A Carnival of Rome: In Two Parts. Part I

EVERYBODY who has been in Rome knows the house which stands at the convergence of two steep streets, the Via Gregoriana and Via Sistina. It is of triangular shape and adorned with a semi-circular, pillared portico which has obtained for it the designation of the Tempietto.¹ The two aforesaid streets here merge into the Piazza of the Trinità de’ Monti, an open paved space in the midst of which rises an obelisk; on one hand is the church from which the place takes its name, with a high, double flight of steps and twin turrets; on the other, the heavy stone balustrade of the magnificent Scalinata, or Spanish stairs, which descend by successive intervals of broad flights and wide landing-places to the Piazza di Spagna, the heart of the foreign quarter. Beyond the church and balustrade a wide gravel road, planted with four rows of trees, passes the unpromising street-front of the Villa Medici to the Monte Pincio, the favorite drive and lounge of all Rome, native and foreign: a hill of terraced gardens, bearing on its brow a tall palm, where huge aloes and cactuses and other semitropical plants, high evergreen hedges and shrubberies, plashing fountains and smooth green grass make perpetual summer. This quarter is the chosen resort of Anglo-Saxondom in Rome, which has earned for it the nickname of the English Ghetto. The steepness of the streets makes them unusually quiet. No one takes either of them as a short cut, yet the Piazza della Trinità de’ Monti is the gayest spot in the whole city, for the obelisk is the goal of the chariots on the Pincian; the double stream of carriages which every afternoon brings to the gardens turns there as the limit of its round, and for a couple of hours before sunset it is difficult for a pedestrian to cross. Yet the idlers on foot far outnumber those in carriages. After the Ave Maria it is deserted again. The sun basks upon it all day; by the Scalinata you may descend from its tranquil heights to the shops, hotels, circulating libraries, banks, and hack-stand of the Piazza di Spagna; while from the balustrade and all the upper windows of the neighborhood you look across the picturesque confusion of the city to the noble cupola of St. Peter’s, and, still further, to the ridge of Monte Mario, with its white villa and solitary stone-pine.

Early in the winter of 186— there was tacked upon the outer door of the second story of the Tempietto a visiting-card engraved, “ Mr. & Mrs. Geo. W. Mason, Fifth Avenue; ” beside which, through a hole in the door, hung the bit of packthread which generally does duty for a bell-handle at the entrance of a Roman apartment. An American family had rented this for the season. The most interesting members of the party were two young girls, Henrietta Mason, and her bosom friend Marion Sands, who had been allowed to come abroad with these old family friends. Henrietta was pretty, attractive, clever, quick, and like other nice girls; Marion was not quick, less pretty, and in some respects different from girls in general. They were neither of them twenty, but Henrietta, who was about six months the elder, had been “ out.” for two years, while Marion lived in the country and had been in mourning since she left school. Henrietta was already a little woman of the world; Marion was in a half-developed condition, not understanding herself very well, and very much afraid of being laughed at. She was chiefly distinguished by enthusiasm and a sort of simple largeness, not incompatible with complex feeling, but rendering her incapable of pettiness in her estimates or actions. No young dream of love was ever more rapturous than the idea to her of going abroad with her adored Henrietta; six months had already passed and brought no disillusion. Her transports were roused anew by each country in turn, until when at length they reached Rome she felt that this was the climax and acme of emotion. It took her weeks to calm down from the first effects of meeting such beauty and antiquity at every turn, and to surmount the repulsion and disgust which the squalor, dirt, and meanness in which they are sunk occasioned her. But after New Year, when the rush for seats at the great church ceremonies was over, when her senses had undazzled from the many - colored gorgeousness of St. Peter’s with its Christmas pantomime of worship, her soul gently descended from the altitudes to which it had been rapt by the aerial notes of the silver trumpets (now forever silent), and she began to subside into a consciousness of perpetual enjoyment, tranquil but intense, such as she had never known before. Lying in bed wide awake, in the lengthening mornings, with a laziness unknown to her at home, idly watching the January sun stream in with a plenitude of light and warmth it seems to possess nowhere else, hearing no sound in the quiet streets save the melodious call of one newspaper vender who passed daily at that early hour chanting softly and sonorously his Giornale di Roma, she used to think the luxury of that hour alone enough to make Rome incomparable. Meanwhile the lively Henrietta was enjoying Rome after her fashion: tripping away betimes with vivacious diligence, arm in arm with Marion, down the broad, sunny steps of the Scalinata to hail a legno, or little one-horse open carriage, in the Piazza di Spagna, which should carry them to the Vatican or the Capitol, the Colonna or Barberini palace, or whatever other gallery was open on that day; driving in state with her mother in the grounds of the Pamfili or Borghese villas in the afternoon, and returning before sunset to somebody’s reception and five o’clock tea; or, if it was a hunting-day, off by ten o’clock with a party of friends to follow the hounds over break-neck country for six or seven hours, coming home quite fresh to dance all night with Italian princes at a ball.

One afternoon, as they were waiting for Mrs. Mason and the barouche, a card was brought in by the august Fortunate, their courier. Henrietta took it.

“‘Mr. Roger Carey!’ Why, Mal! your cousin Roger; yes, let him come in by all means. You have n’t seen him for an age, have you? ”

“ No, not for ages; not since I was twelve, when he was sent to Switzerland to school.”

“ I’ve seen him since then, you know, when we were abroad before; you remember I told you that we had a little three days’ flirtation at Heidelberg; it’s positively thrilling.”

Here the door opened and Roger Carey was shown in; he was a tall, handsome, well-made young fellow of twenty-three or twenty-four, very well-dressed, and beaming with high spirits. He and Henrietta rushed at one another: “ How delightful ! ” they said in a breath. “ When did you come? ” “ How did you know we were here?” etc. Then she broke off to present him to Marion.

“ Little Mal! ” He had not seen her for seven years, and had not expected to see her now; he had met none of his old playmates since he had left America, and this unlooked-for encounter with a pretty young kinswoman was a most agreeable surprise. He went towards her with a slight intimation of intent to kiss her, which was met on her part by an equally slight intimation that he should not do so; so he only stood holding both her hands and laughing down into her fresh young face, which looked up at him with a mixture of pleasure and bashfulness. It passed through his mind that if Henrietta had been his cousin he would have kissed her, and that he rather wished she were, but he was very glad to see them both on any terms. At this moment Fortunate reappeared to announce the carriage, and the girls began to gather up the numerous shawls and rugs without which no one goes for an afternoon drive in Rome.

“ Mamma will be so glad to see you; perhaps we can drop you somewhere, — or, if you have no engagement, won’t you come with us? We have a seat.”

“ Why, I should be delighted! I’ve no engagement; I got here only this morning by the night train from Florence.”

