CHAPTER II

THE scene just related took place in Venice about a hundred years ago, in the church of the Mendicanti, where the celebrated maestro Porpora had just rehearsed the grand vespers which he was to direct on the following Assumption-day. The young choristers whom he had so smartly scolded were pupils of the state schools, in which they were instructed at the expense of government and afterwards received a dowry preparatory to marriage or the cloister, as Jean Jacques Rousseau, who admired their magnificent voices at the same period and in the same church, has observed. He mentions the circumstance in the charming episode in the eighth book of his "Confessions." I shall not here transcribe those two admirable pages, lest the friendly reader, whose example under similar circumstances I should certainly imitate, might be unable to resume my own. Hoping, then, that the aforesaid confessions are not at hand, I continue my narrative.

All these young ladies were not equally poor. Notwithstanding the strictness of the administration, it is certain that some gained admission, to whom it was a matter of speculation rather than necessity to receive an artistic education at the expense of the republic. For this reason it was that some permitted themselves to forget the sacred laws of equality, thanks to which they had been enabled to take their seats clandestinely along with their poorer sisters. All, therefore, did not fulfil the intentions of the austere republic respecting their future lot. From time to time there were numbers who, having received their gratuitous education, renounced their dowry to seek a more brilliant fortune elsewhere. The administration, seeing that this was inevitable, had sometimes admitted to the course of instruction the children of poor artists, whose wandering existence did not permit them a long stay in Venice. Among this number was the little Consuelo, born in Spain, and arriving from thence in Italy by the route of St. Petersburg, Constantinople, Mexico, Archangel, or any other still more direct after the eccentric fashion of the Bohemians.

Nevertheless, she hardly merited this appellation; for she was neither Hindoo nor gipsy, and still less of any of the tribes of Israel. She was of good Spanish blood—doubtless with a tinge of the Moresco; and though somewhat swarthy, she had a tranquillity of manner which was quite foreign to any of the wandering races. I do not wish to say any thing ill of the latter. If I had invented the character of Consuelo, I do not pretend that I would have traced her parentage from Israel, or even further; but she was altogether, as everything about her organization betrayed, of the family of Ishmael. To be sure I never saw her, not being a century old, but I was told so and I cannot contradict it. She had none of the feverish petulance, alternated by fits of apathetic languor, which distinguishes the zingarella; neither had she the insinuating curiosity nor the frontless audacity of Hebrew mendicancy. She was calm as the water of the lagunes, and at the same time active as the light gondolas that skimmed along their surface.

As she was growing rapidly and as her mother was very poor, her clothes were always a year too short, which gave to her long legs of fourteen years' growth, accustomed to show themselves in public, a sort of savage grace which one was pleased and at the same time sorry to see. Whether her foot was large or not, it was impossible to say, her shoes were so bad. On the other hand, her figure, confined in narrow stays ripped at every seam, was elastic and flexible as a palm-tree, but without form, fulness, or attraction. She, poor girl! thought nothing about it, accustomed as she was to hear herself called a gipsy and a wanderer by the fair daughters of the Adriatic. Her face was round, sallow, and insignificant, and would have struck nobody, if her short thick hair fastened behind her ears, and at the same time her serious and indifferent demeanor, had not given her a singularity of aspect which was but little attractive. Faces which do not please at first, by degrees lose still more the power of pleasing. The beings to whom they belong, indifferent to others, become so to themselves, and assume a negligence of aspect which repels more and more. On the contrary, beauty observes, admires, and decks itself as it were in an imaginary mirror which is always before its eyes. Ugliness forgets itself and is passed by. Nevertheless, there are two sorts of ugliness: one which suffers, and protests against the general disapprobation by habitual rage and envy—this is the true, the only ugliness. The other, ingenuous, careless, which goes quietly on its way, neither inviting nor shunning comparisons, and which wins the heart while it shocks the sense—such was the ugliness of Consuelo. Those who were sufficiently generous to interest themselves about her, at first regretted that she was not pretty; and then, correcting themselves, and patting her head with a familiarity which beauty does not permit, added—"After all, you are a good creature;" and Consuelo was perfectly satisfied, although she knew very well that that meant, "You are nothing more."

In the meantime, the young and handsome signor who had offered her the holy water at the font, stayed behind till he had seen all the scholars disappear. He looked at them with attention, and when Clorinda, the handsomest, passed near him, he held out his moistened fingers that he might have the pleasure of touching hers. The young girl blushed with pride, and passed on, casting as she did so one of those glances of shame mixed with boldness, which are expressive neither of self-respect nor modesty.

As soon as they had disappeared in the interior of the convent, the gallant patrician returned to the nave, and addressed the preceptor, who was descending more slowly the steps of the tribune.

"Corpo di bacco! dear maestro," said he, "will you tell me which of your pupils sang the 'Salve Regina?'"

