The Other Half-Rome

Another day that finds her living yet,     Little Pompilia, with the patient brow     And lamentable smile on those poor lips,     And, under the white hospital-array,     A flower-like body, to frighten at a bruise     Youd think, yet now, stabbed through and through again,     Alive i the ruins. Tis a miracle.     It seems that, when her husband struck her first,     She prayed Madonna just that she might live     So long as to confess and be absolved;     And whether it was that, all her sad life long,     Never before successful in a prayer,     This prayer rose with authority too dread,     Or whether, because earth was hell to her,     By compensation, when the blackness broke     She got one glimpse of quiet and the cool blue,     To show her for a moment such things were,     Or else, as the Augustinian Brother thinks,     The friar who took confession from her lip,     When a probationary soul that moves     From nobleness to nobleness, as she,     Over the rough way of the world, succumbs,     Bloodies its last thorn with unflinching foot,     The angels love to do their work betimes,     Staunch some wounds here nor leave so much for God.     Who knows? However it be, confessed, absolved,     She lies, with overplus of life beside     To speak and right herself from first to last,     Right the friend also, lamb-pure, lion-brave,     Care for the boys concerns, to save the son     From the sire, her two-weeks infant orphaned thus,     And with best smile of all reserved for him     Pardon that sire and husband from the heart.     A miracle, so tell your Molinists!     There she lies in the long white lazar-house.     Rome has besieged, these two days, never doubt,     Saint Annas where she waits her death, to hear     Though but the chink o the bell, turn o the hinge     When the reluctant wicket opes at last,     Lets in, on now this and now that pretence,     Too many by half, complain the men of art,     For a patient in such plight. The lawyers first     Paid the due visit justice must be done;     They took her witness, why the murder was;     Then the priests followed properly, a soul     To shrive; twas Brother Celestines own right,     The same who noises thus her gifts abroad:     But many more, who found they were old friends,     Pushed in to have their stare and take their talk     And go forth boasting of it and to boast.     Old Monna Baldi chatters like a jay,     Swears but that, prematurely trundled out     Just as she felt the benefit begin,     The miracle was snapped up by somebody,     Her palsied limb gan prick and promise life     At touch o the bedclothes merely, how much more     Had she but brushed the body as she tried!     Cavalier Carlo well, theres some excuse     For him Maratta who paints Virgins so     He too must fee the porter and slip by     With pencil cut and paper squared, and straight     There was he figuring away at face     A lovelier face is not in Rome, cried he,     Shaped like a peacocks egg, the pure as pearl,     That hatches you anon a snow-white chick.     Then, oh that pair of eyes, that pendent hair,     Black this, and black the other! Mighty fine     But nobody cared ask to paint the same,     Nor grew a poet over hair and eyes     Four little years ago when, ask and have,     The woman who wakes all this rapture leaned     Flower-like from out her window long enough,     As much uncomplimented as uncropped     By comers and goers in Via Vittoria: eh?     Tis just a flowers fate: past parterre we trip,     Till peradventure some one plucks our sleeve     Yon blossom at the briars end, thats the rose     Two jealous people fought for yesterday     And killed each other: see, theres undisturbed     A pretty pool at the root, of rival red!     Then cry we, Ah, the perfect paragon!     Then crave we, Just one keepsake-leaf for us!     Truth lies between: theres anyhow a child     Of seventeen years, whether a flower or weed,     Ruined: who did it shall account to Christ     Having no pity on the harmless life     And gentle face and girlish form he found,     And thus flings back: go practise if you please     With men and women: leave a child alone     For Christs particular loves sake! so I say.     Somebody, at the bedside, said much more,     Took on him to explain the secret cause     O the crime: quoth he, Such crimes are very rife,     Explode nor make us wonder now-a-days,     Seeing that Antichrist disseminates     That doctrine of the Philosophic Sin:     Molinos sect will soon make earth too hot!     Nay, groaned the Augustinian, whats there new?     Crime will not fail to flare up from mens hearts     While hearts are mens and so born criminal     Which one fact, always old yet ever new,     Accounts for so much crime that, for my part,     Molinos may go whistle to the wind     That waits outside a certain church, you know!     Though really it does seem as if she here,     Pompilia, living so and dying thus,     Has undue experience how much crime     A heart can hatch. Why was she made to learn     Not you, not I, not even Molinos self     What Guido Franceschinis heart could hold?     Thus saintship is effected probably;     No sparing saints the process! which the more     Tends to the reconciling us, no saints,     To sinnership, immunity and all.     For see now: Pietro and Violantes life     Till seventeen years ago, all Rome might note     And quote for happy see the signs distinct     Of happiness as we yon Tritons trump.     What could they be but happy? balanced so,     Nor low i the social scale nor yet too high,     Nor poor nor richer than comports with ease,     Nor bright and envied, nor obscure and scorned,     Nor so young that their pleasures fell too thick,     Nor old past catching pleasure when it fell,     Nothing above, below the just degree,     All at the mean where joys components mix.     So again, in the couples very souls     You saw the adequate half with half to match,     Each having and each lacking somewhat, both     Making a whole that had all and lacked nought;     The round and sound, in whose composure just     The acquiescent and recipient side     Was Pietros, and the stirring striving one     Violantes: both in union gave the due     Quietude, enterprise, craving and content,     Which go to bodily health and peace of mind.     But, as tis said a body, rightly mixed,     Each element in equipoise, would last     Too long and live for ever, accordingly     Holds a germ sand-grain weight too much i the scale     Ordained to get predominance one day     And so bring all to ruin and release,     Not otherwise a fatal germ lurked here:     With mortals much must go, but something stays;     Nothing will stay of our so happy selves.     Out of the very ripeness of lifes core     A worm was bred Our life shall leave no fruit.     Enough of bliss, they thought, could bliss bear seed,     Yield its like, propagate a bliss in turn     And keep the kind up; not supplant themselves     But put in evidence, record they were,     Show them, when done with, i the shape of a child.     Tis in a child, man and wife grow complete,     One flesh: God says so: let him do his work!     Now, one reminder of this gnawing want,     One special prick o the maggot at the core,     Always befell when, as the day came round,     A certain yearly sum, our Pietro being,     As the long name runs, an usufructuary,     Dropped in the common bag as interest     Of money, his till death, not afterward,     Failing an heir: an heir would take and take,     A child of theirs be wealthy in their place     To nobodys hurt the stranger else seized all.     Prosperity rolled river-like and stopped,     Making their mill go; but when wheel wore out,     The wave would find a space and sweep on free     And, half-a-mile off, grind some neighbours corn.     Adam-like, Pietro sighed and said no more:     Eve saw the apple was fair and good to taste,     So, plucked it, having asked the snake advice.     She told her husband God was merciful,     And his and her prayer granted at the last:     Let the old mill-stone moulder, wheel unworn,     Quartz from the quarry, shot into the stream     Adroitly, should go bring grist as before     Their house continued to them by an heir,     Their vacant heart replenished with a child.     We have her own confession at full length     Made in the first remorse: twas Jubilee     Pealed in the ear o the conscience and it woke.     She found she had offended God no doubt,     So much was plain from what had happened since,     Misfortune on misfortune; but she harmed     No one i the world, so far as she could see.     The act had gladdened Pietro to the height,     Her husband God himself must gladden so     Or not at all (thus much seems probable     From the implicit faith, or rather say     Stupid credulity of the foolish man     Who swallowed such a tale nor strained a whit     Even at his wifes far-over-fifty years     Matching his sixty-and-under.) Him she blessed,     And as for doing any detriment,     To the veritable heir, why, tell her first     Who was he? Which of all the hands held up     I the crowd, would one day gather round their gate,     Did she so wrong by intercepting thus     The ducat, spendthrift fortune thought to fling     For a scramble just to make the mob break shins?     She kept it, saved them kicks and cuffs thereby.     While at the least one good work had she wrought,     Good, clearly and incontestably! Her cheat     What was it to its subject, the childs self,     But charity and religion? See the girl!     A body most like a soul too probably     Doomed to death, such a double death as waits     The illicit offspring of a common trull,     Sure to resent and forthwith rid herself     Of a mere interruption to sins trade,     In the efficacious way old Tiber knows.     