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CANTO VII.
THE GREAT UNKNOWN.
I
“Once on a day,” as says the nursery rhyme;There came to Rome, a strange, wild-looking man;
Handsome, yet stern; not old, yet past his prime.
The oddest rumours round the salons ran.
His visage wore the hue of Hindostan;
All thought, they knew, him; and yet, none knew where;
But, all agreed that, came he from Japan,
However some might shake their heads, or stare,
His “Gran' palazzo” stood in Rome's most princely square.
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II
The stranger made a marvellous “impression;”The Cavalieri asked—his depth of purse;
The Signorine asked—his birth, profession;
Some thought he had a great estate at nurse;
Some thought him an “escroc,” or something worse!
But then—the Stranger gave such charming dinners;
At play, too, he could handsomely disburse;
A thing, especially, which pleased the winners.
“We must not be too hard—the best of us are sinners.”
III
Still, dark reports would, now and then, transpire,Of matters, done at night in his hotel;
His chimney-tops were seen to shoot blue fire;
Some found, in passing by, a sulphurous smell;
'Twas said, he laughed at priest, and book, and bell;
Nay scoffed, whene'er St. Peter's chimes were ringing.
At midnight, more than once, was heard a yell;
At least, the sound was anything but singing;
With roar of furnaces, and chains of iron swinging.
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IV
At all events, “whate'er might be his errors;”All owned, he drove a splendid set of bays,
Pure Arab blood, with skins as bright as mirrors;
Besides, for highdays, and for holidays,
A carriage, carved and gilt beyond all praise;
With four tall footmen, and two “grands chasseurs;”
Producing on the Corso, quite a blaze:
The very virtuous called them “rabble lures;”
The young and pretty wished, to join them in their tours.
V
At length, reports came thick; and certain measures,(Old Inquisition touches,) were in petto,
To mulct the Stranger of his midnight pleasures;
—“The Swindler must be dungeon'd in the Ghetto.”
Such was the verdict of Count Marmozetto,
Field-marshal to St. Peter and St. Paul.
Not so pronounced the Cardinal of Loretto,
(As fat a prelate, as e'er filled a stall,)
Not so, the Bishops, Deans, Archdeacons, Priests, and all.
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VI
In delicacy, I suppress their reasons;(Your priests should tell, what only priests can know,)
But, the Confessional, at certain seasons,
Shriving the lapses of Rome's comme il faut,
Makes them familiar with—the “Courts below.”
Here were no Jesuits, blowing hot and cold;
They stamped the Stranger black from top to toe—
A Fiend, despatched to ravage all their fold—
A Special Envoy, sent from—“Nicholas the old.”
VII
But, while they sat, in poured a shower of cards,The Stranger's invitations to a fête;
It broke up all their conclave, like petards.
'Twas known his “petits soupers” were first-rate;
His Holiness himself showed no such plate;
His truffles were suprême, his wines delicious;
—“A banquet was no treason to the state.”
“'Tis true, his character might seem suspicious,”
But,—who on earth e'er stopped, to ask, who was Apicius?
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VIII
Rome has some showy doings at her “festas;”This banquet threw them all into eclipse;
Never were dreamed in Mahomet's siestas,
Draughts so luxurious, as now bathed their lips—
The cardinals' rôtis to his were chips;
The entremets, dessert, were all enchanting.
Then followed scenes, o'er which description skips.
At dawn, Count Marmozetto was “found wanting,”
A neckcloth (rather tight), 'twas said, had cured his taunting.
IX
Then, came the bustle of his grand relations,(All Counts are saints, of course, when once they're strangled.)
Ten Abbés made ten funeral orations;
In which the Stranger's morals were much mangled;
He brought ten actions—Rome's first lawyers wrangled—
The facts lost nothing in their “learned jaws:”
The sex, were quickly on both sides entangled,
(Those native lawyers, who fight best for straws.)
Till Chancery engulfed fees, damages, and cause.
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X
The proudest house in Rome, was the Valonna,The Stranger boldly asked its daughter's hand;
The princess-mother vowed to the Madonna,
“She 'd sooner give her to the hangman's brand;”
The prince pronounced the suitor a “brigand.”
The son resolved—“to break his spine down stairs;”
The twenty cousins—“asked but the command,
To stab him, ‘if he ever went to prayers;’
Or, in the Tyber cool, for life, his love affairs.”
XI
Next morning, to the palace, came a box,The Stranger's gift,—inscribed, “A marriage jewel.”
The father swore “to clap him in the stocks,
On workhouse diet, chaff and water-gruel;”
The son new-edged his sabre for a duel.
The daughter—“only asked, one peep within—
To send it back unopened, might seem cruel.”
