"The old kings, the consuls and tribunes, the emperors, drunk with blood and gold, return for us. The seven hills tower, the innumerable temples glitter, and the Via Sacra swarms with triumphal life once more."
In the later Papal Rome she discerns, through the confusion of rite and legend, a sense which to her marks the growth "of the human spirit struggling to develop its life." And the Rome of that day was dear to her in spite of its manifold corruptions; dear for the splendor of the race, surviving every enslaving and deforming influence; dear for the new-born hope of freedom which she considered safe in the nursing of Pope Pius.
Most of the occasions chronicled by Margaret in her letters of this period are of the sort familiarly known to travellers, and even to readers of books of travel.
The prayers for the dead, early in November, the festival of San Carlo Borromeo, the veiling of a nun, the worship of the wooden image called "the most Holy Child," idolatrous, Margaret thinks, as that of the Capitoline Jove, the blessing of the animals, the festival of the Magi at the Propaganda,—these events are all described[221]by her with much good thought and suggestion.
She saw the Pope occasionally at the grand ceremonies of the Church, and saw the first shadow fall upon his popularity, partly in consequence of some public utterances of his which seemed to Margaret "deplorably weak in thought and absolute in manner," and which she could not but interpret as implying that wherever reform might in future militate against sacerdotal traditions, it would go to the wall, in order that the priest might triumph.
The glorious weather had departed almost as soon as she had sung its praises, namely, on the 18th of December; after which time her patience was sorely tried by forty days of rain, accompanied by "abominable reeking odors, such as blessed cities swept by the sea-breeze never know." We copy from one of her letters a graphic picture of this time of trial:—
"It has been dark all day, though the lamp has only been lit half an hour. The music of the day has been, first, the atrociousariaswhich last in the Corso till near noon. Then came the wicked organ-grinder, who, apart from the horror of the noise, grinds exactly the same obsolete abominations as at home or in England, the 'Copenhagen Waltz,' 'Home, Sweet Home,' and all that! The cruel chance that both an[222]English my-lady and a councillor from the provinces live opposite, keeps him constantly before my window, hoping forbajocchi.
"Within, the three pet dogs of my landlady, bereft of their walk, unable to employ their miserable legs and eyes, exercise themselves by a continual barking, which is answered by all the dogs in the neighborhood. An urchin returning from the laundress, delighted with the symphony, lays down his white bundle in the gutter, seats himself on the curb-stone, and attempts an imitation of the music of cats as a tribute to the concert.
"The door-bell rings.Chi è?('Who is it?') cries the handmaid. Enter a man poisoning me at once with the smell of the worst possible cigars, insisting I shall look upon frightful, ill-cut cameos and worse-designed mosaics, made by some friend of his. Man of ill odors and meanest smile! I am no countess to be fooled by you."
These passages give us some glimpses of our friend in the surroundings which at first gave her so much satisfaction, and whose growing discomforts were lightened for her by her native sense of humor.
In spite of this, however, "the dirt, the gloom, the desolation of Rome" affected her severely. Her appetite failed, and with it her strength, while nervous headache and fever conspired to[223]make the whole season appear, in review, "the most idle and most suffering" one of her life.
The most important public event of the winter in Rome seems to have been the inauguration of a new Council, with some show of popular election, said to have been on the whole satisfactory. As this was considered a decided step in the direction of progress, preparations were made for its celebration by the representatives of other Italian States, and of various friendly nations. The Americans resident in Rome were aroused to an unwonted degree of interest, the gentlemen subscribing funds for the materials of a flag, and the ladies meeting to make it. To accompany this banner, a magnificent spread eagle was procured. Everything was in the height of preparation, when some counter-influence, brought to bear upon the Pope, led him to issue an edict forbidding this happy concourse of the flags of all nations, and allowing only that of Rome to be carried in honor of the occasion. Margaret saw in this the work of the Oscurantists, "ever on the watch to do mischief" to the popular cause.
Despite the disappointment of the citizens at this curtailment of their show, the streets were decorated, and filled with people in the best humor. Margaret was able to see nothing but this crowd, but found even that a great pleasure. A[224]ball at the Argentina Theatre terminated the festivities of the day. Here were seen "Lord Minto; Prince Corsini, now senator; the Torlonias, in uniform of the Civic Guard, Princess Torlonia (the beautiful Colonna) in a sash of their colors, which she waved often in answer to their greetings." The finest show of the evening, Margaret says, was the native Saltarello, danced by the Trasteverini in their gayest costumes. In this dance, which is at once verynaïveand very natural, Margaret saw the embodiment of "the Italian wine, the Italian sun."
In the course of this winter it became evident that the liberalism of Pio Nono would not stand the test of any extensive practical application. His position was, indeed, a very difficult one, the natural allies and supporters of the Papacy being, without exception, the natural enemies of the new ideas to which he had so incautiously opened the door.
Margaret relates various attempts made by Austrians in Lombardy and by Oscurantists in Rome to excite the people to overt acts of violence, and thus gain a pretext for the employment of armed force. In Rome, on New Year's day, an attempt of this sort was near succeeding, the governor of the city having ungraciously forbidden the people to wait upon the Pope at the Quirinal, and to ask for his blessing. Fortunately,[225]instead of rising in rebellion, they betook themselves to Senator Corsini, by whose friendly interposition the Pope was induced to make a progress through the city, interrupted only by the prayers of his subjects, who, falling on their knees as he passed, cried out: "Holy Father, don't desert us! don't forget us! don't listen to our enemies!" the Pope, in tears, replying: "Fear nothing, my people; my heart is yours." And this tender-hearted populace, seeing that the Pope looked ill, and that the weather was inclement, begged him to return to the Quirinal, which he did, the popular leader, Ciceruacchio, following his carriage.
A letter from Mazzini to Pope Pius, printed in Paris, had reached Italy by this time, and was translated by Margaret for publication in the "New York Tribune." Some passages of it will not be out of place here, as showing the position and outlook of a man by far the most illustrious of the Italian exiles, and one whose purity of life and excellence of character gave to his opinions a weight beyond their intellectual value.
After introducing himself as one who adores God, Mazzini says that he adores, also, an idea which seems to him to be of God, that of Italy as "an angel of moral unity and of progressive civilization for the nations of Europe."[226]
Having studied the great history of humanity, and having there found "Rome twice directress of the world, first through the Emperors, later through the Popes," he is led to believe that the great city is destined to a third and more lasting period of supremacy.
"I believe that another European world ought to be revealed from the Eternal City, that had the Capitol and has the Vatican. And this faith has not abandoned me through years, poverty, and griefs which God alone knows."
One cannot help pausing here to reflect that in both historic instances the supremacy of Rome was due to a superiority of civilization which she has long lost, and is not likely to regain in this day of the world.
Mazzini says to the Pope: "There is no man this day in all Europe more powerful than you; you then have, most Holy Father, vast duties."
He now passes on to a review of the situation:—
"Europe is in a tremendous crisis of doubts and desires. Faith is dead. Catholicism is lost in despotism; Protestantism is lost in anarchy. The intellect travels in a void. The bad adore calculation, physical good; the good pray and hope; nobody believes....
