Adventures of an Aide-de-Camp; or, A Campaign in Calabria, Volume 3 (of 3)

[Transcriber's note: This volume references page 186 in Volume 1.
In that volume search for "186" (without the quotes).]

ADVENTURES

OF

AN AIDE-DE-CAMP:

OR,

A CAMPAIGN IN CALABRIA.

BY

JAMES GRANT, ESQ.

AUTHOR OF "THE ROMANCE OF WAR."

Claud. I look'd upon her with a soldier's eye,

That liked, but had a rougher task in hand

Than to drive liking to the name of love:

But now I am returned, and that war thoughts

Have left their places vacant; in their rooms

Come thronging soft and delicate desires,

All prompting me how fair young Hero is,

Saying how I liked her ere I went to war.

SHAKSPEARE.

IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. III.

LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER, AND CO., CORNHILL.
1848.

London:
Printed by STEWART and MURRAY,
Old Bailey.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER

I.—[The Third Penitent.—The Monk]
II.—[The Monk's Story]
III.—[A Narrow Escape]
IV.—[Castelguelfo.—The Wolf of Amato]
V.—[Happiness]
VI.—[The Villa Besieged]
VII.—[The Nuptials]
VIII.—[The Tempest.—The Last of the Hunchback]
IX.—[A Military Honeymoon]
X.—[Wreck of the "Delight"]
XI.—[The Voltigeurs.—The Massacre of Bagnara]
XII.—[A Retreat In Square.—The Prisoner of War]
XIII.—[The Drum-head Court-martial]
XIV.—[Dianora.—The Forfeited Hand]
XV.—[The Monastery]
XVI.—[The Sanctuary Violated]
XVII.—[Unexpected Perils]
XVIII.—[Captured by the Enemy.—The Two Generals]
XIX.—[The Albergo.—The Bandit's Revenge]
XX.—[The Bandit's Cavern.—Recapture]
XXI.—[Joys of a Military Honeymoon]
XXII.—[The Siege of Scylla]
XXIII.—[The Fall of Scylla.—Conclusion]

ADVENTURES

OF AN

AIDE-DE-CAMP.

CHAPTER I.

THE THIRD PENITENT—THE MONK.

The escape of a second victim from the vaults caused a great surmising and anxiety at Canne; and although, no doubt, the cardinal suspected that I had a hand in the matter, he never spoke of it. The astonishment of the keeper was boundless, when he discovered his charge vanishing so unaccountably: he was accused of conspiracy, and imprisoned by order of the podesta. The poor man defended himself before the tribunal, by laying the blame upon—whom think you, gentle reader?—VIRGIL; who is regarded by the lower order of Italians less as a poet, than as a conjuror and magician, upon whose guilty head the blame of everything wicked and wonderful is laid.

Among the mountains, he has for ages been deemed the architect of every devilish contrivance, every fathomless cavern, splendid crag, fantastic rock, and ruined tower. A long dispute ensued between two learned lawyers, concerning the question whether it might or might not have been Virgil; and the decision was given for the prisoner, on the testimony of the chiavaro, or smith: who declared that a venerable man with a white beard, meagre aspect, and eyes like living coals, had ordered a set of keys like those produced in court, for which he paid in strange and antique coin; and when he (the chiavaro) looked for them next day, they had vanished from his pouch, showing plainly that they were coins of hell. All present crossed themselves; and the keeper was immediately set at liberty, and restored to his dignity and bunch of keys.

Of the Cavalier Paola, I had intelligence before leaving Canne. Gathering together a band of those bold spirits who infested the wilds of the Brettian forest, he fired the palace of his foe, the bishop; who narrowly escaped with a severe bullet wound, of which he soon after died. For this outrage, Casteluccio had to pay many a bright ducat to the altars of mother church, before he was permitted to resume his place in society; and it was not until the death of Murat that he obtained peaceable possession of his patrimony at Cosenza.

Several days elapsed without the appearance of the Roman courier, and I became very impatient to rejoin my regiment. Notwithstanding the risk of discovery, prompted equally by curiosity and humanity, I made a last visit to those frightful vaults, to free the remaining captive.

The stillness of midnight was around me when I entered, but a noisy singing rang through the echoing cells; the measure was a boisterous sailor's carol, such as I had often heard the fishermen singing, as they sat mending their nets on the shore of Messina.

I beheld in the third captive, an Italian, about forty years of age, possessing a powerful and savage aspect, strongly chained to a large stone which served him for a chair and table, while a pile of straw between it and the wall formed his bed. He was flourishing his arms and snapping his fingers whilst he sang; but ceased on my entrance, and regarded me with a sullen stare of surprise. A large leathern flask, which stood on the stone near him, explained the cause of his merriment.

"Ha! thou cursed owl that pokest about in the night, what seek you here, when you should be snug in the dormitory? Up helm and away, black devil! there's no girl here to confess—no one but Lancelloti of Fruili, a born imp of Etna, who will break every bone in your hypocritical body, if it comes within reach of his grapnels!"

"The pirate—the companion of Petronio!" I exclaimed; "are you that Lancelloti of whom I have heard so much? Astonishing!"

"Ho! ho! what are you talking about?" asked the captive, rolling his great head about. "I tell you, Signor Canonico, that I am Osman Carora, a jovial monk of Friuli—(what am I saying?) yes, Friuli—would I was there again! Never have I seen a prospect equal to the fair Carinthian mountains, and the deep rocky dales through which the Isonza sweeps, on to the Gulf of Trieste. It was my hap to look for many a dreary day through the iron bars of my dormitory on that gulf, and afterwards to sail, with royals and sky-sails set, every rope a-taunto, and the red flag of Mahomet flying at the foremast head. Accursed bishop! I may revenge me yet, if the good friend who brings me this jolly flask every night proves true. Ah, Truffi, though crooked in form and cross in spirit, thou art an angel of light to me!"

"Truffi!" said I; "mean you Gaspare?"

The renegade, moved alternately by brutality, rage, and maudlin sentimentality, burst into a shout of drunken laughter.

"You know him—ha! ha! and are a jolly priest after all. Alla akbar! instead of a prying monkish spy, I find you a comrade. Thou who knowest Gaspare must doubtless have heard of me. He is now in Canne, planning my escape from this cursed cockpit; to which the double-dyed villany of Petronio has consigned me. Gaspare was my stanch gossip in the cloisters of Friuli, and my master-at-arms and fac-totum on board the Crescent: his ingenuity alone saved me when I had nearly fallen into the clutches of the grand bailiff, for slaying the Capitano Batello. Fi! the recollection of that adventure haunts me yet: the glazing eyes, the clenched teeth, the pale visage, and the gleaming sword; the silver hairs, and the old man's blood streaming on the white dress and whiter bosom of his daughter! "O, cursed flask!" said the ruffian, pausing to squeeze the leathern bottle. "May every monk and mollah anathematize thee in the name of Christ and Mahomet; for thou art now empty, useless, and upon thy vacuity I cry anathema! Beautiful wert thou indeed, Paula Batello, and too pure a being for such a serpent as Lancelloti to behold!"

"Caro signor, I would gladly hear her story?"

"And so thou shalt: firstly, because thou art a comrade of our Apollo with the hump; secondly, because I would like to hear thy opinion upon it; and thirdly, because I love to have some one to talk to in this blasted vault, whose walls I would that Satan rent asunder and ruined for ever." And without further preface, he commenced the following story; which deserves a chapter to itself.

CHAPTER II.

THE MONK'S STORY.

The Capitano Batello was an old soldier of the Venetian Republic, who, after an active life, retired to spend the winter of his days among the woody solitudes of Friuli. All the village loved the good old capitano, who made wooden swords and flags for the children, and retailed his campaigns and adventures a thousand times to the frequenters of the cantina, where he was the military and political oracle; and at mass, all made way for the white-haired old man, when he came slowly marching up the aisle, with the Signorina Paula leaning on his arm. The old soldier's doublet was perhaps a little threadbare, or his broad hat glazed at the edge; yet he never forgot his rank, even when struggling for existence with half a ducatoon a day.

But Paula, the gentle-voiced, the blue-eyed and fair-haired Paula, was the admiration of all—the glory of the village; and the old captain watched her as a miser would a precious jewel. Beard of Ali! she would have brought a princely sum at Algiers.

She was beautiful, and her soft blue eyes looked one fully and searchingly in the face with all the confidence of perfect innocence. Her mother was gone to heaven, as the captain said, when he engaged me as tutor to Paula and her brother: an office for which I received a trifle, that went into the treasury of San Baldassare—a trap which swallowed everything. The boy, Rosario, was a chubby little rogue, and for a time I took pleasure in hearing their lisping accents, as they conned over their task in an arbour which Paula's hands had formed at the back of their little cottage.

Thunder! how often have I looked back with astonishment on those days, when on the gun-deck of the Crescent I stood at the head of five hundred of the boldest hearts of Tunis and Tripoli. Who then could have recognised in Osman the blood-thirsty, the hypocritical Fra Lancelloti? Yes! I was ever a hypocrite, and regarded with scorn and detestation the sombre garb which tied me to the monastery. But my fate was not in my own hands: my parents were a son and daughter of old mother church, and I came into the world very unfortunately for both parties. They threw me into the lantern of San Baldassare, where thirty years before my father had been found himself. As a reward for giving me life, my mother died in the dungeons of San Marco; and my father expiated his share in the matter at the first general auto-da-fé: so you see that I come of a martyred family.

A prisoner from my boyhood upwards, I looked upon the world as a realm of light and joy, from which I was for ever debarred by those mysterious vows which the monks had induced me to profess before their meaning was understood. When from my iron grate I looked on the vale of the winding Isonza, blooming with foliage and verdure and bounded by the blue Carinthian hills, and listened to the rushing sound of the free bold river, how intense were my longings to follow its course to where it plunged headlong into the Gulf of Trieste; where for hours I have watched the scudding sails till my eyes and heart ached. O, hours of longing and of agony! To see nature spread before me in all her glory, yet be unable to taste her sweets: to be a prisoner without a crime. And love, or what the world calls love, I knew not what it was; though a secret spirit whispered within me: I longed to look on some fair face, and to hear a gentle voice reply to mine; but love's magic, its mystery, and its madness, I was yet to learn. With a heart thus formed, and open to the assaults of that wicked little god—whom the ancients should have depicted as a giant—you may imagine my sensations on finding myself in the presence of Paula; whose face and form far outshone the famous Madonna of our chapel. A hot blush suffused my cheek: but the fair face of Paula revealed only the rosy tinge of health, and her brow the calm purity of perfect innocence. I was silent and awed in her presence: an Italian monk awed by a girl of seventeen!

With evening I returned to the cloisters; and a chill sank upon my heart as their cold shadows fell over me. I was in my old dormitory, where the truckle-bed, the polished skull, the cross, and rough vaulted roof seemed yet the same: but I was changed. The recollection of Paula's soft gazelle-like eyes and snowy breast never left me for a moment, and I passed a sleepless night.

"O, that I were a soldier or a cavalier, for then Batello would respect, and his daughter might love me: but a priest—a priest—anathema! anathema! there is no hope for me: none! O, malediction! why did I ever behold thee, Paula?"

