University of Virginia Library

12. CHAPTER XII.

“To-morrow, gentlemen,” said our captain, as we ascended
from the supper-table to the deck, “is the ever-memorable anniversary
of our national independence. I shall prepare, in my
department, that it shall be welcomed with due honors. It will
be for you to do your part. A committee, I suppose — eh, gentlemen?”

Here was a hint; and the excellent Captain Berry never
looked more like a stately Spanish Don, in a gracious moment,
than when delivering that significant speech.

“In plain terms, captain, we are to have a dinner corresponding
with the day. I have pleasant auguries, my mates, of puddings
and pasties. There shall be cakes and ale, and ginger
shall be hot i' the mouth too. Nay, because thou art a Washingtonian,
shall there be no wine? Shall there not be temperance
— after the manner of Washington — namely, that goodly
use, without abuse, of all the precious gifts of Heaven? The
hint is a good one, captain. We thank you for your benevolent
purposes. It will be for us to second your arrangements, and
prepare, on our parts, for a proper celebration of the Fourth of
July.”

“I rejoice that I am understood, gentlemen. It is usual, on
board this ship, to show that we duly sympathize with the folks
on shore. We are still a part of the same great family. There
will be shoutings in the cities to-morrow. The country will
shake with the roar of cannon from Passamaquoddy to the Rio
Grande. Boston will blaze away, and Gotham will respond,
and Baltimore and Norfolk will cry aloud, `What of the day?'
to Charleston and Savannah; and these in turn will sing out to
Mobile and New Orleans, and the whole gulf, to the Rio Grande,
will catch up the echoes with a corresponding uproar of rejoicing.
And shall we say nothing? we who sail under the name of the
great partisan warrior of the Revolution? Gentlemen, those

pretty little brass pieces, that now sleep at your feet, are stuffed
to the muzzle with eloquence. They will give tongue at the
first signs of the dawn, and I trust that all on board this ship
will be prepared to echo their sentiments.”

“In other words, captain, we must have a celebration.”

“Even so, gentlemen, if it be your pleasure. We shall have
a dinner — why not an oration? Why not our toasts and sentiments,
as well as our friends in Charleston and New York.
We are here a community to ourselves, and I venture to say
that no community is more unanimous in regard to the dinner
at least.”

“Or the drink.”

“Or the puddings.”

“Or the pies.”

“The pasties.”

“The ices.”

“The — the —”

There was no end to the enumeration of the creature comforts
which were to prove our unanimity of sentiment, and a
feeling of the mock-heroic prompted us to take up with due
gravity the hints of our captain.

We agreed upon a president, and he was — the captain; a
vice, and he was — no matter who.

We appointed a committee of arrangements, with instructions
to prepare the regular toasts. And — we appointed an orator!
This was a little shrivelled-up person in striped breeches, with
a mouldy yellow visage, and green spectacles. Nobody knew
anything about him, or, in fact, why he came to be chosen. He
was at his books all day; but it was observed that whenever he
had condescended to open his jaws it was to say something of
a dry satirical character. He was accordingly appealed to,
and made no scruple about consenting; only remarking, by
way of premonitory, that “it was no easy matter to know the
opinions of all on board ship; he should therefore simply unfold
his own, satisfied that if they were not exactly those of the company,
it was only their misfortune, which it should make them
highly grateful to enjoy that opportunity of repairing.”

Some of us thought this speech smacked not a little of a delightful
self-complacency, but it was said so easily, so naturally,

and so entirely as if the speaker had no consciousness of having
delivered himself other than modestly, that we concluded to
leave the matter in his hands, and forebore all comment. In
this resolution we were confirmed by seeing him begin his preparations
the next moment by an enormous draught from the bar;
the potency of which, judging from the infinite depth of its color,
was well calculated to afford to the orator all the inspiration that
could ever be drawn from an amalgam of Snake and Tiger.
Such was the title which he gave to a curious amalgam of the
sweet, the sour, the bitter, and the strong — bitters and brandy,
lemon and sugar, and, I think, a little sprinkling of red pepper,
being the chief elements in the draught. We felt persuaded,
after this specimen of his powers, that his tastes would be sufficiently
various, and his fancies sufficiently vivid; and we saw
him pull off his spectacles, and put off to bed, with full confidence
that neither sleeping, dreaming, drinking or waking,
would he defraud our honest expectations.

His departure did not constitute a pernicious example. It
was followed by no other of the party. Soon, the ladies appeared
on deck, and we grouped ourselves around them, my
Gothamite friend planting himself on the right of Selina Burroughs,
closely, but a little in the rear, as if for more convenient
access to her ear.

“So squat the serpent by the ear of Eve,” I whispered him
in passing.

“Ah! traitor,” quoth he, sotto voce also, “would you betray
me?”

“Do not too soon betray yourself.”

“Hem! a sensible suggestion.”

We were not allowed to proceed any farther. The lady began
with reproaches.

“I am told, gentlemen, that you took advantage of our departure
last night to say some of your best things — told, in
fact, some of your best stories. How was this? But we must
not be made to suffer again in like manner, and I propose that
we begin early to-night. Signor Myrtalozzi”— turning to an
interesting professor of Italian, who formed one of the party —
“we should hear from you to-night. If I did not greatly misunderstand
you, there were some curious histories recalled to

you this morning in our conversation touching the `Tarchun,'
and `Sepulchres of Etruria,' by Mrs. Hamilton Gray?”

“You did not err, señorita. In my own poor fashion, I have
gleaned from these and other picturesque chronicles a story of
three thousand years ago, which may be sufficiently fresh for
our present audience.”

“In this salt atmosphere?”

“Precisely. With your permission, señorita, I will narrate
the legend thus compiled from the antique chronicle, and which
I call —

THE PICTURE OF JUDGMENT; OR, THE GROTTA DEL TIFONE.

A TALE OF THE ETRURIAN.

—Dante.

