Romola

by George Eliot

  CHAPTER FORTY THREE.

  THE UNSEEN MADONNA.

  In returning from the hospital, more than an hour later, Romola took adifferent road, making a wider circuit towards the river, which shereached at some distance from the Ponte Vecchio. She turned her stepstowards that bridge, intending to hasten to San Stefano in search ofBaldassarre. She dreaded to know more about him, yet she felt as if, inforsaking him, she would be forsaking some near claim upon her.

  But when she approached the meeting of the roads where the Por' SantaMaria would be on her right-hand and the Ponte Vecchio on her left, shefound herself involved in a crowd who suddenly fell on their knees; andshe immediately knelt with them. The Cross was passing--the Great Crossof the Duomo--which headed the procession. Romola was later than shehad expected to be, and now she must wait till the procession hadpassed. As she rose from her knees, when the Cross had disappeared, thereturn to a standing posture, with nothing to do but gaze, made her moreconscious of her fatigue than she had been while she had been walkingand occupied. A shopkeeper by her side said--

  "Madonna Romola, you will be weary of standing: Gian Fantoni will beglad to give you a seat in his house. Here is his door close, at hand.Let me open it for you. What! he loves God and the Frate as we do. Hishouse is yours."

  Romola was accustomed now to be addressed in this fraternal way byordinary citizens, whose faces were familiar to her from her having seenthem constantly in the Duomo. The idea of home had come to beidentified for her less with the house in the Via de' Bardi, where shesat in frequent loneliness, than with the towered circuit of Florence,where there was hardly a turn of the streets at which she was notgreeted with looks of appeal or of friendliness. She was glad enough topass through the open door on her right-hand and be led by the fraternalhose-vendor to an upstairs-window, where a stout woman with threechildren, all in the plain garb of Piagnoni, made a place for her withmuch reverence above the bright hanging draperies. From this cornerstation she could see, not only the procession pouring in solemnslowness between the lines of houses on the Ponto Vecchio, but also theriver and the Lung' Arno on towards the bridge of the Santa Trinita.

  In sadness and in stillness came the slow procession. Not even awailing chant broke the silent appeal for mercy: there was only thetramp of footsteps, and the faint sweep of woollen garments. They wereyoung footsteps that were passing when Romola first looked from thewindow--a long train of the Florentine youth, bearing high in the midstof them the white image of the youthful Jesus, with a golden glory abovehis head, standing by the tall cross where the thorns and the nails layready.

  After that train of fresh beardless faces came the mysterious-lookingCompanies of Discipline, bound by secret rules to self-chastisement, anddevout praise, and special acts of piety; all wearing a garb whichconcealed the whole head and face except the eyes. Every one knew thatthese mysterious forms were Florentine citizens of various ranks, whomight be seen at ordinary times going about the business of the shop,the counting-house, or the State; but no member now was discernible asson, husband, or father. They had dropped their personality, and walkedas symbols of a common vow. Each company had its colour and its badge,but the garb of all was a complete shroud, and left no expression butthat of fellowship.

  In comparison with them, the multitude of monks seemed to be stronglydistinguished individuals, in spite of the common tonsure and the commonfrock. First came a white stream of reformed Benedictines; and then amuch longer stream of the Frati Minori, or Franciscans, in that age allclad in grey, with the knotted cord round their waists, and some of themwith the _zoccoli_, or wooden sandals, below their bare feet;--perhapsthe most numerous order in Florence, owning many zealous members wholoved mankind and hated the Dominicans. And after the grey came theblack of the Augustinians of San Spirito with more cultured human facesabove it--men who had inherited the library of Boccaccio, and had madethe most learned company in Florence when learning was rarer; then thewhite over dark of the Carmelites; and then again the unmixed black ofthe Servites, that famous Florentine order founded by seven merchantswho forsook their gains to adore the Divine Mother.

