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[page 40:]
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Original.
THE
VISIONARY.
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Ich habe gelebt,
und geliebet. — Schiller's
Wallenstein.
I have lived, and I have
loved.
Uud [[Und]] sterbich
denn, so sterbich
doch
Durch sie — durch sie. — Goethe.
And
if I die, at least I
die
With her — with
her.
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[column 1:]
THERE is a name — a sound
—
which, above all other music, vibrates upon my ear with a delicious,
yet
wild and solemn melody. Devoutly admired by the few who read, and
by the very few who think, it is a name not as yet, indeed, blazoned in
the escutcheon of immortality; but there, nevertheless, heralded
in character of the Tyrian fire hereafter to be rendered legible by the
breath of centuries.
It is a name, moreover, which for
reasons
intrinsically
of no weight, yet in fact conclusive, I am determined to conceal.
Nor will I, by a fictitious appellation, dishonour the memory of that
great
dead whose life was so little understood, and the received account of
whose
melancholy end is a tissue of malevolent blasphemies. I am
not of that class of writers who, making some euphonous cognomen the
key-stone
to the arch of their narrations, can no more conclude without the one
than
the architect without the other.
Ill-fated and mysterious man! —
bewildered
in the brilliancy of thine own imagination, and fallen in the flames of
thine own youth! Again in fancy I behold thee. Once more
thy form hath risen before me — not, oh not as thou art
— in the cold valley and shadow; but as thou should'st be —
squandering
away a life of magnificent meditation in that city of dim visions,
thine
own Venice, which is a star-beloved city of the sea, and the wide
windows
of whose Paladian palaces, gleaming with the fires of midnight revelry,
look down with a sad and bitter meaning upon the secrets of her silent
waters.
Yes! I repeat it — "as thou should'st
be." There
are surely other worlds than this — other thoughts than the thoughts of
the multitude — I would almost venture to say other speculations than
the
speculations of the sophist. Who, then, shall call thy conduct into
question? — who blame thee for thy visionary
hours —
or declare those occupations a wasting away of life, which were but the
overflowings of thine everlasting energies?
It was at Venice, beneath the covered
archway there
called
the "Ponte di Sospiri," that met me, for the third or fourth time, the
person
of whom I speak. It is, however, with a confused recollection,
that
I recall to mind the circumstances of that meeting — yet I
remember
— ah! how should I forget! the deep
midnight —
the Bridge of Sighs — the beauty of woman, and the Demon of Romance who
stalked up and down the narrow canal.
It was a night of unusual gloom. The great
clock
of the piazza had sounded the fifth hour of the Italian evening. The
square of the Campanile lay silent and deserted, and the lights in
the old Ducal palace were dying fast away. I was returning home
from
the Piazetta, by way of the Grand Canal. But as my gondola
arrived
opposite the mouth of the canal San Marco, a female voice from its
recesses
burst suddenly upon the night in one wild, hysterical, and
long-continued
shriek.
Startled at the sound, I sprang upon
my feet,
while
my gondolier, letting slip his oar, lost it, in the pitchy [column
2:] darkness
beyond
a chance of recovery, and we were left at the mercy of the current,
which
here sets from the greater into the smaller channel. Like some
huge
bird of sable plumage, we were drifting slowly down towards the Bridge
of Sighs, when a thousand flambeaux flashing from the windows and down
the staircases of the Ducal palace turned, all at once, that deep gloom
into a ghastly and supernatural day.
A child slipping from the arms of its own
mother, had
fallen from an upper window of the lofty structure into the deep and
dim
canal. The quiet waters had closed placidly over their victim, and
although my own gondola was the only one in sight, many a stout
swimmer
already in the stream, was seeking in vain upon the surface the
treasure
which, alas! was only to be found in the abyss.
