed Robert, detaining him; 
" it will not task your courtesy much, for we can 
leave him in a few minutes and I have so much 
to say to you." 

" Why, to tell the truth," resumed Francis, 
" I have my own reasons for wishing to avoid an 
encounter with yonder sullen fanatic. As ill luck 
would have it, I was with Goring's dragoons the 
night his house was burnt. Do not look so 
reproachfully ; we did but enter his hall for the 
joke of forcing the old Presbyterian into hospi- 
tality, when his refusal to drink the king's health 
led to high words, and thence to hard blows. I 
did not draw till Edward Stukeley was killed by 
my side. I then cut down his opponent, who was 
Johnsone's only son I myself received a wound" 
pointing to a slight scar on the temple " from 
his father. We were then separated ; but I hear he 
vows eternal vengeance against me. Now I care 
for his threats as little as I care for his anger ; but, 
come down as I am on my good behaviour, a broil 
is the last thing in the world that I desire so I 
shall judiciously retreat. We shall meet again, if 
you will go home, whither I shall direct my steps." 

So saying, he turned into a narrow path, and 
soon left the stern horseman and his brother far 
behind. 



56 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Suddenly the way terminated in a little lonely 
glade, through which a small clear brook ran with 
a sweet low song, a perpetual and musical murmur, 
as the waves rippled over the white and blue 
pebbles which lay glittering below. On either 
side spread the moss thick and soft, and starred 
with a thousand coloured particles, red, gold, and 
purple, Nature's own delicate broidery. There 
was nothing of that luxuriance of blossom which 
had hitherto clothed the wood, for there were no 
hawthorns ; but the bog-myrtle imparted its tender 
fragrance, and the caressing honeysuckle wound 
round many an ancient trunk, odours exhaling 
from every fairy-like tube fit trumpets for the 
heralds of Titania. 

Bending down beside the brook, from whose 
bank she was gathering the moss, the slender out- 
line of her form mirrored darkly on the stream, 
was a girl, lovely enough even for the lovely scene 
around. The grey stuff dress, the white cap, 
whose border was drawn close round the face, were 
such as a peasant would wear ; but there was 
about her not only that grace which nature and 
beauty give, but that softness and refinement which 
belong, if not to gentle blood, yet to gentle breed- 
ing. The pure white of her skin had known no 
exposure to the weather, and the fair and delicate 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 57 

hands had obviously known no ruder task than 
their present employment. She did not look 
above eighteen, and yet the first bloom of youth 
was past ; it was the complexion to which colour 
would naturally belong, and yet her cheek was 
pale, and the deep blue eyes had an expression of 
melancholy, fixed, but still not seeming to be their 
native expression. 

Francis gazed for a moment on the exquisite 
profile, which was all he could see, and hesitated ; 
it was an interview he had half resolved not to 
seek but Lucy Aylmer looked more lovely than 
ever ; and he sprang across the brook. 

" Are you gathering moss for the linnet's cage ?" 
asked he, aware that the bird had been his own 
gift. 

Lucy started from her bending attitude a flush 
of beautiful delight upon her face. In a moment 
that most beloved voice went to her heart ; her 
head sunk on his shoulder ; and for a few minutes 
she had no thought, no feeling, but the intense 
happiness of seeing him again. Could he, could 
any one, be insensible to tenderness so guileless 
and yet so deep? Perhaps, too, the very con- 
sciousness of how little it was deserved, quickened 
affection with remorse ; and at that instant Francis 
felt the love which had been weakened by absence, 

D2 



58 FBANCESCA CARRARA. 

and forgotten in change, spring up again with all 
the fervour of a new impulse. 

Lucy Aylmer was the only child of a favourite 
attendant of Lady Evelyn's, and left an orphan 
when but three years' old. Lady Evelyn had 
always wished for a daughter, and she adopted as 
her own the beautiful little girl, whose docility and 
affection more than repaid the debt of gratitude 
for what, alas ! was not kindness. Poor Lucy was 
only accustomed, not elevated to another sphere. 
Refinement of feeling belongs equall/ to every 
station, but refinement of taste must be matter of 
education. Every year, when she went to pay 
her annual visit to her father and grandmother, 
she found more and more how wide was the gulf 
between them. They had not a habit or an idea in 
common ; their pleasures were not her pleasures, 
and their hopes were not her hopes. 

But it was not till Francis Evelyn came home 
that she felt the full wretchedness of her position. 
Robert, brought up under the same roof, was* as a 
brother, associated in her mind only with the pains 
and pleasures of childhood. Not so the young 
and handsome cavalier, who had for two years 
entirely resided with the distant relative, who died, 
bequeathing to him the wreck of a once princely 
fortune. Sir Robert bitterly reproached himself 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 59 

for having consigned his child to another, when 
he saw the effect of too early initiation into pro- 
fligacy, or, as Francis called it, knowledge of 
the world. 

Frankness and confidence belong to youth ; 
and where experience comes too soon, it brings 
but half knowledge. The conviction of much evil 
in the heart should be learned at a later period, 
when we shall be aware also of much good. The 
worldly wisdom of the young is always of a harsh 
and bitter nature, making no allowance, and for- 
giving nothing ever ready to attribute the ill 
motive, and holding suspicion to be penetration. 
Moreover, he was pained to perceive that the 
youth had no higher rule of action than worldly 
honour honour which makes so many exceptions 
in favour of its pleasures. Principle was in his 
eyes but prejudice and where he could not 
reason the right away, he ridiculed it. 

Still he was so handsome, so graceful, so lively, 
that Sir Robert, making more excuses than he 
could well justify to himself, believed in the 
improvement he wished, and hoped every thing 
from the future. 

And what was the impression produced on 
the innocent Lucy? only that Francis Evelyn 
was the realisation of those dreams which had 



60 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of late cast a deeper tenderness over the page 
of the poet, and given a keener interest to the 
creation of the romance. Her creed of love was 
taken from Sir Philip Sydney's " Arcadia," and 
its real life grew out of the gentle tenderness 
native to her naturally melancholy temper the 
result, perhaps, of a very solitary existence, and 
of health uncertain, if not positively weak. 

Francis at first sought only amusement, and 
made love to her as he would to any other pretty 
girl, for he belonged to a school who considered 
gallantry as something between a relaxation and a 
science. It was, however, impossible for his feel- 
ings not to become interested something of the 
truth and poetry of her nature communicated 
themselves to his own. Not that he was prepared 
to make one sacrifice for her sake, but then she 
expected none; her presence was a delight, and 
he left the future to chance. And Lucy, she too 
was happy ; she hoped for nothing she wished 
for nothing. To see him every day, to listen to 
him, to dwell with trembling joy on the slightest 
instance of preference, was enough to fill up the 
circle of her charmed existence. 

But Lady Evelyn soon penetrated into her 
heart, and with a sorrow allied to anger. Alas 
for the weakness of human pride ! Lady Evelyn 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 61 

was a just, ay, and a kind woman ; yet she would 
sooner have seen the lovely and gentle creature 
who had grown up at her knees, whose watchful 
ove had been for years the daily solace of a life 
broken by sickness in the grave, than the bride 
of her son. She spoke to her, and harshly, while 
Lucy only wept, and felt the most guilty thing in 
the wide world. From that hour, love to the one 
seemed ingratitude to the other ; the disparity of 
their conditions haunted her perpetually. She was 
wretched and restless when Francis was away, 
but still more wretched when with him ; for the 
thought of his mother haunted her with all the 
bitterness of remorse. 

Francis was enraged at the interference, and 
opposition made him more in earnest ; but just at 
this time, the civil war, which had hitherto left 
their part of the country comparatively quiet, arose 
with great virulence in their immediate vicinity. 
Early friends, and the superior gaiety of their 
camp, soon led the younger Evelyn to join the roy- 
alists ; and the burning of Major Johnsone's house 
compelled him to leave the neighbourhood. Per- 
haps, as bitter medicines strengthen the weakened 
system, it would have given force to Lucy's efforts 
at resignation could she have known how seldom 
did her image arise in her lover's memory. His 



62 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

indifference was the only sorrow which her anx- 
ious fancy never conjured up. She felt more for 
what she believed must be his regret than for 
her own. 

Lady Evelyn's death led to her leaving the 
hall for a home more than ever distasteful ; true, 
she was independent, even rich, for her station ; 
but for it she was utterly unfit. She was too 
gentle, too unselfish, not to be beloved ; and though 
her father sometimes wished that she were more 
active, and her grandmother that she were less sad, 
still they were both proud and fond of her. They 
soon would have sorely missed the fairy hand whose 
birds and flowers gave a new cheerfulness to the 
house, and the sweet voice ever ready to sing their 
favourite old songs, or to read the sacred page, 
which, to use the poor old woman's words, " she 
did like an angel." But for herself the hope of 
life was gone. Every hour that she could, she 
passed in solitude, dreary, unoccupied, mournful 
solitude ; what wonder was it that the colour left 
a cheek so often washed with tears? 

But the crimson just now was radiant enough. 
Recovering from the first almost shock of delight, 
she clasped her hands in mute thankfulness to 
Heaven. She, whose timid eyes drooped at his 
least look, now gazed on his countenance as if 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 63 

she feared to lose that most beloved face, nor did 
she turn for one moment away. Scarcely could 
she believe in the reality. 

" You are lovelier than ever, my Lucy," said 
Francis. 

He was about to have added, that he had come 
forth on purpose to seek her, but the flattering 
falsehood died on his lips for his life he could 
not at that moment have deceived her even in a 
trifle. 

" Ah, Francis ! your mother ! " exclaimed she, 
turning pale ; " I must leave you." 

This was easy to say ; but where the heart 
is reluctant, the steps linger. What needs it to 
repeat that gentle discourse which all can either 
imagine or remember ? Their interview was, how- 
ever, brief; for Francis was little desirous of a 
discovery, and he knew he was expected by both 
father and brother. It was long before Lucy left 
that little lonely dell ; and when she did, it was 
with a sensation of passionate happiness beating at 
her heart which no fear for the future, no consci- 
ousness of disparity, could restrain. Ah, how little 
suffices to make earth a paradise in the young and 
eager eyes of early and unsuspicious love ! 

Francis was met by his brother just at the 
entrance of the wood ; for Robert was too full of 



64 FRANCESCA CARHARA. 

enjoyment in visiting all his early haunts not to 
desire a companion who would at least listen to 
the buoyant overflow of pleasant remembrances. 

Whenever the scene of a narrative changes, it 
has been a custom, venerable from its antiquity, to 
leave the hero in some danger or dilemma. With 
all our respect for good old rules, we must here 
reverse the practice, and leave ours both in content 
and security, while we return to Italy and Fran- 
cesca, whom we left to that drear absence whose 
passive loneliness is ever the lot of woman. 



65 



CHAPTER VI. 



" Get rich honestly, if you can but, at any rate, get rich. 

Useful Advice. 



" OH! Francesca, such news!" exclaimed Marie 
Mancini, bounding into the old hall, and followed, 
though at a slower pace, by her sister ; " come, 
put aside your embroidery, and congratulate us. 
My father's scruples have yielded to my uncle's 
wishes, nay commands, and we depart at once for 
France." 

" Alas!" replied Francesca, " you can scarce 
expect me to rejoice over an event which will part 
us so utterly !" 

" Not so," interrupted the gentle voice of 
Henrietta ; " you must join us ; the Cardinal's 
letters are full of -kindness he seems anxious to 
indulge our least wishes surely be will not deny 
us our earliest and dearest friend. Think, too, 
what his patronage may effect for Guido ! " 



66 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" And what the young nobles of France may 
say to your dark eyes ! " added Marie. 

" Is it true," said Guido, who had just entered 
" that you are about to leave Italy and us?" 

" Yes," answered Marie, " we are like the 
knights of old, about to go forth and conquer." 

She paused, for she felt rebuked by the earnest 
and melancholy gaze of the young sculptor. Marie 
loved him as much as it was in her nature to 
love more than she suspected herself. It was 
with a flushed cheek and glittering eye that she 
let him draw her towards the window, while she 
listened to a passion pleaded with all the fervour 
of the South, and made beautiful by an imagination 
which turned all it touched to poetry. True it is 
that the innate buoyancy of the as yet unbroken 
spirit soon rebounds from the pressure of sorrow ; 
nevertheless, it is in youth that sorrow is most 
keenly felt. Time, of which so little has been 
measured, seems so very long we soon learn the 
worldly lesson, that friends are easily replaced, and 
still more easily forgotten. We become accustomed 
to change we grow hardened to regret and in 
after-years look back with surprise, nay, even 
disdain, at the poignant grief with which we first 
parted from our early companions. We never again 
form those open, eager, and confiding attachments. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 67 

It was late in the autumn when the Mancinis 
departed; and drearily did the ensuing months 
pass with Francesca and Guido. The season, too, 
added its gloom. In our northern climes we have 
comfort and even gaiety with winter ; there the 
cheerful fireside and the hospitality of Christmas 
make that period a sort of rallying point for the 
year. But where summer forms so large a portion 
of the enjoyment of the people where all the 
habits are those of a warm climate where all 
ordinary avocations of life are carried on in the 
open air, a long and severe winter is tedious in- 
deed. The first letter they received was from 
Marie; their next was from Henrietta, who ear- 
nestly advised their coming to Paris. This was 
rendered impossible by the fiied attachment of 
their grandfather to his present residence, whose 
habits of seclusion were become more engrossing 
than ever. 

" I sometimes believe," said Guido, as, one cold, 
raw evening they sat beside the hearth, illumined 
by the red glare of the burning pine-boughs, "that 
the thing we call happiness, exists not. Its desire 
is implanted in our hearts, its promise dazzles our 
eyes ; but its reality is unknown. I look back to 
each moment I have experienced of enjoyment 
how was it ever mingled with fever and with 



68 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

fear ! I remember hearing, that in the East the 
clear and azure waters seem to flow before the 
weary and parched traveller ; yet a little further, 
and on he urges his weary way, but in vain the 
fair stream is a delusion. Even thus happiness 
is the mirage which leads us over the desert of 
life, ever fated to end in deceit and disappoint- 
ment. Young, beautiful, and innocent, are you 
happy, Francesca?" 

She turned her face towards him, silently it 
was glittering with tears. 

"And what is it that we want? Wealth !" con- 
tinued the youth ; t( had I possessed but a portion 
of my house's heritage, I should not be forced to 
picture to myself Marie but as surrounded by 
the gay flatterers of a foreign court. And you, 
Francesca need you have feared the English 
noble's denial, could the bride have brought gold 
instead of a true and loving heart ?" 

" You are right!" exclaimed the aged Carrara, 
who had, unperceived, been a witness to their dis- 
course ; " gold is the earthly deity, to whom is 
intrusted the destinies of humanity. It is power, 
it is pleasure, it is love ; for even affection may be 
bought by gratitude. What can a king give to his 
bravest but wealth? How can the lover surround 
the loved with the lovely but with wealth ? Nay, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 69 

will it not," added he, with a scarce perceptible 
sneer, " buy even salvation from our holy church? 
There is only one thing on earth more glorious, 
and that is science ; science, which can master the 
subtle spirit, and force it to enter even the most 
worthless substances. It is now before me ; the toil 
of a life is near its completion ; how mightily will 
one moment repay the vigils of years ! Ay, my 
cl^dren, be wild, be uncurbed in your wishes; little 
dream ye how near you are to their fulfilment !" 

The old man's pale face gleamed with excite- 
ment, his wan cheek was flushed, his eyes kindled 
with fire, and his step was buoyant, like that 
of youth, as he ascended the winding staircase 
which led to his solitary tower. The young are 
easily carried away by whatever appeals to their 
imagination ; and the cousins now began to build 
golden and aerial castles, with a vivacity the re- 
action of their previous despondency. 

" Holy mother ! what is that ?" ejaculated 
Francesca, as an explosion, like a clap of thunder 
bursting directly over the palace, shook the very 
ground beneath their feet. Both sprang to the 
door ; but the night, though cold, was clear, the 
moon shone large and bright in the deep blue 
sky; and all again was profound silence, when 
Guido exclaimed 



70 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" Surely that is a most unusual light from 
the turret !" 

The windows of the tower were illuminated 
with a sudden blaze, where usually glimmered but 
one solitary spark. Both rushed towards the 
staircase, down which, like waves, rolled the ed- 
dying smoke ; fortunately, there were large gaps 
in the dilapidated walls, or they never could have 
made their way. The last flight of steps iQs 
lighted from the open door, which the shock had 
forced from its hinges. A large clear flame, but 
evidently subsiding, arose on the hearth ; various 
vessels and instruments, mostly broken, were scat- 
tered round ; and thrown with his face on the floor 
lay their grandfather. Guido caught him up in 
his arms, and bore him to the lower chamber, 
where the noise had assembled their two servants. 
The features still wore their expression of eager- 
ness and triumph but set and rigid, for life had 
departed from them for ever. 

The danger of the palace was too imminent for 
neglect ; and leaving the body, beside which Fran- 
cesca was kneeling, Guido again ascended the 
steps of the tower ; but the smoke had nearly dis- 
persed, the blaze on the hearth was flickering and 
faint, while the pale moonlight shone quietly into 
that room of disappointment and death, as it had 



FRANCSSCA CARRARA. 71 

a thousand times shone on its lonely and deluding 
pursuits. Again he descended; and the same 
reddening pine-boughs that had lit his own and 
Francesca's countenance, in all the animation of 
their late discourse, now lighted the ghastly fea- 
tures of the dead. 



CHAPTER VII. 



" The future, that sweet world which is hope's own, 
Lay fair before." Anon. 



FRANCE now became the land of promise to the 
Carraras ; their youthful connexion with the 
nieces of Cardinal Mazarin might have encou- 
raged the most amhitious hopes; but they knew 
too little of the world to be worldly : Guido dwelt 
only on the thought that he should again see 
Marie Mancini ; and Francesca remembered that 
it was so much nearer England. Her expectations 
were, however, of a more subdued kind the very 
depth of a woman's affection casts its own shadow, 
and love and fear are with her twin-born. With 
a natural sensitiveness, she exaggerated dangers, 
and with natural timidity mistrusted the effects of 
absence. Months had passed away, and she had 
heard nothing of Evelyn. Alas ! how many old 
stories had she been told of change and falsehood ! 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 73 

But her spirit was firm as gentle. She had 
been from childhood less her grandfather's favour- 
ite than her cousin, and from the very earliest 
age all the household cares had fallen to her 
share. Thus, habits of thought and activity were 
forced upon her ; she soon acquired that self- 
reliance which exertion ever brings ; and at the 
age of seventeen she united a sweet seriousness, 
a mild energy, with all the guileless simplicity 
of youth. 

Impassioned and imaginative, living in an 
ideal world, little broken in upon by the small 
sacrifices of daily life, Guido was far less fitted for 
the ordinary struggle of existence ; he possessed 
genius in the highest sense of the word inherent, 
spiritual, and creative. In hand, heart, and mind, 
he was alike a poet. But, alas ! those who are 
heirs of the future, destined to fill the earth with 
the immortal and the beautiful, what is their 
share in the present ? the sad and the weary path 
the bowed-down and broken heart ! Look at 
the golden list of the few who have left behind 
them the bright picture, the god-like statue, the 
inspired scroll, to whom we yet owe ay and 
now pay our debt of gratitude what was each 
life but a long and terrible sacrifice to futurity ? 
But the young look to the goal, not to the road ; 

VOL. I. E 



74 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

and well it is for them so to do ; they would never 
reach it but for such onward gaze. 

Their few arrangements were soon made, 
hastened by a letter from Henrietta, now Duchesse 
de Mercoeur ; and they found themselves in pos- 
session of a degree of wealth, which, however 
moderate, was sufficient to preclude any thing 
like dependence. It was a bright morning when 
they embarked at the port of Leghorn. The blue 
sea spread far away, till lost, as it were, in light ; 
the shore lay glittering behind, and the sunshine 
seemed to fall like a blessing around. The buoy- 
ant atmosphere gives its own lightness to the 
spirits; and our young voyagers felt as if the beau- 
tiful day were the augury of the future. 

Yet, at that very time the power of their ex- 
pected patron seemed on the verge of final over- 
throw. Cardinal Mazarin had, for the second 
time, been forced into exile by the Fronde, and 
Paris was in a state of equal confusion and ex- 
citement excitement, that peculiarly Parisian 
word. The disturbances had commenced, like 
those of England, in the refusal of the parliament 
to sanction an obnoxious tax ; but here all resem- 
blance ended. The position of the two countries 
was, indeed, entirely opposite. In the English 
parliament the tax was refused on great and gene- 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 75 

ral principles; in the French, in consequence of 
its immediate pressure and hardship. In France, 
the parliament soon became a .mere engine in 
the hands of a few high-born and ambitious men, 
who had nothing in common with its interests, 
which were those of the people. In England 
the House of Commons was a powerful body, 
sufficing to itself, and whose members had com- 
mon cause in the privileges for which they con- 
tended. The truth is, our island had far preceded 
her Gallic neighbour in knowledge and liberality. 
The great body of Englishmen were far better 
educated than their compeers on the other side 
the channel. The Reformation had thrown open 
the rich extent of classic literature ; the age had 
been fertile in those great men who give their 
own impetus to the national mind ; and habits of 
religious led also to political discussion. More- 
over, one greatest advantage in all questions of 
government, the spring of action was no vain love 
of change, but a just desire of confirming olden 
privileges. The claimants went back upon what 
they believed to be their rights. Perhaps a more 
able and intelligent body of men were never col- 
lected together strong in conviction and ability 
than that which presented the memorable peti- 
tion of rights. 




76 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

But that hope is the most enduring of mortal 
feelings, what profound discouragement would it 
throw on the noblest and most promising efforts 
of humanity, to think that men so intellectual 
and so upright could be swayed, in the long-run, 
by the thirst of dominion ; and, carried away from 
all sober sense by the wildest and most fanatic 
enthusiasm, that a spirit of fierce and narrow 
religious persecution should be one of the chief 
legacies which they bequeathed to posterity ! 

But neither with the just sense of right with 
which our struggle was commenced, nor with the 
mad fanaticism with which it continued, had the 
division of the Fronde any thing in common. 
The parliament refused to register the royal edict 
because the tax was a present grievance, a hard- 
ship immediately felt. But they had not that 
only material for resistance a strong and rising 
middle class a class whose prosperity must ever 
grow out of commerce. Their opposition became 
armed rebellion, because upheld and stimulated 
by those to whom they gave all they wanted a 
sanction and a name. 

The wars of La Fronde were in reality the 
struggle of Cardinal de Retz for the post of Car- 
dinal Mazarin. The Coadjutor for so he was 
then entitled was the extraordinary man of his 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 77 

time. Disliking the clerical profession, which his 
family obliged him to adopt, he was as unprin- 
cipled as those necessarily must be upon whom 
hypocrisy is forced. It is difficult to imagine a 
more thoroughly bad person. Profligate, selfish, 
false, and profane, his moral character had but 
one excuse that of circumstance. His hypocrisy 
was matter of necessity, and his faults were those 
of his day; but his talents perhaps the surest 
mark of talents were eminently suited to the 
times which called them forth. Ready-witted, he 
had a resource for every emergency; and what- 
ever was his purpose, he perceived intuitively the 
best methods of effecting it. He was both eloquent 
and persuasive, and few men ever better under- 
stood the delicate science of flattery. A temper 
originally violent was kept under by the strong 
curb of interest ; though what it naturally was 
when unchecked by the all-potent fear that of 
consequences may be inferred by an anecdote. 

The Princess de Guimenee deserted Paris on 
the first breaking out of the disturbances. De 
Retz's connexion with her had been of long con- 
tinuance ; her timidity savoured, therefore, of 
treachery. On her return, he himself states. 
" I was so transported with rage, that I caught 
her by the throat !" 



78 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

What must have been his self-control, when, 
amid all the thwarting and vexatious affairs by 
which he was surrounded, in scarce a single in- 
stance did passion hurry him beyond the bounds of 
prudence ! La Fronde was equally of his foment- 
ing and his continuing. With the parliament 
for his pretext, and some prince of the blood 
for his puppet, he twice drove his rival into exile, 
governed a violent party, and made his way to 
power by the sole force of his own genius. 

Nothing more sensibly shews the veneration 
and the obedience of the French for the royal 
authority, than that a foreigner, obnoxious to all 
ranks, and mediocre in talent, was supported by 
it against all opposition. Well might De Iletz 
exclaim, "Give me but the king on my side for 
a single day !" Another striking difference be- 
tween the two countries was the nullity of female 
influence in the one, and its extreme importance 
in the other. True thkt in London a brewer's 
wife headed a godly company of her sex, and 
presented a petition against popery, and that 
Mr. Pym commended their anxiety, and voted 
them the thanks of the house. True, also, that in 
Scotland the old women shewed much activity in 
pelting the ungodly with the stools whereon they 
sat at meeting. But these absurdities were of 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 79 

no real consequence. In France the dames of 
La Fronde were equally active with its cava- 
Hers ; every intrigue passed through their hands, 
and the Duchesse de Longueville's part in the 
drama was quite as effective as that of the Prince 
of Conde, her brother. The results of this femi- 
nine interference were inevitable vacillation, 
absurdity, and profligacy. The northern and 
southern hemispheres are not more divided than 
those allotted to man and woman public and 
private life. 

There is no period of history which records 
the authority of the gentler sex without also re- 
cording its injurious effects. Leaving out the 
darker shades of the picture, are not impulse and 
sentiment the two mainsprings of all female ac- 
tion? and can aught be more mischievous in 
matters of politics or business? A king, the 
history of whose youth is that of a few insipid 
flirtations a queen, weak, bigoted, and obsti- 
nate a court rent by petty factions a detested 
minister a capital in a state of insurrection, and 
suffering both from inundation and famine ; 
such was the country, and such the state of affairs, 
where our young Italians expected to find all the 
rainbow dreamings of youth and hope realised. 
Something of this, however, they heard in the 



80 FRANCESCA CARHARA. 

progress of their voyage, during which their 
principal companion was a little French painter 
called Bournonville. 

If self-content form happiness, Corregio Bour- 
nonville was the happiest of men. Perfectly con- 
vinced that miniature-painting was the most im- 
portant pursuit in life, he was equally persuaded 
that he was the finest miniature-painter in the 
world. Character he had none; for he was 
simple as a child experience taught him no- 
thing, being one of those in whom the faculty of 
comprehension is utterly wanting. His only re- 
maining characteristic was an extravagant defer- 
ence to rank, mingled, too, with an odd sort of 
patronage. " I to whom the court will owe its 
immortality !" was with him a common phrase. 
For hours he would dilate, with an enthusiasm 
only broken in upon by emotion, how he had 
relieved the monotony of colouring in Anne of 
Austria's picture (taken during the second year of 
her widowhood, when she wore a suit of entire 
grey silk) by painting her as Juno, and introduc- 
ing a peacock. He was touched even to tears 
when he mentioned that her majesty graciously 
condescended to resume the use of powder for 
that occasion expressly, she not having worn it 
since the death of the king. " Yes, her grace had 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 81 

her hair frizzed and powdered entirely on my 
account !" Neither was he less animated in 
describing the young monarch, whom he had 
represented as Jupiter, dressed in purple velvet 
broidered in gold, a flaxen periwig floating over 
his shoulders, an eagle by his side, and a thunder- 
bolt in his hand. 

Guide's ideas of these personifications were 
somewhat at variance with Monsieur Corregio 
Bournonville's ; but, naturally shy and silent, he 
was little inclined to dispute the point ; and, long 
before the voyage was over, they were the best 
possible friends. The ignorance of the young 
Italians was their best recommendation ; it gave 
the Frenchman an agreeable feeling of superiority, 
and, by a very ordinary process, he liked them 
because he was useful to them. Thus, when on 
their arrival in France, they found that Mazarin 
had a second time been forced into exile by the 
Fronde, he insisted on their making his house at 
least their temporary home. Dreary, indeed, was 
their journey to Paris ; want and desolation ap- 
palled them on every side. In addition to the dis- 
tress occasioned by intestine troubles, the severity 
of the season, and the scarcity of provisions, the 
Seine had recently overflowed its banks, and the 
horrors of inundation were added to those of war 
E 2 



82 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

and famine. Groups of shivering wretches sat by 
the road-side, and more than one unburied corpse 
shewed what inroads distress had made on hu- 
manity. So strongly is sympathy with the dead 
implanted in our nature, that when those last sad 
offices of affection and decency are neglected, 
life indeed is in its last despair. 

It was mid-day when they arrived in Paris ; 
and though Bournonville's house was near the 
Barrier de Sergens, they saw enough to shew 
them what excitement prevailed through the city. 
Groups of citizens (armed apparently with the 
heir-looms of the wars of the league, so heavy 
were some of the two-handled swords, and so 
antiquated were the long and lumbering pikes) 
were scattered round ; and if they were to be as 
violent in action as they were in gesture and dis- 
course, the future might well be matter of appre- 
hension. But Bournonville, who had witnessed 
the day of the barricades in the first La Fronde, 
looked on with great composure* *' They will 
disperse," said he, " about four o'clock ; nos 
bons bourgeois ne s'en desheurerontjamais. They 
must go home to their soup, coute qui coute" 

A shrill sound of childish voices rose upon the 
air ; and whether from the folly or the careless- 
ness of their parents, some of the clamourers 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 83 

actually carried daggers; and what appeared to 
them a holyday, had its enjoyment increased by 
a sort of self-importance. Last of all, crying 
"Point de Mazarin!" with the whole power of 
his voice, and dragging after him a huge spear, 
whose weight greatly impeded his progress, came 
a boy of some five or six years old. Alas ! the 
young patriot was soon taught a wholesome lesson 
of submission to the powers that be ; for from a 
corner-house out came his mother, a slight, active, 
viragoish-looking woman. She seized the juvenile 
Gracchus, with a sharp question of "Petit vaurien! 
what do you do in the streets r" and having duly 
enforced her words with a box on the ear, drag- 
ged the child home, still tenaciously clinging to 
his spear. 

The travellers were welcomed to Bournon- 
ville's house by the gouvernante Madelon, a bus- 
tling, goodnatured Normande, whose pyramidal 
white cap and large gold ear-rings were the 
delight of her heart ; next came the house, and 
after that her master ; all objects of a most deep 
and unfeigned attachment. 

Bournonville's first step was to ask Madelon a 
few questions, and then hurry to his painting- 
room. " Every thing has changed since I left, 
and I must change every thing too. The beauties 



84 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of La Fronde will soon ask of me chains for pos- 
terity, and they must not encounter their rivals." 

The first objects that caught the Italians' 
attention were portraits of Henriette and Marie 
Mancini. 

" How she is improved !" exclaimed Guido, 
gazing on the face of the last. 

Francesca almost unconsciously asked herself 
how much of this improvement might be owing 
to the courtly flattery of the painter. 

Bournonville allowed them no time for remark. 
Hastily he turned their faces to the wall, and 
placed before them two others one whose large 
melancholy blue eyes and languid fairness bespoke 
the Duchesse de Longueville, while the other had 
the perfect features and dark oriental orbs of 
Mademoiselle de Qhevreuse. These two heroines 
of La Fronde being placed in the most conspi- 
cuous lights, the artist proceeded to' other ar- 
rangements. 

" The King may remain," muttered he, brush- 
ing the dust from the periwig of the royal Jupiter; 
"the Queen is just as well in the shade this 
sketch of Mademoiselle will partially hide her. 
Now, a few nobodies and messieurs of La Fronde 
may come as soon as they please. And so, my 
children, for some dinner!" 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 85 

And the man who had just been engaged in 
the most time-serving neglect of former, and a 
most cringing anticipation of new patrons, be- 
came forthwith the kind and hospitable host of 
strangers who had no claim upon him beyond 
their own isolated situation. Consistency is a 
human word, but it certainly expresses nothing 
human. 



86 



CHAPTER VIII. 

" "Tis he what doth he here 1 ?" Lara. 

THE following evening, Bournonville and his 
guests were seated round the large old-fashioned 
hearth, whose wooden chimney-piece represented 
the death of St. Louis, rudely carved in the same 
material, and once painted white, now brown 
with smoke and time. Madelon sat in the corner 
with her eyes closed ; but her hands moved, as if 
telling her large oaken beads were a mechanical 
effort. Guido and Francesca were in attitudes 
at least of attention, though the thoughts of each 
were far away ; and the painter was dilating on 
the fair beauty of Mademoiselle de Longueville, 
arid the dark beauty of Mademoiselle de Chevreuse, 
at both of whose portraits he had been assiduously 
employed during the day. Henriette and Marie 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 87 

de Mancini, his former inexhaustible themes, 
seemed to have entirely escaped his memory. 

Suddenly the whole party were alarmed by a 
violent knocking at the door. The sound of armed 
men with their heavy footsteps and clanging 
swords, mingled with oath and threat, were dis- 
tinctly heard ; and the bolt was scarcely with- 
drawn, before in rushed a party of about twenty, 
who appeared both prepared and determined to 
take possession of the place. Guido drew the 
slight rapier that hung by his side ; but his guard 
was instantly beaten down by the leader of the 
band, who, however, in so doing, dropped the 
cloak from his face. 

" M. D'Argenteuil !" exclaimed Bournonville, 
" surely this is not the respect you shew to the 
fine arts. Even during the ferocious siege of 
Rhodes, Demetrius honoured the house of Pro- 
togenes the painter. Will you, a Christian and a 
gentleman, allow yourself to be outdone in cour- 
tesy by a heathen ?" 

D'Argenteuil laughed. " Not so, my prince 
of colours. I knew not of your return ; and this 
house commands the barrier which we have some 
reason to expect will be attacked to-night. Most 
of my men will disperse as sentinels ; and you 



88 FEANCESCA CARRARA. 

must find room by your fireside for myself and a 
friend or so." 

Bournonville was profuse in politeness and 
protestations. " I have yet left a flask or two 
of fine old Burgundy ; and I think I know what 
fair saint will best honour the health," added he, 
with a most insinuating smile. 

But in the meantime a far different scene had 
been going on in the chamber. Francesca, as the 
door opened, had shrunk to the side of Madelon, 
when her attention, as the tumult ceased, was 
caught by a young cavalier who was gazing ear- 
nestly upon her. The light fell more fully on his 
face she could not be deceived she sprang for- 
ward, and, laying her hand on his arm, exclaimed 
in English, " Evelyn, dearest Evelyn ! have you 
forgotten Francesca Carrara ?" 

" Mr. Evelyn !" exclaimed Guido, at the same 
moment. 

Lost in delight and surprise, the young Eng- 
lishman stood for an instant motionless; when, 
recovering from his astonishment, he caught the 
beautiful hand extended towards him, and, kissing 
it, eagerly whispered, " Francesca, the lovely 
Francesca, I am too happy !" 

Turning to Guido, he expressed his pleasure 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 89 

at meeting him also ; and then, addressing a few 
words in a low voice to D'Argenteuil, took his 
place by the fire. 

The soldiers were dismissed, the Burgundy 
produced, and, despite their forcible entry, the 
new arrivals were as much disposed to its cheer- 
ful enjoyment as if they had been old friends 
bidden to a festival ; Evelyn, Francesca, and 
Guido, occupying a little nook to themselves. 