"I call upon you, after so many ages of doubt and corruption, to be the apostle of eternal[227]truth. I call upon you to make yourself the 'servant of all;' to sacrifice yourself, if needful, so that the will of God may be done on earth as it is in heaven; to hold yourself ready to glorify God in victory, or to repeat with resignation, if you must fail, the words of Gregory VII.: 'I die in exile because I have loved justice and hated iniquity.'
"But for this, to fulfil the mission which God confides to you, two things are needful,—to be a believer, and to unify Italy."
The first of these two clauses is here amplified into an exhortation which, edifying in itself, had in it nothing likely to suggest to the person addressed any practical solution of the difficulties which surrounded him.
Having shown the Head of Christendom the way to right belief, Mazzini next instructs him how to unify Italy:—
"For this you have no need to work, but [only to] bless Him who works through you and in your name. Gather round you those who best represent the national party. Do not beg alliances with princes. Say, 'The unity of Italy ought to be a fact of the nineteenth century,' and it will suffice. Leave our pens free; leave free the circulation of ideas in what regards this point, vital for us, of the national unity."
Here follow some special directions with regard[228]to the several powers to be dealt with in the projected unification. The result of all this, foreseen by Mazzini, would be the foundation of "a government unique in Europe, which shall destroy the absurd divorce between spiritual and temporal power, and in which you shall be chosen to represent the principle of which the men chosen by the nation will make the application."
"The unity of Italy," says Mazzini, "is a work of God. It will be fulfilled, with you or without you. But I address you because I believe you worthy to take the initiative in a work so vast; ... because the revival of Italy, under the ægis of a religious idea of a standard, not of rights, but of duties, would leave behind all the revolutions of other countries, and place her immediately at the head of European progress."
Pure and devout as are the sentiments uttered in this letter, the views which accompany them have been shown, by subsequent events, to be only partially just, only partially realizable. The unification of Italy may to-day be called "a work of God;" but had it been accomplished on the theocratic basis imagined by Mazzini, it could not have led either Europe or Italy itself to the point now reached through manifold endeavor and experience. Spirits may be summoned from the upper air as well as from the "vasty deep," but they will not come until the time is ripe for[229]their work. And yet are prayer and prophecy of this sort sacred and indispensable functions in the priesthood of ideas.
On March 29, 1848, Margaret is able to praise once more the beauty of the scene around her:—
"Now the Italian heavens wear again their deep blue. The sun is glorious, the melancholy lustres are stealing again over the Campagna, and hundreds of larks sing unwearied above its ruins. Nature seems in sympathy with the great events that are transpiring."
What were these events, which, Margaret says, stunned her by the rapidity and grandeur of their march?
The face of Italy was changed indeed. Sicily was in revolt, Naples in revolution. Milan, Venice, Modena, and Parma were driving out their tyrants; and in Rome, men and women were weeping and dancing for joy at the news. Abroad, Louis Philippe had lost his throne, and Metternich his power. Margaret saw the Austrian arms dragged through the streets, and burned in the Piazza del Popolo. "The Italians embraced one another, and cried,Miracolo!Providenza!The Tribune Ciceruacchio fed the flame with fagots. Adam Mickiewicz, the great poet of Poland, long exiled from his country, looked on." The double-headed Austrian[230]eagle was torn from the front of the Palazzo di Venezia, and in his place was set the inscription, "Alta Italia." By April 1st the Austrian Viceroy had capitulated at Verona, and Italy appeared to be, or was for the time, "free, independent, and one."
Poor Pope Pius, meanwhile, had fallen more and more into the rear of the advancing movement, and finally kept step with it only as he was compelled to do, secretly looking for the moment when he should be able to break from the ranks which he himself had once led. On May 7th, Margaret writes of his "final dereliction to the cause of freedom," by which phrase she describes his refusal to declare war against Austria, after having himself done and approved of much which led in that direction. The position of the Pontiff was now most unhappy. Alarmed at the agitation and turmoil about him, it is probable that he bitterly regretted the acts in which he had been sincere, but of which he had not foreseen the consequences. Margaret describes him as isolated in his palace, guided by his confessor, weak and treacherous in his movements, privately disowning the measures which the popular feeling compelled him to allow, and secretly doing his utmost to counteract them.
In the month of May Margaret enjoyed some excursions into the environs of Rome. She visited[231]Albano, Frascati, and Ostia, and passed some days at Subiaco and at Tivoli. On the 28th of the same month she left Rome for the summer, and retired to Aquila, a little ruined town in the Abruzzi Mountains, where, after so many painful excitements, she hoped to find tranquillity and rest.[232]
Thestory of this summer in the mountains Margaret never told, and her letters of the previous winter gave no account of matters most personal to herself. In continuing the narrative of her life, we are therefore obliged to break through the reserves of the moment, and to speak of events which, though occurring at this time, were not made known to her most intimate friends until a much later period.
Margaret had been privately married for some months when she left Rome for Aquila. Her husband was a young Italian nobleman, Ossoli[233]by name, whose exterior is thus described by one of her most valued friends[D]:—
"He appeared to be of a reserved and gentle nature, with quiet, gentlemanlike manners; and there was something melancholy in the expression of his face which made one desire to know more of him. In figure he was tall, and of slender frame, with dark hair and eyes. We judged that he was about thirty years of age, possibly younger."
Margaret had made the acquaintance of this gentleman during her first visit to Rome, in the spring of the year 1847, and under the following circumstances: She had gone with some friends to attend the vesper service at St. Peter's, and, wandering from one point of interest to another in the vast church, had lost sight of her party. All efforts to rejoin them proved useless, and Margaret was in some perplexity, when a young man of gentlemanly address accosted her, and asked leave to assist her in finding her friends. These had already left the church, and by the time that this became evident to Margaret and her unknown companion, the hour was late, and the carriages, which can usually be found in front of the church after service, had all disappeared. Margaret was therefore obliged to walk from the Vatican to her lodgings on the Corso,[234]accompanied by her new friend, with whom she was able at the time to exchange very little conversation. Familiar as she was with Italian literature, the sound of the language was new to her, and its use difficult.
The result of this chance meeting seems to have been love at first sight on the part of the Marchese Ossoli. Before Margaret left Rome he had offered her his hand, and had been refused.
Margaret returned to Rome, as we have seen, in the autumn of the same year. Her acquaintance with the Marchese was now renewed, and with the advantage that she had become sufficiently familiar with the Italian language to converse in it with comparative ease. Her intense interest in the affairs of Italy suggested to him also ideas of "liberty and better government." His education, much neglected, as she thought, had been in the traditions of the narrowest conservatism; but Margaret's influence led or enabled him to free himself from the trammels of old-time prejudice, and to espouse, with his whole heart, the cause of Roman liberty.