"And why do you wish to know, Count Zustiniani?" said the professor, accompanying him out of the church.

"To compliment you on your pupil," replied the patrician. "You know how long I have attended vespers, and even the exercises; for you are aware what a dilettante I am in sacred music. Well, this is the first time that I have heard Pergolese sung in so perfect a manner, and as to the voice, it is the most beautiful that I have ever listened to.

"I believe it well," replied the professor, inhaling a large pinch of snuff with dignity and satisfaction.

"Tell me then the name of this celestial creature who has thrown me into such an ecstasy. In spite of your severity and your continual fault-finding, you have created the best school in all Italy. Your choruses are excellent, and your solos very good; but your music is so severe, so grand, that young girls can hardly be expected to express its beauties."

"They do not express them," said the professor mournfully, "because they do not feel them. Good voices, God be thanked, we do not want; but as for a good musical organization, alas, it is hardly to be met with!"

"You possess at least one admirably endowed. Her organ is magnificent, her sentiment perfect, her skill remarkable—name her, then."

"Is it not so?" said the professor, evading the question; "did it not delight you?"

"It took my heart by storm—it even drew tears from me—and that by means so simple, combinations so little sought after, that at first I could hardly understand it. Then I remembered what you had so often told me touching your divine art, my dear master, and for the first time I understood how much you were in the right."

"And what did I say to you?" said the maestro, with an air of triumph.

"You told me," replied the count, "that simplicity is the essence of the great, the true, the beautiful in art."

"I also told you that there was often reason to observe and applaud what was clever, and brilliant, and well combined."

"Doubtless; but between these secondary qualities and the true manifestations of genius, there was an abyss, you said. Very well, dear maestro: your cantatrice is alone on one side, while all the rest are on the other."

"It is not less true than well expressed," observed the professor, rubbing his hands.

"Her name?" replied the count.

"What name?" rejoined the malicious professor.

"Oh, per Dio Santo! that of the siren whom I have just been hearing."

"What do you want with her name, Signor Count?" replied Porpora, in a tone of severity.

"Why should you wish to make a secret of it, maestro?"

"I will tell you why, if you will let me know what object you have in finding out."

"Is it not a natural and irresistible feeling to wish to see and to know the objects of our admiration?"

"Ah! that is not your only motive. My dear Count, pardon me for thus contradicting you, You are a skillful amateur and a profound connoisseur in music, as every body knows; but you are, over and above all, proprietor of the theater of San Samuel. It is your glory and your interest alike, to encourage the loftiest talent and the finest voices of Italy. Yon know that our instruction is good, and that with us alone those studies are pursued which form great musicians. You have already carried off Corilla from me, as she will one day be carried off from you by an engagement in some other theater; so you are come to spy about, to see if you can't get a hold of some other Corilla—if, indeed, we have formed one. That is the truth, Signor Count, you must admit."

"And were it even so, dear maestro," replied the count, smiling, "what would it signify to you?—where is the harm?"

"It is a great deal of harm, Signor Count. Is it nothing to corrupt, to destroy these poor creatures?"

"Ha! my most austere professor, how long have you been the guardian angel of their tender virtues?"

"I know very well, Signor Count, I have nothing to do with them, except as regards their talent, which you disfigure and disgrace in your theaters by giving them inferior music to sing. Is it not heart-rending—is it not shameful—to see Corilla, who was just beginning to understand our serious art, descend from the sacred to the profane—from prayer to badinage—from the altar to the boards—from the sublime to the absurd—from Allegri and Palestrina to Albinoni and the barber Apollini?"

"So you refuse, in your severity, to name a girl respecting whom I can have no intention, seeing that I do not know whether she has the necessary qualifications for the theater?"

"I absolutely refuse."

"And do you suppose I shall not find it out?"

"Alas! you will do so if you are bent upon it, but I shall do my utmost to prevent you from taking her from us."

"Very well, maestro, you are half conquered, for I have seen her—I have divined your mysterious divinity."

"So, so," replied the master, with a reserved and distrustful air; "are you sure of that?"

"My eyes and my heart have alike revealed her to me, and, that you may be convinced, I shall describe her to you. She is tall—taller, I think, than any of your pupils—fair as the snow on Friuli, and rosy as the dawn of a summer morn; she has flaxen hair, azure eyes, an exquisitely rounded form, with a ruby on her finger which burned my hand as I touched it, like sparks from a magic fire."

"Bravo!" exclaimed Porpora, with a cunning air; "in that case I have nothing to conceal. The name of your beauty is Clorinda. Go and pay your court to her; gain her over with gold, with diamonds, and gay attire. You will easily conclude an engagement with her. She will help you to replace Corilla; for the public of your theater always prefer fine shoulders to sweet sounds, flashing eyes to a lofty intellect."

