The country of The ring and the book

Front matter

ft ft; 'THE COUNTRY

E RING & THE BOOK

IR FREDERICK TREVES

Preface

The purpose of this book is to describe the scene of a story of two hundred years ago, the story of the Franceschini, husband and wife, and of the priest who came between them. It is of these three that the tale is told in the wondrous poem of "The Ring and the Book," a poem as brilliant, as pathetic, as lurid and as dolorous as a winter sunset.

Few need to be reminded that the story is true, and that the poet follows the ancient record with as much exactness as the limner of a missal copies a passage of Holy Writ.

It is a tragic story, since of the six chief persons who took part in it four died a violent death, a fifth vanished to distant lands and was heard of no more, while one remained alone to end his days haunted by the face of a dead woman, who, when she lived, had called him " far beyond friend."

The scene of this tale of the Franceschini is laid in the heart of Italy, in that gracious stretch of valley and hill which lies between Florence and Rome. To the traveller, no part of Italy is more familiar, unless it be the country of the lakes or the northern sea beaches. It is with no widely scattered region that the narrative is concerned, but rather with little more than a winding road between two towns, with the towns themselves, with a church or so and certain streets, and with a small

vii

Preface

posting-inn, where a meagre upper room still rings with the voices of tragedy, for here the husband, wife and priest met, face to face, for the last time.

It may be of service to point these places out, lest some, interested in the story, should pass them by as if they were like other roads, other streets and other churches, or stay to admire an altar-piece without knowing that they stand on the spot where Pompilia was married to her woeful husband, and where her body lay after her troublous life was over. Elsewhere, from utter lack of knowing, we may pass, all unheeding, by the banks of "the crystal dykes at Camelot," ramble over the spot where bloomed the roses of Rosamond's Bower, and watch, with apathy, the holiday folk who trample the English beach first touched by the prows of Caesar's galleys.

The story covers an unquiet period of four years, the direful part of which fell in the time of mid-winter, while that which was more happy to recall came, like a break of blue sky, in the heyday of spring.

The history of Pompilia has been already briefly told in prose. The sole excuse for repeating it again, and in greater detail, is to bring the actual incidents of the narrative into immediate association with the places of their happening. It can be of small interest to read of Castelnuovo if the events that came to pass in the little town are either unfamiliar or indistinct. The field of Waterloo, even with its obtrusive monuments, is no more than a piece of eligible farm land to the uninformed, while no study of the circumstances of the battle can compare in vividness with a reading of the event made on the spot.

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Preface

When all that was needed for the purpose of this book had been done it was impossible to resist the temptation of setting forth, in the gorgeous language of the poem, what Robert Browning himself made of the people of the story. As they appear in the old documents, they are a company of faded folk, distinctive in a way, but with as little human warmth in them as animates a row of costumes hanging in a playhouse cupboard. Browning breathed into these ghostly men and women the breath of life. They do not pretend to exact portraiture, neither was the Perseus of Benvenuto Cellini a portrait, nor Raphael's u Madonna with the Goldfinch." The Pompilia and Caponsacchi of the poem may never have walked the streets of Arezzo, but in some place, and at some time, they must have trod the highway of the world together, must have suffered as did the lonely woman and the man who was "the lover of her life," must have faced their fate with the same untrammelled spirit, and so have added some lustre to the chronicle of human endeavour and devotion.

FREDERICK TREVES.

