More than once, in the course of my life, I have found myself under the
painful necessity of telling falsehoods to the woman I loved; but in
this case, after so true, so touching an appeal, how could I be
otherwise than sincere? I felt myself sufficiently debased by my crime,
and I could not degrade myself still more by falsehood. I was so far
from being disposed to such a line of conduct that I could not speak,
and I burst out crying.
"What, my darling! you are weeping! Your tears make me miserable. You
ought not to have shed any with me but tears of happiness and love.
Quick, my beloved, tell me whether you have made me wretched. Tell me
what fearful revenge you have taken on me, who would rather die than
offend you. If I have caused you any sorrow, it has been in the
innocence of a loving and devoted heart."
"My own darling angel, I never thought of revenge, for my heart, which
can never cease to adore you, could never conceive such a dreadful idea.
It is against my own heart that my cowardly weakness has allured me to
the commission of a crime which, for the remainder of my life, makes me
unworthy of you."
"Have you, then, given yourself to some wretched woman?"
"Yes, I have spent two hours in the vilest debauchery, and my soul was
present only to be the witness of my sadness, of my remorse, of my
unworthiness."
"Sadness and remorse! Oh, my poor friend! I believe it. But it is my
fault; I alone ought to suffer; it is I who must beg you to forgive me."
Her tears made mine flow again.
"Divine soul," I said, "the reproaches you are addressing to yourself
increase twofold the gravity of my crime. You would never have been
guilty of any wrong against me if I had been really worthy of your
love."
I felt deeply the truth of my words.
We spent the remainder of the day apparently quiet and composed,
concealing our sadness in the depths of our hearts. She was curious to
know all the circumstances of my miserable adventure, and, accepting it
as an expiation, I related them to her. Full of kindness, she assured me
that we were bound to ascribe that accident to fate, and that the same
thing might have happened to the best of men. She added that I was more
to be pitied than condemned, and that she did not love me less. We both
were certain that we would seize the first favourable opportunity, she
of obtaining her pardon, I of atoning for my crime, by giving each other
new and complete proofs of our mutual ardour. But Heaven in its justice
had ordered differently, and I was cruelly punished for my disgusting
debauchery.
On the third day, as I got up in the morning, an awful pricking
announced the horrid state into which the wretched Melulla had thrown
me. I was thunderstruck! And when I came to think of the misery which I
might have caused if, during the last three days, I had obtained some
new favour from my lovely mistress, I was on the point of going mad.
What would have been her feelings if I had made her unhappy for the
remainder of her life! Would anyone, then, knowing the whole case, have
condemned me if I had destroyed my own life in order to deliver myself
from everlasting remorse? No, for the man who kills himself from sheer
despair, thus performing upon himself the execution of the sentence he
would have deserved at the hands of justice cannot be blamed either by a
virtuous philosopher or by a tolerant Christian. But of one thing I am
quite certain: if such a misfortune had happened, I should have
committed suicide.
Overwhelmed with grief by the discovery I had just made, but thinking
that I should get rid of the inconvenience as I had done three times
before, I prepared myself for a strict diet, which would restore my
health in six weeks without anyone having any suspicion of my illness,
but I soon found out that I had not seen the end of my troubles; Melulla
had communicated to my system all the poisons which corrupt the source
of life. I was acquainted with an elderly doctor of great experience in
those matters; I consulted him, and he promised to set me to rights in
two months; he proved as good as his word. At the beginning of September
I found myself in good health, and it was about that time that I
returned to Venice.
The first thing I resolved on, as soon as I discovered the state I was
in, was to confess everything to Madame F----. I did not wish to wait
for the time when a compulsory confession would have made her blush for
her weakness, and given her cause to think of the fearful consequences
which might have been the result of her passion for me. Her affection
was too dear to me to run the risk of losing it through a want of
confidence in her. Knowing her heart, her candour, and the generosity
which had prompted her to say that I was more to be pitied than blamed,
I thought myself bound to prove by my sincerity that I deserved her
esteem.
I told her candidly my position and the state I had been thrown in, when
I thought of the dreadful consequences it might have had for her. I saw
her shudder and tremble, and she turned pale with fear when I added that
I would have avenged her by killing myself.
"Villainous, infamous Melulla!" she exclaimed.
And I repeated those words, but turning them against myself when I
realized all I had sacrificed through the most disgusting weakness.
Everyone in Corfu knew of my visit to the wretched Melulla, and everyone
seemed surprised to see the appearance of health on my countenance; for
many were the victims that she had treated like me.