Was not so much proved by the ready sale     O the child, glad transfer of this irksome chance?     Well then, she had caught up this castaway:     This fragile egg, some careless wild bird dropped,     She had picked from where it waited the foot-fall,     And put in her own breast till forth broke finch     Able to sing God praise on mornings now.     What so excessive harm was done? she asked.     To which demand the dreadful answer comes     For that same deed, now at Lorenzos church,     Both agents, conscious and inconscious, lie;     While she, the deed was done to benefit,     Lies also, the most lamentable of things,     Yonder where curious people count her breaths,     Calculate how long yet the little life     Unspilt may serve their turn nor spoil the show,     Give them their story, then the church its group.     Well, having gained Pompilia, the girl grew     I the midst of Pietro here, Violante there,     Each, like a semicircle with stretched arms,     Joining the other round her preciousness     Two walls that go about a garden-plot     Where a chance sliver, branchlet slipt from bole     Of some tongue-leaved eye-figured Eden tree,     Filched by two exiles and borne far away,     Patiently glorifies their solitude,     Year by year mounting, grade by grade surmounts     The builded brick-work, yet is compassed still,     Still hidden happily and shielded safe,     Else why should miracle have graced the ground?     But on the twelfth sun that brought April there     What meant that laugh? The coping-stone was reached;     Nay, a light tuft of bloom towered above     To be toyed with by butterfly or bee,     Done good to or else harm to from outside:     Pompilias root, stem, and a branch or two     Home enclosed still, the rest would be the worlds.     All which was taught our couple though obtuse,     Since walls have ears, when one day brought a priest,     Smooth-mannered soft-speeched sleek-cheeked visitor,     The notable Abate Paolo known     As younger brother of a Tuscan house     Whereof the actual representative,     Count Guido, had employd his youth and age     In culture of Romes most productive plant     A cardinal: but years pass and change comes,     In token of which, here was our Paolo brought     To broach a weighty business. Might he speak?     Yes to Violante somehow caught alone     While Pietro took his after-dinner doze,     And the young maiden, busily as befits,     Minded her broider-frame three chambers off.     So giving now his great flap-hat a gloss     With flat o the hand between-whiles, soothing now     The silk from out its creases oer the calf,     Setting the stocking clerical again,     But never disengaging, once engaged,     The thin clear grey hold of his eyes on her     He dissertated on that Tuscan house,     Those Franceschini, very old they were     Not rich however oh, not rich, at least,     As people look to be who, low i the scale     One way, have reason, rising all they can     By favour of the money-bag: tis fair     Do all gifts go together? But dont suppose     That being not so rich means all so poor!     Say rather, well enough i the way, indeed,     Ha, ha, to better fortune than the best,     Since if his brothers patron-friend kept faith,     Put into promised play the Cardinalate,     Their house might wear the red cloth that keeps warm,     Would but the Count have patience theres the point!     For he was slipping into years apace,     And years make men restless they needs must see     Some certainty, some sort of end assured,     Sparkle, tho from the topmost beacon-tip     That warrants life a harbour through the haze.     In short, call him fantastic as you choose,     Guido was home-sick, yearned for the old sights     And usual faces, fain would settle himself     And have the patrons bounty when it fell     Irrigate far rather than deluge near,     Go fertilise Arezzo, not flood Rome.     Sooth to say, twas the wiser wish: the Count     Proved wanting in ambition, let us avouch,     Since truth is best, in callousness of heart,     Winced at those pin-pricks whereby honours hang     A ribbon oer each puncture: his no soul     Ecclesiastic (here the hat was brushed)     Humble but self-sustaining, calm and cold,     Having, as one who puts his hand to the plough,     Renounced the over-vivid family-feel     Poor brother Guido! All too plain, he pined     Amid Romes pomp and glare for dinginess     And that dilapidated palace-shell     Vast as a quarry and, very like, as bare     Since to this comes old grandeur now-a-days     Or that absurd wild villa in the waste     O the hill side, breezy though, for who likes air,     Vittiano, nor unpleasant with its vines,     Outside the city and the summer heats.     And now his harping on this one tense chord     The villa and the palace, palace this     And villa the other, all day and all night     Creaked like the implacable cicalas cry     And made ones ear-drum ache: nought else would serve     But that, to light his mothers visage up     With second youth, hope, gaiety again,     He must find straightway, woo and haply win     And bear away triumphant back, some wife.     Well now, the man was rational in his way     He, the Abate, ought he to interpose?     Unless by straining still his tutelage     (Priesthood leaps over elder-brothership)     Across this difficulty: then let go,     Leave the poor fellow in peace! Would that be wrong?     There was no making Guido great, it seems,     Spite of himself: then happy be his dole!     Indeed, the Abates little interest     Was somewhat nearly touched i the case, they saw:     Since if his simple kinsman so were bent,     Began his rounds in Rome to catch a wife,     Full soon would such unworldliness surprise     The rare bird, sprinkle salt on phnix tail,     And so secure the nest a sparrow-hawk.     No lack of mothers here in Rome, no dread     Of daughters lured as larks by looking-glass!     The first name-pecking credit-scratching fowl     Would drop her unfledged cuckoo in our nest     To gather greyness there, give voice at length     And shame the brood . . but it was long ago     When crusades were, and we sent eagles forth!     No, that at least the Abate could forestall.     He read the thought within his brothers word,     Knew what he purposed better than himself.     We want no name and fame having our own:     No worldly aggrandisement such we fly:     But if some wonder of a womans-heart     Were yet untainted on this grimy earth,     Tender and true tradition tells of such     Prepared to pant in time and tune with ours     If some good girl (a girl, since she must take     The new bent, live new life, adopt new modes)     Not wealthy Guido for his rank was poor     But with whatever dowry came to hand,     There were the lady-love predestinate!     And somehow the Abates guardian eye     Scintillant, rutilant, fraternal fire,     Roving round every way had seized the prize     The instinct of us, we, the spiritualty!     Come, cards on table; was it true or false     That here here in this very tenement     Yea, Via Vittoria did a marvel hide,     Lily of a maiden, white with intact leaf     Guessed thro the sheath that saved it from the sun?     A daughter with the mothers hands still clasped     Over her head for fillet virginal,     A wife worth Guidos house and hand and heart?     He came to see; had spoken, he could no less     (A final cherish of the stockinged calf)     If harm were, well, the matter was off his mind.     Then with the great air did he kiss, devout,     Violantes hand, and rise up his whole height     (A certain purple gleam about the black)     And go forth grandly, as if the Pope came next.     And so Violante rubbed her eyes awhile,     Got up too, walked to wake her Pietro soon     And pour into his ear the mighty news     How somebody had somehow somewhere seen     Their tree-top-tuft of bloom above the wall,     And came now to apprise them the trees self     Was no such crab-sort as should feed the swine,     But veritable gold, the Hesperian ball     Ordained for Hercules to haste and pluck,     And bear and give the Gods to banquet with     Hercules standing ready at the door.     Whereon did Pietro rub his eyes in turn,     Look very wise, a little woeful too,     Then, periwig on head, and cane in hand,     Sally forth dignifiedly into the Square     Of Spain across Babbuino the six steps,     Toward the Boat-fountain where our idlers lounge,     Ask, for forms sake, who Hercules might be,     And have congratulation from the world.     Heartily laughed the world in his fools-face     And told him Hercules was just the heir     To the stubble once a corn-field, and brick-heap     Where used to be a dwelling-place now burned.     Guido and Franceschini; a Count, ay:     But a cross i the poke to bless the Countship? No!     All gone except sloth, pride, rapacity,     Humours of the imposthume incident     To rich blood that runs thin, nursed to a head     By the rankly-salted soil a cardinals court     Where, parasite and picker-up of crumbs,     He had hung on long, and now, let go, said some,     But shaken off, said others, in any case     Tired of the trade and something worse for wear,     Was wanting to change town for country quick,     Go home again: let Pietro help him home!     The brother, Abate Paolo, shrewder mouse,     Had pricked for comfortable quarters, inched     Into the core of Rome, and fattened so;     But Guido, over-burly for rats hole     Suited to clerical slimness, starved outside,     Must shift for himself: and so the shift was this!     What, was the snug retreat of Pietro tracked,     The little provision for his old age snuffed?     Oh, make your girl a lady, an you list,     But have more mercy on our wit than vaunt     Your bargain as we burgesses who brag!     