William Godwin, Cloudesley: A Tale

Performer Name:

Perfetti

Performance Venue:

 

Performance Date:

 

Author:

Godwin, William

Date Written:

 

Language:

English

Publication Title:

Cloudesley: A Tale

Article Title:

 

Page Numbers:

2:195-219, 3:262-268

Additional Info:

3 vols. vol. 2 ch. 13, 14, 16; vol. 3 ch. 13

Publisher:

Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley

Place of Publication:

London

Date Published:

1830

Text:

[2: 195] In addition however to her avowed admiration of the great pillars of Italian literature, the princess Violante was forward to encourage every indication of talent among the present generation of Tuscans. Several authors who devoted themselves to the illustration of the history of Italy, or to the preparing new and improved editions of the writers of ancient [196] Greece and Rome, were distinguished by her patronage, and judiciously assisted by her in bringing the fruits of their investigations before the public. The most pleasing poets of the day basked in the sunshine of her favour. But there was one species of poetry, which particularly flourished at the present period. This was the effusions of persons who, a subject being given them by others, immediately poured out a copious stream of verses, figurative, impassioned and eloquent, before a numerous audience, assembled to witness their performances. The Italian language is particularly adapted to this species of exhibition. Pronounced with fervour and animation, it seems to be the very soul of music; and, by its structure and inflexions, appears to fall easily into almost any species of verse at the pleasure of the speaker. The character of the people of Italy is not less suited to the success of the experiment. Their [197] first appearance is that of being open, uncontroled in the expression of their emotions, and enthusiastic and voluble in giving utterance to their feelings.

The most eminent of these individuals was a person of the name of Bernardino Perfetti, a native of Siena. His limbs were active, his carriage animated, and his voice melodious. His figure was beautiful: but his countenance was heaven. The bones stood out; the chin was pronounced and projecting; the cheekbones were high; the complexion was fair, even to transparency. There was no incumbrance of flesh, and no deficiency. His eyes were liquid and soft, full of tenderness, full of delicate and diversified meaning. There was an ingenuousness in his visage, impossible to be described, impossible to be resisted. It said, Here I am at your mercy; use me at your pleasure; but I know you will not hurt me.

[198] Bernardino was specially in favour with the princess; and it seldom failed that he was called on once or twice a week at her assemblies to give a specimen of his powers. The subjects of his verses, as I have said, were almost always furnished by the different persons who happened to be present. They were usually written on slips of paper, which were thrown into a box, and then drawn out fortuitously by a lady named to that office. This ceremony was first performed; and the artist was then summoned into the apartment. The subjects were sometimes classical, sometimes of a courtly stamp, having reference to some beneficial and gracious act of the government, and sometimes to topics of gallantry and the praises of the beauties of the court. However trite or hackneyed might be the materials of the composition, or the figures with which it was adorned, the sustained fervour and the [199] varied manner of the speaker effectually for the time concealed these defects.

But the most extraordinary part of Bernardino's performances was a comedy, with which his exhibitions were always concluded. The materials of these comedies were indeed in a great degree common-place: a peevish and avaricious father, a beautiful and simple-hearted daughter, a lover slenderly endowed with the goods of fortune, but graceful and irresistible in his addresses, a lacquey inexhaustible in tricks, disguises and imposition, and a soubrette who assisted the lacquey in all his arts. But, simple as these materials were, they were inexhaustible in the hands of this consummate artist. The deceptions were so new, and the unsuspecting simplicity with which the father gave into them so ludicrous. The cautiousness of old age was multiplied to an extraordinary extent, yet was in all cases made a dupe of. The triumph of [200] the lovers was of the most exhilarating cast; yet they were again and again defeated, when they thought themselves most secure. Their disappointment and despair excited interest in the most callous spectator; and the earnestness of their affection was always in the end crowned with success. All this was represented by one performer, who by the changes of his position and his voice, the imbecility of the dotard, the devotedness of the young female, the ardour of the lover, the assurance of the lacquey, and the ever ready glosses of the soubrette, made you always apprehend who were the parties brought forward, without its being necessary to have recourse to the bungling expedient of naming them. Bernardino sometimes assisted himself with a scarf, or the voluminous folds of a cloak, which he caught up, or cast aside at pleasure, but his great resource was in the endless variety that he gave to the lines and expression of his [201] countenance, sometimes discharging it of all appearance of understanding, and looking now with inexpressible innocence, demureness, slyness, penetration, consciousness, dexterity, and even wit. The attention of the audience was unremitted; but their applauses were frugal and well discriminated, the most frequent and gratifying being uncontroled bursts of genuine hilarity and laughter.

