The complete works of Nathaniel Hawthorne
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864 | Lathrop, George Parsons, 1851-1898 | Hawthorne, Julian, 1846-1934
Mil 3 9007 0313 6181 9 e\x5 vr-^V V^~^ Date Due -•w Wilt I £c08 19 M ftitocr^itic <£tiition THE COMPLETE WORKS OF NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE, WITH INTRODUCTORY NOTES BY GEORGE PARSONS LATHROP AND ILLUSTRATED WITH Etchings by Blum, Church, Dielman, Gifford, Shirlaw, and Turner IN THIRTEEN VOLUMES VOLUME VI. 9 THE MARBLE FAUN THE ROMANCE OF MONTE BENI NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY (ailfce ftftiersitie press, Cambnbge M DCCC XCIX 0 Copyright, 1860, B-r NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE. Copyright, 1883, Br HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO. Copyright, 1888, By ROSE HAWTHORNE LATHROP. All rights reserved.. The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., V. S. A. Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0- Houghton & Company. CONTENTS. PAGE Introductory Note ? Preface "* Chap. I. Miriam, Hilda, Kenyon, Donatello ... 19 II. The Faun 20 III. Subterranean Reminiscences .... 35 IV. The Spectre of the Catacomb .... 43 V. Miriam's Studio 53 VI. The Virgin's Shrine 68 VII. Beatrice 80 VIII. The Suburban Villa 89 IX. The Faun and Nymph 97 X. The Sylvan Dance 106 XI. Fragmentary Sentences 114 XII. A Stroll on the Pincian 122 XIII. A Sculptor's Studio 138 XIV. Cleopatra 149 XV. An ^Esthetic Company 158 XVI. A Moonlight Ramble 170 XVII. Miriam's Trouble , 182 XVIII. On the Edge of a Precipice .... 191 XIX. The Faun's Transformation .... 203 XX. The Bdrial Chant 210 XXI. The Dead Capuchin 219 XXII. The Medici Gardens 229 XXIII. Miriam and Hilda 236 XXIV. The Tower among the Apennines . . . 248 XXV. Sunshine 256 XXVI. The Pedigree of Monte Beni .... 267 vi CONTENTS. PAGE XXVII. Myths 2S0 XXVIII. The Owl Tower . 201 XXIX. On the Battlements .... 300 XXX. DONATELLO*S BUST . 312 XXXI. The Mabble Saloon .... 320 XXXII. Scenes by the Way . 332 XXXIII. Pictured Windows .... 345 XXXIV. Market-Day in Perugia .... . 355 XXXV. The Bronze Pontiff's Benediction. 363 XXXVI. Hilda's Tower . 372 XXXVII. The Emptiness of Picture Galleries 380 XXXVIH. Altars and Incense . 392 XXXIX. The World's Cathedral 403 XL. Hilda and a Friend . 413 XLI. Snow-Drops and Maidenly Delights 425 XLII. Reminiscences of Miriam . 435 XLIII. The Extinction of a Lamp. 444 XLIV. The Deserted Shrine .... . 454 XLV. The Flight of Hilda's Doves 465 XLVI. A Walk on the Campagna . 474 XLVII. The Peasant and Contadina 482 XLVIII. A Scene in the Corso .... . 493 XLIX. A Frolic of the Carnival. 502 L. Miriam, Hilda, Kenyon, Donatello . 514 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. THE MARBLE FAUN. The last of Hawthorne's completed romances wag also thought by its author to be his best. "The Marble Faun " certainly was the outcome of copious observation and mature deliberation ; and it was pro- duced after he had rested from composition for the space of five years. He began the book in the winter of 1859, at Rome, wlvile harassed by illness in his family, and to some extent distracted by the number of interests appealing to him on all sides — " interrup- tions," as he expressed it, " from things to see and things to suffer." He wrote to Mr. Fields at this time : " I take great credit to myself for having sternly shut myself up for an hour or two almost every day, and come to close grips with a romance which I have been trying to tear out of my mind. As for my success, I can't say much. ... I only know that I have produced what seems to be a larger amount of scribble than either of my former romances, and that portions of it in- terested me a good deal while I was writing them." He had already begun to sketch the romance dur- ing the previous summer while at Florence, where he wrote, in his journal, with reference to this new scheme : "It leaves me little heart for journalizing 8 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. and describing new things ; and six months of unin- terrupted monotony would be more valuable to me just now, than the most brilliant succession of novelties.'" Soon after this he removed from his quarters in the city to the villa of Montauto on the hill called Bello- sguardo, about a mile from Florence. This is a lovely spot, and the view from it over the valley of the Arno has since been described by a sympathetic traveller, himself a poet, as suggesting an outlook upon some " glade of heaven." The villa itself, which remains standing, and is occasionally occupied by American tenants, is a capacious, old-fashioned building, with a tower, and served as the model for Donatello's ances- tral home, Monte Beni. At the time of Hawthorne's residence there, it was invested with a sort of tradi- tion not likely to lessen its desirability for him — that of being haunted. A murder was said to have been committed at some epoch conveniently remote, in a small oratory, in the tower ; and from time to time semi-unaccountable sounds — the rustling of unseen robes, stealthy steps, and groans from the oratory, — were heard, which passed as evidence that the tragedy was reenacting by the murderer and the victim. Here Hawthorne continued, no doubt, to dream over his new story, perhaps