Life in the Ghetto: Or, The Jewish Physician

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Chapter I

A Sabbath evening in Eome — ^Vexations of a Jewish doctor — ^An nnwelcome patient — Morini's danger — His family life — ^Yearnings of a motherless child ...

CHAPTER n.

Convent life refiised — ^A dying wish at last fulfilled

— ^Mrs. Percival's home — ^A sudden journey ... 17

CHAPTER ni.

Pontifical lottery — ^The successful gambler — Sad tidings — ^A death-bed — Priestly consolations — Where is hep ... ... ... 25 xii CONTENTS.

OHAPTEE IV.

PAOB

The Ghetto — The first Jews in Borne — Pagan persecutions and Papal — ^Disgraceful scenes — Cruelties of Paul FV. — ^Unwilling worship at St. Angelo — ^Everybody taxed to pay for nobody ... ... ... ... 41

OHAPTBB Y.

Invisible barriers — Oppressive disabilities — ^A night

walk through the Fiumara — ^Mysterious sound 51

CHAPTER VL

A home picture — Sudden alarm — The murder of

Costello — ^The lost jewel — Seeking a clue ... 63

CHAPTER Vn.

Dr. Selwyn — ^Zillah's secret — ^A possible clue —

Mysteries unravelled ... ... ... 82

CHAPTER Vin.

A timely visit — Miriam protected — ^A new day-dawn

—The light brightens ... ... 97

CONTENTS. xiii

CHAPTEE IX.

PAOI

The Contessa Barberini — Comforfc for the desolate — Lnigi and Gian — ^Priestly incredulity — ^An odious discoyery — Pio Nono's reform ... 114

CHAPTEE X.

Disaffection in Eome — ^Imperious demands — Concessions won and retracted — ^The flight of the Holy Father — ^French occnpatioii of Eome — AntonelH ... ... ... ... 139

CHAPTEE XI.

Midnight reyelations — ^A bitter parting — ^The childcomforter — Gloomy thoughts ... ... 159

CHAPTEE XII.

Seeking and finding peace — Harvest in the cam-

pagna— The unknown Padre — ^Becognitions 177

CHAPTEE Xm.

Zillah's danger — Saved by a priest — Luigi's

treachery — Secret baptism — Stealing a child 197

XIV CONTENTS.

CHAPTER XIV.

PAOI

Luppino confronts Luigi — A hopeless search — ^Dr.

Selwyn baffled — ^Antonelli*s pique . . . 226

CHAPTER XV.

Gian's advice — ^Deborah's illness — ^Night-watches and the Book — ^Adriel betrays himself — Light in gloom ... ... ... ... 241

CHAPTER XVI.

English protest — ^Apparent concessions — ^A cruel

fraud — hopes rise — Bitter disappointment 262

CHAPTER XVn.

Hope deferred maketh the heart sick — ^The lost one

found — ^At evening time it shall be light ... 276

CHAPTER XVm.

Earth committed to earth — ^Plans for safety — Desires accomplished — Old acquaintances renewed pfe in the ^hetto^

CHAPTER I.

A SABBATH EVENING IN ROME — VEXATIONS OP A JEWISH DOCTOR — ^AN UNWELCOME PATIENT — MORINl's DANGER — HIS FAMILY LIFE — ^YEARNINGS OP A MOTHERLESS CHILD.

OUB narrative will lead us back to the early days of Pius the Ninth, the Pope whose reign was initiated by deeds of clemency and liberality which called forth the significant acclamation, "Long live Pio Nono, the first liberal Pope, and the last of the Popes!" The long life sought for him has been accorded; the foot which ascended vigorously the Pontificial throne in 1846, rests there still in infirm old age. Will the prediction also be verified ? Time will show.

In what we may relate of the government, or rather misgovemment, of the priest-ruled city, we shall chiefly confine ourselves to that which concerns the Jews of the Ghetto.