According to the best authority extant, the marriage of Margaret and the Marchese took place in the December following her return to Rome. The father of the Marchese had died but a short time before this, and his estate, left[235]in the hands of two other sons, was not yet settled. These gentlemen were both attached to the Papal household, and, we judge, to the reactionary party. The fear lest the Marchese's marriage with a Protestant should deprive him wholly, or in part, of his paternal inheritance, induced the newly married couple to keep to themselves the secret of their relation to each other. At the moment, ecclesiastical influence would have been very likely, under such circumstances, to affect the legal action to be taken in the division of the property. Better things were hoped for in view of a probable change of government. So the winter passed, and Margaret went to her retreat among the mountains, with her secret unguessed and probably unsuspected.
Her husband was a member—perhaps already a captain—of the Civic Guard, and was detained in Rome by military duties. Margaret was therefore much alone in the midst of "a theatre of glorious, snow-crowned mountains, whose pedestals are garlanded with the olive and mulberry, and along whose sides run bridle-paths fringed with almond groves and vineyards." The scene was to her one of "intoxicating beauty," but the distance from her husband soon became more than she could bear. After a month passed in this place, she found a nearer retreat at Rieti, also a mountain-town, but within the[236]confines of the Papal States. Here Ossoli could sometimes pass the Sunday with her, by travelling in the night. In one of her letters Margaret writes: "Do not fail to come. I shall have your coffee warm. You will arrive early, and I can see the diligence pass the bridge from my window."
In the month of August the Civic Guard were ordered to prepare for a march to Bologna; and Ossoli, writing to Margaret on the 17th, strongly expresses his unwillingness to be so far removed from her at a time in which she might have urgent need of his presence at any moment. For these were to her days of great hope and expectation. Her confinement was near at hand, and she was alone, poor and friendless, among people whose only aim was to plunder her. But Margaret could not, even in these trying circumstances, belie the heroic principles which had always guided her life. She writes to her doubting, almost despairing husband: "If honor requires it, go. I will try to sustain myself."
This dreaded trial was averted. The march to Bologna was countermanded. Margaret's boy saw the light on the 5th of September, and the joyful presence of her husband soothed for her the pangs of a first maternity.
He was indeed obliged to leave her the next day for Rome. Margaret was ill cared for, and lost,[237]through a severe fever, the ability to nurse her child. She was forced to dismiss her only attendant, and to struggle in her helpless condition with the dishonesty and meanness of the people around her. Abalia[E]for the child was soon found, but Margaret felt the need of much courage in guarding the first days of her infant's life. In her eyes he grew "more beautiful every hour." The people in the house called him Angiolino, anticipating the name afterwards given him in baptism,—Angelo Eugene.
She was soon to find a new trial in leaving him. Her husband still wished to keep his marriage a profound secret, and to this end desired that the baby should be left at Rieti, in charge of "a good nurse who should treat him like a mother." Margaret was most anxious to return to Rome, to be near her husband, and also in order to be able to carry on the literary labor upon which depended not only her own support, but also that of her child.
Writing to Ossoli, she says: "I cannot stay long without seeing the boy. He is so dear, and life seems so uncertain. It is necessary that I should be in Rome a month at least, to write, and to be near you. But I must be free to return here, if I feel too anxious and suffering for him."[238]
Early in November Margaret returned to Rome. In a letter to her mother, bearing the date of November 16, she says:—
"I am again in Rome, situated for the first time entirely to my mind.... I have the sun all day, and an excellent chimney. It [her lodging] is very high, and has pure air, and the most beautiful view all around imaginable.... The house looks out on the Piazza Barberini, and I see both that palace and the Pope's [the Quirinal]."
The assassination of the Minister Rossi had taken place on the previous day. Margaret describes it almost as if she had seen it:—
"The poor, weak Pope has fallen more and more under the dominion of the cardinals. He had suffered the Minister Rossi to go on, tightening the reins, and because the people preserved a sullen silence, he thought they would bear it.... Rossi, after two or three most unpopular measures, had the imprudence to call the troops of the line to defend him, instead of the National Guard.... Yesterday, as he descended from his carriage to enter the Chamber [of Deputies], the crowd howled and hissed, then pushed him, and as he turned his head in consequence, a sure hand stabbed him in the back."
On the morrow, the troops and the people united in calling upon the Pope, then at the Quirinal,[239]for a change of measures. They found no audience, but only the hated Swiss mercenaries, who defeated an attempt to enter the palace by firing on the crowd. "The drum beat to call out the National Guard. The carriage of Prince Barberini has returned, with its frightened inmates and liveried retinue, and they have suddenly barred up the court-yard gate." Margaret felt no apprehension for herself in all this turmoil. The side which had, for the moment, the upper hand, was her own, and these very days were such as she had longed for, not, we may be sure, for their accompaniments of bloodshed and violence, but for the outlook which was to her and her friends one of absolute promise.
The "good time coming" did then seem to have come for Italy. Her various populations had risen against their respective tyrants, and had shown a disposition to forget past divisions in the joy of a country reconciled and united.
In the principal churches of Rome, masses were performed in commemoration of the patriotic men who fell at this time in various struggles with existing governments. Thus were honored the "victims" of Milan, of Naples, of Venice, of Vienna.
Not long after the assassination of Rossi, the Pope, imploring the protection of the King of Naples, fled to Gaeta.[240]
"No more of him," writes Margaret; "his day is over. He has been made, it seems unconsciously, an instrument of good which his regrets cannot destroy."
The political consequences of this act were scarcely foreseen by the Romans, who, according to Margaret's account, remained quite cool and composed, saying only: "The Pope, the cardinals, the princes are gone, and Rome is perfectly tranquil. One does not miss anything, except that there are not so many rich carriages and liveries."
In February Margaret chronicles the opening of the Constitutional Assembly, which was heralded by a fine procession, with much display of banners. In this, Prince Canino, a nephew of Napoleon, walked side by side with Garibaldi, both having been chosen deputies. Margaret saw this from a balcony in the Piazza di Venezia, whose stern old palace "seemed to frown, as the bands each, in passing, struck up theMarseillaise." On February 9th the bells were rung in honor of the formation of a Roman Republic. The next day Margaret went forth early, to observe the face of Rome. She saw the procession of deputies mount the Campidoglio (Capitol), with the Guardia Civica for their escort. Here was promulgated the decree announcing the formation of the Republic, and guaranteeing[241]to the Pope the undisturbed exercise of his spiritual power.
The Grand Duke of Tuscany now fled, smiling assent to liberal principles as he entered his carriage to depart. The King of Sardinia was naturally filled with alarm. "It makes no difference," says Margaret. "He and his minister, Gioberti, must go, unless foreign intervention should impede the liberal movement. In this case, the question is, what will France do? Will she basely forfeit every pledge and every duty, to say nothing of her true interest?" Alas! France was already sold to the counterfeit greatness of a name, and was pledged to a course irrational and vulgar beyond any that she had yet followed. The Roman Republic, born of high hope and courage, had but few days to live, and those days were full of woe.