Thus passed the night. Noon found me again in the arbour of Batello's garden: the golden-haired and ruddy-cheeked Rosario was drawling over his task; but I neither heard nor beheld him. I saw only his sister, who, seated beneath the shadow of the luxuriant rose-trees, was immersed in the glowing pages of the warrior bard, Luigi Tansilla, the brave follower of Piero di Toledo.

The rays of the sun streamed between the foliage of the arbour, lighting up her fair ringlets, which glittered like living gold; her white neck sparkled in the same mysterious radiance: a glory seemed around her, and the soft calm aspect of her downcast face made her seem the very image of our lovely lady, the famed Madonna of Cantarini. Intoxicated with her appearance, I trembled when addressing her, while she entered frankly into conversation with me on the merits of the soldier's poems. Full and calmly her mild eyes gazed on mine, yet no suspicion struck her of the passion which glowed within me; and which I dared not reveal, for death was the doom: on the one hand, her firm father's poniard; on the other, the dungeons of the Piombi or the horrors of the holy office.

By night the ravings of my dreams were heard by the tenants of the adjoining dormitories, Petronio and Truffi the crookback; and they soon learned from my mutterings that I loved Paula, the daughter of the Signor Batello. Petronio—the same accursed Petronio, who from his archiepiscopal palace sent forth the mandate which entombed me here, when, after a tough battle with a Maltese cruiser, I was cast half drowned and bleeding on the beach of Canne—Petronio, whose matchless hypocrisy makes his villany even of a deeper dye than mine, then came to act the part of friend; to counsel me to destruction, and to become the evil genius of the good Batello and his innocent children.

A thorough Italian monk, dark, gloomy, and superstitious, he was my senior by fifteen years, and had secretly plunged into all the excesses of Venice. Like the fiendish hunchback, he was an adept in every dissimulation and debauchery, and boasted of his exploits; till, ashamed of my weakness, I took heart, and burned for distinction in the same worthy fields. I put myself under his guidance and tuition: to effect what? O, innocent Paula!

I had resolved, by every art of reasoning and sophistry, to break down the barriers of religion and modesty, and bend her mind to my purpose. But each successive day when I looked upon her snowy brow, her pure and happy face, blooming with beauty and radiant with youth, my diabolical purpose was left unfulfilled, unattempted; and my heart shrank from the contest.

Sometimes young and handsome cavaliers, from the castle of Gradiska or the citadel of Friuli, came to visit the old capitano; and the gallantry of their air, the glitter of their military garb and weapons, the ease with which they lounged about, strummed on the mandolin, or whispered soft nothings to the fair girl, made my envious heart burn with alternate rage and jealousy. Intensely I longed to be like one of them: and yet I could have slain them all, and Paula too when she smiled on them.

But I soon found a more powerful auxiliary to my love, than either Petronio's sophistry or Truffi's villany could furnish: and where think you? In Paula's own heart. Ho! ho! a young girl soon discovers that which is the sole object of her thoughts by day, and her dreams by night—a lover! There is a mysterious emotion so pleasing to her heart, so flattering to her fancy, and altogether so peculiarly grateful to her mind in being beloved, that she gives way to all the fervour of a first passion with joy and trembling. Ha! thou knowest the hearts of our Italian girls: warm, tender, and easily subdued; what more can lover wish?

The garrisons were marched to the Carinthian frontier, and the cavaliers came no more to the cottage of Batello: he spent the most of his time detailing his battles and reading the Diaries and Gazette at the wine-house; while his old housekeeper (whom my cowl kept in awe) was always occupied in household matters. I kept Rosario close to his task, and therefore had the dear girl all to myself.

What could she hope for in yielding to such a passion? Remorse, despair, and madness! But of these the young damsel thought not then. Ha! I was then graceful and well looking, and we both were young and ardently in love. My eyes at one time, my tremulous tones at another, had informed her of the mighty secret which preyed upon my heart; and which my lips dared not reveal until the rapturous moment when I perceived the mutual flame that struggled in her bosom. Then, but not till then, did I pour forth a rhapsody expressive of my love; when yielding to its burning impulses, all the long-concealed ardour of my heart burst at once upon her ear. Love lent a light to my eyes, a grace and gesture to my figure, and imparted new eloquence to my tongue: I was no longer myself; no more the cold, cautious friar, but the impetuous Italian lover. The monk was forgotten in the man; my vows in the delight of the moment; and the lovely Paula sank upon my shoulder overcome with love and terror. O, hour of joy! when I first pressed my trembling lip to that soft and beautiful cheek. Long years of penance and of prayer—of dreary repining, of soul-crushing humiliation and sorrow—were all repaid by the bliss of that embrace: which I have never forgotten. No! not all the years that have passed since then; not all the dark villanies I have planned and perpetrated: and they are many; not all the dangers I have dared: and they are countless as the hairs of your head; not all the toils and miseries of a life can efface it from my memory. I was happy then: I who, perhaps, have never been so since. * * * * *

A footstep aroused us, and the blushing girl shrank from me as the little boy Rosario came gamboling towards the arbour with a chaplet for her hair. I cast a fierce glance of hatred upon him. Even Paula was piqued, and refused to receive the flowers; upon which the child wept, and pulling my cassock, prayed me to lecture his sister for being so coy.

"Scold her, Father Lancelloti!" said he, rubbing his glittering eyes with his plump little hands; "for she will neither kiss me nor receive my roses to put among her pretty hair, as she used to love to do."

"Give me the flowers, child," said I; "shall I kiss sister Paula for you, Rosario?"

"O, yes, yes," cried the little boy, "or sister Paula will kiss you, and then me."

Our lips met, and the agitated and infatuated Paula embraced the child, who laughed and clapped his hands with innocent glee; and yet he knew not at what. At that moment the long sword of the captain jarred on the gravel walk, and his heavy tread rang beneath the trellis of the garden. Aware that, as a priest, I had wronged him in the declaration made to his daughter, and that I had committed a deadly sin before God, I shrank from meeting him; and, leaping over the garden-wall, returned to the monastery, where, not without sensations of triumph, I recounted my conquest to Petronio and the hunchback.

Three days I visited her as usual, and rejoiced in the success of my amour; for I loved her tenderly and dearly. My air was so sanctified that the most jealous guardian would not have suspected me; then how much less the good Batello, who, by his profession, had been accustomed to intercourse with men of the strictest honour, and suspected no man of duplicity, because his own brave heart was guileless.

My rose-bud of love was just beginning to bloom, when matters were doomed to have a terrible crisis.

One bright forenoon, when Rosario had finished his task, I was about to return to Friuli, and merely bowed to Paula, because her father was present.

"Brother Lancelloti," said he, grasping my cope, "hast heard the news? The senate is about to declare war against the Turks, and the capeletti are to be doubled. Brave news for an old soldier, eh! I may be a colonello, with Rosario for captain! Come hither, thou chubby rogue—wouldst like to be a captain?"

"O, yes, if sister Paula would play with me as she used to do, and kiss me instead of Father Lancelloti."

"Rosario! what sayest thou?" cried the fierce old soldier with a stentorian voice, while Paula grew pale as death, and my spirit died away within me; but the terrified child made no reply. The captain's face was black with rage: his eyes sparkled, and stern scorn curled his lip; yet he spoke calmly.

"Go—go, Father Lancelloti, and may God forgive you! I will not require the services of your faithful reverence from to-day. Away—march! or you may fare worse: dare not to come here again, I am Annibal Batello—thou knowest me!" And, touching the hilt of his sword, he turned on his heel and left me.

I rushed away, overwhelmed with bitterness, rage, and humiliation, and hating Rosario with the hate of a fiend.

To Truffi and Petronio, my story was the source of endless merriment: the hunchback snapped his fingers, whooped, and laughed till the cloisters rang with his elfish joy. Deprived of my mistress, whom I dared not visit for dread of the captain's sword, stung by the taunts of my friends, dejected and filled with gloomy forebodings, the cloisters soon became intolerable to me. I formed many a romantic and desperate scheme to rid myself of those cursed trammels which monkish duplicity had cast around me in boyhood: but thoughts of the holy office, the Piombi, and the fate of my father, filled me with dismay; and I dared not fly from Friuli.

One day, whilst wandering far up the banks of the Isonza, with a heart swollen by bitter thoughts, I plunged into the deepest recesses in search of solitude. Reaching the cascade which falls beneath the ancient castle of Fana, I paused to listen to the rushing water, whose tumult so much resembled my own mind. The voice of no living thing, save that of the lynx, broke the stillness around me: the lofty trees of the dense forest, clad in the richest foliage of summer, cast a deep shadow over the bed of the dark blue stream; which swept noiselessly on, between gloomy impending cliffs, until it reached the fall, where it poured over a broad ledge of rock, and thundered into a terrible abyss, whence the foam arose in a mighty cloud, white as Alpine snow. Rearing its grey and mossy towers high above the waving woods, the shattered rocks, and roaring river, the ancient castello looked down on the solitude beneath it. A mighty place in days gone by, it had been demolished by the bailiff of Friuli, for the crimes of Count Giulio (see vol. i. p. 186), and was now roofless and ruined; the green ivy clung to the carved battlement, and the rays of the bright sun poured aslant through its open loops and empty windows. But the scenery soothed not my heart: I burned for active excitement, to shake off the stupor that oppressed me.

A turn of the walk brought me suddenly upon the little boy, Rosario, who was weaving a chaplet of wild roses and trailing daphne; culled, doubtless, for the bright tresses of Paula. Remembering some stern injunction from his father, on beholding me he fled as from a spectre. Like a tiger, I sprang after him: fear added wings to his flight; but I was close behind. A fall on the rocks redoubled my anger and impatience, and I caught him by his long fair hair, while he was in the very act of laughing at my mishap.

"Cursed little babbler!" said I, shaking him roughly; "what deservest thou at my hands?"

"Spare me, good Father Lancelloti, and I will never offend again."

"Silence, or I will tear out thy tongue!"

My aspect terrified him, and he screamed on his father and Paula to save him.

"Paula!" said I, shaking him again, "thy devilish tongue hath destroyed Paula and me too!"

"Spare me," said he, whimpering and smiling; "and pretty sister Paula will kiss you for my sake."

"Anathema upon thee!" His words redoubled my fury, and I spat on him. The cascade roared beside me, the deepest solitude was around us, hell was in my heart, and the devil guided my hand; I launched the screaming child from the rocks: headlong he fell through the air, and vanished in the cloudy spray of the vast abyss. The bright sun became suddenly obscured by a cloud, and a deeper gloom stole over the dell of Fana: the ruined tower seemed a monstrous head, and its windows invidious eyes looking down on me—the landscape swam around, and I heard a cry of murder above the roar of the cascade. The yell of a lynx completed my terror, and I rushed in frenzy from the spot. * * *

I was in my dormitory; the darkness of night was in my soul and all around me: overwhelmed with an excess of horror for my wanton crime, I spent the night in the agonies of penance and prayer, and making mental vows to sin no more. Had the universe been mine, I would have given it that Rosario might be restored to life. O, that I could have lived the last day over again, or have blotted it for ever from my mind! But, alas! the strong and dark fiend had marked me for his own. Through the silence of the still calm night, came the rush of the distant river: there was madness in the sound; but I could not exclude it, and the cry of the poor child mingled ever with its roar. Humble in spirit, and contrite in heart, at morning matins I bowed down in prayer among the brotherhood. The sublime symphonies of the hymn Veni Creator, or of the litanies of our lady of Loretto, the song of the choir and the mellifluous strain of the organ, rang beneath the vaulted dome like the voice of God and the knell of death; and yet they spoke of hope—hope to the repentant—and I prostrated myself before the altar: tears burst from my eyes, and the fire of my heart was assuaged.