[…]

[203] The scenes I have mentioned occurred five years before the time when Julian took up his residence in Florence. But the princess Violante lived till the year 1731; and, even after her death, the tone which she had inspired into the best society there, for a long time survived the accomplished personage to whom it was indebted for its existence. Bernardino had in no wise decreased in powers or popularity, either when Julian arrived at Florence, being then ten [204] years of age, or for several winters following. The English boy had heard repeatedly of the fame of the exhibitions of the improvvisatore; and he intreated his protector to allow him the gratification of being present. The indulgence was attended with no difficulty. The mode was for the grand duke or any of the principal nobility to grant to Bernardino for the occasion the use of a hall in their palace, and all who were admitted to the entertainment paid at entering a piece of money at the door.

It was not till the beginning of the third year of Julian's residence at Florence, that he enjoyed the pleasure of which he had formed such sanguine expectations. On the death of the princess, an event equally unexpected and afflicting, all public entertainments had been suspended for several weeks. The occasion on which Julian first saw and heard Bernardino, was the first on which this extraordinary man stood forward [205] before a public assembly, since the death of his patroness. It was announced, that in this exhibition all his performances would be of a serious cast, to conclude with a monody on the death of the princess.

Julian was fresh from the perusal of Ariosto and the popular Italian poets. He had familiarised himself with their language; he was in the daily practice of conning their most admired passages. He was in fact, practically speaking, native to the dialect of the peninsula, and as if 'to the manner born.'

He had therefore no difficulties which lay in the way of his gratification. He instantly entered into the phraseology and sentiment of Bernardino. But how great was to him the contrast between the school-boy reading of the poets, and the formal glosses of his instructors to which he had been accustomed, and the vehement, and, as it [206] seemed the inspired delivery of the improvvisatore!

One of the subjects was the leaping of signor Costantino Boccali on horseback, from the bridge into the river of the Adige, at the command of his scornful mistress, as recorded by Bandello, in the Forty-seventh Novel of his First Book, which Bernardino was called on to describe in extemporary verse. It was done to perfection. The disdain of the lady, and the generous devotedness of the lover were painted in the most glowing colours. You saw the desperate leap which the cavalier made; you saw the deep and rapid course of the river, swelled as it was with autumnal rains, and chilled with the bleak wind that swept over the Alps. The horse and his rider sank at once to the bottom, and then rose like a ball, Boccali still maintaining his seat with firmness. He directed [207] his steed toward the bank; but, more attentive to the observing his mistress than to his own safety, he approached where the cliff was perpendicular, and it was impossible to land. Turning the bridle to correct his error, and struggling with the swiftness of the stream, an unexpected start of the animal deprived him of the stirrups and his seat, while he had still hold of the reins. He threw away them and his cloak, and set himself to swim with all his force. The spectators on the bridge shivered and screamed at sight of the imminent peril to which he was exposed; and his mistress, hitherto so unfeeling, was drowned in tears, and expressed the bitterest agony. The sight of her sympathy gave him tenfold courage. Through tremendous dangers he reached a more accessible part of the shore, and stood on dry land. His horse, freed from the load that confined him, was equally successful. Dripping as he was, the [208] lover hastened to the feet of his mistress; and, moved by the sight of the daring and terrible act by which he had proved the sincerity of his passion, she at once dismissed the severity in which she had prided herself, and ever after considered the attachment of her cavalier as her chiefest glory.

Julian was entranced with the narrative of the improvvisatore. All the circumstances as they were described, were to his apprehension realities. He saw the bridge and the river, familiar objects as they had been to him for years past. He felt with intense earnestness for the perils which Boccali encountered, and entered deeply into the courage with which he breasted them. He could scarcely keep his seat for emotion. His youthful faculties were fully commensurate to take in the thing which the poet described. He was astonished at the completeness and the living colours in which [209] the whole was placed before him. He was filled with admiration and enthusiasm.