" I will not tell you to-night," said the young 
Englishman, " of the disappointment and diffi- 
culties which awaited my arrival at home ; suffice 
it to say" looking towards Francesca "that 
henceforth I shall look but to myself for happi- 
ness. I am now engaged in an affair which, if it 
succeed, will enable me to make my own terms." 

" Why do you not speak in Italian?" said 
Francesca, who was something chilled by the 
over-frankness with which her lover alluded to 
feelings which with her were so sacred and silent. 

" In good sooth, my sweet saint, my stay in 
England and here has somewhat roughened my 
tongue for the words of the soft south. I must 
learn them again from you." 

Francesca sighed, and thought how little she 
had forgotten the English she had learned for his 
sake. 



90 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Evelyn proceeded to narrate his business in 
Paris. " Only that the majority of people are 
idiots, and prefer their fancies to their interests, 
these cavalier and roundhead differences might 
soon be settled. My plan is perfect, on the old 
principle that les extremes touchent. I propose 
to unite the opposites, and conclude our civil wars 
like a comedy with a marriage : Charles Stuart 
and Frances Cromwell !" 

" So degrading a connexion !" interrupted 
Guido. 

" The daughter of his father's murderer !" 
exclaimed Francesca. 

" Ay, ay, prejudice and fine feelings, the old 
Scylla and Charybdis of action," returned Evelyn, 
with something between a smile and a sneer ; " if 
the brewer's daughter has not the blood of the 
Stuarts and Plantagenets mingling in her veins, 
she is but the more ennobled by an alliance with 
him who has. As for * his father's murderer,' 
such harsh expressions are never used, beautiful 
Francesca ! We must talk of the force of circum- 
stances, of imperative necessity, and find fault with 
the cruel horoscope which ordained such a fate. 
Charles Stuart will suddenly have seen the errors 
of his royal father. Cromwell's conscience will 
equally suddenly be touched with the desire of re- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 91 

paration. He will perceive that the innocent should 
not suffer for the guilty. The converted king's re- 
turn will be another crowning mercy ; and Frances 
Cromwell will bring three kingdoms for her dower. 
I much misdoubt me if our royal master would not 
take her for but the revenues of one of them." 

" Well arranged," said D'Argenteuil, joining 
in their conversation ; " but a man's circumstances 
must be desperate before he attempt to mend 
them by marriage. Why, your prince has already 
three alliances in agitation. There is his mother 
trying flattery in every shape to win for him the 
good graces and fair domains of our princess, 
Mademoiselle de Montpensier." 

" If it be true what I hear," said the Che- 
valier de Joinville, the other remaining cavalier, 
she had better take him. When she ordered the 
cannon of the Bastile to be turned on the royal 
troops, at the sound of the first gun, Cardinal 
Mazarin only remarked, ' Ah ! Mademoiselle has 
killed her husband.' Gallantly as he has played 
it, De Retz has a losing game : the Conde is 
against him, and his reliance on Orleans we 
all know what that is." 

" Your young monarch," continued D'Argen- 
teuil, " must then resume his devoirs to one of 
Mazarin's nieces." 



92 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

"They say," returned Joinville, " that our own 
Louis is his rival there. Mafoi, the subtle Italian 
knows well how to weave his net. If the fair 
Mancini manages the son as her uncle has ma- 
naged the mother, France is but a heir-loom to 
the Mazarins." 

" If we were but as civilised as those Turks 
who, but that we zealous ones consider you papists 
as the more pressing danger, would doubtless ere 
this have been the objects of another crusade 
all these marriages would be easily arranged. 
Charles Stuart might have one wife for money 
your own Montpensier, for example ; another for 
his home interests my Frances Cromwell ; a 
third the Mancini for a foreign alliance ; while 
let the fourth be chosen for love, unless there be 
any other advantage to be gained." 

" Mr. Evelyn never makes unnecessary diffi- 
culties," replied D'Argenteuil, in a sarcastic tone. 
" But the night is far advanced ; I think we need 
now dread no attack ; so I drink my farewell, and 
thanks to Monsieur Corregio Bournonville for 
his hospitality." 

D'Argenteuil set down the cup, and, bending 
courteously to the strangers, withdrew. 

Evelyn lingered for a moment, took from 
Francesca a few early violets Madelon's gift, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 93 

the first of their small garden and, placing them 
beside the little bunch of straw which hung from 
his button-hole, " They will be scarce withered 
ere I am again at your feet," and followed his 
companions. 

" Why, Evelyn," exclaimed Joinville, " in 
what profound mystery you had enveloped your 
beautiful Italian ! Remember I am not on honour, 
and shall do my utmost to rival you." 

" I pity all who take fruitless trouble," said 
Evelyn, carelessly. 

" I understand now," added D'Argenteuil, 
" what made our volunteer so ready to accompany 
us. I believe, however, Mr. Evelyn usually has 
some reason for his actions." 

"Could I give a fairer one?" laughingly re- 
plied Evelyn. 

D'Argenteuil was, however, wrong in his sup- 
position. The young Englishman had only joined 
his party from mere love of adventure, for he was 
recklessly brave ; and Francesca's arrival in Paris 
was as little known to him as to the rest of the 
party. 

The heavy door had scarcely closed, when 
Francesca, leaning her head on Guido's shoulder, 
burst into a passion of tears. 



94 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" Is he not altered ?" asked she, in an almost 
inaudible voice. 

"You must make allowances," said her cousin, 
soothingly, " for the different manner of the coun- 
tries ; he has been talking carelessly, and before 
others." But he thought not what he said, and 
both retired to a sad and reflective pillow. 

So much for anticipation in this life! Had 
Francesca been asked that morning what would 
give her the most perfect happiness, she would 
unhesitatingly have replied, her meeting with 
Evelyn. They had met, and she was sorrowful 
even to weeping. Ah ! hope fulfilled is but a 
gentler word for disappointment. 



95 



CHAPTER IX. 

" History is but a tiresome thing in itself it becomes the more 
agreeable the more romance is mixed up with it." 

Crotchet Castle. 

" CHILDREN and fools speak truth," muttered 
Evelyn, as he parted that night from Joinville, 
and meditated on the return of Mazarin, which 
the other had so lightly prophesied. " If so, I 
am paying court in the wrong quarter; and the 
promises made by De Retz of assistance to our 
cause, when he becomes minister, are as vain as 
promises usually are. Well ! I will attend the 
meeting at the Duke of Orleans' to-morrow, and 
the gales of La Fronde must blow fairer than 
they do now for me to sail by. The safe way 
will be to leave Paris ; but then that lovely 
Francesca ! I am much mistaken if the least 
hint, backed by that high-sounding word duty, 
will not be sufficient excuse for absence ; and if 



96 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Mazarin returns, her connexion with his nieces 
may be useful." 

.The next morning, Joinville was the first 
person he encountered in the ante-chamber of 
Monsieur. 

" Have you heard the news ?" exclaimed he, 
eagerly ; " the Prince of Conde has left Paris, 
and the twenty-first is talked of as being the day 
fixed for the king's entrance. The troops are 
advancing every hour, and Mazarin is omnipotent 
with Turenne." And the young Important, in his 
delight at being the first to communicate a piece 
of intelligence, seemed to forget that it was the 
utter ruin of his party that he was announcing. 

Evelyn made his way to the inner room, 
where an assembled group were already engaged 
in conference; but the voices were languid, and 
the speakers hesitated ; each seemed waiting for 
the other's opinion before he would venture his 
own. Gaston of Orleans was seated in a fauteuil, 
wrapped in a loose dressing-gown, every thing 
about him betokening an indolent love of ease. 
He had that striking likeness which characterises 
all the Bourbons and his first appearance was 
dignified ; but when he spoke or moved, this 
dignity, at least on ordinary occasions, was en- 
tirely lost. He had a peculiarity in speaking, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 97 

strikingly indicative of his character. He began in 
a clear voice and a decided tone, but before he 
arrived at the end of a sentence, his voice sunk 
so low as to be almost inaudible, and the meaning 
became as confused as the sound. Never was 
there a man less calculated for the chief of a 
party ; rash in his commencements, he was never 
prepared for their consequences. He had no con- 
fidence in others ; how could he, when he had 
none in himself? Without judgment to foretell, 
or nerve to meet, the dangers his impetuosity had 
provoked, he never saw things as they actually 
were but usually took the view suggested by 
any one at his elbow, to whom habit, or even 
chance contact, gave a passing authority. 

Marguerite of Lorraine was seated at his side. 
Thin, pale, with that worn look which indicates 
the broken spirit, or the habit of bodily suffering, 
save in the still fine outline of feature, there was 
slight remains of the beauty for which her hus- 
band had dared so much, and yet endured so 
little. She leant back feebly in her chair, like a 
confirmed invalid ; but there was a feverish flush* 
upon her cheek, and a sparkle in her eye, that 
betokened the keenest interest in what was going 
on. A grave, quiet, and elderly man, the Presi- 

VOL. I. F 



98 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

dent, De Bellicore, stood near ; and between him 
and Monsieur was the Coadjutor. 

De Retz was now in the prime of life, and his 
heavy ecclesiastical dress could not disguise his 
light and even elegant figure, while his feet and 
hands were of feminine size and delicacy ; but 
here ended his personal advantages. His face was 
plain, his brow was dark and knit, while the 
clear grey eye was deep-seated, stern, and piercing; 
his complexion was sallow, and the lines of his 
countenance at once harsh and worn. Monsieur 
was speaking when they entered, with much ani- 
mation : 

" War rests with myself t have but to give 
the signal, and we shall fight with greater spirit 
than ever. Ask the Cardinal." 

" Doubtlessly," said De Retz, bowing with the 
most passive politeness. 

" The people are with me?" 

" Yes." 

" M. Le Prince would return at my request." 

" Your wish would be his law." 

' The Spanish army await but my bidding to 
advance." 

" So we have every reason to suppose," replied 
the Cardinal, in the same uninterested tone of 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 99 

mere and necessary acquiescence to the assertion 
of a superior. 

The Duke, who was quite unprepared for these 
unlimited affirmatives, paused ; for he had ex- 
pected difficulties to have been raised and ob- 
stacles to have been confessed, to which he might 
have yielded with something of a grace. But now, 
that none denied the power to which he laid 
claim, it seemed inevitable that he must propose 
acting upon it. Madame could restrain herself 
no longer : 

" Out upon it, Gaston !" exclaimed she ; " we 
are not playing Italian comedy. This is just like 
Trivelin reproaching Scaramouch, ' What fine 
things I should have said, if you had but had the 
sense to contradict me !' It matters little what you 
can do, the question is, what you will do?" 

The Coadjutor turned towards her, his whole 
face changed by its altered expression. It was 
impossible to imagine any thing more sweet, more 
winning, than his smile ; it had all the effect of 
sudden sunshine. Still he remained silent when 
Monsieur, turning towards him somewhat sul- 
lenly, "Well, what do you say? is there any 
safety in treating with the court?" 

" None ; unless your highness make your 



100 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

own security," he replied, with an energy the 
very reverse of his former manner. 

" But you told me the King would not return 
to Paris without compromising with me." 

" I told you such was the Queen's assertion ; 
but I also gave you my reasons for doubting that 
such was the intention." 

" I .know Anne of Austria's smooth-lipped 
falsehoods of old. All women are false enough*- 
but she has dissimulation for a whole sex. Verily 
there must now be some surpassingly honest, for 
she has engrossed the portion of deceit allotted 
to many. Why, I had a letter this morning from 
her, filled with professions of forgiveness and of 
friendship." 

" Your grace best knows, from experience, 
what weight to attach to the Queen's honied 
words," observed De Retz, who needed no further 
clue to Monsieur's present irresolution. 

" Does it not," asked the President, De Bel- 
licore, " touch his grace's honour to ensure some 
safety to the cky and to the adherents who have 
risked much in his c"ause ?" 

" What would you advise?" exclaimed the 
Duke, directing his question to the Coadjutor. 
" I venture not on advice," replied De Retz ; 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 101 

but I will venture on laying before Monsieur the 
bearings of his present position. Our difficulty is 
to avoid being blamed as a faction, willing to draw 
out the civil war to all eternity, or stigmatised as 
traitors, ready to betray their party for their own 
advantage. We have to advise you between peace 
and war ; but with yourself the choice must rest. 
If peace, you must submit at once to the Queen, 
and allow the unconditional return of the court, 
involving that of Mazarin with all Paris at his 
mercy. He, however, will not be vindictive ; 
punishment suits neither with his temper nor his 
interest. But you know Anne of Austria, and may 
guess how her native bitterness will be excited by 
the violence of Servien, the harshness of Tettier, 
the impetuosity of Fouquet, and the foolishness of 
Oudedey. And all this, it will be said, the Duke 
of Orleans might have prevented by an effective 
treaty, securing an act of indemnity." 

" But how am I to obtain such treaty ?" asked 
Monsieur, in a querulous tone. 

" By active and defensive measures ; which 
brings us to the second question of war. If war 
there be, it must be made as if there was no such 
thing as peace. You must arouse the good city 
of Paris by a personal appeal recall the Prince 
de Conde, and act together in strict unity. You 



102 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

must confirm your treaty with the Spaniard ; and, 
my life on the issue, you dictate your own terms. 
But you must act at once. Permit me to con- 
clude with the old legend of the English friar, 
who framed unto himself a brazen head, endowed 
with all sorts of magical properties. In the course 
of time, this head was to speak ; and when the 
hour of its finding a voice came, it was to com- 
municate every thing in the world. The appointed 
moment arrived the image spoke, and said, 
'Time was time is' but, alas! the friar was 
sleeping at that precise instant. ' Time is past !' 
said the voice ; and the head was shivered into a 
thousand pieces, leaving the luckless maker nothing 
but regret for having thus wasted the labours of a 
life. Now, decision is our brazen image the time 
is, and is also rapidly passing away ; in a short 
while we shall be broken up and dispersed, even 
like the fragments of the brazen head." 

" Still," replied Monsieur, who had listened 
with evident impatience, "if the King has resolved 
on his return, it is not my duty to oppose it. I 
must regret my inability at Blois : truly, quiet 
and retirement will be very acceptable, after all 
my fatigue and anxiety." 

" Mon bon Dieu!" exclaimed Madame; "is 
this language for a prince of France ? But if it 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 103 

come to this, had we not better go with a good 
grace to meet the King half-way ?" 

" And where the devil should I go !" ejacu- 
lated the Duke and rising impetuously, went 
into an inner apartment. 

The Duchess followed him, but returned a 
minute after " His highness is at present disin- 
clined for farther conference ; but begs me to offer 
his thanks for your zeal in his cause." Saluting 
the company, she again withdrew ; and for a mo- 
ment there was a profound silence. 

" It is vain, mon ami," said the President, De 
Bellicore ; " however strong the arm, it cannot cut 
down a forest with a broken axe."- 

" Well," returned De Retz, " let the worst 
come to the worst ; I am still Cardinal, and Arch- 
bishop of Paris a temporary absence may be re- 
quisite, but that will be spent at Rome I have 
made my reputation, and look to the future for 
its fruits." 

" And I must retire into my shell," replied 
the President ; " I have done with activity." 

The council broke up ; and Evelyn pursued 
his way to Bournonville's, fully resolved on leav- 
ing Paris. .He found Francesca somewhat pale, 
but beautiful even as a painter's dream of beauty. 
Her picturesque costume, too, increased the effect, 



104 FRAKCESCA CARRARA. 

for she had as yet had no time either to observe or 
follow the fashion of the French. She wore neither 
the rouge, the powder, nor the frizzed hair, so 
universal at this period ; but her rich dark tresses 
were bound with classical simplicity round a head 
small like that of a greyhound; and she wore a 
black silk dress close up to the throat, with loose 
sleeves, like the garb of the novices of the convent 
where she had been partly educated. 

Her manner was at first constrained, but it 
gradually became kind, as if she reproached her- 
self for her involuntary coldness ; while Evelyn 
expressed his regret at his being obliged so soon 
to leave her, and enlarged upon the necessity of 
stating to Charles the turn in affairs. 

" My father blames the part I have taken in 
the Stuart cause ; and perhaps I had studied our 
interest more" and here a gentle stress was laid 
on the words " had I disguised my feelings. 
But, methinks, every spark of generosity and 
spirit must arouse for the exiled and the unfortu- 
nate. I loathe the canting Roundheads, from 
their straight hair to their long sermons ; and 
pant for the hour when, instead of the low-bred 
hypocrite who now holds sway in England, the 
throne will be filled by our young, free, and gal- 
lant prince." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 105 

" You were not such an advocate of the 
Stuarts in Italy," said Francesca. 

" Forsooth, my beauty," replied her lover, 
laughing, " I had not then seen how all the pretty 
faces in England are being spoilt by their straight 
caps and close coifs. I should renounce the Puri- 
tans, were it but for the sake of those glossy 
tresses. And now, sweetest, keep your chamber 
closely till I return. I love not that gay gallants 
of Paris should hawk round my dovecot." 

" Your caution seems to me most needless," 
replied the Italian, the haughty blood of her race 
rushing to her brow. 

" Nay, I meant not to offend; but who can 
have a miser's treasure, and not guard it with 
a miser's care ? And now, farewell ; I leave my 
fetters on you." So saying, he flung over her 
neck a small Venetian chain of delicately wrought 
gold : " So light, yet so firm, are the links which 
bind my heart!" 

Francesca leant by the window after he was 
gone, and, almost unaware, watched his graceful 
figure recede from her sight ; and it seemed like a 
relief when she could see him no more. 

" And this, then," thought she, " is incon- 
stancy that inconstancy of which the tales of my 
native land are so full. It no longer excites my 

F2 



106 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

wonder, for I feel in myself how involuntary is 
change. I may control my words, tutor my looks, 
nay, curb my very thoughts ; but my feelings are 
beyond my power. Can I force myself to rejoice, 
as I once rejoiced, in the least look of Evelyn ? 
Can I bid my heart beat with delight at but the 
echo of his step? Can I persuade myself, that only 
to breathe the very air he breathes is happiness, 
when I know that his presence revolts and chills 
me ? I may be faithful to the letter, but, ah ! not 
to the spirit of my vow. False and ungrateful 
that I am, I do not love him now! Holy Ma- 
donna ! must it be in myself that I first find that 
want of true affection which we are warned to 
expect in the world ? or is it the heartlessness of 
this great city which thus affects me?" 

She looked down, and marked where her 
large tears had fallen, like rain -drops, on her 
black dress. 

" Alas !" exclaimed she, " I have cause to 
weep I must weep over my own changefulness, 
and over the sweetest illusions of my youth. I 
feel suddenly grown old. Never more will the 
flowers seem so lovely, or the stars so bright. 
Never more shall I dwell on Erminia's deep and 
enduring love for the unhappy Tancred, and think 
that I too could so have loved. Ah ! in what now 



FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 107 

can I believe, when I may not trust even my own 
heart?" 

Ay, love teaches many lessons to a woman ; 
but its last and worst, must be when she learns to 
know that it is not eternal that it can depart, 
and leave a scar never to be effaced, and a void 
never to be filled. 



108 



CHAPTER X. 



" There seemed to me no achievement of which I was not 
capable, and of which I was not ambitious. In imagination 
I shook thrones and founded empires." Contarini Fleming. 



OUR inexperienced travellers could scarcely be- 
lieve, the next day, that Paris was the same city 
which they had seen on their first arrival, full of 
barricades, armed groups, defiance, and discontents. 
A bright sunny morning ushered the public 
entrance of the King, triumphant as if La Fronde 
had never existed. White flags waved from the 
windows ; flowers were flung down in profusion ; 
not a voice was raised but in huzzas not a hand 
but in applause. Preceded by the richly capa- 
risoned guards, care had been taken to give them 
the appearance of an escort necessary to dignity 
but not to security. Mounted on a snow-white 
horse, whose trappings of scarlet and gold swept 
the ground, and whose curvettings served but 
to shew the graceful management of the rider; 
his purple velvet cloak fastened with jewels, and 



FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 109 

his whole garb glittering with worked silver, the 
young monarch might well win and fix the eye. 
Never was king more skilled in the science of his 
high place than Louis ; he was well aware of the 
power of the pomp that dazzles, and the state that 
awes well did he know how to excite the enthu- 
siasm which he only seemed to permit. He ac- 
knowledged the acclamations of the multitude, 
now by a wave of the hand scarce amounting to 
a sign, and now by a slight inclination of the 
head, which just bent the light plumes of his hat. 
But when he passed the statue of Henri Quatre he 
uncovered, and the sun shone full on his bright 
and falling curls, which fell like light on each side 
of his young but grave and noble countenance. 

The people rent the air with their shouts, it 
was as if he thus publicly pledged himself to fol- 
low the example of his popular predecessor. He 
passed on, followed by a brilliant train ; and, long 
before night, old grievances, parliaments, Ma- 
zarin, and all, were merged in eulogiums on the 
young sovereign. Events followed each other ra- 
pidly : De Retz the popular, the beloved was 
arrested, without so much as a crowd in the streets ; 
and thus ended the celebrated league his ambition 
had fomented, his spirit animated, and his genius 
maintained. Years of exile and privation fol- 



110 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

lowed ere the return of the bold agitator was per- 
mitted. To those who have sympathised in the 
energy and daring of his earlier life, it seems 
marvellous to hear him mentioned in the gentle 
language of one of Madame de Sevigne's letters, 
where he is spoken of as a peculiarly mild and 
gentlemanlike old man, especially kind to the 
young, whose society he seemed to enjoy. 

Mazarin immediately resumed his former 
power ; and Bournonville early one morning an- 
nounced, not only the return of Madame de Mer- 
cosur to Paris, but also that he had communicated 
to her who were his guests. Almost before he 
had delivered his message, the Duchesse's carriage 
arrived, with a brief but affectionate note, entreat- 
ing the immediate presence* of her earliest friends. 
They soon reached the hotel, whose thronged 
court-yard told how many were the courtiers to 
the minister's nieces. 

Francesca and Guido, accustomed to be their 
own heralds in the lonely Italian palace, were 
startled by the sudden contrast of the many do- 
mestics and the numberless visitors who choked up 
the passages and the ante-room. The chamber into 
which they were ushered was filled with people ; 
but both the Duchesse and Marie came forward 
and received them with every mark of kindness and 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. Ill 

affection. But Francesca's eye was quick to remark 
that Mademoiselle Mancini's manner to Guido 
was wholly changed. Some emotion was per- 
ceptible a hurried voice, a slight tremour, a 
heightened colour ; but these signs were instantly 
checked, and her air indicated a degree of su- 
periority, even patronage, very different to the 
simple and warm welcome of her sister. So many 
guests thronged the apartment, that exclusive at- 
tention to any was out of the question ; and after 
a hasty presentation to the Due de Mercosur, the 
strangers were inevitably left much to themselves. 
Francesca gazed round, as we gaze in some 
half- waking dream, of whose illusion we seem 
aware, and yet partake. The glittering crowd, 
whose high - sounding names ever and anon 
reached her ear the magnificent room the 
splendour of the dresses the diamonds shin- 
ing amid the elaborately curled tresses she had 
been accustomed to see in their native darkness, 
their summer ornament the half-blown rose, and 
their winter -wreath the myrtle-branch all op- 
pressed her with the sense of change. She saw 
at once how wide a gulf had opened between 
herself and her early friends, and she felt that 
they never again could be what they had been to 
each other. There might be benefit on one side. 



112 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

and obligation on the other ; but their reciprocity 
of affection, their mutual exchange of small kind- 
nesses those strongest rivets of common attach- 
me nt were no more. 

Guido's thoughts were very different to his 
cousin's : he partook not in her depression his 
eye was caught by the scene before him, its novelty 
excited his imagination, and he was wrapt in the 
happiness of again seeing Marie. He was strong, 
too, in the conscious superiority of talent that 
first hope of genius, as yet unchecked by circum- 
stances, and unbroken by experience. He leant 
by the window, half alive to the gorgeous picture 
which moved around him, and half lost in deli- 
cious dreams of all the splendid impossibilities 
which he was to achieve. 

Nothing at first frames such false estimates as 
an imaginative temperament. It finds the power 
of creation so easy, the path it fashions so actual, 
that no marvel for a time hope is its own se- 
curity, and the fancied world appears the true 
copy of the real. How much of disappointment 
what a bitter draining of the cup of mortification 
to the dregs does it take, to sober down the 
ardour, and chain the winged thoughts of a mind 
so constituted ! Let any, now perhaps staid with 
care, and grave with many sorrows, but who once 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 113 

indulged in the romance born of enthusiasm and 
ignorance let them recall the visions in which 
their youth delighted, while they smile at their 
folly, or sigh over their sweetness. Moreover, 
the lover and the friend ask very different foun- 
dations for their confidence. The one invests 
all things with the poetry with which himself is 
imbued ; the other, of necessity, examines into 
their truth. Again love cares not for dis- 
tinctions ; but friendship cannot exist without 
equality. 

Francesca, too, was suffering under the em- 
barrassment of singularity. Alive only to the 
happiness of again meeting her friends, she had 
not thought of her own appearance ; and she 
was painfully aware that her Italian costume was 
a complete contrast to the garb of the other ladies 
present. She caught many looks directed towards 
her, but all of curiosity none of interest. She 
heard the groups laughing and talking around, 
but not one voice addressed to her. Good heavens! 
the isolation of a crowd that bitter blending of 
solitude and shame, when you fancy every one 
that passes casts on you an invidious or scornful 
glance, and yet are perfectly aware that they do 
not care scarcely know whether you are a 
human being like themselves ! It is in vain to 



] 14 FBANCESCA CARRARA. 

say this is over-sensitiveness ; weakness though it 
be, it is very universal. 

Francesca would have rejoiced only to see a 
face she had ever seen before, when, as if to 
shew the folly of wishes, one appeared. It was 
the Chevalier de Joinville, the cavalier who 
accompanied D'Argenteuil the night when forcible 
possession was taken of Bournonville's house. 
He remained for some minutes opposite the young 
Italian, with that fixed yet impertinent gaze which 
it is equally impossible to escape or to endure. 
Her evident annoyance, however, appeared to 
produce no other effect upon him than a desire 
to increase it by addressing her : 

" I am happy to see," said he, approaching 
her, " that the bloom of la signora is^iot affected 
by her late vigil." 

Now, if there be one thing in the world more 
provokingly insolent than another, it is a personal 
compliment from a stranger, whom you consider 
to have not even the right of speaking to you. 
Francesca was too new to society to possess the 
art of seeming neither to hear, see, nor understand, 
excepting what it is your own good pleasure so to 
do ; she therefore replied by a slight bend and a 
deepened blush. 

" Our English cavalier has left Paris on a 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 115 

bootless errand ; for the news arrived this morning, 
that the daughter of the pious regicide is married 
to some young nobleman, whose name I have 
forgotten. Has Mr. Evelyn your permission for 
any length of absence ?" 

Now, this was really too much :*Francesca felt 
at once enraged and powerless. How is that im- 
pertinence to be checked, to which silence is no 
rebuke ; and which, yet, is your only method of 
marking your displeasure? 

But a thoroughly unselfish temper is singu- 
larly alive to the feelings of others. While 
Marie Mancini, engrossed by the amusement of 
the minute, had no attention to give beyond the 
gay converse of the group around her, Madame 
de Mercoeur had never quite lost sight of the 
stranger. She had observed the whole of De 
Joinville's manner. Perhaps, \oo, a little pride 
might blend with her kindness : she had been too 
much accustomed to homage to tolerate for a 
moment the young courtier's supercilious manner 
to one whom she protected. Advancing to where 
Francesca stood, she took her arm, and said, in a 
tone of affectionate familiarity, " Cara arnica mia, 
I love to speak to you in our native language, 
though, do you know, I have somewhat lost its 
practice, how have you formed acquaintance 



116 FRANCKSGA CARRARA. 

with one so dangerous as the Chevalier de Join- 
ville, are you aware that you have risked your 
peace of mind for ever?" 

" Nay," replied Francesca, laughing ; for, like 
a true woman, she saw her vantage-ground, and 
instantly took*it ; " it were hard that misfortune 
should be punished like a fault. Never was there 
a more involuntary acquaintance it was made 
by force of arms. Monsieur was one of the party 
who entered M. Bournonville's house the night 
my brother and myself arrived." 

" Ah! our little Corregio, " answered the 
Duchesse, " told us somewhat of this ; but, with 
his usual prudence, would not name the cavaliers. 
Now, Monsieur le Frondeur, what faith may we 
place in the devotion you have just been pro- 
fessing to my sister and to myself?" 

Joinville bit fiis lip; but instantly recovering 
himself, replied, " Pardon me if the feeling 
born of your presence did not exist previous to 
such influence ; and, as a pledge of forgiveness, 
introduce me to your friend, who seems rather to 
resent than appreciate the ready memory of ad- 
miration." 

The chevalier's manner was now completely 
altered ; and Francesca wondered within herself 
that he could be so amusing, as he exerted himself 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 117 

to describe the various visitors who flitted to and 
fro. And yet, when he withdrew, she blamed 
herself for being amused so completely had it 
been at the expense of others. But ill-nature is 
inevitable in those who " season their discourse 
with personal talk." De Joinville only aimed at 
being entertaining ; and what is there entertaining 
about people in general, but their faults, follies, 
and peculiarities, served up with the sauce piquant 
of epigrammatic epithet and of ludicrous inference? 
At length the crowded apartment gradually 
cleared. Drawing Francesca's arm within her own, 
the Duchesse gave orders that no more visitors 
were to be admitted ; and the little party ad- 
journed to sup in an adjacent room. 



J18 



CHAPTER XI. 



" It is a difficult thing to paint the pleasures of youth ; for, 
after all, the real enjoyment is in being young." 



THE Duchesse's boudoir was fitted up in a style of 
luxury utterly different from any thing before 
familiar to the Carraras. They had been accus- 
tomed to the extensive halls, the large pictures, 
the mosaic floors, the marble pillars, whose ro- 
mantic magnificence belonged to other times. Here 
the splendour was more adapted to the actual en- 
joyments of the present day. The walls were hung 
with blue silk, edged with silver fringe ; and the 
closely - drawn blue velvet curtains swept the 
ground. On one side was a dressing-table covered 
with white satin, whose border of flowers, wrought 
in rich and natural colours, emulated those of April. 
On it stood a mirror in a frame of curiously cut 
crystal and silver ; and scattered round lay half- 
open boxes, whose glittering contents were equally 



FRANCESC A CARRARA. 119 

precious and fanciful ; and flung down carelessly, 
as if in thoughtless haste, was a diamond carcanet, 
whose rich gems reflected in every angle the blaze 
of the two large waxen tapers placed in branches 
extending from the mirror. Near were two cu- 
riously carved cabinets, one in ebony, the other 
in ivory, from each of which exhaled a delicious 
perlume. An immense Venetian glass occupied the 
farther end of the room, and, just opposite, hung 
a picture of the King. The couches and fauteuils 
were of crimson damask ; and drawn towards the 
fire was the supper-table. The domestics being 
dismissed, all gathered round, and Guide's place 
was beside Mademoiselle Mancini. 

" Do," said she, smiling, " let me give you 
some of these diminutive mushrooms ; with what 
a feeling of triumph I enjoy them ! When Made- 
moiselle was enacting the part of the modern 
Maid of Orleans, that town supplied the court 
with provisions; and, a somewhat unheroic em- 
ploy for the fair Thalestris, she commanded that 
our future breakfasts, dinners, suppers, &c. should 
be brought her; among other articles she found 
some mushrooms, seizing upon which, she threw 
them aside ' They are too delicate,' exclaimed 
the Montpensier ; * I will not have the Cardinal 
eat them!'" 



120 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" A very feminine little bit of spite," said the 
Due de Mercceur. 

" Now why do you say feminine?" exclaimed 
Francesca ; "I think I could remember many 
small instances of masculine vengeance." 

" I observe," rejoined Marie, " we are always 
blamed ; but, after all, Mademoiselle's revenge 
told. For my part, if I had a lover, I should 
give him all sorts of nice things to eat. I believe 
the pleasures of childhood, being translated, means 
the comfits and confections with which we were 
regaled. As for myself, I candidly own to being 
greedy." 

" Did not the King," said Madame de Mer- 
coeur, " admire your pretty fingers while stripping 
the grapes the other day?" 

" I think," replied Marie, laughing, " that 
great science, the science of grace, which I con- 
sider one of the fine arts, may be displayed in 
eating a bunch of grapes. First, there is the stalk 
to be poised in one hand, then the small fingers 
are to be put in motion while picking the berries 
of the puq)le fruit one by one; then a pretty 
eagerness may be evinced, and a half smile shews 
at once your teeth and your dimples ; and all this 
without that constant suspicion of display which 
attends your bending over a lute." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 121 

" We must send a fleet to Lisbon on purpose 
for grapes, my pretty sister," said the Duke. 

" Have you heard," continued Marie, " the 
new version M. de Rochefoucault has given of his 
celebrated epigram on Madame de Longueville? 
Joinville was telling it to me to-day." 

" And he told me," added the Duchesse, " that 
the lady, since the death of the Due de Nemours, 
has taken to la haute devotion. By the by, this is 
the second lover she has lost in a duel ; her first, 
Coligni, was killed by the Due de Guise." 

" Her face," said Guido, " has all the mourn- 
ful loveliness of one of Coreggio's Magdalens." 

" Hush, hush !" said Marie, " we do not allow 
her beauty ; I forewarn you against admitting that 
a single trace remains." 

" You will see the court to great advantage 
to-morrow," said tbe Duchesse, addressing Fran- 
cesca. " We are on the eve of a most delightful 
fete we are going to put Amadis of Gaul into 
rehearsal ; the King and the principal nobles will 
ride at the ring to-morrow. The King himself 
leads the first band, the Due de Guise the second, 
the Due de Candale " 

" The Due de Guise," said Mercoeur, " is quite 
my beau ideal of a hero of the days of chivalry. 

VOL. I. G 



122 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

His adventures, whether of love or war, seem 
like the old Provencal ballads; my only marvel 
is, where in these days he finds his romantic 
materiel" 

" In himself," returned Marie; " but I do 
wonder you can mention him with the Due de 
Candale there is le vrai heros de roman. I ad- 
mire him, if it were only for his spirited rejection 
of my cousin Martinozzi's hand." 

" She will have cause to thank him," said 
Mercoeur gravely, " if it be true that it is now 
asked by the Prince de Conti." 

" The Prince de Conti ? " exclaimed she, in 
reply, " impossible ! I laugh at the very idea." 

" Time will shew," said the Duchesse, evidently 
wishing to change the conversation. " De Join- 
ville tells me " 

" It is quite singular," interrupted her hus- 
band, " I seem never to hear a piece of news 
but it is prefaced with * De Joinville tells me !' " 

" Well," continued Madame de Mercoeur, " his 
present intelligence is, that the colours of the Due 
de Guise are blue and white, those of the Due de 
Candale green and white ; but that those worn by 
his Majesty remain a profound secret." 