B

It is Sunday evening in Borne ; the season is that of early May; the morning had been sultry, but towards noon a dashing thunder-storm had cooled the air, and the wind blowing steadily from the west, had brought with it an invigorating freshness from the Mediterranean. Let us mingle for a few moments with the crowd of peasants who have gathered in the Piazza Montanara. Is this indeed a Boman Sabbath ? Are we really in the city exalted so high in privilege as to be ruled by Christ's Vicar upon earth ? We recall the Sabbaths spent by Him whom he represents, — ^the diligent attendance on synagogueworship, the laborious efforts to instruct an ignorant crowd, the deeds of mercy at home and abroad, the hours redeemed from sleep for prayer, — is this the Sabbath which, under the auspices of Christ's infallible Vicar, has taken root in the Pope's own vineyard? In truth, if it were not treason to breathe such a suspicion within the walls of Home, we should almost think that we, Protestants and heretics, with no infallible guide, have copied for ourselves, in apostate England, a Sabbath less glaringly unlike the Divine original than that which we see around us in the Piazza Montanara.

It is the season when the peasants come down from the mountain to plough and sow the Campagna. They are hired by the week, and Sunday is the chosen day for renewing old engagements or making fresh ones, with the factors of the great farms, who meet them for this purpose in the Piazza. Here too

OK, THE JEWISH PHYSICIAN. 3

they enjoy their Sunday holiday, attend their cheap theatres provided for them at least twice in the day, make their bargains and purchases, ]ounge in the sun, pass the merry jest, do everything but " remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy."

Our eye had not long wandered with mingled admiration and regret from group to group of these careless children of the sunny south, before our attention was arrested by two pedestrians who were advancing towards us from the opposite comer of the Piazza. It needed but a glance to tell that they were father and son, and already, before they bend their steps to the comer of the Piazza which leads to the Ghetto, we have mentally concluded that they are Jews: not indeed Jews of the ordinary type, who form the vast majority of the inhabitants of the Ghetto. We have here no servile cringing, no stereotyped cunning, no imbruted physiognomy, no greasy squalor in person or dress. Lines of deep thought are written on the brow of the father, and a touching expression of patient endurance contrasts strangely with the fire of his kindling eye, and the firmness expressed in his finely cut mouth ; it was the air of one who had achieved the greatest of all victories, — the victory over himself. The youthful countenance of the son was chiefly remarkable for its extreme guilelessness, and the gracious and graceful deference with which he hung upon his father's words.

Their conversation was apparently not yet concluded, neither was it intended for the public ear ;

for, with a glance at the crowds whom they must soon overtake, they stood still under the deep shadow cast by the setting sun from a projecting building, and in lowered tones, Ben Ezra Luppino, a Jewish physician of high celebrity in the Ghetto, and greatly respected by many Roman families without its precincts, thus addressed his son : —

"To-morrow, then, Adriel, you take your place among the students of the University, to show, I hope, that your father has laid a groundwork of knowledge for abler hands to build upon."

Adriel's clear brow became clouded, and the colour mounted to his forehead ; an expression of impatient disgust rose to his lips, and was with difficulty repressed.

" How now, my son : you were surely content with the reception given to us by His Eminence. Let me tell you, Adriel, that when at your age I presented myself to the Cardinal Vicar of that day, the favour was thrown to me as churlishly as one may throw a bone to a dog ; but our good Contessa loves our little Zillah, and she has the ear of His Eminence. Besides, blessed be the God of Israel, who has disposed towards us the heart of our sovereign Pontiff, we are fallen upon better times, and our bondage is lightened."