My illness was not my only sorrow; I had others which, although of a
different nature, were not less serious. It was written in the book of
fate that I should return to Venice a simple ensign as when I left: the
general did not keep his word, and the bastard son of a nobleman was
promoted to the lieutenancy instead of myself. From that moment the
military profession, the one most subject to arbitrary despotism,
inspired me with disgust, and I determined to give it up. But I had
another still more important motive for sorrow in the fickleness of
fortune which had completely turned against me. I remarked that, from
the time of my degradation with Melulla, every kind of misfortune befell
me. The greatest of all--that which I felt most, but which I had the
good sense to try and consider a favour--was that a week before the
departure of the army M. D---- R---- took me again for his adjutant, and
M. F---- had to engage another in my place. On the occasion of that
change Madame F told me, with an appearance of regret, that in Venice we
could not, for many reasons, continue our intimacy. I begged her to
spare me the reasons, as I foresaw that they would only throw
humiliation upon me. I began to discover that the goddess I had
worshipped was, after all, a poor human being like all other women, and
to think that I should have been very foolish to give up my life for
her. I probed in one day the real worth of her heart, for she told me, I
cannot recollect in reference to what, that I excited her pity. I saw
clearly that she no longer loved me; pity is a debasing feeling which
cannot find a home in a heart full of love, for that dreary sentiment is
too near a relative of contempt. Since that time I never found myself
alone with Madame F----. I loved her still; I could easily have made her
blush, but I did not do it.
As soon as we reached Venice she became attached to M. F---- R----, whom
she loved until death took him from her. She was unhappy enough to lose
her sight twenty years after. I believe she is still alive.
During the last two months of my stay in Corfu, I learned the most
bitter and important lessons. In after years I often derived useful
hints from the experience I acquired at that time.
Before my adventure with the worthless Melulla, I enjoyed good health, I
was rich, lucky at play, liked by everybody, beloved by the most lovely
woman of Corfu. When I spoke, everybody would listen and admire my wit;
my words were taken for oracles, and everyone coincided with me in
everything. After my fatal meeting with the courtezan I rapidly lost my
health, my money, my credit; cheerfulness, consideration, wit,
everything, even the faculty of eloquence vanished with fortune. I would
talk, but people knew that I was unfortunate, and I no longer interested
or convinced my hearers. The influence I had over Madame F---- faded
away little by little, and, almost without her knowing it, the lovely
woman became completely indifferent to me.
I left Corfu without money, although I had sold or pledged everything I
had of any value. Twice I had reached Corfu rich and happy, twice I left
it poor and miserable. But this time I had contracted debts which I have
never paid, not through want of will but through carelessness.
Rich and in good health, everyone received me with open arms; poor and
looking sick, no one shewed me any consideration. With a full purse and
the tone of a conqueror, I was thought witty, amusing; with an empty
purse and a modest air, all I said appeared dull and insipid. If I had
become rich again, how soon I would have been again accounted the eighth
wonder of the world! Oh, men! oh, fortune! Everyone avoided me as if the
ill luck which crushed me down was infectious.
We left Corfu towards the end of September, with five galleys, two
galeasses, and several smaller vessels, under the command of M. Renier.
We sailed along the shores of the Adriatic, towards the north of the
gulf, where there are a great many harbours, and we put in one of them
every night. I saw Madame F---- every evening; she always came with her
husband to take supper on board our galeass. We had a fortunate voyage,
and cast anchor in the harbour of Venice on the 14th of October, 1745,
and after having performed quarantine on board our ships, we landed on
the 25th of November. Two months afterwards, the galeasses were set
aside altogether. The use of these vessels could be traced very far back
in ancient times; their maintenance was very expensive, and they were
useless. A galeass had the frame of a frigate with the rowing apparatus
of the galley, and when there was no wind, five hundred slaves had to
row.
Before simple good sense managed to prevail and to enforce the
suppression of these useless carcasses, there were long discussions in
the senate, and those who opposed the measure took their principal
ground of opposition in the necessity of respecting and conserving all
the institutions of olden times. That is the disease of persons who can
never identify themselves with the successive improvements born of
reason and experience; worthy persons who ought to be sent to China, or
to the dominions of the Grand Lama, where they would certainly be more
at home than in Europe.
That ground of opposition to all improvements, however absurd it may be,
is a very powerful one in a republic, which must tremble at the mere
idea of novelty either in important or in trifling things. Superstition
has likewise a great part to play in these conservative views.