Why, Goodman Dullard, if a friend must speak,     Would the Count, think you, stoop to you and yours     Were there the value of one penny-piece     To rattle twixt his palms or likelier laugh,     Bid your Pompilia help you black his shoe?     Home again, shaking oft the puzzled pate,     Went Pietro to announce a change indeed,     Yet point Violante where some solace lay     Of a rueful sort, the taper, quenched so soon,     Had ended merely in a snuff, not stink     Congratulate there was one hope the less     Not misery the more: and so an end.     The marriage thus impossible, the rest     Followed: our spokesman, Paolo, heard his fate,     Resignedly Count Guido bore the blow:     Violante wiped away the transient tear,     Renounced the playing Danae to gold dreams,     Praised much her Pietros prompt sagaciousness,     Found neighbours envy natural, lightly laughed     At gossips malice, fairly wrapped herself     In her integrity three folds about,     And, letting pass a little day or two,     Threw, even over that integrity,     Another wrappage, namely one thick veil     That hid her, matron-wise, from head to foot,     And, by the hand holding a girl veiled too,     Stood, one dim end of a December day,     In Saint Lorenzo on the altar-step     Just where she lies now and that girl will lie     Only with fifty candles company     Now in the place of the poor winking one     Which saw, doors shut and sacristan made sure,     A priest perhaps Abate Paolo wed     Guido clandestinely, irrevocably     To his Pompilia aged thirteen years     And five months, witness the church register,     Pompilia (thus become Count Guidos wife     Clandestinely, irrevocably his),     Who all the while had borne, from first to last,     As brisk a part i the bargain, as yon lamb,     Brought forth from basket and set out for sale,     Bears while they chaffer, wary market-man     And voluble housewife, oer it, each in turn     Patting the curly calm inconscious head,     With the shambles ready round the corner there,     When the talks talked out and a bargain struck.     Transfer complete, why, Pietro was apprised.     Violante sobbed the sobs and prayed the prayers     And said the serpent tempted so she fell,     Till Pietro had to clear his brow apace     And make the best of matters: wrath at first,     How else? pacification presently,     Why not? could flesh withstand the impurpled one,     The very Cardinal, Paolos patron-friend?     Who, justifiably surnamed a hinge,     Knew where the mollifying oil should drop     To cure the creak o the valve, considerate     For frailty, patient in a naughty world,     He even volunteered to supervise     The rough draught of those marriage-articles     Signed in a hurry by Pietro, since revoked:     Trusts politic, suspicion does the harm,     There is but one way to brow-beat this world,     Dumbfounder doubt, and repay scorn in kind,     To go on trusting, namely, till faith move Mountains.     And faith here made the mountains move.     Why, friends whose zeal cried Caution ere too late!     Bade Pause ere jump, with both feet joined, on slough!     Counselled If rashness then, now temperance!     Heard for their pains that Pietro had closed eyes,     Jumped and was in the middle of the mire,     Money and all, just what should sink a man.     By the mere marriage, Guido gained forthwith     Dowry, his wifes right; no rescinding there:     But Pietro, why must he needs ratify     One gift Violante gave, pay down one doit     Promised in first fools-flurry? Grasp the bag     Lest the sons service flag, is reason and rhyme,     Above all when the sons a son-in-law.     Words to the wind! The parents cast their lot     Into the lap o the daughter: and the son     Now with a right to lie there, took what fell,     Pietros whole having and holding, house and field,     Goods, chattels and effects, his worldly worth     Present and in perspective, all renounced     In favour of Guido. As for the usufruct     The interest now, the principal anon,     Would Guido please to wait, at Pietros death:     Till when, he must support the couples charge,     Bear with them, housemates, pensionaries, pawned     To an alien for fulfilment of their pact.     Guido should at discretion deal them orts,     Bread-bounty in Arezzo the strange place,     They who had lived deliciously and rolled     Romes choicest comfit neath the tongue before.     Into this quag, jump bade the Cardinal!     And neck-deep in a minute there flounced they.     But they touched bottom at Arezzo: there     Four months experience of how craft and greed,     Quickened by penury and pretentious hate     Of plain truth, brutify and bestialise,     Four months taste of apportioned insolence,     Cruelty graduated, dose by dose     Of ruffianism dealt out at bed and board,     And lo, the work was done, success clapped hands.     The starved, stripped, beaten brace of stupid dupes     Broke at last in their desperation loose,     Fled away for their lives, and lucky so;     Found their account in casting coat afar     And bearing off a shred of skin at least:     Left Guido lord o the prey, as the lion is,     And, careless what came after, carried their wrongs     To Rome, I nothing doubt, with such remorse     As folly feels, since pain can make it wise,     But crime, past wisdom, which is innocence,     Needs not be plagued with till a later day.     Pietro went back to beg from door to door,     In hope that memory not quite extinct     Of cheery days and festive nights would move     Friends and acquaintance after the natural laugh,     And tributary Just as we foretold     To show some bowels, give the dregs o the cup,     Scraps of the trencher, to their host that was,     Or let him share the mat with the mastiff, he     Who lived large and kept open house so long.     Not so Violante: ever a-head i the march,     Quick at the bye-road and the cut-across,     She went first to the best adviser, God     Whose finger unmistakably was felt     In all this retribution of the past.     Here was the prize of sin, luck of a lie!     But here too was the Holy Year would help,     Bound to rid sinners of sin vulgar, sin     Abnormal, sin prodigious, up to sin     Impossible and supposed for Jubilee sake:     To lift the leadenest of lies, let soar     The soul unhampered by a feather-weight.     I will, said she, go burn out this bad hole     That breeds the scorpion, baulk the plague at least     Its hope of further creeping progeny:     I will confess my fault, be punished, yes,     But pardoned too: Saint Peter pays for all.     So, with the crowd she mixed, made for the dome,     Through the great door new-broken for the nonce     Marched, muffled more than ever matron-wise,     Up the left nave to the formidable throne,     Fell into file with this the poisoner     And that the parricide, and reached in turn     The poor repugnant Penitentiary     Set at this gully-hole o the worlds discharge     To help the frightfullest of filth have vent,     And then knelt down and whispered in his ear     How she had bought Pompilia, palmed the babe     On Pietro, passed the girl off as their child     To Guido, and defrauded of his due     This one and that one, more than she could name,     Until her solid piece of wickedness     Happened to split and spread woe far and wide:     Contritely now she brought the case for cure.     Replied the throne Ere God forgive the guilt,     Make man some restitution! Do your part!     The owners of your husbands heritage,     Barred thence by this pretended birth and heir,     Tell them, the bar came so, is broken so,     Theirs be the due reversion as before!     Your husband who, no partner in the guilt,     Suffers the penalty, led blindfold thus     By love of what he thought his flesh and blood     To alienate his all in her behalf,     Tell him too such contract is null and void!     Last, he who personates your son-in-law,     Who with sealed eyes and stopped ears, tame and mute,     Took at your hand that bastard of a whore     You called your daughter and he calls his wife,     Tell him, and bear the anger which is just!     Then, penance so performed, may pardon be!     Who could gainsay this just and right award?     Nobody in the world: but, out o the world,     Who knows? might timid intervention be     From any makeshift of an angel-guide,     Substitute for celestial guardianship,     Pretending to take care of the girls self:     Woman, confessing crime is healthy work,     And telling truth relieves a liar like you,     But what of her my unconsidered charge?     No thought of, while this good befalls yourself,     What in the way of harm may find out her?     No least thought, I assure you: truth being truth,     Tell it and shame the devil!     Said and done:     Home went Violante and disbosomed all:     And Pietro who, six months before, had borne     Word after word of such a piece of news     Like so much cold steel inched through his breast-blade,     Now at its entry gave a leap for joy,     As who what did I say of one in a quag?     Should catch a hand from heaven and spring thereby     Out of the mud, on ten toes stand once more.     What? All that used to be, may be again?     My money mine again, my house, my land,     My chairs and tables, all mine evermore?     What, the girls dowry never was the girls,     And, unpaid yet, is never now to pay?     Then the girls self, my pale Pompilia child     That used to be my own with her great eyes     He who drove us forth, why should he keep her     When proved as very a pauper as himself?     Will she come back, with nothing changed at all,     And laugh But how you dreamed uneasily!     I saw the great drops stand here on your brow     Did I do wrong to wake you with a kiss?     