1. CHAPTER I.

The “Grotta del Tifoné” — an Etruscan tomb opened by the
Chevalier Manzi, in 1833 — discovered some peculiarities at the
time of its opening, which greatly mystified the cognoscenti of
Italy. It was found, by certain Roman inscriptions upon two
of the sarcophagi, that the inmates belonged to another people,
and that the vaults of the noble Tarquinian family of Pomponius
had, for some unaccountable reasons, been opened for the
admission of the stranger. No place was so sacred among the
Etruscans as that of burial; and the tombs of the Lucumones
of Tarquinia were held particularly sacred to the immediate
connections of the chief. Here he lay in state, and the scions
and shoots of his blood and bosom were grouped around him,
being literally, as the old Hebrew phraseology hath it, “gathered
to their fathers.” It was not often — and then only under
peculiar circumstances which rendered the exception to the rule
proper — that the leaves of stone which closed the mausoleum
were rolled aside for the admission of foreigners. The “Grotta
del Tifoné” — so called from the Etruscan Typhon, or Angel of
Death, which appears conspicuously painted upon the square
central pillar — was the last resting-place of the distinguished

family of Pomponius. It is a chamber eighteen paces long and
sixteen broad, and is hewn out in the solid rock. The sarcophagi
were numerous when first discovered. The ledges were
full — every place was occupied, and a further excavation had
been made for the reception of other tenants. These tombs
were all carefully examined by the explorers with that intense
feeling of curiosity which such a discovery was calculated to
inspire. The apartment was in good preservation; the paintings
bright and distinct, though fully twenty-two centuries must
have elapsed since the colors were first spread by the hands
of the artist. And there were the inscriptions, just declaring
enough to heighten and to deepen curiosity. A name, a fragment
— and that in Latin. That a Roman should sleep in a
tomb of the Etruscan, was itself a matter of some surprise; but
that this strangeness should be still further distinguished by an
inscription, an epitaph, in the language of the detested nation —
as if the affront were to be rendered more offensive and more
imposing — was calculated still further to provoke astonishment!
Why should the hateful and always hostile Roman find repose
among the patriarchs of Tarquinia? — the rude, obscure barbarian,
in the mausoleum of a refined and ancient family? Why
upon an Etruscan tomb should there be other than an Etruscan
inscription? One of the strangers was a woman! Who was
she, and for what was she thus distinguished? By what fatality
came she to find repose among the awful manes of a people,
between whom and her own the hatred was so deep and inextinguishable
— ending not even with the entire overthrow of the
superior race? The sarcophagus of the other stranger was without
an inscription. But he, too, was a Roman! His effigy,
betraying all the characteristics of his people, lay at length
above his tomb; a noble youth, with features of exquisite delicacy
and beauty, yet distinguished by that falcon visage which
so well marked the imposing features of the great masters of
the ancient world.

The wonder and delight of our visiters were hardly lessened,
while their curiosity was stimulated to a still higher degree of
intensity, as their researches led them to another discovery
which followed the further examination of the “Grotta.” On
the right of the entrance they happened upon one of those

exquisite paintings, in which the genius of the Etruscan proves
itself to have anticipated, though it may never have rivalled the
ultimate excellence of the Greek. The piece describes a frequent
subject of art — a procession of souls to judgment, under
the charge of good and evil genii. The group is numerous.
The grace, freedom and expression of the several figures are
beyond description fine; and, with two exceptions, the effect is
exquisitely grateful to the spectator, as the progress seems to be
one to eternal delights. Two of the souls, however, are not
freed, but convict; not escaping, but doomed; not looking hope
and bliss, but despair and utter misery. One of these is clearly
the noble youth whose effigy, without inscription, appears upon
the tomb. He is one of the Roman intruders. Behind him,
following close, is the evil genius of the Etruscan — represented
as a colossal negro — brutal in all his features, exulting fiendishly
in his expression of countenance, and with his claws
firmly grasping the shoulders of his victim. His brow is twined
with serpents in the manner of a fillet, and his left hand carries
the huge mallet with which the demon was expected to
crush, or bruise and mangle, the prey which was assigned him.
The other unhappy soul, in similar keeping, is that of a young
woman, whose features declare her to be one of the loveliest of
her sex. She is tall and majestic; her carriage haughty even
in her wo, and her face equally distinguished by the highest
physical beauty, elevated by a majesty and air of sway, which
denoted a person accustomed to the habitual exercise of her own
will. But, through all her beauty and majesty, there are the
proofs of that agony of soul which passeth show and understanding.
Two big drops of sorrow have fallen, and rest upon
her cheeks, the only tokens which her large Juno-like eyes
seem to have given of the suffering which she endures. They
still preserve their fires undimmed and undaunted, and leave it
rather to the brow, the lips, and the general features of the face
to declare the keen, unutterable wo that swells within her soul,
triumphant equally over pride and beauty. Nothing can exceed
in force the touching expression of her agony unutterable, unless
in the sympathizing imagination of him who looks for the sources
of the painter's pencil into the very bosom of the artist. Immediately
behind this beautiful and suffering creature is seen, close
following, as in the case of the Roman youth already described,
the gloomy and brutal demon — the devil of Etruscan superstition
— a negro somewhat less dark and deformed than the other,
and seemingly of the other sex, with looks less terrible and
offensive, but whose office is not less certain, and whose features
are not less full of exultation and triumph. She does not actually
grasp the shoulders of her victim, but she has her, nevertheless,
beneath her clutches, and the serpent of her fillet, with
extended head, seems momently ready to dart its venomous
fangs into the white bosom that shrinks, yet swells, beneath
its eye.

Long indeed did this terrible picture fix and fascinate the
eyes of the spectators; and when at length they turned away,
it was only to look back and to meditate upon the mysterious
and significant scene which it described. In proceeding further,
however, in their search through the “Grotta,” they happened
upon another discovery. They were already aware that the
features of this beautiful woman were Roman in their type.
Indeed, there was no mistaking the inexpressible majesty of that
countenance, which could belong to no other people. It was
not to be confounded with the Etruscan, which, it must be
remembered, was rather Grecian or Phœnician in its character,
and indicated grace and beauty rather than strength, subtlety
and skill rather than majesty and command. But, that there
might be no doubt of the origin of this lovely woman, examining
more closely the effigy upon the sarcophagus first discovered
— having removed the soil from the features, and brought
a strong light to bear upon them — they were found to be those
exactly of the victim thus terribly distinguished in the painting.