There is one thing that the Republic of Venice will never alter: I mean
the galleys, because the Venetians truly require such vessels to ply, in
all weathers and in spite of the frequent calms, in a narrow sea, and
because they would not know what to do with the men sentenced to hard
labour.
I have observed a singular thing in Corfu, where there are often as many
as three thousand galley slaves; it is that the men who row on the
galleys, in consequence of a sentence passed upon them for some crime,
are held in a kind of opprobrium, whilst those who are there voluntarily
are, to some extent, respected. I have always thought it ought to be the
reverse, because misfortune, whatever it may be, ought to inspire some
sort of respect; but the vile fellow who condemns himself voluntarily
and as a trade to the position of a slave seems to me contemptible in
the highest degree. The convicts of the Republic, however, enjoy many
privileges, and are, in every way, better treated than the soldiers. It
very often occurs that soldiers desert and give themselves up to a
'sopracomito' to become galley slaves. In those cases, the captain who
loses a soldier has nothing to do but to submit patiently, for he would
claim the man in vain. The reason of it is that the Republic has always
believed galley slaves more necessary than soldiers. The Venetians may
perhaps now (I am writing these lines in the year 1797) begin to realize
their mistake.
A galley slave, for instance, has the privilege of stealing with
impunity. It is considered that stealing is the least crime they can be
guilty of, and that they ought to be forgiven for it.
"Keep on your guard," says the master of the galley slave; "and if you
catch him in the act of stealing, thrash him, but be careful not to
cripple him; otherwise you must pay me the one hundred ducats the man
has cost me."
A court of justice could not have a galley slave taken from a galley,
without paying the master the amount he has disbursed for the man.
As soon as I had landed in Venice, I called upon Madame Orio, but I
found the house empty. A neighbour told me that she had married the
Procurator Rosa, and had removed to his house. I went immediately to M.
Rosa and was well received. Madame Orio informed me that Nanette had
become Countess R., and was living in Guastalla with her husband.
Twenty-four years afterwards, I met her eldest son, then a distinguished
officer in the service of the Infante of Parma.
As for Marton, the grace of Heaven had touched her, and she had become a
nun in the convent at Muran. Two years afterwards, I received from her a
letter full of unction, in which she adjured me, in the name of Our
Saviour and of the Holy Virgin, never to present myself before her eyes.
She added that she was bound by Christian charity to forgive me for the
crime I had committed in seducing her, and she felt certain of the
reward of the elect, and she assured me that she would ever pray
earnestly for my conversion.
I never saw her again, but she saw me in 1754, as I will mention when we
reach that year.
I found Madame Manzoni still the same. She had predicted that I would
not remain in the military profession, and when I told her that I had
made up my mind to give it up, because I could not be reconciled to the
injustice I had experienced, she burst out laughing. She enquired about
the profession I intended to follow after giving up the army, and I
answered that I wished to become an advocate. She laughed again, saying
that it was too late. Yet I was only twenty years old.
When I called upon M. Grimani I had a friendly welcome from him, but,
having enquired after my brother Francois, he told me that he had had
him confined in Fort Saint Andre, the same to which I had been sent
before the arrival of the Bishop of Martorano.
"He works for the major there," he said; "he copies Simonetti's battle-
pieces, and the major pays him for them; in that manner he earns his
living, and is becoming a good painter."
"But he is not a prisoner?"
"Well, very much like it, for he cannot leave the fort. The major, whose
name is Spiridion, is a friend of Razetta, who could not refuse him the
pleasure of taking care of your brother."
I felt it a dreadful curse that the fatal Razetta should be the
tormentor of all my family, but I concealed my anger.
"Is my sister," I enquired, "still with him?"
"No, she has gone to your mother in Dresden."
This was good news.
I took a cordial leave of the Abbe Grimani, and I proceeded to Fort
Saint Andre. I found my brother hard at work, neither pleased nor
displeased with his position, and enjoying good health. After embracing
him affectionately, I enquired what crime he had committed to be thus a
prisoner.
"Ask the major," he said, "for I have not the faintest idea."
The major came in just then, so I gave him the military salute, and
asked by what authority he kept my brother under arrest.
"I am not accountable to you for my actions."
"That remains to be seen."
I then told my brother to take his hat, and to come and dine with me.
The major laughed, and said that he had no objection provided the
sentinel allowed him to pass.
I saw that I should only waste my time in discussion, and I left the
fort fully bent on obtaining justice.