Thatched House Lodge,

IX

Part One — The Story

page

I. The Old Yellow Book . . . . . . 3

II. The Comparini Family in Rome 9

III. A Quiet Wedding IS

IV. Palace Life at Arezzo 23

V. Violante's Confession 28

VI. Pompilia at Bay 35

VII. The Flig-ht with the Priest 44

VIII. The Scene at Castelnuovo 48

IX. After Castelnuovo 52

X. Guido Decides to Visit Rome 59

XI. The Murder in the Via Vittoria .... 66

XII. Guido's Arrest 73

XIII. The Death of Pompilia 76

XIV. The Trial for Murder 79

XV. The Execution in the Piazza del Popolo . . .88

XVI. The Epilogue 93

Part Two—The Country of the Story

I. ROME.

1. The Via Vittoria 97

2. The House of the Comparini 101

3. The Neighbourhood of the Via Vittoria . . 105

4. The Street of the Lion's Mouth . . . .111

5. The Ursuline Convent 114

7. Le Scalette 126

9. The Route to the Place of Execution . .138 10. The Piazza del Popolo 145

II THE INN AT MERLUZZA 150

xi

Contents

l'AGE

III. AREZZO . 161

IV. THE FLIGHT TO ROME.

i. The Road 171

4. The Journey Across the Hills and Beyond

to Castelnuovo 207

6. From Castelnuovo to Rome 231

7. How the People of the Story Looked . . . 235

Part Three — The People of the Story as they appear

in the Poem

I. The Comparini 245

II. The Franceschini 249

III. POMPILIA 25O

IV. Caponsacchi 263

V. Guido 270

VI. The Pleaders 283

VII. The Pope 287

Appendix 299

Index 301 xu

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

The photographs used in illustration of the text were taken by the Author at various seasons of the year, and, for the most part, at or about the actual date in the calendar on which occurred the episode with which the particular scene is associated.

Madonna, by Fra Filippo Lippi .... Frontispiece

FACING PAGE

i. Via Vittoria, Rome 8

2. Via Vittoria, Rome 10

3. Robert Browning's House in the Via Bocca di Leone, Rome 10

4. The Corso, as it would appear in Pompilia's Time. . 14

5. The Church of San Lorenzo in Lucina, Rome . . 16

6. The Lion by the Door of the Church of San Lorenzo in

Lucina, Rome 18

7. The Courtyard of the House of the Knights of Malta, Via

Condotti, Rome 18

8. Le Scalette, Rome 20

9. The Tramp on the Steps of the Convent of the Good

Shepherd 20

10. The Via Giulia, Rome 24

11. Via Giulia and Church of Santa Maria della Morte, Rome 28

12. The River Side of the Via Giulia, Rome ... 3°

13- 14.

15. The Back of the New Prisons in the Via Giulia, Rome . 36

16. Map of Modern Rome 38

17. The Via del Governo Vecchio, Rome .... 40

18. The Old House in the Via del Governo Vecchio, Rome . 44

19. Church of the Agonizzanti, Rome ..... 48

xiii

The New Prisons in the Via Giulia, Rome ... 32

List of Illustrations

FACIN

20. The Piazza Navona, Rome ....

21. The Fountain, "II Moro," Piazza Navona, Rome

22. The Piazza della Rotonda and Pantheon, Rome

23. The Piazza del Popolo, Rome

24. The Piazza del Popolo, Rome {from an Engraving by

Piranesi) . . ....

25. The Church of Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome

26. The Porta del Popolo, Rome

27. On the Road from Rome to the Ponte Milvio

28. Fountain by the Roadside on the Way to the Ponte Milvio

29. The Ponte Milvio, Rome

30. The Ponte Milvio, Rome (from Vemiti's " Antichita di

31. The Inn at La Storta connected with Guido's Flight

32. The Inn at Merluzza where Guido was arrested

33. Map of Arezzo .......

34. A Street in Arezzo

35. The Church of Santa Maria della Pieve, Arezzo

36. The Door of the Church of Santa Maria della Pieve, Arezzo

37. The Old Canale Inn, Arezzo .

38. The San Clemente Gate, Arezzo

39. The City Wall, Arezzo, just inside the San Clemente Gate

40. The Town Wall of Arezzo, from the outside .

41. The Wall of Arezzo by the Torrione

42. Map of the Country between Arezzo and Rome

43. Vitiano, whence came the Four Bravoes

44. A Typical Wayside Cottage on the Route of Pompilia'

Flight .

45. Castiglion Fiorentino

46. Old House at Camoscia

47. The Walls of Cortona .

48. A Street in Cortona

49. Posting- Road Map from Arezzo to Foligno by Assisi

50. The Frontier between Tuscany and the States of the

Church, near Terontola .

