Volume Ii Part 7 (1/2)
as they call Diplomacy, and would scarcely do me a favor if I pressed him ever so much.”
When urged further, he only laughed, and, lighting his cigar, puffed away for a moment or two; after which he said in his careless way: ”After all, it mightn't have been a bad dodge of me to send the Doctor off to Turkey. He was an old admirer, wasn't he?”
After this, Kitty, to allude to the subject was impossible, and here I had to leave it. But who could possibly have insinuated such a scandal concerning me? or how could it have occurred to malignant ingenuity to couple my name with that of a person in his station? I cried the entire evening in my own room as I thought over the disgrace to which the bare allusion exposed me.
Is there not a fatality, then, I ask you, in everything that ties us to Ireland? Are not the chance references to that country full of low and unhappy a.s.sociations? and yet you can talk to me of ”when we come back again.”
We are daily becoming more uneasy about James. He is now several weeks gone, and not a line has reached us to say where he is, or what success has attended him. I know his high-spirited nature so well, and how any reverse or disappointment would inevitably drive him to the wildest excesses, that I am in agony about him. A letter in your brother's hand is now here awaiting him, so that I can perceive that even Robert is as ignorant of his fate as we are.
All these cares, dearest, will have doubtless thrown their shadows over this dreary epistle, the reflex of my darkened spirit. Bear with and pity me, dearest Kitty; and even when calmer reason refuses to follow the more headlong impulses of my feeling, still care for, still love Your ever heart-attached and devoted
Mary Anne Dodd.
P. S. The post has just arrived, bringing a letter for Lord G. in James's hand. It was addressed Bregenz, and has been several days on the road. How I long to learn its tidings! But I cannot detain this; so again good-bye.
LETTER XII. KENNY JAMES DODD TO THOMAS PURCELL, ESQ., OF THE GRANGE, BRUFF
Lake of Como.
My dear Tom,--Though I begin this to-day, it may be it will take me to the end of the week to finish it, for I am still very weak, and my ideas come sometimes too quick and sometimes too slow, and, like an ill-ordered procession, stop the road, and make confusion everywhere.
Mary Anne has told you how I have been ill, and for both our sakes, I 'll say little more about it. One remark, however, I will make, and it is this: that of all the good qualities we ascribe to home, there is one unquestionably pre-eminent,--”it is the very best place to be sick in.”
The monotony and sameness so wearisome in health are boons to the sick man. The old familiar faces are all dear to him; the well-known voices do not disturb him; the little gleam of light that steals in between the curtains checkers some accustomed spot in the room that he has watched on many a former sick-bed. The stray words he catches are of home and homely topics. In a word, he is the centre of a little world, all anxious and eager about him, and even the old watchdog subdues his growl out of deference to his comfort.
Now, though I am all grat.i.tude for the affection and kindness of every one around me, I missed twenty things I could have had at Dodsborough, not one of them worth a bra.s.s farthing in reality, but priceless in the estimation of that peevish, fretful habit that grows out of a sick-bed.
It was such a comfort to me to know how Miles Dogherty pa.s.sed the night, and to learn whether he got a little sleep towards morning, as I did, and what the doctor thought of him. Then I liked to hear all the adventures of Joe Barret, when he ”went in” for the leeches, how the mare threw him, and left him to scramble home on his feet. Then I revelled in all that petty tyranny illness admits of, but which is only practicable amongst one's own people, refusing this, and insisting on that, just to exercise the little despotism that none rebel against, but which declines into a mixed monarchy on the first day you eat chicken-broth, and from which you are utterly deposed when you can dine at table. In good truth, Tom, I don't wonder at men becoming _malades imaginaires_, seeing the unnatural importance they attain to by a life of complaining, and days pa.s.sed in self-commiseration and sorrow.
In place of all this, think of a foreign country and a foreign doctor; fancy yourself interrogated about your feelings in a language of which you scarcely know a word, and are conscious that a wrong tense in your verb may be your death-warrant. Imagine yourself endeavoring, through the flighty visions of a wandering intellect, to find out the subjunctive mood or the past participle, and almost forgetting the torment of your gout in the terrors of your grammar!
This is a tiresome theme, and let us change it. Like all home-grown people, I see you expect me to send you a full account of Italy and the Italians within a month after my crossing the Alps. It is, after all, a pardonable blunder on your part, since the very t.i.tles we read to books of travels in the newspapers show that for sketchy books there are always to be found ”skipping” readers. Hence that host of surface-description that finds its way into print from men who have the impudence to introduce themselves as writers of ”Jottings from my Note-Book,” ”Loose Leaves from my Log,” ”Smoke Puffs from Germany,” and ”A Canter over the Caucasus.” Cannot these worthy folk see that the very names of their books are exactly the apologies they should offer for not having written them, had any kind but indiscreet friend urged them into letterpress? ”I was only three weeks in Sweden, and therefore I wrote about it,” seems to me as ugly a _non sequitur_ as need be. And now, Tom, that I have inveighed against the custom, I am quite ready to follow the example, and if you could only find me a publisher, I am open to an offer for a tight little octavo, to be called ”Italy from my Bedroom Window.”