Here, then, was a coincidence involving a very curious mystery.
About the facts there could be no mistake. Two strangers,
of remarkable feature, find their burial, against all usage,
in the tumulus of an ancient Etruscan family. Both are young,
of different sexes, and both are Roman. Their features are
carved above their dust, in immortal marble — we may almost
call it so, when, after two thousand years, it still preserves its
trust; and in an awful procession of souls to judgment, delineated
by a hand of rare excellence and with rare precision, we
find the same persons, drawn to the life, and in the custody,

as doomed victims, of the terrible fiend of Etruscan mythology.
To this condition some terrible tale was evidently attached.
Both of these pictures were portraits. For that matter, all were
portraits in the numerous collection. With those two exceptions,
the rest were of the same family, and their several fates,
according to the resolve of the painter, were all felicitous.
They walked erect, triumphant in hope and consciousness, elastic
in their tread, and joyous in their features. Not so these
two: the outcasts of the group — with but not of them — painfully
contrasted by the artist, — terribly so by the doom of the
awful Providence whose decree he had ventured thus freely to
declare. The features of the man had the expression of one
whom a just self-esteem moves to submit in dignity, and without
complaint. The face of the woman, on the contrary, is full of
anguish, though still distinguished by a degree of loftiness and
character to which his offers no pretension. There were the
portraits, and there the effigies, and beneath them, in their stone
coffins, lay the fragments of their mouldering bones — the relic
of two thousand years. What a scene had the artist chosen to
transmit to posterity, from real life! and with what motive?
By what terrible sense of justice, or by what strange obliquity
of judgment and feeling, did the great Lucumo of the Pomponii
suffer the members of his family to be thus offensively perpetuated
to all time, in the place of family sepulture? Could it
have been the inspiration of revenge and hatred, by which this
vivid and terrible representation was wrought; and what was
the melancholy history of these two strangers — so young, so
beautiful — thus doomed to the inexpiable torments of the endless
future, by the bold anticipatory awards of a successor or a
contemporary? To these questions our explorers of the “Grotta
del Tifoné” did not immediately find an answer. That they
have done so since, the reader will ascribe to the keen anxiety
with which they have groped through ancient chronicles, in
search of an event which, thus wonderfully preserved by art for
a period of more than twenty centuries, could not, as they well
conjectured, be wholly obliterated from all other mortal records.

2. CHAPTER II.

The time had passed when Etruria gave laws to the rest of
Italy. Lars Porsenna was already in his grave, and his memory,
rather than his genius and spirit, satisfied the Etrusean.
The progeny of the She Wolf[1] had risen into wondrous strength
and power, and so far from shrinking within their walls at the
approach of the vulture of Volterra, they had succeeded in clipping
her wings, and shortening, if not wholly arresting her flight.
The city of the Seven Hills, looking with triumph from her eminences,
began to claim all within her scope of vision as her own.
Paralyzed at her audacity, her success, and her wonderful
genius for all the arts of war, the neighboring cities began to
tremble at the assertion of her claims. But the braver and less
prudent spirits of young Etruria revolted at this assumption, and
new wars followed, which were too fierce and bloody to continue
long. It needs not that we should describe the varying fortunes
of the parties. Enough for our purposes that, after one well-fought
field, in which the Romans triumphed, they bore away,
as a prisoner, with many others, Cœlius, the youthful Lucumo
of the Pomponian family. This young man, not yet nineteen,
was destined by nature rather for an artist than a soldier. He
possessed, in remarkable degree, that talent for painting and
statuary, which was largely the possession of the Etrurians;
and, though belonging to one of the noblest families in his native
city, he did not think it dishonorable to exercise his talent with
industry and devotion. In the invasion of his country by the
fierce barbarians of Rome, he had thrown aside the pencil for
the sword, in the use of which latter weapon he had shown himself
not a whit less skilful and excellent, because of his preference
for a less dangerous implement. His captivity was irksome,
rather than painful and oppressive. He was treated with
indulgence by his captors, and quartered for a season in the family
of the fierce chief by whose superior prowess he had been
overthrown. Here, if denied his freedom, and the use of the
sword, he was not denied a resumption of those more agreeable
exercises of art to which he had devoted himself before his captivity.

He consoled himself in this condition by his favorite
studies. He framed the vase into grace and beauty, adorned its
sides with groups from poetry and history, and by his labors delighted
the uninitiated eyes of all around him. The fierce warrior
in whose custody he was, looked on with a grim sort of satisfaction
at the development of arts, for which his appreciative
faculties were small; and it somewhat lessened our young
Etruscan in his esteem, that he should take pleasure in such
employments. At all events, the effects, however disparaging,
were so far favorable that they tended to the increase of his
indulgences. His restraints were fewer; the old Roman not
apprehending much danger of escape, or much of enterprise,
from one whose tastes were so feminine; and the more gentle
regards of the family, in which he was a guest perforce, contributed
still more to sweeten and soften the asperities of captivity.
As a Lucumo of the first rank in Etruria, he also claimed peculiar
indulgencies from a people who, conscious of their own inferior
origin, were not by any means insensible to the merits of aristocracy.
Our captive was accordingly treated with a deference
which was as grateful to his condition as it was the proper tribute
to his rank. The wife of the chief whose captive he was,
herself a noble matron of Rome, was as little insensible to the
rank of the Etrurian, as she was to the equal modesty and manliness
of his deportment. Nor was she alone thus made aware
of his claims and virtues. She had a son and daughter, the latter
named Aurelia, a creature of the most imposing beauty, of a
lofty spirit and carriage, and of a high and generous ambition.
The brother, Lucius, was younger than herself, a lad of fifteen;
but he, like his sister, became rapidly and warmly impressed
with the grace of manner and goodness of heart which distinguished
the young Etrurian. They both learned to love him;
the youth, probably, with quite as unreckoning a warmth as his
sister. Nor was the heart of Cœlius long untouched. He soon
perceived the exquisite beauties of the Roman damsel, and, by
the usual unfailing symptoms, revealed the truth as well to the
family of the maiden as to herself. The mother discovered the
secret with delight, was soon aware of the condition of her
daughter's heart, and, the relations of the several parties being
thus understood, it was not long before they came to an explanation,
which ended to their mutual satisfaction. Cœlius was
soon released from his captivity, and, to the astonishment of all
his family, returned home, bearing with him the beautiful creature
by whom his affections had been so suddenly enslaved.

