 | Fun-jottings, or, Laughs I have taken a pen to |  |
PASQUALI, THE TAILOR OF VENICE.
1. CHAPTER I.
Giannino Pasquali was a smart tailor some five years ago
occupying a cool shop on one of the smaller canals of Venice
Four pairs of suspenders, a print of the fashions, and a motley row
of the gay-colored trousers worn by the gondoliers, ornamented
the window looking on the dark alley in the rear, and, attached to
the post of the water-gate on the canal side, floated a small black
gondola, the possession of which afforded the same proof of
prosperity of the Venetian tailor which is expressed by a horse
and buggy at the door of a snip in London. The place-seeking
traveller, who, nez en l'air, threaded the tangled labyrinth of
alleys and bridges between the Rialto and St. Mark's, would
scarce have observed the humble shop-window of Pasquali, yet
he had a consequence on the Piazza, and the lagoon had seen
his triumphs as an amateur gondolier. Giannino was some thirty
years of age, and his wife Fiametta, whom he had married for
her zecchini, was on the shady side of fifty.
If the truth must be told, Pasquali had discovered that, even
with a bag of sequins for eye-water, Fiametta was not always the
most lovely woman in Venice. Just across the canal lived old
the blonde in Titian's picture of the Marys; and to the charms of
Turturilla, even seen through the leaden light of poverty, the unhappy
Pasquali was far from insensible.
The festa of San Antonio arrived after a damp week of November,
and though you would suppose the atmosphere of Venice
not liable to any very sensible increase of moisture, Fiametta, like
people who live on land, and have the rheumatism as a punishment
for their age and ugliness, was usually confined to her brazero of
hot coals till it was dry enough on the Lido for the peacocks to
walk abroad. On this festa, however, San Antonio being, as every
one knows, the patron saint of Padua, the Padovese were to
come down the Brenta, as was their custom, and cross over the
sea to Venice to assist in the celebration; and Fiametta once more
thought Pasquali loved her for herself alone when he swore by his
rosary that unless she accompanied him to the festa in her wedding
dress, he would not turn an oar in the race, nor unfasten his
gondola from the door-post. Alas! Fiametta was married in the
summer solstice, and her dress was permeable to the wind as a
cobweb, or gossamer. Is it possible you could have remembered
that, O wicked Pasquali?
It was a day to puzzle a barometer; now bright, now rainy,
now gusty as a corridor in a novel, and now calm as a lady after
a fit of tears. Pasquali was up early and waked Fiametta with
a kiss, and, by way of unusual tenderness, or by way of ensuring
the wedding dress, he chose to play dressing maid, and arranged
with his own hands her jupon and fazzoletta. She emerged from
her chamber looking like a slice of orange-peel in a flower-bed,
but smiling and nodding, and vowing the day warm as April, and
the sky without a cloud. The widening circles of an occasional
after a passing oar, or perhaps the last flies of summer. Pasquali
swore it was weather to win down a peri.
As Fiametta stepped into the gondola, she glanced her eyes over
the way and saw Turturilla, with a face as sorrowful as the first
day in Lent, seated at her window. Her lap was full of work,
and it was quite evident that she had not thought of being at the
festa. Fiametta's heart was already warm, and it melted quite at
the sight of the poor girl's loneliness.
“Pasquali mio!” she said, in a deprecating tone, as if she were
uncertain how the proposition would be received, “I think we
could make room for poor Turturilla!”
A gleam of pleasure, unobserved by the confiding sposa, tinted
faintly the smooth olive cheek of Pasquali.
“Eh! diavolo!” he replied, so loud that the sorrowful seamstress
heard, and hung down her head still lower; “must you take
pity on every cheese-paring of a ragezza who happens to have no
lover! Have reason! have reason! The gondola is narrower
than your brave heart, my fine Fiametta!” And away he pushed
from the water-steps.