Upon
the
broad black marble flag-stones at the entrance of the palace, and a few
steps above the water, stood a figure which none who then saw, can ever
since have forgotten. It was the Marchesa Bianca, "the adoration of
all Venice — the gayest of the gay;" but, alas! the young wife of the
old and intriguing Mentoni and the
mother — the mother
of that fair child; her first and only one — who now, deep beneath the
water, was thinking in bitterness of heart upon her gentle caresses,
and
exhausting its little life in struggles to call upon her name.
She stood alone. Her small, bare, and
silvery
feet
gleamed in the black mirror of marble beneath. Her hair partly
loosened, for the night, from its ball-room array,
clustered amid a shower of diamonds, round and round her classical
head
in curls like the young hyacinth. A snowy-white, and
gauze-like
drapery seemed to be nearly the sole covering to her delicate form; but
the midsummer, and midnight air was hot, sullen, and still — and no
motion — no shadow of motion in that statue-like form itself, stirred
even the folds of that
raiment
of very vapour which hung around it as the heavy marble hangs around
the
weeping Niobe.
Her large lustrous eyes
were
not however bent downwards to the grave where her dearest hope lay
buried; but riveted — ah! strange to say! in a widely-different
direction. The prison of the
city is, I think, the fairest building in all Venice; but
how
could that lady gaze so fixedly upon it, when her
only child lay stifling
at her feet? Yon dark, gloomy niche yawns right
opposite
her chamber-window — what then could there possibly be in its shadows
—
in its architecture, that
the
Marchesa di Mentoni had not wondered at a thousand times before?
Nonsense! — Who does not remember that, at such a time as this, the
eye,
like a shattered mirror, multiplies the images of its sorrow, and sees
in a million far-off places, the woe which is close at hand?
Many steps above the Marchesa, and within
the arch of
the
water-gate, stood, in full dress, the Satyr-like figure of Mentoni
himself. He was occasionally occupied in thrumming a guitar, and seemed
ennuied to the very death, as, at intervals, he gave directions for the
recovery
of his child. [page 41:]
Stupified, and bewildered, I had no power to move
from the upright position I had assumed upon first hearing the shriek,
and must have presented to the eyes of the agitated group a spectral
and
ominous appearance, as with my pale countenance and rigid limbs, I
drifted
down among them in that funeral gondola.
All efforts were in vain. Many of
the most
energetic
in the search were relaxing their endeavours, and yielding to a gloomy
sorrow.
There seemed but little hope for the child — how much less then
for the mother! But now, from the dark niche
which has been before mentioned as forming part of the old
Republican
prison, and fronting the lattice of the Marchesa, a figure muffled
in
a cloak, stepped out within reach of the light, and pausing a moment
upon
the verge of the giddy height, plunged headlong into the canal. As in
an instant afterwards he stood with the still living and
breathing
child within his grasp, upon the marble flag-stones by the side of the
Marchesa —
his cloak heavy with the water, became unfastened, and,falling
in folds about his feet, discovered to
the
wonder-stricken
spectators, the graceful person of a very young man, with
whose
name the greater part of Europe was then ringing.
No word spoke the stranger. But the
Marchesa! She will now receive her child — she will press it to her
heart. She
will
cling to its little form, and smother it with her caresses. — Alas!
another's
arms have taken it away, and borne it afar-off unnoticed into the
palace. And the Marchesa! a tear is gathering into her eyes — those
eyes which like Pliny's
own Acanthus,
are "soft and almost liquid." Her lip — her beautiful lip trembles; the
entire woman thrills throughout the soul,
and
the statue has started into life! The pallor of the marble
countenance —
the swelling of the marble bosom — the very purity of the marble feet,
is suddenly flushed over with a tide of ungovernable crimson, and a
slight shudder quivers about the entire frame, like a soft wind at
Napoli, about the rich lilies in the grass.
