A Siren Read online

  CHAPTER III

  St. Apollinare in Classe

  The Marchese remained at the ball to see one more dance between Ludovicoand Bianca after their supper; and then left the rooms. There wasnothing at all to cause remark in his thus retiring before the evening.He never danced;--he happened not to be playing cards on that evening.It was quite natural that such a man should prefer going home to bed toremaining with the jeunes gens till the break-up of the ball.

  How he enjoyed that last dance, which he stayed to see, the reader mayperhaps imagine. Standing by a chimney-piece, on one corner of which herested his elbow, he in great measure shaded his face with his hand, yetnot so as to prevent him from seeing every movement of the persons, andevery expression of the faces of the couple he was watching. There was araging hell in his heart. And yet he stood there, and gazed eagerly,greedily one would have said. And every minute, and every movementblasted his eyes and stabbed his heart, and poured poison into hisveins.

  When the dance was over he did not move for some time; for he doubtedhis power to hold himself upright and walk steadily. Presently, however,when Ludovico and Bianca had again quitted the ball-room together, hegathered himself up, and moved slowly away, shaking in every limb, pale,fever-lipped, and haggard.

  The man who gave him his cloak in the ante-room remarked to anotherservant, as soon as he was gone, that he would bet that the MarcheseLamberto would not be at the next Carnival ball.

  At six o'clock, with wonderful punctuality for an Italian, Ludovico,with a neat little bagarino and fast-trotting pony, was at the door ofthe Diva's lodging. But Bianca was not ready. Her maid came down to thedoor with all sorts of apologies, and assurances that her mistress wouldbe ready in a few minutes. The few minutes, however, became half anhour, as minutes will under such circumstances. And the result of thisdelay was that Ludovico and his companion were not the first travellersout of the Porta Nuova that morning.

  During the whole of the past Carnival and the latter months of theprevious year there had been living in Ravenna a young girl,--an artistfrom Venice, who had come to Ravenna with a commission given her by atravelling Englishman to make copies of some of the more remarkable ofthe very extraordinary and unique series of mosaics which exist in theold imperial city. She had brought with her a letter of introductionfrom her employer to the Marchese Lamberto,--a circumstance which hadled to a degree of intimacy between the Marchesino Ludovico and theextremely attractive young artist, which threatened to stand more orless in the way of the match which had been arranged by thehigh-contracting parties between Ludovico and the Lady Violante, thegreat niece of the Cardinal. The girl's name was Paolina Foscarelli.

  It is probable that in due time and season the reader may become betteracquainted with Paolina. But at present there is no need of troublinghim with more particulars respecting her than the above, save to mentionthat, having industriously and successfully completed the greaterportion of her task in the churches within the city, she had determinedto make her first visit to the strange old Basilica of St. Apollinare inClasse, on that same Ash Wednesday morning. She did not purposebeginning her task there on that day; but intended merely to reconnoitrethe ground, look to the needful preparations that had been made for herwork, and ascertain how far the spot was within her powers of walking.

  Paolina, too, had felt that the morning of Ash Wednesday was afavourable time for the first experiment of an undertaking that a littlealarmed her. For she also had calculated that on such a morning sheshould be little likely to meet anybody. It was just about six o'clockwhen Paolina started on her proposed walk; and she passed through thePorta Nuova, therefore, a little more than half-an-hour before Ludovicoand his companion passed, travelling in the same direction.

  The road, which it was necessary for her to follow in order to reach St.Apollinare in Classe, is the same for the whole of the distance betweenthe city and the ancient church as that which Ludovico and Bianca wouldfollow to reach the celebrated pine forest. The soil on which the foreststands is composed of the accumulation of sand which the rivers--mainlythe Po--have brought from distant mountains, and deposited in the bed ofthe Adriatic since the old church was built "in Classe,"--where thefleet once used to be moored. The building thus stands nearly at theedge of the forest, hardly more than a stone's throw from the furthestadvanced sentinels of the wood. The road coming out from the city by thePorta Nuova, on its way to the little town of Cervia, a few miles to thesouthward, traverses ground once thickly covered with palaces, streets,and churches, now open fields,--and passes by the western front anddoorway of the almost deserted old Basilica, a little before it reachesthe turning off towards the left, which enters the forest.

  The walk before Paolina, when she had passed the city gate, was abouttwo miles or rather more. So that had La Bianca taken a few less minutesto put the finishing touches to the charming morning toilette whichreplaced the gorgeous Venetian costume she had taken off, the bagarinowhich carried her and Ludovico would infallibly have overtaken the youngartist. As it was, however, having more than half-an-hour's start of it,she reached the church before they came within sight of it.

  Little Paolina had felt rather nervous when first stepping into the coolfresh morning air from the door of the lodging she occupied. But thestreet was utterly empty, and she took courage. The first human beingsshe saw on her way were the octroi officers at the gate. They satapparently half asleep at the doorway of their den, by the side of thecity gate, wrapped in huge cloaks; and took not even so much heed of heras to say "Good morning."

  The long bit of straight flat road outside the gate was equallydeserted; and Paolina, braced by the morning air, stepped outvigorously, and began to enjoy her walk.

  There is little enough, however, in the country through which she waspassing to delight the eye. The fields in the immediate neighbourhood ofthe city are cultivated, and not devoid of trees. But the cheerfulnessthence arising does not last long. Very soon the trees cease, and thereare no more hedge-rows. Large flat fields, imperfectly covered withcoarse rank grass, and divided by the numerous branches of streams, allmore or less diked to save the land from complete inundation, succeed.The road is a causeway raised above the level of the surroundingdistrict; and presently a huge lofty bank is seen traversing thedesolate scene for miles, and stretching away towards the shore of theneighbouring Adriatic. This is the dike which contains the sulkilytorpid but yet dangerous Montone.