3. CHAPTER III.

His return to Tarquinia was hailed with delight by every
member of his family but one. This was a younger brother,
whose position had been greatly improved by the absence and
supposed death of Cœlius. He cursed in the bitterness of his
heart the fate which had thus restored, as from the grave, the
shadow which had darkened his own prospects; and, though
he concealed his mortification under the guise of a joy as lively
as that of any other member of the household, he was torn with
secret hate and the most fiendish jealousy. At first, however, as
these feelings were quite aimless, he strove naturally to subdue
them. There was no profitable object in their indulgence, and
he was one of those, cunning beyond his years, who entertain
no moods, and commit no crime, unless with the distinct hope of
acquisition. It required but a little time, however, to ripen
other feelings in his soul, by which the former were rather
strengthened than diminished, and by which all his first, and
perhaps feeble, efforts to subdue them were rendered fruitless.
In the first bitter mood in which he beheld the return of his
brother, the deep disappointment which he felt, with the necessity
of concealing his chagrin from every eye, prevented him
from bestowing that attention upon the wife of Cœlius which her
beauty, had his thoughts been free, must inevitably have commanded.
With his return to composure, however, he soon made
the discovery of her charms, and learned to love them with a
passion scarcely less warm than that which was felt by her husband.
Hence followed a double motive for hating the latter,
and denouncing his better fortune. Aruns — the name of the
younger brother — was, like Cœlius, a man of great talent and
ingenuity; but his talent, informed rather by his passions than
by his tastes, was addressed to much humbler objects. While
the one was creative and gentle in his character, the other was
violent and destructive; while the one worshipped beauty for its

own sake, the other regarded it only as subserving selfish purposes.
Cœlius was frank and generous in his temper, Aruns
reserved, suspicious and contracted. The one had no disguises,
the other dwelt within them, even as a spider girdled by his
web, and lying secret in the crevice at its bottom. Hitherto,
his cunning had been chiefly exercised in concealing itself, in
assuming the port of frankness, in appearing, so far as he might,
the thing that he was not. It was now to be exercised for his
more certain profit, in schemes hostile to the peace of others.
To cloak these designs he betrayed more than usual joy at the
restoration of his brother. His, indeed, seemed the most elated
spirit of the household, and the confiding and unsuspecting
Cœlius at once took him to his heart, with all the warmth and
sincerity of boyhood. It gave him pleasure to perceive that
Aurelia, his wife, received him as a brother, and he regarded with
delight the appearance of affection that subsisted between them.
The three soon became more and more united in their sympathies
and objects, and the devotion of Aruns to the Roman wife
of Cœlius was productive of a gratification to the latter, which
he did not endeavor to conceal. It was grateful to him that his
brother did not leave his wife to that solitude in her foreign
home, which might sometimes have followed his own too intense
devotion to the arts which he so passionately loved; and, without
a fear that his faith might be misplaced, he left to Aruns the
duty which no husband might prudently devolve upon any man,
of ministering to those tastes and affections, the most delicate
and sacred, which make of every family circle a temple in which
the father, and the husband, and the master, should alone be the
officiating priest.

Some time had passed in this manner, and at length it struck
our Lucumo that there was less cordiality between his brother
and his wife than had pleased him so much at first. Aurelia
now no longer spoke of Aruns — his name never escaped her
lips, unless when she was unavoidably forced to speak it in
reply. His approaches to her were marked by a timidity not
usual with him, and by a hauteur in her countenance which was
shown to no other person. It was a proof of the superior love of
Cœlius for his wife that he reproached her for this seeming dislike.
She baffled his inquiry, met his reproaches with renewed

shows of tenderness, and the fond, confiding husband resumed
his labors on the beautiful, with perhaps too little regard to what
was going on around him. Meanwhile, the expression in the
face of Aurelia had been gradually deepening into gravity. Care
was clouding her brow, and an air of anxiety manifested itself
upon her cheek — a look of apprehension — as if some danger
were impending — some great fear threatening in her heart.
This continued for some time, when she became conscious that
the eye of her husband began to be fixed inquiringly upon her,
and with the look of one dissatisfied, if not doubtful — disturbed
if not suspicious — and with certain sensibilities rendered acute
and watchful, which had been equally confiding and affectionate
before. These signs increased her disquiet, deepened her anxiety.
But she was silent. The glances of her husband were full
of appeal, but she gave them no response. She could but retire
from his presence, and sigh to herself in solitude. There
was evidently a mystery in this conduct, and the daily increasing
anxieties of the husband betrayed his doubts lest it might
prove a humiliating one at the solution. But he, too, was silent.
His pride forbade that he should declare himself when he could
only speak of vague surmises and perhaps degrading suspicions.
He was silent, but not at ease. His pleasant labors of the studio
were abandoned. Was it for relief from his own thoughts that
he was now so frequently in company with Aruns, or did he
hope to obtain from the latter any clue to the mystery which
disturbed his household? It was not in the art of Aurelia so to
mould the expression of her countenance as to hide from others
the anxiety which she felt in the increasing and secret communion
of the brothers. She watched their departure with dread,
and witnessed their return together with agitation. She saw, or
fancied she saw, in the looks of the younger, a malignant exultation
which even his habitual cunning did not suffer him entirely
to conceal.

4. CHAPTER IV.

At length the cloud seemed to clear away from the brow of
her husband. He once more resumed his labors, and with an
avidity which he had not betrayed before. His passion now

amounted to intensity. He gave himself no respite from his
toils. Late and early he was at his task — morning and night
— without intermission, and with the enthusiasm of one who rejoices
in the completion of a favorite and long-cherished study.
Aurelia was not unhappy at this second change; to go back to
his old engagements and tastes seemed to her to indicate a return
to his former equanimity and waveless happiness. It was
with some surprise, however, and not a little concern, that she
was not now permitted to watch his progress. He wrought in
secret — his studio was closed against her, as, indeed, it was
against all persons. Hitherto it had not been so in her instance.
She pleasantly reproached him for this seclusion, but he answered
her — “Fear not, you shall see all when it is done.”
There was something in this reply to disquiet her, but she was
in a state of mind easily to be disquieted.