putting an occasional touch to it. On the journey thence to Siena, in October, he left the manuscript in a bag, under one of the seats in the railway carriage ; but, as he notes down, on going to search for his luggage, " At last the whole of cur ten trunks and tin bandbox were produced, and finally my leather bag, in which was my journal and a manu- script book containing my sketch of a romance. It gladdened my very heart to see it." While in Rome, Hawthorne went on laboring and INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 9 meditating upon " The Marble Faun," the general theme and scope of which he occasionally descanted upon to his friend John Lothrop Motley, during the rambles which they took together ; though the ro- mancer never gave the historian any clew to the whole problem of his still unfinished work. "More than four months were now taken up in writing ' The Marble Faun,' in great part at the sea- side town of Eedcar, Yorkshire, Mr. Hawthorne having concluded to remain another year in England, chiefly to accomplish that romance. In Redcar, where he re- mained till September or October, he wrote no jour- ual, but only the book. He then went to Leaming- ton, where he finished ' The Marble Faun,' in March [I860]."1 "The long, hairy ears of Midas," in the "Virtu- oso's Collection," have already been spoken of as fur- nishing a slight intimation of Hawthorne's interest in such a phenomenon,2 long before he went to Italy. But the first positive trace of the conception, which 1 French and Italian Note-Books, June 22, 1859. 2 See the prefatory note to Mosses from an Old Manse, in this edition. « 10 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. was to ripen into " The Marble Faun," appears in the " French and Italian Note-Books," under the date of April 22, 1858. Setting down a brief account of his visit to the Capitol, Hawthorne says : — " We afterwards went into the sculpture gallery, where I looked at the Faun of Praxiteles, and was sensible of a peculiar charm in it ; a sylvan beauty and homeliness, friendly and wild at once. The length- ened but not preposterous ears, and the little tail which we infer, have an exquisite effect, and make the spectator smile in his very heart. This race of fauns was the most delightful of all that antiquity imagined. It seems to me that a story, with all sorts of fun and pathos in it, might be contrived on the idea of their species having become intermingled with the human race. the pretty hairy ears should occasionally reappear in members of the family ; and the moral instincts and intellectual characteristics of the faun might be most picturesquely brought out, without det- riment to the human interest of the story. Fancy this combination in the person of a young lady ! " It is believed by a member of the author's family that one of the Counts of Montauto, whose personal appearance and grace were known to have made an impression on Hawthorne, furnished him with sugges- tions which established a connection between the Faun of Praxiteles and the Montauto villa as it afterward appeared, under the guise of Monte Beni. This living figure may also perhaps have assisted him in giving reality to his conception of Donatello. The young Italian of the romance, whose resemblance to the statue is made an important point, receives appropri- ately the name of a famous Italian sculptor ; a name of which the associations form a link between the mar- INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 11 ble and the man. The assertion has often been put forth in private, and it may be in print also, that Hawthorne made studies for other personages in the story from people of his acquaintance, and even from members of his own family or household. It is per- haps advisable to state here that there is no authority whatever for such an assertion, excepting the unaided fancy of those who, having known something of his connections, chose to trace purely imaginary resem- blances. With the problem of Donatello's develop- ment into a being with a conscience was interwoven the mystery of Miriam's situation, concerning which no more need be said in this place than that it was evidently inspired by the author's reflections upon the story of Beatrice Cenci.1 Of the original of Hilda's tower in the Via Portoghese, at Rome, a description is given in the "Note-Books" (May 15, 1858), to- gether with the legend accounting for the perpetual light at the Virgin's shrine on the tower. 12 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. I have read many times. . . . But the ' Romance of Monte Beni,' has the additional charm for me that it is the first book of yours that I have read since I had the pleasure of making your personal acquaintance. My memory goes back at once to those walks (alas, not too frequent) we used to take along the Tiber, or in the Campagna ; . . . and it is delightful to get hold of the book now, and know that it is impossible for you any longer, after waving your wand as you occasionally did then, indicating where the treasure was hidden, to sink it again beyond plummet's sound. . . . With regard to the story, which has been some- what criticised, I can only say that to me it is quite satisfactory. I like those shadowy, weird, fantastic, Hawthornesque shapes