" Ah !" exclaimed Marie, brightening up from 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 123 

a somewhat sullen silence, " you have not seen 
my new dress : it is perfect. It ought so to be, 
for I had his Grace's advice upon the subject." 

At this moment a noise was heard, as if of 
coming guests. 

** How is this?" said the Duchesse. " I had 
given orders that no one should be admitted." 

" But we," replied the tallest of two cavaliers 
who entered muffled up in cloaks, " would only 
take a denial from your own lips." 

" Ah, your Grace," exclaimed Madame de 
Mercoeur, " how easy it is to command when the 
command can only be obeyed with pleasure !" 

" Are you," said the King for the visitors 
were Louis himself, and his brother, the Comte 
d'Artois and addressing himself more especially 
to Mademoiselle Mancini, " preparing for the 
fatigues of to-morrow ?" 

" Not so," she replied ; " but we were closeted 
to talk over old times with old friends." 

Francesca smiled ; for it could not but occur to 
her how little these said old times had been men- 
tioned, the whole conversation having turned ex- 
clusively on present topics. Again, she felt there 
was nothing in common between them ; and how 
painful it is to discover this, when our attachment 
seems to ourselves a thing of course ! This, how- 



124 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

ever, was but a passing thought; for, naturally 
enough, her whole attention was fixed upon their 
illustrious visitor. Smilingly repeating his de- 
claration that he was incog., a wandering cava- 
lier, who merely sought to sun himself in their 
bright eyes, and then to depart, still, while 
waving the observances of his rank, he yet per- 
mitted them to be paid. All knelt as they kissed 
his hand, and all remained standing while he 
seated himself in the fauteuil from which the 
Duchesse had just risen. Discovering, with the 
quick eye of those accustomed to watch every 
shade of manner, that Louis, transient as was the 
glance he flung round, had observed the Italians, 
Madame de Mercoeur said, " We will not intrude 
upon your Grace our childish reminiscences, but 
" Nay," interrupted the King very graciously, 
for he had noted the singular beauty of Francesca, 
" I will not allow one of the party to be disturbed, 
not even little Mignon," patting a small snow- 
white dog that belonged to Mademoiselle Mancini, 
whose eyes flashed as she thought that it was her 
favourite that was thus honoured by 'the royal 
notice. She knelt down to caress it, thus, as if 
by chance, kneeling beside Louis's chair. 

There was a slight family likeness between 
the brothers, but the resemblance extended no 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 125 

farther. The Comte d'Artois had neither the 
dignified nor the manly air of his brother he 
rather appeared like a pretty-looking girl, so 
effeminate was he and fair. He had more, too, 
of the lively bearing of youth, and indulged in a 
reckless and even noisy gaiety, the very reverse of 
the other's grave composure. 

It was rather odd that those former remi- 
niscences, to which allusion had been made, should 
in reality become the subject of discourse from the 
questions of a stranger; yet so it was. Partly 
from that courtesy which, when it interfered not 
with his enjoyment, was Louis's great characteristic, 
he immediately turned the conversation to what 
he supposed had been the preceding dialogue. 
There was some curiosity, too, in it; for those 
who depend much on others for their amusement 
are always curious, especially when conversation 
is a great staple of entertainment. People are 
apt to mistake this, and fancy the attention given 
to their details is a proof of the interest taken in 
themselves ; it is merely that their auditors are 
attracted by novelty. Louis had the topics of the 
hour twisted into every possible shape to amuse 
him ; but he had never thought about his favourites, 
the Mancinis, having even lived before he knew 
them : their existence, in his memory, was dated 



126 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

from 'their arrival in France. Their early days 
were, therefore, quite delightful, because quite new. 

" Ruel," exclaimed the youthful monarch, in- 
terrupting their description of how, in the myrtle 
and ilex woods, they used to recite Tasso and act 
his scenes, " Ruel will be the very place for it; 
we must get up a ballet there, with characters 
from your favourite poet ; I will be Rinaldo, De 
Guise shall be Tancred, you," turning to Made- 
moiselle Mancini, " Armida, and " 

" We will keep Clorinda for the northern 
Amazon about to visit us," interrupted his brother ; 
" she will understand the character." 

" Nay," replied Louis, with a half smile, " but 
the ballet shall be one of the fetes we meditate in 
her honour. Demi-savage as the Swede is, of 
course royalty must be royally entertained." 

" Such a description," said Marie, " as I heard 
to-day ! I understand that she wears a sword, and 
a buff waistcoat for*a boddice military hat, boots, 
and sash gloves she disdains; and that her 
peruke would do honour to Marshal Turenne 
himself." 

" I hear," added Madame de Mercosur, " that 
she is awfully clever, speaks eight languages, and 
would put the Academy and the Sorbonne united 
to shame." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 127 

" Ah !" exclaimed the Comte d'Artois, who had 
been sitting for some minutes apparently quite 
absorbed in meditation, " I have imagined such 
an exquisite costume for Tancred ! No, no ; you 
shall not anticipate my intention." 

" But we are forgetting, in our future plans, 
the fete of to-morrow. Mercceur," said the King, 
" summon the page who waits in the ante- 
chamber." 

The boy was called, and, dropping on his 
knee, presented a small coffer, which, as it opened, 
diffused a strong but delicious fragrance. It con- 
tained those delicate gloves for which Spain was 
then so famous. 

" Will you not wear these to-morrow?" said 
the King, offering one pair to Madame de Mer- 
coeur ; then, turning to her sister, he added, " I 
only hope yours are small enough for those mignon 
hands." 

Francesca observed that the gloves given to 
the Duchesse were embroidered in white and 
silver ; but those of Mademoiselle Mancini were 
worked with scarlet and gold, and fastened by a 
scarlet cord round the wrist. The party imme- 
diately broke up, as all were to rise early the 
following morning. 

It was long before Francesca slept ; we are so 



128 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

much the creatures of habit, that any great change 
has the effect of a moral chill. We dread the 
future, unless it comes upon us imperceptibly; 
whenever we anticipate, unless under some strong 
excitement of joy, we always fear. There are so 
many dangers, so many disappointments, and so 
many sorrows, ready to beset the human path, 
that we cannot but expect some at least to fall to 
our lot. The truth is, the young Italian was in a 
state of the utmost depression ; and those subtle 
emotions we call being in good or bad spirits are 
utterly beyond our control. The weight of one 
sad thought pressed upon every other ; she at once 
saw the hopelessness of Guido's attachment, and 
fancied she understood Marie's inconstancy by 
her own altered feelings. She, who knew him 
with the entire knowledge of perfect affection, 
knew well what the effect would be wretched- 
ness, the most complete, the most lasting, and the 
most irrevocable. Could it be the Mancinis the 
impoverished and forgotten inhabitants of the de- 
solate palace by the pine-wood who were now the 
glittering idols of a court, favourites of Europe's 
most powerful monarch, and whose intercourse 
with them was one of the most unrestrained fami- 
liarity? witness his visit of that very evening. 
Again and again she marvelled what were Marie 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 129 

Mancini's expectations unbounded, she could 
well suppose. Generally speaking, we are. incre- 
dulous of the good fortune of our friends, and, 
even though loving them, undervalue their quali- 
ties ; the success of our greatest intimates takes 
us by surprise. But this was a singular in- 
stance ; the change in her former companions' 
position had burst so suddenly upon Francesca, 
that she was more inclined to exaggerate than to 
diminish its extent. The very difference she felt 
between herself and them she a stranger, friend- 
less but for their kindness, in a foreign land 
made the contrast more forcible ; and she at last 
fell asleep, with the vision before her eyes of the 
Cardinal's triumphant niece a crowned queen! 



130 



CHAPTER XII. 



Incessant in the games your strength display ; 
Contest, ye brave ! the honours of the day." 

Odyssey. 



IT was a boast of Napoleon, that the very weather 
owned the influence of his auspicious star, his 
triumphal entry, his procession, or his fete, were 
always marked by sunshine. The clouds were 
equally complimentary to Louis XIV. ; no sky 
could be brighter than that of the morning which 
ushered in the festival ; and when Francesca took 
her place on a temporary gallery erected for the 
occasion, the coup d'ceil more than realised the 
descriptions in the old romances. The ground 
appointed for the course was the open space be- 
tween the Palais Royal and the dwelling of the 
English Queen; a palisade marked the career; 
and at one end, just below the gallery where 
Francesca sat, hung the ring, suspended from an 
arch ornamented with laurel, and in the centre 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. . 131 

the royal arms of France. Beside stood seneschals, 
the appointed witnesses of the ensuing games. At 
the other extremity were the gardens, now in the 
full beauty of summer foliage ; and from Francesca's 
seat being at the extremity, and the gallery being 
a little curved, she commanded a panoramic sweep 
of the whole scene. 

Windows, balconies were alike crowded ; but 
the most striking group was on the terrace in the 
centre. Seated in an arm-chair, covered with 
cloth of gold, was the Queen ; her robe was of 
black velvet, edged with the richest sable ; and the 
diadem at the back of her head confined the folds 
of a long black Cyprus veil. Her mourning now 
was but a ceremonious habit; nay, some said it 
was persevered in for the contrast, so becoming, of 
the dark garment with her still dazzlingly fair 
skin and bright hair yet it caught the eye mourn- 
fully ; those sombre robes were the only indications 
that life had one loss, one sorrow, or one change. 
Madame de Mercoeur and her sister stood on either 
side ; and, leaning on the back of the chair, was 
the Cardinal, looking both inattentive and weary, 
and taking no part in the conversation going on 
around him. Behind was a brilliant group of ladies 
and nobles. 

Suddenly a flourish of trumpets arose upon the 



132 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

air ; and, emerging from the middle avenue, came 
a gallant company, to borrow a phrase from those 
old romances whose picturesque descriptions the 
present actors were emulating. Two stately elms 
formed a natural arch, from beneath whose waving 
boughs swept the band belonging to the King. 

Francesca marked at the first glance that 
their colours were white and scarlet ; and then she 
noted that Marie Mancini wore a dress of white 
damask, looped up and garnished with scarlet 
ribands. " The embroidery on the gloves," 
thought she, " was no chance selection." 

The gay procession advanced. First came 
fourteen pages, wearing fanciful costumes of silver 
tissue and scarlet ; they bore the long lances, and 
the devices of the knights who followed them. 
Then came six trumpeters, blowing a brave chal- 
lenge, each note swelling more proudly than its 
predecessor. Then came the squire, who mar- 
shajled the King's own pages, twelve in number, 
the last two of whom carried the royal lance, and 
the royal scutcheon, on which was emblazoned a 
rising sun, with the motto, 

" Ne piu, ne pari." 
No superior, nor yet an equal. 

Next rode the camp marshal, unmasked, and in 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 133 

his usual costume. Then followed the young 
monarch and his chevaliers, dressed after the 
Roman fashion the cuirass of gold, the robes 
of frosted silver, the brodequins wrought with 
gold and silver mixed ; and the casques were 
of silver, with white plumes tipped with scarlet. 
All were masked ; but the King was easily dis- 
tinguished by his snowy charger, whose mane was 
fantastically knitted with scarlet ribands. Toge- 
ther they rode round the circle, bending as they 
passed the Queen till the feathers swept the 
shining necks of their steeds. Again came the 
bold challenge of the trumpets, and the troop of 
the Due de Guise appeared, marshalled in the 
same order, but garbed in- blue and silver. Their 
leader's romantic temperature shewed itself in one 
peculiarity ; his horse, black as night when the 
summer's tempest is on the sky, was led behind 
by two gigantic Moors y who by sign and word 
subdued the beautiful and fiery animal to the slow 
step of the procession. Trappings and housings 
there were none; and the slight silken bridle, 
which looked like a fragile thread, needed indeed 
a skilful hand if meant to control the noble crea- 
ture. A page of singular, almost feminine beauty, 
whose delicate complexion suited well the delicate 
colours of his azure cap and plume, bore the 



134 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

graceful flattery of the Duke's ingenious device. 
It represented a funeral pile, from whose embers a 
phoenix was rising, animated by the sun, whose 
light was its life. Beneath was inscribed in golden 
letters, 

" Qu'importa que matou, se resucitan?" 
What matters his destroying, if he revives 1 

All took the courtly insinuation, for the Guise 
had but lately been restored to royal favour. A 
third call of the trumpets announced the approach 
of the Due de Candale from the avenue on the 
left. The livery of his company was forest green 
and gold ; but perhaps he himself most attracted 
Francesca's attention. He had not yet put on his 
plumed casque, which a page on foot at his side 
carried ; and he held his mask in his hand. It 
was one of those faces so pale, yet so beautiful, 
with large melancholy blue eyes, and profusion 
of fair golden hair with that ethereal seeming, 
whose associations are not of this earth one of 
those that we unconsciously connect with early 
death. The presage here was prophecy ; a little 
while, and that youthful and brilliant head found 
its pillow in the grave. After riding round the 
circle, the three companies drew up in a line 
before the narrow space, which led to the point 
where the ring hung. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 135 

" Ah!" exclaimed Madame de Brie, the old 
lady to whose care Francesca had been especially 
consigned by Madame de Mercceur, " these troubles 
of La Fronde have sadly scattered the beauties 
which surrounded the throne. You should have 
seen the court ten years ago." 

" To me," replied Francesca, " the scene 
appears as if it could not be surpassed ; but, then, 
I have seen nothing of the kind before." 

" True, true, my dear ; experience is every 
thing you are no judge till you begin to compare. 
You, if it had been only to form your taste, should 
have seen the beauties of the earlier period of the 
regency. There was the queen herself; fifteen 
years have somewhat palled the red and white of 
a complexion which in its day was unparalleled. 
Then there was the Duchesse de Longueville, 
whose languid loveliness was that of the lily the 
flower sacred to her house ; Madame de Mont- 
bazou, stately and dark-eyed like Juno, conjuring 
every heart by one look of her splendid face ; or 
' Madame de Chatillion, the very queen of smiles, 
and with a fascination even beyond her beauty. 
They might at least recall Mademoiselle de Mont- 
pensier proud, but so fair, like the young queen 
of Palmyra." 

Madame de Brie had quite forgotten that 



136 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

fifteen years ago she had been equally eloquent in 
favour of fifteen years before. Well, memory is a 
very comfortable thing, usually adapting itself to 
the prejudices of the present. 

Fortunately, the commencement of the games 
prevented Francesca from being quite overpowered 
by the envy of beauties that had been. It was a 
commencement worth the chivalric magnificence 
of Louis's after-reign the scene in those gardens ! 
The fine old trees in the distance, so rich in 
shadow, while the foreground was in broad sun- 
shine the long green alleys, along which rode 
an occasional horseman, breathing his courser 
the terraces, crowded with the young, the gor- 
geously arrayed, and the beautiful the youthful 
cavaliers, darting at full gallop down the narrow 
palisade the burst from the trumpets, that noblest 
of music, as each competitor dashed at the ring, 
altogether formed a pageant in which Amadis of 
Gaul might have taken a part before the eyes of 
the peerless Oriana. 

As yet none had been successful, and now the* 
three leaders were all that remained. Their pre- 
cedence had been determined by lot, and the Due 
de Candale was the first. He dashed forward 
his long lance touched the ring it trembled ; but 
at that very moment his horse started he passed, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 137 

and the quivering ring remained swinging to and 
fro. Francesca, whose position enabled her to 
discern the slightest movement, could not divest 
herself of a suspicion that the start of the horse 
had been provoked by the rider. The Due de 
Guise came next ; he made but one bound from 
the slender palfrey on which he rode at first, to 
the noble charger that stood beside, pawing the 
1 ground, as if disdainful of rest. On he darted with 
the speed of hope, and his lance bore the ring off 
triumphantly ; but while turning to salute the 
fair spectators on his right, the prize, carelessly 
balanced, fell to the ground ; and again Francesca 
thought that the failure was intentional. The 
young King now clapped spurs to his white steed, 
which had stood champing with impatience till 
his bit was covered with foam. A loud shout arose 
from the spectators Louis had carried off the ring ; 
and, balancing it gracefully on his lance, he rode 
round the circle ; the second time he stopped before 
the Queen, and laid the prize at her feet. Two 
pages advanced ; one took the spear, the other laid 
hand on the bridle, and Louis sprung to the 
ground ; then, ascending to where Anne of Austria 
was seated, knelt before her. At the signal, Marie 
de Mancini took his casque, and his mother flung 
over his neck a silver chain, to which hung a star 



138 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of rubies, and, in the style of the old romaunt, bade 
him name the Queen of the Festival. Louis rose, 
and, taking his casque from Marie, offered her the 
red rose, which was to mark sovereignty for the 
day. Her first glance was one of triumph her 
next was one of mingled admiration and grati- 
tude for Louis ; and, accepting his offered hand, 
they led the way to the banquet prepared in the 
Palais Orion, a favourite garden-house, where* 
they often had collations when the party was but 
small, which was the case to-day. The Queen- 
mother did not dine with them ; and only those 
nobles who were of the three bands, and twenty- 
four ladies. The banquet was gay but brief, as 
preparations had been made for dancing. Made- 
moiselle Mancini was led forth by Louis, who 
entertained all with the chivalric gallantry suited 
to his assumed character. The next dance she 
declined, under pretext of fatigue she had no 
attention to give to another partner, and Louis's 
last words were to engage her hand again ; and 
truly she required rest, for every effort had been 
exerted to amuse her royal listener. 



139 



CHAPTER XIII. 



" Love is an offering of the whole heart, Madam 
A sacrifice of all that poor life hath ; 
And he who gives his all, whate'er that he, 
Gives greatly, and deserveth no one's scorn." 

BARRY CORNWALL. 



THE tremulous pressure of Louis's hand yet 
vibrating through every pulse of her own his 
last whispered words yet musical in her ear, Marie 
hastily turned into one of the more shaded walks, 
where the boughs, trained to meet overhead, and 
the trellis-work on either side thick with creeping 
and odoriferous shrubs, shut out all view but its 
own green and winding path. Her cheek was 
flushed, her eyes danced in light, and a frequent 
smile passed like sudden sunshine over her face ; 
vanity, in that moment of triumph, had all the 
strength of a passion, its enthusiasm its ima- 
gination ; every thing seemed possible the future 
rose palpable before her. Her eager and buoyant 
step became more stately, as if already in the pre- 
sence of her court ; already she granted favours, 



140 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

and requited injuries for assuredly forgiveness 
formed no part of her creed. She even put aside the 
boughs with somewhat of an air of condescension. 

" My first struggle," thought she, " must be 
against the influence of his mother. Gratitude ! 
we owe none to Anne of Austria ! We are just the 
puppets she destines for the amusement of her son 
toys to guard against graver thoughts the 
ornaments of the chariot, while she guides the 
reins. Fickle unloving, is there one about her 
whom she would not sacrifice to her interests 
ay, even to her whims ? Holy Madonna ! but I 
do respect my uncle's genius when it has so con- 
trolled our false and wilful Queen ; I may chance 
to save him some future trouble." 

It is singular the charm that youth flings over 
both its exaggeration and its selfishness perhaps 
they are pardoned for their very unconsciousness. 
Its expectations are unreasonable ; but they are 
entertained in such good faith, that we first envy 
and then excuse the state of mind which admits 
them, and forgive their present folly, from our 
conviction of their coming disappointment. It is 
our own sense of superiority the conscious supe- 
riority of knowledge, dear bought by experience, 
that makes us thus charitable. In youth, too, 
selfishness is divested of its most obnoxious part 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 141 

its calculation; it seems thoughtlessness again 
we pity, pardon, and fancy that amendment which 
never comes. 

There is something amiable in even believing 
in our own good feelings, but it is an amiability 
whose loveliness is even less lasting than that of 
the complexion. Marie passed along she had 
arrived at an especially pleasant part of her reverie 
she was arranging her future household. 

" I will be lenient," thought she, " to Mesdames 
les Frondeurs ; they will be glad to get back on 
any terms, and their high birth will be an answer, 
to the many who may urge claims on the plea of 
having known me now. My sisters had better 
marry foreign princes it would be mortifying to 
see them forced to yield precedence to any. As 
for Henriette, that cannot be helped ; an embassy 
will be the thing for Mercosur." 

How many more places might have been dis- 
tributed by her incipient majesty it is impossible 
to say, for the thread of her meditation was broken 
by the sudden termination of the path. It ended 
in one of those beautiful little nooks, which, o-irdled 

' ' O 

in by shade, are yet full of sunshine ; the branches 
close the sides, but the clear sky is overhead. In 
the midst of a circular plot of grass was a small 
fountain ; a nymph knelt amid the waters, and a 



142 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

little trickling stream fell from the urn by her 
side with a low and musical murmur. Even the 
small space of this fountain was a divided empire ; 
the farther side was clear and glittering with the 
golden daylight, but the nearer one lay dark in 
shadow, for a large sombre branch hung directly 
over it. The very gloom made it the better mir- 
ror ; and Marie started as she saw her face reflected 
side by side with that of the statue. For a moment 
she smiled at the contrast of her own head, with 
its ribands and its waving feathers, beside the 
pimply-wreathed hair of the marble figure. But 
even as she looked, another thought arose in her 
mind. The nymph was so like one that had been 
a favourite jn Guido's studio a world of early 
fancies, of tender recollections, were called up by 
the resemblance. She thought of the deep and 
earnest love, which had seemed to her like folly 
amid more worldly scenes ; she thought of their 
wanderings by twilight, with the rosy sunset dying 
aw.ay amid the thick-leaved pines: she turned, 
and saw Guido by her side. Admitted by the 
influence of Bournonville into the royal gardens, 
he had wandered round, and by chance followed 
the very path which Marie had taken. 

" My beloved Marie!" exclaimed her unsus- 
pecting lover, " this is happiness! Ah! if you 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 143 

knew how chilled, how constrained, I have felt by 
the forms and the crowds by which we have been 
surrounded how I have pined for a moment to 
tell you how dearly during absence I have che- 
rished your image how beautiful you seemed 
when I saw you again!- how beautiful you are, 
even in this strange and unfamiliar dress," added 
he, following the direction of her eyes towards the 
fountain. 

She allowed him to retain the hand which he 
had taken it was but for an instant. The mo- 
mentary softening of her heart was gone, and she 
felt as if she could reason him out of love, even as 
she had reasoned herself. She was strong in what 
would be the universal opinion; it would be an 
act of insanity to allow a girlish preference to 
interfere with her present brilliant hopes it would 
be folly, nay, presumption, on his part, to talk 
more of love ; still, she would act kindly by him 
she would impress upon him the impossibility 
of constancy, and make the necessity of change 
obvious to his own conviction. 

At h'rst her words were hurried and confused ; 
and the young Italian, though startled from his 
fond security, might still ask, had he, could he, 
have heard aright ? But as Marie spoke, her 
voice grew firm, her anticipations gave strength to 



144 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

her resolves, and she really avoided all difficulty 
by speaking the truth. 

" I do not," continued she, " talk about my 
uncle's displeasure, or the obstacles which it would 
entail I talk to you of myself. I own I am 
changed I cannot help it ; nature never intended 
me for a heroine of a romance. I despise poverty 
I dislike trouble I enjoy the luxury which 
surrounds me I delight in the homage and I 
look to my future husband for more settled wealth 
and more assured rank. Of all that I most prize, 
you can offer me nothing ; and I confess love to be 
insufficient for my happiness. You and Francesca 
will ever be to me my dear and my early friends. 
You " 

" Say no more, as a last grace ! " interrupted 
Guido, passionately " I ask it at your hands. I 
see it I feel it all, your place, and my own 
folly. May the holy Madonna keep you from 
from ever suspecting the pain of knowing that in 
one little moment life can lose every hope." 

He sprung so rapidly down the opposite path, 
that Marie almost asked, had she really seen him ? 
But she heard the quick steps passing along the 
gravel -walk ; she listened to their echo with 
anxiety, even tenderness ; all became silent, and 
her heart filled with sorrow for the anguish she 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 145 

had inflicted. She felt the value of entire affection 
the contrast forced itself, of love the deep and 
true, compared with the falsehood and the selfish- 
ness by which she was surrounded. A little while, 
and the warm and kindly feelings of long ago 
came back, and she sat down beside the fountain 
and wept bitterly. 



VOL. I. 



146 



CHAPTER XIV. 



" I loved her ; for her sweet familiar face 
Brought back my earlier self." 



THE great fatigue of the day being too much for 
the delicate state of Madame de Mercosur's health, 
she soon retired ; and early in the evening she 
and Francesca found themselves, for the first 
time, tete-a-tete, and without fear of interrup- 
tion. 

The evening was chilly ; some fresh wood was 
heaped on the hearth ; they drew the fauteuils 
closer to the fire and to each other ; and felt as 
if old times and sentiments were come again. 
Past events and past feelings soon led to present 
recollections ; but, to Francesca's surprise, the 
Duchesse did not seem to consider their posi- 
tion so perfect in felicity as it appeared to her 
guest. 

" What," exclaimed her youthful friend, "have 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 147 

you to desire? You have rank, wealth, favour, 
health, and a husband who loves you, and whom 
you love, and of whom you may well be proud. 
I like the Due de Mercosur so much; and I should 
have been sorry not to have liked him, Hen- 
riette : he is so handsome, so kind, arid so silent." 

Madame de Mercosur laughed at silence being 
mentioned as a merit. 

" You may laugh," rejoined Francesca ; " but 
you cannot imagine how bewildered I feel by the 
infinite variety of discourse which is here ap- 
parently a daily habit. I am talked out of my 
wits ; I have scarcely recovered the surprise of the 
ingenious question, before I meet another surprise 
in the still more ingenious answer. I remember,, 
in the dear old pallazzo, and the still dearer pine- 
woods around, that we have conversed away hours ; 
but, then, think how interesting were the subjects 
ourselves. We had the whole future before 
us ; but here -it is yesterday, whose sayings and 
doings are so repeated, as if every thing were done 
that afterwards it might be told." 

" The truth is, ma mignonne" replied her com- 
panion, " we have nothing else to do talking is 
tke business of the idle. We do not talk out of 
the careless gaiety of the heart, which indulges 
its hopes, or expresses its feelings we talk for 



148 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

amusement; we are not interested in the doings 
of others, but we are entertained always sup- 
posing, as the narrator may very well contrive, 
there is something a little absurd in them. We 
live together in society strangers, rivals, and 
enemies, hiding the envy and hate, which it would 
be impolitic to exhibit. We care nothing for each 
other ; society could not exist a day now, did the 
dislike or the indifference rise to the surface. 
Talking is an ingenious contrivance for hiding all 
this. An agreeable compliment conceals careless- 
ness ; a pointed phrase gives vent to many a sup- 
pressed emotion ; and we can veil our perfect dis- 
regard to what people feel, by a most studied 
attention to what they say. I can assure you, 
talking is more than an amusement it. is a ne- 
cessity." 

" Well, I shall do my best to learn what seems 
to me a profound science; but at present, in my 
astonishment at many of the questions put to 
me, I quite forget that it is necessary for me to 
answer." 

" My dearest Francesca, it is very indiscreet 
ever to be astonished ; and an answer is a sort of 
conversational coin, which you should always ha\e 
in readiness." 

" Well, Henriette, what answer have you to 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 149 



my question what have you to desire more than 
you at present possess ? " 

" Security. Here we are strangers, dependents 
on that vainest of human reliances, court favour. 
I have seen my uncle forced into exile by an 
imperious and ambitious faction ; true, I, per- 
haps, should not complain ; for it proved, if I 
had needed proof, the disinterestedness of Mer- 
cosur's attachment. He followed me into banish- 
ment, and married me when the very name of 
Mazarin was the signal for popular outcry and 
contumely." 

" But, now that the Cardinal's power is more 
firmly fixed than ever, and yourself so happy in 
your husband and your home " 

" It is for others that I fear for my sisters, 
indulging the most golden hopes, depending on 
so many chances, and which must make any 
destiny less brilliant than what they now antici- 
pate, and of which they once so little dreamed, 
a disappointment hard to be borne." 

" Yet what is not within your reasonable ex- 
pectations ? I saw from the gallery the caresses 
which the Queen so publicly lavished upon you 
all ; and, then, the flattering distinction of the king 
appearing in Marie's colours !" 

" Ah ! it is on Marie's account that I am most 



150 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

anxious ; I know how vain is the delusion she is 
now cherishing." 

" Yet if Louis did love her " 

" Louis," interrupted theDuchesse, " love her ! 
it is not in him to love aught but himself. His 
mother is well aware that she may trust him, or 
Marie Mancini would have been, ere this, in a 
convent. The Queen encourages his intimacy with 
us rejoices even at his preference; for we amuse 
him, and are less dangerous than any that might 
carry him away from her immediate care. But 
she relies, and safely, upon the selfishness of 
Louis. Let Marie cause him trouble, annoyance, 
or interfere with the slightest of his interests, and 
her hope her happiness would be sacrificed as 
things of course. It would never even enter his 
mind that they could be consulted." 

" But Marie so shrewd, so penetrating; is 
it possible that she does not perceive this ? " 

" You have not lived long enough among us 
to know the intoxication of vanity. Marie has 
allowed herself to dwell on one brilliant object till 
her eyesight is dazzled." 

' But cannot you advise cannot you warn 
her?" 

;{ Alas, Francesca ! we are not now in the 
pine groves, where we once talked so freely. There 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 151 

is here something in the very air we breathe which 
precludes confidence. We are sisters no longer ; 
we fancy ah, how falsely! that our interests 
are opposed, and that a favour extended to one is 
at the expense of the other. Moreover, you must 
remember, even as children, Marie was ever more 
resolute than myself; and now, how little would 
she heed remonstrance of mine ! " 

" Ah!" replied Francesca, after a moment's 
silence, somewhat sad in both, " the air of this 
great city does cause change ; a thousand illusions 
seem to have passed away even from me. I have, 
I know not why, a vague fear of the future the 
future, from which I once hoped so much." 

" It must be my care. For the present you 
remain with me, you will excite less envy than 
if placed immediately about the queen, as was at 
first my wish, and I think you will be happier; 
I feel that I am so myself. You know not, dear 
friend, how much of youth and of Italy you bring 
with you." 

How could Francesca answer, but by affec- 
tionate thanks? 

" One thing more," added the Duchesse : " I 
have not forgotten Guido ; I have thought " and 
here she hesitated " that all young men like 
change. The Cardinal will visit Bournonville 



152 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

tomorrow, to see his Majesty's picture. Guido 
will there be presented to him, and receive his 
commands for Modena ; he is to be the bearer of 
letters to our cousin. His absence will be tem- 
porary ; so you need not weep at parting with 
your brother." 

Francesca deeply felt the kindness which so 
unobtrusively removed Guido, for the present, 
from the frequent meeting with Mademoiselle 
Mancini. He was thus spared that, perhaps, worst 
pang of unrequited affection that of perpetually 
coming in contact with its object caressed, flat- 
tered, beloved, brilliant, while you are forgotten, 
though in sight. 

" You know, Francesca," continued her friend, 
" that you must accustom yourselves to separa- 
tion, for Paris is nearer England than Rome." 

" I have seen Mr. Evelyn since my arrival," 
replied Francesca. 

" That is a disappointment to me ! I had 
arranged so many charming adventures, in which 
I was to enact the part of the good fairy set- 
tling every thing for the happiness of my two 
lovers. Very provoking of Destiny to have taken 
the affair into her own hands, without my inter- 
ference. But you look grave ! A lover's quarrel, 
I hope ; I shall be delighted to reconcile you." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 153 

" Alas, Henriette ! how little are our feelings 
in our control ! I shame to tell you how much 
mine are altered. I endeavour to persuade my- 
self that it is Evelyn who is changed ; but I am 
forced to confess that the fault is my own." 

" Well, after this let no one pretend to be sure 
they know the heart of another ! Why, I would 
have risked my life on your constancy. You were 
always so earnest, so grave, so much to be relied 
upon! I slfould have thought you would have 
needed another Petrarch to celebrate your ro- 
mantic devotion. However, it leaves the field 
open to me; I shall soon find you another lover 
in Paris." 

" I feel that I am incapable of love nothing can 
bring back the illusion of my earlier and happier 
belief. But, at least, I hold my faith to Mr. Evelyn 
as sacred as if he still were, what I once deemed 
he was, the only hope and object of my ex- 
istence." 

" We shall see," said the Duchesse, laughing ; 
" but I am now too tired to enact the part of presi- 
dent in the parliament of love, we must leave 
this knotty point for discussion some other night. 
I own I have my doubts about constancy surviving 
love; but though your infidelity makes me not 
quite certain about any thing, yet of one fact I 
H2 



154 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

feel tolerably convinced, which is, that in all 
places, and under all circumstances, I shall love 
you very dearly, and be as anxious for your hap- 
piness as I am at this moment." 

Francesca embraced her friend tenderly, and 
they parted for the night. 



155 



CHAPTER XV. 



" It is a dreadful question, when we love, 
To ask, is love returned 1 " 

The Hunchback. 



IT had been arranged that Francesca was to join 
Guido at Bournonville's, where he still resided, 
previous to the visit of the Cardinal and Madame 
de Mercosur. On her arrival, she was surprised 
to hear that he had not yet arisen ; but on enter- 
ing his room, she saw at once that he had not been 
in bed. The apartment looked into the garden, 
and a large old tree almost darkened the window 
with the heavy foliage of one huge bough; the 
casement was open, and there Guido was leaning, 
his face bowed upon his arm, and so engrossed 
in his own thoughts, that he did not hear Fran- 
cesca enter. Softly closing the door, she ap- 
proached him with a light step, which, however, 
failed to rouse his attention. 
: " Dearest Guido," exclaimed she ; but his face 



156 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

still remained hidden. With gen tie force she passed 
her arm round his neck : " My own brother, are 
you ill? you frighten me!" 

Half unconsciously, he raised his head ; and 
his cousin was startled to observe his extreme 
paleness, and the unnatural brightness of his eyes. 
She was herself shivering with the chill of the 
open lattice; but his hand, as she took it, was 
burning. Making a strong effort to appear un- 
concerned, Guido muttered something about the 
over-fatigue of the previous day. 

" Now shame, dearest Guido ! what can be the 
cause of untruth to me ? when have we kept a 
thought from each other?" 

Still he remained silent and confused ; when 
Francesca, placing herself beside him on the win- 
dow-seat, said, in tones of the most tender affection, 
" Guido, we are here alone, in a strange place, 
orphans, with scarce a friend save each other; 
where may we place confidence but in ourselves ? 
If we bar out love from our own hearts, where 
shall we ever find it again? Speak to me to 
your own Francesca. What sorrow can you have 
that will not be a sorrow to me also ?" 

Hesitatingly and reluctant at first, but warmed 
into passionate expression as he proceeded, Guido 
at length detailed his interview with Mademoiselle 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 157 

Mancini, interrupted but by Francesca's soothing 
ejaculations of pity and of anger ; for at first she 
felt too much to say half the rational things she 
had intended. 

