Rienzi

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The Bishop extended his hand; Rienzi grasped it firmly, and then raised
it respectfully to his lips. Both felt that the compact was sealed.

This conference, so long in recital, was short in the reality; but its
object was already finished, and the Bishop rose to depart. The outer
portal of the house was opened, the numerous servitors of the Bishop
held on high their torches, and he had just termed from Rienzi, who
had attended him to the gate, when a female passed hastily through the
Prelate's train, and starting as she beheld Rienzi, flung herself at his
feet.

"Oh, hasten, Sir! hasten, for the love of God, hasten! or the young
Signora is lost for ever!"

"The Signora!--Heaven and earth, Benedetta, of whom do you speak?--of my
sister--of Irene? is she not within?"

"Oh, Sir--the Orsini--the Orsini!"

"What of them?--speak, woman!"

Here, breathlessly, and with many a break, Benedetta recounted to
Rienzi, in whom the reader has already recognised the brother of Irene,
so far of the adventure with Martino di Porto as she had witnessed: of
the termination and result of the contest she knew nought.

Rienzi listened in silence; but the deadly paleness of his countenance,
and the writhing of the nether lip, testified the emotions to which he
gave no audible vent.

"You hear, my Lord Bishop--you hear," said he, when Benedetta had
concluded; and turning to the Bishop, whose departure the narrative had
delayed--"you hear to what outrage the citizens of Rome are subjected.
My hat and sword! instantly! My Lord, forgive my abruptness."

"Whither art thou bent, then?" asked Raimond.

"Whither--whither!--Ay, I forgot, my Lord, you have no sister. Perhaps
too, you had no brother?--No, no; one victim at least I will live to
save. Whither, you ask me?--to the palace of Martino di Porto."

"To an Orsini alone, and for justice?"

"Alone, and for justice!--No!" shouted Rienzi, in a loud voice, as he
seized his sword, now brought to him by one of his servants, and rushed
from the house; "but one man is sufficient for revenge!"

The Bishop paused for a moment's deliberation. "He must not be lost,"
muttered he, "as he well may be, if exposed thus solitary to the wolf's
rage. What, ho!" he cried aloud; "advance the torches!--quick, quick! We
ourself--we, the Vicar of the Pope--will see to this. Calm yourselves,
good people; your young Signora shall be restored. On! to the palace of
Martino di Porto!"



Chapter 1.VI. Irene in the Palace of Adrian di Castello.

As the Cyprian gazed on the image in which he had embodied a youth of
dreams, what time the living hues flushed slowly beneath the marble,--so
gazed the young and passionate Adrian upon the form reclined before him,
re-awakening gradually to life. And, if the beauty of that face were
not of the loftiest or the most dazzling order, if its soft and quiet
character might be outshone by many, of loveliness less really perfect,
yet never was there a countenance that, to some eyes, would have seemed
more charming, and never one in which more eloquently was wrought that
ineffable and virgin expression which Italian art seeks for in its
models,--in which modesty is the outward, and tenderness the latent,
expression; the bloom of youth, both of form and heart, ere the first
frail and delicate freshness of either is brushed away: and when even
love itself, the only unquiet visitant that should be known at such an
age, is but a sentiment, and not a passion!

"Benedetta!" murmured Irene, at length opening her eyes, unconsciously,
upon him who knelt beside her,--eyes of that uncertain, that most liquid
hue, on which you might gaze for years and never learn the secret of the
colour, so changed it with the dilating pupil,--darkening in the shade,
and brightening into azure in the light:

"Benedetta," said Irene, "where art thou? Oh, Benedetta! I have had such
a dream."

"And I, too, such a vision!" thought Adrian.

"Where am I?" cried Irene, rising from the couch. "This room--these
hangings--Holy Virgin! do I dream still!--and you! Heavens!--it is the
Lord Adrian di Castello!"

"Is that a name thou hast been taught to fear?" said Adrian; "if so, I
will forswear it."

If Irene now blushed deeply, it was not in that wild delight with which
her romantic heart motive foretold that she would listen to the
first words of homage from Adrian di Castello. Bewildered and
confused,--terrified at the strangeness of the place and shrinking even
from the thought of finding herself alone with one who for years had
been present to her fancies,--alarm and distress were the emotions
she felt the most, and which most were impressed upon her speaking
countenance; and as Adrian now drew nearer to her, despite the
gentleness of his voice and the respect of his looks, her fears, not the
less strong that they were vague, increased upon her: she retreated to
the further end of the room, looked wildly round her, and then, covering
her face with her hands, burst into a paroxysm of tears.

