Chapter II: Part 2

The only person who makes any effort for society is an Austrian countess, a great court lady. She has taken a tiny cottage, brought her own cook, maid, and butler from Vienna, and tries to give “at homes.” I heard some good music at her rooms the other day. Somehow she had managed to draw together half a dozen people of the sort that can make “society” in the prison of La Jacquerie, on an ocean steamer, or even at a German cure,--an Austrian officer, an English diplomat, a French abbé, my Polish count, and the musician, who is a real artist. We walked with the gods for that hour; the pianist gave us whatever we asked for--Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Grieg. It was a _Kaffee-klatsch_ without the coffee (all stimulants are forbidden, even tea and coffee); the butler handed--scornfully, I thought--milk and grapes. The party broke up rather hurriedly at sunset, everybody rushing away to get their _Wassertreten_ before dark. Water treading is to wade up to one’s knees in one of the streams which run through the fields. Very pleasant, very comic--fortunately, there is a male stream and a female stream; such chippendales! such piano legs have I seen! It is all so strange, so _echt deutsch_! The countess does not harmonize with the rest, she is out of key. I meet her at seven o’clock in the morning, her feet, head, neck, and arms bare, strolling over the wet grass, a lovely, incongruous vision; her hair dressed and “_ondulée_” in the latest fashion; her parasol, rose-colored satin. Now, a rose-colored satin parasol at Woerishoven is a false note in a pastoral symphony. She worships Father Kneipp; they all say she owes him her life; he cannot endure her, has attacked her almost openly in his talks; he will not tolerate folly, vanity, or worldliness; she personifies--oh, so charmingly--all three! She wears the prescribed dress of coarse Kneipp linen with such a difference; the other women look like meal-sacks; she has the lines of a Greek goddess.

In the early morning all the patients walk barefoot through the wet grass. Those who have been here longest go without shoes and stockings all day. I am told it is delightful to walk bare foot in the new-fallen snow. Women’s skirts reach only to the ankles; men wear knickerbockers. The only foot-gear allowed at Woerishoven is the leather sandal, classic and comfortable. Newcomers begin by wearing the sandal over the stocking, then the stocking is left off for half an hour--an hour--finally for the whole day. An hour and a half after breakfast and dinner a cold douche is taken. The _blitzguss_ (lightning douche) is for people who have been taking the cure for some time, the _rumpf_ (body) douche is commonly prescribed for new arrivals. At the ladies’ bath attached to this hotel a rosy _mädchen_ plays the hose upon the patient with skill and firmness. That ordeal over, the dripping victim scrambles hastily into her clothes--drying and rubbing are forbidden--and exercises vigorously until she is perfectly dry and warm. The exhilaration which follows is indescribable. In the exercise-room attached to the largest bath, I have seen a bishop capering, a princess sawing wood, a fat American millionaire pirouetting with a balancing pole. No one laughs; it is too grave a matter. You dance or prance, box, saw wood, or do calisthenics for your life--anything to get up the circulation!

Bavaria is enchanting, Bavarians are delightful, not at all like other Germans, more like the Tyrolese,--simple, kind, deeply religious. I cannot imagine becoming a “convert” in Rome, but here it would be easier. Why should the people of Catholic countries have better manners than those of Protestant lands? I know you will bring up some old saw about sincerity and truth not always being compatible with suavity! We can’t be _all_ right and they _all_ wrong, “and yet and yet” it is known that the Pope keeps his own private account at the Bank of Protestant England! Does this mean that he, like the Italians I meet every day, is readier to trust an Englishman or an American than his own countrymen?

I keep thinking of him, my neighbor in Rome, the Prisoner of the Vatican, shut up between the walls of his vast garden through all the long summer. I used to look at his windows and wonder if he felt the heat as much as I did in those last August days before we came away on our _villeggiatura_. No _villeggiatura_ for him, he is still there! The “Black Pope” (as the power of the Jesuit is called) is his gaoler,--not good King Humbert, as you may have been led to suppose,--but a prison is a prison, whoever the gaoler may be.

I am learning all I can about the German Kaiser. I am inclined to think he plays the strongest game at the European card-table. The Bavarians I have talked with seem rather bored by him; they compare him unfavorably with poor, dear, mad King Ludwig and his father, great art patrons, both.

The Prussians think their Kaiser the greatest man on earth. I gather from one of their number that the court people are harried by him beyond belief; he is forever interfering with their private affairs. A young officer with an English wife and English tastes set up a tandem in Berlin last winter. He received a message from the Emperor requesting him not to drive one horse before the other! How can they bear it? When we first arrived the Kaiser had lately been at Rome and people were still telling stories of him. The Italians are not over-fond of his visits; he costs a great deal to entertain and is too much given to dropping in to tea! He stayed at the Quirinal Palace, the guest of the King. As such, etiquette forbade his visiting the Pope. You don’t suppose he let a little thing like that interfere! On a certain day the German Ambassador to the Vatican (you understand there are two Ambassadors, don’t you, one to the King, one to the Pope?) received notice that the Emperor was to be his guest for the morrow. The Ambassador, a bachelor of simple tastes, prepared for the imperial visit as best he could. The Emperor arrived with a portmanteau, made one of his lightning changes, and came down to breakfast. The breakfast-table was a bright spot, a friend having lent a fine service of silver and some wonderful Venetian glass. When the Kaiser saw the display he cried out, “Mein Gott, A----, where did you steal all these?” Rather nice, wasn’t it? After they had “eated and drinked,” as your children say, a carriage, come all the way from Berlin, with horses, harnesses, and servants to match, drove up to the door and carried the Emperor off to call on the Pope! It would not have been etiquette to use the Italian royal carriage to pay the papal visit!