" But why must there be' bondage at all, father ? Why this hateful restriction to which I have just bound myself by solemn oath, that my healing art shall never be exercised on a Christian ? Must we be always fettered and hedged in ? And what is this liberty we have rejoiced in ? Is it not every day becoming more of a shadow ? My good, noble father, how patiently you have preferred your suit to be permitted to exchange our close quarters in the Ghetto, for a house and a situation suited to your fame and fortune. Is not the request in strict accordance with the privileges they have professed to grant us? Why are you thus vexed with endless delay, and threatened with denial ? "

It was now Ben Ezra's turn to struggle with his feelings, for it had been hard to bear with calmness the irritating opposition to his wishes in the matter of a change of residence. None had hailed more eagerly than he, the permission to the Jews to hire houses beyond the limits of the Ghetto, granted in the first years of Pius IX, He hailed it less for the reason assigned by Adriel, than because to its damp and noxious atmosphere he attributed the failing health of his beloved Deborah, the wife of his youth, and the mother of his children. All had been as he hoped settled, and the rental agreed upon of a house in an airy situation ; but he would have become the next door neighbour of a Roman Catholic proprietor, who considered the proximity of a Jewish physician as a degradation, and commenced a vexatious opposition, which the Cardinal Vicar, by whose individual caprice all such questions must be settled, was not likely to decide in favour of a Jew, against a son of the Church.

He looked up, and caught the level rays of the sinking sun. Every window in the Piazza which reflected its beams, flashed back a crimson light; each irregular building was transfigured into a golden palace; light clouds were hurrying to the west, to steep in gorgeous dyes their fleecy mantles. Ben Ezra gazed, and his eyes grew calm, and the knitted brow relaxed. " The Lord God of Israel reigneth," he said. " He' is filled with majesty. Though the Lord be high, yet hath He respect unto the lowly, and He fixeth the bounds of my habitation."

" But we must hasten home," he added ; and Adriel, touched and calmed, prepared to follow his father. They hastily traversed the Piazza, and with eyes still dazzled by the blaze of western glory, passed under the frowning and irregular mass of building known as the Orsini Palace.

At some ten yards distance, a gentleman stood with his face towards them, and with one hand holding the balustrade. For a moment Ben Ezra supposed him irresolute as to which direction he should take ; but as his own rapid strides speedily diminished the distance between them, the fixed eye and impurpled countenance of the stranger, betrayed at once to the educated glance of the physician, that he had been the victim of an apoplectic seizure.

There was one hope : the free and immediate use of the lancet might relieve the engorged brain ; and while with one hand Ben Ezra assisted Adriel to support the now staggering form of the unfortunate

OK, THE JEWISH PHYBICUK. 7

gentleman, with the other he drew forth and opened his pocket-case.

With a sudden revulsion of feeling, he remembered his race, his oath, the fatal restriction which forbade him to exercise the common instincts of humanity. It was a moment of intense humiliation. A crowd was gathering, and gazed in wonder at his helplessness, his irresolution. He would have braved legal consequences, but he held himself bound by the sacredness of an oath ; and returning the lancet to his pocket, he wrote a few hurried words on a card, and bade Adriel take it at once to an English physician in the immediate neighbourhood, with whom he was on terms of friendship.

It was hard to have to wait his arrival, and thus draw public attention to the civil disability under which he laboured ; but he could not leave the unfortunate stranger in the hands of the ignorant country people around him, and he desired to find some clue as to his name and residence. With the exception of the ecrivano, or letter-writer, who, attracted by the unusual excitement, had come up with his iron-rimmed spectacles still on his nose, and an half-finished letter left to its fate on his ricketty table in the comer of the Piazza, probably none among the crowd could read or write.

So Ben Ezra waited, and with a heavy weight at his heart, and with fears which grew every moment Htronger, that the assistance he could so easily have rendered would arrive too late, he searched the pockets of the stranger. Among lottery tickets and other papers which aflforded no information, he found at length a letter addressed to Signer Lorenzo Morini, in the Largo dell' Impresa. Dr. Selwyn came up at the same moment^ and leaving his son to assist in removing Signer Morini to his house, Ben Ezra withdrew ; and passing round the Orsini Palace, reached the Ghetto by the Piazza, so appropriately found at its entrance, the Piazza del Pianto, or the Place of Weeping.

Ere long we may return to him, and seek to interpret some of the feelings with which his heart is overcharged; but we would first outstrip the heavy tread of the bearers, and introduce the reader to the home to which the unfortunate Morini is being conveyed, under the skilled guidance of Dr. Selwyn.