51. The First Glimpse of Lake Trasimene

xiv

List of Illustrations

52. Lake Trasimene, from the High Road

53. Passignano, on Lake Trasimene

54. Tuoro, from the High Road .

55. Lake Trasimene, from the High Road

56. The Old Posting- Inn, Torricella

57. Torricella .....

58. The Castle at Magione, from the High Road

59. View from Magione

60. Perugia, from the Road to the North

61. Niccolo Pisano's Fountain, Perugia

62. Perugia : A Dark Entry

63. The Ponte San Giovanni over the Tiber

64. The First View of the Tiber in the process of Flight

65. The Bridge at Bastia crossed in the process of Flight

66. Distant View of the Church of St. Mary of the Angels

67. Assisi, from the Church of San Francesco

68. Assisi, from the Road . . . . .

69. The Old Posting-House at Santa Maria degli Angeli

70. The Town Wall of Spello and the Foligno Road .

71. The Gate of Spello

72. Foligno : The Gate into the Town from the Perugia Road

73. The Cathedral of San Feliziano, Foligno

74. Trevi, from the High Road .

75. Posting-Road Map from Foligno to Rome by Castelnuovo

76. Spoleto

77. The Road between Spoleto and Strettura

78. The Old Bridge crossed between Spoleto and Strettura

79. A Street in Spoleto

80. The Castle above Strettura .

81. The Posting- House at Strettura

82. Narni

83. A Street in Narni

84. The Main Road through Otricoli, from the Old Post-House

85. The Ponte Felice across the Tiber

86. The Ruined Castle near the Ponte Felice, Borghetto

87. The Gorge at Civita Castellana ....

XV

List of Illustrations

FACING PAGE

88. A Street in Civita Castellana 238

89. The Valley to the South of Civita Castellana, from the

Road to Rome ....... 244

90. Monte Soracte, from the Walls of Civita Castellana . 246

91. Monte Soracte, from the High Road near Rignano . 250

92. Rignano, the last Stopping-Place before Castelnuovo . 254

93. The Town of Castelnuovo 256 /

94. The Inn at Castelnuovo where Pompilia and Caponsacchi

were discovered by Count Guido ....

95. The Interior of the Inn at Castelnuovo ....

96. The Little Chapel between the Post-House and the Town,

97. A Street in Castelnuovo 272

98. The Piazza del Duomo, Castelnuovo .... 274

99. The Pretura at Castelnuovo ...... 276 >

100. Castelnuovo : The Steps by which Pompilia ascended to

the Prison 280

101. The Piazza Garibaldi, Castelnuovo .... 282

102. The Back of the Pretura, Castelnuovo .... 284

103. The Roman Campagna, from the High Road near

Borghettaccio ....... 288

104- The Bridge between Prima Porta and Rome . . . 292

105. Plan of Rome in 1676 296

106. Plan of Rome in 1676 300

XVI

Part One THE STORY THE OLD YELLOW BOOK

A BUNDLE of old legal documents, collected by a lawyer curious in the dry sophistries of his calling, proved to be the unlikely material out of which was fashioned one of the finest, most imaginative, and most human poems of the nineteenth century, a work which has been described as " the most precious and profound spiritual treasure that England has produced since the days of Shakespeare."*

The lawyer was Monsignore Francesco Cencini of Florence, and the object of his concern was a certain murder trial held at Rome in 1698, in which the principal accused was Count Guido Franceschini of Arezzo. It is evident that the man of law was a friend of the Franceschini. Probably he had had legal dealings with the family, for Arezzo is only fifty-one miles distant from Florence. Moreover, he sent from Florence " proofs on behalf of Count Guido," but they arrived too late, since by the time of their coming the nobleman was merely " Signor Guido of blessed memory." Whatever Cencini's interest may have been, his curiosity in the case was acute, for he persuaded at least three of his legal friends in Rome to send him every possible paper that bore in any way upon the trial.

* The Athenaum. 3

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

In response to his demand, these correspondents forwarded to their u most illustrious and most worshipful Signor and Patron" no fewer than eighteen documents, partly in print, partly in manuscript, heavy with words, swollen with arguments, " instruments," citations and depositions, set out for the most part in the Latin tongue, and with as little coherence as would be found in the clamour of eighteen disputatious persons all speaking at once. These eighteen papers Signor Cencini arranged in such order they were capable of, indexed the whole, and then caused the collection to be bound in vellum with some care.