“ And what have you been about ever since? ”

“ I’ve been in bed,” said he, laughing; while the girls cried, “ Oh! ” “I breakfasted at two, and then went to the banker’s, where I saw Mr. Mason’s name in his book; so I came straight up those awful steps to your door.” This meant the Scalinata, and the girls cried “ Oh! ” again.

“ Only wait,” said Henrietta, nodding. ‘ ‘ I give you a week to be converted and become fanatical.”

“ And I give you a day,” added Marion, “ for we are going to drive on the Appian Way.” By this time they were at the door, and the good-natured Mrs. Mason warmly seconded her daughter’s welcome and invitation.

In a few minutes they were driving along the narrow, crowded Corso, Henrietta playing cicerone to the lions by the way.

“ There’s the Antoniue column. You never were in Rome before? Oh, lucky man! How long are you to stay ? Till after Carnival? Good! two full months; we ’re to stay until Easter; but how time does slip away here; ‘ runs itself in golden sands’ — no, you need n’t smile—• without anybody to shake the hour-glass. And there’s the Doria palace, where Marion and I go to see the pictures and make believe we like it. Here we are in the Piazza de Venezia; is n’t that a grand old dungeon of a palace which stops the way? Does n’t it make you think of Rienzi? Now, Mal! don’t tell me I’m out in my reckoning; what difference does a hundred years make in the Eternal City? Marion goes in for knowing things, and studies, and stays at home to read Gibbon, while I am dancing the German. I call that sheer waste of time; we’ve all our lives before us to do that in when we get back to America. Heigh-ho! that one should ever have to leave Rome! I’d compound for never seeing even Paris again,—if I might have a box from Worth twice a year, — to stay here all my days. There ’s the Forum of Trajan.” The young man leaned forward eagerly. " Mamma, may we stop the carriage a minute ? and may I tell the coachman not to take us by the Coliseum to-day, but to turn at the foot of the Capitol and go by the Theat re of Marcellus and the Circus Maximus? Mr. Carey ought n’t to see everything in a breath. ”

The order was obeyed, but as they passed between the high blank walls which balk expectation, and Henrietta, pointing right, said, “ There are the Baths of Caracalla; ” and left, “ There are the tombs of the Scipios,” long before they drove under the arch of Drusus and beheld the two great bastions of the San Sebastiano gate, Roger felt that marvels came too thick and fast, and that his brain was oppressed. He almost regretted having come with these companions; there was a solemnity about such places and names which made him wish to see them first alone. But as soon as the city was left behind, and the tantalizing walls of villas and vineyards sank from sight, and the wide Campagna opened before them with the white vista of ruined sepulchres marking their way, Henrietta’s talk began to subside and took a softer and more interrupted flow, and by degrees ceased altogether. Suddenly Marion started up.

“ Take my place,” she exclaimed to her cousin. “ You are sitting with your back to the view. ’ ’

He resisted stoutly. “ I shall see it as we come back,” he said.

“ No, no; then you must face towards Rome;” and nothing would induce her to resume her seat, until, still protesting, he exchanged with her, and sat down by Mrs. Mason, who was placidly laughing at her vehemence. They had reached the tomb of Cecilia Metella, and here, of course, the young people got out.

“ What a pity that all the places one cares for most in Europe are so hackneyed,” said Carey. " It’s provoking to think that where one stops and sighs, everybody does the same, from Byron to Cook’s tourists.”

“ But our feeling for them is as fresh as if we were the first,” said Marion, earnestly. “ Or, if I think of Byron or Shelley, it does not make a spot seem common that they have been here before me and felt it as I do.” Roger Carey turned his eyes, which had been studying the ancient cornice, upon her face, and was struck by the depth of expression for such a young person. Henrietta laughed lightly, and gave her friend a love-pat.

“ Oh, no; some of us find the chief attraction of a place in the fact that Tasso, or Keats, or Lamartine sentimentalized over it.”

They went back to the carriage, and drove on until they came to the tombs of the Horatii and Curatii, where Mrs. Mason bade the coachman turn. Here the trio got out again and strolled along on the turf beside the road, stopping to decipher inscriptions on the fragments of marble still incrusted in the brick-work, or to pull an early wild flower.

“ And what have you been doing these four years, Miss Mason ? ”

“ Let me see: I will tell you the history of my life, as they do in novels and plays. You remember, then, that it was late in the autumn when we bade each other a long farewell; ” here she laughed a little; he laughed, too, and gave her a glance of mock reproach. “ That winter we spent here. Papa was one of those who always thought the war was coming to an end after a victory. When spring opened with those terrible battles, it was like the first shock again, and we hurried home.” Here Marion noticed that her cousin’s face changed, and he drove a little cane he carried into the ground with a sudden thrust. " Then I went back to school for a couple of years; then I went into society, had a very good time, broke a heart or two, — all mended now, and the owners married; then last summer poor papa’s dyspepsia was so bad again that we came abroad to see what a year’s entire change of climate would do for him.”

“ I hope he is better? ”

“ He is always well in Europe, only a good deal bored in Italy; but he can’t stand the damp, cloudy winters north of the Alps, so here we are.”

“ And what have you been doing, Marion, since the old days when, we used to play at being husband and wife, at Beechy Heights? ”

Marion was embarrassed, reddened, and replied, “ Nothing,” falling behind a step or two, as if looking at the view.

“ How absurdly shy she is,” said her cousin, a little vexed.

“ Yes, rather; she has never been anywhere, you know.”

“ Well, you won’t snub me so if I remind you of old times; not the old times when we were children, but later ones.”

“ Oh no; I feel so old now that all that ’s quite lang syne,” said Henrietta, laughing, but blushing, too; and she waited for Marion to come up. “But I don’t think Rome a good place for falling in love, do you?”

“ No, I should think not; there is too much to do, to think about; one does not seem to want anything more than one has here.”

“ Then,” said her cousin, “ you think love comes only because nature abhors a vacuum.”