The next day I went to the war office, where I had the pleasure of
meeting my dear Major Pelodoro, who was then commander of the Fortress
of Chiozza. I informed him of the complaint I wanted to prefer before
the secretary of war respecting my brother's arrest, and of the
resolution I had taken to leave the army. He promised me that, as soon
as the consent of the secretary for war could be obtained, he would find
a purchaser for my commission at the same price I had paid for it.
I had not long to wait. The war secretary came to the office, and
everything was settled in half an hour. He promised his consent to the
sale of my commission as soon as he ascertained the abilities of the
purchaser, and Major Spiridion happening to make his appearance in the
office while I was still there, the secretary ordered him rather
angrily, to set my brother at liberty immediately, and cautioned him not
to be guilty again of such reprehensible and arbitrary acts.
I went at once for my brother, and we lived together in furnished
lodgings.
A few days afterwards, having received my discharge and one hundred
sequins, I threw off my uniform, and found myself once more my own
master.
I had to earn my living in one way or another, and I decided for the
profession of gamester. But Dame Fortune was not of the same opinion,
for she refused to smile upon me from the very first step I took in the
career, and in less than a week I did not possess a groat. What was to
become of me? One must live, and I turned fiddler. Doctor Gozzi had
taught me well enough to enable me to scrape on the violin in the
orchestra of a theatre, and having mentioned my wishes to M. Grimani he
procured me an engagement at his own theatre of Saint Samuel, where I
earned a crown a day, and supported myself while I awaited better
things.
Fully aware of my real position, I never shewed myself in the
fashionable circles which I used to frequent before my fortune had sunk
so low. I knew that I was considered as a worthless fellow, but I did
not care. People despised me, as a matter of course; but I found comfort
in the consciousness that I was worthy of contempt. I felt humiliated by
the position to which I was reduced after having played so brilliant a
part in society; but as I kept the secret to myself I was not degraded,
even if I felt some shame. I had not exchanged my last word with Dame
Fortune, and was still in hope of reckoning with her some day, because I
was young, and youth is dear to Fortune.
CHAPTER XVII
I Turn Out A Worthless Fellow--My Good Fortune--I Become A Rich Nobleman
With an education which ought to have ensured me an honourable standing
in the world, with some intelligence, wit, good literary and scientific
knowledge, and endowed with those accidental physical qualities which
are such a good passport into society, I found myself, at the age of
twenty, the mean follower of a sublime art, in which, if great talent is
rightly admired, mediocrity is as rightly despised. I was compelled by
poverty to become a member of a musical band, in which I could expect
neither esteem nor consideration, and I was well aware that I should be
the laughing-stock of the persons who had known me as a doctor in
divinity, as an ecclesiastic, and as an officer in the army, and had
welcomed me in the highest society.
I knew all that, for I was not blind to my position; but contempt, the
only thing to which I could not have remained indifferent, never shewed
itself anywhere under a form tangible enough for me to have no doubt of
my being despised, and I set it at defiance, because I was satisfied
that contempt is due only to cowardly, mean actions, and I was conscious
that I had never been guilty of any. As to public esteem, which I had
ever been anxious to secure, my ambition was slumbering, and satisfied
with being my own master I enjoyed my independence without puzzling my
head about the future. I felt that in my first profession, as I was not
blessed with the vocation necessary to it, I should have succeeded only
by dint of hypocrisy, and I should have been despicable in my own
estimation, even if I had seen the purple mantle on my shoulders, for
the greatest dignities cannot silence a man's own conscience. If, on the
other hand, I had continued to seek fortune in a military career, which
is surrounded by a halo of glory, but is otherwise the worst of
professions for the constant self-abnegation, for the complete surrender
of one's will which passive obedience demands, I should have required a
patience to which I could not lay any claim, as every kind of injustice
was revolting to me, and as I could not bear to feel myself dependent.
Besides, I was of opinion that a man's profession, whatever it might be,
ought to supply him with enough money to satisfy all his wants; and the
very poor pay of an officer would never have been sufficient to cover my
expenses, because my education had given me greater wants than those of
officers in general. By scraping my violin I earned enough to keep
myself without requiring anybody's assistance, and I have always thought
that the man who can support himself is happy. I grant that my
profession was not a brilliant one, but I did not mind it, and, calling
prejudices all the feelings which rose in my breast against myself, I
was not long in sharing all the habits of my degraded comrades. When the
play was over, I went with them to the drinking-booth, which we often
left intoxicated to spend the night in houses of ill-fame. When we
happened to find those places already tenanted by other men, we forced
them by violence to quit the premises, and defrauded the miserable
victims of prostitution of the mean salary the law allows them, after
compelling them to yield to our brutality. Our scandalous proceedings
often exposed us to the greatest danger.
