 | CHAPTER IX. The headsman, or, The Abbaye des Vignerons |  |
9. CHAPTER IX.
Where are my Switzers? Let them guard the door:
What is the matter?
Hamlet.
The American autumn, or fall, as we poetically
and affectionately term this generous and mellow
season among ourselves, is thought to be unsurpassed,
exhilarating airs, and its admirable constancy, by
the decline of the year in nearly every other portion
of the earth. Whether attachment to our
own fair and generous land, has led us to over-estimate
its advantages or not, and bright and cheerful
as our autumnal days certainly are, a fairer
morning never dawned upon the Alleghanies, than
that which illumined the Alps, on the reappearance
of the sun after the gust of the night which
has been so lately described. As the day advanced,
the scene grew gradually more lovely, until
warm and glowing Italy itself could scarce present
a landscape more winning, or one possessing
a fairer admixture of the grand and the soft, than
that which greeted the eye of Adelheid de Willading,
as, leaning on the arm of her father, she issued
from the gate of Blonay, upon its elevated
and gravelled terrace.
It has already been said that this ancient and
historical building stood against the bosom of the
mountains, at the distance of a short league behind
the town of Vévey. All the elevations of
this region are so many spurs of the same vast
pile, and that on which Blonay has now been seated
from the earliest period of the middle ages belongs
to that particular line of rocky ramparts,
which separates the Valais from the centre cantons
of the confederation of Switzerland, and which
is commonly known as the range of the Oberland
Alps. This line of snow-crowned rocks terminates
in perpendicular precipices on the very margin of
the Leman, and forms, on the side of the lake,
a part of that magnificent setting which renders
the south-eastern horn of its crescent so wonderfully
beautiful. The upright natural wall that
overhangs Villeneuve and Chillon stretches along
the verge of the water, barely leaving room for a
at its base, for the distance of two leagues, when
it diverges from the course of the lake, and,
withdrawing inland, it is finally lost among the
minor eminences of Fribourg. Every one has observed
those sloping declivities, composed of the
washings of torrents, the débris of precipices, and
what may be termed the constant drippings of perpendicular
eminencies, and which lie like broad
buttresses at their feet, forming a sort of foundation
or basement for the superincumbent mass. Among
the Alps, where nature has acted on so sublime a
scale, and where all the proportions are duly observed,
these débris of the high mountains frequently
contain villages and towns; or form vast
fields, vineyards, and pasturages, according to
their elevation or their exposure towards the sun.
It may be questioned, in strict geology, whether
the variegated acclivity that surrounds Vévey,
rich in villages and vines, hamlets and castles, has
been thus formed, or whether the natural convulsions
which expelled the upper rocks from the
crust of the earth left their bases in the present
broken and beautiful forms; but the fact is not
important to the effect, which is that just named,
and which gives to these vast ranges of rock secondary
and fertile bases, that, in other regions,
would be termed mountains of themselves.
The castle and family of Blonay, for both still
exist, are among the oldest of Vaud. A square,
rude tower, based upon a foundation of rock, one
of those ragged masses that thrust their naked
heads occasionally through the soil of the declivity,
was the commencement of the hold. Other edifices
have been reared around this nucleus in different
ages, until the whole presents one of those peculiar
and picturesque piles, that ornament so many
The terrace towards which Adelheid and her
father advanced was an irregular walk, shaded by
venerable trees that had been raised near the principal
or the carriage gate of the castle, on a ledge
of those rocks that form the foundation of the
buildings themselves. It had its parapet walls, its
seats, its artificial soil, and its gravelled allées, as
is usual with these antiquated ornaments; but it
also had, what is better than these, one of the most
sublime and lovely views that ever greeted human
eyes. Beneath it lay the undulating and teeming
declivity, rich in vines, and carpeted with sward,
here dotted by hamlets, there park-like and rural
with forest trees, while there was no quarter that
did not show the roof of a château or the tower
of some rural church. There is little of magnificence
in Swiss architecture, which never much
surpasses, and is, perhaps, generally inferior to our
own; but the beauty and quaintness of the sites,
the great variety of the surfaces, the hill-sides, and
the purity of the atmosphere, supply charms that
are peculiar to the country. Vévey lay at the water-side,
many hundred feet lower, and seemingly
on a narrow strand, though in truth enjoying ample
space; while the houses of St. Saphorin, Corsier,
Montreux, and of a dozen more villages, were
clustered together, like so many of the compact
habitations of wasps stuck against the mountains.