Bernardino at length proceeded to his monody for the princess Violante. He expatiated on her charms and her indescribable grace. He spoke of the sweetness of her smiles, and the melody of her voice. No taste, as her panegyrist affirmed, could be so true as hers; no sympathy so unbounded and entire. All that Rome or Greece ever knew of literature and the mimetic arts, was her own. As a stateswoman and a financier she was perfect; and no being in human form ever felt so entire a passion for the improvement and happiness of all within the reach of her influence. The poet then described the sudden revolution in the health of the princess, from a state of the most entire vigour and energy to the doors of the grave. She had been only a few days indisposed. The instant she was known to be in [210] danger, all Florence was in alarm. It seemed as if the life of the court and of all the inhabitants was suspended on her life. And, when Bernardino came to speak of the last hours of her existence, that night of terror, that night of disaster, when the news suddenly burst on those who filled the avenues of the palace with anxious expectation, Violante is dying, our mistress is no more—the audience was drowned in tears; their sobs were audible; and the speaker was compelled to pause in his discourse by the vehemence of his emotions.

The exhibition of this morning constituted an era in the life of Julian. The seats for the audience, filled with the first society in Florence, and the area prepared for the exhibitor, were alike a scene to him. The fervour of the speaker, and the sympathy of the hearers, acted with united influence on his soul. To add to the whole, there was a youth who sat [211] next him, two or three years older than himself, who engaged him in conversation, who told him what was to come next, explained the method and arrangement of the whole, and was 'as good as a chorus' to him. This youth was nephew to the improvvisatore.

Julian was eager for a repetition of that which had afforded him so high a delight; and no difficulty was made in indulging his wish. His late associate presently found him out, and was eager to join him again. There was something in Julian that won upon the good will of almost every one with whom he was brought into contact. His eye was so open and frank, and the diversified lines of his cheeks and lips promised so much discrimination and tact, combined with the utmost benignity and sweetness of disposition, that all anticipated that they should find gratification in being associated with such a companion. His manner was so animated, and [212] the activity of his limbs and spirits so great, as to rouse the partiality of the most careless observer.

Francesco Perfetti (that was the name of the stranger youth) revealed to him in this interview his kindred with the laureated exhibitor, and offered to present Julian to his uncle. With native modesty, but with unspeakable anticipation of the pleasure and distinction of such an interview, Julian accepted the proposal. As was usually his fortune with strangers, the improvvisatore conceived an immediate liking to the boy. Bernardino was himself of the most mercurial disposition, indulging in a thousand freaks, never, but when he was engaged in the rehearsing or utterance of his compositions, able to contain himself for any time in one posture, quick in impulse, joyous of temperament, and with as many whims as an ape. So long as he devoted himself to the embodying and [213] development of one thought, he was all in that thought, his powers of mind and body flowed in that single direction. Nothing could interrupt or disturb him: you would say that, if the roof that covered him fell on his head, he would not be aware of it. But, when he had finished the purpose to which he had vowed his efforts, it seemed as if he revenged himself for the periodical singleness and concentration of his mind, by a quick succession of the most extravagant humours and fantasies.

Julian had never in his life fallen in with a person of this cast; and he felt himself singularly gratified and deeply interested in watching all his motions. Bernardino on his part was flattered in observing the demonstrations of Julian's transport. He told a multitude of stories and anecdotes, interspersing them with the dialogue, the sarcasms, and lively remarks of the low Italians, and occasionally mimicking [214] the solemn discourse and pedantic expostulations of one of the professors of the Liceo. He would then suddenly become grave and enthusiastic, would undertake the personation of Dante, Petrarca or Ariosto, and, habiting himself in their costume as it appears in their pictures and statues, and assuming in a certain degree their countenance and gesture (an art in which he particularly excelled), would pour out his thoughts in extempore verse, in imitation of the style of these various writers, which, in the first surprise of novelty, and aided by the graces of the speaker, appeared scarcely inferior to those of these great apostles of Italian literature. All this was done without seeming preparation, by a sort of instantaneous conversion of himself into the person he represented. You would have thought that by a kind of legerdemain, or the spell of a powerful incantation, the souls of these illustrious persons had descended [215] from the blessed abodes, to inspire with their conceptions the favoured individual who, with fervent and harmonious accents, engrossed the soul of the delighted hearer.