" But, dearest Guido," at length she ventured 
to whisper, " you seem to me to be scarcely aware 
of the great change which has taken place in the 
situation of our friends. Adopted children of him 
who is almost a king in this great country, to 
what honours may they not aspire ? while we " 

" Ah, Francesca ! " he exclaimed, " do you 
think I do not see my folly niy weak, miserable, 
extravagant folly, in believing that the deep devo- 
tion of one loving heart could reckon for aught in 
this gay chaos? You think that only one dream 
has vanished you know not how many sprang 
out of that one. Marie has ever been the aim of 
all my hope, the reward of all my ambition. I 
imagined myself capable of so much, and for her 
sake ! I awaken from the delusion, and ask, Where 
is there any thing like truth in all the visions 
which have been to me the prophecies of future 
life ? Deceived in one, shews me how deceived I 
am in all. Poor, friendless, solitary, what have 
I to live for?" 

" Friendless and solitary!" replied Francesca, 
reproachfully; " at this moment, my brother, I 



158 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

could lay down my life to spare the pain you are 
suffering." 

" My own sweetest sister !" exclaimed he, draw- 
ing her tenderly towards him. 

" Marie was never worthy of you. Vain, she 
sought but for flattery, where you gave affec- 
tion ; selfish, she thought only of her own passing 
amusement, heedless of the pain which she in- 
flicted on you. In her childish pleasures, herself 
was ever the first object ; and now, ambitious and 
.calculating, she grasps at more glittering toys, to 
gratify the same vanity in a higher form, and with 
interest instead of amusement for her object. She 
is incapable of caring for any one but herself." 

" Francesca, you are too severe. She did 
love me once ; but absence, and, as you must own 
yourself, the temptations by which she is sur- 
rounded " 

Francesca was about to contradict him the 
next moment she checked the impulse ; if it was 
any consolation, .why not let him think that he 
was once beloved 1 "It seems to me, dear Guido, 
that youth has passed away from us both," this 
was the philosophy of eighteen "for, young as we 
are, how different every thing appears to what 
it did ! But a few months since, how we looked 
forward to our arrival in Paris ! Now it would be 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 159 

our greatest happiness to leave it. But, alas J could 
we bear returning to our former home with such 
altered hearts ? " 

" Yet, why should you feel thus? you have 
seen Evelyn, and he is unchanged." 

" In words, but not in himself. Holy saints! 
to think that I should feel his absence a relief, and 
look forward to his return with dread !" 

" I must leave France," said Guido, abruptly ; 
his own feelings yet too fresh to admit of sympathy 
with those of his cousin's, which, in his heart, he 
thought somewhat fanciful ; " what do I want 
with the Cardinal's patronage? the world is 
before me, and Mademoiselle Mancini shall not 
see one suing for her favour who once hoped for 
her love." 

" Madame de Mercosur," replied Francesca, 
" was telling me last night, that, aware of her 
uncle needing some one in whom he could place 
confidence, as the bearer of letters to the Duchesse 
of Modena, she had mentioned you, and that his 
Eminence was pleased to decide upon employing 
you." 

" And so," returned Guido, colouring with 
mortification, " it was soon decided that I was to 
be sent out of the way?" 

" If there was any intention in Madame de 



160 FRANCES,CA CARRARA. 

Mercosur's plan, it was with the view of sparing, 
not hurting, your feelings," said Francesca, sooth- 
ingly. 

" Henriette, Madame de Mercosur," con- 
tinued he, correcting himself, " was always good 
and kind." 

" And so she is still ; the same Henriette who 
never came without some choice leaf or flower for 
my poor grandfather. I remain with her till your 
return, and it will then be time enough to decide 
on our future plans. But the Cardinal will soon 
be here ; so I shall go, and lend an attentive ear to 
Mons. Bournonvjlle's raptures about le superbe 
jeune roi, &c., while you attend to your toilette. 
Look here ! " said she, passing her fingers through 
the tangled masses of his long dark hair, and 
parting it on his forehead : she turned deadly pale 
for there was blood upon her hands ! . 

" It is nothing," exclaimed Guido, with a faint 
smile. 

Francesca kissed him in silence, and left the 
room ; but it was some time before she had reso- 
lution to join Bournonville. 

" Mon Dieu ! Mademoiselle," exclaimed the 
fluttered artist; "his Eminence the Cardinal 
and he may be here in five minutes ! For the love 
of the saints, help me to place his portrait on the 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 161 

easel, there, there," giving it a touch or two 
" I am working at " 

" But," said Francesca, " it is the picture of 
the King which he comes to see." 

" Good, good ; I can reach that down when 
he comes. Madelon, burn some sandal-wood on 
the stairs ; and, Madelon, when I look at the 
picture of Tragedy, with the dagger and cup, 
go you, without my telling, into the cellar 
here is the key and bring up a bottle of Bur- 
gundy : if his Excellency is in a good humour, I 
may venture to offer it him ; and, Madelon, your 
best confitures for Madame de Mercoeur. Ah, 
Mademoiselle, you are too good," for Francesca 
had knelt down to assist in unfastening the cords 
of a package, which Correggio, in his haste, 
was rather tightening than loosening. A small 
but exquisite Madonna was produced, " Leave 
the cords about that ; his Eminence may observe 
it is only opened in honour of his arrival." 

As Guido entered, a carriage was heard slowly 
rolling into the court-yard. Bournonville flew 
down to receive his expected visitors, and, almost 
involuntarily, the cousins drew closer together. 
Guido grew paler he only recollected that the 
Cardinal was the uncle of Marie ; while Francesca 



162 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

trembled and coloured with anxiety, that he should 
make a favourable impression. 

The door flew open, and Bournonville first ap- 
peared, walking backwards, swinging to and fro the 
cassolette containing the perfumed wood, and fol- 
lowed by the Cardinal, leaning on his niece's arm. 

Madame de Mercosur advanced, and, extending 
both hands to Guido, addressed him with the 
utmost kindness. " I shall soon," said she, smil- 
ing, " be ashamed to confess what very old friends 
we are ; " then, leading the ^strangers to the Car- 
dinal, presented them to him, adding, " their 
name will be familiar to you, for the fresco in 
your oratory once belonged to the Carraras." 

Each dropped on a knee before him, while 
Mazarin looked at them for a moment in silence, 
evidently struck by their great and peculiar 
beauty. " You might know them for Romans," 
he observed, " all the world over; but rise, my 
children, and the blessing of the saints be upon 
you !" His eye now rested, as the painter intended 
it should, on his own likeness : " Holy Madonna ! 
but, Monsieur Bournonville, I owe you some gra- 
titude ; pray how many years have you taken off?" 

Before Bournonville could give utterance to 
the flattering assurances that rose in their tens 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 163 

of thousands in his mind, the Cardinal's attention 
was fixed on the Madonna, seemingly carelessly, 
but, in reality, most skilfully displayed. 

"Raphael! by all that is beautiful!" ex- 
claimed Mazarin, examining the picture with 
much attention. " How long has it been in your 
possession?" 

" Just arrived, a little speculation of mine, 
and only hastily opened, from a desire to have its 
merit appreciated by so admirable a judgment as 
that of your Excellency." 

" What do you think of it ? " asked the Car- 
dinal, turning to Guido, who gave a warm and, 
gradually, an enthusiastic opinion of its beauties. 

The conversation now turned entirely on works 
of art, and the Cardinal evidently took much in- 
terest in the fervour with which Guido dwelt on 
the subject. The love of art, which was with 
Mazarin a passion, seems to have been the only 
sign in him of that poetry which is part of the 
Italian character ; but there is no mind, however 
worldly, without some ideal enjoyment ; and his 
was in his superb collection of paintings. He 
pointed out the " glorious spoil which hung his 
storied walls" to a friend on his death-bed, and 
said, " Is it not hard to leave all these behind?" 
The enthusiasm and freshness of Guido, too, at- 



164 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

tracted him. There is an inexpressible* charm to 
politic and care-worn age in the hopes which can 
never more be its own, and the illusions which 
can never again lend a grace to the beaten path 
of existence. It is memory that makes the old 
indulgent to the young. The Cardinal, moreover, 
deemed Guide's admiration and love the more 
reasonable, as they were lavished on his own fa- 
vourite object. 

Bournonville was able to look at Tragedy 
her cup and dagger with perfect complacency ; 
the Burgundy was tasted ; and, at length, Ma- 
zarin departed, leaving them all convinced that he 
was a very great man, who deservedly filled the 
high station of France's prime minister. Yet, 
notwithstanding his prelent condescension, Ma- 
zarin was not popular, neither had he popular 
manners they were not what he affected ; and 
he was right. It is the man who is feared not 
the man who is loved that succeeds in the world. 
Refuse a favour, and all your gracious smiles, your 
kind words, aye, and even your really kind feel- 
ings, are utterly forgotten. But be necessary ; let 
men have aught to hope from you; forward in 
any way their interests and it matters not how 
you do it ; be harsh, abrupt, insolent, and it will 
only be " your way." People would, to be sure, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 165 

rather obtain their object by trampling upon you ; 
but, sooner than not obtain it, they will let you 
trample upon them. Civility is not only trouble- 
some, but it is waste. To vary the old simile, 
people in general are like sweet herbs they 
require crushing, not for their sakes, but for your 
own. 



166 



CHAPTER XVI. 



" How does the heart deceive itself, and feed upon a future 
which will never be !" 



ALL arrangements for the morrow's departure were 
soon coippleted. The day passed away in that 
hurry which makes it seem so short, and in the 
many little cares, so few of which ever answer their 
purpose, and which yet appear so indispensable to 
the feminine affection from which they generally 
emanate. Night came at last, and Bournonville, 
after much good advice, in which the gouvernante 
cordially joined touching the necessity of early 
going to bed where there was a necessity for early 
rising and after many good wishes, left the cousins 
to themselves. To those who had never before 
parted for even a day, there was something almost 
terrible in separation. Francesca had rejoiced in 
the thought of Guide's absence; but it now rose 
before her, with all its possible perils and evils. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 167 

Absence, like every other pang, weakens by repe- 
tition ; the friend who has once returned in safety 
may return so again we soon draw precedents 
from the past. She had to say farewell for the 
first time, and whatever we do not know, we always 
exaggerate. They sat together, with clasped hands, 
till the silence was suddenly broken by Guido, 
who had been intently watching a small bright 
flame, which, after having struggled for some 
time with the smoke around, sunk into darkness. 

" Francesca," exclaimed he, " that is my 
emblem ! Did you mark that little blaze, how it 
has striven, and how it has perished ? It had in 
it the germ of the glorious and the lovely, but 
it had no open space wherein to expand ; the heavy 
vapour oppressed it other and brighter flames 
obscured its weakness and now it is gone quite 
out. I see our resemblance. I, too, have in me a 
gift of power and of loveliness ; but it is power that 
will be subdued, and loveliness that will die un- 
developed. I feel around me the iron weight of 
circumstance I am oppressed by the heavy vapour 
of hopelessness and lo! I go, and my place will 
be no more seen." 

" But that I have no heart for chiding to- 
night," replied Francesca, " dear Guido, I should 
blame this weakness, which creates the mis- 



168 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

fortune it deplores. It is the adverse circum- 
stance that gives the triumph. Were I a man, 
I should delight in difficulties I should desire 
toil, exertion, and obstacles. Let the world be 
before me, and I would make my way in it. I 
cannot understand sinking under any shape that 
adversity could take ; I should enjoy the struggle, 
in my strong belief of the success." 

" I cannot force myself into hoping," answered 
Guido, in the same low and melancholy tone. 
" Even in my happiest moments, while the grass 
was crowded with flowers beneath me the sweet 
monotony of the running water in mine ear, only 
broken by the cheerful chant of the grasshopper 
the boughs of the chestnut, filled with sun- 
shine, dazzling my eyes, till the golden air seemed 
thronged with lovely shapes, even then came 
pale and mournful shadows, whose white faces 
looked upon me pityingly. Even then, darkness, 
but a speck at first, would spread and spread till it 
overhung the atmosphere ; and I would lie doubt- 
ing, and mournful, and encompassed by night." 

" And what was this, my beloved brother, but 
a vain yielding to unbridled imagination, which, 
like a spring confined to one spot, collects its 
pure clear waters, and is at once a beauty and a 
blessing ; but which, allowed to spread abroad in 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 169 

every direction, oozes through the marshy earth, 
becomes stagnant, and is habited by the loathsome 
reptile. That which would have been a green 
haunt, with its fair fountain, is a dreary and 
useless quagmire. Is it not thus with the mind, 
Guido?" 

He made no reply ; and Francesca was too 
anxious for his taking some rest previous to his 
journey, to pursue their discourse. The next 
morning she rose early ; but as she bent over 
Guide's pillow to awaken him, she started to 
observe how oppressed was his breathing, and how 
feverish his slumber. " It is evidently the rest 
of complete exhaustion sleep won by hours of 
weary restlessness." She had not the heart to rouse 
him, and seated herself watchfully beside, while 
the fear of his being ill when far away made her 
heart sink with affectionate apprehension. " Yet 
it is best he should go," and, for the first time, 
the sense of her own utter loneliness, when he 
should be gone, rose sadly before her. 

" Great God !" exclaimed she, stepping softly 
to the window, which commanded the view of 
many streets, " to think, amid this multitude of 
human beings, we have neither kindred nor friends 
not one to care for our welfare, not one to re- 
joice in our joy, not one to sorrow in our sorrow." 

VOL. I. I 



170 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

As she spoke, her heart reproached her with 
Henriette's kindness still, it was kindness only ; 
how many hopes, fears, and cares, would she have, 
in which Madame de Mercosur could have no 
share ! " Guido has made me fanciful. I am un- 
thankful for the good which has really fallen to our 
share. Henriette is very, very kind how glad I 
ought to be of such powerful protection ! And my 
brother this journey will do him good ; the sight 
of our^)wn dear Italy will be inspiration to him 
again he will feel the excitement of praise, and he 
will return eager and hopeful." Yet, as she kissed 
his brow to waken him, she left her tears upon 
his cheek. 

The bustle of a departure suspends every thing 
but itself; and it was not till Guido rode out of 
the court-yard, that Francesca remembered, or 
fancied she remembered, a thousand things that 
yet remained to say. Fortunately for her, Bour- 
nonville was too much occupied to administer more 
than a word of consolation in passing; and she 
remained in the window-seat, watching the gate- 
way through which he rode, as if she every mo- 
ment expected him to return. 

Suddenly she started from her seat, the bell 
rung, and a horseman entered ; the dark-gray 
colour of the horse made her heart beat ; but in an 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 171 

instant she saw that the rider was too tall to be 
Guido. He dismounted, and dropped the cloak 
which had hitherto concealed his face, and shewed 
the countenance of Evelyn. 

Francesca sunk back. " And do I feel no 
happier that he is returned ?" But it was in vain 
to persuade herself that she was glad. Her hand 
was extended readily to him when he entered, but 
it was cold and trembling ; however, he seemed 
perfectly satisfied, and was eloquent in his praises 
of her improved beauty in the French costume. 

" I find here all loyalty and festivity. What a 
charming example for England to follow!" 

" The scene yesterday was splendid." 

" Did you venture out in the crowd to see it?" 
asked the visitor. 

" I was not so bold ; but, thanks to the Du- 
chesse de Mercosur's kindness, witnessed the whole 
from the gallery of the palace." 

" You have, then, seen your old friends the 
Mancinis?" 

" I am residing with Madame de Mercosur; 
and only remained here last night, that I might 
see Guido set off. He is charged with a com- 
mission of the Cardinal's in Modena 1 ." 

" Residing with Madame de Mercceur ! you 
could not be more agreeably placed," replied 



172 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Evelyn ; yet the expression of his face belied his 
words. Meeting Francesca's eyes, he added, " for 
your own sake-:- for mine, I must regret aught 
that places ceremony or distance between us." 

She was saved the trouble of a reply, by the 
announcement of Madame de Mercosur's coach, 
sent to fetch her ; and as Evelyn handed her in, 
he said, " I shall wait upon you this evening. 
Mazarin's fair nieces hold almost a court, and I 
will find some one to present me, for your sweet 
sake." 

Francesca could only say something indistinctly 
about pleasure, &c. ; and the ponderous machine 
rolled off at a rate little calculated to disturb any 
meditation in which she might please to indulge. 

Evelyn's train of thought was far the most 
agreeable of the two. " If I had for a moment," 
thought he, " renounced my old belief in luck, 
I should resume its worship with all possible 
speed. Mark now what Fortune has done for me ; 
well does she deserve my entire trust. Meeting 
the pretty Italian was enough in itself; and now 
she promises to be as serviceable as she is charm- 
ing. Without money, our enterprise must fall to 
the ground. All hope of obtaining it from the 
Pope through De Retz is at end that negotiation 
has been most judiciously kept out of sight. Well, 



FRAXCESCA CARRARA. 173 

we must turn to Mazarin. I hear much of the 
influence his nieces possess ; let me try what it 
can do for us. I must not expect a great deal 
from Francesca : shy, proud, and cold, her very 
beautiful face will never be of half the use it 
ought to be. Why, in her place, I should dispute 
the heart of the young King with the Mancini. By 
the by, a little flattery will not be ill bestowed in 
that quarter, if she possess the power with Louis 
which is usually ascribed to her. Puppet though 
he be, in the hands of his mamma and her minister, 
his good pleasure would go for something. Ay, 
give us but a small present supply, and a hope of 
future assistance which, if we succeeded, it would 
be policy to accord and I wager my head, that 
the fire we should kindle in the west of England 
would soon spread over the whole island." 

The great popularity of the Stuarts cer- 
tainly more allied to personal causes than we can 
at present calculate is a curious fact. It was not 
one of those feelings drawn from hoar antiquity, 
when habit has become religion. No their 
ascension to the throne was of recent occurrence. 
Neither were they grafted into the heart by that 
enthusiasm which, more than all others, dazzles 
and delights, viz. military renown. No victories, 
no conquests, excited the imagination, and con- 



174 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

founded their's and the glory of England together. 
Their reigns had been most pacific, and their few 
warlike attempts unsuccessful ; and yet what de- 
votion and attachment they inspired ! fortune, 
liberty, and life, were yielded, and joyfully, in 
their cause. Wrongs were forgiven ; violated 
privileges and outraged laws forgotten ; and no- 
thing but the still mightier spirit of fanaticism 
could have been opposed with any success to the 
spirit of loyalty. It was Charles's bigotry that 
cost him his crown. If he had given up the 
bishops, uncurled his hair, and spoken through 
his nose, he might have been an absolute monarch 
in all but name. As it was, he contrived to 
die a martyr, and to be mourned with a degree 
of personal affection which one, now-a-days, 
scarcely expects from the nearest and dearest 
friends. 

Evelyn was but one of many. Reckless, lov- 
ing pleasure and ease ; with much of worldly 
wealth and aggrandisement to tempt him on the 
other side of the question ; yet was he heart and 
soul devoted to the Stuarts prepared to sacrifice 
his own enjoyment, risk his life ; in short, to be 
all but actually disinterested ; and, indeed, his 
only drawback to that, was his cordial hatred to 
the Roundheads. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 175 

It may easily be supposed, with these motives, 
that he was an early visitor that evening at Ma- 
dame de Mercosur's, where his reception was most 
gracious. For a brief while he forgot all his 
intended flatteries of the Mancinis, in his admira- 
tion of Francesca's beauty. 

The appearance of your lover known to be 
such among your intimate friends, is embarrass- 
ing enough to any girl, who anticipates their re- 
marks, and foresees their railleries. To Francesca, 
little accustomed to strangers, and, moreover, em- 
barrassed and anxious in herself, it was enough to 
give the brilliant colour that reddened her cheek, 
and added to the light of her large black eyes 
the more striking, from the white powdered hair ; 
whereas, in general, they were shaded by the 
dark tresses now so differently adorned. She was, 
perhaps, more strictly beautiful, with her statue- 
like head in its own native darkness ; but use is 
every thing, and fashion still more. Besides, Evelyn 
was accustomed to associate an idea of distinction 
with a certain mode of dress. Francesca's peculiar 
and high-bred air so easy to feel, so difficult to 
define flattered his prejudice for rank, at that 
time so broadly marked. 

But their conversation was soon interrupted ; 
for Mademoiselle Mancini, who had her own 



176 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

motives for the attention, came .across the room 
exclaiming, " Since you do not remember 
me " 

" Nay," answered Evelyn, " it is I who wait 
upon your memory." 

" Ah, I thought you were going to make the 
usual remark, that really I am so improved since 
I left Italy," 

" Pardon me," interrupted Evelyn ; " this 
usual remark is not mine. I own I can see no 
improvement perhaps it was impossible." 

" Seriously" this was said with a very gra- 
cious smile "I am truly glad to see you ; 
it is something not to have lost your head in 
England. But, now, do tell us all your ad- 
ventures; and, remember, we expect you to be 
very amusing." 

This " we " might have been rendered " I ;" for 
Marie soon contrived to engross the young cavalier's 
attention. The truth was, that Louis's attraction 
towards her had proceeded far enough for jealousy ; 
he had more than once questioned her with evi- 
dent pique about the attentions she received from 
many of the aspirants either to her or to her 
uncle's favour. She deemed it injudicious to 
encourage any ; and yet the time often hung hea- 
vily on her hands. Now, Evelyn was a perfectly 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 177 

safe person, and yet both handsome and entertain- 
ing, moreover, evidently well inclined to offer 
that incense in which she delighted. She might 
amuse herself with him, and yet have ready the 
unobjectionable answer of, " An old friend, known 
ages ago in Italy when he was, as he is now, a 
very devoted slave of my pretty friend the Signora 
Carrara." This reply effecting a double purpose ; 
for Marie had not been too well pleased the other 
evening with Louis's glance of admiration at this 
said pretty friend. It was as well to let him know 
that the ground was pre-occupied ; and the King 
was quite young enough to be deterred by a 
rival. 

The conversation on both sides proceeded with 
so much animation, that neither had a word for 
Francesca. She sat silent and lonely ; left to ru- 
minate at her leisure on the solitude of society. 
She heard around her gay converse, in which she 
had no share ; and laughter, in which she was 
little tempted to join. She observed every face, 
and, still more minutely, every dress in the room ; 
and, despite what philosophers say of its charm, 
found the task of observation very tiresome she 
would have preferred a little participation. She 
could just hear the voices of Marie and Evelyn, 
without being able to distinguish what they said ; 
i2 



178 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 



but could perceive that they were amused, which 
she was not. Now, one may be very well content 
to renounce a lover ; but it is very disagreeable to 
have him taken away. 



179 



CHAPTER XVII. 



\Ve must make 

The heart a grave, and in it bury deep 

Its young and beautiful feelings." 

BARRY CORNWALL. 



" I THINK our young Englishman so much im- 
proved," said Madame de Mercosur, the next 
morning ; " and as I take it for granted that you 
have found out, by this time, that your inconstancy 
was one of these mistakes \vhich the heart will 
sometimes make, I have invited him to Compeigne. 
Now do allow that there is such a thing as friend- 
ship in the world.". 

" I never denied it," said Francesca, who, how- 
ever, wished that the friendship had shewn its 
activity in any other shape. She could not deceive 
herself ; neither pique nor flattery could bring 
back her old feeling for Evelyn. Every hour some 
sentiment of his, carelessly expressed, jarred upon 
the inmost chords of her heart. All that she had 
from infancy revered as high and generous, was 



180 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

to him matter of ridicule; he did not even pay 
virtue the compliment of belief in its existence. 
Then, his insincerity perpetually revolted her. The 
present circle were always flattered not so much 
by any set phrase of compliment, but by his desire 
to please ; while the absent, with him, realised 
the old proverb, " Us avoient toujours tort." Their 
faults grew suddenly perceptible, and their absur- 
dities an unfailing subject of mimicry. All these, 
in his hands, became singularly amusing. Fran- 
cesca, who had little knowledge, and no envy, 
of the individuals so relentlessly caricatured, could 
not help being entertained. While their more 
intimate friends, whose competitors they were, who 
had a thousand small jealousies to be gratified, 
and divers little grudges almost unconsciously 
treasured up, placed no bounds to their encourage- 
ment. Still, it was a mirth that left, as sarcasm 
always does, its doubt and its depression. Human 
nature avenges itself by suspicion. First there comes 
the internal and unerring whisper, As others have 
been used, so shall we ; and, secondly, we are in 
our hearts a little ashamed of our own enjoyment, 
we feel how contemptible it is, thus to revel in, 
and exult over, our neighbour's faults, follies, and 
misfortunes. Our very selfishness rebukes us. And 
if the many are thus actuated, what must it have 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 181 

been with Francesca, whose life had passed in a 
small and affectionate circle, with all the fresh 
warm feelings of youth about it? where there 
might have been angry words to the face, but to 
the face only. While from their lovely climate, 
the poets native to their sweet south, the old ruins 
hallowed with the memories of other days, the 
lovely paintings, the still diviner statues, which 
had been their constant companions the character 
had imperceptibly caught a tone of romance, cal- 
culated long to resist the inroads of worldliness 
and deceit. 

On Marie Mancini the effect had been but 
slight. There was an innate little selfishness in 
her, which defied the finer influences. In Madame 
de Mercosur they were neutralised by a total de- 
ficiency of imagination. She was kind, good, and 
even penetrating, when enlightened by the affec- 
tions ; but head is required for the very highest 
qualities of the heart, and those were beyond 
Madame de Mercosur. 

In Guido the imagination had taken one pe- 
culiar bent, and given one peculiar talent. In 
Francesca it was more generally diffused ; it gave 
something of poetry her feeling of beauty was 
more keen, her reverence for the good more ex- 
alted, and her perception of the generous more 



182 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

strong, from native sympathy. Evelyn's faults 
were, therefore, of a kind eminently calculated 
to disgust one whose mind was so high-toned and 
so ideal. Still, there were times when she bitterly 
reproached herself, and thought, " I ought to have 
seen these faults before, or I ought to be blind to 
them now ; " and by a sort of compromise with 
her conscience, resolved to make up in fidelity 
what she wanted in tenderness. 

Previous, however, to their following the court 
to Compeigne, Monsieur de Mercosur having gone 
to join the army, the Duchesse resolved on passing 
a week at the Carmelite Convent. 

The superstition which once taught us to be- 
lieve that prayer and penance brought down 
their blessing on some beloved one, was at least a 
kindly one. The affections of earth grew at once 
more tender and more spiritual, thus elevated and 
purified by an intercourse with heaven. The court 
was dissipated, worldly, false, even as human 
nature has ever been from the beginning, and will 
be even unto the end ; but there, also, human 
nature asserted its better part, and had its deeper 
feelings and its higher hopes. Many a young and 
lovely woman, whose feet knew but the pleasant 
paths of prosperity, and whose ear was familiar but 
with the voice of the flatterer, would voluntarily 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 183 

offer up a portion of her time, as her holiest 
sacrifice ; and on the straw pallet, and in the 
serge robe, take a profound lesson of the vanities 
which made up ordinary existence. To these 
vanities, it is true, they returned ; but surely not 
without a stronger humility, and some thoughts 
which, even in the world, were God's own. 

Madame de Mercoeur was at first unwilling 
that Francesca should share her seclusion ; but her 
young companion was too much in earnest to be 
refused. Francesca was still depressed by her 
recent parting with Guido, and clung to Henriette 
as her only friend, she would have felt so utterly 
alone with Marie ; besides, she too wished to pray 
for the absent and the dear. 

It was a gloomy evening when they arrived. 
A small, drizzling rain, chill and damp, seemed to 
relax the fibres of the body, even as it did their 
hair, which fell over the face heavy and uncom- 
fortable. The wind howled with a sudden gust, as 
the gates of the convent swung on their sullen 
hinges, and sounded almost like a human voice in 
its agony or in its despair, as it swept through the 
vaulted corridors. 

They were conducted first into the presence 
of the abbess a harsh, severe -looking woman, 
stately and reserved one who seemed never to 



184 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

have known youth or emotion ; a breathing ma- 
chine, pursuing, day after day, a monotonous 
round of habits rather than duties, and impassive 
rather than content. They were then conducted 
to their separate cells, where they were left for the 
night. 

Francesca felt oppressed as she gazed on the 
bare walls, the wooden pallet, the crucifix at the 
foot, where the wan light of the ill-supplied lamp 
gave a strange ghastliness to the dying agony of 
the Saviour. She turned to the casement, on which 
the moon was shining ; for the high wind had 
driven aside the clouds, whose huge dark masses 
threatened soon to eclipse the pale and dim circle 
of passing light. The window opened on a square 
court-yard, paved, and surrounded by the heavy 
building, whose high dead walls seemed to repel 
the gaze. 

The imagination of the Italian, accustomed to 
the picturesque convents of her native land, shrank 
from the sterile austerity around. "Alas!" thought 
she, " can the Almighty Benefactor, who de- 
lighteth^ in the work of his hands who has 
coverea the fair earth with beauty as with a gar- 
ment, can he take pleasure in the penance 
which fills this sullen edifice ? Why are we sent 
into,4ife, but to share in life's sympathies and 



FRANCESCA CARRARA, 185 

struggles ? Methinks it is not well, thus to make 
a fenced boundary of that devotion which should 
mingle with and aid every action of existence." 

Again the wind drove the dark vapours across the 
moon ; a heavy rain began to pour down ; and cast- 
ing one more glance round the gloomy quadrangle, 
she felt it a relief to gaze on a medal of the Madon- 
na, which hung round her neck. It recalled all 
the vivid hopes and beliefs of her childhood, when 
she was wont to kneel before some lovely image, till 
the face seemed to smile encouragement, and the 
little supplicant felt as if beneath a mother's eye. 
This period had long since passed ; the discursive 
reading, the enlightened "discourse of her grand- 
father, had cast her mind in a different mould 
to the usual superstition of her country ; but faith 
and love were only more pure and perfect in a 
soul too innocent not to be religious. 

At the morrow's early matins, Francesca's at- 
tention was. particularly drawn towards one nun. 
Sister Louise was still in the early period of youth, 
but it was youth from which bloom had utterly 
departed. The features were thin, even to emacia- 
tion, and cheek and lip were alike colourless; 
while this deadly paleness rendered more remark- 
able the large lustrous black eyes, filled with all 
the light of excited fervour. But when the en- 



186 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

thusiasm of devotion died away, as it were, with 
the dying notes of the anthem, the whole face 
wore the impress of fixed melancholy, to which 
there could be no hope but beyond the grave. 

" That is Mademoiselle d'Epernon," replied 
Madame de Mercoeur, in answer to her friend's 
inquiry : " I can scarcely recognise her. When I 
first arrived in Paris, she was among the most 
celebrated of our youthful beauties one whose 
destiny promised to be brilliant as herself. The 
crown of Poland was offered for her acceptance ; 
when she announced her intention of retiring from 
the world. Prayer and remonstrance were alike 
in vain ; and she took* the veil before she was 
nineteen. " 

The attraction between Louise (for so she was 
always called) and Francesca was mutual, and 
they soon became constant companions during the 
few leisure moments that the constant succession 
of religious offices permitted. Worked up to a 
high pitch of devotional enthusiasm, Louise was 
energetic in the performance of penance, and 
fervid in psalm and prayer ; but from all other 
duties she shrunk with disgust, and never volun- 
tarily participated in the ordinary employments 
of her associates. A convent to her had evidently 
been the refuge of the bruised spirit and of the 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 187 

broken heart. At first, Rome was the great 
theme of their discourse. Rome, the mighty mother 
of the Christian faith, whose amphitheatres had 
been red with the blood of the saints, and where 
the pilgrimage and the miracle still testified to the 
truth. But it was not likely that conversation 
between two very young persons should always 
keep to this exalted strain ; the feelings are sure to 
follow close upon imaginings, and confidence is 
natural to youth. 

Francesca had been so long accustomed to 
have every thought spring from the heart to the 
lip, that the restraint so familiar to those with 
whom she had of late associated, oppressed and 
chilled her. Reserve and distrust seemed equally 
painful and unnatural; it was too soon for the 
pride of art, which supports so many through 
winding and rugged pathways. 

Louise, bred up amid strict forms and courtly 
observances, perhaps found the far greater relief. 
To talk of herself and of her feelings, with the 
entire conviction of affectionate attention in the 
listener, was a new sensation. Besides, there was 
now such a wide and such an irretrievable gulf 
opened between her present and the past, that she 
referred to the days of her youth with a delight 
like that of age, which recalls mournfully and 



188 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

tenderly joys and sorrows which never more can 
disturb a pilgrimage, which is even now passing 
through the valley of the shadows of death. The 
monastic seclusion of Sister Louise was like old 
age, inasmuch as all events and emotions in life 
were left far behind ; all emotions, did we say ? 
not so. There are some that will rise even at 
the foot of the altar, and will haunt the pillow, 
however guarded by penance and by prayer. 
These remembrances would have been less vivid 
had Mademoiselle d'Epernon remained in the 
world : love would have become its own atheist, 
as it found of what changeable and finite material 
that passion was formed, which once seemed so 
eternal ; and the single disappointment on which 
she now dwelt would have grown supportable from 
companionship. Mademoiselle d'Epernon, in the 
gay and varied pathway of busier life, would have 
almost lost the image, now so constant and so 
precious. 

At the back of the convent was a large though 
neglected garden. Fruit and yew-trees mingled 
together; and in some of the more sunny patches, 
one or two of the nuns had cultivated some carna- 
tions, whose green buds were just beginning to 
take the small globular form, which, as yet, had 
no beauty but that of promise. 



FBANCESCA CARRARA. 189 

" I observe," said Francesca to her companion, 
" that you have no flowers." 

" I have not patience to cultivate them," re- 
plied Louise : " I planted some once ; but, poor 
things, they soon perished for want of care. I 
used to love them ; but now my thoughts wander 
awaw from the flowers to their recollections to 
all that should be so utterly banished from my 
meditations." 

Perhaps there is not a situation in the world 
so confidential as pacing up and down some shady 
walk, arm in ann. The freedom of that freest ele- 
ment, the air, communicates itself to the thoughts ; 
the green obscurity of the closing branches over- 
head re-assures timidity ; the motion gives its own 
activity, and dissipates the nervous restlessness 
ever attendant on excitement. Your face is neces- 
sarily a little averted from your companion's, 
though not enough to prevent your marking the 
attention given. Then the chance which led to your 
choice of subject was so accidental, the discourse 
has proceeded so gradually, that restraint has 
melted away from the lip, and reserve from the 
heart, almost before the speaker is aware that the 
secret soul has found its way in words. 

" I can scarcely," said the nun, as she com- 
plied with Francesca's request that she would 



190 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

trace the progress of the change seemingly so 
strange and sudden which sent the youthful 
beauty from the court to the cloister, " recall one 
sorrow or one disappointment in my earlier life. I 
had good health, a gay temper, and was surrounded 
by indulgence and affection, from my father, of 
whom I was the darling plaything, to my nurse, 
whose principal object in existence was myself. 

" The court was at its very gayest, when, on 
our return from England, my age allowed me to 
participate in the festivities which were the order of 
the day. The sombre austerity of the late King had 
disappeared with himself the dissensions, whose 
echoes have pierced even these walls, had not then 
commenced. There was some truth in the flattery 
which said, that the Queen ruled all France with 
a smile. But the pleasantest time of our life leaves 
the lightest impression ; or, perhaps, one deep feel- 
ing has absorbed all memory,* as it has destroyed 
all hope. I am astonished to think how little I 
remember of all the light fancies and vanities which 
made the delight of my first two years at court. 