Why should that lady blush? To this
demand
there is no answer, except that having left in the haste and
terror
of a mother's heart, the privacy of her own bureau, she has
neglected
to enthral her feet in their tiny slippers, and utterly forgotten to
throw
over her Venetian shoulders that drapery which is their due. What
other possible cause could there have been for her so blushing? — for
the glance of those large appealing eyes? — for the unusual tumult
of that throbbing bosom? — for the convulsive pressure of
that trembling hand which fell, as Mentoni turned into
the
palace, accidentally, upon the hand of the stranger? — or for the low —
the singularly low tone of those
unmeaning
words which the lady uttered, and departed?
"Thou
hast conquered," she said, or the murmurs of the water deceived me —
"thou hast conquered, one hour after sun-rise — let
it be."
The tumult had subsided — the lights had
died away
within
the Piazzo, and the stranger whom I now recognized, stood alone upon
the
flags. He shook with inconceivable agitation, and his eye glanced
around in search of a gondola. I could do no less than offer him
the service of my own; in a hurried manner he accepted my civility. An
oar was
obtained at the water-gate, and as we passed together to his residence,
he
rapidly recovered his self-possession, and spoke of our former
slight
acquaintance in terms of great apparent cordiality.
There are some subjects upon which I take
pleasure in
being
minute. The person of the stranger — let me call him by this
title,
who to all the world was still a stranger — the person of the stranger
is one of these subjects. In height, he might have been below
rather
than above the medium size; although there were moments of
intense
passion when his frame actually expanded, and belied the
assertion. The light, almost [column 2:] slender symmetry of
his figure, promised more of that
ready activity which he evinced at the Bridge of Sighs, than of that
Herculean
strength which he has been known to wield without an effort, upon
occasions
of more dangerous emergency. With the mouth and chin of a deity —
a nose like those delicate creations of the mind to be found only in
the
medallions of the Hebrew, full eyes,
whose shadows varied from pure hazel to intense and brilliant jet, and
a profusion of glossy black hair, from which a forehead rather low than
otherwise,
gleamed forth, at intervals, all light and ivory. His were features
than
which I have seen none more classically regular, except perhaps the
marble
ones of the emperor Commodus.
Yet his countenance was
nevertheless,
one of those which all men have seen at some period of their lives, and
have never afterwards seen again. It had no peculiar — I wish to be
prefectly understood — no
settled, predominant expression, to be fastened upon the memory; a
countenance seen, and instantly forgotten — but forgotten with a vague,
intense,
and
never-ceasing desire of recalling it to mind. Not that the spirit
of each rapid passion failed, at any time to throw its own distinct
image
upon the mirror of that face; but that the mirror, mirror-like,
retained
no vestige of the passion when the passion had departed.
Uponparting from him on the night of our
adventure, he
solicited
me in an urgent manner, to call upon him very
early
the next morning. Shortly after sun-rise, I found myself
accordingly
at his Palazzo, one of those huge piles of gloomy, yet fantastic
grandeur which tower above the waters of the Grand Canal. I was shown
up a broad winding stair-case of mosaics, into
an apartment whose unparalleled splendour burst through the opening
door
with an actual glare, making me sick and dizzy with luxuriousness.
I knew my acquaintance to be wealthy.
Report had
spoken of his possessions in terms which I had even ventured to call
terms
of ridiculous exaggeration; but as I gazed about me, I could with
difficulty
bring myself to believe that the wealth of any subject in Europe could
have supplied the far more than imperial magnificence which burned and
blazed around.
Although as I say, the sun had risen, yet
the room
was
still brilliantly lighted up, and I judged from this circumstance, as
well as from an air of apparent exhaustion in the countenance of my
friend, that
he had not retired to bed during the whole of the preceding
night.
In the architecture and embellishments of the chamber, the evident
design
was to dazzle and astound. Little attention had been paid to
the decora of what is technically called "keeping," or to
the
proprieties of nationality. The eye wandered from object to object, and
rested upon none; neither the "Grotesques" of the Greek
painters,
nor the sculptures of the best Italian days, nor the huge carvings of
untutored
Egypt.