flitting through the golden gloom which is the atmosphere of the book. I like the misty way in which the story is indicated rather than revealed ; the outlines are quite definite enough from the beginning to the end, to those who have im- agination enough to follow you in your airy flights ; and to those who complain, I suppose that nothing less than an illustrated edition, with a large gallows on the last page, with Donatello in the most pensile of atti- tudes — his ears revealed through a white night-cap — would be satisfactory." In replying to this, Hawthorne wrote : " You work out my imperfect efforts and half make the book with your wrarm imagination ; and see wrhat I myself saw, but could only hint at. Well, the romance is a suc- cess, even if it never finds another reader." G. P. L. PREFACE. It is now seven or eight years (so many, at all events, that I cannot precisely remember the epoch) since the author of this romance last appeared before the Public. It had grown to be a custom with him to introduce each of his humble publications with a familiar kind of preface, addressed nominally to the Public at large, but really to a character with whom he felt entitled to use far greater freedom. He meant it for that one congenial friend, — more comprehensive of his purposes, more appreciative of his success, more indulgent of his shortcomings, and, in all respects, closer and kinder than a brother, — that all-sympa- thizing critic, in short, whom an author never actually meets, but to whom he implicitly makes his appeal whenever he is conscious of having done his best. The antique fashion of Prefaces recognized this genial personage as the " Kind Reader," the " Gentle Reader," the " Beloved," the " Indulgent," or, at cold- est, the " Honored Reader," to whom the prim old author was wont to make his preliminary explanations and apologies, with the certainty that they would be fa- vorably received. I never personally encoimtered, nor corresponded through the post with this rejjresentative essence of all delightful and desirable qualities which a reader can possess. But, fortunately for myself, I never therefore concluded him to be merely a mythic 14 PREFACE. character. I had always a sturdy faith in his actual existence, and wrote for him year after year, during which the great eye of the Public (as well it might) almost utterly overlooked my small productions. Unquestionably, this gentle, kind, benevolent, indul- gent, and most beloved and honored Reader did once exist for me, and (in spite of the infinite chances against a letter's reaching its destination without a definite address) duly received the scrolls which I flung upon whatever wind was blowing, in the faith that they would find him out. But, is he extant now ? In these many years, since he last heard from me, may he not have deemed his earthly task accomplished, and have withdrawn to the paradise of gentle readers, wherever it may be, to the enjoyments of which his kindly charity on my behalf must surely have entitled him ? I have a sad foreboding that this may be the truth. The " Gentle Reader," in the case of any indi- vidual author, is apt to be extremely short-lived ; he seldom outlasts a literary fashion, and, except in very rare instances, closes his weary eyes before the writer has half done with him. If I find him at all, it will probably be under some mossy gravestone, inscribed with a half -obliterated name which I shall never rec- ognize. Therefore, I have little heart or confidence (es- pecially, writing as I do, in a foreign land, and after a long, long absence from my own) to presume upon the existence of that friend of friends, that unseen brother of the sotd, whose apprehensive sympathy has so often encouraged me to be egotistical in my pref- aces, careless though unkindly eyes should skim over what was never meant for them. I stand upon cere- mony now ; and, after stating a few particulars about PREFACE. 15 the work which is here offered to the Public, must make my most reverential bow, and retire behind the curtain. This Romance was sketched out during a residence of considerable length in Italy, and has been rewritten and prepared for the press in England. The author proposed to himself merely to write a fanciful story, evolving a thoughtful moral, and did not purpose at° tempting a portraiture of Italian manners and char- acter. He has lived too long abroad not to be aware that a foreigner seldom acquires that knowledge of a country at once flexible and profound, which may jus- tify him in endeavoring to idealize its traits. Italy, as the site of his Romance, was chiefly valu- able to him as affording a sort of poetic or fairy pre- cinct, where actualities would not be so terribly in- sisted upon as they are, and must needs be, in Amer- ica. No author, without a trial, can conceive of the difficulty of writing a romance about a country where there is no shadow, no antiquity, no mystery, no pic- turesque and gloomy wrong, nor anything but a com- monplace prosperity, in broad and simple daylight, as is happily the case with my dear native land. It will be very long, I trust, before romance-writers may find congenial and easily handled themes, either in the an- nals of our stalwart republic, or in any characteristic and probable events of our