Morini has barely attained to middle life; the heavy half-closed eyes and the stertorous breathing only disguise in part the flexibility, the easy grace stamped both upon his form and features. Humorous, gay, good natured, life was to him in early youth one prolonged pastime. Everywhere received and welcomed, he had found little difficulty in winning the hand and heart of the beautiful Clara Percival, who twenty years ago had come with her father to spend a winter in Eome, leaving behind her a mother and younger members of her family. True, Clara and her father professed another creed; but their Protestanism sat lightly upon them as a loose outer

OK, THE JEWISH PHYSICIAN. 9

garb. And then Lorenzo was "so liberal:" did he not often himself laugh at the priests ? and besides, there was much to be said for "mother Church," with her grandeur, and her music, and her purchased pardons, and her convenient vicarious religion. Yes ; perhaps after all Lorenzo had the best of it: and, at all events, he and Clara loved each other too well ever to quarrel about such trifles ; so she submitted, with no ill grace, to a brilliant betrothal and subsequent marriage, according to Romish rites.

And they did not quarrel, — neither cared enough about their creeds to do so, — and for the short summer day of their married life they lived in unclouded prosperity. Mr. Percival found it hard to understand why his wife should express anything but satisfaction in his reports of Clara's happiness.

On the anniversary of their wedding day, the finishing touch was added to their joy in the birth of a little daughter, and as the honour of the child's being baptized at St Peter's far outweighed with Clara any question of creed, Lorenzo made immediate arrangements for the performance of the rite with more than ordinary ceremony ; for it is not usual in Rome to make much of the baptism of a girl.

A gay convoy attended the infant, as on the lap of her godmother she occupied the seat of honour in the first carriage, her blue ribbons fluttering conspicuously from the window ; for blue is the colour of the Virgin, and to her aU female children are dedicated.

It was perhaps well for Clara that Roman customs require the baptism of a child within forty-eight hours of its birth, thus excluding the mother from the ceremony, for her English nerves might have found it somewhat of an ordeaL Arrived at the church the priest received her babe near the font, accompanied by a little boy who carried a candle, a box of salt, and a vase of oil He mumbled an indistinct hum of Latin, looking carelessly round him the while, rubbed the oil behind the infant's ears, made the sign of the cross oi its forehead, mouth, and breast, thrust his soiled finger covered with dirty salt into its tiny mouth, regardless of its cries of disgust, lifted the stole from his own neck and placed it over that of the child, and finally brought the ceremony to an end by pouring over its head some holy water ladled from the font The little creature was not easily composed after suflfering so many indignities, but as Romish baptism is supposed to exorcise the evil spirit, the friends of the infant take comfort in the thought that they are listening to the cry of remonstrance uttered by the devil in his expulsion.

The interest excited by the beautiful young mother in her daily receptions, made her long for the season of weakness to be over, that she might once more share in the gaieties so congenial to her. Slightly piqued to find that her inability to accompany him would not prevent Lorenzo from taking his own pleasure at a magnificent ball to be given by one of their noble friends, she rose from her couch, dressed herself magnificently, and, with beauty rendered still more attractive by the languor of recent weakness, she presented herself prepared to accompany him.

It was the last gay scene in which Clara Morini took part: a chill was followed by fever which attacked the brain, her ravings were piteous to hear, and consciousness only returned in the last hour of mortal weakness. She cast a terrified look upon her husband, but signed a negative to his offer to call for a priest. One gleam of natural affection seemed to kindle in her eye when her child was brought to her side, and Lorenzo thought he caught the words, " My mother will care for my child," but the attempt to speak was broken short by the convulsive sob which marked that the last breath had come.