Moved himself by these tears, and divining her thoughts, Adrian forgot
for moment all the more daring wishes he had formed.

"Fear not, sweet lady," said he, earnestly: "recollect thyself, I
beseech thee; no peril, no evil can reach thee here; it was this hand
that saved thee from the outrage of the Orsini--this roof is but the
shelter of a friend! Tell me, then, fair wonder, thy name and residence,
and I will summon my servitors, and guard thee to thy home at once."

Perhaps the relief of tears, even more than Adrian's words, restored
Irene to herself, and enabled her to comprehend her novel situation;
and as her senses, thus cleared, told her what she owed to him whom her
dreams had so long imaged as the ideal of all excellence, she recovered
her self-possession, and uttered her thanks with a grace not the less
winning, if it still partook of embarrassment.

"Thank me not," answered Adrian, passionately. "I have touched thy
hand--I am repaid. Repaid! nay, all gratitude--all homage is for me to
render!"

Blushing again, but with far different emotions than before, Irene,
after a momentary pause, replied, "Yet, my Lord, I must consider it a
debt the more weighty that you speak of it so lightly. And now, complete
the obligation. I do not see my companion--suffer her to accompany me
home; it is but a short way hence."

"Blessed, then, is the air that I have breathed so unconsciously!" said
Adrian. "But thy companion, dear lady, is not here. She fled, I imagine,
in the confusion of the conflict; and not knowing thy name, nor being
able, in thy then state, to learn it from thy lips, it was my happy
necessity to convey thee hither;--but I will be thy companion. Nay, why
that timid glance? my people, also, shall attend us."

"My thanks, noble Lord, are of little worth; my brother, who is not
unknown to thee, will thank thee more fittingly. May I depart?" and
Irene, as she spoke, was already at the door.

"Art thou so eager to leave me?" answered Adrian, sadly. "Alas! when
thou hast departed from my eyes, it will seem as if the moon had left
the night!--but it is happiness to obey thy wishes, even though they
tear thee from me."

A slight smile parted Irene's lips, and Adrian's heart beat audibly
to himself, as he drew from that smile, and those downcast eyes, no
unfavourable omen.

Reluctantly and slowly he turned towards the door, and summoned his
attendants. "But," said he, as they stood on the lofty staircase, "thou
sayest, sweet lady, that thy brother's name is not unknown to me. Heaven
grant that he be, indeed, a friend of the Colonna!"

"His boast," answered Irene, evasively; "the boast of Cola di Rienzi is,
to be a friend to the friends of Rome."

"Holy Virgin of Ara Coeli!--is thy brother that extraordinary man?"
exclaimed Adrian, as he foresaw, at the mention of that name, a barrier
to his sudden passion. "Alas! in a Colonna, in a noble, he will see no
merit; even though thy fortunate deliverer, sweet maiden, sought to be
his early friend!"

"Thou wrongest him much, my Lord," returned Irene, warmly; "he is a man
above all others to sympathize with thy generous valour, even had it
been exerted in defence of the humblest woman in Rome,--how much more,
then, when in protection of his sister!"

"The times are, indeed, diseased," answered Adrian, thoughtfully, as
they now found themselves in the open street, "when men who alike mourn
for the woes of their country are yet suspicious of each other; when to
be a patrician is to be regarded as an enemy to the people; when to
be termed the friend of the people is to be considered a foe to the
patricians: but come what may, oh! let me hope, dear lady, that no
doubts, no divisions, shall banish from thy breast one gentle memory of
me!"

"Ah! little, little do you know me!" began Irene, and stopped suddenly
short.

"Speak! speak again!--of what music has this envious silence deprived my
soul! Thou wilt not, then, forget me? And," continued Adrian, "we shall
meet again? It is to Rienzi's house we are bound now; tomorrow I shall
visit my old companion,--tomorrow I shall see thee. Will it not be so?"

In Irene's silence was her answer.

"And as thou hast told me thy brother's name, make it sweet to my ear,
and add to it thine own."

"They call me Irene."

"Irene, Irene!--let me repeat it. It is a soft name, and dwells upon the
lips as if loath to leave them--a fitting name for one like thee."