individual lives. Ro- mance and poetry, ivy, lichens, and wall-flowers, need ruin to make them grow. In rewriting these volumes, the author was some- what surprised to see the extent to which he had in- troduced descriptions of various Italian objects, an- tique, pictorial, and statuesque. Yet these things fill the mind everywhere in Italy, and especially in Rome, 16 PREFACE. and cannot easily be kept from flowing out upon the page when one writes freely, and with self -enjoy- ment. And, again, while reproducing the book, on the broad and dreary sands of Redcar, with the gray German Ocean tumbling in upon me, and the north- ern blast always howling in my ears, the complete change of scene made these Italian reminiscences shine out so vividly that I could not find it in my heart to cancel them. An act of justice remains to be performed towards two men of genius with whose productions the author has allowed himself to use a quite unwarrantable free- dom. Having imagined a sculptor in this Romance, it was necessary to provide him with such works in marble as should be in keeping with the artistic ability which he was supposed to possess. With this view, the author laid felonious hands upon a certain bust of Milton, and a statue of a pearl-diver, which he found in the studio of Mr. Paul Akers, and secretly con- veyed them to the premises of his imaginary friend, in the Via Frezza. Not content even with these spoils, he committed a further robbery upon a magnificent statue of Cleopatra, the production of Mr. William W. Story, an artist whom his country and the world will not long fail to appreciate. He had thoughts of appropriating, likewise, a certain door of bronze by Mr. Randolph Rogers, representing the history of Columbus in a series of admirable bas-reliefs, but was deterred by an unwillingness to meddle with public property. Were he capable of stealing from a lady, he would certainly have made free with Miss Hos= Mer's admirable statue of Zenobia. He now wishes to restore the above-mentioned beau- tiful pieces of sculpture to their proper owners, with PREFA CE. 17 many thanks, and the avowal of his sincere admira- tion. What he has said of them in the Romance does not partake of the fiction in which they are imbedded, but expresses his genuine opinion, which, he has little doubt, will be found in accordance with that of the Public. It is, perhaps, unnecessary to say, that, while stealing their designs, the Author has not taken a similar liberty with the personal characters of either of these gifted sculptors ; his own man of marble being entirely imaginary. Leamington, December 15, 1859. THE ROMANCE OF MONTE BENT. CHAPTER I. MIBIAM, HILDA, KENTON, DONATELLO. FoUK individuals, in whose fortunes we should be glad to interest the reader, happened to be standing in one of the saloons of the sculpture gallery in the Capitol at Rome. It was that room (the first, after ascending the staircase) in the centre of which re- clines the noble and most pathetic figure of the Dy- ing Gladiator, just sinking into his death -swoon. Around the walls stand the Antinous, the Amazon, the Lycian Apollo, the Juno ; all famous productions of antique sculpture, and still shining in the un- diminished majesty and beauty of their ideal life, al- though the marble that embodies them is yellow with time, and perhaps corroded by the damp earth in which they lay buried for centuries. Here, likewise, is seen a symbol (as apt at this moment as it was two thousand years ago) of the Human Soul, with its choice of Innocence or Evil close at hand, in the pretty figure of a child, clasping a dove to her bosom, but assaulted by a snake. From one of the windows of this saloon, we may see a flight of broad stone steps, descending along- 20 ROMANCE OF MONTE BENI. side the antique and massive foundation of the Capi- tol, towards the battered triumphal arch of Septimius Severus, right below. Farther on, the eye skirts along the edge of the desolate Forum (where Roman washer, women hang out their linen to the sun), passing over a shapeless confusion of modern edifices, piled rudely up with ancient brick and stone, and over the domes of Christian churches, built on the old pavements of heathen temples, and supported by the very pillars that once upheld them. At a distance beyond — yet but a little way, considering how much history is heaped into the intervening space — rises the great sweep of the Coliseum, with the blue sky brightening through its upper tier of arches. Far off, the view is shut in by the Alban Mountains, looking just the same, amid all this decay and change, as when Rom- ulus gazed thitherward over his half-finished wall. We glance hastily at these things, — at this bright sky, and those blue distant mountains, and at the ruins, Etruscan, Roman, Christian, venerable with a threefold antiquity, and at the company of world-fa- mous statues in the saloon, — in the hope of putting the reader into that state of feeling which is experi- enced oftenest at Rome. It is a vague sense of pon- derous remembrances ; a perception of such' weight and density in a by-gone life, of which this spot was the centre, that the present moment is pressed down or crowded out, and our individual affairs and inter- ests are but half as real here as elsewhere. Viewed through this medium, our narrative — into which are woven some airy and unsubstantial threads, inter- mixed with others, twisted out of the commonest stuff of human existence — may seem not widely different from the texture of all our lives. MIRIAM, HILDA, KENYON, DONATELLO. 