The Manzoni Family

by Natalia Ginzburg

  ‘I shall say nothing of the wretched matters I spoke of in my last. I am waiting with painful anxiety for you to speak of them. Embrace Giovannina and the two dear innocents who are starting their lives in the midst of woes they do not feel.’ At that time Pietro had two little girls: Vittoria and Giulia.

  Pietro had said he would come to see them at Lesa. Teresa to Stefano: ‘So Pietro wants to call at Lesa? We’ve never seen him here yet, and if he comes he knows what poor lodgings he will find, but he is welcome to them.’

  In January 1850, Manzoni wrote the new declaration required by Teresa:

  ‘Dear Teresa,

  ‘Since from an excess of delicacy you will not keep the English chaise-longue and the linen-warmer of tin which are at Lesa, without a declaration that you received them as a gift from me, I am making this declaration. But I have the right to add that they are trifles, not only in themselves, but still more by comparison with the gifts I have joyfully received from you, as a pledge of our immutable affection.’

  A few days later he wrote affectionately to Pietro once again. Pietro’s collaboration in everything was invaluable to him; in work; in disputes with Filippo, or with Enrico; in every difficulty. Now intent upon the supervision of this edition, he wanted Pietro’s help as always: he used to approach him with requests for books, research, proof-reading. ‘Tell me, Pietro, what is this silence? ... I close, saying: do write; embracing you; and saying again: do write.’

  Pietro did not come: he could not get a passport, which he had requested for only four days.

  Manzoni had registered a complaint about the tax, asking that it should be annulled. ‘So far no news of that fatal tax/ he had written to Vittoria in the summer. ‘Lesa and the surrounding area are full of Austrian troops. We have two officers in the house. I am waiting for a very long letter from you, with detailed news of you all, of Lodovico and his children, of Luisa: dear names! When will I see you again? And my Matilde? How can I thank you, when you keep her so far from me? How can I not thank you, when she is in such dear safe-keeping?’

  In the end the tax was annulled. He gave the news in a letter, this time, to Matilde. He had good news of Matilde’s health. ‘From now on it’s not a question of being better, but being really well; and you can enjoy it without having to make comparisons with the past, or to recall the ailments you have suffered. But how long must I hear of this wonder, and not see it? We live here with no fixed plan, waiting each day for the next to bring one ready-made; but our chief plan is to be able, and to have to, return to Milan at the end of the autumn. And then my Matilde too will return to the nest: if only I could go and fetch her! But there are too many obstacles. However, even if it can’t be done that way, we still must be together. . . You too tell me wonders about this little granddaughter of mine; but I’m afraid you are not telling all. Beautiful, graceful, gentle, loveable, with a quick intelligence; but you say nothing about caprice. Goodness me! is she the only child to display none? Oh, my poor dear little granddaughter! If when they name gran papà Sandro she knew that this wretch counters the universal praise with imaginary criticism? she would say even at this tender age that human beings are poor things: but she will have to say it some day, anyway. . . A hundred kisses, and my apologies to the little granddaughter. To you the blessing of the Father of fathers.’

  This prodigious little daughter of Vittoria’s, at two years old knew all the characters in I promessi sposi, ‘and if necessary would remind others of them’. ‘Keep her in these good ways,’ Manzoni wrote to Vittoria, and as soon as she can read properly, that’s the book to make her read, for this is the way to make her enjoy it all her life. Old and sharp as I am, I can’t look at the stories of Soave, the verses of Frugoni, the Veillées du Chateau of Madame de Genlis of blessed memory, without a real feeling of sympathy, and a tug at the heart: why? Because they are things I read as a child. And now that these Promessi sposi have run through a good part of their allotted span, and are growing old at a terrible rate, there’s a real need for somebody to be growing up who will perforce remember them. And if my own kith and kin won’t do me this charitable office, who will?’

  Vittoria to him:

  ‘As time goes by, it becomes ever more grievous to me to have to live so far from you! Oh, it would be better, in my opinion, if, instead of maintaining the impossibility of Mama’s undertaking the journey, you were to apply for a passport stating the need for her to spend the winter in a milder climate than Milan and Lesa. . . – I am convinced that it could only do Mama good to come and spend the cold months on the banks of the Arno where there’s no such thing as winter. . . I will not and cannot give up hope of embracing you again this coming year, and one way or another I hope the good Lord will grant us this consolation and that I may at last throw myself into your arms, show you your Matilde grown up and in good health, put my poor little one in your arms, and hear you having long discussions with my Bista. . .’