They laughed, but Marion would not talk about love; she pointed to a hillock a few paces withdrawn from the road, composed of broken marble and masonry overgrown with sod and weeds, and overhung by a vigorous bush which had struck root down among the chinks and crevices. “ Let us climb that mound to see the view; ” and up they both sprang, light-footed as kids. He followed them, supposing that it was a joke, but found even that slight elevation an advantage amidst the surrounding expanse. The ardent-colored plain spread, out on every side, its surface broken into countless irregularities, in which, at a short distance, no eye could distinguish the natural inequalities of the soil from the wreck of man’s sumptuous pride. Villas, theatres, mausoleums, were strewn about in fragments, here a column, there a pedestal, yonder a long symmetrical mass pierced with a row of cells; some fallen and smothered in grass and briers, some still erect and bearing their wealth of herbage, trailing wreaths, waving tufts, thick shrubbery, like hanging gardens high in air; endless-arched, dark-red aqueducts, burnished in the late afternoon sunshine, stretched in great radii from Rome to the mountains, — the wondrous mountains which encompass her afar with a zone of imperial purple. Here and there a tall, slender, square tower stood up lonely and glowing against the cerulean sky. The great avenue of the Appian Way, bordered with broken marbles, led southward till lost in the heavy velvet shadow of the Alban range, whose slender serrate outline has a grace unknown in the heavy, round-shouldered hills of our country; north, they looked to where Rome was piled up on her many hills above the bronzed circuit of her walls, a sublime chaos of domes, towers, pinnacles, huge shapeless moles of ancient ruin, and black spires of cypresstrees; on that side the mountains, unillumined by the sun, were of a deep opaque blue, their summits blanched with the dead white purity of the snow. An air at once soft and cool, too quiet to be called a breeze, breathed upon their cheeks: it was the tramontana, or wind from the Apennines.

“ Oh, this is Italy!” exclaimed the young man, lifting his hat from his brow and drawing a long breath; “ this is the Italy we dream of; I see it all now.”

“Converted already!” said Henrietta.

“ Yes,” he replied, and then they were all silent. Mrs. Mason had to call to them that the sun was going down, before any of them moved, and by the time they were within the walls again, the narrow streets between their high houses were already dark. As they left the Campagna behind, Miss Mason’s lively chatter recommenced, and she drew from Carey an account of himself during the years since they had seen him. He had then been in his first semester at Heidelberg, where he had stayed for two years, going thence for one to Berlin; the last twelvemonth he had spent chiefly in London and Paris with his parents, whom he had left at the latter place. He was going home with them in the summer “to go to work,” whereat Henrietta made an incredulous grimace; meanwhile he had come over the Alps for the first time, with his college friend, Count Rudolf von Rothenstein, to see Italy, and perhaps Greece and Turkey.

“ A friend ? Is he young? Is he handsome? Has he a castle on the Rhine? Why, it is just like Hyperion and the baron! And what have you done with him? ”

“For shame, Henrietta!” said her mother.

“ Treated him shabbily, I suppose he is beginning to think; but he had to go to his banker’s, to leave some letters of introduction, and to call at the Prussian legation and at the Archæological Society, for he is a very erudite young Herr, — would suit Marion, I think; so he had several hours’ work before him.”

“ Well, you must bring him to see us; bring him this evening, and then we can make some plans for to-morrow. That’s the way one has to do abroad, or the time is gone, and the people too.”

“ But, Netta, Mr. Carey did not come to Rome to see you.”

“ No, mamma, so think how much more pleased he must be to find me here.”

“ I hope that you and your friend will dine with us to-morrow,” said Mrs. Mason, giving up the attempt to repress her daughter. “ We should be glad to see you to-day, but ” —

“ But,” continued her daughter, as she hesitated, " the basket will only bring four portions; how can you have so much false pride, mamma ? And they calculate closely, very closely, at Nazzari’s. You know how we live? Everything comes cooked from a restaurant, from soup to blanc manger, all at once, and so we have it overdone and cold, and never can bring home a friend with us. Nobody thinks about eating, here — the people themselves, to begin with; and we soon learn it of them.”

Roger Carey had always been in the pleasant position called having the world in a string. The younger and more promising of two sons, he had been sent abroad at sixteen because his popularity was found to interfere with his studies; just as he was beginning to fancy himself nearly ready for college, he was put to school, first in Switzerland and then in Germany, to make up for lost time and prepare for a German university. But this check did not depress him; the change and novelty compensated for the slight humiliation, and he was one of those who find friends and fun wherever they go. Something high-flown in his notions, which he never belied in action, gave a peculiar charm to his handsome face, and won him a friend for life on his first day at Heidelberg, the young man with whom he was now traveling. Von Rothenstein was a few years his senior, not so bright, but more mature; no better a fellow, but less volatile; in fact, without being a prig, he belonged to the old-head-on-young-shoulders order. He had been of great use in keeping the young American steady, so that he did not disappoint his father’s ambition, and it was to be with Rudolf that Carey went to the University of Berlin. In his whole life he had had but one real trial — when his brother Duncan, a noble boy, but not clever, was killed in the second year of the war. Roger, then not twenty, had implored permission to come home and go into the army. His parents would not listen to it; distracted with grief at the loss of his only brother — though he had not seen him for years — and goaded by feelings of patriotism which absence and war made doubly poignant, he was on the point of quitting Germany in defiance of his father, and entering the ranks unknown. It needed all Rothenstein’s influence to prevent this rash act, and it was only after tempestuous scenes that he finally prevailed. It took the lad months to recover his equilibrium; Rothenstein used to chaff him long afterwards, and call it his Sturm und Drang period; but Roger never could joke about it. Now this belonged to by-gones; it had been a small share of trouble for even so young a life; and when he found himself with his friend reaching their old castle-in-the-air, a journey to Italy and the East, he was as happy as any young fellow under the sun, and felt his oats not a little.

So the friend was brought to the Tempietto, a fair, fine-looking young man, with no oppressive evidences of erudition. He was quite as ready as Roger to give himself up to the guidance of two charming young ladies, and next morning the four sallied forth without having decided where they should go, and held a council on the Trinità de' Monti.

“ I want to show them so many things, and all first,” cried Netta. “ St. Peter’s and the Palatine, the Coliseum, the Catacombs. But we must n’t waste time in making up our minds, for mamma wishes me to pay visits with her at three, and I must be back to dress.” At last by common consent they referred the decision to Count Rothenstein, as the oldest and wisest of the party, and he gave his voice in favor of beginning with ancient Rome; so the day was dedicated to the ruins. They ran down the broad, flat steps of the Scalinata, past the models in their bright-colored costumes who were basking in the morning sunshine. The girls knew them all by sight, and exchanged many a nod and smile with the handsome Stella and the more beautiful Nanna, the bandit-like Giovanni, laziest and most amiable of Trasteverines. Netta had a few centessimi ready for the angel-faced boy of four in a peaked hat, sheep-skin jacket, and goat-skin breeches, who looked like Cupid masquerading as a brigand, and who was learning beggary betimes; and for his dear little black - eyed, rosymouthed baby sister, done up like a woman in the gaudy - striped woolen apron, the bodice, and square, white linen head-dress of a contadina, who got out of the lap of her aged grandam and toddled over to the foreigners to ask for “ Qualche cosa,” as naturally as a duckling takes to the water.

“ Are n’t you lucky to have two Corinnes to introduce you to Rome? ” said Henrietta, as they established themselves in a barouche. “ Where first? Oh! the agger of Servius Tullius.”