I left the monastery to seek some calm solitude, wherein to pour forth my soul in secret prayer; but my evil genius was beside me, and guided me to detection and disgrace. I wandered on, but knew not and cared not whither; wishing only to fly from the haunts of men and my own burning thoughts. Vain idea! Rosario, as he sank among the spray, his sister's tears, his father's sorrow, were ever before me, and I looked upon myself with horror.

"Good father!" cried a voice, disturbing my dreadful reverie; "O, reverend signor, help, in the name of the Blessed Trinity!"

I started with dismay—what did I behold? The white-haired veteran, Batello, bearing in his arms the dripping corpse of Rosario, while Paula clung to him overcome with sorrow and terror. Even the venerable goatherd, whose crook had fished up the dead child, was moved to tears; while I, the cause of the calamity, looked on with unmoved visage. Was it an index of my mind? O, no! a serpent was gnawing my heart: I could have screamed with agony; and my breath came close and thick. I trembled and panted while Batello spoke.

"Fra Lancelloti," said he, "thou comest upon me in an hour of deep woe, when I have much need of godly consolation; but not from thy lips. A week ago we quarrelled: I know the weakness of the human heart, and from the bottom of my soul forgive thee; for in this terrible moment I cannot look on any man with anger. Pass on, in the name of God! for thy presence is—I know not why—peculiarly hateful to me at this moment. Many a dead face have I looked upon by breach and battlefield, but thou—my Rosario—thy mother—" and the old soldier kissed his dead child, and wept bitterly.

The goatherd, who had been observing me narrowly, now whispered in Batello's ear. His eyes glared, and relinquishing the body, with one hand he grasped his sword, with the other my throat.

"Double-dyed villain!—hypocrite!—thou knowest of this, and canst say how Rosario died! Speak, or this sword, never yet stained with the blood of a coward, shall compel thee."

"Sacrilege!" I gasped, while Paula swooned: "Sacrilege!—I am a priest—"

"Rosario's hand grasps part of a rosary—lo! thy chaplet is broken, and the beads are the same. Speak, ere I slay thee!" and he drew his sword.

Trembling, I glanced at my girdle: but a half of my chaplet hung there; the other was grasped in the tenacious hand of Rosario. Overwhelmed with terror, I attempted to escape; and, in the blindness of his fury, the old man struck me repeatedly with his sword, while he cried aloud for help. Transported with fury at the sight of my own blood, and dreading discovery, I became mad, and plunged yet deeper into crime: closing with him, my strength and youth prevailed over his frame, now enfeebled by age, wounds, and long campaigns; I struck him to the earth, and with his own sword stabbed him to the heart. His blood streamed over Paula—I remember nothing more. I fled to the hills, and, throwing off my upper vestments, wandered in wild places, far from the reach of the Grand Bailiff; who offered five hundred ducats for my head, sent the carbineers of Gradiska and the vassals of the duchy to hunt me down, and established such a close chain of communication along the frontiers that escape was almost impossible. He solemnly vowed to avenge the murder of Batello (who had been the friend and fellow-soldier of his father, the old Count of Lanthiri) and I should assuredly have become his victim, and been consigned to the gallows or the Holy Office, had I not been joined by Gaspare Truffi; who, after transferring to his own pouch every bajoccho in the convent treasury, had come to share my fortunes in the wilderness.

Changing our attire, we embarked for Greece; but were captured off Calabria by a corsair of Tunis. Whereupon I instantly turned Mussulman, and served his highness the Bey with such courage and devotion, that, as Osman Carora, I became the idol of the Tunisians, and terror of the Mediterranean. Enough!—thou knowest the rest. Shipwreck and the fortune of war placed me in the power of my old friend Petronio—and I am here."

"And Paula?"

"Became Contessa di Lanthiri, and soon forgot poor Fra Lancelloti."

Such was the story related to me by the third captive whom those vaults contained: I have jotted it down just as it was related to me; but without the many pauses of maudlin grief, or oaths of rage, with which his half-intoxicated state caused him to intersperse it.

I need hardly add that I left this deliberate ruffian to his fate, locking all the doors securely behind me; and, to make the keeper more alert in future—as I intended to return no more—I left my false keys in his niche in the little chapel. The terrified warder, on finding a set of keys the exact counterpart of his own, declared they must have belonged either to Virgil or to the devil: they were destroyed, the vaults sprinkled with holy water, and the wizard was seen no more.

CHAPTER III.

A NARROW ESCAPE.

It was a clear and beautiful morning when I issued forth on my return to the cardinal's villa. As I passed a cantina by the roadside, under a trellis in front of it, I encountered two personages whom I had no wish to meet on that side of Massena's lines: the surly Captain Pepe, who treated me so insultingly at Crotona, and Truffi the hunchback, whom I recognised notwithstanding his disguise—a white Cistertian frock and shovel hat. Draughts, dominoes, and wine-horns were before them; and they had apparently passed the night at the table over which they leaned, sleeping away the fumes of their potations.

As I passed, an unlucky house dog leaped forth from his barrel, yelling and shaking his chain. The captain, yet half intoxicated, started up and felt for his sword, and I saw a bastia knife gleaming in the long lean fingers of the cripple.

"Corpo!" said he, "'tis only a priest."

"Hola! call you that fellow a priest?" replied Pepe, balancing himself with difficulty: but, drunk as he was, he had the eyes of a lynx, and knew me in a moment. "Mille baionettes! an English spy. Ah, Monsieur Aide-de-camp!—villain! Hola, the quarter guard! Hola, the provost, and the noose from the nearest tree: à la lanterne!"

He staggered towards me with his drawn sabre, and I supposing the cantina was full of soldiers, became alarmed, as the hideous Truffi yelled and whooped till the welkin rang. My death was certain if captured: not even York could have saved it, or those important despatches with which the general entrusted me. But I thought less of them than of Bianca, life, liberty, and honour. I easily wrenched Pepe's sabre from him, and knocked him down with my clenched hand: his head clattered on the hard dusty road, and he lay motionless. Truffi rushed on me with his poniard, but I dealt him a blow across the head with my sabre, and he fell prone over the body of his companion.

I fled to the villa, entered unseen, and threw myself panting upon my bed; where, notwithstanding my fears and agitation, I soon fell fast asleep.

In two hours after I was awakened by Catanio, whose countenance betokened something unusual. My first thought was of Captain Pepe.

"The courier has arrived from Rome, and his Majesty awaits you." I leaped up, joyful at being undeceived so agreeably.

"Has he brought the signora's dispensation?"

"His Majesty has not said."

My toilet was soon completed, and I was ushered into the presence of the cardinal, who was seated at breakfast. His Irish valet was in attendance. The plainness of his equipage contrasted strongly with the splendour of his pretensions. He was busy reading, and heard not our approach.

"You see him, perhaps, for the last time," whispered Catanio. "Behold! does there not reign around him a mystic dignity that makes him seem as much a king as if he stood in the halls of Windsor or Holy rood? Ah, who can look on such a man, declining into the vale of life, venerable with years, the majesty and memory of ages, without being moved? But this is a cold and calculating age, without veneration for the past; and the regrets of those who love it, provoke but a smile from the selfish and unreflecting."

Without partaking of his enthusiasm, I was not a little moved by his tone and words.

"Catanio, place a chair for Captain Dundas," said the cardinal, perceiving us. "Sir, you will breakfast with me, as I have intelligence for you. Our most Holy Father has been pleased to dispense with the vows of the Signora D'Alfieri at my intercession; and on presenting this document to the Abbess at Canne, she will be free to quit the convent and resume her place in society. This is the despatch from the spedizioniere of the papal court."

I returned thanks with suitable sincerity of manner.

"Zamori, a Calabrian fisherman of Gierazzo, is now in the harbour of Carine with his little vessel, which, as Catanio informs me, will sail in the evening; on receipt of my order, Zamori will convey you to any part in Calabria, or place you on board the British frigate now cruising in the Adriatic."

"A fisherman's bark will be but a comfortless place on these rough waters, for the delicate signora. But O, most sincerely have I to thank your Eminence for the interest you have taken in this matter, and the kindness you have shown me."

"Captain Dundas, here at least I am a king!" said the old man, whose broad brow became clouded for the first time. "Though exiled, forgotten by Britain, and standing on the verge of the tomb, I will yield my pretensions only with my last breath."

My reply was interrupted by the appearance of six French soldiers, with a sergeant, coming down the avenue at a quick pace, with their bayonets fixed. I remembered my encounter with Pepe, the keen glances of Compere in the church, and all the dangers of my situation flashed upon me: I stood irresolute whether to fight, fly, or surrender.

"Sir, they are no doubt in pursuit of you," said the cardinal, his aged cheek beginning to flush: "but will they dare to cross my threshhold? Alas! what will they not? The invasion of Rome, the expulsion of the sacred college, and the seizure of Pius himself, are yet fresh in my recollection. Catanio meet them at the porch, and in the name of God dare them to enter the house of one of his servants!"

"Alas!" replied Catanio, "let me implore your majesty to pause. We are but three aged and infirm men, against seven soldiers, armed, insolent, and rapacious; as the followers of a usurper ever are."

"This is no time for delay. Away, Captain Dundas!" exclaimed York; "you must fly. Catanio will lead you to the beach ere the house is surrounded. Farewell, sir! a long farewell to you: we may never meet again!"

Deeply moved by the old man's manner, I bowed, and, according to the custom, kissed the hand he extended towards me: a massive ruby ring—the great coronation ring of our ancient kings—sparkled on his finger.

Catanio hurried me away, and by the most unfrequented paths we reached the beach; while the soldiers surrounded and searched the villa.

The cardinal died a few months afterwards, at Rome, in the eighty-second year of his age, and was buried between his father and brother at Frescati. Henry IX. is inscribed on his tomb; which the genius of Canova has adorned with the most splendid sculpture. It is a curious fact, that till the last day of his life, the cardinal was in communication with many men of rank, wealth, and power, who seemed still to have entertained the chimerical hope of placing him on the British throne; and many documents discovered after his decease, and now preserved in our archives, prove that his family had, even then, numerous adherents in the three kingdoms: some of them men whom the Government could little have suspected of such sentiments. Buonaparte, too—that overturner of kings and kingdoms—is said to have expressed a wish to place him on the throne; and, as an earnest of his friendship, robbed him of his French estates: but the star of the Stuarts had set. George III. kindly and wisely passed over in silence the names of those whose romantic enthusiasm, or political bias, the papers of the cardinal-duke had so awkwardly revealed.

I got on board Zamori's little sloop in safety; and, in obedience to the cardinal's command, the warp was cast off, the sweeps run out, and he anchored about half a mile from the shore. Catanio left me, promising to return after dusk with the signora, whom I anxiously awaited; expecting every minute to see bayonets glittering on the sunny beach, or a boat filled with armed men push off towards the barque of Zamori.