We would very often spend the whole night rambling about the city,
inventing and carrying into execution the most impertinent, practical
jokes. One of our favourite pleasures was to unmoor the patricians'
gondolas, and to let them float at random along the canals, enjoying by
anticipation all the curses that gondoliers would not fail to indulge
in. We would rouse up hurriedly, in the middle of the night, an honest
midwife, telling her to hasten to Madame So-and-so, who, not being even
pregnant, was sure to tell her she was a fool when she called at the
house. We did the same with physicians, whom we often sent half dressed
to some nobleman who was enjoying excellent health. The priests fared no
better; we would send them to carry the last sacraments to married men
who were peacefully slumbering near their wives, and not thinking of
extreme unction.
We were in the habit of cutting the wires of the bells in every house,
and if we chanced to find a gate open we would go up the stairs in the
dark, and frighten the sleeping inmates by telling them very loudly that
the house door was not closed, after which we would go down, making as
much noise as we could, and leave the house with the gate wide open.
During a very dark night we formed a plot to overturn the large marble
table of St. Angelo's Square, on which it was said that in the days of
the League of Cambray the commissaries of the Republic were in the habit
of paying the bounty to the recruits who engaged to fight under the
standard of St. Mark--a circumstance which secured for the table a sort
of public veneration.
Whenever we could contrive to get into a church tower we thought it
great fun to frighten all the parish by ringing the alarm bell, as if
some fire had broken out; but that was not all, we always cut the bell
ropes, so that in the morning the churchwardens had no means of
summoning the faithful to early mass. Sometimes we would cross the
canal, each of us in a different gondola, and take to our heels without
paying as soon as we landed on the opposite side, in order to make the
gondoliers run after us.
The city was alive with complaints, and we laughed at the useless search
made by the police to find out those who disturbed the peace of the
inhabitants. We took good care to be careful, for if we had been
discovered we stood a very fair chance of being sent to practice rowing
at the expense of the Council of Ten.
We were seven, and sometimes eight, because, being much attached to my
brother Francois, I gave him a share now and then in our nocturnal
orgies. But at last fear put a stop to our criminal jokes, which in
those days I used to call only the frolics of young men. This is the
amusing adventure which closed our exploits.
In every one of the seventy-two parishes of the city of Venice, there is
a large public-house called 'magazzino'. It remains open all night, and
wine is retailed there at a cheaper price than in all the other drinking
houses. People can likewise eat in the 'magazzino', but they must obtain
what they want from the pork butcher near by, who has the exclusive sale
of eatables, and likewise keeps his shop open throughout the night. The
pork butcher is usually a very poor cook, but as he is cheap, poor
people are willingly satisfied with him, and these resorts are
considered very useful to the lower class. The nobility, the merchants,
even workmen in good circumstances, are never seen in the 'magazzino',
for cleanliness is not exactly worshipped in such places. Yet there are
a few private rooms which contain a table surrounded with benches, in
which a respectable family or a few friends can enjoy themselves in a
decent way.
It was during the Carnival of 1745, after midnight; we were, all the
eight of us, rambling about together with our masks on, in quest of some
new sort of mischief to amuse us, and we went into the magazzino of the
parish of the Holy Cross to get something to drink. We found the public
room empty, but in one of the private chambers we discovered three men
quietly conversing with a young and pretty woman, and enjoying their
wine.
Our chief, a noble Venetian belonging to the Balbi family, said to us,
"It would be a good joke to carry off those three blockheads, and to
keep the pretty woman in our possession." He immediately explained his
plan, and under cover of our masks we entered their room, Balbi at the
head of us. Our sudden appearance rather surprised the good people, but
you may fancy their astonishment when they heard Balbi say to them:
"Under penalty of death, and by order of the Council of Ten, I command
you to follow us immediately, without making the slightest noise; as to
you, my good woman, you need not be frightened, you will be escorted to
your house." When he had finished his speech, two of us got hold of the
woman to take her where our chief had arranged beforehand, and the
others seized the three poor fellows, who were trembling all over, and
had not the slightest idea of opposing any resistance.