  In November 1849 the Capponi Ministry in Tuscany fell, Gaetano Giorgini, Bista’s father, was Minister of Foreign Affairs. The Ministry of Guerrazzi-Montanelli succeeded the Capponi Ministry. Gaetano Giorgini lost his office and retired to private life.

  In December of that year Bista’s sister, Giannina, got married. Matilde used to spend a lot of time with her; they had two little rooms next to each other; they went to church together; sewed and embroidered together. After Giannina’s wedding Matilde became melancholy.

  Grandfather Niccolao sold the house at Lucca, which was too big for him on his own. Vittoria, Bista and Matilde spent Christmas at Massarosa; then they returned to Pisa, where they left their furnished apartments, and took a bigger house.

  Tante Louise came to Pisa, Rina had been at school in Florence for two years. In February 1850, Massimo d’Azeglio was a guest at case Giorgiani. The government suspected he had come to Tuscany for political reasons, to spread the idea of a Piedmontese intervention to restore order. The Giorginis detested the Guerrazzi Ministry. Vittoria recalls in her memoirs: ‘At that time the porters and the worst dregs of the streets were masters of Pisa: we saw these fine fellows come into our house and ask threateningly if the marchese was there, and I lived in a state of agitation. . . I told Massimo, and he jokingly showed me his seven-bore revolver, and his sabre, and glorified these guardian angels (as he called them). . . But I was far from serene. One morning a letter came from Florence from Tabarrini to Bista, telling him a warrant of arrest had been issued against Massimo, and that he should be sure to leave without delay. At first Massimo wouldn’t hear of going; but Bista had to take a hard line, and then Massimo had his horse saddled and rode off secretly, straight to Sarzana.’

  Rosmini’s mission to the Pope in Rome had been unsuccessful. He returned to Stresa in November 1849. On his return journey he had spent a day at Massarosa, and he brought Manzoni news of Vittoria, Bista, Matilde and Luisina, or Luigina as Manzoni sometimes called her. The Pope had shown and expressed great esteem for Rosmini, and this won him jealousy and antipathy in the ecclesiastical world. Two of his books were put on the index. Manzoni and Rosmini met frequently in 1850: either Rosmini came to Lesa in his carriage, or Manzoni found a carriage to take him, accompanied, to Rosmini. When they could not meet, Manzoni was sad. ‘I would never have thought I could feel such sadness for the sickness of a horse,’ he wrote to Rosmini. ‘Moreover, the absence of Stefano, who is in Milan for a few days, makes it more difficult than usual for me to go and avail myself of all the mental and spiritual benefit your words afford me.’ And to Pietro: ‘I still have the pleasure of seeing Rosmini. All is vanity, except the carriage, said Saint Filippo Neri. What luck for me that Rosmini has one! I see in him a great proof of how one’s sense of deference may be preserved entirely, even when one’s deepest personal emotions are involved.’

  Stefano often went to Milan; his mother anxiously awaited his return, as there were frequent storms on the lake in the winter; Manzoni sent him little notes with news, requests and recommendations of prude
nce: ‘Please will you go to Radaelli to make a correction in the proofs. . . where it says “la pianta era morta dopo aver portato il suo fiore immortale”, for “portato” substitute: “messo”. ‘Do me. . . the favour of going back to the printer, to tell him that if, in the correction of the proofs he finds some buono or cuore or nuovo, he should take out the u.'

  In Milan Stefano used to go to see his uncles Giuseppe and Giacomo Borri, and Rossari and Grossi. ‘Last night I went to Grossi’s’, he wrote to his mother. ‘I also saw his ladies who had come from the country, and who charged me with so many greetings for you and Papa and n’occor alter (without fail). They looked well. . . Peppino had already retired to bed, but I saw little Lisa and thought she had grown and her hair is getting quite long.’ His mother wrote: ‘When you see Grossi’s babes, take their little hands, and squeeze them for me.’

  In February 1850 Manzoni wrote a long letter to Grossi. He enclosed summonses he had received from Vienna, from which he had learnt that, while Filippo was a prisoner in Austria, he had run into debt; and now Manzoni neither knew how to pay these debts, nor considered it just that he should have to.