The mother voted, “Diamonds were no sin.”
The sex, on such nice points, are always sure to win.
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A DIGRESSION ON DIAMONDS.
A few “last words” on diamonds—charm of thrones!—Tempters of man, of woman, and of child!
Whether ye flash embossed on harem-zones,
Or rust, on Europe's old regalia piled,
Or cluster in your “caves and antres wild,”
Tell me, what are ye?—moonbeams crystalized;
Or glittering dust from comets' coach-wheels filed;
Or fragments of some Asteroïd demised?—
I never knew the belle, by whom ye were despised.
XIII
I touch but their elite,—and first, the Regent ,Bought by old roué Orleans, sold by Pitt,
(Not Will the mighty,) the Bencoolen agent.
Pope said , the Indian finder had been bit,
(For which the Pittite should have caned the Wit.)
The gem next figured on Napoleon's sword;
Until the kings and queens of earth thought fit,
To crowns and civil lists to be restored;
And flung with one consent, the “Corporal” overboard!
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XIV
An emerald tinge just shades the Saxon gem ;Once the bright eye-ball of a golden cat,
Couched on a Rajah's spell-bound diadem,
Now, glittering in the monarch's opera-hat.
The Peishwa, when his courtiers played the rat,
(Not liking British bayonets in their backs,)
Left the Nassuc ; some say, 'tis cut too flat.
I only know, 'twas worth a pair of lacs.
Those were gay days among our red-coated Cossacks.
XV
The Austrian diamond figures, like Othello,The handsomest dark thing you ever saw;
With one broad turban-stripe of golden yellow.
The Pigott shines on Egypt's old Pasha—
Your Turk regards those “high-caste” stones with awe,
As talismans for poison, lead, and steel;
No tiger on their wearer lays a paw;
No lion swallows him from head to heel;
Since Solomon the king, first wore a diamond seal!
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XVI
Pray, in whose coffers sleeps the Grand Nizam ?That dazzled all the court of George the Third;
When Nabob Hastings made his first salám?
(Your nabobs seldom have the world's good word.)
Where lurks the Breastplate of the magic bird,
Torn from the turban of the Great Mogul?
When Nadir's dashing horse to Delhi spurred,
Paving their road with many an Omrah's skull;
Macadamizing, for thy sturdy step, John Bull?
XVII
Now, flit, across the mountains, to Lahore;To see old, sly Runjeet's “three million” prize.
Diamond of diamonds! Earth's one Koh-i-noor!—
The most famous of Indian diamonds, in our day. After going through the hands of various chiefs, it became the property of Shah Soojah, who carried it with him in his flight to Lahore. The Rajah Runjeet, resolving to obtain possession of this memorable jewel, imprisoned the Shah, and famished him, until he gave up the Koh-i-Noor (Mountain of Light).
Matchless in weight, in water, and in size;
The wonder of a hundred million eyes!
(Forgive me all this jeweller's detail—
You 'll have it yet, in “Customs or Excise,”
Darting across the world by steam and rail:
I merely furnish now its London “bill of sale.”)
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XVIII
But, to its story—(all those magnifiques,In Indian jewel-annals have a story)—
The Noor, long ere the Romans and the Greeks,
Blazed on an idol's brow, the Temple's glory,
Guarded by maidens black, and Brahmins hoary;
Till, down on India rushed the Persian Khan,
Leaving some hundred thousand saddles gory;
Then, came the robbers' robber, the Affghan.
(Some pretty pickings still remain in Hindostan.)
XIX
Then, when Shah Soojah—“Dust be on his mother!Burnt be his father!”—tottered from his throne;
(Those vagrants should be left to slice each other,
Our wisest plan is, letting them alone!)
He packed up the crown jewels, every stone;
Then, from his subjects beat a quick retreat,
(A trick not quite to Europe's kings unknown,)
A neck-and-neck affair: he won the heat,
And ran to hide his head with cunning old Runjeet.
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XX
The Rajah panted to possess the Noor;The Shah resolved, to keep it from his host;
The Rajah simply chained him to the floor,
(Humanity had always been his boast!)
Next day, Shah Soojah missed his boiled and roast!
He (yet) was neither poisoned, hanged, nor drowned.
Next week, his regimen was tea and toast!
Each day, they asked him, “was the jewel found?”
The Shah's affairs, and shape, by no means “getting round.”
XXI
Next week, the tea and toast alike were “nil;”The famished Shah now scribbled, roared, and whined.
The Rajah sent him a gilt dinner-pill!
The Shah was still convinced, he had not dined.
The gem was still—“beyond all hope to find.”