Most writers set out by bespeaking your attention on the ground of their greater opportunities, their influential acquaintances, position, and so forth. To this end, therefore, must I tell you that my bedroom window, besides a half-view of the lake, has a full look-out over a very picturesque landscape of undulating surface, dotted with villas and cottages, and backed by a high mountain, which forms the frontier towards Switzerland. At the first glance it seems to be a dense wood, with foliage of various shades of green, but gradually you detect little patches of maize and rice, and occasionally, too, a green crop of wurzel or turnips, which would be creditable even in England; but the vine and the olive surround these so completely, or the great mulberry-trees enshadow them so thoroughly, that at a distance they quite escape view.
The soil is intersected everywhere by ca.n.a.ls for irrigation, and water is treasured up in tanks, and conveyed in wooden troughs for miles and miles of distance, with a care that shows the just value they ascribe to it. Their husbandry is all spade work, and I must say neatly and efficiently done. Of course, I am here speaking of what falls under my own observation; and it is, besides, a little pet spot of rich proprietors, with tasteful villas, and handsomely laid-out gardens on every side; but as the system is the same generally, I conclude that the results are tolerably alike also. The system is this: that the landlord contributes the soil, and the peasant the labor, the produce being fairly divided afterwards in equal portions between them. It reads simple enough, and it does not sound unreasonable either; while, with certain drawbacks, it unquestionably contains some great advantages. To the landlord it affords a fair and a certain remuneration, subject only to the vicissitudes of seasons and the rate of prices. It attaches him to the soil, and to those who till it, by the very strongest of all interests, and, even on selfish grounds, enforces a degree of regard for the well-being of those beneath him. The peasant, on the other hand, is neither a rack-rented tenant nor a hireling, but an independent man, profiting by every exercise of his own industry, and deriving direct and positive benefit from every hour of his labor. It is not alone his character that is served by the care he bestows on the culture of the land, but every comfort of himself and his family are the consequences of it; and lastly, he is not obliged to convert his produce into money to meet the rent-day. I am no political economist, but it strikes me that it is a great burden on a poor man, that he must buy a certain commodity in the shape of a legal tender, to satisfy the claim of a landlord. Now, here the peasant has no such charge. The day of reckoning divides the produce, and the ”state of the currency” never enters into the question. He has neither to hunt fairs nor markets, look out for ”dealers” to dispose of his stock, nor solicit a banker to discount his small bill. All these are benefits, Tom, and some of them great ones too. The disadvantages are that the capabilities of the soil are not developed by the skilful employment of capital. The landlord will not lay out money of which he is only to receive one-half the profit. The peasant has the same motive, and has not the money besides. The result is that Italy makes no other progress in agriculture than the skill of an individual husbandman can bestow. Here are no Smiths of Deanstown,--no Sinclairs,--no Mechis. The grape ripens and the olive grows as it did centuries ago; and so will both doubtless continue to do for ages to come. Again, there is another, and in some respects a greater, grievance, since it is one which saps the very essence of all that is good in the system. The contract is rarely a direct one between landlord and tenant, but is made by the intervention of a third party, who employs the laborers, and really occupies the place of oar middlemen at home. The fellow is usually a hard taskmaster to the poor man, and a rogue to the rich one; and it is a common thing, I am told, for a fine estate to find itself at last in the hands of the _fattore_. This is a sore complication, and very difficult to avoid, for there are so many different modes of culture, and such varied ways of treating the crops on an Italian farm, that the overseer must be sought for in some rank above that of the peasant.
We have a notion in Ireland that the Italian lives on maccaroni; depend upon it, Tom, he seasons it with something better. In the little village beside me, there are three butchers' shops, and as the wealthy of the neighborhood all market at Como, these are the recourse of the poorer cla.s.ses. Of wine he has abundance; and as to vegetables and fruits, the soil teems with them in a rich luxuriance of which I cannot give you a notion. Great barges pa.s.s my window every morning, with melons, cuc.u.mbers, and cauliflowers, piled up half-mast high. How a Dutch painter would revel in the picturesque profusion of grapes, peaches, figs, and apricots, heaped up amidst huge pumpkins of bursting ripeness, and those brilliant ”love apples,” the allusion to which was so costly to Mr. Pickwick. You are smacking your lips already at the bare idea of such an existence. Yes, Tom, you are reproaching Fate for not having ”raised” you, as Jonathan says, on the right side of the Alps, and left you to the enjoyments of an easy life, with lax principles, little garments, and a fine climate. But let me tell you, Idleness is only a luxury WHERE OTHER PEOPLE ARE OBLIGED TO WORK; where every one indulges in it, it is worth nothing. I remember, when sitting listlessly on a river's bank, of a sunny day, listening to the hum of the bees, or watching the splash of a trout in the water, I used to hug myself in the notion of all the fellows that were screaming away their lungs in the Law Courts, or sitting upon tall stools in dark counting-houses, or poring over Blue-books in a committee-room, or maybe broiling on the banks of the Ganges; and then bethink me of the easy, careless, happy flow of my own existence. I was quite a philosopher in this way,--I despised riches, and smiled at all ambition.