The latter was a garrulous old fellow, whose tongue gave me very little time for reflection. Night began to close over Canne; and I beheld its approach with joy: the day had seemed interminably long. The evening gun was fired from the French fort, the tricolor descended from its ramparts, and I heard the evening hymn floating over the glassy sea from the various craft around us; where many of the sailors lay stretched upon bundles of sails, smoking cigars, tinkling the mandolin, and enjoying the rich sunset of their glorious clime. Sinking behind the mountains, the sun bade us adieu; darkness gradually crept along the winding shore, and white vapours curled in fantastic shapes from the low flats and ravines: slowly and brightly the moon soared into view, bathing land and ocean in a flood of silvery light.

I lay on a bundle of sails listening to the skipper's legends of the young Count of Caulonia, who fell in love with a mermaid that arose from her coral cave in the Gulf of Gierazzo, and sat beneath his castle walls singing as the syrens sung to Ulysses; and of the wondrous demon fish caught in Naples, in 1722, with a man in armour in its stomach; and Heaven knows what more. Hearing the dash of oars alongside the Echino, as Zamori's bark was named, and seeing a boat shoot under her quarter, I leapt up. I went to the side and received Catanio, who handed up Francesca D'Alfieri. The poor girl was so happy to find herself free, and entrusted to my care, that she could only weep with joy; uttering sobs in the depths of an ample satin faldetta which the abbess had given her, with two rosemary sprigs sewn crosswise in front, to scare away evil spirits.

"Farewell to you, captain!" said Catanio, or Duncan Catanach; "do not forget us when you go home to the land we love so well."

"Good-bye: God bless you, old man!" I replied, as the boat was pushed off and moved shoreward.

The dark grave has long closed over the faithful Catanach and his illustrious master; but memory yet recalls the old man's visage: I can see it as I saw it then; clouded by honest sorrow, and its hard wrinkled features tinged by the light of the moon.

An hour afterwards we were ploughing the waters of the gulf, with the broad latteen sail of the Echino bellying taut before the breeze as she cleft the billows with her sharp-beaked prow. Zamori grasped the tiller with important confidence; the crew, his two athletic and black-browed sons, remained forward, and I seated myself beside the signora, who permitting her hood to fall back, the moon shone on her beautiful features and glossy hair. So dangerous an attraction near old Zamori disturbed his steering, and the Echino yawed till her sail flapped to the mast.

"A sweet face!" he muttered, as the boat careened over; "but it will work mischief, like the mermaids."

"O, signor, I am happy, so very happy!" said Francesca: the richness of her tone, and the artlessness of her manner moved me. "Shall we soon see Calabria?"

"That is Capo Trionto," said I, pointing ahead.

"Dear Calabria!" she exclaimed, kissing her hand to the distant coast; "there was a time when I thought never to behold thee more! Beautiful star!" continued the enthusiastic girl, pointing to a twinkling orb: "Signor, is it not lovely? alas! 't is gone: perhaps it is a world!" she added, clasping her hands, as it shot from its place and vanished. The increasing roughness of the sea, as we sailed along the high Calabrian coast, soon made Francesca uneasy: her prattle died away; she became very sick, and lay in the stern-sheets of the boat, covered up with Zamori's warm storm jacket, and a spare jib: both rather coarse coverings for a beautiful and delicate female. At length she slept; and I was left for a time to my own reflections.

About midnight, I was roused from a sound nap by Zamori.

"Look around you, excellency," said he, in a whisper; "saw you ever aught so splendid—so terrible?"

Like a vast globe of gold the shining moon was resting on the summit of Cape Trionto; which, rising black as ebony from the ocean, heaved its strongly-marked outline against the illuminated sky: its ridge was marked by a streak of fiery yellow. The water was phosphorescent; the waves seemed to be burning around us, and we sped through an ocean of light! The spray flying past our bows seemed like sparks of living fire; the ropes trailing over the gunnel, and the myriads of animalcules which animate every drop of the mighty deep, were all shining with magic splendour. An exclamation of rapture escaped me: at that moment the moon sank down behind Trionto; in an instant the sea became dark, and not a trace of all that glorious and magnificent illumination remained behind.

"Have you seen these often, Zamori?"

"No!" said he, shuddering and crossing himself; "but such sights never bode good. We shall have the French in Lower Calabria soon. 'Tis Fata Morgana," he added, whispering; "she dwells in the straits of Messina: I have seen her palace of coral and crystal rise above the waves. She is a mermaid of potent power: God send that we have no breeze before morning!"

Cape St. James was in sight when the sun arose from the ocean, revealing all the glories of the beautiful coast and sparkling sea. After the stout Calabrians had knelt and prayed to a rudely-carved Madonna nailed above the horse-shoe on the mast, I partook of their humble breakfast; which consisted of olives, salt-fish, maccaroni, and sour wine: the signora was too much indisposed to join us.

I looked forward with pleasure to assuming my important command at Scylla; but other prospects made me happier still: I welcomed the freshening breeze, as the little bark rushed through the surging sea which boiled over her gunnels, and roared like a cascade under her counter; while the ruin-crowned or foliaged headlands, and the countless peaks which towered above them, changed their aspect every moment as we flew on. I thought of my smiling Bianca, and hailed with joy the hills of Maida. We beheld the evening sun gilding the Syla, and at night were off Crotona, and saw the lights glimmering in its narrow streets and gloomy citadel, where Macleod was stationed with his Highlanders. Anchored close under its ramparts, lay the Amphion, and brave Hanfield's sloop of war, the Delight. The sky was dark and lowering, the sea black as ink: everything portended a rough night, and I was well pleased that our voyage was over.

My despatch for Captain Hoste required him to bring round the Ross-shire Buffs without delay to Messina; and the order was forthwith given to heave short, to cast loose the sails, and lower away all the boats.

My old friend Castagno, with a party of the Free Corps, formed the guard at the citadel gate; I was immediately recognized, and consigning the happy Francesca to his care, beat up the quarters of Macleod: I found him comfortably carousing with Drumlugas and some of his officers, who were passing a portly jar of gioja round the table with great celerity. When the curiosity and laughter occasioned by my attire had subsided, and when the general's order had been read, I related my adventures; passing over the visits to the vaults, and the discovery of Francesca D'Alfieri.

An hour before gun-fire the Buffs were all on board the frigate: her ample canvas was spread to the breezes of the Adriatic, and by sunrise we saw her vanish round the promontory of Lacinium. The Cavaliere Benedetto, with four hundred rank and file of the Free Corps, was left to hold Crotona; while, by Macleod's order, I took command of a company of those troops which the Amphion could not accommodate: that evening, bidding adieu to brave Castagno (whom I never saw again), we marched en route for St. Eufemio, where I was to see them safely embarked for Messina.

Thanks to Macleod and his officers, my attire had now become a little more professional: one gave me a regimental jacket, another a tartan forage-cap, a third a sash, and Drumlugas presented me with a very handsome sabre; of which he had deprived the Swiss colonel whom he vanquished at Maida. In this motley uniform, I rode at the head of the Free Company; which formed a very respectable escort for Francesca and her sister, who accompanied us: both were mounted on fiery-eyed Calabrian horses, a breed famous for their strength and endurance. While so many bayonets glittered around them, the ladies had no fear of banditti; Ortensia laughing merrily, made her horse curvet and prance, and lent her soft melodious voice to the jovial chorus with which the Italian soldiers lightened the toil of their morning march. But Francesca was reserved; and beneath her veil I often saw tears suffusing her mild and melancholy eyes.

"Dear Francesca, why are you so sad?" asked her sister; "O, now is the time for joy! See how brightly the sun shines on the distant sea, and how merrily the green woods are waving in the breeze. Most unkind, Francesca! for your sake, I have left my poor Benedetto in that gloomy castle of Crotona. Laugh and be joyous. Think on the happiness awaiting us at home, and the embrace of our dear little Bianca, when she throws her arms around you."

"And Luigi," added Francesca, unable to restrain her tears.

The path we pursued was different from that which I had travelled before, and the intense solitude around it was almost oppressive. We were marching through a dense forest, where not a sound broke its stillness, save the cry of a solitary lynx or the flap of an eagle's wing, as he soared to his eyrie in the sandstone cliffs which reared their rugged front above the woodlands. White wreaths of distant smoke shot up in vapoury columns through the green foliage, announcing that the wild contained other human beings than ourselves; but whether these were poor charcoal-burners, or robbers roasting a fat buck on the green sward, we knew not. We passed one or two lonely cottages, where the labouring hinds were separating grain from its husks, by the ancient modes—trampling the corn under the hoofs of cattle, or rolling over it a large stone drawn by a team of stout buffaloes.

Calabria was then (and perhaps is yet) widely different from every other part of Italy: its peculiar situation, its lofty mountains, its dense forests spreading from sea to sea and intersected by few roads, and its hordes of banditti, made it dangerous and difficult of access to the artist and tourist; consequently, until the close of Manhes' campaign of blood, it was an unknown territory to the rest of Europe. These circumstances rendered the natives rude in character and revengeful in spirit; and thus a mighty barrier rose between the lower orders and the noblesse: who (in the words of a recent writer on Italy) "live wholly apart from the people—they compose two entirely distinct worlds."

After halting in forests during the sultry noon, cantoning in villages, and marching in the cool morning and evening for two days, we arrived near Amato, a little town within a few leagues of the Villa D'Alfieri. We were traversing a deep pass of the Apennines, when the evening, which had been serene and fine, became clouded: the lowering sky portended a coming tempest. We pushed on, at an increased pace, to reach a castellated villa, the residence of a Calabrian of rank, which we saw perched on an isolated mass of rock, about a league up the mountains. Striking and picturesque appeared the Vale of Amato, as the setting sun poured its last blaze of radiance down the deep gorge between the dark wooded hills, gilding the crenellated battlements, Saracenic galleries and Norman keep of the distant castle; and reflected in the river, which glowed like a stream of molten gold between thickets of sombre cypress and fragrant orange-trees. Gradually, the hue of the setting orb changed from bright saffron to deep red; and a flood of crimson lustre fell over everything, tinging the lofty hills, the thick woods, the glassy river with a blood-red tint, which rapidly became more sombre as the sun disappeared behind the pine-clad hills. Then thunder rumbled through the darkening sky; gloomy banks of cloud came scudding across it, and volumes of vapour rolled away from the bed of the Amato.

"On, on!" cried Francesca; "O, the storm will be a terrible one: feel you not the very blast of the sirrocco? Alas! we may die among the mountains. Yonder is the residence of Guelfo the Buonapartist—ah! the subtle knave! If we trust ourselves under his roof, say not a word of Luigi, and mention not our names. Ah! if he should recognise us: you remember that terrible night with the conciarotti and the mob of Palermo."