Prince Doria’s ball for the Kaiser at the splendid Palazzo Doria--one of the finest of the Roman palaces--must have been gorgeous; the picture gallery was a blaze of glory,--you remember there the great Velasquez portrait of Pope Innocent X.?--all the jewels in Rome were present except the emeralds of the Pope’s tiara. When he went away the Kaiser said to Prince Doria,--

“We shall be very glad to see you and the Princess at Potsdam, but we cannot show you anything like this.” Handsome of him, wasn’t it?

When the Kaiser went sightseeing to St. Peter’s he admired my fountains. Well he might! After watching them leap and play for some time he said, “Turn them off now; it’s a pity to waste so much water.” Thrifty, eh? Turn off Carlo Maderno’s tireless fountains, which have danced in the sun and shimmered in the moon nigh three hundred years!

III

A VISIT TO QUEEN MARGARET

PALAZZO RUSTICUCCI, ROME, December 7, 1894.

Yesterday was _sirocco_. In consequence the house was full of fine sand blown up from the African desert and everybody was out of humor; it is curious how this soft wind sets people’s nerves on edge. In spite of _sirocco_, I saw the King and Queen going to open Parliament. The King, Prince of Naples, and two officers were in the first crystal and gilt coach, the Queen her mother the Duchess of Genoa, and a gentleman of the court in the next. The horses, trappings, coachmen, and footmen were magnificent. There were three servants to each of the six royal carriages--one on the box, two standing behind. They wore scarlet coats, white wigs, three-cornered hats, and pink silk stockings. The King and the Prince were in uniform, the Queen and her mother in the latest French fashion. Little Gwennie Story (the granddaughter of our dear old friends the William Storys) was dreadfully disappointed when she found that the Queen did not always wear a crown. I sympathize with her. I had a place in the loggia of the Palazzo Montecitorio--where Parliament meets--and saw the royalties step out of their carriages and enter the palace.

January 21, 1895.

Yesterday I went to the annual memorial mass for Victor Emmanuel at the Pantheon. The noble old temple--the only one of the Roman buildings which has been in continuous use since it was erected in the first century--was hung with black and cloth of gold. A huge catafalque stood in the middle, directly under the open dome; the whole interior was lighted by classic torches, urns, and tripods holding blue fire. A tribune had been constructed for the orchestra and singers. The music, a mass of Cherubini’s, was very fine. The catafalque was surrounded by a double line of men who stood facing one another through the long service. The men of the outer circle were soldiers of the King, the men of the inner ring were priests of the Church, for Victor Emmanuel was a good Catholic and died in the faith.

I was in Rome for the first time in 1878, the last winter of his life. I often saw him driving on the Pincio or in the Corso. He was an extraordinary-looking man, fierce, powerful, bizarre, every inch a king; loved and hated accordingly. I remember the intense excitement when the two old enemies, Pius the Ninth and Victor Emmanuel, both lay dying in the city for which they had fought. Would the King be permitted to receive the sacrament? When it was known that the Pope on his death-bed had sent his blessing to the King _in extremis_ all Rome drew a long breath. We went to see _Il Re Galantuomo_ lying in state in the _capella ardente_ at the Quirinal. He was dressed in full uniform with high riding-boots, the royal robe of red velvet and ermine was spread over the inclined plane on which he lay, the crown and sceptre at his feet. The chapel blazed with candles; in each of the four corners knelt a brown Capuchin monk telling his beads. Signor Simone Peruzzi, chamberlain to the King, watched one night beside the body. He was alone for the moment when he heard a deep sigh, saw the King’s breast heave. The matter was explained by the physicians afterwards. I remember to this day the thrill in Peruzzi’s voice when he spoke of the dead King’s sigh.

March 10, 1895.

Mrs. Potter Palmer and I have had a private audience with the Queen. The visit went off very well. We arrived at the Quirinal Palace at two o’clock, and were received by the Marchesa Villamarina and two other court ladies, with whom we talked for perhaps ten minutes. A tiny old woman dressed in mourning, looking like the Fairy Blackstick, came out from her audience just as we entered the Queen’s reception-room for ours. She must have been a privileged person, for we had been warned not to wear black and not to wear hats, bonnets being _de rigueur_. As I do not own a bonnet, Mrs. Palmer kindly lent me a charming one, fresh from Paris--a few days later, when she was received by the Pope, she wore my Spanish mantilla. The Queen, who was seated on a sofa, rose as we entered and shook hands cordially with us. She is still beautiful, her hair magnificent, her eyes kind and keen. When you visit royalty you must only speak when you are spoken to; the choice of the topic of conversation thus remains with the royal personage. You must always say “your Majesty,” and you must make three reverences on entering and leaving the presence. In all this, I was tutored by Marion Crawford, who has often been “received,” and whose books the Queen is said to read with pleasure. She speaks English perfectly, by the way. She had seen an article in a late magazine--_The Century_, I think--on American country houses; she spoke of those at Newport, and said that, “judging from the illustrations, they must be very fine.” She showed us a grand piano at the end of the room, saying that it was an American instrument, a Steinway, and that “it had a very brilliant action.” With Mrs. Palmer the Queen spoke of the World’s Fair. Mr. MacVeagh had presented her with a copy of the book I edited on the Woman’s Department of the Chicago Exposition. The audience lasted about twenty minutes; then the Queen rose, the signal for us to withdraw. We made our three courtesies and backed successfully from the room. The Queen is much beloved; she has real charm, besides being good and clever.