"Am I then mistaken, my dear maestro?" said the count, a little confused; "and is Clorinda but a commonplace beauty?"

"But suppose my siren, my divinity, my angel, as you are pleased to call her," resumed the maestro, maliciously, "was anything but a beauty?"

"If she be deformed, I beseech you not to name her, for my illusion would be too cruelly dissipated. If she were only ugly, I could still adore her; but I should not engage her for the theater, because talent without beauty is a misfortune, a struggle, a perpetual torment for a woman. What are you looking at, maestro, and why do you pause?"

"Why? because we are at the water-steps, and I see no gondola. But you, Count, what do you look at?"

"I was looking to see if that young fellow on the steps there, beside that plain little girl, was not my protegé, Anzoleto, the handsomest and most intelligent of all our little plebeians. Look at him, dear maestro. Do you not, like me, feel interested in him? That boy has the sweetest tenor in Venice, and he is passionately fond of music, for which he has an incredible aptitude. I have long wished to speak to you about it, and to ask you to give him lessons. I look upon him as the future support of my theater, and hope in a few years to be repaid for all my trouble. Hola, Zoto! come hither, my child, that I may present you to the illustrious master Porpora."

Anzoleto drew his naked legs out of the water, where they hung carelessly while he amused himself stringing those pretty shells which in Venice are poetically termed fioro di mare. His only garments were a pair of well-worn pantaloons and a fine shirt, through the rents of which one could see his white shoulders, modeled like those of a youthful Bacchus. He had all the grace and beauty of a young Fawn, chiseled in the palmiest days of Grecian art; and his features displayed that singular union, not unfrequent in the creations of Grecian statuary, of careless irony with dreamy melancholy. His fine fair hair, somewhat bronzed by the sun, clustered in Antinöus-like curls about his alabaster neck; his features were regular and beautifully formed; but there was something bold and forward in the expression of his jet-black eyes which displeased the maestro. The boy promptly rose when he heard the voice of Zustiniani, pitched his shells into the lap of the little girl beside him, who without raising her eyes went on with her occupation of stringing them along with golden beads, and coming forward, kissed the count's hand, after the fashion of the country.

"Upon my word, a handsome fellow!" said the professor, giving him a tap on the cheek; "but he seems occupied with amusements rather childish for his time of life: he is fully eighteen years old, is he not?"

"Nineteen shortly, Sior Professor," replied Anzoleto in the Venetian dialect; "but if I amuse myself with shells it is to help little Consuelo here to make her necklaces."

"Consuelo," said the master, advancing toward his pupil with the count and Anzoleto, "I did not imagine that you cared for ornaments."

"Oh, it is not for myself, Signor," replied Consuelo, rising cautiously to prevent the shells falling from her lap; "I make them for sale in order to procure rice and Indian corn."

"She is poor and supports her mother," said Porpora. "Listen, Consuelo: should you find yourself in any difficulty, be sure to come and see me: but I absolutely forbid you to beg, remember."

"Oh, you need not forbid her, Sior Professor," replied Anzoleto with animation; "she will never do so; and beside I would prevent her."

"But you have nothing," said the count.

"Nothing but your liberality, Eccellenza; but we share together, the little one and myself."

"She is a relative, then?"

"No; she is a stranger—it is Consuelo."

"Consuelo! what a singular name!" said the count.

"A beautiful name, Eccellenza," resumed Anzoleto; "it means Consolation."

"Oh, indeed? She is your friend then, it appears?"

"She is my betrothed, Signor."

"So soon? Such children! to think of marriage already!"

"We shall marry on the day that you sign my engagement at San Samuel, Eccellenza."

"In that case you will have to wait a long time, my little ones."

"Oh, we shall wait," replied Consuelo, with the cheerful gaiety of innocence."

The count and the maestro amused themselves for some time longer with the frank remarks and repartees of the young couple; then having arranged that Anzoleto should give the professor an opportunity of hearing his voice in the morning, they separated, leaving him to his serious occupations.

"What do you think of that little girl?" said the professor to Zustiniani.

"I saw her but an instant, and I find her sufficiently ugly to justify the maxim, that in the eyes of a youth of eighteen every woman is handsome."

"Very good," rejoined the professor; "now permit me to inform you that your divine songstress, your siren, your mysterious beauty, was no other than Consuelo."

"What! that sooty creature? that dark and meager grasshopper? Impossible, maestro!"

"No other, Signor Count. Would she not make a fascinating prima donna?"

The count stopped, looked back, and clasping his hands while he surveyed Consuelo at a distance, exclaimed in mock despair, "Just Heaven! how canst thou so err as to pour the fire of genius into heads so poorly formed?"

"So you give up your culpable intentions?" said the professor.

"Most certainly."

"You promise me?" added Porpora.

"Oh, I swear it," replied the count.