"Qu'est-c'qui passe ici si tard,
Compagnons de la Marjolaine,"
--CHANSONS DE FRANCE
...I came down from the mountain and into the pleasing valley of the
Adige in as pelting a heat as ever mortal suffered under. The way
underfoot was parched and white; I had newly come out of a wilderness
of white limestone crags, and a sun of Italy blazed blindingly in an
azure Italian sky. You are to suppose, my dear aunt, that I had had
enough and something more of my craze for foot-marching. A fortnight
ago I had gone to Belluno in a post-chaise, dismissed my fellow to
carry my baggage by way of Verona, and with no more than a valise on
my back plunged into the fastnesses of those mountains. I had a fancy
to see the little sculptured hills which made backgrounds for
Gianbellini, and there were rumours of great mountains built wholly of
marble which shone like the battlements.
...1 This extract from the unpublished papers of the Manorwater family
has seemed to the Editor worth printing for its historical interest.
The famous Lady Molly Carteron became Countess of Manorwater by her
second marriage. She was a wit and a friend of wits, and her nephew,
the Honourable Charles Hervey-Townshend (afterwards our Ambassador at
The Hague), addressed to her a series of amusing letters while making,
after the fashion of his contemporaries, the Grand Tour of Europe.
Three letters, written at various places in the Eastern Alps and
despatched from Venice, contain the following short narrative....
of the Celestial City. So at any rate reported young Mr. Wyndham, who
had travelled with me from Milan to Venice. I lay the first night at
Pieve, where Titian had the fortune to be born, and the landlord at the
inn displayed a set of villainous daubs which he swore were the early
works of that master. Thence up a toilsome valley I journeyed to the
Ampezzan country, valley where indeed I saw my white mountains, but,
alas! no longer Celestial. For it rained like Westmorland for five
endless days, while I kicked my heels in an inn and turned a canto of
Aristo into halting English couplets. By-and-by it cleared, and I
headed westward towards Bozen, among the tangle of rocks where the
Dwarf King had once his rose-garden. The first night I had no inn but
slept in the vile cabin of a forester, who spoke a tongue half Latin,
half Dutch, which I failed to master. The next day was a blaze of
heat, the mountain-paths lay thick with dust, and I had no wine from
sunrise to sunset. Can you wonder that, when the following noon I saw
Santa Chiara sleeping in its green circlet of meadows, my thought was
only of a deep draught and a cool chamber? I protest that I am a great
lover of natural beauty, of rock and cascade, and all the properties of
the poet: but the enthusiasm of Rousseau himself would sink from the
stars to earth if he had marched since breakfast in a cloud of dust
with a throat like the nether millstone.
Yet I had not entered the place before Romance revived. The little
town--a mere wayside halting-place on the great mountain-road to the
North--had the air of mystery which foretells adventure. Why is it
that a dwelling or a countenance catches the fancy with the promise of
some strange destiny? I have houses in my mind which I know will some
day and somehow be intertwined oddly with my life; and I have faces in
memory of which I know nothing--save that I shall undoubtedly cast eyes
again upon them. My first glimpses of Santa Chiara gave me this earnest
of romance. It was walled and fortified, the streets were narrow pits
of shade, old tenements with bent fronts swayed to meet each other.
Melons lay drying on flat roofs, and yet now and then would come a
high-pitched northern gable. Latin and Teuton met and mingled in the
place, and, as Mr. Gibbon has taught us, the offspring of this
admixture is something fantastic and unpredictable. I forgot my
grievous thirst and my tired feet in admiration and a certain vague
expectation of wonders. Here, ran my thought, it is fated, maybe, that
romance and I shall at last compass a meeting. Perchance some princess
is in need of my arm, or some affair of high policy is afoot in this
jumble of old masonry. You will laugh at my folly, but I had an
excuse for it. A fortnight in strange mountains disposes a man to look
for something at his next encounter with his kind, and the sight of
Santa Chiara would have fired the imagination of a judge in Chancery.
