ONGRATULATIONS were now offered in the Bor

CON

ghese Palace. Flaminia-Elizabeth was really the bride of heaven. Francesca's seriousness was not concealed by her artificial smile; the tranquillity which lay on her countenance was banished from her heart.

Fabiani, most deeply affected, said to me, "You have lost your best benefactress! You have reason for being very much depressed! She desired me to give you some scudi," continued he, "for old Domenica; you have certainly spoken to her about your old foster-mother. Take her these, they are Flaminia's gift."

The dead lay like a snake around my heart; my thoughts were life's weariness; I trembled before them; before them self-murder seemed to lose its terrors.

"Out into the free air!" thought I; "to the home of my childhood, where Domenica sang cradle-songs to me; where I played and dreamed."

Yellow and scorched lay the Campagna; not a green blade spoke of the hope of life; the yellow Tiber rolled its waves towards the sea in order to vanish there. I saw again the old burial-place, with the thick ivy over the roof, and depending from the walls, the little world which, as a child, I had called my own. The door stood open; a pleasant melancholy feeling filled my heart; I thought of Domenica's affection and her joy at seeing me. It certainly was a year since I had last been out there, and eight months since I had spoken with her in Rome, and she had prayed me to go very often to see her. I had very often thought about her, had talked of her to Flaminia ; but our summer residence in Tivoli and my

excited state of mind since our return had prevented my going out to the Campagna.

I heard, in thought, her scream of joy as she saw me, and hastened my steps; but, when I came pretty near the door, walked very softly to prevent her hearing me. I looked into the room; in the middle stood a great iron pan over a fire, some reeds were laid upon it, and a young fellow blew them; he turned his head and saw me; it was Pietro, the little child which I had nursed here.

"Saint Joseph!" exclaimed he, and sprung up overjoyed, "is it your Excellency? It is a long, long time since you were so gracious as to come here!"

I extended to him my hand, which he would kiss.

'Nay, nay, Pietro !" said I; "it almost seems as if I had forgotten my old friends, but I have not."

"No, the good old mother said so too," cried he. “O, Madonna! how glad she would have been to see you!"

"Where is Domenica?" inquired I.

“Ah!" returned he, "it is now half a year since she was laid under the earth. She died whilst Excellenza was in Tivoli! She was only ill for a few days, but through all that time she talked about her dear Antonio. Yes, Excellenza, do not be angry that I call you by that name, but she was so very fond of you. 'Would that my eyes could see him before they are closed!' said she, and longed so very much for it. And when I saw very well that she could not last the night over, I went in the afternoon to Rome; I knew very well that you would not be angry at my request. I would have prayed of you to have accompanied me to the old mother, but when I got there you and the gentlefolks were all gone to Tivoli; so I came home full of trouble; but when I came to the house she was already gone to sleep."

He held his hands before his face and wept.

Every word which he had said fell heavily upon my heart. I had been her dying thought, and, at the same time, my thoughts had been far away from her. Would that I had only said farewell to her before I set off for Tivoli! I was not a good man!

I gave the money to Pietro from Flaminia, and all that I

had also. He sank down upon his knees before me, and called me his guardian angel. It sounded like a jest in my heart. With a twofold sense of suffering, cut, as it were, to the very heart, I left the Campagna. I know not how I reached

home.

For three long days I lay without consciousness in a violent fever. God knows what, during this time I said; but Fabiani frequently came to me; he had appointed the deaf Fenella to be my nurse. No one named Flaminia to me. I had returned home ill from the Campagna, and had laid myself immediately on my bed, when the fever took hold upon me.

I recovered my strength, but very slowly; in vain I endeavored to compel myself to humor and cheerfulness; I was possessed of neither.

It was about six weeks after the time when Flaminia took the veil, that the physician permitted me to go out. Almost without knowing whither I directed my steps, I went to the Porta Pia; my eye gazed down upon the Quattri Fontane, but I had not courage enough to pass the convent. Some evenings, however, after this, when the new moon shone in the heavens, the emotions of my heart drew me thither; I saw the gray convent walls, the grated windows, Flaminia's closed grave. "Wherefore dared I not to see the burial-place of the dead?" said I to myself, and felt within me a resolution to do so.

