Giulia

“ But, with a feeling of perfect helplessness and internal indignation, Giulia stood defenceless before the raging mob. With the rapidity of lightning the pictures of a whole life-time passed before her mind: she saw the joyful movement of a crowd of people coming exultantly towards her, as she had seen it in Florence, Barcelona, London and even here! What evil demon had metamorphosed the public into a rage-foaming monster! Yet over her career as an actress writhed one widespread shadow, as if beneath a scorching blast her laurel wreaths withered, her future was destroyed. ”

“ If you fear the world, Giulia, only let me stand between you and the world.”
“It cannot be, Beppo,” she said, shaking her head sadly. “It can never be. Let me go home.”
“And leave me thus. Oh, Giulia, you cannot be so cruel. Think of my wretchedness when you are gone.”
“And I am going to such happiness,” said Giulia; and the tears began to flow from her eyes and betray themselves in her voice.
“Why should you not be happy? You will find plenty to love you, and some one among them you can love,” said Beppo, bitterly. ”

“ Giulia was intensely excited at her friend's intelligence, amid tears she squeezed Beate's hands. And yet she could not conquer an internal fear. Thus breaking into the sanctuary of the church seemed like an inexpiable act of sacrilege which rested upon her soul; and even if she believed in the newly-gained liberty she could not feel glad. Anxious forebodings of unknown possibilities that lay waiting in the air disturbed her confidence in unclouded happiness. What secrets oppressed her soul! How could she meet her beloved one's eye? ”

“ Encouraged by Lady Felicia's urbanity, Signor Provana went on to tell her that he was plebeian on both sides, and that all there was of nobility about him belonged to Giulia.
"My wife came of one of the noblest families in Italy," he said, "and when we want to tease Giulia, we call her Contessina, a title to which she has a right, but which always makes her angry."
"I don't want to be better than my father!" Giulia cried eagerly. "If he is not a noble, he comes of a line of good and gifted men. ”

“ Giulia, I am descended from an old and mighty race, and tradition affords no room to believe that any one who has borne the name of Arestino has dishonored it—until now! Oh! fool—dotard—idiot that I was to think that a young girl could love an aged man like me! For old age is a weed, which, when twined round the plant of love, becomes like the deadly nightshade, and robs the rose-bush of its health! ”

“ But as they saw one another the old love burst out, again it burnt them with consuming fire, and Giulia hated me because I had made her faithless to the lover of her heart.
The candles were burning low, throwing strange lights and shadows on the faces of the dead.
Poor fool! His love was as powerful as ever, but he fought against it with all the strength of his weak will. She was the Evil One to him; she took his youth from him, his manhood, his honour, his strength; he felt that her kisses degraded him, and as he rose from her embrace he felt vile and mean. ”

“ It would be a dull world if every one were to think as you do, Giulia, and to say exactly as they meant. Fancy a young man saying to you: 'I think you are a nice sort of girl, no prettier than the rest, but good tempered and pleasant, and to be desired because your father is rich!' A nice sort of way that would be to be made love to! ”

“ Manuel—how can you reproach me thus?" asked Giulia, in a voice scarcely above a whisper; for that woman who dared be unfaithful to her husband revolted from the thought that a coarse-minded bandit should be in a position to overhear her conversation with her lover:—"how can you reproach me thus, Manuel?" she repeated;—"have I not given thee all the proofs of tenderest love which woman can bestow? ”

“ In the brilliantly lighted apartment, to which we have already introduced our readers, the Countess Giulia receives her lover, the dissipated but handsome Marquis of Orsini; the bandit-captain is concealed behind the richly-worked tapestry; and at the door—not the little private one—of that room, an old man is listening; an old man whose ashy pale countenance, clinched hands, quivering white lips, and wildly rolling eyes indicate how terrible are the feelings which agitate within his breast.
This old man was the Count of Arestino, one of the mightiest nobles of the republic. ”