I strode happily into the courtyard of the Tre Croci, and presently had
my expectation confirmed for I found my fellow,--a faithful rogue I got
in Rome on a Cardinal's recommendation,--hot in dispute with a lady's
maid. The woman was old, harsh-featured--no Italian clearly, though she
spoke fluently in the tongue. She rated my man like a pickpocket, and
the dispute was over a room.
"The signor will bear me out," said Gianbattista. "Was not I sent to
Verona with his baggage, and thence to this place of ill manners? Was
I not bidden engage for him a suite of apartments? Did I not duly
choose these fronting on the gallery, and dispose therein the signor's
baggage? And lo! an hour ago I found it all turned into the yard and
this woman installed in its place. It is monstrous, unbearable! Is
this an inn for travellers, or haply the private mansion of these
Magnificences?"
"My servant speaks truly," I said firmly yet with courtesy, having no
mind to spoil adventure by urging rights. "He had orders to take these
rooms for me, and I know not what higher power can countermand me."
The woman had been staring at me scornfully, for no doubt in my dusty
habit I was a figure of small count; but at the sound of my voice she
started, and cried out, "You are English, signor?"
I bowed an admission. "Then my mistress shall speak with you," she
said, and dived into the inn like an elderly rabbit.
Gianbattista was for sending for the landlord and making a riot in that
hostelry; but I stayed him, and bidding him fetch me a flask of white
wine, three lemons, and a glass of eau de vie, I sat down peaceably at
one of the little tables in the courtyard and prepared for the
quenching of my thirst. Presently, as I sat drinking that excellent
compound of my own invention, my shoulder was touched, and I turned to
find the maid and her mistress. Alas for my hopes of a glorious being,
young and lissom and bright with the warm riches of the south! I saw a
short, stout little lady, well on the wrong side of thirty. She had
plump red cheeks, and fair hair dressed indifferently in the Roman
fashion. Two candid blue eyes redeemed her plainness, and a certain
grave and gentle dignity. She was notably a gentlewoman, so I got up,
doffed my hat, and awaited her commands.
She spoke in Italian. "Your pardon, signor, but I fear my good
Cristine has done you unwittingly a wrong."
Cristine snorted at this premature plea of guilty, while I hastened to
assure the fair apologist that any rooms I might have taken were freely
at her service.
I spoke unconsciously in English, and she replied in a halting parody
of that tongue. "I understand him," she said, "but I do not speak him
happily. I will discourse, if the signor pleases, in our first speech."
She and her father, it appeared, had come over the Brenner, and arrived
that morning at the Tre Croci, where they purposed to lie for some
days. He was an old man, very feeble, and much depending upon her
constant care. Wherefore it was necessary that the rooms of all the
party should adjoin, and there was no suite of the size in the inn save
that which I had taken. Would I therefore consent to forgo my right,
and place her under an eternal debt?
I agreed most readily, being at all times careless where I sleep, so
the bed be clean, or where I eat, so the meal be good. I bade my
servant see the landlord and have my belongings carried to other rooms.
Madame thanked me sweetly, and would have gone, when a thought detained
her.
"It is but courteous," she said, "that you should know the names of
those whom you have befriended. My father is called the Count
d'Albani, and I am his only daughter. We travel to Florence, where we
have a villa in the environs."
"My name," said I, "is Hervey-Townshend, an Englishman travelling
abroad for his entertainment."
"Hervey?" she repeated. "Are you one of the family of Miladi Hervey?"
"My worthy aunt," I replied, with a tender recollection of that
preposterous woman.
Madame turned to Cristine, and spoke rapidly in a whisper.
"My father, sir," she said, addressing me, "is an old frail man, little
used to the company of strangers; but in former days he has had
kindness from members of your house, and it would be a satisfaction to
him, I think, to have the privilege of your acquaintance."
She spoke with the air of a vizier who promises a traveller a sight of
the Grand Turk. I murmured my gratitude, and hastened after
Gianbattista. In an hour I had bathed, rid myself of my beard, and
arrayed myself in decent clothing. Then I strolled out to inspect the
little city, admired an altar-piece, chaffered with a Jew for a cameo,
purchased some small necessaries, and returned early in the afternoon
with a noble appetite for dinner.