21 Side by side with the massiveness of the Roman Past, all matters that we handle or dream of nowa- days look evanescent and visionary alike. It might be that the four persons whom we are seeking to introduce were conscious of this dreamy character of the present, as compared with the square blocks of granite wherewith the Romans built their lives. Perhaps it even contributed to the fanciful merriment which was just now their mood. When we find ourselves fading into shadows and unrealities, it seems hardly worth while to be sad, but rather to laugh as gayly as we may, and ask little reason where- fore. Of these four friends of ours, three were artists, or connected with art ; and, at this moment, they had been simultaneously struck by a resemblance between one of the antique statues, a well-known masterpiece of Grecian sculpture, and a young Italian, the fourth member of their party. " You must needs confess, Kenyon," said a dark- eyed young woman, whom her friends called Miriam, " that you never chiselled out of marble, nor wrought in clay, a more vivid likeness than this, cunning a bust-maker as you think yourself. The portraiture is perfect in character, sentiment, and feature. If it were a picture, the resemblance might be half illusive and imaginary ; but here, in this Pentelic marble, it is a substantial fact, and may be tested by absolute touch and measurement. Our friend Donatello is the very Faun of Praxiteles. Is it not true, Hilda ? " " Not quite — almost — yes, I really think so," re* plied Hilda, a slender, brown-haired, New England girl, whose perceptions of form and expression were wonderfully clear and delicate. " If there is any dif- 22 ROMANCE OF MONTE BENT. ference between the two faces, the reason may be, I suppose, that the Faun dwelt in woods and fields, and consorted with his like ; whereas, Donatello has known cities a little, and such people as ourselves. But the resemblance is very close, and very strange." "Not so strange," whispered Miriam, mischiev- ously ; "for no Faun in Arcadia was ever a greater simpleton than Donatello. He has hardly a man's share of wit, small as that may be. It is a pity there are no longer any of this congenial race of rustic crea- tures for our friend to consort with ! " " Hush, naughty one ! " returned Hilda. " You are very ungrateful, for you well know he has wit enough to worship you, at all events/' " Then the greater fool he ! " said Miriam, so bit- terly that Hilda's quiet eyes were somewhat startled. " Donatello, my dear friend," said Kenyon, in Ital- ian, " pray gratify us all by taking the exact attitude of this statue." The young man laughed, and threw himself into the position in which the statue has been standing for two or three thousand years. In truth, allowing for the difference of costume, and if a lion's skin could have been substituted for his modern talma, and a rustic pipe for his stick, Donatello might have figured per- fectly as the marble Faun, miraculously softened into flesh and blood. " Yes ; the resemblance is wonderful," observed Kenyon, after examining the marble and the man with the accuracy of a sculptor's eye. " There is one point, however, or, rather, two points, in respect to which our friend Donatello' s abundant curls will not permit us to say whether the likeness is carried into minute detail." MIRIAM, HILDA, KEN YON, VONATELLO. 23 And the sculptor directed the attention of the party to the ears of the beautiful statue which they were con- templating. But we must do more than merely refer to this ex= quisite work of art ; it must be described, howevef inadequate may be the effort to express its magic pe- culiarity in words. The Faun is the marble image of a young man, leaning his right arm on the trunk or stump of a tree ; one hand hangs carelessly by his side ; in the other he holds the fragment of a pipe, or some such sylvan in- strument of music. His only garment — a lion's skin, with the claws upon his shoulder — falls half - way down his back, leaving the limbs and entire front of the figure nude. The form, thus displayed, is mar- vellously graceful, but has a fuller and more rounded outline, more flesh, and less of heroic muscle, than the old sculptors were wont to assign to their types of masculine beauty. The character of the face corre- sponds with the figure ; it is most agreeable in outline and feature, but rounded and somewhat voluptuously developed, especially about the throat and chin ; the nose is almost straight, but very slightly curves in- ward, thereby acquiring an indescribable charm of geniality and humor. The mouth, with its full yet delicate lips, seems so nearly to smile outright, that it calls forth a responsive smile. The whole statue — unlike anything else that ever was wrought in that severe material of marble — conveys the idea of an amiable and sensual creature, easy, mirthful, apt for jollity, yet not incapable of being touched by pathos. It is impossible to gaze long at this stone image with- out conceiving a kindly sentiment towards