No, indeed, darling! No, for wide awake     I see another outburst of surprise:     The lout-lord, bully-beggar, braggart-sneak,     Who not content with cutting purse, crops ear     Assuredly it shall be salve to mine     When this great news red-letters him, the rogue!     Ay, let him taste the teeth o the trap, this fox,     Give us our lamb back, golden fleece and all,     Let her creep in and warm our breasts again!     What care for the past? we three are our old selves,     Who know now what the outside world is worth.     And so, he carried case before the courts;     And there Violante, blushing to the bone,     Made public declaration of her fault,     Renounced her motherhood, and prayed the law     To interpose, frustrate of its effect     Her folly, and redress the injury done.     Whereof was the disastrous consequence,     That though indisputably clear the case     (For thirteen years are not so large a lapse,     And still six witnesses survived in Rome     To prove the truth o the tale) yet, patent wrong     Seemed Guidos; the first cheat had chanced on him:     Here was the pity that, deciding right,     Those who began the wrong would gain the good.     Guido pronounced the story one long lie     Lied to do robbery and take revenge:     Or say it were no lie at all but truth,     Then, it both robbed the right heirs and shamed him     Without revenge to humanise the deed:     What had he done when first they shamed him thus?     But that were too fantastic: losels they,     And leasing this worlds-wonder of a lie,     They lied to blot him though it brand themselves.     So answered Guido through the Abates mouth.     Wherefore the court, its customary way,     Inclined to the middle course the sage affect     They held the child to be a changeling, good:     But, lest the husband got no good thereby,     They willed the dowry, though not hers at all,     Should yet be his, if not by right then grace     Part-payment for the plain injustice done.     But then, that other contract, Pietros work,     Renunciation of his own estate,     That must be cancelled give him back his goods,     He was no party to the cheat at least!     So ran the judgment: whence a prompt appeal     On both sides, seeing right is absolute.     Cried Pietro, Is Pompilia not my child?     Why give her my childs dowry? Have I right     To the dowry, why not to the rest as well?     Cried Guido, or cried Paolo in his name:     Till law said Reinvestigate the case!     And so the matter pends, unto this day.     Hence new disaster that no outlet seemed;     Whatever the fortune of the battle-field,     No path whereby the fatal man might march     Victorious, wreath on head and spoils in hand,     And back turned full upon the baffled foe,     Nor cranny whence, desperate and disgraced,     Stripped to the skin, he might be fain to crawl     Worm- like, and so away with his defeat     To other fortune and the novel prey.     No, he was pinned to the place there, left alone     With his immense hate and, the solitary     Subject to satisfy that hate, his wife.     Cast her off? Turn her naked out of doors?     Easily said! But still the action pends,     Still dowry, principal and interest,     Pietros possessions, all I bargained for,     Any good day, be but my friends alert,     May give them me if she continue mine.     Yet, keep her? Keep the puppet of my foes     Her voice that lisps me back their curse her eye     They lend their leer of triumph to her lip     I touch and taste their very filth upon?     In short, he also took the middle course     Rome taught him did at last excogitate     How he might keep the good and leave the bad     Twined in revenge, yet extricable, nay     Make the very hates eruption, very rush     Of the unpent sluice of cruelty relieve     His heart first, then go fertilise his field.     What if the girl-wife, tortured with due care,     Should take, as though spontaneously, the road     It were impolitic to thrust her on?     If, goaded, she broke out in full revolt,     Followed her parents i the face o the world,     Branded as runaway not castaway,     Self-sentenced and self-punished in the act?     So should the loathed form and detested face     Launch themselves into hell and there be lost     While he looked oer the brink with folded arms;     So should the heaped-up shames go shuddering back     O the head o the heapers, Pietro and his wife,     And bury in the breakage three at once:     While Guido, left free, no one right renounced,     Gain present, gain prospective, all the gain,     None of the wife except her rights absorbed.     Should ask law what it was law paused about     If law were dubious still whose word to take,     The husbands dignified and derelict,     Or the wifes the . . . what I tell you. It should be.     Guidos first step was to take pen, indite     A letter to the Abate, not his own,     His wifes, she should re-write, sign, seal, and send.     She liberally told the household-news,     Rejoiced her vile progenitors were fled,     Revealed their malice how they even laid     A last injunction on her, when they fled,     That she should forthwith find a paramour,     Complot with him to gather spoil enough     Then burn the house down, taking previous care     To poison all its inmates overnight,     And so companioned, so provisioned too,     Follow to Rome and all join fortunes gay.     This letter, traced in pencil-characters,     Guido as easily got retraced in ink     By his wifes pen, guided from end to end,     As it had been just so much Hebrew, Sir:     For why? That wife could broider, sing perhaps,     Pray certainly, but no more read than write     This letter which yet write she must, he said,     Being half courtesy and compliment,     Half sisterliness: take the thing on trust!     She had as readily re-traced the words     Of her own death-warrant, in some sort twas so.     This letter the Abate in due course     Communicated to such curious souls     In Rome as needs must pry into the cause     Of quarrel, why the Comparini fled     The Franceschini, whence the grievance grew,     What the hubbub meant: Nay, see the wifes own word,     Authentic answer! Tell detractors too     Theres a plan formed, a programme figured here     Pray God no after-practice put to proof,     This letter cast no light upon, one day!     So much for what should work in Rome, back now     To Arezzo, go on with the project there,     Forward the next step with as bold a foot,     And plague Pompilia to the height, you see!     Accordingly did Guido set himself     To worry up and down, across, around,     The woman, hemmed in by her household-bars,     Chased her about the coop of daily life,     Having first stopped each outlet thence save one     Which, like bird with a ferret in her haunt,     She needs must seize as sole way of escape     Though there was tied and twittering a decoy     To seem as if it tempted, just the plume     O the popinjay, and not a respite there     From tooth and claw of something in the dark,     Giuseppe Caponsacchi.     Now begins     The tenebrific passage of the tale:     How hold a light, display the caverns gorge?     How, in this phase of the affair, show truth?     Here is the dying wife who smiles and says     So it was, so it was not, how it was,     I never knew nor ever care to know     Till they all weep, physician, man of law,     Even that poor old bit of battered brass     Beaten out of all shape by the worlds sins,     Common utensil of the lazar-house     Confessor Celestino groans Tis truth,     All truth, and only truth: theres something else,     Some presence in the room beside us all,     Something that every lie expires before:     No question she was pure from first to last.     So far is well and helps us to believe:     But beyond, she the helpless, simple-sweet     Or silly-sooth, unskilled to break one blow     At her good fame by putting finger forth,     How can she render service to the truth?     The bird says So I fluttered where a springe     Caught me: the springe did not contrive itself,     That I know: who contrived it, God forgive!     But we, who hear no voice and have dry eyes,     Must ask, we cannot else, absolving her,     How of the part played by that same decoy     I the catching, caging? Was himself caught first?     We deal here with no innocent at least,     No witless victim, hes a man of the age     And a priest beside, persuade the mocking world     Mere charity boiled over in this sort!     He whose own safety too, (the Popes apprised     Good-natured with the secular offence,     The pope looks grave on priesthood in a scrape)     Our priests own safety therefore, may-be life,     Hangs on the issue! You will find it hard.     Guido is here to meet you with fixed foot,     Stiff like a statue Leave what went before!     My wife fled i the company of a priest,     Spent two days and two nights alone with him:     Leave what came after! He is hard to throw.     Moreover priests are merely flesh and blood;     When we get weakness, and no guilt beside,     We have no such great ill-fortune: finding grey,     We gladly call that white which might be black,     Too used to the double-dye. So, if the priest,     Moved by Pompilias youth and beauty, gave     Way to the natural weakness. . . . Anyhow     Here be facts, charactery; what they spell     Determine, and thence pick what sense you may!     There was a certain young bold handsome priest     Popular in the city, far and wide     Famed, for Arezzos but a little place, .     As the best of good companions, gay and grave     At the decent minute; settled in his stall,     Or sideling, lute on lap, by ladys couch,     Ever the courtly Canon: see in such     A star shall climb apace and culminate,     Have its due handbreadth of the heaven at Rome,     Though meanwhile pausing on Arezzos edge,     As modest candle mid the mountain fog,     To rub off redness and rusticity     Ere it sweep chastened, gain the silver-sphere.     