But the principal charm was in the Leman. One
who had never witnessed the lake in its fury, could
not conceive the possibility of danger in the tranquil
shining sheet that was now spread like a liquid
mirror, for leagues, beneath the eye. Some six or
seven barks were in view, their sails drooping in
negligent forms, as if disposed expressly to become
models for the artist, their yards inclining as chance
complete the picture. To these near objects must
be added the distant view, which extended to the
Jura in one direction, and which in the other was
bounded by the frontiers of Italy, whose aërial
limits were to be traced in that region which appears
to belong neither to heaven nor to earth, the
abode of eternal frosts. The Rhone was shining,
in spots, among the meadows of the Valais, for
the elevation of the castle admitted of its being
seen, and Adelheid endeavored to trace among the
mazes of the mountains the valleys which led to
those sunny countries, towards which they journeyed.
The sensations of both father and daughter,
when they came beneath the leafy canopy of the
terrace, were those of mute delight. It was evident,
by the expression of their countenances, that
they were in a favorable mood to receive pleasurable
impressions; for the face of each was full
of that quiet happiness which succeeds sudden and
lively joy. Adelheid had been weeping; but, judging
from the radiance of her eyes, the healthful
and brightening bloom of her cheeks, and the
struggling smiles that played about her ripe lips,
the tears had been sweet, rather than painful.
Though still betraying enough of physical frailty
to keep alive the concern of all who loved her,
there was a change for the better in her appearance,
which was so sensible as to strike the least
observant of those who lived in daily communication
with the invalid.
“If pure and mild air, a sunny sky, and ravishing
scenery, be what they seek who cross the Alps,
my father,” said Adelheid, after they had stood a
moment, gazing at the magnificent panorama,
“why should the Swiss quit his native land? Is
more healthful, than this?”
“This spot has often been called the Italy of our
mountains. The fig ripens near yonder village of
Montreux, and, open to the morning sun while it
is sheltered by the precipices above, the whole of
that shore well deserves its happy reputation. Still
they whose spirits require diversion, and whose
constitutions need support, generally prefer to go
into countries where the mind has more occupation,
and where a greater variety of employments
help the climate and nature to complete the cure.”
“But thou forgettest, father, it is agreed between
us that I am now to become strong, and active,
and laughing, as we used to be at Willading, when
I first grew into womanhood.”
“If I could but see those days again, darling,
my own closing hours would be calm as those of
a saint—though Heaven knows I have little pretension
to that blessed character in any other particular.”
“Dost thou not count a quiet conscience and a
sure hope as something, father?”
“Have it as thou wilt, girl. Make a saint of
me, or a bishop, or a hermit, if thou wilt; the only
reward I ask is, to see thee smiling and happy, as
thou never failedst to be during the first eighteen
years of thy life. Had I foreseen that thou wert
to return from my good sister so little like thyself,
I would have forbidden the visit, much as I love
her, and all that are her's. But the wisest of us
are helpless mortals, and scarce know our own
wants from hour to hour. Thou saidst, I think,
that this brave Sigismund honestly declared his
belief that my consent could never be given to one
who had so little to boast of, in the way of birth
and fortune? There was, at least, good sense, and
should have thought better of my heart.”
“He said this;” returned Adelheid, in a timid
and slightly trembling voice, though it was quite
apparent by the confiding expression of her eye,
that she had no longer any secret from her parent.
“He had too much honor to wish to win the daughter
of a noble without the knowledge and approbation
of her friends.”