it, as if its substance were warm to the touch, and imbued with 24 ROMANCE OF MONTE BEN I. actual life. It comes very close to some of our pleas* antest sympathies. Perhaps it is the very lack of moral severity, of any high and heroic ingredient in the character of the Faun, that makes it so delightful an object to the hu- man eye and to the frailty of the human heart. The being here represented is endowed with no principle of virtue, and would be incapable of comprehending such ; but he would be true and honest by dint of his simplicity. We should expect from him no sacrifice or effort for an abstract cause ; there is not an atom of martyr's stuff in all that softened marble ; but he has a capacity for strong and warm attachment, and might act devotedly through its impulse, and even die for it at need. It is possible, too, that the Faun might be educated through the medium of his emotions, so that the coarser animal portion of his nature might eventually be thrown into the background, though never utterly expelled. The animal nature, indeed, is a most essential part of the Faun's composition ; for the characteristics of the brute creation meet and combine with those of hu- manity in this strange yet true and natural conception of antique poetry and art. Praxiteles has subtly dif- fused throughout his work that mute mystery which so hopelessly perplexes us whenever we attempt to gain an intellectual or sympathetic knowledge of the lower orders of creation. The riddle is indicated, however, only by two definite signs ; these are the two ears of the Faun, which are leaf-shaped, terminating in little peaks, like those of some species of animals. Though not so seen in the marble, they are probably to be considered as clothed in fine, downy fur. In the coarser representations of this class of mytholog- MIRIAM, HILDA, KEN YON, DONATELLO. 25 ical creatures, there is another token of brute kindred, — a certain caudal appendage ; which, if the Faun of Praxiteles must be supposed to possess it at all, is hid- den by the lion's skin that forms his garment. The pointed and furry ears, therefore, are the sole indica- tions of his wild, forest nature. Only a sculptor of the finest imagination, the most delicate taste, the sweetest feeling, and the rarest ar- tistic skill — in a word, a sculptor and a poet too —. could have first dreamed of a Faun in this guise, and then have succeeded in imprisoning the sportive and frisky thing in marble. Neither man nor animal, and yet no monster, but a being in whom both races meet on friendly ground. The idea grows coarse as we handle it, and hardens in our grasp. But, if the spec- tator broods long over the statue, he will be conscious of its spell ; all the pleasantness of sylvan life, all the genial and happy characteristics of creatures that dwell in woods and fields, will seem to be mingled and kneaded into one substance, along with the kindred qualities in the human soul. Trees, grass, flowers, woodland streamlets, cattle, deer, and unsophisticated man. The essence of all these was compressed long ago, and still exists, within that discolored marble sur- face of the Faun of Praxiteles. And, after all, the idea may have been no dream, but rather a poet's reminiscence of a period when man's affinity with nature was more strict, and his fel- lowship with every living thing more intimate and dear, CHAPTER II. THE FAUN. "Donatello," playfully cried Miriam, "do not leave us in this perplexity ! Shake aside those brown curls, my friend, and let us see whether this marvel- lous resemblance extends to the very tips of the ears. If so, we shall like you all the better ! " " No, no, dearest signorina," answered Donatello, laughing, but with a certain earnestness. " I entreat you to take the tips of my ears for granted." As he spoke, the young Italian made a skip and jump, light enough for a veritable faun ; so as to place himself quite beyond the reach of the fair hand that was out- stretched, as if to settle the matter by actual exami- nation. " I shall be like a wolf of the Apennines," he continued, taking his stand on the other side of the Dying Gladiator, " if you touch my ears ever so softly. None of my race could endure it. It has always been a tender point with my forefathers and me." He spoke in Italian, with the Tuscan rusticity of accent, and an unshaped sort of utterance, betokening that he must heretofore have been chiefly conversant with rural people. " Well, well," said Miriam, " your tender point — your two tender points, if you have them — shall be safe, so far as I am concerned. But how strange this likeness is, after all ! and how delightful, if it really includes the pointed ears ! Oh, it is impossible, of THE FAUN. 27 course," she continued, in English, "with a real and commonplace young man like Donatello ; but you see how this peculiarity defines the position of the Faun ; and, while putting him where he cannot exactly assert his brotherhood, still disposes us kindly towards the kindred creature. He is not supernatural, but just on. the verge of nature, and }Tet within it. What is the nameless charm of this idea, Hilda? You can feel it more delicately than I." " It perplexes me," said Hilda, thoughtfully, and shrinking a little ; " neither do I quite like to think about