Thus making his welcome court to Irene, in that flowered and glowing
language which, if more peculiar to that age and to the gallantry of
the south, is also the language in which the poetry of youthful passion
would, in all times and lands, utter its rich extravagance, could heart
speak to heart, Adrian conveyed homeward his beautiful charge, taking,
however, the most circuitous and lengthened route; an artifice which
Irene either perceived not, or silently forgave. They were now within
sight of the street in which Rienzi dwelt, when a party of men bearing
torches, came unexpectedly upon them. It was the train of the Bishop of
Orvietto, returning from the palace of Martino di Porto, and in their
way (accompanied by Rienzi) to that of Adrian. They had learned at the
former, without an interview with the Orsini, from the retainers in
the court below, the fortune of the conflict, and the name of Irene's
champion; and, despite Adrian's general reputation for gallantry, Rienzi
knew enough of his character, and the nobleness of his temper, to feel
assured that Irene was safe in his protection. Alas! in that very safety
to the person is often the most danger to the heart. Woman never so
dangerously loves, as when he who loves her, for her sake, subdues
himself.

Clasped to her brother's breast, Irene bade him thank her deliverer;
and Rienzi, with that fascinating frankness which sits so well on those
usually reserved, and which all who would rule the hearts of their
fellow-men must at times command, advanced to the young Colonna, and
poured forth his gratitude and praise.

"We have been severed too long,--we must know each other again," replied
Adrian. "I shall seek thee, ere long, be assured."

Turning to take his leave of Irene, he conveyed her hand to his lips,
and pressing it, as it dropped from his clasp, was he deceived in
thinking that those delicate fingers lightly, involuntarily, returned
the pressure?



Chapter 1.VII. Upon Love and Lovers.

If, in adopting the legendary love tale of Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare
had changed the scene in which it is cast for a more northern clime, we
may doubt whether the art of Shakespeare himself could have reconciled
us at once to the suddenness and the strength of Juliet's passion. And,
even as it is, perhaps there are few of our rational and sober-minded
islanders who would not honestly confess, if fairly questioned, that
they deem the romance and fervour of those ill-starred lovers of Verona
exaggerated and over-drawn. Yet, in Italy, the picture of that affection
born of a night--but "strong as death"--is one to which the veriest
commonplaces of life would afford parallels without number. As in
different ages, so in different climes, love varies wonderfully in the
shapes it takes. And even at this day, beneath Italian skies, many a
simple girl would feel as Juliet, and many a homely gallant would rival
the extravagance of Romeo. Long suits in that sunny land, wherein, as
whereof, I now write, are unknown. In no other land, perhaps, is there
found so commonly the love at first sight, which in France is a jest,
and in England a doubt; in no other land, too, is love, though so
suddenly conceived, more faithfully preserved. That which is ripened
in fancy comes at once to passion, yet is embalmed through all time by
sentiment. And this must be my and their excuse, if the love of
Adrian some too prematurely formed, and that of Irene too romantically
conceived;--it is the excuse which they take from the air and sun, from
the customs of their ancestors, from the soft contagion of example.
But while they yielded to the dictates of their hearts, it was with a
certain though secret sadness--a presentiment that had, perhaps, its
charm, though it was of cross and evil. Born of so proud a race, Adrian
could scarcely dream of marriage with the sister of a plebeian; and
Irene, unconscious of the future glory of her brother, could hardly
have cherished any hope, save that of being loved. Yet these adverse
circumstances, which, in the harder, the more prudent, the more
self-denying, perhaps the more virtuous minds, that are formed beneath
the northern skies, would have been an inducement to wrestle against
love so placed, only contributed to feed and to strengthen theirs by
an opposition which has ever its attraction for romance. They found
frequent, though short, opportunities of meeting--not quite alone, but
only in the conniving presence of Benedetta: sometimes in the public
gardens, sometimes amidst the vast and deserted ruins by which the house
of Rienzi was surrounded. They surrendered themselves, without much
question of the future, to the excitement--the elysium--of the hour:
they lived but from day to day; their future was the next time they
should meet; beyond that epoch, the very mists of their youthful love
closed in obscurity and shadow which they sought not to penetrate: and
as yet they had not arrived at that period of affection when there was
danger of their fall,--their love had not passed the golden portal where
Heaven ceases and Earth begins. Everything for them was the poetry,
the vagueness, the refinement,--not the power, the concentration, the
mortality,--of desire! The look--the whisper--the brief pressure of the
hand, at most, the first kisses of love, rare and few,--these marked the
human limits of that sentiment which filled them with a new life, which
elevated them as with a new soul.