Julian listened with never-ending amazement to the rhapsodies of this wonderful artist. His first feeling was unmingled delight; his next, admiration of the talent that could produce such stupendous effects. When these sensations were in some degree exhausted, his thoughts reverted to himself. He had always been regarded as something wonderful; all his efforts had been applauded; he had felt that he at all times accomplished with ease whatever he set himself to perform. But every thing that he had ever done seemed to shrink into nothing, in comparison with the achievements of Bernardino. This circumstance afforded him a salutary lesson of diffidence and modesty. He felt that, if nature had done much for him, there [216] was also much to be effected by application and diligence. He felt that, if his present acquisitions were by no means contemptible, there was still a wide field before him, the cultivation of which might occupy many industrious days, and be a theme for the meditation of many anxious nights. Instead of being depressed and disheartened by this discovery, he regarded it as a new spur to his ambition. He rejoiced to see the prospect widening and lengthening before him, and that there was much in the arts of civilisation, and within the scope of his faculties, worth living for. He felt impelled to gird up the loins of his mind, and was like a man revelling in the fulness of vigour and activity, when he prepares himself for the race.

It had hitherto been one of his favourite amusements to declaim from memory, and with all the energy of juvenile enthusiasm, long passages from Homer and Ariosto, in the solitude [217] of his chamber, or as he wandered in the fields or on the banks of the Arno. The thought now first occurred to him with vividness, Might he not be a poet himself? In the rawness of his unfledged conceptions he found some parity between the venerable Grecian bard, and the modern Italian to whom he had just been introduced. Homer is said to have recited his verses before numerous audiences of assembled Greeks. What we now receive for the successive books of the Iliad and Odyssey, are understood to have been originally named his Rhapsodies. Might they not sometimes have been the animated effusions of extempore verse? At least such was the appearance which they presented to his hearers. Julian sought for subjects on which he might exercise his unfledged muse. Nor did he search long. In the circle of his new sensations, in the various incidents that presented themselves in their freshest gloss [218] to his unworn observation; in the persons he saw, in the different topics that were the subject of his studies, he drew from time to time matters that inspired him with the deepest interest. They found their way to his tongue; they formed themselves into numbers; and he also was an improvisor.

Yet Julian was not the fool of his own enthusiasm. He knew that he was neither a Homer nor a Bernardino. He was delighted with the music of his own verses as they first suggested themselves. But he was a youth of an enquiring spirit. He called them to mind afterwards; he looked at them sceptically; he tried them by the test of being committed to paper. He found them sometimes flat, sometimes childish: he suspected his muse of not being blessed with a sustained and a soaring wing, but rather of belonging to that species of birds, which rise from the ground, and make [219] their way for a little, but presently, from their own weight and want of inherent strength, are brought again to the earth, and betray their want of a genuine nobility.

[…]

[3: 262] It was in the fifth week of my forced stay at Messina, that, stepping into a coffee-house to beguile the weary hours, I overheard a conversation in an adjoining box which immediately arrested my attention. The principal speaker was a young officer, who had just arrived from Taranto in Apulia. He said, the greatest novelty of the place at the time he left it, was an improvvisatore, not more than twenty years of age, who greatly surpassed every thing he had before heard of the kind. He was countenanced by the duke of Taranto and the archbishop. Nobody seemed to know where he came from. One of the compositions that the officer had [263] heard from his lips was a poem in which he represented himself as an orphan, who had just lost his only parent, shot by a company of banditti in the mountains, and who was left without a friend. He complained of a cruel guardian, that had treated him with intolerable austerity. He related that, flying from this guardian, he had taken refuge in the woods, had fallen in with banditti, and even made one among them. He was at that time wholly unconscious in what manner his father had come to his untimely end, and had by the most unexpected accident discovered, that the individual with whom he had entered into terms of the closest friendship, had fired the musket that rendered him fatherless. He described in the most expressive language the horror with which he was seized, the instantaneousness with which he quitted his new associates, and the detestation he conceived of their pursuits, and in a most eloquent peroration threw himself [264] upon the compassion and pity of his auditors. The whole company was in tears; and nothing was to be heard for some time after he had concluded, but sobs and groans from every one present. In a short while however they recovered from this transport; and the clapping and applause that followed lasted a considerable time.