This was the first of many mornings, all equally gay. Count Rothenstein was elected to order their goings. He was fresh from Mommsen and Ranke, and the girls found themselves in for a steady course of Roman history, illustrated by the remains of her architecture, which was the sort of thing Marion liked, and which, to her own surprise, did not bore Henrietta under present auspices. Both young men had at one time crammed themselves with Goethe, Winckelman, and Lessing, and although Roger, at least, had got rid of some of his theories in Paris, the sculpture galleries had an interest for him which they can possess only for those who have been to some degree students of art and antiquity. So on fine mornings they explored ancient Rome, from the foundations of Romulus to the Circus of Maxentius, and on the infrequent rainy ones they repaired to the galleries. On afternoons when the girls were not doing duty in visiting, there were drives to the Villa Pamfili-Doria, or Borghese; very often Mrs. Mason gave up the barouche to the young people altogether, and took a turn on the Pincian on foot with her husband, who did not like driving; and then there were long expeditions out upon the Campagna, which in their hearts, perhaps, they all liked better than anything else. Marion, who was a little disposed to be high church (she was too much behind the times for ritualism, ten years ago), suggested that when they had done their duty by the classic remains they should take up the Christian ones. So to the Cloaca Maxima and the Forum succeeded the Catacombs, the basilicas, and pilgrimages to the sites of sundry miracles and martyrdoms. During the first fortnight after the young men’s arrival, the Campagna had been too hard and dry for hunting, but a week of mild, rainy weather covered it with fresh green grass and countless violets, daisies, and periwinkles: they had slipped from winter into spring. Henrietta began to be impatient. Neither Rothenstein nor Carey had ever ridden across country, but Roger, being an American, unhesitatingly joined the hunt, although prophesying that he should speedily come to grief; the count, less reckless, said that he should devote hunting days to his friends of the Archæological Society. Marion secretly liked him less for this, but he did not appear to lose in Netta’s estimation.

“ Don’t you hunt, Marion? ” asked her cousin. “ You used to be a great rider; not a ditch within six miles of Beechy Heights which did n’t know you and that gray pony.' ’

“They knew me much better than the pony, I ’m afraid. Do you recollect that first summer we had him, — I was ten, —when he came home without me regularly every afternoon? ”

“ Yes, I recollect well enough, for your brother Ned and I used to be sent to look for you, and we were much less anxious about you than uncle and aunt; we knew we should meet you about two miles from home, trudging along, holding up the tatters of your habit in one hand and your crushed hat in the other, whip gone, net and hair-ribbon lost, that curly, brown mane of yours hanging over your shoulders, fury in your face, but no bones broken. Meanwhile, it was all up with our afternoon’s swimming, nutting, bird’s-nesting, orchard-robbing, as the case might be.”

“ I was a terrible tom-boy. Nurse ended by tying my hair with twine. It was wonderful how the pony always picked out a soft ditch, generally one about half full of water. But I was never thrown afterwards.”

“ Then why don’t you ride to hounds? ”

“Mrs. Mason wouldn’t take the responsibility. I wrote home for permission, but father and mother would not give it, though they have three other children; and Netta’s the only one. I know they would if they were here; but it’s like the waltzing.”

“ So you don’t waltz, either; well, I confess it has been a relief to me that you have n’t any of those lusty, redcheeked, blue-bearded Adonises with bell-crowned hats and green gloves, whom Miss Henrietta finds so charming, hanging about you. But it is a pity you don’t ride.”

“ We used to have delightful rides with Mr. Mason when we first came, before the afternoons grew too short; perhaps we might begin again now, when it is n’t a ' field day.’ ”

“ I should like to see you in a habit once more; you used to be very picturesque, and perhaps you would be more like the Marion of old times; you have not made me feel as if I were your old playfellow yet; I am a great deal more intimate with your friend; I don’t know what Inis become of my little wife.” The latter part of this speech was spoken rather low.

“ What’s that about Mal’s being picturesque? ” said Henrietta, who had been writing a note. “ Now is n’t she? That’s why the Baroness von Stockfisch wants her for those tableaux. By the way, we have n’t heard anything about them lately, — some difficulty in getting them up, I suspect.”

“ Tableaux vivants ? Do you have that sort of thing in Rome? ”

“ The Prussian minister’s wife has gone crazy about having an artistic series from pictures and statues. She did n’t do me the honor to include me, but said Marion had just the head, face, figure for a classic group, sehr mahlerisch, gar bildhauhaftig.”

Count Rothenstein, who was talking politics with Mr. Mason, could not help hearing this specimen of his ambassadress’ conversation, and laughed most irrelevantly to his grave discussion.

“ She has riot given them up, however,” he said; “ she spoke to me about it last evening; she is very anxious to get them up before Lent, so many people go away then; she gave me her list, and I promised to sketch some groups for her.”

They were all interested by the announcement; he had the list in his pocket, and Henrietta begged him to make his sketches immediately, that he might have the benefit of their suggestions. He was a capital draughtsman, and being supplied with materials sat down to his task; the rest gathered round the table, and Roger, picking up a pencil, began his favorite distraction of twisting initials into odd combinations, as he had been commanded to devise a new monogram for Miss Mason.

The tableaux at the Palazzo Caffarelli were soon an engrossing topic in the foreign resident circles at Rome, — not the most brilliant society in the world. The baroness was an Austrian by birth, a Donnersburg, so if she wished for a thing she expected to have it; she went about among the English, French, Russians, and Americans, selecting beauties suitable for the purpose, as Frederick chose his grenadiers; for such people are seldom resisted in this weak world. Half the artists in Rome were under orders to find pictures among the old masters which could be imitated by living personages; there was a great rummaging of curiosity shops for old satin, damask, brocade, and other rich stuffs wrought with gold, for yellow point-lace, and trinkets of obsolete fashion. Marion’s dress was a matter of a few yards of soft white cashmere, with what Henrietta called “walls of Troy” border; she herself, after all, was to figure in a scene from Le Dépit Amoureux, in a Louis XIV. costume. The young men were ready to assist in any way, but refused to be impressed bodily. It was when these preparations were at high tide that they were all one evening at the house of an English inhabitant whose parties were not famous for their liveliness. The guests sat about the room in rows; those who had come together talked among themselves; those who had come alone remained alone and stared blankly before them. The lady of the house did not seem quite happy, herself.

“ I wonder it none of those Americans can do anything, — sing, or play.”

“ Americans always do lots of things,” replied her daughter in a tone of disparagement; “ I’d ask them.”