She was conscious also of a secret withheld from her husband
— and her reproaches sunk back upon her heart, unuttered, from
her lips. She could not, because of what she felt, declare to him
what she thought; and she beheld his progress, from day to day,
with an apprehension that increased momently, and made her
appearance, in one respect, not unlike his own. She was not
aware that he was the victim of a strange excitement, in which
his present artist labors had a considerable share. He seemed
to hurry to their prosecution with an eager impatience that
looked like frenzy — and to return from his daily task with a
frame exhausted, but with an eye that seemed to burn with the
subtlest fires. His words were few, but there was a strange intelligence
in his looks. His cheeks had grown very pale, his frame
was thinned, his voice made hollow, in the prosecution of these
secret labors; and yet there was a something of exultation in
his glance, which fully declared that, however exhausting to his
frame might be the task he was pursuing, its results were yet
looked to with a wild and eager satisfaction. At length the
work was done. One day he stood before her in an attitude of
utter exhaustion. “It is finished!” he exclaimed. “You shall
see it to-morrow.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“Nay, to-morrow! to-morrow!”

He then retired to sleep, and rested several hours. She looked

on him while he slept. He had never rested so profoundly since
he had begun the labor from which he was now freed. The
slumber of an infant was never more calm, was never softer,
sweeter, or purer. The beauty of Cœlius was that of the
most peaceful purity. She bent over him as he slept, and kissed
his forehead with lips of the truest devotion, while two big tears
gathered in her large eyes, and slowly felt their way along her
cheeks. She turned away lest the warm drops falling upon his
face might awake him. She turned away, and in her own apartment
gave free vent to the feelings which his pure and placid
slumbers seemed rather to subdue than encourage. Why, with
such a husband — her first love — and with so many motives to
happiness, was she not happy? Alas! who shall declare for
the secret yearnings of the heart, and say, as idly as Canute to
the sea, “thus far shalt thou go, and no farther — here shall thy
proud waves be stayed.” Aurelia was a creature of fears and
anxieties, and many a secret and sad presentiment. She was
very far from happy — ill at ease — and — but why anticipate?
We shall soon enough arrive at the issue of our melancholy narrative!

That night, while she slept — for grief and apprehension have
their periods of exhaustion which we misname repose — her husband
rose from his couch, and with cautious footsteps departed
from his dwelling. He was absent all the night and returned
only with the dawn. He re-entered his home with the same
stealthy caution with which he had quitted it, and it might have
been remarked that he dismissed his brother, with two other
persons, at the threshold. They were all masked, and otherwise
disguised with cloaks. Why this mystery? Where had
they been — on what mission of mischief or of shame? To
Cœlius, such a necessity was new, and scarcely had he entered
his dwelling than he cast aside his disguises with the air of one
who loathes their uses. He was very pale and haggard, with a
fixed but glistening expression of the eye, a brow of settled
gloom, from which hope and faith, and every interest in life
seemed utterly to be banished. A single groan escaped him
when he stood alone, and then he raised himself erect, as if
hitherto he had leaned upon the arms of others. He carried
himself firmly and loftily, his lips compressed, his eye eagerly

looking forward; and thus, after the interval of a few seconds,
he passed to the chamber of his wife. And still she slept. He
bent over her, earnestly and intently gazing upon those beauties
which grief seemed only to sadden into superior sweetness. He
looked upon her with those earnest eyes of love, the expression
of which can never be misunderstood. Still he loved her, though
between her heart and his, a high, impassable barrier had been
raised up by the machinations of a guilty spirit. Tenderness
was the prevailing character of his glance until she spoke. Her
sleep, though deep, was not wholly undisturbed. Fearful images
crossed her fancy. She started and sobbed, and cried, “Save,
O save and spare him — Flavius, my dear Flavius!” and her
breathing again became free, and her lips sunk once more into
repose. But fearful was the change, from a saddened tenderness
to agony and despair, which passed over the features of
Cœlius as he listened to her cry. Suddenly, striking his clenched
hands against his forehead, he shook them terribly at the sleeping
woman, and rushed wildly out of the apartment.

5. CHAPTER V.

It was noon of the same day — a warm and sunny noon, in
which the birds and the breeze equally counselled pleasure and
repose. The viands stood before our Cœlius and his wife, the
choicest fruits of Italy, and cates which might not, in later days,
have misbeseemed the favorite chambers of Lucullus. The goblet
was lifted in the hands of both, and the heart of Aurelia felt
almost as cheerful as the expression on her face. It was the
reflection in the face of her husband. His brow was gloomy no
longer. The tones of his voice were neither cold, nor angry,
nor desponding. A change — she knew not why — had come
over his spirit, and he smiled, nay, laughed out, in the very exultation
of a new life. Aurelia conjectured nothing of this so
sudden change. Enough that it was grateful to her soul. She
was too happy in its influence to inquire into its cause. What
heart that is happy does inquire? She quaffed the goblet at his
bidding — quaffed it to the dregs — and her eye gleamed delighted
and delightfully upon his, even as in the first hours of their union.
She had no apprehensions — dreaded nothing sinister — and did

not perceive that ever, at the close of his laughter, there was a convulsive
quiver in his tones, a sort of hysterical sobbing, that he
seemed to try to subdue in vain. She noticed not this, nor the
glittering, almost spectral brightness of his glance, as, laughing
tumultuously, he still kept his gaze intently fixed upon her. She
was blind to all things but the grateful signs of his returning
happiness and attachment. Once more the goblet was lifted.
“To Turmes [Mercury] the conductor,” cried the husband. The
wife drank unwittingly — for still her companion smiled upon
her, and spoke joyfully, and she was as little able as willing to
perceive that anything occult occurred in his expression.

“Have you drank?” he asked.

She smiled, and laid the empty goblet before him.

“Come, then, you shall now behold the picture. You will
now be prepared to understand it.”

They rose together, but another change had overspread his
features. The gayety had disappeared from his face. It was
covered with a calm that was frightful. The eye still maintained
all its eager intensity, but the lips were fixed in the icy
mould of resolution. They declared a deep, inflexible purpose.
There was a corresponding change in his manner and deportment.
But a moment before he was all life, grace, gayety and
great flexibility; he was now erect, majestic and commanding
in aspect, with a lordly dignity in his movement, that declared
a sense of a high duty to be done. Aurelia was suddenly impressed
with misgivings. The change was too sudden not to startle
her. Her doubts and apprehensions were not lessened when,
instead of conducting her to the studio, where she expected to
see the picture, he led the way through the vestibule and into
the open court of the palace. They lingered but for a moment
at the entrance, and she then beheld his brother Aruns approaching.
To him she gave not a look.

“All is right,” said the latter.

