“I give you full measure, as I give to everybody.”
“The measure should be an inch cube, I know,” said Carlo; “that’s what all the little merchants have agreed to, you know.”
“True,” said Piedro, “so it is.”
“And so it is, I must allow,” said Carlo, measuring the outside of it with the carpenter’s rule which he held in his hand. “An inch every way; and yet by my eye—and I have no bad one, being used to measuring carpenter’s work for my father—by my eye I should think this would have held more sugar-plums.”
“The eye often deceives us;” said Piedro. “There’s nothing like measuring, you find.”
“There’s nothing like measuring, I find, indeed,” replied Carlo, as he looked closely at the end of his rule, which, since he spoke last, he had put into the cube to take its depth in the inside. “This is not as deep by a quarter of an inch, Signor Piedro, measured within as it is measured without.”
Piedro changed colour terribly, and seizing hold of the tin box, endeavoured to wrest it from the youth who measured so accurately. Carlo held his prize fast, and lifting it above his head, he ran into the midst of the square where the little market was held, exclaiming, “A discovery! a discovery! that concerns all who love sugar-plums. A discovery! a discovery that concerns all who have ever bought the sweetest, and most admirable sugar-plums ever sold in Naples.”
The crowd gathered from all parts of the square as he spoke.
“We have bought,” and “We have bought of those sugar-plums,” cried several little voices at once, “if you mean Piedro’s.”
“The same,” continued Carlo—“he who, out of gratitude to his numerous customers, gives, or promises to give, burnt almonds gratis.”
“Excellent they were!” cried several voices. “We all know Piedro well; but what’s your discovery?”
“My discovery is,” said Carlo, “that you, none of you, know Piedro. Look you here; look at this box—this is his measure; it has a false bottom—it holds only three-quarters as much as it ought to do; and his numerous customers have all been cheated of one-quarter of every measure of the admirable sugar-plums they have bought from him. ‘Think twice of a good bargain,’ says the proverb.”
“So we have been finely duped, indeed,” cried some of the bystanders, looking at one another with a mortified air. “Full of courtesy, full of craft!” [317] “So this is the meaning of his burnt almonds gratis,” cried others; all joined in an uproar of indignation, except one, who, as he stood behind the rest, expressed in his countenance silent surprise and sorrow.
“Is this Piedro a relation of yours?” said Carlo, going up to this silent person. “I am sorry, if he be, that I have published his disgrace, for I would not hurt you. You don’t sell sugar-plums as he does, I’m sure; for my little sister Rosetta has often bought from you. Can this Piedro be a friend of yours?”
“I wished to have been his friend; but I see I can’t,” said Francisco. “He is a neighbour of ours, and I pitied him; but since he is at his old tricks again, there’s an end of the matter. I have reason to be obliged to you, for I was nearly taken in. He has behaved so well for some time past, that I intended this very evening to have gone to him, and to have told him that I was willing to do for him what he has long begged of me to do—to enter into partnership with him.”
“Francisco! Francisco!—your measure, lend us your measure!” exclaimed a number of little merchants crowding round him. “You have a measure for sugar-plums; and we have all agreed to refer to that, and to see how much we have been cheated before we go to break Piedro’s bench and declare him bankrupt, [318]—the punishment for all knaves.”
They pressed on to Francisco’s board, obtained his measure, found that it held something more than a quarter above the quantity that could be contained in Piedro’s. The cries of the enraged populace were now most clamorous. They hung the just and the unjust measures upon high poles; and, forming themselves into a formidable phalanx, they proceeded towards Piedro’s well known yellow lettered board, exclaiming, as they went along, “Common cause! common cause! The little Neapolitan merchants will have no knaves amongst them! Break his bench! break his bench! He is a bankrupt in honesty.”
Piedro saw the mob, heard the indignant clamour, and, terrified at the approach of numbers, he fled with the utmost precipitation, having scarcely time to pack up half his sugar-plums. There was a prodigious number, more than would have filled many honest measures, scattered upon the ground and trampled under foot by the crowd. Piedro’s bench was broken, and the public vengeance wreaked itself also upon his treacherous painted board. It was, after being much disfigured by various inscriptions expressive of the universal contempt for Piedro, hung up in a conspicuous part of the market-place; and the false measure was fastened like a cap upon one of its corners. Piedro could never more show his face in this market, and all hopes of friendship—all hopes of partnership with Francisco—were for ever at an end.
If rogues would calculate, they would cease to be rogues; for they would certainly discover that it is most for their interest to be honest—setting aside the pleasure of being esteemed and beloved, of having a safe conscience, with perfect freedom from all the various embarrassments and terror to which knaves are subject. Is it not clear that our crafty hero would have gained rather more by a partnership with Francisco, and by a fair character, than he could possibly obtain by fraudulent dealing in comfits?
When the mob had dispersed, after satisfying themselves with executing summary justice upon Piedro’s bench and board, Francisco found a carpenter’s rule lying upon the ground near Piedro’s broken bench, which he recollected to have seen in the hands of Carlo. He examined it carefully, and he found Carlo’s name written upon it, and the name of the street where he lived; and though it was considerably out of his way, he set out immediately to restore the rule, which was a very handsome one, to its rightful owner. After a hot walk through several streets, he overtook Carlo, who had just reached the door of his own house. Carlo was particularly obliged to him, he said, for restoring this rule to him, as it was a present from the master of a vessel, who employed his father to do carpenter’s work for him. “One should not praise one’s self, they say,” continued Carlo, “but I long so much to gain your good opinion, that I must tell you the whole history of the rule you have restored. It was given to me for having measured the work and made up the bill of a whole pleasure-boat myself. You may guess I should have been sorry enough to have lost it. Thank you for its being once more in my careless hands, and tell me, I beg, whenever I can do you any service. By-the-by, I can make up for you a fruit stall. I’ll do it to-morrow, and it shall be the admiration of the market. Is there anything else you could think of for me?”
“Why, yes,” said Francisco; “since you are so good-natured, perhaps you’d be kind enough to tell me the meaning of some of those lines and figures that I see upon your rule. I have a great curiosity to know their use.”
“That I’ll explain to you with pleasure, as far as I know them myself; but when I’m at fault, my father, who is cleverer than I am, and understands trigonometry, can help us out.”
“Trigonometry!” repeated Francisco, not a little alarmed at the high sounding word; “that’s what I certainly shall never understand.”
“Oh, never fear,” replied Carlo, laughing. “I looked just as you do now—I felt just as you do now—all in a fright and a puzzle, when I first heard of angles and sines, and cosines, and arcs and centres, and complements and tangents.”
“Oh mercy! mercy!” interrupted Francisco, whilst Carlo laughed, with a benevolent sense of superiority.
“Why,” said Carlo, “you’ll find all these things are nothing when you are used to them. But I cannot explain my rule to you here broiling in the sun. Besides, it will not be the work of a day, I promise you; but come and see us at your leisure hours, and we’ll study it together. I have a great notion we shall become friends; and, to begin, step in with me now,” said Carlo, “and eat a little macaroni with us. I know it is ready by this time. Besides, you’ll see my father, and he’ll show you plenty of rules and compasses, as you like such things; and then I’ll go home with you in the cool of the evening, and you shall show me your melons and vines, and teach me, in time, something of gardening. Oh, I see we must be good friends, just made for each other; so come in—no ceremony.”