The waiter of the magazzino came to be paid, and our chief gave him what
was due, enjoining silence under penalty of death. We took our three
prisoners to a large boat. Balbi went to the stern, ordered the boatman
to stand at the bow, and told him that he need not enquire where we were
going, that he would steer himself whichever way he thought fit. Not one
of us knew where Balbi wanted to take the three poor devils.
He sails all along the canal, gets out of it, takes several turnings,
and in a quarter of an hour, we reach Saint George where Balbi lands our
prisoners, who are delighted to find themselves at liberty. After this,
the boatman is ordered to take us to Saint Genevieve, where we land,
after paying for the boat.
We proceed at once to Palombo Square, where my brother and another of
our band were waiting for us with our lovely prisoner, who was crying.
"Do not weep, my beauty," says Balbi to her, "we will not hurt you. We
intend only to take some refreshment at the Rialto, and then we will
take you home in safety."
"Where is my husband?"
"Never fear; you shall see him again to-morrow."
Comforted by that promise, and as gentle as a lamb, she follows us to
the "Two Swords." We ordered a good fire in a private room, and,
everything we wanted to eat and to drink having been brought in, we send
the waiter away, and remain alone. We take off our masks, and the sight
of eight young, healthy faces seems to please the beauty we had so
unceremoniously carried off. We soon manage to reconcile her to her fate
by the gallantry of our proceedings; encouraged by a good supper and by
the stimulus of wine, prepared by our compliments and by a few kisses,
she realizes what is in store for her, and does not seem to have any
unconquerable objection. Our chief, as a matter of right, claims the
privilege of opening the ball; and by dint of sweet words he overcomes
the very natural repugnance she feels at consummating the sacrifice in
so numerous company. She, doubtless, thinks the offering agreeable, for,
when I present myself as the priest appointed to sacrifice a second time
to the god of love, she receives me almost with gratitude, and she
cannot conceal her joy when she finds out that she is destined to make
us all happy. My brother Francois alone exempted himself from paying the
tribute, saying that he was ill, the only excuse which could render his
refusal valid, for we had established as a law that every member of our
society was bound to do whatever was done by the others.
After that fine exploit, we put on our masks, and, the bill being paid,
escorted the happy victim to Saint Job, where she lived, and did not
leave her till we had seen her safe in her house, and the street door
closed.
My readers may imagine whether we felt inclined to laugh when the
charming creature bade us good night, thanking us all with perfect good
faith!
Two days afterwards, our nocturnal orgy began to be talked of. The young
woman's husband was a weaver by trade, and so were his two friends. They
joined together to address a complaint to the Council of Ten. The
complaint was candidly written and contained nothing but the truth, but
the criminal portion of the truth was veiled by a circumstance which
must have brought a smile on the grave countenances of the judges, and
highly amused the public at large: the complaint setting forth that the
eight masked men had not rendered themselves guilty of any act
disagreeable to the wife. It went on to say that the two men who had
carried her off had taken her to such a place, where they had, an hour
later, been met by the other six, and that they had all repaired to the
"Two Swords," where they had spent an hour in drinking. The said lady
having been handsomely entertained by the eight masked men, had been
escorted to her house, where she had been politely requested to excuse
the joke perpetrated upon her husband. The three plaintiffs had not been
able to leave the island of Saint George until day-break, and the
husband, on reaching his house, had found his wife quietly asleep in her
bed. She had informed him of all that had happened; she complained of
nothing but of the great fright she had experienced on account of her
husband, and on that count she entreated justice and the punishment of
the guilty parties.
That complaint was comic throughout, for the three rogues shewed
themselves very brave in writing, stating that they would certainly not
have given way so easily if the dread authority of the council had not
been put forth by the leader of the band. The document produced three
different results; in the first place, it amused the town; in the
second, all the idlers of Venice went to Saint Job to hear the account
of the adventure from the lips of the heroine herself, and she got many
presents from her numerous visitors; in the third place, the Council of
Ten offered a reward of five hundred ducats to any person giving such
information as would lead to the arrest of the perpetrators of the
practical joke, even if the informer belonged to the band, provided he
was not the leader.
The offer of that reward would have made us tremble if our leader,
precisely the one who alone had no interest in turning informer, had not
been a patrician. The rank of Balbi quieted my anxiety at once, because
I knew that, even supposing one of us were vile enough to betray our
secret for the sake of the reward, the tribunal would have done nothing
in order not to implicate a patrician. There was no cowardly traitor
amongst us, although we were all poor; but fear had its effect, and our
nocturnal pranks were not renewed.