Turturilla rose from her work and stepped out upon the rusty
gratings of the balcony to see them depart. Pasquali stopped to
grease the notch of his oar, and between that and some other embarrassments,
the gondola was suffered to float directly under her
window. The compliment to the generous nature of Fiametta,
was, meantime, working, and as she was compelled to exchange a
word or two with Turturilla while her husband was getting his oar
into the socket, it resulted (as he thought it very probable it
would), in the good wife's renewing her proposition, and making a
point of sending the deserted girl for her holiday bonnet. Pasquali
made herself ready, though she was but five minutes gone from
the window, and telling Fiametta in her ear that she must consider
it as the purest obligation, he backed up to the steps of old
Donna Bentoccata, helped in her daughter with a better grace
than could have been expected, and with one or two short and
deep strokes, put forth into the grand canal with the velocity of a
lance-fly.
A gleam of sunshine lay along the bosom of the broad silver
sheet, and it was beautiful to see the gondolas with their gay colored
freights all hastening in one direction, and with a swift track
to the festa. Far up and down they rippled the smooth water,
here gliding out from below a palace-arch, there from a narrow
and unseen canal, the steel beaks curved and flashing, the water
glancing on the oar-blades, the curtains moving, and the fair women
of Venice leaning out and touching hands as they neared
neighbor or acquaintance in the close-pressing gondolas. It was
a beautiful sight, indeed, and three of the happiest hearts in that
swift gliding company were in Pasquali's gondola, though the bliss
of Fiametta, I am compelled to say, was entirely owing to the
bandage with which love is so significantly painted. Ah! poor
Fiametta!
From the Lido, from Fusina, from under the Bridge of Sighs,
from all quarters of the lagoon, and from all points of the floating
city of Venice, streamed the flying gondolas to the Giudecca.
The narrow walk along the edge of the long and close-built island
was thronged with booths and promenaders, and the black barks
by hundreds bumped their steel noses against the pier as the agitated
water rose and fell beneath them. The gondolas intended
for the race pulled slowly up and down, close to the shore, exhibiting
gondoliers to the crowds on land and water; the bands of music,
attached to different parties, played here and there a strain; the
criers of holy pictures and gingerbread made the air vocal with
their lisping and soft Venetian; and all over the scene, as if it
was the light of the sky or some other light as blessed but less common,
shone glowing black eyes, black as night, and sparkling as
the stars on night's darkest bosom. He who thinks lightly of
Italian beauty should have seen the women of Venice on St. Antonio's
day '32, or on any or at any hour when their pulses are
beating high and their eyes alight—for they are neither one nor
the other always. The women of that fair clime, to borrow the
simile of Moore, are like lava-streams, only bright when the volcano
kindles. Their long lashes cover lustreless eyes, and their
blood shows dully through the cheek in common and listless hours.
The calm, the passive tranquillity in which the delicate graces of
colder climes find their element are to them a torpor of the heart
when the blood scarce seems to flow. They are wakeful only to
the energetic, the passionate, the joyous movements of the soul.
Pasquali stood erect in the prow of his gondola, and stole furtive
glances at Turturilla while he pointed away with his finger
to call off the sharp eyes of Fiametta; but Fiametta was happy
and unsuspicious. Only when now and then the wind came up
chilly from the Adriatic, the poor wife shivered and sat closer to
Turturilla, who in her plainer but thicker dress, to say nothing
of younger blood, sat more comfortably on the black cushion and
thought less about the weather. An occasional drop of rain fell
on the nose of poor Fiametta, but if she did not believe it was
the spray from Pasquali's oar, she at least did her best to believe
so; and the perfidious tailor swore by St. Anthony that the clouds
was not in the secret of this day's treacheries.