Carlo was not mistaken in his predictions; he and Francisco became very good friends, spent all their leisure hours together, either in Carlo’s workshop or in Francisco’s vineyard, and they mutually improved each other. Francisco, before he saw his friend’s rule, knew but just enough of arithmetic to calculate in his head the price of the fruit which he sold in the market; but with Carlo’s assistance, and the ambition to understand the tables and figures upon the wonderful rule, he set to work in earnest, and in due time, satisfied both himself and his master.
“Who knows but these things that I am learning now may be of some use to me before I die?” said Francisco, as he was sitting one morning with his tutor, the carpenter.
“To be sure it will,” said the carpenter, putting down his compasses, with which he was drawing a circle—“Arithmetic is a most useful, and I was going to say necessary thing to be known by men in all stations; and a little trigonometry does no harm. In short, my maxim is, that no knowledge comes amiss; for a man’s head is of as much use to him as his hands; and even more so.
“A word to the wise will always suffice.”
“Besides, to say nothing of making a fortune, is not there a great pleasure in being something of a scholar, and being able to pass one’s time with one’s book, and one’s compasses and pencil? Safe companions these for young and old. No one gets into mischief that has pleasant things to think of and to do when alone; and I know, for my part, that trigonometry is—”
Here the carpenter, just as he was going to pronounce a fresh panegyric upon his favourite trigonometry, was interrupted by the sudden entrance of his little daughter Rosetta, all in tears: a very unusual spectacle, for, taking the year round, she shed fewer tears than any child of her age in Naples.
“Why, my dear good humoured little Rosetta, what has happened? Why these large tears?” said her brother Carlo, and he went up to her, and wiped them from her cheeks. “And these that are going over the bridge of the nose so fast? I must stop these tears, too,” said Carlo.
Rosetta, at this speech, burst out laughing, and said that she did not know till then that she had any bridge on her nose.
“And were these shells the cause of the tears?” said her brother, looking at a heap of shells, which she held before her in her frock.
“Yes, partly,” said Rosetta. “It was partly my own fault, but not all. You know I went out to the carpenter’s yard, near the arsenal, where all the children are picking up chips and sticks so busily; and I was as busy as any of them, because I wanted to fill my basket soon; and then I thought I should sell my basketful directly in the little wood-market. As soon as I had filled my basket, and made up my faggot (which was not done, brother, till I was almost baked by the sun, for I was forced to wait by the carpenters for the bits of wood to make up my faggot)—I say, when it was all ready, and my basket full, I left it altogether in the yard.”
“That was not wise to leave it,” said Carlo.
“But I only left it for a few minutes, brother, and I could not think anybody would be so dishonest as to take it whilst I was away. I only just ran to tell a boy, who had picked up all these beautiful shells upon the sea-shore, and who wanted to sell them, that I should be glad to buy them from him, if he would only be so good as to keep them for me, for an hour or so, till I had carried my wood to market, and till I had sold it, and so had money to pay him for the shells.”
“Your heart was set mightily on these shells, Rosetta.”
“Yes; for I thought you and Francisco, brother, would like to have them for your nice grotto that you are making at Resina. That was the reason I was in such a hurry to get them. The boy who had them to sell was very good-natured; he poured them into my lap, and said I had such an honest face he would trust me, and that as he was in a great hurry, he could not wait an hour whilst I sold my wood; but that he was sure I would pay him in the evening, and he told me that he would call here this evening for the money. But now what shall I do, Carlo? I shall have no money to give him: I must give back his shells, and that’s a great pity.”
“But how happened it that you did not sell your wood?”
“Oh, I forgot; did not I tell you that? When I went for my basket, do you know it was empty, quite empty, not a chip left? Some dishonest person had carried it all off. Had not I reason to cry now, Carlo?’
“I’ll go this minute into the wood-market, and see if I can find your faggot. Won’t that be better than crying?” said her brother. “Should you know any one of your pieces of wood again if you were to see them?”
“Yes, one of them, I am sure, I should know again,” said Rosetta. “It had a notch at one end of it, where one of the carpenters cut it off from another piece of wood for me.”
“And is this piece of wood from which the carpenter cut it still to be seen?” said Francisco.
“Yes, it is in the yard; but I cannot bring it to you, for it is very heavy.”
“We can go to it,” said Francisco, “and I hope we shall recover your basketful.”
Carlo and his friend went with Rosetta immediately to the yard, near the arsenal, saw the notched piece of wood, and then proceeded to the little wood-market, and searched every heap that lay before the little factors; but no notched bit was to be found, and Rosetta declared that she did not see one stick that looked at all like any of hers.
On their part, her companions eagerly untied their faggots to show them to her, and exclaimed, “That they were incapable of taking what did not belong to them; that of all persons they should never have thought of taking anything from the good natured little Rosetta, who was always ready to give to others, and to help them in making up their loads.”
Despairing of discovering the thief, Francisco and Carlo left the market. As they were returning home, they were met by the English servant Arthur, who asked Francisco where he had been, and where he was going.
As soon as he heard of Rosetta’s lost faggot, and of the bit of wood, notched at one end, of which Rosetta drew the shape with a piece of chalk, which her brother had lent her, Arthur exclaimed, “I have seen such a bit of wood as this within this quarter of an hour; but I cannot recollect where. Stay! this was at the baker’s, I think, where I went for some rolls for my master. It was lying beside his oven.”
To the baker’s they all went as fast as possible, and they got there but just in time. The baker had in his hand the bit of wood with which he was that instant going to feed his oven.
“Stop, good Mr. Baker!” cried Rosetta, who ran into the baker’s shop first; and as he heard “Stop! stop!” re-echoed by many voices, the baker stopped; and turning to Francisco, Carlo and Arthur, begged, with a countenance of some surprise, to know why they had desired him to stop.
The case was easily explained, and the baker told them that he did not buy any wood in the little market that morning; that this faggot he had purchased between the hours of twelve and one from a lad about Francisco’s height, whom he met near the yard of the arsenal.
“This is my bit of wood, I am sure; I know it by this notch,” said Rosetta.
“Well,” said the baker, “if you will stay here a few minutes, you will probably see the lad who sold it to me. He desired to be paid in bread, and my bread was not quite baked when he was here. I bid him call again in an hour, and I fancy he will be pretty punctual, for he looked desperately hungry.”
The baker had scarcely finished speaking when Francisco, who was standing watching at the door, exclaimed, “Here comes Piedro! I hope he is not the boy who sold you the wood, Mr. Baker?”
“He is the boy, though,” replied the baker, and Piedro, who now entered the shop, started at the sight of Carlo and Francisco, whom he had never seen since the day of disgrace in the fruit-market.
“Your servant, Signor Piedro,” said Carlo; “I have the honour to tell you that this piece of wood, and all that you took out of the basket, which you found in the yard of the arsenal, belongs to my sister.”