Margaret had so made the life of Rome her own at this period, that we have found it impossible to describe the one without recounting something of the other. Her intense interest in public affairs could not, however, wean her thoughts from the little babe left at Rieti. Going thither in December, she passed a week with her darling, but was forced after this to remain three months in Rome without seeing him. Here she lay awake whole nights, contriving how[242]she might end this painful separation; but circumstances were too strong for her, and the object so dearly wished for could not be compassed.
In March she visited him again, and found him in health, "and plump, though small." The baby leaned his head pathetically against her breast, seeming, she thought, to say, "How could you leave me?" He is described as a sensitive and precocious little creature,—affected, Margaret thought, by sympathy with her; "for," she says, "I worked very hard before his birth [at her book on Italy], with the hope that all my spirit might be incarnated in him."
She returned to Rome about the middle of April. The French were already in Italy. Their "web of falsehood" was drawing closer and closer round the devoted city. Margaret was not able to visit her boy again until the siege, soon begun, ended in the downfall of the Roman Republic.
The government of Rome, at this time, was in the hands of a triumvirate, whose names—Armellini, Mazzini, and Saffi—are appended to the official communications made in answer to the letters of the French Envoy, M. de Lesseps, and of the Commander-in-Chief, General Oudinot. The French side of this correspondence presented[243]but a series of tergiversations, the truth being simply that the opportunity of reinstating the Roman Pontiff in his temporal domain was too valuable to be allowed to pass, by the adventurer who then, under the name of President, already ruled France by military despotism. In the great game of hazard which he played, the prospective adhesion of the Pope's spiritual subjects was the highest card he could hold. The people who had been ignorant enough to elect Louis Napoleon, were easily led to justify his outrageous expedition to Rome.
In Margaret's manifold disappointments, Mazzini always remained her ideal of a patriot, and, as she says, of a prince. To her, he stands alone in Italy, "on a sunny height, far above the stature of other men." He came to her lodgings in Rome, and was in appearance "more divine than ever, after all his new, strange sufferings." He had then just been made a Roman citizen, and would in all probability have been made President, had the Republic continued to exist. He talked long with Margaret, and, she says, was not sanguine as to the outcome of the difficulties of the moment.
The city once invested, military hospitals became a necessity. The Princess Belgiojoso, a Milanese by birth, and in her day a social and political notability, undertook to organize these[244]establishments, and obtained, by personal solicitation, the funds necessary to begin her work. On the 30th of April, 1849, she wrote the following letter to Margaret:—
"Dear Miss Fuller,—You are named Superintendent of the Hospital of theFate Bene Fratelli. Go there at twelve, if the alarm-bell has not rung before. When you arrive there, you will receive all the women coming for the wounded, and give them your directions, so that you are sure to have a number of them, night and day.
"May God help us!"Christine Trivulze, of Belgiojoso."
[245]
Margaretwrites to Mr. Emerson in June: "Since the 30th of April I go almost daily to the hospitals, and, though I have suffered, for I had no idea before how terrible gun-shot wounds and wound-fever are, yet I have taken great pleasure in being with the men. There is scarcely one who is not moved by a noble spirit."
"Night and day," writes the friend cited above,[F]"Margaret was occupied, and, with the Princess,[246]so ordered and disposed the hospitals that their conduct was admirable. Of money they had very little, and they were obliged to give their time and thoughts in its place. I have walked through the wards with Margaret, and have seen how comforting was her presence to the poor suffering men. For each one's peculiar tastes she had a care. To one she carried books; to another she told the news of the day; and listened to another's oft-repeated tale of wrongs, as the best sympathy she could give. They raised themselves on their elbows to get the last glimpse of her" as she went her way.
Ossoli, meanwhile, was stationed, with his command, on the walls of the Vatican,—a post of considerable danger. This he refused to leave, even for necessary food and rest. The provisions sent him from time to time were shared with his needy comrades. As these men were brought, wounded and dying, to the hospitals, Margaret looked eagerly to see whether her husband was among them. She was able, sometimes, to visit him at his post, and to talk with him about the beloved child, now completely beyond their reach, as the city was invested on all sides, and no sure means of communication open to them. They remained for many days without any news of the little one, and their first intelligence concerning him was to the[247]effect that the nurse with whom he had been left would at once abandon him unless a certain sum of money should be sent in prepayment of her services. This it seemed at first impossible to do; but after a while the money was sent, and the evil day adjourned for a time.
Margaret's letters of the 10th of June speak of a terrible battle recently fought between the French troops and the defenders of Rome. The Italians, she says, fought like lions, making a stand for honor and conscience' sake, with scarcely any prospect of success. The attack of the enemy was directed with a skill and order which Margaret was compelled to admire. The loss on both sides was heavy, and the assailants, for the moment, gained "no inch of ground." But this was only the beginning of the dread trial. By the 20th of June the bombardment had become heavy. On the night of the 21st a practicable breach was made, and the French were within the city. The defence, however, was valiantly continued until the 30th, when Garibaldi informed the Assembly that further resistance would be useless. Conditions of surrender were then asked for and refused. Garibaldi himself was denied a safe-conduct, and departed with his troops augmented by a number of soldiers from other regiments. This was on July 2d, after it became known that the[248]French army would take possession on the morrow. Margaret followed the departing troops as far as the Place of St. John Lateran. Never had she seen a sight "so beautiful, so romantic, and so sad."
The grand piazza had once been the scene of Rienzi's triumph: "The sun was setting, the crescent moon rising, the flower of the Italian youth were marshalling in that solemn place. They had all put on the beautiful dress of the Garibaldi legion,—the tunic of bright red cloth, the Greek cap, or round hat with puritan plume. Their long hair was blown back from resolute faces.... I saw the wounded, all that could go, laden upon their baggage-cars. I saw many youths, born to rich inheritance, carrying in a handkerchief all their worldly goods. The wife of Garibaldi followed him on horseback. He himself was distinguished by the white tunic. His look was entirely that of a hero of the Middle Ages,—his face still young.... He went upon the parapet, and looked upon the road with a spy-glass, and, no obstruction being in sight, he turned his face for a moment back upon Rome, then led the way through the gate."
Thus ended the heroic defence of Rome. The French occupation began on the next day, with martial law and the end of all liberties. Alas! that it was not given to Margaret to[249]see Garibaldi come again, with the laurels of an abiding victory! Alas! that she saw not the end of the Napoleon game, and the punishment of France for her act of insensate folly!
It was during these days of fearful trial and anxiety that Margaret confided to Mrs. Story the secret of her marriage. This was done, not for the relief of her own overtasked feelings, but in the interest of her child, liable at this time to be left friendless by the death of his parents. Margaret, in her extreme anxiety concerning her husband's safety, became so ill and feeble that the duration of her own life appeared to her very uncertain. In a moment of great depression she called Mrs. Story to her bedside, related to her all the antecedents of the birth of the child, and showed her, among other papers, the certificate of her marriage, and of her son's legal right to inherit the title and estate of his father. These papers she intrusted to Mrs. Story's care, requesting her, in case of her own death, to seek her boy at Rieti, and to convey him to her friends in America.