The broad centre of the Giudecca was cleared, and the boats
took their places for the race. Pasquali ranged his gondola with
those of the other spectators, and telling Fiametta in her ear that
he should sit on the other side of Turturilla as a punishment for
their malapropos invitation, he placed himself on the small remainder
of the deep cushion on the farthest side from his now
penitent spouse, and while he complained almost rudely of the
narrowness of his seat, he made free to hold on by Turturilla's
waist, which no doubt made the poor girl's mind more easy on the
subject of her intrusion.
Who won and who lost the race, what was the device of each
flag, and what bets and bright eyes changed owners by the result,
no personage of this tale knew or cared, save Fiametta. She
looked on eagerly. Pasquali and Turturilla, as the French say,
trouvaient autress chats á frotter.
After the decision of the grand race, St. Antonio being the
protector, more particularly of the humble (“patron of pigs” in
the saints' calendar), the seignoria and the grand people generally,
pulled away for St. Mark's, leaving the crowded Giudecca
to the people. Pasquali, as was said before, had some renown as
a gondolier. Something what would be called in other countries
a scrub race, followed the departure of the winning boat, and several
gondolas, holding each one person only, took their places for
the start. The tailor laid his hand on his bosom, and, with the
smile that had first stirred the heart and the sequins of Fiametta,
begged her to gratify his love by acting as his make-weight while
he turned an oar for the pig of St. Antonio. The prize roasted
to an appetizing crisp, stood high on a platter in front of one of
her tears with an effort, and told him, in accents as little as possible
like the creak of a dry oar in the socket, that he might set
Turturilla on shore.
A word in her ear, as he handed her over the gunwale, reconciled
Bonna Bentoccata's fair daughter to this conjugal partiality,
and stripping his manly figure of its upper disguises, Pasquali
straightened out his fine limbs, and drove his bark to the line in a
style that drew applause from even his competitors. As a mark
of their approbation, they offered him an outside place where his
fair dame would be less likely to be spattered with the contending
oars; but he was too generous to take advantage of this considerate
offer, and crying out as he took the middle, “ben pronto,
signori!” gave Fiametta a confident look and stood like a hound
in the leash.
Off they went at the tap of the drum, poor Fiametta holding
her breath and clinging to the sides of the gondola, and Pasquali
developing skill and muscle—not for Fiametta's eyes only. It
was a short, sharp race, without jockeying or management, all fair
play and main strength, and the tailor shot past the end of the
Giudecca a boat's length ahead. Much more applauded than a
king at a coronation or a lord-mayor taking water at London
stairs, he slowly made his way back to Turturilla, and it was
only when that demure damsel rather shrunk from sitting down
in two inches of water, that he discovered how the disturbed
element had quite filled up the hollow of the leather cushion and
made a peninsula of the uncomplaining Fiametta. She was as
well watered, as a favorite plant in a flower-garden.
“Pasquali mio!” she said in an imploring tone, holding up
“could you just take me home while I change my dress?”
“One moment, Fiametta cara! they are bringing the pig!”
The crisp and succulent trophy was solemnly placed in the
prow of the victor's gondola, and preparation was made to convoy
him home with a triumphant procession. A half hour before
it was in order to move—an hour in first making the circuit of
the grand canal, and an hour more in drinking a glass and
exchanging good wishes at the stairs of the Rialto, and Donna
Fiametta had sat too long by two hours and a half with scarce a
dry thread on her body. What afterwards befell will be seen in
the more melancholy sequel.
2. CHAPTER II.
The hospital of St. Girolamo is attached to the convent of
that name, standing on one of the canals which put forth on the
seaward side of Venice. It is a long building, with its low windows
and latticed doors opening almost on the level of the sea, and the
wards for the sick are large and well aired; but, except when the
breeze is stirring, impregnated with a saline dampness from the
canal, which, as Pasquali remarked, was good for the rheumatism.
It was not so good for the patient.