“That the boy should love thee, Adelheid, is
natural; it is an additional proof of his own merit
—but that he should distrust my affection and justice
is an offence that I can scarce forgive. What
are ancestry and wealth to thy happiness?”
“Thou forget'st, dear sir, he is yet to learn that
my happiness, in any measure, depends on his.”
Adelheid spoke quickly and with warmth.
“He knew I was a father and that thou art an
only child; one of his good sense and right way
of thinking should have better understood the feelings
of a man in my situation, than to doubt his
natural affection.”
“As he has never been the parent of an only
daughter, father,” answered the smiling Adelheid,
for, in her present mood, smiles came easily, “he
may not have felt or anticipated all that thou
imagin'st. He knew the prejudices of the world
on the subject of noble blood, and they are few indeed,
that, having much, are disposed to part with
it to him who hath little.”
“The lad reasoned more like an old miser than
a young soldier, and I have a great mind to let
him feel my displeasure for thinking so meanly of
me. Have we not Willading, with all its fair lands,
besides our rights in the city, that we need go begging
money of others, like needy mendicants!
Thou hast been in the conspiracy against my
either uneasiness for a moment.”
“I never thought, father, that thou would'st
reject him on account of poverty, for I knew our
own means sufficient for all our own wants; but I
did believe that he who could not boast the privileges
of nobility might fail to gain thy favor.”
“Are we not a republic?—is not the right of the
bürgerschaft the one essential right in Berne—why
should I raise obstacles about that on which the
laws are silent?”
Adelheid listened, as a female of her years would
be apt to listen to words so grateful, with a charmed
ear; and yet she shook her head, in a way to express
an incredulity that was not altogether free
from apprehension.
“For thy generous forgetfulness of old opinions
in behalf of my happiness, dearest father,” she resumed,
the tears starting unbidden to her thoughtful
blue eye, “I thank thee fervently. It is true
that we are inhabitants of a republic, but we are
not the less noble.”
“Dost thou turn against thyself, and hunt up
reasons why I should not do that which thou hast
just acknowledged to be so necessary to prevent
thee from following thy brothers and sisters to
their early graves?”
The blood rushed in a torrent to the face of
Adelheid, for though, weeping and in the moment
of tender confidence which succeeded her thanks-givings
for the baron's safety, she had thrown herself
on his bosom, and confessed that the hopelessness
of the sentiments with which she met the declared
love of Sigismund was the true cause of the
apparent malady that had so much alarmed her
friends, the words which had flowed spontaneously
from her heart, in so tender a scene, had never appeared
to her to convey a meaning so strong, or
father, in the strength of his masculine habits, had
now given them.
“In God's mercy, father, I shall live, whether
united to Sigismund or not, to smooth thine own
decline and to bless thy old age. A pious daughter
will never be torn so cruelly from one to whom
she is the last and only stay. I may mourn this
disappointment, and foolishly wish, perhaps, it
might have been otherwise; but ours is not a house
of which the maidens die for their inclinations in
favor of any youths, however deserving!”
“Noble or simple,” added the baron, laughing,
for he saw that his daughter spoke in sudden pique,
rather than from her excellent heart. Adelheid,
whose good sense, and quick recollections, instantly
showed her the weakness of this little display of
female feeling, laughed faintly in her turn, though
she repeated his words as if to give still more
emphasis to her own.
“This will not do, my daughter. They who
profess the republican doctrine, should not be too
rigid in their constructions of privileges. If Sigismund
be not noble, it will not be difficult to obtain
for him that honorable distinction, and, in failure
of male line, he may bear the name and sustain the
honors of our family. In any case he will become
of the bürgerschaft, and that of itself will be all that
is required in Berne.”
“In Berne, father,” returned Adelheid, who had
so far forgotten the recent movement of pride as to
smile on her fond and indulgent parent, though,
yielding to the waywardness of the happy, she
continued to trifle with her own feelings—“it is
true. The bürgerschaft will be sufficient for all
the purposes of office and political privileges, but
will it suffice for the opinions of our equals, for the
prejudices of society, or for your own perfect contentment,
have passed?”