Though now you might make purses up of his skin.
For death the Indian had made up his mind.
Runjeet, at last, bethought him, how to win:
A pudding passed his grate—the Shah at once gave in!
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XXII
The box was opened; it contained two sets;One for the princess-mother, one the daughter.
The ladies vowed, that both were “downright pets!”
“Never had eyes seen brilliants of such water!”
The gallant son postponed his plans of slaughter;
The father “found the stones without a flaw;
But then, the sneering world would say he bought her.”
The mother “for the world cared not a straw.”
The Stranger was declared, Valonna's son-in-law!
XXIII
The Roman dames all hurried to Confession;The new mésalliance raised a general moan;
The monks pronounced the whole a “plain possession.”
It was a “horror” to Marchese Trombone!
It “shocked the soul” of Duca Pantalone!
It clothed in sackcloth all the tribes of “Ninny!”
The rumour plunged in “agonies unknown,”
All the Filchini, all the Cigarini!
Nay, almost killed the “Gran' Duchessa Fantocini!”
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XXIV
The twenty cousins now grew more outrageous,(No ducats having come, to cool their rage.)
Pronounced the Stranger's very touch “contagious,”
And met, to pledge themselves the war to wage,
“Until they drove the ‘Sorcerer’ off the stage.”
The Stranger challenged the whole clique that night;
Next morning, each could tell a tour de page,
Some had been stript, some pumped, some flogged outright,
All Rome laughed long and loud,—the heroes took to flight.
XXV
The wedding came: the walls were hung with flowers;The streets were lined with horse and halberdier.
First, rode the valets, scattering coin in showers;
Then, with a troop of nobles, front and rear,
The bridal carriage, hailed with many a cheer,
Clustered with pages.—But, the man was bold
Who gazed upon the spectral dancers there,
Painted upon its sides of glass and gold!
Never had such four wheels o'er Roman pavements rolled.
196
A DIGRESSION ON COACHES.
I have been long a connoisseur in coaches;Not, your trim, varnished, citizen affairs;
Your Stanhopes, Clarences—Taste's last reproaches!
Consumptive cousins to your “chaise-and-pairs!”
Nor your huge, tumbril things, like my Lord Mayor's,
Lumbered with old-world finery, carved and gilt;
Britain at top, with Tritons at their prayers;
Ireland in trousers; Scotland in her kilt;
Simply a six-horse wain, with an embroidered tilt!
XXVII
I liked the phaëton—it marked the age.What if it sometimes broke a noble neck:
'Twas showy—'twas like dying on the stage:
Or, by court-martial, on the quarter-deck!
Then, came the four-in-hand; and went—to wreck!
Then, the gay curricle.—Alas! Queen Mab,
Sovereign of whips! with Fashion at thy beck,
Why didst thou suffer in thy realms the cab?
Fit but for pedlars, quacks, and the meek men of drab!
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XXVIII
France! for your royal coach I can't say much:'Tis spruce, but modern, like your monarchy;
The crown and sceptre trembling at a touch.
I much prefer old Austria's gilt goose-pie.
But still, the finest thing that met my eye,
Was Spain's; now mouldering in Valencay's stables;
A genuine emblem of the days gone by:
Like an old golden house, with all its gables,
Covered with nymphs and sylphs, from Ovid's gayest fables.
XXIX
But, to its points—I love to be particular,In great affairs, like carriages of kings.
Royal the back, you must sit perpendicular,
(Comfort and kingship are two different things;)
Its pannels all a blaze of quarterings
Of kingdoms, which long since have bid adieu:
Caged pigeons, that no sooner felt their wings,
Than, turned to kites and falcons, off they flew:
Belgium and Portugal, stout Holland, wild Peru!
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XXX
Naples, thy Coach has failed to touch my heart:Send to Long-Acre, monarch, if thou 'rt wise,
And give thy dogs thy lazzaroni-cart!
The Pope has taste; his holy coach outvies
His Holiness's state coach is as handsome as his Neapolitan neighbour's is the contrary. Nothing tries the loyalty of the noblesse of Parthenope so severely on public days. The chief delight of Rome, however, is in the monstrosity of the powdered and hatless periwigs of the Pope's coachman and footmen.
All toys that ever charmed Italian eyes;
But finer to those eyes, than flags unfurled,
Than crosiers, keys, and Saintly blazonries;
Are its six valets' perukes, Jove-like curled—
Its Jehu's monster-wig, the wonder of the world.
XXXI
I think Soult's coach the prettiest one remembers,In all the glitter of the coronation;
When, to prevent the blowing of the embers,
(La France all longing for the conflagration,)
The veteran came, to make his last oration
Expecting to be roasted like a poult;
Heading his will—“In case of my cremation!”