To Lewis Cass, at that time American Envoy to the Papal Court, the same secret was confided, and under circumstances still more trying. Shortly before the conclusion of the siege, Margaret learned that an attack would probably be made upon the very part of the city in which[250]Ossoli was stationed with his men. She accordingly sent to request that Mr. Cass would call upon her at once, which he did. He found her "lying on a sofa, pale and trembling, evidently much exhausted." After informing him of her marriage, and of the birth and whereabouts of her child, she confided to his care certain important documents, to be sent, in the event of her death, to her family in America. Her husband was, at that very moment, in command of a battery directly exposed to the fire of the French artillery. The night before had been one of great danger to him, and Margaret, in view of his almost certain death, had determined to pass the coming night at his post with him, and to share his fate, whatever it might be. He had promised to come for her at the Ave Maria, and Mr. Cass, departing, met him at the porter's lodge, and shortly afterward beheld them walking in the direction of his command. It turned out that the threatened danger did not visit them. The cannonading from this point was not renewed, and on the morrow military operations were at an end.
Among our few pictures of Margaret and her husband, how characteristic is this one, of the pair walking side by side into the very jaws of death, with the glory of faith and courage bright about them![251]
The gates once open, Margaret's first thought was of Rieti, and her boy there. Thither she sped without delay, arriving just in time to save the life of the neglected and forsaken child, whose wicked nurse, uncertain of further payment, had indeed abandoned him. His mother found him "worn to a skeleton, too weak to smile, or lift his little wasted hand." Four weeks of incessant care and nursing brought, still in wan feebleness, his first returning smile.
All that Margaret had already endured seemed to her light in comparison with this. In the Papal States, woman had clearly fallen behind even the standard of the she-wolf.
After these painful excitements came a season of blessed quietness for Margaret and her dear ones. Angelo regained his infant graces, and became full of life and of baby glee. Margaret's marriage was suitably acknowledged, and the pain and trouble of such a concealment were at end. The disclosure of the relation naturally excited much comment in Italy and in America. In both countries there were some, no doubt, who chose to interpret this unexpected action on the part of Margaret in a manner utterly at variance with the whole tenor and spirit of her life. The general feeling was, however, quite otherwise; and it is gratifying to find that, while no one could have considered Margaret's marriage[252]an act of worldly wisdom, it was very generally accepted by her friends as only another instance of the romantic disinterestedness which had always been a leading trait in her character.
Writing to an intimate friend in America, she remarks: "What you say of the meddling curiosity of people repels me; it is so different here. When I made my appearance with a husband, and a child of a year old, nobody did the least act to annoy me. All were most cordial; none asked or implied questions."
She had already written to Madame Arconati, asking whether the fact of her concealed marriage and motherhood would make any difference in their relations. Her friend, a lady of the highest position and character, replied: "What difference can it make, except that I shall love you more, now that we can sympathize as mothers?"
In other letters, Margaret speaks of the loving sympathy expressed for her by relatives in America. The attitude of her brothers was such as she had rightly expected it to be. Her mother received the communication in the highest spirit, feeling assured that a leading motive in Margaret's withholding of confidence from her had been the desire to spare her a season of most painful anxiety. Speaking of a letter recently received from her, Margaret says:—[253]
"She blessed us. She rejoiced that she should not die feeling there was no one left to love me with the devotion she thought I needed. She expressed no regret at our poverty, but offered her feeble means."
After a stay of some weeks at Rieti, Margaret, with her husband and child, journeyed to Perugia, and thence to Florence. At the former place she remained long enough to read D'Azeglio's "Nicolò dei Lapi," which she esteemed "a book unenlivened by a spark of genius, but interesting as illustrative of Florence." Here she felt that she understood, for the first time, the depth and tenderness of the Umbrian school.
The party reached Florence late in September, and were soon established in lodgings for the winter. The police at first made some objection to their remaining in the city, but this matter was soon settled to their satisfaction. Margaret's thoughts now turned toward her own country and her own people:—
"It will be sad to leave Italy, uncertain of return. Yet when I think of you, beloved mother, of brothers and sisters and many friends, I wish to come. Ossoli is perfectly willing. He will go among strangers; but to him, as to all the young Italians, America seems the land of liberty."
Margaret's home-letters give lovely glimpses[254]of this season of peace. Her modest establishment was served by Angelo's nurse, with a little occasional aid from the porter's wife. The boy himself was now in rosy health; as his mother says, "a very gay, impetuous, ardent, but sweet-tempered child." She describes with a mother's delight his visit to her room at first waking, when he pulls her curtain aside, and goes through his pretty routine of baby tricks for her amusement,—laughing, crowing, imitating the sound of the bellows, and even saying "Bravo!" Then comes his bath, which she herself gives him, and then his walk and mid-day sleep.
"I feel so refreshed by his young life, and Ossoli diffuses such a power and sweetness over every day, that I cannot endure to think yet of our future. We have resolved to enjoy being together as much as we can in this brief interval, perhaps all we shall ever know of peace. I rejoice in all that Ossoli did (in the interest of the liberal party); but the results are disastrous, especially as my strength is now so impaired. This much I hope, in life or death, to be no more separated from Angelo."
Margaret's future did indeed look to her full of difficult duties. At forty years of age, having labored all her life for her father's family, she was to begin a new struggle for her own. She had looked this necessity bravely in the face, and[255]with resolute hand had worked at a history of recent events in Italy, hoping thus to make a start in the second act of her life-work. The two volumes which she had completed by this time seemed to her impaired in value by the intense, personal suffering which had lain like a weight upon her. Such leisure as the care of Angelo left her, while in Florence, was employed in the continuation of this work, whose loss we deplore the more for the intense personal feeling which must have throbbed through its pages. Margaret had hoped to pass this winter without any enforced literary labor, learning of her child, as she wisely says, and as no doubt she did, whatever else she may have found it necessary to do. In the chronicle of her days he plays an important part, his baby laugh "all dimples and glitter," his contentment in the fair scene about him when, carried to theCascine, he lies back in her arms, smiling, singing to himself, and moving his tiny feet. The Christmas holidays are dearer to her than ever before, for his sake. In the evening, before the bright little fire, he sits on his stool between father and mother, reminding Margaret of the days in which she had been so seated between her own parents. He is to her "a source of ineffable joys, far purer, deeper, than anything I ever felt before."[256]
As Margaret's husband was destined to remain a tradition only to the greater number of her friends, the hints and outlines of him given here and there in her letters are important, in showing us what companionship she had gained in return for her great sacrifice.
Ossoli seems to have belonged to a type of character the very opposite of that which Margaret had best known and most admired. To one wearied with the over-intellection and restless aspiration of the accomplished New Englander of that time, the simple geniality of the Italian nature had all the charm of novelty and contrast. Margaret had delighted in the race from her first acquaintance with it, but had found its happy endowments heavily weighted with traits of meanness and ferocity. In her husband she found its most worthy features, and her heart, wearied with long seeking and wandering, rested at last in the confidence of a simple and faithful attachment.