The roving tendencies of Adrian were at once fixed and centered; the
dreams of his tender mistress had awakened to a life dreaming still, but
"rounded with a truth." All that earnestness, and energy, and fervour of
emotion, which, in her brother, broke forth in the schemes of patriotism
and the aspirations of power, were, in Irene, softened down into one
object of existence, one concentration of soul,--and that was love. Yet,
in this range of thought and action, so apparently limited, there was,
in reality, no less boundless a sphere than in the wide space of her
brother's many-pathed ambition. Not the less had she the power and
scope for all the loftiest capacities granted to our clay. Equal was her
enthusiasm for her idol; equal, had she been equally tried, would have
been her generosity, her devotion:--greater, be sure, her courage; more
inalienable her worship; more unsullied by selfish purposes and sordid
views. Time, change, misfortune, ingratitude, would have left her the
same! What state could fall, what liberty decay, if the zeal of man's
noisy patriotism were as pure as the silent loyalty of a woman's love?

In them everything was young!--the heart unchilled, unblighted,--that
fulness and luxuriance of life's life which has in it something of
divine. At that age, when it seems as if we could never die, how
deathless, how flushed and mighty as with the youngness of a god, is all
that our hearts create! Our own youth is like that of the earth itself,
when it peopled the woods and waters with divinities; when life
ran riot, and yet only gave birth to beauty;--all its shapes, of
poetry,--all its airs, the melodies of Arcady and Olympus! The Golden
Age never leaves the world: it exists still, and shall exist, till love,
health, poetry, are no more; but only for the young!

If I now dwell, though but for a moment, on this interlude in a drama
calling forth more masculine passions than that of love, it is because
I foresee that the occasion will but rarely recur. If I linger on the
description of Irene and her hidden affection, rather than wait for
circumstances to portray them better than the author's words can, it is
because I foresee that that loving and lovely image must continue to the
last rather a shadow than a portrait,--thrown in the background, as is
the real destiny of such natures, by bolder figures and more gorgeous
colours; a something whose presence is rather felt than seen, and whose
very harmony with the whole consists in its retiring and subdued repose.



Chapter 1.VIII. The Enthusiastic Man Judged by the Discreet Man.

"Thou wrongest me," said Rienzi, warmly, to Adrian, as they sat alone,
towards the close of a long conference; "I do not play the part of a
mere demagogue; I wish not to stir the great deeps in order that my
lees of fortune may rise to the surface. So long have I brooded over the
past, that it seems to me as if I had become a part of it--as if I
had no separate existence. I have coined my whole soul into one master
passion,--and its end is the restoration of Rome."

"But by what means?"

"My Lord! my Lord! there is but one way to restore the greatness of a
people--it is an appeal to the people themselves. It is not in the power
of princes and barons to make a state permanently glorious; they
raise themselves, but they raise not the people with them. All great
regenerations are the universal movement of the mass."

"Nay," answered Adrian, "then have we read history differently. To
me, all great regenerations seem to have been the work of the few, and
tacitly accepted by the multitude. But let us not dispute after the
manner of the schools. Thou sayest loudly that a vast crisis is at hand;
that the Good Estate (buono stato) shall be established. How? where are
your arms?--your soldiers? Are the nobles less strong than heretofore?
Is the mob more bold, more constant? Heaven knows that I speak not with
the prejudices of my order--I weep for the debasement of my country! I
am a Roman, and in that name I forget that I am a noble. But I tremble
at the storm you would raise so hazardously. If your insurrection
succeed, it will be violent: it will be purchased by blood--by the blood
of all the loftiest names of Rome. You will aim at a second expulsion of
the Tarquins; but it will be more like a second proscription of Sylla.
Massacres and disorders never pave the way to peace. If, on the other
hand, you fail, the chains of Rome are riveted for ever: an ineffectual
struggle to escape is but an excuse for additional tortures to the
slave."