The Tre Croci had been in happier days a Bishop's lodging, and
possessed a dining-hall ceiled with black oak and adorned with frescos.
It was used as a general salle a manger for all dwellers in the inn,
and there accordingly I sat down to my long-deferred meal. At first
there were no other diners, and I had two maids, as well as
Gianbattista, to attend on my wants. Presently Madame d'Albani
entered, escorted by Cristine and by a tall gaunt serving-man, who
seemed no part of the hostelry. The landlord followed, bowing civilly,
and the two women seated themselves at the little table at the farther
end. "Il Signor Conte dines in his room," said Madame to the host, who
withdrew to see to that gentleman's needs.
I found my eyes straying often to the little party in the cool twilight
of that refectory. The man-servant was so old and battered, and of
such a dignity, that he lent a touch of intrigue to the thing. He stood
stiffly behind Madame's chair, handing dishes with an air of great
reverence--the lackey of a great noble, if I had ever seen the type.
Madame never glanced toward me, but conversed sparingly with Cristine,
while she pecked delicately at her food. Her name ran in my head with
a tantalizing flavour of the familiar. Albani! D'Albani! It was a
name not uncommon in the Roman States, but I had never heard it linked
to a noble family. And yet I had somehow, somewhere; and in the vain
effort at recollection I had almost forgotten my hunger. There was
nothing bourgeois in the little lady. The austere servants, the high
manner of condescension, spake of a stock used to deference, though,
maybe, pitifully decayed in its fortunes. There was a mystery in
these quiet folk which tickled my curiosity. Romance after all was not
destined to fail me at Santa Chiara.
My doings of the afternoon were of interest to me alone. Suffice it to
say that when at nightfall I found Gianbattista the trustee of a
letter. It was from Madame, written in a fine thin hand on a delicate
paper, and it invited me to wait upon the signor her father, that
evening at eight o'clock. What caught my eye was a coronet stamped in
a corner. A coronet, I say, but in truth it was a crown, the same as
surmounts the Arms Royal of England on the sign-board of a Court
tradesman. I marvelled at the ways of foreign heraldry. Either this
family of d'Albani had higher pretensions than I had given it credit
for, or it employed an unlearned and imaginative stationer. I
scribbled a line of acceptance and went to dress.
The hour of eight found me knocking at the Count's door. The grim
serving-man admitted me to the pleasant chamber which should have been
mine own. A dozen wax candles burned in sconces, and on the table
among fruits and the remains of supper stood a handsome candelabra of
silver. A small fire of logs had been lit on the hearth, and before it
in an armchair sat a strange figure of a man. He seemed not so much
old as aged. I should have put him at sixty, but the marks he bore
were clearly less those of time than of life. There sprawled before me
the relics of noble looks. The fleshy nose, the pendulous cheek, the
drooping mouth, had once been cast in looks of manly beauty. Heavy
eyebrows above and heavy bags beneath spoiled the effect of a choleric
blue eye, which age had not dimmed. The man was gross and yet haggard;
it was not the padding of good living which clothed his bones, but a
heaviness as of some dropsical malady. I could picture him in health a
gaunt loose-limbed being, high-featured and swift and eager. He was
dressed wholly in black velvet, with fresh ruffles and wristbands, and
he wore heeled shoes with antique silver buckles. It was a figure of
an older age which rose to greet me, in one hand a snuff-box and a
purple handkerchief, and in the other a book with finger marking place.
He made me a great bow as Madame uttered my name, and held out a hand
with a kindly smile.
"Mr. Hervey-Townshend," he said, "we will speak English, if you please.
I am fain to hear it again, for 'tis a tongue I love. I make you
welcome, sir, for your own sake and for the sake of your kin. How is
her honourable ladyship, your aunt? A week ago she sent me a letter."
I answered that she did famously, and wondered what cause of
correspondence my worthy aunt could have with wandering nobles of Italy.