Rich draperies in every part of the room
trembled to the
vibration
of low melancholy music, whose unseen origin undoubtedly lay in the
recesses
of the red coral trellice-work which tapestried the ceiling. The
senses were oppressed by mingled and conflicting perfumes, reeking up
from
strange Arabesque censers which seemed actually endued with a
monstrous
vitality as their particoloured fires writhed up and down, and around
about
their extravagant proportions. The rays of the rising sun
poured
in upon the whole, through windows formed each of a single huge pane of
crimson-tinted
glass, and glancing to and fro in a thousand reflections from
curtains
which rolled from their cornices like streams of molten silver, mingled
at length, fitfully with the artificial light,
and lay weltering and subdued upon a carpet of rich,
liquid-looking
cloth of gold.
Here then had the hand of genius been
at work. —
A wilderness — a chaos of beauty was before me; a [page 42:]
sense of
dreamy
and incoherent grandeur took possession of my soul, and I remained
speechless.
"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed the proprietor, pointing me to a
seat, and throwing himself back upon an
ottoman.
There was, I thought, a tincture of bitterness in the laugh, and I
could not immediately reconcile
myself
to the bienseance of so singular a welcome
"Ha! ha! ha! — ha! ha!
ha!" continued he. "I see you are
surprised
at my apartment — my statues — my pictures — my originality of
conception
in architecture — in upholstery; absolutely drunk with my
magnificence! Ha! ha! ha! pardon me; my dear sir, pardon me — I must
laugh or die — perhaps both," continued he, after a pause. "Do you
know,
however," said he, musingly, "that at
Sparta, which is now Palaochori — at Sparta, I say — to the west
of the citadel, among the scarce visible ruins, is a kind of socle,
upon which are still visible the letters [[Greek text:]] ΛΑΣΜ [[:Greek
text]].
They are, I verily believe, part of [[Greek text:]] ΓΕΛΑΣΜΑ [[:Greek
text]].
How many divinities had altars at Sparta, and how strange that that of
Laughter should be found alone surviving! But just now, to be
sure,
I have no right to be surprized at your astonishment.
Europe
— the world, cannot rival this my regal cabinet. My other
apartments,
however, are mere matters of fact — ultras of fashionable insipidity.
This
is better than fashion — is it not? Yet this has but to be seen,
to become the rage; that is to say, with those who could afford it at
the
expense
of their entire patrimony. But I have guarded against any
such
profanation, with one exception" — (here the pallor of death rapidly
overspread
his countenance, and as rapidly spread away) — "with one exception; you
are the only human being, besides myself, who has
ever
set foot within its imperial precincts."
I bowed in acknowledgment, for the
unexpected
eccentricity
of his address and manner, had filled me with amazement, and I could
not
express in words my appreciation of what I might have construed into a
compliment.
"Here," said he, arising and leaning upon
my arm, as he
sauntered around the apartment — "here are paintings of all ages, from
the Greek painters to
Cimabue, and from Cimabue to the present hour. Many are chosen,
as
you see, with little deference to the opinions of Vertu. Here
too, are some chefs-dœuvres of the unknown great — and
there,
unfinished designs by men celebrated in their day, whose very names
the
perspicacity of the Academies has left to silence, and to me. What
think you," said he, turning as he spoke — "what think you of
this Madonna della Pieta?"
"It is Guido's own," I said, with
all the
enthusiasm
of my nature; for I had been poring intently over its surpassing
loveliness — "it is Guido's own — how could you have obtained
it? She is
undoubtedly in painting what the Venus is in sculpture!"
"Ha!" said he, thoughtfully — "the Venus! — the beautiful
Venus! — the
Venus of
Venuses! — the Venus de Medicis! — the work of Cleomenes, the son of
the
Athenian! as much as it is the work of mine own hands! — part of
the left arm, and all the right, are restorations; and in the
coquetry
of that right arm lies, I think, the quintessence of
affectation. The Apollo too! — you spoke of
Apollo! — it is a copy; there can be no reasonable doubt of
it.