“Thou puttest these questions, girl, as if employed
to defeat thine own cause—Dost not truly love
the boy, after all?”
“On this subject, I have spoken sincerely and as
became thy child,” frankly returned Adelheid.
“He saved my life from imminent peril, as he has
now saved thine, and although my aunt, fearful of
thy displeasure, would not that thou should'st hear
the tale, her prohibition could not prevent gratitude
from having its way. I have told thee that
Sigismund has declared his feelings, although he
nobly abstained from even asking a return, and I
should not have been my mother's child, could I
have remained entirely indifferent to so much worth
united to a service so great. What I have said of
our prejudices is, then, rather for your reflection,
dearest sir, than for myself. I have thought much
of all this, and am ready to make any sacrifice to
pride, and to bear all the remarks of the world, in
order to discharge a debt to one to whom I owe
so much. But, while it is natural, perhaps unavoidable,
that I should feel thus, thou art not necessarily
to forget the other claims upon thee. It
is true that, in one sense, we are all to each other,
but there is a tyrant that will scarce let any escape
from his reign; I mean opinion. Let us then not
deceive ourselves—though we of Berne affect the
republic, and speak much of liberty, it is a small
state, and the influence of those that are larger and
more powerful among our neighbors rules in every
thing that touches opinion. A noble is as much a
noble in Berne, in all but what the law bestows, as
he is in the Empire—and thou knowest we come
of the German root, which has struck deep into
these prejudices.”
The Baron de Willading had been much accustomed
understanding of his daughter, who, in the
retirement of her father's castle, had read and reflected
far more than her years would have probably
permitted in the busier scenes of the world.
He felt the justice of her remark, and they had
walked the entire length of the terrace in profound
silence, before he could summon the ideas necessary
to make a suitable answer.
“The truth of what thou sayest, is not to be denied,”
he at length said, “but it may be palliated.
I have many friends in the German courts, and
favors may be had; letters of nobility will give
the youth the station he wants, after which he can
claim thy hand without offence to any opinions,
whether of Berne or elsewhere.”
“I doubt if Sigismund will willingly become a
party to this expedient. Our own nobility is of
ancient origin; it dates from a period anterior to
the existence of Berne as a city, and is much older
than our institutions. I remember to have heard
him say, that when a people refuse to bestow these
distinctions themselves, their citizens can never
receive them from others without a loss of dignity
and character, and one of his moral firmness
might hesitate to do what he thinks wrong for a
boon so worthless as that we offer.”
“By the soul of William Tell! should the unknown
peasant dare—But he is a brave boy,
and twice has he done the last service to my race!
I love him, Adelheid, little less than thyself; and
we will win him over to our purpose gently, and
by degrees. A maiden of thy beauty and years,
to say nothing of thy other qualities, thy name,
the lands of Willading, and the rights of Berne,
are matters, after all, not to be lightly refused by
a nameless soldier, who hath naught—”
“But his courage, his virtues, his modesty, and
his excellent sense, father!”
“Thou wilt not let me have the naked satisfaction
of vaunting my own wares! I see Gaetano
Grimaldi making signs at his window, as if he
were about to come forth: go thou to thy chamber,
that I may discourse of this troublesome matter
with that excellent friend; in good season thou
shalt know the result.”
Adelheid kissed the hand that she held in her
own, and left him with a thoughtful air. As she
descended from the terrace, it was not with the
same elastic step as she had come up half an hour
before.
Early deprived of her mother, this strong-minded
but delicate girl had long been accustomed to
make her father a confidant of all her hopes,
thoughts, and pictures of the future. Owing to
her peculiar circumstances, she would have had
less hesitation than is usual to her sex in avowing
to her parent any of her attachments; but a dread
that the declaration might conduce to his unhappiness,
without in any manner favoring her own
cause, had hitherto kept her silent. Her acquaintance
with Sigismund had been long and intimate.