He motioned me to a chair between Madame and himself, while a servant
set a candle on a shelf behind him. Then he proceeded to catechise me
in excellent English, with now and then a phrase of French, as to the
doings in my own land. Admirably informed this Italian gentleman
proved himself. I defy you to find in Almack's more intelligent
gossip. He inquired as to the chances of my Lord North and the mind of
my Lord Rockingham. He had my Lord Shelburne's foibles at his fingers'
ends. The habits of the Prince, the aims of the their ladyships of
Dorset and Buckingham, the extravagance of this noble Duke and that
right honourable gentleman were not hid from him. I answered
discreetly yet frankly, for there was no ill-breeding in his curiosity.
Rather it seemed like the inquiries of some fine lady, now buried deep
in the country, as to the doings of a forsaken Mayfair. There was
humour in it and something of pathos.
"My aunt must be a voluminous correspondent, sir," I said.
He laughed, "I have many friends in England who write to me, but I have
seen none of them for long, and I doubt I may never see them again.
Also in my youth I have been in England." And he sighed as at
sorrowful recollection.
Then he showed the book in his hand. "See," he said, "here is one of
your English writings, the greatest book I have ever happened on." It
was a volume of Mr. Fielding. For a little he talked of books and
poets. He admired Mr. Fielding profoundly, Dr. Smollet somewhat less,
Mr. Richardson not at all. But he was clear that England had a
monopoly of good writers, saving only my friend M. Rousseau, whom he
valued, yet with reservations. Of the Italians he had no opinion. I
instanced against him the plays of Signor Alfieri. He groaned, shook
his head, and grew moody.
"Know you Scotland?" he asked suddenly.
I replied that I had visited Scotch cousins, but had no great
estimation for the country. "It is too poor and jagged," I said, "for
the taste of one who loves colour and sunshine and suave outlines." He
sighed. "It is indeed a bleak land, but a kindly. When the sun shines
at all he shines on the truest hearts in the world. I love its
bleakness too. There is a spirit in the misty hills and the harsh
sea-wind which inspires men to great deeds. Poverty and courage go
often together, and my Scots, if they are poor, are as untamable as
their mountains."
"You know the land, sir?" I asked.
"I have seen it, and I have known many Sc
Compagnons de la Marjolaine,"
--CHANSONS DE FRANCE
...I came down from the mountain and into the pleasing valley of the
Adige in as pelting a heat as ever mortal suffered under. The way
underfoot was parched and white; I had newly come out of a wilderness
of white limestone crags, and a sun of Italy blazed blindingly in an
azure Italian sky. You are to suppose, my dear aunt, that I had had
enough and something more of my craze for foot-marching. A fortnight
ago I had gone to Belluno in a post-chaise, dismissed my fellow to
carry my baggage by way of Verona, and with no more than a valise on
my back plunged into the fastnesses of those mountains. I had a fancy
to see the little sculptured hills which made backgrounds for
Gianbellini, and there were rumours of great mountains built wholly of
marble which shone like the battlements.
...1 This extract from the unpublished papers of the Manorwater family
has seemed to the Editor worth printing for its historical interest.
The famous Lady Molly Carteron became Countess of Manorwater by her
second marriage. She was a wit and a friend of wits, and her nephew,
the Honourable Charles Hervey-Townshend (afterwards our Ambassador at
The Hague), addressed to her a series of amusing letters while making,
after the fashion of his contemporaries, the Grand Tour of Europe.
Three letters, written at various places in the Eastern Alps and
despatched from Venice, contain the following short narrative....
of the Celestial City. So at any rate reported young Mr. Wyndham, who
had travelled with me from Milan to Venice. I lay the first night at
Pieve, where Titian had the fortune to be born, and the landlord at the
inn displayed a set of villainous daubs which he swore were the early
works of that master. Thence up a toilsome valley I journeyed to the
Ampezzan country, valley where indeed I saw my white mountains, but,
alas! no longer Celestial. For it rained like Westmorland for five
endless days, while I kicked my heels in an inn and turned a canto of
Aristo into halting English couplets. By-and-by it cleared, and I
headed westward towards Bozen, among the tangle of rocks where the
Dwarf King had once his rose-garden. The first night I had no inn but
slept in the vile cabin of a forester, who spoke a tongue half Latin,
half Dutch, which I failed to master. The next day was a blaze of
heat, the mountain-paths lay thick with dust, and I had no wine from
sunrise to sunset. Can you wonder that, when the following noon I saw
Santa Chiara sleeping in its green circlet of meadows, my thought was
only of a deep draught and a cool chamber? I protest that I am a great
lover of natural beauty, of rock and cascade, and all the properties of
the poet: but the enthusiasm of Rousseau himself would sink from the
stars to earth if he had marched since breakfast in a cloud of dust
with a throat like the nether millstone.