“Enter!” was the reply of Cœlius; and as the brother disappeared
within the vestibule, the two moved forward through the
outer gate. They passed through a lovely wood, shady and
silent, through which, subdued by intervening leaves, gleamed
only faintly the bright, clear sun of Italy. From under the
huge chestnuts, on either hand, the majestic gods of Etruria extended

their guiding and endowing hands. Tina, or Jupiter,
Aplu, or Apollo, Erkle, Turmes, and the rest, all conducting
them along the via sacra, which led from the palaces to the
tombs of every proud Etruscan family. They entered the solemn
grove which was dedicated to night and silence, and were
about to ascend the gradual slopes by which the tumulus was
approached. Then it was that the misgivings of Aurelia took a
more serious form. She felt a vague but oppressive fear. She
hesitated.

“My Cœlius,” she exclaimed, “whither do we go? Is not
this the passage to the house of silence?”

“Do you not know it?” he demanded quickly, and fixing
upon her a keen inquiring glance. “Come!” he continued, “it
is there that I have fixed the picture!”

“Alas! my Cœlius, wherefore? It is upon this picture that
you have been so deeply engaged. It has made you sad — it
has left us both unhappy. Let us not go — let me not see it!”
Her agitation was greatly increased. He saw it, and his face
put on a look of desperate exultation.

“Ay, but thou must see it — thou shalt look upon it and behold
my triumph, my greatest triumph in art, and perhaps my
last. I shall never touch pencil more, and wilt thou refuse to
look upon my last and noblest work. Fie! this were a wrong
to me, and a great shame in thee, Aurelia. Come! the toil of
which thou think'st but coldly, has brought me peace rather than
sadness. It has made of death a thing rather familiar than offensive.
If it has deprived me of hopes, it has left me without
terrors!”

“Deprived you of hopes, my Cœlius,” said the wife, still lingering,
and in mortal terror.

“Even so!”

“And, wherefore, O, my husband, wherefore?”

“Speak not, woman! See you not that we are within the
shadow of the tomb?”

“Let us not approach — let us go hence!” she exclaimed entreatingly,
with increasing agitation.

“Ay, shrink'st thou!” he answered; “well thou may'st. The
fathers of the Pomponii, for two thousand years, are now floating
around us on their sightless wings. They wonder that a

Roman woman should draw nigh to the dwellings of our ancient
Lucumones.”

“A Roman woman!” she exclaimed reproachfully. “My
Cœlius, wherefore this?”

“Art thou not?”

“I am thy wife.”

“Art sure of that?”

“As the gods live and look upon us, I am thine, this hour and
for ever!”

“May the gods judge thee, woman,” he responded slowly, as
he paused at the gate of the mausoleum, and fixed his eyes intently
upon her. Hers were raised to heaven, with her uplifted
hands. She did not weep, and her grief was still mixed with a
fearful agitation.

“Let us now return, my Cœlius!”

“What, wilt thou not behold the picture?”

“Not now — at another season. I could not look upon it now!”

“Alas! woman, but this can not be. Thou must behold it
now or never. Hope not to escape. Enter! I have a tale to
tell thee, and a sight to show thee within, which thou canst not
hear or see hereafter. Enter!” As he spoke, he applied the
key to the stone leaf, and the door slowly revolved upon the
massy pivots. She turned and would have fled, but he grasped
her by the wrist, and moved toward the entrance. She carried
her freed hand to her forehead — parted the hair from her eyes,
and raised them pleadingly to heaven. Resistance she saw was
vain. Her secret was discovered. She prepared to enter, but
slowly. “Enter! Dost thou fear now,” cried her husband,
“when commanded? Hast thou not, thou, a Roman, ventured
already to penetrate these awful walls, given to silence and the
dead — and on what mission? Enter, as I bid thee!”

6. CHAPTER VI.

She obeyed him, shuddering and silent. He followed her,
closed the entrance, and fastened it within. They were alone
among the dead of a thousand years — alone, but not in darkness.
The hand of preparation had been there, and cressets
were burning upon the walls; their lights, reflected from the

numerous shields of bronze within the apartment, shedding a
strange and fantastic splendor upon the scene. The eyes of
Aurelia rapidly explored the chamber as if in search of some expected
object. Those of Cœlius watched them with an expression
of scornful triumph, which did not escape her glance. She
firmly met his gaze, almost inquiringly, while her hands were
involuntarily and convulsively clasped together.

“Whom dost thou seek, Aurelia?”

“Thou know'st! thou know'st! — where is he? Tell me,
my Cœlius, that he is safe, that thou hast sped him hence —
that I may bless thee.”

He smiled significantly as he replied, “He is safe — I have
sped him hence!”

“Tinai [Adonai], my husband, keep thee in the hollow of his
hand.”

“How! shameless! dost thou dare so much?”

“What mean'st thou, my Cœlius?”

“Sit thou there,” he answered, “till I show thee my picture.”
He pointed her, as he spoke, to a new sarcophagus, upon which
she placed herself submissively. Then, with a wand in his hand,
he, himself, seated upon another coffin of stone, pointed her to a
curtain which covered one of the sides of the chamber. “Behind
that curtain, Aurelia, is the last work of my hands; but
before I unveil it to thine eyes, let me tell thee its melancholy
history. It will not need many words for this. Much of it is
known to thee already. How I found thee in Rome, when I
was there a captive — how I loved thee, and how I believed in
thy assurances of love; all these things thou know'st. We
wedded, and I brought thee, a Roman woman, held a barbarian
by my people, into the palace of one of the proudest families of
all Etruria. Shall I tell thee that I loved thee still — that I
love thee even now, when I have most reason to hate thee,
when I know thy perjury, thy cold heart, thy hot lust, thy base,
degrading passions!”

“Hold, my lord — say not these things to my grief and thy
dishonor. They wrong me not less than thy own name.
These things, poured into thine ear by some secret enemy, are
false!”

“Thou wilt not swear it?”

“By all the gods of Rome —”

“And of what avail, and how binding the oath taken in the
names of the barbarian deities of Rome.”

“By the Etrurian —”

“Perjure not thyself, woman, but hear me.”

“Go on, my lord, I will hear thee, though I suffer death with
every word thou speak'st.”

“It is well, Aurelia, that thou art prepared for this.”

“Thy dagger, my Cœlius, were less painful than thy words
and looks unkind.”

“Never was I unkind, until I found thee false.”

“Never was I false, my lord, even when thou wast unkind.”