Rooted esteem and deep respect lay at the bottom
of her sentiments, which were, however, so lively
as to have chased the rose from her cheek in the
endeavor to forget them, and to have led her sensitive
father to apprehend that she was suffering
under that premature decay which had already
robbed him of his other children. There was in
truth no serious ground for this apprehension, so
natural to one in the place of the Baron de Willading;
for, until thought and reflection paled her
cheek, a more blooming maiden than Adelheid, or
one that united more perfect health with feminine
delicacy, did not dwell among her native mountains.
journey, in the expectation that it might serve to
divert her mind from brooding over what she had
long considered hopeless, and with the natural desire
to see lands so celebrated, but not under any
mistaken opinions of her own situation. The presence
of Sigismund, so far as she was concerned,
was purely accidental, although she could not prevent
the pleasing idea from obtruding—an idea so
grateful to her womanly affections and maiden
pride—that the young soldier, who was in the service
of Austria, and who had become known to
her in one of his frequent visits to his native land,
had gladly seized this favorable occasion to return
to his colors. Circumstances, which it is not necessary
to recount, had enabled Adelheid to make
the youth acquainted with her father, though the
interdictions of her aunt, whose imprudence had
led to the accident which nearly proved so fatal,
and from whose consequences she had been saved
by Sigismund, prevented her from explaining all
the causes she had for showing him respect and
esteem. Perhaps the manner in which this young
and imaginative though sensible girl was compelled
to smother a portion of her feelings gave them
intensity, and hastened that transition of sentiment
from gratitude to affection, which, in another case,
might have only been produced by a more open
and prolonged association. As it was, she scarcely
knew herself how irretrievably her happiness was
bound up in that of Sigismund, though she had so
long cherished his image in most of her day-dreams,
and had unconsciously admitted his influence
over her mind and hopes, until she learned
that they were reciprocated.
The Signor Grimaldi appeared on one end of
the terrace, as Adelheid de Willading descended
at the other. The old nobles had separated late
communication that had shaken the soul of the
Italian, and drawn strong and sincere manifestations
of sympathy from his friend. Though so
prone to sudden shades of melancholy, there was
a strong touch of the humorous in the native character
of the Genoese, which came so quick upon
his more painful recollection, as greatly to relieve
their weight, and to render him, in appearance at
least, a happy, while the truth would have shown
that he was a sorrowing, man. He had been
making his orisons with a grateful heart, and he
now came forth into the genial mountain air, like
one who had relieved his conscience of a heavy
debt. Like most laymen of the Catholic persuasion,
he thought himself no longer bound to maintain
a grave and mortified exterior, when worship
and penitence were duly observed, and he joined
his friend with a cheerfulness of air and voice that
an ascetic, or a puritan, might have attributed to
levity, after the scenes through which he had so
lately passed.
“The Virgin and San Francesco keep thee in
mind, old friend!” said the Signor Grimaldi, cordially
kissing the two cheeks of the Baron de
Willading. “We both have reason to remember
their care, though, heretic as thou art, I doubt not
thou hast already found some other mediators to
thank, that we now stand on this solid terrace of
the Signor de Blonay, instead of being worthless
clay at the bottom of yonder treacherous lake.”
“I thank God for this, as for all his mercies—
for thy life, Gaetano, as well as for mine own.”
“Thou art right, thou art right, good Melchior;
'twas no affair for any but Him who holds the universe
in the hollow of his hand, in good faith, for
a minute later would have gathered both with our
fathers. Still thou wilt permit me, Catholic as I
in the moment of extremity.”
“This is a subject on which we have never
agreed, and on which we probably never shall,”
answered the Bernese, with somewhat of the reserve
of one conscious of a stronger dissidence than he
wished to express, as they turned and commenced
their walk up and down the terrace, “though I
believe it is the only matter of difference that ever
existed between us.”