Sir, I will not bow to falsity, although begrimed with age — there is no
inspiration in the boasted Apollo, and the
Antinous is worth
a dozen of it. After all, there is much in the saying of Socrates
— 'that the statuary found his statue in the block of marble.'
Michel
Angelo was not original in his couplet —"
"Non ha l'ottimo artista aleun
concetto
Chè un marmo solo in se non
circunscriva."
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It has been, or should be remarked, that in the
manner [column 2:] of
the true gentleman, we are always aware of a difference from the
bearing
of the vulgar, without being able at once precisely to determine in
what
such difference consists. Allowing the remark to have applied in
its full force to the outward demeanour of my friend, I felt it
on
that eventful morning, still more fully applicable to his moral
temperament
and character — nor could I better define that peculiarity of spirit
which
seemed to place him so essentially apart from all other human beings,
than
by calling it a habit of intense and continual thought,
pervading
even his most trivial actions, intruding upon his moments of dalliance,
and interweaving itself into his very flashes of merriment, like
adders
which writhe from out the eyes of the grinning masks in the cornices
around
the temples of Cybele.
I could not help, however, repeatedly
observing,
through
the mingled tone of levity and solemnity with which he rapidly
descanted on matters of little importance, a certain air of trepidation
— a
nervous
inquietude of manner, which appeared to me unaccountable, and at times
even filled me with alarm.
Frequently pausing in the middle
of a sentence, whose commencement he had apparently forgotten, he
seemed
to be listening, in the deepest attention, as if either in
expectation
of a visiter, or to sounds which must have had existence in
imagination
alone.
It was during one of these apparent reveries, or
pauses of
abstraction that, in turning over a page of Politian's
beautiful tragedy, the "Orfeo,"
which
lay near me upon an Ottoman, I found a passage underlined in
pencil. It is a passage near the conclusion of the third act — a
passage
of
heart-stirring pathos — a passage which, divested of its impurity,
no man could read without a thrill — no maiden without
a sigh. The whole page was blotted with fresh tears, and
upon the opposite interleaf were the following lines written, as I now
write them, in English; but in a hand so very different from the
peculiar and bold characters of my acquaintance, that I had difficulty
in
recognizing
it as his own.
Thou wast
that
all to
me, love,
For which my soul did pine —
A green isle in the sea, love —
A fountain and a shrine
All wreathed round with wild flowers,
And all the flowers were mine!
But the dream — it could not last;
Young Hope! that did'st arise
But to be overcast!
A voice from out the Future cries
"Onward!" while o'er the Past,
Dim gulf! — my spirit hovering lies,
Mute — motionless — aghast!
For alas! — alas! — with me
Ambition — all — is o'er;
"No more — no more — no more" —
(Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore,)
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,
Or the stricken eagle soar!
And all my hours are trances,
And all my nightly dreams
Are where the dark eye glances —
And where thy footstep gleams
In what ethereal dances,
By far Italian streams!
Alas! for that accursed time
They bore thee o'er the billow
From me — to titled age and crime,
And an unholy pillow — [page 43:]
From Love, and from our misty clime
Where weeps the silver willow! |
That these lines were written in English, a language with
which I had not believed their author acquainted, afforded me little
matter
for surprize. I was too well aware of the variety of his
acquirements,
as well as the strange pleasure he took in hiding them from
the world,
to be astonished at any similar discovery. But I must confess that the
place of
date of the M. S., appeared to me singular. It had been
originally
written "London," and afterwards carefully overscored; although not
so effectually as to conceal the word from a scrutinizing eye. I
repeat that this appeared to me singular — for I well remembered having
asked him if he had ever met with, some person — I think, the Marchesa
di Mentoni, who resided in England some years before her marriage — if
he had, at any time, met with her in London; and his answer led
me to understand that he had never visited Great Britain. I must
here add that I have more than once heard, but, of course, never gave
credit
to a report involving so much improbibility — that the person of whom I
write, was not only by birth, but in education an Englishman.
