The World's Greatest Books - Volume 1 Part 6

In my sadness of heart I thought of my childhood and old Domenica, whom I had not seen for many months. I went out to the Campagna. Domenica had died six months back! When I returned I was seized by a violent fever, from which I recovered but slowly. It was six months after Flaminia had taken the veil that the doctor allowed me to go out.

My first walk was to the grey convent where she now pa.s.sed her monotonous days. Every evening I returned, and often I stood gazing at her prison and thinking of Flaminia as I used to know her. One evening Fabiani found me thus, and made me follow him home. He spoke to me with unusual solemnity in his voice, but with great kindness. I was ill.

Travelling, change of scene, would do me good. I was to move about for a year, and then return to show what the world had made of me.

I went to Venice. Dreary, sad and quiet seemed to me the Queen of the Adriatic. In the gently swaying gondola I thought with bitterness of Annunciata. I felt a grudge even against innocent, pious Flaminia, who preferred the convent to my strong, brotherly love. Then my thoughts floated between Lara, the image of beauty, and Santa, the daughter of sin.

One day I took a boat to the Lido to breathe the fresh air of the sea.

On the beach I came across Poggio, a young Venetian n.o.bleman with whom I had made friends; and as a storm hung threatening in the sky I decided to accept his invitation for dinner. We watched the fury of the storm from the window, and then joined a crowd of women and children anxiously watching a fishing boat out at sea. Before our very eyes the boat was swallowed by the waves, and with aching hearts we witnessed the prayers, shrieks, and despair of the anxious watchers whose husbands and fathers perished thus within their sight.

Next evening there was a reception at my banker's. The storm became a topic of conversation; and Poggio related the death of the fishermen, trying to enlist sympathy for the poor survivors. But n.o.body seemed to understand his intention. Then I was asked to improvise. I was quickly determined. "I know of an emotion," I exclaimed, "which awakens supreme happiness in everybody, and I have the power of exciting it in every heart. But this art cannot be given, it must be purchased. He who gives most will be most deeply initiated." Money and jewels were quickly forthcoming; and I began to sing of the proud sea and the bold mariners and fishermen. I described what I had seen; and my art succeeded where Poggio's words had failed. A tumult of applause arose. A young lady sank at my feet, seized my hand, and with her beautiful, tear-filled eyes gave me a look of intense grat.i.tude, which agitated me in strange fashion. Then she withdrew as if in horror at what she had done.

Poggio afterwards told me that she was the queen of beauty in Venice, the podesta's niece, adored by everybody, but known by few, since the podesta's house was most exclusive, and received but few guests. He accounted me the luckiest of mortals when he heard that I had received an invitation from the podesta, and would have a chance of improving my acquaintance with Maria, his beautiful niece. I was received as if I had been a beloved relative. Something in Maria's expression recalled to me the blind beggar-girl Lara; but Maria had eyes with a singularly dark glance of fire. I became a daily visitor at the podesta's house, and spent many happy hours in Maria's company. Her intellect and charm of character captivated me as much as her beauty.

_VI.--A Marriage in Venice_

One evening I strayed into a wretched little theatre, where one of Mercadante's operas was being performed. How can I describe my feelings when in one of the singers--a slight, ordinary figure, with a thin, sharp countenance and deeply sunken eyes, in a poor dress, and with a poorer voice, but still with surprising grace of manner--I recognised Annunciata? With aching heart I left the theatre, and ascertained Annunciata's address. She lived in a miserable garret. She turned deathly pale when she recognised me, and implored me to leave her. "I come as a friend, as a brother," I said. "You have been ill, Annunciata!" Then she told me of her illness, four years back, which robbed her of her youth, her voice, her money, her friends. She implored me, with a pitiful voice, to leave her. I could not speak. I pressed her hand to my lips, stammered, "I come--I come again!" and left her.

Next day I called again, and found Annunciata had left, no one knew whither.