Three or four months afterwards the chevalier Nicolas Iron, then one of
the inquisitors, astonished me greatly by telling me the whole story,
giving the names of all the actors. He did not tell me whether any one
of the band had betrayed the secret, and I did not care to know; but I
could clearly see the characteristic spirit of the aristocracy, for
which the 'solo mihi' is the supreme law.
Towards the middle of April of the year 1746 M. Girolamo Cornaro, the
eldest son of the family Cornaro de la Reine, married a daughter of the
house of Soranzo de St. Pol, and I had the honour of being present at
the wedding--as a fiddler. I played the violin in one of the numerous
bands engaged for the balls which were given for three consecutive days
in the Soranzo Palace.
On the third day, towards the end of the dancing, an hour before day-
break, feeling tired, I left the orchestra abruptly; and as I was going
down the stairs I observed a senator, wearing his red robes, on the
point of getting into a gondola. In taking his handkerchief out of his
pocket he let a letter drop on the ground. I picked it up, and coming up
to him just as he was going down the steps I handed it to him. He
received it with many thanks, and enquired where I lived. I told him,
and he insisted upon my coming with him in the gondola saying that he
would leave me at my house. I accepted gratefully, and sat down near
him. A few minutes afterwards he asked me to rub his left arm, which, he
said, was so benumbed that he could not feel it. I rubbed it with all my
strength, but he told me in a sort of indistinct whisper that the
numbness was spreading all along the left side, and that he was dying.
I was greatly frightened; I opened the curtain, took the lantern, and
found him almost insensible, and the mouth drawn on one side. I
understood that he was seized with an apoplectic stroke, and called out
to the gondoliers to land me at once, in order to procure a surgeon to
bleed the patient.
I jumped out of the gondola, and found myself on the very spot where
three years before I had taught Razetta such a forcible lesson; I
enquired for a surgeon at the first coffee-house, and ran to the house
that was pointed out to me. I knocked as hard as I could; the door was
at last opened, and I made the surgeon follow me in his dressing-gown as
far as the gondola, which was waiting; he bled the senator while I was
tearing my shirt to make the compress and the bandage.
The operation being performed, I ordered the gondoliers to row as fast
as possible, and we soon reached St. Marina; the servants were roused
up, and taking the sick man out of the gondola we carried him to his bed
almost dead.
Taking everything upon myself, I ordered a servant to hurry out for a
physician, who came in a short time, and ordered the patient to be bled
again, thus approving the first bleeding prescribed by me. Thinking I
had a right to watch the sick man, I settled myself near his bed to give
him every care he required.
An hour later, two noblemen, friends of the senator, came in, one a few
minutes after the other. They were in despair; they had enquired about
the accident from the gondoliers, and having been told that I knew more
than they did, they loaded me with questions which I answered. They did
not know who I was, and did not like to ask me; whilst I thought it
better to preserve a modest silence.
The patient did not move; his breathing alone shewed that he was still
alive; fomentations were constantly applied, and the priest who had been
sent for, and was of very little use under such circumstances, seemed to
be there only to see him die. All visitors were sent away by my advice,
and the two noblemen and myself were the only persons in the sick man's
room. At noon we partook silently of some dinner which was served in the
sick room.
In the evening one of the two friends told me that if I had any business
to attend to I could go, because they would both pass the night on a
mattress near the patient.
"And I, sir," I said, "will remain near his bed in this arm-chair, for
if I went away the patient would die, and he will live as long as I am
near him."
This sententious answer struck them with astonishment, as I expected it
would, and they looked at each other in great surprise.
We had supper, and in the little conversation we had I gathered the
information that the senator, their friend, was M. de Bragadin, the only
brother of the procurator of that name. He was celebrated in Venice not
only for his eloquence and his great talents as a statesman, but also
for the gallantries of his youth. He had been very extravagant with
women, and more than one of them had committed many follies for him. He
had gambled and lost a great deal, and his brother was his most bitter
enemy, because he was infatuated with the idea that he had tried to
poison him. He had accused him of that crime before the Council of Ten,
which, after an investigation of eight months, had brought in a verdict
of not guilty: but that just sentence, although given unanimously by
that high tribunal, had not had the effect of destroying his brother's
prejudices against him.
M. de Bragadin, who was perfectly innocent of such a crime and oppressed
by an unjust brother who deprived him of half of his income, spent his
days like an amiable philosopher, surrounded by his friends, amongst
whom were the two noblemen who were then watching him; one belonged to
the Dandolo family, the other was a Barbaro, and both were excellent
men. M. de Bragadin was handsome, learned, cheerful, and most kindly
disposed; he was then about fifty years old.