“Woman! lie not! thou wert discovered with thy paramour,
here, in this tomb; thou wert followed, day by day, and all thy
secret practices betrayed. This thou ow'st to the better vigilance
of my dear brother Aruns — he, more watchful of my honor
than myself —”

“Ah! well I know from what hand came the cruel shaft!
Cœlius, my Cœlius, thy brother is a wretch, doomed to infamy
and black with crime. I have had no paramour. I might have
had, and thou might'st have been dishonored, had I hearkened
to thy brother's pleadings. I spurned him from my feet with
loathing, and he requites me with hate. Oh, my husband, believe
me, and place this man, whom thou too fondly callest thy
brother, before thine eyes and mine!”

“Alas! Aurelia, this boldness becomes thee not. I myself
traced thee to this tomb — these eyes but too frequently beheld
thee with thy paramour.”

“Cœlius, as I live, he was no paramour — but where is he,
what hast thou done with him?”

“Sent him before thee to prepare thy couch in Hades!”

“Oh, brother! — but thou hast not! tell me, my lord, that thy
hand is free from this bloody crime!”

“He sleeps beneath thee. It is upon his sarcophagus thou
sittest.”

She started with a piercing shriek from the coffin where she
sat, knelt beside it, and strove to remove the heavy stone lid,
which had been already securely fastened. While thus engaged

the Lucumo drew aside with his hand the curtain which concealed
the picture.

“Look,” said he, “woman, behold the fate which thou and
thy paramour have received — behold the task which I had set
me when first I had been shown thy perjuries. Look!”

She arose in silence from her knees, and turned her eyes upon
the picture. As the curtain was slowly unrolled from before it,
and she conceived the awful subject, and distinguished, under
the care of the good and guardian genii, the shades of well-known
members of the Pomponian family, her interest was greatly excited;
but when, following in the train and under the grasp of
the Etrurian demon, she beheld the features of the young Roman
who was doomed, she bounded forward with a cry of agony.

“My brother, my Flavius, my own, my only brother!” and
sunk down with outstretched arms before the melancholy shade.

“Her brother!” exclaimed the husband. She heard the
words and rose rapidly to her feet.

“Ay, Flavius, my brother, banished from Rome, and concealed
here in thy house of silence, concealed even from thee,
my husband, as I would not vex thee with the anxieties of an
Etrurian noble, lest Rome should hear and punish the people by
whom her outlaw was protected. Thou know'st my crime. This
paramour was the brother of my heart — child of the same sire
and dame—a noble heart, a pure spirit, whose very virtues have
been the cause of his disgrace at Rome. Slay me, if thou wilt,
but tell me not, O, Cœlius, that thou hast put the hands of hate
upon my brother!”

“Thy tale is false, woman — well-planned, but false. Know
I not thy brother? Did I not know thy brother well in Rome?
Went we not together oft? I tell thee, I should know him
among a line of ten thousand Romans!”

“Alas! alas! my husband, if ever I had brother, then is this
he. I tell thee nothing but the truth. Of a surety, when thou
wert in Rome, my brother was known to thee, but the boy has
now become a man. Seven years have wrought a change upon
him of which thou hast not thought. Believe me, what I tell
thee — the youth whom I sheltered in this vault, and to whom I
brought food nightly, was, indeed, my brother — my Flavius, the
only son of my mother, who sent him to me, with fond words of

entreaty, when the consuls of the city bade him depart in banishment.”

“I can not believe thee, woman. It were a mortal agony,
far beyond what I feel in the conviction of thy guilt, were I to
yield faith to thy story. It is thy paramour whom I have slain,
and who sleeps in that tomb. His portrait and his judgment are
before thee, and now — look on thine own!”

The picture, fully displayed, showed to the wretched woman
her own person, in similar custody with him who was her supposed
paramour. The terrible felicity of the execution struck
her to the soul. It was a picture to live as a work of art, and
to this she was not insensible. She clasped her hands before it,
and exclaimed,

“Oh! my Cœlius, what a life hast thou given to a lie. Yet
may I bear the terrors of such a doom, if he whom thou hast
painted there in a fate full of dreadful fellowship with mine, was
other than my brother Flavius — he with whom thou didst love
to play, and to whom thou didst impart the first lessons in the
art which he learned to love from thee. Dost hear me, my Cœ
lius, as my soul lives, this man was none other than my brother.”

“False! false! I will not, dare not believe thee!” he answered
in husky accents. His frame was trembling, yet he busied himself
in putting on a rich armor, clothing himself in military garb,
from head to foot, as if going into action.

“What dost thou, my lord?” demanded Aurelia, curious as she
beheld him in this occupation.

“This,” said he, “is the armor in which I fought with Rome
when I was made the captive of thy people, and thine. It is
fit that I should wear it now, when I am once more going into
captivity.”

“My husband, what mean'st thou — of what captivity dost
thou speak?”

“The captivity of death! Hear me, Aurelia, dost thou feel
nothing at thy heart which tells thee of the coming struggle
when the soul shakes off the reluctant flesh, and strives, as it were,
for freedom. Is there no chill in thy veins, no sudden pang, as
of fire in thy breast? These speak in me. They warn me of
death. We are both summoned. But a little while is left of
life to either!”

“Have mercy, Jove! I feel these pains, this chill, this fire
that thou speak'st of.”

“It is death! the goblet which I gave thee, and of which I
drank the first and largest draught, was drugged with death.”

“Then — it is all true! Thou hast in truth slain my brother.
Thou hast — thou hast!”

“Nay, he was not thy brother, Aurelia. Why wilt thou forswear
thyself at this terrible moment? It is vain. Wouldst
thou lie to death — wouldst thou carry an impure face of perjury
before the seat of the Triune God! Beware! Confess thy crime,
and justify the vengeance of thy lord!”

“As I believe thee, my Cœlius — as I believe that thou hast
most rashly and unjustly murdered my brother, and put death
in the cup which, delivered by thy hands, was sweet and precious
to my lips, so must I now declare, in sight of Heaven, in
the presence of the awful dead, that what I have said and sworn
to thee is truth. He whom I sheltered within the tombs of thy
fathers, was the son of mine — the only, the last, best brother of
my heart. I bore him in mine arms when I was a child myself.
I loved him ever! Oh, how I loved him! next to thee, my Cœ
lius — next to thee! Couldst thou but have spared me this
love — this brother!”