It was a month later that Maria handed me a letter, which had been given to her for me by a dying person who had sent for her. The letter was from Annunciata, who was no more. It told me of her happiness at having seen me once more--told me that she had always loved me; that her pain at having to part from me had made her conceal her face on what she then believed to be Bernardo's dead body; told me that it was she who had sent me those two letters in Naples, who had believed my love was dead, since I left for Rome without sending her a reply. It told me of her illness, her years of poverty, and her undying love. And then she wished me happiness with, as she had been told, the most beautiful and the n.o.blest maid in Venice for my bride! ...

In travel I sought forgetfulness and consolation. I went to Padua, Verona, Milan; but heaviness did not leave my heart. Then came an irrepressible longing to be back in Venice, to see Maria--a foreboding of some new misfortune. I hastened back to Venice. The podesta received me kindly; but when I inquired after Maria, he seemed to me to become grave, as he told me she had gone to Padua on a short visit. During supper I fell into a swoon, followed by a violent fever in which I had visions of Maria dead, laid out before an altar. Then it was Lara I saw on the bier, and I loudly called her by name. Then everything became bright; a hand pa.s.sed softly over my head. I awoke, and found Maria and her aunt by my bedside.

"Lara, Maria, hear me!" I cried. "It is no dream. You have heard my voice at Paestum. You know it again! I feel it. I love you; I have always loved you!"

"I have loved you, too," she said, kneeling by my side and seizing my hand. "I have loved you from the day when the sun burnt your kiss into my forehead--loved you with the intuition of the blind!"

I then learnt that Maria--my Lara--had been cured of her blindness by a great specialist in Naples, the podesta's brother, who, touched by her beauty and purity, had her educated, and adopted her as his own child.

On his death his sister took her to Venice, where she found a new home in the podesta's palace.

APULEIUS

The Golden a.s.s

Apuleius was born about 125 A.D., at Madaura, in Africa.

After studying at Athens, he practised as an advocate at Rome, and then wandered about Northern Africa, lecturing on philosophy and rhetoric. At Tripoli he was charged with having won by witchcraft the love of a rich widow who had left him her wealth. But he was acquitted after delivering an interesting defence, included among his extant works. He then settled in Carthage, where he died at an advanced age. Poor Apuleius! His good fame was darkened by the success of an amusing romance, "The Golden a.s.s," which he wrote, by way of recreation, at Rome. He related the story of the adventures which befell a young Greek n.o.bleman who, by an extreme curiosity in regard to witchcraft, got changed into a donkey.

It was an age of wild superst.i.tion and foolish credulity; and his readers confused the author of "The Golden a.s.s" with the hero of it. Apuleius was credited with a series of impossible exploits, which he had not even invented. For his work is merely a Latin adaptation of a lost Greek romance by Lucius of Patras. But Apuleius deserves our grat.i.tude for preserving a unique specimen of the lighter literature of the ancient Greeks, together with the beautiful folk-tale of Cupid and Psyche.

_I.--Lucius Sets Out on His Wonderful Adventures_

I set out from Corinth in a fever of excitement and expectation, riding my horse so hard that it fell lame; so I had to do the remainder of the journey on foot. My heart was filled with joy and terror as I entered the town of Hypata.

"Here I am, at last," I cried, "in Thessaly! Thessaly, the land of magic and witchcraft, famous through the world for its marvels and enchantments!"

Carried away by my desire after strange and mystic knowledge, I gazed around with wonder and disquietude. Nothing in this marvellous city, I thought to myself, is really what it seems to be. The stones I stumbled over appeared to be living creatures petrified by magic. I fancied that the trees in the gardens and the birds that sang in their branches were men that had been transformed by Thessalian witches. The very statues seemed as if they were about to walk; every wall had ears; and I looked up into the blue, cloudless sky, expecting to hear oracles.

Entering the market place, I pa.s.sed close to a n.o.ble lady who was walking with a crowd of servants in her train.