“Is it not extraordinary,” returned the Genoese,
“that men should consort together in good and
evil, bleed for each other, love each other, do all
acts of kindness to each other, as thou and I have
done, Melchior, nay, be in the last extremity, and
feel more agony for the friend than for one's self,
and yet entertain such opinions of their respective
creeds, as to fancy the unbeliever in the devil's
claws all this time, and to entertain a latent distrust
that the very soul which, in all other matters,
is deemed so noble and excellent, is to be everlastingly
damned for the want of certain opinions and
formalities that we ourselves have been taught to
think essential?”
“To tell thee the truth,” returned the Swiss,
rubbing his forehead like a man who wished to
brighten up his ideas, as one would brighten old
silver, by friction; “this subject, as thou well
knowest, is not my strong side. Luther and Calvin,
with other sages, discovered that it was weakness
to submit to dogmas, without close examination,
merely because they were venerable, and
they winnowed the wheat from the chaff. This
we call a reform. It is enough for me that men
so wise were satisfied with their researches and
changes, and I feel little inclination to disturb a
decision that has now received the sanction of
nearly two centuries of practice. To be plain
opinions of my fathers.”
“Though it would seem not of thy grandfathers,”
said the Italian, drily, but in perfect good humor.
“By San Francesco! thou wouldst have made a
worthy cardinal, had chance brought thee into the
world fifty leagues farther south, or west, or east.
But this is the way with the world, whether it be
your Turk, your Hindoo, or your Lutheran, and I
fear it is much the same with the children of St.
Peter too. Each has his arguments for faith, or
politics, or any interest that may be named, which
he uses like a hammer to knock down the bricks
of his opponent's reasons, and when he finds himself
in the other's intrenchments, why he gathers
together the scattered materials in order to build
a wall for his own protection. Then what was
oppression yesterday is justifiable defence to-day;
fanaticism becomes logic; and credulity and pliant
submission get, in two centuries, to be deference
to the venerable opinion of our fathers! But let it
go—thou wert speaking of thanking God, and in
that, Roman though I am, I fervently and devoutly
join with or without saints' intercession.”
The honest baron did not like his friend's allusions,
though they were much too subtle for his
ready comprehension, for the intellect of the Swiss
was a little frosted by constant residence among
snows and in full view of glaciers, and it wanted
the volatile play of the Genoese's fancy, which
was apt to expand like air rarefied by the warmth
of the sun. This difference of temperament, however,
so far from lessening their mutual kindness,
was, most probably, the real cause of its existence,
since it is well known that friendship, like love, is
more apt to be generated by qualities that vary a
little from our own than by a perfect homogeneity
of character and disposition, which is more liable
each party has some distinct capital of his own
on which to adventure, and with which to keep
alive the interest of him who, in that particular
feature, may be but indifferently provided. All
that is required for a perfect community of feeling
is a mutual recognition of, and a common respect
for, certain great moral rules, without which there
can exist no esteem between the upright. The alliance
of knaves depends on motives so hackneyed
and obvious, that we abstain from any illustration
of its principle as a work of supererogation. The
Signor Grimaldi and Melchior de Willading were
both very upright and justly-minded men, as men
go, in intention at least, and their opposite peculiarities
and opinions had served, during hot youth,
to keep alive the interest of their communications,
and were not likely, now that time had mellowed
their feelings and brought so many recollections
to strengthen the tie, to overturn what they had
been originally the principal instruments in creating.
“Of thy readiness to thank God, I have never
doubted,” answered the baron, when his friend had
ended the remark just recorded, “but we know
that his favors are commonly shown to us here
below by means of human instruments. Ought
we not, therefore, to manifest another sort of gratitude
in favor of the individual who was so serviceable
in last night's gust?”
“Thou meanest my untractable countryman? I
have bethought me much since we separated of his
singular refusal, and hope still to find the means
of conquering his obstinacy.”
“I hope thou may'st succeed, and thou well
know'st that I am always to be counted on as an
auxiliary. But he was not in my thoughts at the
instant; there is still another who nobly risked
risked life.”
“This is beyond question, and I have already
reflected much on the means of doing him good.