With all the passion of his nature, Morini mourned his young wife; but the strongest impulses are not the most enduring, and their union, though fond and complete of its kind, had wanted all the deeper and higher elements which render memories indelible and a loss irreparable. Neither was it to be expected that the care of his orphaned babe would long restrain the tastes and habits of a young man so devoted as Lorenzo had been to a life of pleasure. The rare beauty of the child, indeed, and the admiration she excited from strangers, awoke in the young father's heart some feelings of pleasant exultation, and he drew for her a horoscope of a brilliant future in the "beau monde." But this was in the far distance. He could not conceive that as yet his child had any claims upon him which might not as well be performed by hirelings. To them, therefore, she was left, and their selection was committed to her godmother, who was herself too much engrossed by society to take any effectual superintendence of her orphan charge.

Years passed on, and the neglected child grew up in a world of her own imaginings. Her father was her hero. His person, his gay laugh, his indulgent fondness in the rare and short seasons he spent with her, were dwelt upon and stored up as treasured memories. Her wistful eyes followed him to the door when he laughingly tore himself from her clinging arms, " to go/' as he said, " and make her fortune; for his little Juliet should be a Contessa some day." But with his retreating footsteps her sunshine vanished. Surrounded by toys or books, she yet sat with listless and folded hands, and even an unskilled reader in the human heart might have seen that the sweet child was pining for some one to love : she had no mother, she knew what childhood was never meant to know, — the grief of heart loneliness. It was her misfortune that both instructors and attendants pursued their tasks in a mercenary spirit, and though Juliet was one whose confidence might easily have been won, she needed that the first advances should be made by others.

It was not likely that her father would take any pains to instruct her in a religion he held so loosely himself, yet in name she belonged to the Romish

Church. On one occasion, when his easy goodnature made it diflScult to him to refuse to her anything, he consented to take her with him to the exhibition on Christmas-eve, of the miraculous Bambino, in the Ara Coeli. This is the Bambino, or Holy Child, which, as legend informs us, was carved from a tree on the Mount of Olives, by a Franciscan pilgrim, who having completed his work as far as his carving tools could carry it, lay down to sleep. St Luke, willing to encourage his pious toil, visited the spot in his sleep, and added the charm of colour to that of form. No wonder that the heavenly limner should have left a virtue in the image. It was found that diseases vanished at the touch of the Santissimo Bambino, to which St. Luke appears to have delegated his own healing power. So firmly fixed is this superstition in the hearts of the people, that to this day the miraculous Bambino is the most popular and the most venerated of Rome's physicians. In the ceremony which takes place on Christmas-eve, he has his part to play in the Ara Coeli, and from that time to the Epiphany he may be said to be " at home ; " but at all other seasons he may be had if he is fetched, and he makes his progress in a great tan-coloured coach, surmounted by a vermillion flag, which warns the faithful reverently to bow the knee, or the peasant woman to cover her head as he passes. But it was not to see the Santissimo Bambino in his quality of physician, that Juliet visited with her father the church honoured as his habitual abode, and from which, if we may believe the priests, he is never willingly absent ; for one of them gravely assured a visitor, that having been on one occasion violently carried oflf by sacrilegious hands during the day, the Bambino found his own way back at night to his familiar home.

From Christmas-eve till Epiphany he forms an important part year by year in the scene of the nativity. We will make, with Juliet and her father, the toilsome ascent of 120 steps which leads to the great door in the Ara Coeli facing the west. Pushing aside the heavy leathern curtain, we find ourselves in a church rich with associations of the past, and, if not architecturally perfect, full of a picturesque beauty of its own. The whole of one of the side chapels is given up to a representation, in which perspective and light and shade are so well maintained, that our senses are for a moment deceived, we seem to be looking into a grotto or cave, in which is seated the Virgin mother, with the Holy Child in her arms, an ox and ass immediately behind suggest that it is a stable, Joseph is at her side, the wise men are worshipping and presenting their gifts, shepherds are in the distance, and overhead God the Father is represented with cherubs and angelic harpers around Him. This gross conception added to the bedizened and be-jewelled dresses of the Virgin and Child, dispel any illusion which may have crept over us as to the reality of the scene. From the opposite side to the chapel strange sounds meet our ear, a staging is erected which affords a preaching place for little girls ; and here they recite little speeches or dialogues (written for them doubtless by the priest or some religious friend of their family), in explanation of the scene of the nativity opposite to them. Strangely their shrill piping voices contrast with the deep and solemn mysteries of which they speak, but indeed their theme is more often the praise of the Virgin mother, than the grace of the Incarnate Saviour.