Yesterday I went to Mr. William Story’s studio. The garden is lovelier than ever, the climbing vines that mask the dead wall make a rustling screen of cool green in which the birds build their nests. I waited in the studio among the statues--most of them old friends of mine--and found my particular tassel on the fringed robe of the marble Sardanapalus. One day, seventeen years ago, when Mr. Story was working on the clay, he let me take his modelling tool and add a few touches to the fringe. I have seen a copy of this statue in Lord Battersea’s fine house in London opposite the Marble Arch of Hyde Park. When Mr. Story came in--much as you remember him, the same graceful, brilliant talker, only with a new pensive note since his wife’s death--we talked of the old days at Dieppe, of the meetings in the studio there, when he and my mother read aloud from the books they were writing, and Mrs. Story gave us tea and read us Mallock’s “New Republic,” published that year; it must have been the summer of 1878. Mr. Story remembered the mornings on the _plage_ when we sat on the warm sea sand under big red umbrellas watching “the boys” tumbling in the surf, and mamma’s calling Waldo “the amber god,” and Julian “a young leopard,” as he swam and dove through the waves like a merman. I reminded him of the little poem he wrote in our autograph book, and showed him the locket Mrs. Story gave me with a picture of herself and Pippa, the funny little pug dog she took with her wherever she went. We both remembered how Pippa behaved the day they left Dieppe when she saw the handbag in which she always travelled. She bit and scratched the bag, whined and generally remonstrated. Once inside the satchel, however, she was perfectly quiet and never betrayed her presence by barking _en route_.

Mr. Story showed me the monument he is modelling for Mrs. Story’s grave--a kneeling figure of an angel leaning over a classic altar. The face, every line of the figure, every finger of the hand, each feather of the drooping wings seems to weep. He calls it the Genius of Grief. This last expression of a great life love gripped me by the heart. It is to be placed in the Protestant cemetery here (where lovely Jennie Crawford is buried) not far from the corner where the ashes of Shelley were interred, and near the tombstone of Keats with its familiar inscription,--

“Here lies one whose name is writ in water.”

ST. AGNELLO DI SORRENTO, March 18, 1895.

Last Monday we left Rome in a rain-storm and came here to break up a pair of obstinate colds. We are delightfully established at the Cocumella, an old Jesuit monastery turned into a hotel. There is less of what Hawthorne calls the odor of sanctity--a peculiar mildewed smell the monks leave behind them--than is usual in such places. Our windows command an astonishing view of the Bay of Naples and Mt. Vesuvius. To the right, about a quarter of a mile away, is Villa Crawford, where we are most kindly welcomed by the ladies; the man of the house is away. The children are charming; the villa ideal; it stands on the edge of a high cliff leaning over the sea. The grounds, filled with flowers and fruit-trees, are seamed with quaintly paved walks. On the left of the house is a terrace, where they dine in summer. Here a flaming heart in gray and white paving-stones took my fancy. The house is large and luxurious; there are roses everywhere inside and out.

To-day is Palm Sunday. The chambermaid who brings my morning coffee brought me a bit of olive-branch, instead of palm, from early service. Later we went to high mass at the cathedral in Sorrento. The procession was headed by the bishop, his acolytes, and some smart young canons in rose-colored satin capes. After the mass the procession marched through the town, led by a group of bronzed fishermen and boys dressed in white robes, with bright blue _moiré_ capes, and loose oriental white hoods over their heads. They all carried yellow palm branches in their hands. It was the most perfect contrast of color imaginable.

Yesterday I saw the nets hauled in. The men and women, old and young, form a line upon the beach, take hold upon the rope, and with a graceful, swinging motion pull in the seine inch by inch, as they did in the days of St. Peter. The Sorrentines are a handsome and seem a kindly people; there are comparatively few beggars here.

Throughout the _Piano di Sorrento_ thousands of men and women are employed in the manufacture of silk stockings, scarfs, carved and inlaid wood, coral ornaments, tortoise-shell combs, and jewelry. I dare not enter a shop for fear of temptation. The Italian spoken is far pleasanter than the nasal Neapolitan; the chief peculiarity is the dropping of the final vowel. Maria, the dark-eyed chambermaid, asks if she shall make the _lett_, for _letto_ (bed), and speaks of Sorrent, _doman_, and _Sabad_, meaning Sorrento, _domani_ (to-morrow), and _Sabato_ (Saturday).

The trees in the garden are laden with oranges and lemons, the feast of the roses is beginning, the birds are singing. The service of the hotel is excellent, the table quite good enough, our room has a fireplace and afternoon sun; for all this, food and wine included, we pay six francs--one dollar and twenty cents--a day, with permission to roam in the garden and pick as many oranges and roses as we like. I am reminded of Hugh Norman’s saying, “When I have only a dollar and a half a day left to live on, I shall retire to the Cocumella and pass the rest of my life there.” We have _uva secca_ for luncheon, grapes dipped in wine and spices, rolled up with bits of citron in grape-leaves, tied in little bundles, and roasted. They may be kept half the year, and are among the dainties of the world. The miniature Italian count who married Mrs. Tom Thumb, _veuve_, said when he came to take tea at our house, “_In Italia si mangia bene_ (In Italy one eats well).” He was right; we hear less about Italian than about French cookery, but it is quite as good--the range of dishes is wider and shows more imagination. There is a great deal about cooking in my letters; so there is in life. Fire, cookery, and civilization seem to be inseparable. Speaking of fire, the women about here say that Vesuvius, across the bay there, sets a bad example smoking his eternal pipe. The men sit watching him, presently they imitate him, and try and see how big a cloud of smoke they can make.