They pushed forward at a gallop, and I followed; after leaving orders with old Signor Gismondo, who—as I ought to have mentioned before—was captain of the Free Company, to continue his route double-quick to Amato, where we would rejoin him by daybreak next day. Gismondo was now grave, reserved, and melancholy in the extreme: but I was much pleased at renewing my acquaintance with him. Poor man! it was fated to be of short duration. We had scarcely separated before the lightning gleamed between the splintered rocks of the pass; the air became sulphurous, close, and dense; in five minutes it was dark; we saw the luminous glow-worms sparkling amid the dewy grass beneath the shady foliage, while ever and anon the red lightning shot from peak to peak, illuminating the scenery with its lurid glare. After scrambling up a steep ascent, the face of which was scarped and defended by four pieces of French cannon, we reached the gate of this Neapolitan lord; whom I had no wish to meet again, as his bad political bias had gained him an unfavourable name in Calabria. Numerous towers and curtain walls of red stone surrounded the building; few windows were visible outwardly, and those were far from the ground and well barred with time-worn stancheons.

Passing through a gate surmounted by a wolf's head cabossed on a shield, and surrounded by the collar of shells, with the crescent and ship of the Knights' Argonauts of San Nicolo, we dismounted in the courtyard.

"Alas! for poor Gismondo and his soldiers!" exclaimed Francesca, as the gates were closed; and the descending storm burst forth in all its fury.

CHAPTER IV.

CASTELGUELFO—THE WOLF OF AMATO.

By the barone, a short and meagre little man of a most forbidding aspect, we were received with all due honour and courtesy, and without being recognised; but his residence was so full of armed men, that it could scarcely afford us accommodation, ample though its towers and corridors seemed to be.

"These are Lucchesi, the most hideous provincials of Italy; those wanderers who spread over all Europe with organs and monkeys," whispered Ortensia, as we passed through the court, which was crowded with the most savage-looking fellows imaginable. Many were half naked, or clad only in the skins of sheep and lynxes, beneath which might be seen the remains of a ragged shirt, a tattered vest, or breeches, once red or yellow; their legs and feet were bare; some had old battered hats, or red slouched caps: but the greater number had only their shock heads of hair, bleached by the weather till it was coarse as a charger's mane, and overhanging their gaunt ferocious visages, grim with starvation and misery: which ever accompanied French invasion. A few wore the gallant bandit costume of the south, and all were carousing, and filling the hollow towers, the dark arcades, and echoing corridors with bursts of brutal laughter to lighten their work: for all were busy, polishing rifle and pistol locks, and grinding the blades of sabres, poniards, and pikes. My fair companions shrank with dismay from the hall windows when they viewed the assemblage below, and even I did not feel quite at ease; especially after seeing about two hundred stand of French arms and accoutrements ranged along the vestibule.

"Signor Barone, you keep a strong garrison here," said I, smiling, while we surveyed the motley crew of ruffians from a lofty oriel; "do you expect Massena to pass the Amato soon?"

"That would be superb!" replied he, with a grin, which revealed his ample and wolfish jaws. "No, no, 't is only my good friend Scarolla, the valiant captain of four hundred free companions, who is here with his band: we are bound on a little piece of service together. Ha! ha! if that fool Belcastro had not poisoned himself instead of the Maltese Knight, he would have been here too."

At that moment Scarolla approached: I attentively surveyed the celebrated bandit-chief, whose name, in the annals of Italian ferocity, stands second only to that of Mammone, "the blood-quaffer." He was above six feet high, and moulded like a Hercules; dark as that of a Negro, his mean visage announced him a Lucchese; long black hair hung down his back, and a thick beard fringed his chin. The band of his ample beaver, his velvet jacket and mantello were covered with the richest embroidery, and a silver hilted poniard glittered in his waist-belt. His brows were knit and lowering, his eyes keen and sinister: the ladies trembled beneath the bold scrutiny of his glance, and shrank close to my side for protection while the withered little barone introduced us.

"Signor Inglese, the valiant Capitano Scarolla; brave men ought to know each other: you are both captains, remember."

"Serving under different leaders," I replied, while bowing, and repressing a scornful smile.

"Superba!" cried the little barone, laughing and rubbing his hands; but Scarolla's brows knit closer, and his eyes kindled at my inuendo.

The hall was now lighted by several tall candelabra; their lustre was reflected from the gilded columns and pendants of the lofty roof, and the frames of dark, gloomy, and mysterious portraits of the ancient Guelfi; who seemed scowling from their pannels on their degenerate descendant and his unworthy confederate.

That ancient apartment, when viewed as I beheld it, one-half bathed in warm light, and the other sunk in cold shadow, seemed the very scene of a romance; to which the graceful figures of the Signora del Castagno and her sister, and the picturesque garb of the tall Scarolla gave additional effect. Now were appropriate sounds wanting; for a storm raged in the valley below, thunder growled in the mountains above, and the rain rushed like hail on the casements; the painted traceries of which were often lit by fitful gleams of the moon or the blue forked lightning, as it shot from hill to hill.

Uneasy in the presence of Scarolla, the ladies, after a slight refreshment, withdrew to repose; promising to be up with the lark for our journey to-morrow.

When travelling, or on active service, one is compelled to accommodate oneself to every kind of society, place, and circumstance; and upon this philosophical principle, I made myself quite at home, and supped merrily with the barone and bandit: of whom the servants stood in the greatest awe. Supper over, wine was produced: however abstemious the Italians may be, I saw no sign of the national trait that night, at Castelguelfo; where we drank the richest continental wines, emptying the decanters in rapid succession, as if we had been three Germans drinking for a wager.

Rendered mellow by his potations, our host became talkative; and, in spite of the nods and contemptuous frowns of the impatient Scarolla, informed me that he was collecting men to make a political demonstration, of which I should soon hear at Palermo—an attack on a powerful feudatory, with whom he had a deadly quarrel, which the presence of our army only smothered for a time.

"It will be superb," grinned the barone. "I hate him with the stern bitterness of a thorough old Calabrese. Thrice has he crossed me at court: he caused Ferdinand to regard me with coldness and jealousy, and when all the nobles of the province received the order of San Constantino, I alone was left undecorated; and my name, the oldest in Naples, was forgotten. We have now the country to ourselves; and taking advantage of the lull, all Italy, from Scylla to the Alps, shall ring with my retribution. Yesterday, Crotona was abandoned to the Calabri; the soldiers who fought and won at Maida have all withdrawn, and there is no one to mar my revenge. O, it will be signal! In their king's service, the followers of my foe are all in garrison at Reggio; and his residence is unprotected. I have a hundred sbirri well mounted, armed and faithful; Scarolla has four hundred of the bravest rogues that ever levelled a rifle. Superba! Loyal visconte, beware the fangs of the Wolf! Per Baccho! there shall be a modern feud between the Guelfi and Alfieri, famous as that they had of old—ha! ha!"

"The Villa D'Alfieri is then the point of attack," said I.

"Superba!" screamed the little barone, who was becoming more inebriated: "yes; I will clothe its walls in flames; and if blood can quench them, then so shall they be quenched. Yea, in blood, shed where my ancestor's yet cries for vengeance. Viva Guesippe Buonaparte!"

"One alone shall be spared, excellency;" remarked Scarolla, who was also becoming excited.

"So I have promised you, prince of rogues, as the price of your services. The plunder of the villa belongs to your followers; and to you falls that glorious prize, the theme of our improvisatori, the pride of the Calabrias——"

"Bianca D'Alfieri!" added Scarolla, his eyes lighting with insolent triumph.

"Superb! is she not?" laughed the barone.

"God curse you both," I muttered; instinctively feeling for my sabre, and gulping down my wine, to hide the passion that boiled within me. I thanked Heaven that they knew not of Gismondo and his company; by whom I hoped the villa would be saved from this revengeful rebel.

"When does the attack take place, signor?"

"To-morrow, at midnight. We will burn a light at St. Eufemio that will astonish the good citizens of Messina, and scare Fata Morgana in her ocean palace. You are on your way to Palermo?"

I bowed.

"Say, when you get there, that Castelguelfo is in league with Regnier, has burned the grand bailiff, and hoisted the standard of Guiseppe of Naples: cospetto! the cross of the iron crown will outweigh the star of Constantine!"

"Success to the expedition, signori," said I, drinking to conceal my anger and confusion. "Faith! this is quite a revival of that ancient feud, of which the improvisatori sing so much."

"And long will they sing of the diabolical treachery of the Alfieri."

"Signor, I would gladly hear the relation."

"You shall, in a few words. You have heard of the famous fighting Dominican Campanella, who, in 1590, raised the banner of revolt in the Calabrias: my ancestor, Barone Amadeo, disgusted by Spanish misrule, joined him with three hundred men-at-arms; but these were all defeated and slaughtered by the followers of the then Visconte Santugo, on the same field of Maida where you so lately vanquished Regnier. Then commenced the quarrel between the Guelfi and the Alfieri; which, though we never came to blows, has survived for two centuries, and has settled down into coldness, mistrust, and jealousy, intriguing at court and petty squabbling at home. We are old-fashioned people here; but France holds out civilization and regeneration to us. Well, Messer Amadeo was defeated, and Santugo gave his castle to the flames, so that the Wolf of Amato might have nowhere to lay his head. An outcast, deserted by his followers and abandoned by all, he wandered long in the wild forest of St. Eufemio, until, reduced to the last extremities of hunger and despair, he resolved to throw himself upon the generosity of his triumphant enemy; and knocking at the gate of the castle of Santugo, craved the insolent porter to admit him to the visconte's presence. He was absent, fighting against Campanella; but Theodelinde of Bova, his young wife, resided at the castle during his campaign.

"Gaunt, from long continued misery, overgrown with a mass of beard and hair—clad in the skins of his namesake the wolf instead of the knightly Milan steel, and grasping a knotted staff in lieu of the bright-bladed falchion of Ferrara—Messer Amadeo had more the aspect of an ancient satyr than a Neapolitan cavalier.

"'Madonna mia!" cried Theodelinde, with dismay, 'Who art thou?'

"'Signora, thou beholdest Guelfo, the persecuted lord of Amato, who is come to cast himself at thy feet. My territories spread from the Tyrrhene to the Adriatic Sea; they have passed away, my people are destroyed, my castle is ruined, and I have nowhere to lay my head, save in the grave. Though thy husband's foe, take pity upon me, gentle signora! I am perishing with want; for the ban of God and the king are upon me, and no man dares to give me a morsel of bread or a cup of water.'

"Gentle in spirit, and milder in blood than our Italian dames, Theodelinde came of an old Albanian race; and, moved with pity, wept to behold a warrior of such high courage and birth reduced to such exceeding misery. Enjoining her maidens to secrecy, she provided him with food and raiment, and concerted means for his escape into Greece. The unfortunate Amadeo was grateful, and, touched with her generosity, swore on the cross that he would forgive the visconte for all the persecutions to which he had subjected him. That night he retired to rest in peace, beneath the roof of his deadliest enemy.

"Long exhaustion caused a deep slumber to sink upon his eyelids, and he heard not the clang of hoofs and the clash of steel ringing in the wide quadrangle, announcing that Santugo had returned, flushed with victory and triumph; his sword reeking with the blood of the revolters. Theodelinde rushed forth to meet her husband, and their meeting was one of joy: her tears of happiness fell on the steel corslet of the stern visconte, and he too rejoiced; for the Spanish king had promised to bestow upon him all the possessions of Amadeo, if before the festival of the Annunciation, which was but three days distant, he placed the Wolf's head on the high altar of St. Eufemio.