Yet, of a feather not compelled to moult;
But, welcomed by John Bull with—“Hurrah! brave old Soult!”
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XXXII
'Tis odd, those Frenchmen never know John Bull;Have never known him, and will never know.
They think the honest fellow's honest skull
Paints, like their own, all things, en laid, en beau;
Always in extacies, of joy or woe!
They little dream, how quickly John forgets,
Whether he helps a friend, or flogs a foe—
The thing is past; he neither crows, nor frets;
Goes on, and thinks no more of triumphs—than of threats.
XXXIII
The Stranger issued, on his wedding-day,Cards for a supper and a masquerade.
The monks advised their penitents, to stay,
—“At least, until the demon should be laid.”
The women all were piously “afraid!”
But, let the Sex be once upon the scent,
What power can stop them, widow, wife, or maid?
—“How could they help, how people made their rent?
“A fête was still a fête!”—And so, en masse, they went!
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XXXIV
The Romans are renowned for masquerades;But this eclipsed them all—ten grand saloons
Were filled with masquers, of all shapes and shades;
Witches and watchmen, cardinals, buffoons;
Jewelled pashās, all whiskers and half-moons;
Dwarfs in plate armour; babies six feet high;
Muftis, magicians, crocodiles, baboons;
Nymphs from the waves, and sylphids from the sky,
Winning, with smile and song, the soul of a goose-pye!
XXXV
There, groups were whirling in the prettiest dances;The wild Fulana of the Calabrese;
The Monferrina, with its lovesick glances;
Its flying fair, and lover on his knees;
The Tarantella, music's charmed disease,
Gay, melancholy; loving, love-defying;
The Piva, piping from the Pyrenees,
(Its music imitates the breeze's sighing,)
The Torrescone's “Round,” all waltzing, bounding, flying!
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XXXVI
Then came “Les Grandes Quadrilles,”—a Pulk of Tartars,En Galopade, as wild as their own Crim;
Next, La Jeune France, armed cap-a-pie with charters,
Dancing—with fetters upon every limb.
La Jeune Allemagne, slow, spectacled, and grim,
Meerschaum in mouth, Voltaire's top-heavy scholars.
Young Turkey, breeched and fez'd, in Mahmood's trim.
Young England, with white vest, and Byron-collars.
Last, Young America, all decked with British dollars.
XXXVII
'Twas midnight.—All was dance, and song, and rapture;All, dazzling as an Oriental dream;
When, sudden sounds were heard, of fight, and capture;—
They died away.—Then rose a savage scream;
Forthwith, to all the doors the living stream
Hurried pell-mell.—Then riot had its fling;
Stilettoes, in foul hands, were seen to gleam.
A masked banditti, snatched at watch, and ring.
(Some thought the stranger's self was foremost plundering.)
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XXXVIII
Next morn, all Rome was in a general wail;—All had been rifled of some favourite jewel;
Some lost a turban, and some lost a tail.
(The rage of gossips never wants for fuel.)
All whispered, (plainer speech might cost a duel,)
That, as the chandeliers began to crash,
They saw a visage, leering, and yet cruel,
Just at the moment when they lost their cash;
A goblin's long-horned face, dart by them, like a flash!
XXXIX
The wonder had not passed its due “nine days,”(The wedding feasts the Cardinals still fêteing,)
When, one fine night, all Rome was in a blaze;
The fire-bells ringing, the alarm-drums beating;
All the thermometers to 90 heating;
The streets, a flying mob of nun and friar;
The metal saints in every chapel sweating;
Flames shooting up from every roof and spire.
Since Nero, Rome had seen no more hard-working fire.
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XL
“In sooth, it was a showy sight to see,”(I use bard-language), Rome, by her own light,
One flush of flame on church, and tower, and tree;
The Scarlet lady, scarlatized by night,—
The Tyber's slimy banks, the Pincian's height,
Showing, by fits and starts, their half-dressed crowd;
St. Peter's, like a molten mountain, bright;
St. Angelo's angel, gleaming through his cloud;
The Coliseum's pile, a giant in his shroud!
XLI
One point, at least, was certain,—that the flames,Were first seen bursting from the stranger's roof.
The Roman mob are clever at hard names,
Their softest, on that night, was “cloven hoof;”
But, all took special care, to stand aloof:
Vowing they saw the oddest figures glancing,
Through all the flames, with horns and tails fire-proof;
Some, riding broomsticks; some, on pokers prancing:
Imps, witches, goblins, gouls—in full-dress sulphur dancing!
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XLII
Rome has no chimney-sweepers.—She relies,In conflagration-cases, on St. Peter.