Whether through Guidos absence or what else,     This Caponsacchi, favourite of the town,     Was yet no friend of his nor free o the house,     Though both moved in the regular magnates march     Each must observe the others tread and halt     At church, saloon, theatre, house of play.     Who could help noticing the husbands slouch,     The black of his brow or miss the news that buzzed     Of how the little solitary wife     Wept and looked out of window all day long?     What need of minute search into such springs     As start men, set o the move? machinery     Old as earth, obvious as the noonday sun.     Why, take men as they come, an instance now,     Of all those who have simply gone to see     Pompilia on her deathbed since four days,     Half at the least are, call it how you please,     In love with her I dont except the priests     Nor even the old confessor whose eyes run     Over at what he styles his sisters voice     Who died so early and weaned him from the world.     Well, had they viewed her ere the paleness pushed     The last o the red o the rose away, while yet     Some hand, adventurous twixt the wind and her,     Might let the life run back and raise the flower     Rich with reward up to the guardians face,     Would they have kept that hand employed the same     At fumbling on with prayer-book pages? No!     Men are men: why then need I say one word     More than this, that our man the Canon here     Saw, pitied, loved Pompilia?     This is why;     This startling why: that Caponsacchis self     Whom foes and friends alike avouch, for good     Or ill, a man of truth whateer betide,     Intrepid altogether, reckless too     How his own fame and fortune, tossed to the winds,     Suffer by any turn the adventure take,     Nay, more not thrusting, like a badge to hide,     Twixt shirt and skin a joy which shown is shame     But flirting flag-like i the face o the world     This tell-tale kerchief, this conspicuous love     For the lady, oh, called innocent love, I know!     Only, such scarlet fiery innocence     As most men would try muffle up in shade,     Tis strange then that this else abashless mouth     Should yet maintain, for truths sake which is Gods,     That it was not he made the first advance,     That, even ere word had passed between the two,     Pompilia penned him letters, passionate prayers,     If not love, then so simulating love     That he, no novice to the taste of thyme,     Turned from such over-luscious honey-clot     At end o the flower, and would not lend his lip     Till . . . but the tale here frankly outsoars faith:     There must be falsehood somewhere. For her part,     Pompilia quietly constantly avers     She never penned a letter in her life     Nor to the Canon nor any other man,     Being incompetent to write and read:     Nor had she ever uttered word to him, nor he     To her till that same evening when they met,     She on her window-terrace, he beneath     I the public street, as was their fateful chance,     And she adjured him in the name of God     Find out and bring to pass where, when and how     Escape with him to Rome might be contrived.     Means found, plan laid and time fixed, she avers,     And heart assured to heart in loyalty,     All at an impulse! All extemporised     As in romance-books! Is that credible?     Well, yes: as she avers this with calm mouth     Dying, I do think Credible! youd cry     Did not the priests voice come to break the spell:     They questioned him apart, as the custom is,     When first the matter made a noise at Rome,     And he, calm, constant then as she is now,     For truths sake did assert and reassert     Those letters called him to her and he came,     Which damns the story credible otherwise.     Why should this man, mad to devote himself,     Careless what comes of his own fame, the first,     Be studious thus to publish and declare     Just what the lightest nature loves to hide,     Nor screen a lady from the bywords laugh     First spoke the lady, last the cavalier!     I say, why should the man tell truth just here     When graceful lying meets such ready shrift?     Or is there a first moment for a priest     As for a woman, when invaded shame     Must have its first and last excuse to show?     Do both contrive loves entry in the mind     Shall look, i the manner of it, a surprise,     That after, once the flag o the fort hauled down,     Effrontery may sink drawbridge, open gate,     Welcome and entertain the conqueror?     Or what do you say to a touch of the devils worst?     Can it be that the husband, he who wrote     The letter to his brother I told you of,     I the name of her it meant to criminate,     What if he wrote those letters to the priest?     Further the priest says, when it first befell,     This folly o the letters, that he checked the flow,     Put them back lightly each with its reply.     Here again vexes new discrepancy:     There never reached her eye a word from him;     He did write but she could not read she could     Burn what offended wifehood, womanhood,     So did burn: never bade him come to her,     Yet when it proved he must come, let him come,     And when he did come though uncalled, she spoke     Prompt by an inspiration: thus it was.     Will you go somewhat back to understand?     When first, pursuant to his plan, there sprung,     Like an uncaged beast, Guidos cruelty     On the weak shoulders of his wife, she cried     To those whom law appoints resource for such,     The secular guardian thats the Governor,     And the Archbishop, thats the spiritual guide,     And prayed them take the claws from out her flesh.     Now, this is ever the ill consequence     Of being noble, poor, and difficult,     Ungainly, yet too great to disregard,     That the born peers and friends hereditary     Though disinclined to help from their own store     The opprobrious wight, put penny in his poke     From purse of theirs or leave the door ajar     When he goes wistful by at dinner-time,     Yet, if his needs conduct him where they sit     Smugly in office, judge this, bishop that,     Dispensers of the shine and shade o the place     And if, the friends door shut and purse undrawn,     The potentate may find the office-hall     Do as good service at no cost give help     By-the-bye, pay up traditional dues at once     Just through a feather-weight too much i the scale,     A finger-tip forgot at the balance-tongue,     Why, only churls refuse, or Molinists.     Thus when, in the first roughness of surprise     At Guidos wolf-face whence the sheepskin fell,     The frightened couple, all bewilderment,     Rushed to the Governor, who else rights wrong?     Told him their tale of wrong and craved redress     Why, then the Governor woke up to the fact     That Guido was a friend of old, poor Count!     So, promptly paid his tribute, promised the pair,     Wholesome chastisement should soon cure their qualms     Next time they came and prated and told lies:     Which stopped all prating, sent them dumb to Rome.     Well, now it was Pompilias turn to try:     The troubles pressing on her, as I said,     Three times she rushed, maddened by misery,     To the other mighty man, sobbed out her prayer     At footstool of the Archbishop fast the friend     Of her husband also! Oh, good friends of yore!     So, the Archbishop, not to be outdone     By the Governor, break custom more than he,     Thrice bade the foolish woman stop her tongue,     Unloosed her hands from harassing his gout,     Coached her and carried her to the Count again,     His old friend should be master in his house,     Rule his wife and correct her faults at need!     Well, driven from post to pillar in this wise,     She, as a last resource, betook herself     To one, should be no family-friend at least,     A simple friar o the city; confessed to him,     Then told how fierce temptation of release     By self-dealt death was busy with her soul,     And urged that he put this in words, write plain     For one who could not write, set down her prayer     That Pietro and Violante, parent-like     If somehow not her parents, should for love     Come save her, pluck from out the flame the brand     Themselves had thoughtlessly thrust in so deep     To send gay-coloured sparkles up and cheer     Their seat at the chimney-corner. The good friar     Promised as much at the moment; but, alack,     Night brings discretion: he was no ones friend,     Yet presently found he could not turn about     Nor take a step i the case and fail to tread     On someones toe who either was a friend,     Or a friends friend, or friends friend thrice-removed,     And woe to friar by whom offences come!     So, the course being plain, with a general sigh     At matrimony the profound mistake,     He threw reluctantly the business up,     Having his other penitents to mind.     If then, all outlets thus secured save one,     At last she took to the open, stood and stared     With her wan face to see where God might wait     And there found Caponsacchi wait as well     For the precious something at perditions edge.     He only was predestinate to save,     And if they recognised in a critical flash     From the zenith, each the other, her need of him,     His need of . . . say, a woman to perish for,     The regular way o the world, yet break no vow,     Do no harm save to himself, if this were thus?     How do you say? It were improbable;     So is the legend of my patron-saint.     Anyhow, whether, as Guido states the case,     Pompilia, like a starving wretch i the street     Who stops and rifles the first passenger     In the great right of an excessive wrong,     Did somehow call this stranger and he came,     Or whether the strange sudden interview     Blazed as when star and star must needs go close     Till each hurts each and there is loss in heaven     Whatever way in this strange world it was,     Pompilia and Caponsacchi met, in fine,     She at her window, he i the street beneath,     And understood each other at first look.     