"The gentle viscontessa knew not of this bloody compact; but presuming on the joy and tenderness displayed by her husband, and shrinking from aught that resembled duplicity, she led him to the chamber of Amadeo. He was reposing on a stately couch, and fitfully the beams of the night-lamp fell on his pale forehead and noble features. He started, awoke, and saw—what? Theodelinde by his bed-side, with her stern husband clad in complete armour. Santugo, his barred visor up, regarded him with a lowering visage; while he grasped a heavy zagaglia, such as our estradiots used of old, and which glittered deadly like the eyes of him who held it. Then Theodelinde knew, by the glare of that terrible eye, that Amadeo was lost, and she sank upon her knees.

"'Oh, pity him and spare him for my sake: spare him if you love me, my husband.'

"But the ruthless Alfieri heard her not—saw her not: he beheld only the aggrandisement of his power, and hearkened only to the whisperings of avarice and enmity. Amadeo leaped up; but his foe was too swift for him. Hurled with equal force and dexterity, the zagaglia flew hissing from Santugo's hand, and its broad barbed head cleft the skull, and lay quivering in the brain of Amadeo. Theodelinde sank down on the floor in horror; while the visconte cut off the head with his poniard, and knitting the locks to his baldrick, galloped to the church of St. Eufemio, where he flung the gory trophy on the altar. The ghastly skull remained there on a carved stone bracket, for half a century; until the cathedral of St. Eufemio was destroyed, on the anniversary of the deed, by the earthquake of 1638. Those who viewed its fall beheld a spectacle which was beyond description terrible! The earth yawned, and the stately church with its three tall taper spires; its pinnacles, rich with gothic carving; its windows, sparkling with light and gorgeous with tracery; its massive battlements and echoing aisles, sank slowly into the flaming abyss,—down, down, until the gilded cross on the tallest pinnacle vanished. Convents, stately palaces, and streets sank down with it, and where St. Eufemio stood, there lay a vast black fetid lake, rolling its dark sulphurous waves in the light of the summer moon. Ho! ho! what a tomb for the skull of the Wolf!

"The Guelfi were landless outcasts, until, by the treaty of Utrecht, in 1713, Naples passed away from Spanish domination; and under Charles of Parma, my father recovered the old possessions of our house: now, in imitation of Amadeo, I am ready for revolt; and, with every chance of success, to-morrow shall unroll the banner of Joseph of Naples, whom Madonna bless! To-morrow, let the Alfieri and loyalists beware! I will not spare even the linnet in the cage, or the dog that sleeps on the hearth. Drink, Scarolla, to the Signora Bianca; who by to-morrow eve will be hailed as thy gay capitanessa!"

But Scarolla heard him not: his head had fallen forward on his breast, and long ere the host's story was concluded, he was snoring with the force of a trombone.

CHAPTER V.

HAPPINESS.

By daybreak next morning we were clear of the castello; for we quitted its walls while its ruffian inmates were buried in slumber. I was happy when the ladies were mounted, and once more on the road; having been under considerable apprehension for their safety: dreading, perhaps, our detention as royalist prisoners in the barone's residence.

"A rough night the last for a march, signor," said I to Captain Gismondo, whom we found parading the Calabri in the street of Amato.

"A tempest, signor! the blue glare of the lightning alone revealed to us that foaming river which we forded, the water rising to our waist-belts; and the rain that rushed down from heaven was every drop large enough to beat in our drumheads."

Ordering the company to march by a solitary and long forgotten road, towards St. Eufemio, I informed Gismondo and my fair charge of the diabolical plan laid by the barone and his revolters to destroy the villa, and assign the innocent Bianca to the wretch Scarolla as the price of his co-operation. Her sisters shrieked with terror, and old Battista gave me a stern smile while laying his hand on his sword.

"I know a path across the mountains, signor; I travelled it once to Monteleone: my little daughter was with me then;" he sighed deeply. "By Ave Maria this evening our good friends the Alfieri will have a hundred and fifty bayonets at their disposal. Compagna! threes right, quick march!" and we moved off with rapidity.

Marching by the most retired roads, we made a circuit among the mountains to deceive the barone, if any of his scouts should have followed us. The evening sun was casting the long shadows of the lofty hills of Nicastro across the woods and valleys of St. Eufemio, the waters of the bay were rolling in their usual varied tints of sparkling blue, and the eve was so calm and still, that the dash of the lonely breakers, as they flowed on the sandy beach, was heard many miles from the shore; mingling with the solemn hymn of the Sicilian mariners, and the crews of those picturesque feluccas which spread their striped latteen sails to the breezes of the strait.

Leaving Gismondo with his company to follow, I pushed on with the ladies at full gallop towards the villa: they were both expert horsewomen, and quite outstripped me, as we flew along the sandy marino. Their merry laughter and taunting cries of "Fi! fi! Signor Capitano," were very galling to me; for I was considered the best horseman (except Lascelles) on the Sicilian staff, and had twice won the regimental and brigade cup at the Palermitan races.

"On my honour! ladies, if I held the reins of my brave English grey instead of those of a chubby Calabrian horse, you would not have distanced me thus," said I, when they halted to let me come up with them.

The battery erected by the soldiers of Sir Louis de Watteville was now abandoned and demolished; the cannon were away, and the platforms overgrown with luxuriant grass. How stirringly my time had passed since the morning when our army landed on the beach close by!

The moment we rode into the quadrangle of the villa, the clattering hoofs roused the whole household, as the blast of a trumpet would have done. To be brief: great was the joy diffused by our arrival. We disturbed the old viscontessa from cards, with which she was rapidly gaining from old Adriano all the ducats she had paid at confessional an hour before for peccadilloes. The young visconte, pale and worn with long illness of mind and body, received the trembling Francesca to his arms as if she had been restored to him from the tomb. The Italians are peculiarly exciteable, and his transports were wild in the extreme. He had expected to behold his bride no more; and now she was hanging on his bosom, free, happy, and more beautiful than ever. As I had long foreseen, he placed in my hand that of his blushing cousin, Bianca; while the venerable viscontessa wept and prayed with joy, scattered a handful of cards and counters over us, in her confusion, and embraced us by turns. The whole household, male and female, from Andronicus the chasseur to the little ragazzo who turned the spits, joined in a general chorus of joy; they commenced the furious tarantella in the quadrangle, and the whole mansion rang with shouts: which were soon to be changed for those of a less agreeable nature.

Around the white neck of Bianca, I threw the riband with the gold medal presented to me by Cardinal York, whose kindness had restored Francesca to light and life; and the sweet girl kissed it, promising to treasure it for his sake and mine. She appeared so beautiful, so blooming and happy, as she hung upon my shoulder in the recess of a lofty window, with the light of the western sky streaming on her bright curls and glittering dress; and Santugo seemed so much absorbed in the presence of her sister, who was seated between him and his mother, with a hand clasped fondly by each; that I was loath to disturb the happy group and blight their general joy, by speaking of Guelfo: but the appearance of Gismondo's company marching along the marino, and the advanced hour of the evening, made it imperative that arrangements should be made for fighting or flying. All changed colour when I mentioned Castelguelfo: Santugo's brow grew black, and his mother burst into tears.

"O, Luigi! to remain would be madness, when Giacomo and all our people are serving as soldiers at Reggio!" she exclaimed.

"It ill beseems you, signora, to counsel me to my dishonour;" replied the fierce young man, with singular hauteur, while his lip quivered and his dark eyes shone with fire. "Like all the family of Amato, Dionisio is a coward at heart, and a rebel Buonapartist; and shall I, who am esteemed among the bravest and most patriotic of our noblesse, fly before a base leaguer with banditti? Never! With Gismondo's Calabri, and the armed men I can collect on an hour's notice, to the last will I defend my father-house; fighting from chamber to chamber and story to story, and die rather than yield, even should Guelfo involve the whole fabric in flames and destruction."

"Ammirando!" exclaimed Gismondo, entering, "you speak as I expected to hear the son of my old comrade; whose honours you will never tarnish. Courage, ladies! One hundred and fifty bayonets are here, under my orders; and with Madonna's blessing, and our own hands, the Wolf may fall into as great a snare as old Amadeo did in the days of poor Campanella."

The viscontessa shuddered: but her son took down his sword from the wall.

"Dundas," said he; "to you, who are a soldier of greater experience than any here (not even excepting our old guerilla, Gismondo), I look principally for advice during this night's uproar. Come, signor, leave Bianca, and loosen your sabre in its sheath. Ladies, away to your mandolins and embroidery, or to ave and credo; your presence alone unmans me. Ola, Zaccheo! where the devil is my old courier tarrying now? Bolt and barricade every door and window, and muster and arm the valets. Even the little ragazzo must handle a musket to-night."

"Had we not better send a horseman to the Royal Reggitore of Nicastro for aid?"

"An insolent Sicilian dog!" replied Santugo. "No, no; we must trust to Heaven and our own bravery."

Land and ocean had grown dark, or what is deemed so in fair Ausonia. The bright stars studding the whole firmament, and the pale silver moon rising over the dark green ridges of the wooded hills, shed their mystic light on cape and bay over Amato's frowning rocks and flowing river; illuminating the tall round tower, the broad façade, and many arcades of the Villa D'Alfieri, and bathing in silver the orange woods around it.

Before the hour of the projected attack, we had all prepared for defence; and our arrangements had been made for a vigorous one: every door, window, and aperture were strongly barred and barricaded; piles of furniture, statues, cushions, ottomans, massive tomes from the library, and everything suitable, were pressed into the service; forming barriers in the passages and on stair-landings, in case of an assault. Ere midnight tolled from the sonorous old clock in the quadrangle, all the ladies and their attendants were stowed away in the attic story, and one hundred and eighty men were stationed at the different posts assigned them below. Gismondo commanded one wing of the mansion; his lieutenant and Alfiero, two cavaliers of the House of Bisignano, the other; while Santugo and myself occupied the centre.

The soldiers were so well posted, that the different approaches to the villa were completely enfiladed; while that by the quadrangle would be exposed to a deadly cross fire from fifty windows. In this order we awaited the revolters.

On making my rounds, to see that all were on the alert, I visited the ladies; who, in the attic story of the old round tower, were quite secure from musketry. The old viscontessa was on her knees praying: she had relinquished her cards for "The Litanies of our Blessed Lady;" and a crowd of female domestics knelt around her. Bianca and her sisters were clustered together, with arms entwined, like three beautiful graces; but looking pale and terrified: awaiting the strife with beating hearts and eyes suffused with tears.

"Dearest Claude!" said she whose gentle voice I loved best, "for God's sake! O, for my sake! do not expose yourself heedlessly to danger."

"Courage, dear one," said I, putting an arm playfully round her; "we must all fight like the Trojans of old. Think of what will be the fate of us all—of yourself in particular—if Guelfo and his ruffian compeers capture the villa to-night. If I can put a bullet into the head of this new suitor, Scarolla—Tush, Bianca! ridiculous, is it not?" She made a sickly attempt to smile, but bowed her head on my shoulder and wept. I heard Santugo and his chasseur uttering my name, and calling aloud through various parts of the mansion; but I was too agreeably occupied to attend to them just then.

"Allerta!" cried Gismondo; and knowing the military warning, I hurried away to the scene of action.