Henrietta could sing a French romance very prettily, and did so with a graceful readiness which would have won the gratitude of any but an English hostess. When she finished, however, the mother was talking aloud to somebody, and the daughter said, —

“ Thanks, so much; it was so very, very nice, and we are so much obliged; now can’t your brothers sing, or something, you know? ”

“If you mean Mr. Carey and Count von Rothenstein, who are no relations of mine whatever,” replied Henrietta with asperity, “ I believe they do.”

What young men who have been to a German university do not sing? Roger and his friend knew a hundred college songs, and pretty, simple German ditties; the accomplished count, moreover, had cultivated his voice, and could accompany very well, so they amiably went to the piano. While they were singing, a lady appeared at the door who instantly attracted the attention of the two young girls. She was of medium height, with a lithe figure which had an indescribable look of being alive in every member; her complexion was olive, her hair raven black, her face narrow and aquiline; her dark eyes, which sparkled softly, like stars on a summer night, were rather near together, beneath straight black brows which, without being heavy, nearly met, and this would have given a sinister cast to her countenance if it had not been for her smile; her lips were thin, but her smile was a spell. She wore a brown satin dress relieved by rose-color, a dress of Worth’s, as Henrietta’s quick eye discerned in a moment; but she had (lung a shawl of cobweb-fine black lace over her head and shoulders with a picturesque carelessness that did not come from Paris, and round her long, slight throat, without regard to the original design of the ornament, a string of jewels was wound three or four times; a touch of neglect was also to be noted in one of her long gloves, which, half unbuttoned, fell wrinkling round her tapering wrist. The hostess was bustling up to receive her with slow haste, but the stranger, with a gracious nod and smile, made a little quick gesture to wait until the song was over; the heavy hostess stopped short in ungraceful purposelessness; the lady stood in the doorway listening, with her small head a little bent, smiling an enchanting smile. Marion could not take her eyes off her, and never in aftertimes forgot that first apparition. When the song was ended the stranger advanced with a rapid, sinuous step, exchanged greetings with the hostess, and without loosing her hand drew her to the piano before the young men had got away from it.

“ Now, my dear Lady Turnbull, you must present the delightful forestieri to me,” she said in French, addressed quite as much to them as to the hostess; the latter remembered only Rothenstein’s name, because of its handle, but almost before she could pronounce it her guest had passed over to the pair with the friendliest glance and motion of the head. “ I lost half your song; you must give me another. Dear Lady Turnbull, beg them to sing again. Come!” she added, with a little imperious gesture toward the piano and a look no one could have resisted.

“ Oh, certainly, marchesa, we shall all be too glad to hear them again.”

“ What were you singing? German, was it not? I never heard anything like it before.” Rothenstein, whose French was not as prompt as Roger’s, did not reply, and the latter explained that it was a student’s song. “Then sing me another, pray; I have always wished to hear them.”

Rothenstein held a little consultation with his friend, and reseated himself. A stir had spread through the assembly as if some quickening pulse had begun to beat; before, all had remained glued to their chairs; now there was a general move towards the piano. Lady Turnbull bade a footman bring a chair for the marchesa, but the latter refused it with a smile and wave of the hand, and leaned upon the piano, beating time inaudibly with her fan upon tlio palm of her glove. When they had finished she clapped, and a score of people followed her lead. She begged for another and another, and a score of voices seconded the petition. The singers, inspirited by her enjoyment, gave their lieder with a swing, a zest, as hearty as if the hock-glasses were clinking round them. After the fourth song Roger turned from the piano. She did not push her eagerness to indiscretion, but thanked them warmly for the pleasure they had given her, and began to ask about the popular music of Germany, the chorales and Volkslieder, and whether Mendelssohn’s were genuine. Here Rothenstein came to the front, for Roger, though he had a fresh, sweet voice and good ear, was not a musician. She told them that she was always curious about national music; that she knew Russian, Spanish, Hungarian, gypsy, and some Tyrolese airs, but none of northern Germany. “ I will sing you some of my own country’s,” she said; and, with another nod at Lady Turnbull, sat down, drew a rain of diamond notes from the keys, and then in a deep contralto voice, unlike her speaking tones, which were treble, sang them Venetian barcarolles in gondolier dialect, Tuscan lays, with harsh aspirates, and lisping Neapolitan mariner’s hymns, all with the utmost spirit and expression. Everybody was delighted and crowded round the piano; everybody talked in the pauses. At length she started up; her movements had a darting grace like flame. “ I must not bore you with my hobbies.” Her eye fell upon a clock, and she made a gesture of horror. “Half past twelve! and I told the Princess Frangipani I would call for her at midnight precisely, to go and pay our respects at the Austrian embassy. Ah! Madonna mia! and she is in the Trastevere, and we have to drive to the Palazzo di Venezia. ” Away she went, but before reaching the door she saw the Mason party, whom the young men had rejoined; she stopped and looked round for Lady Turnbull. “ Pray present me to these ladies.”

“ Mrs. Mason, the Miss Masons; the Marchesa di Rocca Diavolo.”

A few amiable words, a smile, a courtesy. “ I shall come and see you; that is your etiquette, I know; for me, I care that for etiquette,” with a slight puff as if she were blowing away thistle-down, and she was gone. Marion was surprised to see that there were silver threads among the jetty locks on her temples, lines round her eyes and across her forehead; she must be over forty, but the eyes, the smile, the figure, the swift buoyant step, were a girl’s, and the manner as natural and impulsive as a child’s. Driving home the three spoke of nobody but the marchesa. Mrs. Mason was too much surprised to be sure she was pleased. “ She was certainly very cordial, and sang charmingly.”

“ She saved the evening,” said Henrietta, “and I think she saved my life. Mamma, we must never go to Lady Turnbull’s again; English parties are too stupid. ’ ’

“Well,” said Marion, “I think she is fascinating, and I never knew what the word meant before.”

“ I wonder if we shall ever hear of her again,” said Henrietta.

“ Oh !” exclaimed Marion warmly, “you don’t Suppose she didn’t mean what she said? I’m sure she will come.”