Vesuvius dominates the whole landscape. He finally got the better of us, drew us like a magnet; so, finding that the ascent can be made from here as well as anywhere, we gave a day to it. The road, an ascending spiral, embraces the great black mountain like the coils of a serpent. At first it leads through pleasant vineyards; when these are left behind the dreadful lava fields begin. The weird forms of the petrified rivers of lava, once red and molten, now grim and black, suggest human bodies writhing in the clutch of horrid monsters. Here a huge trunk madly wrenches itself from the toils, there a vast body lies supine and agonized, the last resistance passed. When we left our carriage at the foot of the funicular railway, I felt I had passed through several circles of the Inferno. Dante must have received many of the impressions he transmits to us from Vesuvius. At the summit, when I looked down into the crater, at the slippery, slimy sides, with their velvet bloom of sulphur, I saw where the fathers of the Church and the early painters, Fra Angelico among them, got their ideas of hell. Marcus Aurelius, my guide, bibulous, muscular, with a grip of iron, found a point from which, when the wind lifted the veil of thick white smoke, I could, by leaning well over the crater, see the flood at the bottom surge, seethe, toss up from its depth big, red-hot stones, which dropped back again while the mountain roared and scolded. It was an awesome day. Vesuvius has given me not only a new understanding of the poetry and religion of Italy, but of the volcanic Italian character, which it surely has had a share in forming. On our way down we ran over a soldier, the front wheel of our carriage passing across his leg. As we were three people in the carriage, it must have hurt him, but he got up and walked nimbly off, cursing us vehemently. I wish the Abyssinians might find the Italian soldiers equally invincible in Africa.

ST. AGNELLO DI SORRENTO, Easter Sunday, 1895.

I find the services of Holy Week more impressive here than in Rome. Thursday afternoon, on a lonely road by the sea, we heard a strange, primitive chanting,--the music might have been Palestrina’s,--and came suddenly upon a procession led by children carrying the usual emblems of the Passion, and some I have never seen before. The story of the betrayal and the crucifixion was told by symbols, the basin of Pilate, the cock and sword of Peter, the bag of Judas, the scourge, the pillar, the spear, the sponge, the cross, the hammer and nails, the crown of thorns, and the winding-sheet. The washing of the apostles’ feet at the cathedral Holy Thursday was really moving. A dozen poor old fishermen, scrubbed as clean as possible, represented the twelve; they were each rewarded by a loaf of bread and a franc at the end of the service. Early Good Friday morning, before the sun was up, a band of peasants passed through the town bearing a life-sized image of the Madonna dressed all in white, going out to look for her son. After sundown they returned, bringing back the mother from her search, clad in mourning robes. She had found her son; behind her the figure of the dead Christ was carried on a bier. The people stood gravely watching the bearers as they passed through the dark, torch-lit streets. On Saturday, as we were driving, a cannon sounded at twelve o’clock in token of the resurrection. Our driver threw himself from the cab and, touching his head to the ground three times, remained kneeling long enough to repeat several _aves_.

PALAZZO RUSTICUCCI, ROME, March 27, 1895.

We were glad to get back to Rome, and to the terrace, where the wall-flowers are out, and daffodils, pansies, primroses, forget-me-nots, and lilies-of-the-valley. Two large lilac-bushes and three spiræa will be in bloom by Sunday. There is snow on the Leonessa; it is a trifle chilly up here on the terrace where I write, but it is near “peaks and stars” and very near peace. I weed the flowers, and collect the snails that prey upon our pansies and threaten our roses. The awful gardens where Nero’s living torches flamed lay just below my windows, where the Piazza of St. Peter’s is now. Soracte, the Leonessa, with all the rest of the purple Alban hills, looked down on that sight as calmly as they look on my lilies and me. There is no place in the world where one feels so small as in Rome. The sunflowers come up, each with his little burst shell of seed on his head, which he soon throws away; so the lesson of the new life springing from the old is studied in the shadow of Angelo’s dome. The great church greeted me like a friend. Tourists criticise the architecture: I do not deny faults, I only do not see them.

We have a nightingale of our own at last. His name is Pan. He sings gloriously. What a thrill his voice has! We feed him on bullock’s heart. Jeremy Bentham, the tortoise, knew me; he never was so friendly before; he now snaps fresh lettuce-leaves out of my hand without trying to nip my fingers. Our great Thomas cat threatened Pan, and my life was a constant struggle to keep them apart, so I have sent Pan to the studio, where J. has a falcon and two pigeons. He threatens to buy a jackdaw, and was with difficulty restrained from purchasing a baby fox. It was such an engaging little animal that I confess to have wanted it myself. The happy family at the studio is cared for by Vincenzo, a young painter, a scholar of J.’s. In the old days, when J. was a pupil of Villegas, Vincenzo was the studio boy who washed their brushes. J. thinks he has some talent and has given him a whole floor in his great barrack of a studio.