“Yes, indeed,” cried Rosetta.
Piedro being very certain that nobody saw him when he emptied Rosetta’s basket, and imagining that he was suspected only upon the bare assertion of a child like Rosetta, who might be baffled and frightened out of her story, boldly denied the charge, and defied any one to prove him guilty.
“He has a right to be heard in his own defence,” said Arthur, with the cool justice of an Englishman; and he stopped the angry Carlo’s arm, who was going up to the culprit with all the Italian vehemence of oratory and gesture. Arthur went on to say something in bad Italian about the excellence of an English trial by jury, which Carlo was too much enraged to hear, but to which Francisco paid attention, and turning to Piedro, he asked him if he was willing to be judged by twelve of his equals?
“With all my heart,” said Piedro, still maintaining an unmoved countenance, and they returned immediately to the little wood-market. On their way, they had passed through the fruit-market, and crowds of those who were well acquainted with Piedro’s former transactions followed, to hear the event of the present trial.
Arthur could not, especially as he spoke wretched Italian, make the eager little merchants understand the nature and advantages of an English trial by jury. They preferred their own summary mode of proceeding. Francisco, in whose integrity they all had perfect confidence, was chosen with unanimous shouts for the judge; but he declined the office, and another was appointed. He was raised upon a bench, and the guilty but insolent looking Piedro, and the ingenuous, modest Rosetta stood before him. She made her complaint in a very artless manner; and Piedro, with ingenuity, which in a better cause would have deserved admiration, spoke volubly and craftily in his own defence. But all that he could say could not alter facts. The judge compared the notched bit of wood found at the baker’s with a piece from which it was cut, which he went to see in the yard of the arsenal. It was found to fit exactly. The judge then found it impossible to restrain the loud indignation of all the spectators. The prisoner was sentenced never more to sell wood in the market; and the moment sentence was pronounced, Piedro was hissed and hooted out of the market-place. Thus a third time he deprived himself of the means of earning his bread.
We shall not dwell upon all his petty methods of cheating in the trades he next attempted. He handed lemonade about in a part of Naples where he was not known, but he lost his customers by putting too much water and too little lemon into this beverage. He then took to the waters from the sulphurous springs, and served them about to foreigners; but one day, as he was trying to jostle a competitor from the coach door, he slipped his foot, and broke his glasses. They had been borrowed from an old woman, who hired out glasses to the boys who sold lemonade. Piedro knew that it was the custom to pay, of course, for all that was broken; but this he was not inclined to do. He had a few shillings in his pocket, and thought that it would be very clever to defraud this poor woman of her right, and to spend his shillings upon what he valued much more than he did his good name—macaroni. The shillings were soon gone.
We shall now for the present leave Piedro to his follies and his fate; or, to speak more properly, to his follies and their inevitable consequences.
Francisco was all this time acquiring knowledge from his new friends, without neglecting his own or his father’s business. He contrived, during the course of autumn and winter, to make himself a tolerable arithmetician. Carlo’s father could draw plans in architecture neatly; and pleased with the eagerness Francisco showed to receive instruction, he willingly put a pencil and compasses into his hand, and taught him all he knew himself. Francisco had great perseverance, and, by repeated trials, he at length succeeded in copying exactly all the plans which his master lent him. His copies, in time, surpassed the originals, and Carlo exclaimed, with astonishment: “Why, Francisco, what an astonishing genius you have for drawing!—Absolutely you draw plans better than my father!”
“As to genius,” said Francisco, honestly, “I have none. All that I have done has been done by hard labour. I don’t know how other people do things; but I am sure that I never have been able to get anything done well but by patience. Don’t you remember, Carlo, how you and even Rosetta laughed at me the first time your father put a pencil into my awkward, clumsy hands?”
“Because,” said Carlo, laughing again at the recollection, “you held your pencil so drolly; and when you were to cut it, you cut it just as if you were using a pruning-knife to your vines; but now it is your turn to laugh, for you surpass us all. And the times are changed since I set about to explain this rule of mine to you.”
“Ay, that rule,” said Francisco—“how much I owe to it! Some great people, when they lose any of their fine things, cause the crier to promise a reward of so much money to anyone who shall find and restore their trinket. How richly have you and your father rewarded me for returning this rule!”
Francisco’s modesty and gratitude, as they were perfectly sincere, attached his friends to him most powerfully; but there was one person who regretted our hero’s frequent absences from his vineyard at Resina. Not Francisco’s father, for he was well satisfied his son never neglected his business; and as to the hours spent in Naples, he had so much confidence in Francisco that he felt no apprehensions of his getting into bad company. When his son had once said to him, “I spend my time at such a place, and in such and such a manner,” he was as well convinced of its being so as if he had watched and seen him every moment of the day. But it was Arthur who complained of Francisco’s absence.
“I see, because I am an Englishman,” said he, “you don’t value my friendship, and yet that is the very reason you ought to value it; no friends so good as the English, be it spoken without offence to your Italian friend, for whom you now continually leave me to dodge up and down here in Resina, without a soul that I like to speak to, for you are the only Italian I ever liked.”
“You shall like another, I promise you,” said Francisco. “You must come with me to Carlo’s, and see how I spend my evenings; then complain of me, if you can.”
It was the utmost stretch of Arthur’s complaisance to pay this visit; but, in spite of his national prejudices and habitual reserve of temper, he was pleased with the reception he met with from the generous Carlo and the playful Rosetta. They showed him Francisco’s drawings with enthusiastic eagerness; and Arthur, though no great judge of drawing, was in astonishment, and frequently repeated, “I know a gentleman who visits my master who would like these things. I wish I might have them to show him.”
“Take them, then,” said Carlo; “I wish all Naples could see them, provided they might be liked half as well as I like them.”
Arthur carried off the drawings, and one day, when his master was better than usual, and when he was at leisure, eating a dessert of Francisco’s grapes, he entered respectfully, with his little portfolio under his arm, and begged permission to show his master a few drawings done by the gardener’s son, whose grapes he was eating.
Though not quite so partial a judge as the enthusiastic Carlo, this gentleman was both pleased and surprised at the sight of these drawings, considering how short a time Francisco had applied himself to this art, and what slight instructions he had received. Arthur was desired to summon the young artist. Francisco’s honest, open manner, joined to the proofs he had given of his abilities, and the character Arthur gave him for strict honesty, and constant kindness to his parents, interested Mr. Lee, the name of this English gentleman, much in his favour. Mr. Lee was at this time in treaty with an Italian painter, whom he wished to engage to copy for him exactly some of the cornices, mouldings, tablets, and antique ornaments which are to be seen amongst the ruins of the ancient city of Herculaneum. [326]
CHAPTER III.
Tutte le gran faciende si fanno di poca cosa.
What great events from trivial causes spring.
Signor Camillo, the artist employed by Mr. Lee to copy some of the antique ornaments in Herculaneum, was a liberal minded man, perfectly free from that mean jealousy which would repress the efforts of rising genius.