"There is one painting," said he, turning
to me with
evident
emotion, as I replaced the volume upon the Ottoman — "there is
one
painting which you have not seen," and throwing aside a drapery, he
discovered
a full[[-]]length portrait of the Marchesa di Mentoni.
Human art could have done no
more in the
accurate delineation
of her superhuman beauty. The same sylph-like figure which stood
before
me the preceding night, upon the steps of the Ducal palace, stood
before
me once again. But in the expression of the countenance, which
was
beaming all over with smiles, there still lurked that incomprehensible
strain of melancholy which is, I do believe,
inseparable
from the perfection of the beautiful. On a scroll which lay at
her
feet were these words — "I am waiting but for thee." Her right
arm
lay folded across her bosom, and with her left she pointed downwards to
a curiously-fashioned vase. One small, fairy foot, alone visible,
barely touched the earth — and, scarcely discernible in the
brilliant
atmosphere which seemed to encircle, and enshrine her loveliness,
floated
a pair of the most delicately-imagined silvery wings.
I glanced from
the painting to the figure of my friend, and the powerful words of
Chapman's Bussy D'Ambois, quivered instinctively upon my lips —
——— I am up
Here like a Roman statue — I will
stand
Till death hath made him marble!
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"Come," said he at length, approaching a table
of massy silver, upon which were some beautifully dyed and enamelled
goblets, together with two large Etruscan vases, filled with what I
took
to be Vin de Barac, and fashioned in the same extraordinary model as
the
vase in the foreground of the portrait.
"Come," he said
abruptly,
"let us drink — it is early; but let us drink. It is indeed
early," he continued, as a cherub, with a heavy golden hammer,
made the chamber ring with the first hour after sun-rise — "it
is indeed early; but what matters it — let us
drink. Let us pour out, like true Persians, an offering to that solemn
sun which these
lamps
and
censers are struggling to overpower." Here having made me pledge him in
a
bumper,
he swallowed in rapid succession several goblets of the wine.
"To dream," continued he, resuming the tone
of his
desultory
conversation, as he held up to the rich light of a censer one of the
magnificent
vases — "to dream has been the business of my life, and I have
therefore
decked out
for myself, as you see, a Bower of Dreams. Here, in the heart of
Venice,
could I have erected a [column 2:] better? You behold
around you, it is
true,
a medley of architectural embellishments. The chastity of Ionia is
offended
by antediluvian devices, and the Sphynxes of Egypt are stretching
upon
cloth of gold. Yet the effect is incongruous to the timid
alone. Proprieties of place, and especially of time, are the bugbears
which
terrify
mankind from the contemplation of the magnificent. Once I was myself a
decorist, but that sublimation of folly has palled upon my
soul. All this is now the fitter for my purpose. Like these Arabesque
censers,
my spirit is writhing in fire, and the whirling delirium of this scene
is
fashioning
me for the wilder visions of that land of real dreams whither I am now
rapidly departing."
Thus saying, he confessed the power of the wine, and
threw himself,
at full length, upon a chaise-longue. A quick step was now
heard upon the
stair-case, and a
loud
knock at the door rapidly succeeded. I hurried to
anticipate
a second disturbance, when a page of the Marchesa di Mentoni burst into
the
room, and, in a voice choking with emotion, faltered out the incoherent
words, "my mistress! — Bianca! — poison! — horrible!
horrible!"
Bewildered, I flew to the sleeper, and endeavoured
to
arouse
him to a sense of the startling intelligence; but his lips were
livid — his form was rigid — his beautiful eyes were riveted in
death.
I staggered back towards the table — my hand fell upon a cracked and
blackened
goblet, and a consciousness of the entire and terrible truth, flashed
suddenly
over my soul. |
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