All was determined and performed at once     And on a certain April evening, late     I the month, this girl of sixteen, bride and wife     Three years and over, she who hitherto     Had never taken twenty steps in Rome     Beyond the church, pinned to her mothers gown,     Nor, in Arezzo, knew her way through street     Except what led to the Archbishops door,     Such an one rose up in the dark, laid hand     On what came first, clothes and a trinket or two,     Belongings of her own in the old day,     Stole from the side o the sleeping spouse who knows?     Sleeping perhaps, silent for certain, slid     Ghost-like from great dark room to great dark room,     In through the tapestries and out again     And onward, unembarrassed as a fate,     Descended staircase, gained last door of all,     Sent it wide open at first push of palm,     And there stood, first time, last and only time,     At liberty, alone in the open street,     Unquestioned, unmolested found herself     At the city gate, by Caponsacchis side,     Hope there, joy there, life and all good again,     The carriage there, the convoy there, light there     Broadening into a full blaze at Rome     And breaking small what long miles lay between;     Up she sprang, in he followed, they were safe.     The husband quotes this for incredible,     All of the story from first word to last:     Sees the priests hand throughout upholding hers,     Traces his foot to the alcove, that night,     Whither and whence blindfold he knew the way,     Proficient in all craft and stealthiness;     And cites for proof a servant, eye that watched     And ear that opened to purse secrets up,     A woman-spy, suborned to give and take     Letters and tokens, do the work of shame     The more adroitly that herself, who helped     Communion thus between a tainted pair,     Had long since been a leper thick in spot,     A common trull o the town: she witnessed all,     Helped many meetings, partings, took her wage     And then told Guido the whole matter. Lies!     The womans life confutes her word, her word     Confutes itself: Thus, thus and thus I lied.     And thus, no question, still you lie, we say.     Ay, but at last, een have it how you will,     Whatever the means, whatever the way, explodes     The consummation the accusers shriek:     Here is the wife avowedly found in flight,     And the companion of her flight, a priest;     She flies her husband, he the church his spouse:     What is this?     Wife and priest alike reply     This is the simple thing it claims to be,     A course we took for life and honours sake,     Very strange, very justifiable.     She says, God put it in my head to fly,     As when the martin migrates: autumn claps     Her hands, cries Winters coming, will be here,     Off with you ere the white teeth overtake!     Flee! So I fled: this friend was the warm day,     The south wind and whatever favours flight;     I took the favour, had the help, how else?     And so we did fly rapidly all night,     All day, all night a longer night again,     And then another day, longest of days,     And all the while, whether we fled or stopped,     I scarce know how or why, one thought filled both,     Fly and arrive! So long as I found strength     I talked with my companion, told him much,     Knowing that he knew more, knew me, knew God     And Gods disposal of me, but the sense     O the blessed flight absorbed me in the main,     And speech became mere talking through a sleep,     Till at the end of that last longest night     In a red daybreak, when we reached an inn     And my companion whispered Next stage Rome!     Sudden the weak flesh fell like piled-up cards,     All the frail fabric at a fingers touch,     And prostrate the poor soul too, and I said,     But though Count Guido were a furlong off,     Just on me, I must stop and rest awhile!     Then something like a white wave o the sea     Broke oer my brain and buried me in sleep     Blessedly, till it ebbed and left me loose,     And where was I found but on a strange bed     In a strange room like hell, roaring with noise,     Ruddy with flame, and filled with men, in front     Whom but the man you call my husband, ay     Count Guido once more between heaven and me,     For there my heaven stood, my salvation, yes     That Caponsacchi all my heaven of help,     Helpless himself, held prisoner in the hands     Of men who looked up in my husbands face     To take the fate thence he should signify,     Just as the way was at Arezzo: then,     Not for my sake but his who had helped me     I sprang up, reached him with one bound, and seized     The sword o the felon, trembling at his side,     Fit creature of a coward, unsheathed the thing     And would have pinned him through the poison-bag     To the wall and left him there to palpitate,     As you serve scorpions, but men interposed     Disarmed me, gave his life to him again     That he might take mine and the other lives,     And he has done so. I submit myself!     The priest says oh, and in the main result     The facts asseverate, he truly says,     As to the very act and deed of him,     However you mistrust the mind o the man     The flight was just for flights sake, no pretext     For aught except to set Pompilia free:     He says I cite the husbands selfs worst charge     In proof of my best word for both of us.     Be it conceded that so many times     We took our pleasure in his palace: then,     What need to fly at all? or flying no less,     What need to outrage the lips sick and white     Of a woman, and bring ruin down beside,     By halting when Rome lay one stage beyond?     So does he vindicate Pompilias fame,     Confirm her story in all points but one     This; that, so fleeing and so breathing forth     Her last strength in the prayer to halt awhile,     She makes confusion of the reddening white     Which was the sunset when her strength gave way,     And the next sunrise and its whitening red     Which she revived in when her husband came:     She mixes both times, morn and eve, in one,     Having lived through a blank of night twixt each     Though dead-asleep, unaware as a corpse,     She on the bed above; her friend below     Watched in the doorway of the inn the while,     Stood i the red o the morn, that she mistakes,     In act to rouse and quicken the tardy crew     And hurry out the horses, have the stage     Over, the last league, reach Rome and be safe:     When up came Guido.     Guidos tale begins     How he and his whole household, drunk to death     By some enchanted potion, poppied drugs     Plied by the wife, lay powerless in gross sleep     And left the spoilers unimpeded way,     Could not shake off their poison and pursue,     Till noontide, then made shift to get on horse     And did pursue: which means, he took his time,     Pressed on no more than lingered after, step     By step, just making sure o the fugitives,     Till at the nick of time, he saw his chance,     Seized it, came up with and surprised the pair.     How he must needs have gnawn lip and gnashed teeth,     Taking successively at tower and town,     Village and roadside, still the same report,     Yes, such a pair arrived an hour ago,     Sat in the carriage just where your horse stands,     While we got horses ready, turned deaf ear     To all entreaty they would even alight;     Counted the minutes and resumed their course.     Would they indeed escape, arrive at Rome,     Leave no least loop to let damnation through,     And foil him of his captured infamy,     Prize of guilt proved and perfect? So it seemed:     Till, oh the happy chance, at last stage, Rome     But two short hours off, Castelnuovo reached,     The guardian angel gave reluctant place,     Satan stepped forward with alacrity,     Pompilias flesh and blood succumbed, perforce     A halt was, and her husband had his will,     Perdue he couched, counted out hour by hour     Till he should spy in the east a signal-streak     Night had been, morrow was, triumph would be.     Do you see the plan deliciously complete?     The rush upon the unsuspecting sleep,     The easy execution, the outcry     Over the deed, Take notice all the world!     These two dead bodies, locked still in embrace,     The man is Caponsacchi and a priest,     The woman is my wife: they fled me late,     Thus have I found and you behold them thus,     And may judge me: do you approve or no?     Success did seem not so improbable,     But that already Satans laugh was heard,     His back turned on Guido left i the lurch,     Or rather, baulked of suit and service now,     That he improve on both by one deed more,     Burn up the better at no distant day,     Body and soul one holocaust to hell.     Anyhow, of this natural consequence     Did just the last link of the long chain snap:     For his eruption was o the priest, alive     And alert, calm, resolute, and formidable,     Not the least look of fear in that broad brow     One not to be disposed of by surprise,     And armed moreover who had guessed as much?     Yes, there stood he in secular costume     Complete from head to heel, with sword at side,     He seemed to know the trick of perfectly.     There was no prompt suppression of the man     As he said calmly, I have saved your wife     From death; there was no other way but this;     Of what do I defraud you except death?     Charge any wrong beyond, I answer it.     Guido, the valorous, had met his match,     Was forced to demand help instead of fight,     Bid the authorities o the place lend aid     And make the best of a broken matter so.     