  And now the hearts of all onlookers began to beat a little faster,either with hatred or with love, for there was a stream of black andwhite coming over the bridge--of black mantles over white scapularies;and every one knew that the Dominicans were coming. Those of Fiesolepassed first. One black mantle parted by white after another, onetonsured head after another, and still expectation was suspended. Theywere very coarse mantles, all of them, and many were threadbare, if notragged; for the Prior of San Marco had reduced the fraternities underhis rule to the strictest poverty and discipline. But in the long lineof black and white there was at last singled out a mantle only a littlemore worn than the rest, with a tonsured head above it which might nothave appeared supremely remarkable to a stranger who had not seen it onbronze medals, with the sword of God as its obverse; or surrounded by anarmed guard on the way to the Duomo; or transfigured by the inward flameof the orator as it looked round on a rapt multitude.

  As the approach of Savonarola was discerned, none dared conspicuously tobreak the stillness by a sound which would rise above the solemn trampof footsteps and the faint sweep of garments; nevertheless his ear, aswell as other ears, caught a mingled sound of slow hissing that longedto be curses, and murmurs that longed to be blessings. Perhaps it wasthe sense that the hissing predominated which made two or three of hisdisciples in the foreground of the crowd, at the meeting of the roads,fall on their knees as if something divine were passing. The movementof silent homage spread: it went along the sides of the streets like asubtle shock, leaving some unmoved, while it made the most bend the kneeand bow the head. But the hatred, too, gathered a more intenseexpression; and as Savonarola passed up the Por' Santa Maria, Romolacould see that some one at an upper window spat upon him.

  Monks again--Frati Umiliati, or Humbled Brethren, from Ognissanti, witha glorious tradition of being the earliest workers in the wool-trade;and again more monks--Vallombrosan and other varieties of Benedictines,reminding the instructed eye by niceties of form and colour that in agesof abuse, long ago, reformers had arisen who had marked a change ofspirit by a change of garb; till at last the shaven crowns were at anend, and there came the train of untonsured secular priests.

  Then followed the twenty-one incorporated Arts of Florence in longarray, with their banners floating above them in proud declaration thatthe bearers had their distinct functions, from the bakers of bread tothe judges and notaries. And then all the secondary officers of State,beginning with the less and going on to the greater, till the line ofsecularities was broken by the Canons of the Duomo, carrying a sacredrelic--the very head, enclosed in silver, of San Zenobio, immortalbishop of Florence, whose virtues were held to have saved the cityperhaps a thousand years before.

  Here was the nucleus of the procession. Behind the relic came thearchbishop in gorgeous cope, with canopy held above him; and after himthe mysterious hidden Image--hidden first by rich curtains of brocadeenclosing an outer painted tabernacle, but within this, by the moreancient tabernacle which had never been opened in the memory of livingmen, or the fathers of living men. In that inner shrine was the imageof the Pitying Mother, found ages ago in the soil of L'Impruneta,uttering a cry as the spade struck it. Hitherto the unseen Image hadhardly ever been carried to the Duomo without having rich gifts bornebefore it. There was no reciting the list of precious offerings made byemulous men and communities, especially of veils and curtains andmantles. But the richest of all these, it was said, had been given by apoor abbess and her nuns, who, having no money to buy materials, wove amantle of gold brocade with their prayers, embroidered it and adorned itwith their prayers, and, finally, saw their work presented to theBlessed Virgin in the great Piazza by two beautiful youths who spreadout white wings and vanished in the blue.

  But to-day there were no gifts carried before the tabernacle: nodonations were to be given to-day excep
t to the poor. That had been theadvice of Fra Girolamo, whose preaching never insisted on gifts to theinvisible powers, but only on help to visible need; and altars had beenraised at various points in front of the churches, on which theoblations for the poor were deposited. Not even a torch was carried.Surely the hidden Mother cared less for torches and brocade than for thewail of the hungry people. Florence was in extremity: she had done herutmost, and could only wait for something divine that was not in her ownpower.

  The Frate in the torn mantle had said that help would certainly come,and many of the faint-hearted were clinging more to their faith in theFrate's word, than to their faith in the virtues of the unseen Image.But there were not a few of the fierce-hearted who thought with secretrejoicing that the Frate's word might be proved false.