“Here is a lad scarcely fifteen, a poor gardener’s son, who, with merely the instructions he could obtain from a common carpenter, has learned to draw these plans and elevations, which you see are tolerably neat. What an advantage your instruction would be to him,” said Mr. Lee, as he introduced Francisco to Signor Camillo. “I am interested in this lad from what I have learned of his good conduct. I hear he is strictly honest, and one of the best of sons. Let us do something for him. If you will give him some knowledge of your art, I will, as far as money can recompense you for your loss of time, pay whatever you may think reasonable for his instruction.”
Signor Camillo made no difficulties; he was pleased with his pupil’s appearance, and every day he liked him better and better. In the room where they worked together there were some large books of drawings and plates, which Francisco saw now and then opened by his master, and which he had a great desire to look over; but when he was left in the room by himself he never touched them, because he had not permission. Signor Camillo, the first day he came into this room with his pupil, said to him, “Here are many valuable books and drawings, young man. I trust, from the character I have heard of you, that they will be perfectly safe here.”
Some weeks after Francisco had been with the painter, they had occasion to look for the front of a temple in one of these large books. “What! don’t you know in which book to look for it, Francisco?” cried his master, with some impatience. “Is it possible that you have been here so long with these books, and that you cannot find the print I mean? Had you half the taste I gave you credit for, you would have singled it out from all the rest, and have it fixed in your memory.”
“But, signor, I never saw it,” said Francisco, respectfully, “or, perhaps, I should have preferred it.”
“That you never saw it, young man, is the very thing of which I complain. Is a taste for the arts to be learned, think you, by looking at the cover of a book like this? Is it possible that you never thought of opening it?”
“Often and often,” cried Francisco, “have I longed to open it; but I thought it was forbidden me, and however great my curiosity in your absence, I have never touched them. I hoped indeed, that the time would come when you would have the goodness to show them to me.”
“And so the time is come, excellent young man,” cried Camillo; “much as I love taste, I love integrity more. I am now sure of your having the one, and let me see whether you have, as I believe you have, the other. Sit you down here beside me; and we will look over these books together.”
The attention with which his young pupil examined everything, and the pleasure he unaffectedly expressed in seeing these excellent prints, sufficiently convinced his judicious master that it was not from the want of curiosity or taste that he had never opened these tempting volumes. His confidence in Francisco was much increased by this circumstance, slight as it may appear.
One day, Signor Camillo came behind Francisco, as he was drawing with much intentness, and tapping him upon the shoulder, he said to him: “Put up your pencils and follow me, I can depend upon your integrity; I have pledged myself for it. Bring your note-book with you, and follow me; I will this day show you something that will entertain you at least as much as my large book of prints. Follow me.”
Francisco followed, till they came to the pit near the entrance of Herculaneum. “I have obtained leave for you to accompany me,” said his master, “and you know, I suppose, that this is not a permission granted to everyone?” Paintings of great value, besides ornaments of gold and silver, antique bracelets, rings, etc., are from time to time found amongst these ruins, and therefore it is necessary that no person should be admitted whose honesty cannot be depended upon. Thus, even Francisco’s talents could not have advanced him in the world, unless they had been united to integrity. He was much delighted and astonished by the new scene that was now opened to his view; and as, day after day, he accompanied his master to this subterraneous city, he had leisure for observation. He was employed, as soon as he had gratified his curiosity, in drawing. There are niches in the walls in several places, from which pictures have been dug, and these niches are often adorned with elegant masques, figures and animals, which have been left by the ignorant or careless workmen, and which are going fast to destruction. Signor Camillo, who was copying these for his English employer, had a mind to try his pupil’s skill, and, pointing to a niche bordered with grotesque figures, he desired him to try if he could make any hand of it. Francisco made several trials, and at last finished such an excellent copy, that his enthusiastic and generous master, with warm encomiums, carried it immediately to his patron, and he had the pleasure to receive from Mr. Lee a purse containing five guineas, as a reward and encouragement for his pupil.
Francisco had no sooner received this money, than he hurried to his father and mother’s cottage. His mother, some months before this time, had taken a small dairy farm; and her son had once heard her express a wish that she was but rich enough to purchase a remarkably fine brindled cow, which belonged to a farmer in the neighbourhood.
“Here, my dear mother,” cried Francisco, pouring the guineas into her lap; “and here,” continued he, emptying a bag which contained about as much more, in small Italian coins, the profits of trade-money he had fairly earned during the two years he sold fruit amongst the little Neapolitan merchants; “this is all yours, dearest mother, and I hope it will be enough to pay for the brindled cow. Nay, you must not refuse me—I have set my heart upon the cow being milked by you this very evening; and I’ll produce my best bunches of grapes, and my father, perhaps, will give us a melon; for I’ve had no time for melons this season; and I’ll step to Naples and invite—may I, mother?—my good friends, dear Carlo and your favourite little Rosetta, and my old drawing master, and my friend Arthur, and we’ll sup with you at your dairy.”
The happy mother thanked her son, and the father assured him that neither melon nor pine-apple should be spared, to make a supper worthy of his friends.
The brindled cow was bought, and Arthur and Carlo and Rosetta most joyfully accepted their invitation.
The carpenter had unluckily appointed to settle a long account that day with one of his employers, and he could not accompany his children. It was a delicious evening; they left Naples just as the sea-breeze, after the heats of the day, was most refreshingly felt. The walk to Resina, the vineyard, the dairy, and most of all, the brindled cow, were praised by Carlo and Rosetta, with all the Italian superlatives which signify, “Most beautiful! most delightful! most charming!” Whilst the English Arthur, with as warm a heart, was more temperate in his praise, declaring that this was “the most like an English summer’s evening of any he had ever felt since he came to Italy: and that, moreover, the cream was almost as good as what he had been used to drink in Cheshire.” The company, who were all pleased with each other, and with the gardener’s good fruit, which he produced in great abundance, did not think of separating till late.
It was a bright moonlight night, and Carlo asked his friend if he would walk with them part of the way to Naples. “Yes, all the way most willingly,” cried Francisco, “that I may have the pleasure of giving to your father, with my own hands, this fine bunch of grapes, that I have reserved for him out of my own share.”
“Add this fine pine-apple for my share, then,” said his father, “and a pleasant walk to you, my young friends.”
They proceeded gaily along, and when they reached Naples, as they passed through the square where the little merchants held their market, Francisco pointed to the spot where he found Carlo’s rule. He never missed an opportunity of showing his friends that he did not forget their former kindness to him. “That rule,” said he, “has been the cause of all my present happiness, and I thank you for—”
“Oh, never mind thanking him now,” interrupted Rosetta, “but look yonder, and tell me what all those people are about.” She pointed to a group of men, women and children, who were assembled under a piazza, listening in various attitudes of attention to a man, who was standing upon a flight of steps speaking in a loud voice, and with much action, to the people who surrounded him. Francisco, Carlo and Rosetta joined his audience. The moon shone full upon his countenance, which was very expressive and which varied frequently according to the characters of the persons whose history he was telling, according to all the changes of their fortune. This man was one of those who are called Improvisatori—persons who, in Italian towns, go about reciting verses or telling stories, which they are supposed to invent as they go on speaking. Some of these people speak with great fluency, and collect crowds round them in the public streets. When an Improvisatore sees the attention of his audience fixed, and when he comes to some very interesting part of his narrative, he dexterously drops his hat upon the ground, and pauses till his auditors have paid tribute to his eloquence. When he thinks the hat sufficiently full, he takes it up again, and proceeds with his story. The hat was dropped just as Francisco and his two friends came under the piazza. The orator had finished one story, and was going to commence another. He fixed his eyes upon Francisco, then glanced at Carlo and Rosetta, and after a moment’s consideration he began a story which bore some resemblance to one that our young English readers may, perhaps, know by the name of “Cornaro, or the Grateful Turk.”