"By Hercules!" she cried. "It's Lucius!" I hung back, confused and blushing, and Byrrhena, for it was she, said to one of her companions:

"It's Salvia's boy! Isn't he the image of his modest, beautiful mother?

Young, tall and fair, with just her bright, grey-blue eyes, and her alert glance. A Plutarch every bit of him! Lucius, don't you remember your kinswoman, Byrrhena? Why, I brought you up with my own hands!"

I remembered Byrrhena very well, and loved her. But I did not want to meet her just then. However, I went with her to her house, a beautiful building of fine marble, containing some exquisite statuary.

"You will stay here, my dear Lucius, won't you?" she said.

I then told her that I had come to Hypata to see Milo and his wife Pamphila. My friend Demeas of Corinth had given me a letter of introduction.

"Don't you know that Pamphila is a witch?" she cried. "Do not go near her, my child, or she will practise her wicked arts on you. It is just handsome young men like you that she enchants and destroys."

Far from being terrified by Byrrhena's warning, I was delighted with it.

I longed to become an apprentice to a witch as powerful as Pamphila.

With a hasty excuse I left the house and set out to find Milo. Neither he nor Pamphila was in when I called. But their maid who opened the door, was such a pretty wench that I did not regret their absence.

Fotis, as she was called, was a graceful, sprightly little thing, with the loveliest hair I ever saw. I liked the way it fell in soft puffs on her neck, and rested on her neat linen tunic.

It was a case of love at first sight with both of us. But before I began to ask her about Pamphila, Milo returned. He welcomed me very warmly, and put the best room in his house at my disposal, and desired me to stay to dinner. But in spite of my ardent curiosity, I was, I must confess, rather afraid of meeting his wife. So I said that my kinswoman Byrrhena had already engaged me to dine with her.

On arriving at Byrrhena's mansion I was surprised to find that a splendid banquet had been prepared, and that all the best people in Hypata were present. We reclined on couches of ivory, covered with golden drapery, and a throng of lovely girls served us with exquisite dishes; while pretty curly-headed boys brought the wine round in goblets of gold and amber.

When the lights were brought in, the talk became freer and gayer; everybody was bent on laughing and making his neighbours laugh.

"We are, you see, preparing for the great festival to-morrow," Byrrhena said to me. "Hypata is the only city that keeps the feast of the G.o.d of laughter. You must come, and invent some pleasantry to propitiate the merriest of all deities."

"By Hercules!" I replied. "If the laughing G.o.d will only lend me inspiration to-night, I will do my best to entertain the townspeople to-morrow."

_II.--The Feast of the G.o.d of Laughter_

It was the jolliest banquet I was ever at. Even in Corinth we did not do the thing so well. It was not until I got into the open air, and set out for Milo's house, that I knew how much wine I had taken. But though I was rather unsteady on my feet, I retained my presence of mind. I reached the house, and suddenly three great burly fellows sprang up, and battered furiously at the door. They were clearly robbers of the most desperate type, and I drew my sword, and, as they came at me one by one, I plunged it swiftly into their bodies. Fotis was aroused, and opened the door, and I entered, utterly worn out by the struggle, and went at once to bed and to sleep.

Early in the morning I was awakened by a great clamour. A throng of people burst into my bedroom, and two lictors arrested me, and dragged me to the forum. But as they took me through the streets and squares, everybody turned out to see me, and the crowd grew so great that the forum was not large enough to hold the people, and I was led to the theatre.

There the lictors pushed me down through the proscenium, as though I were a victim for sacrifice, and put me in the centre of the orchestra.

"Citizens," said the prefect of the watch, "as I was going on my rounds late last night, I saw this ferocious young foreigner, sword in hand, slashing and stabbing three inoffensive creatures. When I arrived they were lying dead upon the ground. Their murderer, overwhelmed by his terrible crime, fled into a house, and hid there, hoping, no doubt, to escape in the morning. Men of Hypata, you do not allow your own fellow-townsmen to commit murder with impunity. Shall, then, this savage, brutal alien avoid the consequences of his fearful crime?"