" Perhaps you have heard that there was once 
some purpose of marriage between the Due de 
Joyeuse and myself; it is of that which I have 
to tell. Even in your brief experience of society, 
you must have discovered that its success has its 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 191 

chances. There are some evenings when you suc- 
ceed, you scarcely know why, and the homage of 
one seems only to attract that of another. It was 
on such an evening that I first met the Due de 
Joyeuse. I danced with him, and he scarcely 
spoke to me ; perhaps the contrast had its effect, 
for that night my silent cavalier was the only one 
who obtained a second thought. I felt a vague 
desire to see him again ; I wondered whether Jhe 
was always so reserved ; I endeavoured to recall the 
few words which he had said ; and rose the next 
morning eager and impatient, expecting I knew 
not what. How long the morning seemed ! I 
scarcely heard a word that was said to me ; I could 
keep my attention to nothing. I went to a ball in 
the evening. My eyes fixed involuntarily on the 
door ; every one seemed to enter excepting the one 
whom I could not help anticipating in every new 
arrival. I danced without spirit ; I found the 
evening wearisome ; I complained of fatigue ; and 
I retired to rest with a discontent and a des- 
pondency entirely new to my experience. 

" Mademoiselle de Montpensier was at. that 
time my most intimate friend ; and the next morn- 
ing she entered my chamber before I was risen, a 
slight headache serving as an excuse. * As 
usual,' said she, laughing, ' I am come to tell you 



192 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of your conquests. I was at Madame de Guise's 
yesterday evening, and her youngest son could 
talk of nothing but Mademoiselle d'Epernon.' 
* Why, he scarcely spoke to me !' ' Speaking of 
you,' replied my companion, ' is far more ex- 
pressive : but you are actually blushing about it, 
I do verily believe it is a mutual impression.' 

" My mother entered my room at that mo- 
ment ; but Mademoiselle went on rallying, and it 
seemed to me that the subject was not disagreeable 
even to her. Alas, how that thought encouraged 
my own weakness ! The truth was, that an 
alliance between the houses of Guise and Epernon 
was at that time deemed equally suitable by both. 
How little can the very young comprehend the 
affections being made matter of policy ! I dis- 
covered that my headache was gone with a sur- 
prising degree of rapidity ; I arose with such gay 
spirits, I found the liveliest pleasure in all my 
usual occupations. True, I did not continue long at 
any of them, and every now and then lost myself 
in such a delicious reverie of the coming evening. 

^ It was not quite so delightful as I expected ; 
for shame and confusion for the first hour of the 
Due de Joyeuse's presence made me scarce con- 
scious of what I said or how I looked ; and during 
the last I could think of nothing but how silly I 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 193 

must appear to him. Still, with what a happy 
flutter of the heart I flung myself into my 
fauteuil that night, to think over the events of the 
evening ! 

" Time passed on, and Francois became my 
avowed lover. About two months after our first 
meeting, I was taken ill, and of the small-pox. 
The holy saints forgive me for the horror with 
which I heard my disease pronounced ! I prayed 
in my inmost soul that I might die rather than 
become unlovely in his sight : I have been justly 
punished. With what a strange mixture of joy 
and dread did I hear his voice, almost hourly, in 
the antechamber, making the most anxious in- 
quiries ! Others shunned the poisoned atmosphere, 
but Francois feared it not. What prayers I implored 
them to make in my name that he would refrain 
from such visits! 

" One day he came not : I was told, and 
truly, that business the most imperative required 
his personal attendance ; yet I could not force 
the ghastly terror of his illness from my mind. 
I dared not tempt my fate by content the agony 
which I suffered seemed a sort of expiation. The 
next day I heard his voice, and fainted. Fran- 
cesca, it is an awful thing thus to allow your 
destiny to be bound up in that of another to live 

VOL. I. K 



194 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

but by the beatings of another's heart, thus, as 
it were, to double your portion in every risk and 
weakness of humanity. 

" I cannot describe to you the mixture of 
anxiety and shame with which I desired to know 
how I looked. One morning, while alone with 
my mother, I asked her to bring me a little mirror 
that was wont to lie on the table ; she smiled, and 
said, ' Not yet, Louise.' I never felt one moment's 
care after that I knew that she could not have 
smiled, had she anticipated any very terrible alter- 
ation. At length I was able to rise to move 
from one chamber to another, and at last to see 
Francois. Do you wonder I cannot bear flowers, 
when I tell you that he used to bring them to 
me every day ? I was too happy : earth, in its 
perfect enjoyment, had no thought for heaven. 
Life is but a trial ; and wherefore was I to receive 
my reward before the time ? But, ah ! my friend, 
a woman may well be forgiven for the passionate 
sorrow with which she sees the empire of the heart 
pass away from her. Is it a light thing to dis- 
cover that you are poor, where you deemed that 
the most precious riches were garnered ? to find 
what had seemed to you like fate, treated as a 
trifle and a toy? to think that affection, which 
gathered pride from its imperishable nature, is yet 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 195 

dependent on such slight circumstances? The 
discovery, too, how much you have overrated your 
own power ? humiliation and regret exchange but 
to heighten their bitterness. 

" Soon after my recovery, Mademoiselle de 
Guise appeared to seek my friendship more than 
she had before done. How willingly I met her 
advances ! I loved Francois too well not to love 
those connected with him. Yet her friendship 
disturbed our intercourse ; she was constantly in- 
terrupting our conversations, and I found myself 
perpetually engaged in a whispering dialogue, 
from which Francois was completely excluded. 
She possessed a peculiar talent for placing every 
body in their worst possible light ; I felt that I 
never appeared to advantage in her presence. She 
drew from you some playful opinion, and then, 
suddenly repeating your words seriously, would, 
by some imperceptible change, contrive to make 
your expression appear the unconscious betrayal of 
some strangely unamiable feeling. Mademoiselle 
de Montpensier warned me against her treachery. 
' She hates you,' said my friend ; l you give into 
her snares, and will be surprised when you find 
they have succeeded .' I little heeded this warning 
it is so difficult for the young to believe them- 
selves hated without a cause ! 



196 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" A few weeks after my illness we went to 
Sedan. A thousand slight anxieties and difficul- 

o 

ties, contrived by Mademoiselle de Guise, had 
kept me in a perpetual fever ; my health was 
sinking under them and change of air and scene 
always seem such infallible remedies where the 
pale cheek is considered, and not the harassed 
spirits. Indeed, the persecution under which I 
suffered was one not easily to be told in words ; I 
had not then thought over it as I have done since. 
The journey, therefore, was principally undertaken 
on my account ; but, once at Sedan, and some 
affairs of my father's detained us beyond the time 
that had been expected. 

*' Long as our absence appeared, it ended in 
our return to Paris. One two three days 
elapsed, and Franois never came ; yet he knew 
of our arrival, and was -only separated from us by 
a street. The fourth day brought Mademoiselle 
de Montpensier. She laughed, and, recalling her 
former warning, asked me, ' Who was right ?' and 
informed me that the Due de Joyeuse was now 
the devoted attendant of Mademoiselle Guerchy - 
and she ended in being quite angry with me for 
not seeming so utterly overwhelmed as she ex- 
pected. There were two causes for this ; first, 
and that indeed was chief, in my secret soul 1 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 197 

disbelieved what she asserted ; and, secondly, I 
felt so angry with her want of sympathy. 

" But her assertion soon proved its truth. That 
very evening I met both the Due de Joyeuse and 
Mademoiselle Guerchy ; a slight embarrassment 
on his part, a little air of triumphant impertinence 
on hers, and an affected but insolent commisera- 
tion from Mademoiselle de Guise, told the whole. 
Francesca, I have heard my father say, that the 
shock of a gun- wound at first deadens the pain, 
and the suffering is lost in the shock. Mine was 
such a case ; it was confusion, not pride, which 
supported me through the evening. When we 
were in the carriage, my mother put her arm 
round me, and said, ' I am charmed with your 
conduct, my child ; you treated cet jeune insolent 
with fitting disdain.' A sudden resolution grew 
up in my heart, and I thought within myself, 
' My mother shall not -be made wretched by my 
misery ;' and, with a strong effort, I restrained 
the impulse which prompted me to throw myself 
on her neck and weep. 

" It is singular how little I recollect of the 
succeeding period. My existence was a blank 
I neither thought nor felt; a strange impatience 
actuated all my actions. I longed for change- for 
movement ; I dreaded being left a moment. I 



198 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

craved for pleasures which, nevertheless, I did not 
enjoy. I grew bitter in my words I believed the 
worst of every one ; nay, I sometimes doubted the 
affection of my kind, my indulgent parents. But 
let me hastily pass over this vain and profitless 
epoch, the fierce tempest, and the weary calm, 
were but the appointed means by which I reached 
the harbour of faith and rest. 

" During our stay at Bourdeaux, I accom- 
panied my mother to a little convent, whither had 
retired an early friend, one who had seen much 
trouble, and known many sorrows. I was aware 
of her history, and was singularly struck with her 
calm and gentle manner. I left the cell ; and my 
chance wandering through the garden led me to 
the burial-ground. I sat down on one of the 
graves, at first from very idleness ; but the still 
solemnity of the place gradually impressed my 
thoughts the presence of the dead made itself 
felt. I looked over the numerous tombstones, so 
various in their dates : the maiden reposed by the 
full of years ; all bore the same inscription ' Re- 
quiescat in pace.' I had before seen the words I 
had never before reflected on them. What was 
this peace? I felt that it was the peace of hope, 
as well as of rest. It was not only that the tur- 
moil of this feverish life was at an end, but that 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 199 

such end was only the beginning. I saw the sun- 
shine falling over the tombs to me it seemed like 
the blessing of Heaven made visible. It so hap- 
pened that the place where I sat was the only one 
in shadow : to my excited feelings, the darkness 
was emblematic. I stepped forth into the glorious 
sunshine, and prayed that even as that light 
illumined my mortal frame, so might the Divine 
grace illumine my soul! From that instant I 
vowed myself unto God. I know, Francesca, 
that you consider this but as the ill-regulated 
enthusiasm of a moment and such I now confess 
that it was. 

" But out of evil worketh good. That enthu- 
siasm led to reflection that reflection to convic- 
tion. I became deeply penetrated with the vanity 
and the worthlessness of my former life. I looked 
at its petty cares its bitter sorrows, and said, 
' Oh, that I had the wings of the dove, for then 
would I flee away and be at rest ;' and then I 
learned that faith had wings even like the dove's, 
and that its rest was in heaven. One trial yet 
remained ; but I trusted, in all humility, that the 
difficulty would make the sacrifice more accept- 
able. Yet, from day to day, I delayed telling my 
mother, that in me she saw the dedicated servant 
of God. Every time I sought her presence I 



200 PRANCESCA CARRARA. 

resolved on the disclosure, but in vain ; the words 
died on my lips, and again I had to pray for 
strength from above. 

" One morning I was summoned at an earlier 
hour than usual to her chamber. She received me 
with an expression of rejoicing affection, which 
shewed me she had something more than usually 
pleasant to unfold. I had scarcely taken my 
accustomed low seat at her side, when, opening 
a casket which stood on the table near her, she 
took out a diamond tiara, and, placing it in my 
hair, pointed to the glass. ' Ah, my child ! ' she 
exclaimed, ' you well become your future crown ! ' 
and, without waiting for my reply, she informed 
me that my father's negotiations for my marriage 
had been completely successful, and that the King 
of Poland had demanded my hand. 

" The time for concealment was over. Sup- 
ported by a strength not my own, I threw myself 
at her feet, and avowed my unalterable resolve. 
That dear mother has since died in my arms, 
blessing her child, and rejoicing that I had chosen 
the better path ; and yet, even now, I shrink from 
recalling the suffering of that scene. The cloister 
then seemed to my beloved parent even as the 
grave; and, ah ! my father's anger was terrible to 
bear, for it was an anger that grew out of love. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 201 

<( But if their reproaches cut me to the heart, 
how much more did I suffer from their entreaties ? 
Yet I persevered even to the end, and was per- 
mitted to begin my year of noviciate in the hope 
that my resolution would falter when put to the 
trial. They knew not in Avhat entire sincerity it had 
been taken. I remember a letter of remonstrance 
I received from Mademoiselle de Montpensier, 
and, among other arguments, was this : ' I implore 
you to marry the King of Poland, if it were only 
to mortify Mademoiselle de Guise.' She was little 
aware that forgiveness of even her enmity had 
been the earliest offering of my heart above. 

" I have never repented my choice ; every 
hour I have felt my belief more perfect, and my 
hope more exalted. Had I remained in the world, 
experience could but have brought me added -dis- 
content, and more utter weariness. I had been 
too profoundly disabused of life's dearest illusions 
ever again to allow of their sweet engrossment. 
Only those who have looked hopelessly upon life, 
and turned again to the restless and gloomy depths 
of their own heart with a despair which is as the 
shadow of the valley of death, only they can 
know the peace that is of heaven, and the faith 
that looks beyond the portals of the grave. 

" Once only since my abode in this convent 

K2 



202 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

has my heart gone back to the things of its former 
life ; hut tenderly not repiningly. Mademoiselle 
de Montpensier passed here a week in Lent, and 
her first intelligence was, that the Due de Joyeuse 
had died of the wounds he had received while 
leading on a charge of cavalry during a sortie from 
Paris. He died, too, unmarried. Heaven forgive 
the weakness which found in that thought sweetest 
consolation! I was free to remember him to 
pray for him to know that to none other could 
his memory be precious as it was to me. Perhaps 
even now, looking down from another world, 
better and happier than the one where we go on 
our way in heaviness, he knows with what truth 
and constancy I loved him. I now dare hope to 
meet him again ; for, Francesca, what may we 
not hope from the goodness of God?" 

The nun's voice sank into silence, and her 
companion saw that her pale cheek was warm 
with emotion, and her large lustrous eyes. bright 
with tears. A kind pressure of the hand ex- 
pressed her sympathy, and they parted, Louise 
to join a service about to be performed, requiring 
the attendance of the sisters only, and Francesca 
to her solitary cell, to muse over the votary's 
confession. But she looked back to the world ; 
her yet unbroken spirit asked activity, not repose 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 203 

a thousand hopes and wishes rose in vivid 
colours upon her imagination. She knew as little 
what she asked as what she anticipated ; still the 
future was before her, and all know what the 
future is to youth. Nothing more truly proves 
that life is but a trial than the pleasures which 
depart, the sense of enjoyment which deadens, and 
the disappointments which spring up at every step 
in our pilgrimage. Could life preserve its illusions, 
who would be fit to die ? Vanity of vanities is 
written on this side of the grave, but that we may 
more clearly discern that on the other shines the 
hope of immortality. 



204 




CHAPTER XVIII. 



" A new world rises, and new manners reign." 

YOUNG. 



THE first week after their arrival at Compeigne, 
the Duchesse was confined to her room by slight 
indisposition ; and Francesca never left her. It 
was a constant gratification to perceive, that, but 
for herself, the Duchesse's sick-room would have 
been dull and solitary ; for Marie was so much 
occupied with the gaiety of the court, that she had 
little leisure for the amusement of an invalid. 

One morning, the first that Madame de 
Mercoeur had been equal to the task of receiving 
visitors, the Chevalier de Joinville and^Mr. Evelyn 
arrived together. 

" Ah, Madame!" exclaimed the former, " what 
a pity you were not present to witness Mademoiselle 
Mancini's triumph last night! the mere necessity 
for yielding in such a case was victory." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 205 

" Let me hear what the triumph was," said 
their hostess. 

" You are aware that the entertainment last 
night was given in honour of the Queen of Eng- 
land. Few were admitted, as it was quite the 
household circle, and all ceremony was to be 
waved. So thought our young King ; for when 
he led his partner to the dance, that partner was 
not the Princess Henriette, but Mademoiselle 
Mancini. The Queen rose, snatched away the 
King's hand, and led him to the pretty little fairy, 
whose eyes were already filled with tears the 
fear of not dancing being before them. Louis 
turned away, saying, ' He would rather not dance 
at all than dance with a child.' His mother in- 
sisted the English Queen interfered Mademoi- 
selle Marie was the very image of triumphant 
submission and we all stood round, looking as 
innocent and indifferent as possible. The King 
gave way at last, and danced with la petite ; but 
looks and words were alike addressed to your 
sister. Ay, and our white-handed Queen sees she 
must conciliate ; for, at the close of the evening, 
she expressed her regret that she had been so 
hasty, and caressed Mademoiselle Mancini, as if 
there was something to be made up with her." 



206 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" Once for all," interrupted Madame de Mer- 
coeur, " I wish you would not talk such nonsense ; 
their Majesties are too good ; and it was as much 
my sister's duty to obey the King by standing up 
to dance, as it was to resign her place, when she 
understood that such was the Queen's wish." 

The Chevalier saw at once that the subject 
was unpleasing, and immediately changed it. 

" You know, I suppose, that our northern 
Penthesilea arrives to-morrow; she has amazed 
the good people of Paris, and we are all preparing 
to be astonished." 

" I hope," said Evelyn, " that we shall not 
exhaust our astonishment en avant that very 
common process of anticipation." 

" According to my belief," replied the Cheva- 
lier, " there is nothing worth anticipating." 

" Nothing worth realising, you mean !" ex- 
claimed Francesca. 

" Nay," returned the Chevalier; " I do not 
come from so poetical a country as your fair Italy 
to me reality is every thing. Let my pleasure 
come, and I will enjoy it; but I really cannot 
afford to waste my time beforehand in a thousand 
visionary anxieties. No; I hold hope to be a 
great mistake life is too short for it." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 207 

" It is too true that nothing realises your 
previous idea and then how bitter is your dis- 
appointment!" replied Francesca. 

" You seem to have acquired much experience 
in a brief space ; it is somewhat soon to be con- 
vinced of the worthlessness of pleasure," answered 
De Joinville, with an almost imperceptible sneer. 
Slight as the expression was, it had its effect on 
the young Italian, who instantly resumed her 
usual silence. 

We talk of youth as our happiest season, 
because, perhaps, we do not begin to moralise 
upon it till it has been long past. The present 
sorrow always exceeds its predecessors not so 
the present joy ; comparison exaggerates the one, 
while it diminishes the other ; and people talk of 
their youth as if it had not been a period of 
feverish sensitiveness, awkward embarrassments, 
many heart-burnings, and an utter want of that 
self-reliance which alone can ensure content. It is 
folly to dwell on any season's peculiar happiness ; 
each might in turn be weighed in the balance, 
and found wanting. 

The week following Madame de Mercosur's 
recovery was one of great gaiety. Fete succeeded 
fete in honour of the arrival of Christina of 
Sweden, who seemed to communicate her own 



'208 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

reckless love of novelty to the then somewhat 
staid French court. Claim your privileges as an 
oddity, and even you yourself will be astonished 
at their extent. In an atmosphere of ceremony, 
Christina was free as air; surrounded by forms, 
she observed none of them ; and, equally lax in 
her moral and religious notions, she yet succeeded 
with a queen now prude and devotee and both, 
it may be, the more strongly pronounced, from 
their being late assumptions. Anne of Austria 
was amused, so was Louis ; and I'Amazone philo- 
sophe had a prodigious run. 

There never was mask so gay but some tears 
were shed behind it ; and Francesca, one perhaps 
among many, found it possible to be very sad, 
even at a festival. Despite of Madame de Mer- 
cosur's kindness, her situation was often painful, 
and always disagreeable. She could not but con- 
trast her lot with that of others ; of course she 
could only judge of the exterior, which at least 
seemed so much more brilliant than her own. 
They had friends, connexions whose credit was 
mutual, fortune, and a defined place in society ; 
she was an orphan, poor and dependent. Many 
who hated and yet cringed to the Mancinis took 
a sort of petty revenge in slights shewn to a 
favourite without influence; she pined under a 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 209 

constant sense of isolation, ever most painful when 
felt in a crowd. She was a spectator, not a par- 
taker, of the gaiety around ; for, in truth, gaiety 
must make some small appeal to our vanity before 
it is enjoyed. The dance, to be delightful, must 
have an interest in the partner, or the eclat of 
display ; and both these attractions were wanting 
to Francesca. In the numbers that surrounded 
her, there was not one individual for whom she 
cared, few who even honoured her with passing 
notice ; and she daily heard the beauty and grace 
extolled to the skies which could not for a moment 
bear comparison with her own. 

One would think that, in society, beauty, in- 
stead of lying on the surface, was in the mine, 
and required discovery ; the majority would never 
discover the loveliness of the Venus de Medici, 
unless it were pointed out to them. Francesca's 
feelings were those of all whom a chance circum- 
stance has placed in some brilliant circle without 
the acknowledged rank or fortune necessary to 
make their right of entrance ; and yet with an 
innate consciousness of superiority, which makes 
neglect more bitter, by adding to it a sense of 
injustice. 

There were many who would have felt nothing 
of all this who would have made their way by 



210 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

little and little who would either have been 
useful or agreeable, as might have suited the 
occasion, till they reached an elevation astonishing 
even to themselves, when the sneer might be re- 
membered and the scorn retorted, as no advantage 
was longer to be obtained by endurance. Thus, as 
usual, ending the career of flattery by insolence. 

Francesca was at once too simple and too high- 
minded ; simple as regarded worldly knowledge, 
but high-minded, as feeling and talent ever are. 
With her, time passed on, divided between disgust 
and indifference ; or an increasing anxiety re- 
specting her connexion with Evelyn. He still 
urged a secret marriage, but now she no longer 
found it difficult to refuse. Fidelity to her early 
vow yet appeared a duty ; however, like most 
proofs of faith, it was to be put off as long as 
possible. 



211 



CHAPTER XIX. 



" 'Tis a dark labyrinth the human heart." 

YOUNG. 



FRANCESCA one evening attended Madame de 
Mercceur to the small circle allowed entrance to 
the Queen's dressing-room. The morning had 
been one of great fatigue, so that but few of the 
court were admitted ; and Anne of Austria herself 
was in that demi-toilette so favourable to the twi- 
light of beauty. She wore a loose dress of gray 
silk, edged with black, and fastened with loops of 
pearl. A portion of her still beautiful hair was 
parted in two rich auburn bands on her forehead ; 
while the rest was hidden by a long black crape 
veil, which hung nearly to her feet, and set off 
the exquisite fairness of her skin, the more striking 
as she wore no rouge. It was difficult to suppose 
her the mother of the young man who leant on 
the back of her chair ; for Louis looked as much 
older than he really was as she looked younger. 



212 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

It was said of Anne of Austria, after she had 
been some time Regent, that her misfortunes had 
been her only attraction ; to them might be added 
her appearance ; it was the very reverse of her 
character, in the sensitive and changeable com- 
plexion, and its long-retained youthfulness. Yet 
few had grown more old in worldliness and decep- 
tion forgetful in friendship, and vindictive in 
resentment. She had all the faults peculiar to 
very weak people faults which are of the mean- 
est order ; violent, for it requires strength of mind 
to curb emotion ; obstinate, for with the obstinate 
opinion is made up of habit and conceit ; and 
cunning, for cunning is the genius of the fool. It 
is difficult to account for the influence acquired 
over her by Cardinal Mazarin, unless we adopt 
the belief of their private marriage ; for in their 
connexion there was something of the authority 
of the husband, but none of the devotion of the 
lover. His manner to her was abrupt, often 
harsh; it implied the necessity for yielding. La 
haute devotion, to use an untranslatable phrase of 
the time, to which she was addicted, belonged less 
to the mistress, whose chains may be regretted 
and broken, than to the wife, whose repentance 
comes tin pen tard, and who may as well make 
her obedience matter of conscience. Her conduct, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 213 

too, after his death, was very like the conduct of 
those who are always " wonderfully supported ;" 
suited also to her particular situation, in which 
there was so little need for keeping up the sem- 
blance of grief, and in strict accordance with her 
own paramount selfishness. When those around 
her thought to pay their* court by exaggerating 
the merits of the deceased, she exclaimed, " Mon 
Dieu! we must drop the subject I am sure the 
King is sick of it ; we have really enough to do, 
without wasting time in useless words." It would 
be no uncharitable supposition were we to conclude, 
that newly recovered liberty that word which 
always appears so charming was sufficiently 
agreeable to afford a widow's consolation. 

Francesca who, like all persons of naturally 
fine taste that have lived much in solitude, was 
keenly alive to the charms of manner fixed her 
whole attention on the card-table where the Queen 
was playing. She was struck with the grace which 
made the common courtesies of the game appear 
like personal compliment, while the caressing air 
with which she occasionally addressed individuals 
standing round seemed at once so pleasing and so 
much in earnest. " How is it possible," thought 
the young Italian, " that one so fascinating could 
ever have been neglected by her husband, and the 



214 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

object of hatred to the fierce and insolent faction 
so recently subdued ?" 

Her meditation was interrupted by an unusual 
bustle in the antechamber, when, before the pages 
could announce her, the Queen of Sweden walked, 
or rather ran, into the room. Advancing straight 
to the Queen, she exclaimed, " A thousand con- 
gratulations 1 have just heard of the taking 
of Valence, and could not rest till I had rejoiced 
with you on the success of your arms." 

Victory is an agreeable subject, and the visitor 
and her compliments were equally well received. 

" You may give me credit for sincerity," con- 
tinued she, " as there is some selfishness in it. 
It hurts one's vanity to be mistaken ; and you 
know I prophesied the success of the fleur- 
de-lis." 

" Valence," observed M. de Nogent, one of the 
party at the card-table, " was besieged a hundred 
years since by the French army, but unsuccess- 
fully; the fort has never before been taken, 
and" 

" And you should have been there," interrupted 
Christina abruptly, " with your long stories of a 
hundred years since ; I would rather hear them 
a hundred years hence." Then turning, with a 
singular change of countenance from harshness to 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 215 

extreme sweetness, to Madame de Mercceur, " I 
give you joy that your husband should be the first 
conqueror of this redoubtable Valence." 

" I deserve," replied the Duchesse, " some 
compensation for the anxiety I have endured." 

" Anxiety ! nonsense !" exclaimed the Swede ; 
" a man is never in his proper element but when 
fighting. I am persuaded that war was always 
meant to be the one great luxury of the human 
race. War calls out all our good qualities ; courage 
teaches a man to respect himself and self-respect 
is at once the beginning and the guarantee of 
excellence. Besides, a campaign teaches patience, 
generosity, and exertion. So much for the morale; 
and as to the enjoyment, pardieu ! I can imagine 
nothing beyond the excitement of leading a charge 
of cavalry." 

" Alas, Madam," said the King, smiling, " why 
cannot I offer you the baton of a marshal ?" 

" You cannot lament," returned she, " the 
impossibility more than I do. What could God 
mean by sending me into the world a woman? 
But let us change this mournful subject it really 
affects my feelings." 

" I am rejoiced," observed Louis, " that you 
have recovered from the ennui of Messieurs les 
Jesuites' tragedy." 



216 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" I protest," was her reply, " equally against 
confession or tragedy from them ; their rules are 
too lax in both." 

" You do not seem," said the Queen, evidently 
wishing to change the subject just started, " to 
have been much pleased with our dramatic repre- 
sentations; but we have not been fortunate our 
actors are generally more amusing." 

" I suppose so," replied Christina, " as you 
keep them still. But I see I have interrupted 
your game ; go on, and do not mind me I should 
like to have another victory to congratulate you 
upon." 

Crossing the room,' she seated herself on one 
chair, while, drawing another towards her, she 
placed her feet upon it, and thus stretched out 
negligently, began talking in a low tone to the 
King and Mademoiselle Mancini. 

Francesca had now an opportunity of observing 
her more closely, and found that her appearance, 
if equally singular, was more picturesque than she 
had heard described. Her dress was odd enough, 
half-masculine, half-feminine ; but it became her. 
She wore a sort of jacket of bright red camlet, 
richly braided with gold and silver lace ; a fringe 
of which also hung from her gray petticoat, which 
was short enough to shew her feet and ankles, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 217 

whose small size was rendered more remarkable 
by the peculiar -shaped boot. A crimson scarf, 
flung over one shoulder, adroitly hid the defect in 
her figure ; and round her throat was a neckcloth 
edged with point lace, and fastened with a crimson 
riband. She was delicately fair, with an aquiline 
nose, and a mouth the size of which was forgotten 
in its white teeth and pleasant smile. She wore a 
peruke of very fair golden hair ; and herein was 
shewn the lurking spirit of female vanity : her own 
tresses had been very beautiful ; in some whim 
she had had them shaven off, but the colour 
of the peruke had been most assiduously assorted 
to them. Her eyes, large, blue, bright, and rest- 
less, were her most remarkable feature, perhaps 
from their constant employ ; they seemed perpe- 
tually on the watch, and she had also a custom of 
fixing them with singular intentness on the person 
to whom she spoke. It was said this habit had 
somewhat startled the Bishop of Amiens, whom 
she selected for her confessor ; instead of the down- 
cast eyes to which he had been accustomed, the 
royal penitent, who then knelt at his feet, fixed 
her clear piercing orbs full on his face, till the 
good father was all but stared out of coun- 
tenance. She was small and slight ; and the 
impression she gave, as she lounged on her two 
VOL. i. L 



218 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

seats, swinging to and fro her black hat and 
feathers, was of a fair and pretty boy, clever, and 
somewhat spoiled by indulgence. She commenced 
her conversation with the King and his companion 
by saying, " Pray, do not suspend your fleurettes 
on my account; next to being in love myself, I 
like to see other people in love. I shall be a 
charming confidante." 

" Too charming," replied Marie, " not to be 
dangerous." 

" Very prettily said, but more pretty than true. 
Falling in love is quite out of my way. I do not 
often offer up thanksgivings ; but when I do, and 
turn in my mind what to be grateful about, I 
always give thanks for my indifference." 

" You are selfish in your gratitude," said Louis. 

" A very common case. But, truly, I have be- 
come too worldly, have too many other things in 
both head and heart, to find a place for love it 
takes up too much room. But this I do say ; if 
there be an intense, overpowering happiness in 
this world, it is first love, unsullied, unfrittered 
away by a thousand vain considerations deep, 
fervent, and engrossing. Of what avail is a throne, 
save to share it with a beloved one? One with 
whom the deck of the frailest bark that ever cut 
my own stormy seas would be paradise, and with- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 219 

out whom the whole wide world is but a desert. 
Ay, such a love is indeed heaven or hell !" And 
she flung herself back in her chair, and gave way 
to one of those fits of absence in which she was 
accustomed to indulge, with equal disregard o* 
time, place, and company. 

The young King looked tenderly at Mademoi- 
selle Mancini, who gave him a glance quite as 
tender in return not, however, unobserved. His 
mother had been for some time past a displeased 
spectator of a predilection which might become 
dangerous. With her usual dissimulation, she 
refrained from evincing any outward sign of un- 
easiness, and, beckoning Madame de Mercoaur, 
apparently made some request. Madame de 
Mercosur crossed the room to Francesca, and , 
informed her that the Queen had heard of her 
musical skill, and wished herself to judge of a 
voice that had been so extolled. 

Such a request was a command, though one 
she felt inclined, had it been possible, to disobey. 
Her vanity had been too little called forth for her 
to rejoice in display ; she was too indifferent to 
her audience to have any anxiety about pleasing 
them and she was perfectly aware of her own 
powers. Moreover, she was actuated by a feeling 
between indignation and disdain at being thus 



220 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

called on to minister to their pleasure who would 
never dream of contributing to hers. Still, her lute 
was brought ; and, with the first tdne awakened 
from the strings, she grew timid, as if she only 
then noted how much the attention of the circle 
was fixed upon her. At first her voice was tremu- 
lous and low, but it soon asserted its delicious 
power. Rich, deep, and melancholy, it was one 
of those which appeal even more to the heart than 
to the ear one of those which, by some subtle 
spell music's best secret seem to call up every 
sad and sweet thought which memory has garnered 
for years. 

Every one was surprised, or rather touched, 
into warm expressions of delight. The Queen's 
quick eye glanced from Louis, who stood in fixed 
attention, to the singer, who, far more confused 
by the praise than the exertion, rose from the 
kneeling position, whose very humility had in 
it such grace, with that rich flushed colour, so 
lovely in a face usually pale, and with downcast 
eyes, whose darkness was only indicated by the 
black and curled eyelash. 

"How very lovely!" said the Queen in a 
whisper, but loud enough for her son to hear, who 
now approached, and took himself the lute from 
Francesca. Christina, first indulging in a quick 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 221 

and instantly suppressed smile, addressed a few 
words, more kind even than flattering, to the 
singer ; and Francesca, who an hour before had 
been as much neglected as the old fauteuil by 
which she had leant half concealed, was now the 
centre of a little circle of admirers and flatterers. 
Young, and a woman, it would be too much to 
suppose that it was very disagreeable to her. 

" I think," said Anne to Madame de Mercoeur, 
" we must obtain your protegee's services for our 
intended masque ; however, I shall leave that to 
you young people to settle," turning to Louis as 
she spoke. 

The Swedish Queen saw at once that the day 
for civility to Mademoiselle Mancini was over, at 
least in the royal mother's presence, and that she 
had lost some ground by her incautious encourage- 
ment ; besides, the King's ready and obvious 
admiration did not say much for his stability. 

" He is too young to be trusted," thought she ; 
" it takes half a dozen fantasies to prepare the way 
for une grande passion. Madame la Mere at 
present " 

Christina drew near to the card-table, and, 
lolling upon it with her usual indifference, began 
to watch the progress of the game, which was now 
resumed. Suddenly she snatched up the Queen's 



222 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

hand, and, holding it by the wrist, let the light 
fall upon it, as if it had been a toy she wished to 
examine. " Ah, mon Dieu! how perfect ! Talk 
of the works of art as the standard of ideal beauty 
look at this work of nature. I consider my 
voyage from Rome amply repaid by the sight of 
the most lovely object in the world. In my country 
they would say you had the hand of a water-sprite 
white as the earliest snow. And you have beeri 
gathering roses, I see," turning the little palm, 
so that the delicate pink inside became visible. 

" Flatterer ! " exclaimed the Queen, and hold- 
ing up the said hand in a menacing attitude, but 
with no appearance of displeasure. 

Christina snatched both hands, kissed them, 
and, without further farewell, walked out of the 
room, half-singing Scarron's celebrated lines : 

*' Elle avoit au bout de ses manches 
line paire de mains si blanches, 
Que j'eu voudrois tre soufflete." 

She left her character behind her, character 
which usually has the fate of King Pelias, 
namely, that of being torn to pieces by its dearest 
friends. The Swedish Queen, however, escaped 
wonderfully well. She had outraged every rule 
of the court, mocked their proprieties, and in- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 223 

fringed their decorums ; yet they talked of her 
genius, and called her la Reine philosophique. 
Well audacity, oddity, and flattery, are the 
three graces which make their way in modern 
society ! 



224 



CHAPTER XX. 



" Si vous eussiez v6cu du temps de Gabrielle 
Je ne sais pas ce qu'on eut dit de vous, 
Mais on n'aurait point par!6 d'elle." 