The physician who attended him was named Terro; he thought, by some
peculiar train of reasoning, that he could cure him by applying a
mercurial ointment to the chest, to which no one raised any objection.
The rapid effect of the remedy delighted the two friends, but it
frightened me, for in less than twenty-four hours the patient was
labouring under great excitement of the brain. The physician said that
he had expected that effect, but that on the following day the remedy
would act less on the brain, and diffuse its beneficial action through
the whole of the system, which required to be invigorated by a proper
equilibrium in the circulation of the fluids.
At midnight the patient was in a state of high fever, and in a fearful
state of irritation. I examined him closely, and found him hardly able
to breathe. I roused up his two friends; and declared that in my opinion
the patient would soon die unless the fatal ointment was at once
removed. And without waiting for their answer, I bared his chest, took
off the plaster, washed the skin carefully with lukewarm water, and in
less than three minutes he breathed freely and fell into a quiet sleep.
Delighted with such a fortunate result, we lay down again.
The physician came very early in the morning, and was much pleased to
see his patient so much better, but when M. Dandolo informed him of what
had been done, he was angry, said it was enough to kill his patient, and
asked who had been so audacious as to destroy the effect of his
prescription. M. de Bragadin, speaking for the first time, said to him--
"Doctor, the person who has delivered me from your mercury, which was
killing me, is a more skilful physician than you;" and, saying these
words, he pointed to me.
It would be hard to say who was the more astonished: the doctor, when he
saw an unknown young man, whom he must have taken for an impostor,
declared more learned than himself; or I, when I saw myself transformed
into a physician, at a moment's notice. I kept silent, looking very
modest, but hardly able to control my mirth, whilst the doctor was
staring at me with a mixture of astonishment and of spite, evidently
thinking me some bold quack who had tried to supplant him. At last,
turning towards M. de Bragadin, he told him coldly that he would leave
him in my hands; he was taken at his word, he went away, and behold! I
had become the physician of one of the most illustrious members of the
Venetian Senate! I must confess that I was very glad of it, and I told
my patient that a proper diet was all he needed, and that nature,
assisted by the approaching fine season, would do the rest.
The dismissed physician related the affair through the town, and, as M.
de Bragadin was rapidly improving, one of his relations, who came to see
him, told him that everybody was astonished at his having chosen for his
physician a fiddler from the theatre; but the senator put a stop to his
remarks by answering that a fiddler could know more than all the doctors
in Venice, and that he owed his life to me.
The worthy nobleman considered me as his oracle, and his two friends
listened to me with the deepest attention. Their infatuation encouraging
me, I spoke like a learned physician, I dogmatized, I quoted authors
whom I had never read.
M. de Bragadin, who had the weakness to believe in the occult sciences,
told me one day that, for a young man of my age, he thought my learning
too extensive, and that he was certain I was the possessor of some
supernatural endowment. He entreated me to tell him the truth.
What extraordinary things will sometimes occur from mere chance, or from
the force of circumstances! Unwilling to hurt his vanity by telling him
that he was mistaken, I took the wild resolution of informing him, in
the presence of his two friends, that I possessed a certain numeral
calculus which gave answers (also in numbers), to any questions I liked
to put.
M. de Bragadin said that it was Solomon's key, vulgarly called
cabalistic science, and he asked me from whom I learnt it.
"From an old hermit," I answered, "who lives on the Carpegna Mountain,
and whose acquaintance I made quite by chance when I was a prisoner in
the Spanish army."
"The hermit," remarked the senator, "has without informing you of it,
linked an invisible spirit to the calculus he has taught you, for simple
numbers can not have the power of reason. You possess a real treasure,
and you may derive great advantages from it."
"I do not know," I said, "in what way I could make my science useful,
because the answers given by the numerical figures are often so obscure
that I have felt discouraged, and I very seldom tried to make any use of
my calculus. Yet, it is very true that, if I had not formed my pyramid,
I never should have had the happiness of knowing your excellency."
"How so?"
"On the second day, during the festivities at the Soranzo Palace, I
enquired of my oracle whether I would meet at the ball anyone whom I
should not care to see. The answer I obtained was this: 'Leave the ball-
room precisely at four o'clock.' I obeyed implicitly, and met your
excellency."
The three friends were astounded. M. Dandolo asked me whether I would
answer a question he would ask, the interpretation of which would belong
only to him, as he was the only person acquainted with the subject of the question. |
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