What happened to the book when the Florentine lawyer died none can tell. It vanished from the view of the world for one hundred and sixty years, lying, it may be, on some forgotten shelf, with none to ringer its pages nor read its crabbed print. It may well have spent half a century in a worm-eaten muniment chest, or another fifty years among the cobwebs of a lumber room. Whatever its hiding place or its adventure, it emerged at last into the light of day — into the sunlight, indeed, of an Italian summer — in the year 1860. It was then that Robert Browning found it on an open stall in a market square of Florence, among a jumble of minor relics of abandoned homes and odds and ends of rubbish.

He purchased it for eightpence. It was a curious book for a poet to seize upon, a volume, one would have thought, as little likely to interest him as would an old Italian "Herbal" or a treatise on geometry. Yet out of these records of a criminal court, out of this mass of hard-hammered, bitter, unfeeling stuff, he produced a poem palpitating with life, full of tenderness and passion,

The Old Yellow Book

where, within a vast fabric of stern wisdom and learned argument, was enshrined the exquisite, small figure of an adorable, pathetic woman.

Such is the " square old yellow book " which figures in the title of the poem. It lies now in safe keeping in the Library of Balliol College, Oxford, a book with " crumpled yellow covers," " small quarto size," just as Browning describes it in his prelude.*

Two additional documents concerned with the famous case have come to light since Browning found the Yellow Book in 1860. One of these is a contemporary account in manuscript dealing with the general facts of the tragedy and with the execution of the criminals. It was discovered in London by one of Browning's acquaintances, who, knowing the poet's interest in the subject, sent it to him. The MS., which contains many new particulars, was evidently written some years after the story had closed. t The second document, also in manuscript, was discovered in a library in Rome. It shows evidence of having been written at a later period than the pamphlet just referred to. It was published in English by W. Hall Griffin in the Monthly Review for November, 1900. Of this document Browning had no knowledge. J

For years, no doubt, the great murder case was talked about and mused over, its details becoming fainter and

* The most convenient edition of " The Old Yellow Book " is that edited by Charles W. Hodell, and published as a volume of " Everyman's Library," London.

t It is reproduced in the Miscellanies of the Philobiblion Society, 1868-9, and is made free use of in " The Ring and the Book."

\ Both of these interesting manuscripts are to be found in the appendix of "The Old Yellow Book" in "Everyman's Library."

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

fainter in each telling, until it faded into the limbo of

mere legend. It may be surmised that for a century

or more before Browning's time the whole story had

been already blotted out and forgotten. The people

who had played their parts in the vivid tragedy had

passed into nothingness and had vanished as utterly as

if they had never been. As the poet writes :

11 What was once seen, grows what is now described, Then talked of, told about, a tinge the less In every fresh transmission ; till it melts, Trickles in silent orange or wan grey Across our memory, dies and leaves all dark."

Browning brings the tale from out of the dark into the day again, lifts the curtain of the past and shows a brightly illumined stage with a drama in progress, brirgs the very actors once more to life, and has them act their tragedy, scene by scene, not precisely as the world in Rome witnessed it, but as he would have it presented to the greater world of art, of sentiment and of morality. The fragments he pieced together to produce this wondrous reconstruction are to be found scattered amongst the bundles of papers in the Yellow Book. These confusing documents circle and flutter within the vortex of a whirlwind of words, words which arise from an arena full of heated combatants. In the midst the lawyers — a stalwart party of four, two on either side — fight like gladiators armed with buckler and sword. Around them crowd their supporters, friends, and half the people of Rome. If one of the four makes a sharp legal thrust with his blade, it is met, with a thud, by the blunt shield of his opponent. Cases, judgments, precedents and rulings, drawn from the whole arsenal of the law, are snatched up and hurled about like missiles.

The Old Yellow Book

The sentence of a court in ancient Rome is answered by a passage from the Scriptures ; while the solemn decision of an august judge is wafted away by a flippant line of verse from Ovid. The whole battlefield of the Law, extending far back into dim time, is raked over to find stones to throw. The fighters yell, the one against the other, as the missiles fly.

Above the din of the contest there is ever to be heard the same mean tale told over and over again. The words that tell it rise and fall like the notes of a recurrent tune, now pathetic, now horrible, now played in rhythm, now in discord, but ever discernible the while as the one same direful melody. The atmosphere is hissing with abuse, with spiteful denunciations, with partisan praise, with brazen lies and shabby innuendoes, until at last it comes about that, if all that is said be true, on the one side and the other, there is not a soul in the entire company, from the noble lady to the house-boy, who does not emerge from the fray blackened with some degree of infamy — save, perhaps, one only, a genial priest, the easy-going canon, Conti, who died before the great tragedy was played to the end.

