Joseph II. and His Court Part 161

"Capture the convents, and carry off the booty."

"But that will be tantamount to a declaration of war against Rome!"

"Exactly what I propose to bring about. I desire to teach this servant of G.o.d that I am absolute monarch of my own dominions, and that his--"

"True, sire, true, but be cautious, and go warily to work."

"I have no time to temporize," cried Joseph. "What is to be done shall be done at once. So much the more quickly that this question of stripping the convents is not only one of principle but of expediency also. They abound in objects of value, and my treasury needs replenishing. The state debt is large, and we must retrench. I shall not, like my gracious mother, require a budget of six millions. I intend to restrict myself to the expenditure which suffices for the King of Prussia. Of course. I shall not, like the munificent Maria Theresa, dispense ducats and smiles in equal profusion. My people must be satisfied with a greeting that is not set to the music of the c.h.i.n.k of gold. Neither shall I, like my imperial lady-mother, keep two thousand horses in my stables. Moreover, the pension-list shall be decreased--let the retrenchment fall upon whom it may. But all this will not suffice to straighten my financial affairs. I need several millions more. And as they are to be found in church and convent, I shall seek them there."

Prince Kaunitz had listened to this bold harangue with perfect astonishment. Several times in the course of it, he had nodded his head, and more than once he had smiled.

"Sire," said he, "you have such an intrepid spirit that my seared old heart beats responsive to the call like an aged war-horse that neighs at the trumpet's note. Be it so, then. I will fight at your side like a faithful champion, happy, if, during the strife, I be permitted to ward off from my emperor's head a blow from his adversary's hands. Remember that we go forth to fight thousands. For the people are with the clergy, and they will cry out even more bitterly than they did at the expulsion of the Jesuits."

"And they will cease to cry, as they did on that occasion," exclaimed the emperor, with a merry laugh. "Courage, Kaunitz, courage! and we shall prevail over Rome and all monkdom; and when we shall have utilized their treasures, the people will return to their senses, and applaud the deed." [Footnote: Joseph's own words. See Letters, etc., p. 49.]

"So be it then, your majesty. I will help you to pluck the poisonous weeds, and sow in their places good secular grain."

CHAPTER CXLII.

THE BANKER AND HIS DAUGHTER.

The beautiful daughter of the Jewish banker was alone in her apartments, which, from the munificence of her wealthy father, were almost regal in their arrangements.

Rachel, however, was so accustomed to magnificence that she had lost all appreciation of it. She scarcely vouchsafed a glance to her inlaid cabinets, her oriental carpets, her crystal l.u.s.tres, and her costly paintings. Even her own transcendent beauty, reflected in the large Venetian mirrors that surrounded her, was unheeded, as she reclined in simple muslin among the silken cushions of a Turkish divan.

But Rachel, in her muslin, was lovely beyond all power of language to describe. Her youth, grace, and beauty were ornaments with which "Nature's own cunning hand," had decked her from her birth. What diamond ever lit up Golconda's mine with such living fire as flashed from her hazel eyes? What pearl upon its ocean-bed ever glittered with a sheen like that of the delicate teeth that peeped from between her pouting coral lips? When she wandered in her vapory white dresses through her father's princely halls, neither pictures nor statues there could compare in color or proportion with the banker's queenly daughter herself.

She lay on the dark silk cushions of the divan like a swan upon the opalline waters of the lake at sunset. One arm, white and firm as Carrara marble, supported her graceful head, while in her right hand she held an open letter.

"Oh, my beloved!" murmured she, "you hope every thing from the magnanimity of the emperor. But in what blessed clime was ever a Jewess permitted to wed with a Christian? The emperor may remove the shackles of our national bondage, but he can never lift us to social equality with the people of another faith. There is nothing to bridge the gulf that yawns between my beloved and me. It would kill my father to know that I had renounced Judaism, and I would rather die than be his murderer. Oh, my father! oh, my lover! My heart lies between you, and yet I may not love you both!--But which must I sacrifice to the other?"

She paused and raised her eyes imploringly to heaven. Her cheeks flushed, her bosom heaved, and no longer able to restrain her agitation, she sprang from her divan, and light as a gazelle, crossed the room, and threw open the window.

"No, my lover," said she, "no, I cannot renounce you! A woman must leave father and mother, to follow him who reigns over her heart! I will leave all things, then, for you, my Gunther!" And she pressed his letter to her lips; then folding it, she hid it in her bosom.

A knock at the door caused her to start slightly, and, before she had time to speak, the Jewish banker entered the room.

"My dear father!" exclaimed Rachel, joyfully, flying to him and putting her arms around his tall, athletic form.

Eskeles Flies stroked her dark hair, and pressed a kiss upon her brow.