VOLTAIRE. 



THE next morning Francesca received a letter 
from Guido, the first she had ever possessed. Even 
in our time, when they are so many in number 
things of morning, noon, and night occurrence 
a letter is a delight. We never hear the postman's 
knock without a vague sort of hope that it is for 
us. A letter, too, is one of the few mysteries that 
yet remain a small and a transitory one, but still 
a mystery, though but of a moment. We have 
to open it. If these are a pleasure even now, what 
must they have been when an epistle was an event 
in a life, and when rarely any but a beloved hand 
traced the characters ? 

" I have such a happiness in store for you," 
said Madame de Mercosur ; " now do guess." 

" Guido ! what have you to tell me of him?" 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 225 

" Ah, now, how came you to think of him at 
once ? But I have not the heart to disappoint 
those eager eyes so take it ;" and from a packet 
by her pillow she took the letter and gave it to her. 

Francesca felt choked the tears rose she 
tried to thank the Duchesse, but her voice was 
gone ; she kissed her, by way of gratitude, and 
left the room she could not bear to read the 
letter but by herself. Shutting herself in, she 
opened the scroll, arid read it hastily to the end 
then began it over again, but slowly this time, 
as if she feared to lose a word. Again she com- 
menced it, but stopped suddenly; and the tears, 
which had hitherto only stood in her eyes, now 
dropped thick and fast upon the paper. There 
was something unsatisfactory in its contents they 
were too brief and too abrupt ; Guido said nothing 
of his own health, or his own feelings and what 
did his sister care for else ? what to her were the 
Duke, the Duchess, or even Modena itself? nay, 
she felt very disrespectfully towards the Madonna, 
which he described as divine. 

" How very unkind!" exclaimed she; " he 
knows how anxious I am about him, and he tells 
me nothing he may be ill or well for aught he says 
about it." She turned the paper over to see if any 
little corner had escaped her notice, but she had 

L2 



226 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

read it far too carefully. " How differently I 
should have written to him ! and yet, poor Guido, 
I fear he is unwell hurried evidently, and he 
will have the more to say when we meet ;" and 
once more she read the paragraph mentioning his 
speedy return. 

Francesca's was a grievance of which most of 
her sex have to complain ; a man's letter is always 
the most unsatisfactory thing in the world. There 
are none of those minute details which are such a 
solace to feminine anxiety ; the mere fact of writ- 
ing, always seems sufficient to content a mascu- 
line conscience. Guido, therefore, was guilty of 
no uncommon failing ; and could Francesca have 
looked into the heart whose emotions were so ill 
depicted on that brief scroll, she would have seen 
how tender was the affection which clung to 
her image, as the only object beloved the one 
light of a dreaming and melancholy existence. 
But for her sake, he would not have returned to 
France ; for his absence had made his own country 
seem lovelier than ever. His earlier visions re- 
turned upon him ; his despondency, which, amid 
realities, had become embittered by mortifications, 
here took the tone of poetry, and but shewed it- 
self in the deeper sense with which he lingered 
beside the ruined temple, or gathered the wild 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 227 

flowers, and took a fanciful pleasure in seeing them 
wither. 

The imagination shuns to reveal its workings, 
unless it can clothe them in some lovely and 
palpable shape, and create into existence the high 
romance, the mournful song, the animated canvass, 
or the carved marble ; pride then comes to the aid 
of the gifted one, and says, " Lo ! these are the 
fruits of those hours the busier worldlings deem 
given but to idle fantasies !" But Guido knew that 
his summer idlesse had been idlesse indeed. He 
expected so much from himself, that he believed 
Francesca must expect something too and he had 
nothing to tell her ; and this inward consciousness 
she so little suspected, contributed much towards 
the constrained tone of the letter. 

Gradually it gave its possessor more pleasure. 
Francesca smiled at what she now termed unrea- 
sonable sensitiveness, and began to reckon how 
long it must be before her brother's return. More- 
over, the very mention of Italy brought to her all 
the most cheerful recollections of her childhood. 
She recalled the old hall, with its storied frescoes 
the woods, where so many mornings had jessed so 
happily away the little river, where they used 
to launch their light boats, made of the green 
rushes which grew beside ; she recalled the blithe 



228 FKANCESCA CARRARA. 

chirp of the cicala in the fragrant grass and the 
gleam of the fire-flies, glittering by twilight amid 
the boughs of the myrtle. " Ah!" exclaimed 
she, " we will soon return thither, and be happy 
again ! " 

Francesca forgot that she must take back with 
her an altered heart. Her hand fell by chance on 
her lute, which lay near it gave forth a sweet 
but hollow sound, as if the wind had swept over 
it, and, almost unconsciously, her fingers ran over 
the notes of an old familiar air ; she started, for it 
seemed almost like a reproach, it had been such a 
favourite of Evelyn's. The recollection at once 
dissipated her pleasant reverie : " Alas !" she ex- 
claimed, " is it he or I that is changed ?" 

Without waiting to decide, she suddenly re- 
membered that Madame de Mercoeur would marvel 
at her long absence, and hastened to join her. 
She was risen, and seated before her glass, while 
her woman was arranging her long fair hair. 
The Chevalier de Joinville leant opposite j Evelyn, 
with a true Englishman's habit, was fastening and 
unfastening a little enamelled box, which he had 
taken p under plea of admiring her portrait on 
the lid ; and, seated on the arm of a fauteuil, 
instead of the chair itself, was the Queen of 
Sweden, talking with great rapidity. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 229 

" Well, finding remonstrance vain, and tired 
with urging that to-day was a very particular fast 
indeed, the King endeavoured to snatch from 
Monsieur the atrocious bouillon, with its still 
more atrocious meat. The Duke of Anjou resisted; 
but finding his brother strongest, fairly flung plate 
and all into his face. Our pious Louis laughed at 
first ; but Mademoiselle Mancini making it matter 
of personal dignity, he grew angry, and said, 
' That but for the Queen's presence, he would have 
turned Monsieur out of the room. Meat and temper 
being lost alike, la bonne Martian interfered, but 
in vain ; and the Duke sought his chamber in high 
dudgeon. Ah, the blessings of Providence will 
certainly rest upon a monarch so pious." 

The rest of the party were too prudent to com- 
ment ; and Madame de Mercosur asked Christina 
if Mademoiselle was as beautiful as she was allowed 
to be? 

" Even in exile?" said Evelyn. 

" Superb !" replied the Queen, after having 
given the speaker a look, as much as to say, ' I 
take your sarcasm;' " tall fair, a fitting Bel- 
lona for the Prince of Conde. The comedy of the 
League ought to have ended in their marriage. 
Vraiment, Mademoiselle has exerted herself for an 
establishment. She was devout for the Emperor. 



230 FBANCESCA CARRARA. 

I heard that she left off powder, patches, and 
rouge, for a month when his third consort died, 
and he grew religious whether out of grief or 
gratitude, I never heard ; then she grew factious, 
for the sake of your own King, and thought to 
strew the way to the altar with straws* instead of 
flowers. I applaud her spirit in fighting for a 
crown." 

" I marvel," interrupted De Joinville, " at 
such a sentiment from your Majesty." 

" Poor child!" replied she, bursting into one 
of her abrupt, but musical laughs, " where can 
you have lived, not to know we never care for 
what we have ? But to return to Mademoiselle ; 
her pride unabated, though I heard that your 
uncle declared, that the shot she fired from the 
Bastile killed her husband. Pray did he say so?" 

" Really, your Majesty," answered Madame 
de Mercoeur, " seems too well acquainted with all 
our affairs to ask any questions of me." 

" Especially such as you do not deem fitting 
to answer. Pitying Mademoiselle's seclusion, I 
did my best to entertain her, and, by way of news, 
told her that her former lover, the King of Eng- 
land, was talked of for Mademoiselle de Longue- 

* Straws were the badge of the Leaguers. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 231 

ville. Diable ! but her eyes flashed fire. ' I owe 
it, Madame, to myself to disbelieve the story ; con- 
vinced that no one, who had ever once raised his 
hopes to myself, could stoop to Mademoiselle de 
Longue ville.' ' 

" Now, by St. George!" interrupted Evelyn, 
" the daughter of Henri Quatre was ready 
enough to marry his grandfather ; and, let the 
present madness of our islands pass away, and the 
daughter of the Duke of Orleans may repent her 
disdain, or rather her miscalculation." 

" Circumstances are every thing," rocking 
her heavy seat backwards and forwards. 

" I have been busy this morning," continued 
De Joinville, " consoling beauty in distress and in 
debt. Madame de Chatillion and Fouquet have 
quarre^d ! " 

" What! he, the most devoted and most des- 
pairing of lovers, who talked in the same breath 
of her charms and her cruelty who accumulated 
wealth but to lavish it on an idol ! " exclaimed 
Madame de Mercosur ; " why, at the last fair, taste 
was of no use, for every thing pretty had been 
selected beforehand. They said, Madame first went 
round to choose, and 1 'Abbe followed to buy ; and 
the various presents were sent in as mysteriously 
as fairy gifts." 



232 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" But the Abbe is an inglorious successor," 
remarked Christina, " to the Prince of Conde, to 
your English King both of whom wore the chains 
of this triumphant beauty." 

" Circumstances are every thing, as your Ma- 
jesty has just observed," replied De Joinville ; " the 
Conde is absent, the King poor ; Fouquet is pre- 
sent, and rich, and, what is more, generous. Be- 
sides, he helped her out of one of those adventures 
in which her folly she calls it ambition is per- 
petually involving her. Madame de Chatillion 
was threatened with a lettre de cachet, for her sus- 
pected correspondence with Monsieur le Prince, 
and Monsieur 1'Abbe took upon himself the re- 
sponsibility, answered for her loyalty, and made 
his house her prison or her palace." 

" I never saw a house more splendidly fur- 
nished," observed Christina ; " he gave me a col- 
lation ; and there I saw Madame de Chatillion 
glittering with gems ; her diamond earrings alone 
might have lighted up the room. She shewed me 
her portrait, written by herself. I only remember 
what she states of her mouth, which, she says, was 
not only beautiful and red, but had a thousand little 
natural airs and graces not to be found in any other 
mouth. Oh, I must not forget her figure, which, 
she assured the reader, was the best -made and 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 233 

the finest that could be seen : nothing could be 
more regular, more graceful, or more easy. Cer- 
tainly it is pleasant to appreciate one's own per- 
fections ; it puts one on good terms with others, 
by first being on such with ourselves. But now for 
the quarrel." 

" Madame de Chatillion," answered the Che- 
valier, " in the first halcyon hours which her 
smiles created for 1'Abbe, had resigned to him 
some letters of M. le Prince; she also, in due 
time, favoured him with divers addressed to him- 
self. These precious epistles were placed in cer- 
tain caskets, and treasured like really, my ex- 
perience affords me nothing sufficiently precious 
for a likeness. One fine morning, when 1'Abbe 
Fouquet was in the country, she goes to his house ; 
the servants, knowing her authority was absolute 
with their master, supposed it was to be equally 
absolute with themselves, and admitted her to his 
cabinet. Once there, she makes good use of her 
time, and retakes all those said letters ; con- 
sidering, perhaps, that what is said may be unsaid, 
but what is written remains in evidence against 
you." 

" Love-letters are very foolish things," muttered 
Christina. 

" L'Abbe returned," pursued the Chevalier, 



234 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

" and at once missed his caskets, and next heard 
of his visitor. In despair, he rushed into Madame 
de Chatillion's presence, and said every thing that 
could be said by a man very angry and ver^. much 
in love. Words were followed by actions : he 
vented his rage on the magnificent mirrors, till 
the floor was covered with shattered glass, every 
fragment adding to his misery, by another re- 
flection of Madame's beautiful face. He went 
away at last, threatening to send and take away 
furniture, plate, and jewels, all being gifts of 
his own. Madame de Chatillion acted upon the 
threat, took down hangings, &c., and removed to 
Madame de St. Chaumont. This is the tragedy : 
now for the farce. 

" While staying with Madame de Porcinne, in 
the Convent de la Misericorde, Madame de Chatil- 
lion was amazed by the appearance of 1' Abbe and 
his mother in the parlour." 

" Ah," cried Christina, l f I remember the old 
lady simple, kind-hearted, and evidently quite 
astonished by every body and every thing." 

' " 'What,' said la belle dedaigneuse, * do I see? 
dares this man appear in my presence ?' The 
Abb6's answer was couched in the most approved 
terms of love and remorse, his despair quite 
touched the hearts of the three old ladies. ' Re- 



FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 235 

member,' remonstrated Madame de Porcinne to 
the angry beauty, * that you are a Christian, and 
that you should lay down all your animosities at 
the foo,t of the cross.' l In the name of Jesus!' 
exclaimed the Provencal Mere de la Misericorde, 
for even her feelings were affected, ' look upon 
him with pity.' The poor old mother next took 
up the petition : { Madame, I implore, on my 
knees, that my son may just haunt your footsteps.' 
Neither 1'Abbe nor his three old women succeeded 
in softening the angry goddess. It is, however, 
rumoured, that certain offerings at her shrine 
have since had considerable effect, and he is now 
beginning to hope that, perhaps, he may again be 
suffered in Madame de Chatillion's sight." 

Other visitors entering interrupted the thread 
of the discourse ; and Evelyn took the opportunity 
of approaching Francesca, who was seated in a 
window, a little behind the others. " I con- 
gratulate you," said he. 

" Ah, I am so happy!" was her reply, suppos- 
ing that he alluded to Guide's letter, and without 
giving herself time to consider, that it was impos- 
sible for him to know of its arrival. 

" You are not aware of the effect you pro- 
duced ! " 



236 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

" What do you mean ?" ejaculated his listener, 
in the utmost astonishment. 

" Nonsense ! Do you think," replied he, " that 
I have been the last to hear of the beautiful Italian 
and her lute ? " 

" I thought," said Francesca, " you were speak- 
ing of the letter I have this morning had from 
Guido." 

" Pshaw ! what is a letter compared to your 
last night's triumph 1 Joinville told me you 
had never looked more lovely, and that Louis 
never moved his eyes from your face the whole 
time you were singing." 

" Very pleasant to be stared out of coun- 
tenance ! " returned she, colouring. 

" I would have Mademoiselle Mancini look to 
her chains," said Evelyn. 

Francesca remained silent, from vexation and 
anger ; and he continued : 

" But I must say farewell now. Lord Craven 
is to ride by the wood ; and, even if it should be 
observed, our meeting will seem accidental, I 
wish for no appearance of connexion with his 
party, for that would end all my plans. Ah ! my 
fair Italian ; what with their anxiety and your 
cruelty, I have enough on my hands ! " 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 237 

Francesca saw him depart with that profound 
depression of spirits which usually followed their 
interviews. She was vexed at the want of sym- 
pathy which he shewed with her joy or her affec- 
tion, he had not even thought of inquiring after 
Guido. It seemed so very unkind ! Then she was 
mortified at his ready allusion to the admiration 
she had excited, surely he ought not to have 
been pleased by it. A lover owes his mistress 
a little jealousy. Indifference to the homage she 
receives may shew reliance, but it is a bad com- 
pliment. She was roused from her reverie by a 
hand laid upon her arm ; she looked up, and saw 
the Swedish Queen. 

" A cold look at parting, and a sad brow after- 
wards, are bad signs. You know the old fable 
there is little profit in leaving the substance for 
the shadow." 

Francesca only looked her surprise. 
" Some shadows," continued Christina, " are 
enough to dazzle such young sight as yours ; yet 
I warn you of trusting to them." 

" I have little," said Francesca, and her eyes 
filled with tears ; for there was a kindness in the 
speaker's voice, which, in her present depressed 
mood, touched her powerfully, " to trust in, save 
Heaven!" 



238 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

" Poor child!" returned her companion ; " why 
did you leave Italy?" 

" Ah, you may well warn me of trusting to 
shadows! why, indeed, did we leave it?" 

" Because there was a lover in the case. Well, 
well; he is a handsome and noble-looking cavalier. 
Do not quarrel with him again, because he is 
jealous that others beside himself think you have 
a bright blush and a sweet voice." 

Giving her a good-humoured smile, Christina 
moved away, to Francesca's great relief. What 
could she say to so complete a misconception / 
The chamber was by this time cleared of visitors, 
and she was about to thank Madame de Mercosur 
for her letter, when Mademoiselle Mancini en- 
tered. Without saluting either, she flung herself 
into a chair, and exclaimed, " I suppose, Hen- 
riette, you are well aware of the fine marriage 
about to take place?" 

" I know of none," answered Madame de Mer- 
coeur. % 

" Oh, then my uncle has kept you equally in 
the dark ; but the Queen this morning congra- 
tulated me me, forsooth! of the approaching 
alliance between Mademoiselle Martinozzi and the 
Prince de Conti. She shewed me the pearls she 
meant for a wedding present." 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 239 

" A splendid match for our pretty cousin ! Well, 
she is a sweet creature ; and I rejoice in her good 
fortune." 

" You do?" exclaimed Marie, her cheek flush- 
ing with anger ; " very kind, very sisterly, in- 
deed ! No consideration for my interest !" 

" How does it affect you, but advantageously? 
such an alliance is an honour to our whole 
family." 

" Surely I am as well fitted to be Princesse de 
Conti as my cousin ? " 

" And the gentleman's choice is to go for noth- 
ing ( You remember the Prince always greatly 
admired Mademoiselle Martinozzi." 

" The Cardinal has taught you your lesson : 
I meet with the same unkindness from you all; 
but if he does not attend to my interest from 
affection, he may from weariness of my com- 
plaints, and of them I promise him the full 
benefit." 

" For shame, Marie! think how very kind 
he is to us ! " 

" To you, I presume, you mean." 

" For pity's sake, let us drop the subject ; and 
do tell us all about the quarrel between the King 
and the Duke of Anjou." 

" I have nothing to tell, but that it is ridicu- 



240 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

lous for Louis to be so absolutely governed by his 
mother as he is. He hears with her ears, and 
sees with her eyes I suppose, he will soon eat 
with her mouth !" 

" Do not look so angry, Marie ; it quite spoils 
your pretty face." 

" I do not care how I look ; and if you have 
nothing more pleasant to say, I wish you good 
morning." 

" Nay, now, don't run away ; we shall find 
something more agreeable, if you will but have 
patience." 

" Indeed, I should not have come in at all, 
but that the Queen requested I would give the 
plan of the masque to la Signora Carrara, and 
remind her of her engagement." So saying, she 
threw the roll of paper on the table, and left the 
room. 

" I am so delighted at the fancy which the 
Queen has taken to my little Francesca," said the 
Duchesse, kindly. " You must look your best at 
the masque. There is an old picture of my uncle's, 
whose costume will suit you exactly we will go 
and study it." 

Madame de Mercoeur was one of those who 
are happy in their amiability. Gentle and kind, 
rather than acute or strong in feeling, she relied 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 241 

upon the affection she inspired, because she had 
no exaggerated estimate within to whose test she 
applied it ; the expression she witnessed came up 
to her expectation. Hence she was confiding and 
unsuspicious. She could comprehend the under 
motives of an action, when explained ; but she 
would never have penetrated them without such 
explanation. This extreme goodness and sim- 
plicity of character made Henriette her uncle's 
favourite. None but worldly people appreciate 
simplicity. He felt safe with her, and he believed 
in her attachment, because he saw that it was 
natural to her to love. 

Liking Francesca warmly herself, it seemed the 
most natural thing in the world that others should 
like her too. It never would have entered into her 
head, that the Queen hourly saw, with more and 
more suspicion, her sister's influence increasing, 
and that she calculated on Francesca's attraction as 
a passing lure to Louis. The friendless Italian was a 
much safer person than the niece of the all-power- 
ful minister, whose ambition would not stop but 
at the throne. Francesca might be allowed to 
detach him from Mademoiselle Mancini, and could 
then be easily flung aside. The King's devotion 
was the next engine to be brought into play ; and 

VOL. i. M 



242 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

the Queen felt sure that his conscience was still 
sufficiently tender for alarm. 

But Marie was too dangerous ; for though the 
very lilies of France would blush at such an 
alliance, still it was possible ; and Anne of Austria 
was too false herself to place any reliance on the 
Cardinal's professions, that he would be the first 
to oppose such a union. The temptation of the 
crown for his niece seemed too great to be resisted ; 
and the Queen thought it but prudent to diminish 
it as much as she could. Francesca's beauty caught 
her attention ; it could not be better employed than 
in diverting Louis from Mademoiselle Mancini ; 
and that once effected, there was a convent ready 
for her, and her own authority and his confessor 
for the King. Marie, too, would be piqued by the 
prospect of her cousin's brilliant marriage ; and 
let her hopes be once turned towards a similar 
establishment, and no unnecessary delay should 
ensue in finding one for her. 

There is a story somewhere of an eastern king, 
whose delight it was to assemble his subjects in a 
glittering hall, where they were crowned with 
roses, and drank the purple wine from cups of 
gold ; but beneath them were caverns and chains. 
Suddenly, the floor gave way, and the guests were 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 243 

precipitated into the darkness below, there to 
meditate at leisure over their former blind enjoy- 
ment. Human life is just such a tyrant the 
pleasure hides the pain ; but not long soon, very 
soon, are we precipitated into the depths of expe- 
rience and regret ! 



244 



CHAPTER XXI. 

" When factious Rage to cruel exile drove 
The Queen of Beauty and the court of Love, 
The Muses droop'd, with their forsaken arts, 
And the sad Cupids broke their useless darts." 

DRYDEN. 

COURTED, flattered, and caressed, Francesca could 
scarcely believe such a change could have so ra- 
pidly taken place, and on what, moreover, appeared 
such slight grounds. Though more thoughtful 
than Madame de Mercoeur, yet it asked far more 
knowledge of society that wilderness of small 
intricacies for her to penetrate into the motives 
of those who seemed so suddenly struck with her 
fascination ; hut she was too clear-headed to be 
deceived, and set it all down under one general 
belief in caprice. Still, it was pleasant to have 
a little circle gather round her, where before she 
had sat in solitary silence ; it was pleasant, also, 
to have half a dozen cavaliers for the dance, of 
which she had hitherto been little more than a 
spectator ; and it was not very disagreeable to 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 245 

hear how beautiful she was, from even the elderly 
dames of the court. 

The gardens around Compiegne were very ex- 
tensive ; and sunshine and the open air seemed to 
give something of their own freedom to the gaiety 
which prevailed. 

Most days, Francesca was called on to sing to 
the Queen, and, by some chance or other, Louis 
was constantly present, and often entered into con- 
versation with her. He talked to her of Rome, 
and appeared to take great pleasure in exciting 
her enthusiasm, which dwelt delightedly on the 
by-gone glories of the Eternal City; or took a 
more touching tone, when painting its present 
desolation, yet lovely, and even sacred, in its 
ruins. It was very new to him, and herein was 
the secret charm. 

Mademoiselle Mancini pouted, and revenged 
herself by an affectation of extreme intimacy; 
whispering to him even in his mother's presence, 
who now scarcely concealed her displeasure ; and 
by tormenting her uncle with perpetual reproaches 
for what she termed his neglect of her interests. 
An old Italian exclaimed one day, as she left 
Mazarin's chamber, " I hear, Signora, many com- 
plaints of my master ; but, truly, you avenge 
them all." 



246 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

In the mean time, Francesca's favour with the 
Queen apparently increased daily ; she was even 
named to accompany her en caleche, with Madame 
de Mercosur and Christina, the day previous to 
the departure of the latter. 

The morning was delicious, and, arrived at a 
sheltered portion of the gardens, they alighted for 
the sake of walking. In the first avenue which 
they entered, they met Voiture. Voiture belonged 
to a race of poets essentially French, who sacrificed 
to the graces instead of the muses ; to whom 
Cupid, with his wings and arrows, was the ideal 
of love, and whose art of poetry consisted in 
epigram, tournure, readiness, and facility. Made- 
moiselle expressed the spirit of the times, when 
she said, "Trifles weary. me, excepting verses, and 
I am fond of them." 

But the passion which gives its deep and 
melancholy tone to our English imaginative lite- 
rature was unknown across the channel. Feeling 
never got beyond sentiment ; and that bien arrange. 
The heart's faith was but la galanterie a term, 
by the by, which our word gallantry does not 
translate. Voiture carried this talent to perfec- 
tion. His letters were charming full of point 
and flattery ; and his conversation sparkled with 
bon-mots and compliments. The Queen beckoned 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 247 

him to approach, and the whole party seated 
themselves by a fountain, beneath the extended 
boughs of a large old chestnut-tree. 

" A scene from Bocaccio," said Christina; 
" nothing wanting but the lovers." 

" I should like," said Anne, " to know of what 
M. Voiture is thinking, he seems so lost in 
meditation !" 

" It is sometimes," replied the poet, " danger- 
ous to give utterance to one's thoughts ; I claim 
full pardon for the presumption of mine." 

" On one condition," said the Queen " that 
you give them expression." 

Voiture smiled, and, fixing his eyes on the 
shadow of the Queen in the water, repeated the 
following verses : 

" Je pensais que la destinee, 
Apres tant d'injustes malheurs, 
Vous a justement couronnee 
De gloire, d'eclat, et d'honneurs : 
Mais que vous etiez plus heureuse, 
Lorsque vous 6tiez autrefois, 
Je ne veut pas dire amoureuse 
La rime le veut toutefois. 

" Je pensais que ce pauvre amour, 
Qui toujours vous preta ses armes, 
Est banni loin de votre cour, 
Sans ses traits, son arc, ses charmes, 



248 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Et ce que je puis profiler, 
En passant pres de vous ma vie, 
Si vous pouvez si maltraiter 
Ceux qui vous ont se bien servie. 

" Je pensais, car nous autres poetes 
Nous pensons extravagamment, 
Ce que dans 1'humeur ou vous etes, 
Vous feriez si dans ce moment 
Vous avisiez en cette place 
Venir le Due de Bokingham ? 
Et lequel serait en disgrace 
De lui ou du Pere Vincent 1" 

" Have I exceeded my poetical license?" said 
Voiture, dropping on one knee. 

" Ah! the follies of youth are now as nothing 
in my sight, God be praised!" said Anne ; "I 
have long learnt to fix my wandering thoughts on 
graver subjects than the vain flatteries in which 
the young delight. Still, your verses are charm- 
ing, and you must copy them for me." She ex- 
tended her hand, which Voiture kissed with all 
possible devotion. 

" I do not often," replied he, " task my me- 
mory with such trifles ; but your Majesty's com- 
mands would impress the very air that passes on 
my mind." 

" I should like," interrupted Christina, " to 
have seen the Duke of Buckingham ; there was 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 249 

something picturesque and romantic about him, 
infinitely to my taste ; and was he so very hand- 
some?" 

"Very: but we are talking such nonsense!" 
answered Anne ; not, however, with an air as if 
the nonsense displeased her. 

" I have heard," continued Christina, " that 
it was quite a passion de Roman, and that the 
war with England was entirely caused by I 'amour 
de vos beaux yeux" 

" Rather a desperate method of recommend- 
ing himself to my favour." 

" Ah ! women like to have desperate things 
done on their account ; besides, people in love 
never calculate on probabilities. I daresay, the 
Duke dreamed of winning you, like an Amadis, 
sword in hand." 

" And, like most dreamers, woke, and found 
out his mistake." 

" Pardieu ! it does not the least surprise me : 
if people will be beautiful, they must take the con- 
sequence. By the by, what trash the Queen of 
England talked the other night, when she con- 
tended, that no woman retained her beauty after 
five-and-twenty. I am sure, in this kingdom, such 
a speech is lese-majeste. But her fault brings its 
own punishment, for she spoke feelingly. God 

M2 



250 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

knows ! there is little vestige of the lovely Hen- 
riette in her care-worn countenance." 

Few persons flattered with greater audacity 
than the ex-Queen of Sweden ; but it was amazing 
how much the appearance of flattery was done 
away with by her abrupt manner, and seeming 
carelessness as to whether what she said was even 
heard. But the discourse was interrupted by the 
approach of a large party, who, as soon as they 
perceived the Queen, advanced to pay their court. 
Among these was Evelyn, who drew near to Fran- 
cesca with an unusual degree of anxiety. 

" Dearest Francesca," he exclaimed, as soon 
as, by drawing her a little aside, the branches of 
a flowering shrub somewhat concealed them, " I 
think I may trust you, and will, therefore, as 
hastily as possible, make my request. The English 
Ambassador arrives here to-day, and it is of the 
utmost consequence that no suspicion should be 
entertained of my correspondence with Queen 
Henriette, all my present sources of information 
would be at once closed. The visit is unexpected ; 
and I dare not risk sending, still less dare I myself 
communicate, any intelligence. Will you take 
charge of a letter, and watch your opportunity for 
giving it unperceived ? " 

" Oh, yes/' exclaimed Francesca ; " and I think 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 251 

I could manage to do it this evening ; as, after the 
play, there is a sort of fete at the Cardinal's." 

" Good : the Queen will be sure to be there." 

" Where is the letter?" 

" Not yet written ; but I will venture into the 
theatre to-night. I will bring you a bouquet of 
flowers round them will be a note ; and be care- 
ful to excite no supicion in giving it." 

Francesca promised, and the Queen advancing 
towards the caleche, hastily followed her. The 
carriage drove off; though not till Anne had giv^n 
Voiture a most gracious smile, and bid him re- 
member the verses. 



252 



CHAPTER XXII. 



Crystal and myrrhine cups, embossed with gems 
And studs of pearl." 

MILTON. 



FRANCESCA that evening awaited the appearance 
of Evelyn with no little anxiety, which increased 
on perceiving that she was quite hemmed in by 
the quick-eyed Christina in front, the Duchesse 
de Mercoeur on one side, and, to her great sur- 
prise, Louis took his place on the other, and, 
regardless of the eagerness with which she was 
watching the stage, drew her into conversation. 
She could scarcely disguise her preoccupation. 
Like most persons utterly unused to deception, 
she could not imagine how it was to he managed ; 
and her thoughts conjured up every probable 
and improbable embarrassment that might occur. 
The actors, too, diverted her attention, with all 
the fascination their art ever exercises over the 
unaccustomed ; by degrees her eyes fixed upon the 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 253 

I 

scene, and she became almost absorbed in the dis- 
tress of the hero and heroine, who were in their 
usual difficulties. Her inattention, however, rather 
amused the King, though the charm with him 
had lost its illusion from frequent repetition ; yet 
it was something new to observe it in another. 
The amusement would not have lasted very long, 
but Christina, tired of what was going on, ad- 
dressed herself to him, and satirised the play, 
unmercifully, but entertainingly. 

At this moment Mazarin entered, and Evelyn 
was in his suite. It had been arranged that his 
intended invitation should be given personally, as 
if without premeditation, much ceremony being 
thus avoided. During the time that the Cardinal 
was paying his devoirs to the two Queens, Evelyn 
remained behind, and gradually obtained the 
vacant place between Francesca and Madame de 
Mercoeur; the latter, to whom he more particu- 
larly addressed himself, observed, " What very 
fragrant flowers !" With an air of gallantry, he 
anxiously selected some of the rarest, and pre- 
sented them to her ; then turning, as if with a 
sudden thought, to Francesca, offered her the 
remainder. She immediately perceived the note 
around the stems ; and now, while all were en- 
gaged with the Cardinal, concealed it with an 



254 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

ease that astonished herself. Before, however, she 
could look round, Evelyn had disappeared. 

Soon after, Louis resumed his place; and ob- 
serving the flowers, asked Francesca for one of 
the roses, which she immediately gave, when, 
much more to her dismay than to her gratifica- 
tion, he kissed it, and placed it concealed in his 
bosom, adding, in a low voice, " It is too precious 
to be worn openly." Then, as if he were himself 
confused by what he had said, turned hastily, and 
began talking to Madame de Mercoeur. 

From the theatre they proceeded to the Cardi- 
nal's, where many of the guests were already 
assembled ; among others, the Queen of England 
and her daughter. There was something in the 
scene that jarred upon Francesca's previous sym- 
pathy. She, whose councils had done much to- 
wards conducting her husband 'to the scaffold on 
which he perished whose rank was a mockery, 
making her present state of dependence more 
bitter an exile in her own country, whose very 
dreams must be haunted by death and danger; 
yet there she was seated, the centre of a frivolous 
circle, and of flatteries whose worthlessness she 
of all there must best have known Ah ! mis- 
fortune ought to have sufficient self-respect for 
solitude. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 255 

For the first time it struck Francesca how ex- 
ceedingly difficult she would find it to deliver the 
note with which she had been intrusted. The three 
Queens were seated at the upper end of the room, 
surrounded by their attendants, with every eye 
fixed upon their least movement : what excuse had 
she for approaching Henriette? she had never 
been presented to her, and it was most probable 
the whole length of the chamber would be between 
them during the evening. But while she was in- 
creasing the difficulty by thinking about it, Madame 
de Mercoeur, passing her hand through her arm, 
said, " You must come with me, Francesca; I 
want you to see the old portrait I was telling you 
about the other morning." 

So saying, she led her into a small apartment 
adjoining. There were three small rooms, which 
ran one into another. They were alike hung with 
gray cloth, covered with pictures, while all the light 
came from above. The picture before which they 
paused represented one of those ruined fountains 
so common to Italy. Francesca gazed upon it as 
if it had been an old friend : many a time, beside 
such a one, with its carved and broken marble, 
had she wreathed the acanthus that hung around 
it, the green and trailing foliage so profuse in the 
South, into shapes even more fanciful than those 



256 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

which once suggested the Corinthian capital. The 
clear blue sky, and the towers of a church in the 
distance the sunny foreground brought the old- 
accustomed scenes so forcibly to Her mind, that 
for a moment she had forgotten all but themselves. 
Madame de Mercoeur, .though with a kind re- 
membrance of childish habits and haunts, threw 
around them none of that melancholy which is 
their poetry, and soon drew her companion's at- 
tention to the figure. It was a female in the 
prime of life, with the colours and rounded form 
of youth, but with the expression of a more ad- 
vanced period ; it was wonderful how the painter 
had contrived to give such determination, nay, 
even severity, to the brow, and yet retain such 
sweetness in the lower part of the face. But the 
mouth was that of a child so small, so fresh, 
so red, and parted with a smile so glad, so inno- 
cent, and extending its influences to the dimpled 
cheek and little ivory chin. Yet the nose was 
high and Roman; and the eyes, which looked 
boldly out, seemed to flash fire. The dress was 
singular; a green velvet boddice, which fitted 
tight, and was met at the throat by a chain, or 
rather collar, of gold. A crimson scarf was round 
the waist, in which was placed a poniard, whose 
sheath and handle glittered with gems. The large 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 257 

loose sleeve was lined with fur, and on each arm 
was a bracelet. On the one, a plain massive band 
which matched the collar ; on the other, a serpent ; 
the tail reached nearly to the elbow, and the 
head rose a little from the wrist ; the tongue of a 
ruby, the eyes of large brilliants. The costume 
was finished by a petticoat of broad alternate stripes 
of green and crimson, with a deep gold lace. The 
hair was plaited with bullion and red riband, and 
then wound round the head, something after the 
fashion of a turban, save that it entirely displayed 
the forehead. 