He is a soldier of fortune, I learn, and if he will
take service in Genoa, I will charge myself with
the care of his preferment. Trouble not thyself,
therefore, concerning the fortunes of young Sigismund;
thou knowest my means, and canst not
doubt my will.”
The baron cleared his throat, for he had a secret
reluctance to reveal his own favorable intentions
towards the young man, the last lingering
feeling of worldly pride, and the consequence of
prejudices which were then universal, and which
are even now far from being extinct. A vivid picture
of the horrors of the past night luckily flashed
across his mind, and the good genius of his young
preserver triumphed.
“Thou knowest the youth is a Swiss,” he said,
“and, in virtue of the tie of country, I claim at
least an equal right to do him good.”
“We will not quarrel for precedence in this
matter, but thou wilt do well to remember that I
possess especial means to push his interests;—
means that thou canst not by possibility use.”
“That is not proved;” interrupted the Baron
de Willading. “I have not thy particular station,
it is true, Signor Gaetano, nor thy political power,
nor thy princely fortune; but, poor as I am in
these, there is a boon in my keeping that is worth
them all, and which will be more acceptable to
the boy, or I much mistake his mettle, than any
favors that thou hast named or canst name.”
The Signor Grimaldi had pursued his walk, with
eyes thoughtfully fastened on the ground; but he
now raised them, in surprise, to the countenance
of his friend, as if to ask an explanation. The
him, but he was warming with opposition,
for the best may frequently do very excellent things,
under the influence of motives of but a very indifferent
aspect.
“Thou knowest I have a daughter,” resumed
the Swiss firmly, determined to break the ice at
once, and expose a decision which he feared his
friend might deem a weakness.
“Thou hast; and a fairer, or a modester, or a
tenderer, and yet, unless my judgment err, a firmer
at need, is not to be found among all the excellent
of her excellent sex. But thou wouldst scarce
think of bestowing Adelheid in reward for such a
service on one so little known, or without her wishes
being consulted?”
“Girls of Adelheid's birth and breeding are ever
ready to do what is meet to maintain the honor of
their families. I deem gratitude to be a debt that
must not stand long uncancelled against the name
of Willading.”
The Genoese looked grave, and it was evident
he listened to his friend with something like displeasure.
“We who have so nearly passed through life,
good Melchior,” he said, “should know its difficulties
and its hazards. The way is weary, and
it has need of all the solace that affection and a
community of feeling can yield to lighten its cares.
I have never liked this heartless manner of trafficking
in the tenderest ties, to uphold a failing line or
a failing fortune; and better it were that Adelheid
should pass her days unwooed in thy ancient castle,
than give her hand, under any sudden impulse
of sentiment, not less than under a cold calculation
of interest. Such a girl, my friend, is not to
be bestowed without much care and reflection.”
“By the mass! to use one of thine own favorite
I knew a hot-blooded Italian, jealous as a Turk,
and maintaining at thy rapier's point that women
were like the steel of thy sword, so easily tarnished
by rust, or evil breath, or neglect, that no father
or brother could be easy on the score of honor,
until the last of his name was well wedded, and
that, too, to such as the wisdom of her advisers
should choose! I remember thee once saying thou
couldst not sleep soundly till thy sister was a wife
or a nun.”
“This was the language of boyhood and thoughtless
youth, and bitterly rebuked have I been for
having used it. I wived a beauteous and noble
virgin, de Willading; but I much fear that, while
my fair conduct in her behalf won her respect and
esteem, I was too late to win her love. It is a fearful
thing to enter on the solemn and grave ties of
married life, without enlisting in the cause of happiness
the support of the judgment, the fancy, the
tastes, with the feelings that are dependent on
them, and, more than all, those wayward inclinations,
whose workings too often baffle human foresight.
If the hopes of the ardent and generous
themselves are deceived in the uncertain lottery of
wedlock, the victim will struggle hard to maintain
the delusion; but when the calculations of others
are parent to the evil, a natural inducement, that
comes of the devil I fear, prompts us to aggravate,
instead of striving to lessen, the evil.”