“ For "poor Giulia" had been the mother [4] of the rising young churchman's daughter some fifty years or so before the time at which we find his Eminence working in his vocation at the great dam. And this daughter was the celebrated Tullia (more or less) d'Aragona.
GIULIA OF FERRARA.
What did become of poor Giulia? Giulia of Ferrara, the most celebrated beauty of her day, in all Italy: the noted toast of Rome,—the be–rhymed of ecclesiastical sonnetteers—the sighed–for by purple–stockinged swains: Giulia, the Aspasia of many a frocked Pericles, and the mother of a royal–blooded churchman's child! ”

“ And you love as myself a mother whose son you are not! 'Oh!' is Giulia's cry, 'will our Italy reward him with a daughter?'—the noblest that we have. Yes, for she would be Italian always through you. We pray that you may not get old too soon, before she grows for you and is found, only that you may know in her our love. ”

“ My love for Giulia was indeed finished now—dead, buried, and a stone Venus erected over it as only sign of its existence. I tried to think of a suitable inscription.... Time could kill the most obstinate love, and a beautiful woman, with the breezes of spring to help her, could carry away even the remembrance. I felt that my life was now complete. I had all pleasures imaginable at my beck and call: good wines to drink, good foods to eat, nice clothes; games, sports and pastimes; and, last of all, the greatest gift the gods can make, a beautiful woman to my youth and strength. ”

“ If some one should say to me:—You must choose;—I would reply:—I cannot;—because Giulia is nothing without wine, and wine is nothing without cards: and they are like Ser Cecco and the Court of Berni. Ser Cecco cannot live without the Court, nor can the Court live without Ser Cecco.... They live necessarily together; they all form a single substance; they exist united like soul and body. Take away the soul from the body, and you would see the latter destroyed as Giulia would be destroyed without wine, and wine without cards.... Oh, Giulia!... ”

“ You make me desperate; you make me feel as if neither my own life nor any other man’s life were worth a straw. Giulia, say a word to me, look kindly on me, and I will be good and kind and gentle to all the world. Oh, Giulia, don’t leave me in my despair and misery! Give me some hope, Giulia; some little hope, and it will save me!”
Certainly the fight was a very, very hard one. It was almost going against her; and if Beppo could only have known how nearly it was going in his favour, he would have conquered. ”

“ The sky over a funeral should be low and grey, with a soft, fine rain falling, and no ray of sunshine to mock the mourners' gloom; but over Giulia Provana's funeral train the sky was a vault of unclouded blue, reflected on the blue of the tideless sea, and olive woods and lemon groves were steeped in sunlight. It was one of those mornings such as Giulia had enjoyed with her utmost power of enjoyment, the kind of morning on which the pretty soprano voice had burst into song, from irrepressible gladness—brief song that ended in breathlessness. ”

“ One after another Blanden unrolled these magically illuminated worlds of thought conceived by silent thinkers in penitents' garb and hermits' huts. Is the world but the veil, the dream, the existence?--why then is life full of nervous dread? Giulia felt herself strengthened by that dream-world of the Bast, everything painful and impious faded away in that mild, softening twilight. ”

“ That, I said to myself, is the highest wisdom—never to think; for the way of happiness is to live in one's senses as the beasts, and like the ox, chewing the cud, use the mind only to consider one's superiority to the rest of mankind.
I laughed a little as I thought of my tears and cries when Giulia left me. It was not a matter worth troubling about; all I should have said to myself was that I was a fool not to abandon her before she abandoned me. Poor Giulia! I quite frightened her in the vehemence of my rage.
The following evening I would not let Matteo go to bed. ”

“ Thus, while silence, and calmness, and moonlight reign without—yet within the walls of the Arestino mansion a storm has gathered, to explode fearfully. And all through the unlawful, but not less ardent, love of Giulia for the spendthrift Marquis of Orsini!
Sober-minded men, philosophic reasoners, persons of business-habits, stern moralists—all these may ridicule the poet or the novelist who makes Love his everlasting theme; they may hug themselves, in the apathy of their own cold hearts, with the belief that all the attributes of the passion have been immensely exaggerated ”

“ Beppo’s eyes glared with rage and indignation; and assuredly his whole appearance was very little like that of one meeting an old friend, to say nothing of an old love, with pleasure.
Giulia, too, was to a certain degree moved, and to a certain degree embarrassed by the presence of the corporal at her skirts and in her conscience. But when was ever a woman embarrassed under circumstances of the kind, let their difficulty be what it may, as a man is embarrassed.
Giulia’s blood rushed to her face and neck, but she did not lose for an instant either her faculty of speech or her presence of mind ”