Yet I had not entered the place before Romance revived. The little
town--a mere wayside halting-place on the great mountain-road to the
North--had the air of mystery which foretells adventure. Why is it
that a dwelling or a countenance catches the fancy with the promise of
some strange destiny? I have houses in my mind which I know will some
day and somehow be intertwined oddly with my life; and I have faces in
memory of which I know nothing--save that I shall undoubtedly cast eyes
again upon them. My first glimpses of Santa Chiara gave me this earnest
of romance. It was walled and fortified, the streets were narrow pits
of shade, old tenements with bent fronts swayed to meet each other.
Melons lay drying on flat roofs, and yet now and then would come a
high-pitched northern gable. Latin and Teuton met and mingled in the
place, and, as Mr. Gibbon has taught us, the offspring of this
admixture is something fantastic and unpredictable. I forgot my
grievous thirst and my tired feet in admiration and a certain vague
expectation of wonders. Here, ran my thought, it is fated, maybe, that
romance and I shall at last compass a meeting. Perchance some princess
is in need of my arm, or some affair of high policy is afoot in this
jumble of old masonry. You will laugh at my folly, but I had an
excuse for it. A fortnight in strange mountains disposes a man to look
for something at his next encounter with his kind, and the sight of
Santa Chiara would have fired the imagination of a judge in Chancery.
I strode happily into the courtyard of the Tre Croci, and presently had
my expectation confirmed for I found my fellow,--a faithful rogue I got
in Rome on a Cardinal's recommendation,--hot in dispute with a lady's
maid. The woman was old, harsh-featured--no Italian clearly, though she
spoke fluently in the tongue. She rated my man like a pickpocket, and
the dispute was over a room.
"The signor will bear me out," said Gianbattista. "Was not I sent to
Verona with his baggage, and thence to this place of ill manners? Was
I not bidden engage for him a suite of apartments? Did I not duly
choose these fronting on the gallery, and dispose therein the signor's
baggage? And lo! an hour ago I found it all turned into the yard and
this woman installed in its place. It is monstrous, unbearable! Is
this an inn for travellers, or haply the private mansion of these
Magnificences?"
"My servant speaks truly," I said firmly yet with courtesy, having no
mind to spoil adventure by urging rights. "He had orders to take these
rooms for me, and I know not what higher power can countermand me."
The woman had been staring at me scornfully, for no doubt in my dusty
habit I was a figure of small count; but at the sound of my voice she
started, and cried out, "You are English, signor?"
I bowed an admission. "Then my mistress shall speak with you," she
said, and dived into the inn like an elderly rabbit.
Gianbattista was for sending for the landlord and making a riot in that
hostelry; but I stayed him, and bidding him fetch me a flask of white
wine, three lemons, and a glass of eau de vie, I sat down peaceably at
one of the little tables in the courtyard and prepared for the
quenching of my thirst. Presently, as I sat drinking that excellent
compound of my own invention, my shoulder was touched, and I turned to
find the maid and her mistress. Alas for my hopes of a glorious being,
young and lissom and bright with the warm riches of the south! I saw a
short, stout little lady, well on the wrong side of thirty. She had
plump red cheeks, and fair hair dressed indifferently in the Roman
fashion. Two candid blue eyes redeemed her plainness, and a certain
grave and gentle dignity. She was notably a gentlewoman, so I got up,
doffed my hat, and awaited her commands.
She spoke in Italian. "Your pardon, signor, but I fear my good
Cristine has done you unwittingly a wrong."