Francisco was deeply interested in this narrative, and when the hat was dropped, he eagerly threw in his contribution. At the end of the story, when the speaker’s voice stopped, there was a momentary silence, which was broken by the orator himself, who exclaimed, as he took up the hat which lay at his feet, “My friends, here is some mistake! this is not my hat; it has been changed whilst I was taken up with my story. Pray, gentlemen, find my hat amongst you; it was a remarkably good one, a present from a nobleman for an epigram I made. I would not lose my hat for twice its value. It has my name written withinside of it, Dominicho, Improvisatore. Pray, gentlemen, examine your hats.”
Everybody present examined their hats, and showed them to Dominicho, but his was not amongst them. No one had left the company; the piazza was cleared, and searched in vain. “The hat has vanished by magic,” said Dominicho.
“Yes, and by the same magic a statue moves,” cried Carlo, pointing to a figure standing in a niche, which had hitherto escaped observation. The face was so much in the shade, that Carlo did not at first perceive that the statue was Piedro. Piedro, when he saw himself discovered, burst into a loud laugh, and throwing down Dominicho’s hat, which he held in his hand behind him, cried, “A pretty set of novices! Most excellent players at hide-and-seek you would make.”
Whether Piedro really meant to have carried off the poor man’s hat, or whether he was, as he said, merely in jest, we leave it to those who know his general character to decide.
Carlo shook his head. “Still at your old tricks, Piedro,” said he. “Remember the old proverb: No fox so cunning but he comes to the furrier’s at last.” [332]
“I defy the furrier and you, too,” replied Piedro, taking up his own ragged hat. “I have no need to steal hats; I can afford to buy better than you’ll have upon your head. Francisco, a word with you, if you have done crying at the pitiful story you have been listening to so attentively.”
“And what would you say to me?” said Francisco, following him a few steps. “Do not detain me long, because my friends will wait for me.”
“If they are friends, they can wait,” said Piedro. “You need not be ashamed of being seen in my company now, I can tell you; for I am, as I always told you I should be, the richest man of the two.”
“Rich! you rich?” cried Francisco. “Well, then, it was impossible you could mean to trick that poor man out of his good hat.”
“Impossible!” said Piedro. Francisco did not consider that those who have habits of pilfering continue to practise them often, when the poverty which first tempted them to dishonesty ceases. “Impossible! You stare when I tell you I am rich; but the thing is so. Moreover, I am well with my father at home. I have friends in Naples, and I call myself Piedro the Lucky. Look you here,” said he, producing an old gold coin. “This does not smell of fish, does it? My father is no longer a fisherman, nor I either. Neither do I sell sugar-plums to children: nor do I slave myself in a vineyard, like some folks; but fortune, when I least expected it, has stood my friend. I have many pieces of gold like this. Digging in my father’s garden, it was my luck to come to an old Roman vessel full of gold. I have this day agreed for a house in Naples for my father. We shall live, whilst we can afford it, like great folks, you will see; and I shall enjoy the envy that will be felt by some of my old friends, the little Neapolitan merchants, who will change their note when they see my change of fortune. What say you to all this, Francisco the Honest?”
“That I wish you joy of your prosperity, and hope you may enjoy it long and well.”
“Well, no doubt of that. Everyone who has it enjoys it well. He always dances well to whom fortune pipes.” [333a]
“Yes, no longer pipe, no longer dance,” replied Francisco; and here they parted; for Piedro walked away abruptly, much mortified to perceive that his prosperity did not excite much envy, or command any additional respect from Francisco.
“I would rather,” said Francisco, when he returned to Carlo and Rosetta, who waited for him under the portico, where he left them—“I would rather have such good friends as you, Carlo and Arthur, and some more I could name, and, besides that, have a clear conscience, and work honestly for my bread, than be as lucky as Piedro. Do you know he has found a treasure, he says, in his father’s garden—a vase full of gold? He showed me one of the gold pieces.”
“Much good may they do him. I hope he came honestly by them,” said Carlo; “but ever since the affair of the double measure, I suspect double-dealing always from him. It is not our affair, however. Let him make himself happy his way, and we ours.
“He that would live in peace and rest,
Must hear, and see, and say the best.” [333b]
All Piedro’s neighbours did not follow this peaceable maxim; for when he and his father began to circulate the story of the treasure found in the garden, the village of Resina did not give them implicit faith. People nodded and whispered, and shrugged their shoulders; then crossed themselves, and declared that they would not, for all the riches of Naples, change places with either Piedro or his father. Regardless, or pretending to be regardless, of these suspicions, Piedro and his father persisted in their assertions. The fishing-nets were sold, and everything in their cottage was disposed of; they left Resina, went to live at Naples, and, after a few weeks, the matter began to be almost forgotten in the village.
The old gardener, Francisco’s father, was one of those who endeavoured to think the best; and all that he said upon the subject was, that he would not exchange Francisco the Honest for Piedro the Lucky; that one can’t judge of the day till one sees the evening as well as the morning. [334]
Not to leave our readers longer in suspense, we must inform them that the peasants of Resina were right in their suspicions. Piedro had never found any treasure in his father’s garden, but he came by his gold in the following manner:—
After he was banished from the little wood-market for stealing Rosetta’s basketful of wood, after he had cheated the poor woman, who let glasses out to hire, out of the value of the glasses which he broke, and, in short, after he had entirely lost his credit with all who knew him, he roamed about the streets of Naples, reckless of what became of him.
He found the truth of the proverb, “that credit lost is like a Venice glass broken—it can’t be mended again.” The few shillings which he had in his pocket supplied him with food for a few days. At last he was glad to be employed by one of the peasants who came to Naples to load their asses with manure out of the streets. They often follow very early in the morning, or during the night-time, the trace of carriages that are gone, or that are returning from the opera; and Piedro was one night at this work, when the horses of a nobleman’s carriage took fright at the sudden blaze of some fireworks. The carriage was overturned near him; a lady was taken out of it, and was hurried by her attendants into a shop, where she stayed till her carriage was set to rights. She was too much alarmed for the first ten minutes after her accident to think of anything; but after some time, she perceived that she had lost a valuable diamond cross, which she had worn that night at the opera. She was uncertain where she had dropped it; the shop, the carriage, the street, were searched for it in vain.
Piedro saw it fall as the lady was lifted out of the carriage, seized upon it, and carried it off. Ignorant as he was of the full value of what he had stolen, he knew not how to satisfy himself as to this point, without trusting someone with the secret.