The loving wife Fiametta grew worse and worse after the fatal
festa, and the fit of rheumatism brought on by the slightness of
her dress and the spattering he had given her in the race, had
increased by the end of the week, to a rheumatic fever. Fia
metta was old and tough, however, and struggled manfully
out of her head, her loving husband took occasion to shudder at
the responsibility of taking care of her, and jumping into his
gondola, he pulled across to St. Girolamo and bespoke a dry bed
and a sister of charity, and brought back the pious father Gasparo
and a comfortable litter. Fiametta was dozing when they
arrived, and the kind-hearted tailor willing to spare her the pain
of knowing that she was on her way to the hospital for the poor,
set out some meat and wine for the monk, and sending over for
Turturilla and the nurse to mix the salad, they sat and ate away
the hours till the poor dame's brain should be wandering again.
Toward night the monk and Dame Bentoccata were comfortably
dozing with each other's support (having fallen asleep at
table), and Pasquali with a kiss from Turturilla, stole softly up
stairs. Fiametta was muttering unquietly, and working her
fingers in the palms of her hands, and on feeling her pulse he
found the fever was at its height. She took him, besides, for the
prize pig of the festa, for he knew her wits were fairly abroad.
He crept down stairs, gave the monk a strong cup of coffee to
get him well awake, and between the four of them, they got poor
Fiametta into the litter, drew the curtains tenderly around and
deposited her safely in the bottom of the gondola.
Lightly and smoothly the winner of the pig pulled away with
his loving burden, and gliding around the slimy corners of the
palaces, and hushing his voice as he cried out “right!” or
“left!” to guard the coming gondoliers of his vicinity, he
arrived, like a thought of love to a maid's mind in sleep, at the
door of St. Girolamo. The abbess looked out and said, “Benedicite!”
and the monk stood firm on his brown sandals to receive
the precious burden from the arms of Pasquali. Believing firmly
Peter, and of course abandoning all hope of seeing her again in
this world, the soft-hearted tailor wiped his eye as she was lifted
in, and receiving a promise from Father Gasparo that he would
communicate faithfully the state of her soul in the last agony, he
pulled, with lightened gondola and heart back to his widower's
home and Turturilla.
For many good reasons, and apparent as good, it is a rule in
the hospital of St. Girolamo, that the sick under its holy charge
shall receive the visit of neither friend nor relative. If they
recover, they return to their abodes to earn candles for the altar
of the restoring saint. If they die, their clothes are sent to their
surviving friends, and this affecting memorial, besides communicating
the melancholy news, affords all the particulars and all the
consolation they are supposed to require upon the subject of their
loss.
Waiting patiently for Father Gasparo and his bundle, Pasquali
and Turturilla gave themselves up to hopes, which on the tailor's
part (we fear it must be admitted), augured a quicker recovery
from grief than might be credited to an elastic constitution.
The fortune of poor Fiametta was sufficient to warrant Pasquali
in neglecting his shop to celebrate every festa that the church
acknowledged, and for ten days subsequent to the committal of
his wife to the tender mercies of St. Girolamo, five days out of
seven was the proportion of merry holydays with his new
betrothed.
They were sitting one evening in the open piazza of St. Mark,
in front of the most thronged café of that matchless square.
The moon was resting her silver disk on the point of the Campanile,
and the shadows of thousands of gay Venetians fell on the
cartoon. The four extending sides of the square lay half in
shades half in light, with their innumerable columns and balconies
and sculptured work, and, frowning down on all, in broken
light and shadow, stood the arabesque structure of St. Mark's
itself, dizzying the eyes with its mosaics and confused devices, and
thrusting forth the heads of her four golden-collared steeds into
the moonbeams, till they looked on that black relief, like the
horses of Pluto issuing from the gates of Hades. In the centre
of the square stood a tall woman, singing, in rich contralto, an
old song of the better days of Venice; and against one of the
pillars, Polichinello had backed his wooden stage, and beat about
his puppets with an energy worthy of old Dandolo and his helmeted
galley-men To those who wore not the spectacles of grief
or discontent, the square of St. Mark's that night was like some
cozening tableau. I never saw anything so gay.
