author of this crime, who I need not say was Mascalbruni, remained undiscovered. Strange as it may appear, I am enabled to connect two more links in the chain of this ruffian's history, and thus, as it were, to become his biographer. Having been in town at the period when he was in the zenith of his glory, and being slightly acquainted with the family whom, like a pestilence, it was his lot to destroy and blight, I was well acquainted with his person, and he with mine; indeed, once seen, it was not easy to mistake his. After two winters at Naples, I travelled, by the way of Ravenna and Rimini, to Venice. The carnival was drawing to a close, and, on quitting a soirée at Madame Benzon's, I repaired to the Ridotta. The place was crowded to excess with that mercurial population, who during this saturnalia, particularly its last nights, mingle in one orgie, and seem to endeavour, by a kind of intoxication of the senses, and general licentiousness, to drown the memory of the destitution and wretchedness to which the iron despotism of the Austrian has reduced them, The scene had a sort of magnetic attraction in it. I had neither mask nor domino, but it is considered rather distingué for men to appear without them; and, as I had no love-affair to carry on, it was no bad means of obtaining one, had I been so inclined. Among the other groups, I observed two persons who went intriguing round the salle, appearing to know the secrets of many of their acquaintances, whom it seemed their delight to torment and persecute, and whom, notwithstanding their masks, they had detected by the voice, which, however attempted to be disguised, betrays more than the eyes, or even the mouth, though it is the great seat of expression. The pair wore fancy dresses. The domino of the man was of Persian or Turkish manufacture, a rich silk with a purple ground, in which were inwoven palm-leaves of gold, The costume of the lady, who seemed of a portly figure, not the most symmetrical, was a rich Venetian brocade, such as we see in the gorgeous pictures of Paul Veronese, and much in use during the dogal times of the republic. As they passed me, I heard the lady say, looking at me, "That is a foreigner." "Si signora, è Inglese," was the reply; "lo conosco." Who this could be who knew me,—me, almost a stranger at Venice, I was curious to discover. By the slow and drawling accent peculiar to the Romans, I felt satisfied he was one, and fancied that I had heard that voice before,-that it was not altogether unfamiliar to me. I was desirous of unravelling the secret, for such it was, as the man did not address me; and I remained at the Ridotta much later than I should otherwise have done, in order to find out my unknown acquaintance. I therefore kept my eye on the couple, hoping that accident might favour my wish. On the last nights of the carnival it is common to sup at the Ridotta, and I at length watched the incognito into a box with his inamorata, where he took off his mask, and whom should I discover under it but the identical hero of romance, the villain Mascalbruni. He was an acquaintance who might well shun my recognition, and I was not anxious he should see I had attracted his observation. As I was returning to my hotel on the Grand Canal, I asked the gondo lier if he knew one Signor Mascalbruni. These boatmen are a kind of Figaros, and, like the agents of the Austrian police, are acquainted with the names and address of almost every resident in Venice, especially of those who frequent the public places. The man, however, did not know my friend by that name,-perhaps he had changed it. But when I described his costume, he said that the signor was the cavalier servente of a Russian princess, who had taken for a year one of the largest palaces in Venice. "Il signor," he added, "canta come un angelo." The idea of coupling an angel and Mascalbruni together amused me. "An angel of darkness!" I was near replying; but thought it best to be silent. I had no wish to encounter Mascalbruni a second time. I went the next day to Fusina, and thence to Milan; indeed I had made all the preparations for my departure, nothing being more dull than the Carême at Venice. Two years after this adventure, I was travelling in the Grisons, after having made a tour of the petits cantons, with my knapsack on my back, and a map of Switzerland in my pocket, to serve the place of a guide,-a description of persons to whom I have almost as great an objection as to cicerones, preferring rather to miss seeing what I should like to see, than to be told what I ought to like to see; not that it has fallen to the lot of many guides, or travellers either, to be present at a spectacle such as I am going to describe. I had been pacing nine good leagues; and that I saw it was merely accidental, for if it had not come in my way, I should not have gone out of mine to witness it. Coire, the capital of the Grisons, my place of destination for the night, had