Pompilia and Filomena had swept and garnished the house with flowers in honor of our return. All our friends and our small world of hangers-on (the ancient Romans called them clients) welcomed us kindly, with the single exception of the porter.

Porters seem to be natural enemies, like mothers-in-law. We all know shining exceptions, but the rule commonly holds good of both. None of our friends are on speaking terms with their porters. Our old porter was dreadful--dirty, drunk, disreputable. At first the new one seemed a treasure. J. had recommended him for the place chiefly on account of his lovely tenor voice. The man--we call him Ercole “because it is his name”--used to sit at work (he is a mender of leather) on the sidewalk opposite the studio singing airs from the latest operas, Bohême, Pagliacci, Iris, but singing them like an artist. It helped J., shut up at his work in the big studio, to hear him, and in a reckless moment he spoke to Signor Mazzocchi about the singing saddler. Behold him installed with his big, white-haired wife, Maria, his little daughter, Lucrezia, brown and bonnie, in a grim room without light or air (you would not put a cat in such a hole)--still, an improvement on their former quarters. The landlord is responsible for the porter’s wages. We give him a _mancia_ of ten francs a month, extras for extra service, and a present at Christmas and at Easter. His duty towards us is to receive our cards and letters and bring them up the three long flights of stairs. Our mail grew staler and staler. The Paris New York _Herald_ (read by all Americans in Europe), instead of being served with breakfast, arrived barely in time for luncheon. J. had built on the first landing a little open stall, light and airy, where Ercole could stitch his old saddles and harnesses and sing his jolly songs. Alas and alas! there is a wine-shop opposite the palace, there is a _trattoria_ on the ground floor next the baker’s; both proprietors are generous and soft-hearted. Somehow the fat wife, the slim daughter, are fed, but Ercole stitches no longer, sings no more. Sober and poor, a rival to Pan. Rich and drunk, he is sourly silent. It is a dangerous thing to play at being providence! The _postino_ now brings up the mail and delivers it at our door, _ultimo piano_ (top floor).

February, 1896.

Last week I took Isabel to a ball at the Princess del Drago’s. We have kept Ercole up at night a good deal lately, so I took the key of the big _portone_ and told him that he need not wait for us. Isabel’s maid, Franceline, was to sit up and open the old green door of our apartment the key of which weighs two pounds and will not go into my pocket. We wore our very best gowns and trinkets, and Isabel had a pretty tinsel ribbon in her hair which sparkled like diamonds. It was a great dance; the drive home at three in the morning under a full silver moon, past Hilda’s tower, the fountain of the Triton, and the hospital of Santo Spirito was as far as I was concerned not the least of the fun. We met a few empty cabs returning to their stables, and just as we entered the Borgo Nuovo we passed a pair of grave _carabinieri_ (military police) pacing their beat, wrapped in long black cloaks, their three-cornered hats drawn over their eyes. Our good coachman Cesare opened the _portone_, found and lighted the candle left on the lower step, as had been arranged, and bade us good-night. We picked up our skirts and went up the two easy flights chattering about the party. At the second landing we stopped beside the Etruscan ladies to rest before breasting the third short, steep flight. I rang softly, not to disturb the sleepers, and waited. I rang loudly, and waited. Through the door came a gentle, familiar murmur. Then the cracked bell rang out a tocsin that should have roused the whole palace; still no sound from within save that rhythmical murmur; we beat and kicked upon the door till hands and feet were tired; we called, bellowed, screamed, shrieked for a matter of five minutes, until the terrified Franceline, guilty yet denying sleep, threw open the door. I was just dropping off into dreamland when I heard the _portone_ shut heavily. As the stairway belongs exclusively to us, I sat up and listened. There was a hubbub on the stairs. I heard Ercole’s voice protesting, calling upon the Trinity first as a whole, then severally, upon all the saints, last and loudest upon the Madonna, to witness his innocence. A stern, accusing voice drowned Ercole’s. I threw on a wrapper, ran to the door, and listened.

“Where are they, then? Make me to see them, those ladies, all festive with jewels. Did we not ourselves behold them enter this _portone_, laughing and talking gaily? this _portone_, brute beast, of which one knows that thou, and thou only, hast the key. Did we not hear, we out in the street, feminine yells horrible, to make one tremble, and thou sayest thou heardst nothing? Animal, where are they, then? What have you done with them, those ladies so bright, so beautiful? Robbed, murdered, dying, perhaps--possibly dead.”

“By the mass, by Peter and Paul, I was asleep in my bed at ten o’clock. Ask Maria, ask Lucrezia, ask the _padrone_ of the wine-shop, who turned me out at that hour. I knew nothing till you came, _illustrissimi_, you tore me from my bed. What do I know of the ladies? I saw them go at quarter before eleven with Cesare in a coupé. Is it sensible to ask me? Ask that fat pig, Cesare. If they are dead, he is responsible.”

“Might it not be well to ring the bell and ask the signore?” said a third voice, that of the elder _carabiniere_. Explanations, apologies, thanks, “_e buona notte_!”

February 4, 1897.

The ball at the embassy last night (given by Mr. MacVeagh, the retiring American Ambassador, for the King and Queen) went off very well. Her Majesty looked charming and danced the quadrille with great spirit. Some of the dancers forgot the figures, she put them all straight, and was so winning, so fascinating that the Americans were enthusiastic about her.