" It is too fierce," said Louis, who, together 
with Mazarin, had entered the gallery. 

" Such was the original," replied Mazarin; 
" she was the wife of a celebrated bandit in the 
Abruzzi ; and this likeness was its artist's ransom. 
It was found in the old castle, which had long 
been the haunt of a most desperate band. Tradi- 
tion says she died by her husband's side, fighting 
to the last." 

" I cannot approve this costume for la Signora 
Carrara : Amazons are out of keeping in a fete. 
Now, I much prefer the one to the left." 

They passed on to the picture which he named ; 
singular enough, there was a resemblance in the 
features, and yet no likeness between the two. 



258 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

it was as if to shew the infinite difference that 
could be wrought by expression. The background 
of the painting was a crimson velvet curtain, which 
threw out the drapery of the figure. It was 
dressed in white satin, unmixed with any colour ; 
the boddice was laced with pearls, but the fair 
neck and arms wore no ornament ; and the" pro- 
fusion of raven black hair hung down in large 
loose curls, without any visible confinement. The 
large, soft dark eyes were raised, but seemed 
rather engrossed by their own feelings (thoughts 
are scarcely tender enough for such a look) than 
fixed upon any surrounding object. 

" It is a lovely portrait; Francesca will, of 
course, adopt a dress honoured by your Grace's 
approval." 

Louis looked at Francesca, who, colouring a 
little, bent her head in silence. 

" I have lately," remarked Mazarin, " added 
to my collection of royal likenesses ; this is a very 
scarce one of Francis the First." 

" I am proud of my ancestor," exclaimed 
Louis, gazing on it with an animation which 
suspended every thing else for the moment ; " I 
envy the glory which yet lingers round the name 
of France's most chivalrous king. Ah! but for 
my mother's fearful love, I should now be at the 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 259 

head of my army. I envy Turenne every victory 
he gains in my cause." 

" It is a grave fault/' answered the Cardinal, 
" for a King thus rashly to expose his life. Think 
of all the evils France has suffered from the im- 
prudent valour of her monarch." 

" Imprudent, if you please," rejoined Louis ; 
" but this very imprudence has ranked him among 
our greatest heroes." And saying this, he passed 
on, as if unwilling to continue the conversation. 

" Ay," exclaimed Mazarin, looking after him 
with an expression of almost affection, " he has 
in him stuff enough for four kings, and an honest 
man beside." 

A landscape, with a palace in the distance, 
somewhat resembling that of La Franchini's, at- 
tracted Francesca ; and while she was observing 
a scene which seemed so familiar to her, she 
dropped the flowers which Evelyn had given her. 
Before she even perceived her loss, the King had 
picked them up, and was about to give them to 
her, when he perceived the note, and also observed 
that the seal was yet unbroken. 

" Mademoiselle has not had time to read a 
letter so surrounded by sweets pray, use no 
ceremony." 



260 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" Good Heaven !" exclaimed Francesca, " if 
I had lost it!" 

" Is it, then, so very precious?" asked Louis. 

Francesca was too young not to feel ashamed 
of its being supposed that she could be the possessor 
of a love-letter, and answered unguardedly, " Oh, 
I am only its bearer ; it is not for me." 

" Can I. save you the trouble?" asked the 
King, smiling ; partly from that general gallantry, 
which was his universal tone, and a little, it must 
be owned, from curiosity. 

" Holy Madonna!" ejaculated Francesca; " if 
your Majesty would but take charge of it ! I see 
clearly that it is impossible I shall be able to 
deliver it." 

Louis, amused by the ignorance of form which 
so readily took him at his word, assured her he 
would give it. " But to whom? for the note has 
no address!" 

" To the English Queen." 

" Louis looked surprised ; but having pro- 
mised, his courtesy was too perfect to allow of 
either hesitation or question. 

Further conversation was interrupted by the 
approach of the Cardinal and his niece, who 
asked the King to adjourn to a neighbouring gal- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 261 

lery, " Where," said he, " you will witness the 
perfect enthusiasm of my gallantry." 

They went forward ; but Madame de Mercosur 
lingered a moment behind. " I do not know how 
you will manage your hair," said she, looking at 
the picture ; " though, Heaven knows ! we found 
it easy enough some three or four years ago." 

" I like the other best," answered Francesca, 
who had a sort of unconscious reluctance to allow 
her costume to be thus Louis's especial choice. 

" That is quite out of the question," rejoined the 
Duchesse ; " have you not lived here long enough 
to know, that a royal wish is a command ? " 

They then proceeded towards the gallery, 
which they found already partially filled, and the 
news of its contents soon attracted thither the rest 
of the company. It contained every species of 
ornament: toys, china, shawls, lace, &c. a very 
fair, whose temptations were selected with all pos- 
sible attention to taste, and an equal disregard to 
expense. On one table were Indian cabinets, 
wrought in ivory, ebony, tortoise-shell, and amber ; 
on another were the exquisite porcelain of Dresden 
and Sevres; a third was heaped with gold and 
silver stuffs ; a fourth, with the colours of the 
rainbow, in embroidered taffetas ; close beside 
were perfumed gloves, and the rich ribands of 



262 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Lyons, and velvets from Genoa fit for the mantle 
of a Queen. 

Other stands were covered with the " cunning 
devices" of the goldsmith and the jeweller. There 
were diamonds colourless with excess of light; 
rubies, rich as the sunset of their native clime ; 
the purple amethyst ; the pale, pure pearl ; and 
ornaments worked in gold, from the massive 
links, like precious fetters, to the light fragile 
chains of Venice. Nor were there only articles of 
personal decoration ; but on some of the tables 
stood silver cups and lamps, crystal girandoles, 
and alabaster vases. 

The surprise excited by this exhibition was 
indeed increased when the Cardinal came forward 
and said, that he trusted his guests would accept 
his offering, as whatever the gallery contained was 
to be distributed among them by means of a lottery. 
" It is fortune you will have to thank, not me." 

A murmur of applause and gratitude arose 
from the crowd, which was soon interrupted by 
the preparations for distributing the tickets. 

Four pages, clothed in white and crimson, 
brought in two massive salvers, whose delicate 
carving was from the unrivalled graver of Ben- 
venuto Cellini. These were filled with small sealed 
billets, from which the company were to draw, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 263 

and afterwards open, in succession. The pages 
first approached and knelt before the Queens, who 
each took one of the billets, and then proceeded 
to distribute the remainder among the rest. 

It was curious to observe the many indications 
of character called forth by the spirit of gambling 
so unexpectedly evoked. Some pressed forward ; 
others hung back, as if they feared to tempt their 
fate without some effort at propitiation, in the 
way of " muttered vow and inward prayer." 
While one would take up the sealed billet with 
affected carelessness belied, however, by the 
anxious eye another could not conceal the flushed 
cheek and the trembling hand. Many elbowed 
their way to the pages, without consideration or 
scruple ; some few, with innate courtesy, made 
way, and seemed to think that others had as much 
right as themselves. 

But Francesca's whole attention was soon en- 
grossed ; for, attracted by the beauty of some vases 
of cut crystal, Queen Henriette was standing 
beside one of the tables. A moment afterwards, 
Louis approached her, and began, apparently, to 
discuss with her their exquisite workmanship. He 
passed one or two from his own hand to her's ; 
but scarcely five minutes had elapsed, before he 
turned away ; yet Francesca could not doubt but 



264 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

that the letter had been delivered. The young 
Italian could scarcely believe, that what had seemed 
to her a difficulty so insuperable could be so easily 
effected. Her eyes were fixed upon the place, 
aware of what was going on, but she had not 
been able to perceive look or gesture that either 
party wished unobserved. She little knew the 
perfect command of countenance so early acquired 
in society ; or how one who, like Henriette, had 
lived in a world of plot, intrigue, and anxiety, 
was alive almost by intuition to the slightest signal 
of intelligence. 

The King moved carelessly amid the surround- 
ing groups, evidently, however, verging to her side 
of the room ; when his progress was interrupted by 
Mademoiselle Mancini, who addressed to him 
some laughing question. This was soon followed 
by another, and she contrived completely to en- 
gross Louis's notice. Marie even then began the 
course which, in after-years, secured her so vast 
an influence in the court, alternately taking 
up and laying down her claim to the youthful 
monarch's penchant ; administering to his amuse- 
ment, and ready to encourage his passing fancies. 
Already she had controlled her temper, excepting 
where it might be indulged in safety. She saw 
that Francesca was now the idol ; and artfully 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 265 

turning the discourse on Italy, contrived to talk 
about her former friend the most interesting 
subject she could have selected. Any one pos- 
sessed of less finesse -would have disparaged a 
rival, not so Marie. She praised Francesca ; told 
many slight but amusing anecdotes of her child- 
hood, and all in her favour ; till the King was 
charmed with her for such warm and ingenuous 
friendship, and with himself for having been the 
first to discover those merits and graces. 

In the mean time, Francesca, separated from 
Madame de Mercosur, was hidden by a group 
around the Queen of Sweden. With the wall 
on one side, and a human blockade on the 
other, she was left at full leisure to meditate on 
a vow made at the first announcement of the 
lottery, namely, that whatever might fall to her 
lot she would offer in a neighbouring chapel to 
the Virgin, at whose shrine she would kneel one 
hour for Guide's safe return. But conversation 
was too busy to allow of any very abstracted 
meditation, and she was compelled, perforce, to 
listen. 

" I shall carry away with me," said Christina, 
" an equally brilliant and grateful remembrance 
of your court." 

" I trust," said the Duke de Candale, " you 
VOL. i. N 



266 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

will defer these pleasures of memory to the latest 
possible period of enjoyment." 

" Till to-morrow," replied she. 

" So soon !" replied the Duke ; " and can you 
tell us so with a smile ?" 

" Ah! you, I know, are one of those," con- 
tinued Christina, " who imagine existence is 
bounded by Paris that life elsewhere is but dull 
vegetation ! Now, denounce me not as a heretic ; 
but I prefer Rome. Here, every thing is absorbed 
in the present, as all there is merged in the past. 
Yet, you must admit, that the past, with its 
gathered glories of many ages, exceeds the past 
which has only to-day?" 

" Yes," replied Candale ; " but such glory has 
its gloom. The shadow of the tombs whence it 
emanates rests upon it." 

" But what superb repose! what deep con- 
viction of the worth in life's nobler uses ! I have," 
said the Queen, " higher hopes, and more gene- 
rous feelings, in those marble solitudes, sacred to 
great names, than I have here, where pleasure 
is business, and a tabouret the best ambition. It 
is very catching ; I am half inclined to dispute 
precedence myself." 

" Yet, these forms are necessary," replied an 
elderly courtier, whose well - powdered aiks de 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 267 

pigeon stood out a little more stiffly than usual at 
hearing such doctrines. 

" Well, well," interrupted the Queen, impa- 
tiently ; " you take good care to surround your- 
self with them." 

" I'll tell you an anecdote," said De Joinville. 
" You are aware that the privilege of entrance to 
the staircase of the Louvre is reserved to the 
Princes, to Ambassadors, and to Dukes. One 
evening, when we were all assembled after his 
Majesty's supper, M. De Roquelaure entered, 
and advancing at once to the King, said, ' I came 
in my carriage to the bottom of the staircase.' 
Now he is not entitled to this honour, and the 
King is severe on any breach of etiquette ; so 
he was asked, in an angry tone of voice, ' And 
who could be ignorant enough to allow you to 
enter?' ' Ignorant, indeed, Sire,' replied Roque- 
laure ; ' for he allowed me to pass under the 
name of the Due d'Epernon, the last deceased.' 
Louis laughea at this ; and we all, as in duty 
bound, followed the example. * I must tell you 
how it happened,' continued Roquelaure. * It 
was raining in torrents when I arrived at the 
Louvre, and I told my coachman to enter. The 
sentinel called out, * Who is it?' * It is a Duke.' 
' What Duke ?' < The Duke d'Epernon.' ' Which?' 



268 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

1 The last deceased.' ' Enter!' and ray ghostly 
grace entered.' So, you see, Madame, wit makes 
its way in spite of all our forms." 

The conversation was interrupted by an an- 
nouncement, that as the billets had all been dis- 
tributed, they were now to be opened. 

Poor Francesca felt most cruelly disappointed. 
Pushed aside in the crowd, with none to heed her 
hidden position, no billet had been handed to her : 
the pages had passed to and fro, but she had been 
kept completely out of sight. She thought of her 
intended offering to the Madonna ; it was as if 
her very intention had been rejected. Perhaps, 
even at that moment, Guido was in trouble 
or sickness ! " Though I shall have nothing to 
offer, yet I will go to-morrow and pray," thought 
she; and, in spite of her efforts, her eyes filled 
with tears. 

The whole gallery was now a scene of gay con- 
fusion, all were exhibiting and comparing their 
prizes ; and in the mouvement Francesca con- 
trived to draw near to Madame de Mercoeur. 
She held in her hand a superb jasmine spray of 
pearls, which she was shewing to the group around. 

" I pray you look at mine," said a cavalier, 
who, though rather advanced beyond middle age, 
retained the buoyant step and clear glad eye of 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 269 

youth; " do you not think it very appropriate?" 
and he exhibited a small hermitage, carved in 
alabaster. 

" Quite a moral lesson, Benserade, for you. 
When do you retire?" 

"A hermitage? Benserade would prefer a 
monastery, if all tales be true," exclaimed De Join- 
ville ; " and, in their confirmation, I muet say I 
never tasted such venison as at the Benedictine 
Abbey." 

" And I," said the Due de Candale, " add 
my testimony in favour of their wines : summer 
seemed to have been expressly made for their 
vineyards. No trifling recommendations, Monsieur 
Benserade." 

" I have known, in my court experience, much 
worse ones attended to," replied Benserade. 

" Your hermitage wants nothing but an in- 
scription," said Madame de Mercosur. 

" It shall want nothing that you wish," 
answered the poet ; and, taking up a pencil, 
wrote four lines on the vacant space which seemed 
destined for such use. 



" Adieu, fortune, hijpneurs, vous et les votres, 

Je riens ici vous oublier ; 

Adieu, toi-meme amour, bien plus que tous les autres 
Difficile a congedier.'' 



270 PRANCESCA CARRARA. 

The little circle were warm in their commen- 
dations on the readiness and the grace of the in- 
scription; when the English Queen stopped for 
an instant in passing, and addressed Madame de 
Mercoeur. " Have I calculated too much on your 
kindness? I want my Henriette to see some of 
the dresses preparing for the ballet ; will you 
allow her to come to-morrow, and trespass on 
your time and good-nature for their exhibition?" 
and as she spoke, her eye, with the most seeming 
unconsciousness, rested on Francesca. Madame 
de Mercoeur returned a polite consent, and the 
Queen left the gallery. 

Francesca was again confounded at the ease 
with which the appointment was made ; for she 
was right in her supposition, that the Princess's 
visit the following morning was to give an answer 
to the note which had that evening been conveyed 
to her mother. 

Mademoiselle Mancini, whose dialogue with 
Louis had been interrupted by the Queen's de- 
parture, whom her son almost invariably him- 
self conducted to her carriage, now advanced to 
exhibit a splendid pair of diamond earrings. She 
was herself radiant with triumph ; which grew 
still more obvious, when Louis returning joined 
their circle. Francesca was still in the back- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 271 

ground ; but the quick eye of the King at once 
perceived her. He produced his prize : it was a 
massive bracelet, consisting of a broad band of 
gold, widest in the middle, and shaped something 
like a cuff; though it was obvious, from its un- 
usually small size, it was only fitted to a most 
delicate wrist. It was set with a sort of running 
pattern of various precious stones ; and it was 
difficult to say, whether the costliness of the ma- 
terial or the taste of the workmanship was most 
to be admired. 

Many a bright eye grew brighter as the glit- 
tering toy was submitted to their inspection ; but 
Louis seemed to have no immediate intention of 
parting with the beautiful bracelet. He passed 
round the circle, addressing each individual with 
his own peculiar grace of manner, questioning 
them on the various results of the lottery, till he 
arrived where Francesca stood. " And you, Sig- 
nora Carrara, have you been very successful? 
what memorial of our Cardinal's gallantry has 
fallen to the lot of his fair country-woman ?" 

" I had no billet," was the hesitating and con- 
fused reply. 

" Mon Dieu ! why did you not take one?" ex- 
claimed Madame de Mercosur. " My dear Fran- 
cesca, you are too shy." 



272 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

" The pages did not happen to pass near me." 
" And you, my poor child, were ashamed to help 
yourself! Will you ever forgive my carelessness ? 
^t is I that am to blame," said the Duchesse, 
with a kindness that quite deprived her young 
companion of all power to thank her. 

" Allow me the pleasure of reparation," said 
the King. " The Signora Carrara will, I hope, 
accept this toy in token that she extends her for- 
giveness to us all. There is not a gentleman here 
but must feel such a neglect as a personal re- 
proach." With the most dignified, yet graceful 
courtesy, Louis fastened the bracelet on Francesca's 
arm. 



273 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



" That early love that longest haunts the heart, 
Bringing back youth and home ! " 



THE glittering bracelet, every precious stone on its 
golden circle lighted with the morning sunshine, 
was the first thing that caught Francesca's sight 
when she awoke. Up she sprang; for at once 
the remembrance of its destination flashed upon 
her mind. She dressed hastily, as she wished to 
be at home again before Madame de Mercosur 
had risen. 

Once she fastened the beautiful toy on her 
arm in a passing touch of feminine vanity, equally 
momentary and pardonable ; but not for an instant 
did she think of appropriating it to her own gra- 
tification. Her education, it is true, had preserved 
her from much of the ignorant belief of her coun- 
try ; but, whatever the hfiad may be, the heart is 
always superstitious. The more unexpected the 

N2 



274 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

arrival of the prize, the more it seemed given for 
the fulfilment of her original purpose. Indeed, 
so paramount was Guido in her thoughts, that it 
may be questioned whether it had even the merit 
of a sacrifice. 

Closely drawing her cardinal round her, she 
descended into the park, at whose extremity was 
the little chapel where she intended to make her 
offering. She soon arrived there, and found the 
aged priest in attendance. The gem was given, 
and a blessing received ; and many and fervent 
were the prayers which she uttered at the foot of 
the altar, for the safety and the welfare of her 
beloved brother. She returned homewards more 
slowly ; for the lovely morning was so bright, and 
so quiet, that a sense of enjoyment and security un- 
consciously stole into her heart. The glorious sun- 
shine, the clear blue heaven, somewhat reminded 
her of Italy. She felt the gladdening influences, 
and walked slowly on in one of those pleasant 
reveries which so rarely last beyond our child- 
hood ; and when by chance they do revive, they 
bring with them the freshness of that early and 
happy time. 

The path which she pursued overlooked the 
high road, and, though* little exposed to view, it 
commanded all that was passing. Suddenly, she 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 275 



saw Evelyn advancing slowly along, quite alone, 
and seemingly lost in deep meditation. Francesca 
was on the very point of beckoning to him, when 
she checked herself; she had already learned that 
leading lesson of society, namely, that of curbing 
your first impulses. She was unwilling to have it 
said that her early rising had been to meet him ; 
and still more unwilling, when she recalled his wish 
to avoid any suspicion of his intercourse with the 
English Queen, it was impossible to say how it 
might be excited, and she therefore resolved to 
pass on, without communicating the successful 
delivery of the letter. But, as he came nearer, 
she was startled to perceive his pale and haggard!* 
appearance. His dress was neglected, like one 
who had watched through the night, and cared 
not for the coming daylight. His lip and cheek 
were white ; and his step was uncertain and agi- 
tated. 

Every kind feeling in Francesca's heart rose to 
the surface ; and she was just about to lean for- 
ward and speak, when, a servant on horseback, 
leading another horse, rode up. Evelyn snatched 
the bridle hastily, flung himself on the steed, which 
pranced as if as impatient as himself, plunged the 
spurs in its side, and darted off like a man who 
strives to fly even from his very thoughts ; while 



276 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Francesca watched the rapidly receding figure in 
mute amazement. 

There is something peculiarly attractive to a 
woman in any display of strong emotion, though 
she has herself no part in it. Evelyn's pale coun- 
tenance and disturbed manner awakened in Fran- 
cesca the most tender interest. Involuntarily, she 
recurred to the period of their earliest acquaint- 
ance their first meeting, when each felt attracted 
to the other, they knew not wherefore ; how shy- 
ness deepened into timidity, and how that gra- 
dually melted away before the sweet confidence of 
mutual affection. She remembered, how, one long 
*' summer day, they had, together with Guido, wan- 
dered amid the ruins of ancient Rome ; and how, 
while Guido dwelt on the poetry of the present, 
Evelyn rather turned to the history ef the past, 
and with what a noble enthusiasm ! How many 
true and generous feelings had found an un- 
conscious vent in words! " Beloved Evelyn," ex- 
claimed she; " I am infected with the worldly 
atmosphere around. I do you less than justice, 
because necessity forces you to conform to the false 
and frivolous spirit, which here seems the very 
soul of existence, I forget what your higher 
nature really is ; rather ought I to blame my own 
judgment, which looks not behind the mask." 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 277 

Francesca pursued her way, calling up every 
better attribute of her lover with all the aids which 
imagination is ever so ready to offer on such occa- 
sions, and, like most generous tempers, exaggerat- 
ing the right to efface the wrong. 

On her return, she hastened to Madame de 
Mercosur's apartment, who was already risen. 

" Do not hate me," said the Duchesse, " for my 
news ; but a new commission of my uncle's has 
taken your brother on to Rome." 

" Ah ! he will visit our old home," exclaimed 
Francesca, her eyes filling with tears. 

" Why is it," asked Madame de Mercosur, 
" that you turn with a more tender feeling than 
I can to your former home, and former life ? I 
candidly confess, that they never come into my 
head, at least, of their own accord. But, do 
you know, I deem it one of my faults to live as 
much as I do in the present. I never think of 
what I do not see ; unless, as you must bear me 
witness, an old friend now and then," passing her 
arm affectionately round Francesca. 

Just then a page announced, that the Princess 
Henriette ^England desired to be admitted. 

" Ah," cried Madame de Mercosur, " there is 
another instance of my forgetfulness. I promised 
the dear child to shew her the caskets of that 



278 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

curiously wrought tortoise-shell a gift of my 
uncle's; and she is forced to recall my promise 
by a visit." 

There was something singularly interesting in 
the youtliful Princess, who now entered. Her 
figure was very childish, and so were her small 
and delicate features; not so their expression ; 
for there was a degree of thought, mournful in 
one so young ; and her large blue eyes had that 
melancholy which is almost always prophetic. 
It was stranger, that while gazing on that fair 
child, images of misfortune, early death, and 
all life's saddest accidents, rose uppermost in the 
mind ; it was like spring with the association of 
autumn. 

Henriette approached, and, with a remarkably 
sweet voice, addressed Madame de Mercoeur, 
blushing, as it were, at the sound of her own voice; 
" You see, Madame, what it is to promise a plea- 
sure ; am I too bold in reminding you of your 
caskets ? Remember, if I intrude, the fault began 
in your own kindness." 

Madame de Mercoeur was all delight and 
courtesy, and the caskets were immediately pro- 
duced. " I must make a merit of a fault," added 
she, " and hope my candour will excuse my for- 
getfulness. It is curious, that just as your high- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 279 

ness entered, I was lamenting my utter want of 
memory." 

" I am glad," replied Henriette, " that in 
future I shall have your example to plead. In- 
deed, I never remember any thing but kindness." 
And Francesca. was conscious that the glance 
which she caught was directed towards her ; 
their eyes met, and the Princess withdrew her's 
with a smile, which said, " we understand each 
other." 

No person is much in any particular room 
without having a favourite seat in it; and Fran- 
cesca was in the large window. Here she was a 
little withdrawn from the circle, and yet able both 
to see and hear ; timidity and curiosity being each 
satisfied. 

The progress of Madame de Mercoeur's toilette 
went on ; and while her woman was exhausting 
her ingenuity and attention in arranging the front 
hair, Henriette exclaimed, " Ah, how beautiful 
the veins of the tortoise-shell are, with the light 
coming through, just like painted glass ; " and 
raising one in her hand, she approached the win- 
dow. Francesca, of course, offered to hold it ; 
and while thus employed, the Princess said, in the 
lowest possible tone, " Tell Mr. Evelyn, .his note 
was just in time ;" and then added, in a higher 



280 FRANCESCA CARRAEA. 

tone, " I really must thank the Signora Carrara; 
she holds the box so that the light comes through 
quite beautifully ! " and turned away with another 
of her sweet and intelligent smiles. The carriage, 
with the lady in waiting, being announced, Hen- 
riette departed, leaving Madame de Mercosur 
charmed with her grace, and her admiration of 
the favourite caskets. 

But though Francesca strove to repress the 
idea, as harsh and unkind, she could not repress 
.the feeling, that this grace was but the per- 
fection of art. How must the natural emotions 
have been checked the wild, warm impulses of 
childhood subdued ; how much of dissimulation 
taught as a study, before a child could be so 
guarded, and so ready in resource ! " Tis a weary 
apprenticeship to serve," thought she ; " and, after 
all, is not this perfection of manner a thing rather 
to be admired than loved? love asks reality." 

Visitor after visitor filled up the morning ; and 
late in the day, to Francesca's utter astonishment, 
Evelyn was among the number, looking equally 
well in health and gay in spirits. He came into 
the room accompanied by the Chevalier De Join- 
ville; and they were discussing, with much ani- 
mation, whether blue and amber, or green and 
scarlet, were the best mixture of colours. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 281 

" Give me scarlet and green," said the Che- 
valier De Joinville ; " they are magnificently bar- 
baric. The one so warlike ; the other so sacred 
to all true believers. Why, I should feel like the 
Sublime Porte himself." 

" Give me," replied Evelyn, " blue 

' The sunny azure in my lady's eye,' 

and amber 

' The amber tresses of her dropping hair.' 

I appeal to Madame de Mercosur " 

" Who gives it in your favour, were it but for 
the gallantry which brings but feminine instances 
to support its taste. Out on the Chevalier's bar- 
barous references." 

" Theory and practice do not always accord," 
observed De Joinville, as he watched Evelyn take 
a seat beside Francesca. 

" I am impatient," exclaimed she, " to tell 
you about your note ;" and she proceeded to detail 
her anxieties and safe accomplishment of her un- 
dertaking. " I was very near stopping you this 
morning ; but tell me, " and her voice took an 
unusual tone of interest, " what had just affected 
you so seriously?" 



282 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Evelyn absolutely coloured to the forehead as 
he asked, in a hesitating voice, where she had seen 
him. 

" As you mounted in the high road this morn- 
ing, and spurred that unfortunate horse of your's 
as if life and death had been in his speed." 

" I cannot allow myself to be cross ques- 
tioned," replied Evelyn, with a smile obviously 
forced. 

Francesca felt her interest flung back again ; 
nothing is more painful, than to have a kindly 
anxiety treated as curiosity. Involuntarily, her 
manner became constrained ; and the conversation, 
which had begun with so much animation, died 
away into an awkward silence, which Evelyn 
was the first to break. 

" I have heard nothing talked of this morn- 
ing," said he, " but the King's gallantry and your 
beautiful bracelet. Do shew it to me." 

" I offered it this morning to the Madonna. 
It was in returning from the chapel through the 
park that I saw you." 

" You have made an offering of your bracelet! 
What could tempt you to do any thing half so 
absurd ? Were you afraid it would haunt you with 
too brilliant hopes ?" 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 283 

" I pray you," returned Francesca coldly, 
" not to make my belief a subject of ridicule." 

" But I must know what deep sin it was in- 
tended to expiate. " 

" None," replied Francesca ; " it only accom- 
panied my prayers for my brother's safety " 

" As if, " continued he, " his safety were 
endangered by that pretty arm being worthily 
clasped." 

\ " At all events," replied Francesca, " it could 
not be better bestowed, than as an offering, how- 
ever unworthy, for his sake who is nearest and 
dearest to me in the world." 

" I thank you for the implied compliment," 
returned Evelyn, in a tone of pique. But all 
further intercourse was suspended, by Madame 
de Mercosur's rising, as it -was near the hour of 
her attendance upon the Queen. 

Again Francesca felt dispirited, and discon- 
tented. " It is in vain," thought she, " to deceive 
myself: there is, there can be, no sympathy be- 
tween us. He excludes me from his confidence 
he takes no interest in my feelings. Ah ! I see 
now that love is the delusion which the sage and 
the grave say it is. Perhaps I should be thankful 
that my eyes have so soon been opened to its 
vanity." Yet she did not feel very grateful. Tis 



284 FRANCE8CA CARRARA. 

pity for those whose standard of love is high and 
ideal ; for them are prepared the downfal and the 
disappointment. The heart is the true sensitive 
plant revolting at a touch. 



285 



CHAPTER XXIV. 



" The comic triumphs and the spoils 



Of sly Derision still on every side 
Hurling the random bolts." 

AKENSIDE. 

FRANCESCA would have been not a little astonished 
could she have known with what curiosity her 
arrival was anticipated that night in the royal 
circle. Already the history of the bracelet had 
reached the Queen's ear, with every possible varia- 
tion and addition that human ingenuity, height- 
ened by human envy, could devise. Perhaps of 
these Marie's version was the most covertly bitter ; 
and poor Francesca appeared with a degree of 
artifice and coquetry about as far removed from 
her real nature as it was from the real case. But 
Anne of Austria, like most in her station, had 
singular tact in detecting the true and the false. 
The ear long accustomed to, and therefore on its 
guard against, dissimulation, often catches the 
fact from slight indications which would pass un- 
noticed by the common observer. Still, she too 



286 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

had some desire to note what effect the present 
honour, and still more brilliant fancies, would 
produce on a character whose simplicity and 
nature she had discerned at a glance. The truth 
was, that Francesca was perfectly fancy free ; she 
saw nothing in the King's action but the most 
genuine kindness; she was very grateful, and 
there, to her thought, the matter ended. 

When they entered the royal apartment, Louis 
was at one end, entirely engrossed by Mademoi- 
selle Mancini, while the Queen and her imme- 
diate circle, which they joined, was at the other. 
Marie had completely changed her plan ; she saw 
that the higher game was not in her hands ; the 
King was not, and would not, be in love with her ; 
but she amused him, and, by a little skilful manage- 
ment and flattery, could contrive to occupy his at- 
tention quite enough to alarm his mother ; " And 
I shall be brilliantly married," thought she, " by 
way of security." It may be questioned whether 
Guido ever even entered her head ; love never lasts 
with a temper like hers ; a first lover was welcome 
rather as an omen of future triumph than for his 
own sake. The sentiment of such a heart is dew, 
that exhales with the earliest sunbeam. 

The group round Anne were busily employed 
in dissecting the Swedish Queen, who had departed 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 287 

that morning, her eclat a little tarnished by an 
overlong visit, and by an indiscreet patronage of 
Marie Mancini's fascinations. An idol must be 
picked to pieces before it is discovered to be but 
wood and stone. An affected inattention, and a 
grave smile from the Queen, reassured De Join- 
ville as to the success of his mimicry, and Fran- 
cesca was certainly the only one who stood per- 
fectly dismayed at the sudden change from flattery 
to sarcasm. So eagerly was the discourse carried 
on, that not one perceived the Queen, who was 
moving round, drop her glove ; it fell close to 
Francesca, who, drawing off her own, picked 
it up, and presented it. In so doing, Anne's 
quick eye discovered that she had no bracelet 
on; like all artful people, she suspected artifice, 
and immediately supposed that Francesca feared 
to wear the gem in her presence. 

" My beautiful simplicity has then," thought 
ttye Queen, " deeper designs than I suspected, and 
is unwilling to let me see aught that can excite 
suspicion." " How is this," continued she aloud, 
" that the Signora Carrara does not honour my 
son by wearing his gift?" 

Francesca was dismayed ; this was a difficulty 
which she had not foreseen. Even the conscious- 
ness of right does not always support us ; and to 



288 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

increase her consternation, Louis had joined the 
circle, while the eyes of every one were turned 
upon her. Colouring till the tears glistened on 
her long dark lashes, in a low faltering whisper 
she stammered, " I have it not." 

" Have you lost it?" demanded the Queen. 

" No, madame." 

" Then why did you not wear it to-night?" 

"It is mine no longer," replied the young 
Italian. 

" Surely," rejoined Anne, who was already 
offended that such a gift should have been lightly 
held, " you cannot have given it to any friend ?" 

" O no!" was the eager answer. 

" Then what have you done with it?" 

" I offered it at the shrine of Our Lady, in the 
chapel of the Valley." 

" Now, the blessed Virgin forbid I should 
grudge aught to her altar," exclaimed Louis, with 
evident displeasure, " but, methinks, the pie^y 
was ill-timed." 

" Who knows," observed Mademoiselle Man- 
cini with a sneer, " what idea la Signora might 
attach to the gift ; perhaps it needed a little ex- 
piation." 

"We cannot tell for what tender interests it 
was to plead," added the Chevalier de Joinville. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 28 

With a cold and indifferent air the Queen 
turned away, when Francesca, regardless of form 
in the excitement of the moment, sank on her 
knee before her. " I cannot endure this imputa- 
tion of being thankless for kindness so gracious 
and so precious. Madame, I have an only and 
beloved brother, delicate from infancy, and parted 
from me^for the first time in our life parted from 
me on a long and dangerous journey. When the 
lottery commenced yesterday evening, I vowed 
within my heart, that whatever became mine 
should be offered to the Madonna, with my earnest 
prayers for his safety. I felt almost, in haying 
nothing to offer, that my tribute had been, as it 
were, rejected ; and when, by the most unexpected 
chance, the beautiful bracelet became mine, could 
I, dared I, not fulfil my precious vow? Was I 
the less grateful, because I put the gift to its most 
worthy use ?" 

There was not one kindly feeling in the Queen 
but what was touched by the youthful stranger's 
narrative ; she raised her, saying, " And so, my 
poor child, you thought we were angry the 
blessed Virgin forbid ! We could wish her shrine 
as well served by others young as yourself." 

Look and word at once changed all round, 
and not a few found themselves growing most 

VOL. i. o 



290 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

suddenly devout. Just then, an attendant to 
whom the Queen had whispered returned ; and 
taking a small case from her hand, Anne pro- 
duced a bracelet somewhat similar to the very one 
with which Francesca had parted, excepting that 
it had her cipher, surrounded by a wreath of 
fleurs-de-lis. " Louis, will you offer this to 
Mademoiselle Carrara ?" 

The young King again fastened the clasp on 
Francesca's arm. " I hope you have no more 
vows to pay?" said he, smiling. 

Francesca could not have spoken, had it been 
to save her life ; but there are cases in which 
silence is very eloquence. 

" My dearest child," exclaimed Madame de 
Mercceur, " how I enjoyed your triumph ! But do, 
pray, remember that royal gifts are meant to be 
kept. I must say, however, that the Madonna 
stood your friend to-night; and I am sure you 
deserved it." 