“ Giulia inquired, with a look of surprise.
"Call me Edith—I am only a poor, friendless girl, like yourself," she gently returned. "But I want to go away from this house immediately—I must get out of it unobserved; then I can catch a train that leaves Boston at three o'clock, for New York."
"Ah! you wish to run away from Emil!" exclaimed Giulia, her face lighting with eagerness.
"Yes—I would never own myself his wife for a single hour. ”

“ I’ll have no love,” said Giulia, now sobbing beyond her power to conceal it. “No love—no love—” he said amid her sobs, while a little nervous movement of her foot on the grass and the convulsive wreathing together of her fingers as she held them in front of her bosom, showed the extremity of her agitation; “no love—” she repeated,—“save yours,” was upon her tongue. She had all but said it. She felt as if she would have given worlds to say it; but she choked it down, and said instead, “Oh, Beppo, how can you make me so miserable?” ”

“ No, it was the storm which had risen, sweeping through the tops of the pines, and stirring up the waves of the northern water mirror.
Fancy often erects a bridge of dreams from one summit of life to another, and deep below in oblivion lie all its other paths.
Giulia was absorbed in a vision, in a self-delusion; the pictures of the past and present became mixed up, but the confusion was agonising; her hand trembled in Blanden's. ”

“ Why do ye not rather take wrong? Why do not ye rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded?'"
"That is very fine for St. Paul to say," said Giulia. "I wonder how he would have liked it himself."
"Giulia! you must not say such things as that. It is wicked."
"Why, to hear you talk, one would think it was I who wanted to go to law with Isabella; whereas, it is Isabella who wants to go to law with me!"
And Giulia began to cry.
"Nobody is so unfortunate as I," said she.
"I pity you," said Vittoria, "but I own I think you are blameworthy." ”

“ Never did Giulia feel the degradation of her actress' calling more than in the presence of such German critics and their professional malice: a prima donna who had associated on friendly terms with the highest nobility of Italy was compelled to receive with all well-bred affability persons to whom the doors of a drawing-room would never have been thrown open. ”

“ Therefore will I, my lotus-flower, kiss the tears from your cheeks, as King Duschmanta kissed his regained beloved one."
"Then, I will belong only and wholly to you," cried Giulia, amid kisses and embraces, "and even the fame which I conquered shall fade away like visions in the air."
"I feel better every day," said Blanden, "I shall soon go to Kulmitten, and make all preparations for our marriage." ”

“ When Buschmann and Böller had retired, Giulia gave way to violent tears and sobs. Beate came to her and enquired as to the cause of this despair.
"Despair, indeed! I have seen him again and all else has become worthless to me; it is the breath of this passion that extinguishes all the other lights on the Christmas tree of my life, while I, dazzled, stare fixedly into the one all-consuming flame! But he, he--how can he respect me? That love, which I as if in a dream and intoxication gave to him, I the nameless one to the stranger--does it not now speak its own verdict of condemnation upon me? ”

“ Fie on you, Giulia! with all your advantages, you ought not to sit and wail about nothing. I think you loved Ippolito more than you say you did, or you would not give way so."
"I did not love Ippolito at all," said Giulia, nettled. "I suppose one may be sorry for a friend, without having been in love with him. You do injustice to the memory of my dear Duke, to suppose I could ever forget him."
"As to that," said Vittoria, "considering your good Duke's years and infirmities, it is difficult for any one to see why you should be inconsolable. ”

“ With a loud cry, Giulia sank into the sofa cushions.
"Well, then, I congratulate you upon the Polter-abend," [1] said Buschmann scornfully, as he turned upon his heels and left the room amid the clatter of his spurs.
"What have you done?" said Giulia, as she gazed at Blanden with large tearful eyes, her hand raised as if in protest, and sobbing with internal agitation.
"I will protect you against all the world," cried Blanden with, overwhelming emotion, "my Giulia, my betrothed!" ”