"I have not seen you for two days, father," said Rachel, reproachfully.

"I have been absent inspecting my new factories at Brunn, my daughter."

"And you went away without a word of adieu to me!"

"Adieu is a sorrowful word, my daughter, and I speak it reluctantly; but a return home is a joy unspeakable, and you see that my first visit is to YOU, dear child. To-day I come as a messenger of good tidings."

Rachel raised her head, and a flush of expectation rose to her face.

"Do the good tidings concern us both?" asked she.

"Not only ourselves, but our whole people. Look at me, Rachel, and tell me wherein I have changed since last we met."

Rachel stepped back and contemplated her father with an affectionate smile. "I see the same tall figure, the same energetic, manly features, the same dear smile, and the same--no, not quite the same dress. You have laid aside the yellow badge of inferiority that the Jew wears upon his arm."

"The emperor has freed us from this humiliation, Rachel. This burden of a thousand years has Joseph lifted from our hearts, and under his reign we are to enjoy the rights of men and Austrians!"

"The emperor is a great and magnanimous prince!" exclaimed Rachel.

"We have been trampled so long under foot," said the banker, scornfully, "that the smallest concession seems magnanimity. But of what avail will be the absence of the badge of shame? It will not change the peculiarity of feature which marks us among men, and betrays us to the Christian's hate."

"May our nation's type be ever written upon our faces!" exclaimed Rachel. "The emperor will protect us from the little persecutions of society."

"He will have little time to think of us, he will have enough to do to protect himself from his own enemies. He has decreed the dispersion of the conventual orders, and as he has refused to yield up the goods of the church, his subjects are becoming alienated from a man who has no regard for the feelings of the pope. Moreover, he has proclaimed universal toleration."

"And has he included us among the enfranchised, dear father?"

"Yes, my child, even we are to be tolerated. We are also to be permitted to rent estates, and to learn trades. Mark me--not to BUY estates, but to rent them: We are not yet permitted to be landed proprietors.

[Footnote: Ramshorn, "Joseph II," p. 259.] But they cannot prevent the Jew from acc.u.mulating gold--'yellow, shining gold;' and riches are our revenge upon Christendom for the many humiliations we have endured at its pious hands. They have withheld from us t.i.tles, orders, and rank, but they cannot withhold money. The finger of the Jew is a magnet, and when he points it, the Christian ducats fly into his hand. Oh, Rachel! I look forward to the day when the Jews shall monopolize the wealth of the world: when they shall be called to the councils of kings and emperors, and furnish to their oppressors the means of reddening the earth with one another's blood! We shall pay them to slaughter one another, Rachel; and that shall be our glorious revenge!"

"My dear, dear father," interposed Rachel, "what has come over you that you should speak such resentful words? Revenge is unworthy of the n.o.ble sons of Israel; leave it to the Christian, whose words are love, while his deeds are hate."

"His words to the Jew are as insolent as his deeds are wicked. But I know very well how to exasperate and humble the Christians. I do it by means of my rich dwelling and my costly equipages. I do it by inviting them to come and see how far more sumptuously I live than they. The sight of my luxuries blackens their hearts with envy; but most of all they envy the Jewish banker that his daughter so far outshines in beauty their Gentile women!"

"Dear father," said Rachel, coloring, "you go to extremes in praise, as in blame. You exaggerate the defects of the Christian, and the attractions of your daughter."

Her father drew her graceful head to him, and nestled it upon his breast. "No, my child, no, I do not exaggerate your beauty. It is not I alone, but all Vienna, that is in raptures with your incomparable loveliness."

"Hush, dear father! Would you see me vain and heartless?"

"I would see you appreciate your beauty, and make use of it."

"Make use of it! How?"

"To help your father in his projects of vengeance. You cannot conceive how exultant I am when I see you surrounded by hosts of Christian n.o.bles, all doing homage to your beauty and your father's millions.

Encourage them, Rachel, that they may become intoxicated with love, and that on the day when they ask me for my daughter's hand, I may tell them that my daughter is a Jewess, and can never be the wife of a Christian!"

Rachel made no reply; her head still rested on her father's bosom, and he could not see that tears were falling in showers from her eyes. But he felt her sobs, and guessing that something was grieving her, he drew her gently to a seat.

"Dear, dear child," cried he, anxiously, "tell me why you weep."

"I weep because I see that my father loves revenge far more than his only child; and that he is willing to peril her soul by defiling it with wicked coquetry. Now I understand why it is that such a profligate as Count Podstadsky has been suffered to pollute our home by his visits!"

The banker's face grew bright. "Then, Rachel, you do not love him?" said he, pressing his daughter to his heart.