"See you the rascals, signor?" said he, pointing from a barricaded window, to a dark mass moving along the distant roadway, and rapidly debouching into the lawn. They marched in the full glare of the moonlight, and the gleam of steel flashed incessantly from the shapeless column. They carried two standards, and one was a tri-color.

"Some of those Jacobin dogs are the iron miners of Stilo: they have long been stubborn traitors," said Santugo, in accents of rage.

"And bold Scarolla, so long the scourge of Frenchmen, why leagues he with villains such as these?"

"You forgot, signor," replied the young lord, with a grim smile, "that he is either to gain a noble bride, or an ounce bullet to-night."

CHAPTER VI.

THE VILLA BESIEGED.

"Trombadore, sound the alert!" cried I to the little Calabrian trumpeter. The sharp blare of his brass instrument awoke every echo of the great villa; there was a clatter of accoutrements, a clashing of bayonets and buckles, a hum, and all became still as the grave. We now heard the tread of the advancing force, which divided into two bodies; one to assault the house in front, the other in flank. A red light shot up between the trees of the avenue, as an earnest of what was to ensue: the gate lodge had been given to the flames.

A steep sloping terrace, enclosed by a high balustrade, encircled the whole villa: six iron wickets, leading to the lawn and garden, had been well secured, and this outer defence formed our first barrier against the foe; who advanced within a few yards of it, before I ordered the trumpeter to sound again. At the first note, a volley, which the assailants little expected, was poured upon them, throwing them into the utmost confusion, and driving them back with slaughter. They replied with promptitude, and poor old Gismondo fell dead by my side. My blood now got heated in earnest!

"Bravissimo soldateria!" I cried to the Free Calabri, while brandishing my sabre and hurrying from post to post to animate their resistance: "level low, and fire where they are thickest!" The roar of the musketry stirred all the echoes of the vast resounding building: its long corridors, lofty saloons, and domed ceilings, gave back the reports with redoubled force; every place was filled with smoke, without and within; every window and aperture was streaked with fire, bristling with bright steel bayonets, and swarming with dark fierce visages.

Our fire made frightful havoc among the revolters; who numbered above a thousand, all keen for plunder, infuriated by unexpected opposition, and maddened by wine drank in the various houses and cellars they had pillaged on their march: their yells were like those of wild beasts or savages.

The sbirri, or feudal gens-d'armes who wore the barone's livery, were lost among the dense rabble of barefooted miners from Stilo, grim charcoal-burners, and Scarolla's squalid banditti. A revolting array of hideous faces I beheld moving beneath me in the moonlight; distorted by every malignant and evil passion, and flushed with wine, fury, and inborn ferocity. In the blaze of their brandished torches, glittered weapons of every description, from the pike twelve feet long, to the short spadetto and knife of Bastia. Onward they rushed, a mighty mass of ferocity and filth; and again they were repulsed, leaving the quadrangle strewn with killed and wounded.

"Viva Giuseppe! superba!" cried a shrill quavering voice: it was that of the barone, whom we now saw heading a third attack in person; whilst a strong party, making a lodgment under the portico, assailed the grand entrance with crowbars and levers. The colonnade protected them from our fire, and the massive frame-work of the door was fast yielding to the blows of pickaxes and hammers with which the strong-armed miners assailed it; whilst their courage increased, as the barrier gradually gave way before their strenuous efforts. At last a tremendous shout announced that an aperture was made; upon which I ordered the barricades of the vestibule to be strengthened, and lined by a double rank of soldiers, entrusting their command to the young Alfiero Caraffa.

The fire of the besiegers had now reduced our force to about eighty effective men; and my anxiety for the safety of the villa and its inmates increased with the wounds and deaths around me. The whole terrace on the land-side was lined with marksmen, who knelt behind the stone balusters, and fired between them with deadly precision at the large upper windows; through which the white uniforms and gay trappings of the Royal Calabrians were distinctly visible in the moonlight. I dreaded the continuation of this deadly fire more than a close assault; and to increase my anxiety, Andronicus, who acted as our commissary, came with a most lugubrious visage to inform me that the ammunition was becoming expended, and that the pouches of the Free Calabri were almost empty.

"God! we are lost then!" I exclaimed: this information fell upon me like a thunderbolt. I hurried to Santugo, whom I found kneeling, rifle in hand, before a narrow loophole, endeavouring to discover the little barone, the main-spring of this revolt; whom it was no easy task to perceive, among such a rabble, although we heard his croaking voice and chuckling laugh every moment.

"Superba! viva Giuseppe Buonaparte! viva la Capitanessa Scarolla!" The banditti answered by a yell of delight. "On, on brave rogues;" he added, "we will have two pieces of cannon here in an hour."

"Cannon!" I reiterated, and exchanged glances with Santugo. We were both astounded by the intelligence.

"O, Claude!" said my friend, "I tremble only for my mother, for Francesca and her sisters. For myself, per Baccho! you know I would fight, without a tremor, till roof and rafters, column and cupola, fell in ruins above me. Is all lost, then?'

"No," said I, speaking through my hand; for the noise of the conflict was deafening; "we may save the villa yet, and all its inmates: but a bold dash must be made. Look yonder! what see you?"

"I understand—the task is mine."

"Mine, rather."

"No, no, Signor Claude, I have Francesca at stake."

"And I, Bianca—we are equal."

"I care not. Ola, Andronicus! saddle my cavallo Barbero, and look well to girth and holster—quick, away, Signor Greco!"

What we saw was the British fleet, consisting of a gigantic ship of the line and three or four frigates and corvettes, standing slowly down the Straits of the Pharo, and keeping close in shore; attracted, probably, by the sound of the firing. I knew the flag-ship of Sir Sidney Smith, by its old-fashioned poop-lantern; and my project was to despatch a messenger on board, craving help. But how could one leave the villa? it was environed on one side by surf and steep rocks, shelving down to a whirlpool; on the other by fierce assailants who were merciless as the yawning sea.

Desperate was the venture: but that it must be attempted, we knew was imperative. A friendly contest ensued between us and the two Cavalieri Caraffa; each insisting on being the executor of the dangerous service. We contested the point so long, that it was at last referred to a throw of dice: the lot fell on Luigi; who prepared at once for the deadly mission, by divesting himself of his mantle, buttoning his short velvet surtout closely about him, and taking in three holes of his sword belt; while I hurriedly indited the following note to the admiral.

"VILLA D'ALFIERI. Sept. 20*th*, 1808.

"Sir,

"I have the honour to request that you will order as strong a detachment of seamen or marines as you may deem necessary, to be landed at the villa of the Alfieri, which is closely besieged by the Baron of Castelguelfo, a Buonapartist, who is now at the head of a numerous force of Italian rebels. To protect the loyal family of the bearer, the Visconte di Santugo, I placed in the villa a company of the Free Corps, and have already to regret the loss of Captain Battista Gismondo, and nearly sixty rank and file. Our case is desperate. The villa will not be tenable one hour longer, as the barone (whom Regnier has supplied with all munition of war) is bringing two pieces of cannon against it, and our cartridges are totally expended. I have the honour, &c. &c.

"CLAUDE DUNDAS,
Capt. 62d Regt."

Admiral Sir SIDNEY SMITH,
H.M. ship Pompey.

According to the fashion of many large Italian houses, the stables formed a part of the principal building; and so in the present emergency it was lucky that the horses were at hand. Santugo's black Barbary horse, with its red quivering nostrils, eyes sparkling fire, and its mane bristling at the noise of the musketry, was led by the Greek chasseur through a long corridor to a saloon which overlooked the grottoes by the sea-shore. The saddled steed was an unusual visitor in that noble apartment; where statues, vases, pictures, and sofas, were piled up in confusion to form barricades before six tall windows which faced the straits. One was open, revealing the bright sky, the sparkling sea, Sicilia's coast and the sailing fleet; while ten Calabri, with their bayonets at the charge, stood by to guard the aperture.

The brave young noble mounted, and stooping as he passed out, guided his horse along a ledge of slippery rock, and the casement was immediately secured behind him. We watched him with equal anxiety and admiration, as he rode along the perilous path, where one false step of the Barbary would have plunged him in the whirlpool, which roared and sucked in the foaming eddies, beneath the villa walls. The instant he passed the angle of the building which was swept by the fire of the assailants, there burst from them a simultaneous yell; which was answered by a shout of reckless defiance from the daring Santugo, who driving spurs into his fleet horse, compelled it to clear the high balustraded terrace by a flying leap. Then his long sword flashed in the moonlight as he slashed right and left, crying—"Viva Carolina! Ferdinando nostra e la Santa Fede!" cutting his way through the yelling mass, escaping bullet and steel as if he had a charmed life, he passed through them and was free; and I had no doubt would gain the village (where the boats lay) safely and rapidly.

Enraged at his escape, the revolters pressed on with renewed fury, but changed their mode of attack. A cloud now passed over the moon involving the scenery in comparative darkness; but it was soon to be illuminated in a manner I little expected.

There flashed forth a sudden glare of light, revealing the sea of ferocious visages and glancing arms of the enemy, the bloody terrace heaped with dead, the dark arcades, carved cornices, and lofty portico of the villa: a lurid glare shone over everything, and a man advanced to the terrace holding aloft an Indian sky-rocket; a terrible species of firework often used by the French. Its yellow blaze fell full upon the face of the bearer, in whom I recognised the villainous engineer, Navarre; I snatched a musket from the hand of a dead soldier, but ere it was aimed the traitor had shot the fiery missile from his hand and disappeared.

This terrible instrument of eastern warfare forced itself forward, roaring and blazing towards the villa, and breaking through a window, plunged about as if instinct with life, setting fire to everything inflammatory within its reach. From its size and weight, and the formation of its sides, which were bristling with spikes, it finally stuck fast to the flooring of a room; where its power of combustion increased every instant, and a succession of reports burst from it as its fire-balls flew off in every direction. All fled in dismay, to avoid being blown up by the sparks falling into their pouches, scorched to death by remaining in its vicinity, shot by its bullets, or stabbed by the spikes; which it shot forth incessantly, like quills from a "fretful porcupine."

In vain I cried for water: no one heard me; the diabolical engine bounded, roared, and hissed like a very devil, involving us in noisome and suffocating smoke; and in three minutes the magnificent villa was in flames, and its defenders paralysed.

"Superba!" cried the barone. "Viva Guiseppe!" and the triumphant yells of his enraged followers redoubled. I turned to the Cavalieri Caraffa.

"Gentlemen, keep your soldiers at their posts to the last," said I, "while I provide for the retreat of the ladies."

"How, signor?" asked Andronicus; "on every hand they environ us, save the seaward; where a whirlpool—O, omnipotente!"

At that moment we heard the report of a cannon; a round shot passed through the great door, demolishing in its passage a beautiful fountain of marble and bronze, and the water flowed in a torrent over the tessellated pavement, while musketry was discharged in quick succession through the breach. To augment our distress, the barone's guns had come up; and the triumphant cries, the ferocity and daring of the assailants increased as the hot flames grew apace around us. Shrieks now burst from the summit of the round tower: overwhelmed with anxiety and rage, and faint with the heat and smoke of the fire-arms and conflagration, I hurried up the great staircase to bring away the females, who could not remain five minutes longer: but where or how I was to convey them, Heaven only knew!