Cristine snorted at this premature plea of guilty, while I hastened to
assure the fair apologist that any rooms I might have taken were freely
at her service.
I spoke unconsciously in English, and she replied in a halting parody
of that tongue. "I understand him," she said, "but I do not speak him
happily. I will discourse, if the signor pleases, in our first speech."
She and her father, it appeared, had come over the Brenner, and arrived
that morning at the Tre Croci, where they purposed to lie for some
days. He was an old man, very feeble, and much depending upon her
constant care. Wherefore it was necessary that the rooms of all the
party should adjoin, and there was no suite of the size in the inn save
that which I had taken. Would I therefore consent to forgo my right,
and place her under an eternal debt?
I agreed most readily, being at all times careless where I sleep, so
the bed be clean, or where I eat, so the meal be good. I bade my
servant see the landlord and have my belongings carried to other rooms.
Madame thanked me sweetly, and would have gone, when a thought detained
her.
"It is but courteous," she said, "that you should know the names of
those whom you have befriended. My father is called the Count
d'Albani, and I am his only daughter. We travel to Florence, where we
have a villa in the environs."
"My name," said I, "is Hervey-Townshend, an Englishman travelling
abroad for his entertainment."
"Hervey?" she repeated. "Are you one of the family of Miladi Hervey?"
"My worthy aunt," I replied, with a tender recollection of that
preposterous woman.
Madame turned to Cristine, and spoke rapidly in a whisper.
"My father, sir," she said, addressing me, "is an old frail man, little
used to the company of strangers; but in former days he has had
kindness from members of your house, and it would be a satisfaction to
him, I think, to have the privilege of your acquaintance."
She spoke with the air of a vizier who promises a traveller a sight of
the Grand Turk. I murmured my gratitude, and hastened after
Gianbattista. In an hour I had bathed, rid myself of my beard, and
arrayed myself in decent clothing. Then I strolled out to inspect the
little city, admired an altar-piece, chaffered with a Jew for a cameo,
purchased some small necessaries, and returned early in the afternoon
with a noble appetite for dinner.
The Tre Croci had been in happier days a Bishop's lodging, and
possessed a dining-hall ceiled with black oak and adorned with frescos.
It was used as a general salle a manger for all dwellers in the inn,
and there accordingly I sat down to my long-deferred meal. At first
there were no other diners, and I had two maids, as well as
Gianbattista, to attend on my wants. Presently Madame d'Albani
entered, escorted by Cristine and by a tall gaunt serving-man, who
seemed no part of the hostelry. The landlord followed, bowing civilly,
and the two women seated themselves at the little table at the farther
end. "Il Signor Conte dines in his room," said Madame to the host, who
withdrew to see to that gentleman's needs.
I found my eyes straying often to the little party in the cool twilight
of that refectory. The man-servant was so old and battered, and of
such a dignity, that he lent a touch of intrigue to the thing. He stood
stiffly behind Madame's chair, handing dishes with an air of great
reverence--the lackey of a great noble, if I had ever seen the type.
Madame never glanced toward me, but conversed sparingly with Cristine,
while she pecked delicately at her food. Her name ran in my head with
a tantalizing flavour of the familiar. Albani! D'Albani! It was a
name not uncommon in the Roman States, but I had never heard it linked
to a noble family. And yet I had somehow, somewhere; and in the vain
effort at recollection I had almost forgotten my hunger. There was
nothing bourgeois in the little lady. The austere servants, the high
manner of condescension, spake of a stock used to deference, though,
maybe, pitifully decayed in its fortunes. There was a mystery in
these quiet folk which tickled my curiosity. Romance after all was not
destined to fail me at Santa Chiara.
My doings of the afternoon were of interest to me alone. Suffice it to
say that when at nightfall I found Gianbattista the trustee of a
letter. It was from Madame, written in a fine thin hand on a delicate
paper, and it invited me to wait upon the signor her father, that
evening at eight o'clock. What caught my eye was a coronet stamped in
a corner. A coronet, I say, but in truth it was a crown, the same as
surmounts the Arms Royal of England on the sign-board of a Court
tradesman. I marvelled at the ways of foreign heraldry. Either this
family of d'Albani had higher pretensions than I had given it credit
for, or it employed an unlearned and imaginative stationer. I
scribbled a line of acceptance and went to dress.