“Thou dost not speak of wedlock as one who
found the condition happy, poor Gaetano?”
“I have told thee what I fear was but too true,”
returned the Genoese, with a heavy sigh. “My
birth, vast means, and I trust a fair name, induced
the kinsmen of my wife to urge her to a union,
that I have since had reason to fear her feelings
did not lead her to form. I had a terrible ally too
captivated her young fancy, and whom, as age
brought reflection, her reason condemned. I was
accepted, therefore, as a cure to a bleeding heart
and broken peace, and my office, at the best, was
not such as a good man could desire, or a proud
man tolerate. The unhappy Angiolina died in giving
birth to her first child, the unhappy son of
whom I have told thee so much. She found peace
at last in the grave!”
“Thou hadst not time to give thy manly tenderness
and noble qualities an opportunity; else, my
life on it, she would have come to love thee, Gaetano,
as all love thee who know thee!” returned
the baron, warmly.
“Thanks, my kind friend; but beware of making
marriage a mere convenience. There may
be folly in calling each truant inclination that deep
sentiment and secret sympathy which firmly knits
heart to heart, and doubtless a common fortune
may bind the worldly-minded together; but this is
not the holy union which keeps noble qualities in a
family, and which fortifies against the seductions
of a world that is already too strong for honesty.
I remember to have heard from one that understood
his fellow-creatures well, that marriages of
mere propriety tend to rob woman of her greatest
charm, that of superiority to the vulgar feeling of
worldly calculations, and that all communities in
which they prevail become, of necessity, selfish
beyond the natural limits, and eventually corrupt.”
“This may be true;—but Adelheid loves the
youth.”
“Ha! This changes the complexion of the affair.
How dost thou know this?”
“From her own lips. The secret escaped her,
under the warmth and sincerity of feeling that the
late events so naturally excited.”
“And Sigismund!—he has thy approbation?—
for I will not suppose that one like thy daughter
yielded her affections unsolicited.”
“He has—that is—he has. There is what the
world will be apt to call an obstacle, but it shall
count for nothing with me. The youth is not
noble.”
“The objection is serious, my honest friend. It
is not wise to tax human infirmity too much, where
there is sufficient to endure from causes that cannot
be removed. Wedlock is a precarious experiment,
and all unusual motives for disgust should
be cautiously avoided.—I would he were noble.”
“The difficulty shall be removed by the Emperor's
favor. Thou hast princes in Italy, too, that
might be prevailed on to do us this grace, at need?”
“What is the youth's origin and history, and by
what means has a daughter of thine been placed
in a situation to love one that is simply born?”
“Sigismund is a Swiss, and of a family of Bernese
burghers, I should think, though, to confess
the truth, I know little more than that he has passed
several years in foreign service, and that he
saved my daughter's life from one of our mountain
accidents, some two years since, as he has
now saved thine and mine. My sister, near whose
castle the acquaintance commenced, permitted the
intercourse, which it would now be too late to
think of prohibiting. And, to speak honestly, I begin
to rejoice the boy is what he is, in order that
our readiness to receive him to our arms may be
the more apparent. If the young fellow were the
equal of Adelheid in other things, as he is in person
and character, he would have too much in his
favor.—No, by the faith of Calvin!—him whom
thou stylest a heretic—I think I rejoice that the
boy is not noble!”
“Have it as thou wilt,” returned the Genoese,
and thought, for his own experience had made him
wary on the subject of doubtful or ill-assorted alliances;
“let his origin be what it may, he shall not
need gold. I charge myself with seeing that the
lands of Willading shall be fairly balanced: and
here comes our hospitable host to be witness of
the pledge.”
Roger de Blonay advanced upon the terrace to
greet his guests, as the Signor Grimaldi concluded.
The three old men continued their walk for an hour
longer, discussing the fortunes of the young pair,
for Melchior de Willading was as little disposed
to make a secret of his intentions with one of his
friends as with the other.
| CHAPTER IX. The headsman, or, The Abbaye des Vignerons | |