it." " But, surely," said Kenyon, " you agree with Miriam and me that there is something very touching and im- pressive in this statue of the Faun. In some long-past age, he must really have existed. Nature needed, and still needs, this beautiful creature ; standing betwixt man and animal, sympathizing with each, comprehend- ing the speech of either race, and interpreting the whole existence of one to the other. What a pity that he has forever vanished from the hard and dusty paths of life, — unless," added the sculptor, in a sport- ive whisper, " Donatello be actually he ! " " You cannot conceive how this fantasy takes hold of me," responded Miriam, between jest and earnest. " Imagine, now, a real being, similar to this mythic Faun ; how happy, how genial, how satisfactory would be his life, enjoying the warm, sensuous, earthy side of nature ; revelling in the merriment of woods and Streams ; living as our four-footed kindred do, — as mankind did in its innocent childhood ; before sin, Borrow or morality itself had ever been thought of! Ah ! Kenyon, if Hilda and you and I — if I, at least — had pointed ears ! For I suppose the Faun had no 28 ROMANCE OF MONTE BENI. conscience, no remorse, no burden on the heart, no troublesome recollections of any sort ; no dark future either." " What a tragic tone was that last, Miriam ! " said the sculptor ; and, looking into her face, he was star- tled to behold it pale and tear-stained. " How sud- denly this mood has come over you ! " " Let it go as it came," said Miriam, " like a thun- der-shower in this Roman sky. All is sunshine again, you see ! " Donatello's refractoriness as regarded his ears had evidently cost him something, and he now came close to Miriam's side, gazing at her with an appealing air, as if to solicit forgiveness. His mute, helpless ges- ture of entreaty had something pathetic in it, and yet might well enough excite a laugh, so like it was to what you may see in the aspect of a hound when he thinks himself in fault or disgrace. It was difficult to make out the character of this young man. So full of animal life as he was, so joyous in his deportment, so handsome, so physically well-developed, he made no impression of incompleteness, of maimed or stinted nature. And yet, in social intercourse, these familiar friends of his habitually and instinctively allowed for him, as for a child or some other lawless thing, ex- acting no strict obedience to conventional rules, and hardly noticing his eccentricities enough to pardon them. There was an indefinable characteristic about Donatello that set him outside of rules. He caught Miriam's hand, kissed it, and gazed into her eyes without saying a word. She smiled, and be- stowed on him a little careless caress, singularly like what one would give to a pet dog when he puts him- self in the way to receive it. Not that it was so de» THE FAUN. 29 cided a caress either, but only the merest touch, some- where between a pat and a tap of the finger ; it might be a mark of fondness, or perhaps a playful pretence of punishment. At all events, it appeared to afford Donatello exquisite pleasure ; insomuch that he danced quite round the wooden railing that fences in the Dy- ing Gladiator. " It is the very step of the Dancing Faun," said Miriam, apart, to Hilda. " What a child, or what a simpleton, he is ! I continually find myself treating Donatello as if he were the merest unfledged chicken ; and yet he can claim no such privileges in the right of his tender age, for he is at least — how old should you think him, Hilda ? " "Twenty years, perhaps," replied Hilda, glancing at Donatello ; " but, indeed, I cannot tell ; hardly so old, on second thoughts, or possibly older. He has nothing to do with time, but has a look of eternal youth in his face." " All underwitted people have that look," said Mir- iam, scornfully. " Donatello has certainly the gift of eternal youth, as Hilda suggests," observed Kenyon, laughing; "for, judging by the date of this statue, which, I am more and more convinced, Praxiteles carved on purpose for him, he must be at least twenty-five centuries old, and he still looks as young as ever." " What age have you, Donatello ? " asked Miriam. " Signorina, I do not know," he answered ; " no great age, however ; for I have only lived since I met you." " Now, what old man of society could have turned a silly compliment more smartly than that ! " exclaimed Miriam. " Nature and art are just at one sometimes,. 30 ROMANCE OF MONTE BENI. But what a happy ignorance is this of our friend Do- natello ! Not to know his own age ! It is equivalent to being immortal on earth. If I could only forget mine ! " " It is too soon to wish that," observed the scidptor ; " you are scarcely older than Donatello looks." " I shall be content, then," rejoined Miriam, " if 1 could only forget one day of all my life." Then she seemed to repent of this allusion, and hastily added, " A woman's days are so tedious that it is a boon to leave even one of them out of the account." The foregoing conversation had been carried on in a mood in which all imaginative people, whether ar- tists or poets, love to indulge. In this frame of mind, they sometimes find their profoundest truths side by side with the idlest jest, and utter one or the other, apparently without