  Gradually, as the traveller proceeds, the scene grows worse and worse.Soon the only kind of cultivation to be seen from the road consists ofrice-grounds, looking like--what in truth they are--poisonous swamps.Then come swamps pure and simple, too bad even to be turned into ricegrounds,--or rather simply swamps impure; for a stench at most times ofthe year comes from them, like a warning of their pestilential nature,and their unfitness for the sojourn of man. A few shaggy, wild-lookingcattle may be seen wandering over the flat waste, muddy to the shouldersfrom wading in the soft swamps. A scene of more utter desolation it ishardly possible to meet with in such close neighbourhood to a livingcity.

  Paolina shivered, and drew her little grey cloak more closely around hershoulders; not from cold, though a bleak wind was blowing across themarshes. She was warmed by walking; but the aspect of the scene beforeher almost frightened the Venetian girl by the savagery of itsdesolation.

  The raised causeway, however, keeps on its course amid the low-lyingmarshes on either side of it; and presently the peculiar form of outlinebelonging to a forest composed entirely of the maritime pine isdistinguishable on the horizon to the left. The road quickly drawsnearer to it; and the large, heavy, velvet-like masses of dark verdurebecome visible. In a forest such as the famous Pineta, consisting of themaritime pine only, the lines, especially when seen at a distance, havemore of horizontal and less of perpendicular direction than in any otherassemblage of trees. And the effect produced by the continuity ofspreading umbrella-like tops is peculiar.

  Then, soon after the forest has become visible, the
road brings thewayfarer within sight of a vast lonely structure heaving its huge longback against the low horizon, like some monster antidiluvian saurian,the fit denizen of this marsh world. It is the venerable Basilica of St.Apollinare in Classe.

  Through all this dismal scene Paolina tripped lightly along with a quickstep through the crisp morning air, no little awed by the dreary,voiceless desolation of it, but yet encouraged and not unpleased by thesolitude of it.

  The walk she found to be quite within her powers, at all events at thathour of the morning and in that season of the year; and when she stoodbefore the western door of the ancient church, in front of which theroad passes, Ludovico and Bianca were only then on the point of startingfrom the quarters of the latter, in the Strada di Porta Sisi.

  Though knowing but little of the long and strangely diversified storywhich presses on the mind of a stranger read in history as he standsbefore the door of that desolate old church, Paolina could not but bemuch struck by the appearance of the building and of the scene aroundit. If ever a spot was expressive in every way by which a locality canspeak to the imagination of the abomination of desolation, the viewwhich spreads before the eye at the huge doorway of the Basilica of St.Apollinare in Classe is so. The general character of the country aroundit has been described. But the church itself is the most dreary andmelancholy feature in the landscape. No desolation resulting solely fromthe operations of Nature, even in her least kindly mood, can eversuffice to speak to the imagination as the change and decay of the worksof man's hand speak. To produce the effect of desolation in its highestdegree man must have at some former period been present on the scene,and the remains of his work must be there to show that activity, life,energy, has once existed where it exists no more. Nature is always andeverywhere progressive, and no sentiment of sadness belongs to progress.Man's ruined work alone imparts the suggestion--(a delusive one, indeed,but most forcible)--of falling back from the better to the worse.

  Wonderfully eloquent after this fashion are the temples of Paestum, faraway there to the south beyond Naples, on the flat strip of miserablycultivated soil between the Apennines and the Mediterranean. But theyare too far gone in ruin and decay to speak with so living a voice ofsadness as does this old Byzantine church. The human element is atPaestum too far away,--too utterly dead and forgotten. In St. Apollinarelife still lingers. Life, flickering in its last spark, like thetwinkling of a lamp which the next moment will extinguish, is stillthere. Life more suggestive of death, than any utter absence of lifecould be.

  There are some dilapidated remains of conventual buildings on thesouthern side of the church, mean, and of a date some thousand yearssubsequent to that of the Basilica. They are nearly ruinous, but arestill--or were till within a few years--inhabited by one Capucin friar,and one lay brother of the order, whose duty it was to mutter a mass,with ague-chattering jaws, at the high altar, and act as guardians ofthe building.

  Small guardianship is needed. The huge ancient doors--made of planksfrom vine trunks which grew fifteen hundred years ago on theBosphorus--are never closed; probably because their weight would defythe efforts of the two poor old friars, to whom the keeping of thebuilding is committed, to move them. But a poor and mean low gate ofiron rails has been fitted to the colossal marble door-posts, whichsuffices to prevent the wandering cattle of the waste from straying intothe church, but does not prevent the fever-laden mists from the marshesfrom drifting into the huge nave, and depositing their unwholesomemoisture in great trickling drops upon the green-stained walls.

  But not even the low iron gateway was closed when Paolina reached thechurch. It stood partially open. After having stood a minute or twobefore the building to look round upon the scene, Paolina stepped up tothe gate and looked into the church, but could see no human being.Within, as without, all was utter death-like silence. She shivered, anddrew her cloak more closely round her, as she stood at the gate; for thehealthy blood was running rapidly through her veins after her briskwalk, and the deadly cold damp air from the church struck her with ashudder, which was but the physical complement of the moral impressionproduced by the aspect of the place.

  After a minute, however, wondering at the stillness, half frightened atthe utter solitude, and awed by the vast gloomy grandeur of the nakedbut venerable building, she pushed the gate, and entered.