“ I am not so sure,” replied the other. The next day, however, a heap of cards was left, cards of the Marchese di Rocca Diavolo, cards of the Marchesa di Rocca Diavolo, nata Crescenzi, and a little note for Mrs. Mason, begging them all to come the next Sunday evening, signed Fiammetta di Rocca Diavolo. A similar invitation was left with the marchesa’s cards for the young men at their hotel. They were impressed by the energy of the proceeding, as she must have been at some pains to find out their names and addresses in so short a time. Their curiosity was excited, and that evening, at a ball at a great Roman palace, Netta made inquiries among her princes. All she learned was that the marchesa was the wife of a very rich, very noble marquis, much older than herself, and not very popular in his own class or any other; she had been a great beauty, and was considered the most charming woman in Italy, and had a great many enemies. Mrs. Mason, on her side, was making inquiries of the American minister, or whatever our representative in Rome was then called, of whom she learned all that her daughter found out, and much more; for there is nobody like a diplomatist for knowing secrets and telling them. The lady was forty-five; she had been taken from a convent a very young, and it was said a very unwilling bride, to marry a man a quarter of a century older than herself, of bad habits and broken constitution; she had lost her only two children in their infancy, and her grief had been followed by a violent attempt to get a separation from her husband, that she might go into a convent, but her family had prevented it. For a year afterwards she had lived in great retirement, not even driving out. Then she suddenly emerged an extremely handsome young woman of twenty, insatiable for pleasure and admiration; this had lasted ten years, a prolonged triumph, and no woman in Italy had been more talked about. Then she had rushed into politics, and shown such liberal tendencies as to compromise her husband, who after several warnings received a paternal recommendation from the Vatican to travel for a year or two, and he carried her off to Vienna, where it was said that she knew every secret of the cabinet. But for years past she had given herself up almost wholly to music, for which her talent was remarkable; she was a great lady, and had struck out a line for herself. All the clever men in Rome were to be met at her house, and her receptions were delightful, informal, and gay; but her musical evenings were those to which it was a special compliment to be asked; few people were admitted, and an invitation was supposed to mark a certain point of favor; for though the marchesa was so easy and affable, it was always found that she entirely controlled the position people occupied towards her, and nobody could steal a march on her intimacy. “And she is perfectly capricious,” concluded Mr. Randolph. Marion, who had gone for the sake of seeing a ball in this great historical house, which had witnessed the vicissitudes of three hundred years, was sitting by, listening to all this and occasionally interposing a question, which made the minister more guarded than if he had been talking to Mrs. Mason alone. Mrs. Mason was perplexed. She had been flattered by the marchesa’s civility, flattered for her daughter and her young country-folk; music had been mentioned in the note; the invitation, then, was one of those so much coveted. But she was far from certain that this was a house to which she would wish to take the young girls. She had interrupted the minister to ask whether Americans and English went there, and had been assured that they did whenever they could by hook or crook; a woman of that age, she reflected, almost as old as herself, a woman who might have been a grandmother, must long ago have left scandal behind; still she felt uneasy and undecided. Sunday evening was out of the question; Mrs. Mason had never departed from her American mode of observing the day; perhaps that would solve the difficulty; they might not be asked again. But as they were going down the grand marble staircase to their carriage, they passed the marchesa coming up, her starry eyes glancing from her velvet and lace mufflings; she stopped to hope that they had got the cards and note, and that she should see them on Sunday. Mrs. Mason regretted that it would be impossible. “I am so sorry; another evening then, Tuesday,” said the Italian, smiling so frankly and persuasively, her manner so sweet and simple, that the good matron was entirely disarmed. She said that it would make them most happy, and went away confident that there was no harm in that woman, and that, whatever the follies or faults of her past, she must have been the victim of circumstances, of a false religious and social code. The marchesa’s story had interested Marion intensely; here was enough to build a romance upon; it was a romance ready made.

The young men went on Sunday evening, of course. The next day they were riding with their friends of the Tempietto, and Mr. Mason asked about it and received an enthusiastic account from both of them. The Palazzo Satanasso was an imposing old castellated keep in the Capitoline quarter; the room in which the marchesa had received them was modernized. The marchese had not shown himself. There had been only about a dozen people, of whom but two were women, Russian ladies, one of whom played admirably upon the piano and the other upon the violoncello, who smoked cigarettes the whole evening. An elderly ecclesiastic had sung them some grand old church-music of Scarlatti’s; but what had carried them both entirely away was the marchesa’s singing of Gluck; she had sung them airs from Orfeo and Alceste. Rothenstein’s enthusiasm knew no bounds.

“ Such dramatic power, such tragic depth,” he continued, " and such a change in her whole appearance ! She was Melpomene! in person.”

“ One would never imagine,” said Roger, pensively, “ that those bright eyes could grow so gloomy.”

“ Ah ! ” said Marion, " that is where the anguish of her life finds expression. I was sure her music was her consolation.”

Roger eyed her rather quizzically. “What do you mean? I fancy few people have a better time in their own way.”

“ Oh !" I ” said Marion, sinking her voice, “you don’t understand her.” Roger smiled, and asked, —

“Who has been telling you about her? ”

“ Mr. Randolph told Mrs. Mason her story when I was by.”

“ Not the whole of it, I fancy,” said her cousin, with a glance at Rothenstein, for they, too, had been making inquiries. She would have said more, but they had reached the Ponte Saara, and, turning off the hard road, began to canter beside the yellow Tiber, over the soft springy turf whitened by hundreds of tufts of straw-colored daffodils, whose sweet breath freighted the air.

They did not find the marchesa when they returned her visit, and it was decided that they must not fail to present themselves on the following Tuesday evening, although there was to be a rehearsal of the tableaux at the Prussian legation. They were ushered into a noble suite of apartments, furnished in the most striking and singular manner, with Oriental carpets and hangings, massive brass candelabra and platters which acted as reflectors, and a few fine portraits of defunct Crescenzi and Satanassi. There was nothing in common with the meagre, denuded aspect of other Roman rooms of state; these, though lofty and spacious, had a sombre luxury, and the marchesa’s dress, which was black satin, with one scarlet velvet bow confining the black lace thrown about her shoulders and bust, was in complete harmony with them. She came forward with that charming smile which Marion thought was never twice the same; now it had a warmth of welcome which gave it a new character; she had something to say to each of them, something unsought, unstudied, which seemed to rise to her lips at, the sight of them. Then she turned and called, “ Sigismondo ! ” in her high, clear speaking-tones, and a short, grayheaded old man, who looked like a senile satyr in evening dress, without a satyr’s joviality, left the American minister, with whom he was in talk, came forward, and was presented as the Marchese di Rocca Diavolo. There was a distinction in his appearance and bearing which they had not seen in any of the Fabii, Emiliani, or other princely descendants of the fabulously old houses, but perhaps this was in a measure due to age; for Marion, without being able to define the quality,— of which her own country affords few illustrations,—had remarked that the older men, who were generally thin, pale, and gray, looked more like gentlemen to her than the dazzling young dandies whom Henrietta admired so much, but who all looked like the courier. The marchese spoke English, having been attached to the Neapolitan embassy in London before his marriage, and poor Mr. Mason found himself for once in foreign society not in the character of a deafmute. It chanced that the marchesa, greeting Marion last, retained her hand; the young girl’s eyes wandered round the room as if in search of something.

“ What is it? ” said the quick Italian. “ What do you want? ”

“ The piano is shut,” said Marion, rather abashed at being detected. “ And I hoped to hear you sing again.”