The King, who does not dance, seemed bored. He is first and above all else a soldier, a man of action. I watched him as he stood pulling his big mustachios, talking to an ancient ambassadress; by his expression it was easy to see he would be glad when it was over and time to go home. He was in uniform as usual, carrying his white-plumed helmet under his arm. His honest face had that puzzled look it so often wears; no wonder! Of all the monarchs in the world, his riddles are the hardest to read. The Queen wore a superb dress of pale blue satin with point lace and her famous pearls. The King gave her a string of pearls on each anniversary of their marriage, it is said, till at their silver wedding she protested she could not bear the weight of another rope. The finest jewels after the royal pearls were Mrs. Potter Palmer’s. She wore the crown of pearls and diamonds I remember her wearing at her reception for the Spanish Infanta Eulalia at the time of the World’s Fair at Chicago. The supper was served in an immense room, the handsomest in the apartment, which occupies the _piano nobile_ of the Palazzo Ludovisi. Nothing could be better arranged for entertaining in the grand manner than the present American Embassy. You enter an enormous _anticamera_, where the servants take your wraps, pass on through a second waiting-room into a long corridor which runs the whole length of the palace. The state rooms all lead from this corridor; they have communicating doors, so that standing in the doorway of the supper-room one looks through the two drawing-rooms to the ballroom, where on a stage the musicians are seated. The diplomats all wore court dress. A ball where the men as well as the women are splendid is naturally far more brilliant than one of our balls, where the girls monopolize the finery. The most striking figure there was the military attaché of the Russian embassy. He wore the dress of a Cossack colonel, cartridge belt, jewelled weapons, and all, and--as if to heighten the warlike look--a black patch over one eye. The tender-hearted regarded him with sympathy: “poor man, in what dreadful encounter with savage tribesmen had he lost the missing eye?” Worse luck yet! It was knocked out by the point of an umbrella carelessly handled by a lady in getting out of the travelling compartment of a train!

I never saw such a crowd around a supper-table. Refreshments at most entertainments here are simpler than would be believed at home. In this the Italians are more civilized than the English or ourselves. The supper last night was of the generous American order. The Romans seemed to enjoy it and did not limit themselves to biscuits and lemonade. The army officers in especial took kindly to the good things.

To-day I looked into St. Agostino and saw the beautiful miracle-working Madonna. She is a lovely marble woman with a less lovely _bambino_. The mother is literally covered with gems; she has strings upon strings of pearls about her neck, her fingers are laden to the very tips with rings; the child is hung with scores of watches. Both heads are deformed with ugly crowns. The Madonna is by Jacopo Sansovino, a Florentine sculptor of the fifteenth century. She is much adored and quite adorable. She is very rich, has a good income of her own from the various legacies she has received. On the pedestal below her silver foot--the marble one was long since kissed out of existence--an inscription states that “on the assurance of Pius the Seventh an indulgence of two hundred days will be granted to whoever shall devoutly touch the foot of this holy image and recite an _ave_.”

From a photograph]

I also went to see the _appartamento Borgia_, newly opened at the Vatican. It contains one of the most splendid pieces of decoration I have ever seen--three rooms painted by Pinturicchio; they have been closed for twenty years, having been used as libraries; the walls were covered with books. The Pope has gone to great expense to put them in order, and has thrown them open to the public. Artistic Rome has gone mad about them. They surpass everything in the way of decoration here save the Sistine Chapel and the Stanze of Raphael.

June 29 and 30, 1897.

To-night the Feast of St. Peter is to be celebrated by a dinner-party on the terrace. That old statue of Jupiter in the great church across the way,--now held venerable as a portrait of St. Peter--is dressed in his best vestments, his finest tiara, and wears his most sumptuous sapphire ring on his stiff forefinger. As the whole Borgo is under the protection of St. Peter, I always make a little feast on his day. There are many sermons preached about him; I heard an excellent one in a neighboring church. The object of the saints’ days is to keep alive the memory of noble lives. Just as on Washington’s Birthday the old stories of Valley Forge and Yorktown are recited year after year, so the story of Peter is told on the 29th of June every year. I was surprised to hear Signor Rodolfo Lanciani say he thought it possible St. Peter had actually been in Rome, and that in his opinion the great church may cover his last resting-place as well as perpetuate his name.

Ripe figs are supposed to be eaten first on St. John’s Day, the 24th of June. Tradition says that the first plate of figs was always presented on that day to Pope Pius the Ninth. Either figs are late this season or Pompilia has been slow about finding them, for the purple figs which were served with cold boiled ham for our luncheon to-day are the first we have seen this season. Naturally there was no second course to such a superlative first. The terrace dinner was a great success. The table was set under the _pergola_ covered thick with the second crop of roses. We hung _lucerne_ (brass lamps for burning olive oil) from the yellow canes of the crossed bamboos and lighted the farther end of our airy dining-room with colored lanterns. Among the guests were Monsignor William O’Connell, director of the American College, a genial Irish-American priest, and Dr. William Bull, physician to the American Embassy, guide, philosopher, and friend of all wandering Americans. He is beloved of artists, a collector of antiquities, a genial, not a melancholy Dane, a wise physician, and one of the most picturesque figures in our Roman world. The sun was still staining the sky when we sat down. By the time old Nena brought the ices from the _trattoria_ below, the full yellow moon came up over the Sabine Hills, flooding every corner with its yellow light. Below, in the baker’s shop, the nightingale sang to the roses. Our best rose, _il Capitano Christi_, is a very large, flat, pink rose, growing on a stiff stalk with long, fierce thorns. It opens wide as a saucer, and is of the most rapturous, tender color. It is grafted on an excellent commonplace red rose-tree, a generous and prolific bloomer, which yields a brave harvest, the first to blossom, the last to wither, always to be depended on if I want roses in a hurry. The Captain gives a rare rose, never more than one at a time, but I know that it is to the Captain’s rose that the baker’s nightingale sings.