  Slowly the tabernacle moved forward, and knees were bent. There wasprofound stillness; for the train of priests and chaplains fromL'Impruneta stirred no passion in the onlookers. The procession wasabout to close with the Priors and the Gonfaloniere: the long train ofcompanies and symbols, which have their silent music and stir the mindas a chorus stirs it, was passing out of sight, and now a faint yearninghope was all that struggled with the accustomed despondency.

  Romola, whose heart had been swelling, half with foreboding, half withthat enthusiasm of fellowship which the life of the last two years hadmade as habitual to her as the consciousness of costume to a vain andidle woman, gave a deep sigh, as at the end of some long mental tension,and remained on her knees for very languor; when suddenly there flashedfrom between the houses on to the distant bridge somethingbright-coloured. In the instant, Romola started up and stretched outher arms, leaning from the window, while the black drapery fell from herhead, and the golden gleam of her hair and the flush in her face seemedthe effect of one illumination. A shout arose in the same instant; thelast troops of the procession paused, and all faces were turned towardsthe distant bridge.

  But the bridge was passed now: the horseman was pressing at full gallopalong by the Arno; the sides of his bay horse, just streaked with foam,looked all white from swiftness; his cap was flying loose by his redbecchetto, and he waved an olive-branch in his hand. It was amessenger--a messenger of good tidings! The blessed olive-branch spokeafar off. But the impatient people could not wait. They rushed to meetthe on-comer, and seized his horse's rein, pushing and trampling.

  And now Romola could see that the horseman was her husband, who had beensent to Pisa a few days before on a private embassy. The recognitionbrought no new flash of joy into her eyes. She had checked her firstimpulsive attitude of expectation; but her governing anxiety was stillto know what news of relief had come for Florence.

  "Good news!"

  "Best news!"

  "News to be paid with hose!" (_novelle da calze_) were the vagueanswers with which Tito met the importunities of the crowd, until he hadsucceeded in pushing on his horse to the spot at the meeting of the wayswhere the Gonfaloniere and the Priors were awaiting him. There hepaused, and, bowing low, said--

  "Magnificent Signori! I have to deliver to you the joyful news that thegalleys from France, laden with corn and men, have arrived safely in theport of Leghorn, by favour of a strong wind, which kept the enemy'sfleet at a distance."

  The words had no sooner left Tito's lips than they seemed to vibrate upthe streets. A great shout rang through the air, and rushed along theriver; and then another, and another; and the shouts were heardspreading along the line of the procession towards the Duomo; and thenthere were fainter answering shouts, like the intermediate plash ofdistant waves in a great lake whose waters obey one impulse.

  For some minutes there was no attempt to speak further: the Signoriathemselves lifted up their caps, and stood bare-headed in the presenceof a rescue which had come from outside the limit of their own power--from that region of trust and resignation which has been in all agescalled divine.

  At last, as the signal was given to move forward, Tito said, with asmile--

  "I ought to say, that any hose to be bestowed by the MagnificentSignoria in reward of these tidings are due, not to me, but to anotherman who had ridden hard to bring them, and would have been here in myplace if his horse had not broken down just before he reached Signa.Meo di Sasso will doubtless be here in an hour or two, and may all themore justly claim the glory of the messenger, because he has had thechief labour and has lost the chief delight."

  It was a graceful way of putting a necessary statement, and after a wordof reply from the _Proposto_, or spokesman of the Signoria, thisdignified extremity of the procession passed on, and Tito turned hishorse's head to follow in its train, while the great bell of the PalazzoVecchio was already beginning to swing, and give a louder voice to thepeople's joy in that moment, when Tito's attention had ceased to beimperatively directed, it might have been expected that he would lookround and recognise Romola; but he was apparently engaged with his cap,which, now the eager people were leading his horse, he was able to seizeand place on his head, while his right-hand was still encumbered by theolive-branch. He had a becoming air of lassitude after his exertions;and Romola, instead of making any effort to be recognised by him, threwher black drapery over her head again, and remained perfectly quiet.Yet she felt almost sure that Tito had seen her; he had the power ofseeing everything without seeming to see it.