The marchesa gave her hand a little squeeze, and said, “ Oh, no; I never have music on my general evenings; but come next Sunday, and I will sing for you as much as you like.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t,” said Marion, dropping her eyes, and reluctant to give the reason.

“ No, of course,” replied the marchesa, instantly divining the scruple.

“ One should always observe the custom of one’s country in such matters. Well, some morning.”

“ All by myself? ” said Marion, looking at her with large, earnest eyes.

° All by ourselves,” was the reply, with a radiant smile. The marchesa perceived that she had made a conquest, and took a fancy to her captive. The evening was pleasant for the Americans, though they could scarcely tell why ; the marchesa’s influence pervaded the atmosphere with vivacity. She sent off Count Rothenstein, whose antiquarian tastes she had discovered, to take his three friends to a small inner room where there was a valuable collection of coins and beautiful small plaster casts of ancient bassi rilievi; she pointed out to Mrs. Mason one or two well-known public men and offered to present them, but the good lady, though interested to see them, had no desire for their acquaintance, especially as her hostess added that they spoke only Italian. “Ah!” she continued, “ you should have known Rossi; how he admired your country! what a man! He was a great friend of mine; they murdered him, the assassins, like your Lincoln. He was a martyr! The blood of the saints is not the only sacred gore which has moistened this Roman soil, and it will bear fruit some day; you will see; but I speak of these things no more.” Her eyes flashed, and her tones woke chords which in those days vibrated readily in every American heart. But the engagement at the Palazzo Caffarelli could not be forgotten; owing to the lateness of Italian habits there were still so few people in the rooms that they could not withdraw unseen; their hostess remonstrated. " You go before my society arrives,” she said; “ a little later these young ladies will find some friends. You know the Savellis? They meet you at the hunt.” Their engagement was mentioned. “ Oh! the Donnerundblitzenburg and her tableaux,” said the marchesa, laughing. “ I can’t bear that woman, with her prepotenza. But,” she cried with a sudden inspiration, “I will go with you if you will take me. I am to sing an air from Gluck’s Fall of Troy, for the tableau of Cassandra; I should like to see it and get an idea. But your carriage is full”— It was not ; Mr. Mason was not going with them; none except those to take part being admitted, he and the young men were going to walk back to the club; Mrs. Mason’s surprise did not prevent her saying how glad she should be to take her hostess with them. “I go!” cried the marchesa. “Sigismondo! I must go to the Palazzo Caffarelli about some tableaux,

—I promised the baroness,— you will make my excuses to my visitors; an imperative engagement.”

The marchese seemed in no wise startled or discomposed. She hurried off into her bedroom for her wraps, and drove off with the ladies, laughing like a truant child.

On their arrival they found matters at a dead-lock, and the baroness in high ill-humor.

“Really, ladies, I thought you were not coming at all,” was her gracious salutation as they entered. But as she caught sight of the marchesa, who was a little in the rear, her face relaxed somewhat: “ Why, you, marchesa? This is very kind; your evening, too; how did you manage to get off? ”

The sharp Henrietta turned to Marion, while Madame di Rocca Diavolo was speaking to various people seated about in different disconsolate attitudes, and whispered, “ The fascinating Fiammetta must have told a fib when she said she had promised to come.”

“How can you! ” returned Marion, reproachfully. “ The baroness must have forgotten.”

“ Vediamo, voyons, voyons,” cried the marchesa, gayly. “What is the trouble? ” There was no end of it. The painter who was to arrange the groups had not come; moreover, most of the personages declared themselves incapable of assuming or conceiving the postures or expression befitting their characters; Miss Turnbull, who was not pretty, but had been chosen for her handsome arms, was making difficulties about the people she was to be grouped with: “ Mamma won’t like me to act with anybody she docs n’t know; ” but this, being analyzed, resolved itself into a determination to appear only with the young Donnersburgs (the baroness’s kinsfolk), the Countess Savelli, Prince Fabio, the Duke of Tor’alto, or the beautiful Lady Edith Atheling, daughter of the Duchess of Deria; although she was unacquainted with several of these. The marchesa disposed of the last difficulty by saying summarily that she had no doubt Mrs. Mason would permit her young ladies to take those parts: Miss Sands’ arms were perfect, she was sure, and if her figure would do for Cassandra it would do for anything; which instantly brought Miss Turnbull to terms. Then she bade them pose, and laughed and clapped her hands at their stupidity until they laughed themselves, for they made poor work of it, especially the Americans and English; the Germans were much more stupid, but were not aware of it, which helped them immensely. She took one by one the attitude, gesture, or expression of each part, from Medea to Célimène. Henrietta needed no suggestions; put upon her mettle by the demeanor of Miss Turnbull, and a faint, latent antagonism to the marchesa, she perched herself daintily upon an arm-chair and opened her fan in a manner which won the latter’s applause. But poor Marion vowed that she could never do what was required of her; she was sure she should spoil her scene. The marchesa reassured her earnestly. “ Now only think,” she said, “ think of the situation; she knows the wrath to come, the woe that is to be, hers as well as theirs; she feels the prophetic gift, yet she cannot rouse them from their infatuation ; she is treated as a mad woman.” As she spoke her brows met, her eyes drew closer and gathered intensity, her features took the lines of a tragic mask; with one hand she drew her lace shawl into folds on her breast, extending the other with a beck worthy of Rachel, and at the same time threw herself into an attitude of which her modern dress could not disguise the antique and imposing simplicity. It was masterly; exclamations broke forth on all sides. “ Now you could do that,” she said, dropping her arms and turning to Marion.

“ Never. But now, at least, I know how it should be done.”

“ There, baroness, it will go now, I think; I ’ll come and help you at the dress rehearsal, but don’t fix it for a Tuesday. You have n’t a Chinese tableau; why don’t you copy one from a screen? I once heard some Chinese sing; it was like this.”

And she pursed up her mouth, arched her brows, drew her eyes into slits, and began to mince about the room as if her knees were tied together, drawling out some extraordinary gibberish in a shrill, nasal sing-song like the twanging of a fiddle-string, pointing upwards in time with alternate forefingers. Everybody went into convulsions of laughter, and so the evening ended.