IV

A PRESENTATION TO LEO THE THIRTEENTH

PALAZZO RUSTICUCCI, November 20, 1897.

Our mother, comfortably established in the guest-room under the protection of Apollo, already feels at home in Rome. In the morning she sits on the terrace in a grand hooded chair we had made for her in that haunt of basket-makers, the Vicolo dei Canestrari--the little street of the basket-makers--are not the names of the Roman streets delightful? After luncheon we drive on the Pincio when the band plays, in the Doria or the Borghese Villa, or, best of all, on the Campagna. She shall have enough out-of-doors this winter! For a hundred years English doctors have sent elderly people to Rome, “where the effect of the air on the heart’s action tends to increase longevity.” The old here are uncommonly frisky. Mr. Greenough, an octogenarian, trots up our stairs as if he were twenty. On stormy days the mother drives to

From a photograph]

St. Peter’s and takes her walk inside the church. It is so vast that it has a climate of its own, varying only ten degrees in temperature during the entire year, consequently it is warm in winter and cool in summer. In August I put on a wrap when I go over there; in January I take off my furs! Socially as well as climatically Rome is an ideal place for the old; that horrid topic, _age_, is properly ignored. I have seen a gentleman of seventy-nine waltzing at a ball with a partner not twenty years his junior. The example of the Pope--always an old man--may have something to do with this admirable energy of the elders; the age of the civilization probably counts for more.

Do not believe what the papers say about the Pope; he is likely to live for years. Eighty-seven is the prime of life for pontiffs. Leo the Thirteenth serves the Italian newspaper men and foreign correspondents as the sea-serpent serves ours. When news is scarce, when the rich and great are veiled from the public eye by reason of summer seclusion or wandering, that blessed serpent, sailing into the sea of ink, saves the situation. The reports of _Sua Santita’s_ failing health used to rouse my sympathy; now they only make me angry, because they hurt his poor old feelings. He once said, on reading an account of his approaching end in a Roman paper, “Why do they wish me dead?”

Was not that pathetic? In spite of being White in my politics, I feel a personal sympathy for the Pope. We are such near neighbors, I see the windows of his private apartment from the terrace; we both look down upon the piazza of St. Peter’s; we have the same surgeon (Dr. Bull took me to consult Mazzoni about a bicycle ankle); I know several of his chamberlains; we both are left behind when the hot weather drives the _beau monde_ out of Rome for the summer: you see, we have much in common; his not knowing it does not alter my feelings; it’s one-sided, like a book friendship. I was in Rome when Pius the Ninth died and Leo the Thirteenth was elected. I remember how handsome Pius looked lying in state, with his foot in such a position that his red slipper (it had a cross embroidered on it) could be kissed. I do not remember much about the coronation ceremonies, but I have a very clear impression of my presentation to Pope Leo in the winter of 1878, very soon after he became Pope. The mother refused to go: those stubborn Protestant knees would not bow down to Baal or to the Pope. Our generation takes things differently, not half so picturesquely. We say, “An old man’s blessing is a good thing to have, whether he be a lama from Thibet or a priest of Rome.” Two other young American girls went with me; there were, all told, perhaps twenty people presented that day. We wore black, with such diamonds as our mothers would lend us, and Spanish mantillas. A few minutes before the Pope entered a chamberlain made us all kneel; then Leo, dressed in white, with a heavy gold chain around his neck, from which hung a cross set with emeralds, made the tour of the room, stopping to speak to every one. The chamberlain mentioned our names and nationality, the Pope asked each of us to what church we belonged. My place was next an emotional convert; he hardly noticed her, merely giving her his blessing and passing on. He asked me where I came from, said Boston was a famous city, inquired how long I had been in Rome, wished me a pleasant journey, and a safe return to my people. He spoke longest to a little Jewess who was at my left--on the principle, I suppose, that we already have our friends, and should make friends of our enemies. We kissed his ring--a large amethyst--as we had been told, _not_ his hand. I am not sure whether it was Pope Leo or Pius the Ninth who always asked strangers how long they had been in Rome. When the answer indicated that the stay had been for days or weeks, he said in parting “_Addio_,” when it had been months, “_Arriverderci_”--au revoir,--“because if you have been here only a short time, you may not return, but if you have been here for months, you are sure to come back.” I have heard it told of both; it very likely dates back to Gregory the Sixteenth. Stories are immortal in Rome, those from the “Gesta Romanorum” being still current.

December 27, 1897.

Oh! the terrace, the terrace! with the white hyacinths ablow, little starry bunches of narcissi, pansies, a rare rose, and the yellow gourds of the passion-flower hanging down through the crossed bamboos of the trellis. Our mother feels the fascination of the terrace life more and more. Yesterday she asked me to buy her a small watering-can,--ours are huge,--and to-day she helped water the plants and weed the tulips. I put the pots up on the wall for her where she could easily reach them, and she pulled out the tender weeds with her beautiful hands. Bulbs do not thrive so well the second year as the first. The delirium of the hyacinths is gone with that precious burst of youth. This season they bloom soberly; no more passionate, lavish giving, they have left that behind,--like some other flowers,--but they do their little, middle-aged best. We had a merry Christmas. The weather was perfect: a gift, the first and best of all, of a clear, bracing morning. “Give me health and a day, and I will make the pomp of emperors ridiculous.” No emperor being at hand, we went to St. Peter’s, walked up and down the side aisles, had just a whiff of the high mass, Cardinal Rampolla officiating, the Pope’s angel singing the soprano part phenomenally. His voice has a peculiar soaring quality; it seems to scale the heights and knock at the door of heaven.