just appeared, when I observed a great crowd collecting together immediately in front, but at some distance off, the peasants running in all directions from the neighbouring hills, like so many radii to meet in a centre. One of these crossed me; and, on inquiring of him the occasion of all this haste and bustle, I learned that an execution was about to take place. My informant added with some pride that the criminal was not a Swiss, but an Italian. He seemed perfectly acquainted with all the particulars of the event that had transpired, for he had been present at the trial; and, as we walked along the road together, in his patois,-bad German, and worse French, with here and there a sprinkling of Italian,-he related to me in his own way what I will endeavour to translate. "An Englishman of about twenty years of age was travelling, as you may be, on foot, about seven weeks ago, in this canton, having lately crossed the St. Gothard from Bellinzona. He was accompa nied by a courier, whom he had picked up at Milan. They halted for some days in our town, waiting for the young gentleman's remittances from Genoa, where his letters of credit were addressed. On their arrival at Coire they had a guide; but the Italian persuaded his master, who seemed much attached to him, to discharge Pierre, on the pretence that he was thoroughly acquainted with the country, and spoke the language, which indeed he did. He was a dark brigand-looking fellow, with a particularly bad expression of countenance, and a gloomy look about his eyes; and, for my part, I am sur prised that the young man should have ventured to trust himself in his company, for I should not like to meet his fellow on the road by myself even in the day-time. Well: the Englishman's money, a good round sum,-they say, two hundred napoleons d'or, was paid him by an order on our bankers; and then they set out, but not as before. "They had only been two days in company, when the villainous Italian, who either did not know the road over the mountains, or had purposely gone out of the way, thought it a good opportunity of perpetrating an act, no doubt long planned, which was neither more nor less than despatching his master. It was a solitary place, and a fit one for a deed of blood. A narrow path had been worn in the side of a precipice, which yawned to the depth of several hundred feet over a torrent that rushed, as though impatient of being confined, foaming and boiling through a narrow chasm opened for itself through the rocks. I could show you the spot, for I know it well, having a right of commune on the mountains; and have often driven my cows, after the melting of the snows, up the pass, to feed on the herbage that, mixed with heath and rhododendrons, forms a thick carpet under foot. It is a pasture that makes excellent cheese. "But, solitary as the place looks, the Italian did not know that there are several chalets, mine among the rest, in the Alp; and herdsmen. As for me, I happened to be down in the plain, or I might have been an eye-witness of much of what I am about to describe. I was saying that the spot seemed to suit his purpose; and his impatience to ease his master of his gold was such, that, happily for the ends of justice, he could not wait till night-fall, or none but (and here he pointed to the sky) He above might have been privy to the crime. It was, however, mid-day. Into the deep-worn pass I have mentioned runs a rivulet, which, sparkling on the green bank, had made for itself a little basin. The day was hot and sultry; and the young gentleman, tempted, it would seem, by the gentle murmur of the water as it fell rippling over the turf, and its crystal brightness, stooped down to drink. The Italian watched this opportunity, sprung upon him like a tiger, and plunged a dagger, which he always carried concealed about him, into the Englishman's back. Fortunately,however, the point hit upon the belt in which he carried his money, perhaps on the napoleons; for, before the assassin could give him a second blow, he sprang up and screamed for help, calling Murder, murder!' "Three of the herdsmen whom I have mentioned heard the cries, and came running towards the direction whence they proceeded, when they discovered two men struggling with each other; but, before they could reach them, one had fallen, and the other was in the act of rifling him, in order afterwards to hurl him down the precipice into the bed of the river. So intent was he on the former of these occupations, that he did not perceive my countrymen till they seized him. He made much resistance; but his dagger was not within his reach. They bound his hands, and, together with the lifeless corpse of his master, transported him to Coire, where, not to enter into the trial, he was condemned to death. "But he has been now some weeks in prison, in consequence of our not being able to procure a bourreau; and we have been forced to send for one to Bellinzona, no