Marion did not forget to secure an appointment with Madame di Rocca Diavolo. She received her affectionately, and took off her hat and coat with a caressing softness which Marion often longed for but did not invite, and therefore, seldom receiving, enjoyed all the more. “I shall like to sing to you,” said her hostess, “ you are so simpatica. Do you care much for Italian music ? ”

Marion knew very little, and that chiefly Verdi’s; the marchesa sang her a number of airs which she had never heard; they were from Beatrice di Tenda, Gemma di Vergy, Elena da Feltre, and other operas now seldom performed, and all had a deep strain of tragic lyrism. Her singing was dramatic in the highest degree, yet perfectly free from exaggeration; every accent rang with the strong passion of her nature and shook the answering chords in those who listened; yet there was no violence, rather a smothered fire, a compressed intensity, more profoundly affecting. Marion sat on a low stool beside the piano, with her hands clasped round her knees, her gaze fixed on the dark, melancholy face of the singer, with difficulty restraining the tears which started to her eyes, the sobbing sighs which rose in her throat. Her cheeks burned, her breath came short and quick in her effort to control herself. The marchesa was prepared for this; she was accustomed to witness it. Presently she stopped and took Marion’s ice-cold hand. “ It is too much for you,” she said, tenderly; “ you are too young to bear that harrowing music.” Marion shook her head, but the singer struck a few large arpeggios and began a grand, simple anthem, a piece of church-music by Pergolese, which she uttered with so clear an enunciation, so reverently and devoutly, that the young girl’s agitation calmed and sank as the wind dies away under a serene evening sky. Then the marchesa rose from the piano.

“ Oh, don’t stop! ” cried Marion, who could now speak, clasping her hands. “ Won’t you sing me something of Gluck’s? ”

“ Not to-day, no more to-day. I will sing for you again, whenever you wish. Tell me, they call you Marion, — is that Marianna? ”

“ Nearly; it comes from the same name, I suppose.”

“ I had a daughter called Marianna, — ah, my only daughter! She died many years ago. How old are you, — Marianna? ”

“ Nineteen,” said the girl, with her whole soul’s sympathy in her face.

“ And you seem so young, —a child; yet at your age I had lost both my children, my life was over. I did not care for the boy,” she went on, walking up and down the room in a feverish way; “ he was born first; they said, ‘ Now you must have a son for the great name, for the great estate.’ What was their name to me, the descendant of Crescentius? But the boy was born and I said, ' There is your son, be satisfied.’ I was desperately ill for weeks, I nearly died, and before I was out of danger, he was dead. They were afraid to tell me; but I guessed, and it made no difference to me; I had hardly seen him, and I felt as if he belonged to the hated house, not to me. A year afterwards my little girl came, so beautiful, a little angel! She stayed a year, then she went to heaven; she was taken that she might not behold my wretched, wicked life, and that her pure spirit might plead for me.”

She spoke with a concentration of anguish which appalled the young girl, who threw her arms round her, exclaiming amid tears, “ Oh, you cannot have been wicked! but if she had lived she might have been wretched; think of that.”

“ Yes, yes,” cried the Italian, pressing her to her breast and raising her great, tearless eyes to heaven. “ I have thought of it a thousand times, and been thankful. No, my poor little child! I have lived through my own misery, but misery of yours would have killed me! How can I talk to you so, and wring your young heart? Come, let us go into the air and sunshine.”

She took Marion to her room and bathed her brow and eyes, and soothed her as if the young girl were the chief sufferer. Then they went out in the carriage.

“ Where shall we go? ”

“ Anywhere,” said Marion, too much exhausted by the emotions of the morning to have will or choice. The marchesa ordered the carriage to the Vatican; she had a private pass to the galleries at all hours, and they found themselves the only visitors in the great hall of the Braccio Nuovo.

“ How often I have come here,” said the marchesa, “ when I could not open my piano, nor go to church, nor speak to a human creature. I used to walk up and down in the presence of those marble beings until I felt as if they were — not alive, but conscious, and saw and heard and understood. I used to think they looked at me, and it would quiet me and lift me up.”

“ Like poor Mignon,— Goethe’s Mignon,— you know Beethoven’s song.”

“ Yes, yes. Well, they seemed to me not like persons, but individuals; intelligences incorporate in those beautiful forms. I used to come here alone, at early morning, and at night when the full moon shone in.”

“ Oh! " said Marion with a half-shudder, “ it would be awful to me, — like being alone among the high Alps.”

The marehesa laughed. “ But I think that would do me good.”

They paced up and down slowly, her hand within Marion’s arm, pausing now and then before some statue or vase of extraordinary beauty. But they were not exactly looking at the sculpture; they were imbibing the influence of the place, as one walks in a wood or beside a lake, and Marion felt it pervade her spirit with a strange, elevated repose. The great white shapes of immortal beauty aloft on their pedestals create a realm for themselves; their silence and immobility seem but their chosen modes of appearing to mortals; they impose upon beholders a calm and contemplation akin to their own. Those who yield themselves to this ascendency are translated to new spheres; wonder, delight, and active admiration are exalted into comprehension and a high, joyous serenity, which the importunities of every-day life cannot disturb.

After this, Marion was so given over to the marchesa that Henrietta was a little jealous. “You are in love with her,” she said, half-reproachfully.

“ I never quarrel with you about Count Savelli or Prince Fabio, and between dancing and hunting you see a great deal more of them than I do of Madame Bocea Diavolo. ”

“ I am not in love with them,” retorted Henrietta. “ I never quarrel with you about Count Rothenstein;” and Marion had no rejoinder ready.

Marion did not seem to be in love with the handsome German, certainly, and what was still more singular, Roger Carey was not in love with Henrietta.

Whether the slight absurdity which attaches to the recollection of earlier loves while one is still young chilled the seeds of sentiment, whether the memory of those unspoken passages at Heidelberg when he was a romantic Fuchs, and of the last forget-me-not of the autumn silently offered and accepted at parting, came between them now, whether her lively nature and precocious worldly wisdom were unfavorable to the tender passion in herself or others, or whether Marion had been right in saying that one has too much to do and think of in Rome to fall in love, he could not decide. He was very fond of her, and she amused him excessively, but of the two his cousin interested him the more. Roger had a certain way with him which won him the intimacy of women on very short acquaintance; it was a tone of friendly familiarity free from the least touch of impertinence or fatuity, which commanded their confidence at once; he gently assumed a right of greater nearness than other men, and it was always accorded. Now he could not be intimate with his cousin, and this puzzled and baffled him a little. He wondered whether she liked Rothenstein; it would not be a good match, after all, for she would not be an heiress, like Henrietta, and the count, though not a fortunehunter, wished to find a wife with money, not having much of his own. Roger had seen so many marriages between American girls and foreigners, both in Paris and in Rome, that he had begun to dislike them on principle; in this matter of Marion he thought he felt as her brother would have done. But his cogitations troubled him little; he was swimming in a sea of enjoyment and the wave seemed mounting with him hourly. He greatly desired to see Naples, yet dreaded the day which should take him from Rome. The Masons had not altered their plans; a large party was going to Naples when Lent began, to return for the Easter ceremonies; the young men had agreed to go on with them, and return, too, if they did not go to Greece.