distinguishing which is the most valuable, or assigning any considerable value to either. The resemblance between the marble Faun and their living companion had made a deep, half-serious, half- mirthful impression on these three friends, and had taken them into a certain airy region, lifting up, as it is so pleasant to feel them lifted, their heavy earthly feet from the actual soil of life. The world had been set afloat, as it were, for a moment, and relieved them, for just so long, of all customary responsibility for what they thought and said. It might be under this influence — or, perhaps, because sculptors always abuse one another's works — that Kenyon threw in a criticism upon the Dying Gladiator. " I used to admire this statue exceedingly," he re- marked, "but, latterly, I find myself getting weary and annoyed that the man should be such a length of THE FAUN. 31 time leaning on his arm in the very act of death. If he is so terribly hurt, why does he not sink down and die without further ado ? Flitting moments, immi- nent emergencies, imperceptible intervals between two breaths, ought not to be incrusted with the eternal re- pose of marble ; in any sculptural subject, there should be a moral stand-still, since there must of necessity be a physical one. Otherwise, it is like flinging a block of marble up into the air, and, by some trick of en- chantment, causing it to stick there. You feel that it ought to come down, and are dissatisfied that it does not obey the natural law." " I see," said Miriam, mischievously, " you think that sculpture should be a sort of fossilizing process. But, in truth, your frozen art has nothing like the scope and freedom of Hilda's and mine. In painting there is no similar objection to the representation of brief snatches of time : perhaps, because a story can be so much more fully told in picture, and buttressed about with circumstances that give it an epoch. For instance, a painter never would have sent down yon- der Faun out of his far antiquity, lonely and desolate, with no companion to keep his simple heart warm." " Ah, the Faun ! " cried Hilda, with a little gesture of impatience ; " I have been looking at him too long ; and now, instead of a beautiful statue, immortally young, I see only a corroded and discolored stone. This change is very apt to occur in statues." "And a similar one in pictures, surely," retorted the sculptor. " It is the spectator's mood that trans» figures the Transfiguration itself. I defy any painter to move and elevate me without my own consent and assistance." " Then you are deficient of a sense," said Miriam. 32 ROMANCE OF MONTE BEN I. The party now strayed onward from hall to hall of that rich gallery, pausing here and there, to look at the multitude of noble and lovely shapes, which have been dug up out of the deep grave in which old Rome lies buried. And still, the realization of the antique Faun, in the person of Donatello, gave a more vivid character to all these marble ghosts. Why should not each statue grow warm with life! Antinous might lift his brow, and tell us why he is forever sad. The Lycian Apollo might strike his lyre ; and, at the first vibration, that other Faun in red marble, who keeps up a motionless dance, should frisk gayly forth, lead- ing yonder Satyrs, with shaggy goat-shanks, to clatter their little hoofs upon the floor, and all join hands with Donatello ! Bacchus, too, a rosy flush diffusing itself over his time-stained surface, could come down from his pedestal, and offer a cluster of purple grapes to Donatello's lips ; because the god recognizes him as the woodland elf who so often shared his revels. And here, in this sarcophagus, the exquisitely carved figures might assume life, and chase one another round its verge with that wild merriment which is so strangely represented on those old burial coffers : though still with some subtile allusion to death, care- fully veiled, but forever peeping forth amid emblems of mirth and riot. As the four friends descended the stairs, however, their play of fancy subsided into a much more som- bre mood ; a result apt to follow upon such exhilara- tion as that which had so recently taken possession of them. " Do you know," said Miriam, confidentially to Hilda, " I doubt the reality of this likeness of Dona- tello to the Faun, which we have been talking so much THE FAUN. 6Z about ? To say the truth, it never struck me so forci- bly as it did Keuyon and yourself, though I gave in to whatever you were pleased to fancy, for the sake of a moment's mirth and wonder." " I was certainly in earnest, and you seemed equally so," replied Hilda, glancing back at Donatello, as if to reassure herself of the resemblance. " But faces change so much, from hour to hour, that the same set of features has often no keeping with itself ; to an eye, at least, which looks at expression more than outline. How sad and sombre he has grown all of a sudden ! " " Angry too, metliinks ! nay, it is anger much more than sadness," said Miriam. " I have seen Donatello in this mood once or twice before. If you consider him well, you will observe an odd mixture of the bull- dog, or some other equally fierce brute, in our friend's composition ; a trait of savageness hardly to be ex- pected in such a gentle creature as he usually is. 