After some hesitation, he determined to apply to a Jew, who, as it was whispered, was ready to buy everything that was offered to him for sale, without making any troublesome inquiries. It was late; he waited till the streets were cleared, and then knocked softly at the back door of the Jew’s house. The person who opened the door for Piedro was his own father. Piedro started back; but his father had fast hold of him.
“What brings you here?” said the father, in a low voice, a voice which expressed fear and rage mixed.
“Only to ask my way—my shortest way,” stammered Piedro.
“No equivocations! Tell me what brings you here at this time of the night? I will know.”
Piedro, who felt himself in his father’s grasp, and who knew that his father would certainly search him, to find out what he had brought to sell, thought it most prudent to produce the diamond cross. His father could but just see its lustre by the light of a dim lamp, which hung over their heads in the gloomy passage in which they stood.
“You would have been duped, if you had gone to sell this to the Jew. It is well it has fallen into my hands. How came you by it?” Piedro answered that he had found it in the street. “Go your ways home, then,” said his father; “it is safe with me. Concern yourself no more about it.”
Piedro was not inclined thus to relinquish his booty, and he now thought proper to vary in his account of the manner in which he found the cross. He now confessed that it had dropped from the dress of a lady, whose carriage was overturned as she was coming home from the opera, and he concluded by saying that, if his father took his prize from him without giving him his share of the profits, he would go directly to the shop where the lady stopped whilst her servants were raising the carriage, and that he would give notice of his having found the cross.
Piedro’s father saw that his smart son, though scarcely sixteen years of age, was a match for him in villainy. He promised him that he should have half of whatever the Jew would give for the diamonds, and Piedro insisted upon being present at the transaction.
We do not wish to lay open to our young readers scenes of iniquity. It is sufficient to say that the Jew, who was a man old in all the arts of villainy, contrived to cheat both his associates, and obtained the diamond cross for less than half its value. The matter was managed so that the transaction remained undiscovered. The lady who lost the cross, after making fruitless inquiries, gave up the search, and Piedro and his father rejoiced in the success of their manœuvres.
It is said, that “Ill gotten wealth is quickly spent”; [336] and so it proved in this instance. Both father and son lived a riotous life as long as their money lasted, and it did not last many months. What his bad education began, bad company finished, and Piedro’s mind was completely ruined by the associates with whom he became connected during what he called his prosperity. When his money was at an end, these unprincipled friends began to look cold upon him, and at last plainly told him—“If you mean to live with us, you must live as we do.” They lived by robbery.
Piedro, though familiarized to the idea of fraud, was shocked at the thought of becoming a robber by profession. How difficult it is to stop in the career of vice! Whether Piedro had power to stop, or whether he was hurried on by his associates, we shall, for the present, leave in doubt.
CHAPTER IV
We turn with pleasure from Piedro the Cunning to Francisco the Honest. Francisco continued the happy and useful course of his life. By his unremitting perseverance, he improved himself rapidly under the instructions of his master and friend, Signor Camillo; his friend, we say, for the fair and open character of Francisco won, or rather earned, the friendship of this benevolent artist. The English gentleman seemed to take a pride in our hero’s success and good conduct. He was not one of those patrons who think that they have done enough when they have given five guineas. His servant Arthur always considered every generous action of his master’s as his own, and was particularly pleased whenever this generosity was directed towards Francisco.
As for Carlo and the little Rosetta, they were the companions of all the pleasant walks which Francisco used to take in the cool of the evening, after he had been shut up all day at his work. And the old carpenter, delighted with the gratitude of his pupil, frequently repeated—“that he was proud to have given the first instructions to such a genius; and that he had always prophesied Francisco would be a great man.”
“And a good man, papa,” said Rosetta; “for though he has grown so great, and though he goes into palaces now, to say nothing of that place underground, where he has leave to go, yet, notwithstanding all this, he never forgets my brother Carlo and you.”
“That’s the way to have good friends,” said the carpenter. “And I like his way; he does more than he says. Facts are masculine, and words are feminine.” [337]
These goods friends seemed to make Francisco happier than Piedro could be made by his stolen diamonds.
One morning, Francisco was sent to finish a sketch of the front of an ancient temple, amongst the ruins of Herculaneum. He had just reached the pit, and the men were about to let him down with cords, in the usual manner, when his attention was caught by the shrill sound of a scolding woman’s voice. He looked, and saw at some paces distant this female fury, who stood guarding the windlass of a well, to which, with threatening gestures and most voluble menaces, she forbade all access. The peasants—men, women and children, who had come with their pitchers to draw water at this well—were held at bay by the enraged female. Not one dared to be the first to advance; whilst she grasped with one hand the handle of the windlass, and, with the other tanned muscular arm extended, governed the populace, bidding them remember that she was padrona, or mistress of the well. They retired, in hopes of finding a more gentle padrona at some other well in the neighbourhood; and the fury, when they were out of sight, divided the long black hair which hung over her face, and, turning to one of the spectators, appealed to them in a sober voice, and asked if she was not right in what she had done? “I, that am padrona of the well,” said she, addressing herself to Francisco, who, with great attention, was contemplating her with the eye of a painter—“I, that am padrona of the well, must in times of scarcity do strict justice, and preserve for ourselves alone the water of our well. There is scarcely enough even for ourselves. I have been obliged to make my husband lengthen the ropes every day for this week past. If things go on at this rate, there will soon be not one drop of water left in my well.”
“Nor in any of the wells of the neighbourhood,” added one of the workmen, who was standing by; and he mentioned several in which the water had lately suddenly decreased; and a miller affirmed that his mill had stopped for want of water.
Francisco was struck by these remarks. They brought to his recollection similar facts, which he had often heard his father mention in his childhood, as having been observed previous to the last eruption of Mount Vesuvius. [338a] He had also heard from his father, in his childhood, that it is better to trust to prudence than to fortune; and therefore, though the peasants and workmen, to whom he mentioned his fears, laughed, and said, “That as the burning mountain had been favourable to them for so many years, they would trust to it and St. Januarius one day longer,” yet Francisco immediately gave up all thoughts of spending this day amidst the ruins of Herculaneum. After having inquired sufficiently, after having seen several wells, in which the water had evidently decreased, and after having seen the mill-wheels that were standing still for want of their usual supply, he hastened home to his father and mother, reported what he had heard and seen, and begged of them to remove, and to take what things of value they could to some distance from the dangerous spot where they now resided.
Some of the inhabitants of Resina, whom he questioned, declared that they had heard strange rumbling noises underground; and a peasant and his son, who had been at work the preceding day in a vineyard, a little above the village, related that they had seen a sudden puff of smoke come out of the earth, close to them; and that they had, at the same time, heard a noise like the going off of a pistol. [338b]
The villagers listened with large eyes and open ears to these relations; yet such was their habitual attachment to the spot they lived upon, or such the security in their own good fortune, that few of them would believe that there could be any necessity for removing.—“We’ll see what will happen to-morrow; we shall be safe here one day longer,” said they.