Every evening I took my way past there. "I was very fond of walking to the Villa Albani," said I to those of my acquaintance whom I met by chance. "God knows what will be the end of it!" sighed my heart; "I cannot endure it long!" I was then just at the gaol.

It was a dark evening; a ray of light streamed down the wall of the convent; I leaned against the corner of a house, fixed my eyes upon this bright point, and thought on Flaminia. 66 Antonio!" said a voice close behind me ; Antonio, what are you doing here?"

66

It was Fabiani. "Follow me home!" said he.

I accompanied him; we spoke not a word by the way; he knew it all as well as I myself did; I felt that he did so. I was an ingrate; I had not courage to look at him. Presently, and we were alone in my chamber.

"You are yet ill, Antonio," said he, with an unusual solemnity in his voice. "You need occupation, change of scene. It will do you good to mix more in the world. There was a time when you spread out your wings for freedom; perhaps it was unjust in me that I decoyed the bird back to his cage. It is a great deal better for human beings to have their will; then if misfortunes befall them they have only themselves to blame. You are quite old enough to direct your own steps. A little journey will be beneficial to you; the physician is of the same opinion also. You have already seen Naples; visit now the north of Italy. I shall provide the means for it. It is the best thing for you, necessary, and," added he, with a seriousness, a severity, which I had never known in him before, “I am convinced that you will never forget the benefits which we have conferred upon you. Never occasion us mortification, shame, and sorrow, which indiscretion or blind passion might do. A man can do anything, whatever he will, if he be only a good man."

His words struck me to the earth like a flash of lightning; I bent my knee, and pressed his hand to my lips.

"I know very well," said he, half-jestingly, "that we may have done you injustice; that we have been unreasonable and severe. No persons, however, will intend more uprightly and more kindly towards you than we have done. You will hear more flattering modes of speech, more loving words, but not more true integrity than we have shown you. For a year you shall move about. Let us then see what is your state of mind, and whether we have done you an injustice."

With these words he left me.

Had the world still new suffering for me - still fresh poison drops? Even the only draught of consolation, freedom to fly about in God's world, fell like gall into my deep wound. Far from Rome, far from the south, where lay all the flowers of my remembrance, over the Apennines, toward the north, where there actually lay snow upon the lofty mountains! Cold blown from the Alps into my warm blood? Toward the north, to the floating Venice, the bride of the sea! God! let me never more return to Rome, to the grave of my cherished memories! Farewell, my home, my native city!

The carriage rolled across the desolate Campagna. The dome of St. Peter's was concealed behind the hills. We drove past Monte Soracte, across the mountains, to the narrow Nepi. It was a bright, moonlight evening. A monk was preaching before the door of the hotel; the crowd repeated his Viva Santa Maria! and followed him, singing through the streets. The crowd of people carried me along with them. The old aqueduct, with its thick, twining plants, and the dark olive groves around, formed a dark picture, which corresponded to my state of mind.

I passed through the gate by which I had entered. Just outside of this lay the vast ruins of a castle or convent, the broad high-road running through its dilapidated halls; a little path turned from the main road, and led into the midst of them; ivy and maiden-hair grew dependingly from the walls of the solitary cells. I entered into a large hall; tall grass grew above the rubbish and the overthrown capitals; enwreathing vine shoots moved their broad leaves through the great Gothic windows, where now were only small remains of loosely hanging painted glass. Aloft, upon the walls, grew bushes and hedges; the beams fell upon a fresco-painting of Saint Sebastian, who stood bleeding, and pierced with an arrow. Deep organ-tones resounded, as it seemed, continuously through the hall; I followed the sounds, and, passing out through a narrow door, found myself among myrtle hedges and luxuriant vine leaves, close to a perpendicular descent of great depth, down which a waterfall was precipitated, foaming and white, in the clear moonlight.

The whole romantic scene would have surprised any mind, yet perhaps my distress would have allowed it to slide out of my memory, had not that which I saw further impressed it painfully, deeply into my heart. I followed the narrow, almost overgrown path, close to the abyss, towards the broad highway. Close beside me, from over the lofty, white wall, upon which the moon was shining, stared three pale heads, behind an iron grating, the heads of three executed robbers, which, as in Rome, on the Porta del Angelo, were placed in iron cages, to serve as a terror and a warning to others. There was to me nothing terrible in them. In earlier days, the sight