Now there is no such resources for me here. There are eight or nine fellows that pa.s.s the day--and the night also, I believe--under my window, that would beat me hollow in the art of doing nothing, and seem to understand it as a science besides. There they lie--and a nice group they are--on their backs, in the broiling sun; their red nightcaps drawn a little over their faces for shade; their brawny chests and sinewy limbs displayed, as if in derision of their laziness. The very squalor of their rags seems heightened by the tawdry pretension of a scarlet sash round the waist, or a gay flower stuck jauntily in a filthy bonnet.
The very knife that stands half buried in the water-melon beside them has its significance,--you have but to glance at the shape to see that, like its owner, its purpose is an evil one. What do these fellows know of labor? Nothing; nor will they, ever, till condemned to it at the galleys. And what a contrast to all around them,--ragged, dirty, and wretched, in the midst of a teeming and glorious abundance; barbarous, in a land that breathes of the very highest civilization, and sunk in brutal ignorance, beside the greatest triumphs of human genius.
What a deal of balderdash people talk about Italian liberty, and the cause of const.i.tutional freedom! There are--and these only in the cities--some twenty or thirty highly cultivated, well-thinking men--lawyers, professors, or physicians, usually--who have taken pains to study the inst.i.tutions of other countries, and aspire to see some of the benefits that attend them applied to their own; but there ends the party. The n.o.bles are a wretched set, satisfied with the second-hand vices of France and England grafted upon some native rascalities of even less merit. They neither read nor think: their lives are spent in intrigue and play. Now and then a brilliant exception stands forth, distinguished by intellect as well as station; but the little influence he wields is the evidence of what estimation such qualities are held in.
My doctor is a Liberal, and a very clever fellow too; and I only wish you heard him describe the men who have a.s.sumed the part of ”Italian Regenerators.”
Their ”antecedents” show that in Italy, as elsewhere, patriotism is too often but the last refuge of a scoundrel. I know how all this will grate and jar upon your very Irish ears; and, to say truth, I don't like saying it myself; but still I cannot help feeling that the ”Cause of Liberty” in the peninsula is remarkably like the process of grape-gathering that now goes on beneath my window,--there is no care, no selection,--good, bad, ripe, and unripe,--the clean, the filthy, the ruddy, and the sapless, are all huddled together, pressed and squeezed down into a common vat, to ferment into bad wine or--a revolution, as the case may be. It does not require much chemistry to foresee that it is the crude, the acrid, the unhealthy, and the bad that will give the flavor to the liquor. The small element of what is really good is utterly overborne in the vast Maelstrom of the noxious; and so we see in the late Italian struggle. Who are the men that exercise the widest influence in affairs? Not the calm and reasoning minds that gave the first impulse to wise measures of Reform, and guided their sovereigns to concessions that would have formed the strong foundations of future freedom. No; it was the advocate of the wildest doctrines of Socialism,--the true disciple of the old guillotine school, that ravaged the earth at the close of the last century. These are the fellows who scream ”Blood! blood!” till they are hoa.r.s.e; but, in justice to their discretion, it must be said, they always do it from a good distance off.
Don't fancy from this that I am upholding the Austrian rule in Italy. I believe it to be as bad as need be, and exactly the kind of government likely to debase and degrade a people whom it should have been their object to elevate and enlighten. Just fancy a system of administration where there were all penalties and no rewards,--a school with no premiums but plenty of flogging. That was precisely what they did. They put a ”ban” upon the natives of the country; they appointed them to no places of trust or confidence, insulted their feelings, outraged their sense of nationality; and whenever the system had goaded them into a pa.s.sionate burst of indignation, they proclaimed martial law, and hanged them.
Now, the question is not whether any kind of resistance would not be pardonable against such a state of things, but it is this: what species of resistance is most likely to succeed? This is the real inquiry; and I don't think it demands much knowledge of mankind and the world to say that stabbing a cadet in the back as he leaves a _caf_, shooting a solitary sentinel on his post, or even a.s.sa.s.sinating his corporal as he walks home of an evening, are exactly the appropriate methods for reforming a state or remodelling a const.i.tution. Had the Lombards devoted themselves heart and hand to the material prosperity of their country,--educated their people, employed them in useful works, fostered their rising and most prosperous silk manufactories,--they would have attained to a weight and consideration in the Austrian Empire which would have enabled them not to solicit, but dictate the terms of their administration.
A few years back, as late as '47, Milan, I am told, was more than the rival of Vienna in all that const.i.tutes the pride and splendor of a capital city; and the growing influence of her higher cla.s.ses was already regarded with jealousy by the Austrian n.o.bility. Look what a revolution has made her now! Her palaces are barracks; her squares are encampments; artillery bivouac in her public gardens; and the rigors of a state of siege penetrate into every private house, and poison all social intercourse.