Francisco’s father and mother, more prudent than the generality of their neighbours, went to the house of a relation, at some miles’ distance from Vesuvius, and carried with them all their effects.
In the meantime, Francisco went to the villa where his English friends resided. The villa was in a most dangerous situation, near Terre del Greco—a town that stands at the foot of Mount Vesuvius. He related all the facts that he had heard to Arthur, who, not having been, like the inhabitants of Resina, familiarized to the idea of living in the vicinity of a burning mountain, and habituated to trust in St. Januarius, was sufficiently alarmed by Francisco’s representations. He ran to his master’s apartment, and communicated all that he had just heard. The Count de Flora and his lady, who were at this time in the house, ridiculed the fears of Arthur, and could not be prevailed upon to remove even as far as Naples. The lady was intent upon preparations for her birthday, which was to be celebrated in a few days with great magnificence at their villa; and she observed that it would be a pity to return to town before that day, and they had everything arranged for the festival. The prudent Englishman had not the gallantry to appear to be convinced by these arguments, and he left the place of danger. He left it not too soon, for the next morning exhibited a scene—a scene which we shall not attempt to describe.
We refer our young readers to the account of this dreadful eruption of Mount Vesuvius, published by Sir W. Hamilton in the “Philosophical Transactions.” It is sufficient here to say that, in the space of about five hours, the wretched inhabitants of Torre del Greco saw their town utterly destroyed by the streams of burning lava which poured from the mountain. The villa of Count de Flora, with some others, which were at a little distance from the town, escaped; but they were absolutely surrounded by the lava. The count and countess were obliged to fly from their house with the utmost precipitation in the night-time; and they had not time to remove any of their furniture, their plate, clothes, or jewels.
A few days after the eruption, the surface of the lava became so cool that people could walk upon it, though several feet beneath the surface it was still exceedingly hot. Numbers of those who had been forced from their houses now returned to the ruins to try to save whatever they could. But these unfortunate persons frequently found their houses had been pillaged by robbers, who, in these moments of general confusion, enrich themselves with the spoils of their fellow-creatures.
“Has the count abandoned his villa? and is there no one to take care of his plate and furniture? The house will certainly be ransacked before morning,” said the old carpenter to Francisco, who was at his house giving him an account of their flight. Francisco immediately went to the count’s house in warn him of his danger. The first person he saw was Arthur, who, with a face of terror, said to him, “Do you know what has happened? It is all over with Resina!”
“All over with Resina! What, has there been a fresh eruption? Has the lava reached Resina?”
“No; but it will inevitably be blown up. There,” said Arthur, pointing to a thin figure of an Italian, who stood pale and trembling, and looking up to heaven as he crossed himself repeatedly. “There,” said Arthur, “is a man who has left a parcel of his cursed rockets and fireworks, with I don’t know how much gunpowder, in the count’s house, from which we have just fled. The wind blows that way. One spark of fire, and the whole is blown up.”
Francisco waited not to hear more; but instantly, without explaining his intentions to anyone, set out for the count’s villa, and, with a bucket of water in his hand, crossed the beds of lava with which the house was encompassed; when, reaching the hall where the rockets and gunpowder were left, he plunged them into the water, and returned with them in safety over the lava, yet warm under his feet.
What was the surprise and joy of the poor firework-maker when he saw Francisco return from this dangerous expedition! He could scarcely believe his eyes, when he saw the rockets and the gunpowder all safe.
The count, who had given up the hopes of saving his palace, was in admiration when he heard of this instance of intrepidity, which properly saved not only his villa, but the whole village of Resina, from destruction. These fireworks had been prepared for the celebration of the countess’ birthday, and were forgotten in the hurry of the night on which the inhabitants fled from Torre del Greco.
“Brave young man!” said the count to Francisco, “I thank you, and shall not limit my gratitude to thanks. You tell me that there is danger of my villa being pillaged by robbers. It is from this moment your interest, as well as mine, to prevent their depredations; for (trust to my liberality) a portion of all that is saved of mine shall be yours.”
“Bravo! bravissimo!” exclaimed one, who started from a recessed window in the hall where all this passed. “Bravo! bravissimo!”—Francisco thought he knew the voice and the countenance of this man, who exclaimed with so much enthusiasm. He remembered to have seen him before, but when, or where, he could not recollect. As soon as the count left the hall, the stranger came up to Francisco. “Is it possible,” said he, “that you don’t know me? It is scarcely a twelvemonth since I drew tears from your eyes.”
“Tears from my eyes?” repeated Francisco, smiling; “I have shed but few tears. I have had but few misfortunes in my life.” The stranger answered him by two extempore Italian lines, which conveyed nearly the same idea that has been so well expressed by an English poet:—
“To each their sufferings—all are men
Condemn’d alike to groan;
The feeling for another’s woes,
Th’ unfeeling for his own.”
“I know you now perfectly well,” cried Francisco; “you are the Improvisatore who, one fine moonlight night last summer, told us the story of Cornaro the Turk.”
“The same,” said the Improvisatore; “the same, though in a better dress, which I should not have thought would have made so much difference in your eyes, though it makes all the difference between man and man in the eyes of the stupid vulgar. My genius has broken through the clouds of misfortune of late. A few happy impromptu verses I made on the Count de Flora’s fall from his horse attracted attention. The count patronizes me. I am here now to learn the fate of an ode I have just composed for his lady’s birthday. My ode was to have been set to music, and to have been performed at his villa near Torre del Greco, if these troubles had not intervened. Now that the mountain is quiet again, people will return to their senses. I expect to be munificently rewarded. But, perhaps, I detain you. Go; I shall not forget to celebrate the heroic action you have performed this day. I still amuse myself amongst the populace in my tattered garb late in the evenings, and I shall sound your praises through Naples in a poem I mean to recite on the late eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Adieu.”
The Improvisatore was as good as his word. That evening, with more than his usual enthusiasm, he recited his verses to a great crowd of people in one of the public squares. Amongst the crowd were several to whom the name of Francisco was well known, and by whom he was well beloved. These were his young companions, who remembered him as a fruit-seller amongst the little merchants. They rejoiced to hear his praises, and repeated the lines with shouts of applause.
“Let us pass. What is all this disturbance in the streets?” said a man, pushing his way through the crowd. A lad who held by his arm stopped suddenly on hearing the name of Francisco, which the people were repeating with so much enthusiasm.
“Ha! I have found at last a story that interests you more than that of Cornaro the Turk,” cried the Improvisatore, looking in the face of the youth, who had stopped so suddenly. “You are the young man who, last summer, had liked to have tricked me out of my new hat. Promise me you won’t touch it now,” said he, throwing down the hat at his feet, “or you hear not one word I have to say. Not one word of the heroic action performed at the villa of the Count de Flora, near Torre del Greco, this morning, by Signor Francisco.”
“Signor Francisco!” repeated the lad with disdain. “Well, let us hear what you have to tell of him,” added he. “Your hat is very safe, I promise you; I shall not touch it. What of Signor Francisco?”
“Signor Francisco I may, without impropriety, call him,” said the Improvisatore, “for he is likely to become rich enough to command the title from those who might not otherwise respect his merit.”