  ‘Dear Grossi,

  ‘I knew perfectly well I would never stop being a nuisance to you as long as I live, but I didn’t expect the nuisance to be of this kind. The enclosed summonses, apart from the effect they have had on my spirits, of which it is superfluous to speak, leave me entirely undecided what I must do or not do in response to them. It is quite impossible for me to pay these debts, which are nothing to do with me; moreover, if it were possible, I would not do so without thinking it over, and deciding it was right to do so, and how to do so. But since I have already received these demands, and there may be more, and a lawyer is appointed for me, I beg you to tell me what steps are necessary, and which might be dangerous.

  ‘Seeing a young man forcibly removed from his home, kept hostage in another country, and, having a father, yet running up debts in that country, people might easily think: what was his father thinking of? I am sure you will have no such doubts about me, but I must tell you how it all happened.’

  When Filippo had been transferred from Kufstein to Vienna, Manzoni had asked a certain Signor Fortis, who had a business house in Vienna, to make arrangements for him to send money to Filippo, and asked if three hundred Austrian lire would do for a start. Signor Fortis ‘thought it was a bit on the mean side’, but Manzoni knew that Filippo had for years been inclined to spend in a grandiose, regardless way, and did not want to give any more; in the end he gave five hundred lire. Later he sent more. But Filippo borrowed money elsewhere; he ran up a debt of three thousand six hundred lire in the city. ‘My distress at this and the many other similar instances will surely be increased in good measure by the judgements of the world,’ Manzoni wrote to Grossi. ‘What I have been doing for several years (for we are talking about years) to curb this fatal tendency of Filippo’s to spend beyond his means, I have naturally done so that no one should know about it. . . So the world cannot know how, and how often, I have reproved him while paying his earlier debts; how I have intimated that, if it continued, I would be neither able nor obliged to heal his wounds; . . . how I have had, very reluctantly, to warn those who were giving him credit; how I gradually imposed such necessary restrictions as I deemed possible, and how I saw that they were carried out insofar as my situation, which you understand, permitted. I repeat, the world cannot know all this, and does not consider, indeed has never considered, itself obliged to wonder whether its judgement is based on insufficient information. So that it has the double advantage of condemning both of us at once, and saying: he did not keep a tight enough rein on him. But unjust judgements are, perhaps, the way the Lord teaches us a just knowledge of our own errors. And I pray He will grant my heart the strength to give Him the thanks I know in my mind I owe him on this score. But, as it is none the less permitted to seek comfort, and the compassion of true friends is a great and dear comfort, I have allowed myself this outburst to you. . .’

  In this same month of February Manzoni received a letter from Vittoria (Teresa asked to keep it. She often asked her husband to give her letters he received. On this one she wrote: Letter from Vittoria, which Alessandro gave me in response to my wish to have the words of his little girl). News of Matilde’s health was not good. She had no appetite and was losing weight. ‘I made her keep taking her lactate of iron tablets, sometimes combined with a little absinthe. . . This winter I’ve taken her out to some social occasions not to keep her hidden away all the time, and her pleasant, modest manner was generally found pleasing. In the last days of carnival she had a slight temperature, lasting a few hours. I immediately sent for a university professor, who prescribed an ounce of castor oil. . . This doctor found her rather lymphatic, and told me she had an excess of serum in her blood. He changed the lactate of iron treatment to iodine mixed with extract of walnut leaves; he also recommended her to take milk and roast meat, and to drink a spoonful of good wine every day and take plenty of exercise. Then we thought of giving her a change of air, and it was already arranged for her to join my sister-in-law who has just gone to Massarosa with her husband and baby. . . But tante Louise, writing also on behalf of the Arconatis, was so eager that we should take her to them in Florence, that we changed our plan. . . Thursday morning Bista took her to Florence, Aunt welcomed her like an angel, and although she has not been very well herself this winter, Bista says she was so happy to have Matilde with her that she’s a different woman at the moment. Poor Aunt, she is so kind-hearted; Matilde is already better since being in Florence, she’s having a very pleasant time, going for beautiful rides and seeing a lot of people.’