The scene in the Presepio (or manger, as the word literally signifies) had awakened in Juliet little more than juvenile curiosity and wonder, but one of the recitations, well written, and rendered with touching pathos by the little childish voice which uttered it, struck a deep chord which seemed for ever vibrating in the lonely chamber of her heart. The Holy Virgin was described, her universal sympathy, her maternal arms open to all who wanted a friend, a mother. Juliet seemed rooted to the spot. She bent her young head, and two large hot tears escaped from the brimming eyelids, and splashed upon the pavement as she breathed from her inmost soul the desire, " Holy Virgin, be my mother."

"Morini wondered at her abstracted manner on their return ; he had himself been heartily amused at the gestures and tones of the little preachers, and he sought to parry with jests the earnest questions of his child. He would Ul have liked to have had his peace disturbed, and peace such as his consisted in taking life as he found it, and seeking to know nothing below the surface or beyond the present.

JuUet now more than ever longed for a teacher, but among all the worshippers of the Madonna who surrounded her, none seemed to seek or find in her the tender protector, the maternal counsellor, above all, the sympathizing friend, of whom she had dreamed. Hours were spent by the lonely child in prayer before a little altar to the Virgin which occupied a niche in her own apartment ; but there was no answer of peace. She scarcely knew what she expected, what she hoped for: she had heard that the Holy Mother sometimes vouchsafed wondrous tokens of her presence to her devout worshippers. Eome was even now ringing with her praises, in that she had graciously winked upon the adoring crowd gathered round her altar in the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo; but it was not a sign like this which could satisfy Juliet : the cry of her heart was, " Holy mother, hear me : come to me." But, as it happened to the worshippers of old, "there was neither voice, nor any to answer, nor any that regarded."

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Chapter II

CONVENT LIFE REFUSED — ^A DYING WISH AT LAST FULFILLED — ^MRS. PERCIVAL's HOME — ^A SUDDEN JOURNEY.

"Hope deferred maketh the heart sick," and the yearnings of Juliet Morini towards the Holy Mother were already beginning to be paralyzed by long delay, when the time arrived for her first communion. She was sent, as is customary with young Roman girls, to a convent, to pass a week in prayer and preparation. The eflforts of the sisters were not wanting to render this week of monastic life agreeable, and ere long they had drawn from her the secret grief which preyed upon her. She conceived herself " fore-doomed." " The Holy Mother," she said, "would have none of her: she had sought her long and earnestly, but sought in vain."

It was then their turn to interpret her tale. " The world, the cold, chilling world," they told her, " had stood between her and peace. The conventual life was a haven of refuge, — a family, a sisterhood, where an earthly mother lavished her tenderness, and the Heavenly Mother vouchsafed the brightness of her

c unseen presence. Why should the dove remain outside the ark ? Once within its shelter, she would never wish again to leave it."

To all this Juliet had but one answer: "My father!" but it was sufficient. And she left the convent firm in her filial duty, though with a conviction that she was closing behind her the one door which led to happiness.

But that Morini was entangled at this time in the meshes of gambling speculations, and alternately absorbed in moody abstraction, or excited into hilarious gaiety, as fortune showed herself adverse or favourable, he could hardly have failed to notice the settled dejection, rendered only more touching by Juliet's attempt to conceal it in his presence, which betrayed itself in her quiet tones and subdued manner. Corroding grief soon wrought its ravages in the fair young form, and blanched cheeks, untasted meals, and failing strength, could no longer be concealed. Morini, who had drunk the cup of pleasure till it palled upon his taste, and had sought latterly to intoxicate himself with the fatal excitement of gambling, awoke suddenly to the conviction that his child was fading away before his eyes.