The hour of eight found me knocking at the Count's door. The grim
serving-man admitted me to the pleasant chamber which should have been
mine own. A dozen wax candles burned in sconces, and on the table
among fruits and the remains of supper stood a handsome candelabra of
silver. A small fire of logs had been lit on the hearth, and before it
in an armchair sat a strange figure of a man. He seemed not so much
old as aged. I should have put him at sixty, but the marks he bore
were clearly less those of time than of life. There sprawled before me
the relics of noble looks. The fleshy nose, the pendulous cheek, the
drooping mouth, had once been cast in looks of manly beauty. Heavy
eyebrows above and heavy bags beneath spoiled the effect of a choleric
blue eye, which age had not dimmed. The man was gross and yet haggard;
it was not the padding of good living which clothed his bones, but a
heaviness as of some dropsical malady. I could picture him in health a
gaunt loose-limbed being, high-featured and swift and eager. He was
dressed wholly in black velvet, with fresh ruffles and wristbands, and
he wore heeled shoes with antique silver buckles. It was a figure of
an older age which rose to greet me, in one hand a snuff-box and a
purple handkerchief, and in the other a book with finger marking place.
He made me a great bow as Madame uttered my name, and held out a hand
with a kindly smile.
"Mr. Hervey-Townshend," he said, "we will speak English, if you please.
I am fain to hear it again, for 'tis a tongue I love. I make you
welcome, sir, for your own sake and for the sake of your kin. How is
her honourable ladyship, your aunt? A week ago she sent me a letter."
I answered that she did famously, and wondered what cause of
correspondence my worthy aunt could have with wandering nobles of Italy.
He motioned me to a chair between Madame and himself, while a servant
set a candle on a shelf behind him. Then he proceeded to catechise me
in excellent English, with now and then a phrase of French, as to the
doings in my own land. Admirably informed this Italian gentleman
proved himself. I defy you to find in Almack's more intelligent
gossip. He inquired as to the chances of my Lord North and the mind of
my Lord Rockingham. He had my Lord Shelburne's foibles at his fingers'
ends. The habits of the Prince, the aims of the their ladyships of
Dorset and Buckingham, the extravagance of this noble Duke and that
right honourable gentleman were not hid from him. I answered
discreetly yet frankly, for there was no ill-breeding in his curiosity.
Rather it seemed like the inquiries of some fine lady, now buried deep
in the country, as to the doings of a forsaken Mayfair. There was
humour in it and something of pathos.
"My aunt must be a voluminous correspondent, sir," I said.
He laughed, "I have many friends in England who write to me, but I have
seen none of them for long, and I doubt I may never see them again.
Also in my youth I have been in England." And he sighed as at
sorrowful recollection.
Then he showed the book in his hand. "See," he said, "here is one of
your English writings, the greatest book I have ever happened on." It
was a volume of Mr. Fielding. For a little he talked of books and
poets. He admired Mr. Fielding profoundly, Dr. Smollet somewhat less,
Mr. Richardson not at all. But he was clear that England had a
monopoly of good writers, saving only my friend M. Rousseau, whom he
valued, yet with reservations. Of the Italians he had no opinion. I
instanced against him the plays of Signor Alfieri. He groaned, shook
his head, and grew moody.
"Know you Scotland?" he asked suddenly.
I replied that I had visited Scotch cousins, but had no great
estimation for the country. "It is too poor and jagged," I said, "for
the taste of one who loves colour and sunshine and suave outlines." He
sighed. "It is indeed a bleak land, but a kindly. When the sun shines
at all he shines on the truest hearts in the world. I love its
bleakness too. There is a spirit in the misty hills and the harsh
sea-wind which inspires men to great deeds. Poverty and courage go
often together, and my Scots, if they are poor, are as untamable as
their mountains."
"You know the land, sir?" I asked.
"I have seen it, and I have known many Sc