Grison being willing to perform the office. He arrived last night; and how do you think, sir? According to our laws, he is to be executed with a sword that has not been used for forty years, no murder having been committed in the canton during all that period,-though no sword could be applied to better purpose than it will in a few moments." Whilst he was thus speaking, we reached the dense circle already formed. On seeing a stranger approach, they made room for me; and curiosity to witness this mode of execution, the remnant of barbarous times, as well as to see the Italian, induced me to enter the Place de Grève. At the first glance I recognised Mascalbruni. He was stripped of his shirt, and on his knees; by his side was a Jesuit to whom he had just made his confession; and over him, on an elevation from the ground by means of a large stone, stood the prevôt, with a sword of prodigious length and antique shape, and covered with the rust of ages, pendent in his hands. The lower part of Mascalbruni's face was fallen, whilst all above the mouth was drawn upward as from some powerful convulsion. The eyes, that used to bear the semblance of living coals, had in them a concentrated and sullen gloom. The cold and damp of the cell, and the scantiness of his diet, which consisted of bread and water, had worn his cheek to the bone, and given it the sallowness of one in the black stage of cholera. His face was covered with a thick beard, every hair of which stood distinct from its fellows; and his matted locks, thickly sprinkled with grey, trailed over his ghastly features and neck in wild disorder. His shoulders down to the waist were, as I said, bare; and they and his arms displayed anatomically a muscular strength that might have served as a model for a gladiator. Over all was thrown an air of utter prostration moral and physical, -the desolation of despair. A few yards to the right, the priest, with his eyes uplifted to heaven, seemed absorbed in prayer; and between them the bourreau, who might have superseded Tristan in his office, and been a dangerous rival in the good graces of Louis the Eleventh. He called to mind a figure of Rubens',-not the one who is turning round in the Descent of the Cross at Antwerp, and saying to the thief, writhing in horrible contortions after he has wrenched his lacerated foot from the nail, "Sacre, chien,"--but a soldier in another of his pictures in the Gallery at Brussels (the representation of some martyrdom,) who has just torn off the ear of the saint with a pair of red-hot pincers, and is eyeing it with a savage complacency. It was, in short, exactly such a group, with its pyramidical form and startling contrasts of colour and expression, as the great Flemish painter could have desired. A dead silence, which the natural horror, the novelty of the scene created, prevailed among the assembled crowd; and it spoke well for the morality and good feeling of the simple peasantry, that not a woman was present on the occasion. The hand of the swordsman was raised, and the stroke fell on the neck of the culprit; but, horrible to say,-what was it then to witness?-though given with no common vigour, so blunt was the instrument, that, instead of severing the head, it only inflicted a gash which divided the tendons of the neck, and the undecapitated body fell doubled up, whilst only a few gouts of blood issued from the wound. The tortured wretch's groans and exclamations found an echo in all bosoms; and it was not till after two more sabre strokes that the head lay apart, and rolled upwards in the dust. I then saw what I have heard described of Charlotte Cordé, after she had been guillotined; the muscles of the face were convulsed as if with sensibility, and the eyes glared with horrid meaning, as though the soul yet lingered there. Even the executioner could scarcely meet their scowl without shuddering. It was the first and last spectacle of this kind at which I mean ever to be present; and I should not have awaited its awful termination, could I have penetrated through the living wall that was a barrier to my exit. You may now guess from whom I obtained many of the details contained in this memoir of Mascalbruni. It was from the confessor, who had endeavoured, but in vain, to give him spiritual consolation in the dungeon and at the block. The Jesuit and myself had mutual revelations to make to each other, connecting the present with the past, and which have enabled me to weave the dark tissue of his life's thread into one piece. I repeat the last words of the good old man at our final interview,- "May God have mercy on his soul !" F. MEDWIN. SMOKE. "A trifle light as air." SWIFT sang a broomstick, and with matchless lore Nor scorn'd the humble snail; and Goldsmith's lyre A haunch of venison nobly did inspire; Of such light themes the loftiest lyres have spoke, And my small shell shall sound the praise of smoke. Essence sublime! serenely curling vapour! |