They soon obeyed the summons I suppose,     Apprized and ready, or not far to seek     Laid hands on Caponsacchi, found in fault,     A priest yet flagrantly accoutred thus,     Then, to make good Count Guidos further charge,     Proceeded, prisoner made lead the way,     In a crowd, upstairs to the chamber-door     Where wax-white, dead asleep, deep beyond dream,     As the priest laid her, lay Pompilia yet.     And as he mounted step by step with the crowd     How I see Guido taking heart again!     He knew his wife so well and the way of her     How at the outbreak she would shroud her shame     In hells heart, would it mercifully yawn     How, failing that, her forehead to his foot,     She would crouch silent till the great doom fell,     Leave him triumphant with the crowd to see!     Guilt motionless or writhing like a worm?     No! Second misadventure, this worm turned,     I told you: would have slain him on the spot     With his own weapon, but they seized her hands:     Leaving her tongue free, as it tolled the knell     Of Guidos hope so lively late. The past     Took quite another shape now. She who shrieked     At least and for ever I am mine and Gods,     Thanks to his liberating angel Death     Never again degraded to be yours     The ignoble noble, the unmanly man,     The beast below the beast in brutishness!     This was the froward child, the restif lamb     Used to be cherished in his breast, he groaned     Eat from his hand and drink from out his cup,     The while his fingers pushed their loving way     Through curl on curl of that soft coat alas,     And she all silverly baaed gratitude     While meditating mischief! and so forth.     He must invent another story now!     The ins and outs of the room were searched: he found     Or showed for found the abominable prize     Love-letters from his wife who cannot write,     Love-letters in reply o the priest thank God!     Who can write and confront his character     With this, and prove the false thing forged throughout:     Spitting whereat he needs must spatter who     But Guidos self? that forged and falsified     One letter called Pompilias, past dispute:     Then why not these to make sure still more sure?     So was the case concluded then and there:     Guido preferred his charges in due form,     Called on the law to adjudicate, consigned     The accused ones to the Prefect of the place.     (Oh mouse-birth of that mountain-like revenge!)     And so to his own place betook himself     After the spring that failed, the wildcats way.     The captured parties were conveyed to Rome;     Investigation followed here i the court     Soon to review the fruit of its own work,     From then to now being eight months and no more.     Guido kept out of sight and safe at home:     The Abate, brother Paolo, helped most     At words when deeds were out of question, pushed     Nearest the purple, best played deputy,     So, pleaded, Guidos representative     At the court shall soon try Guidos self, whats more,     The court that also took I told you, Sir     That statement of the couple, how a cheat     Had been i the birth of the babe, no child of theirs.     That was the prelude; this, the plays first act:     Whereof we wait what comes, crown, close of all.     Well, the result was something of a shade     On the parties thus accused, how otherwise?     Shade, but with shine as unmistakable.     Each had a prompt defence: Pompilia first     Earth was made hell to me who did no harm:     I only could emerge one way from hell     By catching at the one hand held me, so     I caught at it and thereby stepped to heaven:     If that be wrong, do with me what you will!     Then Caponsacchi with a grave grand sweep     O the arm as though his soul warned baseness off     If as a man, then much more as a priest     I hold me bound to help weak innocence:     If so my worldly reputation burst,     Being the bubble it is, why, burst it may:     Blame I can bear though not blameworthiness.     But use your sense first, see if the miscreant here     The man who tortured thus the woman, thus     Have not both laid the trap and fixed the lure     Over the pit should bury body and soul!     His facts are lies: his letters are the fact     An infiltration flavoured with himself!     As for the fancies whether . . . what is it you say?     The lady loves me, whether I love her     In the forbidden sense of your surmise,     If, with the midday blaze of truth above,     The unlidded eye of God awake, aware,     You needs must pry about and track the course     Of each stray beam of light may traverse earth,     To the nights sun and Lucifer himself,     Do so, at other time, in other place,     Not now nor here! Enough that first to last     I never touched her lip nor she my hand     Nor either of us thought a thought, much less     Spoke a word which the Virgin might not hear.     Be that your question, thus I answer it.     Then the court had to make its mind up, spoke.     It is a thorny question, and a tale     Hard to believe, but not impossible:     Who can be absolute for either side?     A middle course is happily open yet.     Here has a blot surprised the social blank,     Whether through favour, feebleness, or fault,     No matter, leprosy has touched our robe     And were unclean and must be purified.     Here is a wife makes holiday from home,     A priest caught playing truant to his church,     In masquerade moreover: both allege     Enough excuse to stop our lifted scourge     Which else would heavily fall. On the other hand,     Here is a husband, ay and man of mark,     Who comes complaining here, demands redress     As if he were the pattern of desert     The while those plaguy allegations frown,     Forbid we grant him the redress he seeks.     To all men be our moderation known!     Rewarding none while compensating each,     Hurting all round though harming nobody,     Husband, wife, priest, scot-free not one shall scape,     Yet priest, wife, husband, boast the unbroken head     From application of our excellent oil:     So that whatever be the fact, in fine,     It makes no miss of justice in a sort.     First, let the husband stomach as he may,     His wife shall neither be returned him, no     Nor branded, whipped, and caged, but just consigned     To a convent and the quietude she craves;     So is he rid of his domestic plague:     What better thing can happen to a man?     Next, let the priest retire unshent, unshamed,     Unpunished as for perpetrating crime,     But relegated (not imprisoned, Sirs!)     Sent for three years to clarify his youth     At Civita, a rest by the way to Rome:     There let his life skim off its last of lees     Nor keep this dubious colour. Judged the cause:     All parties may retire, content, we hope.     Thats Romes way, the traditional road of law;     Whither it leads is what remains to tell.     The priest went to his relegation-place,     The wife to her convent, brother Paolo     To the arms of brother Guido with the news     And this beside his charge was countercharged;     The Comparini, his old brace of hates,     Were breathed and vigilant and venomous now     Had shot a second bolt where the first stuck,     And followed up the pending dowry-suit     By a procedure should release the wife     From so much of the marriage-bond as barred     Escape when Guido turned the screw too much     On his wifes flesh and blood, as husband may.     No more defence, she turned and made attack,     Claimed now divorce from bed and board, in short:     Pleaded such subtle strokes of cruelty,     Such slow sure siege laid to her body and soul,     As, proved, and proofs seemed coming thick and fast,     Would gain both freedom and the dowry back     Even should the first suit leave them in his grasp:     So urged the Comparini for the wife.     Guido had gained not one of the good things     He grasped at by his creditable plan     O the flight and following and the rest: the suit     That smouldered late was fanned to fury new,     This adjunct came to help with fiercer fire,     While he had got himself a quite new plague     Found the worlds face an universal grin     At this last best of the Hundred Merry Tales     Of how a young and spritely clerk devised     To carry off a spouse that moped too much,     And cured her of the vapours in a trice:     And how the husband, playing Vulcans part,     Told by the Sun, started in hot pursuit     To catch the lovers, and came halting up,     Cast his net and then called the Gods to see     The convicts in their rosy impudence     Whereat said Mercury, Would that I were Mars!     Oh it was rare, and naughty all the same!     Brief, the wifes courage and cunning, the priests show     Of chivalry and adroitness, last not least,     The husband how he neer showed teeth at all,     Whose bark had promised biting; but just sneaked     Back to his kennel, tail twixt legs, as twere,     All this was hard to gulp down and digest.     So pays the devil his liegeman, brass for gold.     But this was at Arezzo: here in Rome     Brave Paolo bore up against it all     Battled it out, nor wanting to himself     Nor Guido nor the House whose weight he bore     Pillar-like, not by force of arm but brain.     He knew his Rome, what wheels we set to work;     Plied influential folk, pressed to the ear     Of the efficacious purple, pushed his way     To the old Popes self, past decency indeed,     Praying him take the matter in his hands     Out of the regular courts incompetence;     But times are changed and nephews out of date     And favouritism unfashionable: the Pope     Said Render Csar what is Csars due!     As for the Comparinis counter-plea,     He met that by a counter-plea again,     Made Guido claim divorce with help so far     By the trials issue: for, why punishment     However slight unless for guiltiness     However slender? and a molehill serves     Much as a mountain of offence this way.     