She writes from Florence: "My love for Ossoli is most pure and tender; nor has any one, except my mother or little children, loved me so genuinely as he does. To some, I have been obliged to make myself known. Others have loved me with a mixture of fancy and enthusiasm, excited at my talent of embellishing life. But Ossoli loves me from simple affinity;[257]he loves to be with me, and to serve and soothe me."
And in another letter she says: "Ossoli will be a good father. He has very little of what is called intellectual development, but has unspoiled instincts, affections pure and constant, and a quiet sense of duty which, to me who have seen much of the great faults in characters of enthusiasm and genius, seems of highest value."
Some reminiscences contributed by the accomplishedlittérateur, William Henry Hurlbut, will help to complete the dim portrait of the Marchese:—
"The frank and simple recognition of his wife's singular nobleness, which he always displayed, was the best evidence that his own nature was of a fine and noble strain. And those who knew him best are, I believe, unanimous in testifying that his character did in no respect belie the evidence borne by his manly and truthful countenance to its warmth and sincerity. He seemed quite absorbed in his wife and child. I cannot remember ever to have found Madame Ossoli alone, on the evenings when she remained at home."
Mr. Hurlbut says further: "Notwithstanding his general reserve and curtness of speech, on two or three occasions he showed himself to possess quite a quick and vivid fancy, and even a[258]certain share of humor. I have heard him tell stories remarkably well. One tale especially, which related to a dream he had in early life, I remember as being told with great felicity and vivacity of expression."
Though opposed, like all liberals, to the ecclesiastical government of Rome, the Marchese appeared to Mr. Hurlbut a devout Catholic. He often attended vesper services in Florence, and Margaret, unwavering in her Protestantism, still found it sweet to kneel by his side.
Margaret read, this winter, Louis Blanc's "Story of Ten Years," and Lamartine's "Girondists." Her days were divided between family cares and her literary work, which for the time consisted in recording her impressions of recent events. She sometimes passed an evening at the rooms occupied by the Mozier and Chapman families, where the Americans then resident in Florence were often gathered together. She met Mr. and Mrs. Browning often, and with great pleasure. The Marchesa Arconati she saw almost daily.
One of Margaret's last descriptions is of the Duomo,[G]which she visited with her husband on Christmas eve:—
"No one was there. Only the altars were lit up, and the priests, who were singing, could not[259]be seen by the faint light. The vast solemnity of the interior is thus really felt. The Duomo is more divine than St. Peter's, and worthy of genius pure and unbroken. St. Peter's is, like Rome, a mixture of sublimest heaven with corruptest earth. I adore the Duomo, though no place can now be to me like St. Peter's, where has been passed the splendidest part of my life."
Thus looked to her, in remembrance, the spot where she had first met her husband, where she had shared his heroic vigils, and stood beside him within reach of death.
The little household suffered some inconvenience before the winter was over. By the middle of December the weather became severely cold, and Margaret once more experienced the inconvenience of ordinary lodgings in Italy, in which the means of heating the rooms are very limited. The baby grew impatient of confinement, and constantly pointed to the door, which he was not allowed to pass. Of their several rooms, one only was comfortable under these circumstances. Of this, as occupied in the winter evenings, Mr. Hurlbut has given a pleasant description:—
"A small, square room, sparingly yet sufficiently furnished, with polished floor and frescoed ceiling; and, drawn up closely before the[260]cheerful fire, an oval table, on which stood a monkish lamp of brass, with depending chains that support quaint classic cups for the olive oil. There, seated beside his wife, I was sure to find the Marchese, reading from some patriotic book, and dressed in the dark brown, red-corded coat of the Guardia Civica, which it was his melancholy pleasure to wear at home. So long as the conversation could be carried on in Italian, he used to remain, though he rarely joined in it to any considerable degree. If manyforestieri[H]chanced to drop in, he betook himself to a neighboringcafé,—not absenting himself through aversion to such visitors, but in the fear lest his silent presence might weigh upon them."
To complete the picture here given of the Ossoli interior, we should mention Horace, the youngest brother of Charles Sumner, who was a daily visitor in this abode of peace. Margaret says of him: "He has solid good in his mind and heart.... When I am ill, or in a hurry, he helps me like a brother. Ossoli and Sumner exchange some instruction in English and Italian."
This young man, remembered by those who knew him as most amiable and estimable, was abroad at this time for his health, and passed[261]the winter in Florence. Mr. Hurlbut tells us that he brought Margaret, every morning, his tribute of fresh wild flowers, and that every evening, "beside her seat in her little room, his mild, pure face was to be seen, bright with a quiet happiness," which was in part derived from her kindness and sympathy.
This brief chronicle of Margaret's last days in Italy would be incomplete without a few words concerning the enviable position which she had made for herself in this country of her adoption.
The way in which the intelligence of her marriage was received by her country-people in Rome and Florence gives the strongest proof of the great esteem in which they were constrained to hold her. Equally honorable to her was the friendship of Madame Arconati, a lady of high rank and higher merit, beloved and revered as few were in the Milan of that day. She was the friend of Joseph Mazzini, and shared with George Sand and Elizabeth Barrett Browning the honors of prominence in the liberal movement and aspiration of the time. But it is in her intercourse with the people at large that we shall find the deepest evidence of her true humanity. Hers was no barren creed, divorced from beneficent action. The wounded soldiers in the hospital, the rude peasants of[262]Rieti, knew her heart, and thought of her as "a mild saint and ministering angel."[I]Ferocious and grasping as these peasants were, she was able to overcome for the time their savage instincts, and to turn the tide of their ungoverned passions.
In this place, two brothers were one day saved from the guilt of fratricide by her calm and firm intervention. Both of the men were furiously angry, and blood had already been drawn by the knife of one, when she stepped between them, and so reasoned and insisted, that the weapons were presently flung away, and the feud healed by a fraternal embrace. After this occurrence, the American lady was recognized as a peace-maker, and differences of various sorts were referred to her for settlement, much as domestic and personal difficulties had been submitted to her in her own New England.
Among the troubles brought under her notice at Rieti were the constant annoyances caused by the lawless behavior of a number of Spanish troops who happened to be quartered upon the town. Between these and the villagers she succeeded in keeping the peace by means of good counsel and enforced patience. In Florence she seems to have been equally beloved and respected. A quarrel here took place between[263]her maid, from Rieti, and a fellow-lodger, in which her earnest effort prevented bloodshed, and effectually healed the breach between the two women. The porter of the house in which she dwelt while in Florence was slowly dying of consumption; Margaret's kindness so attached him to her that he always spoke of her asla cara signora.