“How knew I — how know I now — that he was thy brother?”
was the choking inquiry.

“To save thee the cruel agony that thou must feel, at knowing
this, I could even be moved to tell thee falsely, and say that he
was not my brother; but, indeed, some paramour, such as the
base and evil thought of thy brother has grafted upon thine;
but I may not; thy love is too precious to me at this last moment
even if death were not too terrible to the false speaker. He
was, indeed, my Flavius, dear son of a dear mother, best beloved
of brothers; he whom thou didst play with as a boy; to whom thou
gav'st lessons in thy own lovely art; who loved thee, my Cœ
lius, but too fondly, and only forbore telling thee of his evil plight
for fear that thou shouldst incur danger from the sharp and angry
hostility of Rome. Seek my chamber, and in my cabinet
thou wilt find his letters, and the letters of my mother, borne
with him in his flight. Nay, — oh! mother, what is this agony?”

“Too late! too late! If it be truth thou speakest, Aurelia,

it is a truth that can not save. Death is upon us — I see it in
thy face — I feel it in my heart. Oh! would that I could doubt
thy story!”

“Doubt not — doubt not — believe and take me to thy heart.
I fear not death if thou wilt believe me. My Cœlius, let me
come to thee and die upon thy bosom.”

“Ah! shouldst thou betray me — shouldst thou still practise
upon me with thy woman art!”

“And wherefore? It is death, thou say'st, that is upon us
now. What shall I gain, in this hour, by speaking to thee falsely?
Thou hast done thy worst. Thou hast doomed me to
death, and to the scornful eyes of the confiding future!”

She threw her arms around him as she spoke, and sunk, sunk
sobbing upon his breast.

“Ah!” he exclaimed, “that dreadful picture! I feel, my
Aurelia, that thou hast spoken truly — that I have been rash
and cruel in my judgment. Thy brother lies before thee, and
yonder tomb is prepared for thee. I did not yield without a
struggle, and I prepared me for a terrible sacrifice. Upon this
bier, habited as I am, I yield myself to death. There is no
help — no succor. Yet that picture! Shall the falsehood overcome
the truth. Shall that lie survive thy virtues, thy beauty,
and thy life! No! my Aurelia, this crime shall be spared at
least.”

He unwound her arms from about his neck, and strove to rise.
She sunk in the same moment at his feet. “Oh, death!” she
cried, “thou art, indeed, a god! I feel thee, terrible in thy
strength, with an agony never felt before. Leave me not, my
Cœlius — forgive — and leave me not!”

“I lose thee, Aurelia! Where —”

“Here! before the couch — I faint — ah!”

“I would destroy,” he cried, “but can not! This blindness.
Ho! without there! Aruns! It is thy step I hear! Undo,
undo — I forgive thee all, if thou wilt but help. Here — hither!”

The acute senses of the dying man had, indeed, heard footsteps
without. They were those of the perfidious brother. But,
at the call from within, he retreated hastily. There was no answer
— there was no help. But there was still some consciousness.
Death was not yet triumphant. There was a pang yet to be felt

— and a pleasure. It was still in the power of the dying man to
lift to his embrace his innocent victim. A moment's return of consciousness
enabled her to feel his embrace, his warm tears upon
her cheek, and to hear his words of entreaty and tenderness imploring
forgiveness. And speech was vouchsafed her to accord
it.

“I forgive thee, my Cœlius — I forgive thee, and bless thee,
and love thee to the last. I know that thou wouldst never do
me hurt of thy own will; I know that thou wert deceived to
this — yet how, oh, how, when my head lay upon thy breast at
night, and I slept in peace, couldst thou think that I should do
thee wrong!”

“Why,” murmured the miserable man, “why, oh, why?”

“Had I but told thee, and trusted in thee, my Cœlius!”

“Why didst thou not?”

“It was because of my brother's persuasion that I did not —
he wished not that thou shouldst come to evil.”

“And thou forgiv'st me, Aurelia — from thy very heart thou
forgiv'st me?”

“All, all — from my heart and soul, my husband.”

“It will not, then, be so very hard to die!”

An hour after and the chamber was silent. The wife had
yielded first. She breathed her last sigh upon his bosom, and
with the last effort of his strength he lifted her gently and laid
her in the sarcophagus, composing with affectionate care the drapery
around her. Then, remembering the picture, he looked
around him for his sword with which to obliterate the portraits
which his genius had assigned to so lamentable an eternity; but
his efforts were feeble, and the paralysis of death seized him
while he was yet making them. He sunk back with palsied
limbs upon the bier, and the lights, and the picture, faded from
before his eyes, with the last pulses of his life. The calumny
which had destroyed his hopes, survived its own detection. The
recorded falsehood was triumphant over the truth; yet may you
see, to this day, where the random strokes of the weapon were
aimed for its obliteration. Of himself there is no monument in
the tomb, though one touching memorial has reached us. The
vaulted chamber buried in the earth was discovered by accident.
A fracture was made in its top by an Italian gentleman in company

with a Scottish nobleman. As they gazed eagerly through
the aperture, they beheld an ancient warrior in full armor, and
bearing a coronet of gold. The vision lasted but a moment.
The decomposing effects of the air were soon perceptible. Even
while they gazed, the body seemed agitated with a trembling,
heaving motion, which lasted a few minutes, and then it subsided
into dust. When they penetrated the sepulchre, they found
the decaying armor in fragments, the sword and the helmet, or
crown of gold. The dust was but a handful, and this was all
that remained of the wretched Lucumo. The terrible picture is
all that survives — the false witness, still repeating its cruel lie,
at the expense of all that is noble in youth and manhood, and
all that is pure and lovely in the soul of woman.”

We all agreed that our professor, who delivered his narrative
with due modesty, had made a very interesting legend from the
chronicles — had certainly shown a due regard for the purity of
the sex, in thus vindicating the virtuous sufferer from the malicious
accusation which had been preserved by art, through the
capricious progress of more than twenty centuries.

Several stories followed, short, sketchy, and more or less spirited,
of which I could procure no copies. The ladies gave us
sundry pleasant lyrics to the accompaniment of the guitar, and
one or two male flute players contributed to our musical joys
until we began to verge toward the shorter hours, when the fairer
portion of the party bowed us good night — Duyckman nearly
breaking his own and Selina Burroughs's neck, in helping her
down the cabin-steps.