So was he gathering strength on every side     And growing more and more to menace when     All of a terrible moment came the blow     That beat down Paolos fence, ended the play     O the foil and brought Mannaia on the stage.     Five months had passed now since Pompilias flight,     Months spent in peace among the Convert nuns:     This, being, as it seemed, for Guidos sake     Solely, what pride might call imprisonment     And quote as something gained, to friends at home,     This naturally was at Guidos charge:     Grudge it he might, but penitential fare,     Prayers, preachings, who but he defrayed the cost?     So, Paolo dropped, as proxy, doit by doit     Like hearts blood, till whats here? What notice comes?     The Convents self makes application bland     That, since Pompilias health is fast o the wane,     She may have leave to go combine her cure     Of soul with cure of body, mend her mind     Together with her thin arms and sunk eyes     That want fresh air outside the convent-wall,     Say in a friendly house, and which so fit     As a certain villa in the Pauline way,     That happens to hold Pietro and his wife,     The natural guardians? Oh, and shift the care     You shift the cost, too; Pietro pays in turn,     And lightens Guido of a load! And then,     Villa or convent, two names for one thing,     Always the sojourn means imprisonment,     Domum pro carcere nowise we relax,     Nothing abate: how answers Paolo?     You,     What would you answer? All so smooth and fair,     Even Pauls astuteness sniffed no harm i the world.     He authorised the transfer, saw it made,     And, two months after, reaped the fruit of the same,     Having to sit down, rack his brain and find     What phrase should serve him best to notify     Our Guido that by happy providence     A son and heir, a babe was born to him     I the villa, go tell sympathising friends!     Yes, such had been Pompilias privilege:     She, when she fled, was one month gone with child,     Known to herself or unknown, either way     Availing to explain (say men of art)     The strange and passionate precipitance     Of maiden startled into motherhood     Which changes body and soul by natures law.     So when the she-dove breeds, strange yearnings come     For the unknown shelter by undreamed-of shores,     And there is born a blood-pulse in her heart     To fight if needs be, though with flap of wing,     For the wool-flock or the fur-tuft, though a hawk     Contest the prize, wherefore, she knows not yet.     Anyhow, thus to Guido came the news.     I shall have quitted Rome ere you arrive     To take the one step left, wrote Paolo.     Then did the winch o the winepress of all hate,     Vanity, disappointment, grudge, and greed,     Take the last turn that screws out pure revenge     With a bright bubble at the brim beside     By an heirs birth he was assured at once     O the main prize, all the money in dispute:     Pompilias dowry might revert to her     Or stay with him as laws caprice should point,     But now now what was Pietros shall be hers,     What was hers shall remain her own, if hers,     Why then, oh, not her husbands but her heirs!     That heir being his too, all grew his at last     By this road or by that road, since they join.     Before, why, push he Pietro out o the world,     The current of the money stopped, you see,     Pompilia being proved no Pietros child:     Or let it be Pompilias life he quenched,     Again the current of the money stopped,     Guido debarred his rights as husband soon,     So the new process threatened; now, the chance,     Now, the resplendent minute! Clear the earth,     Cleanse the house, let the three but disappear     A child remains, depositary of all,     That Guido may enjoy his own again!     Repair all losses by a master-stroke,     Wipe out the past, all done and left undone,     Swell the good present to best evermore,     Die into new life, which let blood baptise!     So, i the blue of a sudden sulphur-blaze,     And why there was one step to take at Rome,     And why he should not meet with Paolo there,     He saw the ins and outs to the heart of hell     And took the straight line thither swift and sure.     He rushed to Vittiano, found four sons o the soil,     Brutes of his breeding, with one spark i the clod     That served for a soul, the looking up to him     Or aught called Franceschini as life, death,     Heaven, hell, lord paramount, assembled these,     Harangued, equipped, instructed, pressed each clod     With his wills imprint; then took horse, plied spur,     And so arrived, all five of them, at Rome     On Christmas-Eve, and forthwith found themselves     Installed i the vacancy and solitude     Left them by Paolo, the considerate man     Who, good as his word, disappeared at once     As if to leave the stage free. A whole week     Did Guido spend in study of his part,     Then played it fearless of a failure. One,     Struck the years clock whereof the hours are days,     And off was rung o the little wheels the chime     Goodwill on earth and peace to man: but, two,     Proceeded the same bell and, evening come,     The dreadful five felt finger-wise their way     Across the town by blind cuts and black turns     To the little lone suburban villa; knocked     Who may be outside? called a well-known voice.     A friend of Caponsacchis bringing friends     A letter.     Thats a test, the excusers say:     Ay, and a test conclusive, I return.     What? Had that name brought touch of guilt or taste     Of fear with it, aught to dash the present joy     With memory of the sorrow just at end,     She, happy in her parents arms at length     With the new blessing of the two weeks babe,     How had that names announcement moved the wife?     Or, as the other slanders circulate,     Were Caponsacchi no rare visitant     On nights and days whither safe harbour lured,     What bait had been i the name to ope the door?     The promise of a letter? Stealthy guests     Have secret watchwords, private entrances:     The mans own self might have been found inside     And all the scheme made frustrate by a word.     No: but since Guido knew, none knew so well,     The man had never since returned to Rome     Nor seen the wifes face more than villas front,     So, could not be at hand to warn or save,     For that, he took this sure way to the end.     Come in, bade poor Violante cheerfully,     Drawing the door-bolt: that death was the first,     Stabbed through and through. Pietro, close on her heels,     Set up a cry Let me confess myself!     Grant but confession! Cold steel was the grant.     Then came Pompilias turn.     Then they escaped.     The noise o the slaughter roused the neighbourhood.     They had forgotten just the one thing more     Which saves i the circumstance, the ticket to wit     Which puts post-horses at a travellers use:     So, all on foot, desperate through the dark     Reeled they like drunkards along open road,     Accomplished a prodigious twenty miles     Homeward, and gained Baccano very near,     Stumbled at last, deaf, dumb, blind through the feat,     Into a grange and, one dead heap, slept there     Till the pursuers hard upon their trace     Reached them and took them, red from head to heel,     And brought them to the prison where they lie.     The couple were laid i the church two days ago,     And the wife lives yet by miracle.     All is told.     You hardly need ask what Count Guido says,     Since something he must say. I own the deed     (He cannot choose, but ) I declare the same     Just and inevitable, since no way else     Was left me, but by this of taking life,     To save my honour which is more than life.     I exercised a husbands rights. To which     The answer is as prompt There was no fault     In any one o the three to punish thus:     Neither i the wife, who kept all faith to you,     Nor in the parents, whom yourself first duped,     Robbed and maltreated, then turned out of doors.     You wronged and they endured wrong; yours the fault.     Next, had endurance overpassed the mark     And turned resentment needing remedy,     Nay, put the absurd impossible case, for once     You were all blameless of the blame alleged     And they blameworthy where you fix all blame,     Still, why this violation of the law?     Yourself elected law should take its course,     Avenge wrong, or show vengeance not your right;     Why, only when the balance in laws hand     Trembles against you and inclines the way     O the other party, do you make protest,     Renounce arbitrament, flying out of court,     And crying Honours hurt the sword must cure?     Aha, and so i the middle of each suit     Trying i the courts, and you had three in play     With an appeal to the Popes self beside,     What, you may chop and change and right your wrongs     Leaving the law to lag as she thinks fit?     That were too temptingly commodious, Count!     One would have still a remedy in reserve     Should reach the safest oldest sinner, you see!     Ones honour forsooth? Does that take hurt alone     From the extreme outrage? I who have no wife,     Being yet sensitive in my degree     As Guido, must discover hurt elsewhere     Which, half compounded-for in days gone by,     May profitably break out now afresh,     Need cure from my own expeditious hands.     The lie that was, as it were, imputed me     When you objected to my contracts clause,     The theft as good as, one may say, alleged,     When you, co-heir in a will, excepted, Sir,     To my administration of effects,     Aha, do you think law disposed of these?     My honours touched and shall deal death around!     Count, that were too commodious, I repeat!     If any law be imperative on us all,     Of all are you the enemy: out with you     From the common light and air and life of man!