“Likely to become rich! how?” said the lad, whom our readers have probably before this time discovered to be Piedro. “How, pray, is he likely to become rich enough to be a signor?”
“The Count de Flora has promised him a liberal portion of all the fine furniture, plate and jewels that can be saved from his villa at Torre del Greco. Francisco is gone down hither now with some of the count’s domestics to protect the valuable goods against those villainous plunderers, who robbed their fellow-creatures of what even the flames of Vesuvius would spare.”
“Come, we have had enough of this stuff,” cried the man whose arm Piedro held. “Come away,” and he hurried forwards.
This man was one of the villains against whom the honest orator expressed such indignation. He was one of those with whom Piedro got acquainted during the time that he was living extravagantly upon the money he gained by the sale of the stolen diamond cross. That robbery was not discovered; and his success, as he called it, hardened him in guilt. He was both unwilling and unable to withdraw himself from the bad company with whom his ill gotten wealth connected him. He did not consider that bad company leads to the gallows. [342]
The universal confusion which followed the eruption of Mount Vesuvius was to these villains a time of rejoicing. No sooner did Piedro’s companion hear of the rich furniture, plate, etc., which the imprudent orator had described as belonging to the Count de Flora’s villa, than he longed to make himself master of the whole.
“It is a pity,” said Piedro, “that the count has sent Francisco, with his servants down to guard it.”
“And who is this Francisco of whom you seem to stand in so much awe?”
“A boy, a young lad only, of about my own age; but I know him to be sturdily honest. The servants we might corrupt; but even the old proverb of ‘Angle with a silver hook,’ [343] won’t hold good with him.”
“And if he cannot be won by fair means, he must be conquered by foul,” said the desperate villain; “but if we offer him rather more than the count has already promised for his share of the booty, of course he will consult at once his safety and his interest.”
“No,” said Piedro; “that is not his nature. I know him from a child, and we had better think of some other house for to-night’s business.”
“None other; none but this,” cried his companion, with an oath. “My mind is determined upon this, and you must obey your leader: recollect the fate of him who failed me yesterday.”
The person to whom he alluded was one of the gang of robbers who had been assassinated by his companions for hesitating to commit some crime suggested by their leader. No tyranny is so dreadful as that which is exercised by villains over their young accomplices, who become their slaves. Piedro, who was of a cowardly nature, trembled at the threatening countenance of his captain, and promised submission.
In the course of the morning, inquiries were made secretly amongst the count’s servants; and the two men who were engaged to sit up at the villa that night along with Francisco, were bribed to second the views of this gang of thieves. It was agreed that about midnight the robbers should be let into the house; that Francisco should be tied hand and foot, whilst they carried off their booty. “He is a stubborn chap, though so young, I understand,” said the captain of the robbers to his men; “but we carry poniards, and know how to use them. Piedro, you look pale. You don’t require to be reminded of what I said to you when we were alone just now?”
Piedro’s voice failed, and some of his comrades observed that he was young and new to the business. The captain, who, from being his pretended friend during his wealthy days, had of late become his tyrant, cast a stern look at Piedro, and bid him be sure to be at the old Jew’s, which was the place of meeting, in the dusk of the evening. After saying this he departed.
Piedro, when he was alone, tried to collect his thoughts—all his thoughts were full of horror. “Where am I?” said he to himself; “what am I about? Did I understand rightly what he said about poniards? Francisco; oh, Francisco! Excellent, kind, generous Francisco! Yes, I recollect your look when you held the bunch of grapes to my lips, as I sat by the sea-shore deserted by all the world; and now, what friends have I. Robbers and—” The word murderers he could not utter. He again recollected what had been said about poniards, and the longer his mind fixed upon the words, and the look that accompanied them, the more he was shocked. He could not doubt but that it was the serious intention of his accomplices to murder Francisco, if he should make any resistance.
Piedro had at this moment no friend in the world to whom he could apply for advice or assistance. His wretched father died some weeks before this time, in a fit of intoxication. Piedro walked up and down the street, scarcely capable of thinking, much less of coming to any rational resolution.
The hours passed away, the shadows of the houses lengthened under his footsteps, the evening came on, and when it grew dusk, after hesitating in great agony of mind for some time, his fear of the robbers’ vengeance prevailed over every other feeling, and he went at the appointed hour to the place of meeting.
The place of meeting was at the house of that Jew to whom he, several months before, sold the diamond cross. That cross which he thought himself so lucky to have stolen, and to have disposed of undetected, was, in fact, the cause of his being in his present dreadful situation. It was at the Jew’s that he connected himself with this gang of robbers, to whom he was now become an absolute slave.
“Oh, that I dared to disobey!” said he to himself, with a deep sigh, as he knocked softly at the back door of the Jew’s house. The back door opened into a narrow, unfrequented street, and some small rooms at this side of the house were set apart for the reception of guests who desired to have their business kept secret. These rooms were separated by a dark passage from the rest of the house, and numbers of people came to the shop in the front of the house, which looked into a creditable street, without knowing anything more, from the ostensible appearance of the shop, than that it was a kind of pawnbroker’s, where old clothes, old iron, and all sorts of refuse goods, might be disposed of conveniently.
At the moment Piedro knocked at the back door, the front shop was full of customers; and the Jew’s boy, whose office it was to attend to these signals, let Piedro in, told him that none of his comrades were yet come, and left him in a room by himself.
He was pale and trembling, and felt a cold dew spread over him. He had a leaden image of Saint Januarius tied round his neck, which, in the midst of his wickedness, he superstitiously preserved as a sort of charm, and on this he kept his eyes stupidly fixed, as he sat alone in this gloomy place.
He listened from time to time, but he heard no noise at the side of the house where he was. His accomplices did not arrive, and, in a sort of impatient terror, the attendant upon an evil conscience, he flung open the door of his cell, and groped his way through the passage which he knew led to the public shop. He longed to hear some noise, and to mix with the living. The Jew, when Piedro entered the shop, was bargaining with a poor, thin-looking man about some gunpowder.
“I don’t deny that it has been wet,” said the man, “but since it was in the bucket of water, it has been carefully dried. I tell you the simple truth, that so soon after the grand eruption of Mount Vesuvius, the people of Naples will not relish fireworks. My poor little rockets, and even my Catherine-wheels, will have no effect. I am glad to part with all I have in this line of business. A few days ago I had fine things in readiness for the Countess de Flora’s birthday, which was to have been celebrated at the count’s villa.”
“Why do you fix your eyes on me, friend? What is your discourse to me?” said Piedro, who imagined that the man fixed his eyes upon him as he mentioned the name of the count’s villa.
“I did not know that I fixed my eyes upon you; I was thinking of my fireworks,” said the poor man, simply. “But now that I do look at you and hear your voice, I recollect having had the pleasure of seeing you before.”
“When? where?” said Piedro.
“A great while ago; no wonder you have forgotten me,” said the man; “but I can recall the night to your recollection. You were in the street with me the night I let off that unlucky rocket, which frightened the horses, and was the cause of overturning a lady’s coach. Don’t you remember the circumstance?”