Triumph it might be it certainly was; but 
Francesca enjoyed it not as such. Injustice is 
so revolting to the young they hear of it, they 
think of it, they believe in its existence, but 
always as of that which cannot affect themselves. 
It is a bitter lesson that which first brings it home. 
Many a moment of feverish unrest did that night 



i 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 



291 



bring to Francesca's pillow; she questioned, she 
blamed herself what could she have done that 
the whole company appeared so to rejoice in her 
pain ? Why should they dislike her what offence 
could she have given ? With what increased grati- 
tude did she turn to the Queen's kindness! It 
would have yielded her small pleasure, could she 
have known that, beyond the momentary impulse, 
that kindness was, of all, the most deceitful. 

No marvel that we regret our youth. Let its 
bloom, let its health, let its pleasures ' depart, 
could they but leave behind the singleness and 
the innocence of the happy and the trusting heart. 
The lessons of experience may open the eyes ; but, 
as in the northern superstition, they only open 
to see dust and clay, where they once beheld the 
beauty of palaces. 



292 



CHAPTER XXV. 

" Nous avons chang6 tout cela." 

" I MUST be early in my attendance on the Queen 
to-day, and you shall accompany me," said Madame 
de Mercceur to Francesca. " Mademoiselle de 
Montpensier, so long an exile from the court, has 
at last obtained permission to return; she will 
arrive this morning. Have you any curiosity to 
see this heroine of the Fronde ?" 

" Indeed I have," answered Francesca ; " my 
only fear is, in seeing so many new faces, that I 
shall forget from remembering too much. The 
whole of my former life would not fill one week 
of my present existence." 

" I, too, recall," replied the Duchesse, " how 
bewildered I felt at first. I really lost half of what 
I wanted to observe, through fear of losing any. 
But we must be quick. I myself long to see if 
our Princess return with her former unbroken 
spirit. There is a saying of hers when a child, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 293 

which is the key to her whole character. Some 
one was talking to her of her grandmother, 
Madame de Guise, when she exclaimed, ' She 
is my grandmother at a distance she is not 
Queen.' " 

On Madame de Mercceur's arrival at the pa- 
lace she found the carriage and guards in waiting, 
the Queen having decided that she would do her 
niece the honour of going to meet her. 

"As we have deemed a reconciliation expe- 
dient," said Anne to Madame de Mercosur, as they 
passed down the steps, " we must do it with a 
good grace; a flourish of trumpets, and a few 
extra guards, are a ready way to Mademoiselle's 
heart." 

The cortege proceeded about a mile, when a 
courier announced the Princess's approach, who 
arrived almost as soon. The carriage, which was 
at full gallop, stopped suddenly; the guards de- 
ployed round, and Mademoiselle alighted. She 
advanced with the step of an empress, till she 
came beside the Queen, when, dropping on her 
knee, she kissed the hem of her robe, and then 
the royal hand. This, however, Anne would 
scarcely permit, and, raising the penitent, em- 
braced her with seeming cordiality, exclaiming, 
" I am very glad to see you ; you know I was 



294 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

always fond of you." The Princess again kissed 
her hands. " Not but what I have sometimes 
been very, very angry with you. I did not mind 
the Orleans business ; but as to la porte Saint 
Antoine, well for you I was not near I could 
have strangled you!" 

" Ah, Madame!" was the reply, " I deserve 
it, since I displeased you ; but it has been my 
misfortune to be connected with people who in- 
duced me to act contrary to my duty." 

" I have said all I meant to say it is as well 
to have it over at once. But henceforth it is a 
forbidden subject one, indeed, quite forgotten; 
and I shall love you as well as ever." And again 
they embraced. " Though it is six years since I 
have seen you," exclaimed Anne, " you are not 
the least altered ; instead of that, you are hand- 
somer than ever ; your being rather more embon- 
point suits you, and your complexion is brilliant 
to a degree." 

" Has your Majesty," rejoined Mademoiselle, 
" heard that I have actually some gray hairs'?" 

" I am surprised," said Anne, " to see so 
many at your age." 

" I was resolved," observed her companion, 
" that you should see me as I am, so have not 
worn powder." Then, as if unwilling to admit 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 295 

them as a defect, she added, " But my mother 
had them before she was twenty ; and gray hairs 
are quite an heir-loom on my father's side." 

When they reached the gates, the Queen 
desired her to notice the guard. " It is doubled 
to-day on your account; we have not so many 
usually." 

" Nay," exclaimed the guest, " this is treating 
me like a foreign princess." 

" Only in honour, not in affection/' was the 
gracious answer. 

On their arrival, Francesca could not resist 
an opportunity of expressing her astonishment to 
Madame de Mercosur. " I expected," whispered 
she, " the interview would be attended with such 
awkwardness, and made myself quite uncomfort- 
able before with thinking how annoying it would 
be to both parties. Instead of that, nothing could 
be easier ; and they seemed so glad to meet. But 
were they quite in earnest ?" 

" My dear Francesca," said the Duchesse, 
laughing, " there are some questions that were 
never meant to be asked, still less to be answered ; 
and yours is one of the number." 

They were all now assembled in the Queen's 
apartment, who, passing her finge"rs through 
Mademoiselle's hair, said, " It is very beautiful, 



296 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

but I must see it better dressed." The conversa- 
tion then took the most familiar turn ; and Fran- 
cesca, from where she stood, could hear the Queen 
giving a laughing account of the Due de Dom- 
ville's attachment to Mademoiselle Menneville, 
the prettiest of her maids of honour, all of whom 
were pretty. 

" It is a passion of the good old time, and 
has already lasted some four years ; but Madame 
la Duchesse de Vantadour, his mother, will not 
hear of it. Never before was a lover of fifty so 
put out, to think that he cannot yet have his 
own way. Not content with his own cares, when 
obliged to be absent he leaves his almoner to take 
charge of her; It is gallantry equally antediluvian 
and interminable ; I suppose they will be married 
one day, and buried the next." 

At this moment the King arrived. He had 
been riding, and was covered with dust ; but that 
was, as his mother observed, the more flattering, 
for it marked his impatience to see their visitor. 
On his entrance the Queen presented Mademoi- 
selle. " Here is a young lady who is very sorry 
that she has been so wicked, and promises to be 
very good in future." The King laughed. "But 
where is your brother ?" 

" He is coming in the carriage ; he would not 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 297 

spoil his dress by riding. He is adorned to dis- 
traction." 

And he began laughing again, while Made- 
moiselle betrayed the conviction that she was her- 
self the object of this decoration ; but instantly 
assuming an air of the utmost humility, she ex- 
claimed, " I ought to kneel to implore your 
Majesty's pardon for my past offences." 

" Nay," replied he, " it is I who must kneel 
to you, to entreat you not to speak in such a 
style." 

" How like she is to your brother!" said Anne. 

" My brother is much flattered by the dis- 
covery," said her son ; while Mademoiselle wore 
a pleased and conscious smile. 

" My life for it," whispered the Chevalier de 
Joinville, " that Mademoiselle is already calcu- 
lating the probabilities of marrying Monsieur." 

At last the Duke of Anjou arrived, dressed, as 
his brother said, to distraction. He wore a garb 
rather fanciful, of a silver-gray colour, trimmed 
with crimson, and a narrow edging of silver ; the 
lace round his throat was of the finest point; 
and, some time before he was seen, his perfumes 
announced his approach. The youthful prince 
was just at the age when love of dress is a passion. 
The first appreciation of one's own face and figure 
o2 



298 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

is a very delightful feeling ; and as the youth out- 
grows the boy, it seems as if so much lost time 
had to be made up. The Duke embraced his 
cousin with extreme cordiality, which was greatly 
increased by her ready compliments on his growth 
and appearance. 

A few minutes afterwards the Cardinal was 
announced ; and Francesca was not the only one 
who was curious to observe the meeting. They 
had been such declared, such personal enemies, 
that, even in a court, it seemed wonderful how a 
decent external could be given to their reconcilia- 
tion. The difficulty was, however, only ima- 
ginary. Mademoiselle was the first to salute the 
Cardinal, who returned it with an air of great 
empressement ; then addressing the Queen, she 
said, " Really, I do think, your Majesty, after all 
that has passed, should bid us embrace; I am 
sure, on my part, it will be with all my heart." 

The Cardinal immediately approached, and 
knelt. This was, however, not suffered by the 
Princess, who, extending both hands, raised him, 
and they embraced with great apparent good- 
will. 

" The times are changed," said De Joinville, 
in a low tone to Francesca, " since Mademoiselle 
promenaded the terraces of the Louvre, with her 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 299 

fan ornamented with bunches of straw tied with 
blue riband, and half Paris shouting at the sight." 

Francesca made no reply; Mademoiselle was 
so overflowing with happiness at her return to the 
court, that it was absolute cruelty to make an 
allusion to the dangerous past. Refinement and 
amusement, like knowledge, are so diffused now- 
a-days, that an exile from the royal circle would 
be a nominal punishment; but it then included 
every species of privation. The theatre at that 
era such a resource balls, fetes, &c., to say no- 
thing of worldly influence, were all forfeited by a 
banishment from court, the centre of all the plea- 
sures, variety, and ambition of society. 

" I look upon to-day, Mademoiselle," said the 
Cardinal, " as the reward of my anxiety for your 
return. I' have, indeed, not been master of the 
obstacles which opposed it." 

" I can assure you," replied the Princess, 
" you are but little aware how I used to take 
your part, when my father was most enraged 
against you. I always said things would be ex- 
actly as they are." 

Memory has many conveniences, and, among 
others, that of foreseeing things as they have 
afterwards happened. 

The dinner -hour being near, Mademoiselle 



300 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

departed, Louis handing her to her carriage. 
Francesca could not but admire her noble de- 
meanour, her easy yet stately walk, and the finely 
turned head, placed so gracefully on her shoul- 
ders ; certainly no one ever more completely 
looked her high descent. 

" The comedy has gone off to perfection," ex- 
claimed Madame de Mercosur. " I am glad she 
is allowed to return ; she is no longer dangerous, 
and her exile has been sufficient punishment." 

" Alas," replied Francesca, " I look upon the 
self-possession, the readiness of reply, the ease, I 
daily witness, with such hopelessness " 

" All in good time," answered her friend, 
laughing ; " you are quite young enough to blush 
a little longer. Wait till you have a motive for 
dissimulation. I am afraid it is intuitive with 
us all." 

Truly, society is like a large piece of frozen 
water; there are the rough places to be shunned, 
the very slippery ones all ready for a fall, and 
the holes which seem made expressly to drown 
you. All that can be done is to glide lightly 
over them. Skaiting well is the great art of 
social life. 



301 



CHAPTER XXVI. 



Many falsehoods are told from interest, many from ill-nature, 
but from vanity most of all." 



THE return of the Due de Mercoeur added, if 
possible, to the gaiety of Compiegne; and the 
Duchesse gave a fete in its honour. Every thing 
then was expressed by a fete; saints were wor- 
shipped, mistresses fleered, ministers courted, 
victories celebrated, sentiments affiched and all 
by a fete. Francesca greatly enjoyed the prepara- 
tions the pleasant part of a festival. For the 
truth of this, ask any young person you please. 
No entertainment, however brilliant, to which 
you merely go, can at all equal the delights of one 
where you have assisted from the original idea 
of the giving to the actual accomplishment of its 
being given. Your taste has been consulted, and 
your self-love enlisted in its cause; your advice 
has been asked, and, consequently, you have a 
personal interest in its success. Your time has 



302 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

been taken up by a thousand details and occu- 
pation is the life of time. Who shall deny that 
" les avenues de la bonheur sont delicieuses a 
parcourir ?" 

Francesca was somewhat shocked to find it was 
thought " charmant" that all the fountains for 
the occasion were to flow from dolphins' mouths, 
instead of from the classic urn of some marble 
naiad. Neither could she perceive the absolute 
necessity of fastening all the wreaths with blue 
and white ribands, the colours of the house of 
Mercoeur. Moreover, she could not help thinking 
that the congratulatory verses were rather profuse 
in their Mars', Hercules', Alexanders, and Julius 
Caesars. Still, these werqp^ery small matters as 
nothing, beside the display of fireworks which were 
prepared, and the rose-coloured taffeta brocaded 
with silver which was to be her own dress. 

The important night arrived ; an unusually hot 
day had been succeeded by a cool fresh evening, 
with a slight wind just enough to stir the orange- 
flowers, till the air was redolent of their perfume. 
The gardens were* illuminated, and a striking 
effect was produced by the large pieces of water, 
which spread like immense mirrors, filled with 
the light which they reflected. 

Enjoyment is the least descriptive of all feel- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 303 

ings ; and Francesca, who by this time had formed 
many slight and pleasant acquaintances, no longer 
found that a crowd was such very dreary solitude. 
She passed from one gay companion to another, 
greeted with numberless slight flatteries, alike 
listening and forgetting with a smile; honoured 
by a few words of compliment from Anne, and a 
look still more flattering from Louis, who at that 
moment found the homage which surrounded him 
on such a public occasion somewhat irksome, when 
a glance only could follow the lovely creature who 
flitted past. 

I believe there are few who have not, even in 
their gladdest hours, felt how nearly gaiety and 
sadness are allied ; a shadow steals over the spirits, 
like a cloud over the moon, soft and subduing, 
perhaps transitory, but not the less dark for the 
moment. 

It was with a sensation of relief that Francesca 
parted with her last companion, and glided away 
to a lonely spot in the garden. The lamps, the 
music, came softened from the distance ; the turf 
before her was silvered only by the moonlight. 
The moss at the foot of an old chestnut served her 
for a seat ; and a trellis-work covered with honey- 
suckle separated her from the adjacent walk, the 
arch opening into which was just beyond. She 



304 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

sat, her beautiful head leaning upon her hand, 
now listening to the sweet tones floating on 
the wind, and now lost in a vague and pensive 
reverie. 

" I know not," thought she, " why I should 
feel so sad it seems the very wilfulness of a child ; 
and yet what an unutterable depression is upon 
me at this moment ! Why should there arise so 
vividly before me all that is most painful in my 
destiny its uncertainty, its dependance, its 
emptiness ? How unsatisfactory has my life been 
of late ! I have been divided between petty mor- 
tifications, which I blushed to confess even to 
myself, and vain feverish amusements for I can- 
not call them pleasures. I wish I could look be- 
yond the smiling faces which meet me on every 
side, and see whether they conceal feelings like 
my own. Madame Mercosur is happier than I 
am, and has more causes for happiness. She 
has so much kindness in her power is so be- 
loved, and so secure of that love ! Alas, I am 
so very, very grateful to her; and yet I cannot 
help asking, what is my gratitude to her, and 
of what consequence is my affection ? Ah ! how 
foolish nay, worse, is this repining ! It is as 
if I wished some misfortune to befall Henriette, 
merely to prove my attachment. Not so but 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 305 

surely I may contrast our situations without wish- 
ing hers to change." 

And Francesca was drawing 'a contrast as con- 
trasts are usually drawn, namely, as unfairly as 
possible. We take some most favourable portion 
of another's existence, and compare it with one of 
the darkest in our own, and then exclaim against 
the difference. 

Gradually the young Italian's reverie became 
merged in one of the sweet Venetian barcarolles 
which had been familiar to her from infancy, when 
her attention was first attracted, and then fixed, 
by the conversation carried on by two individuals 
in the walk behind her, and whose voices she at 
once recognised to be those of the Chevalier de 
Joinville and Evelyn. There is not much to be 
said in defence of her overhearing ; but is there 
a girl in the world who would not listen to her 
own name, and from the lips of her lover? it 
must be so pleasant to hear him confirm to others 
what he has first said to yourself. Curiosity would 
be quite motive enough ; but vanity and curiosity 
together are irresistible. 

" What," asked the Chevalier, " will your 
beautiful Italian do?" 

" Console herself," replied Evelyn. "To be 
very candid with you, I am getting heartily tired 



306 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of my connexion in that quarter. It was a very 
amusing dtlassement during her residence with 
that most amiable of artists, Bournonville ; but 
now that some childish acquaintance with the 
Mancinis has induced them to try the dear de- 
light of patronage, my beauty assumes les grands 
airs, and actually, the other day, gave a distant 
hint of marriage ! " 

" The forgetfulness of women is really charm- 
ing," observed De Joinville. 

" What say you to taking my place? many 
a heart is caught in the rebound ; and La Carrara's 
is worth having for a little while." 

" I thank you," replied De Joinville ; " but 
I have a foolish prejudice against les belles de- 
laissees I have no talents for consolation." 

" Between ourselves, Francesca will find con- 
solation in ambition. With her beauty and hypo- 
crisy she may yet make a brilliant match. Well, 
I wish her all possible success ; and, by the by, 
De Joinville, we really must keep her secret." 

" Any secret of mine that you possess, you are 
at perfect liberty to reveal," said Francesca. 

The sudden turn in the walk had brought 
the whole party face to face. For a moment the 
three stood in perfect silence. Evelyn for false- 
hood brings its own cowardice was speechless. 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 307 

De Joinville watched the scene with curiosity 
perhaps with deeper interest; for in his secret 
soul he disbelieved what his companion had just 
asserted. There was a perfect simplicity a clear 
purity a frankness in Francesca's whole de- 
meanour, that no art could have assumed it was 
too natural to be adopted. Moreover, his atten- 
tion was ri vetted as if on an exquisite picture ; 
the moonlight fell full on her face, which was pale 
as death, for her emotion was far too strong for 
confusion ; her fine upper lip curled with unutter- 
able scorn, while the blue veins on the temple 
rose distinct. The large dark eyes seemed filled 
with light, while her recreant lover cowered be- 
neath their flashing disdain ; and yet he was the 
first to speak. 

" My dearest Francesca must forgive what a 
moment's jealousy " 

" I do indeed forgive," exclaimed she, while 
a smile of the most entire contempt rested on her 
beautiful features, " what I despise too much to 
resent ! But as even the most cowardly liar may 
have his own miserable portion of influence, I 
owe a formal disavowal to myself." Turning to 
De Joinville, she continued, " As you have heard 
so much of this discourse, you may have patience 
for a moment more. My engagement with Mr. 



308 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

Evelyn has been open and avowed approved 
by my only friend, Madame de Mercoeur, who, 
as a girl, was the confidante of an attachment 
whose origin she witnessed why still unfulfilled, 
has been in consequence of my feeling that it was 
a duty we owed to Mr. Evelyn's father, not to 
marry without his consent. I pray your pardon 
for troubling you with what can so little interest 
a stranger ; but every man must have some femi- 
nine tie near and dear to his heart ; and for the 
sake of such, he owes somewha't of courtesy to 
all who bear the name of woman. As for you, 
sir," again addressing Evelyn, " I must say, our 
parting will to me be only a relief. Your right 
has for some time been your only claim on affec- 
tions that have long ceased to be yours. I felt 
your unworthiness before I knew it. My only 
sense at this moment is thankfulness." She 
turned away, and passed De Joinville with a 
slight bend, and in another instant was hidden 
by the trees. 

" I must follow her," exclaimed Evelyn, " and 
even try a little flattery;" but De Joinville ob- 
served that he did not take the same path. 

" Ma foil" exclaimed the Chevalier, " he must 
try his flattery on himself." 



309 



CHAPTER XXVII. 



Tis a bard lesson for the heart to learn, 
That it can give itself, but give in vain." 



FRANCESCA hurried through the winding paths 
that led unperceived- to the chateau, and, once 
safe in the solitude of her own chamber, gave 
way to the choking tears she sought not to re- 
press ; and yet she felt it a relief to look back to 
the event of the past evening. She no longer re- 
proached herself for the change of her feelings 
towards Evelyn how completely was it justified! 
her growing dislike had been, as it were, a natural 
warning the good revolting unconsciously from 
the bad. Then her cheek burned, and her brow 
darkened, when she recalled the imputation he 
had cast upon her; shame, in the first instance, 
had been merged in surprise and anger shame 
can never be the first feeling of the innocent ; but 
even the falsest accusation brings the burning and 
bitter blush, to think that such can even have 



310 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

been imagined. To this was added deep humilia- 
tion ; for Francesca's worst mortification was to 
remember that she had loved him. How had her 
ingenuous and trusting affection been requited ! 
Deeply within her inmost soul Francesca felt that 
thus she could never love again. 

It is no " romantic phantasy," no " eternal con- 
stancy," no " dying for love," no " blighted affec- 
tion," phrases so strangely misunderstood, and 
still more strangely misapplied, no vain dream- 
ing sentiment, when I say, deeply is that woman 
to be pitied whose first attachment has been ill 
requited. The qualities most natural to youth are 
at once destroyed, suspicion takes the place of 
confidence, reserve of reliance, distrust instead 
of that ready belief in all that was good and 
beautiful. Knowledge has come to her too soon 
knowledge of evil, unqualified by the general cha- 
rities which longer experience infallibly brings; 
but her age has lent its own freshness to this first 
great emotion ; it becomes unconsciously a criterion, 
and the judgment is harsh, because the remem- 
brance is bitter. Another affection may, and in 
nine cases out of ten does, supersede the first j and 
it is well that it should, the daily contentment 
of life, the household happiness of hourly duty 
and hourly love, are not to be offered up in vain 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 311 

sacrifice to the unpi tying past. But not the less 
at the time did the disappointment appear too 
heavy, not the less cruel was its influence over 
the mind; the ideal of love is gone for ever its 
poetry a dream, its fairy-land a departed vision. 

Francesca felt as if life had suddenly lost its 
interest ; yet it was not the lover that she regretted, 
but the love. Never more could the future be one 
vague but delicious hope ; never more could she 
turn away disbelieving from the tale of treachery 
and inconstancy ; never more take refuge in the 
depths of her own imagination, and find comfort 
in her own belief of perfect love. 

Her taper sinking in the socket, warned her 
how late, or rather how early, it was ; for a shadowy 
light made the chamber dimly visible. She drew 
back the heavy curtain, and in came the bright 
sunshine, and the cool fresh air. Below lay the 
garden, where arches of gathered flowers drooped, 
discoloured and withered, beside the fresh growth 
on the natural bough. Most of the lamps were 
extinct, but they glittered golden in the morning 
light, and in some few a pale white flame yet 
struggled with day. As she left the window, 
the mirror opposite caught her eye that mirror 
which she had left the evening before radiant 
with the graceful aids of dress. She started back 



312 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

at the contrast; her hair was dishevelled, and 
pushed from the forehead in tangled masses, while 
the wreath added to the unseemliness by the con- 
trast of finery; her face was wan, and the eyes red 
and heavy with watching, to say nothing of tears ; 
while the parched lip had not a vestige of colour. 
Her -dress, too, had lost its freshness ; and its 
gaiety, the bare neck and arms, were strangely 
at variance with the broad daylight and quiet 
morning. The very first glance suggested the 
propriety of going to bed. Leaning for a few 
minutes at the open casement, she breathed the 
pure and sweet air, which at once revived and 
soothed her ; then, closing the curtains, she re- 
tired to rest, and, thoroughly worn out, body and 
mind, was soon asleep. 

There are few but must recollect the first 
awakening after any event ; the unconscious 
rousing, the gradual remembrance that something 
unusual has occurred, the half reluctance to recall 
it, till suddenly it flashes full upon your mind, 
and you start up in astonishment at even your 
momentary oblivion. One part was indeed 
disagreeable to Francesca the necessity which 
existed of telling Madame de Mercosur : not but 
what she was certain of the most affectionate 
sympathy ; but it was painful to be the herald of 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 313 

her own mortification, and the disgrace of him 
who, at least, had been her lover. Still the 
disclosure was inevitable she would be obliged 
to explain the cessation of intercourse between 
Evelyn and herself; and even without that, she 
owed confidence to Madame de Mercosur's kind- 
ness. 

The account was received with more regret 
and surprise than she had expected ; the Duchesse 
could scarcely listen for her own exclamations all 
the while begging Francesca to go on. Suddenly 
she started from her seat, for the Duke entered 
the room : passing her hand through his arm, she 
made him sit down in the fauteuil, while in the 
same breath she told Francesca to tell her story, 
and at the same time went on telling it for her, 
only interrupted by the angry or contemptuous 
ejaculations of her husband. 

" Mademoiselle da Carrara," said he, when 
the narrative was ended, " I never heard of a 
more gratuitous insult of a more unmerited ca- 
lumny ; allow me at least to say, that your friends 
feel that it is offered to themselves. But now let 
us dismiss so worthless a subject. We will find you 
a better cavalier in our belle France." So saying, 
he rose to depart ; while a most painful suspicion , 
suggested by the sudden paleness of the Duchesse, 

VOL. i. p 



314 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

arose in Francesca's mind ; and yet to give it 
words, should she be mistaken, would be cruelly 
embarrassing. 

" It must not go unpunished," exclaimed the 
Duchesse, as if answering to her own thoughts. 
" Yes, mine is the best plan ; I will instantly go 
to my uncle, and ask him for a lettre de cachet. 
Solitary imprisonment in the Bastile will be the 
very thing for Mr. Evelyn." 

" I think," replied Francesca, " that to give 
me pain is the farthest in the world from your 
wishes ; and yet what could be more painful 
to me than any thing like revenge on Mr. 
Evelyn?" 

" Good Heavens ! " interrupted Madame de 
Mercoeur, " you cannot retain one spark of affec- 
tion for him ? " 

" Indeed I do not. I speak from motives of 
pure selfishness. I wish, now, nothing of or from 
Mr. Evelyn but forgetful ness. I disdain his miser- 
able conduct too much to resent it ; and the only 
proof my friends can give me of sympathy in my 
feelings, is to shew how unworthy they consider it 
to be of notice." 

" Ah, but Francesca, a few months' solitary 
meditation would be of such infinite service to 
le perf.de! it would bring him to his senses per- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 315 

haps to your feet again ; and the pleasure of re- 
jection would be something." 

" To me less than nothing. No, dear Hen- 
riette, I never wish to see or hear of Mr. Evelyn 
again ; it is sufficient mortification to think that 
I ever could have loved him. Besides, may I add, 
that I have my own little vanity on the occasion, 
and its suggestions whisper perfect discretion. 
Confidence, entire confidence, I owed to your 
friendship ; but I am not bound to extend that 
confidence. A subject like the present must be an- 
noying in the mouths of indifferent people ; their 
comments, whether of wonder or pity, would be 
intolerable. Any notice of Mr. Evelyn's conduct 
must excite them, and from such I do entreat to 
be spared." 

" Rely upon me, that it shall not be talked 
of," replied the Duke. " And now, Henriette," 
addressing his wife, " do let us praise her. In 
such a case I should have expected tears, faint- 
ings, and a most ready acceptance of your kind 
offer of the Bastile." 

" Now, see the selfishness !" exclaimed Madame 
de Mercosur, laughing ; " he is charmed with 
you because you have given him no trouble he 
has not had even to offer you a glass of water. 
But T do say you are a dear creature, and quite 



316 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

worthy to be one of those much-enduring heroines 
of your line, on whose merits it so delighted your 
poor old grandfather to dwell." 

" And when I remember," said Francesca, 
" the stiff red and blue figures he used to exhibit, 
the saints and my forefathers forgive me for 
saying, the blessed Virgin keep me from the 
resemblance !" 

" But see what it is," cried the Duchesse, " to 
enact the part of confidante ! I am actually for- 
getting, and you too, Francesca, the important 
duties of the toilette. Come, come we must 
make haste ; for in a little while I expect to be 
overwhelmed with congratulations 011 the success 
of my charming fete ; and you must prepare for 
not a few compliments on your own appearance 
and, indeed, I never saw you look better." 

So saying, the little knot broke up ; Francesca 
greatly relieved to think the disclosure was made. 

The following evening was the one previous 
to their meditated return to Paris a resolution 
somewhat suddenly taken, in consequence of the 
King's intention to visit Sedan, and inspect the 
proceedings of the army. Among the visitors who 
crowded in to express their regret that Compiegne, 
still so beautiful, was about to be deserted, was 
the Chevalier de Joinville. He took the earliest 






FRANCESCA CARRARA. 317 

opportunity of addressing Francesca who, in 
spite of herself, could not help blushing as she 
saw him approach, partly, it must be owned, from 
apprehension. He had usually contrived to say 
or to imply something disagreeable and now he 
had such an opening ! 

She was pleasantly mistaken. His manner was 
respectful, and even kind, as he said, " I cannot 
depart for Sedan, without entreating Mademoiselle 
la Carrara's forgiveness." 

" A forgiveness most readily granted, did she 
know what there was to forgive." 

" An unjust opinion. Is the offence quite 
unpardonable ?" 

" If concerning myself, I can assure you it is 
already forgotten." 

" That is to say, you do not care what my 
opinion is, was, or may be." 

" That is a very sweeping assertion," replied 
Francesca, hesitating, for the best reason in the 
world because she really did not know what 
to say. 

" Now," continued the Chevalier, " I feel 
sufficiently sorry for past injustice to be very 
desirous of both explanation and amendment. 
Mr. Evelyn - 

" Perhaps," interrupted Francesca, " you will 
p2 



318 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

allow me to speak, and, in so doing, put an end 
for ever to a very painful subject. I have myself 
not a remark to make on Mr. Evelyn's conduct 
and I wish to hear none. I owed it to Madame 
de Mercosur's kindness to have no concealments 
from her ; the explanation given, the subject will 
not again pass my lips. On yourself I can have 
no claim but for that general courtesy which I 
think authorises me to request that here the topic 
may be dropped." 

" You are right ; and, I can assure you, my 
own remembrance is too disagreeable to dwell 
upon. But it is a gratification to have friends ; 
and I must be permitted to tell you how warmly 
the Due de Mercoeur took up your cause." 

Francesca's anxious look now betrayed her 
attention. 

" He called on me this morning to request me 
to be the bearer of a challenge to Mr. Evelyn." 
" Good God !" exclaimed Francesca. 
" You need not look so pale ; Mr. Evelyn is 
half-way to Holland by this time a fact which 
was my answer. Mercosur then bade me to be 
silent for once in my life. I promised, and, what 
is more, intend faithfully to perform." 

Observing that his companion smiled, he went 
on, 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 319 

" And you do not consider this communication 
any great proof of my discretion ? On the con- 
trary, it is its seal. I could not help gratifying 
you, by telling you what sincere friends you had ; 
and myself, by entreating permission to remain at 
least in their outward rank." 

What answer but a gracious one could be made 
to such a speech ? And the Chevalier with obvious 
discontent obeyed Mademoiselle Mancini's signal, 
who wanted to ask some question respecting the 
royal departure, on which he was to be an at- 
tendant. 

Francesca remained, rather marvelling in her 
own mind at the change in De Joinville. With 
all her recently acquired experience in society, 
she scarcely arrived at the right conclusion. The 
truth was, her last words to Evelyn had done her 
great service with the Chevalier, who was charmed 
to hear her say, that it was no preference that had 
ensured her fidelity. No man likes to hear that 
any woman is in love with his friend it seems a 
sort of personal affront to himself; and, without 
being epris with Francesca, De Joinville admired 
her quite enough to have an undefined resentment 
at her favour to another. And here we cannot 
but note the less selfish nature of woman. In 
nine cases out of ten, a girl is delighted in her 



320 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

companions' conquests to be confidante is almost 
equal to having the lover her own. This, we 
grant, is confined to the very young, and perhaps 
they may consider it as an augury ; still, this mere 
satisfaction in confidence is a purely feminine 
feeling. Besides, to do De Joinville justice, he 
felt, too, a degree of kindly compunction for the 
former harsh judgment entertained of one who so 
little deserved it; and for there is no such thing 
in the human mind as an unmixed sensation he 
was struck both with the spirit with which she 
resented, and the proud humility with which she 
forgave the affront. 

The idea of the parting so near gave rather 
more than usual animation to the circle. The 
visit to the camp the hope of meeting with the 
enemy, were but stirring excitements ; all were 
too young, too happy, too prosperous, for fear. 
The room was crowded and warm ; and, stepping 
from the window, Francesca leant on the balus- 
trade which looked on the garden below, silvered 
over by the quiet moonlight. 

" I hope," said a voice by her side, " your 
absent brother will not engross all your orisons." 

" No one will offer them more fervently than 
I shall do for your Grace's success," said Fran- 
cesca, who instantly recognised her royal com- 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 321 

panion. A minute's silence ensued the young 
Italian always required encouragement to con- 
verse ; and Louis was struck by the beauty of her 
profile, whose pure and sculptured features seemed 
so much more than fair in the soft clear radiance. 

A burst of laughter now came from the 
chamber. 

" How this perpetual gaiety," exclaimed Louis, 
"jars upon the ear! Good Heaven! is farewell 
to be said so gladly ? I sometimes start when 
I think upon the hollowness of all that surrounds 
me. I often wish my eye had the power of search- 
ing the inmost depths of the bosoms whose watch- 
word is my name." 

" And amid, perhaps, some disappointments, 
how many hearts would you not find faithful and 
devoted to your Majesty !" 

" I wish but for one." 

Francesca looked down and blushed, first, 
at the earnest gaze of Louis's face ; and, secondly, 
but still deeper, at her own folly in having indi- 
vidualised a general expression. 

" It were against all rules, whether of history 
or romance whether I look to my grandfather 
Henri Quatre, or to the less veracious chronicles of 
Scuderi, and copy Oroondates to depart without 
some favour." So saying, he took a little bunch 



322 FRANCESCA CARRARA. 

of white violets from her hand, and then raised 
the hand itself after a moment's half-hesitation, 
he kissed it, and left her side. 

Francesca was at first surprised at the youth- 
ful monarch's gallantry ; but her thoughts soon 
wandered to other subjects for thoughts usually 
wander when neither vanity nor interest fix them. 

" I 'have news for you!" exclaimed Madame 
de Mercosur, when they retired for the night ; 
" Marie is going to be married in another week 
she will be Countess of Soissons. A splendid for- 
tune the blood royal, I think even her expec- 
tations must be satisfied." 

" I hope she will be happy," said Francesca. 
" But what will the King say ?" 

" Whatever his mother pleases the present 
visit to the camp is, I suppose, by way of consola- 
tion. Perhaps, though it has been kept so quiet, 
to prevent interference : we never understand the 
value of things, hearts included, till we are about 
to lose them. I was not aware of the alliance till 
this afternoon. My uncle's presents, I hear, are 
magnificent." 

The image of Guido naturally arose in his 
sister's mind how would this marriage affect 
him ? Surely it were best, if any vain and un- 
avowed hope una vowed even to himself lurked 



FRANCESCA CARRARA. 323 

in his dreams, that it should be utterly destroyed. 
" Alas, my brother !" thought she, " we are alike 
in this each must .part from the first idol which 
the heart set up ; and each, too, with a deep sense 
of its unworthiness, and a late, sad knowledge of 
the falsehood of our early creed ! " 

A stronger affection seemed born of the con- 
viction. Each was yet left to the other Italy still 
remained : and Francesca fell asleep, and dreamed 
of returning to all the hopes, pleasures, and scenes 
of her childhood. 



END OF VOL. I. 



LONDON : 

J. MOVES, CASTLE STREET, LEICESTER SQUARE. 



DINGSECT. NOV3 184 



PR Land on, Letitia Elizabeth 

4865 Francesca Carrara 

L5F7 

1834 

v.l 



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CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET 

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