Bandied to and fro in the thick of the crowd is the figure of a girl of seventeen, delicate and sweet to look upon. She is now lifted aloft by lusty arms above the heads of the rabble, is now mercilessly trampled underfoot, is now dragged through the dirt like a half-strangled thief, and is now raised high on a sunny pedestal beyond the reach of harm. There is in the crowd, too, the strong figure of a man who stands unmoved in the midst of the squalid riot. It would seem that no assault can shake him, nor can

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

any eddy of violence drag him from his post. It is to him that the girl with the fawn-like eyes holds out her hand, and when the crowd has vanished and all is still, it is by his side that she rests.

The story, so far as it can be made out from the twenty documents and so far as it can be extracted from among the mass of contradictions and discrepancies which they present, is, briefly, as follows.

1.— VIA VITTORIA, ROME.

To the left are the barred windows of the Ursuline Convent

II The Comparini Family In Rome

IN the year 1693 there lived, in a quiet street in Rome, a family of the name of Comparini. They were people of the middle class and of comfortable means. The husband, Pietro Comparini, at the time when the story opens, was about sixty-four years of age. He followed no occupation, and it is not known that he had ever adopted any trade or profession. A native of Florence and therefore a foreigner, he appears to have been an indolent, easy-going, " independent gentleman," who graciously left the affairs of his household to the charge of his wife. According to those who wished him ill, he was a spendthrift, and in debt. Indeed, these enemies of his did not shrink from saying that he was so poor as to be in receipt of secret doles from the Papal Charities. There seems to have been but little truth in this, for the last will and testament of Pietro Comparini, completed shortly before he died, shows that he was possessed of quite comfortable means. Other traducers affirmed that he was addicted to vulgar company and the frequenting of taverns. It is a hard saying, but, although there are no grounds upon which to dispute the libel, there were circumstances in his life and times which make it conceivable that he would find his "warmest welcome at an inn."

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

The wife, Violante, who was some three years younger than her husband, was a Roman born. She was a masterful woman, with a shrewd eye for business, and a capacity for scheming of a quite exceptional order. Modern cynics would have called her a "managing woman." In domestic strategy she was bold and resourceful, fearless as a lion, quick and crafty as a fox. She was furthermore haughty, and, on occasion, arrogant. Another quality she had, which enabled her to use her special talents with full effect: she was endowed with a preternatural volubility of speech.

The only child was a daughter, Pompilia, who, at the time the narrative begins, was thirteen years old. The sole record, so far, in the life of this little girl is that she was born on July 17th, and baptised on July 23rd, 1680, in the parish church of San Lorenzo in Lucina, on which occasion the curate, one Bartolomeo Mini, bestowed upon her the sonorous title of Francisca Camilla Victoria Angela Pompilia Comparini, a name like the ripple of a brook expressed in words.

Pietro's estate consisted of some realisable property, and of an income derived from certain trust funds, which funds, in the event of his dying without children, would pass into the hands of strangers. This latter detail, although commonplace enough, is noteworthy, because it proved to be the beginning of trouble. Indeed, this item in the covenant of a trust led to tragedy and murder.

The Comparini family lived in the Via Vittoria, a narrow street leading out of the northern end of the Corso.

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The Comparini Family in Rome

In the same year of grace 1693, there was to be found in the ancient Tuscan town of Arezzo — some 154 miles north of Rome — certain relics of the noble family of the Franceschini. The house consisted then of the Donna Beatrice Franceschini, a widow of advanced years,* of her three sons, and one daughter.

The eldest son, Paolo — a man of forty-three — was a priest with the style of abate. He resided at Rome, where he held the office of Secretary to Cardinal Lauria. The second son, Girolamo, who was four years younger than this brother, was a priest and a canon of the Church of Santa Maria della Pieve at Arezzo. He lived with his mother in the Franceschini Palace. The third son, Guido, was thirty-five years of age at the time when this story begins. He followed no avocation, and as his other brothers were priests he assumed the title of Count and took his place in the household at Arezzo as the head of the family. The only daughter, Porzia, had already married a member of the distinguished family of Aldobrandini, and had apparently taken her leave of the old city.f The household, therefore, at Arezzo, at the time dealt with, consisted of the widowed countess, the Canon Girolamo, and the Benjamin of the family, the idle Guido.