We met Boston society, as we always do when we go to St. Peter’s,--an old friend and his bride, and a pair of pleasant Beacon Street neighbors.

February 11, 1898.

J. says “Rome is always festering (_festa_-ing).” Between saints’ days, national holidays, and our own private celebrations there _are_ rather too many festivities. It is a pretty custom they have here of celebrating the feast of the patron saint rather than the birthday. The embarrassing question, “How old?” is thus avoided. It is also convenient. On the feast of Santa Lucia I am reminded to go and see Lucia di Villegas and carry her a bunch of flowers. I am sure to find Villino Villegas swept and garnished, the signora dressed in her best, all smiles and sweetness. She has been to mass and is ready to receive friends and relatives. Anglo-Saxons are fond of saying that the home does not exist in Latin lands. This is not quite true. In Italy the home is less a social centre and more a family stronghold than with us. An outsider is admitted to it only as the last test of friendship. It has still a touch of oriental feeling. It is the place where the women belong, where they mostly stay; it is jealously guarded from strangers--from strange men especially; “_chi va piano va sano!_”

Wednesday, the anniversary of our wedding-day, was one long frolic. At nine we went up to our play-house and played with our flower dolls. In the evening we had a little dinner of intimates. Filomena arranged a large horseshoe in double violets and pansies between J.’s place and mine at table “for good luck.” In the morning she brought me a basket of fresh eggs from her people in the country and wished me “_cento di questi giorni_ (a hundred of these days).” Even Pompilia, the cook, who has been rather cross lately, gave us two paper fans. In the kitchen a _fiascone_ of wine and a huge _panettone_ were on tap; everybody who passed that way drank our health. After dinner we sat over the fire till past midnight telling ghost stories or listening to J. C. (the Muse of Via Gregoriana), who played divinely to us. It was a good day.

We do not have much music worth hearing in Rome, so we doubly enjoy what the gods send us. Sgambati’s concert last week began with that adorable overture to Fingal’s Cave. Cotogni, an old singer (sixty-eight is old to sing in concerts), sang well with the remains of a glorious bass voice which he handled like a delicate soprano. He is just back from St. Petersburg, where he has been the director of the Conservatory for twenty years. I heard him again at Mme. Patti’s concert. They sang “_la ci darem la mano_” from “Don Giovanni,” which they had last sung together in their early youth. The gallant manner in which the old singer handed out the _diva_ was very nice. Mme. Patti is here on a wedding-tour with her husband,--Baron Cedarstrom,--a young Swede twenty-eight years old, who used to take care of her throat. She wore a pretty lilac dress which smelt of Paris and the Rue de la Paix.

Signor Sgambati is responsible for the best music we have. He is a true musician, a delightful composer, and the most enchanting person. Of course you know his compositions; the Boston Orchestra lately gave his symphony. Some time ago he was on the point of leaving Rome for London, where they were on their knees for him to come: the musical people and critics were waiting with open arms to receive him. He went to the station, weighed his luggage, bought his ticket, was just about to get on the train, when he realized that he was leaving Rome! That was more than he had bargained for! It was one thing to go to London, another to leave Rome! He calmly returned to his quiet house and his piano in the Via della Croce, and has remained there ever since, the friend of the Queen, of all true artists, of every starving musical genius brought to his notice. That such a man should endure the drudgery of giving music lessons is a fearful waste of fine material; the musical world should make him independent, as it made Wagner.

If you only stay long enough in Rome you meet everybody you ever heard of: all the world comes here sooner or later. The best thing about the social life is its cosmopolitan quality. Among the people we see most are a Greek woman (I had almost written goddess), a Dutchman, a Swede, a Dane, a Turk, an Irish priest, and a French Protestant pastor. American Protestant houses are no-man’s-land, neutral ground: we have visitors of every faith and of all parties. One Sunday afternoon Mrs. Agassiz, the President of Radcliffe College, Mr. Peabody, the Master of Croton School, and Mgr. O’Connell, the Director of the American College for young priests in Rome, chanced to meet at tea in my _salon_. There are a dozen different cliques, all more or less linked together--artistic, musical, political, sporting. The people who form “smart” society seem to me more cultivated than is usual with that class.

We have lately returned from an old-furniture hunt at Viterbo. We found no furniture, but the most picturesque Roman Gothic town I have seen. When I first knew Italy Viterbo had a bad name for brigands. The railroad has been open only four years; I hear no more of brigands, though I suspect several of my Viterbo acquaintances once belonged to the band. The place is not yet tourist stricken. We slept in a grim caravansary and went to a villanous _trattoria_ for our meals, where we were poisoned by the food. A twenty-four-hour fast brought us again into condition. Viterbo is a gray fourteenth-century town with massive stone walls and turrets. It has many handsome buildings, some fair pictures, good Etruscan and Roman antiquities, but the most admirable thing about it is its wonderful completeness. Everything hangs together architecturally, the parts are subservient to the whole, the result--grace, harmony, repose! Shall we ever learn the trick?