Everybody who has “swam in a gondola,” knows how the
cafés of Venice thrust out their checkered awnings over a portion
of the square, and filled the shaded space below with chairs and
marble tables. In a corner of the shadow thus afforded, with
ice and coffee on a small round slab between them, and the flat
pavement of the public promenade under their feet, sat our two
lovers. With neither hoof nor wheel to drown or interrupt their
voices (as in cities whose streets are stones, not water), they
murmured their hopes and wishes in the softest language under
the sun, and with the sotto voce acquired by all the inhabitants
of this noiseless city. Turturilla had taken ice to cool her and
coffee to take off the chill of her ice, and a bicchiere del perfetto
amore to reconcile these two antagonists in her digestion, when
the slippers of a monk glided by, and in a moment the recognized
bundle was under his arm, and he was on his way to Pasquali's
dwelling. Having assured the disconsolate tailor that she
had unction and wafer as became the wife of a citizen of Venice
like himself, he took heart and grew content that she was in heaven.
It was a better place, and Turturilla for so little as a gold
ring, would supply her place in his bosom.
The moon was but a brief week older when Pasquali and Turturilla
stood in the church of our lady of grief, and Father Gasparo
within the palings of the altar. She was as fair a maid as
ever bloomed in the garden of beauty beloved of Titian, and the
tailor was nearer worth nine men to look at, than the fraction of
a man considered usually the exponent of his profession. Away
mumbled the good father upon the matrimonial service, thinking
of the old wine and rich pastries that were holding their sweetness
under cork and crust only till he had done his ceremony, and
quicker by some seconds than had ever been achieved before by
priest or bishop, he arrived at the putting on of the ring. His
hand was tremulous, and (oh unlucky omen!) he dropped it within
the gilden fence of the chancel. The choristers were called,
and Father Gasparo dropped on his knees to look for it—but if
the devil had not spirited it away, there was no other reason why
that search was in vain. Short of an errand to the goldsmith on
the Rialto, it was at last determined the wedding could not proceed.
Father Gasparo went to hide his impatience within the
restiary, and Turturilla knelt down to pray against the arts of
Sathanas. Before they had settled severally to their pious occupations,
Pasquali was half way to the Rialto.
Half an hour elapsed, and then instead of the light grazing of
a swift-sped gondola along the church stairs, the splash of a sullen
hastened to the door to receive him—monk, choristers and bride
—and to their surprise and bewilderment, he waited to hand out
a woman in a strange dress, who seemed disposed, bridegroom as
he was, to make him wait her leisure. Her clothes fitted her ill,
and she carried in her hand a pair of shoes, it was easy to see
were never made for her. She rose at last, and as her face became
visible, down dropped Turturilla and the pious father, and
motionless and aghast stood the simple Pasquali. Fiametta stepped
on shore!
In broken words Pasquali explained. He had landed at the
stairs near the fish market, and with two leaps reaching the top,
sped off past the buttress in the direction of the goldsmith, when
his course was arrested by encountering at full speed, the person
of an old woman. Hastily raising her up, he recognized his
wife, who, fully recovered, but without a gondola, was threading
the zig-zag alleys on foot, on her way to her own domicil. After
the first astonishment was over, her dress explained the error of
the good father and the extent of his own misfortune. The
clothes had been hung between the bed of Fiametta and that of
a smaller woman who had been long languishing of a consumption.
She died, and Fiametta's clothes, brought to the door by
mistake, were recognized by Father Gasparo and taken to Pasquali.
The holy monk, chop-fallen and sad, took his solitary way to
the convent, but with the first step he felt something slide into
the heel of his sandal. He sat down on the church stairs and
absolved the devil from theft—it was the lost ring, which had
fallen upon his foot and saved Pasquali the tailor from the pains
of bigamy.
| Fun-jottings, or, Laughs I have taken a pen to | |