My whole soul was engrossed with the tale of the officer; but I was scarcely able to arrive at any satisfactory conclusion from what I heard. On the one hand I recollected Julian's having early associated himself with improvvisatori, and the perfection he was said to have reached in their art. On the other hand I could hardly persuade myself that he would have chosen in his own person to become the hero of his tale: there was an indelicacy in the idea to which I could not reconcile myself. But then there were so many circumstances that favoured the conclusion—his age, his unquestionable talents [265] the coincidence of the stories in such a variety of particulars. I took an opportunity of questioning the officer as to the voice, the features, and the air of the speaker: but I had never seen Julian; and therefore the answers I received could lead me but a little way. What I heard now sufficiently agreed with what I had learned no long time before from the lips of lord Danvers. At all events I felt impelled to set out immediately for Taranto.

I arrived. I found the young man of whom the officer had spoken at Messina. I encountered him just as he had finished one of these exhibitions; and I never saw a more interesting countenance. He was in the first bloom of youth, when ingenuousness is marked in every lineament; and had that very moment closed the scene, in which he had presented himself as an extempore poet to an admiring audience. His hair hung in beautiful disorder; his eyes sparkled; his whole frame trembled with emo- [266] tion; he was out of breath. I perused his features with the keenest attention; I said to myself, Is this the youth who is rightful heir to an English earldom, but who is made an outcast and a vagabond, a being without a name, by a cold-blooded usurper?

I found in him no trace of the features of earl Danvers, or of lord Bardsley, the uncle and cousin of Julian. His face was perfectly beautiful, but of the true Italian cast. He answered all my questions with perfect unreserve. He said, he was of Siena, and had been first excited to embrace the profession of an improvvisatore by witnessing the performance of the celebrated Perfetti. On these occasions he had seen both Francesco and Julian.

I asked him, how he came by the story, the particulars of which had so much roused my attention at Messina? He replied, that he had heard it as a tale, he believed founded in fact, but knew nothing of the parties. He did not [267] in the smallest degree connect it with the person of the young Cloudesley. It struck him as remarkably well adapted for a poetical narrative to be recited in public; and he adopted it accordingly. The mode in the sort of exhibitions with which he was concerned, is for the company indiscriminately to suggest subjects for the poet; and he contrived that this should be drawn out of the box, and put into his hand as if by accident. As the manners of this person were the very mirror of frankness, we talked of several subjects, beside that on which I first accosted him; and, among other things, I said I had come from England, on purpose to endeavour to be of service to the young Cloudesley.

The next morning, to my exceeding surprise, I had no sooner opened the door of my lodging, than my acquaintance of yesterday presented himself before me. He had a printed paper in his hand. It contained a list of certain banditti, [268] who had been captured by a party of the military, and brought prisoners into Palermo. They amounted to twenty persons. At the head of the list was the name of St Elmo. Among those that followed was Francesco Perfetti, and the object of all my solicitude, the unfortunate Julian. My visitor observed, that, after what had fallen from me yesterday on the subject, he could do no less, however unwelcome the intelligence might be, than bring me the earliest information. He observed, that the affair did not admit of the delay of a moment, and that the resolution that had been avowed by the king of the two Sicilies, to reform the police of his dominions, and to introduce the most perfect security every where, rendered the case of these prisoners a matter in the highest degree critical.

I confess it did not strike me in that light. I was perfectly convinced that Julian was not a robber; he had never joined in any of their de- [269] predations, though he might have lived among them. I could not bring myself to believe that any criminal proceeding could touch the life of this interesting youth.—The affair however assumed a very different aspect from any thing I had anticipated.

Notes:

Collected by:

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