The reverend brother in Christ, the Abbe Paolo Franceschini, occupies a prominent place in the Old Yellow Book. He moves through the scenes of the

* She was born in 163 1, and would therefore have been sixty-two years old in 1693. She died in 1701.

t Porzia was born in January, 165 3, and was thus the second in age in the family. Guido's baptismal entry is January, 1658.

II

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

drama as a dim, unquiet, sinister figure, whose footsteps were a portent of ill. He was a man of parts, a consummate trickster, a Machiavelli of the back streets and a coward to boot. His position in Rome was good. His patron, the Cardinal Lauria, died in November, 1693, whereupon Paolo secured the lucrative post of secretary to the Order of the Knights of St. John of Malta. The headquarters of the Order in Rome were in the Via Condotti, a street very close to the Via Vittoria. The abbe had also a villa, or garden house with a vineyard, near the Ponte Milvio, a little river suburb on the fringe of the Campagna, about two miles distant from the walls of Rome.

Of Canon Girolamo very little is said in the Yellow Book, but that very little — if the facts be true — is very bad. Inasmuch as he lacked the keen intellect of his brother Paolo, his wickedness was somewhat elemental and wanting in finish. As a scoundrel, he never rose above mediocrity, limiting his efforts to listening at doors, to kicking women and to plotting their ruin.

Count Guido Franceschini was a woeful degenerate who combined some of the shrewdness of the epileptic with the domestic attributes of the Bushman. He was a crawling ruffian, meaner than a robber of children and malicious as a wounded snake. His dwarfed brain seems to have been drugged by misery of his own making and to be capable only of devising fresh poisons for the shafts of hatred and revenge. He reduced cruelty to an art, made greed the fetish of his worship and developed to the best of his restricted ability the accomplishment of lying. He does not seem to have possessed any rudimentary virtue except patience, the

The Comparini Family in Rome

patience of a coward to wait until the back of his victim is turned.

It will not be a matter of surprise that Guido is described in the Yellow Book as presenting " a disposition more gloomy than pleasant." Those who knew him in the life speak of him as a man ol low stature, thin and pallid, with a prominent nose, black hair and heavy beard. A less exact observer remembers him as being " ordinary in appearance and of weak temperament." A drawing of Count Franceschini exists which was made on the day of his execution.* He there appears as a dazed melancholic, such as might be seen lolling aimlessly in the courtyard of a madhouse. The portrait is that of a ruffian, not of the fine, slouch-hatted brigand or pirate type, but rather of a kind that in modern times is discovered by a cook skulking in an area.

This nobleman had found a place, strange to say, in the service of a distinguished prelate, Cardinal Nerli. In what particular manner he assisted the cardinal is not known. By the time, however, that the present narrative commences, he was no longer in this pious household, but was loafing about Rome looking for something to do.

Had the Franceschini been rich they might have flaunted it in Arezzo with the best, for their long lineage gave them a claim to consideration. They might, indeed, have been the great people of the city and have lorded it over both the bishop and the governor. But, unhappily, the Franceschini had fallen

* This appears in Vol. X. of " The Poetical Works of Robert Browning." London, 1889.

The Country of "The Ring and the Book"

upon evil times. Although they occupied a palace, they were desperately poor and were indeed driven to straits to live. One can imagine the cavern-like palazzo with its vaulted hall and its solemn stair, a stair so wide as to give the single figure mounting it an aspect of unutterable loneliness. One can fancy its shuddering passages, its echo-haunted suites of empty rooms, where the plaster that had fallen from ceilings, still bright with Venuses and Cupids, made grave-like heaps on the creaking floor ; where the light, shot through the gap left by a shutter dropping from its hinge, showed bare walls with dull square patches, whence pictures had been taken, one by one, to fill the empty treasury, with perhaps just one tall portrait left of some arrogant count — alone in the gloom— whose canvas was too mouldy or too frayed to fetch a soldo.