The unruly Garibaldi Legion overtook Margaret one day between Rome and Rieti. She had been to visit her child at the latter place, and was returning to Rome alone in a vettura. While she was resting for an hour at a wayside inn, the master of the house entered in great alarm, crying: "We are lost! Here is the Legion Garibaldi! These men always pillage, and, if we do not give all up to them without pay, they will kill us." Looking out upon the road, Margaret saw that the men so much dreaded were indeed close at hand. For a moment she felt some alarm, thinking that they might insist upon taking the horses from her carriage, and thus render it impossible for her to proceed on her journey. Another moment, and she had found a device to touch their better nature. As the troop entered, noisy and disorderly, Margaret rose and said to the innkeeper: "Give these good men bread and wine at my expense, for after their ride they must need refreshment." The men at once became[264]quiet and respectful. They partook of the offered hospitality with the best grace, and at parting escorted her to her carriage, and took leave of her with great deference. She drove off, wondering at their bad reputation. They probably were equally astonished at her dignity and friendliness.
The statements of Margaret's friends touch us with their account of the charities which this poor woman was able to afford through economy and self-sacrifice. When she allowed herself only the bare necessaries of living and diet, she could have the courage to lend fifty dollars to an artist whom she deemed poorer than herself. Rich indeed was this generous heart, to an extent undreamed of by wealthy collectors and pleasure-seekers.[265]
Returnto her own country now lay immediately before Margaret. In the land of her adoption the struggle for freedom had failed, and no human foresight could have predicted the period of its renewal. Europe had cried out, like the sluggard on his bed: "You have waked me too soon; I must slumber again."
Margaret's delight in the new beauties and resources unfolded to her in various European countries, and especially in Italy, had made the thought of this return unwelcome to her. But now that free thought had become contraband in the beautiful land, where should she carry her high-hearted hopes, if not westward, with the tide of the true empire that shall grow out of man's conquest of his own brute passions?
This holy westward way, found of Columbus, broadened and brightened by the Pilgrims, and[266]become an ocean highway for the nations of the earth, lay open to her. From its farther end came to her the loving voices of kindred, and friends of youth. There she, a mother, could "show her babe, and make her boast," to a mother of her own. There brothers, trained to noble manhood through her care and labor, could rise up to requite something of what they owed her. There she could tell the story of her Italy, with the chance of a good hearing. There, where she had sown most precious seed in the field of the younger generations, she would find some sheaves to bind for her own heart-harvest.
And so the last days in Florence came. The vessel was chosen, and the day of sailing fixed upon. Margaret's last letter, addressed to her mother, is dated on the 14th of May.
We read it now with a weight of sorrow which was hidden from her. In the light of what afterwards took place, it has the sweet solemnity of a greeting sent from the borders of another world.
"Florence, May 14, 1850.
"I will believe I shall be welcome with my treasures,—my husband and child. For me, I long so much to see you! Should anything hinder our meeting upon earth, think of your daughter as one who always wished, at least, to do her duty, and who always cherished[267]you, according as her mind opened to discover excellence.
"Give dear love, too, to my brothers; and first, to my eldest, faithful friend, Eugene; a sister's love to Ellen; love to my kind and good aunts, and to my dear cousin E——. God bless them!
"I hope we shall be able to pass some time together yet, in this world. But, if God decrees otherwise, here and hereafter, my dearest mother,
"Your loving child,"Margaret."
Who is there that reads twice a sorrowful story without entertaining an unreasonable hope that its ending may change in the reperusal? So does one return to the fate of "Paul and Virginia," so to that of the "Bride of Lammermoor." So, even in the wild tragedy of "Othello," seen for the hundredth time, one still sees a way of escape for the victim; still, in imagination, implores her to follow it. And when repeated representation has made assurance doubly sure, we yield to the mandate which none can resist, once issued, and say, "It was to be."
This unreasonable struggle renews itself within us as we follow the narrative of Margaret's departure for her native land. Why did she choose a merchant vessel from Leghorn? why one which was destined to carry in its hold[268]the heavy marble of Powers's Greek Slave? She was warned against this, was uncertain in her own mind, and disturbed by presages of ill. But economy was very necessary to her at the moment. The vessel chosen, the barque "Elizabeth," was new, strong, and ably commanded. Margaret had seen and made friends with the captain, Hasty by name, and his wife. Horace Sumner was to be their fellow-passenger, and a young Italian girl, Celeste Paolini, engaged to help in the care of the little boy. These considerations carried the day.
Just before leaving Florence, Margaret received letters the tenor of which would have enabled her to remain longer in Italy. Ossoli remembered the warning of a fortune-teller, who in his childhood had told him to beware of the sea. Margaret wrote of omens which gave her "a dark feeling." She had "a vague expectation of some crisis," she knows not what; and this year, 1850, had long appeared to her a period of pause in the ascent of life, a point at which she should stand, as "on a plateau, and take more clear and commanding views than ever before." She prays fervently that she may not lose her boy at sea, "either by unsolaced illness, or amid the howling waves; or if so, that Ossoli, Angelo, and I may go together, and that the anguish may be brief."[269]
These presentiments, strangely prophetic, returned upon Margaret with so much force that on the very day appointed for sailing, the 17th of May, she stood at bay before them for an hour, unable to decide whether she should go or stay. But she had appointed a general meeting with her family in July, and had positively engaged her passage in the barque. Fidelity to these engagements prevailed with her. She may have felt, too, the danger of being governed by vague forebodings which, shunning death in one form, often invite it in another. And so, in spite of fears and omens, too well justified in the sequel, she went on board, and the voyage began in smooth tranquillity.
The first days at sea passed quietly enough. The boy played on the deck, or was carried about by the captain. Margaret and her husband suffered little inconvenience from seasickness, and were soon walking together in the limited space of their floating home. But presently the good captain fell ill with small-pox of a malignant type. On June 3d the barque anchored off Gibraltar, the commander breathed his last, and was accorded a seaman's burial, in the sea. Here the ship suffered a detention of some days from unfavorable winds, but on the 9th was able to proceed on her way; and two days later Angelo showed symptoms of the[270]dreadful disease, which visited him severely. His eyes were closed, his head swollen, his body disfigured by the accompanying eruption. Margaret and Ossoli, strangers to the disease, hung over their darling, and nursed him so tenderly that he was in due time restored, not only to health, but also to his baby beauty, so much prized by his mother.
Margaret wrote from Gibraltar, describing the captain's illness and death, and giving a graphic picture of his ocean funeral. She did not at the time foresee Angelo's illness, but knew that he might easily have taken the infection. Relieved from this painful anxiety, the routine of the voyage re-established itself. Ossoli and Sumner continued to instruct each other in their respective languages. The baby became the pet and delight of the sailors. Margaret was busy with her book on Italy, but found time to soothe and comfort the disconsolate widow of the captain after her own availing fashion. Thus passed the summer days at sea. On Thursday, July 18th, the "Elizabeth" was off the Jersey coast, in thick weather, the wind blowing east of south. The former mate was now the captain. Wishing to avoid the coast, he sailed east-north-east, thinking presently to take a pilot, and pass Sandy Hook by favor of the wind.
At night he promised his passengers an early[271]arrival in New York. They retired to rest in good spirits, having previously made all the usual preparations for going on shore.