  That spring Teresa had an abscess in her ear which made her whole face throb and made it difficult to eat; she wrote to Stefano, who was in Milan: ‘This morning I took my usual coffee and cream with a little soft bread, but although I had added some cold coffee, the tepid liquid felt so boiling hot that it set off terrible pains not where you filed my tooth, but further down where I think the enamel is damaged, which is not what you said. Can it be caused by the abscess in the ear? None the less, without even recalling the heroic Sancho Panza, who bit on a spoon while his mouth was being stitched up, for fear of not being able to bear it, unworthy Teresa di Sancho that I am, I continued my breakfast, alternating pains, coffee, soft bread and fresh butter which soothed me and gave me the courage for a renewed assault on my coffee.’

  On Easter Day, Giuseppe Giusti died in Florence. Vittoria wrote to tell her father. Giusti was staying with Gino Capponi at the time. He had had lung trouble for years, and had recently seemed very poorly. ‘They had brought his breakfast when at the first spoonful of soup he coughed blood more violently than usual; but he was not perturbed and even told the servant who was close by to pay no attention and not to tell anyone, but it happened again at the second spoonful, and in a few minutes his dear soul had left that poor body which had been so long tormented! He had told poor Gino Capponi, whose grievous misfortune it was that he should die in his house, that he intended to confess and take communion that week, and God who sees in our hearts will have taken note of this! The second day of Easter, an hour after the evening Ave Maria, a great number of friends of poor Giusti and Gino gathered in the latter’s house, and they all accompanied the sad cortege!’ Bista was one of the four bearers, and he returned home broken. ‘Now he does not feel at all good and he looks wretched too because, apart from the moral anguish which was obviously considerable, it can’t have done him much good to be out in the streets of Florence on a cold, rainy evening. . . Poor tante Louise, too, is very, very upset, as you can imagine; yesterday morning she wanted to go to church for a while! . . . and of course she emerged sadder and more disturbed than ever. . . Ah, dear Papa, I can’t tell you how much this unhappy letter has cost me! ... I am deeply sorry to have had to cause you such grief, poor dear Papa, I should like to find some words to soften the blow if possible, but you will find them in your heart!
‘

  Giusti was buried at San Miniato al Monte.

  Manzoni to Vittoria:

  ‘Poor Giusti! in the prime of life and talent, and when that lively and original talent was steadily maturing! I am so grateful to you for telling me he had expressed the intention of confessing that very week! ... I need hardly say that my second thoughts were for all of you, especially poor Bista, and our good Luisa, and Gino Capponi for whom the blow was so close. I see from the papers that there was general mourning in Tuscany; and such a loss is bound to be felt throughout Italy. But I think only the friends, not only of Giusti, but of Geppino, were able to appreciate fully the gentleness and goodwill concealed beneath that proud, sharp-edged intellect. . .’

  ‘I must come to another sad thing,’ he wrote in the same letter, ‘because it is involved with so many sad things, that is, I must speak of my plans.’ Teresa’s poor health would not allow them to return to Milan, and they had had to renew their passports; the new passports ran out half-way through September. ‘And Matilde? this is the thought that keeps me in cruel suspense.’ There could be no question of sending for her to come to Lesa, because Teresa was ill so Matilde would have no ‘company for walks’ and would be bored; however, if she did not mind the boredom too much, he would send Nanny at once to fetch her. ‘If not, I’ll have to rely on you again for another five months, after which, barring serious illness, which God forbid, we’ll go to Milan. . . I await a letter from Matilde, and, since you say nothing more about her, I assume she is quite well now.’

  Matilde had returned to Pisa from Florence. She seemed more melancholy than usual. In fact, this was what had happened: in Florence a frequent visitor to tante Louise’s house was a young Florentine aristocrat, a widower with a little baby daughter. A romantic relationship seemed to develop between him and Matilde, and Matilde had grown very fond of the pretty little child. But suddenly he disappeared and no more was heard of him. Vittoria learned from friends that doubts had been raised about Matilde’s health. His wife had died of consumption. He took fright and left. Matilde must have realized why he had vanished, but she never said a word about it. She was inclined to be withdrawn and reserved. Vittoria and Bista felt that tante Louise had been rash to encourage meetings between the young man and Matilde, and did not conceal some slight irritation. There was some bad feeling, especially between Bista and la tante, but this soon evaporated. Matilde resumed her usual life, between Massarosa and Pisa, Bista’s Grandfather Niccolao and his father Gaetano, Giannina and the whole Giorgini family. She was deeply fond of Vittoria’s little girl, Luisina; she spent a lot of time embroidering, sewing and reading, and she used to write down her thoughts in albums, which she begged her sister to destroy or burn, if she died.