"And what, then, would the Lord Adrian have us do?" said Rienzi, with
that peculiar and sarcastic smile which has before been noted. "Shall
we wait till the Colonna and Orsini quarrel no more? shall we ask the
Colonna for liberty, and the Orsini for justice? My Lord, we cannot
appeal to the nobles against the nobles. We must not ask them to
moderate their power; we must restore to ourselves that power. There may
be danger in the attempt--but we attempt it amongst the monuments of the
Forum: and if we fall--we shall perish worthy of our sires! Ye have
high descent, and sounding titles, and wide lands, and you talk of your
ancestral honours! We, too,--we plebeians of Rome,--we have ours! Our
fathers were freemen! where is our heritage? not sold--not given away:
but stolen from us, now by fraud, now by force--filched from us in
our sleep; or wrung from us with fierce hands, amidst our cries and
struggles. My Lord, we but ask that lawful heritage to be restored to
us: to us--nay, to you it is the same; your liberty, alike, is gone. Can
you dwell in your father's house, without towers, and fortresses, and
the bought swords of bravos? can you walk in the streets at dark without
arms and followers? True, you, a noble, may retaliate; though we dare
not. You, in your turn, may terrify and outrage others; but does licence
compensate for liberty? They have given you pomp and power--but the
safety of equal laws were a better gift. Oh, were I you--were I Stephen
Colonna himself, I should pant, ay, thirstily as I do now, for that
free air which comes not through bars and bulwarks against my
fellow-citizens, but in the open space of Heaven--safe, because
protected by the silent Providence of Law, and not by the lean fears
and hollow-eyed suspicions which are the comrades of a hated power.
The tyrant thinks he is free, because he commands slaves: the meanest
peasant in a free state is more free than he is. Oh, my Lord, that
you--the brave, the generous, the enlightened--you, almost alone amidst
your order, in the knowledge that we had a country--oh, would that you
who can sympathise with our sufferings, would strike with us for their
redress!"

"Thou wilt war against Stephen Colonna, my kinsman; and though I have
seen him but little, nor, truth to say, esteem him much, yet he is the
boast of our house,--how can I join thee?"

"His life will be safe, his possessions safe, his rank safe. What do we
war against? His power to do wrong to others."

"Should he discover that thou hast force beyond words, he would be less
merciful to thee."

"And has he not discovered that? Do not the shouts of the people tell
him that I am a man whom he should fear? Does he--the cautious, the
wily, the profound--does he build fortresses, and erect towers, and not
see from his battlements the mighty fabric that I, too, have erected?"

"You! where, Rienzi?"

"In the hearts of Rome! Does he not see?" continued Rienzi. "No, no;
he--all, all his tribe, are blind. Is it not so?"

"Of a certainty, my kinsman has no belief in your power, else he would
have crushed you long ere this. Nay, it was but three days ago that he
said, gravely, he would rather you addressed the populace than the best
priest in Christendom; for that other orators inflamed the crowd, and no
man so stilled and dispersed them as you did."

"And I called him profound! Does not Heaven hush the air most when
most it prepares the storm? Ay, my Lord, I understand. Stephen Colonna
despises me. I have been"--(here, as he continued, a deep blush mantled
over his cheek)--"you remember it--at his palace in my younger days,
and pleased him with witty tales and light apophthegms. Nay--ha! ha!--he
would call me, I think, sometimes, in gay compliment, his jester--his
buffoon! I have brooked his insult; I have even bowed to his applause.
I would undergo the same penance, stoop to the same shame, for the same
motive, and in the same cause. What did I desire to effect? Can you tell
me? No! I will whisper it, then, to you: it was--the contempt of Stephen
Colonna. Under that contempt I was protected, till protection became
no longer necessary. I desired not to be thought formidable by the
patricians, in order that, quietly and unsuspected, I might make my way
amongst the people. I have done so; I now throw aside the mask. Face
to face with Stephen Colonna, I could tell him, this very hour, that I
brave his anger; that I laugh at his dungeons and armed men. But if he
think me the same Rienzi as of old, let him; I can wait my hour."

"Yet," said Adrian, waiving an answer to the haughty language of his
companion, "tell me, what dost thou ask for the people, in order to
avoid an appeal to their passions?--ignorant and capricious as they are,
thou canst not appeal to their reason."

"I ask full justice and safety for all men. I will be contented with no
less a compromise. I ask the nobles to dismantle their fortresses; to
disband their armed retainers; to acknowledge no impunity for crime in
high lineage; to claim no protection save in the courts of the common
law."

"Vain desire!" said Adrian. "Ask what may yet be granted."

"Ha--ha!" replied Rienzi, laughing bitterly, "did I not tell you it was
a vain dream to ask for law and justice at the hands of the great? Can
you blame me, then, that I ask it elsewhere?" Then, suddenly changing
his tone and manner, he added with great solemnity--"Waking life hath
false and vain dreams; but sleep is sometimes a mighty prophet. By sleep
it is that Heaven mysteriously communes with its creatures, and guides
and sustains its earthly agents in the path to which its providence
leads them on."