By nine o'clock that evening the breeze had become a gale, by midnight a dangerous storm. The commander, casting the lead from time to time, was without apprehension, having, it is supposed, mistaken his locality, and miscalculated the speed of the vessel, which, under close-reefed sails, was nearing the sand-bars of Long Island. Here, on Fire Island beach, she struck, at four o'clock on the morning of July 19th. The main and mizzen masts were promptly cut away, but the heavy marble had broken through the hold, and the waters rushed in. The bow of the vessel stuck fast in the sand, her stern swung around, and she lay with her broadside exposed to the breakers, which swept over her with each returning rise,—a wreck to be saved by no human power.
The passengers sprang from their berths, aroused by the dreadful shock, and guessing but too well its import. Then came the crash of the falling masts, the roar of the waves, as they shattered the cabin skylight and poured down into the cabin, extinguishing the lights. These features of the moment are related as recalled by Mrs. Hasty, sole survivor of the passengers. One scream only was heard from Margaret's stateroom.[272]Mrs. Hasty and Horace Sumner met in the cabin and clasped hands. "We must die!" was his exclamation. "Let us die calmly," said the resolute woman. "I hope so," answered he. The leeward side of the cabin was already under water, but its windward side still gave shelter, and here, for three hours, the passengers took refuge, their feet braced against the long table. The baby shrieked, as well he might, with the sudden fright, the noise and chill of the water. But his mother wrapped him as warmly as she could, and in her agony cradled him on her bosom and sang him to sleep. The girl Celeste was beside herself with terror; and here we find recorded a touching trait of Ossoli, who soothed her with encouraging words, and touched all hearts with his fervent prayer. In the calm of resignation they now sat conversing with each other, devising last messages to friends, to be given by any one of them who might survive the wreck.
The crew had retired to the top-gallant forecastle, and the passengers, hearing nothing of them, supposed them to have left the ship. By seven o'clock it became evident that the cabin could not hold together much longer, and Mrs. Hasty, looking from the door for some way of escape, saw a figure standing by the foremast, the space between being constantly swept by the[273]waves. She tried in vain to make herself heard; but the mate, Davis, coming to the door of the forecastle, saw her, and immediately ordered the men to go to her assistance. So great was the danger of doing this, that only two of the crew were willing to accompany him. The only refuge for the passengers was now in the forecastle, which, from its position and strength of construction, would be likely to resist longest the violence of the waves. By great effort and coolness the mate and his two companions reached the cabin, and rescued all in it from the destruction so nearly impending. Mrs. Hasty was the first to make the perilous attempt. She was washed into the hatchway, and besought the brave Davis to leave her to her fate; but he, otherwise minded, caught her long hair between his teeth, and, with true seaman's craft, saved her and himself. Angelo was carried across in a canvas bag hung to the neck of a sailor. Reaching the forecastle, they found a dry and sheltered spot, and wrapped themselves in the sailors' loose jackets, for a little warmth and comfort. The mate three times revisited the cabin, to bring thence various valuables for Mrs. Hasty and Margaret; and, last of all, a bottle of wine and some figs, that these weary ones might break their fast. Margaret now spoke to Mrs. Hasty of something[274]still left behind, more valuable than money. She would not, however, ask the mate to expose his life again. It is supposed that her words had reference to the manuscript of her work on Italy. From their new position, through the spray and rain they could see the shore, some hundreds of yards off. Men were seen on the beach, but there was nothing to indicate that an attempt would be made to save them. At nine o'clock it was thought that some one of the crew might possibly reach the shore by swimming, and, once there, make some effort to send them aid. Two of the sailors succeeded in doing this. Horace Sumner sprang after them, but sank, unable to struggle with the waves. A last device was that of a plank, with handles of rope attached, upon which the passengers in turn might seat themselves, while a sailor, swimming behind, should guide their course. Mrs. Hasty, young and resolute, led the way in this experiment, the stout mate helping her, and landing her out of the very jaws of death.
And here we fall back into that bootless wishing of which we spoke a little while ago. Oh that Margaret had been willing that the same means should be employed to bring her and hers to land! Again and again, to the very last moment, she was urged to try this way of escape, uncertain, but the only one. It was all in vain.[275]Margaret would not be separated from her dear ones. Doubtless she continued for a time to hope that some assistance would reach them from the shore. The life-boat was even brought to the beach; but no one was willing to man her, and the delusive hope aroused by her appearance was soon extinguished.
The day wore on; the tide turned. The wreck would not outlast its return. The commanding officer made one last appeal to Margaret before leaving his post. To stay, he told her, was certain and speedy death, as the ship must soon break up. He promised to take her child with him, and to give Celeste, Ossoli, and herself each the aid of an able seaman. Margaret still refused to be parted from child or husband. The crew were then told to "save themselves," and all but four jumped overboard. The commander and several of the seamen reached the shore in safety, though not without wounds and bruises.
By three o'clock in the afternoon the breaking-up was well in progress. Cabin and stern disappeared beneath the waves, and the forecastle filled with water. The little group now took refuge on the deck, and stood about the foremast. Three able-bodied seamen remained with them, and one old sailor, homeward bound for good and all. The deck now parted from the hull, and rose and fell with the sweep of the[276]waves. The final crash must come in a few minutes. The steward now took Angelo in his arms, promising to save him or die. At this very moment the foremast fell, and with it disappeared the deck and those who stood on it. The steward and the child were washed ashore soon after, dead, though not yet cold. The two Italians, Celeste and Ossoli, held for a moment by the rigging, but were swept off by the next wave. Margaret, last seen at the foot of the mast, in her white nightdress, with her long hair hanging about her shoulders, is thought to have sunk at once. Two others, cook and carpenter, were able to save themselves by swimming, and might, alas! have saved her, had she been minded to make the attempt.
What strain of the heroic in her mind overcame the natural instinct to do and dare all upon the chance of saving her own life, and those so dear to her, we shall never know. No doubt the separation involved in any such attempt appeared to her an abandonment of her husband and child. Resting in this idea, she could more easily nerve herself to perish with them than to part from them. She and the babe were feeble creatures to be thrown upon the mercy of the waves, even with the promised aid. Her husband, young and strong, was faithful unto death, and would not leave her. Both[277]of them, with fervent belief, regarded death as the entrance to another life, and surely, upon its very threshold, sought to do their best. So we must end our questioning and mourning concerning them with a silent acquiescence in what was to be.
A friend of Margaret, who visited the scene on the day after the catastrophe, was persuaded that seven resolute men could have saved every soul on board the vessel. Through the absence of proper system and discipline, the life-boat, though applied for early on the morning of the wreck, did not arrive until one o'clock in the afternoon, when the sea had become so swollen by the storm that it was impossible to launch it. One hopes, but scarcely believes, that this state of things has been amended before this time.
The bodies of Margaret and her husband were never found. That of Angelo was buried at Fire Island, with much mourning on the part of the surviving sailors, whose pet and playmate he had been. It was afterwards removed to the cemetery at Mt. Auburn, where, beneath a marble monument which commemorates the life and death of his parents, and his own, he alone lies buried, the only one of Margaret's treasures that ever reached the country of her birth.[278]