must know, for I never missed them all the winter!”
Don Evandro knew and understood all the low hypocrisy of this speech quite as perfectly as any man could; nevertheless he approved of it; thought it the desirable sort of tone for a young man, and considered that it showed Carlo to be the sort of man that was needed for a good subject and a good churchman. So a woman who receives a compliment which she knows to be insincere may yet be pleased with it, as indicating the desire on the part of the payer of it to please her.
“Ah! it is a bad business—a very bad business—I am afraid! Part of my object in going into the city on Saturday was to make inquiries and ascertain if there might be any hope of saving her. I fear me!—I fear that there is nothing to be done!”
The priest, not calculating on the chivalrous generosity of heart of the man he was speaking to, or rather at—(as how should he calculate on what he could not conceive?),—was overshooting his mark a little in the excess of his calumnious statements. For the idea of Giulia in danger and in trouble at once began to make love assume the mask of pity, and an evident desire to save and protect her began to override and overpower, for the moment, his own infinite misery.
“What has she been up to?” asked Carlo again.
“Oh, up to!” said the priest, hesitating as if unwilling to speak out. “What mischief do unprincipled girls get into when they get the opportunity? It is the old story. There is the town, too, full of soldiers, reprobate profligates, without religion or principle of any kind! It is destruction to the character of any decent girl to be known to have any communication with them, or be seen in their company. And this abandoned girl has formed an intimacy with one of the most notorious blackguards in the whole lot of them!”
Beppo groaned audibly, as he acknowledged to himself that his first impressions with regard to Corporal Tenda had been but too just.
“What! you don’t mean,” said Carlo, eagerly, “that she has—taken up with any one in particular you know—so as to lose her character, you know?”
“Character! It will be well for her if that is all she has lost! Character! She will never be able to hold her head up in this country any more! The best thing that could happen to her would be to follow the blackguard for good and all, and let the disgrace she has brought upon her name be forgotten. But he is no doubt too knowing a rascal for that.”
“But he may be made to answer for his conduct—to do what is right by her!” said Beppo, breathing hard and clenching his fists.
The priest could not see the action; but he knew from Beppo’s voice all that was passing in his mind. And he considered for a moment or two, during which he took a rapid survey of all the circumstances of the case with masterly comprehensiveness, whether it might be good policy to bring these men face to face with a result that might probably in one way or other make Carlo the heir to the Bella Luce homestead and savings. But he gave up the idea as involving too many possibilities of miscarriage. So he replied:—
“How make him answer for his conduct? His officers are as bad as he. There is no law to touch him. And to resort to unchristian violence would bring destruction upon your own soul, in all probability without injuring him.”
“Who is the man?” asked Carlo.
“One Tenda, a corporal; a low Piedmontese blackguard—one of the worst characters in the army, I am told.”
“A Piedmontese too!” exclaimed Carlo, with unaffected disgust; “to think of Giulia taking up with a Piedmontese, of all the men in the world! Why, it is against nature!”
“I must say that I think Signor Sandro has been very much to blame,” continued the priest, “in not making himself better acquainted with the character of the woman with whom he placed Giulia—a retired actress, I learn! It is true that, as far as I can hear, there is nothing to be said against the woman now. She has become reconciled to the church, and there is no more to be said about it. But Signor Sandro might have known that such a woman was not likely to be a safe protectress for such a girl as Giulia.”
“But, then, who would have guessed that our Giulia would need so much protecting!” said Carlo.
“That is true too, figliuolo mio,” said the priest. “Well, I must be thinking of walking homewards. It is getting late. Good-night, Signor Paolo. I need not wish it you, for you have been taking a slice of it already—a calm conscience makes an easy pillow. Good-night, Signor Beppo. We shall have some further conversation as soon as the result of this detestable drawing is known. Good-night.”
So the priest set out on his moonlight walk to Santa Lucia, satisfactorily reflecting that he had—he could hardly doubt—deprived Victor Emmanuel of one of the likeliest soldiers in Romagna; and had, in all probability, put an end to all inconveniences arising from love-passages between Beppo and Giulia.
AT A COUNTRY FAIR.
With sad thoughts of once merry England on our mind, the other day, we came upon a remnant of the olden time. It was not a pilgrimage, nor a mystery-play, nor a fairy godmother, nor an old tory, but a genuine old-fashioned fair. Though not so humble as the village May-day festival, nor so renowned as the nine days of Nottingham Goose Fair, it yet combined the excellences of both, and seemed to us so faithful a reflection of “merrie England” as we love to fancy it, that others may not be displeased to hear of it.
One of the oldest towns in Lincolnshire stands on a ridge of the Wolds commanding a fine view over a stretch of low country, and it was towards this town we found ourselves driving one lovely autumnal morning. For some time well-to-do yeomen, plough-lads in gorgeous crimson waistcoats, and country girls with hats trimmed in