Give him but time, the conflagration dies!
Than this no miracle could be completer.
The stranger's palace fell, in fumes and fœtor.
The Jews, next morning, dug out crucibles;
Also, in fifty fragments, a gas-meter,
Stamps, dies, and packets of all kinds of fusibles;
(Witchcraft, and worse, from those, were plain deducibles!)
XLIII
Furious suspicion on the stranger fell!Within twelve hours the Grand Inquisitor
Paid him a visit in his new hotel;
Leaving the Sbirri planted at his door.
Whate'er the interview, 'twas quickly o'er,
The stranger went, to take his daily drive;
His visitor was found upon the floor,
Dead, e'er the priest could come, his soul to shrive.
'Twas clear, the bees stung sharp, which clustered in that hive.
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XLIV
All now was fright. A Grand Inquisitor,“Jerked under the fifth rib ,” was somewhat new.
The witnesses, upon the inquest, swore
It must be done by him, or by his crew.
But, who was he? No living creature knew.
Some thought him “cousin to the Witch of Endor,”
Some thought he was, at least, “the Wandering Jew,”
Some thought him “Belzebub's chief money-lender;
One thing was plain, in Rome none lived in greater splendor.
XLV
His style was now, the “cool magnanimous.”—“He scorned to give Rome's gossips a denial.
“He knew the venom of the monkish animus.
“His rapier, to the rest was his defial.
“He asked but of the state, a public trial.”—
The trial came. (The pleadings are omitted.)
A purse, 'twas said, ere day had touched the dial,
Was to each Judge's conscience duly fitted.
The stranger marched from court, “triumphantly acquitted!”
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XLVI
Some said; who watched him through the day, in court;That his deep eyeballs almost shot a blaze.
Some, that his huge, hooked nose, in spite, or sport,
Curled, like ram's horns, before their very gaze.
Some, that his lips were twirled in such wild ways,
They made one shudder, while they made one laugh.
All, that he kept the Judges in amaze,
Looking much more the butcher, than the calf.
(My rule, in things like these, is, to believe one half.)
XLVII
He now dashed on, at Fashion's double speed.“Demon or man,” he gave “delightful routs.”
None longer asked his country, or his creed.
His noble borrowers resigned all doubts.
The rabble hung upon his wheels with shouts.
The Monsignori washed him of his sins.
Even belles, beneath his smiles, forgot their pouts;
So gallantly he showered his gold zechins.
(Earth 's a teetotum, which old Mammon's finger spins.)
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XLVIII
The very well-bred world is not too nice;Its science is, to lead an easy life.
Nature abhors, in all things, the precise.
Bon ton detests the Stoic's pruning knife.
If woman errs, what then—“Is she your wife?”
If man—“Are you his spiritual director?”
Enjoy their feasts; why dabble in their strife?
Shut both your eyes. “Who made you their inspector?
Must all the world perform Andromache and Hector?”
XLIX
Yet, still the rumours, thick and thicker flew,Of midnight sounds, and “deeds without a name.”
'Twas marked, the stranger never wore a shoe!
Even at his marriage feast 'twas all the same;
Yet his bold stride was anything but lame.
But, what dyed double-black, the blackest story,
Was, that, one night, he won at every game;
Breaking the bank, and all its Monsignori;
Proof to all Roman eyes, of fiendship, a priori.
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L
Some would “pluck up the evil by the roots,”And talked of “burning,” with Rome's ancient vigour.
Some would begin by “ripping off his boots,”
But then, the stranger was a dashing figure,
A well-known artiste at the sword and trigger.
The man whose bullet hits the ace of spades,
Requires some prudence, mingled with one's rigour;
Your monks, besides, can work at safer trades,
Than English pistol shots, or sharp Toledo blades.
LI
But, suddenly, 'twas found, the cash of RomeRang rather oddly, and looked rather queer;
The stranger, too, was seldomer “at home,”
He wore a darker frown, and fiercer sneer.
The Jews were gathering up their bills, in fear.
Scudi of copper, and pistoles of tin,
Began, in tens of thousands, to appear;
Monks knit the brow, and Rabbis shook the chin;
—Rome, treasury and all,—was not worth a zechin!
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LII
The guards were sent, quick-march, to seize the Stranger;The Stranger had out-marched them, and was gone!
They hunted his hotel, from roof to manger,
They might as well have let the deed alone.
Whate'er he was, in Rome was never known!
Some think him, but a Coiner with his Mill,
(The antiquarian's teeth still gnaw that bone.)
Some have it, that he was a “shape of ill.”
Nay, some will take their oaths, he 's working in Rome still!
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