The moon, which had been obscured for some time, now shone forth with renewed lustre; and I saw the sea brightening like a silver flood, as the last clouds passed away from the shining orb. O, sight of joy! Three large boats filled with marines and seamen were at that moment pulled close under the rocks; to which they had advanced unseen by the foe. The headmost had already disappeared in the sea grottoes; and I heard the measured clank of the rowlocks, and saw the oar-blades of the sternmost barge flash like blue fire as they were feathered in true man-o'-war style. The boats shot under the rocks, like arrows: one moment the glittering moon poured its cold light on the glazed caps and bristling bayonets of the closely packed marines—on the bright pike-heads, the gleaming cutlasses, and little tarpaulins of the seamen—and the next, it shone on the lonely seething ocean.

"Saved, thank Heaven!" I exclaimed, rushing down the stair. "Bravo, soldateria! fight on, brave Calabri, for aid is near. Hollo, Zaccheo! throw open the windows to the back, and bring down the ladies before the fire reaches the upper stories. Hollo, signor trombadore! sound the rally, my brave little man!"

The poor boy was so terrified that his trumpet-call was only a feeble squeak; but the survivors of the company, about fifty in number, rushed from all quarters to the spot. A volley of musketry announced that our marines had opened on the assailants.

"Let us sally out—away with the barricades!" cried Lieutenant Caraffa; and we rushed forth with charged bayonets, eager to revenge the slaughter and devastation of the night. The regular fire of a hundred marines from the terrace—to which Santugo led them by a secret passage from the grottoes below—threw the revolters into a panic; and their discomfiture was completed by a strong detachment of seamen, headed by Hanfield the gallant captain of the Delight, whom Sir Sidney had sent in command of the expedition. Rushing over the lawn with a wild hurrah, they fell slashing and thrusting with cutlass and pike among the recoiling rabble of the barone; who, abandoning their two six-pounder guns, fled, en masse, with rapidity: but fighting every step of the way towards the mountains, and firing on us from behind every bush and rock which afforded momentary concealment. In the pursuit I encountered the formidable Scarolla, who fired both his pistols at me without effect, as I rushed upon him with my sabre: clubbing his rifle, he swung it round his head with a force sufficiently formidable; but watching an opportunity when he overstruck himself, I sabred him above the left eye, and beat him to the ground; when some of his followers made a rally and carried him off.

"Viva Guiseppe!" cried a well-known voice close by me; and looking round, I beheld the little author of all the mischief, struggling in the grasp of a seaman; whom, by his embroidered anchors, I recognised as boatswain of the Delight. He was not much taller than his antagonist, the barone, but strong and thickset, with the chest and shoulders of an ox; an ample sunburnt visage, surmounted by a little glazed hat, and fringed by a circular beard of black wiry hair below, his cheek distended by a quid, and an enormous pig-tail reaching below his waist-belt, made him seem a very formidable antagonist to Guelfo; whom, he had knocked down, and over whom he was flourishing his heavy cutlass, squirting a little tobacco-juice into his eyes from time to time.

"Maladetto!" growled the Italian lord, "O, povero voi, Signor Marinero!"

"Avast, old Gingerbread! I speak none of your foreign lingos," replied the boatswain.

Flushed with rage and disappointment, the barone struggled furiously with his strong antagonist, who held him at arms' length, in doubt whether to cleave him down or let him go; till Zaccheo, the Greek, approached, and, ere I could interfere, ended the matter, by driving his couteau-de-chasse through the heart of Guelfo, who expired without a groan.

By daybreak, the fighting was over. A poor little midshipman and several seamen were killed; a hundred of our mad assailants lay dead in the quadrangle, and as many more round the terrace. In the villa, half its garrison lay killed or wounded around the windows, from which the flames and smoke rolled forth in mighty volumes; many were roasted or consumed before we could remove them: poor old Gismondo with the rest. Hanfield ordered his men to save the villa from further destruction; but the flames had gathered such force, that for a time every effort seemed fruitless. Assisted by three boats' crews from the flag-ship, they pulled down a part of the mansion, and turned the water of the jets d'eau on the rest, to prevent the fire (which was confined to one wing) from spreading to the main building. After an hour of toil and danger, during which I worked away in my shirt-sleeves until I was as black as a charcoal-burner, the flames were suppressed: but how changed was the aspect of the once splendid villa!

One portion of the building was roofless and ruined: its lofty casements shattered, its corbelled balconies, tall pillars, and rich Corinthian entablatures, scorched by fire, and blackened by smoke; the ravaged gardens and terraces were strewn with corpses, the halls, saloons, and corridors, encumbered with the same ghastly objects, splashed with blood, and filled with confusion and destruction; pier-glasses, vases, and statues, were dashed to pieces, hangings and pictures rent and torn. The quiet library and elegant boudoir rang with the cries of the wounded, or the reckless merriment of the sailors, who caroused on the richest wines. But Santugo looked around him with the most perfect sang froid.

Twenty prisoners we had captured were sent over to Palermo, where they expiated their revolt in the horrible dungeons of the Damusi,—the most frightful perhaps in the world, where their bones are probably lying at this hour.

CHAPTER VII.

THE NUPTIALS.

When the fight was over, the fire extinguished, and the dead all interred, I repaired to the grotto, where the ladies and their attendants were shivering with terror and the cold air of the sea, which every instant threw a shower of sparkling spray into the damp vaults. A statue to St. Hugh, before which three dim tapers were always burning, gave a picturesque aspect to the natural grotto; and a rill of limpid water, at which the saint had quenched his thirst, gurgled from the rocks into a rich font of white marble. Around this little shrine the females were clustered; and a cry burst from them when I approached in my unseemly garb, spotted with blood, blackened by powder, smoke, and toil, and plastered over with clay, as if I had been dipped in the mud-baths of Abano.

The carriage was brought; the horses of the ladies were saddled, and they left the half ruined villa with a strong escort, to take up a temporary residence at the castle of Angistola, the property of the Duke of Bagnara, near Pizzo. After seeing the remains of the Calabrian company embarked for Messina in our gun-boats, I, accompanied by Santugo, followed the ladies at full gallop; leaving the old chasseur to act as commandant at the villa. I despatched a mounted servant to Scylla, for some of my baggage; a suit of uniform especially, as my harness was quite ridiculous in the gay salons of the duchess.

At Angistola, the ladies soon recovered from their terror and fatigue: the beauty of the scenery, where the steep Apennines sloped down to the Gulf of St. Eufemio, covered with dark pines or orange trees, and the deep-wooded dell through which the river wound, seemed gloomy, solemn, and picturesque. The Duke of Bagnara held a military command at a distance; but his fair duchessa, who was one of the reigning beauties of the Sicilian Court, received us with every honour and kindness.

A few days after our arrival we had the castello filled with milliners from Palermo, and the ladies were constantly clustered in deep consultation around the duchess in her boudoir; the visconte was joyous and gay—a fête was evidently approaching: he was about to espouse his cousin, with all the splendour that wealth could yield, and the imposing pomp of the Catholic Church impart; and (to be brief) I found myself on the same happy footing with my dear little Bianca, without the portentous question having been asked. It was all quite understood: we had made no secret of our mutual attachment, which was revealed by every gentle word and tender glance. Our marriage was the earnest wish of Santugo and the vicontessa; and as for her principal relative, the withered little Prince of St. Agata, as the girl was without a ducat, he cared not a straw who became her husband.

The day before the auspicious one, old Fra Adriano came jogging up to the castello on his ambling mule, in the execution of his office as family confessor, to confess us all, according to the Italian custom, before marriage. To this I objected, first with a joke, and then gravely; much to the horror of the reverend friar: he turned up his eyes, and muttering "ahi! eretico!" went in search of Bianca, who confessed to him—Heaven knows what! So innocent a being could have nothing to reveal, save her own happiness and joy.

Adriano had scarcely left me, when I saw a sergeant, in the welcome and well-known uniform of my own regiment, ascending the steep avenue to the castle porch.

"What can be the matter now?" thought I; and at such a time—the deuce! "Well, Gask, what news from the corps, and what has brought you here?" said I, as he entered the room and stood straight as his half-pike, which he held advanced. "Take a chair, man," I added, with that kind familiarity with which an officer ought always to greet a soldier of his own regiment in a strange place.

"Sir, I have brought a letter from Sir John Stuart. Being on my way to join the garrison at Scylla castle, he sent me over in a gun-boat from Messina, that I might deliver this; which he was anxious you should receive without delay."

I tore open the note. It ran thus;—

"Messina, Tuesday morning.

"DEAR DUNDAS,—Join your garrison at Scylla without a moment's delay: General Sherbrooke threatens to supersede you, and order you to join the 'Wiltshire' at Syracuse; as he understands that you attend more to the ladies than H.M.'s service. Massena and Regnier are concentrating forces in Upper Calabria; the chiefs of the Masse are wavering; and you may expect more broken heads by Christmas. Adieu! I start for London to-morrow.

"I am, &c. &c.,

"J. STUART, Major-General."

"So, Gask, you are bound for Scylla?" said I, glad the note contained only a friendly hint.

"Yes, sir."

"You will go with me, as it is unsafe for you to travel alone in such a country as this. I set out the day after to-morrow."

"I am much obliged to you, sir, for your forethought. Do we march by daybreak?"

"No, no," I answered, laughing; "that would scarcely suit; but retire with the chamberlain, who will order you a luncheon and tell you news."

Though pleased with Sir John's friendly attention, I could very well have dispensed with the presence of my countryman, the sergeant; who was a true blue Presbyterian from the Howe of Fife, an ardent worshipper of Eben Erskine, and one, consequently, who would look with pious horror on the popish ceremonies of the morrow: which there was no doubt he would witness, with the household of the castello.

Poor Gask! He was a worthy and good soldier, for whom the whole corps had a sincere respect. Educated for our stern Scottish kirk, some misfortunes in early life forced him into the ranks, where his superior attainments and classical education made him a marvel among the Wiltshire men, and gained him three stripes, although it could do nothing more; the quiet tenor of his way being the reverse of the smart drill-corporal or bustling sergeant-major, who looks forward to the post of adjutant. He was the beau-ideal of a Scottish soldier, grave, intelligent, and steady; and was seldom seen, unless, book in hand, reading in some retired nook, when his comrades were roystering in the canteen or sutler's tent. Poor Gask! this page is the only tribute to your memory.

Next day the marriages were celebrated with great pomp, in the church of St. Eufemio, at Nicastro: that of the visconte and Francesca took place first, and was followed by that of Bianca and myself. A new uniform coat was quite spoiled by the holy water, which the bishop sprinkled over us very liberally; and my white "regimental breeches" were totally ruined by the rough Mosaic of the church, when I advanced on my knees, with a lighted candle in one hand, to present bread and wine to the bishop, while old Adriano waved the stole over us, according to the usage of the land.

"Ah! if any of our mess could see me just now, how the rogues would laugh!" thought I, while scrambling along the aisle, with the hot wax dropping on my fingers from the confounded taper, which I did not hold so gracefully as Bianca held hers. Grand as the ceremony was, I disliked so much of it, and dreaded to encounter the cold smile and smirking face of Sergeant Gask; who stood, upright as a pike, among the kneeling domestics.